The Aatrox Rework is not bad and actually might be broken!
ABOUT ME.
I am a Aatrox main since season 3 and once made it to the 46th Best Aatrox Player during the preseason of season 5! Recently I stopped playing Aatrox though and moved to Kled + other champs because I thought my Aatrox was dead and forgotten but now with Riot remembering that Aatrox is a champion it makes me want to come back to Aatrox.
WHY THESE CHANGES ARE REALLY GOOD? (FIRST PARAGRAPH IS WHAT I THINK MAKES HIM OP)
His passive + Steraks Gage gives him a total of 172.5 base damage! That is more than Mordekaiser who currently has the highest base damage at 146! So why is this good? Triforce & Steraks will be a better item on him than anyone else! SPELLBLADE +Steraks will do 250% of 172.5 or during Steraks Fury 300% of 172.5!! That's 431.25 additional damage from sheen proc and during Steraks Fury it will do a additional 517.5 damage! While he does have to reach Blood Rush to achieve this it will be **EXTREMELY **useful because Sheen Procs with Lifesteal and with the new Blood Thirst Changes you can expect him to heal a lot! The Phage from Triforce will also give him MS to stick on his targets aswell
His Q now scales with flat AD instead of bonus AD so maxing this last will not hurt us as much even with the base damage nerf. Also because the 10% HP Cost is now gone he will not be killing himself by jumping in. I shouldnt have to use 200-300 hp to jump into a fight with weak base stats and a heal thats only effective when below 50% HP.
His W healing is super good now due to the missing HP being part of his scaling and the base stats being increased. Like I said before with Lifesteal and a spellblade proc you will be healing alot without the W so this helps you out even more! (Don't forget Spirit Visage helping out too!)
A lot of people are complaining about this but the E changes are very good, Scaling + Base Damage has been increased for better poke and people are upset that his E is now being turned into physical damage than magic damage but here are the 2 reasons why its better that its physical damage. 1.) E and you can apply Black Clever with it now 2.) Most Tanks built Merc Treads or Spirit Visage anyway making Aatrox E useless anyways being magic damage and most players run scaling magic resist anyways so now being able to build Armor pen means you can make your damage count in the mid to late game instead of it being good only early game.
Problems I think Aatrox will have or still have after this Buff/Rework.
Aatrox's main problem is that his Q is unreliable, easily interrupted, short ranged, and slow. I would hope Riot makes his Q knock up regardless of being in the center of the hitbox OR make it like a Rek'Sai W. Also I wish they made it faster for him to land down and give him a extra 150-200 range on his Q.
Aatrox will still be gold dependent because the items he likes are very expensive and his kit is going to rely on his items for his power spike but I do believe that when he does get his Triforce and Steraks he will be a lot better.
Crowd Controlling Aatrox will still be his weakness because he is a auto attack champion that has to get into your face allowing him to get hit by more CC and stopping him. This weakness is REALLY GOING TO HURT DURING HIS BLOOD RUSH if you CC him then run away then reengage once the blood rush runs off.
WHAT I EXPECT HIS ITEM PATH WILL BE.
ANYWAYS THANK YOU FOR READING AND THANK YOU RIOT FOR REMEMBERING MY CHAMPION! KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK!
