Nexus Blitz: Some thoughts after Day 1

I hope this is the appropriate Board. I kind of wish this had its own Board, but whatever.

After playing quite a few games yesterday, I wanted to give my initial thoughts on Experimental Mode Nexus Blitz and some possible improvements. I will most likely play more today, so will be coming back to discuss further. Feel free to leave your thoughts, too!

Without further ado, here's my thoughts, in mostly no particular order.

General Feelings

Overall, I like the game mode and what its going for. Its a fresh experience from SR that still has some of the gameplay elements I enjoy (mainly, teamfights, skirmishes, just playing Champions in different contexts). I like that the games are shorter, but unlike a short game of SR, they don't feel unsatisfactory even if they're only ten minutes. SR still has some elements I like better, but Nexus Blitz is definitely giving me the shorter, faster, and slightly zany gameplay Riot was aiming for.

In general, I like the events. Although I have issues with some of them individually, I like the pacing they provide. They act almost like "objectives" on their own, and I like that. I also like the jungle viability provided by having two junglers. Some of the Champions I've tried are not even junglers on SR, but they work in a duo jungle environment. You can come up with some creative combos, and I look forward to experimenting more and seeing what other people try.

What I Think is Strong Right Now

Currently, there's no real "meta" developed and everyone sort of just picks what they want. But I have seen a handful of picks that seem quite good.

These two individually are pretty good in Nexus Blitz. The On-Fire mechanic allows Yasuo to shred people with his ult alone, especially since Yas is already kind of snowbally. Alistar's natural tankiness and CC makes him a great pick in the jungle with any damage dealer. But together, you get something really fun with some great high moments. Something I really like about this combo is that, individually, these two aren't viable in SR's jungle, but since they're allowed to jungle together, they make up for each other's horrible clear.

This is another pick that benefits from the On-Fire mechanic. Yi never really had a bad clear, but giving him a partner jungle means he has a potent 2v2 at Red. Add to that his resets and the ball of stats he gets from being On Fire, and he can really power through a team if they don't have a hard CC at the ready.

Although farming isn't exactly required in Nexus Blitz, the waveclear, zone control and most importantly tower-killing potential of Ziggs is pretty useful in this mode. One or two advantages can mean several towers with a Ziggs. He's not super strong, but I think he's a solid option with all of his zoning tools. His ult can really ruin a King of the Hill run, and he can basically use it from anywhere on the map due to its small size.

Kai'Sa has always been a solid jungler. Kai'Sa has always been a great bot lane ADC. In Nexus Blitz, she essentially gets the best of both worlds. She can jungle, but she can still have a support with her at all times. She's a great skirmisher and a solid team fighter, and her partner can provide the lockdown or peel she lacks. I've found that Pyke/Kai'Sa is a really scary combination, but someone like Alistar or Nunu(probably even better will be NewNew) can work here, too. I feel she's going to be really strong in this mode for a while.

On to some more focused feedback and problems.

Bushes

Bush placement in general feels fine. It was weird initially to have jungle camps have a blind path just on the other side of a bush, especially Blue buff, but its not the worst. However, the majority of the bushes are tiny. Having played mostly tanks and big Champions, it can be difficult to even fit your character in them. I haven't tried him yet, but I can't imagine someone like Cho'Gath trying to shove his girth into some of these side bushes. I can't tell you how many times I've seen I or somebody else completely miss the Blue buff bush with a ward: it feels slightly bigger than ward width and I think with just marginal size increase, the usability could be less annoying. You basically have to stand single file in these bushes, and some of them aren't even big enough to fit more than one person. It may be intentional, but at least don't make warding a headache.

Buff Positioning and General Map Feedback

Red buff is a really nice reward, especially on two people, but it feels so far out of the way. After the first one or two clears, it can be difficult to return to Red without the laners getting steamrolled. I like the interactions it forces early in the 2v2 jungling, but right now it feels unbalanced. You aren't rewarded for a faster clear and getting to Red first; if you start Red first, you will lose. It simply does too much damage and with two Smites per side, that's two opportunities for a Smite steal. Or they just kill you. So you end up camping in a bush for the enemy to show up on the map, you skirmish and half the time it ends in a draw and you all back. Feels like the faster junglers should get some kind of advantage, not get decimated by Red.

