So we are nerfing Thornmail, Omen, Frozen heart, and Dead Man's all on the same patch.

hashinshin·Aug 13, 2015·136 votes·23,199 views

I mean really? Dead man's? Really? It seems the ONLY reason for nerfing Dead Man's is they went "man, fuck melee, thinking they're so cool."

You can't nerf all the full tank items, then turn around and nerf the damage items too. You're only giving melee two new items, one of which is a bargin bin discount mid game item that will have the same problem Tahm's shield does where it pisses low ELO off cause "omg scary big number!" but the rapidly decaying part actually renders it far less useful than it appears to be. The other is a side-grade to Hydra which ALREADY got nerfed to +5 damage on auto from +20.

But why Dead Man's? It's barely been out for a patch and we're already nerfing it? Not Rylais which is being built every game on Viktor to perma kite/chase? Not BT which lets ADCs heal any and all poke you do to them? Not even a nerf to LW/VS as you're butchering all the tank items? Not Luden's which continues to be OP as shit?

No, but we're nerfing Dead Man's. An item that has been out for a week. You know the last time Riot nerfed an item in a week? Literally fucking never. Innervating Locket lasted for months before Riot touched it. Sunfire lasted for like half a year. Luden's Echo took a month. Hourglass lasted 3 years. But dead man's? An item that the only person I've seen it on is me? Nerf that fucking shit after a WEEK. Athen's holy grail basically won the S2 finals, and then took another season to nerf.

246 Comments

MimaropaAug 13, 201535 votes

Do you hear it?

That sound?

The sound of ad carries rejoicing and vayne mains cry of happiness

TrebbiAug 13, 20158 votes

Why would they rejoice? other than the thornmail nerf?

Tanks mean protection and are less likely to instagib people.

I think the average lifespan of adc went up during tank metas.

Count BuffonAug 13, 20157 votes

People have forgotten that Lee is going to be the real monster in the bruiser meta. It hasn't even been a year that he's fallen out of 90% pick/ban status, and people forget.

OyddAWqJ5rAug 13, 20158 votes

Don't worry, Riot is buffing him. >.>

Mistress MadokaAug 13, 201511 votes

"Huehue let's make Lee turn the enemy team's tanks into Nuclear bombs"

KarKzzAug 13, 20151 votes

Volibear HI ADC THIS IS BEAR, AND I JUST BITED YOU FOR 2000HP, BYE.

g07h4xf00Aug 13, 20158 votes

{quoted}

HI ADC THIS IS BEAR, AND I JUST BITED YOU FOR 2000HP, BYE.

You're assuming bear can even get in melee range to bite, much less stack 3 autos.

Only Play DariusAug 13, 201533 votes

Quinn Vayne top about to come back, now that the only way to damage them item 3075 is getting a huge nerf.

Looks like it's time to dust off your Irelia 's people!

IcyPepperAug 13, 201576 votes

We used to complain about Irelia needing nerfs, but now we need her more than ever.

She's not the balance we want, but the unbalance we'll need.

IceKingChernobogAug 13, 201592 votes

Ability Power.... Attack Damage... Magic resist.... Armor....

All 4 itemizations lived in harmony, until the armor items got nerfs Only Irelia master of all four itemizations is able to put a stop to the Bull shit that is Vayne and probably devourer meta But when we needed her most, riot nerfed her

VekknaAug 13, 201513 votes

Vayne problems are solved by a Teemo + item 3115 + summoner 14

Mistress MadokaAug 13, 20154 votes

Don't forget your trusty item 3151 for MASSIVE DAMAGE

aperson1Aug 13, 20157 votes

Thornmail is about the same or better against Vayne now, assuming you're actually building tank and not some damage item -> Randuins nonsense. Quinn top is definitely a strong possibility though.

CatAndBookTailsAug 13, 201510 votes

Considering you'll need a few more armor items to make it as usefull as it used to be....goodluck ONLY tanking vayne when they are garenteed to have atleast one AP champion.

KarKzzAug 13, 20152 votes

The AP is unlikely to burst you.

The FastAug 13, 201514 votes

When you are building only armor? lol

WeiseAzirAug 13, 201516 votes

Vayne the only champion I would love to see yanked out of the game and every one of its skins.

AnidanAug 13, 201510 votes

Ooh, I'll chalk that up onto my list! :D

So far I'm up to: Riven, Vayne, Kalista, Yasuo, Zed, Blitzcrank, Thresh, Annie, Yi, Nidalee, Lee Sin, Fizz, Zed, and LeBlanc.

