Reworked Malzahar shows exactly how dated Shaco's kit is

Kr1sys·May 7, 2016·1 votes·602 views

Void swarm makes him clear the jungle insanely fast and without any prep. Higher sustain, and they don't get one shot by camps 4 minutes into the game.

Hit W, clear camp, go to the next.

9 Comments

Hullabaloo907May 7, 20162 votes

They are going to nerf that

TehNACHOMay 7, 20161 votes

Not sure what this has to do with Shaco.

Kr1sysMay 7, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Not sure what this has to do with Shaco.

It's actually quite easy to see how it shows how dated Shaco's kit is.

Shaco's considered 'balanced' by having a box with a short duration fear with a long set up time that lasts 5 seconds that can't be placed in quick succession, which means his clear is based around just being ahead of everyone else on that first camp.

Malzahar's void lings spawn at an extremely fast rate that requires zero set up time, last 12 seconds, provides a higher uptime, and has an AI that allows it to switch targets if needed.

Regardless of potential future nerfs, the fact they design something so silly to clear the jungle with makes it quite impressive that they can't do anything to Shaco to make him more interactive.

TehNACHOMay 7, 20161 votes

But that's not the point of picking Shaco. There are a ton of champions that beat Shaco in clear time or sustain or tanking camps. Shyvana for example literally clears the Jungle faster than it can respawn without any damage items, while being naturally tanky enough to rotate through the Jungle multiple times. If we based Junglers solely on this basis, both Malzahar AND Shaco wouldn't stand a chance to Shyvana.

Do you realize how narrow minded you're being or are you going to drag this argument out?

AlutrosityMay 7, 20161 votes

And that's a bad thing how? It just means he has good clear time like so many other champs in league.

ArkaleMay 7, 20161 votes

Not quite that easy, especially with the hotfix voidlings will now do 50% damage to monsters, even though you already took 16+ seconds on the second camp.

But on to what I think is the topic, what do you propose happens to shaco?

Kr1sysMay 7, 20161 votes

[{quoted}](name=Shadow Hawk2,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=WUcYBbwU,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2016-05-07T16:20:00.837+0000)

Not quite that easy, especially with the hotfix voidlings will now do 50% damage to monsters, even though you already took 16+ seconds on the second camp.

But on to what I think is the topic, what do you propose happens to shaco?

He's in a tough spot for sure. The last few seasons have removed much of the 'early game' and pushed people out of a typical lane phase a lot sooner than in prior seasons, which is where Shaco excelled. Counter-jungling and its rewards have been largely removed as have kill gold and xp. It's actually more beneficial to clear camps especially in Shaco's case than it is to invade in many situations. Shaco needs the buffs early because his high mana costs, and low clearing speed past the first camp, invading potentially loses those buffs at the reward of earning the opposing buff and/or a kill. Meanwhile, even if you counter-jungle and try to make the enemy jungler's life a living hell, they only really need to keep killing camps in order to keep up with Shaco in levels and get past the point he can continue to do so. These recent changes with giving the Red/Blue buff information to all just gives the enemy more time to ambush and increases the risk of counter jungling further.

His kit overall is extremely dated and binary, and since they've done a lot of this reworking with champs that fall into a "can't be both ad and ap" you're building really either AD or AP, which is fine and they have each unique playstyles, but because of that design they're balanced towards not being great at both.

AP Shaco is viable, but can't wave clear worth a shit.

AD Shaco is preferred, but also essentially requires Tiamat because his clear is just still so bad.

He also suffers from the feast or famine, which is consistent for most assassins, and since he doesn't have an escape like many of them as he has to use his to engage, if he falls into the famine he is unlikely to get out. His kit is also not conducive to good gameplay with teammates, as a large majority don't have a clue as to what he's really capable of.

When someone like a Diana, Rango, Kha, Talon, Zed, etc engages, the team knows to go in, when Shaco Q's in, the team decides to either go HAM before Shaco can get into melee range, or they just don't follow up and Shaco dies, simply because he doesn't cause enough havoc to enemy players when he does engage, and his CC requires setup that just doesn't work ingame between it dying from a support auto, or the 2 seconds it takes to arm before it will even fear for 1.5.

DrugsForRobotsMay 7, 20161 votes

What do you think of these changes?

CavemanteroMay 7, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Void swarm makes him clear the jungle insanely fast and without any prep. Higher sustain, and they don't get one shot by camps 4 minutes into the game.

Hit W, clear camp, go to the next.

That just sounds like Malz is broken...has nothing to do with Shaco's kit being outdated (which it is)