Problems with New Sion

LuckyReden·Oct 20, 2014·16 votes·2,742 views

I think Sion has potential to be strong, but there are some usability problems that need fixing.

To start, why does the camara lock onto Sion when you start your ult? You dont know how many times that has caused me to miss because I lose sight of where I was heading upon activation. Also the fact that hitting the edges of terrain, specifically cliffs over the river, stops your movement is pretty dumb. It would be super sweet if cliff edges didn't stop Sion ult. (It would be even cooler if Sion could run down the cliffs during ultimate, but that will never happen) Also destroyed towers, Sion could easily step/run over those, that should change.

Also I've noticed a bug where after E'ing a wraith it would become invulnerable for 2 seconds or so, and it would completely nullify my Q, idk if thats a common problem, but it seems like it should be an easy fix.

His passive is strong, but any form of CC at all can completely shut it down, so why not first of all have him revive faster, and second of all have his passive ability remove crowd control effects, kind of like Garen q. I could see how that might get a bit insane, but just a thought.

Upvote if you think Riot should change some of these. See any problems that I missed? Please post them in the comments.

37 Comments

BeatzBoyFTWOct 20, 201410 votes

That small cast time for his passive gives you or any Sion's opponent to take the time to step back instead of staying at the same place to get rekt by him. Cast time passive can be ignored when you died first in teamfights sicne you have lots of enemies near you to kill them off before they react to you. And if the camera doesn't locks onto Sion, many Sion players will complain about a "~~bug~~" on Sion's ult because he didn't arrive at your destination point, which in reality, you just crashed onto your own turret. The only bug I noticed is that his Q just auto-activates himself early instead of waiting for a full 2 seconds.

LuckyRedenOct 20, 20141 votes

I understand that people will get confused when they run into things, but I can still look back and forth during ult time rather than always looking at me, It is super dumb to have a required camera lock. I understand the passive problem, thats fine.

BeatzBoyFTWOct 21, 20141 votes

I understand that people will get confused when they run into things, but I can still look back and forth during ult time rather than always looking at me, It is super dumb to have a required camera lock. I understand the passive problem, thats fine.

It's not a Hecarim dash, where crashing is not part of its kit that type of thing, and as if you can turn on a 360 degree. It is the only safest option for all Sion players to know where you're running at due to the fact you can only turn like 30 degrees, and have to mind all the small details like a simple rock or destroyed turrets. Just be glad Riot gave the option to lock the camera during ult, whilst giving more visions on where Sion is running at. The ult already grants a lot to the team in terms of AoE airbornes & slows, so we shouldn't ask so much again to "make it clear for most people".

LeaveNotThyBedOct 20, 20143 votes

He needs more health. He's supposed to build tank and he has less health than Caitlyn and many other squishy champions at level 18. The camera locking is indeed annoying. His Q needs to charge slightly faster, pretty much anyone can walk out of it before it stuns regardless of whether they have boots or not. At the moment he's pretty bad. There's more problems than just his kit not working properly.

BeatzBoyFTWOct 20, 20142 votes

He needs more health. He's supposed to build tank and he has less health than Caitlyn and many other squishy champions at level 18. The camera locking is indeed annoying. His Q needs to charge slightly faster, pretty much anyone can walk out of it before it stuns regardless of whether they have boots or not. At the moment he's pretty bad. There's more problems than just his kit not working properly.

His health is fine, that's what your W passive is for, unless you didn't get to cs much.

LeaveNotThyBedOct 22, 20141 votes

Reply's a bit late, sorry I'm not really up to date with this stuff. Sorry for downvoting you, but his W passive should be a reason to play him- a strength, a perk that makes him special. His passive shouldn't be something that makes up for a huge weakness (it doesn't even do a good job of that). And I'm not sure you've done the math, but ignoring items and assuming you have an outstanding 280 cs at 30 minutes and managed to hit level 18 you still only have 560 (ignoring the odd +8 health instead of 2) bonus health. "Only, he says. Hahahaha." Sion's base health at level 18 is 1770. So at level 18 you'll have a mere 2330 hp. Doesn't sound bad, does it? This is assuming you have a perfect game, as in your enemy jungler doesn't take advantage of your weak early game, all your lanes are winning despite your power farming, and you are clearing your jungle at an incredible rate. Or if you're in top lane, assuming your enemy top laner doesn't screw your cs up, you don't die, you don't have to back early, etc. Malphite has a base health of 2133 at level 18. Jax has a base health of 2065 at level 18. Dr. Mundo has 2124. Assuming you have a perfect game, your health at level 18 will only be 197 higher than Malphite's. Again, this is assuming you have a perfect game. Sion currently has a horrible early game, he can't duel 1v1, he can't even farm safely in the top lane, he's outclassed by jungle Katarina, and in order to make an impact he has to gank. He's too weak to do strong ganks pre-6, and he sacrifices farm in doing so. Meaning he sacrifices that bonus health. Not to mention his armor scales horribly into late game compared to other bruisers and tanks and he has bad level 1 armor.

