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The true reason why Malzahar won't be reverted

iTaLenTZ··29 votes·1,559 views

Because in SoloQ he pooped on the holy trinity of Riot's untouchables: LeeSin Yasuo Ahri

I was always happy when I saw one of them at my enemy team. I would always keep my voidling passive ready for Lee's ganks to eat his healthbar with a QE and enraged voidling. I can't recall the amount of times I oneshotted a Lee with his flashy LCS plays diving me under my turret. Same goes for Yasuo as I always baited his Q under my turret to kill him. Also in lane he was really strong vs Yasuo. One of the few champs in the game that didn't care at all about his stupid wind wall. None of Malz abilities were blocked by it. And then Ahri. Yes that champ that is allowed to have a 54% winrate for 3 consecutive years because she is such a cool fox. In lane and roaming her combo was weaker than Malz and in teamfight Malz would outdamage her with his AoE and his utility, Q silence.

So there you have it. A champ that can fight back when Lee ganks or even worse survive his towerdives and punish him for it, a champ that is immune to windwall and counters the most annoying popular champ in the game and a champ that is a counterpick vs such a popular cool fox can't be allowed to exist. It all comes down to flashy LCS, get gut nub, sick plays from popular champs that sell skins and in Malz they all had a common enemy that lacked popularity and sick flashy LCS plays so he was sacrificed.

So next time Meddler when you say you are happy with Malzahar's current champ design and how he is in a good spot just say the truth. Say you don't wanted a champ that was a strong pick vs popular flashy champs.

39 Comments

Apocalypsic19 votes

Something tells me that's not it.

Riot is just stubborn about accepting when a change they've done was bad.

Erockandroll5 votes

[{quoted}](name=Exiled Cat,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=TUNkvJTc,comment-id=0000,timestamp=2017-04-26T21:16:14.593+0000)

Something tells me that's not it.

Riot is just stubborn about accepting when a change they've done was bad.

No, they are still going to be like, "It still fixed a lot of his problems" or "the old Malz doesn't fit our modern standards"

He's more likely to get another rework, than get reverted. Really makes me think that he's becoming the new Ryze.

AMYS GRAVE1 votes

But if it was something players wanted and was good for the game overall, we’d strongly consider adding it to League as well, rather than just be stubborn for the sake of being stubborn.

But just today GC said they weren't stubborn anymore!

LadyRenly8 votes

Malzahar from what I remember had a fairly good, and stable winrate, similar to Ahri. I found him to be a consistently decent champ, and I had a lot of fun with him. I'm really sad I am down a midlaner.

deadlychuck1 votes

Though not nearly the play rate. He wasn't "good", but he was reliable.

Mataka Tek6 votes

Malzahar can't compete because of crappy scaling, and the fact that his ult is interrupted by any CC and QSS. Additionally, they changed his ult so that he also loses the damage when it is negated by QSS... in the past, it was supposed to only negate the CC.

Kuwabaramulberry5 votes

Yeah...a lot of people with opinions about old malz that didn't play very much of old malz... (playing him once every time he was on rotation doesn't really qualify, imo)

As the person commenting about the mid lane triangle, that's so true. Ziggs and xerath and the like would wreck him. His early game consisted of being a bitch until lvl 6 because doing 1 full rotation meant you had no mana aND the passive mana from E was just enough to keep your E up if you fucked up and did a panic rotation on an engage.

Plus he had the exact same problems zed did, being shutdown quite hard by banshees, maw, and QSS. There were plenty of ways for him to lose.

(Though the OP'S talk of the glory days when you could cockblock a tower dive are making me really sad now. So maybe I'm in nostalgia mode)

Kuwabaramulberry4 votes

{quoted}

Yeah...a lot of people with opinions about old malz that didn't play very much of old malz... (playing him once every time he was on rotation doesn't really qualify, imo)

As the person commenting about the mid lane triangle, that's so true. Ziggs and xerath and the like would wreck him. His early game consisted of being a bitch until lvl 6 because doing 1 full rotation meant you had no mana aND the passive mana from E was just enough to keep your E up if you fucked up and did a panic rotation on an engage.

Plus he had the exact same problems zed did, being shutdown quite hard by banshees, maw, and QSS. There were plenty of ways for him to lose.

(Though the OP'S talk of the glory days when you could cockblock a tower dive are making me really sad now. So maybe I'm in nostalgia mode)

Not to mention, he was the easiest person to gank. All he has is flash for mobility, and landing the silence on a Lee with wardhops and Barry Allen move speeds coming out of a river bush is definitely not easy.

SweedishGunner4 votes

Errr pre-rework Malz got dumpstered on by all 3 if they were competent, you were seriously immobile and didn't have the free spellshield. If anything new Malz (pre-Voidling HP nerf) did better against them.

deadlychuck1 votes

And all 3 got dumbstered if you were a competent malzahar player.

