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The problem is not as simple as "too much damage". The problem is "how the hell do you get tanky"

Crunbum·8/23/2018, 7:32:02 PM·1 votes·1,564 views

It's a very long post so here's TL;DR

There are currently 3 big problems circling around damage :

Problem 1 : Armor Reductions work together a little too well, making armor a trap purchase more often than not.

Problem 2 : There're many different, easily accessible types of damage - flat, %HP, physical, magic, true - there is a clear way to counter each of them alone - yes, even %hp true damage to a certain extent.

However, when there're multiple enemy champions dealing a combination of several different damage types each, building defensively becomes heavily inefficient, as, no matter how you do it, you end up wasting a lot of gold value - more detailed explanations below.

Problem 3 : Damage is too high. Numbers need tweaking and the nerfhammer's descension shall be imminent, although it probably won't. Really not that complicated and, while the most visible, not as problematic as the other two. Again, explanation below.

It is going to be a long essay on the current state of damage in the game. Let's start by listing the damage types in League of Legends:

  • Flat Physical/Magic damage (countered with HP and, respectively, Armor/MR )
  • %HP Physical/Magic damage (countered with Armor/MR and countering HP stacking)
  • Flat True damage (countered with HP stacking and countering Armor and MR)
  • %HP True damage (countering BOTH HP stacking and Resists stacking)

Simple, right?

Well, no it's not. Why? Because you have those three little things here:

                                                                                    **Problem 1 :  Armor Reductions**

Lethality, Armor Penetration and Armor Shred

Let's take a look:

1.item 3071 + item 3036

Black Cleaver and Lord Dominik's alone provide up to 24% Armor Shred and 35% Armor Penetration. Sounds okay for 2 items, right?

Well, lets do the math :

Enemy Armor is multiplied by (1-0,24)*(1-0,35). Enemy Armor is multiplied by 49,4%

49,4%

TWO items that ALSO grant other, useful stats (BC is even 100% cost efficient without its passives) just reduced the value of Armor, the stat that is supposed to counter physical damage to less than a half of its original value.

2.This by itself wouldnt be so bad but lets roll along and add Sudden Impact, item 3147 and item 3142 to the calculation.

43 Lethality = equals up to 43 Flat Armor Penetration (based on level).

If you have all four items (you can also get item 3814 if you want for 18 more lethality) and the rune then you're effectively reducing enemy armor to 49,4% (provided BC is fully stacked) and then substracting 43 from that.

Any amount of Armor at or below 87 (123,5 with item 3814) is reduced to ZERO. This means 1740 (2470) gold worth of armor is completely negated.

200 Armor (lategame armor of a tanky bruiser with a balanced build) is reduced to 55,8 (37,8). 2284 (3244) gold worth of armor negated.

400 Armor (lategame armor of a non-malphite/rammus tank focused on armor stacking and little else) is reduced to 154,6 (136,6). A staggering 4908 (5268) gold worth of armor completely deleted from a game simply because you have a few items.

I'm not even countingMonkeyKing, Yasuo or other such champions that have built-in Armor Penetration/Shred because this is just obscene.

In conclusion - Any amount of armor below +/- 250 does next to nothing against Armor Penetration Lethality builds, especially if they have built in armor shred.

You're better off simply building health. But wait, what if they have %hp physical damage?. Such as item 3153 item 1416 or just a part of their kit?

Any amount of health you build then is a waste of money. But you still have to build it because otherwise you're dead from the flat physical damage. But if you do build it, you give up on building that much armor, which means you now die from %hp physical damage too.

You can't counter both at the same time.

                                                  **Problem 2 - Multiple Types of Damage working in tandem to squash you like an ant**

When there are multiples sources of damage of different types you're forced to either focus on countering one or try to build up a balanced defense. But what if the enemies have two or more damage types that have opposing strengths and weaknesses?

A good example is listed above but if you prefer another one, let's say MasterYi with item 1416 and/or item 3153 for %hp physical damage, his w and conqueror for flat true damage and everything else for flat physical damage.

In this example, the MasterYi deals flat physical damage, %hp physical damage AND flat true damage.

How do you build against that?

The balanced approach results in building two layers of defenses that are both countered by the enemy build. Any armor you build is useless against the enemy true damage. Any HP you build is useless against the enemy %HP physical damage and of limited effectiveness against flat physical damage.

You could focus on building one of the two but then you'd be even more squishy and die even faster. The only gimmick strategy that works at this point is item 3053 + item 3190, because shields are unaffected by %hp scalings and will always make you tankier, no matter what they throw at you.

And even then, it does little to stop the incoming burst, because the enemy team does not consist just of MasterYi , or any other champion for that matter. There're 5 (3 on TT) different ones, all of which deal damage to you. It's nearly always impossible to counterbuild each and every one of them without buying a stat that is redundant and useless against one of the damage types the enemy has. Or, in other words, without wasting gold.

So...how do you become tanky? The answer is - You Don't.

