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Intelligent J4 Nerf Proposal

Hyrum Graff··2 votes·1,350 views

I just read a well-written thread on why J4 is OP right now. However, I think one thing the thread misses is just how safe and reliable J4 is. Even pre-6 he has a knockup AND a slow, in addition to his damage. Ganking for a lane that provides any kind of CC is a breeze. Post-6, even if J4 messes up his ult, or his enemy dashes out of it, he can simply cancel the ult and continue the chase. Or if the fight is going poorly, he can cancel the ult and walk away.

The problem with trying to nerf J4 is that his "flag and drag" and cataclysm are all very iconic and cool abilities. If they were nerfed to be weaker, I believe it would ruin much of what feels good about playing Jarvan. This suggests we should nerf some of his hidden power (armor shred or standard AS boost) and/or nerf his (non-iconic) shield. However, I believe one simple change would balance him, without nerfing the impact of any of his abilities.

Jarvan can no longer reactivate Cataclysm to destroy the crater.

#"DEMACIA!... wait, nvm." -Live J4

Cataclysm is COOL. Jarvan is committing so hard that he makes a freakin' crater when he lands. You know what's decidedly uncool? When that crater exists for only .5 seconds because Jarvan's like "nah, I actually want to go somewhere else."

Furthermore, preventing J4 from canceling his ult would make him think more about using it. It would add counterplay and create complexity when he's ganking: J4 wants to bait out their mobility ability so they can't dash out of his ult. At the same time, his opponents don't want to use their dash because they know J4 can then ult them safely. J4 can play off of this knowledge: if he can force them to dash to avoid his knockup, he can safely ult them. If they manage to juke the knockup, they can probably make it to safety.

These mind games are satisfying for both parties. When you bait out the Cataclysm, you feel like you outplayed Jarvan. When he baits your dash, he feels like he outplayed you.

http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110309112421/leagueoflegends/images/3/39/Cataclysm.jpg

Thoughts?

19 Comments

SmokingPuffin2 votes

Not a fan. J4 ult screwing him is fine. J4 ult screwing his teammates is so annoying that it's a meme: http://i.ytimg.com/vi/aG6ev_xgbOU/maxresdefault.jpg

I think J4 needs to have his farming ability nerfed, so that he is focused on ganking.

Hyrum Graff1 votes

It forces J4 to think a little more about where he ults, so he won't screw over his teammates. Is that such a bad thing?

I'd also be down with making his ult a ground-targeted skillshot with the same range. Gives J4 a little more control over where he's gonna be for the next 3.5s.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

The basic problem with this plan is that we need to nerf good Jarvans. That is, Jarvan is a serious competitive balance problem. The mechanic change you propose is easily worked around by a good Jarvan player. Meanwhile, solo queue will be filled with people raging at the Jarvan on their team.

Ground targeted skillshot R is fairly cool idea. Not really a nerf idea, but I'd be interested in exploring what you can do with that. Main danger is that J4 would consider using it as a poor man's Anivia wall while his team escapes, but I think there are some upsides too.

Hyrum Graff1 votes

{quoted}

The basic problem with this plan is that we need to nerf good Jarvans. That is, Jarvan is a serious competitive balance problem. The mechanic change you propose is easily worked around by a good Jarvan player. Meanwhile, solo queue will be filled with people raging at the Jarvan on their team.

I'm going to disagree with you here. Kind of. I think that a good J4 player can still make full use of his ult... but it depends on his ability to outplay his opponents, and at a competitive level, that's more difficult to do as well.

Shoot me some ways that a good J4 player can work around this change, and I'll shoot you back ways that a good opponent can react to those strategies.

Ground targeted skillshot R is fairly cool idea. Not really a nerf idea, but I'd be interested in exploring what you can do with that. Main danger is that J4 would consider using it as a poor man's Anivia wall while his team escapes, but I think there are some upsides too.

Agreed that the idea of ground targeting is kind of a different conversation. He can already use it as a poor man's Anivia wall (love that phrasing) on live, it's just a little more dangerous/suicide-y to do so.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

Shoot me some ways that a good J4 player can work around this change, and I'll shoot you back ways that a good opponent can react to those strategies.

Flash R. Opponent flashes, land QE.

Bring a poke comp. Use R to defend your squishies.

Bring Orianna. Use QERR combo to make escape too late to matter.

I think Jarvan's strength in the early game is just too much. I only see this change making Jarvan feel a bit clunky, not less strong.

Hyrum Graff1 votes

{quoted}

Flash R. Opponent flashes, land QE.

  • Requires flash.
    • Clear nerf.
  • Opponent still has mobility ability to get away from J4.
    • You can't argue "but what about champs without dashes?" against this, because live J4 already screws them over hard.

Bring a poke comp. Use R to defend your squishies.

  • Already possible.

Bring Orianna. Use QERR combo to make escape too late to matter.

  • Requires enemy team to group tight
  • Requires more coordination, and that J4 and Ori be together, and that J4 stay within range of Ori.
  • Same can be said of Ori and any of the following champs:
    • Alistar Amumu Leona Malphite Rengar Shyvana Sion MonkeyKing Vi Thresh Sejuani Or really, anybody with a gapcloser and some AOE cc.

I think Jarvan's strength in the early game is just too much. I only see this change making Jarvan feel a bit clunky, not less strong.

Perhaps a little more clunky, which is why I brought up the ground-targeting thing. But I DO think it would be a significant reduction of power.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hyrum Graff,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=aqaJa6kE,comment-id=000100000000000000000000,timestamp=2015-02-13T19:44:11.647+0000)

  • Requires flash.

    • Clear nerf.

