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Why the fuck was Courage replaced with aftershock in the first place?

Reformedfindlay··62 votes·3,689 views

Courage had no offensive mechanic (so tanks wouldnt be doing even more damage than they need to) and a weaker dueling mechanic while still being the explosive teamfight keystone it was set out to be.

Aftershock is a broken piece of shit that allows tanks to auto win lanes against most melees with absolutely no drawbacks to using it in duels. It has an added damage component that scales with hp so that tanks can pump out bullshit levels of damage on top of their existing durability which is getting augmented.

So again, why exactly was courage of the colossus, a relatively well balanced rune, tossed out the window for this fucking joke of a rune?

People complain that resolve tree sucks balls, but the reality is that it only sucks balls for non tank melees who got shafted by so many rune changes this season. Aftershock alone makes the resolve tree for tanks.

65 Comments

Troll for Trump19 votes

I don't think aftershock is a problem with top lane tanks. The only one that consistently takes it is Maokai, since he can reliably proc it whenever it's off CD. Everyone else doesn't take it, except for Cho/Naut, whom take it occasionally. Aftershock is strongest with the tank junglers, rather than laners.

Tanks autowin lanes by spamming poke and whittling down the opponent. This is the playstyle of ranged champs and Klepto abusers.

Aftershock requires commitment, and that's not what tanks do these days.

AirKingNeo2 votes

While Aftershock is overpowered and all, it's way better for bruisers than Courage of the Colossus. Bruisers stack HP, so gaining bonus resists is much better than a shield, compared to tanks who stack resists who would be better with that shield.

Z3Sleeper1 votes

Yup, Darius is more oppressive vs melees than ever with this rune. The moment they decide to toss out their high damaging or trading skills you just press E and negate it all while slowly stacking up your passive so when you’re finally vulnerable you can’t be fought cuz u have massive tons of AD.

Gesterr4 votes

But then he has to play Aftershock Darius for the rest of the game.

50000000000000001 votes

Give us inspiration keystone that lets us swap keystone xd

Z3Sleeper1 votes

u rite lol

LordGeovanni1 votes

Ha you said slowly

Troll for Trump1 votes

{quoted}

While Aftershock is overpowered and all, it's way better for bruisers than Courage of the Colossus. Bruisers stack HP, so gaining bonus resists is much better than a shield, compared to tanks who stack resists who would be better with that shield.

Yeah, but bruisers really could use a home keystone.

DuskDaUmbreon5 votes

It forces it to being more oriented towards tanks (and some juggernauts) as opposed to every melee with CC.

And for those few melees that need it, it's more helpful. A shield is less useful than increased armor and MR.

Sire Hippington2 votes

And for those few melees that need it, it's more helpful. A shield is less useful than increased armor and MR.

LoL, not in the slightest. Takeing no damage>>>takeing reduced damage. If the defstats would last some time, it would be different, but for 2.5 sec, it's not even half as impactfull as the old shield was.

DuskDaUmbreon3 votes

Except a shield is essentially just temporary health.

~250 points of temporary health are less useful than temporary ~40 points of MR and armor.

Rouwhorst3 votes

That depends on the amount of damage dealt and the amount of resistances you already have. e.g. 500 dmg, 0 resistances, +40 for aftershock: 250 dmg courage, 357 aftershock 1000 dmg, 0 resistances, +40 for aftershock: 750 dmg courage, 714 aftershock 1000 dmg, 100 resistances, +40 for aftershock: 250 dmg courage, 416 aftershock 2000 dmg, 100 resistances, +40 for aftershock: 750 dmg courage, 833 aftershock I would certainly take the 250 shield over 40 resistances.

Note that you noted 250 hp shield vs 40 resistances.

Darius Strada5 votes

Shhhh! I need my free elo Leona

Fedoran5 votes

Courage shield: Negates ALL damage up to a certain point (i.e. when the shield runs out)

Aftershock stat boost: Partially negates damage (excluding true damage) for a set time, deals a little damage afterward.

If you look at these, aftershock is actually MUCH healthier game design (although I dont like the damage bit). Aftershock is just overtuned and needs a nerf.

PopcornBunni5 votes

Aftershock isn't even a better defensive option compared to Courage outside of massive burst (like 1000+ damage after ordinary resistances.) The shield from courage prevented damage entirely in trades, while Aftershock mitigates only some of it.

Resolve tree is just horrible. Aftershock is overtuned in damage but worse than its S7 equivilent, Guardian is a do-nothing keystone with an all-to-long cooldown, and Grasp is the only run in the entire tree that's better than the equivilent mastery.

Even then, without siegemaster, tough skin, Legendary Guardian, and fearless, nor armor res or quints, its effect is overall worse than when it was grouped with all those actually viable defensive masteries.

In runes alone, resolve is missing out on 13 armor straight out of the gate, and that's assuming you have Iron Skin in the first place. Adding siege master, fearless, and legendary guardian into the mix, and the resolve tree is missing another 21 for a total of 34 armor missing out of the supposedly "live forever" path.

Meanwhile, offensive trees get about 100 gold more worth of AD/AS/AP right out of the gate, actual sustain in the domination path, and free damage all over the place.

Even on a tank, I'd rather be taking any combination besides resolve and just go into lane with item 2033 /item 1029 item 2031 for a better combination of early defense and trading power than resolve gets.

Aftershock and Conditioning are the only things remotely worth mentioning in the resolve tree, and aftershock is only so because of its stupidly overtuned damage.

