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The State of Akali; as Balance Dictates

Ayame Isaki··26 votes·4,642 views

Overview

This article will discuss Akali the champion, her recent nerfs, and put forth some ideas on how to fix her. Any implied or explicit comparisons to other champs or design philosophies are for perspective only and are in no way a flame against said champion or design philosophy. I care about Akali, not FotM champion X.

About Me

I am unranked, and relatively new to the game. However, I have played Akali as my main since level 3 or 4 (got her with RP). In fact, she is the reason I started playing (she looked and sounded fun, and my goodness did I suck at her). I have done a ton of research into how to play her as well as how the game works in general (a habit from my decade or so of progression raiding). This has led to me being accused of being a smurf when I was leveling, but that is neither here nor there.

The fact that I am new and do not yet play ranked (I don't have time to commit to a team right now) may discredit my arguments to some of you. That is alright. However, understand that fresh blood and fresh ideas will keep the game alive; thinking outside the box, the herd, and the meta is a good thing.

I had hoped to have a prototype champion evaluator application up and running before Akali was once again targeted by the Nerf Arrow-Storm so that when it came time to make a post like this, I had real hard numbers and comparisons to use.

Instead, I will use some statistics I can find on the net and do a bunch of proverbial hand waving.

The Problem with Akali

The problem with Akali is twofold. The first is one of perception, and the second is one of mechanics.

The perception problem stems from low ELO gameplay in solo play where she stomps any player that doesn't play her nor think vision is a good gold expenditure. This leads to quite a bit of flaming on the forums and on Reddit which in turn (due to human nature and herd mentality) creates a general feeling that she is an OP champ. As an Akali player, I hate facing such players; I don't become better by having an easy lane. Fortunately I haven't played against such players in quite some time. More often than not I play against someone who knows what they are doing, knows how Akali works, and either deletes me from the game entirely or at least manages my threat by playing smart. As long as the game isn't super one sided across the board, I actually enjoy the challenge.

This leads to the second problem: the mechanics of Akali.

Akali, like all champions, does well when is fed and not so well when is not. Akali, unlike other champions, does really well when fed and does really, really, really bad when not.

There are a few reasons for this.

  1. Akali has no early game. She is dominated easily in lane against most champs pre-6, which puts her behind in CS. She needs kills to close the income gap.
  2. She is heavily item dependent, which makes her as gold dependent as an ADC early on. Once she has item 3146 , she is completely different champion, which is why if she is fed early she is so dangerous. This one item is killing Akali (more on that later). With the recent changes, item 3100 is getting up there as well.
  3. Her passive works too well with item 3146 .
  4. Her E makes her passive/item 3146 synergy beyond amazing.
  5. Her scaling is compensation for her lack of early game. I actually think her scaling is pretty solid. I will cover how to address her issues in a bit.
  6. Her Shroud nerf pushed her scaling curve even further into late game dominance (and snowball effect); see nerfs below.

Oh god, the nerfs...

Alright, the removal of her Armor and MR from her shroud may have been a fair change. I can see why thematically they made sense (it's hard to hit something you can't see, so this effectively made attacks "glancing" or "dodged" on average; this could have been made to work better, more on that later).

The speed boost compensation looks good on paper, but in practicality it doesn't help all that much until you put some levels in W, which has never been worth buying beyond rank 1 until you have maxed Q and E. So again, late game boost at the cost of early/mid game survivability.

Where did this leave Akali?

  • She is super squishy, and now even more reliant on spell vamp to survive.
  • Getting ahead becomes even more important to take advantage of the MS boost of shroud as it is not tactically sound to level it early.
  • Akali snowballs even harder when fed, and suffers even more when starved.

So instead of fixing Akali's problems, this just made them more extreme. Let's talk about 5.2 and what it means to Akali.

Ultimate (R)

  • Reduced range.
  • Stacks visible to enemies (again)

The reduced range has made Akali even more devastated by CC, more easily kited, and made it even hard to use her ULT as an escape as max range R to an enemy minion doesn't get you far enough away from super mobile ADCs or anything with extreme range. Again, she needs to feed to get the damage to kill you before you get away now more than ever. Again, we are continuing to push the extremes of her feast or famine design. She is more and more binary and it makes her "unfun" to play against.

The stacks visible to enemies is unfair. While we are at it, let's make the time left on Katarina's ULT visible to all. Same with Fizz. Same with Zed. Why should any champion (Akali, Ahri come to mind) have anything about the status of their cool downs visible to the enemy? I just think this is a bad design decision trying to band-aid the wrong problem.

Crescent Slash (E)

I don't even have words at how horrid the removal of E as a proc trigger for Q is to Akali's gameplay. Her kit always felt a little stiff but now...

  • There is no longer a decision as to should you E to proc Q or wait for one of her ponderous auto attacks. You must AA.
  • CC and slow are an even bigger deal now (to a champion that has none of her own or counters such as Evelynn's W) as you can't hit E to snag that Q proc while the enemy is putting distance between you and his or herself.
  • What is the point of E now other than to heal up in a minion wave? Which brings us back to some of the problems I mentioned earlier; item 3146 .

Gunblade

The changes to item 3146 while technically not a nerf have hurt Akali. Why you might ask? The reduced AD bonus actually reduces the damage of E making it even more useless (AD adds damage to E at a 2:1 ration vs AP; E scales with 60% of AD and 30% of AP).

On the flip side, the reduced E damage does reduce her ability to spell vamp a minion wave and get back into the fight. However, the increased AP means her ability to heal via spell vamp against a champion with Q and Q proc increases slightly.

What does this mean? We have hurt Akali's early laning by side effect by taking down her sustain via an item change. Late game, this small change is not that big of a deal. Again, Akali is forced to get to her late game as fast as possible to be of any consequence.

Some Statistical Facts

While win rate is never a good metric (I wish I had something better), I would like to talk about it briefly, since people do pay attention to these things (look at the PBE changes for Ahri based on her post 5.2 win rate spike).

All stats are sourced from lolking.net. I only look at 5v5 as that is the most popular game mode.

