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Single Target Vs. Skillshot

SuicideJ··1 votes·1,415 views

I have noticed for a while now that there seems to be this agenda that Riot has to remove single target from the game. Riot wants to make everything a skillshot. Which is all fine and dandy, except when i isn't. Which from what I have seen/played isn't, very often. I recently started playing Kog'maw again after not playing him much since I first picked up LoL. I was excited. I knew they had changed his Q to a skillshot, but hadn't played him since they redid it. Needless to say I was disappointed. It has the same range as the previous version of single target but it was pretty much useless as a skill shot, especially at super close range. (Easy to sidestep if you know how to kite properly) So I barely used his Q most of the games I've played with him. Don't get me wrong, the ability is good and I love the passive, but it just isn't viable anymore. In response to waging war on single target abilities, they didn't make up for other variables.

  1. It has a shorter range than most skillshots

How do you expect people to fully utilize this ability when Jinx can use her skillshot and hit you from double AA range away and you have to be in AA range to land your skillshot? Increase the range on Kog'maw's Q or return it back to single target. It is technically a single target skillshot. It doesn't hit everyone, just a single target. Thus, the "single target". If you want to make it like Void Ooze and make it hit multiple champs, then by all means. But until then, it hurts more than helps. And please, at least increase the range to where it can be use to poke or something. It's utterly useless against range champs.

  1. If you don't remove single target skills on other champions you are basically playing favorites

Like Tristana's Grenade or her Ult. Why haven't these been transferred over to skillshots? Or maybe Vayne's Condemn skill? Try hitting people with that.. The list can go on. But having AA champs use skillshots as if they are burst mages is ridiculous at best. It is supposed to be AD Carry. Last time I checked spells relied on AP for most of them. A few modifiers here and there for AA, but most are all damage burst champs that need abilities to do damage or they die.

  1. The passive is currently more effective than the active due to the aforementioned points.

I love this passive. I really do. I kinda wish Kog'maw had a AS steroid like MF that let's him attack faster when he Bioarcane barrages, but I'm sure that would be super strong on him. Doubtful anyone but Kog'maw mains would appreciate that. I'm not reaching for the stars here. But the moment a passive outweighs the usability of the active, what is the point of the active? If I can kill players and go 10/3/? and use my Q like maybe 4 times, then it is probably in need of serious revamping. I'm all for short range and single target ability or long range skillshot. Not short range skillshot that doesn't actually do anything when you can't land it.

Hopefully, this will bring this to light in order for some balancing to be done, either to all champs that use single target abilities and/or buffing the skills that got the short end of the stick. This isn't just for Kog'maw, this is so Riot can take a look at any champ that they have redone and modify the skills to be fair and healthy. Riot, if you are reading this (I won't hold onto hope), this isn't me bashing you. This is me wanting to keep champs playable and fun and not have more salty players pissed off in a match. I hope this kind of thing will be looked into soon. Thanks!

22 Comments

MisterHealYoGirl1 votes

I think that Riot is changing the way that targeted abilities/skillshots work based on whether or not a champion is too strong or weak. For example, Ryze's damage was too guaranteed for it to be very strong, so they turned his Q into a skillshot as a way of removing some of that reliability. I think that they did the same thing with Kog'Maw; because his lategame damage is so strong, and since it comes from long-range autoattacks, inherently reliable, they decided to make his other damage steroid (the Armor/MR shred on his Q) less of a sure thing.

SuicideJ1 votes

But thats not single targetings fault. You can change the CD, damage, or even what the ability does (stun length, etc.) So many things can be changed. How do you turn Nasus' Wither into a skillshot? it isn't a projectile, but it is heavily abused. You can easily fix it by making the CD longer or reducing the amount of time it slows. I'd rather Kog'maw's armor/magic resist shred be reduced and be single target than a skill shot that is severely short in comparison to Jinx's Zap which has a slight charge as a drawback.. Not much of a drawback when you account for the range and the high Damage it does..

MisterHealYoGirl1 votes

I mean, you said it yourself: that's not much of a drawback. And the range is actually quite long; it's longer than his autoattack range, even with a max-rank W active.

SuicideJ1 votes

Yet it always seems short.. And I said Jinx's Zap had a windup to it. Which is not much of a drawback. Because it is the longest skillshot, non-ult in the game. And then Kog'maw's Void Ooze is about as effective as MF's Make It Rain CC. They get over it quickly. So no CC, really. Even Draven has a knockback/knockside. those who don't have hard CC have escape mechanisms. MF at least has speed, though a dash would be better. Kog'maw doesn't have that. So shredding people for jumping on him is his only self defense.

MisterHealYoGirl1 votes

That particular crown belongs to Janna, actually. And yeah, Kog is fairly defenseless, which gives him a lot of power budget to put elsewhere and makes him really strong if his team can protect him. With this in mind, I bet that Riot was looking to nerf his ability to crush tanks, making him require a little more team cooperation.

