What exactly is the drawback on ressourceless champions?

Raoul·Oct 2, 2017·40 votes·8,310 views

Not talking about energy, at least they are kinda limited, I talk about champions like etc.

Those who have absolutely no limitation on their abilities, no ressources to manage, nothing.

By all logic, they should have a drawback to mana users, right? Just that, in this game, they dont.

They dont pay with long Cooldowns, they are average at best, while some even have very low Cooldowns.

So, do they deal less damage? Nope, they do good damage, especially lategame...

Mobility? CC? Nope, they have it all.

So what exactly do they give up for having the advantage of being able to spam all their skills? Especially in lane thats a giant advantage over mana using enemys, who might be able to trade at first, but at some point run oom and are at your mercy.

164 Comments

Buzzkillington0Oct 2, 201739 votes

Kled is not the best example as his courage is a very important resource and his cooldowns are not that low. His Q has 9 seconds cd when mounted and 20 seconds between recharges when dismounted at lvl 1 (scales with Kled's level). His W is his main trading tool but not the first ability to get maxed and its cooldown at the first level is 14 seconds. It's much harder to trade and gain courage without it. It's not a very reliable ability in the laning phase when you are trying to cs and you can't control when you trigger it as you do so. His E also has a 14 second cd and his ult has 160 second cd. I can't talk about the other champions but Kled seems pretty fair

Velzard of KozOct 3, 20172 votes

Kled isn't good example especially since he literally IS limited by resourcelessness. When low on HP, only good Kled player can afford being cockier, the rest basically loses three crucial abilities for one not ideal enough to consider it no limutation at all. Not to mentoin he can't even freely jump from unmounted form to mounted should he lose Skaarl twice in brawl.

So the resourcelessness itself has limitation even without considering his CDs.

RiotNot SurrenderingOct 3, 201732 votes

Some is itemisation; eg. Kat or Vlad don't build Morello even though they'd like to.

Others are that the champion usually pays tradeoffs for being manaless and have strengths and weaknesses associated with it. eg. Resourceless ranged harrass is usually good early game, but mana becomes a non-gate late game and so its relative value decreases over game time. This is essentially declaring that we want the champion to be good early game.

DeadUnbornOct 3, 201732 votes

What would you say is Yasuo's trade-off specifically for being resourceless?

You already mentioned stuff like mana builds not being as efficient on Yasuo (he does fine because he builds around it and has historically been unhealthy when he builds Triforce). I am more curious (genuinely) about the specific trade-offs that Yasuo "pays" for being manaless, therefore justifying him lacking a mana bar.

WhatAGeiniusOct 3, 20175 votes

I know that hating Yasuo is big meme big boyz but he's genuinely probably the best resourceless design in the entire game. His abilities aren't tied to a resource, but they're all gated in other ways (aside from windwall and it at least has a really long cooldown.)

And the big trade-off Yasuo makes is sacrificing control. He can't decide when to use his shield, and it's easy to force him to waste it by just poking him with an autoattack. To use his tornado, he has to land two Qs and he has to use it almost immediately because his Q stacks don't last very long especially since they got nerfed. Furthermore, to stack his Q in lane he has to push the wave. His E gives him a lot of mobility, but only situationally and only ever in the direction of the enemy, and it also forces him to push the wave which he really doesn't want to do because if the enemy's minions are under tower, he has nothing to use his E on. His ultimate has the huge limitation that it can only be used on an airborne enemy, which means that a significant amount of the time he basically just has 3 abilities.

Compare this to someone like Riven who is a really, really shit design for a resourceless character. All of her abilities are on-demand. They have no restrictions other than cooldowns (and her cooldowns barely even matter these days considering that virtually every item in the entire fucking game gives CDR now). She doesn't concede any control to her opponent like Yasuo does and she doesn't have any real windows of opportunity like he does because all she has to care about are her (not very long) cooldowns and her abilites have no conditional power.

DeadUnbornOct 3, 201719 votes

I'm asking about the intended trade-offs for him being manaless and I'd like to keep the conversation in that direction.

