THE FULL AATROX REWORK, as designed by Aatrox players

Hi guys,

The latest Aatrox changes cough nerfs cough left many of us far from satisfied and waiting for the full rework, as promised by Riot, however long that may take. With that in mind, I decided to take a swing at reworking him, and would love your feedback and other ideas. Now as an Aatrox player my favourite character theme was that of demigod bladesman who can singlehandedly change the tides of battle and thrives in the heat of battle. As far as gameplay goes, I think that corresponds relatively well to his old kit (not saying it was perfect) of a lifestealing melee carry whose tankiness depends on your ability to lifesteal and avoid hard cc and burst damage. With that in mind, here's my idea for a fully reworked Aatrox, with special emphasis on being League's preeminent lifestealing diver-carry who effortlessly weaves autoattacks and abilities to decimate his foes.

Guys, I would love any feedback and ideas you have. Thank you in advance for reading it, it'll be a journey!

Passive: Blood Well Aatrox's resource bar is replaced by the Blood Well, which stores the health he spends on his abilities, slowly decaying while out of combat, up to 50% of his maximum health. Aatrox gains 1% attack speed per 2% of the Blood Well filled, up to 50% bonus attack speed. When Aatrox procs Blood Price/Thirst on an enemy champion/large monster while under 50% health, he consumes some of the Blood Well to give him a shield that consumes more Blood Well based on his missing health. This shield has no cooldown but cannot stack. Shield Health: 40-150(+missing health % of Blood Well) The problem with a lifesteal tank is the necessity of building health so you don't get instantly bursted, and no item currently offers any decent combination of health/attack speed or health/lifesteal. Aatrox will be proc-ing his shield many times in a teamfight, and it introduces a interesting health cost management game and directly incentivizes him to build lifesteal. As far as math goes, the thinking is that if he's missing 50% of his health when he procs the shield, he gains 50% of the Blood Well, up to 40-150(+25% max health).

Q: Dark Flight Cost: 10% current Health Aatrox takes flight and lands at target location, dealing damage and slowing in an area and knocking up enemies he lands directly on top of for 1 second. If Dark Flight hits an enemy champion, its cooldown is halved and Aatrox gains 20% Blood Well. Damage: 10/60/110/160/210 (+1.0 Bonus Attack Damage) Slow: 10/18/26/34/42% for 2/2.5/3/4/5 seconds Cooldown: 26/24/22/20/18 Can no longer be interrupted!!! _Aatrox's Q has always seemed problematic to me. As an initiation basic ability it does a LOT of damage, particularly when fed, but its ability to be interrupted leaves Aatrox in a bad spot, particularly when behind. As we are removing some of his other comeback mechanics and shifting focus to being a lategame teamfight melee carry, this QoL change seemed particularly important. The slow also is a result of other changes later in his kit and also forces him to go in to stick to a target. He's always been a high-risk champion, and moving the slow to his engage makes him make tougher choices about when to go in. However, given everything else in the rest of this kit I thought that in-combat mobility makes sense but he shouldn't have great out of combat mobility. _

W: Blood Thirst/Blood Price Now procs every 4th Autoattack Toggle on: Every 4th autoattack, Aatrox deals bonus damage. Toggle off: Every 4th autoattack, Aatrox heals based on his missing health. Blood Price: Bonus damage: 30/60/90/120/150 (+75% Bonus AD) Blood Thirst: Self Healing: 30/40/50/60/70(+6/6.5/7/7.5/8% missing health) Now Aatrox's new passive is every 4th autoattack, it would be confusing if this didn't. Before you start to rage on how weak this ability still is (it's pretty similar to live, except nerfed to be every 4th auto) remember he also procs a 1 second shield every time the Thirst/Price triggers. Also, read on to see his E, which will make his kit much more skill based and also I think justify a lot.

E: Darkin Blade Completely new ability! Cost: 10/15/20/25/30+5% current health Aatrox unleashes his blade to deal damage to all units in a cone in front of him. This ability functions as a basic attack, procs on-hit effects (Including Blood Well, and Blood Price/Thirst), deals mixed damage, and resets Aatrox's basic attack timer. Lifesteal only applies to the physical portion, reducing its effectiveness to 50%. Basic Attacks reduce the cooldown of this ability by 1 second. This ability's range is increased by Massacre. Damage: 10/25/40/65/80(+100% Total Attack Damage) Cooldown 12/10.5/9/7.5/6 Range: So this ability is directly inspired by Yasuo. Yasuo, to me, perfectly epitomizes a skilful bladesman who has actual intelligent sword-weaving in his autoattacks, and I thought that a similar skill had a perfect thematic fit in Aatrox, whose blade is said to slice through armor like butter, cleaving all in its wake. Lategame, this skill will be every 2 or 3 autoattacks, particularly with the CDR of a Death's Dance. However, its cost will mean using it at the start of fights and at full health is unwise, and when low you'll have to manage how much to spam this ability or risk dying prematurely. His ability to combo this with Blood Price- both using it as an will give him pretty decent burst damage, which means some of it has to come off his ult.

Massacre Aatrox draws in the blood of his enemies, dealing magic damage to all enemies around him and gaining bonus attack range and bonus attack speed for 10/12/14 seconds. He gains 20% Blood Well for each champion hit. Damage: 125/225/325 Attack Range: 50/125/200 Attack Speed: 40/50/60%

Other general thoughts: I thought long and hard about the revive passive, and I realized that was what made him so cancerous when ahead. For a carry-type champion, especially one with built-in mobility, to have a revive just makes him too feast or famine with the rest of his kit. This version of Aatrox has a very high skillcap, as you will need to count autos, manage his health and Blood Well and his E onto as many targets as possible, but the risks are outweighed by a champion who can take over a game late with his combination of tankiness, medium range and damage. His counters are the same as before, burst damage, hard CC, blinds, grievous wounds and kiting, Champions who can do any of the above should find ample opportunity to outplay Aatrox, but a skilled Aatrox player will wait for the perfect moment to enter the fray and turn the fight around, which is his ultimate fantasy. His tankiness is entirely based around being able to autoattack repeatedly, and if he cannot, then with no revive he will die very quickly.

There you have it. I hope to see your comments and make this rework as viable as possible! I'm not sure if this is crazy strong or weak, but it should restore his ability to jungle, among other things. Let me know any suggestions/changes/stupid mistakes and thank you for reading this all the way through.