Could Anivia get a little more help?

SirLapse··2 votes·774 views

Summary of topic:

-Speed up auto-attacks. -Make a mana regen mechanic to reduce the burden of her heavy mana costs. -Make Crystallize actually do something when at rank 1.

I would appreciate any support on at least these 3 goals, since I don't see many Anivia players often. She's pretty hard to use due to her in-built and unfixed problems, not because her kit is actually hard to use (especially now that there's a marker telling you when Flash Frost stuns). Anyway, on to the explanations.

I've been testing out some things (minorly), but for the most part been trying to watch more skilled Anivia players to try and get a feel for how she plays. I kept finding problems though.

One thing is a guaranteed problem: her last hitting. It's horrendous, even for an AP caster. It's not really the AD behind it, it's the speed of the projectile. You'll never really know when it will hit the minion, you're just playing a guessing game where you are almost guaranteed to not get as much CS as your opponent during the early game.

I would like the hit confirm boosted to more realistic values, whether it be boosting her ramp-up animation or the actual projectile's speed. Kog'Maw has a similar issue, but he's an AD carry in most cases and thus doesn't have the issue for long.


The other problem is more conceptual...it's her wall. It's great when used correctly. Amazing. Can change entire games. However, most Anivias will not level it up for the sake of inflicting more damage with other abilities. While I enjoy that she has damage potential, her focus should be more on utility, like her Flash Frost and Glacial Storm.

Yes, Glacial Storm and Flash Frost deal a ton of damage when paired with Frostbite. But we already have AP assassins that can do what she does even faster, and with less positioning requirements. Not only that, but it's recommended to completely ignore Anivia's Wall entirely until mid-game! Is that healthy gameplay for a skill to be completely ignorable? I think not.

My proposition here is:

Crystallize now gives a Skarner-esque passive. Chilled is now a status effect where you can see an indicator for someone's stacks of Chilled. Landing Flash Frost applies one or two (based on if you stunned them), and Frostbite will now automatically apply one as well.

At 3 stacks, an enemy will be "Frostbitten" (placeholder) or simply put, stunned for about a second or two. The enemy cannot be stunned again by "Frostbitten" for a few seconds. Until Crystallize is leveled, or if an enemy has been recently stunned, the max number of stacks on any enemy is stuck at 1. Any enemy stunned by "Frostbitten" will increase Anivia's mana regen for a few seconds, based on how many were affected (low mana regen unless smacking champions). It scales with every level of Crystallize.

Early game base damages will have to be reduced like it did for Skarner's (quite a bit since it's a double stun at lv3), but Glacial Storm should be unaffected for the most part. Also, the stun will not deal damage.

Please support giving Anivia help! \o/

3 Comments

Serpents Embrace2 votes

You'll regret asking for this if they do change her.

Look at Cassiopeia, Anivia's closest champion in terms of design. They were designed in the same train of thought and the current Cassiopeia rework has moved so far away from that her identity is unrecognizable. It would be fine if the new rework was fun, but it isn't, and I feel like they wouldn't hand Anivia over to a competent designer if they did go forward with some changes.

IMO just be happy with what you have, because once they touch it you're never getting it back.

SirLapse1 votes

You'll regret asking for this if they do change her.

Look at Cassiopeia, Anivia's closest champion in terms of design. They were designed in the same train of thought and the current Cassiopeia rework has moved so far away from that her identity is unrecognizable. It would be fine if the new rework was fun, but it isn't, and I feel like they wouldn't hand Anivia over to a competent designer if they did go forward with some changes.

IMO just be happy with what you have, because once they touch it you're never getting it back.

I disagree here. Mostly because Cassiopeia's rework was not only unprecedented, but a lot of her playerbase wasn't really consulted for the changes. They're also working on fixing her as well, I'd rather not have that part ignored as long as we're talking about Cass. I can compare Lux to Anivia better than Cass, mostly because Anivia is about CC-based zone control, while Cass is more of a sustained damage-type zone control champion (which means that her pick value was due to doing insane early game sustained damage, whereas new Cass is burst-based and the rest of the mid laner roster can already do that at much safer ranges).