He can activate his ult with all displacements, not just knock-ups. Because he also has a reliable way to knock people up by himself (E+Q combo), the condition to activate it is not tied to him being manaless in my opinion. Most champions require certain criteria for their ults to be effective (Veigar has to land his combo to kill a target, Olaf needs to be fighting against CC for the ult to be effective, Tahm needs someone to go inside him to get the most value out of his ult, Jhin needs the targets to be low health). Yes, Yasuo's Ult is tied to a condition, but that condition is not a "cost" for him being manaless.

The same goes for the rest of his kit btw, Rakan, Jax, Braum, Xin Zao, Fizz and Vi have conditional mobility but they use mana. Most champions that have AoE on their kits push wave when trading but they use mana. Tristana pushes wave for CSing even if she doesn't want to and she uses mana. Therefore pushing wave for trading and CSing is not a manaless scpefiic "cost" for being manaless.

Lastly, you say his empowered Q --where a chunk of his damage you propose -- comes from is tied to the condition of proking Q twice beforehand. Well Azir needs to use first W to use his abilities, Le Blanc needs to land a spell for the next one to be empowered,** Annie needs to use FOUR spells to get the most value out of them**, Veigar needs to land his E in order to land his W. Therefore, this type of constrain is not a cost that is paid specifically just by manaless champions

EDIT: Sorry forgot the shield proking when you don't want it to: Malzahar, Rakan, Sejuani, Galio, Malphite, Anivia and Volibear all use mana

WhatAGeiniusOct 3, 20172 votes

Okay? I never said anything about all of those conditions being specific to Yasuo. It doesn't matter that not every champion that shares one of those conditions is also manaless.

There doesn't have to be any one specific trade-off that comes exclusively from being manaless. Not requiring mana is just part of a champions power budget. Yasuo has drawbacks for being resourceless. Just because other champions that aren't resourceless have one or more similar drawbacks as a part of their power budget doesn't mean that he isn't still paying for that as a part of his

Also, just to address the points about Yasuo's kit, I'm aware that his ult activates off of any displacement. That's why I said "airborne" (which is what the ability itself calls it) and not "knock-up." You say he has a reliable way to get a knockup by himself, but he doesn't, because he still has to get his Q stacks before he can do his E-Q (and his E-Q actually isn't guaranteed to land, his dash goes a fixed distance that is longer than the radius of E-Q and he also has to wait for his dashing animation, so it is absolutely possible for it to whiff.)

Also there are other champions that require certain criteria for their ults to be used to their greatest effectiveness, but few that require them to be used at all, even sub-optimally.

You say that this isn't a cost for him being manaless, but as I previously stated, it absolutely is. Just because other champions make the same trade-off for different benefits does not mean that it isn't still a trade-off.

You go on to point out how other champs share one of his drawbacks, looking at each one in a vacuum instead of seeing how all of Yasuo's drawbacks cumulatively affect him. Yes, other champs have conditional mobility, other champs are forced to push the wave when they don't want to, other champs use stacking mechanics, etc. But the combination of these things on Yasuo (rather than just looking at each one individually and how "oh X champ also has this one drawback") forces him to concede a lot of control to his opponent if he wants to be able to use all of his abilities, and it leaves him with meaningful windows of opportunity despite not having to worry about mana attrition.

DeadUnbornOct 3, 201712 votes

did you really need the wall of text?

Galio, Shen and Kalista need allies to activate their ults and they all use a resources bar.

I'm not debating the E+Q combo as a tool to use ult, it is very reliable. you and I both know it (reliable =/= 100% accuracy)

You talk about Yasuo having meaningful window of opportunity to be traded with (that being his cost for power budget). as well as him ceding control to his opponent. Yet on mid lane (his intended lane during design) he beats around 70% of all mages, and actually is really dominant during laning phase given how short his CDs are and his ability to mitigate damage with his passive and W (which costs his opponent mana and pushes him out of lane). If anything it is the opponent who cedes cotnrol, as they have no kill pressure on Yasuo and have to focus on using their mana to farm and push wave back

WhatAGeiniusOct 3, 20171 votes

Galio, Shen and Kalista need allies to activate their ults and they all use a resources bar.

