The problem with Ekko is that being a squishy melee is literally his only weakness. Otherways he has it all - top-tier damage, top-tier mobility, top-tier utility. If he is ever allowed to be tank, thus removing his only weakness, he will be disgusting, period.
Unfortunately, nerfing his bases wasn't enough. He simply cannot be allowed to have constant damage output, especially one not scaling with AP.
Xx420n0sc0p3sxX8 votesAp ekko actually has very low damage compared to traditional assassins like talon, rengar, zed, diana, etc...That is, unless he lands ult, which is far from reliable. He gets utility to make up for this.
Not denying tankko being strong, but want to point this out.
CppL3 votesAp ekko actually has very low damage compared to traditional assassins like talon, rengar, zed, diana, etc...That is, unless he lands ult, which is far from reliable. He gets utility to make up for this.
Not denying tankko being strong, but want to point this out.
Well then where is a kassadin utility?
The Blue Rajah2 votesMobility
CppL4 votes[{quoted}](name=The Blue Rajah,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=k04oGJBc,comment-id=000300000000,timestamp=2016-05-13T07:04:59.103+0000)
Mobility
Ekko also has mobility.And tp ,and huge heal ,and shield,and % hp dmg ,and 3 slows...i would rather have also these .
FastAsHeck1 votesekko does not have a free targeted blink every 3 seconds
CppL5 votesekko does not have a free targeted blink every 3 seconds
This excuse is getting old.Especially ,thats all he has.Rest of this kit is prety much garbage ,compared to ekko.
FastAsHeck1 votesAre you hating on tank ekko or ekko in general? Because for the first I can agree, tank ekko is cancer. But I think AP ekko is pretty balanced.
SpecterVonBaren2 votesIf he builds CDR he can have a 4.2 second dash+blink and use it more often than Kass since Kass's doubles in cost for every use. This is not even adding that Ekko has another escape, a speed boost and more sources of CC than Kassadin and that Kass's only source of CC requires 6 spells to be cast near him before he can use it.
Carry6 votesAp ekko actually has very low damage compared to traditional assassins like talon, rengar, zed, diana, etc...That is, unless he lands ult, which is far from reliable. He gets utility to make up for this.
Not denying tankko being strong, but want to point this out.
The problem is that 2.25s AOE stuns that require you to put yourself in the middle of the enemy team, and permaslows that require you to stick to your target, scale much better with CDR and tankiness than AP (his stuns/slows/speed boosts don't scale with AP at all in fact). CDR let's you cast more stuns and slows, tankiness lets you get in position to utilize them as best as possible.
When you give an "assassin" that sort of utility in lieu of some damage, you're pushing the champ to build CDR + Tanky rather than glass-cannon, because that's what those abilities scale with.
They need to make his utility scale with AP, or reduce his utility in favor of additional damage or more reliable damage when built AP.
macromite5 votesyou know something that i really need to say in every single one of these posts. tanko is the version of ekko that can be balanced. squisho will never be viable, unless he gets a kit rework. this is due to him having the disruption and initiation qualities if a tank, as well as retaining a few free tank stats in the form of his ult healing and his shield.
the only way to fix ekko is to kill squisho, and make tanko the acceptable form.
riot fucked up as soon as they tried to make an assassin with tank levels of disruption, and tried to balance it with slower damage output. in the end all they did was make a broken diver/vanguard.
peaches7713 votesI went against an ekko who went full tank and didn't have a single AP or AD item. He shredded my heal so insanely fast. I was playing 
Xx420n0sc0p3sxX5 votesIf you are getting shredded by a tank on trundle you are playing him wrong.
Literally just press r on him.
Hullabaloo9073 votesWith Ekko he can disengage pretty easily and wait out your ult
Cirrusstrafe3 votesWith Ekko he can disengage pretty easily and wait out your ult
Let's not forget that Trundle can hit R on Ekko and Ekko can dance around for a few seconds and hit R to regain all of his health lost, back, and no longer be in a weakened state, while basically evading Trundle completely for the duration. Sure, you're trading ults at that point, but Ekko can negate everything Trundle's did to him, and if Trundle isn't careful Ekko comes out way ahead in it with ult damage (and possible sneak stun into a full blown passive spam combo rushdown).
Then Trundle has to hope his autoattacks and occasional Q can outpace Ekko's constant passive burst, in and out damage dealing with only a few windows of melee-counterattack risks, and later on full blown percent health chunking that isn't tied to items whatsoever.
There's a reason that Ekko is the second highest Trundle counter right now http://champion.gg/champion/trundle
peaches7713 votesIf you are getting shredded by a tank on trundle you are playing him wrong.
Literally just press r on him.
Great advice. I totally forgot to use my ult. Thanks buddy. /s Ignorant.
Cirrusstrafe5 votesGreat advice. I totally forgot to use my ult. Thanks buddy. /s Ignorant.
Hey now, his statement is accurate in terms of what he said (just not what he implied).
Problem is that Ekko isn't a god damn tank. He's an assassin that puts out near assassin numbers but can build 100% tank.
