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Riot, tanks respectfully request another role we are allowed to play

MrSc0tty··126 votes·16,947 views

Hello Riot. It's us, the non-support tanks. Regarding your latest jungle changes, you've added 100g to the combine cost of our basic jungle items, and it's giving us the idea that not only do you really not want us jungling, we can no longer defy you and do it anyway.

See, after pitifully clearing two to three camps and going back, we're lucky if we can scrape together 450 gold, and without any potions at all our second clear will be just as sad as the first, at which point we will be several levels and hundred gold behind everyone else. Given that our itemization tends to only be 80-75% gold efficient anyway and that's before penetration...trying to jungle seems like it'll give us about as much success as trying to be the ADC.

So here's our resume again, Riot. Tanks: Rammus Sejuani Hecarim Zac Volibear Amumu Chogath Maokai Nautilus Galio. Currently unemployed, our goals are simple. We would like to be A) hard to kill, B) capable of engaging the enemy and applying strong crowd control and C) flexible enough to trade off our survivability for a bit of damage somehow through tank/damage items if we absolutely have to hurt things.

We would like a new designated lane. May we suggest some ideas, Riot? Maybe throw us in as a counter to those assassins in midlane, or strengthen our early game against ranged tops? Those are a couple lanes that could really use another point in their balance triangle. Really, we'd be happy anywhere you'd agree not to aggressively nerf us out of again.

Talk to us, Riot, let's have a constructive conversation. We make up a whole unique class of your game, we have considerable trade offs, we make big flashy plays, let's figure out where we can be.

149 Comments

NoFunWithNunu39 votes

tanks nowdays are forced into supportish role no matter the lane, and still get killed really easy since penetration items are cheap, dragon provides free damage stats and the mobility on new champs

Big Bang Bob6 votes

Shen Day after day, I find myself immune to ad tops (besides Darius).

First, you annoy your enemy to death by throwing blades until you can leave with 755 (you need a potion) gold. If you take damage, Q and attack minions to heal it back up. With my runes, masteries, a item 1031, and some a few levels, I have effectively double the hp to ads (100 armor). As soon as I get a item 3068 and item 3047 , I lose all respect for any ad melees. I become an invincible tank god capable of traversing teams right to the adc.

In duels, I shield your damage while also healing myself. If things are too even, I dash through you, taunting you into using basic attacks that do half damage on top of my other resistances. After a few seconds, you realize I'm missing 25% hp, and you HAVE 25% hp. You've just lost a duel to one of the lowest winrate champs in the game. His only main weakness is the fact that he tortures enemies with his slow kill speeds.

Tryndamere rage quits

Riven "But his sword was so small" D:

Zed "Why am I targeting a tank again?"

XinZhao "A second has passed...and you're still here..."

MonkeyKing "A pole vs a sword? What was I smoking?"

Garen "He doesn't even do a bit of spinning" D:<

Fiora "Never mind. I'd rather have a noob for my opponent.

Just watch out for Irelia "Go ahead. Damage me." and ranged tops Teemo.

As for non-ninjas, you only need 160 armor to still have double hp (100 armor) against any one armor-pen Item.

doubleguac5 votes

Shen is a huge lane bully against most other melees, and I feel like a lot of people don't realize it. He has really high base stats and good base values on his kit. He's practically a free win in lane against any melee aside from maybe irelia/darius/yorick.

He's pretty easy to disengage from, though, and he has no burst whatsoever. If you build a ton of sustain, it's not that hard to survive the lane, but he'll always be able to beat you in a straight up 100-0% slug fest.

doubleguac5 votes

tanks nowdays are forced into supportish role no matter the lane

Well, their role is, by definition, supportish. They're designed to protect their carries by soaking damage/CC'ing divers, and lock down enemy targets so they can be picked off by higher damage allies. Protecting allies and locking down enemies is what a support does.

