Riot. Was was the reason beyhond the mana-regeneration nerfs?

Kowe The Ewok·Jan 1, 2015·41 votes·10,440 views

The new mana regeneration stat might look fancy with its "+100% base mana regeneration", but it's much less clear than it was before, in terms of explaining how much mana you actually receive.

As a side effect many peoply didn't notice that these items were actually quite drastically nerfed. While champions who didn't buy mana items anyways profitted from the 4.20 changes, those who are forced to buy them like now run out of mana horribly fast compared to before.

Hell, you can invest 5000 gold in mana items and you'll still run out of many in a single teamfights as !
(No need to be with constantly increasing mana cost).

Was there any reason why you wanted these champions nerfed?
Or was the change - nothing bad in admitting that - simply not well thought through?
Or did you feel like you had buff midlaners like ?

114 Comments

RiotPhreakJan 2, 201536 votes

Outside of Athene's, all the mana regen items were pretty significantly buffed. Morellonomicon for example provides significantly more mp5 after about level 5, and it only gets higher from there.

Honestly, I just straight up disagree with you, looking at the numbers.

And judging by the champions played in recent tournament play, with Orianna, Kassadin, Ziggs, Azir, etc. all being common, it doesn't really seem like what you're saying is true.

From my own experiences, I've found it basically impossible to run out with Tear/Morellonomicon.

5G8Nri0B54Jan 2, 201521 votes

I'm not entirely sure if Orianna, Ziggs, or Azir would be all too happy being forced to buy a Tear. The idea that a champion has to buy two mana items to do what they could before doesn't sound all too encouraging when all the mana-less competitors got what is essentially an indirect buff by virtue of not being messed around with.

And what of the champions where Athene's crazy mana regeneration was what allowed them to function? The bird champions that aren't Azir?

And don't mention of Swain's Passive. It's handy in-lane. But not so much in a long teamfight. Athene's was crucial for prolonged teamfights and skirmishes. While Athene's may have been excessive on Ziggs, some champion actually forced players to manage their mana pre-4.21. For someone like Swain, Athene's sometimes gave him the second wind he needed after going oom against a particularly drawn out dragon stand-off where both sides refused to die. And I suspect Anivia would have similar issues too.

Rather than mess with all the items such as this, it may have been better to individually tweak the mana consumption of champions where mana stopped being an issue past the laning phase.

RasCaelestisJan 2, 20154 votes

{quoted}

snip And what of the champions where Athene's crazy mana regeneration was what allowed them to function? The bird champions that aren't Azir? snip

Quinn : Squawk. Valor, that's mean! Squawk! No, I know we never really got mana regen items... SQUAWK! Don't worry, they didn't forget about us again. I hope...

5G8Nri0B54Jan 2, 20158 votes

Swain : "He meant magical birds you weird-chinned freak!"

C9 BaronJan 2, 20157 votes

Quinn : "At least I show mine. Come on, we all know you're projecting."

RottedApplesJan 2, 201515 votes

My biggest issue with the mana changes is the whole +x% thing.

You guys are all about clarity, clarity is the biggest thing, it's what everyone wants. Then you go and make a fairly important thing vague and confusing. I have 0 clue as to how much mana regen i'm ACTUALLY getting from these items now.

killd0zerJan 2, 201511 votes

Are you joking? If you hover over the item it tells you right on it EXACTLY how much regen you get. Hell it tells you before you even buy the item.

BallisticMouseJan 2, 201517 votes

Riot if you keep updating based on tournament play no one is going to like your company. Personally I think a company having a good name is a large part of their game becoming and staying popular.

Please start responding to the forum posts more, since thats why you made this reddit hell hole.

chumblerJan 2, 20157 votes

{quoted}

Riot if you keep updating based on tournament play no one is going to like your company. Personally I think a company having a good name is a large part of their game becoming and staying popular.

Please start responding to the forum posts more, since thats why you made this reddit hell hole.

Balancing around tournament play is absolutely what they should be doing. The problem is their balance and design direction is just terrible.

