@GarenMains What is Garen's identity? What needs to stay and what needs to go?

Toastersaot·Oct 24, 2016·15 votes·2,822 views

I just wanted to make a written record of things that make Garen good and what needs to go, because right now he might be in line for a full VGU if things don't change.

What is Garen's identity as a champion thematically? Is he a hero that brings swift justice to his foes? Or is he one that perseveres through all hardship to bring justice?
What is his scaling as a champion? Is he a lane bully like , a mid game powerhouse like , or a late game hypercarry like ?
As a Top Laner, what is he? Is he a split pusher like ? Is he a Teamfighter like with his AoE?
Is Garen's manaless sustain passive, with all the trade offs his kit must have with it (no ranged abilities, no mobility), have to remain in it's current state? If you would change it, how?

Just wanted to ask some questions.

31 Comments

TyrekGoldenspearOct 24, 201616 votes

Identity wise I believe he is the paragon soldier of Demacia, first and foremost. Fighting through thick and thin. He is not a judge jury or executioner of justice like his kit suggests, as he simply fights for Demacia's values, one of which happens to be justice. An actual warrior of justice would be Kayle.

Kitwise-

Passive. This can go honestly. Demacian soldiers do not retreat from battle, and his passive encourages it so he can heal up and jump back into the fight.
Q. This is his gapcloser as a Juggernaut to get to his target. This can be buffed or changed without messing with his identity too much. If it is replaced it has to let him charge into battle somehow.
W. This is his general defensive steroid. It fits with his theme of being a heavily armored soldier. In this day of league it stacks up way too slowly and hits a cap too low for it to be of general use. Perhaps it could give him some tenacity as well like in the old days. Or give him some kind of infight sustain so he can keep dishing out justice.
E. This is his identity. Spin2Win. It shouldn't be changed. The tickrate/damage of his E late game should be more impactful.
Ultimate This is also his identity. The giant sword from the sky execute that is super satisfying to land. However the Villain passive saps up too much of his power budget. However his nerfs were meant to be compensated by the Juggernaut items, which have since been nerfed without compensation to him. His Villain passive needs to be changed to be more useful or scrapped altogether as he is a soldier, not necessarily an active seeker of justice like law enforcement.

DarkomantisOct 25, 20161 votes

Could I ask you some additional questions on Garen?

What's fun about playing as Garen?
What frustrates, and what is he missing?
What's miserable about playing against Garen?
What items do you want to build on Garen?

TyrekGoldenspearOct 25, 20163 votes

Sure.

What's fun about playing as Garen? It's fun to be the "hero" of the team. When an enemy is getting too big for my team to handle, or if there is a carry that's on the enemy team that tries to be all fancy with outplays and insecs, that's when I come in to shut them down. I am the effective anticarry. I'm too tanky for an assassin to kill and my damage will take them effectively down, and since they like to play around low health my execute is super satisfying to land on their head.
What frustrates, and what is he missing? The point of being an anti carry frustrates me sometimes. He has one job and that is to take out the villain. What is frustrating is that I do no real damage to anybody else but the Villain. Another thing is that Garen's kit is kept super simple so that I cannot be outplayed, this leads to a very shallow skill ceiling where after a certain point, there is literally nothing I can do to win a teamfight, especially if the Villain happens to be the enemy support who got a lucky kill. Basically he's missing reliable damage. Also permaslows kill him so hard it is depressing.
What's miserable about playing against Garen? Personally I have had little issues playing against Garen. Mostly because besides him I don't really play any other melee champs, and all the ranged champs I play have some form of CC that lets me abuse his kiting weakness so hard I feel bad for the Garen. I don't even feel concerned as the Villain, and that troubles me. He has to work so hard to even get to me, often having to burn his flash, that when he finally catches me and executes me I feel nothing but respect for the Garen for managing to pull it off despite the odds.
What items do you want to build on Garen? My typical build is .

