@meddler @riot can we have a context for the skarner nerf?

Miudmon·Nov 26, 2015·32 votes·26,797 views

It just seems out of the blue to hit him this hard. As is, i could see why you would nerf him slightly, looking at his stats. but keyword here: slightly, and not what seems like a humongous nerf. it really feels like something you'd have dropped on him during pre-hotfix juggernaut patch given its magnitude. so, just asking... why nerf him this hard?

For those unaware, the nerfs are as follows Crystal Spires (Passive) Attack speed bonus lowered to [39-90%] from [43-160%] Impale (R) total AD ratio down to .4 from 1

149 Comments

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201529 votes

From what I understand, the team just wanted to try out a few different avenues as to how we want to nerf Skarner. Though it won't show up on the PBE over the holiday weekend, I believe the plan is to go with a pared down version of these nerfs for final changes.

It seems worth noting here that it can be difficult to really try more than one thing out at a time in an effort to land on the correct change when it comes to nerfs and buffs, because we tend to get large reactions from players when we do so. I'm not saying that reaction isn't justified (since we don't have the greatest history of being fully transparent on every change you see on the PBE), but I do think that's what is going on in this case.

Earl EulrichNov 26, 201537 votes

why nerf him in the first place? I mean - he´s a snowbally champ thanks to the shrine-mechanic (control the map->control the shrines->not many places for your opponents to fight Skarner, just snowball with drakes and baron as they have to go through shrine-areas to get there) and currently lol is a snowbally environment so he does fairly well. But once you guys fix the game he´ll be back to a mostly useless creature that gets destroyed by adc-dmg before ever getting to a target he´d like to grab.

(on a sidenote...you guys still know that Ryze sits ~60%winrate for experienced players - or are u just keen on selling SKT-Faker-Ryze-Skins sometime soon?)

Sire HippingtonNov 26, 20157 votes

thats not fuly true, one might think scarner is very snowball due mapcontroll+shrines, but he needs time to scale up and becomes a monster mid lategame, haveing the hardest spike once E is maxed and 40% cdr are aquired, as it allows E-ult-E for 4sec total cc with a heavy displace, or E, pop stun on 3 different targets, E again.

Also, his kidnapping power is more powerfull later on once deathtimers and teamdps are higher, as catching one guy will often translate into multiple objectives come to lategame.

Nerfing skarner honestly is ok, they just have to be carefully on how they nerf him. I think the ult nerf on it's own would be already fine, 70% less as on his passive would be overkill and feel horrible on scarner, and any nerfs to his Q dps also would hit the worng spot imo.

And ryze needs some attention more than ever....

Jeddy017Nov 26, 201521 votes

Um,you forgot to explain WHY Skarner should be nerfed in the 1st place.

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201518 votes

We think he's too strong. Incredibly overpowered? No. But slightly too strong, hence going with a small set of nerfs. You're free to disagree with that assessment; that was my first reaction too. That said, this is a character that is around a 54% win rate, with an experienced player win rate that appears to easily break 60%, so it's not unreasonable to assess him as overtuned.

Skarner does have a low play rate, so yes, he can probably be balanced resting north of a 50% win rate. These changes aren't intended to (nor do I believe they will) be an enormous power hit, just a small power trim.

Malicious MetalNov 26, 20154 votes

Hmm... So will you end up nerfing his spires or chip off some excess power in other areas? I'm all for the latter to be honest since a champion should excel in certain areas and fall shorter in others. His ultimate for example's got a 200% total ad ratio, which isn't even necessary for how powerful of an abduction tool it is.

But his spires, oh boy, this is an aspect of Skarner that should be kept powerful. It's a similar window of power like Darius' Noxian Might and Garen's villain mechanic.

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 20159 votes

We still think the spires should be important to his success, but there's also an argument to be made for him having too many eggs in one basket, so to speak. For now, I believe we're sticking with the ult AD ratio and leaving the spire strength intact.

Malicious MetalNov 26, 201513 votes

Phew, seems I can put my pitchforks away.

Still, I hope you understand why there was so much outrage due to the nerfs to seemingly unpopular champions. The common notion seems to be that unpopular=Underpowered but it's often not the case. Malzahar is a perfect example for this as was pre-rework Mordekaiser.

Still, It's good to see some of the thought process behind those changes, helps understand why you seemingly nerf things out of the blue and cease the rioting. (Hue)

WaetzigNov 26, 20157 votes

{quoted}

Skarner does have a low play rate

Maybe this what you should look at, if he already has a low play rate, nerfing him will drive away even more of his small fanbase, maybe look at changing something about the champion instead of just taking a dump on him until hes just as bad as he was before, no one likes the spires, not skarner players, not his allies, not his enemies, maybe look at that instead

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201523 votes

First of all, you could hardly call a nerf to his ultimate "taking a dump on him," so please don't blow things out of proportion.