And Anivia to be honest does need a kit rework. Flash Frost costs too much mana, Crystallize is nearly useless to level up at all until later on in the game, and Frostbite doesn't add up to her AoE kit. She's also got heavy mana problems due to her Glacial Storm. But that can be left for another time. Kit reworks are prioritized by how old a champion is and how OP/bad their kits are. Anivia's is still half-decent and does amazingly during late game. Not really as toxic as old Cass' Q spam since you're punished severely for missing even one Flash Frost.

I did explain her main issue (last hitting), so even something like that can be done in one or two patches. Her mana costs have to be high cause of her wave clear, but requiring two mana items just to function is ridiculous. Also the Crystallize part is conceptual in nature...the skill has become ignored by Anivia players until later in the game. Not exactly a healthy kit feature to be having.

PenIceland1 votes

So what you are saying is you want Anivia to be able to Flash Frost for two stacks of "Frostbitten," then no doubt follow it up with a Frostbite for a third stack of Frostbitten which would apparently proc the Frostbitten stun to keep them in place for 1-2 seconds, thus allowing Anivia to Glacial Storm underneath them and Frostbite again before they can get away? Fine with me Anivia . Probably not fine with anyone else though even if the base damage was lowered for both Flash Frost and Frostbite, which would infuriate me to no bounds. I guarantee that Anivia will have mana issues even with this Frostbitten gimmick that reminds me of Catalyst passive except based on Frostbitten proc rather than a level up proc. I'm even willing to bet that Anivia would have mana issues if you make her Frostbite give mana back on minion last hits (like Annie). Even if I do like the latter idea more. Anyway, you want a champion with mana problems to have less base damage and do nothing for the first half of the game where all she does is ramp up mana items like Tear/Chalice + RoA?

Moving on to the Crystallize "problem," not all Anivia players wait until level 8 to put their first point into wall. It's entirely dependent on your lane or what you want to do that game. I sometimes level up my wall at level 4 if I can cease an opportunity to get a kill off a wall setup on a low health opponent. I sometimes put 2 points into wall by level 8 in order to block off certain jungle pathways if I find myself fighting a lot in the jungle that game. I sometimes put 3 points in to wall before maxing Flash Frost to make it easier to kill some lane opponents that don't have a built-in escape. The only good idea I've heard of being introduced to Anivia's wall was that it would have a small radius, around the edges of the wall, akin to the new Flash Frost indicator, whereby anyone in its radius would be Chilled debuff'd. This makes it easier for Anivia to do damage pre-6 without feeling helpless if the opponent is extremely mobile and able to dodge all your Q's. The counter-play would be that she could only do it once every 20 seconds and the possibility of getting ganked with no wall is a thing. And even then that wall idea is an iffy subject.

Other Anivia change recommendations include minor buffs like being less of a mana hog, a faster Q projectile speed, or a 5-10 movement speed increase.

Also, Anivia's auto-attack functionality was changed sometime earlier this year if I remember correctly. Although I agree that it makes csing a bit harder early game, changing it again would likely just frustrate veteran Anivia players seeing as some players complained about the first auto-attack change and how it took time to adjust and it wasn't possible to auto-attack people under turret without taking damage anymore. And its sound when it hits something is extremely satisfying to me as well.

By the way, that Flash Frost indicator change, "for clarity," was extremely unnecessary, tacky, and generated more problems than it solved. It literally does not make a difference in landing a Q stun. Most, if not all, Anivia players will agree to that. I think the particles are cool but the circle in the indicator is obnoxious.

I personally think Anivia is in an okay place and any changes to her would just have to be as minor as the one's I have previously stated. I do not wish for Anivia to be reworked or Cassiopeia'd either. Anivia item 3070

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