Making Soul Fragments more impactful

ThurgotOfThunder·Feb 12, 2018·36 votes·2,227 views

So, everyone by now knows that the only thing Swain's soul frags do is make his ult burst harder. This is great, but it feels like it should impact your gameplay more, and that the Swain player should be rewarded for having landed their W and passive. What if each individual lightning bolt was increased by a certain percent per soul fragment. This wouldn't necessarily make his Q start blowing up the world, and base damages could be tuned according to time spent at full soul frags, but it would give you an incentive to stack them up fast, and really think about whether or not you need to ult in a certain situation.

Example: 1 soul frag increases each bolt of lightning's damage by 3%. Total, 15% more damage on Q if he shotguns you with it, scaling up to a total of 75% bonus damage with 5 soul frags, provided you land the whole thing. Again, the base damage could be adjusted to that, but it would give Swain more decision making around his Frags and using his ult.

67 Comments

InTheoryFeb 12, 201817 votes

I didn't play him myslef but from what I saw on streams they really look underwhelming. It's like Shyvanna's Fury Bar that has no other Purpose then enabling her to cast her ultimate - but at least she has no cooldown otherwise. Don't know any solution to this but give you +1

ThurgotOfThunderFeb 12, 201811 votes

I've played a bunch of games, and after watching some streams I agree with you. It also sucks that Swain can't cast his ult without soul frags, so you're punished for not having any, but not really rewarded until you ult if you do. Thanks for the +1

DurzakaFeb 12, 20188 votes

uh, dont they also give him a chunk of health? That sustain can be pretty damn significant during skirmishes against a laner, or even more so during a big team fight.

GibberwattFeb 12, 20186 votes

they do give some health, but often all that does is return a bit of the health you used to engage on a person, generally for the sole purpose of getting that last fragment for your ult. When I'm playing the SexyMan, I often don't pay attention to those unless i'm deciding if I have enough juice to ult.

ThurgotOfThunderFeb 12, 20182 votes

I just think they could be more impactful, rather than like you said just stacking them so your ult does any burst at the end at all.

FefnilFeb 12, 20181 votes

But if what you just said happened, then doesn't it mean you just won your trade because you got refunded a part of your health, and maybe lost less than your opponent? So it actually had a value in that trade, and it doesn't only works for the ultimate. So why buffing it adding unneeded complexity?

GibberwattFeb 12, 20182 votes

That's true - however, the collection of just 5 gives swain a strange playstyle - you go hella aggro until you get ur fives stacks, and then you just kinda derp around until your ult is ready to kill some fukers.

Maybe a good idea would be to give him infinite stacking capability, but have them go away after a set time, like syndra's balls. That way, a truly stacky Swain's ult would be scary af, but a shitty swain would be equally unscary. And it would add some complexity to his soul thing which is currently "throw shit towards enemy. heal. ult with automatic full stack. repeat until Noxus reigns"

FefnilFeb 12, 20182 votes

But... Why would you stop going aggro? You don't get more fragments, but you still get the heals even at max stacks. There's no reason not to, you still have your combat heals to trade with even without ultimate. Your trade potential hasn't lowered at all.

Electro522Feb 12, 20185 votes

I've been playing alot of Swain.....cause I love the rework. While I agree that his Soul Shards are somewhat underwhelming, I'll say that it isn't his most glaring problem.

Did you know that during your ult, you can still gather soul shards? The point at which you should be the most aggressive is the point where you can gather the most soul shards. Generally, you only need 1 or 2 in order to activate your ult. Once you do, that's when you work to get the most soul shards, of which will help deal damage at the end of it. I would like, however, to be able to activate my ult without any soul shards. Your ult can actually save you in some clutch situations, due to the health it gives. Feels kind of bad when I go to activate my ult, only to realize I can't because of no skin shards.

In my opinion, his most glaring issue is that he's basically an AP Juggernaut now. He is SO easy to kite. I've actually been taking Ghost on him due to how easy it is to get away from him. Old Swain was difficult to kite due to his consistent slow on his Q, which could enable a snare from his W. This Swain only has a snare that is difficult to land, especially against a high movespeed champ like TF (I've been having alot of trouble with TF). Sure, his passive enables him to pull basically anyone if your teammates land some good CC (a Swain paired with a good Alistar is VERY scary), but on his own, you have to be patient, and play some mind games with your opponent (which makes alot of sense if you think about it).

All that said, I believe I had the pleasure of playing with Reav3 on Friday! We ended up on different teams in a ranked game. At the end, we had a decent talk, and he mentioned the fact that Swain was mostly balanced around the AP items coming next patch. So, we'll have to see how he improves come then.

