Taliyah's only problem

Hige·May 23, 2016·46 votes·5,031 views

W locks you out of your other skills! it'd be really good (even a tad OP) if you could cast your W, set down E and then activate the vector cast.

Reading this thread has made me realize that Taliyah's W is like that in order to allow you to focus ONLY on the vector cast, I think that Riot thought that if you could cast anything else while W was active you'd end up with the wrong direction...

I think that there could be a little leeway though or at least the ability to queue another skill on top.

74 Comments

QjTHqo3RTqMay 23, 201621 votes

I can assure you she has many, many problems that likely mean a failed champ

Voluug13May 23, 201621 votes

She just need both time and some changes.

Honestly its better that being extremely OP/broken on release.

QjTHqo3RTqMay 23, 20163 votes

I mean, 30% winrate in almost every role says something is HORRIBLY wrong with this champion, likely on the fundamental level

MrBuffingtonMay 23, 20163 votes

Most champions wouldn't even have 30% in four roles. To me, the fact that she has significant play in four roles either means she's quinn, or the community has no idea what they're doing with her. Most champions released now are deliberately under powered so they don't break the game on release, most of them have come out with win rates in the mid 30s. Give it like two patches and she'll be on track like every other new release.

Sightless66May 23, 20167 votes

I don't think that's really a fair conclusion right now. Number issues are a much more likely culprit. We've had other champions release to these kind of winrates, (Bard in particular comes to mind as a champion with an even lower release winrate), and they've done perfectly fine after buffs. Writing it off as a fundamental problem this early seems very uncalled for.

QjTHqo3RTqMay 23, 20161 votes

To be fair, Bard has a very high skill floor, taliyah? Taliyah throws rocks. I know that's a too vague for her kit, but honestly, for the amount of thought that each ability she uses takes, it doesnt have any outplay potential. The current steady combo is kite through worked ground and fit unworked to keep up dps. This demands you have fight in a new place every 3 minutes. What kind of champ demands you siege a new place or else you're totally useless

Sightless66May 23, 20165 votes

To be fair, Bard has a very high skill floor,

To also be fair, he was completely garbage before his buffs. Completely bad. No positives. We can say the same of Syndra's release, which was worse than either of them by far, and she turned out fine after buffs, spending a good amount of time as a low, middle, and high-tier champion.

Again, I see nothing to justify a conclusion that there is a fundamental problem.

but honestly, for the amount of thought that each ability she uses takes, it doesnt have any outplay potential.

I don't agree at all. She's very standard in this regard. She has about as much mechanical potential in her abilities as most champions have.

What kind of champ demands you siege a new place or else you're totally useless

Two things. First, you don't have to go to an entirely new location. You have to stand on a slightly different piece of ground. Very big difference. Second, if this was a concern, it can be fixed numerically by decreasing time it takes for worked ground to despawn. This is not a "fundamental problem" if it can be fixed with a purely numerical change.

devdev463May 23, 20162 votes

{quoted}

To also be fair, he was completely garbage before his buffs. Completely bad. No positives. We can say the same of Syndra's release, which was worse than either of them by far, and she turned out fine after buffs, spending a good amount of time as a low, middle, and high-tier champion.

Again, I see nothing to justify a conclusion that there is a fundamental problem.

I don't agree at all. She's very standard in this regard. She has about as much mechanical potential in her abilities as most champions have.

Two things. First, you don't have to go to an entirely new location. You have to stand on a slightly different piece of ground. Very big difference. Second, if this was a concern, it can be fixed numerically by decreasing time it takes for worked ground to despawn. This is not a "fundamental problem" if it can be fixed with a purely numerical change.

The reason taliyah is fundamentally flawwed is because her kit doesn't interact or make any sense with itself at all. Half of her kit incentivises roaming, while the other half fits the play style of a defencive control mage. Trying to gank enemies with your W E combo is really hard because of the cast times associated with those abilities. Her combo can do a lot of damage but it's hard to justify picking her over someone like tf who is 100 times more reliable. The reliability of her spells wouldn't be that big of a problem as a control mage, but as a roaming champion this absolutely kills her.

They either need to scrap her passive and worked ground mechanic to make her fit the control mage theme better, or lower the cast times on her W E combo to make it flow better as a roaming champion. I think as a control mage her ult could be much better but it's serviceable as it is now.

Sightless66May 23, 20164 votes

Her combo can do a lot of damage but it's hard to justify picking her over someone like tf who is 100 times more reliable.

