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Item Problem Series; Thornmail

Cherysse··6 votes·646 views

http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/leagueoflegends/images/4/4f/Thornmail_item.png/revision/latest?cb=20130731234542 Thornmail!

Hey guys! Thanks for following I've heard all of your feedback and I think that with the new suggestions I've found a way to make Thornmail great again, without being OP, and adding counter play to it and the need for it to actually require skill, also removing the fantasy that if you are tanky enough and you stand still, anyone who attacks you will die a horrible death.

Ok, I think you all have noticed that currently this item is a big Lakcluster, it is only good against champs that go on-hit way too much (cough Kog'Maw cough), and you must HOPE that they do not build either magic resistance or life steal, because it renders this item totally useless. I must say I'm ok with it adding +100 armor and being only an armor item, the problem is that it currently isn't doing it's job, it isnt even mitigating life steal, actually it has almost no job to fulfill and you must have +500 or +600 armor for it to deal the same damage it did before.

Solutions?

FIRST: make the item scale with LEVEL, but make it scale really lowly, like from 15 initial damage to 40 at level 18, so that it doesnt go crazy on champs like Rammus or Malph, actually, so that it doesn't go crazy on anyone, and so that it isn't useless at all by itself. Finally, make it deal 2-3% of the enemy max life as damage (capped against monsters of course), in this way we wont be seeing HUGE chunks of life go away from the enemy, but we will be able to see the impact of it.

SECOND: remove the fantasy of kill-yourself-why-are-you-hitting-yourself? from the item, make it impossible for it to kill enemy champions, so that it does no longer deal damage to champions below 20% of their max life, one of the things that made Thornmail hard to balance was that it made enemy attackers kill themselves by almost standing still.

I believe the key is in fixing those things that make it hard to balance without destroying the item totally.

A) Make it a more tanky item without increasing it's total armor: add a new passive that reduces damage from auto attacks and on-hit effects by X amount based on LEVEL, caps at 30 damage reduction cant reduce more than 40% of the damage received -to avoid rendering monster attacks and on-hit effects meaningless.

B) Make it deal TRUE damage: self explained, I think it is enough for this item to be already countered by life steal, and it is countered a lot, if you add magic resistance to the formula and the fact that most tanks have 0 magic penetration then you can understand the disaster. With the changes implemented as first and second I believe it would hardly take huge chunks of life out of the enemy as it did before, and by taking it's capacity to kill it makes it more balanced and does no longer rewards champs for just being a bulk and standing still, if they want to kill they must move.

C) Add an active to it: doubles the reduction from tanky passive (remember it still can't reduce more than 40% of the damage received) and enemies that hit you also receive the Bleeding Thorns debuff for 3 seconds, reducing only self-heal on the target by 50%, it stacks multiplicatively with Grieveous Wounds, so that at the end the enemy may only get 25% of it's healing from Life Steal or any self-healing effect, the active lasts for 6 seconds. (60 seconds cooldown). The active still applies even if Thornmail doesn't deal damage (when the enemy falls below 20% of their life, and thornmail stops doing damage).

D) Increase its Cost: add a new item component to it that has the damage reflection passive but in a weaker state, by increasing it's slot efficiency and utility we should also be paying more for it, as it is already a fairly cheap item (2350), I think it would be ok to pay 2750 gold for it, or 3k if we want something fancy like cooldown reduction on it or another fancy stat like movement speed (wich would be good to reach targets).

I think that by applying 3 of these 4 solutions we can restore Thornmail to it's glory without being OP.

If you liked this review just hit like, if you don't hit dislike. Tell me what you think and if you believe there is an item that needs a buff or a nerf.

[slayer-jinx-catface]

10 Comments

Spoofghoul4 votes

thornmail could definitely use some love

it's crap right now

maybe if riot added 2+ 1x level base return damage in true damage it be better

and maybe soemthign which applies grievous wounds for 1 second on being attacked

and then it would be alot better already

Cherysse1 votes

Except in Taric, Rammus and Malph, wich abuse the hell out of the item.

Spoofghoul2 votes

well thornmail is supposed to counter adc's

rammus is supposed to counter adc's

counter + counter is supercounter?

maybe not pick 3 adc's and its k?

Cherysse1 votes

True, but I mean, the item is not good when it is only useful like in 3 champs.

Spoofghoul2 votes

well thats true

but thats the problem right there riot didnt want it to be a one stop wonder to counter all basic attack based champions before you could buy get 100 armor and return 30% of the damage back then it was a solid item

its not like malphite or rammus''abuse the item'' becuase it only really works on them currently if it gets buffed then yea

but that has to do with the armor scaling it has, only champs who can get to 500+ armor can really use the item to reasonable effect, and currently stacking armor is plain dumb because everyone has loads of armorpen & shred available Black cleaver reduces armor so its deals less return damage then mercurial has mr to block the rest of it the item is completely innefecive right now even if you stack armor which you shouldn't

so either this could be different forms of scaling like health in which case you could argue its roughly effective for all tanks, juggernauts and heavy fighters because they all get a decently sized healthpool eventually

Like 20% return damage physical damage and 2 + level true damage and 2,5% health magical damage or something

that be effective and difficult to itemize against because its 3 types of damage, considering someone has 4k hp he would deal 20% return damage physical 20 true damage and 100 magical

Cherysse1 votes

It all should be true damage, tanks use no penetration whatsoever and they souldnt be worrying about getting it, the same for item 3068 items, but it is another topic, the thing is that it needs to be changed, and the 100% armor pen issue should be addressed, armor is kinda pointless except during the early game.

Spoofghoul1 votes

well,

i dont know if it all should be true damage, because then you can't counterbuild it in the least im okay with people goign out of their buildpaths into a non optimal build to kind of counter you, but not completely ofc. building 1 mr item should not make thornmail and sunfire useless

Perhaps what can be done in such cases is to make the damage from these items ignore a percent of resistances kind of like how gangplanks barrels work like maybe the greater value between 20 and 20% so they are at least somewhat effective. or have a base value true damage like 2+ level

but i do think armor should be adressed, there are alot of champions with innate penetration or shred XinZhao Kayle Darius Corki MonkeyKing for example and then there are champions with true damage dps Vayne MasterYi Fiora And there is also alot of % damage in the game too

so there are alot of things which counters tanks already and all they have is armor to protect themselfes but then all these champions get to counter this armor.

Honestly though tanks could use a few band aid fixes to their items but i think they need an update in general to their kits and itemization

Cherysse1 votes

What needs an updapte are those champs and items that are rendering armor useless, because if you update tanks then all of those champs that don't have an anti tank component will suffer the most and will be thrown out of the meta.

Spoofghoul1 votes

good point i imagine armorpen would be a part of the update

perhaps those champions and any sort of shred would then penetrate bonus armor and tanks would get high base armor

maybe even items which increase base armor scaling with bonus or base health or something or perhaps an armor which makes debuffs last alot shorter so you can get rid of shred faster

i really dont know how to fix it exactly but i do think tanks shouldn't have their itemization be completely made useless by armorpen/armorshred

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

Except in Taric, Rammus and Malph, wich abuse the hell out of the item.

is is why i said its better to make the passive scale with health.

but level scaling for the flat damage return + true damage makes sense aswell. it would probably work even better. i think additionally it should have an active that makes the damage apply grievous wounds. or to double the effect for a short duration.

and thats basically it. from there on it would be just a matter of balancing the numbers on the actual damage return.

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