JunkοJan 2, 20156 votes

Yeah they should buff Yasuo because he lost almost every single game when he was picked in tournaments. And nerf Zilean to hell cause he had 100% pick/ban rate despite being shit in solo plays.

You know just balancing around tournaments

ChargeItDownMidJan 3, 20151 votes

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JunkοJan 3, 20152 votes

Yasuo had a pick/ban of 43.9%. Alistar, Zilean, Lucian, Maokai, Zed, Tristana and like 5 other champions all beat him by a fair amount. He also had a winrate of 47%, Alistar had a win rate of whooping 80%. So Yasuo would be BUFFED if it was balanced around tournamenets.

ChargeItDownMidJan 3, 20152 votes

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JunkοJan 3, 20152 votes

Then why are Alistar and Zilean not nerfed? Alistar had a 100% pick/ban WITH 80% winrate, that's fucking disastrous.

ChargeItDownMidJan 3, 20151 votes

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JunkοJan 3, 20151 votes

Zilean lost his global passive before that, he lost it along with Janna's to remove global passives from the game. Alistar lost right click because top lane Alistar was OP

XonraJan 4, 20151 votes

{quoted}

You don't buff a champion because "5 other champions" beat him. There are close to 120 champions in the game right now and at max only 30-40 that see any play in tournaments. Anyone that sees a consistent amount of play would get nerfed because they are automatically in the top 1/3 of the champion pool.

When in tournament settings there are only at most 5 other champs even in your lane in an entire split of the LCS, it doesn't matter how many champions there are. The five that beat him could be the only 5 he goes against.

The problem in general isn't that anyone needs nerfs anyways, that is the whole problem. Riot needs to learn buffing over nerfing but they are too quick to play whack-a-mole like they promised they wouldn't at the start of preseason and that is all they know it seems like. You don't have to constantly nerf to balance but...we won't ever see that side of Riot balance I don't think.

ChargeItDownMidJan 4, 20152 votes

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XonraJan 4, 20151 votes

{quoted}

While riot doesn't have to nerf over buffing, nerfing is almost always a superior choice. Both nerfing the strong champions and buffing the weak champions help balance the game. However, overbuffing a champion will make them an instant pick/ban and ruin most games while overnerfing a champion will simply make them fall out of play and have little effect on games. While I agree that riot doesn't have to always nerf, I see little reason why they should take a buff first approach when a nerf first approach is so much more efficient. Small buffs can be used as fine tuning after the problematic champions have been fixed with more significant nerfs.

Completely disagree that nerfing should be the go to choice. Let us just look at ADCs and the balance there. In most cases the ADCs over the years have received many more nerfs than buffs, I would go as far as to say double the amount of nerfs to buffs.

I feel this has caused some of the problems in the jungle as well, if not impacted the jungle more so (same in mid really where immobile mages were all but pushed out or pushed to supports) where Riot nerfed so....many....junglers but didn't touch Lee Sin aside from a few tickles, so now they really need to nerf Lee when what they should have done was balance and not simply nerfing. I mean if you had a dent in the side of your car but the other side looked really nice and waxed and shiny....would you buff out the dent and have it touched up or take a hammer to the nice side so they look equal?

My point is, they shouldn't take a do either thing first approach, which I think is THE problem is they have shown a nerf first approach for years when what they should do instead of playing whack-a-mole is look at the situation as a whole, what is making that champion strong, what is making a champion weak and not just "This champ is strong buff it" because that imbalances everything else, but due to E-Sports now they seem to feel they have to act faster and at least from my own perspective (as I won't speak for anyone else) it seems they rush things sometimes, and I can give lots of examples but that is for another post.

If you only continue to nerf and nerf and give "small buffs" eventually everyone will just be the same level of weak and right back to the same level of bad balance as before since you just nerfed to a reset that makes everyone overall weaker but the same champions are right back to where they started.

