I wish flash wasn't a neccessity.

tieger05·Jul 20, 2017·67 votes·3,646 views

I remember when we didn't have flash, and Summoners spells were actually situational. Wish we could have that again, where we could actually have 2 situational summoner's spells instead of 1. Maybe a 3rd summoner's item to the game would make things interesting (Or a complete hard nerf to flash, I wouldn't mind that). please read my edit before commenting.

edit: too many people are misunderstanding my post. I like flash, its a fun item. I never in my post stated that it should be removed, but it should be nerfed so that it isn't a must-take in every single game. A good nerf to flash would be something like, disabling champs from flashing over walls. I don't mind flash being used offensively, but it provides too much defensive stats to champs that shouldn't have it.

114 Comments

RewtJul 20, 201721 votes

It's a short ranged blink. It's always going to be good. The only way to change that is to nerf it to being useless or removing it. And removing it would just be bad because the game has been designed around it. Not just champions but the map as well. Let's not forget removing flash removes so many cool tricks that are possible.

tieger05Jul 20, 20174 votes

or it can be reworked so that you can't flash over walls. It wont remove any of the "tricks" you can do with it but flashing over walls every few mins imo isn't healthy

DaNinadJul 20, 20179 votes

Leblanc Zed Ekko Ezreal

YalathanilJul 21, 20177 votes

Akali LeeSin

AmenPersonJul 21, 201711 votes

Kassadin Never Forget Old Long Range Ult Way Back When

I just had to really.

RewtJul 20, 20176 votes

That makes it so that any character with real mobility is untouchable. Many champions rely on flash to be able to catch the more mobile champions.

Take Ezreal for example. If you dont have the ability to flash over a wall then he will be nigh unkillable. He will always get away. Flash isnt just balanced for the user. Its balancing for the opponents as well. If we removed flash it would make months of balancing issues as well as make dozens of mandatory reworks to lower mobility in the game to allow for other champions to actually ever catch them.

nargnargnargJul 21, 20172 votes

If it was removed imobile Champions would never get played because they din't have an escape. In lane they would be free kills and in teamfights they have no defense if they get jumped on.

BLACK REALM GODJul 20, 20178 votes

i too wish that smite and flash werent necessities

RewtJul 21, 20177 votes

There is no way to make smite not a necessity. Objective control is so important. I remember when you could actually go smiteless jungle with success. Every time i played against one I would just walk up and steal their buffs and Barons.

BLACK REALM GODJul 21, 20171 votes

there is actually. remove it from the game or put it in the item shop as an active on a really crappy item.

RewtJul 21, 20171 votes

That just actively fucks junglers. The problem would be that Junglers would have to take it early or risk getting their buff stolen early by another jungler who takes it. And if its on a shitty item then they are going to have a very hard time clearing. And if you make the item too expensive to buy initially then it makes it so that Junglers have to buy an expensive shitty item and hold onto it for all game.

Any way you look at it Its bad. The only situation that it could be ok is to put it on ALL jungle items. And make it go with those. But that still is a bad thing because then junglers cant sell their jungle items to get better items later on. (Specifically warrior and Runic Echos)

BLACK REALM GODJul 22, 20171 votes

personally i think that removing smite would make the jungle more about skill. champs like nunu, ivern, and chogath who were originally intended for the jungle could go back to the jungle and new strategies could emerge.

smite in the store could be a trinket. trinkets are free no? upgrades for trinkets are very similar to upgrades for smite no? all right then.

plus it'd be interesting to see junglers have to fight to get to level 9 to upgrade their smite trinket

RewtJul 22, 20171 votes

and now Junglers are at a vision disadvantage. They cant take sweeper to clear wards or Place them early.

Any way you do this it fucks junglers.

Right now they give up a summoner spell to get smite. BUT. IT means that ONLY the people with smite can guaranteed secure objectives. and they have given smite buffs so now you arent even actually giving up a summoner spell to secure objectives.

So lets give the breakdown.