  • Opponent still has mobility ability to get away from J4.

    • You can't argue "but what about champs without dashes?" against this, because live J4 already screws them over hard.

  • Already possible.

  • Requires enemy team to group tight

  • Requires more coordination, and that J4 and Ori be together, and that J4 stay within range of Ori.

  • Same can be said of Ori and any of the following champs:

    • Alistar Amumu Leona Malphite Rengar Shyvana Sion MonkeyKing Vi Thresh Sejuani Or really, anybody with a gapcloser and some AOE cc.

The point with all of these play patterns is that they all already happen on live, and they will all still work after your proposed change. I agree, your change removes some plays he can make. I just think making him slightly less versatile won't cut it.

Re: the long list of champions, the point here is that J4 can fill that role while also being amazing at all the other things a jungler needs to do. If Amumu's a 10 in teamfight initiation, J4 is about an 8, and he gets that without paying any of the prices Amumu has to pay to get that 10.

Perhaps a little more clunky, which is why I brought up the ground-targeting thing. But I DO think it would be a significant reduction of power.

I think it adds way more annoyance than it subtracts real power.

My best guess is that J4 is still OP even if Cataclysm didn't make the crater at all. His early game is just fantastic in every regard, and we've known since the beginning of time that is what you want from a jungler.

Hyrum Graff1 votes

{quoted}

The point with all of these play patterns is that they all already happen on live, and they will all still work after your proposed change. I agree, your change removes some plays he can make. I just think making him slightly less versatile won't cut it.

Re: the long list of champions, the point here is that J4 can fill that role while also being amazing at all the other things a jungler needs to do. If Amumu's a 10 in teamfight initiation, J4 is about an 8, and he gets that without paying any of the prices Amumu has to pay to get that 10.

I think it adds way more annoyance than it subtracts real power.

I think this change would significantly affect his post-6 ganking, and also his initiation ability.

Particularly if it does hurt his initiation, that gives you a reason to pick tank junglers over him.

My best guess is that J4 is still OP even if Cataclysm didn't make the crater at all.

I wholeheartedly disagree with you here. The crater adds a lot to J4's lockdown.

His early game is just fantastic in every regard, and we've known since the beginning of time that is what you want from a jungler.

Agreed, and I did mention in the OP that there are other places to nerf as well (shield slow, banner AS buff, Q armor shred - what if it just ignored % armor instead of shredding it?).

SmokingPuffin1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hyrum Graff,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=aqaJa6kE,comment-id=00010000000000000000000000000000,timestamp=2015-02-13T20:17:14.443+0000)

I think this change would significantly affect his pre-6 ganking, and also his initiation ability.

How would an R change affect his pre-6?

I wholeheartedly disagree with you here. The crater adds a lot to J4's lockdown.

To be clear, what I proposed was a gigantic nerf. One of the biggest nerfs to any champion ever. That's my point. J4 is crazy OP, as are the other current top tier junglers. We are not supposed to have junglers that are good at everything.

I don't actually think we should remove J4's crater, it's iconic and awesome. My point is that the scale of the problem with jungle balance today is huge. The gap between Jarvan and a pretty good jungler like say Aatrox or Kha'Zix is just massive.

Agreed, and I did mention in the OP that there are other places to nerf as well (shield slow, banner AS buff, Q armor shred - what if it just ignored % armor instead of shredding it?).

Right, of course. I mostly dislike your R proposal because it brings back a pile of known problems we had back in the day. Q not shredding armor is a much more likely to work plan in terms of actually repairing the OPness of J4.

Personally, I like the idea of J4 passive only working on champions. This pushes J4 away from farming so well and towards more dunking.

Hyrum Graff1 votes

{quoted}

How would an R change affect his pre-6?

Oops. I misspoke, meant post-6. Fixed now.

Right, of course. I mostly dislike your R proposal because it brings back a pile of known problems we had back in the day.

What problems? Having only played since summer 2013, I don't have quite the background as some people.

Personally, I like the idea of J4 passive only working on champions. This pushes J4 away from farming so well and towards more dunking.

Agreed, although I think I like it on Dragon and Baron.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

What problems? Having only played since summer 2013, I don't have quite the background as some people.

Overenthusiastic J4 ults killed teammates or prevented them from damaging the target fairly often. This is more about bad players than bad mechanics; back then nobody knew how to play.

Agreed, although I think I like it on Dragon and Baron.

Totally fine on the epic monsters.

Hyrum Graff1 votes

{quoted}

Overenthusiastic J4 ults killed teammates or prevented them from damaging the target fairly often. This is more about bad players than bad mechanics; back then nobody knew how to play.

If it was just bad players not knowing how to use J4, I wouldn't imagine it would be an issue now, given that people are familiar with him.

And, like, even if it is, I'm OK with that. It's what separates the good J4's from the bad ones. Like how an anivia wall could mean a clutch save... or it could mean certain death for your ally.

Knight Devout1 votes

ADC: flash out, kill J4. /thread

Hyrum Graff1 votes

If J4 saves his E-Q until after he ults, he can follow.

Vecuu1 votes

Just take away the Armor Pen from his Q.

Tada. Easy peasy. He gets to keep his utility, tankiness, and CC, but can no longer use the massive armor pen to make his passive hit like a lead brick against tanks.

Hyrum Graff1 votes

I think this is the second place I'd look to take power away, if not the change I proposed.

ChargeItDownMid1 votes

[deleted]

Hyrum Graff1 votes

I'm going to respectfully disagree. It certainly makes champs with mobility better against J4, but it also means that he won't be able to E-Q-R Ashe, get her flash, and then walk after her and kill her anyway.

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