ChargeItDownMidJan 4, 20151 votes

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XonraJan 4, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Why would everyone go back to the same level of bad balance? The whole point is that you only nerf the strong champions and only enough so that they are are on par with the average champion. Obviously, that means that tier one champions such as lee sin would get harder nerfs than their 1.5 champions such as pantheon who in turn would get nerfed harder than a tier 2 champion such as rengar. Only the top champions would be overall weaker while the mid and bottom tier champions will stay around the same power +/- a few small buffs.

Also, you have to realize that it takes significantly longer to buff champions than it does to nerf champions for the same payoff. If riot screws up and overbuffs a champion, they will ruin every game. If riot screws up and overnerfs a champion, they will fall out of favor and effect close to no games. It is extremely inefficient to do another approach besides the nerf first when the game is as unbalanced as it currently is (and leads to problems such as lee sin being overpowered for 2 years because riot refuses to nerf fast enough).

The problem is that when you have say three champs that are on top, those three get nerfed, so another three take their place (this is an example not taken from a specific instance) then riot nerfs those three, and another three pop up, and again nerfed, well now we get back to the original offenders ( looks at the past 2 years of balance and you will see that the cycle tends to start with certain overbearing champions then nerfed etc and it eventually goes back to them). The probably is because champions are nerfed more than buffed you eventually end up with the same champions in those strong positions, except they are weaker than they were previously and the others are too, so you not only didn't succeed in overall balance you weaken the entire pack.

That is the point I was trying to make it that you can't simply nerf nerf nerf sort of buff nerf nerf because then you end up with a completely different problem.

deadlychuckJan 2, 20159 votes

{quoted}

Morellonomicon for example provides significantly more mp5 after about level 5, and it only gets higher from there.

So you guys are giving the AD and Manaless champions the early game on a silver platter now too? Why do you even keep AP in the game if it's just going to be a super restrictive and low power alternative to the superior, better itemized, higher scaling AD counter part.

No joke, lifesteal is still stronger than any AP scaling heal in the game (thank you item 3074 for continuing to be the most efficient item in the game), crit still dominates the damage boards ( Yasuo can't imagine why this guy can't be balanced), and tank itemization is still terrible, yet you guys decided to do something about the mp5. It seems like it was a waste of resources revamping all of these mana systems when there are much larger problems that demand to be addressed.

XonraJan 4, 20153 votes

{quoted} It seems like it was a waste of resources revamping all of these mana systems when there are much larger problems that demand to be addressed.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

YoellaJan 2, 20153 votes

I think you're getting a lot of bandwagon downvotes, sorry about that. Personally I like the new mana/hp regeneration system. +% feels a lot better than seeing "per 5" everywhere, and I feel like it opens the doorway to more advanced tactics.

Morellonomicon is a blessing, oh my God I love that item. I get it on pretty much anyone who needs AP and CDR, and often I get two of them by the end of the game. I play a lot of mages, they're my main playstyle, and I have to say that I haven't noticed anything majorly negative about the mana changes. I admit that it does feel like I'm regenerating less mana early game, before level 6, but once I get Forbidden Idol or Morellonomicon I can pretty much farm indefinitely. I mean, unless I use several full ability combos in a row I don't really run out of mana.

While I disagree with those who think this was a nerf, I can see why they'd think that. It's different, it probably tweaked a few existing strategies, and it's visually an entirely new method of regeneration. People don't like to admit they messed up in game, so whenever someone is killed or is kinda braindead for a moment they claim "Lag" or the like. Now they blame the mana regeneration changes. I'm sure it's actually affected some people, but probably 70% of the people complaining about it are just using it as an excuse.

One last thing, thank you for posting it's been a while since I've seen a Red Post. I hope you had happy holidays and I wish you a great new year! Just please, don't forget that normal people play thing game too; we aren't all in tournaments. I have to admit it does feel a bit like Riot cares about the LCS tournaments significantly more than the general playerbase, more so at certain times than others.