I don't agree there either. If the only value you're taking her for is the roaming potential, then yes, you'll find her inferior to TF, but that's true pretty much for pretty much any comparison. TF is the king of reliable roamers. Reliability is his definining characteristic while roaming. That doesn't shut out other roamers so long as they bring strengths that he doesn't, and Taliyah has plenty of strengths he doesn't have. Her problem is that she is too weak for these strengths to be relevant. However, there is no reason why her strengths can not coexist.

her kit doesn't interact or make any sense with itself at all.

Sure it does. As a ganker, you use the Q to push out quickly, roam with the passive and ult, use the E to punish anyone who tries to get over the wall, and try to use the W as a CC. It's not perfectly reliable, but it does work with itself. Later in the game, she exerts area control with the E, the W to zone, and the disruption from the huge wall. The kit works absolutely fine. Fundamentally, her kit works fine together in every scenario she wants to be in. It's just too weak right now.

The reliability of her spells wouldn't be that big of a problem as a control mage,

Sure it would. Control mages love reliability as much as roamers do, and low reliability on control mages has damned many to irrelevance before. There are reliable and unreliable gankers, and reliable and unreliable control mages. Low reliability is not a disqualifying characteristic for either role. It just means that there needs to be enough reward to make up for the low reliability. That's all she's it lacking.

I am unconvinced and I'm sticking with my earlier assessment. There is no fundamental problem. She just sucks.

devdev463May 23, 20161 votes

{quoted}

I don't agree there either. If the only value you're taking her for is the roaming potential, then yes, you'll find her inferior to TF, but that's true pretty much for pretty much any comparison. TF is the king of reliable roamers. Reliability is his definining characteristic while roaming. That doesn't shut out other roamers so long as they bring strengths that he doesn't, and Taliyah has plenty of strengths he doesn't have. Her problem is that she is too weak for these strengths to be relevant. However, there is no reason why her strengths can not coexist.

Sure it does. As a ganker, you use the Q to push out quickly, roam with the passive and ult, use the E to punish anyone who tries to get over the wall, and try to use the W as a CC. It's not perfectly reliable, but it does work with itself. Later in the game, she exerts area control with the E, the W to zone, and the disruption from the huge wall. The kit works absolutely fine. Fundamentally, her kit works fine together in every scenario she wants to be in. It's just too weak right now.

Sure it would. Control mages love reliability as much as roamers do, and low reliability on control mages has damned many to irrelevance before. There are reliable and unreliable gankers, and reliable and unreliable control mages. Low reliability is not a disqualifying characteristic for either role. It just means that there needs to be enough reward to make up for the low reliability. That's all she's it lacking.

I am unconvinced and I'm sticking with my earlier assessment. There is no fundamental problem. She just sucks.

Ok let me put this another way. On the spectrum of good gankers to bad gankers, she is definitely on the lower side of said spectrum. Her cast times are far too long, and this puts her in the same tier as cho gaths ganking power, strong when it works, useless when it doesn't.

About unreliability on control mages and roamers. There is a reason the best roamers have the point and click cc. Control mages control where you can or can't move. Oriana is a perfect example of this with her ball. She throws out her ball at a rather low speed and she can use her ball to zone you away from a particular area. The damage you do with throwing out the ball does not need to be reliable because what you are throwing out the ball for is much different than what someone trying to gank another champ is trying to do. Tf is trying to lock one target down and burst them, while oriana is simply trying to occupy more space and increase her zone of threat. A control mage doesn't need to be reliable, they just have to control something. I think taliyahs e is a great skill for a control mage to have, but using that skill to gank is just simply bad and has a low chance of being effective, making her a bad roamer, which is the point I'm trying to make because if her roaming is bad, and her kit incentivises roaming a lot, then you end up with a flawed kit.

Sightless66May 24, 20163 votes

On the spectrum of good gankers to bad gankers, she is definitely on the lower side of said spectrum.

Don't agree with that either. Kitwise, she's a decently good ganker. The ult is a very strong ganking tool, and while her knockback isn't reliable, the E slow is reliable and the Q is about as good as any skillshot. She's not a cho-level roamer. That's just wrong. She has a strong way to get in that also puts up a wall from range, and she's not reliant on hitting the W in the way he needs to hit the Q. He has nothing without that. She has plenty without it.

There is a reason the best roamers have the point and click cc.

Two things. First, you don't to be the "best roamer". You only have to be good enough that it's worth doing, and she is. She is one of the best control mages at roaming, and she's good enough at roaming that she can compete with dedicated roamers (or at least, she would be if her numbers didn't suck.

