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Can we stop trying to "fix" the tank meta?

Loken Stoneheart·4/19/2015, 11:17:11 PM·80 votes·14,745 views

Really, besides a handful of offenders (lets be honest, when isn't there a broken champion somewhere in the game?), and the fact that they need to shift Cinderhulk's %HP to a normal item so that laners stop taking smite to get their hands on a decent tank item for once... (I'm not seeing infinity edge or deathcap being a smite-only item)

The tank meta is pretty balanced. In fact, it isn't even the "tank meta." This is legitimately just the meta. You're all just calling it the tank meta because its the first time tanks have seen play in a few seasons so you just forgot that they were even champions.

Without tanks in the meta, assassins and burst damage carries rule. Tanks can finally fit into the game again, so there is a counter to these types of champions, so that they can be strong, but not overbearing due to the presence of their natural counter: something they can't burst.

This also means that ADCs don't have to be crazy over-tuned with damage and mobility to compete with the burst damage champions, because ADCs already beat tanks as they are sustained damage.

The rock-paper-scissors of the game has been re-established, and while it may need some mild tuning, its probably the most healthy balance for the game:

Sustained damage > Tank Tank > Burst damage Burst damage > Sustained damage

71 Comments

Aelvr4/20/2015, 4:38:57 AM29 votes

Nobody remembers Season 2, apparently, when Randuin's Omen had better stats AND HP REGEN. And also tanks getting access to philosopher's stone and heart of gold in their builds, which were both gold-producing items, giving them a massive gold advantage to begin with. And don't forget Force of Nature. I remember that, in Season 2, it was not uncommon for all six bans to be tanks. Now THAT was a tank meta.

MalzaharAnyLane4/20/2015, 12:48:22 AM12 votes

I don't have any problem with the tank meta.

I play Malzahar, Viktor, Malphite and Draven though. If I really felt threatened, I'd learn to play Vayne.

But my Fiora is crying when dumping exhaust + ignite + ult is letting tanky people get out of the fight with a mere sliver of HP though, in this meta.

mi ramfan4/20/2015, 3:22:23 PM9 votes

I agree with pretty much everything in your post except this:

[{quoted}](name=Loken Stoneheart,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=r3Gib0Z3,comment-id=,timestamp=2015-04-19T23:17:11.740+0000) Really, besides a handful of offenders (lets be honest, when isn't there a broken champion somewhere in the game?), and the fact that they need to shift Cinderhulk's %HP to a normal item so that laners stop taking smite to get their hands on a decent tank item for once... (I'm not seeing infinity edge or deathcap being a smite-only item)

The %HP being on a jungle item is important because many tanks have laning phases that are so weak that they can only be played in the jungle. Top lane Sejuani/Nautilus/Amumu will get eaten alive by 99% of the top laners in any given meta. So naturally, when those champions don't have something that makes them playable in the jungle, then we see Lee/J4/Vi jungle like we did earlier this season.

However, putting the %HP on an item that isn't available outside the jungle (and most importantly, ISN'T AVAILABLE WITH WARRIOR ENCHANTMENT) prevents the Warrior-enchantment rushing junglers from being "real" tanks. Not only did they take a damage item over a bulk item, their bulk items give them less bulk than the junglers who have committed to building full tank. Now full tank is defined as Cinderhulk/Randuins/Spirit Visage +25% HP as opposed to Randuins/Spirit Visage/Locket or some other reasonable equivalent.

I bring this up in every Cinderhulk thread because people seem to understand that Cinderhulk is why tanks are strong, but are completely wrong about WHY Cinderhulk being a jungle item is so important. Since Cinderhulk and its %HP are a jungle item, the bruiser champions who, historically, have been able to have the best of both worlds in early game strength and late game bulk must now CHOOSE whether they are going to be early game pubstompers or late game tanks.