Sion has an extremely weak early game. He has no early pressure. His pre-6 ganks are weak due to his long charge time on Q, he can't duel until late game, and if the enemy jungler is competent he will take advantage of this. Sion isn't a carry champion- he's heavily reliant on his team following up on his cc in team fights. He can't split push well due to his poor dueling ability and lack of mobility. He doesn't scale that well into late-game, unless you let him farm up for days in a one hour match (which should never happen as Sion currently is); the enemy ADC can just buy Blade of the Ruined King anyway. As someone else has said, his Q is more reliant on the enemy team being bad and sitting in it than you being a good Sion player. Sion has no strengths. He is not viable in any way. If you think I've missed anything, please do elaborate. I'd love to see what you can say in Sion's defense.

Knight SoIaire Oct 20, 20143 votes

sion is fine, proven argument and riot already told why he has less base hp he has his role and he does it fine

Nagoh ShanOct 20, 20141 votes

The reason for his lesser base health, as stated by riot is:

Looking at the base stats it seems like a loss, but we wanted to shift power into the infinite scaling W passive, and add a pretty beefy Max HP ratio to the shield. His tankiness right now is at nautilus levels with all things combined.

Quote source: http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?p=50245879#50245879

Considering he gets 2 health per small minion and 8 per cannon minion, he's going to have 44 health per canon minion cycle available. Old AD Sion would be able to get 57 per cycle and be 600 base health ahead at 18. So he starts with less base health, gains less health per level, and gains less health through his health gain passive. Solo lane Sion can never have as much health as old AD Sion. They didn't shift power to his Infinite scaling W passive, they nerfed both his base health, and his infinite health gain. Considering the stated reasons for his changes, I doubt this is intended and believe it will be fixed, but it doesn't hurt to mention it over and over until it is fixed.

Traditional Sion skin Plox

ProfDrDeathOct 20, 20144 votes

Yes, it is intended.

New Sion has a completely synergistic kit, which is in itself more powerful. He doesn't need that much HP to compensate for the glaring flaws of his kit.

Specifically, the new kit allows him to remain a threat, even when building primarily tank. Thus, his health pool gets amplified by the resistances he gets.

Knight SoIaire Oct 20, 20141 votes

that is a realy good answer ill upvote this

Nagoh ShanOct 20, 20141 votes

He doesn't need that much health? he has one of the lowest base health values in the game. He needs the W passive just to get to normal bruiser/tank health values.

Pay attention to what I wrote. First, I'm not saying his kit is weaker overall, in fact I think it's really cool. What I said was, the specific stated reason for the change, because someone mentioned it in defense of lower health, when the stated reason doesn't defend lower health.

It can't be intended. It's not possible to shift power from an attribute to an ability by nerfing the strength of both.

Kayle and Pantheon aren't compensating for flaws in thier kit when they have 2k base health. Tryn, Garen, and Udyr aren't compensating for flaws in their kit by having 2.2k health. His old health values wasn't to compensate for flaws in his kit, it's because 1900-2200 health is what a tank/bruiser is supposed to have.

ProfDrDeathOct 20, 20141 votes

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/uXXJPR0X-stop-balancing-champions-by-watering-down-their-strength-with-the-same-weakness?comment=001e

CertainlyT explains why he got a base offset while retaining the hyperscaling.

And new Sion can easily reach normal bruiser HP from levels and his Soul Furnace alone in an average game. Normal bruiser HP/level is between 90 to 100. Meaning, Sion needs to kill between 10 and 15 small creeps per level, having between 180 and 270 CS at level 18. -3 for each big creep/large monster/kill or assist he got. A normal top laner should've at least 180 CS at level 18, especially if he gets boni from CS.

