Why People Hate Lee/Fizz/Zed/LB/etc.

EfficientDynamo·Dec 14, 2014·45 votes·6,197 views

Every couple of days, depending on the nerf cycle, there is a new thread about the need to rework one of these champions. Regardless of their relative strengths and weaknesses in their roles, I think it can all be boiled down to a single trait:

In the hands of a semi-skilled player, they are ridiculously safe. They will outrun you in every chase, they will dive bomb and leave before your skillshot CC has time to hit them, they can move around the map like its an open field, and generally your only option is to kill them before they kill you (hyperbole, but still kinda true).

I'm not saying they need ALL of their mobility removed, but Riot might want to think about whether it is a good idea to have any champion be that safe (again, in the hands of someone with a reasonable skill level). Tanks can be chipped away from a distance, ADC's generally have much more limited mobility and are squishier, and mages are usually skillshot reliant and immobile.

EDIT: As many people have pointed out, assassins are designed to jump in and burst squishy targets, and almost all of them have the tools to do so. My complaint is about safety, and the ability to jump in AND out combat without an ult or kill reset, but still doing considerable damage.

123 Comments

AlëkDec 14, 201422 votes

, ADC's generally have much more** limited mobility** and are squishier,

i lol'd Kalista Lucian

EfficientDynamoDec 14, 20147 votes

Fair point, but 2 responses: as a class they do tend to have less mobility, with some outliers like those two. Kalista and Lucian's mobility is also much shorter in range than zed's shadow switching, fizz's troll pole, etc. It makes it easier to hop terrain and escape the range of your opponents.

kunkudunkDec 14, 20143 votes

They have mobility yes, but not to the extent of lee, nor does kalista have the burst of an assassin. Lucian doesn't anymore after the last patch but I haven't fought him yet to see how his damage actually is.

Subject 5Dec 14, 201412 votes

{quoted} i lol'd

Do you know what the word general means?

skrithurzDec 15, 20141 votes

{quoted} i lol'd

Vayne ?

XonraDec 15, 20141 votes

{quoted} i lol'd

Think you forgot a few.

Like Ez which was THE adc with mobility for years known for kiting because he can just jump around Or Tristana who has not only a jump away ability but a knock you away ability Or Corki who just jumps away Or Graves who also has a dash Or Cait who can drop a trap to cc you in place while still jumping away with her Net

The two you mentioned are far from the only adcs with high mobility :P unfortunately Riot has a hard on for mobility so it seems more adcs have dashs or jumps now than don't.

Penguin EclipseDec 14, 201421 votes

With the removal of LeBlanc's silence she's actually not very safe. Yes, she is extremely mobile and can be nearly impossible to kill if you are chasing her through the jungle. But the rest of the time she doesn't have it so easy. Her playstyle requires her to get into danger continuously. Nearly all her combo's require her to get on top of the enemy champion/s. That requirement is exploitable and as a result there are a lot of champions that can beat a similarly skilled LeBlanc in lane pretty easily. She is also very fragile, with her only protection being her mobility and her passive. Her passive may or may not be of any use depending on the circumstances.

I am not saying LeBlanc doesn't have problems. She does. But I would say her apparent safety is deceiving.

Squeaky DreemurrDec 14, 201411 votes

Deceiving. I lol'd. Leblanc

trexmixGDec 14, 20145 votes

LeBlanc does not need much work right now. I'm tired of being told she is a noob champ.

It Is I EmotoDec 14, 20143 votes

I can say that's true. Lb didn't lost her damage, but she lost most of her safety. Any champion with direct cc, like lissandra or riven, can easily stun her while she qw in lane. Other champs that have instant cc do also counter her. But at times I still have quite some problems with mobile assasins, like kat and fizz (mostly fizz jeez) Though with the silence remove, her passive and w got buffed, so decieving will be much easier, and I really like them too. Your escapes can be quite save, if the enemy is really chasing you that far.

Though Lb is a early game champion, and scales quite badly at late game, what makes her to a quite useless champion if she's laning against a champion who can counter her.