It isn't just bruisers getting fucked over by this; in fact, tanks are screwed even more so unless they are the few that are specifically overtuned themselves.

Why the fuck are divers and tanks being screwed out of 34 god damn armor?

Häxel3 votes

pbe change that probably comes to live wednesday: Armor and MR changed from [20 + 30% ] to [70 - 120] Explosion damage lowered from [40 - 140 (+3.5% of your max health)] to [10 - 120 (3% of your max health)(+15% of your bonus attack damage)(+10% of your ability power)

Also saying CoC was relatively well balanced is itself a joke.

Azadethe11 votes

Which is an insane BUFF. Tank supports are going to autowin bot lane simply by existing because on initiation, they will spike to 180-200 Armor at level 1-2. Alistar already has 1300 HP by level 3-4. Now he's going to have 200 Armor too.

The Yetii Rider3 votes

That's not a buff, lol. You could easily pass 120 at the mid levels if you were stacking armor and MR. It's a buff to low income tanks (supports) and non-tanks (top laners). It sucks for real tank players.

Ahristocats3 votes

you're talking to someone who made a post about post buff aftershock being abused by fizz vayne and shaco

Azadethe6 votes

It takes 333 of BOTH Armor and Resist built into a build to get to 120 Bonus from the previous Aftershock.

You never had that on any tank except Sejuani.

Even Malphite, who scales passively, had more Armor BUT did not meet anywhere close to 333 Magic Resist, especially not on the same build.

The Yetii Rider2 votes

Ramus has a 90% armor amp and a 45% MR amp on his Defensive Ball Curl.

Malphite easily eclipses 333 armor by 20 minutes.

Sejuani is a powerful tank as well, you shouldn't just be dismissing her because she's an example that proves my point.

And, in fact, Rammus sprang up to the top of the charts specifically because he's so damn powerful with Aftershock, so it's odd that you wouldn't acknowledge that...

You may not be easily able to get 120 MR, but no one needs 120 MR for 2.5 seconds. A mage's rotation usually comes down in 1-1.5 seconds. 2.5 seconds is much better for armor, you can tank 2 turret shots, a couple of dragon hits, loads of minion/wave attacks, and marksman/assassin burst.

Azadethe3 votes

You Don't Read. They don't reach high levels on BOTH Mag Resist and Armor. They do have Armor kit bonuses, but are meant to be vulnerable to magic. Even when they do get some resist, it settles around 110 TOTAL.

This isn't about tanks. This is about AD builds suddenly ALSO being tanks, and about this change boosting tanks MORE than the old.

Rammus for example, DOUBLES this base (Aftershock takes precedence to his defensive Curl, and Curl almost DOUBLES it - it's going to add 220 Defense or more to Rammus)

The Yetii Rider1 votes

But they don't need MR. I explained that to you. Tanks are already extremely resistant to being bursted down, and for sustained magic damage, we have an item dedicated to squashing that: item 3194 .

The change doesn't boost tanks more than the old, I just explained how 333 armor isn't that hard to reach for the majority of popular tanks. Rammus doubled the old Aftershock bonus as well.

Wimbledofy1 votes

But it does. Just because it supposedly wasn't hard before according to you, doesn't mean it isn't a huge buff. The old version meant they had to already have a ton of armor. Now they don't need that amount of armor.

Azadethe1 votes

Say that to Armor tanks who get Deleted by Veigar or Zed.

The Yetii Rider1 votes

0 armor tanks are getting deleted by Zed. Tanks COUNTER assassins and burst mages, and if you stack armor, surprise surprise, you aren't getting deleted by an AD assassin who builds lethality.

Azadethe1 votes

Zed built correctly drops a 400 Armor champ to 46 Armor, and his ult calculates pre mitigation (including armor reduction). One chain of attacks from Zed can KO a tank who is at 85% HP when built. He might struggle to 1 combo a 100% HP tank, but he has no problems at all deleting a 4000 HP max 85% tank.

This is especially true if there is a Jhin in the game, because Zed's ult bonus permanent AD gets inflated.

The Yetii Rider1 votes

You're going to need to provide the math there. That's a nearly 90% armor reduction, so there's no way in hell it's happening. Even if you do have some odd build that Zed can use to take someone down 350 armor, it's going to involve 6 stacks of The Black Cleaver, which is time being invested BEFORE his ultimate.

T4underbolt1 votes

let me englighten you because you really are bad at math. 20+30% mr. If you have 300 mr (which rarely ever happen to get as much), you were getting (300*3/10)+20 = 110 bonus MR. If you had 300 MR which means you would have to go full MR build probably with few items with no HP. With this change you get 70 MR right away and 120 MR at lvl 18 NO MATTER WHAT YOUR BUILD IS. So before you would have to get a lot of MR to get a huge bonus while now you get that bonus for free without building any MR. Damage is lowered, but it is not that big of a nerf considering how well compensated it is with MR buff.

Pika Fox5 votes

  1. Its only a buff defensively; the damage is getting nerfed

  2. The defensive buff is only useful on initiation. If you land a good initiation with proper support, it will allow you to survive the initiation better for a better trade, but with the loss of the damage youll be contributing less to said trade.

Azadethe1 votes

It's not even really a nerf to the damage. Any Sorcery Secondary will have transcendence, which will cover any lost HP ratio damage. And most of the champs we're talking about have AP or AD anyways.

The damage and availability is and always was reliable.

