Tristana, and why she is so anti-fun.

Astral Duck··14 votes·4,117 views

So, let's get this started shall we?

  • If she has a long range/ hard cc support (Which is everywhere right now in the meta.), she doesn't have to worry about her weak point (1-9) Because she still deals high amounts of damage with her W and E, also the auto attack speed steroid.
  • Her range scales to the point nobody can reach her if she has good positioning. (Well y'know besides the champions that are banned quite often, fun right?)
  • 900 range gap closer that slows and deals damage and it resets on kills/assists, no other ADC has that function when it comes to gap closers (Or any resets I think? Correct me if I'm wrong on this.)
  • Her ult knocks champions back ridiculous amiunts, 600/800/1000 units, deals decent damage and it only has a 60 second cooldown, also it's range scales with her passive.
  • Her E was nerfed recently which is good but it's still an easy 80 damage to get off at lvl 1 if the enemy even tries to go harass her.
  • She doesn't even really need a support, she can go to mid lane for cryin' out loud, so my first point is almost pointless unless she goes bottom lane.

70 Comments

FyshinaTux6 votes

She's a late game hyper-carry.

This usually means weakness early game. With Tristana, it's usually considered the lower CS she can get due to her Explosive Shot wrecking minion waves early, potentially messing up her CS due to minion damage.

That aside, she's a relatively safe pick due to her Rocket Jump (it's not JUST an engage/follow-up), and has really good harass with the active on her explosive shot (that is what it's called right?...).

So she's essentially a late game hyper-carry with a somewhat negligible weakness early game.

With other hyper-carries like vayne (as the example) you need the following:

High skill cap due to low range Insane positioning Ability to use Tumble to dodge The skill to hit the same target multiple times in a teamfight to get off your true damage

With Tristana, all you have to do is know when to hit your AS steroid and when you can/should/can't/shouldn't jump in/out. Positioning, while still important (as it is on EVERY champion in the game), is not AS big of a deal on Tristana due to her insane range.

Her entire kit is designed to be a hyper-carry, the issue is that it does it too well, with too few weaknesses.

The theory of "just dive her" doesn't work unless you can dive 3-4 times, once to get on her, once to get on her after her jump, once to get past the peel of her team, and once for her flash.) The theory of "kite her" is laughable with her range, and the theory of "outplay her" is laughable in all but the highest MMR games where flashing into a bush for vision superiority happens. In Bronze - Plat (obviously moreso the farther down you go), ADC trading/fighting basically consists of a 1v1 old fashioned duel format, with whatever CC the supports can bring to the table. You're not going to beat Tristana in that fight with her AS steroid and, in higher MMRs, her range.

Lumus Avatar4 votes

I think she's an early game hyper carry because, by level 2, she has her jump. Maybe I'm wrong, but that seems to be up quite frequently. (I'm so disgusted by the amount of power she has that you cannot convince me to ever play her.)

I main Ashe, and it seems level 2 hits, I'm under my tower and suddenly Tristana lands on my head and activates her AS boost. My two options are fight back and die or try to run and die. Whether or not she kills me in this tower dive (and she usually does) by the end, she's only taken 1-3 tower hits and is capable of using her jump again to escape the tower.

I don't understand why a champ with the ability to hard engage AND hard disengage also has crippling CC on the same move. Usually hard engages compensate for low damage, hard disengages compensate for low HP. I mean to say there's usually a weakness tied to it. Sure, she doesn't have high HP, she's a squishy ADC. But she can get in, kill you, and get out before she gets into any real danger.

It's not the champ's fault that a good player will bait out the Support's CC and then dive with impunity, but it's still annoying.

I just think a hard look needs to be taken at her kit and power scale. I agree with the general feel of this thread that something isn't quite right, but I don't have the experience and know how to make any suggestions.

FyshinaTux3 votes

My gawd... are you in Bronze V? Tristana should NEVER... NEVER... have her AS steroid at level 2... NEVER... at level 2...

Lumus Avatar4 votes

What bearing does league have on anything?

I'm talking about how Trist makes having fun exchanges and games difficult due to her low counterplay with the recently changes to ADC. If you want to talk about League rank, go talk to someone else. I place zero value on it and it does not affect my feeling about champs, abilities, power levels, or items.

FyshinaTux1 votes

League has every bearing to do with it. People play differently in higher leagues.

This means that the counterplay of low elo is "just kite Darius", whereas the counterplay in high elo is "kite, let him push, CC, receive proper ganks, roam".

I'm not saying that's exactly what counterplay is in high elo for Darius, just an example of the difference in counterplay between low elo and high elo. The same can be applied to Trist, in which case it's no longer Tristana that is anti-fun... it's the IE rush for ADCs that is anti-fun.

Lumus Avatar2 votes

Skill level still has little to do with the overbearing utility of her kit mixed with high damage and range. Assuming a low level exchange involving bot lane, 2 ADC and 2 Support, Tristana generally comes out ahead in the exchange. I attribute this to a highly aggressive kit that is difficult to counter at any level of play during the early game.

Terrorpaw6 votes

What bearing does league have on anything?

I'm talking about how Trist makes having fun exchanges and games difficult due to her low counterplay with the recently changes to ADC. If you want to talk about League rank, go talk to someone else. I place zero value on it and it does not affect my feeling about champs, abilities, power levels, or items.