ZeliwinDec 14, 201416 votes

{quoted} Every couple of days, depending on the nerf cycle, there is a new thread about the need to rework one of these champions. Regardless of their relative strengths and weaknesses in their roles, I think it can all be boiled down to a single trait:

In the hands of a semi-skilled player, they are ridiculously safe. They will outrun you in every chase, they will dive bomb and leave before your skillshot CC has time to hit them, they can move around the map like its an open field, and generally your only option is to kill them before they kill you (hyperbole, but still kinda true).

I'm not saying they need ALL of their mobility removed, but Riot might want to think about whether it is a good idea to have any champion be that safe (again, in the hands of someone with a reasonable skill level). Tanks can be chipped away from a distance, ADC's generally have much more limited mobility and are squishier, and mages are usually skillshot reliant and immobile.

My biggest issue is riot has stated many times, that high mobility champions tend to do less damage then champions who are not, it's their trade off, high survival rate for lower damage, or higher damage for lower survival rate. But they contradicted themselves so many times on this, and high mobility champions actually out damage the more risk to play champions.... Riot needs to get back on track....

ApplyForAGrantDec 15, 20141 votes

I think these champions do have lower damages in a lot of cases. Yes their scaling is on par or exceeds their low mobility counterparts like Lux or Xerath, but they make up for it by having very poor AoE. Most of their abilities (except Fizz maybe) are either single target, have a very small AoE radius, or have damage reduction based on how many targets you pass through. Compare this to mages like Xerath whose every ability has the potential to deal massive damage and cc to the entire team and can do much more work in a teamfight if they have any sort of peel.

Critmaster GarenDec 14, 20149 votes

because these champions have very little to no weaknesses in their kits.

lee sin has no hook in his kit to outplay him. when does he give you a clear opening to fight him? in which situation does he have any weakness? he never runs out of energy. he is more mobile than you even without his spells. and we might aswell reclassify him as a ranged champion, since his q has no cooldown and no energy cost. he can sit back and spam it until he hits one, at which point he goes in on you for a large amount of damage and disengages before you can react.

and in the unlikely event that he ever loses a duel, he can still kick you away, and w to a ward. because his ult has no freaking cooldown. its literally always available for every fight.

overall, lee sin doesnt give you room to make decisions. its always on his terms, when you fight, and when he doesnt want to fight. you make a mistake, hes definitely going to kill you. he makes a mistake and there is a 95% chance he will just disengage.

SouL1essDec 14, 20144 votes

Yeah, someone notices that Dragon's Rage gives Lee Sin the choices to control the flow of a duel as he pleases.

Not gonna kill you? Kicks you away while he walks home.

Can kill you? Q->R->Q->AA for over 1000 base + 4.6*Bonus AD in damage.

TheRainInSpainDec 15, 20141 votes

If that's what it takes, label him a Marksman then. Lol.

ValyrianBladeDec 14, 20145 votes

My biggest problem with the zed/lb types is the fact that, even playing someone with a hard cc move, they can get in, do their full damage combo, and then get out to complete safety in a race of reaction times (where they have the advantage to be honest, because they're the one who's practiced the combo). It might be balanced at okay at the challenger level where everyone has 20 ping, but when you're playing with 80 ping for example, you pretty much have to time in your head when he's going to land. It feels brutal as ahri to get ulted by a zed that you know you can kill once you land your charm, to fire your charm as soon as he appears, only to see it slide through a shadow.

Honestly, if zed/lb had even a full 1 second after appearing where they couldn't jump to safety, I'd love playing against them. It's why I like playing against fizz, at least there are windows of counterplay opportunity to wreck his face. It feels like against zed/Lb though, they get risk free huge burst damage with little skill. It's harder to land an ahri charm or Syndra stun on a non-mobile champion than it is for zed/LeBlanc to land their full combo on a mobile champion (I mean, death mark is targeted, right? ).

That all said I don't think either is OP. I just don't find them fun to play against.

xJLx MCHammerDec 14, 20143 votes

When you have a spamable mobility ability, it opens up a whole new range of possibilities

Easier roaming Easier to answer to ganks and from ganks Getting around the map Escaping

Each of these categories have their own subset.