Häxel1 votes

You talked about Tanksupports prior. So all tanksupports run secondary Inspiration or already Inspiration primary and resolve secondary. Then there is also Domination secondary for zombie ward or ghost poro for example. Keep in mind that next patch with the Aftershockchanges Sightstone will be just na questreward and no longer be able to purchase early, which can make Dominationpath even more important (even if there are also Zombiewardnerfs). If Tanksupports run Sorcery secondary they would get far less health as from Resolve/Inspiration or Insp/Res. And most times while they run that they taked Nullifying Orb and Scorch, rarly Transendence.

But to get what Ap or BONUS Ad Tankupports would get beside the Sorcery or Domination Bonus? None of them builds Ad or Ap. Only Thresh gets Ap from his passive (and thats a Champion that many other Runes suit good too). Transcendence just gives at 40% cdr ratios. Even if you would reach this it would already be total lategame. So yea, Supports lost huge amount of EarlyGame damage by that in exchange for more Tankyness. And thank you Riot for that. Op said he wanted a more defensiv Keystone like CoC and even if this Aftershockrune will still have Damage it is now far more for being Tanky in Early Game as for making much Damage. And i would say it is ok if Tanks can tan but deal not so much damage. The resistances can hold extra Damage in an Engage, but the Damage no longer will Autowin you vs an Ap Support.

Other Aftershockusers the same: Tanks not realy buy Ap or Ad. You see maybe a Amumu , Chogath or Galio with 1, 2 ap items, but thats it (if they would buy Full Ap probably Aftershock wouldn't even be their keystone).

Azadethe1 votes

  1. you talk as if somehow Inspiration is a must pick, when it's not. I never take it except on Zoe.

  2. Ward Runes are not always the best picks, and in fact usually aren't.

  3. Most Supports benefit more from main treeing Resolve, and the secondary is miscellaneous

  4. I have 40% CDR by 10 minutes when i play support (granted I don't play many TANK supports).

  5. The conversation was never exclusively supports.

  6. the defense added is much bigger and much earlier.

  7. the damage loss was tiny early. 3.5% to 3% is not Much..... On a level 4 Thresh, that's :

New: 29.411 + 30.435 = 60 Damage Aftershock Old: 57.647 + 36.435 = 94.082 Damage Aftershock.

That's the initial damage. However:

1 more damage per base new AP 1 more damage per 15 Souls.

AND....

level 4 =

28 + 78 Armor = 106 Armor level 4 32.1 + 78 Magic resist = 110 Magic Resist Level 4

On the Old Aftershock, this was:

(28 + 20) * 122% = 58.56 Armor (32.1 + 20) * 122% = 63.56 Magic Resist

So..... you lost about 30 damage early game per engage, but gained 47.44 Armor and 46.44 Magic Resist.

Which impacts the fight more? the 30 damage? Or the additional ~ 17% damage reduction to BOTH damage sources that you get?

And that's on a champ that doesn't magnify the defense.

(Leona Malphite Alistar will be able to gain even more defense, and they all can build item 3025 item 3001 item 3110 to gain AP)

I jungle Leona and easily pull 340 AP, btw.

Häxel1 votes

so what kills adcs or supports? Damage or Defense? If a ap supp vs tanksupp lane plays, yes the tanksupps holds now more vs the poke of the ap supp. But in a fight, there the adc gets focused and not the support the team wins that can make the msot damage on the adc. Tanksupports now lost damage and if it gets around that who can get the first kill faster: adc1 and tanksupp on adc2 or adc2 and ap supp on adc1, it is now more likly that the adc2 team can hold cause the resistances ont he tanksupport doesn't count at that special moment. Ofc fights focus around hitting or dodging spells and switchign targets depending on what you hit an what you play against (for example soraka). But Tanksupports get rarly focused. Ap supps? Yea, maybe if they are out of psotion cause they are squishy too, but it was already all tme that you focus the adc first and ntot he tanksupport. Not it comes to that the not focused tanksupport gets more resistances but looses damage. A lv2 leona engage has now less chances to kill you directly cause damage is missing. She is tankier but has less damage. And the tankyness doesn't kill the enemy, it is the damage. Which jsut was too high early game and lead to dominant tanksupports. You saw how fervorleona was played on worlds? they played the damagevariant instead of Coc leona. Press the attack would also do good damage but why bother witht hat if aftershock gave you till now more damage and tankyness? It is good that this damage is getign reduced. And wow, ap leona jungle. which runs aftershock. there you coulda lready go aerie or comet.

to your 1). Inspiration with Magical Footwork, Perfect Timing, Biscuit Delivery, Hextech Flashtraption, Cosmic Insight, Celestial Body, Unsealed Spellbook and Klepto (klepto not important for supports) is basicly a must for many champions and especialy supports. Just cause oyu don't pick ti doesn't eman it is not strong. You can look up the whole lcs/lck games. You can look up at streams, probuilds, champion.gg, it is the strognest right now. Unsealed Spellbook is currently a strong option cause you can switch between tp, ignite, exhaust, cleanse or heal. Not saying Aftershock is still dominant but Spellbook is an alternative.

  1. How? You have Transcendence, item 3158 , item 3067 at level 10? this would still be just 30%. Considering most Supports don't even go ionian boots,e ven if they would go transendence (which msot don't go), there is no way you finish 40% cdr lv10. In fact even to the end of the game depending on the items there is a chance that you not even reach the 40% with fullbuild. Apsupports? Yea, heal/shieldsupports probably reach that but tanksupports settle most times (without transcendence) aroudn 30%. Ofc this can and probably will change with next patch sightstone no longer be a seperate item (an item that didn't give cdr). If someone fuses currently sightstone with targons he probably reached with items the 40%cdr but by having ruby and face of the mountain probably not.