As to trying to address a low play rate, there is an assumption here that we would like him to be a popular champion, or at least more popular than he is now. It's unlikely that Skarner will ever be popular, given the theme, fantasy, and kit of the character. His theme and fantasy aren't bad, just niche. And his kit just doesn't really have the best gameplay built into it, and it never really has. Keep in mind, when I mention good gameplay, I don't mean that the kit has never been and will never be fun; it's more that his moment-to-moment power has always been very stat checky. We'd have a lot of work to wholly fix that, and though we tried to chip at it with the Juggernauts update, it would be disingenuous of me to say that it was fixed. He's now more strategically interesting insofar as he thinks about and tries to set up where he fights you, but it's still not particularly interesting how he fights you when he does.

For what it's worth, this isn't an isolated Skarner case. It's pretty consistent with many of the melee guys out there, especially the ones that we made 3-4 years ago.

NefasNov 26, 201526 votes

How about the assumption that he should be enjoyable for his original playerbase? I quit him after the rework and refuse to touch him. He feels absolutely awful outside his ridiculous spire zones.

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201518 votes

Sorry you don't enjoy him anymore.

Photos of GhostsNov 27, 201520 votes

What was the point of the rework in the first place? He fit his supposed juggernaut fantasy better before.

Muted SummonerNov 27, 20155 votes

{quoted}

Sorry you don't enjoy him anymore.

I have to agree with Nefas. I loved Skarner before the spires. Now I hate him. He feels to gimmicky. Got bad team mates say goodbye to your shrines. Got good team mates? Shrines to good. Where is his middle ground? He already gets counter picked so hard with all the great peel a team can use to play against him.

I bought battle cast Skarner only for me to regret it about a half a year later.

Earl EulrichNov 26, 20156 votes

i feel you, really miss the times of toplane-ap-bruiser skarner.

SpecterVonBarenNov 26, 20154 votes

I miss my sticky bug that could claw your face in.

RozzetaNov 27, 20158 votes

Skarner was reolcated to Shurima, and never received any long lore. Just wondering why could he not be very popular...

Let's not forget that his identity was deemed toxic by Riot, and destroyed on several ocasions.

Dominick DestineNov 27, 20153 votes

{quoted}

It's unlikely that Skarner will ever be popular, given the theme, fantasy, and kit of the character.

That is absolute bologna.

Skarner was INCREDIBLY popular after his Juggernaut rework (Read: When he was overpowered), he was nearly 100% pick/ban (At least in my bracket until he got nerf-bat'd). Do you not understand that people play characters based on their strength? why do you think Urgot is almost never played and Lee/Thresh/Riven/Yasuo are a constant presence? But I guess according to Riot, a lot of people wanted to play as a Green Spectre with a Glowing Light.

Seriously, I don't even play Skarner but I can see how illogical it is to give Skarner harder nerfs than Lee/Thresh/Yasuo/Riven have ever received.

Big LincolnNov 27, 20153 votes

flashy champions are always popular though

Urgot isn't popular because he has nothing interesting going for him -- he's just a giant stat-check lane bully who quickly tapers off

champions picked for being flashy and flexible =/= champs picked for being game-warpingly overpowered

Dominick DestineNov 27, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hextech Gunbard,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rZJWtBao,comment-id=0005000100010001000000020000,timestamp=2015-11-27T03:17:30.973+0000)

flashy champions are always popular though

Did you miss the part where Skarner was ultra popular after the juggernaut update? his strength went through the roof and thus, his pick/ban rate did as well.

Urgot isn't popular because he has nothing interesting going for him -- he's just a giant stat-check lane bully who quickly tapers off

Uhh no. He isn't "popular" because he's complete trash. He WAS popular for a brief period when was utter decimating bot lane but got nerfed over and over again.

It's not complicated. Freelo = Higher pick rate. Feedlo = Low pick rate. Or for the third time with different terms; Overpowered = Popular. Underpowered = Unpopular

Big LincolnNov 27, 20152 votes

skarner was popular because he was the most overpowered thing in the game with almost no way to combat him, which you'd note I pointed out in the last sentence

urgot would be more popular if he had any playmaking potential whatsoever, but he doesn't. so, like skarner, he's only ever picked if he just gets to shit on people without any thought or skill required. Skarner's hardly trash right now either, but when he isn't warping the game, nobody wants to play him because he's one of the biggest one-trick ponies currently in the game

riven, lee sin and thresh will always be popular because they're both flashy and versatile. even when they're awful in the meta they'll still maintain a decent pick rate because of that.