The "flaw" in Pantheon's, Kayle's and Tryn's kit that was supposed to be compensated for by their high base HP is their inability to build tank while being melee (same as old Sion, actually). Kayle's base was never really adjusted for her newfound playstyle of essentially being a ranged champion. Garen and Udyr are also melee, both without instant gapclosers and one with essentially no ultimate. Also, Garen has really subpar armor/lvl - another low stat that makes for a different powercurve, especially with Garen's older W - which was 0.5 Armor and MR per CS, up to a cap of 25. This essentially generated a power curve for garen in which he got accelerated access to tankiness, but wasn't significantly more tanky than a similar build champion at level 18.

Nagoh ShanOct 20, 20141 votes

CertainlyT's explanation was for why hyperscaling exists. Specifically to tie stats to something other than gold or experience. In this case CS. That and he points out that while it's possible that people aren't playing Sion correctly, because he's new, it's also possible that they under-tuned his health gain from his W. I have no issue with gaining health off of CS instead of levels.

Scruffy was explaining the reason why the base health was lowered specifically, not the philosophy behind choosing a specific scaling mechanism over another.

At 270 CS, assume 15 of them are Cannon minions. 120 health from cannon minions and 510 from the rest. 2310 health total, for near flawless CS.

At 180 CS, say 10 are cannon minions. 80 health from them and 340 from the rest. 2100 health, or for basic play and the risk of being shutdown, your health is 24 higher than Irelia.

It just shows the point of the entire thread that you linked. It would be like having Veigar start with negative AP, and saying he'd have comparable AP to other Mages with good CS, without having to spend gold.

I don't mind the mechanic, but if they want the power to be in the mechanic, it should be stronger than the old version, at least, and put him in a point, when you do well, that other champs can't reach for just existing.

Knight SoIaire Oct 20, 20141 votes

your argument sucks why does it do it because you just compare one similar part of 2 diferent kits

new sion has stronger (much stronger ) shield,capability to close gaps and spammable cc (either you knock em up or they walk around it, still they dont atack while they do it) and utilizes his entire kit always

old sion ... well all he had was his ult and thats all, he lifestealed but this insane lifesteal didnt even make him a decent splitpusher ... 100% useless pick, kiting was his only weakness and he was just easy to kite

as far as you do incxorrect comparisions you will always consider new sion weaker while its other way around (sion finds his use, deals preety solid dmg, is harder to kite, and is tankier than old sion, while old sion was just a lifesteal bot without any actual use)

Nagoh ShanOct 20, 20141 votes

FFS, I'm not saying new Sion is weaker than old Sion. I'm saying the intended design goal of moving power from his base health to his W was not accomplished when Sion is in solo lane.

The reason why I compare he new W and old E is because of the way Scruffy worded his post. He didn't say that Sion was far too tanky, so they cut his base health value to something more reasonable. He didn't cut Sion base health and increase the W health scaling to compensate. What he said was base health was cut to shift that power to his health scaling, but he didn't increase the new health scaling it stayed at 2/8. That means the only point of change for the health scaling is from old Sion to new Sion, so that must be our point of comparison to see if he did what he intended.

Spoiler: he didn't

Knight SoIaire Oct 20, 20141 votes

kit is diferent

Vellich0rOct 20, 20141 votes

the combination of health gain, a kit that works well when actually building tanky, and a huge % max health shield make it so that he is surprisingly tanky even when building two damage items (which is actually what you should be doing) he also has surprisingly fast jungle clear which allows him to get huge health gain from his passive.

Nagoh ShanOct 20, 20147 votes

Zero issue with Sion jungle. Read everything I've posted to this point. Any Sion feedback thread. My only issue is solo lane Sion. In the Jungle, there's a much higher density of large creeps. 43% of the jungle creeps are large creeps IIRC, compared to 5% of a cannon wave cycle are cannon creeps.

He has a massively increased ability to stack health in the Jungle, and my only goal is to get the small minions to give a little more health, to bring his solo-lane performance closer to his jungle performance, and make sure Sion doesn't keep heavily nerfed health in solo lane. If they made small minions worth 3, he'd be about 5 health short per clear of his Jungle potential health gain, about 18 health higher per cycle that he is now, and have more potential health gain than old Sion. Even with his lowered base health.

All wins imo

SaruyanOct 20, 20142 votes

1: because how the hell are you supposed to see where you're controlling if you're looking down field. its not a projectile, its direction will change.