I'm going for a Bingo, but they don't quite line up unfortunately. I need to keep searching. These aren't even counting the tallies I could've gotten for champions in the past seasons, either. So we're definitely getting somewhere.

Edit: Added Blitz and Thresh, as per request.

Mistress MadokaAug 13, 20159 votes

Add Zed again, one for his Shadow

RiotRiotRepertoirAug 13, 201526 votes

But why Dead Man's? It's barely been out for a patch and we're already nerfing it? Not Rylais which is being built every game on Viktor to perma kite/chase? Not BT which lets ADCs heal any and all poke you do to them? Not even a nerf to LW/VS as you're butchering all the tank items? Not Luden's which continues to be OP as shit?

Nerfing an item can be a good idea even if it's currently not seen as the most op item in the game. First, there may not even be close to full agreement that Rylai's, BT, LW, or Luden's being OP, and for what it's worth, I'm not necessarily saying that Dead Man's is or isn't more OP than any of these other items.

That said, it does seem like a sound logical approach to me, though not necessarily the only approach that could work, to try to systematically balance many or all of the Armor items in the game toward a similar goal in the same patch. What I believe the designers are trying to do with Dead Man's plate and the other armor items out there (Randuin's, Sunfire, etc.), is make it so that when you are choosing which item you want to buy, you're doing it mostly for the unique effects that they're giving you rather than being most cost efficient, which is more what players are used to.

I can't say with certainty that this approach will leave Armor items in a good spot in 5.16, but it really does sound to me like it will put them in a spot where their balance is easier to understand and adjust.

Now, the approach that you seem to be suggesting is that we should have a sort of tier list of all the most OP items in the game, and be nerfing the ones at the top. That may be oversimplified, but honestly, it may also be a valid way to do things, and is probably more akin to how we've done things in the past.

I'd actually be interesting in hearing people's opinions on whether the approach being taken to Armor items in 5.16 (without consideration to exact numbers) is a preferred approach as opposed to a method that is more constantly taking things off the top.

Earl EulrichAug 13, 20157 votes

I'd actually be interesting in hearing people's opinions on whether the approach being taken to Armor items in 5.16 (without consideration to exact numbers) is a preferred approach as opposed to a method that is more constantly taking things off the top.

well i think the philosophy behind the changes is alright...leveling the playfield of a certain set and than adjust them individualy should be more practicable than just bashing the current most used items from patch to patch. However...nerfing an already weak stat further requires serious abuse of certain substances to even start making sense to me.

hashinshinAug 13, 201513 votes

You guys want tanks to be melee to be more selfish (which ironically is the opposite of how you guys did anything post season 2) so you give them a selfish item that allows them to chase. It does a HUGE WHOOPING... 100 damage at max stacks. WITH A HUGE SLOW... that decays over 1 second. It's biggest saving grace was the reasonably high base stats. It was really more of a "get beefy and run at people item." And it's barely BARELY usable at that. Even a 5 armor nerf and it looks like a shitty sunfire. The damage difference between sunfire and dead man's is ridiculous. Sunfire does ~40 (magic) damage per second. Dead man's does 100 if you maintain full stacks when you land your first blow (in physical) and then nothing after that. BUT... at least it had high base stats.

I dunno why Riot is so afraid of making expensive selfish tank items. Half the tank items are bargin bin discount items that serve one purpose and don't scale to late game. How about you make dead man's considerably stronger and increase the price, rather than keep it a bargin bin discount item? And whats going on with the new item anyway. The one that increases base damage. It's basically a late game required item, yet it's priced and stated as if it's a bargin bin discount item. It makes no sense. BT is 3500 gold because it's a core option in the kit, yet melee gets a 2650 discount item?

And it's been out for a fucking week! ONE WEEK and you determine it needs nerfs? What the hell? Why not nerf sunfire if we're nerfing all armor items? Why not nerf ninja tabi which is basically 100% required to not die?

FINALLY: You're going to increase diversity by target nerfs to niche items? That's literally taking 2+2=0. If you see dead man's proliferated all over the worlds scene then call me wrong, but I've never been wrong. 5 years and running. The right king over here.

NublordAug 13, 20157 votes

{quoted}

Nerfing an item can be a good idea even if it's currently not seen as the most op item in the game. First, there may not even be close to full agreement that Rylai's, BT, LW, or Luden's being OP, and for what it's worth, I'm not necessarily saying that Dead Man's is or isn't more OP than any of these other items.