6/7) i already explaiend why the damage is more anoyng at botlane. This damageloose is not tiny. Maybe on toplane it gets more problematic with that change, can't say much to that role but on botlane the damagelosoe probably feels better to play against with the increased tankyness cause again: DAMAGE KILLS PEOPLE. TANKSUPPORTS DON'T GET FOCUSED MUCH.

PS: I don't say that these armor/mr changes are balanced. Could probably be that these get nerfed slightly again enxt patch. I just say it is a step in the right direction cause everyone was complaining about that a Tankrune did the most damage of all keysrunes/runes.

Azadethe1 votes

item 3057 item 3114 item 3096 item 3024 = 40% CDR. That's how I've generally started out Nami for 2 years.

Medallion = most reliable, safe gold farmer, and if you get it as soon as you get 350g, you gain about 325 more gold by 10 minutes, and depending on kills/assists, more. It's very viable, and costs a total of 3,550G.

I do this specifically on Nami, because her kit is all about landing CC and access to R more often. I have such early access to R spam that it generally turns the game for my teams. I play Nami more like a hunter than passive laner because of it. Helps me snowball tops, snowball mids, and jungs, when adc is doing poorly.

Häxel1 votes

but we talked about tanksupports, who go normaly targons and not nami (who isn't a aftershockuser). Also what are you gonna build with that? item 3025 and item 3504 /item 3222 /item 3107 ? Thats not even a standardbuild and these were the foundation of the discussion, not some cheesy special builds. Yea, nami can reach 40 Cdr but doesn't even need the iceborn if you just take the 3item 3114 + suppitem. But just for getting 40% cdr 4 not finished items feels not worth. Also i doubt you can finish even these 4 items before min 10 and also you ditch sightstone which is not cool (at least for people like you the fusioned sightstone was made). As Tanksupport ofc you could go item 3067 , item 3114 , item 3024 and item 3096 for early 40%cdr and finish these to item 3109 , item 3107 , item 3050 and item 2302 but again, tanksupports normaly go item 3097 if they are not selfish cause oyu can heal your adc with that. Also finished items are better as unfinished items. Only maybe Blitzcrank or Thresh could go that if you think you need the 40%cdr for the grab/hook (also thresh next patch is maybe a better coin user after rangehealnerfs on targons so that adcs no longer go that).

Azadethe1 votes

  1. I have a 70% nami win rate and have for 4 years. I don't give a damn what anyone calls a "Standard build" or "Cheesy build."

  2. If it's viable, I do indeed go Iceborne. Iceborne controls games more than any of the items you're calling "standard builds." It allows you to apply both a slow to yourself and your adc, not just vice versa, is a large mana pool to reduce issues, and 20% cdr and lots of armor to counter early game ganks/adcs. Furthermore, for all its Utility, it's CHEAP.

And, on a Transcendence build, Iceborne results in AP.

  1. You need to really research your CDR items. item 3114 Is a UNIQUE PASSIVE on the CDR. In other words, it does not stack CDR.

  2. I don't know how many times I have to reiterate this: Redemption and Mikhaels are not nearly as strong as an actual AP build, and gets in the way of grabbing an item 3174 . Furthermore, item 3174 Cancels out item 3222 's passive (read them). The heal/shield power stacking gives barely smaller heals than an AP build, and completely cripples the rest of an enchanter's kit. Sona or Nami on Active items = always catchable, low damage, low heals. The ONLY thing they gain from a Active item build is the rare occasion to global cast, which is unreliable, and a way to cleanse a teammate whose cc'd. In reality, Redemption is completely wasted 95% of the time, even in high elo play, because actions happen faster than it activates, and often the heal doesn't even create a play. Mikhaels doesn't do much considering its 120 base second cooldown. On Nami and Sona, it's better to just pump AP + Athene's and Censer and actually play a role in the fights other than a CC bot. You can reduce Mikhael's active time, but it's still not reliable enough, and again, Athene's disables one of its passives.

Athene's is INSANELY more powerful than item 3222 item 3504 item 3107 ; It has no cooldown, and can sometimes activate TWICE on the same skill (Nami's Q when cast on an ally, will bounce to an enemy, and if the damage is high enough, will fully charge, and also heal the full amount on the SECOND ally bounce).

This is especially important when pointing out: Nami's bounces do less when your AP is under 180. Porting AP items early results in much better bounce results, fuels your Aery, and keeps you running fast enough that no one can catch you.

  1. Sightstone is a bait trap. It's proven. While Vision is a godsend, sticking it with exclusively support results in predictable motions. When you purchase a sightstone, you are going to use them. When you use them, there is a Jungler with a item 3341 ready to erase it for gold. After about 10 minutes, they also have a item 3147 to clear more. Not only that, Supports are notorious for getting killed warding. And all of this is 100% predictable. River bush becomes a war of the support wards; Whoever is the biggest bully owns it, Pinks it, and farms 3-4 Wards you place in attempts to gain vision.

If you overward, your jungler and mid generally get the signal where is safe/unsafe, and often make horrible decisions. They often go through where they see your wards, which might very well be counter warded. In Pro play, that means someone is hiding around the corner waiting for that ganker to make a move.

Furthermore, most snowballing games aren't decided by wards. They are decided by a poorly equipped team going in and getting baited in a jungle fight vs champs which excel in tight corridors like Annie Katarina Kayn Twitch and it usually happens because someone warded "some" but the enemy still had a vantage point.