It's almost like you didn't pay attention at all. I doesn't matter if you can point to another champ that has a similar drawback. That disadvantage is still a disadvantage.

I'm not debating the E+Q combo as a tool to use ult, it is very reliable. you and I both know it (reliable =/= 100% accuracy)

It's fairly reliable but it's not at all guaranteed. You have to be able to get in dashing range of someone to be able to use it and the animation of his dash as well as the very lengthy animation of his spin leaves him pretty vulnerable to getting CC'd by a teammate, which prevents him from ulting (anyone who has played Yasuo for any extended period of time will have had this happen to them very often.) And again, you also still have to have gotten your 2 stacks to begin with and they can't have expired, which dramatically reduces it's reliability.

You talk about Yasuo having meaningful window of opportunity to be traded with (that being his cost for power budget). as well as him ceding control to his opponent. Yet on mid lane (his intended lane during design) he beats around 70% of all mages, and actually is really dominant during laning phase given how short his CDs are and his ability to mitigate damage with his passive and W (which costs his opponent mana and pushes him out of lane). If anything it is the opponent who cedes cotnrol, as they have no kill pressure on Yasuo and have to focus on using their mana to farm and push wave back

That's largely because most mage players don't actually try to play around him. They just play like they were fighting another mage, expecting to be able to casually harass him at their leisure and fish for a kill combo all day long. People don't exploit any of his downtime because they don't change their playstyle to combat him, and mages don't have the numbers to just flex him to death regardless like many toplaners do.

Also you'll notice that Yasuo doesn't do very well at higher levels of play. This is precisely because he isn't very reliable and his kit is easy to exploit if you actually understand how to manipulate the wave and pay attention to when he's weak (I.E. no Q stacks, minions near your tower, recently popped shield etc.) which again, the vast majority of people who play the game just don't.

DeadUnbornOct 3, 201712 votes

I knew you would eventually deviate the conversations away from mana costs.... anyhow:

1.- I understood you perfectly, but still think is a fair point to make regardless. You want specifics? I'll give you them:

Galio is a melee champ that goes mid/top
Galio W is only effective against magic damage (melee vs ranged W for Yasuo)
Galio can have his shield proc'd without him wanting to.
Galio has 1 mobility spell that is not reliable to escape as it has a long animation
Galio's CC isn't reliable as it has a long wind-up
Galio pushes lane without wanting to when trading with his opponent/farming
Galio needs an ally to ult
Galio USES mana

do Kalista and Shen yourself, you'll find the similies with Yasuo hilariously similar if you are honest with yourself

2.- I'm not arguing in circles number 2. If you look at the win rates by game length for Yasuo you will see what you are saying in the grand scheme of things doesn't hold up

3.-Ugh, I really hate that argument -- I really don't know if the "just proc the shield", "just bait his wind wall" or that one is the worst. Please tell me how I am supposed to play around Yasuo as a mage like Ziggs, Xerath or Lux.

Alternatively, the higher you go the less win rate Yasuo has because you severely compromise damage distribution by having an AD mid trying to siege. You can't compare highly coordinated play to regular Solo Q --it is pears and apples.

MelledoneusOct 3, 20175 votes

{quoted}

I knew you would eventually deviate the conversations away from mana costs.... anyhow:

1.- I understood you perfectly, but still think is a fair point to make regardless. You want specifics? I'll give you them:

Galio is a melee champ that goes mid/top

Galio W is only effective against magic damage (melee vs ranged W for Yasuo)

Galio can have his shield proc'd without him wanting to.

Galio has 1 mobility spell that is not reliable to escape as it has a long animation

Galio's CC isn't reliable as it has a long wind-up

Galio pushes lane without wanting to when trading with his opponent/farming

Galio needs an ally to ult

Galio USES mana

do Kalista and Shen yourself, you'll find the similies with Yasuo hilariously similar if you are honest with yourself

Will do.

