Several thousand Vladimir games' player feedback on Vlad rework

Blue Vanity·5/4/2016, 12:57:31 PM·15 votes·2,640 views

I'll skip the introductions and life story. In short, I liked Vlad.

Post-edit edit

After careful consideration and numerous sample games played it's become evident that riot staff members spent little to no time analyzing vladimir before deciding on a rework option which would accurately not tamper heavily with his playstyle. Riot failed at this, miserably, on a level which deems it obvious that they actually give no hoots about champions played mostly by a dedicated and committed player base. I've never uninstalled league of legends in my time playing it since 2011 but I guess five years is enough to throw in the rag. They ruined vladimir plain and simple, and after making an adjustment this half-assed, they clearly wouldn't care enough to even marginally rectify it. Been a nice half decade; Blue Vanity out.

19 Comments

Damage Inc5/4/2016, 2:10:18 PM6 votes

Well hi there!

I also main Vlad (several thousand games, KDA 6/2.6/5 etc bla bla ) and while I 100 % agree to the above points, I want to highlight Vlads new passive and E:

  • Passive: AP provides less HP now -> losing a lot of beef and tankiness but Riot (accidentally?) did a double nerf to his passive. The reworked AP items provide far less AP, so Vlad also gets far less HP while already being crippled by low AP <-> HP ratios. It's disastrous.

  • E: Seeing it first on some PBE videos it looked somehow nice, but I rapidly changed my mind after playing it for myself. I thought E is a Nova and hits everything within it's cast range (somehow like old E) but there are actually bolts who only hit the first enemies. This means, and happend several times already, E will be utterly useless for a.) harassing in lane (just hide behind minions) b.) in teamfights , e.g. ppl lining behind each other, or even worse, some minions, plants (hi Malz, Zyra) will block the damage -> rendering it to uselessness while costing you so much HP. Hell there is even one more con to his new E, it's channeling, meaning it can be easily interrupted by stuns, kicks, silence etc. :(

Seeing all the others mages go ramp playing Vlad makes me sad and while I had a positive mindeset towards changes I wish Vlad would not have been touched. Nevertheless I'm confident Riot will see similar issues and react accordingly.

Eternvl5/4/2016, 3:16:27 PM4 votes

Uh oh. Looks like Vlad requires brain power to play now. I like how you give your goodbye ceremony like you're someone important. Bye bye. I'm sure you'll be back tomorrow and your story is just something kids make up when they stomp the ground out of anger.

Feathermane5/4/2016, 2:34:41 PM3 votes

As someone who has played more than 5 mins against Vladimir, these are my impressions: There is no way anyone is having fun playing against Vladimir. More than any other champion in the game, this terrible, resourceless, oversustaining sonofabitch does not belong in the game, and the mage update left things more or less at this point.

Rockm Sockm5/4/2016, 2:45:27 PM3 votes

Vladimir will be the new worst champion in the game.

There are absolutely zero reasons to pick him or upsides to his kit.

HIs sustain is entirely reliant on minions(or a horrible laner), his damage is a complete joke compared to the other mages.

The ruined his kit completely then gave malz that passive and Annie that shield buff.

Rozair5/4/2016, 1:59:38 PM2 votes

Riot hates vlad clearly. They wanted to take away his abilities to heal and make him a normal mage while keeping his old kit in mind which revolved around spell vamp. Rework fail. Mordakiser status

Blue Vanity5/4/2016, 2:06:14 PM2 votes

He doesn't work as a normal mage because he's now made to be played like a back-line tank but he has no crowd control and he isn't tanky at all especially with the tank item nerfs. They literally revoked any gap that he previously filled in the game and he's just a bloated water balloon in a place he doesn't belong.

Smitemuffin5/4/2016, 2:09:49 PM2 votes

Nevermind the fact that they're obviously trying to corner you into building tank with how they tinkered with his passive.

Kotex5/4/2016, 2:31:52 PM2 votes

I remember a while back reading a post about how the 2016 season just feels like one huge PBE test on the main client for the 2017 season, and with every change that happens that becomes more and more true i feel.

From the artwork, to the "balances" to the champions, to the items, masteries etc.

And as far as Vlad is concerned it's like riot wants to destroy everything about him so they can rebuild him from the ground up but then only to a sub-par level.

Over Innsmouth5/4/2016, 3:44:38 PM2 votes

So yeah, you saw my thread. I'm personally pretty happy with new Vlad, I just think his numbers (particularly his healing) are low. Nothing that couldn't be solved with some number buffs.

But that's my take, and we seem to have different ones. I'll admit that being a lowly Plat V (and having gotten here it's nothing to hark about in my eyes) my opinion is perceivably less valid than yours, but all the same I do love Vladimir and have played him since I started this game (a friend recommended him to me and I've never looked back).

It does feel like (even though they said they didnt) they calculated new healing values with Spell Vamp in mind. I don't think he's ruined - infact I think he's better than before - but he does need buffs to his healing. And maybe fully charged E's go through all units in the AoE? That doesnt seem unfair.

TheInnocentdevil5/4/2016, 3:17:13 PM1 votes

I didn't think it was possible for vlad to get worse....I feel like riot took that as a personal challenge. Has anyone actually noticed that crimson rush doesn't increase his movement speed...

JMoormann5/4/2016, 3:22:55 PM1 votes

Really, I haven't played him myself yet since 6.9 (I play him fairly frequently), but from what I heard from PBE players Vlad was looking pretty strong.

Also, you cannot deny that his overall game health will probably be increased. Before he was pretty much about "If I can outheal your trade/poke damage, I win lane, else I lose", and his Q was mostly meant to be spammed. Now his Q involves a lot decision making for Vlad, and some counterplay for his opponent other than "stay out of Q range".

His E also seems a lot more interesting. It still has the same use (damaging spell with health cost and a bit of utility), but it also involves a lot more gameplay and decision making, like "How much health am I willing to spend right now?" and positioning for both him and his opponents.

Really, I cannot see why gameplay-wise he has become worse. Maybe he turns out to be slightly weaker, but balancing is not the same as kit changes, and them he will probably get buffed.

TheInnocentdevil5/4/2016, 3:34:25 PM1 votes

His new E is awkward and feels kind of deceptive, and I swear crimson rush isn't working or the movement speed doesn't show up.

Im Impotent5/4/2016, 2:22:31 PM1 votes

They nerfed his damage, they nerfed his healing, they nerfed his tankiness(while trying to shoehorn you into building tank), they nerfed his e, and they basically got rid of his sustain. Literally the only good thing that he got from this "update" is the healing from his ult, and maybe the additional auto-attack damage.