How a lane bully can be healthy?

Giovarco·Feb 3, 2015·4 votes·1,841 views

Riot tries to rework champions who are lane bully somehow. However, how can Riot make a lane bully healthy without changing his spells (like maybe )?

18 Comments

Drunk RummateFeb 3, 20154 votes

i think bullying is fine if you don't have easy access to followup damage to secure kills. i think a good example of this is mages in general, like cassiopeia and azir. they both have really strong lanes, and theyll poke you down a lot, but if you're smart you just back off when you take too much damage and you're fine. they can't dive your tower to finish you off or anything crazy like that.

but then you've got bullies like zed who will harass you to the end of days, and when you hit half HP he swaps with his shadow, autos you, and ignites and you're dead instantly. i think giving that type of champion the potential to bully is an issue, because they snowball off of themselves rather than encouraging team effort and communication.

a different example would be riven. she's not a lane bully in a sense that she harasses, but rather she waits for a power spike and goes all in. you can judge your strength relative to hers and assess when her spike is to avoid her solo kill, but you don't have to worry as much about dodging damage for 8 minutes straight before that spike in power. i think that's a far better design compared to zed, since riven is typically on the defensive until that point of attack which gives her opponent an opportunity to outplay her and farm up.

GiovarcoFeb 3, 20151 votes

Nice point of view. Thanks for the comment!

Truly PridefulFeb 3, 20154 votes

Personally, I think you could make a healthy lane bully but it would take a few things. First off, if they are designed to be a great lane bully then they can't be allowed to evolve into an excellent carry. If something can dominate lane and outscale everything else, why ever pick another champion? Secondly, I don't think a really good lane bully should be extremely mobile. There needs to be a risk to the playstyle. A highly mobile lane bully is just horrible to deal with and offers very little chance for you to punish them. Lastly, don't let them be manaless because that is just stupid.

Just my opinion though.

GiovarcoFeb 3, 20151 votes

Nice answer. Thanks for the comment.

Thanotos OmegaFeb 3, 20152 votes

Mordekaiser

Truly PridefulFeb 3, 20152 votes

To be fair, he used to be a huge menace but he's always been really gankable becuase of his playstyle. He's also pretty immobile so the ability to punish him is there. He is manaless, but his health costs early on are fairly meaningful if you're hitting him back.

I can give you that one though, Morde is a pretty okay guy despite being a manaless lane bully that scales well.

Kuroi86Feb 3, 20151 votes

So then just pick a mid/late game carry and farm under tower and the lane bully is suddenly useless.

This is what your idea does.

At first everyone picks the bully, then they realize how to beat him, then no one plays the bully.

Thank you, you just gutted several champs.

Truly PridefulFeb 3, 20151 votes

I'm not suggesting they gut anything, hell I have a problem with a grand total of two champions in this game. I answered his question on how you would go about designing a lane bully that is healthy, no reason to attack me for it. It was my opinion.

Farming under turret is fine and all, but it's a flawed arguement. If the lane bully scales as well as you do, outlasting them means nothing. They're farming better than you and they scale with you and if they are harassing like the usually do then their jungler is likely diving you.

The whole style of play is difficult to make fair to everyone and no matter what they do someone will be unhappy with it.

Kuroi86Feb 3, 20151 votes

Dude Renekton will never scale as well as Nasus

Truly PridefulFeb 3, 20151 votes

I think you're missing the point of the thread. I never said Renekton scales like Nasus nor did I call Nasus a lane bully. The problem would be if someone like Nasus was a crazy good lane bully while still having infinite scaling. Renekton is actually an example of a lane bully that is kind of okay right now. He bullies really well against a lot of things, but his scaling isn't very good so he just builds like a tank. He's also not overly mobile and a bulk of his damage is linked to his fury being high which you can watch.

Kuroi86Feb 4, 20151 votes

Lol, I didn't mean to say Nasus is a lane bully, Renekton is the lane bully. But Nasus scales massively hard into late game and without getting ahead, Renekton will fall off hard and be useless come mid/late game. I seriously don't think any lane bully scales as hard as a carry laner, that's why the lane bully has to get ahead early.

TsundayFeb 3, 20152 votes

Cait is a lane bully, she doesn't have the massive steroids of other ADCs though. I don't hear anyone calling her OP.

GiovarcoFeb 3, 20151 votes

You're right. Thanks for the comment.

Julius EvolaFeb 3, 20151 votes

Lane bullies were a product of the meta change in the Jungle. The jungle nerfs and lane gold buffs have narrowed the champion pool towards lane dominant champions. If Riot's Balance team didn't realize this by design, they need a new balance team.

BluePolarizerFeb 3, 20151 votes

Lane bullies aren't all that. Unless you get totally, completely shut down and killed 3+ times, as long as you play safe and farm with a mid/late game champ, you will win the game. Pantheon will fall off eventually.

Now the most dangerous are mobile lane bullies that scale well. Zed, J4 and Riven are prime examples.

Kuroi86Feb 3, 20151 votes

How a lane bully can be healthy?

Darius Garen Mordekaiser Renekton Shyvana Pantheon

GiovarcoFeb 4, 20151 votes

Champions like Darius are balanced just because useless late game. It's just a comprimise to be a lane bully.

Kuroi86Feb 4, 20152 votes

They have powerful early games with relatively little item dependency early on. Later in the game though they will fall off due to other champs scaling better. They can stay ahead if they are capable of getting early kills and snowballing, but if they are unable to, they will drop like a brick mid game.