Shen is a melee champion that goes top and sometimes jungle
Shen's W is only effective against auto attacks, and only for 1.5 seconds
Shen cannot control where his W is properly
Shen has one mobility spell that is also his CC, and costs almost half his energy bar
Shen's CC isn't reliable as his dash can be interrupted by displacements and also sidestepped
Shen has trouble pushing lanes before he gets Titanic Hydra
Shen needs an ally to ult
Shen uses immense amounts of energy on every cast
Shen has his damage tied to a reverse-skillshot that is bound to his positioning

DeadUnbornOct 3, 20172 votes

Alternatively:

Shen has a W that counters one specific kind of attacks (autos) vs Yasuo's projectiles
Shen Q requires 3 "casts" to get the most use out of it
Shen Q requires a condition (being behind the target) to get the most damage out of it
Yes actually you are right, Shen's mobility spell is worse, yet it requires energy
Shen requires an ally to use his ult, Yasuo doesn't, yet Shen requires energy
Sometimes procs his shield passive without wanting to

I don't know if you are trying to support my argument or counter it XD

Now Kalista (wasn't she made by the same guy?)

High conditional mobility
Requires an ally to get the maximum potential out of her kit
Needs an ally to Ult
Most of the power in the champ's kit is tied to a condition in its kit (Yasuo's knock up vs sticking on target for rend)

Kalista uses mana

MelledoneusOct 3, 20171 votes

Supporting it.

Also, Stand United (Shen's ultimate) has no cost. Just wanted to clear that up.

DtimeDOct 3, 20172 votes

{quoted}

Supporting it.

Also, Stand United (Shen's ultimate) has no cost. Just wanted to clear that up.

True friendship has no price

MelledoneusOct 3, 20173 votes

https://media.giphy.com/media/3ohzdDtMIVU6QgH39u/giphy.gif?noredirect

Sad TyrantOct 4, 20171 votes

with Xerath, his Q is a Laser, not a projectile, so is his W. so they ignore the wind wall. save E until yas engages, it may be a shit 0.5 stun but it will let you gain distance. his Ult is also not block-able by Yasuo if you have the distance.

and that's essentially how you play Xerath against Yasuo

DeadUnbornOct 4, 20172 votes

Pffff hahaha ya sure, as long as yasuo has winwall up you are never lading E on him (which is always). Moreso fighting against a competent yasuo it is impossible to land Xerath's Q because yasuo can dodge it with his E... and even if you did lan the Xerath Q Yasuo can mitigate it with his shield. Before you say "Xerath only needs to walk up and proc yasuo's shield with an auto" let me explain that as soon as Xerath does that Yasuo will jump on him and outrade him

Teridax68Oct 3, 201710 votes

[{quoted}](name=Trading Stance,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=eGYodX57,comment-id=000b,timestamp=2017-10-03T03:18:03.775+0000)

eg. Resourceless ranged harrass is usually good early game, but mana becomes a non-gate late game and so its relative value decreases over game time.

As an aside, doesn't this also imply that mana on items itself becomes less valuable over time? Sure, there are mana scalings on items and some champion kits, but because mana becomes less and less of a gate, purchasing mana also becomes less innately valuable as champions level up. In this respect, is there an official compensation in place for how mages lose some of the relative value of their items as matches progress?

It Hertz When IPOct 3, 20173 votes

I gathered that mana becomes a non-gate late game BECAUSE mages have completed mana items by then.

Teridax68Oct 3, 20174 votes

Many more champions besides mages are mana users, though, and they all tend to not have mana issues at all come late game, even when they don't opt into mana itemization. Aside from supports, though, mages are the only champions pushed to invest heavily in mana-related stats with Morellonomicon and Catalyst items. Considering how their itemization is already unpopular, the feeling of having to invest gold into a stat that loses relative value over time may not be the best either.

LordGeovanniOct 3, 20172 votes

Vlad wont build morello because he can scale his damage off of health Kat has nothing like that stopping her because morello is just slot effeicnet even without the mana elements.