Block Lee's Q with the voidling, and silence the combo. Land a Q on yasuo as he's dashing around the lane. Eat arhi charm with voidlings and predict the ult dash with Q.

Holy shit, it's almost like it was actually a match up of skill back then, rather than a match up of kits. SMH

TheHappyReaperz3 votes

OP: Riot changed Malz becuase he would bait "untouchables" under towers, then instakill them. Its just that he's a strong pick vs flashy champs.

How the hell do you even think that is balanced? If he does that to the hyper mobile champions in League how do you think people with no mobility felt? It boggles my mind that this is your reasoning.

inplane3 votes

{quoted}

OP: Riot changed Malz becuase he would bait "untouchables" under towers, then instakill them. Its just that he's a strong pick vs flashy champs.

How the hell do you even think that is balanced? If he does that to the hyper mobile champions in League how do you think people with no mobility felt? It boggles my mind that this is your reasoning.

Champs like Lux, Syndra, and Anivia wouldn't even need to get in close to Malzahar. Champs with high mobility would need to because they're usually shorter ranged. It's the same case with Taliyah and her ability to punish high mobility with her E before the 6.14 gutting. High mobility champs need to get in close, making them vulnerable to high damage and CC lockdown. It's kind of like a game of rock-paper-scissors.

TheHappyReaperz1 votes

Lux's AA range is 550. That would be pretty easily in Malz's range. Syndra needs to be close enough to combo, something that Malz can capitalize on. That said, what about champs like Annie, or melee assassins? Having a champion, who hard counters engaging on him, just leads to an uniteractive lane, which is not fun, nor is it balanced.

Arkale4 votes

Thing is that neither lux nor syndra need to get into auto range to make you back.. or die. But hey, if they go to face-check a bush you're in then you can probably kill them no problem.

TheHappyReaperz2 votes

Lux's passive only work off of your AA's, so you do need to auto.

Titanium701 votes

Since when Lux passives contains a self taunt? Guess I missed this patch....

For real - If you play against a Champions that says 'If you get to close, you're dead` DONT GET CLOSE! Especially if the Champ you're playing can outrange said Champ by like 500 Units!

Arkale1 votes

The point is that she doesn't need her passive damage and can easily kill you while staying out of range from all your abilities, plus if her e slows you for half a second before she detonates, your shield is meaningless.

Stevev451 votes

lux passive works with AA's and her ult.

So for a safe poke kill, you poke with her e twice, them he will die to a q,e,r combo. No AA required.

inplane1 votes

{quoted}

Lux's AA range is 550. That would be pretty easily in Malz's range. Syndra needs to be close enough to combo, something that Malz can capitalize on. That said, what about champs like Annie, or melee assassins? Having a champion, who hard counters engaging on him, just leads to an uniteractive lane, which is not fun, nor is it balanced.

Why is someone like Lux even trying to AA Malzahar? As for Syndra, she can just Q E combo from a mile away before Malzahar can even see her. Annie relies on surprise and a summoner 4 engage, so no surprise there that Malzahar can beat her. In fact, almost every midlaner beats Annie due to her low range but high CC lockdown close up.

Beacon Academy7 votes

Target > Mobility > Ranged > Target

Champions with target abilities are strong versus mobile champions and weak to skill shot champions because skill shots are generally longer ranged.

In case you didn't know about the triangle of mid lane.

Malzahar > Leblanc > Xerath > Malzahar for example

iTaLenTZ4 votes

[{quoted}](name=Beacon Academy,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=TUNkvJTc,comment-id=00030001,timestamp=2017-04-27T00:53:06.383+0000)

Target > Mobility > Ranged > Target

Champions with target abilities are strong versus mobile champions and weak to skill shot champions because skill shots are generally longer ranged.

In case you didn't know about the triangle of mid lane.

Malzahar > Leblanc > Xerath > Malzahar for example

Exactly!

Spoofghoul1 votes

Or Sion > Leblanc Xerath Malzahar

:D

Outpoke xerath Stun an incoming leblanc or cover both her point of entrance and return with 1 q Send malazahars voidlings back where they came from ignore his E with your W get some juicy free hp

Also you can outroam them all :P

And if things aren't going quite your way yet, just stack 4 visages and everything will be peachy

iTaLenTZ3 votes

{quoted}

OP: Riot changed Malz becuase he would bait "untouchables" under towers, then instakill them. Its just that he's a strong pick vs flashy champs.

How the hell do you even think that is balanced? If he does that to the hyper mobile champions in League how do you think people with no mobility felt? It boggles my mind that this is your reasoning.

Lol Malzahar had a lot of weaknesses and that was the main reason he was not viable in high diamond and above. Anything with high sustain or poke champs would shit on him. Also hard engage compositions and compositions with multiple high priority targets.

deadlychuck1 votes

I thought that champions with no mobility were compensated in regards to power and utility?