That said, it does seem like a sound logical approach to me, though not necessarily the only approach that could work, to try to systematically balance many or all of the Armor items in the game toward a similar goal in the same patch. What I believe the designers are trying to do with Dead Man's plate and the other armor items out there (Randuin's, Sunfire, etc.), is make it so that when you are choosing which item you want to buy, you're doing it mostly for the unique effects that they're giving you rather than being most cost efficient, which is more what players are used to.

I can't say with certainty that this approach will leave Armor items in a good spot in 5.16, but it really does sound to me like it will put them in a spot where their balance is easier to understand and adjust.

Now, the approach that you seem to be suggesting is that we should have a sort of tier list of all the most OP items in the game, and be nerfing the ones at the top. That may be oversimplified, but honestly, it may also be a valid way to do things, and is probably more akin to how we've done things in the past.

I'd actually be interesting in hearing people's opinions on whether the approach being taken to Armor items in 5.16 (without consideration to exact numbers) is a preferred approach as opposed to a method that is more constantly taking things off the top.

But why nerf Armor items in first place? I can stack 400 armor and still get shred by adc late game and now I will be even weaker. I can't peel when I die as fast as my carries.

g07h4xf00Aug 13, 201531 votes

{quoted}

Nerfing an item can be a good idea even if it's currently not seen as the most op item in the game. First, there may not even be close to full agreement that Rylai's, BT, LW, or Luden's being OP, and for what it's worth, I'm not necessarily saying that Dead Man's is or isn't more OP than any of these other items.

That said, it does seem like a sound logical approach to me, though not necessarily the only approach that could work, to try to systematically balance many or all of the Armor items in the game toward a similar goal in the same patch. What I believe the designers are trying to do with Dead Man's plate and the other armor items out there (Randuin's, Sunfire, etc.), is make it so that when you are choosing which item you want to buy, you're doing it mostly for the unique effects that they're giving you rather than being most cost efficient, which is more what players are used to.

I can't say with certainty that this approach will leave Armor items in a good spot in 5.16, but it really does sound to me like it will put them in a spot where their balance is easier to understand and adjust.

Now, the approach that you seem to be suggesting is that we should have a sort of tier list of all the most OP items in the game, and be nerfing the ones at the top. That may be oversimplified, but honestly, it may also be a valid way to do things, and is probably more akin to how we've done things in the past.

I'd actually be interesting in hearing people's opinions on whether the approach being taken to Armor items in 5.16 (without consideration to exact numbers) is a preferred approach as opposed to a method that is more constantly taking things off the top.

Rito has made this EXACT SAME mistake in the past--double nerfing a group of champions the same patch. This feels like quadruple-nerfing, this time. Last year before worlds every single tank item was nerfed (RIP item 3143 movespeed debuff) and ADC items were simultaneously buffed. This led to one of the worst game balances in history during Worlds.

Tristana was "pick, ban, or lose" and the only tanks that were viable in the meta were Maokai Alistar and ONLY because their kits gave them innate tankyness. Top lane meta was completely ruined and got reduced to cancerous champions like Ryze Nidalee Kassadin Lulu

The same will happen this year if not worse in Worlds. there will be 1 or less tank per game (and I'm going to guess that tank will be Maokai or Alistar surprise surprise), mark my words. Is this Goundhog's Day?? Why does Rito ALWAYS make this mistake and expect a different result? Literally every bit of progress made this season in making tanks viable again will be COMPLETELY undone if these 5.16 changes go through. It's not too late to stop them @RiotRepertoir please cancel these changes before it's too late. The tank meta ended many patches ago. Watch any game now. Tanks are only played in top lane and maybe support. Even then, there are other non-tank champions in those roles that are just as viable.

item 3075 's numbers literally have not been changed since 2010 and 2009. It's currently the least popular armor item in the game. Given a choice of ANY ONE armor item, most champions prefer to buy item 3143 item 3068 item 3110 item 3026 item 3157 item 3047 .

There was a time when item 3110 used to give 15% CDR, 90 armor, and 20% attack speed debuff (Season 2/3) and NOBODY bought it because it was also expensive. We are returning to those times.

item 3143 ALREADY got nerfed last year and until you bring back the 10% movespeed debuff on-hit there is nothing to justify nerfing it further. It's new crit reduction passive is a total joke. So which is it? Is supposed to be good against crits or against speed? The 5.16 nerfs make it shitty at BOTH.

These changes literally decrease strategic diversity. There's not a single good reason for any of these changes. The only think I can see is "well it's almost time for Worlds time to make flashy damage champions strong again LeeSin must always be top pick". Rito has consistently shown bias against tanky melee champions. Any time there's any change to make them viable, they are almost immediately nerfed back into oblivion. What's the fucking pont?