Second, that statement is way too limiting. Point and click CC can be a tool for strong roamers, but some of the strongest roamers and gankers do not have reliability. Nidalee, Ahri, Fizz, Jarvan, Aurelion Sol; strong gankers with an unreliable ganking tool (to be clear, I'm not saying these are the absolute best gankers in the game. However, they are all very good at it). They make up for it. Taliyah is not far detached from this. The only highly unreliable part of her kit is the W. The rest of her kit can make a gank work without it, and it offers a very high amount of power when it does succeed.

the point I'm trying to make because if her roaming is bad, and her kit incentivises roaming a lot, then you end up with a flawed kit.

Her roaming isn't bad. It's just not the best roaming. I think her roaming is average by the standards of roaming champions, and almost none of those champions have the control mage properties that she has. That combination has value and allows her to be a good control mage with a roaming incentive. You are trying to judge her by the standards that a champion with no options except for would be judged by. That's why I criticized your TF comparison earlier. You found her coming up short to him in roaming, but of course she does, because there's maybe 2-3 champions that compete with him there. It was an unrealistic comparison.

Let me put this another way. I understand your argument about roamers and control mages. I just don't agree with your fundamental premise that her kit isn't suited to roaming, and even more importantly, I don't agree with you that she's so reliant on roaming that it makes her kit nonfunctional if she isn't the best roamer. She works as a control mage who gets extra opportunities to ult. She functions perfectly well as a control mage (all of her kit except the passive work for it), and her kit gives her plenty of opportunities to roam well because her kit does give roaming opportunities that other similar champions don't have. She isn't going to be an absolutely top-tier roamer, but with some simple buffs like a lower CD ult and maybe a bit more ult range early, she will do fine.

This is a very, very fixable problem. Her only major problem right now is that she is terrible. Fix her being terrible, and she'll be fine.

devdev463May 24, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Don't agree with that either. Kitwise, she's a decently good ganker. The ult is a very strong ganking tool, and while her knockback isn't reliable, the E slow is reliable and the Q is about as good as any skillshot. She's not a cho-level roamer. That's just wrong. She has a strong way to get in that also puts up a wall from range, and she's not reliant on hitting the W in the way he needs to hit the Q. He has nothing without that. She has plenty without it.

Two things. First, you don't to be the "best roamer". You only have to be good enough that it's worth doing, and she is. She is one of the best control mages at roaming, and she's good enough at roaming that she can compete with dedicated roamers (or at least, she would be if her numbers didn't suck.

Second, that statement is way too limiting. Point and click CC can be a tool for strong roamers, but some of the strongest roamers and gankers do not have reliability. Nidalee, Ahri, Fizz, Jarvan, Aurelion Sol; strong gankers with an unreliable ganking tool (to be clear, I'm not saying these are the absolute best gankers in the game. However, they are all very good at it). They make up for it. Taliyah is not far detached from this. The only highly unreliable part of her kit is the W. The rest of her kit can make a gank work without it, and it offers a very high amount of power when it does succeed.

Her roaming isn't bad. It's just not the best roaming. I think her roaming is average by the standards of roaming champions, and almost none of those champions have the control mage properties that she has. That combination has value and allows her to be a good control mage with a roaming incentive. You are trying to judge her by the standards that a champion with no options except for would be judged by. That's why I criticized your TF comparison earlier. You found her coming up short to him in roaming, but of course she does, because there's maybe 2-3 champions that compete with him there. It was an unrealistic comparison.

Let me put this another way. I understand your argument about roamers and control mages. I just don't agree with your fundamental premise that her kit isn't suited to roaming, and even more importantly, I don't agree with you that she's so reliant on roaming that it makes her kit nonfunctional if she isn't the best roamer. She works as a control mage who gets extra opportunities to ult. She functions perfectly well as a control mage (all of her kit except the passive work for it), and her kit gives her plenty of opportunities to roam well because her kit does give roaming opportunities that other similar champions don't have. She isn't going to be an absolutely top-tier roamer, but with some simple buffs like a lower CD ult and maybe a bit more ult range early, she will do fine.

This is a very, very fixable problem. Her only major problem right now is that she is terrible. Fix her being terrible, and she'll be fine.

When you say she functions perfectly well as a control mage, I don't really agree. You say she functions perfectly well, but also say she's terrible. Do you like her kit as it is currently and think that a number changes would be fine for her or not? To me functioning well and terrible do not work together. If she's functioning well then she's not terrible.

I will admit that my perception of what makes a good roamer may be scewed because of the champions I play, causing me to look at an average roamer as simply bad at roaming. But her kit just feels so awkward to try and use in those situations where your ganking other lanes. It's so easy to go in for a gank with taliyah and feel like you accomplished nothing at all, that it just makes these aspects of her kit feel like they are forced in there just to make interesting things happen.