Normals

  • Akali is less popular, sitting at a 10% pick rate before 5.2 and down to 6.8% post 5.2.
  • Akali has dropped from about a 51% win rate to a 44% win rate.
  • Thoughts: I expect a slightly better than 50% win rate on a champion in a mode that tends to favor champions that do well against disorganized teams or less experienced players, just as I expect to see less than 50% win rate on team oriented champs in such modes. The 51% was not surprising, the 44% is rather telling.

Ranked, Solo

  • Similar to normals, Akali sat at about 10% pick rate overall and is down to 5.45%.
  • Similar to normals, Akali sat at about 51.5% win rate and is now down to 44.5%.
  • Thoughts: Same thoughts as Normals; Solo Q has less team players especially at lower ELO.

ELO Breakdown (P%/W%):

  • BRONZE: 11.6/51 down to 8.7/45.2
  • SILVER: 10/51 down to 6.2/43
  • GOLD: 8.6/52 down to 4.6/43
  • PLAT: 7.5/52 down to 3.1/45
  • DIAMOND: 7/53 down to 2/44.7
  • MASTER+: Too few data points for statistical significance; the graphs are all over the place due to smaller pool of players.

As we can see, she is less popular at the higher levels of play due to her hard counters and available counterplay. Her win rate remains constant as those that are choosing Akali at higher levels know her really well. However, I do find her win rate a bit high prior to nerf (which is probably why she was looked at in the first place). She has dropped in both popularity and win rate; her hardest loss of popularity are in the higher tiers.

Ranked, Team

  • Far less popular than in Solo and Normals, coming in with a 5.9% at her best popularity rating. She has the least drop off, coming in at just under 3% post nerf.
  • A 49% win rate has dropped to the low 40s (due to less popularity, the graph is less normalized).
  • Thoughts: It makes sense that a champion that struggles against well coordinated teams (voice comms, pings) would be less popular and have a sub 50 win rate. It also makes sense that some team comps that like to utilize Akali would still use her in spite of the nerfs due to experience and practice, stemming a raw numbers drop. However, this is still a significant drop (about 40% vs the 50% we saw in Solo) in popularity and on par with other modes in terms of win rate drop.

ELO Breakdown (P%/W%):

  • BRONZE: 6.2/49 down to 3.6/41
  • SILVER: 5.7/49 down to 3.2/41
  • GOLD: 5/51 down to 2/42 (Numbers are less stable due to fewer data points)
  • PLAT: ~4/~48 down to ~2/~38 ((Numbers are far less stable due to fewer data points)
  • DIAMOND+: Too few data points for statistical significance; the graphs are all over the place due to smaller pool of players and lack of popualrity.

She seems to underperform in team situations... which is exactly what one would expect. On average, her numbers were fairly balanced before 5.2... now she is not doing so hot.

Where do we go from here?

I have illustrated what I believe the problems are with Akali, shown statistical evidence that she has been deeply hurt by the recent changes, and now all that is left is to share what I think should be done.

  • Put her ULT range back.
  • E should proc Q or be redesigned/replaced entirely. I think it can be salvaged as her win rate was never obscene.

Now that Akali is back to where she was before 5.2, let's talk about fixing her.

  • Reduce spell vamp on Gunblade. Seriously, 20%? How about 18 for starters, and 15 if that doesn't work? Force Akali to play tactfully instead of kill, run to minions, E, kill again. The Gunblade problem was what the Shroud nerfs failed to fix! By reducing item impact, you make her less snowball oriented.
  • Restore armor and MR to shroud if the attacker does not have vision on you. This fits thematically and reinforces the fact that if you can see her, you can hurt her. This will compensate her for the loss of vamp when fighting champions. By making her more ability dependent, you level her gameplay a bit and reduce the pain if she isn't ahead while still providing hard counters (someone hit her once, now she takes full damage form everyone else; oh you bought a pink ward or are Kallista, go to town and kick Akali's butt).

Conclusion

Personally, I have always felt Akali was relatively weak compared to other assassins. Hell the first time I played Katarina I had a fantastic KDA... on a champ I had never played before. That being said, I am not calling for a Katarina nerf. Like Akali, she has her counters and isn't in that bad of a spot. Sure she is a bit better than Akali mechanically, but that is because Akali's nerfs haven't targeted her feast/famine problems.

I also feel that by design, assassins will always do well in Solo Q as they are designed to take advantage of discord in a team. They will always be less effective against good communication as they can be mitigated more effectively. This assumes they are balanced in the first place, which I personally believe (and the statistics support) Akali can be with changes to Gunblade and some minor compensation buffs.

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

"As balance dictates."

EDITS

Rather than change the main post, I will leave what I have said but as people make points that change my mind or position I will note them here.

Update-01

An excellent point from Belisarius09 (NA):

Where I disagree with you however is shroud, both on points you mention, and on points you fail to mention. Removing the resistances as a tradeoff for the MS buff was fine in my opinion. The shroud change weakens Akali in late game team fights, which you highlighted as her strong point, and strengthens her during her weaker landing phase. Thus I think the shroud change was a move in the right direction.

What you failed to mention was the binary nature of Akali's shroud, and the fact that it is the single weakest stealth in the game. Unlike other champions who utilize stealth, you never have to question where Akali is. As far as the effectiveness of shroud Akali might as well just be un-targetable but visible, we all know she's in that small contained circle of smoke. Other stealth champions can roam around and really surprise their opponents (rengar, twitch, eve, talon etc.) If Akali were visible, but un-targetable in shroud, it could remedy the binary nature of her shroud, and prevent her from being make or break due to the presence or lack of presence of a pink ward. The game of cat and mouse, of Akali taking action (losing her un-targetability) and her opponent trying to predict when Akali will try to attack could add much needed counter play all while solving her binary problems.

Update-02

While I don't necessarily agree entirely with this, Hexten (NA) brings up a well thought out argument for alternate ways of improving Akali by the Reddit user /u/Sayath:

http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/2u6uuu/why_is_no_one_being_more_vocal_to_akali_nerfs/co5w4mp

Update-03

After a long discussion with Sayath (EUW), I now believe that item 3146 is in fact an exacerbating factor and that the problem is not Akali's spell vamp. While I stand by my post, I know realize I only talk about the symptoms and complicating factors of the problem.

