Twisted Fate - In desperate need for a (small scale/gameplay only) rework

... and that's not because he's toxic. Nope, actually from what I have seen he seems pretty balanced, if not UP, to me. But the discussion her is not if he is OP, UP, viable or not. I don't really care about it in that case

Just got my free skin, Underworld TF, and decided to give him a go in teambuilder. Of course I'm no real pro or specialist, but I'm neither blind nor stupid. Playing feels just so... I don't know. Slow? Boring? It's kinda the same as with Taric right now - although not that bad. Taric's entire theme is a mess, but I'Ll save that for another thread. Also he's currently worked on so...

Ok let's break it down: you have two abilities you actually use in combat. Both feel so slow and underwhelming that it's laughable. Sure, you can get some damage out. Some. If everything goes well. Most of his potential vanish somewhere as hidden power, but not in something you "feel" when playing him - lets just add to that that sustained AP dps doesn't really look good in the current meta (as long you need longer than an adc to shoot someone down you'll NEVER be viable as things seem to be right now).

Also, what kind of plays can you make as twisted fate? Throw an auto attack you can't miss anyway? Or throw my slow ass triple card wich feels even more underwhelming? The only actual combo: load a gold card, jumpo through the ult and then Q afterwards. The rest of that is hoping that you'll survive with auto attacks until you can Q or W again. OR hoping that your team cleans up after you jump in.

I do realize that most of his power budget goes into the ult - but you can only get the full potential with a good team backing you up, so you get the full strategic value. My opinion: as long as you aren't a CC machine or a dedicated support you're kit shouldn't make you this reliant on your teammates.

The biggest problem is the difference in theme and how it translates into gameplay. He's suppsed to go into the "Mysterious stage magican" theme - mostly because he's a genius gambler who suddenly got magic powers. A criminal - but not in the Jinx-kind of way if you get what I mean. Honestly I love his theme, but right now it's executed horribly - well mostly because TF is a really old champ and back then Riot had still a lot to learn about Design.

So we got to the basic mix: stage magic (including card tricks) and shady tricks. Now, there's gotta be SOMETHING we can get out of this than this rather boring kit we have currently for him.

But I haven't made this post only to complain, I also got some ideas myself. The basic thoughts for this were:

1.) Get rid of that passive only E. Vi can have it because it synergizes well with her other abilities and she's an auto-attack champ anyway. Gnar has a total acess to six active abilities, so his passives are fine too. But on TF? Nope, get rid of that! Free attack speed is a horrible freestat and there are enough ways to compensate him for it. The stacking mechanic... well, if needed you can pack this in as effect somwhere else but it's just too clunky to use in my eyes.

2.) The ult: sorry folks, but it simply drains WAY too much of his possible power budget. Right now as it is it can be scrapped and be replaced with something that might be actually usefull while trading/duelling. Since his teleporting powers are actually canon I would be against removing the mechanic, but I would change it: Multiple teleports in a limited area. Imagine it like a magican setting the stage: his ult creates a wide AOE radius that allows him to teleport freely everywhere inside this "stage", recastable multiple times, but the teleport itself also takes a SHORT channel.

How this ties together with damage or other skills... I don't know, it's just a concept ^^ But aomehow THAT sound way more awesome than the ult he has now - and would be actually usefull in combat.

3.) The passive. Well. Gold. Sure, passive abilities don't need that much impact but this is like... he gets rewarded for CSing. A bit more than others. Somehow thats... lame.

My idea: since he's a gambler and trickster, why don't we have a passive that can steal tiny amouts of gold from the enemy champ? Not on every auto attack of course - but that alone would make him quite unique. Maybe we can put the staking mechanic from his current E on it and whenever you hit a enemy champ you steal an amout based on the number of stacks (can't affect the same enemy within X seconds, so you'll try to hit maximum stacks as much as possible - something that won't be easy if you have to CS at the same time AND the enemy is ranged. Also Tf's attack range is kinda meh anyways.).

4.)The Q: I honestly love the idea of throwing cards as a weapon. But have you guys ever thrown a card? That thing is FAST - and it has to be, especially when it's supposed to hurt. How about making it an ability that doesn't shoot 3 slow cards at once but one that throws 3 fast cards, but one after another, similiar to the irelia ult. Then you actually get the feeling of "throwing" cards...

5.) The W. No idea what to do with the three cards, but maybe I can come up with something later. Or you guys can think of something...

6.) We need a new, active ability to fill in as the new E. Now what could it be? More cards? Something else? Maybe something that goes more into the "magic trick" corner. How about a "curtain of cards" that works like a wind wall, but denies vision? This would give it the "now you see me, now you don't" magican kind of vibe. Of course it only gets a short duration, a tiny time window for the magican to prepare his next great trick - or just teleport out of it with the ult while making others think he's still there...

Especially on that new ability there is a lot of potential to get. So guys, what do you think?