A "tank" who isn't supportish is just a really tanky bruiser. Volibear/Mundo are both incentivized to build straight tank, but their play pattern is closer to that of a bruiser--they're more about diving and murdering carries than supporting allies with CC and utility.

and still get killed really easy since... the mobility on new champs

I totally agree with this though. I've recently gotten into Sion. I don't have too much of a problem with late game tankiness on him, but it definitely tends to scale down over time (and he's about as tanky as you can get in the late game). More importantly, there are so many popular champions right now who are practically immune to my kit. The only way I'm ever going to hit a kalista with my Q or R is if she screws up incredibly hard. Same goes for Azir and Leblanc, and even to a lesser extent Zed.

Riot has been systematically phasing out point-and-click CC over the last couple seasons. That's all well and good--point and click CC is understandably annoying to play against. But how in the hell am I supposed to ever land something like Sion's Q or R on a champion like Kalista or Leblanc?

Taric has a surprisingly high win rate right now. I don't think Taric's kit is holistically very strong at the moment. I think the only reason he is doing well is because reliable point-and-click CC is so rare and so strong against the super mobile champions. Once a champion is already CC'd, you can layer whatever other skill shot CC you want on them. But landing that first stun on Kalista is so difficult.

But ya, in closing, I think the tank class has been hit pretty hard by mobility creep. Tanks are CC oriented champs, and Riot doesn't like point and click CC, and mobility creep makes it exponentially harder to land skill shot CC on champions.

agbudar25 votes

can i jungle pweeaase?

RiotZenonTheStoic21 votes

I think the real problem is fighter tanks crowding out the jungle space. There's only so much tankiness you need to initiate properly; J4 and Vi can get there easily, so why pick the likes of Nautilus?

Definitely something our live team is aware of. I also have a lot of tank junglers in my champion pool and I actually think they do alright if your team allows them to. Sejuani + MF + Orianna is still hilarious whenever it works. That said, again J4 does nearly the same (little bit less CC of course)

What I'm curious is how you feel about playing Tanks in the top lane. Top lane has historically been the playground of fighters. There's very few top lane tanks that are brought to competitive play these days (is there anyone other than Sion that I'm forgetting? Shen isn't really played anymore, neither is Singed, and Maokai borders on an AP bruiser anyway).

Solidair35 votes

It would be nice to play tanks in the top lane, but a lot of them can't survive against MOST bruisers. Nautilus is a good example. While he has a few match-ups that work out, mostly he's not very good in lane. He does okay in the jungle, but, again, bruisers are crowding tanks out so it's so frustrating!

I would enjoy seeing more tanks top lane, though.

GigglesO23 votes

{quoted}

What I'm curious is how you feel about playing Tanks in the top lane..

I love being raped by the enemy non-tank for the first 30 minutes of the game while I can do nothing but let my tower fall due to such low base stats, and the fact that I'm easy to kill early game.

If I can even farm due to my 54 base ad that is unless I take ad runes, and then I have the mana issues, along with having even less survive ability,

Kobold19 votes

Definitely something our live team is aware of.

Not to come off as rude but that's what was said back in season three about tanks not doing well. Yet the exact opposite effect has happened, tanks are used even less than ever before. Tanks are extremely inefficient due to the effect of last whisper/void staff. Their opponent only needs to build either of those and even assassins can clean them easily.

Sent from my phone.

LankPants3 votes

Why would you mention Vi over Lee Sin? Vi isn't even a problem at the moment, she has obvious hard counters to her play style who are popular in the meta like Sivir, Thresh and Morgana. Lee does a fantastic job of crowding out tanks, other bruisers, assassins and M/ADCs from the meta with his shear presence.

Jeddy0176 votes

Top lane has historically been the playground of fighters.

I be seeing a lot more than just fighters up there.Just saying.

Jambat5 votes

{quoted}

What I'm curious is how you feel about playing Tanks in the top lane. Top lane has historically been the playground of fighters. There's very few top lane tanks that are brought to competitive play these days (is there anyone other than Sion that I'm forgetting? Shen isn't really played anymore, neither is Singed, and Maokai borders on an AP bruiser anyway).

And then they get annihilated by all the mages in top lane.

I have no problem with top lane becoming a mage haven as long as the champs being pushed out have some place else to go that aren't niche picks.