So, as Trundle, you aren't fighting a tank. You are fighting a mage that can avoid most of your damage and burn you down three times faster than any actual tank should be able to, while retaining the durability of a god damn tank.
redniwediS3 votesSo why don't you play him whenever he is unbanned?
Zero Skill Tank9 votesHow me playing, or not playing a champion relates to their in-game power level or game health issues?
Astôlfo3 votes[deleted]
Zero Skill Tank7 votesl2read bruh, this is the exact opposite of what I wrote.
Astôlfo1 votesDo you read what you say?
especially one not scaling with AP.
[zombie-brand-facepalm]
Cirrusstrafe17 votesDo you read what you say? especially one not scaling with AP. [zombie-brand-facepalm]
Actually, you did screw up comprehension here, but it is worded in a way that makes it extremely awkward to pull together grammatically.
"He simply cannot be allowed to have constant damage output, especially one not scaling with AP." He was stating that Ekko, an AP champ with almost entirely AP ratios, should never be able to do non AP scaling damage. Or rather, for even more clarity, let me just reword what he meant: "He simply cannot be allowed to have constant damage output [while building full tank], especially [not from sources that ignore his build path, which would be AP]."
In particular, he was referring to the base damage on his passive (which scales with level, for free, item independent), and his W passive (which scales with enemy health, for free, item independent). Riot attempted to make him an Assassin by giving him a pseudo Merciless mastery proc on his W and a single-out target burst with his passive, but really just should have picked one. The passive is there to help early CS due to his awkward melee-but-AP status, but in conjunction with the other source of free damage on his W passive it allows him to build like Sion and put up higher numbers than Brand while retaining the anti-counterplay kit stylings of LeBlanc.
These problem areas afford Ekko two boosted damage sources that are item-agnostic. Furthermore, due to the very low unique-target cooldown on his passive, the most effective Ekko rune page hefts attack speed. Then he can build full tank items and mastery into full tank due to the fact that he has staggering burst damage that has nothing to do with the items he is building, which is where the entire problem lay. Smacking base damage helped, but the free damage is still a problem, and also dissuades everyone from building him as an assassin because while you get marginally more damage out of assassin Ekko, you also exacerbate his critical weakness, rather than completely smooth it over at the cost of very little potential damage lost.
Same story we've seen with pre nerfstorm Irelia, pre nerf/rework/nerf/rework Jax, pre nerf Gnar, and pre meganerf Riven. High base/item agnostic damage allows someone to build one damage item (if that), 5 tank items and still kill everybody.
Astôlfo2 votesAh, ty, that clears it up.
Cirrusstrafe6 votesAh, ty, that clears it up.
Haha, no problem. World needs clarity.
Well, except for the rift. That summoner spell is freaking goofy.
Spaceman5pff1 votesJust want to throw it out there, that before the nerf train picked up Gnar, he was building MUCH more damage than he does now. So saying he had this issue would be false, as he was building LESS tanky before the nerfs. Trinity Force builds were not uncommon, as back then, gnar could pose a threat as mini gnar rather than need to sit way back and poke for mega. (not to say he did / doesn't have matchups that forced different patterns, but a majority of the time this was / is the case)
Regarding his ability to "build one damage item (if that), 5 tank items and still kill everybody" he must either go unfocused in mini form or be allowed to chain a complete 2 Q rotation of mega abilities, which are mostly short range and all of them are quite slow. Gnar's mega damage potential is quite balanced around the fact that he has a limited and preventable window of opportunity, and if he is too late, his ability to get in range is severely limited without help from another champion.
Can't speak to early Jax / riven as I began playing on and off in early season 3, and wasnt fully understanding of how everything worked until mid-late season 4.
Cirrusstrafe1 votesJust want to throw it out there, that before the nerf train picked up Gnar, he was building MUCH more damage than he does now. So saying he had this issue would be false, as he was building LESS tanky before the nerfs. Trinity Force builds were not uncommon, as back then, gnar could pose a threat as mini gnar rather than need to sit way back and poke for mega. (not to say he did / doesn't have matchups that forced different patterns, but a majority of the time this was / is the case)
Regarding his ability to "build one damage item (if that), 5 tank items and still kill everybody" he must either go unfocused in mini form or be allowed to chain a complete 2 Q rotation of mega abilities, which are mostly short range and all of them are quite slow. Gnar's mega damage potential is quite balanced around the fact that he has a limited and preventable window of opportunity, and if he is too late, his ability to get in range is severely limited without help from another champion.
Can't speak to early Jax / riven as I began playing on and off in early season 3, and wasnt fully understanding of how everything worked until mid-late season 4.
You're right, I flubbed when I said Gnar. I was thinking of someone else entirely but I just got to work and am a little fuzzy on whom I was thinking about.
The point I was hinting at though is that any combination of two or more of: High base stats and damage Item agnostic damage sources Extremely high disparity between cooldowns and effective utility/mobility/evasion Extremely high inherent free stats
Make for a very frustrating and awkward situation and champ. Often overpowered, or at least really easy to feel overpowered and have everyone hate. Back in the day Irelia had all four, and they nerfed all four over time. Riven had items 1 and 3, and they nerfed number 1. Ekko has the first three, and they slap on the wrist nerfed number 1.