ThurgotOfThunderFeb 12, 20182 votes

I agree about ulting with no shards, and yes I know you can gather them while you're ulting. I haven't had any problems getting kited, and I think his W helps with that because you can force players to be slowed or step sideways or back into you. Like you said, mind games.

I've been duoing with a buddy of mine in bot lane as Swain-Sion, and it's hilarious.

DeathBurstFeb 12, 20183 votes

I used Phase Rush, and it worked well. E+passive+1 aa is enough to proc it. No need to hit a slow W or a body-blockable Q.

Agent CorgiFeb 12, 20182 votes

{quoted}

I used Phase Rush, and it worked well. E+passive+1 aa is enough to proc it. No need to hit a slow W or a body-blockable Q.

I've been using Electrocute on Swain lately, it gives pretty good damage against squishy targets.

Flawless FetusFeb 13, 20182 votes

I started with phase rush. Switched to electrocute, and ended back on phase rush. Electrocute is solid, but I think he's more dps- y than burst, which is why I think I like phase more. You should give phase a shot if you haven't yet :)

BloodbornSFeb 13, 20181 votes

I've got the best feeling playing Swain with glacial augment to compensate for your slow loss, actually it work really good

Flawless FetusFeb 13, 20181 votes

I've considered it, but I'm not a fan of protobelt, or any other 'active item slow' on him :(

ChaddyFantomeFeb 13, 20181 votes

he mentioned the fact that Swain was mostly balanced around the AP items coming next patch

I figured as much lol. Thanks for the confirmation.

DeathBurstFeb 12, 20185 votes

In fact, Soul Fragments heal you when you collect them, and that is very impactful. Also, adding a trade-off to using your R, while certainly being an interesting decision from an intellectual point of view, would probably feel very bad in-game. I won't support this suggestion.

ThurgotOfThunderFeb 12, 20187 votes

I think it feels worse to ult now with 1 shard and do nothing. Or ult with 5 shards, die before the Nova goes off, and spawn with 0 shards.

Agent CorgiFeb 12, 20181 votes

You can still gain shards during your Ultimate. Assuming you get into a fight & have one soul to start, your W can nab you 2-3 souls & your E can get you another one. By the time you detonate your Ultimate, you could have between 3-5 Shards.

My Waifu VanillaFeb 14, 20181 votes

I understand you might get ONE person with the W in an actual fight, but anything higher than that is reaching a bit since unless they straight up aren't paying attention or you have a Leona chain stunning them, no one SHOULD get hit by that ability.

VICKLIUSFeb 12, 20181 votes

cant even ult w/out 1 shard, although if u do die the nova should still go off(like lux/gragas ball)

My Waifu VanillaFeb 13, 20181 votes

A better comparison would probably be Nunu Ult or Talon Ult. It's the same concept but those abilities are more similar to Swain R than Lux E.

Flawless FetusFeb 13, 20181 votes

If that's the problem you're having, you're not swaining right. Lol.

Z3SleeperFeb 13, 20181 votes

Sounds like you weren't 5 steps ahead of the enemy.

ModKnightsKemplarFeb 12, 20184 votes

It's a decent thought, but I think all that would do is make him feast or famine. If he's that dependent on soul frags, it punishes you for even using ult in many ways. I'm not sure that's a better way to handle it.

If Swain is weak, they should find some simple buffs; I think the kit has enough nuance and complexity as is.

ThurgotOfThunderFeb 12, 20183 votes

I think it's less feast or famine and more of a sense of ramping power. It's not hard to get to 5 soul frags, especially later in the game when your whole team is wandering around dropping cc everywhere. Once you're at 5, you're MOST dangerous, and everyone should stay out of melee range from your Q. Then, a teamfight breaks out, you drop some empowered Q's, ult, 5 shard nova, and start over, rebuilding your power from the bottom until you're ready to murder everything again.

VICKLIUSFeb 12, 20182 votes

swain didn't need rework, he just needed an update adjustment, such has having his pass gain him mana or hp based on which is lower based on dmg dealt, q add blind and silence(animation Beatrice pecking interact w/ e for 2x dmg lose silence blind Beatrice animation beam), e aoe "WHILE marked dmg to swain is reduced by 20%, and if target DIES furture dmg is increased by 5%,& if target kills swain their future dmg to swain is reduced by 5%"increase range so can lead w/ it w when snare enemy champ gain ms, 10sec cd all ranks R when hit send out another raven at attacker(increase mana cost/for current mana cost) to counter that he can only send one every other second

ThurgotOfThunderFeb 12, 20184 votes

He was one of those champs that dumpstered immobile melees and not much else. I didn't think his old kit was THAT bad, but it wasn't good, and it certainly wasn't very interactive for a lot of matchups, especially in top lane.