VeryGreenNov 26, 20153 votes

{quoted}

We think he's too strong. Incredibly overpowered? No. But slightly too strong, hence going with a small set of nerfs. You're free to disagree with that assessment; that was my first reaction too. That said, this is a character that is around a 54% win rate, with an experienced player win rate that appears to easily break 60%, so it's not unreasonable to assess him as overtuned.

Skarner does have a low play rate, so yes, he can probably be balanced resting north of a 50% win rate. These changes aren't intended to (nor do I believe they will) be an enormous power hit, just a small power trim.

And what are your thoughts of Yasuo at the moment? Im sure you wont answer this. Warlords Bloodlust was obviously not issue with him. OR what about Brand. His passive can reaply Deathfire and Liandrys every tick. You can literally get one shotted by his flame pilar if you are a support late game because of this. Tell me where the balance is in that. One of these days you riot workers will respond to me.

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201525 votes

Yasuo is likely too strong, though it's hard to say by how much. Honestly, and I don't expect this to be a popular opinion, he's probably just more frustrating than he is actually overpowered.

This could be me not remembering correctly, but I was under the impression both Brand and DFT were getting nerfs on the PBE.

HellioningNov 26, 20153 votes

He could be both!

Maybe Skarner is more overpowered than Yasuo, but Yasuo's overpoweredness is obvious (lifestealing constantly in fights, dashing everywhere, 100% crit after 1 1/2 items), and Skarner's is less so (just kinda overpowering you.)

EDIT: And yes, both Brand and DFT are getting nerfed. Brand's mostly getting a lovetap, though, just a mana cost increase on his pillar. Riot's probably wanting to see how the DFT changes for DoT champions affect him before doing anything more extreme.)

Earl EulrichNov 26, 20156 votes

Yasuo is likely too strong, though it's hard to say by how much. Honestly, and I don't expect this to be a popular opinion, he's probably just more frustrating than he is actually overpowered.

so well, if he´s not too strong but still frustrating - he needs a rework.

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 20157 votes

Maybe. It depends how frustrating a champion should be. I think there's an argument to be made that if a champion isn't frustrating in one way or another, it's probably not very compelling/unique/interesting, though of course that isn't to say we should intentionally make frustrating champions.

AltricadNov 26, 20157 votes

Some champions can be frustrating and yet not complained as much because there are moments when you can decide to overcome it

Like Blitzcrank into Morgana for example. Morgana can make it very hard for Blitzcrank to do much, but there are still ways of baiting her spell shield, counting cooldowns or aiming for the person not spell shielded

I think the major complaint people have is that Yasuo decides the pace of his lane, whether or not you get to trade with him is in his capacity

i.e he has good disengage and engage. Champions that seem similar to him are either early game bullies or kill reliant Riven Renekton

But yasuo also scales hard with just farm which is why many people feel hopeless when forced to lane against him

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201515 votes

Yeah, Yasuo feels great to play because he often has so much agency over how his lane goes. Unfortunately, that often seems to come at the expense of his opponents' agency, so it may be fair to say that's what's so frustrating about him.

Drunk TsundereNov 26, 20153 votes

That is an interesting thought. By "agency" you mean control over how the lane turns out: As in if he outplays his opponent(s), he has much more direct impact on the lane than a different champion?

Do you think that being 100% in control of how a lane turns out depending on how well you play is a good thing, or even possible? On one hand, it makes the game more skillful and gives direct control over the game to the player in question, and is great for competitive, but on the other hand you have to be careful because if the game is too skillful then it stops being fun and has a very high barrier of entry for new players.

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201515 votes

By "agency" you mean control over how the lane turns out: As in if he outplays his opponent(s), he has much more direct impact on the lane than a different champion?

Basically, yes. It's about how much control someone has over their fate. If a character is 100% in control of how a lane goes if played well, then that implies it doesn't even matter what their opponent does to defeat them, and it sucks to be that opponent and know that I can play as well as I want and it doesn't even matter all that much.

It's just a barrier based on how well the person can play their champion. These champions are commonly ones that people claim are overloaded. Yasuo, Lee Sin, Nidalee (to use a champion that I was responsible for) have all been guilty of this, and this is some of why we see them needing to be balanced around lower than 50% win rates; because when you actually play things perfectly on champions like these, you leave little room for your opponent to do much of anything.