RiotRiotRepertoirAug 13, 201516 votes

So which is it? Is (Randuin's) supposed to be good against crits or against speed? The 5.16 nerfs make it shitty at BOTH.

I know this wasn't the only thing you asked, but I believe it's supposed to be the clear choice against basic attackers, not necessarily just crits or just attack speed.

To the more general point, I don't think the point of the whole suite of changes is "to make Armor bad," though many seem to be reading it that way. There seems to be two main vocal groups of players when it comes to discussions like this, those that think adcs are too strong, and those that think they are too weak. Naturally, the former group will be more vocal about the subject matter of this thread, and I'm not saying you shouldn't be necessarily. It's more just that I am pretty confident that your opinions on the Armor changes are not necessarily the overwhelming majority.

To be perfectly clear, I don't fall strongly into the "adcs are too weak" category, nor do I fall too strongly into the "adcs are too strong (armor is too weak)" category. I do, however, think that if the goals of changes to armor items is to put all armor items on a somewhat level playing field, then that line of thinking specifically is a good one, and I hope that these changes help to accomplish that.

Will armor be too weak in 5.16? Maybe. Would the game be more balanced if we were also nerfing penetration items and possibly BotRK? Possibly. One of the great things about League of Legends when it comes to issues like this is that we adjust balance very regularly, and there are still two patches following 5.16 before the Worlds patch, so I'm confident that if something was sorely off, it could be accounted for. I can say with very high certainty that no one on the balance or systems team is saying "we don't want to see tanks at Worlds."

LeeDarkAug 13, 201514 votes

No, this is not a case of Forum "He said, she said." ADC's are STILL the ONLY role that are ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY on a viable team. PERIOD. END OF DISCUSSION. You can have SOME discussion on what additional things you want the ADC to excel at, like poke, tank shredding, etc. At the end of the day, though, you are still going to pick one and give them a support because you want to shovel gold in their face to take objectives. You don't HAVE to have an AP carry; you can replace that with a utility mage or AD assassin even. HELL, YOU CAN EVEN REPLACE IT WITH A SECOND ADC IN MID. You don't have to have a tank... you can send a bruiser or assassin top and have a mage in the jungle. Armor is the only thing you are ALWAYS going to have to buy as a tank, because there is ALWAYS going to be a champion that does physical damage. The nerf just makes it so you have to buy two armor items just to handle ONE champion. Even if the entire rest of the team is magic damage based, you'll have to allocate 40% of your items, not counting boots, toward stopping that champion from tearing you apart.

Kuroi86Aug 14, 20151 votes

item 3110 95 armor item 3075 100 armor

Pick one, then stack health and MR items. No, item 3035 does NOT render them moot. Most tanks have a base armor of 80+ come late game, this isn't counting runes and masteries. Even with LW and offensive masteries you only need 170 armor to cut the ADC's physical damage in half.

LeeDarkAug 14, 20153 votes

None of that at all changes the simple fact that the ADC is not only the only role you absolutely have to have on a viable team, but you can even get away with having two of them. Armor is not a problem.

Kuroi86Aug 14, 20151 votes

Because it's an objective based game. You can form a team comp around other factors like winning team fights and getting kills, but at the end of the day you need an AD based champ that can tear a tower apart in order to get objectives after said team fight.

What happens when ADCs are rendered moot? People will take the next best thing, ranged based champs and heavy scaling melee carries, what happens when they are done away with?

What do you want? A kill based game? Then ask for ascension back, it's as close as LoL has gotten to that.

Loken StoneheartAug 14, 20153 votes

{quoted}

Because it's an objective based game. You can form a team comp around other factors like winning team fights and getting kills, but at the end of the day you need an AD based champ that can tear a tower apart in order to get objectives after said team fight.

What happens when ADCs are rendered moot? People will take the next best thing, ranged based champs and heavy scaling melee carries, what happens when they are done away with?

What do you want? A kill based game? Then ask for ascension back, it's as close as LoL has gotten to that.

No, I want tanks to not melt like paper to ADCs, and not get assassinated by assassins. Funfact, if tanks are incapable of surviving the AD onslaught, Assassins rise in the meta to handle the ADCs instead. Assassin meta #1 super hype for worlds though, huh?

Kuroi86Aug 14, 20151 votes

No, I want tanks to not melt like paper to ADCs, and not get assassinated by assassins.

If you're getting assassinated by an assassin then you're either way behind them in terms of farm/kills or you're building wrong.

