Zeds win rate is the 3rd lowest for midlane yet hes still at an 85% banrate.

warpenguin555·Jun 25, 2016·164 votes·9,733 views

This speaks volumes about how little anybody cares to see this champion in their games lol

291 Comments

EedatJun 25, 2016133 votes

I ban Zed for 2 reasons.

I don't want him on my team
His mere presence alone is enough to tilt my ADC

Zed is just one of those champions that I just hate to play with and against. No matter how many times I tell myself I've beaten teams with Zed many times before, the foul taste of those games where he snowballs and obliterates everything outweigh it. When he's on my team its a constant worry of when is Zed going to do something stupid like decide to dive the backline out of nowhere. Whens he's on the other team its the constant worry of when is my ADC going to get obliterated.

Ugh. Just a miserable experience playing with that champ.

Zero Skill TankJun 25, 201660 votes

That's the point. Even if you win against a Zed, it's not fun at all for enemy mage to get shit on for 30 minutes, neither it is fun for enemy adc to never ever leave their support side, because someone thought it is OK for an assassin to be able to close gap of 1.3k+ units, neither is it fun for say a Sona to be degraded to a stun bot just because if she ever used her ult for anything else her marksman WILL die.

Are Zed's mechanics cool? Yes, definitely. Still, he is one of the worst designed champions ever, with Yorick levels of toxicity. He will be kept banned, until he will get Yoricked.

RianJun 25, 201618 votes

Zed mechanic is not the only problem. Because of his access to much better items ( item 3156 and lifesteal sustain) he is a mobile tank sustain burster compared to most ap midlaner. Beside the item advantage for ad caster there is also this passive sustain damage from auto attacks. When was the last time you need to run away from Syndra after all her abilities are on cooldown? It doesn't nessassary mean ad items are overpowered, but certain champions benefit more then they should.

LankPantsJun 25, 201673 votes

At this point I just think Riot should be consistent and treat Zed like other champions who are utterly hell to play against like Yorick, gut him and throw his arse to the back of the rework queue where he can be forgotten for at least two years. The game would honestly be better for it.

BisaknospJun 25, 201626 votes

pls work for riot

amazinick1213Jun 26, 20165 votes

No, don't do that. Riot has followed the right path for Zed. They made the new Zed players not be so strong on Zed but reward the Zed players who put the time into learning the champion. I honestly hate it when people complain that either Zed is easy or Zed is broken. There was a time at the beginning of season six where Zed was pretty dominant but he is no where near OP right now.

LankPantsJun 26, 20167 votes

The point of this went so far over your head. This has nothing to do with Zed's power, or how hard he is to learn, this is from the enemy perspective and Zed is hell to play against. Riot has historically treated champs like Zed in the way I suggested, it's how they treated S1 Eve and Yorick.

KodyackJun 25, 201650 votes

Quite. The problem with Zed isn't that he's all that strong, stats or such wise, (which he is ok, now, still playable but the high banrate means that low elo tries to play him and fails), no the problem lies in how absolutely annoying Zed is to play against both in and out of lane.

in lane, he can bully you with a quick regenerating resource, is fairly safe from ganks, and at levels 6 and up he can 100-0 many squishy targets, or his laner.

Sure, he's squishy himself and doesn't have any really hard CC, so he can get blown up if he's not careful, but as an ADC for example, you don't want to see a Zed because you can't do anything yourself to stop him, as a midlaner you don't want to deal with his bullshit in lane, and everyone else knows the pain of mid/adc is pain for the team.

It's not that he's strong, it's that his kit and style of play is oppressive and annoying, even when weak or "balanced"

really late edit: Something I forgot to mention, technically he has a pretty interesting CC against the enemy midlaner, it's a 2.5 second single target bard ult, weird right? It's almost like every single midlaner is required to be effected by this CC or die to Zed... Funny huh?

Silent ReaperJun 25, 201649 votes

Zed has the "Teemo syndrome" Kills lots of enemy champions but can't contribute to the team to get objectives to win game.

Enemies hate it because they die Teammates hate it because they can't win the game.

Does this make sense?