VlädïmïrOct 3, 20173 votes

This is flawed logic. AP scalings in his kit are drastically higher than HP scaling.

By building AP, you gain a significant amount of HP that also scales your E's damage further.

PennsOct 3, 20176 votes

Hm trading stance.. are you who i think you are? lul

Also https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OF0iyJ7ykpU opieop

InfernapeOct 3, 20177 votes

I've done that on both Vlad and Morde. Morello is overloaded as fuck.

PoskeOct 3, 20178 votes

Vladimir doesnt build Morello ?

I guess those few high elo vladimirs I saw built it by an accident

Seriously even non mana champions build Morello. This ll even get magnified once we get new runes due to cdr choises being underwelming. Lets face it vlad ownt be getting any cdr in runes so might aswell build morelo

Best princess EUOct 3, 20175 votes

malicious metal buys it on morde

riot is extremely naive about morello

AirKingNeoOct 3, 20172 votes

riot is extremely naive about everything

XxxLumberJackxxXOct 3, 20175 votes

[{quoted}](name=Trading Stance,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=eGYodX57,comment-id=000b,timestamp=2017-10-03T03:18:03.775+0000)

Some is itemisation; eg. Kat or Vlad don't build Morello even though they'd like to.

Others are that the champion usually pays tradeoffs for being manaless and have strengths and weaknesses associated with it. eg. Resourceless ranged harrass is usually good early game, but mana becomes a non-gate late game and so its relative value decreases over game time. This is essentially declaring that we want the champion to be good early game.

Morello being mandatory is the only reason its a 'non gate' and it STILL is a gate in poke/siegin/teamfighting. Please riot stop saying it isn't an issue lategame. Its really annoying. Do I need to write an essay as to why?

VlädïmïrOct 3, 20173 votes

Umm...Vlad does build morello's in some cases. lol

Depends on what you're going for.

Blue Moon WolfOct 3, 20173 votes

I don't know if resourceless harass being good early game and becoming less noticeable by late game since mana isn't a an issue is a real tradeoff. Now if you said they don't scale up in damage as much as resource champs do late game or Resourceless champs don't have any real utility, I could see THAT as a tradeoff, but it feels like they just plain get an advantage early game that slowly gets worse over time till they are on level with resource champs. If the champs strength is early game, then late game they should be weak, correct? Maybe the question isn't so much "what is the trade off for being resourceless" and more "what is the advantage of having mana" and by "advantage of having mana", I don't mean being able to use items like item 3004 item 3001 or item 3165 without wasted stats, cause honestly I don't see that as an advantage when those items are less powerful because they give mana (in other words, the mana isn't a free ad on, power is taken away from the item to put mana in it). If a resourceless champ has an advantage early game, then mana champs should have an advantage late game.

Colgate GatorOct 3, 20174 votes

[{quoted}](name=Trading Stance,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=eGYodX57,comment-id=000b,timestamp=2017-10-03T03:18:03.775+0000)

Some is itemisation; eg. Kat or Vlad don't build Morello even though they'd like to.

Others are that the champion usually pays tradeoffs for being manaless and have strengths and weaknesses associated with it. eg. Resourceless ranged harrass is usually good early game, but mana becomes a non-gate late game and so its relative value decreases over game time. This is essentially declaring that we want the champion to be good early game.

Could you really say with a straight face that Riven (or any other manaless AD bruiser for that matter) suffers from itemisation issues?

Zero Skill TankOct 3, 20174 votes

They don't build an item because they would need to pay for what they already have for free (i.e. better access to abilities).

I can't see how this is any real disadvantage.

BârdOct 3, 201713 votes

They pay for it in other ways. Riven is forced to build glass cannon to be useful, yet is melee range. She's like Yi, but with less in the way of defense and DPS, and more burst.

Kled turns into a shitty midget at half health, easily shut down by jungle pressure, and is useless when behind.

RekSai generally doesn't do all that much past the early game. She has mediocre damage/CC, an unreliable ultimate, and mobility that is easily predicted.