Champion SkinJan 5, 20152 votes

One thing the new system does is buff Energy and those with no resource early game since for them it is the same while mana champions can in general use less abilities as mana regen is lower early game

And the best mana regen item is worse now compared to before which is also a slight nerf to mana champions

chumblerJan 1, 201534 votes

Manaless champions make more #LCSBIGPLAYS, so they want people to play them. Pro tip: Riot is incredibly stupid.

TwoDJan 2, 20153 votes

Not too stupid, I mean they do make the $$. They're just pigs, money hungry pigs, they would do anything for the $$ even if it makes them look stupid, which they are. lol

Leblancs BoobJan 1, 201516 votes

As if assassins didn't already rule mid lane now GL taking any immobile mage vs Zed/Akali/Kat/Fizz

Nausicäa Jan 1, 20155 votes

{quoted}

As if assassins didn't already rule mid lane now GL taking any immobile mage vs Zed/Akali/Kat/Fizz

Fizz actually received a massive mana regen buff with the regen normalization. His regen was increased by about 30-40%

Joe DreddJan 1, 201514 votes

Everyone but liss did.

Leti the YetiJan 2, 20152 votes

I've had plenty of luck against Fizz as Karthus I simply put Q's infront of my minions ANNNNNNND hes not farming anymore

NorthernDruidJan 2, 201511 votes

The reasoning they gave at the time, went something like: "We're making this change now so we can more easily tune individual champions later."

Like how they just hammered away Soraka's health regen to the point where it's never a viable thing to build anymore.

RasCaelestisJan 2, 20151 votes

So... Have any of the champions mentioned in this thread ever gotten compensation buffs?

Duke AnaxJan 2, 20152 votes

I don't know any specific champions, mana wise, but Soraka specifically is a great example for the general principle.

True her base regen is abysmall now, so building regen and passively waiting for recharge is nearly impossible. However they greatly buffed her aktive self healing in combat, especially teamfights.

There was one fight where I managed to collect upwards of 6000 health. I don't know exactly, because they couldn't kill me. So I couldn't check death recap.

Atlas McCoyJan 2, 20159 votes

You know, I kinda agree that infinite mana was a big problem, but the problem with nerfing infinite mana is that, even with all the mana regen normalization, there's still way too much difference between certain champions and how much mana they use. And holy shit manaless champs just all rose a couple extra tiers because of the nerfs. As long as there are manaless champs, as well as the newer champs that barely use any mana whatsoever, everyone needs to be able to have matching resources available. Hence the rise of the double morellos meta.

I would be perfectly fine with the mana changes if the changes hit everyone equally, but they don't. I honestly would enjoy it if building high mana and low mana regen, as well as vice versa, were both viable options, as well as building neither and focusing on max damage instead. If riot actually used mana how it was supposed to be used, it would actually be healthier for the game. Champions with a lot of regen and cooldown should do less damage, champions with a lot of mana should be able to stay in lane longer, and champions with neither should have to rely on one or two spell rotations to get a kill.

As it is now, champions who build neither mana nor mana regen consist of those who don't use mana, and leblanc. I don't think any champ really builds a lot of mana and little regen except maybe kassadin. And now, practically every mid needs to build regen now to compete with those who don't need it. But the ones who don't need mana regen just get three times as strong, because while their build and strategy hasn't changed, more enemies need to build mana regen sooner, and even if they do, they have less of it.

Scuttler SlayerJan 1, 20158 votes

Morello just wants people to buy his item. #ScumBagMorello

GlamazonJan 2, 20157 votes

I run out of mana much faster than I ever used to in lane. Grail was over nerfed and isn't worth getting on anyone really. The mana regen from it is indistinguishable from morellos.

All in all the changes made picks like kat and zed way more attractive.

RasCaelestisJan 1, 20156 votes

I've also been having a really hard time as Nautilus since the changes. Whether support, top, or jungle, (used to mainly take him jungle, but have been trying support recently) he has low base mana and high costs on his abilities. For example, at level 3, you have 358 mana, but your Q and E cost 60 mana (at rank 1) and your W costs 80 (at all ranks). If (for some reason) you've not used any abilities before hitting 3 and are at full mana, one full rotation will take 200/358. Like a lot of tank junglers, this pre-season has been pretty rough on Naut, but of all the things that are limiting him, mana is the biggest issue I've been running into.