FyshinaTuxDec 14, 20141 votes

Please, define spammable... Because having any spell on anything longer than say... 1 second, is not "spammable". Fizz E is 5 seconds with MAX CDR at MAX rank. Hardly spammable...

You know what IS spammable? Evelynn's Q. That is a spell that can be called "spammable".

SteelflameDec 14, 201413 votes

Compared to a 5 minute CD flash, Fizz's E is indeed spammable. Fizz effectively has a flash on a CD 1/60th the CD of the real Flash.

Honestly, for mobility, if the CD is not longer than like 10 seconds, then it is spammable. Offensive spells are spammable at about a 5 second CD.

FyshinaTuxDec 14, 20145 votes

Again, Evelynn Q is "spammable"... Fizz E is not. Please get your terminology corrected. What "spammable" means, is that you can literally "spam" (oh gee, look at that...) your spell's button rapidly, and it'll go off pretty rapidly as well.

You know what happens if you spam E on Fizz? You end up hitting E for no reason for 10+ seconds early game, and 5+ seconds late game, with nothing happening.

Stop using "Spammable" as a term to make something sound OP just so you can get it nerfed... It's a relatively low CD, sure; spammable though, hardly.

OyddAWqJ5rDec 14, 201412 votes

Fizz main detected

FyshinaTuxDec 14, 20142 votes

Used to be a main, but I don't get to play mid often enough anymore to call her my main... Still play her though.

ProeliumDec 14, 20141 votes

*him

MrBuffingtonDec 14, 20144 votes

Fizz is female in Korea ;)

Mr SpacemanDec 14, 20142 votes

Your in NA

captainkaigerDec 14, 20143 votes

The community thinks you don't understand, and they'd be right. I'll just keep this short because laziness. Fizz has two instantaneous engage/escapes, that when used in conjunction take him nearly the distance between the two middle towers in a second. And the cd on them is AGAIN, NOT like burning a flash. Just because something doesn't have a short cd (Eve's Q), doesn't make it not spammable. I won't argue Eve's Q isn't spammable, it is. But it's needed for her kit. Otherwise you would NEVER see her in any game. But I digress.

Katarina benefits from the same thing. If she dives you under tower and gets the kill, she can ward hop instantaneously. On top of this, she can do it as long as there are people left to kill. I usually play Xerath, or Viktor, or Vel mid. Champs with easily comparable damage output, but to get out of the same situations that Fizz, LB, Zed, Kat, etc do, I'd have to have perfect timing, OR a much shorter cd on flash, and neither of those is gonna happen.

FyshinaTuxDec 14, 20141 votes

See... now, I don't think you understand... Because you act like I don't think Fizz's mobility is really strong, but I never said her mobility wasn't strong, I only said it wasn't spammable; which... it's not.

I'm not arguing that Fizz is "perfectly balanced", I'm not saying that she's UP, I'm not saying you all are wrong about her mobility being strong, I'm merely stating that people need to stop calling shit spammable just because they don't fucking like it and they want Riot to nerf it.

All this is, is trying to associate something that could be easily construed as "OP" with something that isn't "OP". Yes, Fizz's mobility is strong, but it's not OP. Making the leap to "OMG 5 SECOND CD IF YOU BUILD MAX CDR IS SPAMMABLE" is just stupid and ignorant.

Not only does she have to build CDR in order to get her E CD to 5 seconds, but she also have to have a max rank E. Now, since (I believe) most Fizz max her E first, that isn't much of a point. However, you still have to build some form of CDR, and by "some form" I mean enough to hit the CDR cap, in order to achieve that 5 second CD. You know what that means?

Delayed Damage
Delayed Utility (from Zhonya's)
Delayed Lich Bane

If you choose to get CDR later, then it's not really an issue until everyone is at full build. So again I'll say, it's strong, but it's neither spammable, nor is it OP.

Thank you, and have a good day sir.

Guy Fox TeemoDec 14, 20148 votes

{quoted} See... now, I don't think you understand... Because you act like I don't think Fizz's mobility is really strong, but I never said her mobility wasn't strong, I only said it wasn't spammable; which... it's not.