It only takes 100 AR/MR to cut physical/magical damage in half. item 3035 & item 3135 take that number up to 155 and offensive mastery takes it up to 170. At 170 AR/MR you are reducing their damage by 50%. From there stack health, you'll quickly become a raid boss.

Funfact, if tanks are incapable of surviving the AD onslaught, Assassins rise in the meta to handle the ADCs instead.

Tanks aren't meant to be invulnerable, they are meant to be hard to kill in order to soak damage for their team. Meanwhile ADCs are meant to scale harder as the game reaches late game in order to close out the game and prevent it from going on forever.

Loken StoneheartAug 14, 20155 votes

{quoted}

If you're getting assassinated by an assassin then you're either way behind them in terms of farm/kills or you're building wrong.

It only takes 100 AR/MR to cut physical/magical damage in half. & take that number up to 155 and offensive mastery takes it up to 170. At 170 AR/MR you are reducing their damage by 50%. From there stack health, you'll quickly become a raid boss.

Tanks aren't meant to be invulnerable, they are meant to be hard to kill in order to soak damage for their team. Meanwhile ADCs are meant to scale harder as the game reaches late game in order to close out the game and prevent it from going on forever.

They're reducing the armor on most of the items by like 10, upping the cost by 200 or so, and reducing HP across the board as well. It will be significantly easier for assassins to assassinate tanks.

You seem to completely forget that assassin builds are often ALL armor pen items and even botrk. So, really, you need closer to 240-250 armor to cut their damage by 50% not counting Black Cleaver, and you'll barely pull more than that with a full devoted armor-item in every slot after the round nerfs here, minus boots. They might not burst you, but you're probably only a BOTRK proc and a few extra smacks away from death at that point.

But you won't be in an isolated fight, it'll be a team fight. By then, you would've taken enough random collateral damage to be dead, and then your glass cannons are shattered glass.

No, tanks aren't meant to be invulnerable. But even now in their supposed prime they only live for like 4-5 seconds on the frontline if ONLY the adc is shooting at them. After some lovely round about nerfs coming up here, they won't even be picked beyond people wanting to toy with the new reworks and items, because they'd be lucky to live 2-3 seconds. They might toss their ult before they die, I guess. Its a sad day when ADCs and those hyper mobile assassins are harder to kill than TANKS.

Sire HippingtonAug 14, 20152 votes

Endgame, ADCs pack a AA dps of ~1500 from items alone(so no steroids or whatsoever) so even if you cut that in half, it's 750dps. So and adc will need 5-8sec(4-6k health on the tank) to kill you with rightclicking alone, not even a keyboard requiered. 5-8sec lifetime vs a single enemie that doesn't use skills is rather poor for someone who should be TANKY If you add their skills, the support and some stray aoe, it comes down to 4-6sec, if the enemie AP-carry fouses on you aswell while the toplaner or jungler help peeleing, it comes down to 2-4sec, so you die to focused fire ion the duration of a dark binding. If you don't have a really absurd defensiv steroid, there is no way to survive a frontal engage, and if you don't have mapcontroll, getting a good flank vs competent teas happens rarly. So for tanky-dps it's all about snowballing the midgame(not much difference to now, but even worse rather than a improvement) For CC tanks thats fine, they usually have absurd defense steroids, and 2-4 sec are enough to lock down a priority target.

Kuroi86Aug 14, 20151 votes

Endgame, ADCs pack a AA dps of ~1500 from items alone(so no steroids or whatsoever) so even if you cut that in half, it's 750dps.

In a single auto? Even if we took out 480 to calculate Borks damage. That still leave 1020 damage on an item 3031 crit. That means an ADC must be packing around 408 AD... The highest AD on an ADC is Vayne with 108, that's still 300 you've got to make up for with items/runes/masteries. 80 item 3035 40 item 3006 item 3046 item 3153 25 ?? item 3141 110??

Even then you've still got to make it up with 45 AD from runes/masteries, you'd have to have your rune page nothing but scaling AD.

Well, you could do it with her ult, but you said no steroids. I could see Vayne with her ult or Draven pulling off such a massive crit. But those are steroids. Not to mention with Defensive masteries it's easy to cut that down a heck of a lot.

5-8sec lifetime vs a single enemie that doesn't use skills is rather poor for someone who should be TANKY

That is by design though. At no point were tanks supposed to last much longer than this.