I see what you're saying, and your league shouldn't affect the value of your input as a person, but I think you're also a little too far in the other direction. It's important to understand just how vastly different the game is at those extreme high levels of play. It does definitely have a bearing on champions, abilities, power levels, and items.

Lumus Avatar3 votes

Then perhaps they should have some sort of filter for low-high elo commnters/threads. Because I have a lot of fun playing and talking about League, but I have less than zero interest in playing ranked. It simply is not something I want to do. And I am not bothered that I will not play at the extreme high skill level of other commenters. I'm just concerned with having fun. I just don't see why that should be some gauge that automatically negates the value of anything I have to say to anyone else. We are discussing a champ's kit and it's utility and instead of another poster responding "Yeah, that's tricky, a good way to counter that particular ability is with [this champ]'s ability or move like this in that part of the lane." they will respond more along the lines of "You're just a worhtless Bronzie. Go die, no one cares about your opinion or has the time to explain anything to you."

I dunno, I just thought the Boards were supposed to promote open discussion of topics you care about. If I've missed something about Tristana in my post because my low ELO causes me to not know it, just say "hey, she acts like [this] in higher ELO and that's the real concern here. If you're having trouble against her in Low ELO, I recommend [this] strat." That invites discussion. That doesn't drip venomously with the idea that you're better than me because I don't play ranked. That makes for interesting conversation, or at least a way of saying "I respect you as a person, but there is a layer of the game here you're missing because you haven't experienced it, let me be friendly and give a short explanation so you understand."

Why is it so much easier to say "Go screw, noob!"?

Terrorpaw3 votes

Then perhaps they should have some sort of filter for low-high elo commnters/threads. Because I have a lot of fun playing and talking about League, but I have less than zero interest in playing ranked. It simply is not something I want to do. And I am not bothered that I will not play at the extreme high skill level of other commenters. I'm just concerned with having fun. I just don't see why that should be some gauge that automatically negates the value of anything I have to say to anyone else. We are discussing a champ's kit and it's utility and instead of another poster responding "Yeah, that's tricky, a good way to counter that particular ability is with [this champ]'s ability or move like this in that part of the lane." they will respond more along the lines of "You're just a worhtless Bronzie. Go die, no one cares about your opinion or has the time to explain anything to you."

I dunno, I just thought the Boards were supposed to promote open discussion of topics you care about. If I've missed something about Tristana in my post because my low ELO causes me to not know it, just say "hey, she acts like [this] in higher ELO and that's the real concern here. If you're having trouble against her in Low ELO, I recommend [this] strat." That invites discussion. That doesn't drip venomously with the idea that you're better than me because I don't play ranked. That makes for interesting conversation, or at least a way of saying "I respect you as a person, but there is a layer of the game here you're missing because you haven't experienced it, let me be friendly and give a short explanation so you understand."

Why is it so much easier to say "Go screw, noob!"?

I'm sorry man, that's exactly what I wanted to communicate. Nothing you have to say is any less valuable thanks to your rank, and you seem to understand exactly what my point was about where the ranks have more bearing than others. At any rate, playing against Tristana requires really good mechanics when it comes to trading in lane. Whereas most opponents will only exploit you stepping up too far with an auto or something, Trist is going to hit you with auto-E-auto. You do not want this to happen. If you're letting this happen, there's simply nothing you can do but B which in that case is nearly as bad as dying.

Play, if you can, with a threat support. When I play trist I'm pretty scared of zyra, lux, those types. Blitzcrank is always annoying, too. You want to keep her from feeling like she's in control of the lane, and the way to do that is to quickly collapse and punish any mistakes she makes in positioning. Feel free to add me in game man, and we'll talk more about it. I'd love to be helpful if possible.

Lumus Avatar1 votes

I am happy to have a response that stands outside the 80% of what I usually receive. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

It seems like I always have to bot lane against Tristana in Team Builder and I am just not getting the patterns for countering her. It always just feels like she lands on me, I'm slowed and then she either AA's me down or if I try to fight and deal any remarkable damage to her, she ults on me and it's pretty much over with. I play a pretty good Leona game, working onmaking sure I constantly have a couple wards in my pocket. Balancing that with buying meaningful tank/support items has been a learning experience.

I like to play, but I don't claim to be very good. I fear that I would just bother you with my mistakes/incompetence. I learn things as I play but I'm not putting in the training time and crunching numbers like some of the really high level players do, that's just not my goal. I work 10 hours, then play some League, then Sleep and do it again.

Terrorpaw1 votes

I am happy to have a response that stands outside the 80% of what I usually receive. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

It seems like I always have to bot lane against Tristana in Team Builder and I am just not getting the patterns for countering her. It always just feels like she lands on me, I'm slowed and then she either AA's me down or if I try to fight and deal any remarkable damage to her, she ults on me and it's pretty much over with. I play a pretty good Leona game, working onmaking sure I constantly have a couple wards in my pocket. Balancing that with buying meaningful tank/support items has been a learning experience.

I like to play, but I don't claim to be very good. I fear that I would just bother you with my mistakes/incompetence. I learn things as I play but I'm not putting in the training time and crunching numbers like some of the really high level players do, that's just not my goal. I work 10 hours, then play some League, then Sleep and do it again.

