@Riot, Creating Mandrake wards doesn't stop the underlying the problem: Perma-stealth is too Strong

Darkomantis··5 votes·723 views

Here is the problem, just by the enemy picking up Evelynn, you are forced to spend more gold early getting wards and pinks on this one champion. Even if the Mandrake ward finally does come out, the only people that can effectively use it is Bot lane where the support has the resources to continually buy pinks and wards. The other lanes and jungle can't make much effective use of the wards because there is so many ways to for Evelynn to gank. Also you have to take into the fact that the team that has Evelynn can put out a lot of wards and find where they are pinking and dropping Mandrakes. So players are still wasting gold (especially if they are losing) just to watch out for Evelynn.

You're putting time into something that can be easily solved with just another rework. People would have liked to continue playing as AP assassin Evelynn but it can't be balanced due to the perma-stealth that makes her frustrating to play against. Evelynn had to be changed into a Bruiser because of it where she now has two options: she is able to make (annoying) ganks and gets fed thereby making her super tanky and have strong base damage to kill squishies or she doesn't get good ganks off and is forced to become ONLY a meatshield.

Take the time to put in another rework for Evelynn that has more balanceable stealth on a basic spell (Shaco Twitch ) so that you aren't spending more resources on Pinks until teamfights come, not in the first 5minutes of the game. Shaco can be avoided with only basic wards and doesn't require full on pinks (or a new type of ward) just to deal with him. If you do the rework then you can end up with a healthy champion that players can like and fill their previous cravings: having an AP Evelynn.

12 Comments

Saianna2 votes

"only people that can effectively use it is Bot lane where the support has the resources to continually buy pinks and wards."

He doesn't have resources. He's forced to buy it.

Darkomantis1 votes

.... What are you trying to say then?

IcyPepper2 votes

Support buys sightstone, but saying they're the only ones with the resources (it sounds like it's being implied) is like saying the intern of your company is the only one with the resources to hire new help.

Gold income, bro.

Everybody can buy a pink. 100 gold is not that much.

Saianna1 votes

Yeah this! Also from all 5 players, Supports are the only ones who have the smallest income.. And that income is also hindered by buying wards. I mean they are neccessary, but it's not like supports sleep on mountains of gold :/

1 800 MID LANE2 votes

Time to throw my 2 cents into this...

On your first back, regardless of it being from a death or a kill, you should buy at least 1 ward anyway. The perma-stealth is obnoxious, but this game is 60% strategy, 39% reaction time, and 1% playing an OP champion to win. This is one of those games that could be described as "perfectly imbalanced." That is, you can't play the same champion every time and expect to never get facerolled because they played a different champion. Even if you do end up going against a champion that counters you in every way ( Syndra Fizz item 3070 ), there are ways to beat them using your teammates.

Green wards and pink wards are never wasted gold. That's like saying building defensively is a complete waste. Wards are offensive AND defensive.

kJs1 votes

item 3362

Eve's not that bad. Invisibility was actually far worse before Trinket and Ward changes back in Season 3. You'd essentially be taking away the identity of the champion, that is, always being invisible.

To be honest, Mandrake Ward would go a looong way to countering invisible or long range, strong engage champions, like Shaco, Zac, Rek'Sai

Darkomantis1 votes

But if you hear the responses from people who didn't like how Riot changed Evelynn from AP to a Bruiser, they never said that permastealth is one of their favorite things about Eve. The thing they liked was her pref-nerf ultimate and of course her hate spikes. Besides, people at the time of the stealth rework came out and said that Rengar was Eve 2.0.

Does Rengar's stealth define him? Not really. Does Evelynn's stealth define her? Not at all. It's just something that prevents her from being more interesting as a champion and as an opponent.

kJs1 votes

Evelynn is defined by her perma-stealth. It's a huge part of her identity even if you don't believe that it does anything in teamfights. The fact that she ganks so well with it and puts automatic global pressure with it is the idea of Evelynn. If Riot deems that Evelyn is too boring and it's difficult to make her interesting because of her perma-stealth then so be it. It's still a large part of who she fictionally is.

Rebonack1 votes

Eve was a Fighter before her remake, too. OLD AP Eve was just awful. Trinity/Tanky was the typical go-to build. Stacking Sunfires on her back in the day was hilarious.

Of course, Old Eve also brought a two second stun that could hit two people with proper positioning. So there's that.

AP burst out of stealth is a super-terrible idea. Hell, any burst out of stealth is an awful idea. Just look at how much Riot has had to break Knifecat's legs to keep his Ult.

Best bet for Eve would be to remove the damage component from her Ult and make it give her OnHit magic damage against foes it nails for 10 seconds or so. Then make it refresh on kill/assist. That would fit much better with her old play style.

BluePolarizer1 votes

You can't play the same way every game.

Against eve the proper response is to ward enemy camps instead of the river/tribush so you can see when she farms jungle.

Mafia LeBlanc1 votes

Eve has always been a problematic champ - she's also always been extremely strong. Even when the community perceives her as weak and unviable, her stealth alone makes her a great asset. She had her stun from stealth for years - and for most of this time, she was seen as really weak and unviable, and although I carried myself to gold I in season 1 with her, across hundreds of games as Evelynn; I was also banned frequently because I was reported so often for playing her, which then led to a permanent ban on my first account.

People got really creative with their reports/trolling to make me look like the bad guy as though I picked Eve to spite my team, and would make things up in the tribunal report to make it really look like I was trolling, even though I was just playing the champ I love despite my team actively working against me to steal my mobs/buffs, and bait me into dying then writing in the report that I fed on purpose. Yes, even with her stun, she was still perceived as so bad that you would get harassed by your team relentlessly until you literally could be permanently banned for playing her.

It wasn't really until someone on the EU server carried to diamond with revive/smite jungle eve, that it became a thing that people not only stopped reporting for, but they also finally took the champion seriously, spammed the hell out of her, and then had everyone complain when she was in every single game, and got her nerfed to oblivion.

But, even pre-rework nerfed Evelynn with the slow was a strong champion, simply because her presence in the game forces the enemy team to change their playstyle more than any other champ. Her kit also allows for very high dps and burst at the same time, and every single item in the game goes well on her.

Eve has also been my main champion since beta, and I've dealt with people reporting/trolling me just for picking her, then having those same people around calling me a sheeple noob for playing such an OP champ when she got popular.

I think no matter how nerfed she gets, as long as she has stealth, she's always going to be a champion impossible to balance in the community's eyes - either 'super omg op nerf now' or 'lol useless champ report anyone who plays her'. Her current iteration is nothing like how it was, and I'd gladly trade it for the Eve with the slow from stealth and no aoe ult, but I'm probably in the minority in that regard. She's still really strong either way, and until they remove her stealth completely, she pretty much always will be.

More from Gameplay

More by Darkomantis