Oh, 6.0 Graves had one and four, which is a really brutal combination. They have since nerfed both.
Any one of those is a proper strength, but each of those has a nasty multiplicative effect on the other, and it gets real gross when you lay down a ton all at once (Ekko, initial Irelia). Those "free bonus points" are usually in place to help smooth out a critical weakness that can be exploited later, but too many all at once affords a champion to maintain reliability and functionality while completely removing the weaknesses.
Yes, tank ekko, as said by many, doesn't do near the damage assassin ekko does, but to think he is "useless late game" is a misnomer for two reasons.
A tanky ekko early/mid game can dominate so thoroughly with almost no recourse such that you never even get to a point where he "falls off." His "falls off" still greatly outperforms many other options in survivability, utility, and damage anyway, all at once. His utility makes it folly to ignore him and "just kill his team around him" because unlike say, "just ignore Maokai" he can dance around doing considerable damage with gross amounts of lockdown and utility and distraction, but his ability to harry kite and troll a team forever as tankko means you also can't just remove him from the board with ease before a fight starts.
It's not that he's an unstoppable god of gods, but that his mere presence gives the enemy team no good choices. Every option when dealing with tankko is bad or worse. It's not about "well we just made the wrong decision" when there is no right decision to make.
SpecterVonBaren1 votesMaybe make his W passive cause his autos to deal increased damage based on missing health instead of dealing damage equal to a percent of the target's missing health?
Sohleks2 votesThe tricky thing is if you just nerf his bases then legitimate ap Ekko can only have less pressure in lane and has to end up as a late game champ given ridiculous ratios to off set the bases.
Maybe still the bases can still be hit considering Ekko doesn't usually use his extremely potent ultimate damage and still has his massive stun potential and certainly wasn't absent from high tier play even before they buffed him.
Cirrusstrafe2 votesThe tricky thing is if you just nerf his bases then legitimate ap Ekko can only have less pressure in lane and has to end up as a late game champ given ridiculous ratios to off set the bases.
Maybe still the bases can still be hit considering Ekko doesn't usually use his extremely potent ultimate damage and still has his massive stun potential.
Right, and if he's gonna be an assassin like they always meant him to be then he should ideally spike hard with a single item/mid game, roam and kill into a snowball.
What they need to do is remove his item-agnostic power completely, but give him better waveclear. His passive was designed to help him take out minions, but instead it just makes him win every god damn trade in lane. His W passive is fine by itself, so is his passive passive, but both at the same time (LOOKING AT YOU MALZ PASSIVE) is stupid. Since removing his W passive would be antithetical to the assassin thing, he should lose the free thunderlord's proc he gets, but get better waveclear with some Q tweaking in return.
Tobias Brackner2 votesHis damage is shit when he doesn't build AP.
Force teamfights and watch him cry as the rest of his team dies around him.
Unless you got beaten by a better team.
ImmortalBloodCY2 votesI said it before and i will say it again.
Tank Ekko is useless late game, you can just ignore him and kill the ones who deal the dmg.
ayNigerianPrince2 votesDon't bother saying it another time, because it's not true.
ImmortalBloodCY1 votesI will say another lane.
It is true, he is pretty much useless late game no matter what happens.
I met alot of tank Ekkos in ranked matches, sure they were pretty unkillable early game but once the mid-late game come they were useless.
Long story short, Tank Ekko is more useless than AP Ekko in teamfights.
That's counting from my experiences.
ayNigerianPrince1 votes{quoted} I met alot of tank Ekkos in ranked matches
What elo are you in that leaves him unbanned?
ImmortalBloodCY1 votesWas plat, lost some matches and went to gold.
Kind of lost my interest in going back to plat so i am lurking at gold 1 for now.
EDIT: But i am in EU you are in NA, we got different experiences.
For me in EU Tank Ekko is pretty much useless late game.
Larcos1 votesI've had good success against him playing singed, especially, after the nerf to his base damage and items across the board. :D
Shenmue1 votesthere is bigger issue than Ekko Maokai for exemple is way more broken
Kouhey1 votesThe random passive buff few patches ago, still lmao
MunchCrunchLunch1 voteshes not top tier damage. he won't 100-0 fizz like fizz can or talon or hell even akali or katarina. he can't do that unless you walk into his ultimate
Zero Skill Tank1 votesTank Ekko has top-tier damage for a tank, or at least near top-tier, only tanky champions to noticeably beat him are odd picks like Illaoi, Singed or Morde.
Assassin Ekko doesn't have epic burst like Fizz or Talon, because he was given top-tier utility, feature that assassins usually heavily lack in. But assassin Ekko is not the point of this thread.
MunchCrunchLunch1 votesyes he does have top tier damage for a tank. though tank fizz does have more damage imo.
ayNigerianPrince1 votesWith much less utility.
tXQbsPrjN51 votesWow what a shocker. But lets not kid ourselves, it was never Riot's intention to actually balance this stupid champ. Gypsylord's champs have always dominated the season they're released in so you should just accept Riot for some reason wants to force his abominations on you every season.