Blue buff has the opposite problem: its so difficult to take because its practically in the top lane. I like its proximity to lane, but I feel it could be a little bit further. Even with the lane pushed there's no guarantee you're getting it either, because its easily accessible through the top bush as well. You pretty much have to kill one or two people(preferably the junglers) and have a laner help burst it down to get Blue half the time, and there is NO chance of sneaking it.

Rift Herald...or...Blitz Herald?...it needs a new name, this isn't Summoner's Rift. Anyways, Rift Herald is the only one that feels really right, position-wise. Its right in the middle of the map, a lot of the events end up around here, you can sneak it, but its not so far out of the way that it feels like a chore to even do. It might need more reasons to even do it, as many times the event rewards are more than enough to push down lanes, but the positioning it good.

Overall, it feels like most of the jungle is too far out of the way. It could be that I'm just not used to it, but I feel loading all the camps on top of the map makes it too inconvenient for laners to come and help in many situations. There's this useless strip below bot lane that I always forget about, why not put a buff there? As it stands, there's not a ton of reasons to be in bot lane for the majority of the game. The events rarely center there, usually only Push the Cart and occasionally Loot Teemo pull you there.

Though, one thing I really like is the split lane and the Death Bush between them. I'm feeling like an ideal meta might be two laners who stay mainly in top or bot, and a floater who goes where he's needed. When its time to take Blue, its the floater's job to be top to help pressure. This is mostly speculation, but I like how easy it is to wander between both lanes. It feels really good for Champions like Bard, Talon, Kayn (and maybe Zac, I haven't tried or seen him yet) since they can bypass Death Bush and switch lanes with ease. This is really cool and I hope something else is done with the bottom side of the map to ensure the bot lane half remains important.

Then there's the issue of visual clarity. Nexus Blitz doesn't have the same guiding curvature and design that SR has. I chalk that up to it being essentially a test mockup, but things like more distinct jungle tower range indication using the environment, again, the bushes, or even the point at which the two lanes join could be improved.

Quick Thoughts on the On-Fire Mechanic

Other than events, which I'll get to next, On-Fire is really what makes Nexus Blitz stand out from SR. On SR, kills themselves don't matter as much, only the advantages they give. Knocking someone to low health can often achieve the same goal as killing them if you're contesting a dragon or something. This is less true in Nexus Blitz, and that's thanks to On-Fire. It makes the game mode more about fights and killing, while still having the familiar win condition of "Kill Nexus".

I generally like On-Fire, I think the stats it gives, while totally broken, are the whole point. You want to be as bloodthirsty as possible in this mode, and this will help you kill even more, and most importantly help you win events. Champions like Jinx who are pretty unusable in this mode, become somewhat viable because this buff boosts them to their insane lategame. The drawback of receiving more damage is a great idea for a drawback, though I think as it stands, the damage increase could be a little higher for how much you get from it.

Events

As I mentioned earlier, I like events and I think this makes the game mode distinct from SR or TT. That said, I still have some issues with them. For one, they seem to be somewhat randomly timed. The first event happens around 4-6 minutes into the game, but I have yet to figure out the timing logic. I guess there isn't supposed to be, its supposed to be a random element, but I think the mode would benefit from having more fixed times. Let the events themselves be the random factor. I think the mode could be improved by treating events like an "objective" to take down, something that you back and return, save your ult, and otherwise prepare for. This makes it more strategic and less like Doombots, which is supposed to be crazy, stupid, unstrategizable fun. I think having the first event at 5 minutes, then every other event 5 minutes after the end of the last would give the mode some structure.

