Time for a Shen rework?
Riot has openly admitted that his playstyle does not fit him themeatically. They also admitted that he is not allowed to be "strong" because his kit is "toxic" when he is strong. However, they also stated that Shen would not be reworked because there are players attached to said "toxic" kit.
Shen's an interesting one. There's definitely some mismatch between his theme and his gameplay. Mechanically he's a health stacking tank who gradually grinds you down, bit of a contrast to his image as a 'traditional' looking ninja and the expectations of speed, damage, stealth, assassination etc that go with it. We'd aim to avoid such a mismatch if making him today, he's got an established playstyle and players though so it's not necessarily appropriate to try and change that at this point.
Enter: the Mordekaiser rework. Apparently he's being reworked because A) a supernatural being who controls metal does not themeatically fit as a burst-mage who builds a shield from harming people, and B) apparently an extremely low-range melee mage with no CC and no gapcloser is hard to balance (moreso than a teleporting, ally shielding, AOE taunting tank?).
Right now, we're looking at Mordekaiser and we think he definitely needs some help there. **That said, the "burst mage" play-pattern doesn't serve well enough both in this champion's fantasy and the counterplay (or lack of) around it. So we're aiming to make this big-full-metal guy a fighter/brawler which better fits his fantasy and is more aligned with his shield passive mechanics. We get there are people who liked the whole "Mordekaiser explodes people" play style, but we just can't keep it balanced and healthy in the current state of the game. **
So TL:DR we want to make Mordekaiser more of a brawly-scrappy champion because his current successful play pattern of "explode someone, get a Ghost, roll over the game" is near impossible to tune without hurting some players. This gives us more space to help Mordekaiser succeed while not confusing others as to why a big suit of armor is super squishy and bursty.
Fair enough. You now show willingness to stomp on the players that are attached to a champion's unique playstyle and an unwillingness to buff Shen because of his playstyle. Can we please get some work done on Shen now?