I'm not arguing that Fizz is "perfectly balanced", I'm not saying that she's UP, I'm not saying you all are wrong about her mobility being strong, I'm merely stating that people need to stop calling shit spammable just because they don't fucking like it and they want Riot to nerf it.

All this is, is trying to associate something that could be easily construed as "OP" with something that isn't "OP". Yes, Fizz's mobility is strong, but it's not OP. Making the leap to "OMG 5 SECOND CD IF YOU BUILD MAX CDR IS SPAMMABLE" is just stupid and ignorant.

Not only does she have to build CDR in order to get her E CD to 5 seconds, but she also have to have a max rank E. Now, since (I believe) most Fizz max her E first, that isn't much of a point. However, you still have to build some form of CDR, and by "some form" I mean enough to hit the CDR cap, in order to achieve that 5 second CD. You know what that means?

Delayed Damage

Delayed Utility (from Zhonya's)

Delayed Lich Bane

If you choose to get CDR later, then it's not really an issue until everyone is at full build. So again I'll say, it's strong, but it's neither spammable, nor is it OP.

Thank you, and have a good day sir.

Fizz is a dude

Raja ChachkiDec 15, 20141 votes

him....?

FyshinaTuxDec 15, 20141 votes

her.

LlaniteDec 14, 20145 votes

Fizz and Kass have low CD on their jump because it's both their escape and main source of dmg. Again, if you don't max it, it has lengthy 16s CD, maxing it and the rest of the kit does zero dmg. You need it or both dmg and escape, hence, the lower CD.

Zed Leblanc clone/portals can be used to return afterward. Talon stealth. Ahri Akali R 3 charges. Khazix Katarina MasterYi gap maker/closer reset on kills.

Kassadin Fizz are the only 2 assassins sitting duck after the attempt. I'd gladly trade the short CD for a reset on kill, but that'd only bring more QQ.

EfficientDynamoDec 14, 20147 votes

I would actually disagree that Kass and FIzz's main source of damage is their jump. I could be wrong, but with Fizz I thought the damage usually came from the inevitable Lichbane build + W + AA. Also, Fizz still has an escape in the form of his dash if he wants to back out. As for Kass, I was under the impression the majority of his damage never came from his ult. Could be wrong though, so feel free to prove me incorrect i guess?

Also, I feel that a couple of your examples might not work well because they are either ults with long cooldowns (and therefore unreliable), have weaker mechanics (Lee has a lot easier time jumping to a jungle camp than akali), or do not provide the same utility (I can still nail a Kha'Zix with my abilities in mid-leap).

So TL;DR, I disagree that you need long distance gapclosing abilities to have the combo of low CD and damage.

LlaniteDec 14, 20141 votes

Yes and No. Let's clear a few things.

Fizz does not have LB till 15 minutes which is 1/3 to 1/2 length of the game.
LB costs gold. If he instead went for deathcap, would you say that majority of his dmg come from the cap?

(Q) 130 + 0.6AP +1 AD + (E- active) 10+ 0.25AP + (E-passive) 30 + 0.35 AP + (lichbane) 75% AD + 0.5 AP = 270 +1.7 AP + 1.75 AD. If you compare to an Annie QW: (Q) - 220 + 0.8 AP+ (W) 250+0.85 AP= 470 + 1.65 AP. With Rabadon: 470 + 2.08 AP

Let's have a theoretical Fizz that has only lich bane, no rune or mastery, he would have 80 AD + 80 AP, QW+LB = 670 dmg. Annie w/ Rabadon, no rune and master, 120 AP, QW = 668. So to answer your question, no, Fizz does not kill people with QW+LB which does less than 400 dmg post-mitigation, he needs E to dmg AND to trigger a second lich bane proc.

EfficientDynamoDec 15, 20141 votes

So is there a need, in your eyes, for Fizz' E to be a high source of damage? It currently has 75% AP scaling. One solution to mitigate Fizz' safety (although I am not sure this would be necessary or sufficient) would be to knock the E scaling to 30%, or some other arbitrarily low number. That way it still can trigger LB, but doesn't also chunk you nearly as bad and help guarantee Fizz a kill.

