Azir nerfs 5.3 (pls Riot read this)

Mid or feedd1··3 votes·2,849 views

Sorry for my bad english, it's not my first language.

So, i wanted to talk about the Azir nerfs currently in the PBE. I really don't understand the need of nerfing him, since I consider him one of the most balanced champs in the game. His strengths (range, scaling damage, mobility, disengage tools, sieging power, sexy graphics) are balanced by his weaknesses(squishy as fuck, weak early game, repositioning of his soldiers on a long cooldown, delas 0 damage in mobile fights). If he manages to hit with his soldiers he can deal a lot of damage, this is true, but the mechanics of the campions offer a lot of room for counterplay. He has his niche in which he excels(teamfights in the jungle and situations where he manages to stay in the backline while the enemy team is concentrated in one area and he can put out a lot of aoe damage) and a lot more situations where he's basically useless(mobile fights, 1 vs 1, gets destroyed if jumped on... and many others that people who play azir know well). He's not a forgiving champion at all, just a small positioning error and u get destroyed by 1 single champion even if u are fed as fuck. I agree that he's extremely strong in some situations, like every champion should be: every champion should have scenarios where he excles, that's the reason why there are more than 1 champion for every role and i think Riot did a great job with him. He's just unique in what he does, and nerfing him the way they're doing now will make him never picked again.Just look at the competitive scene right now: He gets picked failry often, but he's not a pick or ban champion at all(like gnar, jaravan and kassadin atm). In 50% of the competitive games he's almost useless, in 35% he does alright and in 15% of them he shines. Doesn't seem OP at all to me. Just look at some games and see the desperate azir running trying to put some damage on the enemy team without success. His ban rate in competitive is actually lower than in ranked, and his win rate in diamond+(since he's a high skill champion people at high level should be able to play him at his full potential) is below 50%. People like Faker and Bjergsen(he actually did once and got solo killed after 5 minutes) are never picking him in competitive now that he's stronger than ever and they are the ones who practiced azir the most and had the most succes with him. Look at pro players streams and u'll see how easy it is, even for them, to fuck up a combo whit this champ. I really don't understand what you Riot are trying to accomplish. After months of work to fix all of his bugs he's finally viable, and after one month of viablity you decide to destroy him. I think the only reason he has a high banrate in ranked is because he's annoying to play against. ANNOYING not OP. People just have to adjust to his playstyle and you are not giving them time to do that. You can't nerf and buff champions that fast. I think he's totally fine right now, but the only nerfs i could accept are to his tower damage. I'd like an answer from you Riot and thank you for taking the time to read my post.

17 Comments

Stacona3 votes

Azir has 100% ban / pick rate and is extremely dominant

Mid or feedd12 votes

NA LCS is live right now. He never got banned, got picked once and the team lost. Just to give you an example

Stacona1 votes

Because the game is based around LCS and not you know THE GAME ITSELF

Kilane1 votes

{quoted}

Azir has 100% ban / pick rate and is extremely dominant

That low popularity and you call it "dominant". Did you even pass grade 12 calculus? That win rate drops as morons think he's a freelo.

Holy shit, LoL community at its best.

Stacona1 votes
  1. Never look at win rates for balancing that is a horrible idea in the first place
  2. At least Azir still takes skill to play and it not a face roll champion like akali or katarina; but Azir is constantly picked or banned in higher elos for a reason
Kilane1 votes

{quoted}

  1. Never look at win rates for balancing that is a horrible idea in the first place
  2. At least Azir still takes skill to play and it not a face roll champion like akali or katarina; but Azir is constantly picked or banned in higher elos for a reason

Apparently you don't look at the stats at all. Do you even compare it to the popularity rate? nope.

No, he's not even that popular in higher elos. In LCS, he's rarely ever picked or banned and the team that pick him lost.

The one that tries to pick/ban him only happen in EU....hmmmm. He still wasn't even that good when he's picked. 1/6...that's good? seriously?

Stacona1 votes

He is banned or picked every game- no one knows how to play him at your bracket- and a constantly banned champion people will not have sufficient practice on azir- a nerf means people may be able to get the chance to play him more and be good with him

Kilane1 votes

Dude, that's what blind mode and teambuilders are for. Those are not a legitimate reason to nerf. The buff/nerf is about balance of the game, not a freaking popularity and difficulty for new players.

If anything, the nerf will make NOBODY plays him at all.

He's not banned every game. Every single time he's picked, it's either feeders or someone decent with him.

He's way too overrated. That's true in LCS. Only EU banned him everygame...they kinda suck anyway.