If you don't have a really absurd defensiv steroid, there is no way to survive a frontal engage, and if you don't have mapcontroll, getting a good flank vs competent teas happens rarly. So for tanky-dps it's all about snowballing the midgame(not much difference to now, but even worse rather than a improvement)

Tanks aren't really about DPS though, they're about disruption. Be it through damage or CC their point is to force the enemy team to focus them and blow their heavy damage on the tank. Even if a tank dies in a team fight, if he's eating 3-4 ults, then he's done his job in soaking damage that the rest of his team doesn't have to worry about.

Sire HippingtonAug 14, 20154 votes

In a single auto?

no, pleas read more carefully, i said AA DPS, damage per second, not damage per AA item 3006 item 3031 item 3035 item 3046 item 3072 item 3139 , takeing caits base values for the example, which are rather on the low side: AD: 101+(80+40+80+80+8(runes)+14(masteries))*1.05(masteries)) = 418AD AS: 0.625 X (1+68%(base AS-growth)+25%+55%+15%(runes)+5%(masteries)) = 1,675AS Crit: 55% chance with 150% damage

dps = AD x AS x (1+(critchance x crit damage) = 418 x 1,675 x 1,825 = ~1277,8 this is without the % damage increase from certain masteries like havoc or executioner and without the up to 15%AS from frenzie on one of the lower dps ADC. Only AAs, no skills or whatsoever involved.

Tanks aren't really about DPS though, they're about disruption. Be it through damage or CC their point is to force the enemy team to focus them and blow their heavy damage on the tank. Even if a tank dies in a team fight, if he's eating 3-4 ults, then he's done his job in soaking damage that the rest of his team doesn't have to worry about.

thats the major probelm, the champs that rely most on tankiness aren't 'Tanks' Bruisers like shyvana or Olaf ARE about dps, they have neither meaningfull burst nor CC, most off the time not even a gapcloser. They need to be tanky, they have to reach and stay within the enemie team for a extended time to be effective. Guys like Mao, Alistar or Amumu don't need much tankiness from items to work in a teamfight.

And the 5-8sec are form just adc-AAs, where is no need to throw 3-4 ults in a tanky guy(unless he's fed, but thats a totally different scenario)

youngjake93Aug 13, 201514 votes

{quoted}

I know this wasn't the only thing you asked, but I believe it's supposed to be the clear choice against basic attackers, not necessarily just crits or just attack speed.

To the more general point, I don't think the point of the whole suite of changes is "to make Armor bad," though many seem to be reading it that way. There seems to be two main vocal groups of players when it comes to discussions like this, those that think adcs are too strong, and those that think they are too weak. Naturally, the former group will be more vocal about the subject matter of this thread, and I'm not saying you shouldn't be necessarily. It's more just that I am pretty confident that your opinions on the Armor changes are not necessarily the overwhelming majority.

To be perfectly clear, I don't fall strongly into the "adcs are too weak" category, nor do I fall too strongly into the "adcs are too strong (armor is too weak)" category. I do, however, think that if the goals of changes to armor items is to put all armor items on a somewhat level playing field, then that line of thinking specifically is a good one, and I hope that these changes help to accomplish that.

Will armor be too weak in 5.16? Maybe. Would the game be more balanced if we were also nerfing penetration items and possibly BotRK? Possibly. One of the great things about League of Legends when it comes to issues like this is that we adjust balance very regularly, and there are still two patches following 5.16 before the Worlds patch, so I'm confident that if something was sorely off, it could be accounted for. I can say with very high certainty that no one on the balance or systems team is saying "we don't want to see tanks at Worlds."

If you actually look at what happened to the armor items, you can see there aren't more choices than before. There are less... Previously, Thornmail was the anti-ADC item, Randuin's was the Health item, Frozen Heart was the cost-effective mana+CDR+aura item.

Now literally all three compete for "use this versus basic attackers." Frozen Heart is no longer the cost-effective first-buy, Thornmail was nerfed vs ADCs and Randuin's was given the crit passive.

Sunfire, Ohmwrecker, and Deadman's have clearly identified roles as items, but the difference between the other 3 armor items just gets blurrier with this patch.

Count BuffonAug 13, 20153 votes

I agree about Randuin's. No one wants the crit passive in the item 3153 meta. I mean seriously. An item you can only buy against Sivir , and even in that case it's not as good as it used to be? Why shackle a perfectly good active to an idiotic passive that would've only mattered in a meta that sailed off a year ago?

Kuroi86Aug 13, 20156 votes

No one wants the crit passive in the meta.

It still retains it's attack speed slow passive, Not to mention most ADC still get item 3031 on top of item 3153 so the crit passive doesn't go to waste.