IS3E531E3F964391Jun 25, 201637 votes

[{quoted}](name=Silent Reaper,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=nJmc9FP0,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2016-06-25T07:23:02.169+0000)

Zed has the "Teemo syndrome" Kills lots of enemy champions but can't contribute to the team to get objectives to win game.

Enemies hate it because they die Teammates hate it because they can't win the game.

Does this make sense?

I think it's more so yorick syndrome just flat out frustrating to lane against even if he isn't great in team fights

ElewdJun 25, 20167 votes

except Yorick is really good in teamfights, specially if he has a carry that is super fed and he can enable them to do super ballsy plays.

NarasimhaJun 25, 201617 votes

Definetly not. Yorick's strength in laning comes from his ghouls. In teamfights, those ghouls evaporate with all the aoe flying around. Theres a reason he becomes known as a walking ult come late game.

I WILL TROLL YOUJun 25, 20166 votes

[{quoted}](name=Silent Reaper,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=nJmc9FP0,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2016-06-25T07:23:02.169+0000)

Zed has the "Teemo syndrome" Kills lots of enemy champions but can't contribute to the team to get objectives to win game.

Enemies hate it because they die Teammates hate it because they can't win the game.

Does this make sense?

Except Teemo's auto attacks can quickly dispose of towers. Teemo is frustrating to play with for most people because your whole team needs to adapt to his style of play in order to win.

Instead of pushing lanes to solidify your lead. You have to passively wait for the enemy team to engage so Teemo can unstealth and kill them. Teemo is so squishy he can be one shot if caught unstealthed and if you build him tank he loses all of his burst.

Not that Teemo is a bad champ it's his play style doesn't work well with the current dash and dive form of engaging.

notmebuthimJun 25, 201630 votes

I think a lot of people that pick him don't actually know how to play him, they see he is up and say "Zed is OP, I'm gunna play Zed!!" Then feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed. But there is the chance that a good Zed player actually gets Zed and reks the whole game... Feeeeed or feast champ.

DarkRitualJun 25, 201626 votes

On champion.gg, he's currently 4th lowest winrate (~47%), with 9th highest playrate (6.44%). This is in platinum+ ranked games, where he is still banned 82.31% of the time. 88.75% Pick/ban rate in platinum+. Next highest banrate champ is Swain at 59.55%. That's a banrate difference of 22.76% between first and second most banned champions.

This isn't bronze level people banning him because they can't play around or through Zed, this is Platinum+. If higher ranked players still don't want to play against him with his changes, there's still a problem with the champion.

Other champs get nerfed into oblivion when they get that out of line for the players, but for some reason Zed is just getting tapped slightly, without actually dealing with the problem (or perceived problem).

Enraged PigletJun 25, 20167 votes

well I just got of a forum post earlier that was about how swain and vlad aren't at all op and the only people who complain about them are adcs... then I look at the op's match history and his past 20 games has 11 vlad games where he had like 11/4 scores for 8 of them.

AaravosJun 25, 201621 votes

Yes because item 3155 = lane lost or you hug tower, and nobody likes to hug tower.

Jet SettJun 25, 201615 votes

Zed "Hug tower? Better hug fountain!"

FizpocalypseJun 25, 20165 votes

{quoted}

Yes because = lane lost or you hug tower, and nobody likes to hug tower. This right here.. He's always ez game ez life until he gets fucking maw then its like i'm just playing at this point not to feed this sob

ElewdJun 25, 201619 votes

its because nobody likes playing against zed, if you have to manage a resource and laning against zed he'll eventually start to outpoke you and out shove the lane due to fast regenerating energy. Nobody complains about the other Energy based champs because their waveclear costs ton of energy and have long cooldowns for their aoe, Zed has them on a short period.