Hey I'm only Silver III myself. I also work 10 hour days, I'm just a huge geek. I like numbers. You're not gonna bother me, I love new friends and I don't really care how poorly anyone plays. I just do my thing you know? I sent you an add, assuming this is your main account. Terrorpaw is my only summoner.

Lumus Avatar1 votes

Thank you. I'm glad something good came of today. I've seen some really toxic responses on the boards today :(

I'll accept the request if league ever let's me on. I've been trying to sign in for about 40 minutes to no avail :O

My friend says I'm still marked as signed in on his friend list...that's weird...

Terrorpaw1 votes

Thank you. I'm glad something good came of today. I've seen some really toxic responses on the boards today :(

I'll accept the request if league ever let's me on. I've been trying to sign in for about 40 minutes to no avail :O

My friend says I'm still marked as signed in on his friend list...that's weird...

I just got in. Been trying since my last post.

bbbbates2 votes

Hey guys can I hop in here? I agree that it is annoying to trade against a trist in lane, and I also like constructive feedback and none of that calling out based on rank stuff. So I'm just going to try and clarify what started this chain of comments:

My gawd... are you in Bronze V? Tristana should NEVER... NEVER... have her AS steroid at level 2... NEVER... at level 2...

Is the comment that started it right? Ignoring the league call out I believe all he was trying to say was that trist usually does not skill her Q at level 2, most commonly she will go E lvl 1 and W lvl 2 so that she has the explosive shot in trades at level one, and has the jump in case of a gank level 2. I think thats what he was trying to communicate.

That aside, here is what I have to try and add to this" As with any late game champ, their level 1 is usually their weakest right? So in theory every level makes the game easier for them. So if if I also look at pre item changes on the BT line, I see very little trist play from anyone, so the question I want to ask is: What changed that made tristana and Kog'Maw must picks?

Is is just that they can output more damage before dying than other champs but their sustain midgame isnt as high so the old BT was not as strong on them? Is the reason that caitlyn has fallen out of favor because she is less assassiny than the other two?

Also, if we are talking about punishing trist in lane, I think the two most popular options are either ezreal or corki due to their long range poke and their escapes. Both have very large midgame power spikes meaning if you go even in lane you will be stronger levels 9 to 14 ish. The reason that kog'maw isnt a huge counter is because although he has that long range poke from his ult, he has no escape to get out of ganks or getting caught by a hard cc support.

Just my 2 cents, call me out if you want

Lumus Avatar1 votes

I'm not here to call people out on in-game theory, experience. I don't have the years under my belt to do that.

That said, I thank you for your enlightening input. I generally play support as opposed to ADC but when I play ADC I'm almost always matched with a Tristana and get clobbered. There are a lot of changes happening very quickly right now so I don't know how Riot intends to tracks the effect of so many alterations. I think they should have done this item rework more slowly, personally. So I can't answer the question of what changed to make Kog and Trist into must-picks.

AbiwonKenabi1 votes

He's a jerk but he's still right. Tristana generally starts with E (Explosive Shot) for harass and then takes Rocket Jump (W).

Specifically speaking on Trist's power level, she has a solid pre-6 and an excellent late game. However, she's one of the only champions that has a weak mid game--its the time when she doesn't quite have her insane range and no longer has her early aggression advantage. If you can shut down a Trist early, you have a while before she hits hyper carry status (assuming she's actually able to recover). I'd say champions like Lucian or Graves can take advantage of this and out-bully her in lane while having a strong mid game, especially if they have a Leona or Thresh with them to push that advantage. At the end of the day, bot lane is really volatile and doesn't really have any definite counters. Sure some supports are better against others, but ADCs don't really care how they match up against each other, its really up to the support for that.

That said, I suspect Tristana will be nerfed soon in some form. She is pretty strong right now, but its mostly from the combination of items and the straight up buff she got at the same time (her R range now scales with Passive). How did Riot not see this coming?

Lumus Avatar1 votes

I noticed that. I thought something must have changed recently cuz I'd never seen her effectively ult from such distance as in my last couple games with her. Guess I didnt' read her patch notes thoroughly enough, because I missed that major headache buff.

OI0p5ajw7w1 votes

The issue here is that you are playing Ashe. Ashe is not in a good place right now. There are so many better options to shut down a early game Trist, because Trist is a late hyper carry, but you are not helping things by playing someone who in no way right now is a carry.

Lord Graves III1 votes

You can't be convinced to play a free champ, if only so you can better understand what you hate?

How sad. item 3070

MrBuffington3 votes

Tristana's weakness is also, ironically, her strength. She is often talked about for having the largest persistent auto attack range at level 18, which is true, and her greatest strength, but the fact of the matter is that she can't do anything to anyone outside of her range. She has no long range skill shot, all her spells are gated by her auto attack range. She has her jump to position herself better, but it's on a longer cooldown than most dashes, which can put her in some very bad spots. If you zone Tristana outside of her auto attack range, she can't CS at all; she's not like Ezreal who can CS at 1150 range with his Qs. Her range is 710 only when she's lvl 18, basically she doesn't have her full strength until very late in the game. There are so many champions that have damage potential at greater ranges, through skill shots, etc.

