What I want preserved and changed in Zyra and Vel'Koz

In regards to the mid-year Mage update, I would like to discuss why I love these two champions in particular and what I would like to see preserved with their changes. I've always found these two out of the six to be the most fun and interesting, and have a decent amount of potential, especially Zyra.

Vel'Koz

In regards to Vel'Koz, I absolutely love him, one of my favorite mages. However, I do think he has a couple of issures. These issues mainly being what exactly does he do and what is he better at than other people. Whenever I play him, I feel like I just another poking mage, and at that point, I'm wondering how am I much different than another poking mage like say...Xerath. The things that make Vel'Koz stand out to me the most are his passive and his ultimate. He's the only mage with a consistent amount of true damage, outside of Ahri, so he can get through targets with a good amount of magic resist more easily. And his ult is the only one of it's kind in terms of how it's controlled. His Q is also pretty unique in the ways it's controlled and aimed. His W and E are pretty lackluster in terms what they do though. His W just feels like a generic waveclear and his E just feels like a generic CC. Yeah, they can combo with his ultimate and whatnot, but them by themselves don't really seem to standout or do anything cool on their own. His Ult and Q feel cool and special to use, but his W and E just...don't. The only reason I would pick Vel'Koz outside of how much fun I think he is is his true damage and decent kiting ability. But that's honestly it, and I could pick other champs if I wanna kite from long range, like Lux for instance. And if I wanted to focus on poking, I could pick Xerath and do it from a safer distance. He doesn't really have that one "identity" that's his and his alone. So I would like to see changed with Vel'Koz is mainly his W and E to make them more fun and engaging than just generic waveclear and CC. He's kinda like this guy that wants to outsmart you with his Q and dissemble you with his passive after he learns you move and play and lands his abilities. Maybe make it so that each ability has different effects depending on the number of passive stacks he has on his targets? I don't really know, I'm not reallyl here to suggest changes myself.

Zyra

Zyra I've always adored since he release just due to her plant interactions. Just spawning them and ulting afterwards to supercharge them felt great, and landing snare -> slowing plant -> Q -> normal plant felt great to do. This is why I think Zyra should just be more focused on plants in general. Right now, she doesn't really feel like she's played because of that unique aspect of her though. She's moreso played because of her high CC and disengage, as well her ability to do insane damage as a bully. Although the plants do a lot of damage, it feels like it's moreso the CC doing the work and overshadowing the plants. Yeah, the CC enables the plants to do damage, but then the focus isn't really on the plants themselves though. What I would like to see from Zyra changes is just a shift to a more plant focused playstyle. Her high CC does feel like a good part of her, but if the focus is moreso on plants, I would imagine she would be more zone control heavy, keeping people at play with intimidating plants. I also like that the plants are different depending on the ability used on them, and that they get an effect from being in her ultimate. She already has a decent amount of interaction with her plants, I would just like to see it emphasized more. It'd be cool if her abilities not only spawned plants, but also had effects on plants that are already spawned. So like if her Q spawns the Thorn Splitter or whatever it's called, like what it does now, but if it's used on a pre-existing Thorn Splitter, it increased their range or something. So Zyra would have to decide to make new plants or buff the ones that are already spawned. I dunno, just something random I just came up with. Overall, I'd say she does have a lot of potential, it'd be cool to see a forest come to life whenever Zyra appeared on the map.

I'm confident though that the changes will be for the best and that they'll preserve who the champions are currently. One thing I am curious about though, I'm kinda surprised that Annie isn't one of the mages being looked out. I feel like she's pretty old and outdated and could use some work.