To balance out Melee vs Ranged, what if Melee Champions had more access to...

DrMarshSwamp·Feb 2, 2015·21 votes·3,339 views

Melee-specific items that are geared towards helping them fight Ranged champions?

One idea is a Starter Item or some kind of Defensive option that reduces damage from Ranged Basic Attacks, similar to the Ninja Tabi but either more or less effective. (Perhaps there could even be an item that "greatly" reduces Ranged Basic Attack's damage, but for a downside increases Melee Basic Damage?)

Ranged Champions already have fairly big advantages against Melee Champions, and right now any damage items Melee's can build work just as well, if not better than on a Ranged Champion simply due to them being ranged.

47 Comments

SmokingPuffinFeb 2, 201516 votes

The problem with item-based solutions is that any melee champ can buy them. That will only exacerbate the gap between the melee champions that can currently handle laning against ranged and the ones who can't.

We need champion-level fixes for guys like Darius and Garen. We don't need buffs for Zed.

Rew711Feb 2, 20151 votes

A problem I've seen is the critical damage. I've noticed that there is a mastery that you can unlock that defends you from 10% of critical strikes. Why don't we have an item that defends from critical strikes as well?

TsundayFeb 2, 20154 votes

Look the thing is a ranged person is going to have more poke but a melee person is going to shred a ranged person the second they get to them. Melee champions have better hard engage and all ins. The Darius pull, the Jax stun, the assassins amazing burst. Once they get their gap closer if they get on the ranged champion they hurt a lot more.

the Anarchit3chtFeb 2, 20152 votes

This USED to be the idea behind it. But now every ranged champion is guaranteed to come with at least escape--probably 2 or more! Or at the very least something like a stun, mega slow, snare etc that works very well in combination with your escape/one another to only solidify the fact that you will never ever touch them unless they happen to have skills on CD.

Sire HippingtonFeb 2, 20151 votes

and even without, item 3153 + item 3139 allow them to break out off cc and steal alot ms, allowing for a easy escape, and all without actually sacreficeing damage for it... And, which is the main problem, atleast in coordinated teams they have tanks/supports peeling for them. For some reason, carrys are somewhat balanced around standing their ground 1v1 vs almost anyone. LEague however is a teamgame, not 1v1, and there are up to 4 guys protecting that carry, which means balanceing them for 1v1 is a mistake, leaving them to strong overall.

SleepyLionCubFeb 2, 20154 votes

item 3075 item 3143 item 3110

Sire HippingtonFeb 2, 20155 votes

item 3035

SleepyLionCubFeb 2, 201510 votes

[{quoted}](name=Don Pavoni,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=gEzzWayF,comment-id=00060000,timestamp=2015-02-02T01:41:58.859+0000)

I do belive having 30% less attack speed, and a percentage of your damage reflected onto you will still outweigh a lil armor penetration.

MrBuffingtonFeb 2, 20153 votes

IIRC LW is gold efficient when the enemy has ~80 armor, which is most champions (even squishy carries) base stats at lvl 18 (no additional armor required, from items or runes/masteries). It's more than a little armor penetration, lol, especially for one very inexpensive item (compared to the three you have in your proposed build)

DeusVultFeb 2, 20158 votes

2300 gold to the ever farming adc

8000 gold total for the tank who has to be everywhere at all times

Lt CuddlesFeb 2, 20151 votes

7400*

qetzelFeb 2, 20152 votes

2300 gold, but only useful after an extra ~6000 has been spent on other items.

SolaxoFeb 2, 20151 votes

{quoted}

I do belive having 30% less attack speed, and a percentage of your damage reflected onto you will still outweigh a lil armor penetration.

Lifesteal. GG your thornmail is useless

TheRainInSpainFeb 2, 20151 votes

I actually have a game where the enemy ADC killed himself on a Thornmail.

aaronconlinFeb 2, 20151 votes

Don't forget MR

CindikleFeb 2, 20153 votes

I think Riot is trying to remove those item differences and instead balance the champion. Outside of Hydra and Hurricane. They're special cases.

But options would be nice.

I think we need a new Doran item.

+80Hp Unique passive - Reduces the damage taken form basic attacks by 8 Unique passive - Restores 10 mana when getting a kill with an ability. This effect has a 5 second cooldown.

It's kind of like Doran's Shield in it's own way. The damage reduction doesn't reduce spell damage though. And instead of giving hp/5, you can farm safer to save HP.

Kitten of EvilFeb 2, 20151 votes

I like that it restores mana, so Lee Sin and Zed have no reason to use it.

TotalJerkFeb 2, 20151 votes

Nor Garen, one of the main champions that have a problem with kiting.

