Boards›Gameplay

A different aproach to Zyra's problems

chaetopterus·2/12/2015, 1:59:34 AM·4 votes·732 views

Hello everyone, I'm writing this thread since I enjoy playing Zyra and realy like the idea behind her kit. However, it's well known she doesn't really fit the role she was intended to take and is played as a bursty support, since her aoe damage is far more rewarding in duo lanes and teamfights than managing her plants in a solo lane. When thinking about that I got to 3 conclusions:

  1. Even if Riot shifted power to her plants, she would still be played as a burst mage, however a more indirect one. Zyra's ability to spawn all her plants at once would enable her to still follow a similar pattern to her current burst. Since her Ult and e are able to hold enemies in place for some time, Zyra Players would just spawn all of their plants and keep the enemies in range with her cc to do the same amount of damage as her burst does, just that the damage is done by the plants, not the abilities themselfes. This leads to the second conclusion:
  2. If you want Zyra to fill a different role, you have to take the part of her kit away that makes her playable as a burst mage. (and I'm not talking about numbers here) These are normally the changes that cause the biggest protest, but she is played bursty since pressing all the buttons produces a good combo. To get her out of this role they have to either reward her greatly for using her abilities situationally, or make them unuseable for bursting.
  3. The two elements of her kit that allow Zyra to burst are the possibility to use w without delay and the cc on her e that allows her to land her delayed skills and her ult's delayed cc. As long as her w remains as it is, shifting power to her plants will only deliver another kind fo burst. If you want Zyra to lose her burst, she needs to lose one of these two abilities. Since losing her aoe cc would make her a low cc-mage, what wouldn't really fit her archetype, I'd personally suggest changing her w primarily. So all in all I'd suggest These changes: A short cd for spending charges on her w (you've gotta admit, suddenly shooting out of the ground isn't too plant-like) a higher cap on w max stacks. A longer lifetime for her plants and more surviveability on them (self heal when hitting a champion for example). Better ap scaling, especially on her plants' damage, base damages down. Hgh reward for summoning a lot of plants (better interactions betwen plants and ult, maybe a new passiv that gives bonus effects on enemies that are atacked by multiple plants)

Please tell me how you think about this or give your own ideas. I know, my ideas are pretty far fetched and discussable. Thank you for reading

6 Comments

Maple Crusader2/12/2015, 3:21:53 PM2 votes

The only thing Zyra needs is a useful passive, not that crappy skillshot that only activates when she's dead.

Cindikle2/12/2015, 2:28:04 AM1 votes

Not sure how these changes would buff/balance differently between AP and Support.

Sure the plant damage shift would weaken her support rolls damage. But not nearly enough to make her any more or less viable in either lane.

Thing about balancing Zyra between the two lanes is that everything she does is equally used in both lanes.

She would need an actual kit change to make separate the rolls.

I guess if they really wanted to, they could increase the AP scaling on her plants but make it so they can't proc Liandry's/Rylia's. But the HP on those items is important to her. As well as the slow. It ends up nerfing both anyway.

At best. I would say change her passive to have a form of mana return that would benefit Mid Zyra but not Support Zyra and increase her mana costs.

Stonington2/12/2015, 2:58:55 AM1 votes

Doing what you want with her W cast would require a mana cost. I'm not quite sure why you'd want move damage from her Q and E to her plants in the first place.

EfficientDynamo2/12/2015, 4:23:35 AM1 votes

This could work. It may run into heimer's territory though, since him and Zyra are differentiated in part by the durability of their turrets. Maybe give plants 1 additional second of life for each hit they have on a champ, in addition to some additional health at higher levels of W/higher amount of zyra max HP.

As a side note, my understanding was that Riot tended to balance between mid and support roles by shifting power between base damage and ratios. High ratio/low base= mid, low ratio/high base= support. Vel'koz would be a decent example of how a champ can be nudged towards a support role.

Also, they really need to rework her passive. It adds very little to her gameplay.