Buffing Tahm Kench was a mistake

ChoGathsSon··36 votes·2,777 views

Once again, you cannot rely on data from only 2-3 weeks as being suggestive of anything realistic when you release a new champion. he's being played both as a support and top laner, where builds fluctuate, match ups are various and the small time pool youve used to determine his need for buffs is extremely stupid.

Here's how you build him: full tank. In solo lane, you abuse the absolute fuck out of base %HP damage and stack HP regen (Warmogs/spirit visage) to stay in lane forever and abuse how hard it is to kill you. You run armor quints, scaling health yellows, scaling MR blues and magic pen reds, going 4/26 in masteries (take 4 points in CDR if you want to run some flat CDR runes, otherwise 0/30/0 or even the old 9/21 for AD/AS to last hit better with is still good).

Support is all about the same thing except your gold income is naturally quite a bit less, but Tahm kench is naturally hard to kill. Max is devour/regurgitate for the damage in solo lanes and the CDR reduction to help allies and potential all-ins in duo lanes. Maxing his E isn't bad either if he's going to be in a poke heavy lane, this makes him pretty hard to kill obviously.

Either way you slice it, these buffs were idiotic. You cannot rely on such a small sample size from something so brand new with the mechanics he has to say he needs buffs or not. You're going to find that you'll regret having done this because much like the Ryze buffs that weren't needed, Tahm will get nerfed and be in worse shape than he was before he was buffed.

29 Comments

S H A Y C 012 votes

he had so much damage yesterday...not sure why he needs more today. Last i checked people were calling him "Freelo Kench" but ...i guess buff him till the masses weep...then nerf until you cant play him, thats what we do around here no?

ChoGathsSon1 votes

[{quoted}](name=ToiletteOfDoom ,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=UZpQkqXs,comment-id=0000,timestamp=2015-07-22T20:41:37.936+0000)

he had so much damage yesterday...not sure why he needs more today. Last i checked people were calling him "Freelo Kench" but ...i guess buff him till the masses weep...then nerf until you cant play him, thats what we do around here no?

It's what they did with Ryze when he had a pretty big gameplay style change and riot didn't allow people the time to figure him out, where someone would have figured out perma snaring was a thing - in fact, it was because i remember a thread where a guy pointed this out and he was picked in the LCS a few days later. They overbuffed him, now they've overnerfed him and he's basically going to be garbage.

But their reasoning was Ryze players shouldn't have to subject to him being bad because that's unfair and unfun, even though he wasn't bad. So explain to me why you've left champions like gangplank and poppy and so many others in shit tier for years before you've made changes to them, you reworked Ryze before you reworked them and Ryze already has had lots of powerful moments as a champion. So it's ok for those players to feel like shit but your golden boy Ryze has to never be subjected to this? Shits dumb.

TheRakkun1 votes

{quoted}

It's what they did with Ryze when he had a pretty big gameplay style change and riot didn't allow people the time to figure him out, where someone would have figured out perma snaring was a thing - in fact, it was because i remember a thread where a guy pointed this out and he was picked in the LCS a few days later. They overbuffed him, now they've overnerfed him and he's basically going to be garbage.

But their reasoning was Ryze players shouldn't have to subject to him being bad because that's unfair and unfun, even though he wasn't bad. So explain to me why you've left champions like gangplank and poppy and so many others in shit tier for years before you've made changes to them, you reworked Ryze before you reworked them and Ryze already has had lots of powerful moments as a champion. So it's ok for those players to feel like shit but your golden boy Ryze has to never be subjected to this? Shits dumb.

The Cycle of Buffs and Nerfs continue.

We Will Buff

Then we will Nerf and never let them be Viable again.

ChoGathsSon1 votes

{quoted}

The Cycle of Buffs and Nerfs continue.

We Will Buff

Then we will Nerf and never let them be Viable again.

Agreed, I'm a Nasus main

Canechurch2 votes

{quoted}

The Cycle of Buffs and Nerfs continue.

We Will Buff

Then we will Nerf and never let them be Viable again.

Unless you're irelia. She's immune to nerfs.

PALIGames5 votes

Tahm Needs the Damage he has no escapes, has a non damaging ult, slow movement speed, on top of that I haven't played a game where I haven't had 3 people come up in my lane, invaded my jungle , or come bot while sup just to kill me and leave. the hit box on his q is too wide, the best way to apply stacks is auto attacking if which is a challenge in itself especially most of the time if your Team fighting . if you get left behind by your team your dead. he has no escapes. you cant count his ult because if takes even a little bit of damage while ulting it gets cancelled. so stop whining, he's not even as bad as some other champs that can penta by smacking your face on your keyboard.

diamondlight2 votes

so stop whining, he's not even as bad as some other champs that can penta by smacking your face on your keyboard.

lol....

KONO RUBICK DA1 votes

i wanted to see how op could argue that TK didn't need a buff, all i saw is him explaining how to play him top/support and said "you will see he didn't need buffs"

Vincent Lucius4 votes

Honestly, Kench was I've of the better balanced champions upon release. I didn't see a lot of them in my games and when he showed up he wasn't more annoying than other champions. I was surprised when I heard about him getting buffed.

With Ekko I saw him every game for over a week until he got nerfed and when I didn't see him it was because he was banned, but the catfish was fine.

