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Can we have a defensive mastery tree?

Carnarius·8/4/2016, 12:30:15 PM·114 votes·5,931 views

if we look at the past, we had 3 perfectly balanced trees for 5 seasons, one with damage amplification (damage dealers), one utility oriented (supports/mages) and one with survivability stats (tanks). let's see what we have now:

  • ferocity tree - pure damage tree with a lot of % scalings, some life steal
  • cunning tree - once again a lot of additional damage (flat and %) with some utility aspects in it
  • resolve tree - some really weak, barely noticeable tank stats, utility (???), the best mastery in this tree is a damage mastery

as we can see, something which was balanced before now heavily favours damage, the difference is out of this world. you used to get similar amount of damage/tankiness whenever tree you decided to use, but now you get nearly more than 20% more damage (not counting keystone), while someone who wants to go tank get 2-3% more survivability?

so my question is, can we have a resolve tree that actually give tank stats, while transfering its utility masteries into cunning tree?

146 Comments

Oleandervine8/4/2016, 12:47:37 PM18 votes

The problem with a pure defense mastery tree that has substantial defensive stats is that it feeds the playstyle of damage dealers running tank builds. If anything, the Ferocity and Cunning trees need to have their wings clipped and brought down to Resolve's level. Especially Cunning. When Thunderlord's is being taken over every other keystone on damage dealers, that means it's unhealthy for the game.

ZT Xperimentor8/4/2016, 4:41:22 PM9 votes

Don't forget they also nerfed a few parts of it too; most noticeably veteran scars going from +4% hp to +50hp.

Gosh Darn8/4/2016, 5:10:22 PM9 votes

They need to start by reverting veteran scars. Makes no sense that most of the offensive masteries are %pen or damage, while the tank masteries are mostly unrelated to AR/MR/HP. Tanks SHOULD get more use out of Veteran Scars than glass cannons.

Then the rest are crap like movement speed, flat hp regen, and reduced damage from monsters. Most of this tree has nothing to do with tankiness at all. You can't find one true tank that can benefit from all 30 points of masteries.

RisenDarkKnight8/4/2016, 5:49:15 PM6 votes

I just realized the OP is right, there is almost nothing in the resolve tree that makes a difference late game, and even early game it doesn't make you much tankier. Strength of Ages is great in the early/mid game, and grasp is OK all game, but their isn't much in the way of real tank stats, not when compared to the power of Thunderlord's/Precision and Fervor of Battle/Bounty Hunter.

People mostly just take the tree for the summoner spell CDR and Grasp/Strength of Ages while not really caring about everything else.

ModCaptainMårvelous8/4/2016, 3:51:04 PM3 votes

Perfectly balanced? u wot m8?

DarkSunSovereign8/4/2016, 2:56:37 PM3 votes

The problem IMO is that tanky champs benefit greatly from damage masteries whereas squishy champs don't benefit at all from defensive masteries.

Noblewind8/4/2016, 8:06:07 PM2 votes

Previous masteries gave you minor stats, and overall were a boring concept hence the decision to revamp them. However, the new system has only added a significant additional layer to balance issues because of the synergy these new masteries create with some champs over others, some items/builds over others.

IMHO the best, truest answer to the problems with masteries is to simply remove them. The most balanced game you'll ever play in LoL is one played with a new account when no one has masteries (or even runes). We've all been there, it's hard af and a challenge. It bothers me when people say "no but they add decision making going in and theres tradeoffs", because while that's a fair point it doesn't mean they aren't an issue. There is plenty of enough complexity to LoL between champion kits + items. Tank Ekko and Tank Fizz would have never existed without the abilities and the aid in defensive scaling gained through masteries, they would have been weird off-meta builds that sometimes worked and sometimes didn't (and easier to balance if it became too strong). We could be in a world where we only needed to balance 2 layers of complexity instead of 3. Note this would also solve some issues within the new player experience.

Killstrado8/4/2016, 2:31:42 PM1 votes

We have one already too add what would become of the mysteries in the cunning Tree? Mysteries that are used quite frequently. What you're saying is trash good mysteries in two trees so you can be happier because you don't realize how tanky they actually are. Maybe it's your runes that need fixing