The real problem is Akali has no depth. As both Sayath (EUW) and Treebornfrogger (NA) have pointed out, Akali is a stat check. Either your numbers are good enough or they aren't. No amount of skill is going to save you if you don't have the numbers to kill your opponent. Again, this ties back to feast or famine argument that was one of my central themes; this boolean check is what makes the feast or famine symptom so pronounced. It also ties into my comments regarding her item dependency.

I now believe the way to give those like Treebornfrogger (NA) who correctly point out Akali needed counter play can be satisfied without major changes to Akali.

Here is what I now believe (and I cannot take credit for this; credit goes to Sayath (EUW) and his persuasive arguments.

  • Restore her ULT range to 800.
  • Leave the E proc nerf in place. This gives that window for counter play that was intended with the nerf.
  • Change E to reset the AA timer. This will allow E to feel like it synergies with her kit, but not provide that instant nuke that frustrated Akali's opponents. It will smooth the clunkiness while still allowing a window of reaction on the part of the marked player. Other changes to E might work as well.

48 Comments

Hexten7 votes

http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/2u6uuu/why_is_no_one_being_more_vocal_to_akali_nerfs/co5w4mp

There is a reason why we do not do design by democracy. It just trashes the champion strengths and usually does not solve the core problem.

Akali's niche is her high mobility paired with her spellvamp capabilities. If you want to take away both, you can just remove her from the game. Because at the end of the day, the new champion you created will have nothing in common with Akali.

Akali's fundamental issue is one of depth. The reason why Zed or Leblanc are deemed as significantly healthier assassins is their utility / flexibility that enables skilled players to outplay the enemy. CertainlyT (Zed's designer) even argued that Zed puts too high an emphasis on skilled play and that's why balancing him is so problematic: Even while Zed is the strongest assassin pick in LCS, he is so much weaker at silver / gold where the majority of the player base is. Still, this is a much better situation to be in.

Hence, the goal should be to 1) make playing Akali more difficult, 2) make playing against Akali less frustrating and 3) to adequately reward her for the increase in difficulty.

Both of the changes done by Riot focus on increasing her counterplay. They achieve 1) and 2), but not 3).

The range reduction of Shadow Dance lowers her primary threat range and makes escaping Akali easier. Albeit this comes at the cost of misaligning her Q projectile speed with her ultimate range (this makes her feel a lot more clunky).

The Crescent Slash detonation removal significantly raises the difficulty of her detonation game. By itself, that's a very good change.

The higher difficulty of AA detonation has multiple reasons:

  1. ** AA range is 100 units shorter:** 125 AA vs. 325 CS AA range is measured from the edge of the model, spell range from the center. This accounts for the additional difference of approx. 100 units.

  2. ** AA enforces a 1.44s window between detonations** which may only be reduced by attack speed. Using CS and AA detonation in tandem, Akali could previously detonate MotA twice without delay. This is no longer possible.

  3. ** AA animation speed is slower than Crescent Slash's cast time (till detonation).**

  4. ** AA can miss. **E.g., dodge and blind prevent AA detonation.

  5. ** AA timing is mechanically more difficult because it depends on attack speed and right clicks.** CS is only activated if the player presses the associated button. Meanwhile, it is far easier to unintentionally AA before MotA has been applied which forces the player to wait for the next AA - 1.44s. Hence, the target might have already left AA range.

However, Riot failed on increasing the **depth **of her detonation game. The removal of CS detonation prevents me from doing a number of "cool" plays:

  1.  Double detonation: Q -> Flash / SD -> AA -> Q -> E

  2.  Detonation through walls: Q -> E

The range reduction on SD prevents me from Shadow Dancing to Dragon from blue-side red (through the wall). It significantly hinders me in escaping through creative Shadow Dance use to minions / monsters. Furthermore, chaining of two Shadow Dance charges became a lot weaker (200 range), e.g. SD to enemy minion and then SD to enemy.

Seeing the large drop in her win rate, the logical conclusion is to now give her some new cool play patterns or give her some old ones back. However, you will not see the revival of Crescent Slash detonation. That's gone for good.

Primarily, there are three angles of attack here:

  1. Give her a tool that allows her to double detonate again - e.g., AA reset on E, MS burst on champion hit by E.

  2. Revert the Shadow Dance range nerf.

  3. Vague: Give her some other form of utility that allows her to make interesting plays.

For a more in-depth history of Akali talk: http://www.reddit.com/user/Sayath

Belisarius092 votes

{quoted}

http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/2u6uuu/why_is_no_one_being_more_vocal_to_akali_nerfs/co5w4mp

  1. ** AA range is 100 units shorter:** 125 AA vs. 325 CS AA range is measured from the edge of the model, spell range from the center. This accounts for the additional difference of approx. 100 units.

  2. ** AA enforces a 1.44s window between detonations** which may only be reduced by attack speed. Using CS and AA detonation in tandem, Akali could previously detonate MotA twice without delay. This is no longer possible.

  3. ** AA animation speed is slower than Crescent Slash's cast time (till detonation).**

  4. ** AA can miss. **E.g., dodge and blind prevent AA detonation.

  5. ** AA timing is mechanically more difficult because it depends on attack speed and right clicks.** CS is only activated if the player presses the associated button. Meanwhile, it is far easier to unintentionally AA before MotA has been applied which forces the player to wait for the next AA - 1.44s. Hence, the target might have already left AA range.

  6.  Double detonation: Q -> Flash / SD -> AA -> Q -> E

  7.  Detonation through walls: Q -> E

  8. Give her a tool that allows her to double detonate again - e.g., AA reset on E, MS burst on champion hit by E.

  9. Revert the Shadow Dance range nerf.

  10. Vague: Give her some other form of utility that allows her to make interesting plays.

For a more in-depth history of Akali talk: http://www.reddit.com/user/Sayath

Good to see you again Hexten. Haven't heard from you since the boards changed. Do you know if Sayath frequents the new boards, or is he just sticking to reddit?

As for the matter at hand, Akali, I'm assuming you're of the same opinion as Sayath, hence why you haven't voiced your perspective on the recent changes. He's said everything already for you.

