I'm just going to say it stealth isn't an interesting mechanic

Derfel·Feb 18, 2017·81 votes·4,916 views

There's nothing interesting about your opponent turning invisible waiting for cooldowns or repositioning while you go play hearthstone waiting for them to show up again. As a theme for one of two champions it can be interesting as a focused mechanic, but right now it's pretty much oh Khazix Q'd be for 50% of my hp welp there he goes till his Q's back up again or oh look there's Eve suddenly showing up out of nowhere wow the way my wards do absolutely nothing sure doesn't run contrary to everything Riot has spoken of about player agency.

102 Comments

ValyrianBladeFeb 18, 201749 votes

Stealth WAS an interesting mechanic when you could see the champion with a pink ward, or even see their outline with a red trinket. It made for good decisions: oh they have a Kha'zix? Better carry a pink ward. Then Kha'zix could make decisions - is it worth risking trying to burst their ADC because the support has a pink ward? I need to wait for the ADC to be too far from the pink ward. etc...

Now, Stealth has 0 counterplay. Short of hitting a champion with damage (when you couldn't see where they were so you need to get lucky) you have no indication where they are. It's no longer interesting. Making true vision not be able to see stealth was a horrendous change - it brings too much power to anyone with stealth and ultimately will need to sap a lot of power away from those champions (it's only a matter of time until the likes of Kha'zix and Vayne get nerfed because their stealth mechanics are too oppressive). Camoflauge is very healthy, stealth definitely is not. Akali's isn't great, but at least it's more balance-able since she's confined to an area to have that stealth (although it makes it a better defensive tool for her when her stealth should be offensive... I think it would be better if her shroud increased the rate at which her cooldowns were refunded but lasted less time (so she could get her abilities back in the same proportion from her shroud, but less time passes for allies to come rescue her).

Nameless VoiceFeb 18, 201734 votes

Invisibility is basically untargetability now.

dragon1xxFeb 18, 201722 votes

It's better in theory. The ADC can't hit autos to kill you AND they don't know where you are.

QuortFeb 19, 20172 votes

But you can still take damage and be CCed. Tradeoffs and all that.

WinTheWarOnPantsFeb 19, 20173 votes

not really. The biggest reason why untargetability beats stealth is of course that you can still take dmg while stealthed and "dmg over time" makes it so you don't lose then and can still use skill shots. item 3151 summoner 14 item 3068 and DFT are all good counters to stealth. not to mention all the DoT champs. Also, if a stealth user buys item 3812 they counter themselves(pretty funny) and item 3364 works as well.

bbQsauçeFeb 19, 20176 votes

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TequilaZombieFeb 19, 20173 votes

It's not about the damage itself. The thing is that any instance of damage into a stealth unit leaves a blue-ish outline around, essentially revealing their position. So any DoT applied before or during a stealth attempt will work are an Oracle for all intents and purposes.

KoggyStyleFeb 19, 20171 votes

doesent help if you cant get them unstealthed so you can fight them and send them back

TequilaZombieFeb 24, 20171 votes

Do you even skillshot bro?

Sire HippingtonFeb 19, 20172 votes

just that aoe still works.

ModAcademy KaynFeb 18, 201716 votes

That's not decision making... and if it is, it's terrible decision making. Real decision making is "Should i wait for them to engage, or should i take initiative?" or "Is it worth using my ult to survive, or to go back in to do more damage?"

The "They got a pink ward" ISN'T decision making. It's a binary, counter that has no actual thought. Oh, a teamfight started, time to put it down and invalidate a characters kit. For the assassin, it's "I can't go in and fight them, they got a pink ward, I'd be killed instanty." Hoping their ADC walks away from a ward isn't exactly "Thrilling gameplay" for an assassin.

The entire point of making Stealth unrevealable, is because Assassins needed a lot of burst to kill someone, as they were killed instantly due to invisibility being that easily broken. By making Stealth an actual tool for Assassins to use, it means they don't need so much damage to compete with getting instantly blown up by Pinks.

AMYS GRAVEFeb 18, 20174 votes

That's not decision making... and if it is, it's terrible decision making.

It may not be compelling decision making but it was at least a mechanic that both sides got to engage in.