LlaniteDec 15, 20141 votes

Nope, I merely explained to you why it should have short CD. For his dmg, I feel it is ok, in fact, less than full combo of Annie/Lb/Akali/Kat and the like, feel free to prove otherwise.

And yes, dmg could be shifted elsewhere so he does not rely on E for dmg and its CD could be raised, but unnecessary, he's fine as he is, people need to L2P and less QQ.

EfficientDynamoDec 15, 20141 votes

Damage-wise I won't argue with you, since you are probably right that his full combo will do similar levels of damage to other assassins. But my complaint wasn't that I can't beat him or that he is stupidly OP. I can often beat a fizz, but with his E he leaves very few options to outplay him relative to other champions. At least with Zed you know he can only switch between stationary shadows.

Personally I think it makes a lot more sense to have his W proc LB (which I don't think it does currently, could be wrong), and reduce the damage on his E. At minimum it would force Fizz during early/mid game to choose between maxing E for utility or Q/W for damage.

As for the CD, I have to maintain that I think it is flawed to give any champ an untargetable that has double the range of flash on a short CD.

LlaniteDec 15, 20141 votes

To be precise, Fizz has less range than flash and can only pass through certain obstacles (trees and cliffs).

I do agree his E is frustrating in lane, a good middle ground would be making it flat 14s CD at all ranks but reset on kill. Guess we'll see.

EfficientDynamoDec 15, 20141 votes

Are you sure? According to the wiki flash has a range of 400, and both the playful and trickster parts of Fizz' E have a range of 400. And unless they changed it relatively recently, I am pretty sure it can go through any obstacle that a flash could (except maybe an Azir wall).

LlaniteDec 15, 20141 votes

It cannot go through walls around the base, destroyed tower ruins, those stone cliffs by the river and various tree complex. Definitely not tweaked recently, I've been playing him since 2013.

EfficientDynamoDec 15, 20141 votes

You are right, it can't jump over all walls. Just looked that up. Although I did find a video of twitch moves where he can jump over a wall in the jungle and then finish his E back where he started for a really good juke.

DiostukosDec 14, 20142 votes

{quoted} Fizz and Kass have low CD on their jump because it's both their escape and main source of dmg. Again, if you don't max it, it has lengthy 16s CD, maxing it and the rest of the kit does zero dmg. You need it or both dmg and escape, hence, the lower CD.

clone/portals can be used to return afterward. stealth. R 3 charges. gap maker/closer reset on kills.

are the only 2 assassins sitting duck after the attempt. I'd gladly trade the short CD for a reset on kill, but that'd only bring more QQ.

Fizz can easily chunk you with just Q + lich bane. His E does damage, yes, but he doesn't need it to kill.

Guy Fox TeemoDec 14, 20142 votes

{quoted} Compared to a 5 minute CD flash, Fizz's E is indeed spammable. Fizz effectively has a flash on a CD 1/60th the CD of the real Flash.

Honestly, for mobility, if the CD is not longer than like 10 seconds, then it is spammable. Offensive spells are spammable at about a 5 second CD.

Yes but that "Spammable" ability cost 120 mana.....

SteelflameDec 14, 20142 votes

Mana Cost =/= spammability. Yes, Fizz can't use it on CD every time he ever wants without some punishment, but in a single fight? He is free to jump 3-4 times easily. More with mana itemization/blue buff.

SlaaneshineDec 14, 20143 votes

{quoted} Yes but that "Spammable" ability cost 120 mana.....

When it comes down to my many experiences with Fizz , when he does manage to fight in longer fights, he always ends up dying to seriously hard oomage. But the fact that he can kill people so quickly with such little effort and with such safety in his engage, this almost never happens. Even if he gets caught out in the fight, a casualty of his shenanigans is basically a given.

MrSc0ttyDec 15, 20141 votes

{quoted} Please, define spammable... Because having any spell on anything longer than say... 1 second, is not "spammable". Fizz E is 5 seconds with MAX CDR at MAX rank. Hardly spammable...