If I'm duo'd with an adc I trust, if they request it, I get wards. If I believe I have to carry a team, I don't. Otherwise it's an 800g Burden for someone who has perfect map awareness (I advise others to have map awareness over warding too).

For what it's worth, I'll probably lean toward buying the new Tier 3 simply because it's like 400g cheaper, but I won't spam the wards. I generally know what gets players to do dumb things.

  1. I just played my most recent Nami game to frustrating results. I chose Nami into Vi Leona Kalista Varus Gangplank (All but the GP should be a Nami counter)

It was a Norms game on an alt level 30. Unfortunately, the Vi is someone with a really high MMR's smurf account, with between 75-100% win rates, and my team just fed her like a champ. She was 7/0 by level 6 or so.... She took a special interest in bot and my Jhin who kept walking right into Leona E's and walking curiously close to the river even though warded. Every time Leona landed an E, Vi was there. I'd bubble both, and Jhin escaped like 11 times. This is pretty much what happened the entire game: Fed Vi trying to operate, trying to pull a 20/0 game, and every time, My ult was up, Q was up, and I had heals on board. I prevented over 24 deaths.

Unfortunately, my team really wanted to lose, and kept going right back in after i shut down entire team engages. Vi got up to 13/2/8, and the Veigar mid went 10/4/2.

I only died 4 times the entire game: mostly to Jhin walking up and becoming a R jump point for Vi, and then bringing Vi close to me. Only died once from a self made error, where I rounded a corner.

Vi and Leona only landed 31/34 cc. I landed 46 on Nami, and all of them were ult interrupts/post ult stuns. Was also basically 2v5, because norms.

I built exactly what I've built for 4 years. And dominated a fed Vi in plays. Dominated a fed Leona in plays. (bot lane resulted in a total of 3 kills; all Jhin)

If I went what you call the "Meta" I would have died 8-10 times.

Häxel1 votes
  1. Your profile shows no games but a 54% namiwinrate. I ask myself: is this 70% winrate on normals? otherwise with 70% on rankeds you would be already challenger or not?
  2. I don't know if you didn't quite udnerstadn me but i didn't say you should build item 3114 3 times. Is said you could buy the3 items amde out of item 3114 . All buildpathcdr items item 3133 , item 3108 , item 3114 , item 3024 , item 3067 , item 3101 have unique cdr, but most times if you upgrade them it vanishes. Still unique and unique name are diffrent things meaning that you can build item 3114 , item 3504 , item 3222 , item 3107 and would get 40% cdr, but going item 3114 item 3114 item 3114 item 3114 would only give 10% cdr.

I know that item 3174 cancels item 3222 but i didn#t say to build both. YOu can buy one or buy both or buy none of it, idc. All of it has it pros and cons

4/5) Wow. Yea sure, vision doesn't win games. Meanwhile if you have no control of Baron or Dragon, the adc can't even solo farm a lane or take red/blue buff without having to fear that an assassin kills you. Especialy with your nami build. Heal/shielditems at least increase the chance of survival yb either having actives or increasing passivly your abilitys. Iceborn Gauntlet would do nothing to protct the adc adc from a rengar/zed/talon/shaco/twitch etc. You say redemption is wasted by 95% of the time and most wards get cleared, which is bullshit. Nothing is proofen onw asted gold. It woulnd't be build all the time plat above if it was proofen that it was wasted gold. You have no statistic for that. Sry if i can't find the links anymore but from riot self or some analysts it showed that redemption hit at least more as 50% if the time (and most of that necesary) and from allw ards there are less than 50% geting cleared over all (low clear number early, higher number late). So it makes definetly a diffrence if you place 2 wards and 1 gets cleared or you place 5 and maybe 2 geting cleared. Also they most times get not cleared directly after. Till that happens you still got vision and know there they headed if you keep an eye on the map. And Gold the enemy would get from clearded wards is still so much less as gold they would get from kills as a result of a gank or the goldvalue of a Dragon/Baron.

3/6)I don't know if you play frontlinenami and need that armor of iceborn and the slow and i don't realy care what you build as long as you are the minority of people who build like that. Just saying that if you want to build full ap, ok, not optimal but ok: If you already ahve the ap to give stronger w heals, e slows and movementspeed from your passive: why you even need the slow of iceborn? If you stay behind in the backline and already hit your bubble on diving enemies, why you need the icebornslow? You know that slows don't stack? lv 4 e without ap already slows as much as iceborn. Ult slows far, far more. The only time iceborn would be usefull is if ult and e are on cd and you use w auto. At that point you already play frontline nami. Also pointing ot that slows in general are not that strong of a stat. You don't see many champions with item 3116 , item 3022 , item 3025 and the majority of the people doesn't build item 3092 on any Ap support too. Just on Ap Junglers it gets build high elo currently lul. Why you need the Armor? A backline Nami would stay behind the adc and the assassinns/divers normaly want to focus the adc. They don't focus you (unless you are a realy anoying soraka, potentialy already lowlife from w heal). Even if your adc dies the armor doesn't help you much probably cause most times there is no chance you will kill the enemy before he kills you. If this happens, it would happen with every build. I have played Nami much too and got many kills just by hitting by ult, q, kitting with w and e. And didn't need much ap or resistances for that. Also you could look at any statistic side: For all supports the normal shield/heal build has highest popularity AND highest winrate. probably for a reason. And if you look up at probuilds for example, the supports tend to not have many deaths either. Probably cause they play more backlneorientated. Again, if you want to play frontlinenami and want to buy an item, which is only usefull after w cast and by playing frontline nami. Feel free. I can't forbid you that. Considering we talked about Aftershock and you felt the change would be to strong and after we discussed who would be aftershockabusers we drifted to the extreme Point of Transcendence iceborn nami, at one point you even said you use aery, it is probably clear that you don't have to add much more to aftershock.