You can say the same thing about most other hyper carries: Dive a Vayne? She'll just tumble away, auto condemn, then tumble again since it's on a 2 second cooldown. Kite her? Have you tried kiting a Vayne? 2 second cooldown on her dash, plus increased movement speed towards enemies. Outplay Vayne? Lol.

How about Kog'Maw? Dive him? Unless you can insta-gib him, his armor shred and %health damage will just shred you (not to mention he has an AoE slow and increased movement speed from Phage passive). Kite him? Again, Phage passive, AoE slow, plus he has Living Artillery to constantly keep you in vision and rain damage on you from a mile away. Outplay him? Sure, but he out-DPSs you at practically every stage in the game, so good luck.

Tristana is no more or less vulnerable to getting popped as any other hyper carry, she just has a longer dash that effectively removes her from a fight anyways. Truth is, the role of an ADC (especially hyper carries) is to deal sustained damage; that's their entire meaning in life. That's their role in the team; being a bruiser, tank, mage, assassin, that doesn't out-DPS an ADC just means the ADC is doing their job, not that they're overpowered. Every role has their purpose in a team.

EMOFRATPARTY5 votes

As someone who mains Ashe, I personally hate playing against Tristana haha. However, I'd definitely be curious to hear counters to the OP, because there have been plenty of times where she's been destroyed in the LCS.

Astral Duck4 votes

Let's not forget she's also dominated quite hard if she got ahead - The 22 minute pentakill LMQ got onto TSM as well, while it was awesome to watch it made me realize that there's something wrong back then, the resetting W is really just the strongest point of her, I feel like the attack speed steroid is a bit much as well.

FyshinaTux4 votes

LCS != Solo Queue.

They're two completely different games. Lane mechanics are roughly the same, but the difference from 5v5 organized teams and solo queue is HUGE everywhere else in the game.

Even ganks are completely different from solo queue to Ranked 5v5 play. Just because someone does well in the LCS with X champion, that doesn't mean X is OP, that just means that X worked in that game for a specific reason.

And FOR THE LOVE OF GAWD... would people stop trying to emulate LCS in solo queue? I'm tired of people trying to Ryze top because that's something that happened in pro play... nevermind the fact that they have NEVER played Ryze before, and have no idea how he works... -- "lemme just rune prison Q you and never level E because the damage is so low it's not worth..." --

YouLostMe3 votes

Don't forget the old Lee Sin / LeBlanc soloQ craziness. The enormous skill gap between your average kid in SoloQ and the pros makes a big difference.

AbiwonKenabi1 votes

There's still something to be said about what happens in the LCS. Obviously, Tristana is in a strong spot right now, and the fact that she is frequently picked in LCS can help support that. Also, the fact that we know most pros are of a similar skill level (no stomps here...usually) let's us better see how champions function against one another without a huge difference in skill; so when a Trist gets beat, we can go back and study the strategy and see if that's something we can use in solo queue. Lastly, pros know this game better than anyone else, so studying them is always a good idea; I like to think of it as looking at a scientific research paper from the experts. Are you going to refuse to study it just because you're a lowly undergraduate student? No, it can still be insightful.

You are exactly right that the LCS (and pro level in general) is not the same as solo queue. Not at all. Some things work in solo queue that don't work with pros, and vice versa. Hell, we see plenty of things in Diamond I and Challenger that we don't see in LCS, much less Plat and below. But we can still learn something from looking at LCS players and how they respond to certain builds, picks, strategies, etc, to inform our own experience.

And yeah...so many bad LeBlancs I saw earlier this year...

MrBuffington3 votes

Odd, I play a lot of Tristana, and Ashe (and Draven. Freaking Draven) is the only champion that gives me trouble. Tell me, how do I make your life miserable? :P

As to Tristana counters, Corki works well (and Draven. A good Draven counters pretty much everything). The thing about Tristana is that, if she doesn't reach her core items (IE + SS/PD, and then later BotRK and LW too), she doesn't really do anything, unless there's a Yasuo who can use her ult or something.

Terrorpaw2 votes

As to Tristana counters, Corki works well (and Draven. A good Draven counters pretty much everything). The thing about Tristana is that, if she doesn't reach her core items (IE + SS/PD, and then later BotRK and LW too), she doesn't really do anything, unless there's a Yasuo who can use her ult or something.

I do have a lot of trouble against draven, and corki's phosphor bomb is perfect for where tristana tends to stand while laning. I agree that those are good counters.

Also as far as the items go I think you're spot on. If you don't have IE by around 18 minutes and PD soon after you're going to be useless as Tristana unless the game just goes obscenely long.

MrBuffington2 votes

Also, Corki has a dash that matches the range of Tristana's, and has basically identical cooldowns; she jumps on you? Just jump away. She tries to run away? You can chase her, nbd.

A lot of times I'll go for SS first (a build I learned from RobertXLee in LCS, who learned from FlappyBearFish in the Challenger series) and IE second. This gives you a very weak lane, but what you do is just clear your wave as fast as possible with SS proc and your E passive, and run back and do your jungle camp. Rinse and repeat. It's a method used to accelerate her through her weaker mid game, since she can just clear her wave and get a jungle camp super fast, she doesn't have to deal with her lane opponent, and she gets gold much faster because of the jungle camp. You're a lot weaker in fights, but you can get IE much faster. I usually get this build unless I get lucky early and just get super fed and can go for IE straight.