Hexten3 votes

I visit the new boards almost everyday, and read. Sayath does sometimes, but rarely. I mainly report to him if I find anything interesting, so that's probably why he doesn't need to read.

Yes, from what Sayath has said, I agree with them. Although, both of us didn't expect Riot to remove Crescent Slash detonation, and soon as well. We actually thought the removal of CS detonation was a solid one ourselves but realised Riot wouldn't remove it due to player attachment. But what do you know, they did. So that is probably why I haven't posted anything, since I have already discussed with Sayath the idea behind the removal beforehand.

The only thing that really wasn't needed is the ult range nerf. CS detonation removal already adds a metric ton of counterplay that was intended from the removal, so ultimate range nerf was overkill. Plus, the projectile speed of MoTA is tuned for a 800 range Shadow Dance, that's why the range on that spell was 800 for 5 years. Now that it is 700, it kinda misaligns in some situations, something that is probably not intended.

For now, 5.3 is too early, so I am just keeping tabs on stats. We never left the Akali discussion at all. We have always been here since those 2 mega threads on the old forums. Just that more of the discussion happens closed doors, i.e. private channel rather than a public channel.

tofutime6 votes

The problem with Akali is her passive. Making her faceroll many melee champs mid with a braindead style gameplay. You think she has a hard laning phase? I really feel like she only had a few bad matchups. She is a direct counter to Yasuo, Fizz and has a slight edge over Zed. If she is against a range champ she can use shroud to keep the opponent guessing if she's going to harass or just farm inside of it. Put your shroud down and most range champs will step back from it because the Q auto hurts a lot on early levels.

I agree that they did not nerf her correctly. The main problem is the passive. She heals far too much from it and it makes her feel stupid when trying to trade with her. Then when she gets gunblade this healing is amplified to all sorts of stupidity. They either had to hit her passive or hit gunblade.

You suggested to bring back armor/mr in her shroud. I think this is stupid as it ups her trading ability while using her shroud in a nontactful manner. Her shroud should be used as a tactical tool not just a buff to her stats so that she can just stand still and proc her Q on you to heal herself while taking less damage in the trade.

All of these things made akali too easy in lane and too forgiving. If she's being harassed she can stealth herself. She can self heal and her last hitting under turret is too easy. This made it so that all she had to do was wait for 1200 gold and then either win lane or start roaming with her level 6 spike.

tldr: they need to nerf her healing not her ult range and E proc.

Linkttp1 votes

Agreeeeed. except fizz.. fizz craps on akali and laughs...

GummyBearWookiee5 votes

Akali was always fine...sadly the herd mentality of those that had no idea what they were talking about...led to riot not only nerfing her...but making her basically unplayable all because a group of kids couldn't figure out what a pink ward was. She was balanced pre-nerf...now she's completely out of the rotation.

Ayame Isaki3 votes

The statistics unfortunately support your stance; her popularity has already halved across the board since 5.2 dropped and is still trending down.

Laughing Cupcake5 votes

I played Akali for the first time last night after her most recent changes, and I agree that she just feels wrong now with no mark proc from her E. It takes longer to proc the mark with an AA than it did to cast her E, so you open the window of retaliation longer. If you're against a ranged opponent, your window is already wide because you have to get in range to hit them with Q.

You're quite right that one of the biggest problems with Akali is item 3146 . I can't think of a single champion for whom this is such a core item. There are other hybrid champions who can use it (Jax , Kayle , Poppy ), but they all have other items they can get instead. The reason Akali really spiraled out of control at the beginning of this year was the change to dragon. Dragon buffs attack damage AND ability power by a percentage. Akali is one of a few champions who builds both every single game and profits hugely from both with her ability scalings and the scaling on her passive.

I think that putting back her damage potential on E and the range of her ult would be fine if item 3146 was changed. Alternatively, her passive spell vamp could be nerfed, but that's such a core part of her identity that it would make me sad.

Linkttp2 votes

You have the 100% same opinion as me. Thank you for existing.

B3ER4 votes

I agreed with everything except for the suggestions. Akali's Q and W are great skills on their own, each with their appropriate amount of counterplay. The problematic parts of her kit are her passive, which gives her snowbally stats, her E which only makes her clunkier, and her R which gives easy access to her Q proc.

Rework the passive and the feast/famine problem is reduced. Make it interact with her skillset, rewards for certain spell combo's.

Rework E because it's a shit skill that just doesn't feel right. Allow her E to be more in line with the slippery ninja theme. Something like a faster, short range (200) Zed ult where you get to choose on which side of your opponent you appear. Makes you untargetable for 0.5 seconds.

Rework R so her jumps have more conditions to be fulfilled, conditions other than get in range. Allow opponents to influence these conditions and you get Riot's little healthy scenario of meaningful decisions and counterplay. Something like where she can only dash to marked targets and her shroud. As long as her shroud is on the ground, she can dash to it infinitely. Gives her 0 damage power in a small sphere of influence.

Boom! Fun, healthy champ with counterplay.

Linkttp1 votes

Akali has no E. It's worse than her autos.

Kat Head4 votes

RIP Akali, her passive and its interaction with item 3146 has been the problem all along. item 3146 coupled with her passive allows Akali to play like a bruiser when even or behind and makes her a unkillable goddess when ahead.

@Tofubots, Akali has a few favorable matchups against melee but for the most part she gets shit on by everything, before these recent e and shroud nerfs and now it is much worse for her. A champion with this bad of a early game needs a huge power spike to ever be playable for most people.

With riots current remove all Assassins not named zed stance, I am afraid it may be awhile before Akali gets the love she needs.

tofutime2 votes

There is no way for her to get behind and even you yourself has said that she heals herself enough to play like a bruiser if she gets behind. If she is forced under tower that's fine for her. If she gets dove she shrouds under turret while her opponent takes aggro. Akali simply has to stay safe until she gets item 3145 then she can either find an opportunity to shove while her opponent is backed and roam or she can win trades with 2 stacks of ult and her sustain she gets from item 3145. What mid pick do you think is her absolute counter? I think only bruisers can really counter her. Again, no one that can burst or dive her.

