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For Illaoi, My Love

Wulffe·4/1/2016, 8:44:45 PM·6 votes·2,165 views

Dear Riot,

Since 2009 I have had an on again, off again relationship with League of Legends. Simply put, I love the game but tend to get burnt out it for a bit. However, there was a 2 year period in which I was around a lot due to the old creations forums where I was active on champ concepts, designs and just making that place better. But I digress. Each time I come back I find new that love and something new that I hate. This time I have seen a lot more of the former. As a matter of fact, I'm quite impressed with everything so far. The game has come a long way.

With each return I find a champ that I love and will main them for awhile. I remember I originally started with Rammus early on, cause I'm apparently that kind of troll. I was Renekton for awhile, Ziggs for awhile, Vi for a much longer time and a few others, but those three are still amongst my most played characters. However, with the recent line up of characters I have to say I'm not impressed. I'm not a fan of the characters, playstyles and so on. But to each their own, right?

I do have to say that I have become enthralled with Illaoi . She is, by far, the funnest character I have played in a long, long time. Bruisers/fighters are my favorite types of champs. Renekton, Shyvana, Garen, etc and aka those nasty champs that get in people's faces and stay there.

Despite my love for her, I don't feel Illaoi belongs in the same league (pun intended) as many of the traditional, and even a lot of unorthodox, top laners. I've tried a few guides, different runes and builds but no matter what I do Illaoi is generally just outplayed by champs with higher sustain, higher mobility or higher general tankiness. If any character has one, or gods forbid more than one, of those advantages over her....she's going to have a bad day.

After many, many plays with her over the last few days here are some suggestions I have for her.

  • Give her a slight stat buff. Nothing substantial, just a few tweaks. Specially to her defenses and/or her movement speed. She's way too squishy compared to many champs in her class and can generally be outran by most champs up top. Which is terrible cause she has no escape or CC abilities.

  • Give her Q or W a slow effect. Preferably her Q.

  • Have her tentacles attack sporadically with lesser damage when enemies are in range. First, it'd be nice if a tentacle you can't utilize is still useful. Second, it'd be nice indicator to warn against gankers as she has no escape abilities. Also have markers for her tentacles on the map for her to see.

  • Up to her attack and/or ability cast speed. Unless I was in their face, I could hardly ever get a hit on them because her Q and E are way too predictable.

  • Slight increase to the range of her W and her R. It'd be great if she could have enough room to use her W to jump over walls. As for her R, this goes with the above as it takes a lot of effort to get her in a good ult use. First, she has to get right in the middle of the group to maximize on her ult. Second, everyone has to be really close together for it to work and that's a challenge in itself as groups tend to be spread out just enough to prevent it from having a decent effect.

  • Give her ult a passive which increases her resistances when tentacles are near, which temporarily increases while her ult is active. Suggested by Critmaster Garen

  • Let her ult be used while in CC to break out of it. Suggested by Critmaster Garen

Obviously I wouldn't suggest making ALL of these changes. Maybe just one or two.

The way Illaoi currently plays I don't feel like she's much a fighter or a juggernaut or even a brawler, really. She's too squishy in team fights. With her kit she should easily be up there with such champs as Renekton and Sion who people tend to think twice before focusing on, saving them for when the other teammates are down. That's not the case at all with her. Illaoi tends to be targeted first and obliterated before she can do anything. If she could get a defense buff or speed buff to get into the middle of the enemy group easier it would make her so much better and viable.

I have over 90 champs and there are few I absolutely enjoy playing. Renekton is one of them. Jayce is another. And a couple of others. But Illaoi has taken a special place on my roster and in my heart and I'd really like to see her be able to stand to toe to toe with many of the champs that shouldn't be able to just steamroll her.

Please take my thoughts and suggestions into consideration.

-C. Wulffe

Also, here's some skin suggestions for her.

Juggernaut Illaoi https://www.dropbox.com/s/76mceuautr7wvru/Sketch303211622.png?dl=0

Iron Maiden or Coldfire Illaoi https://www.dropbox.com/s/lh0zl7ltf0q467a/Sketch3035349.png?dl=0

Pool Party Illaoi (will redo later) [PocketsMcGee suggestion] https://www.dropbox.com/s/7dx99e8gr83q2w3/Sketch3021563.png?dl=0

Wrecking Crew Illaoi https://www.dropbox.com/s/ko5f9re5hn0vqe6/Sketch7419171.png?dl=0

Dunkmaster Illaoi (Coming Soon! /w Wacky Inflatable Tube Guy!)

Deep Sea Illaoi (May or may not do)

Sorceress Illaoi (May or May not do)

34 Comments

PocketsMcGee4/1/2016, 8:51:50 PM4 votes

Pool party Illaoi, Dawn on the giant foam noodle.

Blue Collar Bear4/4/2016, 4:43:57 AM2 votes

I disagree. I don't think she's particularly weak at all. I think her low win rate and generally poor reception stems from the fact that her kit is mostly based around her E, which is very one dimensional and easy to predict. If you land it, you can push an entire team off a turret. If you don't, the cooldown guarantees the enemy a window of opportunity to waveclear, counter engage, etc. Statistics from leagueofgraphs.com show that her winrate gets better with the more games you play (55% at just 20 games, up to 60% at 120+ games at Plat+). I think most people just don't know how to play her.