Also, as a control mage I think she would be fine HOWEVER, the thing that really holds back that aspect of her kit to me is the worked ground on her Q. The fact that she is objectively weaker in the zones she creates means she wants to be out of those zones as much as much as possible. This to me feels completely counter intuitive to what a control mage is trying to do, and the mechanic really lends itself to a more kite centric play style. If the zones just slowed enemies and maybe she didn't create so many (to justify having slow actually be meaningful) I think I would really like it because it would synergise with the rest of her kit and make her high damage combos easier to land, and that could be the risk of the enemy going in there. Maybe the slow could stack based off of the ammount of worked ground fields she has on any given spot up to a cap, that way it would be much easier to actually design with the way it works currently.

What would you change about her current kit to make her not terrible? Just numbers?

Sightless66May 24, 20161 votes

To me functioning well and terrible do not work together.

When I say her kit functions well, I mean that its design is perfectly fine, and numerically it doesn't work because her numbers just aren't high enough. The damage is too low, the mana costs are too high, etc. That doesn't mean the kit's design is screwed. For example, say I took Leblanc and just cut her damage in half, or cut her health in half, or doubled her cooldowns, or something else like that. The kit would be fine and perfectly functional, but she would suck because she was numerically underpowered. This is what Taliyah is like. Her kit works fine with itself and would allow her to do her job without being oppressive if her numbers didn't suck.

It's so easy to go in for a gank with taliyah and feel like you accomplished nothing at all,

Of course. It's easy to do anything as Taliyah and feel like you accomplished nothing. She's weak! Accomplishing nothing is the baseline!

I can think of quite a few ganks I've had with her where if I had more damage or could have gone in from a longer range, there would have been a very different outcome. That speaks to me about how much her general weakness is affecting her ability to do her job.

The fact that she is objectively weaker in the zones she creates means she wants to be out of those zones as much as much as possible. This to me feels completely counter intuitive to what a control mage is trying to do, and the mechanic really lends itself to a more kite centric play style.

"Control mage" and "kiting" go together heavily in my mind. When I'm thinking of someone like Orianna, Karma, maybe Syndra, I can't avoid thinking about how they all move around a ton. It's pretty characteristic of their gameplay. I don't find worked ground tends to be a significant limitation past the laning phase because I don't want to be standing in the same pieces of ground anyway. I may want to be in the same general map area, but worked ground allows that. I've never found my role being limited when I play taliyah because of worked ground. I can always, without exception, stay where my team is and fight with them once the laning phase is over, and as far as I'm concerned that means

What would you change about her current kit to make her not terrible? Just numbers?

Numbers primarily. Lower mana costs, lower ult cd, possibly a higher ult range at lower levels, increased damage. Those are the main components. None represent significant changes to her playstyle. I could be swayed by an argument that worked ground should have a shorter duration to make her laning phase easier, but aside from that, I can't think of any mechanical changes that stand out as a necessity.

If the zones just slowed enemies

I don't like that idea. Having a constant slow in such a large area is going to necessitate that either the slow is so small that it doesn't matter, or that it is going to make immobile champions completely unable to deal with her because they can't deal with an infinite duration slow.

In addition I don't even think it would feel good to play with. First, I don't want to set these up before a fight. Nothing else in her kit has any kind of setup element in it, and it goes against the engage potential her ult promises. Additionally, I think it has problems with being uninteresting to actually use. She already fulfills a kiting control style between the slow on her E and the constant slow from her Q with Rylai's, so this would be a mechanic that wouldn't actually impact the enemy she's directly engaging. It wouldn't syngergize with her kit and her build because she already has this effect against enemies she is directly fighting. If a significant portion of her power gets tied into slowing enemies that she isn't actually targeting, then that is power that isn't going to be enjoyable for her because it's going to be much less noticeable and she isn't doing anything to activate.

Something as passive as that doesn't feel like something that should be on her kit. I don't think them having a negative effect on enemies is a good idea in general. If worked ground is a problem, then we should either reduce its effect on her by decreasing the size/duration, or increasing the benefits it brings by tooling up the movespeed or adding something else she'd like to it.

HigeMay 23, 20163 votes

in all honesty, I thought this as well, still I kept playing with her and to my surprise things started to go smoother and smoother, except of course for what I mentioned at the beginning, she just so happens to have a steep learning curve.

A LiberalMay 23, 20164 votes

AurelionSol Jhin Ekko all had ~30% win rates on release from what I remember.