You know what IS spammable? Evelynn's Q. That is a spell that can be called "spammable".

"Gosh, a situation has arisen in which I may need to use this spell.

Is there any reasonable trade-off to it or any reason I may not want to use this spell?"

If the answer is "no, pretty much use it whenever it's applicable" then that spell is spam able. Example: Garen Q. Am I anywhere near combat? If yes, use Q. Do I want to get away? Use Q. Do I want to be a tiny bit faster moving around the map? Q. Counter-example: Garen W. If I use it too early, I won't have it for an extended period of time

FyshinaTuxDec 15, 20141 votes

Because the 120 mana cost (when you don't build that much Mana on Fizz) isn't a reason to not use the spell...

meatjunjunDec 14, 20141 votes

No matter what, everyone will ALWAYS complain about champs that are top tier or hard to fight against. This is true for EVERY game. I don't think there's anything wrong with these champs because they all require you to play strategically in their own way, and they have counters (see Akali vs Fizz).

The problem is some people don't like playing those counters, and instead like champs like Xerath; who gets destroyed by Leblanc. So what will the Xerath player do? Complain.

Contrary to what many here seem to say, variety is good! I don't want to play a game where everyone is the same, where everyone has the same exact weakness. I like games where variety is plentiful, even if some characters are harder to deal with. And I never understand why people go, "PLS RITO DELETE THIS CHARACTER!".

Guess what? Even if Zed is deleted, you'll all complain about Yasuo. Yasuo get's deleted; you'll complain about Katarina and so on.

EfficientDynamoDec 14, 20143 votes

First, counterpicking isn't an option when you are playing normals. Ranked isn't the only game mode, and Riot has expressed their dissatisfaction in counterplay during the champ select screen.
Variety is a good thing, I agree. Rek'Sai is a very unusual champ and I like that she exists, since it opens up new options in playstyle. But it is a strawman argument to say that nerfing Zed/Fizz/etc's damage to compensate for their utility will ultimately reduce variety. Their safe kit isn't necessarily the problem; the problem is their kit plus VERY high damage output.
No comment I have seen so far said that these characters should be removed from the game. Instead, everyone is talking about how annoying they are to play against. What I am suggesting is a nerf, something more than what they did to Lee and less than what they did to Cass.

meatjunjunDec 14, 20141 votes

Yes you can't counterpick in blind pick matches, but I just get the feeling that many who complain on these posts don't adjust their strategies to the people/champs they're facing.

I come from a background of fighting games (ie Street Fighter, Marvel vs Capcom, Blazblue, etc), and we also have very difficult matchups. Because like lane phase of LoL, fighting games is about 1v1 duels.

The difference is, I seriously think people want to play ONE play-style, and if their opponent counters it, they don't try something different. They expect that whatever strategy that should work against X champion should also work on Y champion.

Ultimately, this is a team game, and if you're stuck in a back matchup, play lane in a way that you'll go even. Maybe you'll lose out on some cs, but at least you won't die. This should also mean that you should be closer to your tower, and you can ask for a gank.

EfficientDynamoDec 14, 20141 votes

I agree with you that people need to always be ready to adapt to difficult opponents. But as a counterexample, lets take Malzahar (someone I enjoy playing with). His E lets him farm from a distance, but in order to set it he must get relatively close (650 range) to the minions and make sure that the affected minion dies so the damage goes on to the next minion.

If I am farming under tower and fizz wants to dive me, his E will give him an 800 range untargetable jump to me, and his Q will let him dash out through a minion. My only hope is to hit him with my ult before I die, or that my jungler is not occupied with helping other lanes and can 2v1 him with me.

So yes, I have to play much more cautious against a Fizz than I would a Yasuo, but even then there is a significant possibility that he can turret dive me and get a kill with only lichbane. I think that this level of safety is inappropriate in an assassin. If he was a tank like Leona, fine. Leona can get in and CC me to hell, but then she has to rely on her health/resistances to get out rather than just jumping out with maybe 1 or 2 turret hits.