2: because hitting the wall teaches you to learn to stop your ult instead of just using it like its malphite, though i can possibly agree with it ignoring destroyed tower areas

3: thats not a bug, its intentional because if you e something and turn it intoa projectile, it will instead die and not become a projectile, so it becomes invincilble. removing this would be nerfing him.

4: agree on passive, they are considering making it a flat amount per second that increases over time, which is pretty much useful. the removing all cc for his passive thing seems pretty good.

LuckyRedenOct 20, 20141 votes

1: because how the hell are you supposed to see where you're controlling if you're looking down field. its not a projectile, its direction will change.

Because your looking right at your target?

2: because hitting the wall teaches you to learn to stop your ult instead of just using it like its malphite, though i can possibly agree with it ignoring destroyed tower areas

I wasn't talking about walls, I was talking about cliff edges, like the edges of the mid lane to the jungle, I don't understand why he couldn't run down them.

3: thats not a bug, its intentional because if you e something and turn it intoa projectile, it will instead die and not become a projectile, so it becomes invincilble. removing this would be nerfing him.

Sorry, I was unclear. It is invincible past the knockback part, I am aware that when it becomes a projectile it must be invincible, but the invincibility has lasted the duration of the slow multiple times for me, nullifying my ability rotation.

4: agree on passive, they are considering making it a flat amount per second that increases over time, which is pretty much useful. the removing all cc for his passive thing seems pretty good.

I saw that, that could be a good fix.

Ashes AriseOct 20, 20142 votes

His passive is already very strong. It doesn't need any change. In the cases where ppl CC you and get away, they deserved to get away. It's stupid to think that Sion should get a free kill every time he dies. Its strength is in his presence in skirmishes and teamfights when he goes down early. Instead of being able to just stick around and start attacking other team mates, they have to contend with Sion passive. When you are alone, it is weak. When you are team fighting it is very very strong. You can also push your lane and get a few CS when you die so they can't just take your tower.

If you honestly think his passive needs any improvements. You are completely and utter unqualified to be making balance suggestions entirely.

Oh and yes... His ultimate needs to not lock the camera. That is bullshit that it does.

LuckyRedenOct 20, 20141 votes

I actually agree that his passive is very strong as it is, and duh itd be super broken to always go 1 for 1, but still at least the revive time should be a little shorter, because otherwise people just need to walk away.

Nagoh ShanOct 20, 20142 votes

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/n5X8dRZr-riot-thoughts-after-a-while-with-the-new-sion

This is my new Sion feedback.

TL:DR

Really fun, but he needs better health gain on his W, his E could be more rewarding when you hit an enemy with a minion, and his character sheet stats are incredibly misleading. His passive is too easy to shutdown. He needs to last longer if he's supposed to absorb damage in the passive, or be immune to CC if he's supposed to Zone with it.

And they need a traditional Sion skin

Kuroi86Oct 20, 20141 votes

About the only change I'd like on his ult is removing the move speed cap on it.

For his passive, remove the move speed and attack speed cap on those.

The rest of his abilities I'm cool with. I'd just like a slightly higher base health and slightly more AD per level, let me have a bit stronger early because his late just doesn't feel strong enough for how weak his early game is.

ProfDrDeathOct 20, 20141 votes

Even more AD/lvl? He already has the second-highest AD/lvl value and the third-highest base AD at level 18 (behind Chogath and Skarner ).

Kuroi86Oct 20, 20141 votes

Why does it feel like he can't hit for jack until I get hydra then? =/ Idk, I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong, but it just feels like his early game is far too punishing and his late game isn't quite strong enough. Farming up lane is dangerous because most lane opponents out duel me and farming under tower is near impossible because I can't last hit no matter how close I try to hit it.

Maybe I'm building him wrong?

ProfDrDeathOct 20, 20141 votes

Dunno - what do you build as runes and masteries?

And for items?

Kuroi86Oct 20, 20141 votes

Right now I only have AD reds, though once I've got the IP I'll be picking up some health reds. I typically go armor yellows, three flat mr blues with six scaling, two cdr quints and one scaling health quint.
Masteries I go 9/21/0

I rush Hydra first, then Iceborn, Frozen Mallet, Merc treads, then my last two are situational.

it's tricky trying to find the right balance for him.

