@Riot - So "Tank" Fiora, Yi, and Akali are a thing. A quick question about item design.

Hey All,

So I think by now all of us have heard about some traditionally squishy melee champs that are now suddenly building almost full tank and making all or at least most of you miserable. Well I'm actually pretty miserable too. You see, Fiora is my favorite champion and a lot of us raised some concerns during her recent rework. Things like "Are you sure % max Health true damage is a good idea?" to "Does Fiora actually have enough incentive to build glass cannon instead of taking the safe route and building tanky?". At first it made a lot of sense; Fiora actually has very low base damage and good scaling, therefore she'd be best played building lots of AD.

Except that's not quite what happened, as a simple glance at these Boards can tell you.

Riot, we have a problem: Glass Cannon Melee is in a terrible state in LoL.

Melee in general is in a bad state where you either need to be virtually unkillable or deal insane damage in under 2 seconds to be viable. Fiora isn't being built Tanky because everyone just imagines that she's supposed to be a big, bulky, tanky fighter. They're playing her that way because it's more effective than building damage like she's supposed to. But they're doing the same thing with Master Yi and Akali (who has one of the most drawn-out damage patterns of any assassin).

The thing is, I play Fiora and Akali glass cannon like I'm supposed to. But while the late-game damage is insanely high, I don't do it because it's a BETTER way to play. I completely realize that I'm handicapping myself - I just choose not to build them tanky because I feel like they shouldn't build that way. And honestly, in past seasons building these three tanky was terrible and did no damage.

But I tried out "Juggernaut/Tank" Fiora and Akali. And it was, in fact, stupid. Stupidly effective, that is.

See this build? If you are playing a melee champ, any melee champ, then build this. This build will win games for you. You will be virtually unkillable and still deal enough damage to be relevant. If Akali can build this can still deal good damage, then literally anyone can. With just the stats from these items alone, not factoring in runes/masteries, you will get:

2350 Health 50 AD 100 Armor 95 MR +250% Base Health Regen +25% Base Damage (doubled when under Fury) 10% CDR 20% Healing increase 30% Max Health shield as a lifeline passive 5 + (1% Max Health) on-hit damage 40 + (2.5% Max Health) damage in a 700 Range cone 40 + (10% Max Health) damage cone that also resets auto-attack timer 26-43 magic damage aura with 400 range Up to +60 Movement Speed Up to 50-100 on-hit physical damage 50% on-hit Slow at max stacks

I actually messed up and took my AP Assassin runes and masteries when I tried this out on Akali...and I still ended up with 4000 Health, 200 Armor, 150 Magic Resist, plus all of the other bonuses. It didn't even feel like I was playing Akali anymore, it felt like I was just playing this build and letting the items do all of the work.

I think we can all agree that this is not okay or good for long term game health.

Riot, as someone that loves playing glass cannon melee in any game that lets me, even I know that 99% of players hate playing glass cannon melee if you just blow up instantly and would much, much, much rather go tanky melee so they can go in and not instantly die for daring to try and do their job. If taking squishy melee champions like Fiora, Master Yi, Akali, Katarina, etc. tanky and being able to succeed is possible, then it will become the default way most people play these champions. And right now it's not just "possible"...it's EASY.

• In the past, you said that you wouldn't put more than 50-55 MR on a single item because it made people too tanky against magic for only investing one item slot into it. So why did you then bump two core MR items up to 70 MR anyway?
• Why do so many items need 450-500 Health? That's a lot when you stack it in multiple item slots and can easily turn literally anyone into an nigh-unkillable tank since that 500 Health is usually tied to 50 Armor or 70 MR currently. Is there a reason why these stats aren't kept separate, or at least somehow gated to actual tanks?
• If gives literally any melee champ % Max Health scaling damage, isn't it just obvious that every melee champ would just build full Health-stacking tank (a build which also gives high Armor and MR from those same health items) since it now also gives high damage?
• Doesn't giving Juggernauts items that make then very tanky while also giving them good damage...kind of give every champ those items? If a build exists that gives tons of Health/Armor/MR and also lets you do lots of damage...isn't it obvious that every single melee champ in the game is better of building that way?

TL;DR

There currently does not seem to be any incentive at all to build full damage, or even mostly damage. Shouldn't the ability to be both tanky and high-damage have to be something built into the kits of champions meant to be like that (i.e. only Juggernauts)? If that kind of power is mostly in items then it's accessible to champions it shouldn't be accessible to. Is there some kind of push to putting tons of power into items and letting champs just do whatever they want? Or would it be at all possible to nerf a lot of these items and then buff champion kits and base stats to fit the build style they are intended to go for?

Thank you for taking the time to read this. Comments and criticism are welcome as always, please just be civil about it. And any Rioters out there that could shed some light on this would just be swell :)