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Unpopular Opinion: Control Mages are too Weak

DW Diana·8/19/2018, 12:26:51 PM·38 votes·12,481 views

Hi,

So I'll start by saying I know a lot of people hate control mages and therefore I know this will likely be downvoted alongside idiotic and contradictory comments like "They get played in Pro play" and "Their winrate is fine". Look at their stats overall and you'll see what I mean.

So first off what IS a control mage? Well a control mage is a carry mage that uses control instead of outright burst to destroy their enemies. Again this sentence will come with a fair amount of abuse because I used the word carry there, but in truth this is what they were MEANT to be. Their playstyle was designed to be far more about CC and sustained damage rather then the standard brainless "blast them" or "hit them a few times" of other carries, but nevertheless they WERE meant to be carries. The reason they received such abuse is because they were "too oppressive" which for those that don't know means "I couldn't walk up and 1 shot them without taking damage "

With this in mind, consider the current state of control mages. is a wave clear machine, is a walking R with waveclear (assuming no one kills his voidlings), is a walking R with, you guessed it, wave clear, and is... well it just goes on...

Control mages are SLOW, have the worst base stats in the game, and the latest powerspikes. They need to be given back their damage and their ability to trade effectively, and yes OPPRESSIVELY.

That's all from me, let the abuse begin! xD

-- Loki --

97 Comments

Fízz v28/19/2018, 1:23:15 PM27 votes

So I'll start by saying I know a lot of people hate control mages and therefore I know this will likely be downvoted alongside idiotic and contradictory comments like "They get played in Pro play" and "Their winrate is fine". Look at their stats overall and you'll see what I mean.

So "they are played in pro play and have good win rates in soloq, but dont look at that because they are weak"? makes sense

Glory978/19/2018, 1:59:13 PM12 votes

No they are very strong in the right hands. They are played in proplay because of how strong they are

The biggest weakness they have is, that nowadays every other champion has some free dashes that allows the player to get out of a bad situation. but control mages don't have this dash in their kit (which is right in my opinion). They can be punished hard everytime they are out of position. So postioning is extremly important (which a lot of players neglect)

Their biggest strenght is also very difficult to utilise: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EL7h0n0MMME Look at this analysis of febiven for example. Control Mages have insane ability to control the lane and completly render their opponent useless, But only if their strenght is utilised correctly. And this is not a exclusivly for ryze, you could have used the same strategy on orianna, azir or lissandra. Most midlaners in bronze-platinum all go into lane and just start passivly farming. They don't try to go for agressive early plays or strategic wave manipulation to deny their enemy. And if this strenght is not utilised, they indeed feel underwhelming.

If you feel that control mages are too weak you should either pick a different class or take the time it takes to get good at playing control mages. The youtube channel skillcapped that made the video above can be of great help for you.

Kurt Hyzan8/19/2018, 1:09:08 PM12 votes

I think Anivia is strong in her current state, Malz on the other hand is garbage and unfun to play. Riot removed everything useful in his kit just because his R is "too op for a spell", so basically people will just fear you because of your R. For Orianna, I guess it's the mana changes that fucked her up. You forgot to mention Taliyah who's a mage not allowed to waveclear, when Talon Zed item 3077 are a thing :v)

Death by Glamour8/19/2018, 1:56:05 PM5 votes

they are doing fine

FilDaFunk8/19/2018, 6:50:18 PM4 votes

Unpopular opinion: This is a popular opinion.

HonestJohnTheCon8/19/2018, 5:23:04 PM4 votes

Don't do the "Unpopular Opinion" thing. It looks like clickbait and ends up being nonsensical if the post gets upvoted, which it is now.

A simple "Opinion:" would have sufficed.

Frozen Diva8/19/2018, 3:59:49 PM3 votes

Lissandra item 3070

Morgana Ultima8/19/2018, 5:56:50 PM2 votes

As person who has played Morgana mid since season 1 I fully agree. She and her kind have never had the sustained damage required to truly hard carry games.

I play a ton of Malz and Morgana and in order to win a game I generally need at least one other high damage character on the team who is ahead. If I don't get that then I lose.

I've had many matches where I'm 7/0 mid as Morgana, but every other lane is super far behind and the games are just over. If I were playing some meme shit like Zed I'd probably still have a chance to win.

At the end of the day CC mages are inherently team oriented champions and if you don't have a team you're screwed.

Season 8 has been fairly good for Morgana mid, however. Now that power has shifted away from ADC I can carry a lot easier as a CC mage mid. As bad as this season has been, the reduction of ADC power was entirely necessary.

Incarceration8/20/2018, 12:06:26 AM1 votes

Ability to trade effectively?? LOL

If you have a problem with not being able to trade effectively, then you're just bad. Unless you're in a matchup where they naturally have a better early game (a.k.a Syndra and LeBlanc), then you've got to learn how to play lanes correctly.