Tychusfindlay918Oct 3, 201710 votes

{quoted}

They pay for it in other ways. is forced to build glass cannon to be useful, yet is melee range. She's like Yi, but with less in the way of defense and DPS, and more burst.

turns into a shitty midget at half health, easily shut down by jungle pressure, and is useless when behind.

generally doesn't do all that much past the early game. She has mediocre damage/CC, an unreliable ultimate, and mobility that is easily predicted.

Riven is fucking obnoxious but that's only because it's SUPER easy for her to get max cdr nowadays. I am certain she was balanced around not getting so much cdr so quickly.

LordGeovanniOct 3, 201711 votes

Glass cannon with a 2 second down time on E i think not.

Anu3isIIOct 3, 20172 votes

CC destroys her and, compared to Yi, silences and snares are enough to destroy her.

Blue Moon WolfOct 3, 20175 votes

She's like Yi, but with less in the way of defense

AOE stun, Shield dash and mini dashes on Q vs one healing ability that roots Yi, can get hard CC'd and costs mana to use. I think I'd know which one I'd want. as for her being a glass cannon, I've seen a Riven build item 3071 item 3812 item 3142 item 3814 (back when it had MR) item 3026 item 3047 and be both the heaviest damage dealer AND nigh unkillable.

BârdOct 3, 20172 votes

Most of those aren't defense.

It's a shield dash vs invulnerability and healing/damage reduction.

statelesskillerOct 4, 20172 votes

black cleaver gives health (WHICH IS DEFENSIVE) deaths dance damage reduction which combined with her low CD shields that blocks most of the bleed makes her REALLY hard to kill especially when combined with its spellvamp, the youmoos also increases her survivability by allowing her shield more often and the ad from it gives her bigger shields (which increases her survivability in 2 ways. the ad scaling shield is silly). the edge of night allows her to eat a cc for free, and guardian angel gives her armor needed to eat damage and gives her ad (ad which makes her shield bigger, and of course the armor makes her shield even more valuable)

BârdOct 4, 20172 votes

You overestimate these things.

Cleaver gives 400 health. Unless you back that up with other tank items, you're still not durable.

Riven's shield is pretty good, but it's duration isn't; only 1.5 seconds. This means that you can only block half the duration of the DD bleed. Add onto that how Rivens tend to use it for target access or animation cancelling, and that shield won't be there to block quite a lot of damage.

Riven deals AOE damage almost exclusively (with the exception of her basic attacks), meaning DD heals her for less.

Edge of Night is trash after its nerf, so nobody builds it anymore. A short spell shield is not worth compromising your build.

GA gives 30 armor (only 15 before it's completed). That's about as much as ninja tabi. Solid, but there's not enough HP elsewhere in the build to make that armor really valuable.

Voluug13Oct 3, 20176 votes

''Glass cannon'' lmao

Nothing that has a low cd, no resource shieldash that scales with the very ''glass cannon'' stat that she stacks in the first place.

And no, RekSai had to be nerfed just like Yasuo, because she had kit too strong to be resourceless.

Ariel the CruelOct 3, 201711 votes

None. Champions are resourceless by default. Excluding a select few who have resources specifically built around their kit. https://dawngate.gamepedia.com/media/dawngate.gamepedia.com/b/bf/Sakari_Avatar.png?version=db6ae7b7ce2fe7ff0b3d5cd48fd6950f

. . . Oh wait. This isn't Dawngate. Where am I!? (RiP)

MordepoolOct 3, 20173 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ariel the Cruel,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=eGYodX57,comment-id=0007,timestamp=2017-10-03T00:37:41.170+0000)

None. Champions are resourceless by default. Excluding a select few who have resources specifically built around their kit. https://dawngate.gamepedia.com/media/dawngate.gamepedia.com/b/bf/Sakari_Avatar.png?version=db6ae7b7ce2fe7ff0b3d5cd48fd6950f

. . . Oh wait. This isn't Dawngate. Where am I!? (RiP)

This is League of Marksmen where the Roles are all Support and the Diversity is made up!!!

HeresyHorusOct 3, 201710 votes

When comparing Kits, there are no drawbacks.