ModAcademy KaynFeb 19, 20175 votes

And by engage, you mean for one side to get completely fucked over.

AninLegions777Feb 19, 20179 votes

What are you even saying? It's decision making. Are you high? The fact that he has to DECIDE whether to engage judging by the items the enemy had is, in it's definition, a decision. Right now it's mindlessly jump in and stealth until everything is up again. Died instantly? I still recall Rengar oneshotting ADCs in 0.5 seconds while being invisible. So what is this instantly you speak of?

NichtHurzFeb 19, 20172 votes

But with pink's it wasn't very good either. Now you can't really counter stealth directly, but back then invisibility just got useless in most coordinated fights since there'd always just be a pink put down and whoops, one of your champs main abilities just got invalidated completely.

I can understand the frustration right now, but I can also understand that it's just super lame when there's just a 75g pink put down and one of your main abilities just got turned useless.

I have no idea how to make it any better, but imho both possibilities are kinda lame for either the one with invis or for the one playing against it.

AninLegions777Feb 19, 20172 votes

People say pink was lame but that's just not true. The problem with pinks were limited range and inability to see over walls meaning I can still come around and fck you up. And most times by the time you drop the pink, you're already dead. I can go on youtube and find montages of Diamond+ players fucking people up with stealth champs. Pinks won't stop your team from getting destroyed by twitch or your ADC from getting destroyed by Rengo or from getting instagibbed by Shaco. And then there the problem that when everyone has full items, there wouldn't be enough space for pinks.

ModAcademy KaynFeb 19, 20172 votes

and if it is, it's terrible decision making

Okay, so tell me what else Stealth is meant to be used for? Khazix's stealth is meant to give him time to reposition and get his Q back up, or to literally not get instashanked. What else is stealth meant to be for, when said stealth is on an assassin?

And don't give me crap about Rengar, one of the assassins WHO IS REVEALED by Control Wards, and who literally GIVES YOU A SIGN that's he's coming around for your ass. And yeah, one assassin out of all the others is a realllllll good example.

AninLegions777Feb 19, 20172 votes

Kha's whole theme is based on catching champs out of place. This way he can pick them off (which is why he deals more dmg to isolated targets). Kha is not a tank. He's not frontline. He's not meant to jump in first. So if he jumps inside and gets instadeleted, then that's perfectly normal. Stealth is like any other effect (shields, heals, invulnerability, etc). It gives an advantage. In this case the advantage is hugely unfair. Pinks made it fair by giving the victim a chance to at least do something other than stand and die.

ModAcademy KaynFeb 19, 20173 votes

And we all know Kha's damage when it comes to killing Isolated targets. Thing is, that isn't always a thing, because people know how to group to negate that. As an assassin, however, he still needs to have a fair chance to kill people when they're grouping, he's just heavily rewarded for catching people out.

And then we reach the same point again. If Kha'zix cannot jump in and kill a target instantly in one go, he's going to die due to the support/tank/peel. This brings it back to my initial point, how assassins would need extreme amounts of damage if it becomes that binary, Kill or be killed. That's not healthy gameplay.

Stealth circumvents that idea. It allows Kha'Zix not to be able to one shot someone with 0 counterplay, but still lets him kill people, over a drawn out period. If he goes into Stealth after using his first rotation, not killing his target, you KNOW he's coming back around, that he's chilling about waiting to finish the job. Him being able to kill people without having to rely on insta-100-0 is a good thing, so what if Stealth is semi-onesided?

AninLegions777Feb 19, 20172 votes

All your scenarios imply that Kha does not have a team. Kha shouldn't depend on anyone to kill isolated targets but when they are grouped, then he does. If he team doesn't work together to give him a window of opportunity, then it's due to the lack of teamwork. Watch past LCS games with pre-nerf pinks. Kha killed PLENTY. He also had high pick/ban in some tournaments. Saying pinks fully "counter" stealth is just false. It gives a LITTLE reaction time as opposed to 0.

ModAcademy KaynFeb 19, 20173 votes

You are completely missing my point. I've said over and over, when Pinkwards still revealed Kha, he HAD to rely on instashanking his target before they could react back. With Stealth, his combat pattern takes longer but he gets safety in return.

