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LeBlanc Rework Concerns

Hoomann··21 votes·5,785 views

TL;DR The rework to LeBlanc lowers her skillcap and reduces her combo potential, the exact opposite of what the rework was supposed to do.

I feel like I need to get my thoughts out somewhere. The LeBlanc rework has gotten a large amount of negative feedback but I feel like there are still things about it that haven't been addressed yet. Most people point to the long arm time for her passive, and while I do believe this to be an issue, there are definitely other problems with the rework. The biggest problem is that she isn't combo-oriented anymore, or at least she doesn't have nearly as much emphasis on combos as she used to. This is due to her ult changes and the fact that her Q is now pretty much useless in any single-target encounter. Right now her "combos" are pretty much just dashing at someone, chaining them, and then using any remaining damaging abilities on them. The order in which you use your abilities feels meaningless, and this is an important part to a real combo. Her Q needs some level of significance against single-targets, right now I feel like it's only allowed to exist because it procs SoM and Thunderlord's.

Something I've noticed that people don't quite understand about this rework yet is the huge emphasis on her E. Ethereal Chain is to new LB as Sigil of Malice was to old LB. What I mean by this is that it's your "main ability." I can understand this shift, as old SoM was a point-and-click spell that did damage instantly. Not much counterplay to this, so Riot shifted power into her E, an skillshot with delayed damage (hence why new SoM has a 1.5s delay, so her E procs it automatically). In theory, this idea makes a lot of sense, but in practice this is a large problem. Not only is 1.5s enough time for a crit-build ADC to turn around and 3-shot you, but her chain has no "synergy" with any of her active abilities. Old SoM required other abilities to do its full damage, but her chain does its full power automatically, which is part of what leads to a lack of comboing and a lower skillcap.

The new functionality of her ult also contributes to this problem. Her old ult forced you to use certain abilities in a certain order in order to get the ability out of her ult that you need. Now that her ult has been changed solely to accommodate for Shadow of the Rose (global clone), it doesn't matter where you use your ult in your "combos" because you just get to pick which ability you get out of it. Also, the fact that it's an extra button press on top of what seems to be a very brief "global cooldown" after using it, the ability now feels extremely clunky.

I don't really care if the new LeBlanc is considered good or bad from a balance perspective, that can be changed with simple buffs and nerfs to a few numbers. However, this rework is definitely bad from a design perspective. Her original identity as the "combo assassin" was thrown out for some silly clone gimmicks. This requires major changes, such as a revert or re-rework to fix. We've seen this before with many of the juggernauts last year, and I'd hate to see this happen again, especially not to my favorite champion. These are my thoughts, and I feel like it is my obligation as a LeBlanc main to get them out here.

13 Comments

Audiomancy5 votes

Personally, I think her skill cap has gone up if anything. Sure, you have more time to pull off her basic combo, but once you got a few games in with her, you could do that thing in your sleep. The Ult-Clone is personally one of my favorite additions to her kit. It's hilarious baiting a low HP enemy towards you with it and it offers a lot of strategic potential that LeBlanc lacked pre-rework. My main concern is that her damage delay starts off slow and remains like that for the rest of the game. 1.5s is a death sentence late game - all it will do is encourage people to play LeTank, or buy Zhonya's, jump in, QWE, Stasis and then W out.

BIuegod4 votes

I agree with you, this is the probably the worst rework I have ever seen in my life. All the assassins got amazing changes but we get this fucking trash??? Legit went from maybe the burstiest champion in the game to being outbursted by every other midlaner even though she is classified as an "assassin". Seriously who the fuck thought of these garbage clone gimmicks? Also.. to add even more salt to the wound they added a snapback delay to her W...

Arcαne1 votes

Ekko did not quite getting 'amazing changes' either.

W4lteR BishoP3 votes

Agreed, it's not about Leblanc being viable or not, it's that they changed a perfectly designed champion to a champion with boring skill set, and i also agree with you about lower skill cap. The old Q made her very unique, but now that her passive do the job for her, it completely feels like a champion like Ekko for me, just throw some ability to put the passive on the enemy, and 1.5 sec later , throw another random ability to proc the passive, doesn't matter what ability, just , something.

Averia3 votes

You seriously think old LeBlanc was a "perfectly designed champion"? Maybe for the person playing her. For anyone else she just felt incredibly anti-fun and overpowered.

W4lteR BishoP6 votes

Yes i do, Leblanc was among the few champions, that was used to show high skill cap of best players in the world, same as zed, azir, lee sin. These are the champions that if you touch their core design, you break their identity.

AUFault3 votes

100% agree.

I find that after I land the passive damage there is no point using the rest of my abilitys. It's better to save them for another target or to get away. In other words after I use e, I find that you should never risk getting close enough to q as the damage is just not worth unless it's nearly perfectly safe and w is to much of an necessary tool to get away or to close gaps like it always has been.

Her ultimate feels alittle the same, as it makes nearly no difference to her damage output over a short time but opens the time window in which you can do damage (or do damage to targets that are further away). I never find I'm using my ultimate to do damage in a fight unless I miss an ability like e and then I would use r to try and recover.

I also feel that her insane early game dominance atm covers up how weak of a champion she is as she can get very fed and close a game out fast. In high elo people will play around this and she will be a lot more useless.

Seenan2 votes

I've played against LBs back then and all the combos I've seen have attributed to something like - QRWE, Q for setup, then RQWE (or chain first.) as the highest damage ones unless you literally throw your face into them with WRQE or WQRE...blah blah, etc, it's the same essential idea, but you can't interlace any Qs or R'd Qs in the mix for big bursts of damage anymore. And mimicked Q/E deal virtually the same damage, with E having a +20% higher AP ratio. And E is your main burst ability instead of Q or W.