Azadethe1 votes
  1. I've already had the conversations about this account on this very page.

There's only 28 games on this account, and they were all during rush hour October, where no game really was same elo players, because mostly it was Booster duos and indignant trolls. The majority of my games on this account were really just trying to learn the new Evelynn.

I have 4 accounts.

2)They problem with upgrading is that costs more gold. 40% CDR on base items = 3550G. On Completed items, you're talking 7000g

  1. I feel like I'm beating a drum.

a) I'm not anti vision. But I'm aware of its limitations and risks. It is NOT a must buy for a support; If anything, it's more reliable on a Jungler, and it doesn't set them back, unless the believe in must have Chilling smite. I do ward drakes and barons, but by them buying is more viable, and I generally save wards for those times. Everyone has on board wards, after all.

b) Healing/Shield items DO NOT enhance your abilities more than AP. If you actually sit down and do the math, an Active vs AP build result in the same or slightly lower heals on the Active build. NOT MORE. That's how Nami and Sona are scaled. Furthermore, if you do NOT have the AP, Nami's W third bounce will do less heals, not more that if you had AP, and the damage bounce will do not much at all. Her passive will give little move speed at all, which means all her skills are inherently affected by not having AP, in addition to losing their scaling/

Active effects from Redemption and Mikhael's are limited, and long durations, and more importantly, detract from actually using your skills, unless you're running scripts. It's far more viable to bubble an enemy, heal a friend, that to pop a Mikhaels and hope your adc just gets away. You can't do that all at once manually. They also do nothing to protect an adc from those junglers you mentioned. Redemption has a delay, by which time the adc is already dead. Mikhaels won't stop the damage they take.

c) They get built because people don't try to break metas at high elos, and often still do things that are risk averse. Also, Plat + generally have an escape if they do get caught. It took players about 6 months to adopt the Ardent Censer meta. We're still trying to figure out Duskblade ward detection + Zombie wards + Ghost poros + meta with surplus vision. The fact Duskblade can Zombie a ward is insane, and half wards getting eaten is huge, and at least at bot lane; Yes. They do kill them right after they are placed.

d) I generally back lane in lane unless there is a REASON for me to be front line. Support is controlled by the mage meta, which doesn't treat a front line Nami kindly. However; Iceborne counters Jhin ults, counters AD ganks, gets you CDR earlier so you can get more W's off, and mid/post lane it a) allows better Nami farming. b) allows for better front line optioning, c) Charges transcendence d) gives supplementary Mana e) helps counter chases or runners more than just self casting E (you cast that on the nearest damage dealer).

Yes. Only 1 Slow applies, but that's an auxilery goal. The Primary is the Armor and CDR, mana, and Transcendence AP. And, sometimes the person you E is not attacking. and isn't aoe. And, it's useful if you DO have a situation where you need to solo, or you are the only person available to prevent a base push. Nami's kit sucks at clearing minions, and Iceborne helps.

Slows don't last! if you've every played vs Tenacity, you know this. Sheen proc slows help address this issue.

It's basically a replacement for item 3110 If you really aren't worried about that extra 35 Armor.

P.S.Zyra Morgana Rumble Karthus Heimerdinger Fiddlesticks Brand all religiously build Rylai's.

There's also several champs who core Frozen Mallet. Tryndamere Yasuo XinZhao Udyr Shyvana Olaf MasterYi Gnar to name a few.

Ice borne is the most common of them all!.

e) Armor is sometimes live or die, namely laning Draven Ezreal Twitch Jhin . Having ~ 180 Armor vs these these champs and 350-500 AP is usually MUCH better than having 60 Armor and 560 AP. That also applies softly to those assassins, Vi Ganks (1 denting blows isn't the end of the world), Rengar or Shacos. Your adc can't reliably tank these exchanges, but you as a support can, especially if you heal out of it.

f) Aftershock. I'm Seriously thinking about using it on Zyra just because of those few counters she has who can just destroy her even if she hits skills. It could buy her enough time to get a second Q out after Ring someone like Riven, who attempts a quick assassination. Nami I probably wouldn't, because I like having access to Domination too much. I could go Resolve/Sorcery, and gain a serious tankiness on Nami, but it would be trading off Ravenous Hunter. Ravenous Hunter is Godly on Nami when coupled with her own heals. Without it, my average per game deaths might increase by 1. But yeah. Most supports are who don't really already use it aren't candidates for aftershock. Bruisers/Fighters/Juggernauts, and a couple adc's are though.

AsbachAlex1 votes

to your ps: Core? I believe on some of these mages you can buy it maybe but not core. Rylais is currently sow eak you not even see Karthus buying that. Also the Frozen Mallet champs where you named a few: I believe you named a few to much seeing only the half of these champions just buying sometimes mallet: Tryndamere , XinZhao , Udyr Olaf like never realy buy this item. On Udyr probably even iceborn would be ebtter (but msot times you see trinity on him. And he decides either for armor and slow or for speed and damage, not going trintiy and malelt). Same xin, would probably be a a better iceborn champ considering he buys either trintiy or bc most times. The guy above said most champs don't buy these and even with oyur listed ones that would be like quite less out of over 30 amges or over 50 melees.