Kat Head3 votes

{quoted}

There is no way for her to get behind and even you yourself has said that she heals herself enough to play like a bruiser if she gets behind. If she is forced under tower that's fine for her. If she gets dove she shrouds under turret while her opponent takes aggro. Akali simply has to stay safe until she gets item 3145 then she can either find an opportunity to shove while her opponent is backed and roam or she can win trades with 2 stacks of ult and her sustain she gets from item 3145. What mid pick do you think is her absolute counter? I think only bruisers can really counter her. Again, no one that can burst or dive her.

If you are playing a ranged mid laner and allow her to have 20 cs at level 6 or you have not killed her at least once before level 6 you are doing it wrong (excluding jungle intervention). She can really only use q to farm if you bully her, if she does she cannot hurt you and you can harass / kill her all the day long.

item 3145 is not the power spike you make it out to be. Level 6 while being a huge power spike is still not what should make you be afraid of Akali. Akali comes into her own when she is level 11 and posses item 3146, this is when she becomes a real threat.

What does not beat Akali in lane ? Akali does good vs some melee champions and that is it. Even vs Katarina (a weak early game champion and my favorite champ) Akali gets bullied into submission pre 6. I have played that matchup from both perspectives many times and it is just a losing scenario for Akali until she has level 6+ and item 3144.

Everything Akali can do and is going to do is so telegraphed and now with e being a worthless waste of energy and R having a shorter range Akali is just a bad champion (unsafe, much to risky).

tofutime2 votes

I think vs Katarina it's an even matchup. You didn't really specify which range champs she has a hard time with. I'll name a few that she does well against though: Anivia Brand Cassiopeia Karthus Jayce TwistedFate Ahri Nidalee Veigar Lux

I've played akali into each of these matchups and it was in my favor each time. As long as you get to sustain from her passive and her free 1200 gold item it's just too safe. Compare this to Fizz. He has no range to last hit with. He has no shroud to zone opponents so he has to choose his moments. He cannot heal himself. He's gated by mana usage so there's only 3 times he can use his trollpole until he's oom. In this regard Fizz has a way worse laning phase than Akali while performing the same job as her with regards to team role.

Anyways I think we're veering off topic here. Her sustain was too strong. They nerfed the wrong thing.

Kat Head1 votes

{quoted}

I think vs Katarina it's an even matchup. You didn't really specify which range champs she has a hard time with. I'll name a few that she does well against though: Anivia Brand Cassiopeia Karthus Jayce TwistedFate Ahri Nidalee Veigar

I've played akali into each of these matchups and it was in my favor each time. As long as you get to sustain from her passive and her free 1200 gold item it's just too safe. Compare this to Fizz. He has no range to last hit with. He has no shroud to zone opponents so he has to choose his moments. He cannot heal himself. He's gated by mana usage so there's only 3 times he can use his trollpole until he's oom. In this regard Fizz has a way worse laning phase than Akali while performing the same job as her with regards to team role.

Anyways I think we're veering off topic here. Her sustain was too strong. They nerfed the wrong thing.

You may have won all of those match ups, but I do not think any of them other than maybe karthus and twisted fate is favorable for akali, even those 2 should crap on you so hard early that you need to kill them 5 or 6 times to even pull back even with them and Karthus is still going to outscale you so hard it isnt even funny.

Akali vs Katarina is not even close to even early. Katarina will max w and spam it on Akali and akali will never get close enough to proc her q on Kat. Katarina's sinister steel has a larger range than you realize. Akali starts winning after 6 if she did not die to Kat early or if kat has not roamed well. With dfg being removed Akali will win a 1 item 1 v 1 with Kat pretty easily now.

tofutime1 votes

It's very simple for Akali since she has no mana gate. She can start boots 4 pots for sustain and the ability to dodge skillshots easily from the boots. The only mage I would be afraid of is Annie because she has a on click stun and high base stats.

Akali is SO HOT1 votes

{quoted}

I think vs Katarina it's an even matchup. You didn't really specify which range champs she has a hard time with. I'll name a few that she does well against though: Anivia Brand Cassiopeia Karthus Jayce TwistedFate Ahri Nidalee Veigar Lux

I've played akali into each of these matchups and it was in my favor each time. As long as you get to sustain from her passive and her free 1200 gold item it's just too safe. Compare this to Fizz. He has no range to last hit with. He has no shroud to zone opponents so he has to choose his moments. He cannot heal himself. He's gated by mana usage so there's only 3 times he can use his trollpole until he's oom. In this regard Fizz has a way worse laning phase than Akali while performing the same job as her with regards to team role.

Anyways I think we're veering off topic here. Her sustain was too strong. They nerfed the wrong thing.

Oh God no. Those matchups are impossible for Akali to win. The only plausible win for her would be against Nid due to no CC. Anivia Doesn't give a fuck about stealth when she can ult you and kill you in it. Going in on her makes for an easy stun into E mega damage. She can't bully you too badly pre 6 unless you suck but it still isn't favorable Brand Ez to land 2 second stun if you engage on him. MEGA BULLY pre 6 against her. High enough burst to kill her post 6 Cassiopeia Can sorta go either way but if she poisons her it is a fuckton of free damage that she can't dodge. Her ult fucks her over in an engage with high enough DPS/Burst to rek her Karthus Can be a fairly good bully but Akali can beat him post 6 as long as she doesn't suck Jayce Akali will be level 6 with 2 cs while he is level 11 with 500+ cs. No possible way to win this matchup TwistedFate Can sorta go either way but her can bully her early Ahri She is a huge ass lane bully against Akali now and can sustain just as much if not more than her early game. Can't really engage on he either without taking a ton of damage Nidalee Dodge her spears and it's not too bad of a matchup. Can get bullied out of lane early on though. Veigar Absolutely no chance against him due to ult and stun. Q to bully her out of lane early on Lux Gl getting to level 6 against her with any chance of bursting her down past 6.

Her only favorable/even matches are: Ezreal Fizz Karma Velkoz Viktor Yasuo (If the Yasuo loses level 1 and 2 trades she can win ezpz)

She even gets dumpstered by Kat who sucks ass early game. You completely overestimate her early game.

Linkttp1 votes

Spell vamp be teh only prob.