EMOFRATPARTY1 votes

The W. Ashe has more of a reliance on items, but the chase of Tristana's W seems to be greater than the escape of Ashe's Q or W. Sure, she has her ult but that's one "get out of jail free" card every 90 seconds, not every 0-10.

Trist's jump isn't perfect, of course, but there is a lot more flexibility for pursuit or avoidance than Ashe has. This makes her a nightmare early game.

MrBuffington3 votes

I always just get poked out by Ashe's range and W early game; Tristana's weakness early game is her range (ironically enough, since it's her strength late game); she can't do anything to you unless she's in auto attack range (or if she jumps onto you, which is pretty silly since I'm pretty sure Ashe outdamages Tristana early; crit proc plus volley and autos does much more than just explosive shot and autos). Tristana doesn't like being in extended trades, since her E cooldown is pretty long and she only has autos to deal damage. If you bully Tristana early, she has a really hard time getting back into the game, in my experience.

Terrorpaw3 votes

I always just get poked out by Ashe's range and W early game; Tristana's weakness early game is her range (ironically enough, since it's her strength late game); she can't do anything to you unless she's in auto attack range (or if she jumps onto you, which is pretty silly since I'm pretty sure Ashe outdamages Tristana early; crit proc plus volley and autos does much more than just explosive shot and autos). Tristana doesn't like being in extended trades, since her E cooldown is pretty long and she only has autos to deal damage. If you bully Tristana early, she has a really hard time getting back into the game, in my experience.

I, too find Ashe to be a bit of a pain in the ass for Tristana, for all those reasons. She outranges early, out damages with volley and autos, and even when you do jump away the slow means it's quite likely that she'll shoot you in the butt a time or two.

I also think that throughout this thread the strength of her W during the laning phase has been rather overstated. I know I'm not the be-all-end-all when it comes to how to play Tristana but personally I never use her W offensively unless I feel sure that it's going to be reset very quickly. Otherwise, it's just an escape. The slow is nice, but really inconsequential because the type of kill I'm looking to get with it (again, talking about laning phase) comes so quickly after the jump that it wouldn't have mattered if there were no slow on it whatsoever.

MrBuffington3 votes

I agree; I'm also no Tristana pro, but I only use W offensively in laning phase when my jungler or support have set up an easy kill. I seldom jump on my opponent; W hardly does damage since I max it last, and who cares about the slow since they're already in range for me to deal damage, not like the slow is going to help; and it's especially bad for trying to disengage ("I will jump on top of the enemy so I can slow them so I can run away...." lolwut). More often than not, I will jump to a better position, likely not right on top of the enemy, so that I can actually use that hyped up range as an advantage XD. Honestly, if they completely remove Tristana's slow, I'm not sure I would notice.

AbiwonKenabi1 votes

Yes, Rocket Jump I rarely use to jump directly on the enemy. Its an escape and re-position tool as far as ADC Trist is concerned (AP Trist is a different story entirely). Not only is it on quite a long cooldown, but its generally maxed last (so less damage, longer cd for most of the game). The slow is nice, as you said, but very seldom used for the slow alone. Also, you can get knocked out of your jump in mid-air rather easily. Rocket Jump's greatest strength is the reset really.

I use W to position better, and let my teammates set up a kill for me. A Tristana that jumps straight into a team is generally considered stupid. Its a waste of range for only a mediocre slow and a slim chance of being able to jump out. At least Kha'Zix has a stealth and tankiness to help him out. If Trist jumps in and gets jumped on in return, she's surely dead.

MrSc0tty4 votes

The problem with Trist isn't necessarily her kit which has been fine for a while now.

You have to understand a few things:

  1. her early weakness in lane was partially due to mana issues-like MF she couldn't afford to pop her steroid for every trade because if the enemy drew back a little and it was just a one-auto trade she would lose on mana. The mana cost being removed and the cost on her W being lowered deleted that weakness. Woooo, removing weaknesses entirely!

  2. her late game DPS at extreme range (the range gained from her passive) was reduced because the only skill she could use was her auto steroid. Remember, her E active and R used to be hard set at her initial (quite short) autoattack range. She could NOT pop E, crit 3 times, and R to finish off at 700 range before.

  3. her R USED to have 500 range, now it has 700. Compare the number of champions with 700 range gapclosers to the number with 500 (I'll give you a hint: the first number is over half the champion pool and the latter number is freaking FIVE)

Honestly, imagine if these buffs were given to any other ADC. What if MF had 200 more range in her Q and ult level 18, and her W active was free. How freaking nuts would an MF ult completely filling the baron pit with her standing in the bush behind it be?

Revert the stupid buffs=boom, Trist is fine.

MrBuffington3 votes

Minor correction: in patch 4.10, her buster shot's range was actually reduced from 700 range, to match her auto attack range. She actually got her range nerfed.

Also I don't think the comparison to MF is fair; Tristana only has single target spells, she can't lay down the teamfight presence that MF can. Honestly I think the biggest factor's in Tristana's power is the ADC changes that affected all hypercarries, not just her.

Cyrex Wingblade4 votes

Ah, I remember when I first joined League and everyone joked how Tristana was a waste of space and 'every ADC does her job better, everyone.'

Now OP.

I.... don't care anymore.