And nowhere did I say that it "counters" Khazix, I said, that it pushes him to have to rely on 100-0 no counterplay from the burst to be viable, so Pinkward or not, Kha just had to get near his target for them to die.

And final thought, I don't get how having a little reaction time, is better than Khazix literally jumping on your face, not killing you with his full rotation, and then having to rely on his Ult's stealth to survive long enough to finish you off. You KNOW Khazix is there, and you know he's coming after your Carry. That alone is plenty of reaction time, if it's as you suggest, and Kha just hides until his Q is back up.

JunkοFeb 18, 20177 votes

Red trinket still detects enemy champions, but it's just so slow that it is basically useless. And that stealth shimmer mechanic they added is useless, by the time the animation plays the person is somewhere completely else.

Backup4nowFeb 18, 201719 votes

That's not play or counterplay, and that's not decision making. That's yes or no. Do they have a stealth character? Buy a pink. Place it down. They no longer have stealth. As the character: Do they have a pink? No? Go in. Yes? Get fucked. That produces a completely bullshit balance point: Is it balanced around you having a pink ward? Then if you don't, theyll fucking destroy you. Is it balanced around you NOT having a pink ward? Then if you do, they have no chance of winning at all. That's not interesting. That's not proper game design.

By making it uncounterable, they guaranteed that it's balanced around ONE possible scenario: You cannot see them, period. That means better balance.

HOWEVER, this little experiment failed because the characters were hardly changed in conjunction with the removal of pinks, so now it's just "they're better now" rather than "they're balanced now".

AninLegions777Feb 19, 20172 votes

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WheatloafFeb 19, 20172 votes

Actually, 95% of the time, it did cause non-evelynn stealth users to be bad. And if they ever were good, their stealth had nothing to do with it.

AninLegions777Feb 19, 20172 votes

Lmfao. Stealth isn't meant to exist for you to walk around your opponents and appear to kill them all. Stealth is an unfair advantage if it has no counter.

WheatloafFeb 19, 20171 votes

I... if stealth isn't meant for you to get around your opponents to appear and do whatever it is your champion does, I'm not sure what it is meant for. And yes, just getting stealth, especially repeatable stealth (cough Vayne cough), with no counterplay is an unfair advantage. That doesn't mean being able to spend 75 gold on an off button for it was a good and interactive one.

KoggyStyleFeb 19, 20171 votes

if someones smart enough to counter your invisability then yes they deserve to.

WheatloafFeb 20, 20171 votes

You don't really need to be smart to drop a pink ward. Nor you need to be skillful. Do they have invis? If yes, buy pink ward. Did they use invis? If yes, drop the pink ward you bought. Boom. No invis. Absolutely no input from the invisibility side other than daring to use an element of their kit near someone ready to instantly, cheaply, and completely invalidate it. No matter how much I hate Grievous Wounds for being a binary hard counter to healing, it's still not as ridiculously one-sided as pink wards invalidating stealth was.

Velzard of KozFeb 18, 20176 votes

Okay, I'll just jump here because you have terminology totally wrong.

Camoflauge is very healthy, stealth definitely is not.

Camoflauge IS stealth. Stealth is any mechanic of trying to not be seen by enemy where they normally have vision. Stealth then either can be Camoflauge or Invisibility, which is what you are talking about.

Making true vision not be able to see stealth was a horrendous change

True sight still reveals stealthed champs, both camoflauged and invisible. Turrets, for example, provide True sight. Invisible champs cannot turretdive you without beign seen.

Akali's isn't great, but at least it's more balance-able since she's confined to an area to have that stealth (although it makes it a better defensive tool for her when her stealth should be offensive... I think it would be better if her shroud increased the rate at which her cooldowns were refunded but lasted less time (so she could get her abilities back in the same proportion from her shroud, but less time passes for allies to come rescue her).

I don't understand how is it supposed to be offensive? It basically works the way you describe. Her cooldowns are around 2 seconds, maximum 6-4 seconds and less. How in the seven hells do you want that to refresh faster? She legit has one of the most frequent combos. You are supposed to use the shroud to deny the enemy their combo while always waiting the second or two for yours, up to twice in one fight. Just recently I laned against Kayle - the shround worked perfectly to deny her advantage of her ult until it went down and I combo'd her one more time.

or even see their outline with a red trinket.