ChoGathsSon2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Vincent Lucius,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=UZpQkqXs,comment-id=0004,timestamp=2015-07-22T23:48:38.455+0000)

Honestly, Kench was of the better balanced champions upon release...

let's not get ahead of ourselves here

Rain NT6 votes

He was definitely balanced imo. He so easy to gank its ridiculous

Kuma No Neko2 votes

What? He eats his adc and runs away with a huge speed boost, so unless you have 5 seconds of stun or a way to do his entire health bar + a shield thats about 80-90% of his health they both get away. And if you kill Tahm, you used all of your damage to kill him and the ADC can just walk away

Rain NT1 votes

^ Thats why its easy, kill tahm when he eats his ADC. Theres no one to hit you back, all of a sudden from 3v2.. it becomes 3v0 cause during that time tahm cant AA so it basically free damage, and if he doesnt eat his ADC he has no mobility at all cause he has one of the lowest base MS.

Top lane Tahm is the easiest piece of fish to slice in half ever with ganks cause hes so damn slow.

And the best way to beat him bot lane is make it look like youre giong to kill him so he has to activate shield, then just back off cause then he cant heal with the grey health anymore and rinse and repeat til he dies. He offers no damage in lane but he does have some cc, but once youre in his stomach the adc cant hit you so its basically saving you from their ADC (since support tahm doesnt get as much hp early as top lane tahm)

But now with the buff, and actually does more damage. He might become a problem top lane once you get enough HP. But still support tahm is pretty easy to handle and has the lowest win rate in the game. Honest my friend ban tahm so he doesnt get them on HIS OWN team cause he thinks its troll to pick Tahm

Kuma No Neko1 votes

He doesn't have one of the lowest base MS, his is medium, but he gets a 25% speed boost when he eats his ADC, if you die to a a gank as tahm you're literally one of the worst players in league or you're pushed waaaaay to far, I would know, I've played a lot of tahm

Vincent Lucius

I'm sorry, one of the more balanced champs released recently. Is that better or did you have a different point?

Dr Pump3 votes

Buffing Ekko was also a mistake.

FantasySniper2 votes

Maybe it was because of his horrendous win-rate.

But I still think he needed nerfs more than buffs.

He's just extremely difficult to play, and people troll with him so hard - making his win-rate what it is.

ChoGathsSon3 votes

{quoted}

Maybe it was because of his horrendous win-rate.

But I still think he needed nerfs more than buffs.

He's just extremely difficult to play, and people troll with him so hard - making his win-rate what it is.

You can't take a winrate from a champion that new and apply it as if it's something along the lines of a champion who has sat in such a miserable state for months, with dedicated mains and the whole 9 yards. I realize how many people play this game, I realize that 2-3 weeks SOUNDS like a lot of time considering that but it's really not. In that time span, people are still learning what he does, what he excels at, what the proper skill orders are depending on match-ups and just match-ups in general. There are so many variables to consider and two weeks just isn't enough time to conclude much of anything.

And his level of difficulty isn't even easy to determine, at first he could seem straight forward and basic but then people pick up on small things, pro play could even expose the power of his kit in coordinated that eventually trickles down to solo queue and normal play. Again, two weeks is just not enough time to rightly determine anything and while you could make the case that buffing him encourages the player base to play him more and collect more data, you do that at the expense of potentially creating a very frustrating experience for the player base much the same way they did with perma snaring Ryze, which needed to be hotfixed but wasn't for some reason. In reality, just give it 2 patches and you'll have a much better idea by the end of that than you would otherwise.

FantasySniper1 votes

You might have misunderstood me, I am in complete agreement with you.

Their buffs, I feel are completely unjustified. He's got Yasuo/Lee Sin/Kalista/Bard symptoms where he's just so difficult to properly play and place in the meta that he seems worthless, on top of his capability to troll games (hence the effect on his win-rate), but is actually extremely OP in the right hands (hence why I prefer him getting nerfed over buffed).

Raja Chachki2 votes

Agreed, I have no idea why they buffed him. His shield passive/shield in general is an annoying ability to fight against, his Q's marker (hit box marker that is), seems to be too small for the actual tongue (so I think it won't hit me then it does), and his teammate swallow is the most fucking annoying ability in this game, possibly besides Kalista passive. It even gives him a speed boost, so that he always has a get-out-of-jail free card for ANY of his teammates. This ability infuriates me, similar to Thresh lantern or Kalista ult, because we SHOULD get the kill, and then some wacky mechanic saves the enemy. Maybe it's just me, but I feel that those 3 abilities, are just impossible to balance, and they provide so much safety with just the press of a button.

TheFancySkeleton1 votes

I just want devour to be less clunky. No, eat the enemy, not that minion. Okay let me eat my friend.... let me eat.... and he's dead.

ChoGathsSon1 votes

"I'm going to downvote you because I disagree with you but not post"

Go ahead, it doesn't make you any less wrong

kyocrisis1 votes

2-3 weeks not enough time, but when Ekko was nerfed in the same amount of time that was OK. Then he got nerfed again and is now getting small buffs and people still complaining....

I agree it is not enough time, but it will happen anyway and has always happened anyway.

Only Play Darius1 votes

Gnar

Krys Star1 votes

Remember a time when Riot would hold off on buffing/nerfing an enemy champion until an entire patch settles in, before deciding on the next patch where to go from there? Yeah, that was so two years ago... Riot's lost their touch. They may not know it, in fact they're too arrogant to see it from their riches and success but... Little by little, Riot's losing their fanbase and community. LITTLE. BY. LITTLE. At this rate, League's going to meet its inevitable decline.

Dr Poro1 votes

Tahm is pick or ban now. He started to perform well during the last few days before the patch. He just went dominating now.

Lil Booler1 votes

This post is cancer

Silents4291 votes

Once again, you cannot rely on data from only 2-3 weeks as being suggestive of anything realistic when you release a new champion.

The irony here is that you think people should listen to you over data collected over 2-3 weeks.

Siyther1 votes

i thought he was too strong on release i mean all that utility why the hell should he do tons of damage????? My opionion is that cause he has a shit ton of utility his damage should be next to nothing;anything else and he will be op

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