Are you saying that champions with mobility have literally no drawbacks to being extra mobile and that it's justified for them to be more powerful?

Hello, mobility creep is calling, they want to fire you as their spokes person.

It's simple. Malz was a mage, which got countered by mages and select fighters, which countered divers, skirmishers and assassins. As far as marksmen were concerned, malz was annoying, but between having a support and front line to interrupt his damage against them, they had access to item 3139 so he was on par with marksmen in terms of being equally counters towards each other.

TeemoXNidalee3 votes

The main problem is that old Malzahar was perfectly fine and didn't need a rework. The rework killed AD Malzahar and now they're killing AP too by overnerfing.

fuffychan2 votes

Replace Ahri with Zed and Ill agree

Magical Zoe2 votes

But at least Zed got nerfed into the grave, I see Ahri a lot more than Zed now.

VoraciousX2 votes

Malz wasn't reworked because of that. He was reworked because all he had to do was E you and you lost over 75% of your health after he got 2 items. He was an uninteractive champion, boring to play AS and annoying to play against. I loved the Malzahar rework tbh. Until they ruined it by nerfing it into oblivion and forcing him into the support role.

Also claiming that a Lux could beat a Malz just because she could shoot him from far away is silly. As Malz all you did was E a minion that was low health near her, and then she got hit by your ability from farther range than you actually had to cast it from. Your most damaging ability in your kit even.

SweedishGunner2 votes

Malz has always had a short cast range on E. If old Malz was walking up to you and just pressing E and you were't trading back then that's not Malz's fault.

If champions stand near minions affected with Malefic Visions and it transfers onto them I think the error might be with said champ. Lux could easily poke Malz down with E and trade when his old passive wasn't ready and since he didn't have a free shield he would take lots of damage.

VoraciousX2 votes

{quoted}

Malz has always had a short cast range on E. If old Malz was walking up to you and just pressing E and you were't trading back then that's not Malz's fault.

If champions stand near minions affected with Malefic Visions and it transfers onto them I think the error might be with said champ. Lux could easily poke Malz down with E and trade when his old passive wasn't ready and since he didn't have a free shield he would take lots of damage.

Except he has a silence as well. As for standing near minions with E on them, they have to try to farm at some point. Lux doesn't have much damage unless she lands her passive early game, she can't just E a wave and it dies, not to mention she has mana to worry about. I don't recall ever having to worry much about mana with Malzahar because of the refund. TBH though I didn't really play him mid much anyways, but I can easily see Malzahar winning against Lux if both are skilled enough to know how to play. Lux doesn't just come with damage out her ass, and it isn't THAT hard to dodge her skillshots in lane. My point still remains, old Malzahar was terrible. They had all of his damage loaded into a point and click spell, his W was so forgettable that they added it ONTO his ult, and his ult was just insurance to 100% kill someone that didn't have a QSS. You didn't NEED any of that though, his Q and his E were all he really NEEDED to kill someone, and as I said, he was BORING to play AS(So boring that I actually refunded him) and terrible to play AGAINST.

The rework fixed these problems, it just so happens that they then decided he was too good and decided to make him feel like crap to play. If they removed the suppression on his ult and gave him something new I would have no problems with it if they returned Malzahar to his direct post-rework status to compensate. His ult never felt NECESSARY in any iteration imo.

Incarceration2 votes

Malzahar was cancer to any AP champ. It gimped us so hard if we bought QSS, and even if he did, he just sits back, pressing E like a braindead idiot. I think they probably didn't revert it because of unskilled players like you abusing him.

deadlychuck2 votes

Literally none of what you described has changed.

In fact, he requires even less skill to play, now that spell blocking is automatic instead of voidling dependent.

The only difference is that no matter how mechanically skilled of a player you are, you have no control over the inconsistent nature of his W. Which given that W is his only source of burst damage now, his kill potential is completely out of the hands of the malzahar player. It literally takes no skill to play the champion anymore, because the only skill check that exists around his mechanics now, is of the other player.

Incarceration1 votes

That's why they went in the wrong direction with this rework, and I wanted to have it reverted and retry again, but what this guy is claiming is utter bullshit.

Anhartamin2 votes

[deleted]

deadlychuck2 votes

He really wasn't. He was only in LCS one season, and he was constantly at a < 5% pick rate in low elo, with a slightly above 50% win rate.

He wasn't cancer, he was chemo.

Anhartamin1 votes

[deleted]

deadlychuck1 votes

Still a better game mechanic than voidling swarm.

Angrychickén1 votes

Yes.

Whenever I go up against someone who "can't be touched", and I pick after them, I just pick malz mid and let their screams commence

Stars Shaper1 votes

Yasuo has had several nerfs, how about you put Caitlyn in his place?

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