StephenizgodOct 24, 20166 votes

I think Garen was suppose to be an early game bully, his damage and lack of resource gave him an advantage over a lot of enemies. That is no longer the case, just look at Darius who, despite having mana, is also an early game bully (a better one with better sustain and a better ult). He isn't the best at Teamfighting and while his split push is decent, its not really what he was meant for. As for his Passive, it may have worked back in the day, but League has evolved to a fast paced, everything is instant, game. Long over time heals just don't cut it when compared to the instant or fast paced healing we have today. His passive needs to be something other than a worse Mundo ult, but with the same idea behind it.

Garen's Villain mechanic, in my opinion, was not that great or at least not how it is implemented. The idea behind it is Garen going to punish someone who is killing his teammates right? Well unfortunately it came at the cost of a lot of his laning power, so now he has a hard time keeping up in his own lane. So not very fed Garen, needs to go to another lane and basically run at a fed enemy champion to try and kill them. While he is doing this I suppose his lane opponent is either coming to stop him or pushing his lane. See where I am going? this mechanic does not really benefit what Garen wants to do. He wants to smash his opponent with his righteousness or if not able to do so, persevere their onslaught and keep them off his team. The Villain mechanic just does not fulfill this idea thematically or mechanically. Garen is a symbol of Justice, he is not an executioner, he should show resilience and power against wrong-doers.

Garen doesn't necessarily need a huge rework, honestly they just need to tweak a few things to make him viable again. His Passive could be something like, Garen activates "insert name here" while in combat, once out of combat he will heal for X% amount of damage he did to the enemy while "insert name here" was active. His Q is fine but if you wanted to you could increase the Silence duration the longer he had it activated. You could remove the Q slow removal and give it to his W instead and give it like a 1-2 seconds of slow resistance. His E is fine. His R should remain roughly the same but the Villain mechanic needs to be changed or removed for his kit to have some of its power back. Perhaps if he took reduced damage from the Villain, and gained MS when running towards them.

Mira Arya EntheOct 24, 20165 votes

Originally he was an 'anti-carry'. Basically played to early game bully to prevent carries from getting gold. Thus his execute power and silence. It lets him take down carries. They tried to accentuate this with the villain system, but it is wonky. It needs to just always target the highest KDA or Gold enemy.

Critmaster GarenOct 24, 20165 votes

honestly, i like his better lategame scaling than being a "win lane lose game" champion. i wouldnt mind his current weak early game as much, if in return hed hyperscale into lategame.

i wish theyd build further on that and add infinite scaling to his w, so he really becomes a lategame carry.

as far as his identity as a juggernaut goes, hes kindof similar to darius. but the main difference is that he has less extreme hit or miss scenarios. darius has gigantic carry potential if a proper teamcomp is built around supporting him. but getting into the position to trigger his passive and chain dunk is incredibly difficult.

darius has higher payoff, but also much less opportunity to get rolling.

garen is still teamreliant, but not quite as teamreliant as darius. he mainly focuses on taking down a single high threat target on the enemy team instead of the entire enemy team, but gets into the position to carry a bit more consistent than darius.

in my opinion he has 2, maybe 3 main issues right now.

1.) the lack of in combat sustain that other juggernauts have. he can either straight up tank through an entire teamfight, by going into it with enough items, or he dies without having much impact.

its also a reason why in many cases even if he manages to get into melee range, he gets outtanked by adc who live through his sustained damage with enough lifesteal.

2.) the isolation damage on his e. the mechanic is problematic overall. its invisible power. most people who are fighting him are probably not even realizing he deals increased damage against isolated targets. it also slows him down in scenarios where he just wants to do what a juggernaut in general wants to do, which is get into the middle of the enemy team and deal as much damage to as many targets as possible.

3.) his villain mechanic is an unreliable element. while its usually targetting the right person it also often ends up on a target you dont need it on.

some form of tweak is neccessary to just make it function better.

