An Open Letter to Ricklessabandon (Karma catches up to you)
This post takes a look on the changes to Karma in 5.10 and compares what they wanted to achieve and what they did achieve. If you disagree anywhere, please let me know, before you downvote!
Dear Rick,
About a year ago you came to work with one of my favourite champions in the league: Karma. While I didn't think she was in a bad spot, I welcomed your effort, as there were some quite unsatisfied Karma fans, that I imagined might enjoy a touchup, and I was excited that my favourite champion might become a little bit more refined or viable.
At first, I was sceptical of the changes I saw on the PBE, but I wanted to keep an open mind. In the end, sometimes things on paper look weird, but work very well ingame. That's why I accepted the changes, and played around with them in different metas, lanes and builds for half a year. Now, that I evaluated your changes thorougly, I want to comment on them, using the patchnotes of 5.10, to go through them step by step.
"DEFIANCE - No longer damages enemies,"
I am pretty sure, that one of Riot's design values is "respecting older champions". Karma's shieldbomb was one of the few things that were left over from her old identity. But even if there had never been an old Karma, why in the bloody axe of Darius would you want to remove the most iconic damage spell of a champion as a means to "improve" them? Would you also remove Ahri's charm to amp the damage in her abilities? Or remove Annie's Tibbers, so lategame she can stun with every 3rd ability?
"we just wanted to highlight more of Karma's unique strengths (utility and control)"
Utility and control? Those are NOT Karma's unique strenghts. Her unique strength was "offering utility and damage at the same time". A kind of duality, that you REMOVED from 2 spells. Utility and control can be found on literally any other mage, but they all have more CC and better zone control.
"much stronger utility potential in R-W / R-E"
First of all, you made the AoE scale off the base shield, which makes it effectively worse, if you don't level it. Secondly, the increased utility in her RW is either useless or annoying. Why? Because Karma can't even use the increased root well. If Morgana catches someone with her root.... great! Cast W below them and use your ulti if you wish, while your allies engage. If Lux catches someone with her root, she can cast an E on them and use her ulti if she wishes, while her allies engage. If Zyra.... you get the point. What does Karma get? Nothing. There is nothing in her kit that can take advantage of an increased root, after you've spent your Mantra. Besides, isn't Riot currently trying to get all long CC abilities out of the game? I thought CC of 3s and longer isn't good for the game, no matter how hard it is to apply?
"Karma does a number of things well (mid-range poke, movement-based team engagement, solo lane dueling), (...) we just wanted to highlight more of Karma's unique strengths (...) While these changes do reduce some of Karma's dueling threat"
How is that not contradicting itself?
"we're trying giving her access to an end game fantasy (there's a word we haven't heard in a while)"
I have literally never heard of a Karma before 5.10 whose lategame fantasy didn't include a shieldbomb. And does it fit a wise leader that seeks balance to speed around the battlefield spamming RQ? I just can't get this idea into my head.
"Quick note on removing the damage on Mantra'd W / E - a goal here was to differentiate Karma's contextual decision making when selecting an ability to Mantra (super root? mega shield?)"
I appreciate it, but it did not work out that way. Now everybody uses RQ 90% of the time. Which was something only noob Karma's did before your changes, because they didn't understand the intricate ups and downs of the different mantras. You used different mantras in lane, depending on your matchup, your current hp, minion placement, positioning, etc... RE could deal surprise damage from afar, but you just gave up all your mobility and defenses, while pushing the lane. Or you could try to sneak in a RW, to not push the lane, but if the enemy quickly disengaged, it wouldn't deal damage at all. Or RQ, which would deal the least damage, if only one part hit, but the most if you managed to pull off the whole thing. Placing your RE propperly in teamfights was a challenge, because you wanted to hit as many enemies AND allies at once, to get the most out of it. Hitting the the spell with 100% efficiency is so easy now it feels like another skillcheck was removed from her kit.
Yes, I know, "damage or CC or utility" sounds like better decision making than "(damage&utility) OR (damage&utility)", but it really isn't. Because having 3 options with slightly different utility and risk is more interesting to choose from, than having the decision cut out for you beforehand. It's true; If the options are too similar, it doesn't feel impactful to decide between them, I agree. But if they feel too different, it doesn't feel like choosing anymore, because it will always have a right decision.
"I can give you (20$ now), or (2$ every day for the next 2 weeks) or (40$ now, but you give me 30$ next year) ." This is a decision that most people will think about, and decide dependent on their current money needs, patience and personality. It feels like a choice to make. "I can give you 20 dollar now, or this plush teddy that smells nice or a diamond ring next week." This sounds like a better choice with more to choose from, but the decision is so much easier. Any reasonable person will go for the diamond ring, BECAUSE it is so obvious. As long as you don't have a crying kid next to you that needs comforting or need cash in THIS VERY moment, there is just no choice to make.
The same holds true for her current kit. RQ is so good, it will always be the best choice. Even in a teamfight it can be best to damage the complete enemy team and slow them by 50%. The other two options are so situational, they don't feel like equal choices anymore.
"Additionally, removing damage on R-E means we can up the ante on Gathering Fire's cooldown reduction without seeing Karma throw out a Mantra'd E every 6 seconds in clumpy team fights"
Would it really have been a problem if Karma had this one nieche of clumpy teamfights? And isn't that something that would have prevented her from falling off lategame, which is one of her main issues?
Don't get me wrong, Rick, I really value your effort and good intentions, that you put into this update. But you must understand, that this update didn't achieve, what you wanted it to. It was supposed to make Karma stronger as a support, but it gave her nothing to compete with other supports (her mega root mechanic doesn't work on a squishy mage), while making her solo-lane qualities worse. It was supposed to make Karma scale better into lategame, but she still falls off. It was supposed to make her passive better, but it only encourages hurting enemies and discourages mantra for massive utility (RE) for your team, contradicting her leader role. It hurt her thematically in that regard and even more so by removing her most iconic spell, which pissed Old Karma fans off even more. And finally, it was supposed to increase Karma's decision making, but it effectively removed any intricacy from it.
Watching Karmas use mantra doesn't allow you to distinguish between good and great Karmas anymore. There is no "wise" decision making left in her kit. There is no „this spell affects enemies and allies, so try to hit both for best effect“. It’s just hurting enemies and using RQ more often. This is mechanically mildly interesting, but thematically unfitting, boring and contrary to Riot's design values.
See look, if I am missing something, please let me know. But as it stands this touch-up seemed like it failed as hard as it was well intended. And all I would hope for is just an explanation. Either why this really was intended and why it DOESNT contradict Riot's design values, or what you think really didn't work and what you want to do with Karma in the future. Please, there are a lot of ears in the community who crave for this answer!
Sincerely, SilverSquid