SEKAIFeb 12, 20183 votes

{quoted}

swain didn't need rework, he just needed an update adjustment, such has having his pass gain him mana or hp based on which is lower based on dmg dealt, q add blind and silence(animation Beatrice pecking interact w/ e for 2x dmg lose silence blind Beatrice animation beam), e aoe "WHILE marked dmg to swain is reduced by 20%, and if target DIES furture dmg is increased by 5%,& if target kills swain their future dmg to swain is reduced by 5%"increase range so can lead w/ it w when snare enemy champ gain ms, 10sec cd all ranks R when hit send out another raven at attacker(increase mana cost/for current mana cost) to counter that he can only send one every other second

You've spammed this like 10 times in the past couple days lol.

And this is proposal is super broken, so borked even moles can see it. I am not even sure why you're pushing it so hard lol.

No, man.

VICKLIUSFeb 12, 20181 votes

I'm allowed my opinion on what riot should've done I came up w/ the pass to help deal w/ the mass healers an he was dot so kills didn't make sense an only mana, q I hate abilities that get adjusted dmg based on target type like(or less from repeated hit) X2 just cause minion,so added e interact for thex2 dmg an to make it aoe also for his pass added the blind and silence to deal w/ jumpers getting in(guess could do w/out cause e(but these are ideas that riot could've tried)), w gain ms so he could either go in or leave, an such long cd for reason idk(honestly hate cd go down, just make constant, more fun, more consistent playing) e to go w/ pass an help vs assassins , the stacking just an added reward effect for playing well/smart , r I already explained

SEKAIFeb 12, 20183 votes

{quoted}

I'm allowed my opinion on what riot should've done I came up w/ the pass to help deal w/ the mass healers an he was dot so kills didn't make sense an only mana, q I hate abilities that get adjusted dmg based on target type like(or less from repeated hit) X2 just cause minion,so added e interact for thex2 dmg an to make it aoe also for his pass added the blind and silence to deal w/ jumpers getting in(guess could do w/out cause e(but these are ideas that riot could've tried)), w gain ms so he could either go in or leave, an such long cd for reason idk(honestly hate cd go down, just make constant, more fun, more consistent playing) e to go w/ pass an help vs assassins , the stacking just an added reward effect for playing well/smart , r I already explained

I am glad they didn't go with what you think they should've done then. What you've suggested is easily more borked than release Zyra, just think about it.

Sure, I was not stopping you from voicing it. But just saying that idea has its very obvious problems, in that the Swain in that iteration is completely busted.

VICKLIUSFeb 12, 20181 votes

well what would u do to my iteration to make it less busted?

SEKAIFeb 12, 20183 votes

{quoted}

well what would u do to my iteration to make it less busted?

Make it less '1-man-army', less loading, basically. This Swain model you proposed is almost a god who literally has the game as his bitch, it's obviously too much.

YoungFarmerFeb 12, 20182 votes

He should be able to ult whenever he collects 5 soul frags imo. So have no cool down on the ulti but don't let him ult until he has 5 soul frags.

ChaddyFantomeFeb 13, 20181 votes

{quoted}

He should be able to ult whenever he collects 5 soul frags imo. So have no cool down on the ulti but don't let him ult until he has 5 soul frags.

seems interesting enough.

AmazoXFeb 12, 20182 votes

I love how the players are coming up with great ideas right now but I'd rather not fire the bullet right away since Swain just got released a few days ago. We should wait at least two weeks more to see how Swain is before requesting for buffs just because he wasn't released broken or needed nerfs on release like most of the champions who did when released newly.

VelasanFeb 13, 20182 votes

{quoted}

I love how the players are coming up with great ideas right now but I'd rather not fire the bullet right away since Swain just got released a few days ago. We should wait at least two weeks more to see how Swain is before requesting for buffs just because he wasn't released broken or needed nerfs on release like most of the champions who did when released newly.

That is probably exactly what they will do. Have to agree. At the moment he has strong parts of his kit, but needs some fine tuning. For one thing his health could be a little higher based on how close he has to be with the target since you are going to get hit a lot.

Swains passive seems okay (although I wish it could infinitely stack just because it would be fun). If I had any complaint it's how unreliable his CC is for someone that has to be so close. Particularly when you want to keep someone inside your ult or get away from a mobile chaser.

GGLineaRFeb 12, 20182 votes

I think your numbers on his Q are a tad too much given it's cooldown is so low, but I do think his abilities should scale based on his soul frags.

Q gets 1.5% bonus damage per bolt per stack, so you get 37.5% vs 75%. You can't give his Q TOO much extra damage, because you already take bonus damage for eating more than one bolt, and it's CD is too low to give too much oomph.

