While I was watching SkinsSpotlight's video on Maokai's changes, I noticed immediately that the travel time of his W had been greatly increased, but I didn't think it became this slow!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k65TfxINge4&ab_channel=Vandiril
Basically, if the enemy champion has more than 750 ms, Maokai won't be able to root them.
BALDG1VEN BOOMER21 votes
: Ban Quinn or we lose!
XIII Vanitas46 votes : Ban Quinn or I'm going to run down mid against my own will, literally!
Melledoneus8 votes Flashes and Presses W
SHIT!
Still traveling
?
I'M GONNA GET YOU. Eventually.
Casually flies away
Damn, she got away.
Mistertheshifter16 votesSir, he is a tree, the fact that he is moving at all is actually rather impressive.
Kingnewgameplus15 votesI heard that flying type beats grass type but this is ridiculous.
jinxedchef14 votesWhat I want to know is, **how is he going to be played as a tank if he doesn't have any damage mitigation? ** His ult is gone and his new passive is more sustain. So he is going to be the only mainly tank champ without damage mitigation(shield, damage reduction, bonus Defensive stats, etc)?
SweedishGunner17 votesThey wanted him to feel more unique, so they made him the least tanky tank in the game? Rito logic.
LankPants8 votesSame logic as "we wanted Sejuani to be a leader, so wait for your ally to stack your E for you so you can follow pleb".
Chembaron Yamada1 votesHe is not the only one.
no shield, no damage reduction, no bonus defensive stats
same for him
and for him
Spoofghoul11 votesnot true not true
Gragas has damage reduction
Nunu can slow enemies attackspeed which is really strong actually when stacked with frozen hearth for example
and all of them have heals which is basically a kind of tank steroid and even scales with both health and armor for maokai zac and gragas
Chembaron Yamada4 votesAh, k didn't know about the damage reduction. Just meant that it isn't true that Maokai is the only one without shield, damage reduction and bonus defense. And I think the same, healing is one kind of tank steroid. And it seems the amount of health Maokai is able to heal is huge.
PePsiLemoNN3 votesMaokai has heals too , just saying
Glory ln Death3 votesHe has a pretty hefty heal on his passive and untargetability during his W.
cinomenapplebae12 votesI can't wait for Maokai top to w me and then flash into my tower and kill him for free lol
Velzard of Koz1 votesUses 300 second cooldown Summoner Spell. "kill him for free"
Yeah, and the circlejerk is already emerging. Surely his W is useless. Because all champs have 500+ MS just like that. It's not fair to him. Because point-click dash+root was. I'll just move and suddenly he's fucked. Because he's not a tank with defense, small direct disengage and decent indirect disengage and other 2 basic abilities. I'll flash out of it and fuck him up for free, because 300 second cooldown doesn't mean anything today.
cinomenapplebae1 votes
It's 
not 
like 
flash 
matters
Pendergast8919 votesActually useless against a fiora who's not braindead
Drago Zankaru2 votesoh you saw that video 2? i think once she almost cast her riposte to soon it took so long to get to her
OverpoweredSoap9 votesDidn't they increase the speed of his W awhile back for this exact reason?
Why change it after his rework again? Especially if he no longer has damage mitigation?
BeatzBoyFTW9 votesRiot's probably gonna reply with "OH CZ U HAVE NEW ULT WHICH ROOTS TOO HURR DURR".
EndlessSorcerer8 votesWell, this removes one champion from my top-lane pool.
They nerfed pretty much every aspect of his kit.
midnight oil243 votesRiot did say that he's shifted to be a jungle tank anyway.
Very Hard Engage9 votesyeah but the only thing making him an effective jungle tank was his W for easy ganking. thats it.
everything else is lacking for a jungler.
DJMason882 votesHeal?
Very Hard Engage5 votesthe last thing you want is an afk farming jungler, especially one whos slow as a tank.
its all about the tanking/team fighting.
GelsominoKiller3 votesHe may find a new niche as a control junlger with new saplings. Aside from that, nothing.
As much as i want maokai returning to jungle, i'm not fine with it being at the expense of his toplane, which is a consolidated role of his now.
If they really want him to jungle they need to speed up his W, or else every gank will turn into a tower dive if the enemy has flash up...
Wolfe KuPo2 votesthe issue is can he deal with Lee Sin since unless they decide to finally hit Lee Sin hard, the current Jungle meta is Lee Sin and whoever can deal with Lee Sin since that is what happens when Lee Sin is too strong
Kilanost6 votesMaokai's rework is garbage. This is just the tip of the iceberg that is the shittiness of his changes.
kasfas5 votesI think everything on maokai is extremely slow now. They even added extra animation to his q and e which they didn't need.