If its on a shitty item then they are fucked. because they are stuck with a 5 item build with a shitty item.
If its on jungle items it makes it so that junglers HAVE to hold onto the jungle items.
If its on the trinket then the jungler cant take part in the vision game unless they take Poacher Knife which would gut jungle diversity since all junglers would have to take poachers knife or face check the entire map.
All these changes allow other roles to grab smite creating a really shitty 5 smite meta where its all about who can press smite 5 times and instaclear an objective. (You thought the snowball problem was bad now)

BLACK REALM GODJul 22, 20171 votes

{quoted}

So lets give the breakdown.

If its on a shitty item then they are fucked. because they are stuck with a 5 item build with a shitty item.

this is true, but your argument is flawed because you assume the item would be bad from the very beginning. balancing a smite active into a useful item isn't complicated - it just takes time.

If its on jungle items it makes it so that junglers HAVE to hold onto the jungle items.

this isn't necessarily true. item 1083 is an easy example, but there used to be an old starting item that would give you hp or something then you could sell it and you'd keep the bonus hp. item 3599 is another example. item 3513 being another one still. item 1041 AND item 1039 both grant bonus xp for having smite and can only be purchased if you have smite. so you already have to buy a smite item or you fall behind in xp.

If its on the trinket then the jungler cant take part in the vision game unless they take Poacher Knife which would gut jungle diversity since all junglers would have to take poachers knife or face check the entire map.

item 3513 and item 3599 <--- is proof that item 3711 can be modified to fit.

All these changes allow other roles to grab smite creating a really shitty 5 smite meta where its all about who can press smite 5 times and instaclear an objective. (You thought the snowball problem was bad now)

no. it doesnt. because you can make purchasing the trinket and using the trinket bind to one of your summoner spells and replace it. and then smite already has a damage reduction for successive allied smites.

RewtJul 22, 20171 votes

If you want to balance smite into a useful item it needs to be a full effective item. not some item that is mostly there for the active. So There would need to be a 70+ AD item with a secondary stat on top of the smite buff. Otherwise you are actively fucking over junglers. And the AP varient would need to be a 120 AP item with a secondary stat.
If it sits on top of the trinket you CANT TRINKET UNTIL YOU USE IT. They need to be independant. And that would mean we would have to just create a whole new keybind for smite and adjust the entire UI to give it a spot. It would just be a huge headache.
No. Those 2 things sit on top of the trinket. So thats a really bad argument.
IF IT BINDS TO A SUMMONER SPELL WHY EVEN CHANGE ANYTHING???????

BLACK REALM GODJul 22, 20171 votes

those were examples of what could be done.

personally if i were to change up smite i would just make it a trinket in the store that replaces item 3340 and item 3341 . pressing T would channel for a few seconds and then you'd be asked to press D or F. your spell would be disabled for the remainder of the match and replaced with smite. then it would disappear out of your inventory. now you have smite and can purchase smite items.

why would i do this for smite? because smite is too important to the game to not have an option to select it after the game has loaded.

Guy Fox TeemoJul 20, 20178 votes

A HUGE amount of balance in League is tied around the fact that flash is taken 99% of the time, every game.

If it were to be nerfed, or removed, it would take an incredible amount of work balancing a huge portion of the champion pool, and risking throwing everything out of wack. Would take months to make Leagues balance stable.

Flash isn't bad for the game, it being core to take on every champion isn't a bad thing, not everything you pick has to be a choice. Having "constants" in League, like flash are a must have, makes it much easier to balance the game, then would otherwise.

Removing flash isn't worth it/nerfing it. TO much work, for little to no benefit.

TEA Nietzsche Jul 21, 20172 votes

Exactly. Removing flash has HUGE downsides - and the biggest downside is probably that the exact side effects are unknown. The only sure thing is that there will be an intense aftermath.

This doesn't mean that it's not a good thing to do, but the only certain thing is that we'd need some huge upsides. So this is your only argument that is supposed to outweigh those downsides:

@OP

but it provides too much defensive stats to champs that shouldn't have it.

I mean I am not even sure whether immobile champions (I take it you are referring to those?) profit the most from Flash - although some may rely on it, Annie comes to mind. Overall the game would become more predictable and I think this would actually help some immobile champions, especially control mages.

Overall you got to acknowledge that there are huge downsides and that there is simply a lack of compelling arguments for removing it.

KloqdqJul 21, 20172 votes

Pretty much this. The amount of aftermath you'd have with any change to flash is just not worth it at this point.

