Is riven even weak at any point of the game?

Altricad·Jul 20, 2015·14 votes·1,810 views

She's a lane bully. She can snowball out of hand. She's resistant to most ganks. ( 4 gap closers, some rivens don't even build boots till late) She has good cc ( 2 hard cc on basic abilities) She can splitpush all-day and not get caught ( chasing 40% cdr riven is like chasing your shadow) And she scales well into late game due to her aoe damage and ability to 1-shot carries

Yes, I will agree that she has her hard counters , but that applies to every champ.

But it just feels very unfair that there's not a definite "moment of weakness" on riven. Yes, she lacks poke but so too do many of the top laners

Like you can't look at her and say "Riven sucks at ____ "

Similar to , but trynd has no hard cc, can't peel for his adc, doesn't have aoe damage either

Just give her energy.... or meaningful cds that prevent her from spamming her q to run across the map...

Rito pls

/rant

23 Comments

StraleyJul 21, 20157 votes

She's weak when she's dead...... and that's about the only point in the game lol.

KoldheartedjspJul 20, 20155 votes

the only thing i hate about riven is that she can get half a kill and aoe your entire team down no matter how much she was behind early on

AMYS GRAVEJul 20, 20154 votes

She's weak pre level 3. Her kit is designed to combo her abilities so when she doesn't have them yet you can bully her. That's all i got for you.

LuggJul 20, 20153 votes

This is the correct answer.

bradJul 20, 20154 votes

if you dont die to her, which most people seem to be unable to do, every single champion picture that you put in your post can fight riven if you dont die to her early, especially jax and tryndamere

NemeBroJul 20, 20153 votes

[{quoted}](name=hi im bread,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=fj09XJXn,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2015-07-20T20:27:09.322+0000)

if you dont die to her, which most people seem to be unable to do, every single champion picture that you put in your post can fight riven if you dont die to her early, especially jax and tryndamere

Fuck that "if you don't die to her" shit.

Tryndamere can first blood Riven at level 2.

Anyway, Riven gets weaker late game. Her ability to kill tanks is basically nonexistent, and the damage dealers have the ability to easily kill her if she is peeled off. Riven has to go all-in in team fights, so she's by nature heavily at risk during them. She's still good in skirmishes and duels, but much less so than someone like Master Yi, Jax, or Tryndamere.

Riven is strong, but perfectly manageable.

ZarxisJul 20, 20152 votes

[{quoted}](name=hi im bread,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=fj09XJXn,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2015-07-20T20:27:09.322+0000)

if you dont die to her, which most people seem to be unable to do, every single champion picture that you put in your post can fight riven if you dont die to her early, especially jax and tryndamere

They require farm/items to scale. Riven being in the same lane doesn't allow for good (or even mediocre) farming.

bradJul 20, 20152 votes

{quoted}

They require farm/items to scale. Riven being in the same lane doesn't allow for good (or even mediocre) farming.

not when you give up before you even get into game

TyroneWatermelonJul 20, 20154 votes

The only con that riven has in the ENTIRE game is weak hp/5.Nothing else.

BeersteinJul 20, 20153 votes

lvls 1-2 and 19-100 TBH shes only strong from 3-18.

Curling VeigarJul 20, 20152 votes

nope

thePandevJul 20, 20152 votes

A Riven that's behind is a useless Riven. Riven strives against basically every unorganized team, the higher you go up the ladder the harder it is to play her. Most teams will force teamfights in open lanes so she cant come out of nowhere and kill everyone. That way if she tries to go in just throw a stun in her face and she blows up so easily.

Other than late game, in lane she has absolutely no sustain compared to those who have no poke, so in sustained trades she almost always loses.

LuggJul 20, 20155 votes

{quoted}

A Riven that's behind is a useless Riven.

Completely false. Riven can still kill any squishy in a couple seconds at any point of the game. Once she gets a couple kills, she snowballs on everyone else.

thePandevJul 21, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Completely false. Riven can still kill any squishy in a couple seconds at any point of the game. Once she gets a couple kills, she snowballs on everyone else.