Dr PoroAug 13, 201513 votes

You're already saying "maybe" but you KNOW armor will be too weak. If you remove 10 AP from all AP items while making them 300g more expensive, mages will also be UP as hell. Sure, armor may currently be slightly underpriced (especially frozen heart), however, these nerfs are through the roof.

Just give back 5 armor to all the nerfed items and it'd be fine.

RiotRiotRepertoirAug 13, 201512 votes

Yes, as far as I am aware, armor from items will be relatively weaker than last patch. I believe many tanks are getting per level base stat buffs to somewhat offset this, though I don't know just how far that will go.

I personally would be really surprised if no further adjustments were made to armor items following 5.16.

AkaliholicAug 13, 20159 votes

{quoted}

Yes, as far as I am aware, armor from items will be relatively weaker than last patch. I believe many tanks are getting per level base stat buffs to somewhat offset this, though I don't know just how far that will go.

I personally would be really surprised if no further adjustments were made to armor items following 5.16.

I apologize if this has been asked before, but WHY exactly is it ok for Armor to get weaker overall as a side effect of the changes? Do you guys really feel like people in general are getting too tanky vs AD right now?

Sometimes it feels like you do random stuff just for the sake of changing things up, but the community values balance far more than it values change. In fact, we really don't like change all that much unless it is obviously for the better.

RiotRiotRepertoirAug 13, 20158 votes

I think everyone could probably agree that it would be okay for Armor to get relatively weaker IF it was overall too strong. What is clearly not agreed upon, or at least rejected by many in this thread in particular, is that Armor is in fact stronger than it needs to be at the moment. As to whether Riot collectively feels that people in general are too tanky vs AD right now, I'm really not the person to make that call (since it's not my specialty nor my team's). I understand that may sound like a cop out, but it's probably not fair for me to make a decisive yes/no call on whether the balance and item guys think Armor too strong when I am not a primary driver of change for those teams.

I would hope it doesn't feel like we make change for the sake of change, though since change is something we do quite often, I can see how one would get that impression. Currently, it wouldn't surprise me if someone said we probably believe that we are continually making change that is for the better more than the community at large shares that belief.

Earl EulrichAug 13, 20154 votes

well, it´s pretty obvious that adcs and ranged/mobile champs in general dominate the game while melees (even more so immobile melees/anything that needs to get tanky) are very rarly seen...all of those changes only further fuel this trend. And unless Juggnauts will be incredible overpowered this will be the least sucessfull rework project of all times, as they will never reach a fight alive vs coordinated teams.

AkaliholicAug 14, 20155 votes

Rather than looking for consensus, I'm more concerned with the question of what evidence is there to suggest that armor is too strong? Are tanks too overbearing? Are we seeing too many fighters stacking armor and being unkillable? What do the statistics say? Is the meta trending in an unhealthy direction because people can just get armor to win?

I'm not saying that you guys are actually applying it in this situation, but for the record I strongly disagree with a philosophy of balancing a game based on how things feel or how they are perceived or "what might be cool". I think an "If it's not broken, don't fix it." mentality is much more healthy because it gives things room to evolve naturally which is largely more valuable than a balance team trying to be the ones to drive the change.

After all, as often as not, perceptions are proven to be false (including the balance team's perceptions >.>) and the most solid and interesting changes in the meta are the ones that arise within the community out of player experimentation and natural growth.

It would be really nice if you could have one of the people behind the changes come out and explain why exactly this is genuinely needed rather than just something someone thought would be a neat idea to mix up the meta a bit.

Jeddy017Aug 13, 20154 votes

http://www.surrenderat20.net/p/current-pbe-balance-changes.html So far,it seems to mostly be support type tanks getting per level base stats buffed,as well as Amumu & Rammus.Nothing more for the rest of the general tanks.

The Yetii RiderAug 13, 20154 votes

{quoted}

Yes, as far as I am aware, armor from items will be relatively weaker than last patch. I believe many tanks are getting per level base stat buffs to somewhat offset this, though I don't know just how far that will go.

I personally would be really surprised if no further adjustments were made to armor items following 5.16.

Well, base stats per level don't count as bonus armor right? So it ends up scaling much more poorly with masteries that give us additional bonus armor.

Meeks011Aug 14, 20154 votes

Blade of the Ruined king definitely needs a nerf, it doubles your DPS as soon as you buy it. Go on a do the math, some how much 8% of current health a hit really is compared to other AD items.

ADCs are never weak, they are the only mandatory role in the game. At full build they reach a DPS of 1500-2000.

For comparison, a full build Veigar with 1000 AP and taking cooldowns into account has a DPS of 356-366.