Terrorpaw4 votes

Ah, I remember when I first joined League and everyone joked how Tristana was a waste of space and 'every ADC does her job better, everyone.'

Now OP.

I.... don't care anymore.

This exactly has been my experience with Tristana. I started playing League in March of this year. When I first started, all my buddies talked about how Tristana's kit was "outdated" and she hadn't been changed in ages and wasn't any good. I think what the other poster wrote about the itemization changes is spot on. She was okay while bloodthirster was king, but she synergizes so damn well with IE that it's not even funny. It's like she invented the infinity edge for her own personal enjoyment. Riot posted (i think it was 4.11?) that they would be watching her as she felt a little weak compared to other AD carries. The next adjustment was they made it slightly easier to jump over walls, but no real changes. The next adjustment was a big nerf to E because her early game was too strong.

It seems like nobody really has a clue when it comes to Tristana. Personally, i feel her kit is just perfect, she has all the abilities needed to minimize her own weaknesses through careful play. I think that's how a champion should be. Not lacking weaknesses altogether, but when played appropriately you should be able to eliminate situations which would leave your weaknesses open to exploitation. That leaves it on the other team to force the situations where they can be exploited.

I don't really know what it takes to exploit those weaknesses because I don't play AGAINST tristana very often. I'd suggest trying to bait her into jumping into a fight she can't actually win, but then, that probably won't work on someone who calculates as they play.

I have trouble playing against Vayne as Trist personally. Even if you outfarm her, she can still be very scary in the 1v1 situations which makes me reluctant to jump and combo her even when she's at low health.

HigeR4 votes

Ok I'll bite, Trist happens to lack scaling on her skills unlike caitlyn for example though everyone would agree that a good trist eats cait in late game. The truth here is that Trist only advantage is range and her kit revolves around her acquiring it; there are several adc's who happen to use range as an advantage but they've got tools to fight up close as well. To name a few: Sivir, Corki, Graves, Quinn, Vayne and Twitch.

Now all these champs share a problem inherent to all ADCs, if they're jumped on, they must regain range or die, same happens for Trist, if you jump to her, she's forced to orbwalk her way out or jump away or ult you. Graves for instance can eat trist in teamfights since he's naturally tanky, takes her vision forcing her to jump away and has WAY more damage through his skills up close. Same for Corki who can decimate a whole team of tanks before Trist can land her third autoattack and several other ADCs have other means to overlook Trist's massive range.

Trist should be more gated by mana though, I remember a time when you were forced to not using skills, nowadays you can harass with explosive shot as you wish and still have mana to jump out, the truth is that explosive shot's active should be expensive as hell forcing you to think twice before using it (Do I want to keep harassing or maybe I'll need to jump out?). Same goes for her ult going up in range, it's ok that she can use it from her AA range, what's not fine is that it will push you out more as she levels up, this knockback range should be fixated at 500

Pyrrasu3 votes

She's not "anti-fun" she's just too strong right now. She lost her old weaknesses so now it's very difficult to stop her from getting to her strong point. I think they could do a few things:

  • Nerf her early game more. Maybe have her rocket jump range scale by level too, or increase the cooldown, or lower her damage early game.
  • Weaken her mid game more, AKA have her scale more slowly.
ULTRAF0RCE1 votes

actually for the cooldown of the rocket jump it starts out being 22 seconds which is one of the longest cooldowns for that kind of dash aka ground targeted dash in the game outside of ults the only one with a higher cooldown is zac and tied with her is kha'zix's leap so the cooldown at least for the beggining of the game is not a problem its range might be though, for the scaling her abilities don't scale unless you are going ap tristana, which is why it is so powerful rocket jump scaling with level is probably the best idea just because it is both simple to program and will not completely mess up her playstyle

MrBuffington2 votes

So, I play a lot of Tristana; I'm by no means an expert on her, though I will try to respond to your points. I will begin by saying I know she's in a particularly powerful spot right now, and that a few minor nerfs would still allow her to be relevant in the game. My discussion will focus on AD Tristana; AP Tristana plays completely differently.