You still can see both invisible and camoflagued champs via red trinket as shillouette.

Stealth WAS an interesting mechanic when you could see the champion with a pink ward ... It made for good decisions

No it either rendered supports to be pinkwarbots, made you waste money for counter to something that was still unstopable or literally easily destroyed core dependency of champ via relatively cheap item.

Seriously half of your statements are just wrong from you having no idea how stealth works and there are 12 people who upvoted it out of their own ignorance. Gameplay boards in a nutshell.

NineTailedMysticFeb 19, 20172 votes

"Seriously, half of your statements were arguing semantics".

ElikainFeb 19, 20173 votes

Stealth WAS an interesting mechanic when you could see the champion with a pink ward,

Basically, if you felt good about knowing when to buy a pink and that was all you needed to counter stealth, that was so bullshit for the stealth champion as their one ability their kit was designed in mind with, was now useless.

Take this logic and apply it to any champion. If there existed a cheap consumable that countered one spell in their kit, how fun would that be for either of you?

ValyrianBladeFeb 19, 20173 votes

{quoted}

Basically, if you felt good about knowing when to buy a pink and that was all you needed to counter stealth, that was so bullshit for the stealth champion as their one ability their kit was designed in mind with, was now useless.

Take this logic and apply it to any champion. If there existed a cheap consumable that countered one spell in their kit, how fun would that be for either of you?

Stealth players could bait the pink ward... rather than ALWAYS using stealth to reposition for a kill, they could go in, trade damage, stealth, run out while the enemy team drops their pink and you're already escaping. Or in Kha'zix case could leap out (as could a few others).

ThefrostyvikingFeb 19, 20172 votes

Did you read the reason's for the changes though? The invisibility was competely pointless as long as the enemy had a pink ward.

Akali was one of the worst cases of the pink ward countering. She was and still is to a large degree, very reliant on her invisibility. So when the enemy bought a pinkward there was suddenly absolutely nothing you could do to touch them. And later on when sweeper revealed invisible targets you just had to reach 9 and akali was suddenly about as good as a minion.

You idea of reducing her cooldowns in her shroud? Very damm pointless by itself, for she would not have the energy to use the abilities even if she had them up. And honestly Riot literally made a assassin class rework with the intent to reduce instant or short burst and then though it failed quite badly in many areas that doesn't mean it's right to give akali even quicker damage.

Then with the outline thing, it was better but it had a fair amount of issue's as well. You just had to carry it around and suddenly any longer type of invisibility was pointless. Riot has always been against strategies that involves the idea of buying 1 item to render an enemy champ useless.

Which is also why people are complaining about item 3123 altho i won't go into detail on that.

No akali needs a full VGU as riot stated, her kit is simply too unbalanced. When good she becomes hella oppressive for little effort and when bad she's Azir lvl difficult to play while not as rewarding.

However i do agree that it certainly feels bad when a kha6 "outplays" you by ulting however i do also not belive that there is any clear cut solution for the "buy 1 item to cripple opponent" deal is one i will never agree to.

ValyrianBladeFeb 19, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Did you read the reason's for the changes though? The invisibility was competely pointless as long as the enemy had a pink ward.

Akali was one of the worst cases of the pink ward countering. She was and still is to a large degree, very reliant on her invisibility. So when the enemy bought a pinkward there was suddenly absolutely nothing you could do to touch them. And later on when sweeper revealed invisible targets you just had to reach 9 and akali was suddenly about as good as a minion.

You idea of reducing her cooldowns in her shroud? Very damm pointless by itself, for she would not have the energy to use the abilities even if she had them up. And honestly Riot literally made a assassin class rework with the intent to reduce instant or short burst and then though it failed quite badly in many areas that doesn't mean it's right to give akali even quicker damage.

Then with the outline thing, it was better but it had a fair amount of issue's as well. You just had to carry it around and suddenly any longer type of invisibility was pointless. Riot has always been against strategies that involves the idea of buying 1 item to render an enemy champ useless.

Which is also why people are complaining about altho i won't go into detail on that.

No akali needs a full VGU as riot stated, her kit is simply too unbalanced. When good she becomes hella oppressive for little effort and when bad she's Azir lvl difficult to play while not as rewarding.

