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I get that Taliyah originally had a lockout on her W.

B0OM·9/13/2016, 6:20:27 PM·22 votes·5,087 views

I don't get why it was removed.

If I understand it correctly, Taliyah's W originally had a lockout animation because you needed to input the command twice - once to activate the ability, and another time to choose a direction. The lockout animation mainly existed for functional reasons.

After they changed the input to vector casting, the lockout animation technically wasn't functionally necessary because the spell now only required one input instead of two to make it work. So they removed the lockout. Apparently this also made the spell "feel better" at the cost of some game health, since this opened up the possibility for W->E combos when previously only E->W was possible.

I personally don't understand why the spell couldn't keep its lockout animation after a completed input. I feel like it's much healthier for the game and her kit. Other abilities have long lockout animations without "feeling bad", such as Lux R, Ezreal R, Orianna R, Braum R, etc. The return of W's lockout animation would encourage Taliyah's zoning potential more than her burst potential by removing the guaranteed E after a successful W hit, which would open up her kit to be more balanceable.

TL;DR I think it is completely feasible for Taliyah's current vector cast W to have a lockout animation post-cast and remain viable, which would make her much easier to balance overall.

Thoughts?

84 Comments

LadyRenly9/13/2016, 7:02:25 PM13 votes

her old W felt so much better to use, the people who praised the vector changes honestly did not play Taliyah at all besides using her once and calling her trash.

inplane9/13/2016, 8:02:20 PM9 votes

To be realistic, Lockout was there for a reason. It was the reason why she was so unique and had a kit that allowed offensive and defensive zone control that punished gapclosing-happy players severely.

Ever since it was removed, her entire kit fell apart because by the nature of her W and E. Those two skills were balanced around Lockout. E was allowed to heavily burst people regardless of HP and resistances because it was situational. She couldn't perform W into E, so she had to go into a close range. Allowing her to use W into E made the setup too safe and E's damage had to be lowered to almost nothing. Of course, using E into W was affected and there is basically no point in using it anymore, getting rid of Taliyah 's "Zoning" aspect. E is usually used as a tacked on DPS skill when W is used first.

Basically, her skill floor and skill ceiling completely fell into the ground because the mechanic that made her so challenging got removed. Everything rewarding that came with overcoming that challenge was dumbed down and we basically have this zone control mage who can only zone through a giant wall that is up every minute and a half at max level. I'd take Orianna or Viktor over her any day.

Luxs Destiny9/13/2016, 6:26:19 PM8 votes

no.

The reason they changed it to vector casting was to keep it in line with (no pun intended) line cast spells, such as rumble ult and viktor e.

game health aside, this is a QoL change for Taliyah that was needed, seeing as how the lockout let vulnerability rip Taliyah a new orifice.

Her spell rotations are healthier now, much more varied, easier to do, and are easier to miss as well.

RiotZenonTheStoic9/14/2016, 10:57:50 PM5 votes

Here's why I originally put a spell cast lockout on Taliyah's W:

I wanted to give the player breathing room to press the W button a second time.
I was very scared of W into E as a best case burst scenario

Here's why we reached the decision to remove the lockout:

It felt really awful not to be able to cast anything else if you got the W combo down quickly. It felt like you got better at W (you're quicker now) but the game won't let you use that hard-won skill
It turns out that we can either have proper spell queueing during a delay or good communication that a spell cannot currently be cast, but not both. This is one of the areas in the game we're working to improve. Either way, the experience was not up to our standards.

It also turns out that I was wrong to be scared of W into E. Ranges and cooldowns make this combo reasonably balanced.

The things we're struggling with right now on her kit are her wave clear (which we've hit very hard. It was meant to be a strength, but it was clearly excessive), the difference is usefulness of her ult between coordinated and uncoordinated play (we always knew this was going to be trouble but signed ourselves up for it because the skill is cool), and how much she falls off late game. Her theoretical DPS is absurdly high, but the later the game goes, the more of a premium there is on getting your damage out INSTANTLY, and her Q means she always has to wait a minimum of 2s to get one rotation out. Again, if you do the math? Her late game DPS is off the charts: At 40% CDR, she has a 2.4s CD spell that deals 420 + 1.2 AP. That's just the one spell. But then you look at actual data and we see there are very few champions in the game who fall off late game quite as hard as she does.

Remember that ours is a game that's never done. Obviously we'll continue working on her and we'll get her into a good spot.

inplane9/13/2016, 8:29:14 PM3 votes

Sadly E is pushed into the dirt like that. :T

About the thing with people being bad. I don't want to offend people like that, but with how some people specifically went out of their way to attack Riot Zenon for creating such a unique champ with clear strengths and weaknesses, it's hard not to call them a bunch of nitwits.

Anonagon9/13/2016, 6:39:24 PM2 votes

It doesn't need a lockout. Lockouts on other abilities exist because of cast times and animations, while Taliyah's was purely functional. It is unreasonable to have an ability that is already completely casted prevent you from using your other abilities for a while. Yes, now going W>E is a strong, reliable combo, but if that's too strong they can simply nerf that rather than make her feel like shit to play.