SuicideJ1 votes

http://champion.gg/champion/Janna

Unfortunately, Janna is not classified as an ADC. even if you could use her as an "ADC". She is still played more in one role more than Kog'maw in two roles. I understand a nerf. However, he is not very AD percent heavy on his abilities. So building him AP bottom lane is not very usable. So, this logic leads me to believe else-wise. I do like having the team cooperate more. Just unrealistic in lower rank.

MisterHealYoGirl1 votes

I didn't say that Janna was an AD carry, just that her tornado is the longest non-global linear skillshot in the game. AD Kog'Maw is built around his autoattacks (with the percent health damage from his W), just like almost every other AD carry. You don't see Caitlyn spamming her Q in teamfights, or Miss Fortune Doubling Up.

SuicideJ1 votes

Actually, I do lol. And when you said crown I thought you were referring to the least used ADC lol My bad xD

Chuck Charles1 votes

pretty easy to understand why certain champs get their skills reworked to skillshots and others don't. Its as beeswax said because that particular ability paired with their kit usually made them oppressive.

Old Ryze was a good example of oppressive as if you were melee he would just Q you into oblivion with no counterplay. whenever it was up, free damage. once he stacked his tear even somewhat stacked up you were going to be harassed out of lane constantly with Q's and point and click root and E.

Annie doesn't get her abilities reworked into a skillshot because if her abilities were to become a skill shot she would pretty much be useless. All of her abilities are fairly short range and require you to let her get close to you which leaves her vulnerable to harass. While she can be toxic because of her 100 to 0 instagib stun, its not the fact that its point and click that is the issue. Nor is it really that big of an issue, as good players will go toe to toe with annie or even harass her out of lane.

tristana's has to be point and click because its her main source of damage. imagine if her ult wasn't a skill shot. you now have a super unreliable knockback and your main source of damage is also unreliable if you make the E a skill shot. Tristana in lane without the explosive charge being targeted would be punished so fast if she missed even once.

there are a slew of other examples, but the biggest thing is that they want to remove things that create little to no counterplay. Old fiora ult, ryze Q, etc. I imagine they will eventually change things like Vi ult as well.

SuicideJ1 votes

You can change a champ skill from being oppressive to pretty much useless by changing it's type (single target to skillshot). When they can tweak damage output of said skill easy. Kog'maw has a major drawback just by being himself. He is slow. He has no escape mechanism like Tristana's Rocket Jump or Ezreal's flash ability. He get's caught out easy and requires a lot of protection from his team, which is not always available.

Ryze could have been tweaked to be less oppressive. Some champs have 20 second CDs. Why can't you increase his so he can't be oppressive? I get harassed out of lane by ADCs with better early game regularly. They going to make us all equal? You ruin what makes a champ a champ by hurting one instead of another. You want oppressive? Look at Vayne. She is super oppressive. Make her Tumble and Condemn skillshots to make her less oppressive.

Pretty much what you said about Annie equates to Kog'maw. I don't see Kog'maw picked as ADC often if at all. 1.88% Play Rate for Kog'maw and a 0.03% Ban Rate. Really oppressive. They could try and change the damage output on Annie or change her CDs. It's gonna be the same for any champ. They do these tweaks every patch to champs. But the ones who need it are ignored. The ones who don't need it nearly as much are hit first. If Kog'maw had a massive stun or something like Annie, I would agree with needing to nerf him a bit or changing some thing. He doesn't. If his Play Rate was like 20% then yeah he needs some fixing. But really now? His Play Rate is so small it's laughable. Jinx has a 26.15% Play Rate and a 0.43% Ban Rate. That is a big difference in Play Rate.

Only Mordekaiser has a lower Play Rate for ADC at 1.34% and that is because no one can play him because his Ban Rate is 49.46%. Well, there is Quinn, but we know why she isn't. Her Play Rate is 0.84% and her Ban Rate is 0.03% (same as Kog'maw). But Quinn is getting a makeover due her since she is massively buggy, which explains why she is not getting picked. I guess Urgot counts... His Play Rate is 1% and Ban Rate is 0.09% (higher than Kog'maw).

Vayne has the highest Pick Rate (go figure) at 35.57% and a Ban Rate of 22.64% (overpowered maybe?) Followed by Jinx (see above) in second and Tristana in third with a 23.29% Play Rate and a Ban Rate of 0.76%. So clearly, Kog'maw is being oppressive. So Urgot is the only one below Kog'maw. But I have heard he is due for a rework.