  1. The same can be said about every hypercarry; A good support can keep most ADC from dying, Kog'Maw is notorious for having entire team compositions revolve around protecting him, since he's so potent late game (or at practically any point in the game). Her E is her main damage spell; it deals DoT, and while it's base stats are high, it has no AD scaling, so the damage starts to fall off later in the game. The same can be said about all her spells; she's an ADC that deals damage almost exclusively through auto attacks, unless someone is low enough and you can burst them with all your spells.
  2. She is actually outranged by Kog'Maw with his W on, and Twitch with his ult on; she only ever reaches max range at lvl 18 as well, so Jinx can also outrange her for much of the game, since Jinx maxes Q first. Caitlyn also outranges her until (I believe) lvl 9. Again, the same can be said about many of the hypercarries: if you have good positioning, the enemy team shouldn't be able to just jump on you and delete you. You also mention that champions that can counter Tristana's range are banned often, which I don't think is a strong point; if anything it just says Tristana isn't powerful enough to warrant a ban. One thing I want to note is that Tristana has a very high auto attack range, but that is also her absolute range; she cannot safely deal damage to anyone outside of her auto attack range. Most skill shots in the game actually outrange her auto attack range, most other ADCs have some ability to poke or deal damage to enemies at much longer range than their auto attack range (ie. Ezreal, Caitlyn, Kog'Maw, Corki, Varus, Jinx, pretty much every other ADC. Twitch and Vayne are two that are in a similar boat as Tristana, and they're both hypercarries). Of course Tristana can use her gap closer to get into range, but that puts her at risk, especially since her jump has one of the longer cooldowns for an ADC's dash/movement ability.
  3. Corki has an 800 range dash that deals AoE damage on the area he passes over and also has no cast time, unlike Tristana's jump. He's the only other ADC I can think of that has a similarly ranged dash. Lucian's dash is free and resets pretty readily with the passive. Jinx also gets "resets" with her passive, which allow her to position herself better after kills, assists, and tower kills. Draven gets a reset on his attack and movement speed steroid with every axe he catches. This is why it's relatively easy to get multi kills/snowball with Jinx, Lucian, Draven, and Tristana.
  4. For the most part, her ult knocks the enemy outside of her attack range, which gives it some fairly limited uses. Vayne has a similar knockback as a basic spell, however the low cooldown on her dash better allows her to reposition herself after the knockback, and continue attacking, while not putting her at extensive risk since her dash has a 2 second cooldown at max rank. Vayne's knockback also stuns her enemies if she pins them against a wall, which is relatively easy to do considering her repositioning ability is so high. For Tristana, it's either a method of self-peel, disengage, or an execute; it has relatively few uses in the middle of a fight since the knockback often puts the enemy outside of her range.
  5. Her E has average base damages early; I could see another nerf to the damage in the future, but honestly, this ability alone is what gives her any particular potency throughout the early game; Tristana has a notoriously weak mid game since, at that point, she lacks the items to make her that powerful late game carry, but she also doesn't have any damaging spells besides her E, which, again, does not scale with AD.

To be continued

MrBuffington2 votes

(5) continued: Compared to most other ADC's abilities, it does similar damage; what gives it it's early game potency is that it's used as an auto attack reset (auto E auto), which gives her some method of trading damage early. Again, this damage falls off because it only has AP scaling on it, which is why her mid game is weak. Not taking free harass early is hardly an exceptional strength of a champion. I suppose you can nerf the base damages on the spell early to mitigate this, however I don't see what the spell would even be used for at that point; maxing it first is generally ideal since it gives her at least some way to trade before she gets her items, though it also makes it more difficult for her to control her wave, since the passive will naturally shove her wave out. If the spell's damage continues to be nerfed, it is simply poor design; why have a spell that puts you at a disadvantage? (6) This is perhaps one of the most misunderstood things about the duo bot lane; a Support is not put in bot lane with the ADC because the ADC needs a baby sitter. They are put in bot lane together because experience is divided between champions near a minion when it dies, and neither an ADC nor a Support need experience and levels as badly as other roles to be relevant late game. ADCs need gold; with gold they buy items, and become stronger, since they deal damage largely through basic attacks and less with their spells. A Support only needs enough levels for their basic set of spells, which is mostly used for utility rather than their numbers, and enough gold to help provide that utility, which, if you look at Support itemization, their items are generally far cheaper than every other role. Any ADC can be played mid lane (many are actually very strong; Lucian for example is incredibly popular in high levels of Korean play; Kog'Maw is seen in mid lane fairly often, LiNK pulled out the AP Kog'Maw mid vs Curse, and Kog'Maw is arguably more vulnerable than Tristana because he has no movement ability). In actuality, mid lane is one of the safest lanes in the game (which is why your other carry is typically in mid lane); it's the shortest lane, meaning you're never very far from your turret, and your team is never more than one lane away from you, since you are in the dead center of the map. The only reason you don't see more ADC in mid lane is because there are other champions that scale better with levels than ADCs, most of the time, and also because you typically want an AP threat on your team (which ADCs, as their name implies, don't provide as well as dedicated APCs).

Now I will try to address the topic of how she could be nerfed, since, as I said, she's particularly powerful.

There are two things (more or less) that contribute to Tristana's strength: her own kit, and the meta. As far as her own kit, the changes (this season) were:

  1. Her Q had it's mana cost removed. I hardly think this mattered; Tristana is almost entirely auto-attacked based, she rarely has mana problems unless you're constantly spamming your E or you get a series of resets with your W. If the mana cost was added, all this would mean is that Tristana players would either be more conservative with their E during teamfights (which, again, E basically is just an auto attack reset late game; her autos will deal more damage. In lane phase, she can afford to use mana, since she only needs ~60 mana at any time to jump away from a bad engage), or they would buy a mana pot to use in teamfights (which is 35 gold, about 1-2 CS).
  2. Base armor increased by 4. I don't think this mattered too much; no one ever mentions it.
  3. Buster Shot range reduced to match her auto attack range; this was a nerf to her range; previously it was set at 700 base, now it starts at 550 and scales up, like her auto attacks and her E. I think this change makes sense; reverting it would actually buff her mid-game, which I don't think Tristana needs buffs, lol.

To be continued

MessiGoalGaming2 votes

I think what makes Trist so good is that her ult works like that. Yes, the enemy is out of autoattack range, but they definitely aren't getting near her soon. Combine that with a jump that resets, and you have an incredibly safe ADC that can self peel. This allows teams to focus less on peel and more on other attributes.