We can see this phenomenon even better with the Smite top laners that have started showing up. Champions like Shyvana are giving up Flash (substantially reducing their early game safety) in order to take Smite, which doesn't help them at all outside of allowing them to eventually purchase Cinderhulk. The fact that we've created a situation where bruisers are WILLINGLY SACRIFICING their early game in order to be tanks instead of having tanks just be eternally outclassed by bruisers is incredible, and we shouldn't just kill that choice by taking the %HP to a non-jungle item.

Basically, the reason Cinderhulk is smite-only is because it's the only way to compensate tanks for their substantially weaker early game compared to bruisers. If the bruisers don't take Cinderhulk, the tanks get an insurmountable late game bulk advantage; if the bruisers do take Cinderhulk, they lose substantial burst on their early ganks, essentially putting the tanks and bruisers on a level playing field. All of these advantages are lost if %HP appears on a non-jungle item.

Beoridas4/20/2015, 3:06:12 AM8 votes

tank meta IS the reason why everything is diversified and fun. with no everyone abusing their champ cause of contant possible danger. and peeling is now a true reality.

TenSlashTen4/21/2015, 3:02:09 AM6 votes

yeah I love the retards that call it tank meta lmfao.

They literally know nothing of what tanks actually did back then.

You actually never died. Hell yeah dude. I played between your turrets at level 1 singed. Force of nature+rylias+randuims+frozen heart. Never die all fucking game. Did you somehow manage to die? Welp guess you need 1,300 hp giving warmongs LOL And then the regen from warmongs and then you bought spirit of visage and had like 100 hp regena second Lmfao I remember playing mundo and had over 150hp regen a second without baron buff or some stupid shit with full build.

Like kids think that tanks live long now? Please The average life in a teamfight was like 30 seconds and thats if you played poorly.

People regened so much hp per second that it was impossible to knock people out of a fight and they lasted for years.

Personally I enjoyed it, was funny to play the stupid full item tanks and just live all day. Plus if the adc was good enough you still lost like any other meta thats existed. You just felt like a big fat bad ass.

Over the years thats been ruined by every tank item getting gutted.

Soon they'll gut cinderhulk then we'll be back to assassin/adc/support being the only roles that matter yet again.

Fuck 3 assassin 1 adc meta. Fuck any more than 1 assassin on my team meta. Fuck That Meta.

SexyTaylorSwift4/20/2015, 11:03:59 AM5 votes

Exactly. There are a couple trouble champs (personally, I think Grag), and a couple really weak champs still. Just because you can't autowin with Lee Sin anymore, doesn't mean the game needs fixed.

People calling it the tank meta OBVIOUSLY didn't play during League of Mundo.

chide da jungler4/20/2015, 2:48:31 PM4 votes

I think it's fair that top-laner tanks have to give up a summoner spell to get cinderhulk. It offers counterplay in the form of having no flash or no TP, which gives the opposing laner an early game advantage to abuse them with.

DarthSpectrum4/20/2015, 2:12:19 PM3 votes

Tanks have consistently held the highest win rates in League - even before the introduction of Cinderhulk.

To say that their current state is balance is an understatement. On LoL Statistics, the 7 out of the top 10 winning champions are tanks. I am fine with tanks countering Assassins; however, with their current durability, they can seriously wound an ADC just by taking damage while doing absolutely nothing with the gromp buff and thorn mail.

If the ADC doesn't kite, a tank such as Amumu or Sejuani can easily beat them with their abilities as well.

As of now, tank can compete with any other archetype. They are a natural counter to assassins, they make ADCs kill themselves by hitting them, and they can out duel even fighters by taking Challenging Smite.

This is far worse than how the Assassin meta was at the end of season 4. At least you had a chance to kill these bastards if they messed up.

warpenguin5554/20/2015, 2:15:25 PM2 votes

im all good with this meta. most balanced one i have been a part of

r11na4/20/2015, 4:24:02 PM2 votes

Chances are if you see someone trying to 'fix' the tank meta, they are either a whingy ADC main who can't play Kogmaw or Vayne and is mad they can't 1v1 everyone, or a top laner who plays a champ like Riven who thinks its unfair that facerolling QWER won't 100-0 a tank.

