buff Teemo

We all know Teemo has been in a tough spot for many seasons now. You might ask how do we know this. It is simple. Try to remember the last time you saw a professional player pick him in a professional competition (e.g. worlds, LPL, LEC, etc). Right, that's what I meant. The only time you can see Teemo in Worlds is when you see him as a plush doll on the Analyst Desk. Not as a champion picked. Before we dive into why Teemo is not picked and needs a buff, let's sum up why professional players pick champions. I will not go into too many details as the reasons why a champ is preferred over another depend heavily on the role. e.g. an ADC is picked over another based on how he can survive dives (see Xayah) or how the champ can dive onto backline and dish out damage (Kai'sa), etc..

PRO GAMES - HOW PRO TEAMS PICK A CHAMPION

1. The champ offers good engage / disengage potential to start or end team fights. This is due to some hard cc ability. (You can see this normally in jungle and support role)
2. The champ offers good damage in team fights while they can stay alive by dishing out damage from a good distance. (You can see this type of champ in mid or bottom role as a mage or ADC)
3. The champ offers good damage and survival in a 1v1 situation while they can escape ganks, making them less vulnerable in a 1v2 situation. These champs have some form of escape, dash or movement ability, good base stats and 3 basic abilities that affect the fight. (You can see this type of champ in top and sometimes in mid)
4. The champ offers good soak potential tanking the enemy team's combined attacks. (You can see this type of champ in top lane role)

I may have missed some but these are the most important ones I could think of quickly while compiling this article. To balance out all the champs at professional level, they have to contribute something in either team fights (engaging, tanking or dishing out damage from a distance) or splitting (going against any champ 1v1 but able to escape 1v2 or 1v3). Teemo does not fit any of these categories. I think to make Teemo a possible choice in a pro game's champion select, we need to find a role from the above he fits best without changing his tool kit as we want to keep his character concept.

TEEMO's BASE STATS MS - ranging from 325 to 350. Teemo's movement speed of 330 is low tier. [This hardly justifies the swift scout nickname. To have an ability that offsets this low tier base stat is not a good ability.] HEALTH - ranging from 480 to 625. Teemo's base health of 525 is low tier. ARMOUR - ranging from 17 to 47. Teemo's armour of 24 is low tier. RANGE - it is hard to draw a line what is low tier and high tier for ranged champions. Nevertheless, I think that Teemo's range of 500 is low tier. AD - ranging from 40 to 74. Teemo's base attack damage of 54 is low tier. AS - ranging from 0.49 to 0.695. Teemo's base attack speed of 0.69 is high tier. This is the only base stat that is high tier. However, since Teemo's abilities scale with AP and AP does not apply to his auto attacks in a 1:1 ratio like AD, only applies in a 1:0.3 ratio, this stats is underwhelming on its own. [E passive scaling 30% AP. The 10% AP poison scaling does not matter as it does not stack, it only ticks once per second, no matter how many times Teemo attacks per second.]

TEEMO's ABILITIES Abilities do multiple things at once. They do not just provide damage but also slow / heal / shield / blind / etc.. Teemo's abilities are so outdated that they do not match today's expectation. Compare Akali's E for example to Teemo's W or even Teemo's Q, which a lot of people think should be nerfed. You will see the difference. Akali's E can be activated twice, scales with 105% AD and 150% AP combined, plus it is a dash ability. Teemo's W provides MS. That's it. Or compare it to Teemo's Q, which scales with 80% AP, no AD scaling, plus blinds the enemy. Teemo's most well-known ability the E only scales with 30% AP. Since poison does not stack, it provides minor damage once per second based on the tick frequency. Late game, champions can auto attacks twice. So this poison damage that ticks only once per second in a team fight provides only half of its value as far as auto attacks are concerned. Even less, when we consider that champions can attack 2.5 times per second. This leaves Teemo's E with an estimated scaling of 35% AP. Compare this to an AD champion's auto attack. A 100 AP on Teemo is the equivalent of 35 AD to provide +35 damage per attack. In addition AP based auto attacks cannot critically hit since there is no AP crit item. Furthermore, Teemo's E has no active ability. It is a passive ability. His no-damage W and no-active E hinders Teemo in certain runes limiting his choices heavily. Finally, the fact that Teemo has only Q that does damage and is relevant in a fight, CDR does not offer the versatility that it offers to champions with 3 active fight-affecting damage abilities. Teemo's fights look like this: auto, Q, auto, auto, auto with an occasional mushroom thrown in [Its animation time negates 2 auto attacks late game. It just takes too long.]

THE MAIN ISSUES with current TEEMO Teemo's team fight tactics - short range, one active basic ability. Cannot compete with ADCs long-ranged 1.5k crit on auto attack damage twice per second. Cannot compete with mages' burst damage as Teemo cannot get close to enemy team. Cannot act as the team's tank as Teemo's base stats are low tier. All of them.

Teemo's split tactics - no dash ability to escape gank situations. no base stats, no active abilities to fight split champions late game, e.g. Vlad, Ryze, Jax, Irelia, Akali, Ekko. Just to mention a few.

Currently, the only viable tactics for Teemo is going invisible laying shroom traps and waiting, hoping that the enemy gets careless and walks into the ambush. In a pro game.. Right. Against pro players even Teemo's only late game option (ambushing someone) is very questionable.

REWORK IDEA To make Teemo a viable pro pick, we have to consider what role we want to see him in, see pro games section. As for me, I would love to see him as a split champion similar to Akali, Irelia, Renekton, Jax. To make this happen and make him viable, we have to: o) rework Teemo's tool kit, providing him 3 active abilities affecting the fight and granting him a dash or some form of escape ability. o) improve his base stats to at least match other split champions in a 1v1 duel.

REWORK

1. Improve all his base stats to at least average tier, some even to top tier. Any champion splitting needs base stats to survive and dish out damage. The stats I use are up for discussion but Teemo needs at least an average tier of combat stats in every aspect to be able to duel.

• Increase movement speed from low tier 330 MS to top tier 350 MS (to become the swift scout).
• Increase auto attack range from low tier 500 to average tier 550 (see ranged champs auto range).
• Increase attack damage from low tier 54 to average tier 60.
• Increase base health from low tier 528 to average tier 600.
• Increase base armour from low tier 24.3 to average tier 38.

2. Improve his W ability. Any champion splitting needs some form of dash or escape ability. See aforementioned split champions: Akali, Irelia, Jax, Ryze, Ekko, Talon, Katarina, Vlad, etc. Also, Teemo needs 3 active abilities that have an impact on fights. Values are up for discussion.

• new W passive: increased movement speed, scaling based on level from 20% to 40%.
• new W active: dash ability with damage or dash ability with slowing nearby poisoned enemy champs, if there is any in range.

3. Improve his E ability and make it an active ability. As mentioned before Teemo needs 3 active abilities that have an impact on fights. Compare this to the only other similar ability: Azir's W [scaling with 60% AP and granting attack speed bonus of 60%.

• new E passive: on hit damage, scaling based on AP, no change here. But stackable poison up to 5 times with a decreased AP ratio from 10% to 5%.
• new E active: poison execute ability, damage scaling based on AP & poison stacks

With this rework, Teemo would be I think a viable choice at professional level for splitting. He would have base stats to enable him to duel a champ and he would have 3 abilities that he can activate.