Thornmail - Better or Worse? My analysis/rant (Wall of text)

I've seen a lot of posts and they all seem to dislike the changed Thornmail , mostly because of its decreased thorn damage passive. But what if the update is not as bad as you think? Well let's take a look at the item.

- 2900g (600 combine cost)

• 250 Health +75 Armor Passive UNIQUE – THORNS: Upon being hit by a basic attack, reflects magic damage equal to 25 (+ 10% bonus armor), while also inflicting Grievous Wounds icon Grievous Wounds on the attacker for 1 second. UNIQUE – COLD STEEL: When hit by basic attacks, Slow icon cripples source's attack speed by 15% for 1 second.

7.13 Gold efficiency for stats alone (armor) was about 85%. Thorn dmg = 17.5% efficient, about 350g cost. 7.14 Gold efficiency = ~74%. Cost is raised by 550g. Health/armor trade relatively even in efficiency but it gained a new passive and current passive got weaker.

I'm not going to lie, because it is 74% gold efficient for the HP/Armor, you need to want the passives to be worth purchasing, you WILL be paying more gold than pre 7.13.

But is it truly a bad change?

Well let's see. The item lost 25 armor (previous had 100 total armor). Passive thorn damage ratio is down. But now gives +250 HP. Some things to keep in mind: Armor only reduces physical damage taken. Having bonus health not only makes you more durable vs magic damage, it is also the only thing that counters True Damage, aside from shields. Bonus HP also scales with especially after the + bonus hp% got buffed, AND it scales off abilities that scale with Maximum HP, something old Thornmail could never do. I don't know the math if this actually makes you weaker to physical damage since it lost 25 armor, but I do know that you need both HP and resistances to be durable. Maybe the 25 armor was better vs full-AD physical damage comps. Maybe.

But the biggest complaint I see on boards isn't about losing durability. It's about doing less thorn damage as a tank/bruiser. This is where I start to rant. The complaints I see are "The new thorns passive do NO damage and the Cold Steel passive is counter productive; you want them to attack you so they kill themselves" is basically what I read. Why, oh why is this a big deal? What players don't seem to understand is old Thornmail was essentially countered by Lifesteal; which is now countered by Thornmail itself. No longer can ADCs, Fioras, Irelias, Jax, etc. can sustain with their life steal items. Grievous Wounds is an underrated but not an underpowered stat. What if healing for 20 less hp per auto was just as good as that 20 extra thorn damage, which is mitigated by MR by the way. Even ADCs can buy MR in the form of / , which the latter has lifesteal FYI. The higher the damage, especially if it was a critical strike, the more lifesteal.

The primary purpose of Thornmail and most tank items is durability/survivability. If you're looking for hybrid item, took a look at or even . The former 2 have AD but no resistances, while DMP has a windowed offensive. To be clear, no one item is supposed to win you the match, especially if you're a tank. If you are rushing Thornmail first item, you probably shouldn't, unless as stated above, you need the passive but then you may only need the new .

OK I need to tackle the Cold Steel passive before I consider this post complete. Some said it's counter-productive, that you should want attackers to keep attacking you so they keep taking thorn damage. I would argue that getting hit slower/taking less hits = less damage taken/less dps on the attacker. Staying alive longer lets you keep disrupting the teamfight. And do not be fooled. No one will dare manually slow down their attacks just so they don't have GW on their next auto. If that was the case then you're even MORE tankier if they refuse to attack you. It would totally negate the incentive to buy attack speed items, reaching 2+ attacks per second, if anyone hit you once, waited 1 second, hit you again, wait 1 second, etc.

Maybe this does hurt Rammus. But I think it's a good change that deserves a chance. It's not a 1 size fits all item. It's not a generalist item. The gold efficiency is not very good unless you like the passive, at which point you may just sit on bramble vest. Don't rush it if you don't need it. But to say that "it sucks, I hate it, revert it" just because your thorns damage don't bully someone out of lane or a fight, is just ludicrous. You need a better argument to convince me. Maybe 2900g is too high. But I wouldn't say one or both passives make it bad. I think everybody is overestimating thorn damage and underestimating GW. I'm only repeating myself at this point but sometimes it is needed for reminders and for emphasis.