Desiderium4/20/2015, 10:27:54 PM2 votes

Tank champions are just doing way too much damage right now while also being impossible to kill. When you can't kill a tank at 15 minutes as Zed because they have Cinderhulk + Ruby Crystal, and get away with 35 health, while taking half of your health off solo, there is something very wrong. The tank meta is broken.

FedAsFuk4/20/2015, 3:05:14 AM2 votes

Exactly, the one thing I see is that alot of the burst champs are kind of screwed because tanks make it very hard to impossible to REACH the carry, or the carries come with a self peel ability that launches you a full screen away (Tristana). This would require a ton of work but i think the most balanced state the game could have would be short ranged peel in carry champ kits (Vayne E, Viktor stun/snare, Draven E, you get the point) because of the ability to simply be massive with hitbox (Elixer of Iron) and tanks needing CC in kit to be viable. This is mostly for soloQ of course as Trist is never played in competitive, but a mild complaint, I can handle a short range kickback as a burst anti carry/assassin but being knocked a full screen away to be forced to fight through the tanks again is more than a bit overbearing.

As above shows overall though everything is in a really good state, assassins have their place against squishy comps, tanks do well against burst, ADCs and APCs are weak to assassins, but some kits offer a bit overbearing amount of peel.

Götterdämmerung11/12/2018, 9:39:28 PM1 votes

I am not a Tank Main and I approve this message.

Bitter Cynic4/21/2015, 3:59:13 PM1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Loken Stoneheart,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=r3Gib0Z3,comment-id=,timestamp=2015-04-19T23:17:11.740+0000) You're all just calling it the tank meta because its the first time tanks have seen play in a few seasons so you just forgot that they were even champions.

What drug you on? Tanks have seen plenty of play throughout all of the seasons. It is now as bad as it was during the atmogs metagolem nonsense. It's no longer one or two full tanks, now literally everyone besides the ADC are building stupid amounts of HP. I'm seeing more games with both top and jungle being full tank on top of the tanky support instead of either top or jungle taking an assassin or mage. The worst part is that this is not simply because of a few buffs, people just literally started playing more tank champs and building more tank items and it's annoying as fuck. Almost every match now is as bad as the very few ones months ago when for whatever random reason a team just went all tanky.

It might be better if they took away the nonsense buffs they gave to a few tank champs that are now just broken, but that probably won't stop the tank meta.

2Kawaii4Hawaii4/20/2015, 11:33:16 AM1 votes

My only problem with the current meta, is that I'm having to build to lane against tanks. Not a lot of people remember the old season 2 meta, where it was similar to the current, but much much harder. In my personal opinion, a meta that revolves around 2 damage dealers and 3 meatshields with cc, shouldn't be the strongest comp in the game. Currently it is, and it was for all of season 2. In all honesty I'm probably going to go back to taking Olaf top a lot more that way I can actually combat tanks and their cc, only problem is, there are so many tanks that are viable in the current meta, especially with the addition of cinderhulk, that currently they are able to out-tank the few tank melters there are in league.

Prince Wesu4/22/2015, 7:14:32 AM1 votes

The only problem I have with Cinderhulk right now is how cost effective it is for how tanky it makes you when you complete this item. Pretty much anyone can rush cinderhulk and thornmail and be a tank god by mid game which in my opinion is very obnoxious because the item is just so cheap in comparison to other tank items.

TacB VIPEREYE6/14/2015, 5:28:20 AM1 votes

riot just needs to learn to shut there fucking mouth. they post this shit for all to see right on the front of your screen when you log in (tank meta is strong!!!) before you know it every fool with half a brain cell is doing it. Tanky comps were always strong S2,S3,S4 S5. It don't matter. Just cause they released a dumb ass cinder hulk doesint change the fact that tanks usually have a lot of CC...may deal %health dmg. And are obviously tanky as fuck.

If you have an amumu, Jarven and a Leona...on the enemy team..and your all squishy...then good luck with team fights. And then we have to be oh so lovingly reminded about tanks in a world where no one ever plays a tank...until you get that team that's stacked full of them.