Brainstorm: Fixing Ezreal's (W)
http://ddragon.leagueoflegends.com/cdn/6.24.1/img/spell/EzrealEssenceFlux.png #Brainstorm: Fixing Ezreal’s (W) Hello everyone. This is my brainstorm thread for ways to fix Ezreal’s (W) and balance out his kit. I will be breaking the content up into nice, edible segments so you don’t have to feel like you’re reading a giant wall of text, even though you totally are. [sg-miss-fortune]
##Why Does It Need A Fix? So, it has only been two days of preseason, but I can already tell that Ezreal is busted. His Q damage is too high, and he’s banned in like half my games, which sucks, because I want to play him, and also because I know that he will probably be nerfed. So instead of just changing his (Q)’s AD ratio, which is the obvious nerf, I figured we could instead move some of the power away from that ability and onto his (W), which has largely been untouched ever since its nerf back in season 2. Back then, Essence Flux would also slow enemy attack speeds, making Ezreal a dueling monster. Riot removed that portion of the ability, and ever since, Ezreal has basically been a champion with only three abilities. If we put more power into landing (W) Essence Flux, then the best Ezreal players have one more skillshot to prove why they’re better than the rest.
##Just How Big Of A Change Are You Suggesting? I don’t know about you guys, but Arcane Shifting towards someone and then blasting them with Q->AA->W->AA feels good. It’s a lot of fun to fling spells and autos at people in quick succession, and I want to retain that feel as much as possible. My goal with this brainstorm is not to suggest a completely new ability for Ezreal. I think there are far too many VOD’s of this champion using his abilities. If a new player were to see a highlight of an Ezreal play and then try the champion out, they would be confused if they couldn’t find that golden skillshot anywhere in his kit. Therefore, I’m only suggesting enhancements for the current (W), but not changes in the way it fundamentally works.
##What Are The Changes? I’m going to group my ideas into two categories:
- Enhancing Effectiveness: Basically, making Essence Flux do Essence Flux things better.
- Better Rewards: Ezreal players will have a bigger incentive and payoff to land Essence Flux
- Passive Changes: Possible changes to the passive that would benefit Essence Flux’s importance.
Keep in mind that these suggestions don’t have to be mutually exclusive. There can be a combination of solutions that involves all categories. Also, some of them are pretty outlandish from a balance perspective, but I’ve posted them to spark inspiration. This is a brainstorm, after all.
https://imgur.com/hH9kkuT.gif ######Here, you can observe the boosted animal, Zenophobia miss his (W) but still get a kill anyway.
[sg-syndra] ##Enhancing Effectiveness The goal of this section is to really separate the good Ezreal players from the best ones by making this ability scale better with the skill of the player. I have some ideas right now for going about doing this.
Double Activation This is just a simple change where Ezreal’s (W) can be fired twice per activation, similar to old Rumble (E). It really smooths out the E->Q->AA->W->AA->Q combo, as there’s usually an awkward gap between the last auto and the next Q. This way, good Ezreal players can stack their passive faster, or spread their attack speed buff to more allies. Of course, the AP ratio on this ability would have to be adjusted to make sure its damage isn’t broken. If we want to get crazier, then Ezreal can be rewarded in some way for landing both activations of the ability on the same enemy champion, but I will get into those ideas later.
Ramping Effectiveness This change makes it so that the (W) deals more damage or grants more attack speed to each subsequent champion hit, incentivizing Ezreal players to aim their (W) to hit as many champions as possible, and greatly rewarding those who do so.
Ramping Range Ezreal’s (W) range will be extended for each champion hit. A pretty simple change, but it works in the same way as the previous suggested change.
[sg-ahri-2] ##Better Rewards This section describes different possible rewards that could be granted for landing Essence Flux, and are focused around utility, since most Ezreal players max (W) last. They can be combined with my Enhancing Effectiveness ideas pretty easily (e.g. Hitting an enemy with both (W)’s in Double Activation will grant X reward, or a miniscule X reward is given, but its effectiveness scales with Ramping Effectiveness).
Mana Recovery Ezreal regenerates X% of his missing (or maybe max) mana for each champion hit. One of Ezreal’s biggest weaknesses is mana consumption, which forces him to invest 750g early on into Tear, or go into the jungle and take blue buff. One of the reasons Ezreal jungle works is because Riot over-tuned him around Tear. Suddenly, with that extra 750g, Ezreal’s early game is a lot stronger. With this change, we can alleviate some of that early mana starvation, but only if players land (W) properly.
General Crowd Control This is pretty crazy, but worth playing around with. If conditions from Enhancing Effectiveness are met, then the (W) could apply maybe a silence or a slow or heck, even an attack speed debuff like the days of old.
Easier to Buff Attack Speed Ezreal’s (W) no longer grants attack speed to allies it hits. Instead, it marks enemy champions. Allies who damage the marked enemies gain the attack speed buff from before. This will make it less awkward for Ezreal players to have to aim their (W) at their own allies when they need to grant them a buff. However, it will make their tower sieging less effective.
[sg-ezreal] ##Passive Changes This section goes along the vein of both of the previous two sections by suggesting changes to the passive. I personally am not a fan of changing Ezreal’s passive, as it has been a signature part of his kit for so long. However, I’m still leaving these suggestions here as food for thought.
Uncapped Passive Pretty plain and simple. Make Ezreal’s passive have the potential to reach unlimited stacks, or at least more than the amount it can reach right now. Of course, there would have to be a limit on the number of stacks granted per ability, but this would really make Ezreal players focus on landing that (W).
Passive Becomes Adaptive Making Ezreal’s passive grant either attack speed or ability power or maybe both would allow (W) to suddenly start dealing damage, as well as the option to use his ultimate as a finisher or as a quick and dirty AP/AS buff.
Passive Instead Reduces Cooldowns Basically, the CDR of Ezreal’s (Q) would instead be moved to his passive, allowing him to Q->W->Q extremely quickly. This is a pretty broken idea, so it probably won’t work.
In the end, I think what Riot will do to nerf Ezreal is reduce his Q AD ratio back down to 1.1xAD and call it a day, but I think nerfing it down to 1.0xAD (what it was way back when) and then putting more power into his (W) is a better option. The ideas I’ve suggested here are in no way balanced. They are just for Riot to experiment with. Perhaps the perfect balance is a blend of multiple options, but the current (W) just has no impact, causing too much of Ezreal’s power to be focused in his (Q). Anyway, that's my brainstorm. Additional ideas and discussion are welcome.