Kilane1 votes

{quoted}

Azir has 100% ban / pick rate and is extremely dominant

And only happen in EU which they suck? So they based the game around bronzies QQ morons? Great.

Sire Hippington3 votes

he has the sustained dps of Ryze with similar burst but twice the range and ~0 manacosts duering lane. ontop of that he got a dash and a massive controll ult. he isn't easy to play, but he got way to much potential, and most off all he shits even more on melees top than any other champ so far, totally takeing away any fun of the game if u have to face him.

Mid or feedd12 votes

1-he consumes a lot of mana, he literally CAN'T LANE without a blue buff 2-ranged champions have shitted on melee champs in lane since the beginning of time, and the hardest azir counters were fizz and zed(melees) 3-why isn't he a pick or ban champ in competitive? why does he performs so bad in competitive? why is his win rate still below 50% in diamond+?

Sire Hippington1 votes

1-he might need mana if u take him mid and face a longranged caster like xerath, but most of the time you only need W and no Q, which costs next to no mana if know what you do. 2-ranged do shit on melees, but most have some windows of vulnerability or atleast kinda downtimes in which you can grap some cs, as they need to get either in your gapclosing range or atleast get minon aggro for harras, or need alot mana. Azir just place a soldier into the meleeminons ever 8sec and you can't take a cs without getting heavily punished by azir without any risk for him, and if things go bad he got E and Ult to get away... 3-he was picked and band quiteoften in the first few weeks, and both 'hard counters' are at a damn low winrate, even leesin is on a bad winr rate depite beeing one of the most contested copetetive picks, while champions like tryn, shaco and Fiddle sit at 53+% winrate in diamond and abve without seeing profesional play. competetive play is very different from soloQ, and winrates don't tell that much either.

the main problem is that he's worse to play lane against than pre-nerf yorik, no matter how bad he performs after lane, it simply is antifun and sucks to lane against him.

TheAwesomeJ1 votes

Man, i'm sorry for my bad english but.. the problem is: he's the counter of yasuo, kata and nasus. It's just because those "counters" can't 1v1 against azir, but except for naus all of them have high mobility or escapes to avoid the soldiers. Atm how you can counter yasuo? He will spam Q to you while jumping to minions and ignore all your soldiers ('cause his shield) but this time you will not have range or damage to be enough painful to punish him like a "counter". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ee6JxKbpkeM Here we've 2 good players, at 2:10 you can see yasuo trading hard with azir (and win the trade even if he misses the 3th Q). If azir need a nerf it's ok because his laaaaategame is really strong, but not in both damage and range. Now it's just useless because he's "high risk, low reward" not worth, like urgot.

Retillin1 votes

He is meant to be a sustain ranged dmg dealer. (ie Ryze) However his burst has been really high so far. Granted if I were to nerf him (and I would) I would take away the sight his soldiers give in brushes and their ability to kill wards. I think that utility is too much. (they took the same sight away from Karth)

JLord3331 votes

I think the real issue is the reduction in auto-attack range. I have no issue with the nerfs to his Q or his W's tower-shredding ability. These are what is necessary.

However, reducing the range of his soldiers' attack from 400 to 325 is massive. Previously, Azir was reliant on getting of a harass combo (W->Q onto enemy + 2 autos) to trade with equally long-ranged poke mages (Xerath, Lux, etc, all of whom have very high winrates against Azir). Furthermore, his ability to put the hurt on assassins with this combo is the only thing that kept him playable against champions like Leblanc and Zed.

I think what people tend to forget is that for squishy, long range mages the ability to get reasonable harass off is absolutely necessary. Their ability to poke down assasins is the only thing stopping their counders from feeding off of them for the entire duration of the laning phase.

Previously, Azir could reliably hit a Q and 2 autos as either poke on melee assassins or to trade against other long-ranged mages. Now, he will struggle to get more than one auto off, as hitting 2 at low attack speeds was difficult at 400 range. This is the thing that will gut Azir. They are not nerfing his poke by 50 damage (the nerf to Q). They are nerfing it by 50 damage plus an auto attack. This is huge, amounting to a roughly 40% decrease in damage in brief/poke exchanges. I expect him to plummet to a win rate in the low 40's. I will be highly surprised (and delighted) if he remains even remotely viable after these nerfs.

TL/DR: Keep the nerfs to Q and W's turret damage, but don't nerf the soldier auto attack range. Azir is reliant on landing several autos to even approach parity in lane against long range mages and assassins. He needs the 400 auto range.

Angry Monster1 votes

They posted there reasoning already. You asking again cause your to lazy to read it is your problem.

ForgiveColour1 votes

you should change your name into mid and feed considering you dont even know why aa champion is strong

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