That isn't true though, a ranged character with any form of CC will absolutely blow her up if she doesn't have enough items to sustain her shield. Unless she completely catches you out of surprise by flashing over a wall, alone, then yes you deserve to die to no matter which champion.

AbyssphereJul 21, 20152 votes

I believe the theory is that if she doesn't get ahead based on her strong early (and I mean significantly ahead, a couple of kills) then her mid and late is horrendous. She's snowball-reliant but most snowbally champions have hyper-aggressive early games to give them a chance to snowball because if they don't, they're screwed. Fiora's a good example of this.

Now the question is of whether or not the theory actually holds up. I've seen useless Fioras but behind Rivens never seem quite as bad.

Lord DusteonJul 20, 20151 votes

Is her Q down? Congrats, the only thing she can do is try to run away because her damage is on cooldown. Is her W down? Congrats, she has no way to hard CC you outside of spamming Q, which gives you time to hard CC her back and either disengage or continue fighting. Is her E down? Congrats, any damage you do is staying on her and her only mobility is a ~450 movement speed Q. Is her R down? Congrats, she doesn't have kill pressure unless you really fuck up.

Riven is based around her cooldowns. If you are facing her you must play around them; you wouldn't try to dive a Kayle or Tryndamere with their ults up, and you shouldn't try to 1v1 a Riven with her Q and R up. She's an amazing duelist and a meh teamfighter; you do not need to win lane, just go even and group. Unless Riven's team gets a good AoE CC on you and she can do her combo without being focused she'll die very quickly.

MohawkBirdJul 20, 20157 votes

Congratulations, you can abuse a champions cooldowns, which every champion in League has. Practically any top laner is useless if all their cooldowns are ticking. Not to mention she has some of the lowest in the game anyways.

Jax: Is his E down? Congrats, the only he can do is run away because he doesn't have his CC/dodge for a trade.

Hecarim: Is his W on cooldown? Congrats, he won't be able to decently trade anymore because he no longer has his healing for it.

Darius: Is his E on cooldown? Congrats, he cannot engage.

Garen: Is his Q on cooldown? Congrats, he cannot engage.

Every champ is based around abilities, especially the 4 above mentioned, and won't be able to do anything meaningful without them. Riven is not a special case, especially when you consider the fact that she has some of the lowest cooldowns in the game while being completely resourceless.

Riven is more like this: Are any of her abilities up? Then back the fuck off and have fun being zoned away from anything and everything. Are you hugging tower? That's no use considering she'll just burst you with 3 seconds with bullshit animation cancelling and getting away with full health because of her shield.

AMYS GRAVEJul 20, 20158 votes

Riven is based around her cooldowns.

And she has some pretty short cooldowns and always gets early CDR in runes/masteries/cdr boots/brutilizer to ensure spamability.

Oh cool, she used the first charge of her q, i'll wait for it to be on cd to go onto her. waits 4 seconds, she used her second charge. waits 4 seconds she used her third charge. Great now i have 5 whole seconds where she is vulnerable.

Slamurai JackJul 21, 20151 votes

Riven is honestly not that strong early and her mid game is quite bad if she hasn't managed to snowball. Her kill pressure is high early in lane but that doesn't make her strong early. If it did, Yasuo and Jax would both be strong early champions too. And both of those champs beat her early as well, provided you play the matchup properly.

ChaosThiefJul 21, 20151 votes

My main problem is that 2 long swords means the riven wins any lane match up, EVER.

Oh, you're trying to stay for EXP? Let me just kill you then.

I'd like a riven who doesn't know every fucking matchup and knows when she can kill me, THANKS.

Silents429Jul 21, 20151 votes

Honestly she is weak early until her early powerspike, but if she doesn't manage to get kills in lane she is pretty useless unless she snabs some kills with her ult.

But it's pretty easy to deny her in lane and kills with the right champions, a lot of champions don't have any moment of perceived weakness, if Riven isn't up to snuff with the enemy team she can get blown up before she can hop her ass towards them.