CindikleJan 1, 20154 votes

Endless mana was a problem.

And your examples are kind of bad.

Orianna has always been a champion with very little counterplay. Being able to punish her mana pool is a good thing. If it proves too weak she may see buffs in her abilities. She also does most of her trading in lane with her passive. Which doesn't cost mana.

Anivia will always have mana problems till she gets her Tear+chalice combo. Which once it starts stacking decently will quickly become like it used to be. As long as you don't keep your R up for too long you shouldn't see too many problems. It was dumb that she could keep it up almost forever with a fully stacked Tear+grail.

Swain is fine. His passive helps. Like Anivia, you shouldn't really be keeping your R up for too long. Unless you'll get a kill out of it to proc his passive. Expect to drop the bird for a few seconds to reset the mana cost.

Zillian was a problem mid lane. He needs a rework anyway. I'm sure Riot has plans for that. Eventually.

In the end I think the problem is the same as every other roll has been seeing for a long time. Itemization. The only option is mana regen. Why are there no items that reduce mana cost? If there was an item that reduced it by say 10. That would instantly make it a good item for Anivia. Or one that reduces it by say 15%(12.5% may be more realistic). The state of tanks is probably the best example of how dull the itemization in this game is. They're very bad at making items better in different situations while doing a similar job. I would say Bork vs BT for ADC's is about as close as it gets. But even then that's still highly decided on the champion. (favor the AS/active or higher AD for abilities). I say it too much probably. But Dawngate had a great itemization. You never felt forced into an item outside of maybe a core 2 items in most cases. Really is a shame that game got dropped. Sure there was always an optimal build. But it wasn't a chore to work around changing it if the game called for it.

Kowe The EwokJan 1, 201515 votes

What? Orianna a champion with little counterplay? Her ball has one of the slowest projectile speeds ingame...

P.S. How on earth is it balanced that a champion who just invested 5K gold (More than BotrK and LW combined) not in mana sustain gaining, barely any damage at all - still doesn't even have enough for a single teamfight? At the sametime there are (near) ressourceless champion who have much better scaling and can build flat damage.

Sorry, but your understanding of "balance" seems more than just off....

CindikleJan 2, 20152 votes

Using E to move her ball for an ult is much faster than Q. Also if you're planning to use your Q for other abilities. It's best to throw it out, then wait for the CD to move it a shorter distance. She has many ways to work around Q's slow speed.

Orianna is very safe in lane and brings massive teamfight utility. This is what I mean by she has little counterplay. She doesn't have to harass with Q. She can farm almost as safe as she wants. Orianna has some pricy abilities and low CD's(with her CD items which she will build). This leads to a lot of mana usage. Even the chalice couldn't honestly keep up with her mana costs if she was spamming abilities. But she would recover fast afterword. With 5k in mana regen you'll do the same. Her only real downside is that her scaling is overall trash on anything but W. So if your team needs a high damage mid lanner, she isn't a strong pick. Her damage isn't weak, but it's nothing to brag about unless you're fed.

In short you built to recover your mana faster. Not equal the amount of costs. With 40% CDR she can use about 250 mana every 5 seconds, excluding her ulti. To counter this it would take a massive amount of mana regen. More than you can get with 5k. If you're using abilities non stop in a teamfight you will run out on her. There is no avoiding it. And there shouldn't be. But if you slow down you will start to gain it back quickly. Also remember that only her W has an increase in mana costs by rank(outside her ulti). Which is generally the first ability ranked. At level 9 with 40% CDR you can spend the mana that not even a level 18 could keep up with.

Do you really think it's OK for her to keep this up with only 5k? If you invest any more your damage will suffer and it will take more mana to keep up.