When comparing Itemization, i see it like this :

What prevents a resourceless champ from getting that super good item intended for Mana users ? ... nothing, he can get it and ignore the Mana on it.

What prevents Mana users from getting that super good item intended for resourceless champs ? ... Mana, he needs to get a Mana item first to function.

Rockem SockmOct 2, 20176 votes

There are only a handful of champions were resources even matter.

Riven use to be gated by lack of cdr but that shit is everywhere. Reksai is a jungler and non of them have mana problems anymore anways.

Kled has a special bar mechanic already. He is primarily an auto attack with easy to dodge skill shots.

Garen would be another similar to riven that yuo are looking for.

MelledoneusOct 3, 20178 votes

If you want to be hard as f*ck to kill, too fast to kite or chase, and have stupid amounts of damage and team utility with virtually no effort, play Garen.

And I'm not saying this as someone who has played against him. I'm saying this as someone who has played AS him. He is the one melee top lane pick that makes me hate myself.

Need Gold 4 TentOct 3, 20171 votes

{quoted}

If you want to be hard as f*ck to kill, too fast to kite or chase, and have stupid amounts of damage and team utility with virtually no effort, play Garen.

And I'm not saying this as someone who has played against him. I'm saying this as someone who has played AS him. He is the one melee top lane pick that makes me hate myself.

Isn't Garen bad right now?

MelledoneusOct 3, 20178 votes

If you go off what the Boards tell you, Garen is squishier than Sona, slower than Morde, and deals less damage than a level 1 Karthus who started W, and desperately needs buffs.

If you actually play the damn game, Garen is probably the strongest and most reliable juggernaut in the game without any of the difficulty.

PoskeOct 3, 20171 votes

Cant tell if sarcastic or not?

I guess its the combination of NA + low elo?

Garen needs massive buffs if anything

MelledoneusOct 3, 20176 votes

[{quoted}](name=Sub HeroCro,realm=EUNE,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=eGYodX57,comment-id=00040000000000010000,timestamp=2017-10-03T13:42:20.783+0000)

Cant tell if sarcastic or not?

I guess its the combination of NA + low elo?

Not gonna argue against me being low elo. But I do analyze things further before I make statements, so let me prove that to you by responding to your next statement:

Garen needs massive buffs if anything

https://www.leagueofgraphs.com/champions/stats/garen https://www.leagueofgraphs.com/champions/stats/darius

Darius has a lower win rate than Garen (given, it is slightly lower, but still numerically lower) at all elos at the moment. These stats are for all regions, are current, and from a reliable source.

So, you saying that Garen needs massive buffs is like saying Darius also needs massive buffs. Which, I doubt you will advocate because Darius has a disgustingly unhealthy presence when he's strong in the meta.

People on the Boards may not be complaining about Garen and getting attention, but that does not mean he needs buffs. He already brings twice as much team utility as Darius, nearly as enough damage (if you consider how reliable Garen's kit is), and being much beefier and harder to kill, and technically almost impossible to kill in fights if you don't have a DPS carry (if your ADC locks in Jhin, for example).

But I won't blame you for not knowing how annoying a Garen can be. If your stats aren't lying to me, you play mostly mid lane and don't really deal with Garen a whole lot, while I main top and have had many matchups involving Garen, most of them winning. But his kit is uninteractive as hell and basically tells you that if you don't have DPS and healing, as well as good survivability, you lose fights against a Garen. And if he loses a trade? Silence and run away deja-vu style, and heal it all back up while he gets immense damage reduction and tenacity if you try to all-in him (That W is the most powerful defensive steroid in the game, by the way, and it's not even on a damn tank). Also, you probably haven't had to deal with difficult Garens often. Especially since in higher elos (unlike down here) people rarely pick Jhin into a beefy team comp, and instead do the smart thing and pick a DPS carry.

Garen may not be an issue for you mid laners in Diamond, but he sure is an issue when your ADC decides to lock in something that can't build BoRK, and thus he's basically unkillable after 2 and a half items.