Once armor-shredders, champions with many damage types or Fiora/Vayne and, to a lesser extent, anyone else, have their core build - you'll die to them 1v1 in 2 seconds or less, whether you're a 7k hp Sion or a 1.8k HP Sona.

This is one of the biggest problems in LoL of s8.

And now, to the only thing most people see but to what is really the least problematic of the three to fix:

                                                                                            **Problem 3 : Damage Creep**

As written in TL ; DR - A simple and highly visible issue of too high numbers. Hit everything with damage nerfhammer ASAP.

Now onto the second part: how to fix all this.

                                         **Problem 1 :**

Revert Lethality to apply before armor penetration, not after.

Yes, item 3036 and item 3071 are anti-armor stacking items. And they'll remain highly effective at shredding tanks.

But item 3147 item 3142 item 3814 and other sources of Lethality should only be effective against squishes with little to no extra armor, and, with this simple change, that's precisely what they'll be - items that aid you in killing squishies but do little against more durable targets.

                                         **Problem 2 :**

  1. Access to %max HP damage, be it physical, magic or true, should be limited to champion kits. And champion kits only.

  2. %HP damage based on current health or missing health can stay but should nonetheless not be everywhere, whether it is champion kits we're talking about, items or runes.

  3. %HP true damage should only be permitted if it has clear limiting factors or is heavily telegraphed.

Example 1 : Garen - you need to be the Villain, he needs to get close and it scales off missing health so you have to be low on it for it to deal significant damage -** this is fair.**

Example 2 : **item 3107 ** - easily dodgeable and delayed ground targetted AOE - also fair.

But Fiora or Vayne solo melting your 7k HP and 200 armor in 1.5s? Not so much.

The %max HP true dmg issue is pretty much limited to those two champions at the moment.

The way I'd go about fixing it is, I'd rework vayne's silver bullets to flat true damage scaling with AD and fiora's vital procs to flat (AD scaling) + % missing health (based on level) true damage. This wouldn't directly nerf them depending on numbers, while allowing some counterbuilding and strategic fights that are not just about "kill them before they kill you" every time they're around or even simply on the opposite team.

4. True damage is everywhere

Conqueror and its flat true damage are the main offenders here. Personally, the way I'd fix it is:

Keystone : Conqueror

After 4 seconds in combat, the first attack against an enemy champion grants you [11-50] AD or [17-83] AP (adaptive and based on level) and [4-8%] Damage Resistance for 3 seconds (halved for ranged champions). Dealing damage to enemy champions refreshes this buff.

With the true damage part phased out and replaced by a damage resistance buff, Conqueror would not only stick with the theme of its name but also provide a defensive-ish precision keystone, which would work wonders for champions that are currently forced to take resolve but lack a proper keystone there.

20% true damage is just too oppressive and easily abused on champions like yasuo or yi, being a big part of what makes their damage nigh uncounterable.

                                         **Problem 3 :**

I wish they dropped that nerfhammer already.

3 Comments

Illabethe8/24/2018, 2:32:03 AM1 votes

I'll respond to this.

I generally agree with you. Versus certain teams, there is no real defensive builds.

Where defensive builds do work:

Versus Mage teams Versus non Penetration AD teams like those with low hitters like Pyke , or ones who use only item 3078 /item 3071 but otherwise build armor..... like top lane "Bruisers."

I do have some small points to break out which are important though:

  1. item 3075 is unique in that its frequency of Grievous wounds and damage reprisal are sometimes far more useful than item 3033 , because of the champions using it, and who it's being used against. If an opposing champ has no choice but to auto attack to perform, Thornmail's generally stronger.

  2. item 3110 item 3025 can double as AP or AD items with Sorcery's Transcendence. Even if their armor gets severely diminished, they do have spot usefulness versus bruiser teams if also being used as a stat item, and with the exception of MasterYi , they do work to diminish attack speeds.

  3. Some champions have secondary purposes for going HP/Armor, that potentially make it viable. Ornn Vi Nautilus Poppy Sion all gain shields proportionate to how large their HP is, so that 's kind of a pseudo counter to the % HP damage argument. It's not a perfect defense by a long shot, but it will let you get in a couple more hits, and react better, and the HP from AD items is just ...... limited.

  4. Armor does generally still affect EARLY game, which can change the viability of an opponent purchasing the whole kit of penetration. On early game teams, that's important to know.

  5. Armor DOES affect NPC survivability and jungle longevity. The more armor you have, the better you take drakes and barons, and clear jungle paths without taking damage, which allows you to make more ganks. You also can reduce some damage from turrets. That's important too.

But..... these are all generally niche arguments. I more or less agree otherwise.

I've taken to playing Ornn with Phase Rush and Transcendence, because it's just so much more influential on a game than a tank build. Mobility has become a tank's best option. Get in. Get out, and be able to run faster than tanks have ever run before. Static tank, not perma tank.

That's kind of why I do well with Pyke.....