ThilmerJul 21, 20177 votes

You know what is fun?

Three people use Teleport in pro-gaming: "We have notice that teleport is too strong and we are going to adjust it". Nerf to teleport in the next patch.
Ten people use Flash in pro-gaming: nobody even thinks it could be a problem.

StandgroundingJul 21, 20174 votes

true... and fuck sheep that downvoted you, they are the cancer of community.

OH WAIT, flash was used all the time in pro gaming and nobody noticed that so far... LMAO!

KrigjerJul 21, 20176 votes

Yup. I either get called a noob or flamed almost everytime I don't bring flash.

I used to not take flash on support. I preferred heal/exhaust because let me assist my team more instead of being such a selfish summoner spell. I was bullied, ridiculed and insulted relentlessly for it. People would add me from the forums just to tell me how much I sucked and how stupid I was for not taking it.

I wouldn't call it a necessity for gameplay (it certainly has its uses, no denying that) but.. it's something else when it comes to this community.

CasterGilgameshJul 21, 20172 votes

this community is cancer?what else is new....

KawaiiShroomJul 21, 20172 votes

I actually still do that. I think the utility of both heal and exhaust for the team is more than flash for myself.

I Main SwainJul 21, 20176 votes

honestly the thing is its balanced as it is, long cooldown, the range isnt super long, but a well placed flash can save your life, get you a kill, or pull of a REALLY high level play. i feel like any nerf to it would make it not worth taking anymore imho, especially if they made it so you couldnt flash over walls. that would actually be a huge nerf to a lot of immobile champs.

LeonerdoJul 21, 20175 votes

TL;DR: Strong opinion alert: Flash is amazing, and is core to LoL's gameplay.

Other people have said similar things, but the way I see it is: Flash does good things for the game as-is, probably the most good things. To be frank, it is probably the best possible summoner spell, both in terms of power and design. It's fun to use, enables clutch plays, and acts as a kind of safety net against ganks/bad plays. This is a gross simplification, but essentially Flash gives everyone a single "free" extra life, so that a single gank or misstep isn't so punishing, and snowballing doesn't occur immediately. It does all these things by being simple, flexible, and streamlined (no cast-time). I don't think anything could OR should replace Flash (except for the rare exceptions like Smite+Ghost Olaf).

I mean, obviously the game would be less flashy without it (pun intended). And I think that action-y, clutch, flashy, rapid gameplay, which is enabled by Flash, is kind of core to League of Legends at this point.

The EcdysiastJul 21, 20175 votes

The design is the worst because it's the best. There shouldn't be a summoner spell that is required basically 100% of the time on every champion.

New and reworked champions are designed around the fact flash exists.

TEA Nietzsche Jul 21, 20175 votes

{quoted}

The design is the worst because it's the best. There shouldn't be a summoner spell that is required basically 100% of the time on every champion.

Why? It adds to the stability of the game - we have some many factors already (items, masteries, runes, champions releases/VGUs&GUs/nerfs&buffs, property changes of jgl/turrets/monsters/whatever and finally the 2nd summoner spell) - imagine the chaos if flash weren't mandatory anymore.

EVERYTHING would be affected. Many items (especially those who affect mobility in any way) would get so much stronger, runes&masteries would essentially have a whole new meaning and people have already commented about the effect it has on champions.

I think we can be sure that it would take 1 whole season to balance flash alone - completely without champion releases/VGUs or any other changes. You can't forget that it takes a while for pro players and others to find the best meta which means that every patch would create new problems. We'd have to sacrifice an entire season of potential changes and desperately needed updates only to make flash not be mandatory anymore. Huge sacrifices need to be worth it and the results of flash are uncertain.

You could have a philosophical discussion about whether LoL would be better off if flash had never existed/in a worse state (I do not think so btw) but practically it's impossible to nerf it significantly.

e46 FanaticJul 20, 20174 votes

Yup. I either get called a noob or flamed almost everytime I don't bring flash. Playing to your comfort is how it's done. I even got questioned if I was new and boosted for having odd builds and or summoner spells on my lvl 7 champs. If they want to follow the meta, let them. They won't advance quickly until they figure out how they can build around the current match they're in and figure out a way that usually helps them succeed. One example is I like to play passive, bait their abilities while they're being aggro and missing cs, then poke, lane won in most cases.