Random Evil Act4 votes

you could make monsters take damage based on defensive stats

LankPants3 votes

I think it would be much better to attach that to the juggernaut enchantment as 'deal bonus DOT damage based off of your armour and MR, doubled against monsters'. The tenacity on the enchant always felt off to me and I think an effect that directly benefited tanks would be better.

5G8Nri0B547 votes

Or...

Stop letting a single item 3035 and item 3135 invalidate their existence.

At the same time, don't nerf them to the point where champions completely reliant on them to be viable get screwed over for it.

However I am 100% on board for the possibility of being able to play tanks in top lane rather than just the jungle. More Maokai's and Mundo's.

MidEvilKnight3k2 votes

From my observation, the reason there aren't many melees in top lane anymore is because health regen has been nerfed. At the beginning of S4 the potential regen from masteries was so high that nobody could hope to bully you out of lane so the lanes got boring. Regen was nerfed so that the top laners could actually fight each other. However ranged champs can harrass top laners without taking damage, so now they are able to dominate most melee champs.

I have been considering posting this idea and I might as well put it here.

What if a soft grievous wounds that only affects passive health regeneration (lifesteal, spell vamp, or heals from abilities all work at full power) was applied to all melee auto attacks for about 5 seconds? That way health regen could be buffed so that melee champs have a chance vs ranged (who don't have the grievous wounds), and the melee vs melee match-up can still hurt each other.

MrSc0tty2 votes

{quoted}

I think the real problem is fighter tanks crowding out the jungle space. There's only so much tankiness you need to initiate properly; J4 and Vi can get there easily, so why pick the likes of Nautilus?

Definitely something our live team is aware of. I also have a lot of tank junglers in my champion pool and I actually think they do alright if your team allows them to. Sejuani + MF + Orianna is still hilarious whenever it works. That said, again J4 does nearly the same (little bit less CC of course)

What I'm curious is how you feel about playing Tanks in the top lane. Top lane has historically been the playground of fighters. There's very few top lane tanks that are brought to competitive play these days (is there anyone other than Sion that I'm forgetting? Shen isn't really played anymore, neither is Singed, and Maokai borders on an AP bruiser anyway).

I think the big problem of tanks boils right down to:

A) tanks want to be hard to kill B) to be at all effective/interactive in lane their rotations need to do something.

The "hard to kill" aspect is usually solved through sustain, (in the case of Zac Voli and most tanky items force something of a sustain route particularly vs and Warmogs when it's strong) which leads to frustrating things like the Zac hyper sustain Manaless bully unkillable AP burster shenanigan of S3.

The problem with jungle tanks is that buffing their power to the point where they're good at clearing makes them somewhat juggernaut-esque come late. That's why you get such inflated winrates historically with Rammus and Amumu until they absolutely fall off when they simply can't jungle anymore.

I would say the sweet spot of tanks is "interactive sustain" if you want them to work in lane, or targeted clear buffs if you want them to work in the jungle.

Zac's current blob system is a great example of interactive sustain for a laning tank, his damage is just left really undertuned from his period of heavy nerfs late S3, particularly when it comes to scaling. If Zac wants to trade tankiness for a bit of power with a damage/tank item, he should be rewarded for that as it significantly increases his risk as a front line diver.

As for jungling speed, it's a great way to tune tank junglers to be viable in pro play without being problematic in Soloqueue. What if Nautilus' shield granted him a small anount of %damage resistance vs monsters? Maybe some of his cc could be tuned down to ease up on his hard-cc stun locking late game. What if Rammus' W damage was a much higher percentage return vs monsters? Then he could get a little less armor/mr out of it so he's not the unstoppable engage tank who shoots in fast as light, point click disables your most fed carry and turns into an unkillable brick late.

In general I think the big issue that recurs with tanks is the shared space with fighters and mages in terms of items. It's hard to grant them good access to items without indirectly buffing one or the other, but many of them make for some of the coolest possible professional plays because of their ability to crack a stalemate wide open. So maybe some targeted clear buffs are in order to make it feasible to bring them to the table while their overall teamfight dominance late game can be slightly toned down? I'm not certain.