When release winrates are high you get shit like Kindred and Azir

My Waifu VanillaMay 24, 20162 votes

Except Azir was considered a trash tier champion until like 6 patches of bugfixes since his kit simply did not work most of the time. Also, when people realized the power of his "shurima shuffle" and the fact he has one of the biggest gap closers in the game.

OleandervineMay 23, 20163 votes

{quoted}

I can assure you she has many, many problems that likely mean a failed champ

Shes by no means a failed champ, just an underpowered one. A failure is someone like Mordekaiser, who they redesigned to be an ADC, but that concept went down burning and left him a hot mess. Taliyah is just simply low on numbers. They have stated that they will be looking to buff her next patch because of her across the board underperformance, they mentioned some mild damage increases coupled with a shorter timer for the Worked Ground areas. I think the best QoL fix for her would be to make W a click and drag like Viktor's laser for easier use.

MasqureManMay 24, 20162 votes

{quoted}

I can assure you she has many, many problems that likely mean a failed champ

Wow you explained those issues so well, with critical analysis and everything, I totally understand where you're coming from, thanks for being clear.

QjTHqo3RTqMay 24, 20161 votes

Do I have to when someone probably made an entire essay on why this champ is absolute garbarino

HigeMay 24, 20161 votes

at least link this info you talk about.

nice tableMay 23, 20168 votes

unpopular opinion: taliyah is balanced people just cant play her.

KalarepaMay 23, 20167 votes

No one can play her, because it's super easy for the enemies to dodge her skills.

DarkRitualMay 23, 20166 votes

She definately needs something, the mentioned change I would welcome. The single-rock Q is another area that could be improved upon. 50% mana refund isn't enough to make it attractive to use the majority of the time. I feel there could be something else added to make it something you don't feel bad about doing often. Maybe additional mana refund on enemy champion hit, or just increased refund on cast. One stone barely tickles. Still having to pay 50% for that seems like a bad deal all over.

Blue Moon WolfMay 23, 20162 votes

2 and a half rocks for 50% of the mana :p

BoulderoxMay 23, 20166 votes

She is by no means a failed champ, but she is flawed.

Her passive makes her seem like a jungler, while making her roaming great, but has 0 relevance in lane. Her Q is great but worked ground counters you so hard, CDR is a must but in the end your lane/jungle is full of worked ground you can't output dps worth anything. Her W is different, and odd but the only problem is the lockout of abilities until the ability is fully done. E is a very potent ability, but i still feel personally it doesn't stop anyone from actually jumping you, 4 rocks worth of damage max... Ahri ok, I kill you now...

And her ult, the game changer, the amazing wall, the stupendous blocker, ( Azir Bard Caitlyn Corki Ekko Ezreal Fiora Fizz Gnar Gragas Graves Jax Katarina Khazix Kindred Leblanc LeeSin Lissandra Lucian Nidalee Sejuani Shaco Shen Tryndamere Vayne Zac Zed : what wall?) I just wish that her ult could AT THE VERY LEAST, have ONE row of her E rocks on each side of the wall, makes thematic sense seeing as you literally unravel the earth when you ult to ride it... and gives it damage that has no real damage, unless someone dashes over it...

Her kit was designed as a control mage, but so far as I have been dedicated to trying to main her (earth champion finally, Malphite doesn't count as he has ONE earth ability). Yet she still suffers from having little control over situations that she does not start herself, which shouldn't they be able to do regardless? Orianna can take control with her ult at any moment with her abilities, why can't Taliyah when she needs to? On the second note, her E is designed to hinder mobility, yet mobility champs counter her HARD....

The only time I see her useful is as a top laner, and as a TANK DENIER. There was once a game where I was vs a Shen top that was constantly getting help from his premade Volibear buddy and racking up 8 kills eventually, under my tower everytime with the "Balanced" bite Eventually He got super fed, and when his team had 3 cloud dragons, item 3742 and his run, he was assured to catch someone, but as Taliyah, I was able to keep him at bay alone. item 3116 and her Q W and E were amazing at stopping this annoying thing and without him there team was very frail. Same experience vs a Maokai , we lost this match but we were able to survive if I was able to keep maokai away from the team. She has power as well, as I have 1 rotationed a Viktor before, but that was max build with blue elixer.

HigeMay 23, 20162 votes

I like your suggestion for the wall.

I also am at war with myself because I see everyone tagging her as a control mage, but I think she has a lot of potential as a skirmisher type... building movement speed items increases the effective range of your passive, meaning that far apart walls aren't so far in between anymore, worked ground is awesome for a MS boost as well and in lane it helps you become really slippery to the point where I think that I rather have worked ground all over with special "holes" that you can rely on to use your 5 rocks Q.