I remember recently, my support called me a noob for bringing cleanse instead of heal while I was playing draven(cc is his worst enemy) and the enemy team had an amumu, leoana and a lux that all can fk me hard. I explained that, got called new and muted.

FearlessCreatorJul 21, 20172 votes

They won't advance quickly -Bronze 2

e46 FanaticJul 21, 20171 votes

{quoted}

They won't advance quickly -Bronze 2

Had bad placement matches and am now struggling to climb, other than that following my own builds has gotten me 10 lvl 7 champs all within 50k mastery points. Sure, lvl 7 isn't much, but it didnt take much to get there and not many people have +5 of them. I haven't actually cared about ranked since 2k13 when everything made sense.

TEA Nietzsche Jul 21, 20173 votes

Look, you've played more than 300 ranked games this season alone and I think it has become evident that your Cleanse/Ghost Iceborn Gauntlet Draven will not take off at this point. And you get mastery points with losing aswell (and you are losing 51% of your games) so I don't think this is the greatest indicator for a functioning build.

I mean sure, it's enough to stay at Bronze II (which is totally fine if you are fine with it!) but I don't think you are in a position to tell others what to use to "climb quickly". After all you yourself either haven't tried that (as you claim) or have just failed to do so.

Ariel the CruelJul 20, 20174 votes

Warwick It's Singed not?

tieger05Jul 20, 201731 votes

"Necessity" - 95% of champions take it.

Ariel the CruelJul 20, 20174 votes

95% =/= 100% ;p

It Hertz When IPJul 20, 201726 votes

[deleted]

paisyJul 21, 20174 votes

Chill

nice tableJul 21, 201710 votes

actually no one with a brain takes ghost on ww

aspects1Jul 21, 20175 votes

trueee

hhaavviikkJul 21, 20174 votes

wait what? I've been playing since 2009, flash has always been a necessity, never was it not a necessity regardless of season or year of LoL

and we have always had flash so I don't know what you're talking about there.

tieger05Jul 21, 20172 votes

they released flash a few years ago..

hhaavviikkJul 21, 20176 votes

{quoted}

they released flash a few years ago..

June 12, 2009 Patch Reworked Reduced range to 800 from 900. Changed functionality: Flash.png Flash is now cast without the need of a target indicator (i.e. it is cast towards the position of your mouse pointer). Flash.png Flash will automatically flash to the furthest valid range in the direction it is cast at. Flash.png Flash no longer has a cast time (to 0 from 0.5).

2009

FalconPawwwwnchJul 21, 20174 votes

what the fuck lol no they didn't

Flash has been in the game since beta

EvilMerodachJul 21, 20174 votes

As a jungle main, I miss having choices in summoner spells at all. I mean I can go: summoner 4 summoner 11 or I can be a pleb and go:

Is there really even a choice there?

I remember wayyy back going summoner 6 summoner 14 on jungle Tryndamere , and it was actually pretty good.

I mean, sure, I pretty much gave up all objective contesting power. But if I wanted to contest objects, I wouldn't play Tryndamere to start with.

But with jungle items being tied to smite, you really can't avoid using smite, you loose way too much gold/exp, and clears become stupid slow. And they nerfed ghost, exhaust, ignite, cleanse, ...removed clarity and revive... So, I mean, only non-troll option for jungle is summoner 4 summoner 11

waits for 'F is for Flash' bandwagoners to downvote me to hell

KingKong2350Jul 21, 20172 votes

Smite/Ignite Eve is the only way to play.

LOSINGISMYPRIDEJul 20, 20173 votes

wht about buffing other summoner because i dont think ppl will throw flash away for so little . Its already on a 5 min cooldown .

Acheron16Jul 22, 20173 votes

I'd like for it to be removed.

So many silly interactions would be fixed overnight (no more Lee Sin Flash+R or Annie Flash+Tibbers) and you wouldn't get stupid kills or escapes that required flash.

Champions without mobility could actually be balanced around the lack of it and champions with too much mobility would have to pay for it.

łnśaneJul 21, 20172 votes

Oh boy 700k into MF down the drain if they ever nerf/remove flash........too much mobility in this game to even suggest a nerf/remove. Come on man think of the immobile champs