W gets it's cost reduced by up to half at max stacks.

E maybe gains up to 15% more scaling on it's first pass, and 25% more AP scaling on it's detonation. So at max stacks you're dealing 40% of your AP on the first pass, and 50% of your AP if you manage to land a detonation, because it already has 25% AP scaling on both ends.

This sounds like a lot, but given that it's a skillshot that you essentially have to aim twice, I think it seems fair.

I'm not sure how well these changes would work out, but I think something similar to this would help make Swain feel more rewarding.

My brother and I love playing Bird Dad, so maybe I'm a tad biased, but I really do think Swain just needs some positive change like this to make him a better pick.

Flawless FetusFeb 13, 20182 votes

Meh. Sounds like an unnecessary buff. I've been playing swain a lot since the rework, he doesn't need a buff at all. I agree, his orbs do feel underwhelming, but I don't think a straight buff is the solution. What if they just removed the ulti cd and changed it so that his orbs determined ulti length? That way we could, kind of, use his ult how we used to.

ChaddyFantomeFeb 13, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Meh. Sounds like an unnecessary buff. I've been playing swain a lot since the rework, he doesn't need a buff at all. I agree, his orbs do feel underwhelming, but I don't think a straight buff is the solution. What if they just removed the ulti cd and changed it so that his orbs determined ulti length? That way we could, kind of, use his ult how we used to.

that sounds interesting.

SEKAIFeb 12, 20181 votes

It's just there to force the necessity of a setup. You can't just show up from nowhere and start wiping people off the map, you had to be doing something prior. It hardly affects his gameplay anyway, because you already should be having a couple fragments at least while you're waiting for CD already; unless you're off somewhere doing absolutely jack shit.

If you force soul fragments into other parts of his kit such as Q, however, Swain will be forced to have his base slashed. As currently stand, Swain already has a hard time doing good clears, you really don't want to make it even harder. And worse, it's only going to be even harder because he can't even build fragments properly if this design/proposal were to go through, because he will be using his fragments all the damn time by just trying to farm or other miscellaneous tasks; if he wants to build up fragments for ulti, he literally has to be doing nothing, just running around sneaking some E-pull and wait around with a thumb up his ass hoping that there would be a fight. This change imo will only hurt him.

ThurgotOfThunderFeb 12, 20184 votes

I'm not saying use his fragments every time you Q, but that for every fragment you've collected, each bolt does a % more damage. So you still only "use" them when you ult, but having them makes you stronger, so there's a decision to be made about whether to ult or not, because when you ult, you lose that % damage on your Q until you build your frags back up.

SEKAIFeb 12, 20185 votes

{quoted}

I'm not saying use his fragments every time you Q, but that for every fragment you've collected, each bolt does a % more damage. So you still only "use" them when you ult, but having them makes you stronger, so there's a decision to be made about whether to ult or not, because when you ult, you lose that % damage on your Q until you build your frags back up.

I see.

but that will still be a problem.

Because ulti is the only method to actually deplete them, which means you will cut down Swain's base a lot with this design or else he'll probably just bully everyone out of the lane especially in pre-6 after racking up some fragments.

And when you do cut his base, Swain suffers. Because he is already suffering from poor clears.

If you have to make fragments add additional effects, imho damage is the least desirable way to approach it.

VelasanFeb 12, 20181 votes

Your passive does damage and heals you and then makes your ult stronger later when you use it... isn't that enough?

ThurgotOfThunderFeb 12, 20183 votes

I agree that it's a lot, especially for a passive, but that's why I suggested tuning the base Q damage down. Like I said, it's not necessarily about making his passive ULTIMATE POWER, but it's this cool mechanic that's unique to Swain that..... only makes his ult do damage. Also it gates his ult, and it feels really bad to ult with only 1-2 fragments.

WolfeurFeb 13, 20181 votes

I don't mind it like that. I just see it as a build up to a big ult climax. Plus, if you used them for anything else than the ult, then casting it would basically make you weaker afterwards, which doesn't feel great.

The Mighty FleaFeb 13, 20181 votes

I have an idea. I've been playing a lot of Swain and my issue is how reliant he is on his Q. It's a relatively boring ability. I propose that each soul fragment collected increase the amount of health gained from each additional stack as well as grant him a burst of decaying movement speed after collecting a stack past the 5 stack cap. The bonuses are lost upon using ult and require some decision making around kiting before popping ult

Ahri BakaFeb 14, 20181 votes

How about completely Remove them and make his ult cd 20 seconds again ?? that would seem better , getting back his old ult would solve a lot of prblems