Linkttp1 votes

I agree, I think the real problem is spell blade. If we removed the current nerfs and address the problem of her spell vamp. I think many people will be quite happy.

Belisarius093 votes

I am in love with your formatting. Very well written post, and plenty of in depth insight, especially for a newer player.

Onto your main points, I agree with just about everything you say. Bring back the multi range, allow e to proc q so her kit isn't so clunky, remove Akali's dependency on one item (gun blade) just as Riot removed Ahri's dependency on DFG. Agree with all of that.

Where I disagree with you however is shroud, both on points you mention, and on points you fail to mention. Removing the resistances as a tradeoff for the MS buff was fine in my opinion. The shroud change weakens Akali in late game team fights, which you highlighted as her strong point, and strengthens her during her weaker landing phase. Thus I think the shroud change was a move in the right direction.

What you failed to mention was the binary nature of Akali's shroud, and the fact that it is the single weakest stealth in the game. Unlike other champions who utilize stealth, you never have to question where Akali is. As far as the effectiveness of shroud Akali might as well just be un-targetable but visible, we all know she's in that small contained circle of smoke. Other stealth champions can roam around and really surprise their opponents (rengar, twitch, eve, talon etc.) If Akali were visible, but un-targetable in shroud, it could remedy the binary nature of her shroud, and prevent her from being make or break due to the presence or lack of presence of a pink ward. The game of cat and mouse, of Akali taking action (losing her un-targetability) and her opponent trying to predict when Akali will try to attack could add much needed counter play all while solving her binary problems.

Ayame Isaki1 votes

Excellent points about the shroud. I will incorporate it into my main post. Thanks!

Also, thanks for the compliments. The formatting comes from learning over the course of my career that how you present information is almost as important as the information itself.

Akali is SO HOT3 votes

The problem I have with all her nerfs is that they have never solved her problem which is and has always been her spellvamp. Not her resists on W, not her E procing Mota, not her ult range, NONE of it. All the changes they continue to make just weaken her early game even more making her an even bigger feast or famine champion exacerbating the problem. Meanwhile the changes also just make her clunky and terrible to play. E not procing Mota was the worst change they could ever make. It is literally useless now.

What they need to do is nerf her spellvamp. This is what I propose:

  1. Revert ult range and e nerfs
  2. Increase the base spellvamp but lower the scaling from AD
  3. Akali only benefits 50% from items
  4. She gets resists back from her shroud and MS is either reduced or removed

What does this do? -She is no longer as much of a drain tank as she is currently because of the reduced spellvamp. -The increase of base spellvamp makes it so her early game isn't hit too hard with the change but makes her much more manageable when she gets gunblade -Instead of having a ridiculous defensive mechanic 24/7 (Spellvamp) she now has a defensive mechanic with a cooldown meaning Akali players would have to be smart about the placement of the shroud. -It would open up new build paths that could incorporate CDR to take advantage of her shroud resists -It makes it so she can teamfight without drain tanking your team -It makes her feel not clunky and terrible to play

Either that or revert the ult nerf and completely rework her E because as of now it's just a waste of energy

Belisarius092 votes

{quoted}

The problem I have with all her nerfs is that they have never solved her problem which is and has always been her spellvamp. Not her resists on W, not her E procing Mota, not her ult range, NONE of it. All the changes they continue to make just weaken her early game even more making her an even bigger feast or famine champion exacerbating the problem. Meanwhile the changes also just make her clunky and terrible to play. E not procing Mota was the worst change they could ever make. It is literally useless now.

What they need to do is nerf her spellvamp. This is what I propose:

  1. Revert ult range and e nerfs
  2. Increase the base spellvamp but lower the scaling from AD
  3. Akali only benefits 50% from items
  4. She gets resists back from her shroud and MS is either reduced or removed

What does this do? -She is no longer as much of a drain tank as she is currently because of the reduced spellvamp. -The increase of base spellvamp makes it so her early game isn't hit too hard with the change but makes her much more manageable when she gets gunblade -Instead of having a ridiculous defensive mechanic 24/7 (Spellvamp) she now has a defensive mechanic with a cooldown meaning Akali players would have to be smart about the placement of the shroud. -It would open up new build paths that could incorporate CDR to take advantage of her shroud resists -It makes it so she can teamfight without drain tanking your team -It makes her feel not clunky and terrible to play

Either that or revert the ult nerf and completely rework her E because as of now it's just a waste of energy

I don't think spell vamp is the problem. But lets assume it is the problem. Lets assume thats what has been needing a nerf.

Assuming thats the case, its already been nerfed... three times.

  1. When they changed Akali's passive so a specific rune page was no longer needed to unlock her passives, they in turn lowered the base values on both of her disciples.
  2. They lowered the base damage on Q (back in S3 or S4 can't remember exactly when.) They increased the ap ration on the second portion of q, but nonetheless they lowered the base damage value on both portions of Q. The less damage Akali does, the less spell vamp she gets.
  3. In this most recent patch they nerfed gun blade. So again, Akali gets less spell vamp.

I don't think spell vamp is the problem. Akali has mobility, burst, and some sustain. She has no cc. She has no escape. Other assassins have either an escape or some form of CC (fizz troll pole, talon slow, lb chains, kass can jump out, lat can jump out, etc.)

Lastly, i'd like to point out that Morgana's passive gives much more spell vamp than Akali's, and you don't see anyone complaining about Morg's spell vamp. (and don't say its because mort uses mana and alkali uses energy, mana regen is so easy in this game its not even funny, every time i see someone complain about mana regen I want to tell them to go play dota where you only have enough mana for 1 rotation of abilities. )

TL';dr Spell vamp isn;t the problem. Akali's problems are in lack of counter play, and binary nature.

Akali is SO HOT2 votes

{quoted}

I don't think spell vamp is the problem. But lets assume it is the problem. Lets assume thats what has been needing a nerf.

Assuming thats the case, its already been nerfed... three times.

  1. When they changed Akali's passive so a specific rune page was no longer needed to unlock her passives, they in turn lowered the base values on both of her disciples.
  2. They lowered the base damage on Q (back in S3 or S4 can't remember exactly when.) They increased the ap ration on the second portion of q, but nonetheless they lowered the base damage value on both portions of Q. The less damage Akali does, the less spell vamp she gets.
  3. In this most recent patch they nerfed gun blade. So again, Akali gets less spell vamp.