Either way, thank you for taking the time to reply.

19 19 193 votes

{quoted}

I think the real problem is fighter tanks crowding out the jungle space. There's only so much tankiness you need to initiate properly; J4 and Vi can get there easily, so why pick the likes of Nautilus?

Definitely something our live team is aware of. I also have a lot of tank junglers in my champion pool and I actually think they do alright if your team allows them to. Sejuani + MF + Orianna is still hilarious whenever it works. That said, again J4 does nearly the same (little bit less CC of course)

What I'm curious is how you feel about playing Tanks in the top lane. Top lane has historically been the playground of fighters. There's very few top lane tanks that are brought to competitive play these days (is there anyone other than Sion that I'm forgetting? Shen isn't really played anymore, neither is Singed, and Maokai borders on an AP bruiser anyway).

Gnar thanks for creating a ranged champion in the top lane, really. -.-

Orangesilk9 votes

Cho'Gath is:

-Perfectly viable jungler, with the right setup, I can often clear camps with no sustain other than my passive all the way for a first back with upgraded jungle item, boots and a few potions.

-Perfectly viable toplaner, his insane sustain also gives him a decent stalling game against the ranged tops, and if the jungle comes to help him, his combination of CC and burst often secure the gank kill.

-An actually decent assassin counter in the midlane, most assassins don't want to trade with him because of the silence, and can't engage him too hard because of the knockup, so they just sit there starved while she shoves the lane under their turrets, and becomes too tanky to kill even with jungler assistance.

What makes Cho'Gath irrelevant in this meta has more to do with how Riot likes to pack %HP damage and mobility on so many kits, since his abilities are easy to dodge and he innately stacks HP.

Chortle6 votes

Sejuani can go pretty much any lane and do well tbh

MrSc0tty21 votes

{quoted}

Sejuani can go pretty much any lane and do well tbh

Yeah?

Why?

What does Sejuani bring to the Jungle that Amumu does not provide better, to the Toplane what a real engage bruiser like Irelia doesn't provide better, to mid what a real assassin doesn't provide better, and to Support what a real support engage tank doesn't provide better?

This is what I mean by "having no role". When there is no answer to "what do I bring with champ A that is better than champs of Class B" then there is no reason to bring champ A other than personal preference or a desire to be different.

Manwad15 votes

Sej brings immense damage and early ganking as a jungler compared to Amumu, and just immense sustained damage while building full tank compared to the rest. She's also more suited to kill squishy targets.

She scales hard with HP for her damage, something engage supports build due to item 3401 and item 2049.

This Fkin Guy19 votes

Sejuani and immense damage do not belong in the same sentence.

Treyen19 votes

you aren't building her right, then.

1st HanarSpectre13 votes

{quoted}

you aren't building her right, then.

Full AP sejuani has good damage, yes, However this is a discussion about tanks, and full AP Sejuani is not a tank, therefore has no place in this thread.

exiledFromBadmen12 votes

A mainly HP build on Sejuani causes her W to deal ~500 magic damage per second (I tested it)

IS1a442cd69a169ed293a392 votes

You really know nothing about Sejuani. She has to build tanky to deal damage. She is one of the fews tanks that relies on tankiness to deal damage. AP is shit on her.

SionideCN4 votes

{quoted}

You really know nothing about Sejuani. She has to build tanky to deal damage. She is one of the fews tanks that relies on tankiness to deal damage. AP is shit on her.

"Ap is Shit on Sejuani"

AP sejuani is actually very, VERY strong if you know how to play it. That meaning tanky ap items.

You run something like RoA, Banner of Command (Actually a really goo item), Zhonyas, Lyandris, Deathcap. And then scaling health and flat mr in your runes to make up for your lack of it.

You'll have a little over 3000 health, 150 ish armor and about 120 mr. (Before her passive) and be able to one shot the adc.

Or you can go pure AP and deal 33% of someone's hp with a W.

IS1a442cd69a169ed293a391 votes

That is before her rework. Her W now requires her to stick long enough to be a threat. She can't burst as she could before. AP Sejuani now is arguably workable, but not efficient. Not to mention her AP ratio is now really shitty compared to her HP ratio.