VasilisGreenJun 25, 20165 votes

you just said the stupidest thing you could have said. The only energy based champion that has higher energy demands than Zed is Shen. Example. Akali, Q cd 6/5.5/5/4.5/4. Zed Q cd 6 at all ranks. Akali's E cd, 5/4/3/2/1. Zed's E cd, 4 at all ranks. Akali Q cost. 60, Zed Q cost 75/70/65/60/55. Akali E cost 60/55/50/45/40 Zed E cost 50 at all ranks. Akali lvl3 combo cost=60+60=120, Zed lvl3 combo cost 75+40+50=165 Akali lvl13 combo=60+40=100, Zed lvl13 combo=55+40+50=145. Akali energy refund per Q proc=40, Zed Energy refund when hiting 1 unit with both original and mimicked abilities=20/25/30/35/40 and energy is only restored 1 time regardless of units hit. This means that even if a W-Q waveclear hits the whole wave with both Qs, you will still only get 40 nergy back. Note for future refference.

Akali's combo downtime varies from 6 to 4 seconds based on Q rank and has 3 point and click jumps after 6. All damage is point and click. Zed's combo downtime has a 22 second cd, the same as W cd, he only has 1 point and click jump. Fully skillshot reliant to do damage.

That's just one of the other energy based champions.

Now let's take Kennen. Kennen's Q cd is 8/7/6/5/4, cost:60/55/50/45/40 has 1050 range and has missile speed of 1650. In comparison, Zed's Q has 900 range and missile speed of 902. Fun fact, Zed's W shadow has a missile speed of 1700. Kennen's W has 750 range of instant damage, AoE, affects every target with kennen's passive on, costs 40 energy at all ranks and has a cd of 14/12/10/8/6.

Kennen's E has a CD of 10/9/8/7/6, 100/95/90/85/80 energy cost and restores 40 energy for each unit hit, energy is restored only once per unit hit. Deals magic damage and gives him resistances while doubling his movement speed. This little guy can essentialy have unlimited energy, his E can completely negate it's own energy cost, his passive also gives him 25 energy per proc per target affected. He can effectively remain fully energized permanently.

Lee Sin has 50 Energy for each of his abilities and an additional 30 for the secondary parts of each ability. His passive gives him back 20 energy on the first AA after an ability is used and 10 on the second, making his energy regen quite high and consistent.

So, your point of the other energy based champions having high energy costs is invalid. At least try to keep your facts straight next time you make stupid comparisons. The only energy based champion that has higher costs than Zed is Shen, and Shen is a Tank.

Theiki KayleJun 25, 201627 votes

Are we seriously comparing Zed to Kennen? Do you have any idea how easy it is for Kennen to run out of energy if he tries to push? Lower costs doesn't mean their waveclear doesn't cost a ton.

Kennen's waveclear: Single target Q, AoE W that requires marks to be placed, AoE E that places marks but is also melee and your only form of escape (and it's not a blink, Kennen is still vulnerable to CC and attacks).

Zed's waveclear: Passthrough Q, W that is your only escape and doubles other skills (it's also a blink), AoE E that is melee, passive that deals extra damage if a minion is below 50%.

Zed might have higher costs but the difficulty Kennen has with using his skills means he can't waveclear like Zed can.

Just compare how many times you've seen a Zed push the enemy then roam vs Kennen push the enemy who isn't Kassadin or Talon then roam.

LichKing234Jun 25, 201610 votes

he also missed that even redmecy (the most well known zed main) says that zed has the best wave clear out of any assassin as he can push in the wave more effectively while still poking you down other assassins either have to poke you or wave clear but rarely can they do both at the same time . probley out of most mages to expect maybe xerath and other longrange type mages.

Theiki KayleJun 25, 20165 votes

The only other assassins I can think of that can push and harass at the same time are Katarina and Diana, but Bouncing Blades' damage is so low early game it barely even tickles if Katarina doesn't proc the mark (and it doesn't push all that much either) and Diana is not really an assassin and, while she can push and harass at the same time, her Crescent Strike is one of the weirdest skillshots in the game, it's not really easy to hit more than a couple of minions if you try to harass, unless the enemy is sitting on the opposite side of Diana (that would be on the side of her left hand) and smack dab in the minion wave.

GayFluffyUnicornJun 25, 20163 votes

Here we go again. Pulling crap out of your arse. Always when it's about Zed. 24 Seconds cooldown for Zeds AOE which is his W. By spamming single Qs and E you will be ooe pretty fast, leaving you vulnerable. Now tell me someone else with 24 secs cd on his Aoe? Oh yeah leblanc, oops that's her ult. Lux can waveclear with ludens With one E (+few AA to procc the passive on melee minions) a bit of mana and 8 secs cooldown.

