Worried About Taliyah
Recent nerfs, both specific to her and across the game, have rocked her.
-Her mana costs and lack of synergy with other items require she first buy Archangel’s Staff, which has been redesigned not to be rushed. Almost every other mage is starting something else, whether it be Rod of Ages or Luden’s Echo.
-Her signature spell is Threaded Volley, which has had its cooldown increased to a whopping 11 seconds. Her other spells have even longer ones. Much of her laning is spent waiting for them to end; her all-in leaves her without waveclear, disengage, or poke for a long time.
-Her strength is mid-game roaming, which the recent mana refactor has aimed to squeeze across the board, leaving her even more dependent on Archangel’s Staff or at least Tear. She cannot use the usual approach of waiting for Rod of Ages to stack and does not need its HP, either.
The stats from op.gg have borne this out. Her winrate is the second lowest it’s been since last season, at 48.68%. She is hovering around 23rd on the midlane tier list, in the company of gutted champs like Viktor and off-meta picks like Irelia. While her ranking has recently gone up two spots, I really worry about where she will stabilize and what her place in solo-queue should be.
Riot has not wanted to relegate her roaming mage style to the dumpster of unhealthy gameplay. Twisted Fate, the original roaming mage, is the top-ranked midlaner right now. Aurelion Sol is doing just fine, too. The problem is with the stoneweaver. The intersection of the above and other well-intentioned changes has left her scrambling.
This isn’t just my opinion, either. Midbeast, the streamer for Team Liquid, adored Taliyah and rated her S every patch, even when the consensus of the scene was against him. I still remember the day he earned Rank 1 in Oceania with her—I was so proud to see her there. But that was patches ago. This May 1st, he described Taliyah in terms I will not reproduce and told his viewers not to play her.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=i6HQ0LZEMbQ
Does anyone know if she’s being looked at and, if so, what could be done to make sure she doesn’t wind up trapped behind her itemization, cooldowns, or mana? While I understand that her dominance in competitive play has warranted nerfs, the effect on her solo-queue performance has put her behind Ryze, a notorious and repeat meta-offender who’s being reworked to fit both the ranked and competitive scenes.
I remember Riot saying of Urgot’s lack of itemization synergy that there could be individual attention for champions who can’t fit into larger changes. I hope she receives similar help.
I’m worried about her.