But, "good players" is subjective since I doubt most players are what you would call "good players". I can get good with a champ, then they get reworked and I am no longer good with them. You say Tristana needs to be point and click? I can agree with that. So why not Kog'maw? I mean even a skillshot that could be useful, if it was useful. I can't use a short skillshot that gets stopped by a minion as I try to get away from a champ that is going to kill me because I am slow..

Reducing Armor/Magic Resist does not mean there is no counterplay. Kog'maw dies easily. Easily. He has a passive assuming he will die. That is how easily he dies. Vi's Ult is a tag Ult because of what it does. Without it, it becomes her Q. Which is not an Ult.

Sources: http://champion.gg/champion/KogMaw

http://champion.gg/champion/Jinx

http://champion.gg/champion/Mordekaiser/ADC

http://champion.gg/champion/Quinn

http://champion.gg/champion/Urgot/ADC

http://champion.gg/champion/Vayne

http://champion.gg/champion/Tristana

Chuck Charles1 votes

{quoted}

You can change a champ skill from being oppressive to pretty much useless by changing it's type (single target to skillshot). When they can tweak damage output of said skill easy. Kog'maw has a major drawback just by being himself. He is slow. He has no escape mechanism like Tristana's Rocket Jump or Ezreal's flash ability. He get's caught out easy and requires a lot of protection from his team, which is not always available.

Ryze could have been tweaked to be less oppressive. Some champs have 20 second CDs. Why can't you increase his so he can't be oppressive? I get harassed out of lane by ADCs with better early game regularly. They going to make us all equal? You ruin what makes a champ a champ by hurting one instead of another. You want oppressive? Look at Vayne. She is super oppressive. Make her Tumble and Condemn skillshots to make her less oppressive.

Pretty much what you said about Annie equates to Kog'maw. I don't see Kog'maw picked as ADC often if at all. 1.88% Play Rate for Kog'maw and a 0.03% Ban Rate. Really oppressive. They could try and change the damage output on Annie or change her CDs. It's gonna be the same for any champ. They do these tweaks every patch to champs. But the ones who need it are ignored. The ones who don't need it nearly as much are hit first. If Kog'maw had a massive stun or something like Annie, I would agree with needing to nerf him a bit or changing some thing. He doesn't. If his Play Rate was like 20% then yeah he needs some fixing. But really now? His Play Rate is so small it's laughable. Jinx has a 26.15% Play Rate and a 0.43% Ban Rate. That is a big difference in Play Rate.

Only Mordekaiser has a lower Play Rate for ADC at 1.34% and that is because no one can play him because his Ban Rate is 49.46%. Well, there is Quinn, but we know why she isn't. Her Play Rate is 0.84% and her Ban Rate is 0.03% (same as Kog'maw). But Quinn is getting a makeover due her since she is massively buggy, which explains why she is not getting picked. I guess Urgot counts... His Play Rate is 1% and Ban Rate is 0.09% (higher than Kog'maw).

Vayne has the highest Pick Rate (go figure) at 35.57% and a Ban Rate of 22.64% (overpowered maybe?) Followed by Jinx (see above) in second and Tristana in third with a 23.29% Play Rate and a Ban Rate of 0.76%. So clearly, Kog'maw is being oppressive. So Urgot is the only one below Kog'maw. But I have heard he is due for a rework.

But, "good players" is subjective since I doubt most players are what you would call "good players". I can get good with a champ, then they get reworked and I am no longer good with them. You say Tristana needs to be point and click? I can agree with that. So why not Kog'maw? I mean even a skillshot that could be useful, if it was useful. I can't use a short skillshot that gets stopped by a minion as I try to get away from a champ that is going to kill me because I am slow..

Reducing Armor/Magic Resist does not mean there is no counterplay. Kog'maw dies easily. Easily. He has a passive assuming he will die. That is how easily he dies. Vi's Ult is a tag Ult because of what it does. Without it, it becomes her Q. Which is not an Ult.

Sources: http://champion.gg/champion/KogMaw

http://champion.gg/champion/Jinx

http://champion.gg/champion/Mordekaiser/ADC

http://champion.gg/champion/Quinn

http://champion.gg/champion/Urgot/ADC

http://champion.gg/champion/Vayne

http://champion.gg/champion/Tristana

why not kog maw? it wouldnt be the worst thing for his Q to be point and click, but considering he is already the highest DPS adc in the game for single target by a wide margin come late game,...i can't imagine if you could guarantee an armor/mr shred on him. remember, kog does % max health magic dmg EVERY auto when his W is up and he has his raw AD as well. the Q synergizes super well with him already.

he is ALREADY doing the best damage in the game, if he was guaranteed to shred a large portion of an enemies armor/mr (especially a suiqshy) he would take them down in maybe two autos similar to draven with two axes up.

I don't know. Kog maw is fine. the only reason he isn't played is because he requires a lot of peel if you aren't an absolute god at positioning. which most people arent. he, like draven, is a risk reward based champion. he is fine i think. he is played by elite adcs and not by much else.