If the problem is near--resourceless champions. Then they need the balancing. Most of those champions honestly have some heavy limitations as well. (Zed being the worst example for this.) Often this limitation is how they can poke at range. Kennen/Gnar probably the strongest in terms of that, and you want see them in mid. Zed and Yasou are the only two that really see play mid lane that i can think of. Zed has always been a kind of issue in this way. Safe early game for the level of power he gets at all points of the game. But he does have many counters from champions to items. Yasou has an overloaded kit, thus he's often seeing nerfs.

SammystormJan 2, 20156 votes

the problem is that you never truly had infinite resources. Before you could stick around after a team fight to help out because you would regen. Now a lot of this champs have to retreat after a fight and go to base or not fight if they are at half mana.

CindikleJan 2, 20151 votes

While you didn't, but you had better regen from a 2600 item than you can get now with 5k. Meaning one item brought you all the mana you ever needed. With the nerfing of assassins and changes at the start of S4 it became better to have a champion that can stall a game than an assassin that can make it a 4v5. Before then there was a large risk to champions like Syndra and Ziggs. Because you were likely to face an assassin that can and will dive you at 6 with a jungler. Vi for example almost always meant a free kill. S4 brought many changes to this.

If you blew half your mana and didn't get the results to stay around why should you? This is what the problem with too much mana regen was causing in S4. You will still get it back in time. Just not as fast. Chances are you'll get a good amount back before your cooldowns are back. Unless you keep spamming abilities.

CenturosJan 2, 201512 votes

Endless mana was a problem.

Tell that to all of those manaless jerks, some of which have resets (which would be much more balanced if they could potentially run out of mana to pentakill your team one after another).

CindikleJan 2, 20152 votes

They will get balanced as needed. The mana problem was with mana. If this problem in S4 meant mana-less champions needed more power to compete they will get nerfed after being Op in S5. And this often means to be talking about Yasou and Zed.

Yasou's kit is overloaded and needs a real look at. He was meant to have a weak early game for all of those stats. But never got that problem. Once he hits 3 he has all the tools he needs to survive in lane.

Zed for needs some power shift. But this has always been a problem with him. Has nothing to do with how long Anivia can run her R. I think part of his problem is the fact his W costs such little mana on top of having a mana restore function. While this combo generally isn't really that easy to do. It's not saintly hard either. Makes his WQ combo only cost 95 energy. On top of both of those abilities costing less energy per rank, and W restoring more energy per rank. Even worse. He restore this twice with both Q and E. Although this is generally only useable with his ult.

Rework this. Remove it as a combo for hitting with both to hitting with just E. This makes his WQ harass cost him 115 energy every time. Unless he can land his W on top of you for an E he will suffer. Another option could be that he has to land his W on you itself to regen the energy. Although this hurts the combo with his ult.

I'm sure there are other options here.

Also both of these champions have sub-50% win rates. Zed's looks better at higher rankings, but overall is evened out. So while he is annoying, I wouldn't directly say he is OP unless you got counterpicked. (Zed would be a counterpick to Anivia.) Zed is also very good at punishing mistakes.

5G8Nri0B54Jan 2, 20156 votes

Unless you're from the future, "they will be balanced" was the phrase thrown around for over 2 years.

Believe it or not, pre-nerf mana champions weren't close to being OP at all, because with even all that mana at their disposal, many still struggle to keep up with their manaless brethrens. At most they can just go toe-to-toe.

And feel free to pretend you know about Swain. As a former main, I can tell you exactly how badly he needed all that mana regeneration, how these new changes aren't doing any favours with a champion that is barely played to begin with.

As for Anivia, because she totally needed those to her core most important items.

Poptart EvelynnJan 2, 20152 votes

I'm not really sure what you are trying to state without math backing it.

JustMyBassCannonJan 2, 20158 votes

I think the idea of this thread is that Riot changed item regeneration from having its own value to being based on the champion's own stats, before properly tending to each champion's regen stats.

Separate from that point, champs like Riven (HP5) and Lissandra (MP5) who have abysmal regen now get less regen out of items. Runes are now the only existing source of flat regen.