I think Illaoi's vessel mechanic could be made healthier

to me, it should provide a buff to Illaoi instead of a significant debuff to the enemy; in my opinion this would be much healthier for both parties involved

why: The Vessel minigame is important to Illaoi because the main reward is the ability to pop a spirit and spawn extra tentacles when your passive is on cd. currently though it doesn't feel satisfying to pop as the Illaoi player and it's nothing but frustrating for the opponent. in addition, it's too easily nullified for something that's supposed to be punishing, as the opponent can stop any spawns from occurring by standing near an existing tentacle, can spawn tentacles in a spot that's actually disadvantageous for Illaoi and leave them there to keep her from getting a better one, in addition to tentacles being easily avoided and easily killed. Opponents have too much agency over the Vessel mechanic and this makes Illaoi hard to be threatening vs players who understand how to fight her.

what i propose: make it so that popping a Vessel, either by killing it or the target breaking the leash, instead empowers Illaoi to spawn extra tentacles from herself to any nearby walls at a few second intervals, decreasing with level, or until Illaoi is able to spawn one. the 'mark' still applies to enemies (slowed when it pops, marked for tentacles to hit) but the spawns are focused on Illaoi instead, to allow for her to decide where to spawn them, to feel better for Illaoi, and to be more fitting for a champ who is centered around being very powerful when able to set up a good nest of constructs

imo since the 'range' of her spawns as well as her threat range is indirectly nerfed by this change i think it would be reasonable for bonus tentacles from E to ignore a % of the minimum 'lock-out' range between tentacles as the game goes on. 0% until level 6, scaling up to a higher number by level 18 to be very minor/nothing at all in her early lane but to give her much-needed power in late game provided she can play well. would be willing to accept damage nerfs in exchange for more control over the vessel mechanic since that's already an indirect damage buff in best-case scenarios, but I think Illaoi should at least be reliable on the part of her kit that's supposed to be a reward for playing well