Sudden Death is my LEAST favorite event. I understand the desire for some kind of Sudden Death to keep things short, but this is not the way to do it. Having the Nexus become sentient, I guess, feels bad, because theoretically it requires no player input for someone to randomly win. They just wail on each other and eventually one will out-push the other due to random chance. Even with players involved, it basically becomes "Welp, the rest of the game barely matters, win this last teamfight and you basically win." Champions like Pyke can even hook them and it just feels wrong. Its like when Poppy could shove Baron around the map and into the fountain, such an important objective shouldn't be able to be manipulated like this. Remember when Poro King would get frustrating because the King was an idiot sometimes? He would just walk into the enemy and die? Well, it feels sort of like that, except you don't lose an important minion, you lose THE GAME. I would rather Sudden Death see the Nexuses moved closer, like they replace the jungle towers or something, but remain Nexuses meaning you still have to strategize. It just feels like something as important as the game-winning condition shouldn't be reduced to something as unimportant as a big minion.

Push the Cart, King of the Hill and Bardle Royale are all fine. They are fun, zone control minigames that do their job in forcing players to interact with each other and teamfight. I like escorting a Payload in League, feels like it could be its own mode if it were fleshed out a billion times more.

I also like Snowball Fight. Its much different from the others, which mainly involve zone control or just straight up fighting, and is pretty skill-based. It makes longer range, poke Champions--particularly with long range CC--actually have a use in this mode. I also like that this event encourages you NOT to fight, but rewards staying back and poking. I like events that promote a variety of playstyles, and I think the mode could use a few more events like this for the sake of variety.

Loot Teemo I'm pretty meh on. It feels like he tends to run more towards one side of the map and generally favor one team. There's no rhyme or reason, he just will randomly favor one team and there's not much player input regarding this. He also gives way too much money considering mostly one team will get to hit him over and over. When I heard it was Teemo, I expected him to have some stealth mechanic, like the old "Hide and Seek" game mode people used to play on Dominion. That might be a little more interesting to hunt for Teemo than to just get lucky and glomp him.

Event Rewards

The Blitzcrank Hooks feel like they hurt more than they help a lot of times. Several times I have seen ill-timed Blitz hooks help the enemy to chase rather than hurt them. Getting this feels like a rip-off, especially since the other rewards are so insanely good. If Riot wants to do more zany weird rewards like this, that's fine, but there needs to be more of them. Otherwise, this one feels out of place since the other rewards are just flat out extremely good in every situation.

Ocean buff and Guardian Angels are good. Ocean buff helps with staying power and Guardian Angel makes you think about how you can push this advantage while you still have a free revive, usually resulting in a dive. They are strong, but can still be played against by the enemy. BF shield is similar to Guardian Angels in terms of what advantage it brings, except you don't have to time anything because it lasts forever. It basically means the BF shield team is going to win the next fight no matter when it happens, so they might as well rush Rift Herald because what is the other team going to do? They don't even have the "revive animation" grace period of a GA to take someone out of the fight for a moment. I think BFS might need a nerf of some kind, either limited time, less shield, something.

That's nothing compared to the Catapult however. By far the most influential reward, it makes any advantage that the enemy gets from winning a fight pretty slim, since respawn timers are short and now you don't even have to walk back to lane, you just launch to basically anywhere on the map. (I haven't tested it, but I'm pretty sure you can launch to the enemy base even). It's like having a Symmetra teleporter: having an easy way back after death makes your team's uptime far higher than the other team can keep up with. I think, like Symmetra's teleporter, it needs limited uses, or a limited time. It definitely needs a nerf.

Some Quick UI Thoughts

Strangely absent are buff timers on the Tab screen. I also think, if event timers become more uniform as I suggested, a timer for event spawns would help here, too. Finally, since On-Fire is such an important status to keep track of, it would be nice if an On-Fire Champion's Tab portrait lit on fire to indicate this, a la Overwatch.

Conclusion

Thanks to those who read or at least skimmed through this long, rambly feedback post. If you're reading this for a tl;dr, feel free to skip to sections you actually care about or have something to say. Or just leave your own thoughts without reading. Either way, I'd love to hear others' experiences. I'm having fun with Nexus Blitz, and I believe it has potential, but it has a long way to go. Hopefully this feed back can help even a little bit.