BresnFeb 2, 20153 votes

Nasus my thanks to you, noble speaker.

lojicianFeb 2, 20152 votes

They had that before with the melee-range split on doran's blade. And doran's shield being actually good enough to carry the early part of the laning phase vs ranged harass. But then some genius decides that d shield needs to be gutted with no compensation to melee laners, d blade needs to be gutted on 90% of fighters because they're redesigning its ranged split for adcs, and the rest is history.

To give you a hint to who this genius might have been a certain ice mage that's currently facerolling top lane got unneeded buffs shortly after.

(They also have levers already built into the masteries which they could use to help equalize melee vs range, they just don't care.)

Gin no NekomataFeb 2, 20152 votes

Thought experiment: Ranged attacks are now unable to crit. Tell me what you think!

RivsuoyiFeb 2, 20151 votes

well that's one way to kill the adc and support role. Without crit I would see no reason for marksmen to be in the game. So now we will just have kill bot lanes like Talon/Zed or Lee sin/J4 bot.

TsundayFeb 2, 20151 votes

Actually support sits botlane to babysit just because they don't need the levels and the gold. Their real job is team fights so it would only kill the ASC role not the support role.

RivsuoyiFeb 2, 20151 votes

the support role started when people realized that most marksmen were absolute shit for early game and that they needed someone there to help them out. Now that the team wouldn't be using an adc and would have a champ with a better earlier game bot lane they could trade out the support that (tbh) doesn't do that much damage for another champion that could kill the enemy faster or could get tankier.

TsundayFeb 2, 20151 votes

no the support role started botlane when people realized that most marksmen were bad for the early game. Taric was played competitively back when TF still had his ult as a normal ability. The 'supporting' back then was more of a bruiser/tank type character with a kit that helped his allies out but was still seen strong independently. Notice how Thresh/Leona (champions very similar to Taric in ideals) are two of the big supports. There are so many people who climb up to the higher ranks just playing Leo top/jungle. If you removed the marksmen from botlane you'd still have playmaker supports somewhere on the board because A) there is a decent amount of the playerbase who enjoys playing support class characters and B) playmaker supports are always going to be useful to the team. In fact supports have a very strong role in teamfights and extended fights.

that (tbh) doesn't do that much damage

The support doesn't do damage, but neither does the tank. If it was all about doing damage you'd have a team solely of assassins/burst mages. What supports don't do in damage they make up for in team sustain and team buffs. When Janna is giving you over the value of a BF Sword in AD with a thick shield to boot, and then healing the team all back to full while separating the highest priority target from all the people who should be peeling for him--you don't complain that she herself doesn't do much damage.

TheRainInSpainFeb 2, 20152 votes

If Marksmen could make use of On-Hit builds and Armor Pen builds for the right situation, yeah, I wouldn't mind seeing Critical Hits nerfed into the ground.

On-Hit builds (Black Cleaver, Wit's End, old Malady, Teemo) Armor Pen builds (Black Cleaver, Last Whisper, BorK)

But the only effective one is Critical Hits with a Last Whisper on the end.

OneriosFeb 2, 20151 votes

Unfortunately its not even a small gap, the optimal four item dps build with current itemisation outputs almost double the dps of a critless BOTRK build against tanky targets, I was running the numbers on it a while back trying to see if you could mimic how Smite's ADC builds revolve around Qin (which is like botrk but does %max health rather then current, at least it used to, no idea what it does now).

TheRainInSpainFeb 3, 20151 votes

Critical Hit builds do so much damage, though on a select few champions I was able to drop the Infinity Edge for some other item (typically a Bloodthirster) because of how I was trying to setup.

Did a variation of the Vayne Silver Bolt build with Kennen (to proc his stun more often in conjunction with Q spam) and found it surprisingly effective against other carries, though to be useful against bruisers and tanks I'd need to drop the Guardian Angel for the always useful Last Whisper, something that Kennen might get away with more often compared to Vayne due to his lightning rush.

Could probably do it against without critical hits, but the extras on Static Shiv and Phantom Dancer are pretty valuable considering my playing style and the needs of the build itself (the build in its nature is a split pushing style build, so the SS is pretty much locked in).

The stack building nature of Runaan's Hurricane might be an option I could see being used. But on only Vayne and Kennen, and probably more Kennen than Vayne (if anyone else actually does it, because stun is more valuable than true damage). That build would have a Black Cleaver in there too.

GallowgrimFeb 2, 20152 votes

[{quoted}](name=Gin no Nekomata,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=gEzzWayF,comment-id=0009,timestamp=2015-02-02T02:36:42.311+0000)

Thought experiment: Ranged attacks are now unable to crit. Tell me what you think!

No.

AFK PushFeb 2, 20152 votes

It really depends on who you are playing, but if you start with a item 1054 , then get a item 3047 or a item 3110 you should be fine against ranged ad tops. Then item 3102 works against ap poke if necessary. I feel like another reason why people have so much problem with ranged is not that they are building incorrectly, but they aren't using the bush effectively.

