Trinity Force has the same problem Duskblade has

Ok sure but why··1 votes·732 views

Remember when the new runes came out, and Riot decided to give a ton of champs an extra 22 base AD? With Trinity Force and Sterak's Gage, you just gave the whole bruiser class an extra 66 damage every 1v5 seconds. If you call taking 5 damage off of Janna's W a "Nerf," then the entire Bruiser class just got a super MASSIVE buff, and no one ever really seemed to notice. Now we got all these Illaoi Darius Yorick Vi Camille Nasus Renekton Garen assholes running around with it, dealing an absolute shit-ton of damage with absolutely no compensation nerfs.

Items like item 3078 item 3053 and item 3147 are unhealthy items that require Riot to balance champions around them, instead of being items that get balanced around them. Deathfire Grasp had this exact problem with AP assassins, and it got taken out because of it!

Items like item 3285 item 3100 are decent because they scale with AP and enhance a specific play-style. item 3078 item 3053 item 3147 don't scale with anything. They're just free damage, and the champions that are better at abusing them either get nerfed or are left being extra strong with them.

2 Comments

TheSandQrator2 votes

Hold on. Hooold on.

You pulled Lich Bane into the "okay" camp when is a burst tool. To make the most out of it you need to build AP, and that's most likely a glassy build.

Triforce, which incentivises a more consistent trading pattern, in part due to its stat spread, can be built on literally anyone. A lot of folks shy away from it for a variety of reasons. Mainly the fact that it provides mana, but also because Orianna will get less use out of it than Illaoi.

Duskblade is literally free damage, yes. It depends on levels so it's more viable on solo laners, but it provides the same amount of damage regardless of who you pick. I used to build it on Kled for example. His ganks were disgusting as a result.

It doesn't matter how much you hit the Spellblade items as long as their Spellblade proc exists. As long as it provides an additional effect, whether it's just extra damage, or a slow, or whatever else you come up with...

By the very nature of its passive, people with autoattack resets or reliable/spammable skills that apply on-hit-effects, will find A LOT more value from them than others, just due to the to the synergy in their kits with the item effects. Lich Bane is a little different in that it's AP-heavy focused. Its user base is a bit more limited: to people who build AP, and have a skill that applies on-hit-effects, or autoattack anyway as a part of their natural play style.

Spellblade items amplify a champion's strengths, but DFG was removed, like the other poster pointed out, because it just added so much regardless of who you hit.

  • % Max HP damage on a targetted effect
  • Amplifies ALL magic damage the target takes; not just from the user, but everyone else as well. (Primary users were mages so they were the magical damage dealers affected most by it, but you cannot entirely discount others' damage.)

It was a horrifically powerful active, that was literally a guaranteed, on-demand multiplier to the user's damage against a target. You could keep it on cooldown just to threaten, like a Blitzcrank holds his hook.

At much as I hate the Duskblade myself, at least it has gating mechanisms.

  • Applies flat damage based on your level
  • Applies only on an autoattack
  • Negated if you have vision of them for 5+ seconds prior
Khristophoros1 votes

The problem with Deathfire Grasp was that it added a huge amount of point and click burst regardless of what your kit was supposed to do. The best example of abuse was actually Lissandra because of how well she can force an engage and lock down a target. She was never supposed to have that kind of unavoidable burst. There was no way to balance her as long as that item existed unless Riot wanted to just give up on her as a battle mage and balance her around being a hardcore assassin.

So which of those items you listed actually changes a champion's role entirely and totally perverts their identity like that?

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