Unfortunately, these champions are also commonly very popular because they have that feeling of being able to do anything with them, so it does someone beg the question of whether we should be trying to make more champions like that (that players feel like they are in full control of their destiny), or ones with clearer weaknesses for opponents to exploit (at the expense of some of that control).

DivewingNov 26, 20159 votes

Wouldn't the fact that you're conflicted about this potentially imply that such champions based around these factors have no place in the game?

qetzelNov 27, 20152 votes

Not quite. There is a balance to be struck between the fun of the player and the fun of the opponent. I think it is possible to get the balance right and hence for these champions to have some place in the game.

Crowe StalkerNov 27, 20156 votes

The problem being that with Yasuo particularly, that fun is clearly balanced towards Yasuo rather than towards Equilibrium.

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 27, 20155 votes

That seems like it could be reasonably argued, yes.

Bethor KookalianNov 27, 20151 votes

That fact does not lead to that conclusion, no.

DivewingNov 27, 20154 votes

OK........ why? Or are you just going to say: "no it doesnt" and leave?

HellioningNov 27, 20159 votes

Here's a hint:

The person playing the champion is outnumbered by the number of people playing against the champion. 1<5.

VeraskaNov 26, 20156 votes

Hey man thanks for taking the time to explain these changes to us, especially on thanksgiving, means a lot ^^

If you get the chance tho, could you take a hot minute to enlighten me on the thought process behind the hecarim nerfs, the passive and E changes specifically? Why are they being done and what you hope they accomplish?

Thanks again friend

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201520 votes

I don't have any deep insight into the particular Hecarim changes on the PBE, but I imagine it has to do with Hecarim's perma unit collision avoidance being somewhat fundamentally flawed given the kit he has. He just gets near you and then spams circles of damage onto you. If he is stronger and you don't have a tool to get away, he will win.

On the one hand, yes, he's always been this way, so the need for this particular change on this very patch is probably no greater than on any other patch. On the other hand, if he's deemed too powerful at the moment by the balance team (which seems to be the case), it seems like a good place to trim power.

For what it's worth, permanently ignoring unit collision is probably not something we should just put on champion kits, and I wouldn't really be opposed to us taking this from Fizz and Kassadin as well, even if it meant we had to compensate them with power elsewhere. It's just not that exciting for how powerful it is. I don't think anyone selects any of these champions primarily because they are excited about ignoring unit collision. As any of these champions, I'd rather have just about any of my spells be a bit stronger rather than always avoiding unit collision.

Even if someone was picking these champions solely for these reasons, this to me is more an argument that pathing/collision should be more tolerable on average than having players choose champions that ignore the rule.

Rule 34Nov 26, 20158 votes

Why not just remove unit collision in general? It's an archaic, unhealthy mechanic that, as you just said, adds unnoticed and exceptional power to champions who can ignore it. Seems to me like it just shouldn't be around if it's so powerful while being so unnoticed.

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 201510 votes

I'm not really the guy to make that call, but I will say I'd prefer that we do that over having champions that selectively ignore it on a case by case basis.

Unit collision between champions is actually something I do think is good, and I do think it's nice that my minions may cause small reroutes for enemies that are ahead of me, so unit collision isn't all bad. However, I do understand how frustrating and inconsistent it has felt on Live lately, and that's not ideal either.

WisenheimerNov 27, 20153 votes

Can you float the idea of minion unit collision removal as a boot upgrade, that seems to be the small type of added power that belongs as a boot upgrade available to everyone and choosing over the other ones.

aperson1Nov 26, 20154 votes

In that case, do you have any plans for Rengar? He also has a pretty high experienced player win-rate and he doesn't seem to have been hit quite as hard as other AD assassins by the preseason changes, which is a little worrying if they're going to get a new item next patch. Also, he's pretty famously frustrating to play against. Is he going to get an adjustment anytime soon?

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 20157 votes

I hope we have some plans for him, but I'd need to look into it next week.

SincarnationNov 26, 20152 votes

{quoted}

We think he's too strong. Incredibly overpowered? No. But slightly too strong, hence going with a small set of nerfs. You're free to disagree with that assessment; that was my first reaction too. That said, this is a character that is around a 54% win rate, with an experienced player win rate that appears to easily break 60%, so it's not unreasonable to assess him as overtuned.

Skarner does have a low play rate, so yes, he can probably be balanced resting north of a 50% win rate. These changes aren't intended to (nor do I believe they will) be an enormous power hit, just a small power trim.