Critmaster GarenOct 24, 20165 votes

maybe it would be an interesting idea to revisit his w passive again. instead of stacking up resistances, he could gather stacks that add some form of health based in combat sustain.

the problem is, that the ideal passive for garen is already taken by another champion: Volibear

garens current passive is neccessary as a safety mechanism in lane. if it wasnt there, his entire melee range focused kit would break down against any form of consistent poke.

volis passive on the other hand is much more versatile and can give him additional sustain in lane when under pressure, while triggering in combat aswell.

if you think about it, voli is a champion who is incredibly similar to garen, being just as melee restricted as him (the only ability in his kit that extends past his auto attack range is his ult, and that damage is rather weak). yet, he still functions as a competitive champion.

the same goes for DrMundo passive which is essentially garens passive on a lower value, but doesnt get deactivaed when taking damage. so it always runs and helps him to out sustain poke.

but in theory it would be possible to put an altered form of volis passive on him, that scales up with stacks like his current resistance bonus. it wouldnt be the same passive, but similar.

here is just a general idea how a garen mini rework to his passive and w could look like:

perseverance: Garen heals 30% of his missing health for a few seconds when his Health drops below 30% of his maximum health. (cooldown 20s)

courage (passive): Killing units permanently grants a flat bonus to perseverance health regeneration.

increase his base health, and/or his base resistances, and/or his base health regeneration. (currently rather low for a jugg since it takes his current passive and his w passive into account)

just spitballing on this one.

and his villain passive could be changed to a mechanic more similar to kindreds where he can chose the villain every couple of minutes by himself.

this could be a possible replacement for the isolation damage.

King of Hearts11Oct 25, 20163 votes

Hi, Garen main since season 1. Couple of things which I should highlight which I feel might be inaccurate coming from some people who might not have spent as much time playing Garen as some of the plat people or some d5 people. I have about 300k mastery points on Garen and generally play around the plat 4 - plat 5 range so I do feel like what I am saying is reasonably valid in comparison to others.

1.) Honestly looking at Garen, I feel like Riot failed at making a Paladin Esque sorta character from WoW. Big pauldrons, he even looks like a Paladin but you have all these warden skins on other champs...anyways that's a different topic lol.

2.) He's not really quite a lane bully anymore like or Darius but he does outscale those champions in the late game considering you don't lose the lane really hard early. He doesn't quite have the burst of someone like Riven or MonkeyKing but he does have quite a bit more survivability than these 2 champs. All these 4 champs currently have very good dueling potential in lane and that's something I feel Garen honestly lacks. I would say fervor is partly to blame for that, as any champion that currently relies on fervor for top lane can all in Garen in the lane until level 6 maybe. This is why Renekton/Darius/Riven will outduel you in the lane. Running fervor on Garen isn't optimal either. In terms of hyper carries like Tryndamere or Jax , Garen does have some elements in his kit in which you can offer more burst than these 2 champions and potentially carry harder but it requires too much gold on him to be able to efficiently carry it out every game and you need atleast 70% crit on him in order to achieve that. That's why most of the games you will find yourself most often building bruiser with a hint of damage rather than straight tank or straight dps. Full AD/ArPen builds are vastly inferior to Full Crit Builds on him just to keep that in mind.

So when is it optimal to pick Garen?

When you see 2-3 tanks on other team. The thing which Garen excels at in comparison to someone like Darius is that Darius needs to get off the chance to get 5 stacks off in a teamfight in order to push the teamfight in your favor. Garen can flat out nuke the target for 1k of their HP leaving a person out of the team fight much quicker. He can also heal back up in case he takes damage early on while peeling. Darius if peeled will most likely proceed to die as there's no way for him to heal back up unless he can land multiple Q's. Garen can function quite well versus poke compositions in late game as well however picks like Karma or Kayle are absolutely nightmarish for Garen to perform his job well.