SuicideJ1 votes

When I'm under attack by Darius.. Sure doesn't feel like I do any Damage regardless of how much DPS I have. How does the highest DPS in the game not get played higher than 1.88%? That sounds OP in theory. But he relies on so many things in order to use that DPS. He needs a peeler, a sustain, or HARD CC. to make him useful. His W doesn't get an AS Boost like MF or Draven or any champ like that. He is super slow, without an escape route. The only one like that I believe.

I played him when I first started playing League. Back when you could have 3 Bloodthirsters stacking. It was glorious. No one played him then. There wasn't complaints about him because their were better choices. He is easy to counter. His Ult needed nerfing. So they did. I'm okay with that because it is still usable.

I agree with his need for peel. That is a massive "what if?" though when playing with strangers, even if they have the proper champ for the job. Maybe in pros, but they don't even consider him. Hopefully that makes me an elite ADC for playing him xD I have a high chance to win with him. Especially with a good support (which I love), but the insurance that I have skills that I can use since his Q used to go over minions to hit champs instead of hitting the first minion it meets. I'd be okay with an active Q like his W were it applies it to the first person he attacks, minion or otherwise.

Crossette1 votes

So you're angry because you can't land an ability that takes SKILL to land? You'd rather click someone and kill them? Play Ryze.

SuicideJ1 votes

Ah, no. I'm not really even angry. This isn't explicitly about Kog'maw. I just use him as an example. This can apply to any champ that has the point to click feature vs the skillshot feature. Which no matter how much we wish we all had the ability to land every skillshot, doesn't mean we do. I'm really good at landing Blitzcrank's Q. But then it becomes a variables game. Is the skillshot fast? Is it slow? Is it wide and hit everything even when you don't want it to? Or is it to narrow and not hit anything? The reverse can be applied, however, it is a much lower percentage of people that can land those on purpose.

Considering with Kog'maw, who already has 2 skillshots, he does take skill. If you rely solely on his W you will lose every time. You HAVE to build AS in order to make him viable. Which means LESS damage. So worrying about his Q being too dangerous when it is still there just not as easy to use does not mean much. Or does it? If his Play Rate drops then it clearly means something. Not that he was easy, necessarily, but that his usability was dropped. He is a sitting duck that can shoot a shotgun at limited range and can get destroyed by any champ with a surprise tactic.

I have tried Ryze. I suck with him. Not my playstyle. It doesn't matter if he is OP or not. Playstyle is everything. I have a good playstyle that matches the champs I play. I'm interested to know who you play that takes skill. Because so far everyone plays Garen, Fiora, Riven, Darius, Morde, Skarner, Annie, Katarina, Jinx, Vayne, etc. and has no skill as they are easy to play. Oh and what about Master Yi? Xin? Those take skill? I doubt it.

Crossette1 votes

I can say with certainty that there are like two champions in this game that take any semblance of skill.

Bard and Gnar being two of the highest on my list.

Also, fair enough on your arguments, but if we make everything point-click then there's no point in them doing anything different. They'll all have the same purpose: easy damage.

SuicideJ1 votes

I don't have or ever played Bard. I have Gnar but haven't really played him since top is in pieces because of juggernauts.. I suppose they take skill. I don't know til I play them. Easy Damage is relative to how easy they are to kill. Leona would poop all over Kog'maw becasue of how squishy he is. Ahri would poop all over Kog'maw. several different champs will do this. Remember, no escape mechanism. the point of an ADC IS easy damage. Making it hard would make other champs bottom much easier (Tank, Fighter, Assassin, etc.). Killing ADC's is supposed to be easy unless they have proper protection.

Crossette1 votes

Killing ADC's is supposed to be easy unless they have proper protection.

Vayne

SuicideJ1 votes

If you CC her she is easy. But I do think she needs to be nerfed. She is way too strong.

Crossette1 votes

That's why there's a total of two ADCs with hard immobilizing CC... In a duel, good luck.

SuicideJ1 votes

I like bringing Exhaust to that fight xD it is really powerful in those dueling situations xD

Crossette1 votes

That's why supports commonly take it. Really helps shut down the ADC. (or the super annoying support :D)

Also, I've only played Vayne top because I hate ADC. TL;DR: Darius is bullshit.

SuicideJ1 votes

What is annoying is POS Suports that don't know how to support. I play Support and I can't stand a Support that can't protect their ADC. No other reason for them to be there. I'm getting game after game, useless Supports playing useless Champs. I even ask for Supports that can peel. They give me Supports that can't use their brains and end up feeding the enemy team.. It's super annoying. I don't care if my Support get's kills or anything like that. But feeding the team is just a BS player. Common sense keeps you alive so don't be a moron.

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