Have you tried this setup? This is the one I use, which has given me a good amount of success. 1 , 2 , 3)

Scaling AD Quints / Marks Flat Armor Seals Flat MR Glyphs Deathfire Touch keystone

The idea behind taking Scaling AD is because each tentacle has a 140% total AD ratio at max rank. I've managed to have up to nine tentacles (three spawn around you, hit five champion + vessel for 1360% total AD damage). You won't have kill pressure pre-6, since you'll run out of mana before you harass them down. Scaling AD reaches cost efficiency at level 6, returning about 13 AD. That's a lot of effective damage that you'd otherwise lose out on if you took early game runes.

We take Deathfire Touch, because it enhances our sieging capabilities. It's incredibly easy to proc, since if your tentacle hits a target (multiple targets, hopefully) it will proc DFT again. It also procs on vessels, burning them for extra damage. It's easy to get a lot of free damage using this keystone. Other keystones are good, but they're only good in certain situations. This keystone is good in most situations.

Three items that are essential to almost every game are Black Cleaver, Sterak's Gage, and Spirit Visage. They allow you to get consistent tentacle hits with your ultimate, deal tons of damage, and heal back to full health after a rotation of the enemies' spells. Items that I also find helpful are Mortal Reminder, Randuin's Omen, Titanic Hydra, Maw of Malmortious, and the occasional Youmuu's.

I would write a section on how to play lane, but I'm too tired. I hope this w as somewhat interesting to read.

5050BS4/4/2016, 6:47:24 PM2 votes

So I agree with you she needs something.

I like the idea of her Tentacles attacking without her W. I would do it like this. Tentacles will attack each enemy Champ one time when in range. After that they will only attack off of a W or a Spirit.

To make her lane a bit better add to passive so each Tentacle near her gives her +.5% Armor/MR

For he Ult (and this she NEEDS) when she ults she needs to heal for 5% missing HP for each enemy hit by ult. Too often in a team fight you will push in to hit the enemy team and ult and die before you can get W off and your ult did nothing.

If you do your ult combo right it takes 2-3s before any damage happens Move in > E (.75s) > R (.75s) > W (.5s) > Tentacle attack (.5s) In this time enemy team has PLENTY of time to CC or just kill you.

Blue Collar Bear4/4/2016, 7:24:26 PM2 votes

I forgot to mention the game has a Wiki. '-' I also forgot to give you the BEST resource I've ever found for League of Legends.

I like to teach people, and I like to help. I like to make new friends. The community is pretty rough, but there are some great ones out there. If you're ever on, you're free to add me (name is same as forum name) and my friends and I will play. I'm only worried our MMR might make your experience a bit less enjoyable.

The vessel does deal damage. Here's the excerpt from the wiki:

Damage Percentage: 25 / 30 / 35 / 40 / 45% (+ 8% per 100 AD)

So, if you dealt 200 AD on an auto attack, the actual champion would be dealt 61% of 200 AD (122, including our damage on DFT). I think I've managed to get a couple vessel kills. It's pretty fun.

Critmaster Garen4/2/2016, 9:24:23 PM2 votes

i dont feel like a slow on her tentacles would be a good idea. neither would more mobility be apprioriate imo. thats just not what juggs are supposed to do. increasing her cast animations isnt a good idea either. youre supposed to be able to play around those skillshots.

it would make more sense to give her a stacking resistance buff. add a passive to her ult that gives her 5 armor/mr for each nearby tentacle.

or add a resistance buff for each spawned tentacle on her ult, as long as her ult is running. imo she should be a bit more tanky for all in engages, rather than being more mobile.

mobility doesnt do much for her anyways, as her effective range is tied down to the position of her tentacles. without them around she doesnt do a whole lot. she needs more to be able to survive in the middle of the enemy team, once she gets there.

maybe actvating her ult could break cc. that would be another solution.

Your Next Kill4/1/2016, 8:49:23 PM2 votes

I hated Illaoi when she first came out because I found that she was just too strong. But I think she's been nerfed pretty hard, cause I haven't seen her hardly ever in the past month or so. As much as I hate her, I'd agree with some of these changes to increase her play.

Vekkna4/4/2016, 7:51:56 PM1 votes

Honestly, I think they only really need to change 3 things:

-tentacles slap at nearby vessel when you cast Q -add 2 sec slow to ulti -minimum 2 tentacle spawn on ulti cast

Wulffe4/7/2016, 11:21:07 PM1 votes

Added in another skin idea. This idea came to me earlier when I was doing a ranked match with her earlier and Wrecking Ball came on Pandora.

Ralanr4/1/2016, 8:52:24 PM1 votes

Her ult ring always did feel really small.

Bellows4/1/2016, 9:50:29 PM1 votes

I cringed at this post...

AurelionSol

Nekusen4/2/2016, 10:31:27 PM1 votes

she looks like a man, could have made her more feminine, or at least look like a gal. i really thought "she" was a man until i read "her" lore using the "she"

Wulffe4/3/2016, 8:03:31 AM1 votes

Added a new skin idea.

RogueWill4/4/2016, 5:46:09 PM1 votes

What about pit figther Illaoi, I think she woudl be awesome on that concept