3b) well if i did the math correct with item 3504 + item 3222 + item 3107 + reviatlize rune you have 45% healpower. ardent + eye of the watchers would give roughly 100ap. the 4 items would cost 8700 gold. The heal from a nami w without reviatlize under 40% health bonus from nami having that rune would heal 311.75 health. A nami without any healpower would need 422.5 ap. Good luck to get that much ap with that amount og gold. Sounds like a full ap build. The luckiest you would be with eye of the watchers + full stacked item 3041 + item 3089 + item 1052 for the same amount of ap and 7835 gold (eye of the watcher is on both builds as starting item for gold generation and 40ap, so its costs are on both). Yea, just the 25 stacks mejais with a cost effiezienty of 273,48% would give you an equal heal for less gold. But considering you say you don't like to be squishy or you die a few times and even with armor you die a few times: a) hetting and holding 25 stacks is realy hard and b) with buying the item 3025 for more tankyness and less risk to loose stacks you need to add 2700 gold, which would make even this lucky case more expensive as the heal/shield build. Ofcourse you coudl add iceborn to that build too for costs but on that build even if you die you would not loose effizienty while on the ap mejais build you would. Also c) mejais+rabadons+tome ocourse give you much ap that increases far more damage too (300 more ap ca). But on the otherhand it is just ap, no additional stats or effects. Considering you get from the 3 healitems more cdr, manareg, healthreg, magig resist, movementspeed, health, attackspeed and onhit for youa dn the one who got healed, an additional heal, cc immunity, it is clear that even if you could get an euqal heal for equal gold (which you can't), you even get additional goldeffizienty important/strong for a peeling support. So ofcourse not only the pros but also the majority of the player buy these items for te 2 reasons: Beeing actualy more cost effizient for heals and giving even more stats good for supports too.

Azadethe1 votes

On 3)

  1. 45% implies you go Resolve

  2. Anywho,

Your build on 4 items:

60 + 0 + 0 + 35 AP + 9 = 104 AP.

W on 4 items:

First Ebb: 317.814 Heal Second Ebb: 260.85 Damage Third Ebb: 270.1419 heal

Total heal: 587.9559 Heal

Now, I want you to Consider this:

item 3504 item 3174 item 3040 item 2302 (Since we're going to lose Tier 3)

My build on 4 items:

60 + 30 (30) + 80 (51) = AP Seraph add on is 51 AP at level 9 Mana, increased slightly as levels go up, with just these 4 items.

Assuming you went Sorcery/Resolve, that's a total of pre transcendence, pre gathering storm 251 AP.

That puts your Heal at:

First Ebb: 300.64 (Pre item 3174 ) Second Ebb: 421.2675 Damage Third Ebb: 410.3872 + 121 Heal from item 3174 (Unavoidable)

Total Pre item 3174 Heal: 832 Heal

If your R and Q pre charged Athene's, it will do a total of 1,039 Heals.

Net Gains: 244/451 Depending on it Athene's charged or not.

Cost weighting:

8700g

VS

9400g

Mine costs 700G more.

Per heal heal efficiency:

Yours: .06758 Heal per Gold.

Mine: Between .0885106 and .1105319 heal per gold.

My heal on average is 47.26 % more efficient than yours at 4 items (and it doesn't take longer to get there, because a Medallion based Gold source gives more gold than a item 2301 Based path, AND it's 300g cheaper. (It never goes on cooldown because you kill minions, and gives 40g per champ assist/takedown, vs item 2301 being prone to always needing to constantly be in battle, kill no minions, and only gains additional gold from attacking turrets, and is prone to champs like Brand Velkoz Making using it properly impossible).

Now, you might understand my item 3025 A little better. I don't always rush it. I do when needed. But it's a source of 500 Mana, which translates into another 15 AP, and on Transcendence it overcaps CDR, and gives me 40 AP for a total of a 55 AP item. That puts that measly 251 AP up to 306 AP, which adds another 3.75% onto my Heal Bounce Bonus, increases the damage, etc. Frozen Heart adds less AP due to the 100 less Mana, but sometimes is also a viable option.

As a last item I often choose one of the following: item 3111 item 3117 item 3089 item 3165 item 3100 , depending on the team I'm facing.

If they are a fast team with low AD output, I'll sac the Iceborne and put in 2 Mobility sources (boots + either Lich or Luden's). If they don't have a fast and aggressive champ like Udyr , i won't even get boots because I don't need them (306 AP makes Nami's passive boost move speed 121; That's usually enough to get away from anything if you're an ace at bubbling, especially if you have multiplicative move speed items like item 3504 item 3100 )

**Also, it's important to note: I did this comparison at level 9 Nami, not a level 18. Your Active item build will not scale to levels. The Athene I was using is only 179 Heal base because of level 9. At 18, the heals are much higher, and Nami has more mana, boosting the Seraph more, and possibly more mana/AP items boosting the heals even higher. ** It's not uncommon when I'm near full build to have some 970 Heals PER EBB.

Also, keep in mind, I didn't include Transcendence in my math or Gathering Storm. Gathering Storm would affect both builds equally, but Transcendence favors my build, as yours only has 50% CDR, and mine potentially has 80-90%.

Something else to consider:

8.2 patch Nerfs Healing/Shield Power. Censer is going to be 8%, Mikhael's is 15%, and Redemption 7%. You're going to lose 10% of your multiplier soon. I'm going to only lose 2%.