Also, lifesteal is one of the most broken stats in the game. I saw a Yasuo healing 300 health per hit. So he gains 800 gold of tank stats throughout fights for every hit. Once there was a fed Tristana our team was 3v1ing. She had Runaan's, Bloodthirster, Phantom Dancer, and Infinity Edge. She was so damn tanky and won that fight in melee range the whole time. She just right clicked.

Games are almost entirely based around who's ADC gets fed. "Fed Veigar? I'll just two-shot him!" Duels are over in less than a second. A Yi was killing me in 1.5 seconds so I got thornmail. Then he killed me in 1 second the next fight. Armor doesn't do shit against ADCs if they're fed or late game. 500 armor and 4000 health? 1000 damage per hit reduced by 83% is still 170 per hit. So with maxed attack speed you die in 9 seconds, WITHOUT ANY PENETRATION OR BLADE OF THE RUINED KING.

Also they're the only role that gets a babysitter.

The Yetii RiderAug 13, 20155 votes

{quoted}

I'd actually be interesting in hearing people's opinions on whether the approach being taken to Armor items in 5.16 (without consideration to exact numbers) is a preferred approach as opposed to a method that is more constantly taking things off the top.

It's definitely nice to see a whole slew of balance changes focused to a single item (though certainly not when it's a blanket nerf).

I just wish that you guys were nerfing Last Whisper in the same patch. With all of the armor items getting weaker and only receiving a 10% reduction in critical strike damage received as compensation, champions who build armor penetration and not critical strike chance (Zed, Talon, Pantheon, Riven) will be buffed hugely against champions they're supposed to have a hard time killing (Tanks are supposed to survive burst damage and die to sustained damage. If you nerf a tank's ability to survive burst, then they aren't doing their job correctly and they have no endgame fantasy).

Attempting to push for a mid-game power spike for tanks also will not work, because tanks are much easier to gank and shut down and they have a harder time farming their lanes and getting kills than AP mid laners do, which means that AP mid laners (who get their power spikes in the mid game as well and also deal burst damage that tanks are supposed to take for the team) will simply outscale them due to the large amount of gold they have at that point in the game.

What am I supposed to enjoy about playing a tank now, with the threat of assassins looming in the distance? Assassins have, by definition and necessity, low counterplay kits. For a tank to survive their burst it has to be a stat check, and that is the designer's fault. And you're nerfing the tank's stats across the board while leaving penetration as powerful as it is.

It just seems like a poor decision on the item team's part to make sweeping changes to armor itemization without touching armor penetration.

LeonDemonOfDeathAug 13, 20156 votes

"certainty" He's hinting at something. CertainlyT confirmed. CertainlyT is holding Repertoir hostage! We'll save you Repertoir!

Sire HippingtonAug 13, 20155 votes

that when you are choosing which item you want to buy, you're doing it mostly for the unique effects that they're giving you rather than being most cost efficient

This only works if the unique effeckts are equally powerfull, cause frankly, you build a item for the unique effeckt combined with the stats it gives. If two items offer similar stats, but one has simply a more powerfull effeckt, it will always be prioritzed outside off specific niche situation in which the other unique effeck might be more valuable.

Hoever, the main concern is the power of defens items relative to offense. Defense items feel rather bad later on, as they get outscaled by offense items, not only because of multipliers, but also by beeing less slotefficient. At the same time, defense is somewhat overhelming early-mid due to it's cost efficency. With 5.16, defenseitems overall recive a nerf to both, cost-efficency(something i'm totally fine with) and slot-efficiency, which will make tankiness (from items) reliant champs that already are in a rather bad spot overall even worse. Slot efficiency actually needs a buff rather than a nerf.

Also, if costefficency is the primary factor for wether or not to get an item, maybe the game currently is to earlygame focused or not as gold efficient items don't make up for that with superior scaleing. Ideally, the most gold efficient items should be at lowish costs(2000-2500g) and thus not really slotefficient, while the expensive and therefor slotefficient items are not as gold efficient. This means you can pick up goldefficient items for an imidiate spike, so with a rather early-mid focus or if you prepare for a baron fight, at the cost of the lategame scaleing a slot efficient item would grant. This would allow for meaningfull strategical decicions when buying items. Right now, the most slot-efficient items are often also amongst the most goldefficient items, so the choice is obvious, and it also leads to more heavy snowballing, as who ever reaches that item first has a significant advantage without real tradeoff, which leads to more focus on early-mid to start snowballing, which leads to a focus on the most cost-efficient items as they improve your early-mid....