ProfDrDeathOct 20, 20141 votes

You shouldn't sink the IP into HP reds. AD reds are too useful for exactly the problems you're talking about with last-hitting. Especially since, if the missing AD causes you to miss last-hits, your health reds will essentially go to waste for missing out on the HP gained from Soul Furnace's passive.

If you really want more HP early, try HP yellows with two Armor Quints. Armor Quints are absurdly efficient right now - more than 4 times the value of Armor yellows.

Iceborn Gauntlet AND Frozen Mallet together make not much sense. Take either of the two and something to make up for not getting the other. For example, IBG and MR/HP item ( item 3102 item 3065 item 3190 ).

Kuroi86Oct 20, 20141 votes

I mostly got Frozen Mallet for sticking power in team fights. It means unless the enemy team blows all of their CC on me (And leaves my team free to go to town.) I WILL get on the carry and they won't be able to get me off without blowing CC or an escape.

Iceborn I get for armor and damage, popping Q real quick followed by an auto attack deals pretty good damage on top of Hydra active. Of course once this is blown you don't have much other damage to deal unless the enemy is dumb enough to let you pop your shield.

FYI, still love initiating with Ult, set up shield before hitting the target, charge Q, pop shield, drop Q, then Auto for Sheen proc, finish with E and keep them from going anywhere.

SkreeteOct 20, 20141 votes

First things: Does this happen a lot? DO other players get this happening often? IF so, this may be a bug that Riot could try to fix. Remember, his rework is still new into the game, so bugs are expected. However, i do feel like there are some small balance issues with his gameplay. Anyways, it may just be a bug.

LuckyRedenOct 20, 20141 votes

Which one may just be a bug? The ultimate camera lock or the E invulnerability, because the extended E invulnerability is definitely a bug.

Yokel85Oct 20, 20141 votes

... You dont know how many times that has caused me to miss because I lose sight of where I was heading upon activation.

That's the whole point.

Also I've noticed a bug where after E'ing a wraith it would become invulnerable for 2 seconds or so, and it would completely nullify my Q, idk if thats a common problem, but it seems like it should be an easy fix.

Stop trying to stun it while the game still thinks the Wraith is being knocked back.

LuckyRedenOct 20, 20141 votes

Stop trying to stun it while the game still thinks the Wraith is being knocked back.

I E, auto attack, quick Q, both after the knockback ends, and neither work for the duration of the slow. You don't know what your talking about.

That's the whole point.

I'm sorry, but I don't think the point of ultimate's are to miss them, and given the already small hitbox and difficulty hitting it, plus delay upon manual activation, It doesn't need to be any harder.

Jungle Lux GodOct 20, 20141 votes

I think removing all crowd control effects is too strong, but not having any kind of CC removal would keep him too weak. If anything, I think he should remove slows on his passive ability, like Garen and Eve do.

I personally like the camera angle on his ultimate because it's set up so that you know where you are going before you get there. Also, if you miss his ultimate because you lose sight where you are going on activation, you probably aren't going to hit it anyways.

In terms of collision with his ult, I think that he should only stop if he is perpendicular to the wall, give or take a few degrees, so you don't stop if you hit it square at a 45 degree angle, and would also help if turret collision doesn't change.

chumblerOct 21, 20141 votes

Apart from the other reasons the rework sucks, his new visual design is incredibly lazy and boring, and they replaced his Arnie voice that actually had character with a completely lame and unmemorable phoned in grimdark grunt.

Expect him to be completely ignored from now on just like the even worse rework Cass got.

DvoltOct 21, 20141 votes

I'm sure it's been said already, but...

Sion's ult locks the camera around him due to how cursor movement is used to control Sion during it. If I were to ult from Blue Side top lane to Purple Side top lane turret, and it didn't lock the camera, Sion would just run into a wall. It's a matter of control, and really gives you, the player, a feeling for how absurdly fast you're going. Broken turrets have unit collision because Azir laughs at foolish Noxians.

Garen's Q does not remove CC. It functions as a Movement speed cleanse+ Speed buff. Sion takes a while to revive because of comparisons to other "revival passives" besides Anivia's. GA, Zilean, and Aatrox all have a time where they can't do anything, but neither can you. The delay is especially long because, well, Sion goes back to full HP, unlike GA and Aatrox and etc. The fact is, the point of the passive is to give players a CHANCE to get revenge. Not definite "I win now," but a chance. It's why there's the momentary speed burst ability.