However i do agree that it certainly feels bad when a kha6 "outplays" you by ulting however i do also not belive that there is any clear cut solution for the "buy 1 item to cripple opponent" deal is one i will never agree to.

She could gain more energy in her shroud too. I'm not saying the idea is complete, just that her current ability to just sit in her shroud for 8 seconds then come out completely to the most illogical side (towards your tower) and get an execute when she was definitely dead to a gank where she was overextended is pretty bs. Her current ability to dive the enemy team then sit in her shroud for 8 seconds without retaliation when her team follows up isn't great either (she should play around minions and need to use her ult to escape - would open up power elsewhere).

ThefrostyvikingFeb 19, 20171 votes

{quoted}

She could gain more energy in her shroud too. I'm not saying the idea is complete, just that her current ability to just sit in her shroud for 8 seconds then come out completely to the most illogical side (towards your tower) and get an execute when she was definitely dead to a gank where she was overextended is pretty bs. Her current ability to dive the enemy team then sit in her shroud for 8 seconds without retaliation when her team follows up isn't great either (she should play around minions and need to use her ult to escape - would open up power elsewhere).

Quicker burst is not the answer, giving her more energy for sitting in the shroud would just cause her to go back to being the same as before the ACU (assassin class update) . Current one is extremely squishy (with a damage build at least ) and is heavily punished by AOE and CC.

And assassins are meant to do mindgames and have escapes. If you weakened the shrouds usability in the area that'd be pointless. She´d simply turn into an assassin that allows her opponent to push as they want and then she´d punish them extremely hard with quick burst and high movespeed. Koreans are already playing her as a early-midgame goddess so i am fairly certain that this would be a horrible idea.

Sorry but your idea's aren't good enough to fix her without breaking her in some way. And i won't say that's bad because i don't have any answers myself. perhaps it's better that you´d acknowledge that Riot is right in saying that she needs a full VGU rather than small change somewhere?

ValyrianBladeFeb 19, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Quicker burst is not the answer, giving her more energy for sitting in the shroud would just cause her to go back to being the same as before the ACU (assassin class update) . Current one is extremely squishy (with a damage build at least ) and is heavily punished by AOE and CC.

And assassins are meant to do mindgames and have escapes. If you weakened the shrouds usability in the area that'd be pointless. She´d simply turn into an assassin that allows her opponent to push as they want and then she´d punish them extremely hard with quick burst and high movespeed. Koreans are already playing her as a early-midgame goddess so i am fairly certain that this would be a horrible idea.

Sorry but your idea's aren't good enough to fix her without breaking her in some way. And i won't say that's bad because i don't have any answers myself. perhaps it's better that you´d acknowledge that Riot is right in saying that she needs a full VGU rather than small change somewhere?

I'm more than willing to accept that. It was a fleeting point (meant to identify that Akali doesn't feel broken / OP right now) so the conversation went a bit further than I initially intended. I don't even play Akali so it's really not my place to suggest how to fix her :) I do think her shroud is a core part of her identity (not sure if Akali players feel this way though) so I was trying to identify a way to keep that stealth while making her healthier (as in, I don't agree with the argument of removing all stealth from the game, Akali's being confined to a space is much healthier than Kha'zix being able to ghostblade and leap as he pleases all while invisible).

ThefrostyvikingFeb 19, 20171 votes

{quoted}

I'm more than willing to accept that. It was a fleeting point (meant to identify that Akali doesn't feel broken / OP right now) so the conversation went a bit further than I initially intended. I don't even play Akali so it's really not my place to suggest how to fix her :) I do think her shroud is a core part of her identity (not sure if Akali players feel this way though) so I was trying to identify a way to keep that stealth while making her healthier (as in, I don't agree with the argument of removing all stealth from the game, Akali's being confined to a space is much healthier than Kha'zix being able to ghostblade and leap as he pleases all while invisible).

oh my apologies then, i misunderstood.

And as someone who has played Akali and watched some of her onetricks stream i do think they at least accept the current shroud, in functionality it allows about the same things while having less bugs that can be abused. At the mini rework it also got the addition of giving her was is like a short range flash which in truly skilled hands allows great outplays and dodges and also jumping over thin walls in general. Old shroud was bigger and had a bug that never got removed, it was that if you placed the core of the shroud inside terrain the smoke could went invisible too with akali inside it which created a perfectly invisible Akali which Riot fixed by giving her the current shroud that deploys ontop of herself with the mini flash.

