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Ways of toning down Tristana and Why

Telosa·9/13/2014, 7:39:47 AM·5 votes·1,816 views

Considering that Riot is starting to look at Tristana and ways to nerf her early game without affecting her late game, I decided to throw my two cents in. The big underlying problem with Tristana was that she was previously held back by AD Casters who scaled far more effectively with the old Bloodthirster and she was repeatedly buffed to be able to compete with them, but then itemization for Marksmen changed. As a result, Tristana has no one in bot lane who can easily bully her, she scales way too easily with too few items and she's far too safe for her level of damage output.

First, let's look at where Tristana does (and SHOULD excel) with her strengths:

  • At level 18, Tristana has the highest permanent auto attack range due to her passive, which increases her range by 153 to 703. Only Jinx with her Rockets (700), Kog'maw with his W (which gives him a range of 710) and Twitch (with his ultimate that gives him a range of 850) can compete with her range. In addition, Tristana has a 90% auto attack steroid, which allows her to out scale almost any every other marksmen in the game.

*Tristana has a huge dash and a point-and-click knock-back on her ultimate, so she's hard to focus and it's very easy for her to peel for herself.

  • Tristana has high-burst on her abilities - she has 900 magic damage from her W, E and R.

Now, let's look at where Tristana could be toned down: *Tristana has too much auto attack range from her passive and she doesn't pay anything for it. She has a relatively high auto attack range at level 1 (550) and she gets a higher auto attack range with each level.

*Tristana's Q has no mana cost, so she doesn't have any serious mana considerations when all-ining her opponent. It made sense to make her Q free when the old Bloodthirster kept Tristana from making a appearance, but that buff is no longer necessary.

*Her W has a reset and a slow. Tristana's W should primarily be a tool for repositioning or for bursting her opponent, but it shouldn't be a forgiving tool for her when misused. In addition, Tristana already has two ways to peel champions off her (her W and her R), and the enemy team will sometimes have to engage on her as many as three times before they can close the gap. I realize that removing the Reset mechanic is a cornerstone of Tristana's AP build , but I don't think RIot should support Tristana's AP build anyway.

Well, with all this in mind, here's my ideas for changing Tristana's kit, which should keep her late game strength intact while making her more abusable during the early game.

First, a change to Tristana's passive. Tristana's base auto attack range is decreased to 500 and her passive formula is increased from 9 × (Tristana's level - 1). to 12 x (Tristana's level -1). Tristana will recover her old-auto attack range at level 5 and she'll go from having a range of 703 to a range of 704 at level 18.

Second, Tristana's Q gets a scaling mana cost of 40/30/20/10/0. It follows the same logic as Lucian's old E - Tristana will still be able to use her Q constantly at level 18 (which keeps her late game intact), but she'll have to be more careful about using her Q during laning phase.

Third, Tristana's W loses the slow and reset mechanic, but she gets her W's cooldown reduced (to something like 18 / 16 / 14 / 12 / 10). The removal of the slow is mostly just for toning down her CC and removing some of her all-in potential at early levels (Since it's only there for making it more difficult for Tristana's opponent to respond when she all-ins the enemy ADC), and the reset mechanic is removed so that Tristana's opponents can be rewarded when they close the gap. This way, when the enemy team finally closes the gap on Tristana, she can't repeatedly kite and kill each of her opponents and dash away with W each time.

So, I realize these changes aren't perfect, but this is just how I envision a way to tone down Tristana's essential strengths while retaining the strength of her late game. But enough about me - how do you all envision a way to tone down Tristana's early game while retaining her late game power?

15 Comments

RainbowBlitz989/13/2014, 10:51:35 AM1 votes

Dont forget that none on her abilities scale with AD so it's kinda balanced. But i agree with removing the slow on her W, and i think her Q should have a small-medium mana cost. Also the passive nerf is a good idea i thought about too. Tristana

MrBuffington9/13/2014, 1:42:10 PM1 votes

I posted about potential Tristana range changes earlier, I actually had the same numbers as you.