SionideCN1 votes

{quoted}

That is before her rework. Her W now requires her to stick long enough to be a threat. She can't burst as she could before. AP Sejuani now is arguably workable, but not efficient. Not to mention her AP ratio is now really shitty compared to her HP ratio.

Uh no? W is a larger aoe of % health damage and scales harder.

you're completely wrong.

IS1a442cd69a169ed293a391 votes

You are the one completely wrong. Read again. It doesn't even do much even if she only hits it once. She would die really fast if you build her mainly AP. Try to improve your reading ability.

SionideCN1 votes

{quoted}

You are the one completely wrong. Read again. It doesn't even do much even if she only hits it once. She would die really fast if you build her mainly AP. Try to improve your reading ability.

Her W does % max health magic damage, you do understand this right? and it's an AOE % max health ability, unlike her old % max health Q.

IS1a442cd69a169ed293a391 votes

{quoted}

Her W does % max health magic damage, you do understand this right? and it's an AOE % max health ability, unlike her old % max health Q.

Man please, this is the third time I repeat it. She has to stay alive to become relevant. While her HP% damage scales on AP, it sucks when you die too fast because it can only hit it once. On the other hand, if you build HP, it scales on her constant damage(W after hit) ALSO helps her survive. The only AP item she should build are RoA and Laundry, others really suck on her.

Please don't make me repeat 4 times.

SionideCN2 votes

{quoted}

Man please, this is the third time I repeat it. She has to stay alive to become relevant. While her HP% damage scales on AP, it sucks when you die too fast because it can only hit it once. On the other hand, if you build HP, it scales on her constant damage(W after hit) ALSO helps her survive. The only AP item she should build are RoA and Laundry, others really suck on her.

Please don't make me repeat 4 times.

Man please, you clearly didn't read my build as my build doesn't die instantly, You're neglecting the existence of banner of command which is an amazing item. It gives every stat she needs.

In order to actually do anywhere near the sustained damage that the build I suggested does (That's a 600~ ish ap build if you sneak a dcap in, 400~ ish if you go for a more tanky item) My build Sejuani will do 30% of the targets max health + 520 damage over four seconds, not counting the burn from lyandris.

In order to even manage to do the 520 damage over four seconds you need upwards of five thousand health.

Learn to math before you talk about what builds are good. Tank sejuani is good, but not for the reason you think

Raptamei3 votes

{quoted}

Yeah?

Why?

What does Sejuani bring to the Jungle that Amumu does not provide better, to the Toplane what a real engage bruiser like Irelia doesn't provide better, to mid what a real assassin doesn't provide better, and to Support what a real support engage tank doesn't provide better?

This is what I mean by "having no role". When there is no answer to "what do I bring with champ A that is better than champs of Class B" then there is no reason to bring champ A other than personal preference or a desire to be different.

That applies to 80% of the champs in this game. No point not picking the handful of best champions.

Summonerrr 18 votes

The problem is Riot keeps catering to spikes like you and the rest of us who don't play solely for competitive reasons and anyone else who isn't "urmagherd I'm so LCS" gets left in the dust.

MEMEME6704 votes

Amumu is also a tank. He isn't a part of Class B.

Alljoy4 votes

If not, there's always the local Hello Work.

MrSc0tty4 votes

{quoted}

If not, there's always the local Hello Work.

I mean, there are maybe, what, ten champs who just don't have a place to feasibly go currently?

Galio Urgot Hecarim Nautilus Aatrox Skarner Zac There is no role where they bring significant strengths that they can feasibly perform. Over half of them at any given time are usually tanks.

AbrakaDoodle4 votes

I played xin zhao the other day and I got a full clear and came back with 1k gold after a full clear. I couldve killed more monsters but I wanted some items. You can build him tanky. Fighters are the new tanks

TwitchInMyPants2 votes

{quoted}

I played xin zhao the other day and I got a full clear and came back with 1k gold after a full clear. I couldve killed more monsters but I wanted some items. You can build him tanky. Fighters are the new tanks

Sure you -can- bulid him tanky but you're basically wasting gold. Midgame an item like sunfire is fine to help you dive harder and set up fights, though past that midgame phase any investment in defense becomes irrelevant since you won't be able to tank the inner turrets, it won't help you clear jungle faster, it's countered by the massive plethora of pen items, and the health that is actually still cost efficient is countered by the massive amount of % hp shred in the game.