I with some practice managed to jump over a Morgana Q and suprise her and her draven for a double kill, one of my finer moments that i remember using the shroud so in my personal opinion it has a great deal of potential benefiting of a assassin altho rather than mindgaming it feels like rengar style of chasing,hunting and jumping, oh well.

As for kha6...he is kinda fine by himself but like so many others the lethality buffs ontop of the exceptionally powerful lethality items (cheapest damage items in game with various powerful actives ) pushed him over the edge.

Sire HippingtonFeb 19, 20172 votes

No, stealth was NOT an interesting mechanic. It was a boring binary boolean check: If Pink = true Get fucked If Pink = false Go fuck them

There is nothing interesting about that, and no agency on the stealth champs side. It was a bad system leading to binary scenarious and prettymuch unbalanceable champs, as you either balance around pink = true, or around pink = false, and what ever you choose, the other scenario weill be off balance.

Now, with stealth doing what it's ment to do 100% of the time, there is only one scenario and you can balance properly around that. And this is there the current issue lies, cause riot failed to properly balance around the new invis after the vision changes. The visual cues from damageing them aren't clear enough and a bit to delayed, redtrinkets are also a bit to delayed, and they could have added aditional cues by default or more 'soft counters' that offer a similar detection as red trinkets. But most off all, they should have adjusted the champs to the new stealth. Kah haveing as much burst as he has and a low enough cd on Q to instantly re use it after invis is quite problematic, just like shaco still haveing** 4.5**sec invis on a setp is pure bullshit after the vision changes. Again, i'm not saying stealth is in a perfect spot now, but atleast it has a proper framework that allows it to become balanced eventually.

KoggyStyleFeb 19, 20171 votes

Wrong if pink = true go somewhere else...... fkin bronzelords.

Sire HippingtonFeb 19, 20171 votes

yea, leaving your team 4vs5 is always a great idea...or giving up that objective. Go somewhere else usually means you give up something rather important, atleast if you don't play vs idiots that throw out pinks like candy because they can.

LimrickFeb 18, 20177 votes

Maybe Riot should make cooldowns pause while you're stealthed so you don't have Akali go invisible just to wait for another jump to charge, or Kha for his Q etc.

Robert SmithFeb 18, 20173 votes

thats part of her combo though and she needs to stay in the circle for it to work

Velzard of KozFeb 18, 201710 votes

With Akali, that's kinda point of her shroud. It's not much balanced but should it work that way as you suggest it would have very little usage (for Energy only possibly). The problem with Akali is more in the fact that she virtually has no cooldowns besides her Energy.

TurquoiseYoshiFeb 18, 20174 votes

I think Akali's is pretty good, as it allows her to be invisible, but in a small circle that the enemy can play around. Other than that, it's pretty dumb.

resumedFeb 18, 20171 votes

dont play heroes of the storm

3 characters have permastealth and theres no way to counter them

GGLineaRFeb 18, 20175 votes

Not to mention how brain dead that game is.

AnidanFeb 19, 20173 votes

It'd probably be better to look at DotA to handle invis in MOBAs rather than HotS anyway. If you don't counter it, you could lose out on a lot of kills or suffer at the hands of a lot of ganks... but there's also plenty of ways to handle it, too. You have the immobile Sentry Wards that provide no direct vision but have True Sight within its range, and you have Dust of Appearance for anti-stealth on the go. Then there's the occasional True Sight on spells, and the Gem of True Sight if you have someone who can reliably not die, and some abilities won't let an enemy stealth until it ends.

League handles it like a gimmick rather than the mechanic it needs to be treated as.

Earl EulrichFeb 18, 20173 votes

though they consistently glimmer, making it rather easy to unvail them with a skillshot if you know what you´re looking for.

Also, if both teams are evenly leveled the burst isn´t that hard so most of the times you can just get away from them jumping on you if you´re not horibly overpushed far from you´re team.

It´s really mostly an annoyance in blindpick, in draft zeratul is the only real viable one - and that´s for the ult combo, not so much for the stealth.