Only Play DariusFeb 2, 20151 votes

Bush really helps. If your getting kited and they have no vision in the bush, they are forced to get near you. Of course they can always ignore you and freeze the lane and get ridiculous farm while you get none.

TalamareFeb 2, 20151 votes

Buff Tabi to 15%

blueberrypancakeFeb 2, 20151 votes

But that hurts the Melee vs Melee matchup

TalamareFeb 2, 20151 votes

{quoted}

But that hurts the Melee vs Melee matchup

Not really, there are VERY VERY few melee who are overly reliant on auto attacks for the majority of their damage

At most it hurts like ... Xin Even Tryn, Yi and Irelia would be like meh whatever

DryditchFeb 2, 20151 votes

XinZhao Did someone say AP Xin? Time to heal for 800 hp every second.

DurfainFeb 2, 20151 votes

Yeah, let's buff Zed even more!

MrBuffingtonFeb 2, 20151 votes

I was actually thinking, since complaints about how insanely gold efficient (and cheap) Last Whisper and Void Staff are, to have items that counter penetration, instead of just nerfing penetration. This could, like you said, function like Ninja Tabi, but I was also thinking it would be cool for it to be an active, something like "Grants 5 seconds of 80% resistance to penetration, each attack absorbed during the time gives +10 MS, stacking up to 5 times" or something to that effect (or course numbers are just placeholders). This could give more counterplay options, where a ranged carry could wait out the active effect before attacking, or the melee could activate it during a teamfight or when being kited to catch up to the carry. I feel like this sort of item would only be useful on tanks (not many other champions are as worried about just getting countered by penetration; for example most bruisers have an easier time with gap closers or damage to just remove a carry before taking too much damage), and it would be a nice later game item as a solution to having to buy more tank stats only to have them shredded through by penetration.

blueberrypancakeFeb 2, 20151 votes

This might sound like the most retarded idea ever but what if Melee champs could have something like Blink Dagger from Dota 2. This could make the Dunkmaster OP but you could always change the cost. My Idea

Dlink Bagger Melee Only (IDGAF)

Long Sword + Long Sword + 1250 (Gold Total 1970) (This might be way to low or high but you never know)

40 AD

Unique Active: Blink- Blink to target location 400 range away (basically a second flash which allows for players to take more unique summoners) 300 second cooldown

Unique Passive: If summoner is using Flash then upon using blink dagger Flash's cooldown is increased by. However if Flash is off of cooldown then Blink Dagger's range is increased by 75. If summoner is using Ghost then champion gains additional movespeed after using blink dagger however if used Ghost's cooldown is increased by 15.

thePandevFeb 2, 20151 votes

{quoted}

This might sound like the most retarded idea ever but what if Melee champs could have something like Blink Dagger from Dota 2. This could make the Dunkmaster OP but you could always change the cost. My Idea

Dlink Bagger Melee Only (IDGAF)

Long Sword + Long Sword + 1250 (Gold Total 1970) (This might be way to low or high but you never know)

40 AD

Unique Active: Blink- Blink to target location 400 range away (basically a second flash which allows for players to take more unique summoners) 300 second cooldown

Unique Passive: If summoner is using Flash then upon using blink dagger Flash's cooldown is increased by. However if Flash is off of cooldown then Blink Dagger's range is increased by 75. If summoner is using Ghost then champion gains additional movespeed after using blink dagger however if used Ghost's cooldown is increased by 15.

If anything, Riot is trying to get rid of flash, this change will just make more ranged champions take it, further increasing the volume of problems around summoner spells

straight4freeFeb 2, 20151 votes

The real problem is that then supports take it and become invincible in lane.

ThePlasticSporkFeb 2, 20151 votes

Suddenly Zed bot is a thing, lol.

No thanks.

EverglaidFeb 2, 20151 votes

item 1054 ? ._.

Imperial JapanFeb 2, 20151 votes

Or just randuins so they can't kite you and maybe get a meelee with a gap closer. Frozen Malet could help once you're in range as well

TaylorGaylorFeb 2, 20151 votes

Oh, I guess you've never heard of item 1054

RaptameiFeb 2, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Melee-specific items that are geared towards helping them fight Ranged champions?

One idea is a Starter Item or some kind of Defensive option that reduces damage from Ranged Basic Attacks, similar to the Ninja Tabi but either more or less effective. (Perhaps there could even be an item that "greatly" reduces Ranged Basic Attack's damage, but for a downside increases Melee Basic Damage?)

That's how it works in Dota.

ThighlanderFeb 2, 20151 votes

It's not that it reduces more damage from ranged attacks, but rather the damage reduced is based on your own melee/ranged status.

bradFeb 2, 20151 votes

they literally took the melee only movespeed buffs on things like ghostblade and scimitar and gave them to ranged champs as well do you think riot really even cares at this point?