ElewdJun 25, 201610 votes

-original post talks about energy based champions- -brings up mana champions to try and counter the argument-

Edge of DaybreakJun 25, 201618 votes

Or it speaks volumes on how player perception doesnt mean you need nerfs. The playerbase isnt interested in how strong he actually is only what other people tell them to ban.

DrCyanideJun 25, 201628 votes

I think there's a good deal of "I don't care what the outcome of the game was, it was miserable to endure" in there. The 5 seconds of Victory screen don't quite outweigh the rest of the early/mid game pain.

Lady HammerlockJun 25, 201618 votes

Even if a champion isn't broken,some people just don't want to fight champions that are beyond frustrating to deal with

zlumpyJun 25, 20167 votes

Same reason blitz sees so much ban even if the enemy team picks champs that counter him.

Weasel KenseiJun 25, 201617 votes

Zed is worse to play against than Yasuo, and Yasuo is giant dirty diaper to the face level of fun to play against (Yes... obviously not if you counter him, im talking about if youre not a counter, spare us).

Zeds strengths are so good, they arnt in proportion to his weaknesses.

As to the OPs point, being 3rd in win rate doesnt say as much as you think with his high ban rate.

For every match hes banned in where someone would have played him, we cant measure his impact that he could have made on Zed win/loss statistics.

Often when a champ is out of bounds on strength, baddies will pick them in a match theyre not banned because they think they are free wins. They have no clue how to play the champ. They lose, and drag the champs win% down.

Most of the players who would be going 60% win rate on Zed, dont get to play him cause people know to ban Zed.

SpôôkedJun 26, 20163 votes

I absolutely hate playing against Yasuo. I honestly think I hate him more than Zed, even tho both are annoying as fuck. But I hate Yasuo more because he buys a 10% crit item at first back and can almost 100-0 me in one combo when he gets back in lane. I main mages like Syndra, VelKoz, and Orianna too, so its even more frustrating when he dashes everywhere and windwalls literally everything :L

A LiberalJun 25, 201612 votes

There are three champions I always want banned, not because they are OP or good, just because I don't want to effing deal with them: Zed : Outranges and Outsustains me, and always seems so slippery. Makes for a really boring lane when my strategy to deal with him is to turtle behind tower and wait for my jungler to gank when he overextends. Yasuo DASH DASH TORNADO. Really though, I hate this guy. It's really fun having to just not go near my minions, and don't forget his RAGE INDUCING WIND WALL, and the shield that seems to be on there for ??? some reason??? Ekko Having to predict where the dome is going is annoying enough, but it seems like EVERY TIME i've ALMOST KILLED that LITTLE FUCKER he ults and salt leeches out of my pores.

RozzetaJun 25, 201610 votes

If he's banned 85% of the time, the 15% of the time he plays is because the enemy has something that either counters him, or can at least manage him.

NymzoJun 25, 201610 votes

Zed is always banned now because of:

The arrival of Duskblade aka I fuck up my easy to use ultimate but I got another one cause why not Riot.
The QSS nerf

Adcs can't do shit right now without their support (I'm a support main) and sometimes not even the support can stop him.

It's like a minigame to see how fast a Zed can delete a carry and goes back to one of his shadows.

Theiki KayleJun 25, 20169 votes

As an Aurelion Sol and Nami main, it is incredibly frustrating to play in a game where Zed is on either team.

If I'm mid Aurelion Sol and my enemy is a Zed, it's a downright miserable experience. I outshine him in teamfights but I'm not Anivia, I can't survive in lane against him and that sets me back considerably, allowing Zed to extend his lead.

If I'm support and either enemy or ally mid is a Zed I have to be on my toes.

Enemy Zeds love to roam bot, I gotta bubble and exhaust him the moment he tries anything funny and if he sees the bubble coming he can just blink out and my ADC is dead.

Ally Zeds never leave their lane, lose lane and when the enemy Lux roams bot and DEMACIAs us out of existence he says "gg wp feed my lane more".