AsbachAlex1 votes

Also how i calculate it: Your Build that gives you 251 ap (it is more of 250ap but ok i calculate with that. beside lul, full stacked seraph lv 9 on support. i already get confused on your whole build as you first said few paragraphs before you go item 3057 item 3301 item 3114 item 3024 for 40%cdr and now you add athenes and full stacked seraph to add for high ap). First ebb pre athenes with 251ap and 15 healpower (cause you went reviatlize onr esolve too?): 299.345 heal: Now what does namis w say? "each bounce being 85% (+ 7.5% per 100 AP) as effective as the previous one." I don't know how you come to increased heal or damage cause that just starts at 300ap (85%+15% for 200ap=100%, no decrease, no increase). Above on my items you got it calculated right, why not here? so second ebb: 355.5 damage. third ebb: 299.345 heal. Now your athenes: " Gain 25% of the premitigation damage dealt to champions as Blood Charges, up to 100 - 250 (based on level). Healing or shielding another ally consumes charges equal to 100% of the heal or shield, to heal them, up to the original effect amount." even with your wrong number that would only be 105.3 heal. but with 355.5 damage that would be just 88.875 heal. HOLD ON: 355.5 damage is jsut the damage you would deal if your target has 0 magic resistant. The actual damage you would deal is far less and with that the heal too. Maybe i didn't get somethign right but i believe the athenes heal is far less greater as you think youc calculate right.

GayFluffyUnicorn1 votes

And the damage never was the problem :^) The early resistance IS the problem. But hey riot hears us toplane mains. Finally even the most bronze player can dive me at level 3 on mao+jungler or a tank jungler who suddenly goes under turret with 200 armor+toplaner. Rek, sej, rammus, zac, jarvan can all carefree dive now. This is a ridiculous change.

Pika Fox1 votes

The early resistances arent that big of an issue, really. It requires hard CC, which means youre going to be engaging, and most people that take this are support tanks who are relatively squishy or only have burst defenses, and are going into melee range.

Daddy Ants2 votes

{quoted}

pbe change that probably comes to live wednesday: Armor and MR changed from [20 + 30% ] to [70 - 120] Explosion damage lowered from [40 - 140 (+3.5% of your max health)] to [10 - 120 (3% of your max health)(+15% of your bonus attack damage)(+10% of your ability power)

Also saying CoC was relatively well balanced is itself a joke.

CoC after the nerfs it got was fairly balanced.

Pre-Nerf CoC was not.

LordGeovanni1 votes

Pre nerf CotC was fine it 40 second coolodown that didnt scale down why should you as a tank have your shield burst through in 1.5 seconds when its only up for 4 seconds and you have to hard cc the enemy to activate it aka its useless for at least half the time its up. It should have forced Burst champions to hold their burst until after the shield went away but they complained, 'Riot why couldnt i burst through this shield and still do half the champs health' and riot went okay my bad and made the shield scale less and nerf the base shield and nerfed the shield up time. they did let its cooldown then scale down but they didnt put it to 15 or even 20 seconds so you could at least dream about using it twice in a team fight. Because the effect of CotC was more akin to Stormraiders Surge in strength than TLD

Oakleaf Ranger3 votes

After shock is much healthier for the game while courage was arguably op/broken. Before the cool down and shield nerfs everyone that could take courage was (at least in lane) because of how much damage it blocked in trades from both a champion and the minion wave. After that tweaks and nerfs the only champions who took it were tank supports and tank junglers. And even then it was only taken by junglers or supports who could hard initiate on multiple opponents at while getting up on them since the shield strength depended on how many champions are around you when you hard CC someone.

That ended up really limiting the number of champions who use the keystone unlike aftershock which does a similar job without being extremely niche.

Its the reason Blitzcrank can finally go down the resolve tree as his main without having a useless keystone in the mid to late game.

Sire Hippington2 votes

People complain that resolve tree sucks balls, but the reality is that it only sucks balls for non tank melees who got shafted by so many rune changes this season. Aftershock alone makes the resolve tree for tanks.

A single busted keystone is not the entier tree. Grasb is ok but not great and very matchup dependent, guardian is only good for tank supports, Demolish is kinda busted but at the same time rather unneeded, towers drop fast enough without it aswell, and the other options are rather underwhelming. The 3 'resistance-runes' are all lackluster, conditioning feels like the only decent and it still is pretty disapointning on any non tank as it needs some stacked up reseistances to give a good value after the 10 min wait. Overgrowth needs to long to have any impact and only works well on HP stackers, Second wind is ok in lane but rather poor later on, and Revitalize can be great on a few very heal/shield focused champs but isn't to strong all in all.

Really, if you take away aftershock and demolish, who would go resolve? Maybe a few tank supports and some desperate that want tankiness which they only can get there.

GayFluffyUnicorn1 votes

Grasp is completely overpowered. Guardian isnt good design at all and toxic as fuck. ADCs dont need even more shields and movement speed bursts.

The rest of the rune tree sucks ass. 5 armor+6mr are a joke. Only conditioning is kinda well i get SOMETHING but needs too long to stack up so i take it by default or leave it in shitty matchups.

Overgrowth is great but getting a measily 100 health after 20+ mins of farming is a bit meh.

Second wind is just way too good on champs whose counterplay is to get poked out of lane+dshield and rather meh on everything else.

Dont know if even anyone takes unflinching or whatever that shit is called. Font of life idk on tank supports i suppose but they run demolish anyways to kill botlane turret in 5 mins.

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