Say we invent a new statistic, let's call it "effective damage". To give an example, I'll list two team compositions below:

Team A: Lulu Lee Sin Orianna Nami Kog'Maw

Team B: Renekton Kha'Zix Syndra Braum Tristana

It's pretty clear that Team A is the patented "Protect the Kog" comp. Every team member sacrifices at least a little damage to make sure little Koggles can stay safe. Yes, Kog is going to dish out insane damage, but his team loses a lot overall.

Team B, however, is loaded with offense. Renekton and Kha'Zix are free to dive the back line, and Syndra gets to delete her target of choice while the enemy team peels off Renekton and Kha. The source of peel for Trist? Only Braum. But, that's all she needs. With her ult and jump combined with braums myriad of defensive options, they both provide more than enough peel for the ADC.

In a pure damage comparison, Kog'Maw is going to win. But because Tristana allows her team to be more offensive, her teams EFFECTIVE DAMAGE is way higher.

In conclusion, Tristana is a lategame hypercarry that can self peel well enough to allow her team more freedom in champ select. That's a dangerous combination, and we're learning that more and more as she dominates the bottom lane.

MrBuffington2 votes

Kog'Maw is actually more heavily prioritized by professional teams than Tristana. Also, Kog'Maw is noted as being very safe as an ADC; he's strong early, mid, and late game, something no other character has. So long as the player knows how to use Kog'Maw, they don't need their entire team to revolve around them. Tristana actually needs more help from her team early since she is weaker; if she doesn't reach her core items, she doesn't provide anything to her team, where Kog'Maw still has a lot of utility in his slow, his ult (free vision), and the resistance shred on his Q.

As for the team compositions you suggested; Lulu is a lane bully, arguably a better one than Renekton. Assuming the teams are equally skilled, Lulu will most likely win that match up, negating Renekton's strongest point (his early game). Lee Sin actually fares really well against Kha'Zix, since Lee Sin has two methods of revealing stealthed champions. Lee Sin's ganks are also more powerful, especially since Kha'Zix is less likely to gank early since he can farm and be a late game carry, which generally means Lee Sin can snowball his team. Lee Sin also has great synergy with Orianna, since he can place the Ball very well for a shockwave. Orianna vs Syndra is most likely just a skill match up, but the emphasis on defense that Orianna's team has (shields from Lulu, Ori, Lee Sin, and heals from Lulu ult, and Nami) means that everyone on that team is harder to kill, not just Kog'Maw, meaning it's very hard for Syndra to burst someone with ult (or Kha'Zix/Tristana to assassinate someone). The bot lane match up is a bit harder, since Braum counters Nami in that he can block her ult with his shield, but at the same time, Kog'Maw doesn't have a weak point in the game; he's incredibly potent at all stages, where Tristana has a notoriously weak mid game. Not to mention, Team A has insanely strong disengage potential, with Lulu and Orianna having incredible utility, Lee Sin's kick, Kog'Maw's slow, and Nami's ult/bubble. Team B's only engage tools are Syndra stun or Braum ult, unless they get the upper hand on vision and are flanking, etc. which is incredibly difficult given there's a Lee Sin on the other team who's probably carrying a sightstone, in addition to the support.

You can argue that Kog'Maw's team loses damage if they create a composition revolving around protecting him, but there's a lot more to winning a game than raw damage; more-over, ability to use that damage is even more important, which Kog'Maw can since he has such an enormous range advantage over most other champions; if Team B builds purely for damage, they lack many options when it comes to engaging and actually using that damage; brute-forcing isn't going to work particularly well against a team that is so good at disengaging and kiting.

Vythanar1 votes

I'm sorry but you lost me at "Kog has a strong early game"

MrBuffington1 votes

A lot of pros and coaches right now will tell you that Kog'Maw doesn't have a weak point (or at least one that is as easily exploited as other ADCs), which is why he is very heavily prioritized in the professional scene. Most hypercarries, like Vayne with her incredibly weak early game, or Tristana with a very weak mid game; they have moments when they are weakest; Kog'Maw starts with many advantages (he can out-range every ADC aside from Caitlyn at lvl 1 with his W, does percent health damage with that skill, and that skill is free of cost), his itemization gives him a very smooth transition into later sections of the game (Trinity Force is a great item not only because of the stats, but because it gives constant power spikes with its intermediate items, which are easy to pick up. For IE, you have to save 1550 for a BF sword, which only gives you AD, and you still have to wait another 2.2k for the rest of the item. Trinity Force, you get phage for ~1300, a huge powerspike, then sheen at another ~1200, another huge power spike, and then you can get zeal and finish Triforce for another ~1200, another huge powerspike). Sure Kog isn't the lane bully that Cait or Lucian can be, but he's certainly not weak early like other hypercarries are.

AbiwonKenabi1 votes

Wow really good analysis.

Jackofheartz2 votes

Is no one going to talk about how broken she is with an AP build?

Terrorpaw1 votes

Is no one going to talk about how broken she is with an AP build?

Certainly less broken than before the E nerf, but still pretty damn annoying. The only thing that might make up for it is that past about 35 minutes her "blow you up all at once" ability goes away, and now she's someone who can jump in, do a decent amount of damage, and then die because everything is on cooldown.

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