InTheoryJun 25, 20161 votes

[deleted]

Theiki KayleJun 25, 20169 votes

It's the Vayne paradox. Your Vayne feeds, flames and AFKs, enemy Vayne gets a Quadra with PD+BotRK.

Same with Zed

LatetotheRaceJun 25, 20167 votes

If riot would just take the hint and nerf him into oblivion, I could get my extra ban back.

SwiftKitten88Jun 26, 20167 votes

it has been said alot in the first few post but im going going to reiterate. it dones't MATTER if you can BEAT zed.

it matters that he is the most aggravating champ in the game to play against.

he has free wave clear.. you have to watch your mana he can rush item 3155 , while you are forced to rush item 3157 to even stay alive giving you zero mana regen

he is ner impossibel to gank.. and he can easily gank from insane range

he can tower dive you, and you cant tower dive him

sure if you play everything absolutely perfectly you CAN win late.

but even if you do play perfectly and you DO beat him. its still not fun.

Zed is not FUN to play against.

NeckoeJun 25, 20166 votes

I just feel like with the qss there's less ways to deal with him.

Even if I don't die to him in lane, if he roams he is still likely to get fed.

The DeckownerJun 25, 20165 votes

There is a list of champions that I don't want to play with or against in a game. They always feed their ass off in my team and always destroy my adc when they are in enemy team due to sheer amount of power in their kit.

for example: Zed, Yasuo, Leesin

KING 5HARKJun 25, 20162 votes

sheer amount of power in their kit.

I play neither of these but could it be that the opponent is justgood at the champ? Holy fuck everything good is either OP or scripting nowadays, could not AT ALL be possible that someone else is simply better at the game...

The DeckownerJun 25, 20167 votes

You can deny a Yasuo all you want but once he gets item 3087 item 3031 he can still kill your squishy with 2~3 autos. You don't need to be good at LeeSin to do some stupid shit, like point and blank qrq can oneshot majority of the squishies at lv6. If both didn't buy lv6 Zed ult point and blank EQ auto ignite boom easy kill easy life and Zed start spamming laugh and mastery emote.

Wonko The SaneJun 25, 20165 votes

One of the big reasons his win rate is so abysmal is because his banrate is so high. This happens all the time with op champions, people see that a champ considered op isn't banned, so they pick it even if they have no clue how to play it, then proceed to get stomped. I ban Zed both because I don't want to play against it and because I don't want someone on my team to do the above.

ElishevaJun 25, 20165 votes

The rare few times he isn't banned, people who are god awful at playing him, choose him because they think he is over powered, then feed.

WitchQueen AnnieJun 25, 20162 votes

I never understood the high ban rate. I think the high ban rate is simply due to a Meta Sheep mentality to be honest, where people ban him out of tradition rather than based on the facts and a realistic assessment of probability.

There are champions that are way better at killing the opposing laner pre-6 and with much greater combo reliability (ex Leblanc) and there are champions that have much greater kill potential at 6 and against with much greater combo reliability (ex Annie). The odds of Zed continuously hitting you with enough Shadow combos to kill or poke you out of lane (unless the player is that much more skilled than you) is actually incredibly low given the fact that his combos are all skill-shot based and that shadow has a 20+ second cool down every time he misses.

Unless a Zed snowballs (and often even if he does), he's almost always irrelevant later on in team fights. All of his combos need him to get up close for a kill and he's squishy as hell; more often than not, the vast majority of players lack the encyclopaedic knowledge/intuition of cool down sense to be able to use him well in fights larger than 2 vs 2 and a natural concentration of CC in fights is almost always enough to render him useless. That and the fact that his abilities are actually very hard to land (they are all skill shots).

Hence why he's always banned (Tradition/Meta Sheep mentality) and why where he's picked he rarely excels and often ends up feeding. The percentage of players who can use him in a way that is OP is minuscule compared to the number of people banning him or the number of people who get to play him.

CasterGilgameshJun 26, 20166 votes

i ban him because i dont want to deal with the head ache of dealing with his poke and his burst plus i want to build other items early besides item 3157