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Aatrox, The Darkin Blade: Rework/Retooling Ideas

Little Stick Man··2 votes·1,303 views

http://ddragon.leagueoflegends.com/cdn/img/champion/splash/Aatrox_0.jpg

Aatrox is an...interesting champion to say the least. His creation and release are pretty hypocritical, seeing as how he was released during a time when super sustain splitpushing was the meta and riot was looking to change away from that, but seeing as how league as a whole has moved away from this being the most effective tactic, I wanted to retool Aatrox to suit a more team focused league.

WHAT HE IS MISSING Aatrox lacks reliable CC, seeing as how his knockup is only put into effect with the epicenter of his Q - Dark Flight, which is stupidly easy to dodge (it's 75 units lol) since it actually shows you where he's going. A new, more meaningful passive would be useful as well. Bloodwell is clunky, giving attack speed based on how full the bloodwell is and restoring a differing amount of health based on the same variable. The revives is nice for cheese, but unless he's already monstrously ahead or its very early, all the revive allows you to do is take 2 seconds to realize you're about to die. Again.

NEW PASSIVE Passive - The Art of War - For each death, ally and enemy, Aatrox permanently gains .5 AD and 2 health. This passive is global. Passive - Dance of Battle - Aatrox relishes the dance of battle, gaining attack speed 5% / 10%/ 15% / 25% / 30% each time he takes damage from Large Monsters, Epic Monsters, and Enemy Champions.

Q - Dark Flight RANGE: 650 / EFFECTIVE RADIUS: 225 COST: 10% current health COOLDOWN: 16 / 15 / 14 / 13 / 12 Dark Flight ACTIVE: Aatrox dashes to the target area after a brief delay (Interrupting him during this time will cancel his dash, putting it on a 1.5 second cooldown) dealing physical damage to enemies within the radius and knocking them up for 1 second. AVATAR FORM - Darkin's Descent - Aatrox dashes to the target area after a brief delay (Aatrox is invulnerable during this time) dealing physical damage to enemies within the radius and knocking them up for 2 seconds. PHYSICAL DAMAGE: 70 / 115 / 160 / 205 / 250 (+ 60% bonus AD) AVATAR FORM DAMAGE: 120 / 170 / 230 / 280 / 330 ( + 50% bonus AD)

W - Bloody Inspiration RANGE: 1000 COST: 10% current health COOLDOWN: 20 / 18 / 16 / 14 /13 Bloody Inspiration PASSIVE: Allies, while near Aatrox generate stacks of Inspiration, at a rate of 8 per second up to a cap of 100. Bloody Inspiration ACTIVE: Aatrox releases a bloody roar, inspiring his allies, giving them 3% bonus attack speed for every 10 stacks of Bloody Inspiration, as well as increasing their armor and magic resist by 20% of their total stacks.

E - Warriors Thirst / Warriors Force RANGE: N/A COST: 10% current health COOLDOWN: 12 / 11 / 10 / 9 / 8 Warriors Thirst PASSIVE: Aatrox gains lifesteal equal to 1% of his max health. Warriors Force ACTIVE: For 5 seconds, Aatrox's next strike deals 180% of his total AD as bonus damage, as well as healing 25% of the damage dealt. (Calculated after resistances.) (Auto attack reset) AVATAR FORM - Warriors Force may be activated once more for 50% of the damage dealt by the first strike, will not heal for any of the damage.

R - The Avatar of War RANGE: 550 COST: N/A COOLDOWN: 100 / 80 / 60 The Avatar of War ACTIVE: Aatrox becomes the essence of war, releasing a cataclysmic shout, dealing 100 / 200 / 300 (+40% of total AD) as physical damage and slowing enemies by 30%, increasing his auto attack range to 325, adding bonus effects to some of his abilities, and gaining 70% bonus movespeed for 1 second.

I think these changes would be great for Aatrox, but let me know what you think. There's also a chance this is stupidly op that I'm not seeing, so if that's the case let me know!

9 Comments

Mob Psycho 1003 votes

You're really only keeping 2 parts of his old kit: his Q and a part of his Ultimate.

Honestly, Aatrox is actually in a pretty good spot. Whats bad is that he IS clunky, not just on his Q or passive, but his ultimate and even his W is clunky. I think what youre going for is creative, but it loses Aatrox's Identity, creating a new champion.

I do think his bloodwell is clunky, and I believe it should be reworked with it scaling with his total health rather than a flat amount that it is now. It's nice at early level dives/baits, but lategame its useless and its CD is useless too.

His Q is fine, but I agree that it should be buffed through some means. It could be increasing the sweet spot, or adding an additional effect to those that get hit but not knocked up, possibly slowed. Also there really is no need of an indicator telling the enemies where he'll land.

Your W just sounds like a new Warwick W, but takes way too long to get ramped up. If he's to be in the jungle, theres not a lot of time to gain stacks for whoever youre ganking for. His W is what is unique to him, and is what makes him "The Darkin Blade". Keep the W. Change it to magic damage to increase his Hybrid damage that he has with his current Ult and E.

You changed his other form of CC in his E to compensate for getting rid of his current W. Indirectly, you heavily nerfed his ganking power, but increased his lategame sustain. Not bad, but it's a heavy nerf to his early game. Keep his current E too. It's probably his most balanced ability at the moment that not a lot of people currently have a problem with. If anything, it should increase slow percentage the more you level it.

