Balancing lethality items

Terminuest·Mar 6, 2017·4 votes·804 views

Hi there, so when Riot tried to buff assassins and their items, they made adcs extremely strong with lethality build. I play adc, and its not just I dont wanna go with the flow. The thing that bothers me is that armor becomes useless against such build, especially if you're playing some squishy role and you build one defensive item with some armor as defense, but you're still being melted in a matter of second by enemies damage. Sure it works for you aswell but it became really easy to kill tank-type champions and I havent seen successful adc with old-school builds like infinity edge, shiv/dancer/dapidfire, some lifesteal, maybe Essence reaver for some champs etc... why build them if you do insane dmg with lethality items even if enemy team has no tanky champions? -_- )

So what I was thinking about, maybe it would come to more balance if damage offered by lethality items would be nerfed, and those items would become something like utility items, like attack speed items with some nice passives, or movement speed or armor/mr... In this case adcs wont rush those and be one-shot machines, and tanks would be tanky again.

Of course this will be indirect nerf to ad assassins like Talon, Zed, Kha etc... but if adjusted right, it can be good thing for them to choose you wanna do less base dmg but you'll be penetrating tanks, or you wanna go flat ad (maybe with a little bit of penetration) and melt squishis, while doing nothing to tanks.

Just interested in your opinions guys/girls. I'd love to know what you think about all those things

5 Comments

AimléssMar 6, 20173 votes

You seem maybe a bit new to the game, but I see 3 things wrong with what you're saying.

Armor is actually pretty good against lethality items, since without armor you nearly take true damage from a full lethality assasin, where with armor though it would penetrate your armor, you will still be reducing more of the damage.
Assassins aren't here for utlility, nor are they for killing tanks. They are only meant to kill squishies, which is why their items penetrate greatly into targets with low armor, and don't make as much of a dent into high armor targets.
Assassin items can't be used for utility purposes because assassins don't need utility they need to be able to melt squishies, nothing more, which is why I don't see why Riot doesn't nerf the lethality of these items, but increase their flat damage, so fed lethality users won't be melting tanks at all.

TerminuestMar 6, 20171 votes

I was talking about marksman champions, and those champions surely melt tanks for now.

I am playing League for 3.5 years already. But it never was so unfair about marksmans with old builds vs marksmans with lethality build, like if you play MF with normal build, you can win only if you're really ahead and finish before late game, cause no matter what, if it comes to late game, enemy marksman with lethality will probably 2-3 shot you when both of you will be full build

SmitemuffinMar 7, 20171 votes

Wrong. Even Riot admitted the exact opposite thing when they said they were trying to balance it by buffing to try and get people to stop stacking lethality and kill tanks that way
Also wrong. Assassins have among the best utility in the game. Being an assassin means having huge burst and the utility to reach a target and/or escape :

Akali has the only refreshing invisibility Camille has the undisputed best engage and lockdown in the game across 2 spells and yet has so much damage she functions as an assassin despite Riot trying to convince people she's a Fighter/Tank Ahri can engage skirmishes with Charm and even frequently is picked in pro level for her ability to do this Ekko AoE stun and one of the best re-engage spells in the game. Clears waves more easily and safely than almost every champ designed to clear waves Evelynn Engages teamfights and forces the entire enemy team to completely change how they play the game just because she's been picked Fizz Engage and the best dodge spell in the game hands-down Katarina blink blink blink blink blink blink blink - kat in a 5-second window Leblanc can gank anywhere on the map from anywhere on the map Nidalee has traps and heal spam/attack speed buff Nocturne literally blocks all vision outside a small proximity of him Riven double AoE stuns and large AoE execute Shaco Traps, clone and dash/invisibility Yasuo windwall was one of the most overpowered spells in the game when he was released and in many ways still is

Again, wrong. and are two of the highest utility items in the game. I have no idea how you arrived at the conclusion that they aren't, but whoever told you these things is making it up