Also, movement speed is crucial on getting out of worked ground so I think it's a seriously powerful stat on her, I'd even say to skip sorc boots and go straight for mobi or swiftness, your survival depends on how quickly you can put distance between you and your foe, specially since all you need is a quarter second to ride your wall and escape if needed.

item 3009 item 3285 item 3100 item 3116

The rest depends on the enemy comp but I think this empowers you enough, also, item 3100 allows you to weave your autoattacks as well, fun fact: you can autoattack while Q is firing xP and since it procs lich bane only once all you need is focus on one auto and then running.

BoulderoxMay 23, 20161 votes

huh, never thought of lich bane honestly, have tried things like item 3115 for increased AA damage with the added damage on hit from teh passive with the ap just felt nice when I played her on PBE, as starting out felt her AA was clunky, but finally coming to terms with it.

HigeMay 23, 20161 votes

haha yeah I mean if you think about it, item 3100 makes your auto almost like a 6th Q stone, maybe item 3115 would be a good idea afterwards in order to weave faster in between casts and increase the damage from lich bane.

Blue Moon WolfMay 24, 20161 votes

Her passive makes her seem like a jungler, while making her roaming great, but has 0 relevance in lane

Makes it worse considering out of every lane, she is in the one with the least amount of wall. At least top and bot would let her hug the edge of the map to get a steady speed boost. Mid lane in early game it has her constantly hopping on and off her rock cause of the breaks in the wall :L

And her ult, the game changer, the amazing wall, the stupendous blocker,( :what wall)

... This just gave me an idea. I wonder if as Bard, I place a portal at one end of the wall, would it be able to reach the other end ?

BoulderoxMay 24, 20163 votes

IKR, a mid lane mage that needs walls to utilize a part of her passive... with barely any walls mid...

And about the bard thing, Idk??? but would be freaking cool!

THESuperStuntManMay 23, 20164 votes

No, she actually has tons of problems. She's super-telegraphed and easily dodged with every ability and doesn't really have anything to make it worth it. Her only reliable damage-dealing spell (Q) only works well once in a large area for a base of 3 MINUTES. Her ult does no damage and is hard to use effectively since it's hard to get the angle to work for her and it can just be jumped over. Her mana costs are insane and her base cooldowns are really long.

To fix her, they really need to decide what they want her to do, since now, she's pretty bad at everything until the lategame when her cooldowns are more reasonable.

If they want her to just be utility, they need to lower the cooldowns on everything but her Q in early levels. If they want her to do damage, they need her Q to have a WAY lower mana cost especially on worked ground.

J EevoMay 23, 20162 votes

I feel like "overloaded with counterplay" could sum up most of the changes and champions in this patch, whether's it's Taliyah with her telegraphed combos and worked ground counterplay, Vlad with his kit being super heavy on telegraphed damage windows, Swain losing his reliability in dots making for better counterplay(though his R got overbuffed to hilarious levels), Cassiopeia with her new W, Anivia with her new R.

Seems like Riot designers want to push League heavily into the unreliable "if you got killed it's your fault for being dumb" territory.

Kitten of EvilMay 23, 20165 votes

Seems like Riot designers want to push League heavily into the unreliable "if you got killed it's your fault for being dumb" territory.

Unless you got killed by an assassin, in which case OUTPLAYED!!11!1!

It was your fault you got close enough to that Zed or Leblanc for them to blink/dash to you.

ForeverLaxxMay 24, 20161 votes

This is just what happens when you force "counterplay dogma" at everything. The current designers at Riot have this seemingly deathly fear of reliable skills. No one is allowed to have anything that can't be responded to. All of the most recent large reworks (and even some of the smaller ones) have suffered from this, the newer champions being released are being held back by forced "counterplay", and for some reason Riot refuses to recognize the issue because they've convinced themselves that everything is fine and that it's just a "numbers issue". The worst part about this is that, sometimes, they'll inadvertently throw too many numbers into a champion redesign because they were trying to keep the feel of said champion while forcing their idiotic "windows of power", like Malz. And thanks to that, Malz is slated for nerfs.

It shouldn't be surprising that a champion where every ability is a delayed conditional effect with highly telegraphed animations is underperforming, especially given the pure utility and functionally worthless status of a laughable "ultimate" ability. And yet, Riot seems utterly mystified that this totally balanced and well-designed champion only manages to leech a win 30% of the time she's played.

HigeMay 23, 20162 votes

uhm I disagree, she is super different from the rest of the champions yes and her rhythm is a bit odd but her mana costs aren't that bad.

