Why the Cunning Tree is the best tree for any champion/role in the game and how to compensate.

TLDR; Thunderlord's Decree is too strong compared to other Keystones and Precision is so much better than Battering Blows.

I want to start this off by getting to the root of the problem: a good majority of people are putting 18 points into the cunning tree without a second thought and for good reason. The fact of the matter is that majority of champions benefit off of Thunderlord's Decree as well as the rest of the Cunning Tree more than any other mastery tree for the simple fact that the Cunning Tree is the most effective tree that benefits any champion in the game besides maybe Tier One. I will give examples of how this tree is more cost effective to spec into for the rest of the 6 points than the other trees for most champions in the game.

I want to explain how the Cunning Tree is better in a way that instead flat out nerfing it, that there could be a solution to buff the other Tier 3 mastery trees or add other ideas for mastery points in general. I want to start out by comparing the Ferocity Tree's % Pen efficiency compared to the Cunning Tree's efficiency in penetrating armor and magic resist in different stages in the game. I'll start out by comparing the entirety of Battering Blows mastery compared to the Flat Armor Pen of Precision in the Cunning Tree. Let's start at level 1 where it's not so bad and reasonable. Precision gives 5.5 Armor Pen flat vs the 7% Armor Pen where the target has 30 armor which is maybe average or slightly above average armor at level 1. 7% of 30 is 2.1 so it is basically like you're penetrating 2.1 of their flat armor compared to 5.5, which is a 3.4 difference. Nothing huge and expected in the early game. I do however, want to talk about when Battering Blows is more efficient than the Flat Armor Pen alone in Precision. The enemy would have to have 79 armor for Battering Blows at level 1 to be 0.03 more flat pen than precision. I'm not stating that it should always be more efficient at level 1 as the flat pen should almost always be more efficient in the early game. Even if we say Battering Blows theoretically gets buffed to 8%, then then the enemy would have to have 69 armor to pen 0.02 more flat armor at level 1. At level 1, giving a slight buff the Battering Blows wouldn't really affect the early game unless you were laning against a top Malphite, Taric, or Rammus. What I want to talk about is level 18, where it really is a huge problem. At 7% Pen from Battering Blows, the enemy would have to have 200 armor to even reach the efficiency of of the flat pen of Precision at 14. This is a huge difference in the power of Precision's flat pen vs Battering Blows % pen. If Battering Blows was 8% from a potential future buff, the enemy would have to have 175 armor to penetrate 14 armor. If Battering Blows was 9% from a potential future buff, then it would take 156 armor late game for it to penetrate 0.04 more flat pen than Precision's armor pen excluding the flat magic pen. I'm not saying you should nerf precision. I'm just saying that you should buff Battering blows to a reasonable level of power. Piercing Thoughts % Pen vs Precision's Flat Magic Pen is another story, as you get less Flat Magic Pen than Flat Armor Pen from Precision. 3.3 at level one and 8.4 at level 18.

I wouldn't have a problem with the Cunning Tree if most ADCs, Mid Laners(AD and AP Assasins, Mages, and Lulu), Supports, Junglers, and Top Laners didn't use it every single game. The last game that I played had 9 people with Thunderlord's Decree, the only one who didn't get it was the Top Lane Fiora on the enemy team who got Warlord's Bloodlust, which brings me to my next point: why Thunderlord's Decree is used on majority of champions in the game. This one Keystone Mastery is the best in the game for the good majority of champions. Even when you're in doubt, you can get away with Thunderlord's Decree on any champion because of it's insanely high 180 base damage at level 18. Whilst there are some champions that are outliers in this argument (Renekton with Fervor of Battle or Grasp of the Undying, Mundo with Grasp of the Undying or Strength of the Ages, Alistar with Bond of Stone, etc.) You can still get Thunderlord's Decree on any of these champions and it will still be effective. Renekton can buy AD early game if ahead enough and add more damage to Thunderlord's, Mundo's E inately increases Thunderlord's damage through the Bonus AD he gets from his E, and Alistar can proc it after his Combo alongside his passive or an auto if it doesn't proc it. This mastery point gives even supports and tanks a relative amount of burst that can't be ignored. It's like I have to buy Magic Resist against a full AD comp just because every single enemy has Thunderlord's. This wouldn't be problematic if it had less base damage and higher scaling or if it did Physical damage if your AD scaling was greater than your AP Scaling or both.

As I said before I don't think flat out nerfing this mastery is the answer to this problem. Whilst I would recommend reducing the flat damage per level of Thunderlord's, I would also advise looking at the other Keystone Masteries afterwards. Maybe buffing Grasp of the Undying to 3.5% or 4% if it somehow needed a buff. I'm going to be honest not one ADC in the game consistently gets Warlord's Bloodlust ever since the nerf. Even Tryn and Yas would rather use Thunderlord's even if it's base damage got nerfed slightly. An idea is to change this mastery into something these champions could use that other champs couldn't that would give them a boost that's not lifesteal/attack speed on a 2 second cooldown. Like if you got more crit damage on your crits or flat bonus damage if your attack crits. (with a cooldown if necessary) Fervor of Battle is in a good place and should be left untouched. I don't know about Deathfire Touch, as it was slightly problematic in the past and really niche. I think that you should definitely think of another option mages could potentially use other than Thunderlord's. Stormraider's Surge is probably the weakest Keystone Mastery in the game at the moment being overshadowed by every other Keystone in the game. The only Champ that I could think of that could consistently use that mastery properly is Nasus and even then Thunderlord's flat out adds to your damage.

I'm going to close out by saying that I don't ever expect to see League of Legends to be perfectly balanced, however I do want to see League of Legends to have more diversity, especially since the mastery system itself was made for the purpose of giving you options that could be meaningful on certain champions and what you are up against. Also I'm going to add a poll at the bottom for the fun of it.