If anything, definitely change the scaling on his Ult, but not with his AD but rather his Health. That would definitely stick with his "drawing blood from his foes" theme in his ult. I like changing his ult, giving him some teamfight potential. I'd personally move your W idea to his Ult. Change the fact that you have to scale it with time around your allies to something like based on Aatrox's current attack speed bonus. Dont let him gain movement speed, it's just like a righteous glory or Olaf ult. Give his allies attack speed and/or lifesteal and spellvamp.

Tl;dr, Keep his old passive, change the scalings. Your Q isnt bad, too big of range though. W is just warwick W. You made E to compensate for you getting rid of his old W. Change his Ult to scale with max health, and give it your W idea, without the need of being by your allies to increase the effectiveness.

Little Stick Man1 votes

Aatrox's identity to me is a freaky demon who loves killing and sees war as an artform, and who has lots of attack speed and healing. Under that thought process i think his identity stays intact. The seperation between warwick w and aa w would be that warwicks doesnt actually give his allies armor and mr, this ties back to his lore where it says that his presence on that battle field caused his allies to fight harder and faster so that's where this fits in thematically. his w as of now is just so...redundant to me. Like the only items of damage you want to build on aatrox are ones that give lifesteal, so giving him and auto attack reset that heals as well as does bonus damage seems like it would fit a lot better for him rather than just having passive healing on every 3rd auto for his identity, playstyle, and kit. Also, rammus, sivir, olaf, janna, nunu, righteous glory, talisman of ascension all do that thing of giving lots of movespeed so for awhile that idea hasnt been original. I just straight up hate his current passive, it looks cool, for a good portion of the game it becomes totally useless.

Mob Psycho 1001 votes

[{quoted}](name=Alas Poor He,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=qsiMTNco,comment-id=00020000,timestamp=2015-10-05T03:38:40.745+0000)

Aatrox's identity to me is a freaky demon who loves killing and sees war as an artform, and who has lots of attack speed and healing. Under that thought process i think his identity stays intact. The seperation between warwick w and aa w would be that warwicks doesnt actually give his allies armor and mr, this ties back to his lore where it says that his presence on that battle field caused his allies to fight harder and faster so that's where this fits in thematically. his w as of now is just so...redundant to me. Like the only items of damage you want to build on aatrox are ones that give lifesteal, so giving him and auto attack reset that heals as well as does bonus damage seems like it would fit a lot better for him rather than just having passive healing on every 3rd auto for his identity, playstyle, and kit. Also, rammus, sivir, olaf, janna, nunu, righteous glory, talisman of ascension all do that thing of giving lots of movespeed so for awhile that idea hasnt been original. I just straight up hate his current passive, it looks cool, for a good portion of the game it becomes totally useless.

I've been playing Aatrox since he came out, from when he was broken to when he was garbage. Right now he's slightly balanced, if not a bit underpowered. Rito has admitted this.

Having an AA reset in his kit to heal, along with a long CD reduces his early game potential heavily.

Him having lifesteal on his build only HELPS his current W and sustain, so he doesnt ONLY have to rely on his 3rd AA proc.

That and I've said that your W idea should shift to his ult. It's a good idea, but your's takes too long to ramp up to something noticeable when ganking. 8 per second would mean being in their lane for 13ish seconds before getting the full effect. Thats too long of a time to be waiting in a lane, when you can be doing something productive. ie warding, scuttles, camps, or ganking someone else.

The identity i'm talking about, is his identity as an All-in brawler. You changing his only form of sustain to a singe AA reset with a long CD reduces his trading capability and his sustain when he all-ins someone with his Q.

Your "rework" is static and lacks diversity, making his gameplay too similar to abilities of other champs. You're not giving him a unique space as a champion in the game.

Little Stick Man1 votes

Jungle Aatrox is straight bad, his clears before you get like 2 or 3 points into his W leave you so beat down it makes it almost obligation to invade, pop his passive, and either kill him or get his flash. Plus his ganking initiation with his Q is so unreliable and easy to read, so JG Aatrox isn't even on my mind. Also, his only form of sustain is not his super long CD (which is like 3.5 seconds with 40% cdr btw) but also in his E passive which gives him 1% of his max health as lifesteal. So let's say you've got 2500 health on him, that's 25% passive lifesteal, plus spirit visage, plus whatever other items build on him (Hydra, Bloodthirster, BORK, etc.) The current W heal is dwarfed by the amount of lifesteal you'd get with each auto, plus the amount you'd get with the auto reset heal.

As for as being static and lacking diversity, his passive, that helps him scale into late game based on the amount of deaths in the game, is totally unlike anything in this game. I get you like current Aatrox, but you can't say with these changes, his gameplan wouldn't be an all in fighter. In that dance both teams do before the teamfight, waiting for the other to engage, he's building inspiration, and is about to give his whole team so much free resistances and attack speed, he pops his ult, dives in, and starts using that massive amount of lifesteal to sustain his way through it. While he doesn't have his free revive, giving him late game scaling is more than a fair trade off for some revive cheese.

53436278DEL11 votes

like it

53436278DEL11 votes

all though he lacks his old w which was his only unique thing

Little Stick Man1 votes

i guess? i mean xin w also gives health back due to auto attacking

53436278DEL11 votes

[{quoted}](name=Alas Poor He,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=qsiMTNco,comment-id=00010000,timestamp=2015-10-05T03:01:06.394+0000)

i guess? i mean xin w also gives health back due to auto attacking

thing was it is a toggle xin is an active leave that one

Little Stick Man1 votes

nah this aa has enough healing with his e and auto resets, plus the new w idea works more thematically and gives him actual teamfighting presence

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