She is susceptible to diving but every champion is and even then, she has the tools to peel herself and if done right she can use her wall to escape, of course you have to do it super early to be effective.

Her ult doing no damage I believe was a decision made in order to keep the skill clean; doing damage with it would result in odd walls placed amidst teamfights and you'd loose the crazy utility this skill has because of it's crazy long cooldown.

Her Q doing good damage every 3 minutes is because this is basically her "real" ult in terms of damage, consider then that she has it from lvl 1 and the 3 minutes kind of makes sense, I do believe though that the Worked ground AoE is a too big and it covers too much terrain too fast.

Blue Moon WolfMay 23, 20162 votes

I gotta say, now that I've played her in a few games, she's actually pretty fun. Her W is pretty easy to read and that whole "worked ground" thing is annoying as hell to work around (I could see that being removed in the future), but her kit feels really rewarding when you do well with her. she seems to need to build a bit tanky though and I don't know if that's what riot was going for with her. item 3027 item 3116 item 3001 item 3152 item 3512 item 3047 seems to work pretty well. Give her some time and some buffs and I'm sure she'll fit right in with the rest of the champs on the roster :p

deadlychuckMay 23, 20162 votes

Honestly having just played a single game on her, the method used for her W control seems not very well thought through. Despite having multiple good examples of directional abilities in the game

Viktor Rumble

They went with this awkward system. I mean i'm gonna try it without smartcast, and maybe it will feel better. Though the way they went about it just seems weird.

HigeMay 23, 20161 votes

the W vector cast is odd at first, but once you get the gist of it it's really simple, actually now that I think about it, I believe it locks you out of the rest of your kit in order for you to focus on just that one thing, if you were able to move you'd probably screw the direction of the spell all the time but I think there's room for a bit of leeway here.

the way it works is very simple, you cast it where you want it, set a direction and then cast it again. In the beginning I hit the W key a thousand times or moved the pointer before hitting W again, all of this screws up the skill itself so you gotta do it more calmly and always remember to hit W again, if not it'll knock everyone upwards and E won't explode.

deadlychuckMay 24, 20162 votes

I understand how it works, but it's just lacks the ease of use that the other abilities have.

If you hold down the key, you set the first anchor point, then select a direction. If you could do that with her w via smart cast, then it would actually be usable. Atm it feels awkward to double case the same ability like it's an anivia Q or something.

MiraweaveMay 24, 20161 votes

{quoted}

I understand how it works, but it's just lacks the ease of use that the other abilities have.

If you hold down the key, you set the first anchor point, then select a direction. If you could do that with her w via smart cast, then it would actually be usable. Atm it feels awkward to double case the same ability like it's an anivia Q or something.

And Anivia's Q doesn't lock out her other abilities.

zach the fighterMay 24, 20162 votes

I just played a few games with her and man, what a mess.

her q is utterly lacking in any punch and very difficult to land. also a staggering reduction in power once she's used up all the ground around her, it feels almost as weak as an auto at that point. the range is fairly short for how low power, slow moving, and predictable it is. even landing a full q and triggering thunderlords off it felt underwhelming.

her w is clunky, like whoah. after a minute you can kinda get used to the double tap but its like a harder to control victor e with longer delay. range is decent but not anything to write home about.

her e to me is what really makes her kit and breaks it at the same time. its a really neat ability laying out landmines and knocking enemies into it with w. very strong burst too when you land her combo. therein lies the problem though; all the power in her kit is wrapped up into that combo that you need to be dangerously close to land. she is approximately as fragile as ziggs with no instant cc or escapes, no defensive sheilds or high defensive stats, and no sustain. how is she supposed to mitigate this weakness? most other midlane mages can stand 10 miles away and blast her out of lane with repeated poke. assassins eat her alive due to being squishy and having no reliable disengage. she can kind of kite but doesnt deal any noticable damage while kiting so you cant really whittle them down.

and then her ult, his move could be playmaking if she had the stats and kit to back up more of a bruiser mage or even a tanky mage like a swain or a maokai or something, then there would be incentive for her to ride it out front to engage with. but as it sands she is too frail and her burst is on too much of a delay to reliably pull anything off aside from blocking a retreat and hoping your team mates can lock them down long enough to land your combo. when a control mage needs someone else to lock people down for them something is very wrong.

and lastly her passive: her passive screams jungler, as does her ult. the problem is she doesnt have the tools to clear the jungle reliably enough (no% health dmg, no sustain), and she is just too easily killed to survive a gank engage. playing as a laner, especially a midlaner who wants to sit put half the time and control the lane, this passive doesnt make any sense.