I don't think spell vamp is the problem. Akali has mobility, burst, and some sustain. She has no cc. She has no escape. Other assassins have either an escape or some form of CC (fizz troll pole, talon slow, lb chains, kass can jump out, lat can jump out, etc.)

Lastly, i'd like to point out that Morgana's passive gives much more spell vamp than Akali's, and you don't see anyone complaining about Morg's spell vamp. (and don't say its because mort uses mana and alkali uses energy, mana regen is so easy in this game its not even funny, every time i see someone complain about mana regen I want to tell them to go play dota where you only have enough mana for 1 rotation of abilities. )

TL';dr Spell vamp isn;t the problem. Akali's problems are in lack of counter play, and binary nature.

I would disagree. I'm not arguing that she doesn't have problems with counter play and being binary but spellvamp has been one of her big problems since release. Despite those nerfs to it she can still get about 34% Spellvamp with gunblade alone making it very frustrating to play against her. You can poke her all you want but she'll just sustain it back up. In teamfights she's basically a drain tank with how much vamp she can get which is really unfun to play against.

With the changes I am suggesting she can't vamp as much to be a drain tank but can still be a little tankier so she can survive which takes away the frustration of having to deal with her going from 20 to 100 in less than a second. I do agree she has other problems but after playing Akali for so long I can confidently say that her spellvamp is something that is really unfun to deal with.

Ayame Isaki2 votes

I also believed the spell vamp was a major problem (and it might be), but after reading the arguments of Belisarius09 (NA) and Sayath (EUW) I am not so sure anymore. It is just another stat that is factored into her binary feast/famine stat check. Until we fix the lack of depth in her kit, it is hard to know which stat is the right dial to turn to bring her in line. Every nerf so far has failed Akali. While the nerf to her W (with a buff to MS) does add some depth to her kit, it wasn't enough and simply made the bar for her stat check a little higher without adding significant depth.

Until we give Akali the balance she deserves in her design, it is hard to know what the right numbers are for everything else. Look at Morgana, with item 3152 , she sits at 40% spell vamp. I spam on her all day long once i have item 3165 . No one is complaining about her 40% because player skill is actually a factor in her play. And don't give me the "mana as power mitigation" argument; mana is only a problem for the first 5-10 minutes of the game (at least on Morgana)... the same time window where Akali has serious energy issues and is incredibly weak.

I'd like to see her E get a facelift for starters. Make it an ability with real utility instead of a raw "you have the stats for this to be useful or you don't"; give it an MS bonus or a minor slow but keep the "no Q proc" change. Reducing the binary nature of her current design doesn't require a rework; I think it can be achieved with small changes. There have been some really good ideas floated by more experienced members of the community that seem like they would make Akali more fun to play and more fun to play against.

Let's then see where she sits before we start turning any more dials down.

EDIT: To be fair, I do not often build item 3152 on Morgana outside of ARAM; it is typically a situational pick for me. However, I do want to start bringing Morgana mid and this might be a interesting choice for my build; I have to play with it and see.

VardenSalad3 votes

I agree with you and I feel that Akali was overnerfed, but since you mentioned you hadn't been playing that long, I want you to know that Riot is not going to revert these nerfs. They are not going to make E reset the AA timer. They are not going to revert the range nerf on ult. They are not going to make ult charges invisible.

With the recent assassin nerfs and the nerfs to DFG, in the current competitive meta Akali actually faces midlane match-ups that have never been easier for top-level players to exploit. With the midlane champ pool reduced to virtually Xerath, LeBlanc, and Zed only, Akali would be in an excellent position as a counterpick against Zed, a CC-less, melee midlane.

Akali has been nerfed to prevent this occurrence. She has relatively boring lane match-ups against competitive midlaners and is a stat-ball, feast or famine pick with the potential to utterly dominate a game. Because of this, she has been moved further from competitive viability.

Treebornfrogger2 votes

  • Going with the "think outside of the box" mentality here, I, as a non-Akali main/doesn't play Akali just want to confess that I am kind of glad for the nerfs.

  • I know that's a horrible thing to say about anyone's main so I'll explain why I say it. As the patch notes/something by rito said, Akali basically does a stat check when she wants to fight. She will do her combo and it'll either kill you or it won't. If Akali is fed and you're alone or your teammates aren't too good, there isn't much counterplay to be had, as far as I can tell, due to the point and click nature of Akali. On stronger (dmg/burst-wise) assassins like Leblanc/Zed/etc. there is counterplay--mitigating the death marks, dodging the skillshot dash/chains.

  • I think rito is nerfing Akali largely due to this lack of counterplay (I also think they will keep her like that until they are ready to rework, tbh).

  • Additionally, in low elo, it's really not fun to play against Akali. Yes, there is a lot of counterplay, but you can only control one champion--sometimes (hahahaahaha "sometimes") it's hard to prevent your teammates from feeding Akali. And once Akali is fed, she'll basically stat check and pubstomp until... well you know where this goes, I mean your post made it clear you wreck people. It's not necessarily that she's universally op so much as that in low elo she can carry games really hard.

Ayame Isaki2 votes

Thank you for a civil counter to my post and adding to the discussion. I have incorporated your feedback into my main post. Thank you.

O Fallen Scholar2 votes

She needs rework. And she will get it in the future.

Reason: point and click, lack of skill.

Thanks for the wall of post effort but don't sweat so much. Riot ditched this kind of design philosophy long time ago.

MotherChurch3 votes

Point and click champions are a lot of fun and really helpful for people getting into a MOBA for the first time. LoL already has too few of them IMO. Not every champion needs to be complicated/hard to play and capable of flashy plays.

Akali is a really cool concept but the recent changes just made her too clunky and actually removed a lot of the more skillful trading potential she had in lane. Was she too strong before? Maybe a bit, but I think the E change gutted a core part of her kits identity.

Note: I am not an Akali main but I liked Akali because I felt she was helpful for keeping ADCs in check.

