I Don't Understand Why Nami Is Put On A Pedestal

Don't get me wrong, she's a very well designed champion, and is consistently one of the more balanced ones out there, rarely getting touched by the balanced team. However, I don't understand why she's put as this gold standard when compared to other Enchanters, when in fact she's incredibly similar to the rest of them. Lets compare her to Janna, a champion that's essentially the Teemo of support in terms of being hated.

Whenever I bring up Janna and Nami, very often others tell me that Janna is straight broken and Nami is what she should be in regards of balancing and playstyle, but these two are almost entirely the same, with the only major difference being their ultimates. Let me just run down their abilities, and compare them one by one.

To start off with their passives, they're quite similar, with both of them being centered around granting movement speed to allies. With Janna, she grants movement speed to all allies near her, as long as their moving towards her, which it usually only helpful for getting to lane quicker, or running from an enemy. Nami's on the other hand only grants movement speed whenever her abilities hit an ally, granting them a small burst of speed. In essence, she can completely disregard the enemy and use all her abilities on her allies to help them chase or escape faster, as I have done many times while playing as her. This also makes all of Nami's abilities an ally buff, and more than once have I just used QWER on my team or ADC rather than using any of them on an enemy.

Next off is there Qs. Janna's is a skillshot AoE knockup with decent range, that can be charged to increase range and damage, but even at max charge, unless building AP, the damage is nonexistant. However, when charging, it gives off a sound to alert enemies, and for any skilled player, is terribly easy to dodge, considering its slow missle speed and again the fact that it alerts enemies that it's being charged. Nami's is much more basic, being a simple point and click AoE knock up, dealing little damage, but great for engagement and disengagement, just like Janna's. With both of these abilties, they're lackluster in damage, but offer powerful crowd control, and some of the easier abilties to land, with all of it just requiring the correct timing and positioning.

Now, onto their Ws, this is where I get confused as to why Janna is considered the totally broken one out of the two. Janna's is a point and clcik single target slow, dealing moderate damage, and having a low cooldown and mana cost, but incredibly low range. It also has a passive that, when the abiltiy is not on cooldown, grants her movement through ally units and movement speed. Also, if you pay attention, you'll know when her abiltiy is on cooldown because she won't have her little bird flying arounf her when it is. Nami's is also a single target point and click ability, with higher mana costs than Janna's, but greatly increased range. Not only this, but after hitting an enemy, if she stays in range, it will bounce back to heal her or her ally, and if in range again, can hit a second enemy for just as much damage as the first hit, allowing her to hit up to 2 enemies with a single point and click to get easy damage, and again with the heal, makes for a low risk poke ability in lane that's easy to spam.

Their E's are a bit more divergent, but at their core focus on the same thing, which is to buff theirs or an allies auto attacks. Janna's E is a shield that after a .75 second grace period, will start to fade, but buffs the shielded champions AD. Nami's E, while not a shield, can proc Summon Aery, basically making it a shield, and when used on a champion, makes their next 3 autoattacks deal bonus magic damage and slow. This essentially makes it a point and click slow that can be used 3 times in a row, as while as simultaneously a shield, if the Nami has Summon Aery, and lets not forget Nami's passive, which also makes this ability a movement buff at the same time.

Finally, their ultimates are really the only things that seperate these two from playing almost entirely the same. Janna's ultimate is an AoE knock back, that knocks back all enemies close to her, but doesn't deal damage, and heals allies that stay in the zone. Something most people overlook is that this ability is a channel, meaning, Janna is at her most vulnerable when using her ultimate, because is she tries to defend herself or counter attack, the healing effect ends. Nami's ultimate is much more enemy focused, being a long range AoE knock up, that damages all enemies hit, and is great for sniping enemies after they think they're safe. Not to mention Nami's passive, which also makes this ability a team buff, granting movement speed to all allies hit by the ability.

Now this isn't a hate thread towards Nami, who in fact I love to play, nor an appreciation thread for Janna, who I also enjoy playing, but just a point to prove that Nami really isn't all that special, in regards to playstyle and balacing, when compared to other Enchanters. The only difference betwen them, aside from their ultimates, is that Janna sacrifices damage for easier to hit CC, and has more focus towards defending allies, where as Nami sacrfices easier to hit CC for damage, and is easily able to switch between playing defensive or aggressive. At their core, these two are just different sides of the same coin.

This last bit is just a little rant, but I don't get why Janna is considered so broken when her only 2 damaging abilities give very clear signs that she either has them up or is ready to use them. Like, maybe if you paid attention, you wouldn't get hit by Janna's Q for THE FIFTEENTH FUCKING TIME!!