Concerning Pre-seasons Lethality and the Diver class (Renekton, pantheon, Wukong, J4 etc)

FlashDoubleDash·10/27/2016, 11:54:55 AM·1 votes·2,051 views

So, Since its all focussed around the assasin reworks, has there been any thought about how it influences other classes but Assasins and Marksmen (the latter about not being able to abuse the assasin items as much). The diver class mainly, and more specifically renekton, pantheon and the likes, currently use Flat Armor penetration runes, Youmoo's and ignite to snowball early game (which arguably is the reason you pick them) and are generally a lot less toxic in gameplay for Adc's and mages, in the specific terms that they generally have a lot less mobility than assasins and more so can only go in, not out. Even if they build full armor pen (youmoos, duskblade, maw (soon to be EoN)), they arent without counterplay, and can almost never .1 second burst squishy's, apart from a flash-dash-stun-hydra-aa-whatever ability if you are significantly ahead, which comes at a great cost.

My concern here is, that the usual rune setup and item build that is the most effective on these champs will be significantly weaker, being an indirect nerf to a whole other class, and could potentially ruin top-lane meta once again. As a semi-renekton main, I found that using armor pen marks, isnt that bad early currently, and specifically after your first buy (which will almost always be AD based, serrated dirk or caulfields hammer), will start to matter more. This is mainly to snowball matchups that are not tanks, and mainly ment for lane. In the midgame (lvl 6-11 in my general experience) you will go for black cleaver, regardless of wether or not you are against a tank, and after that you start picking up tank items.

Problem is that lethality is significantly less relevant early (50% afaik right now) and thus will make this early 1v1 lane phase signifcantly less, basically forcing this class to never run these runes, because they wouldnt be able to snowball, as well as not being able to rush lethality items, because it won't allow that same snowball. this also means that its not logical to dive hard anymore, as you will be less likely to kill the enemy mage or adc, depending on your choices, even if they do make small mistakes.

tl;dr Lethality scaling is forcing the diver class to stop building it, and instead build flat ad into tank, meaning they will have less dive potential, meaning an indirect nerf

So my question is, will there be any time spent into a falling net for the diver class, maybe a small general buff to typical diver items?

I think something along the lines of battle trance is a good step in that direction to look at. Maybe a similar effect on an item like death's dance? (which btw is an item I love for its theme, but think isnt exploited as much as it could be) Maybe gaining increased flat armor penetration/lethality over a duration of 5 seconds? (so it wouldnt work with duskblade or assasins as much, unless you're talking about someone like a bruiser khazix)

3 Comments

Theseus8510/27/2016, 12:14:42 PM1 votes

I think the big problem with it as you were saying is that these champs won't be able to snowball early, which unfortunately champs like pantheon HAVE to have or they are literally worthless. If these items hurt his early game he will never be able to be played :(.

DarkRitual10/27/2016, 5:28:25 PM1 votes

The meta will adapt. We need to see where things settle now that there wont be Ghostblades in every lane. Then adjust some of the divers if needed. For most of those youention, starting Hydra may be the norm.

Hyperiön10/27/2016, 5:33:30 PM1 votes

I wouldn't be surprised with some champs getting early flat AD, and when against a tank, to get early last whisper, no need to grade it quite yet, but if they are rushing armor, it might be worth it to get that now instead of more flat AD, because it is only like 30% effective as it currently is.