VardenSalad1 votes

Yeah, this guy is basically saying playing Katarina isn't a skillful, edge-of-your-seat death dance the entire game. If you screw-up, you're worthless and die; champion kit design is greater than simply reducing it to skillshot v point-and-click.

Linkttp1 votes

You wonderful man. RIOT LOOK RIGHT HERE.

Belisarius092 votes

I hadn't even considered the alignment issues myself with the projectile speed on Q and the range on R. Makes me wonder if Riot even considered that before they nerfed her ult.

Ayame Isaki1 votes

I honestly couldn't say; however it does feel extremely weird, especially when you arrive before your Q.

lDontLiftIcarry2 votes

the main issue with akali is she suffers from majorly low skill floor.

The champion doesn't have much depth to its kit. its just QRQRQR and you're dead or she's dead Yeah they evenutally made it so E could proc Q but that still didn't do much outside of give you 1 more Q proc which you'd probably be dead anyway before that. It was to help her pre six laning against other melees because you had to trade auto's to proc Q (instead of using E to proc it) And that just felt absolutely clunky.

Her E needs to be reworked this is without a doubt.

her Q/R are signature akali things her W could use some work but stealth mechanics are always hit and miss its either too good or too useless. Theres never really a happy medium in a game like league where you force the enemy into spending gold on something to maybe kill you. And its a strong Maybe once akali hits 9 and has rank 5 Q.

Its very hard to outtrade her with a melee post level 6. And even pre six she can do quiet well if played correctly she'll stay withing 5 cs of you and then recall at six for her items and not be dead ofc and tp back to lane and be more than ready to put the pain on.

I actually do like akali though I think her as a character is cool. But I think her kit has alot of toxicity thats just way too hard to balance. She would need a complete rework and honestly Idk how to rework her. I would keep her Q/R for starts but idk.

I think its just too hard to balance low skill floor champions.

Why I hate champions like zed or yasuo they're simple to play. You can have a high skill cap all day but if your skill floor is low there's gonna be a time where you don't know how to buff or nerf or rework the char without changing everything instead of a few things.

Also for the record certainly T is full of it. I have a 100% winrate ahri since her Q buff and a 80% winrate zed this season on my main in KR. And I'm a jungler in d1. (so I'm obviously not some pro ass mid lane that cs's perfectly and lands every skill shot etc etc etc) [the champions kit is just so broken I don't have to be good to succeed is what I'm telling you]

they're both broken as shit. Riot just doesn't want to nerf champions that have flashier plays than someone like a lux or a chogath.

Because we wants to watch someone play a utility champion? I wouldn't mind it. But its riots decision they obvioulsy prefer the champions with a million jumps and high damage and simplicity and big damage and numbers and blah blah blah.

They probably only nerfed akali recently because she;s not that fun to watch play... just afk farm until 6 then all in Or afk farm until 9 then all in. I mean its not exactly "exciting" Yet again I don't mind it thats just how she's played. But riot yet again seems to think everything has to be flashy so they nerf her so she's not played much or even less than she was and then are done with it. Same story with riven and diana.

Nagirah1 votes

Come on Akali, atleast Zed admits that balance is weakness. You're clearly in the same camp with him so you should stop lying to yourself.

VardenSalad2 votes

Nice reply to a well thought out post.

Baron of Bread1 votes

I think it is reasonable that she should have to AA to get the Q proc, otherwise half of her passive isn't used outside of csing. I do agree that her Crescent Strike needs work, but I don't think making it proc Q again is the best option (it originally didn't anyway).

Changes to Gunblade, while somewhat targeted at Akali, also hit a few other champs rather hard. item 3146 item 3078 item 3124 are the only AD and AP items out there, so hitting any one of them hits all of the hybrid champs.

Ayame Isaki1 votes

I can't think of any champ that would be devastated by reducing spell vamp a bit on item 3146 ; that 20% is quite a lot. I am willing to concede you have a point, but Akali is the only hybrid I consistently build it on.

It is an extremely niche pick for Evelynn, who is the only other champ I have ever built it on. Irelia is served well by TF, and then builds tanky, maybe with a item 3153 thrown in for good measure. Tristana (or Caitlyn, or Sivir, or any ADC that has AP scalings on abilities) build almost exclusively full AD or in some cases, especially Tristana or Varus, full AP. None of these champions build Gunblade.

Due to the changes to Gunblade (the shift from AD to more AP), it may be more appealing to AP champions; however I don't see it becoming the must have item for any champion out there right now outside of Akali.

Monotachi1 votes

Spellvamp is Akali's way of surviving, considering stealth and true sight don't go well. Until Riot finds a way to make stealth not binary in League of Legends, nerfing Akali's spellvamp would affect her viability in more ways than previous nerfs.

Plus, it is just too much effort for Riot to look into Gunblade and how well Akali synergizes with this item alone. Anything they do to Akali would be low-scope.

Ayame Isaki2 votes

After some discussion with other Akali players, I agree with you.

Lanofrose1 votes

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/fuAUynaE-the-state-of-akali-as-balance-dictates

made a thread talking about how akali combo isn't working as intended (or at the least its just ridiculously clunky since E nerf) I think its a simple fix as well but apparently other are not so sure

so i wanted a few akali mains to check it as well and see if this sounds right to you guys atleast.

Lanofrose1 votes

Thought of another short-term fix for akali in my thread ill just post this here also

Also I just thought of possibly something to fix this other then increasing Q speed not sure how solid it is but yeah

after Akali uses E her next AA has enhanced range by 75 for 3 seconds(like mord)

so this fixes the combo from Q>R>wait>AA to Q>R>E>AA

this Gives E a purpose in her combo again and also fills the time the Q takes to travel with E then giving her an slightly extended AA to get the Q proc off

RedTrinketGoneHa1 votes

I think one of the biggest problems Akali faced/faces after the Crescent Slash nerfs is that her Auto Attack frame speed is so slow that it feels like the most clunky thing in the game to use. The best buff Akali could ever get after these nerfs is to buff her Auto attack frame by 50%-57% this will make double q procing possible again through a less toxic mechanic but more skillful one. Take some MS in runes and once you hit over 1.20 AS you can double proc pretty easily

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