The echo effect of her old Q has been moved to her passive, so that EVERY ability can setup and proc it. E doesn't slow anymore, but it feels really easy to hit now and I dunno why. Just means Rylai is a probable core item now, since you'll also wanna survive and secure the Sigil proc + E2.

The only differences now is the delay on Sigil, E doesn't slow, R has clones (it's just a prank brooo), and Q has situational waveclear attached to it in exchange for moving Sigil to passive.

Imo, the only change she needs is a lower delay or a delay that scales down over levels. Q could stand to get a buff of some sorts so it isn't just a glorified passive proc ability.

DarthFantasia1 votes

I agree. Her new kit is extremely weak. The huge delay on her passive was a bad idea. No one is gonna stand there in lane and wait for your passive to finish, making it extremely useless. Her W delay is also an issue I have. It may be because I'm not used to it, but having to wait almost a whole second to go back sucks. In that second you just have to hope you don't get CC'ed. They wanted to give assassins more counterplay, yet Talon and Rengar can still oneshot. I want the old Leblanc back.

Asuka Akashta1 votes

I've played a lot of Leblanc throughout my history with League, and overall I am okay with the changes. I DO think however, that her passive (Lategame) makes it almost impossible to teamfight. Unless you are super ahead along with your team, you aren't going to be killing anybody in a teamfight. At least before you could just jump in QR and jump back, taking their out of position ADC out of the fight, or at least he'd have to go lifesteal. That being said I've still done well in teamfights, and I've gotten a couple of Quadras and a Penta or two already with her, it's just that was because our whole team was super far ahead and I just go in with my 25 stack mejais. Even the teams are even at best, your job becomes way more difficult. That being said, I like the new Leblanc's kit, it's fresh and fun, and I've had very good success with it. I just think that the CD on the passive needs to be shorter later on in the game. Maybe for example, every point you put into your ultimate, the passive should go down. So from 1.5/1.25/1 or something, or even lower if need be. That way you can proc the passive late game by going in with W, Q'ing someone, waiting for a little bit, then RQ instead of having to land your chain. I think this Leblanc has a higher skill cap / ceiling than before, and you can do some cool plays with her. It's just late game it's extremely hard to carry if both teams are even because you have to place yourself in danger for so much time, I think simply lowering the passive time a bit by end game should help. As with your other point about combos, I do agree there in saying my only incentive in a fight is to hit my chain and just pile on as much damage as possible until the passive pops. However, people call the old Leblanc the combo assassin, when in reality you either throw your chain first or last, QRW for most damage, you could use two W's but that would remove some damage. I also agree that there needs to be some incentive to use the Q in a 1v1 other than just a little bit of extra damage

JNorr441 votes

Agreed. I used to main her because she was so fun. Now she's boring as hell and shes a worthless champion. If I want a better assassin I'll play a mage like Annie or Lux who have more burst. If I want more utility or mobility I'll play Nidalee or Sej.

Please undo these changes NOW.

I don't think you'll see very many Leblanc mains anymore. This is not just a bunch of old Leblanc players complaining about change, this is about converting a very specialized champion into a champion who has no identity. The new Leblanc does not fit a role; she's not an assassin, she's not a mage, she's not a fighter... wtf!?

Ryze has a better point-and-click Q and more wave clear. Most champions have better CC (her E). And the ultimate is the most useless thing I have ever seen. What LCS player is going to be tricked by a Leblanc decoy when she was just seen on the map in another lane <15s ago? Even if you use the ult on the same lane it's still obvious which is which because the real one went straight to lane whereas the decoy came from a bush.

Why would you ever create a deception in which a requirement for success is that you have to be significantly more aware and intelligent than the opposing player who is supposed to be deceived? That's like saying "I'm going to design a test that is extremely easy to pass but will be extremely difficult to design".

For me personally this has ruined the game. I found Leblanc to be the most enjoyable champion I could play, and now I must choose between playing a less-enjoyable champion due to the developer's idiocy or just quitting the game entirely (which is actually more appealing right now).

Samayo Sora1 votes

I too feel exactly this way. Leblanc's rework is not only everything Hoomann said but also these things make her extremely boring to play. It no longer feels satisfying when you can jump over a wall and pick someone out. And her main skill cap, the part where every fight i had to map out in my head to get max use out of my ult is gone, this is what made the champ fun, cause it made it more punishing to use and ult in the wrong way. Now she has a fail safe for that. Feels really bad. Also the really big thing is her late game ability. Before her late game team fight was terrible, and was pretty hard to pull off even if you were good at lb, now its effectively nonexistent. Try diving and entire team for 2 seconds straight while not dying and the entire enemy team is screaming "LB, LB, LB!". Yeah.... Another thing is that her identity was completely changed, yes her identity is the deceiver, but i hate seeing Lb's think its all about the w and the jukes when its really not. Have you ever seen an assassin that is supposed to just run away from people?? This is what i feel the rework was centered around, making Leblanc more of the "you cant catch me even if you tried all day" type of camp rather than the assassin that she was meant to be. Please riot, read this and revert her changes. All i want is to be able to play my main again and have fun while doing so.

MaixCroft1 votes

I just wanna say for someone that mains leblanc I think that the rework is fair. 1 she needs time to kill someone and everyone have got time to flash or dash to safety 2 It s really hard to juke as much as before cause now she has to count on her clown that she doesn t control 3 Landing her E is hard 4 she s now taking more risks when she goes in to kill someone but on the other hand
She doesn t always need her R to kill secure Her R can help her juke but for real leblanc isn t OP cause late game she s not that good in team fights

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