Building a tank item or two for midgame in S5 is nothing like how building full tank was in previous seasons. There's no meaningful advantage to be gained in a full tank build.

alaskaneagle3 votes

54367

I'm pretty sure riot hates tanks because they make the game less interesting to watch on the lcs and lets face it, normal players don't mean anything to riot.

TaoistMaster3 votes

TankGangplank

sadly... the best tank in the game right now.

Mistress Madoka7 votes

Tankplank

TaoistMaster3 votes

[{quoted}](name=Baldur Odinson,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=mPxl8KIx,comment-id=00200000,timestamp=2015-01-24T16:09:34.370+0000)

Tankplank

this guy gets it

rightmike003 votes

SHYVANA IS ALSO OUT OF EMPOLYEMENT! Shyvana item 3073

Thelmon2 votes

I wonder if it would be beneficial to have the supports tag along for the first full jungle clear before heading to babysit the adc now?

MrSc0tty11 votes

{quoted}

I wonder if it would be beneficial to have the supports tag along for the first full jungle clear before heading to babysit the adc now?

No, because if the other support does not follow suit the 1v2 ADC gets no farm and the 2-man jungle squad ends up extremely out leveled.

Tldr people decided to do that last season to try and make tanks not suck and Riot massively gutted jungle exp to prevent 2 man jungling.

demonsnake4201 votes

A decent amount of tanks actually have consistently high win rates though; particularly of note in this are champions like (if we aren't counting support tanks) Sejuani , Amumu , Malphite , Sion , Rammus , Volibear , Chogath , and maybe Nasus if you count him as a tank. All of those champions have above a 50% win rate, and most of them are consistently around 51-53%. Non-support tanks aren't bad; they are grossly underrated. A lot of people complain about champs like Lee Sin or Zed or Thresh or something like that, but all of those are among the lower win rates in the game. Those champions are skill intensive and have innate high risk playstyles. Those tank champs I listed, most of them are fairly simple to play and (by their very nature) are low risk; those they are consistent and consistent often times means good. Now, I'm not a tank main (hell I'm not even close, I'm an assassin main) but I recognize the strength and value of these tanks. You just need to know how to play them and its just a bit more important that you coordinate better with your team. The situation isn't as dire as you make it out to seem, just have faith in your champion and your playstyle and your skills.

MrSc0tty5 votes

{quoted}

A decent amount of tanks actually have consistently high win rates though; particularly of note in this are champions like (if we aren't counting support tanks) Sejuani , Amumu , Malphite , Sion , Rammus , Volibear , Chogath , and maybe Nasus if you count him as a tank. All of those champions have above a 50% win rate, and most of them are consistently around 51-53%. Non-support tanks aren't bad; they are grossly underrated. A lot of people complain about champs like Lee Sin or Zed or Thresh or something like that, but all of those are among the lower win rates in the game. Those champions are skill intensive and have innate high risk playstyles. Those tank champs I listed, most of them are fairly simple to play and (by their very nature) are low risk; those they are consistent and consistent often times means good. Now, I'm not a tank main (hell I'm not even close, I'm an assassin main) but I recognize the strength and value of these tanks. You just need to know how to play them and its just a bit more important that you coordinate better with your team. The situation isn't as dire as you make it out to seem, just have faith in your champion and your playstyle and your skills.

Yes, tanks have high winrates. Every easy to play champ has a high winrate, anyone playing a more difficult champ has an awful winrate and the power of AOEs is greatly inflated in soloQ. When tanks are barely considered good enough for niche pick LCS play, they tend to have 55% soloQ winrates.

For every actual Lee sin player with a 75% winrate who knows how to abuse all the free shit in his overloaded kit, there are five who can't land Q's.

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