MoonToonExMay 24, 20161 votes

She has a lot of flaws in her kit IMO.

For one it seems like sooo much of her kit doesn't meld together in any reasonable rotation order. Her Q, the most DMG in her kit, makes "worked ground" ... which is a debuff to her when she stands on it but it gives her some tiny amount of movement speed? And Worked Ground does NOTHING to her other skills? It ONLY debuffs her main DMG skill? How about at the cost of your Q DMG you can now do her knock up faster? Something to give you something back for standing on worked ground? Or maybe it slows enemy champs to?

Her ult is useless against sooo many champs in this league of mobility ... why not put a grounded zone around it to forcefully STOP people from being able to cross the wall unless forced over it by a grab or knock up? No need for DMG on it, just making it uncross-able would help.

Knock up ... why not allow her to use it on herself?

The only real apparent synergy in her kit is the Knock up into that ... close ranged mine field -_-. I really wish they would change that mine field into something else that was more useful to her as a ranged non-tanky mage.

HigeMay 24, 20161 votes

I think that all the points you mentioned are frustrations you have with the champ. I think I can quote riot on saying that they want every champion to feel different from each others and Taliyah accomplishes that perfectly.

That said her Q worked ground could be smaller or shorter in duration, though the passive Ms it gives is nothing to laugh about, as a mid laner, Taliyah is particularly slippery thanks to it.

Her ult has its problems, mainly because of blinks and dashes, though, you can't deny that it makes you travel super fast and making the enemy burn their flash is pretty good. It is a very situational skill and it's utility can be incredibly high when used at the right time.

The knock up on herself would be too similar to Ziggs' satchel charge, there's no point on giving her a jump when she has quite a lot of movement speed buffs imo, plus the skill locks you in place before jumping so all in all there would be little to no gain.

I do believe worked ground should give her something else though

My Waifu VanillaMay 24, 20162 votes

Instead of Grounded I feel like Poppy W along the wall would be the better decision to at least allow flash and blinks (not many champions have them) and not make it an ability with little "counterplay" besides "man, I hope Taliyah doesn't instantly win this fight by using a cross map skill shot". Making the wall completely impassible could also allow you to f*ck your team over more than it already does tbh and at least putting Poppy W physics on it would allow you to catch out more of the ADC roster (Lucian, Ez, Cait, Trist can all get over that wall while Ez would be the only one after the proposed change).

SOLOQSUPERHEROMay 24, 20161 votes

I feel like the biggest issue is her Q and her passive, her W and E seem like really solid abilities. I think their ratios could be tweaked a little and I personally wouldn't mind her E exploding earlier. (5 seconds is a long time).

Her Q's main issue is when on worked ground it doesn't do enough. I think this could be solved from 2 things:

Giving her more than just a movement speed buff on worked ground. Not sure what exactly this could be, perhaps a damage reduction on worked ground (this would give her some additional help when she dives in allowing her to use her ultimate as an engage tool late game) I think even if needed you could reduce her output further on worked ground.

Or You could change what her Q does when on worked ground. I know she's meant to be simple, but perhaps her Q on worked ground could be treated similarly to Corki's big rocket.

Either way I think the worked ground duration should be reduced significantly. It lasts far too long.

Her passive, is just terrible. I even don't feel like it works. The movement speed doesn't really help her roam that well considering her ult is a better tool to do it anyway. It has 0 lane impact, it does nothing.

HigeMay 24, 20161 votes

I have found that her passive works wonders IF you build movement speed items, item 3100 item 3285 and item 1402 if you're going jungle, also, combined with worked ground the speed boost is pretty nice, it's a good roaming passive and after 5 seconds is a nice escape tool.

only concern is that it has a weird downtime when you move from a wall to another, if Taliyah gets off the rock she'll need a second or so to jump on it again. With enough movement speed you can increase the range of the passive though and avoid loosing the buff, still if there's a mini space where she can't ride on the rock, you'll have to wait that second out no matter what.

SOLOQSUPERHEROMay 24, 20162 votes

Sorry I wasn't clear. Her passive movement speed increase is significant, but it doesn't actually feel fast. It may be an animation thing or maybe even a bug.

HigeMay 24, 20161 votes

ooooh yeah I agree, perhaps because she barely moves at all, if they used the animation from her ult it might help

QuephaMay 25, 20161 votes

The entire point of locking you out of spellcasting is to make you cast E before your W if you want the combo. If you could cast E during then every landed W is a WE combo without risk meaning it has to be balanced around dealing way less damage.

VenowolfMay 25, 20161 votes

Bump!