Everything about maokai now seems slow af and that's not why people would play him. They would play him because his abilities flow nicely together.
The sad part is, they didn't change the flow. They overemphasized his abilities so much that it just FEELS worse to use.
Also, I think his e bonus damage and new ult are gimmicky as hell and having so much of his power in those abilities makes him feel like shit.
His passive is worse, and the improved heal provided I don't think will make up for how much harder it is to get now, but that is less of an issue.
Overall I think maokai was hard nerfed in this rework, not without reason, but nerfed nonetheless to a point where I expect him to be pretty weak, though not garbage, on release.
ModAcademy Kayn4 votesWhat champ is going to have 750 in a consistent case.
Corvo Attano3 votesQuinn, Sion, Warwick
ModAcademy Kayn3 votesAll of those are heavily situational.
hallfro2 votesBut the fact that a point and click ability just simply doesn't work on them because they move too fast is goofy and not well thought out.
ModAcademy Kayn4 votesIn such rare cases though... Sion would have to be ulting (and running away), Warwick would have to be running at a low health target, and Quinn would have to never be in Combat in the first place.
Chembaron Yamada3 votesAnd mentioning Sion, when he is ulting he can't be rooted anyway. It doesn't really matter if you can hit that skill on him in that situation or not.
So basically just Warwick and Quinn and like you pointed out: extremey situational.
Blackstone012 votesBut reaching him stops him since he stops once he hits a champ. You would be on top of him, at least now not with this one.
XIII Vanitas3 votesThere is Zilean's speed-up, for example, which can be applied to any allied champion.
TheMinez1 votes
Runs into enemy adc at speed of light while being slowly trailed by a tree
Glory ln Death2 votesIt's the same exact thing with any point and click movement ability - if you are moving fast enough, the ability ends before they reach you. Look at Vi and Nocturne's ults.
Mighty Mortein3 votesHow to counter the new Maokai: Walk at a leisurely pace.
TheHappyReaperz1 votes"Basically, if the enemy champion has more than 750 ms, Maokai won't be able to root it."
That is a straight up lie. If you watch through the video, you will notice, in the rare case an enemy can keep 750 MS for an extended period of time, Maokia will still root them.
XIII Vanitas9 votesIt happens only when the target of his W reaches a certain distance away from Maokai. At that point, his root becomes basically pointless, because it loses its intended purpose (which is stopping the target in its track few moments after the spell is cast).
Chembaron Yamada2 votesThat case is so incredibly rare, I doubt anyone is really going to experience it.
TheMinez1 votes
So you're telling me that I just need another movespeed item and an active that the support can purchase and use to outrun Maokai root?
Stacona1 votesI'm perfectly fine with Maokai being nerfed hard in the mid season and buffed later, he has been such a dominant pick for so long that it is time to let others shine
Drago Zankaru4 votesnerfing him so he is not top tier is one thing.
Making the worst eve/olaf tier is something all together
also better nerf maokai should totally be a thing at this point cause any time he starts seeing play in pros he gets nerfed afterwards
Stacona1 votesYou make it sound like Maokai is going to be unplayable, that is far from the case. He will still be good in niche scenarios just no longer god tier overpowered like he is now and especially how he used to be in the past.
Drago Zankaru4 voteswhat niche? he does aoe damage on 2 skills, 1 single target slow as fk god awful gap closer/"hard" cc, and an really bad nami+zyra ult that is as slow or even slower than the gap closer....he doesnt do anything well expt have "free" wards that is literally it anything else you want there is at least 1 if not 2 tanks that does the same thing but even better
Top nautilus better aoe damage and his ult is faster than maokai w or ult(and cant be dodged) jungle amumu longer range/faster initiation(can be dodged) instant aoe prison/root and better clears support bruam is a better peel with instant ult and his slow/stun, leona has more hard cc and is tankier
so what niche does the pbe maokai fill trash troll pick?
Keevalroy1 votesThe one thing I was worried about was his ability to jungle, and I guess Riot wants to fuck him over now that they have another tree-man in the jungle so it's....redundant to have the original back? All you needed to do was decrease the W damage to champions, increase the range slightly, and let it do extra damage to monsters to allow him to be a brick wall for your team without outdamaging an ADC, and allowing him back in the jungle. A rework wasn't necessary, but pigeonholing him top after his last update is apparently the way to go.
XIII Vanitas2 votesThe funny thing is that they said they wanted him to be a jungler primarily.