What happened to win rate not being the reason you nerf champions hmmm? As someone who has been playing skarner quite a bit since the rework, I find a lot of my wins come from snowballing ignorance. No one plays skarner, so no one knows how strong he is at what point in the game nor how to play against him. Ive gotten many MANY kills because some poor uninformed fool thought he could pick a fight with me and win. Now im not saying he isn't a little strong, but these nerfs are waaayyy too hard and in the wrong place. Skarner is a juggernaut now, that means late game fukr of shits. If you try to fight skarner in his relic late game, you deserve to get mauled by 160% attack speed. You guys should Love Tap and I do mean love TAP, his early game a bit so he cant bully out every jungler while still scaling into a monster.

http://matchhistory.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/#match-history/NA1/43063556?champion=72&map=1

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 26, 20157 votes

Win rate, especially just average win rate, is not the sole reason, but it is a data point that we can have conversations around pretty well.

Keep in mind, we're likely to just hit his ult AD ratio at this point, so we do see this as a love tap mostly. It just means he needs like 1 more basic attack to kill someone after ulting them. It can certainly be the difference in winning/losing a fight, but it's hardly a gutting.

SincarnationNov 27, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Win rate, especially just average win rate, is not the sole reason, but it is a data point that we can have conversations around pretty well.

Keep in mind, we're likely to just hit his ult AD ratio at this point, so we do see this as a love tap mostly. It just means he needs like 1 more basic attack to kill someone after ulting them. It can certainly be the difference in winning/losing a fight, but it's hardly a gutting.

I feel the need to clarify, I don't think the current nerfs are a gutting or anywhere near an olaf'ing. I just thought the spire nerf was misguided and counter-productive to the new philosophy you guys are pushing of highlighting strengths and identity. If you want to make the spires being a power point his schtick, don't over smack them with nerfs. You will just leave a champion with a crappy identity without any power to it.

However from what you are saying is that, the spire changes aren't likely going through. This raises the question of why they are on the PBE, I get the testing ground and such but one day on the PBE with how unpopular skarner is doesnt seem like nearly enough time to gauge impact. Despite that you have already made decided the nerfs werent going through. I've realized you only occasionally, if at all, look at the PBE for balance so why are the changes there? Before you say that you guys listen to the balance concerns of the PBE, the fact that reworked Skarner and Graves made it to live without being touched is clear evidence that you don't at least not with major changes that matter. Skarner and Graves were ripping people apart on the PBE and everyone knew they were horribly broken. Not proud to admit it, but the first thing I did when I saw you hadnt nerfed skarner with the juggernaut update was abuse him b4 people realized he was dumb which was only 2 games. You don't really listen to the PBE, so what data are these changes gathering?

Also: Did you guys do some ninja nonsense to Illaoi before her deployment? I remember playing as and against her on the PBE, her E was a pass through skillshot and her ult+tentacles didnt do nearly the absolute nonsense damage im seeing on live. Hell in the champion spotlight scarizard says it stops at the first champion hit, you guys did something.

Thanks for the response btw

RiotRiotRepertoirNov 27, 20156 votes

Hi, thanks for the post.

You don't really listen to the PBE, so what data are these changes gathering?

I get that it may feel this way, but it's not really true. Skarner and Graves are examples of where we didn't tune back given PBE feedback, and they came back too strong. However, there are also cases like Kog'Maw (where PBE people said he would be broken, we nerfed him a little bit, and he came out too weak), so it can be hit or miss.

There's also quite a bit to be gathered just from players' reaction to changes on sites like Surrender@20 or Reddit. At the end of the day we will sometimes (and maybe more often than not) have some unpopular decisions to make, but it's hardly because we don't care about people's opinions. It's a matter of balancing that perspective against what we think is right for the game state.

AMYS GRAVENov 28, 20153 votes

I get that it may feel this way, but it's not really true. Skarner and Graves are examples of where we didn't tune back given PBE feedback, and they came back too strong. However, there are also cases like Kog'Maw (where PBE people said he would be broken, we nerfed him a little bit, and he came out too weak), so it can be hit or miss.

On the subject of kogmaw I actually don't think he came out too weak. Its just that the environment of having shorter games is not conducive to the success of a late game hyper carry. Once the snowballing and short game issues are addressed hes going to come back into his own even if you had left him alone.

Sightless66Nov 28, 20152 votes

I think that's taking it too far. Yeah, he's hurt a good deal by the shorter games, but his performance dropped way more than that of any other hypercarry in the game, and he wasn't even winning half of the games that actually did go really late. At some point, we have to conclude that he really is just weak and needs some help irrespective of the game environment.