I like the Q mana cost, though most builds she'll have this at lvl 14, not 18 (she maxes Q second).

The changes to W don't really affect her early game, so I don't think they're necessary.

Her E is actually one of the only ways she can trade early. I think they're working on ways to remove grievous wounds from the game entirely, so this could get some attention too.

FantasySniper9/13/2014, 9:24:36 PM1 votes

This is pretty much perfect.

Her [Q] really needs a mana cost, it's just free harass with no risk, like old Soraka's.

Catfish0179/13/2014, 11:42:55 PM1 votes

I think her Q basically just needs to be changed into something different. It can still be powerful, but its current state is such a boring, stale, OLD ability.

Stick In Mudd9/14/2014, 4:14:46 AM1 votes

Nah, I either take Draven or Ashe against her in lane.

Draven out trades Trist at EVERY stage in the game. No contest whatsoever. It's rather hilarious how it would take Trist about four shots to kill Draven, but only takes him three to kill Trist. Maybe two if there's lucky criticals.

Ashe is great because Trist's jump has a delay to it, therefore Trist cannot dodge the Arrow without burning flash. So Trist gets locked down pretty hard, just long enough to either knock her out of the fight, or kill her.

Also, Ashe and Trist (for me) are built exactly the same. IE, then Shiv as the core items. Ashe also outranges Trist so early laning bullying, isn't a problem. And besides, most bullying comes from the supports nowadays. Unless you pick Draven, that is.

Trist could be toned down a bit with her numbers; but the core of her play style will remain the same. Resets on jump to dominate a team fight. Trist is really beautiful with this. I have carried many games because of this, without the slow being a factor at all. As for her auto attack range, this will simple destroy her early laning against certain champs. She'll get bullied too much by Lucian forcing her to back too many times, Draven will simply destroy her if she so much as looks at a minion, and Ashe will be the zoning queen.

The reason the AA range nerf worked for Lucian, was because of his quick, instant response dash. Trist does not have this. There is a delay to it, and the animation of the jump is (relatively) slow.

Cloud Potato9/14/2014, 5:17:48 AM1 votes

Trist is a problem when strong because she has almost no counterplay. All of her damage is targeted except for W, which is only used offensively when you're so far ahead there's no risk to it, or it will secure a kill and you can jump back out. When there's nobody that flat out beats her face in she will always be there because you cannot play against anything she has other than to stay out of range. Q mana costs will not fix this whatsoever. Removing W's slow and resets makes it much less of a snowball mechanic, so I don't disagree with that change. But she also needs a change that will let her actually interact with her opponent instead of having a 'I will hurt you' zone.

The facts that Trist's abilities don't scale and deal magic damage, and that every ADC has basic attacks anyway, does not mean that it's okay to lack counterplay (AP Trist is a good example why). This is the same issue many Bruisers have, where they win or lose depending on who has the higher numbers. Being ranged only slightly helps this problem, since she can be numerically weak and get by thanks to her safety, but if she's going to be a healthy champion she needs something in her kit that can be played against.

ValyrianBlade9/14/2014, 6:50:45 PM1 votes

I've always taken caitlyn against tristana and in about 20 Games am yet to lose the match up (or the game). a part of it is probably that caitlyn and tristana are my 2 adc mains so I probably out-skill my opponent in these games, but I think it's a favorable match up to caitlyn anyways. tristana has to push the lane due to her e passive while caitlyn can poke and harass to her heart's content with no trade back pre level 6 for sure and often through level 10. Since tristana pushes passively you can easily get a gank kill after your first back, and since she has nothing but her w to poke back against caitlyn's q, if tristana wastes w aggressively she's going to get killed. without thresh as her support to pull her out, I feel like tristana is just destroyed early game in this match up. Yes she scales way harder but when caitlyn has 2-4 levels on her, 2 extra turrets, and roams to secure kills mid on top of dragons, the game has snowballed way too far that even the mighty late game tristana has no say in the matter. Not to mention there are a few assassins, most notably talon, that can kill tristana pretty easily (talon e silences her and he can get in range via his ult stealth, one combo kill before the silence finishes).