3.) I would say in his current state, Garen does two things well at the moment. He's an extremely potent split pusher, partially due to how well he can clear large waves with either a Sunfire, Thornmail, Tiamat or some crit w/ item 3031 . In team fights, he's perhaps the only bruiser that works like an assassin. His teamfights aren't the best but they aren't the worst imo. The only reason I say is because his villain mechanic is very unreliable as to who the villain is. If the person who you should be focusing in team fights is not the villain, it can be fairly difficult sometimes to kill the target as Garen already suffers enough from kiting. His team fight isn't also considerably the greatest after he uses his ult. His threat level goes considerably down once his ultimate is used.

4.) Honestly if Riot wants to keep Garen's passive in his current state then the numbers need to go up at level 11. At level 16 I guess the regen comes in quite handy once you have a spirit visage as you can heal back up relatively quickly while peeling for your team. But mid-game the passive feels absolutely useless. The reason one could argue that it might be useful early game is if you were to run HP regen runes on Garen and those do greatly help out his laning phase atleast in the current meta against champions who just out poke Garen but it would need to be more impactful atleast mid-late game where it makes a considerable difference.

I would honestly change it to Garen regenerating % of his health in combat as I feel he should be able to thrive IN combat not out of it. And its one of the main reasons why Garen's dueling sucks as well perhaps.

Sire HippingtonOct 25, 20162 votes

Things that garen is did and should do:

Have a good lane/1v1 vs squishyer melees(like riven or jax) it doesn't have to be as good as renektons or darius laneing, but still strong.
Become an very tanky good aoe damage threat in teamfights, but therefor with low cc and rather easy to kite
THE Execute ult
Spin to WIn
High out of combat sustain

What he really doesn't need:

Dealing % truedamage to a semi random(you can't directly influence it) target and paying alot power for it. Realy, just scrap the villian bullshit, it feels horrible to play against and not that statisfying to use.

Imo garen was perfectly fine befor the rework(though i do like the changes to his E, pushing some of his power from lane to mid/late). The Vilian mechinc just is bad, and the nerfs he recived really hurt him. Right now he's a binary bastard that punishes other melees for doing well and therefor totally gets shit on by any ranged. Befor the rework, he already was strong vs melees and weak vs ranged, but it was a bit balanced and by far not as extreme as now, as he had better tools vs kiteing/peeling and less punishing damage vs melees.

I'd happily give up on the villian mechanic in exchange for his tenacity on W, 5more base ms and either the old silence duration or Q speedbuff...

Garen also has alot wasted potential though. I don't care about the new lore and his thing for katatarina, he's the paragon of Demacias millitary, the leader of the vanguard. He's not someone running off to fight a hot chick, he gives commands and sticks with them himself, he goes as an exemple and expects others to follow.

There would be quite some potential in makeing Garen more a commander, leading his team into the fights. Give his Q an aoe speedbuff so others can follow your lead, Give his W an aoe damage reduction, or let garen absorb damage taken by others for the duration so your team can hold the line, Let his Ult grant an aoe buff/heal/whatever if it executes a target so your team can revel in victory as justice prevails. This would have given him an unique identity among juggernauts, but no, riot goes for the stupid villain passive...

Teridax68Oct 25, 20162 votes

Thoughts on this from a non-Garen main:

{quoted}

What is Garen's identity as a champion thematically? Is he a hero that brings swift justice to his foes? Or is he one that perseveres through all hardship to bring justice?

I think the core of Garen's thematic identity is that he is a tireless bringer of justice. You can throw a lot at him, and he'll still keep coming to carve a path through his enemies. He isn't really fast, so much as really tough and resilient to incoming effects, and deadly at close ranges.

{quoted}

What is his scaling as a champion? Is he a lane bully like , a mid game powerhouse like , or a late game hypercarry like ?

I feel Garen is definitely an early game champion, though he should still have some use beyond the laning phase. He should be strong against virtually any lane opponent, and past that he should still be a durable damage-dealer, and should be valuable at all times for his execution potential.

{quoted}

As a Top Laner, what is he? Is he a split pusher like ? Is he a Teamfighter like with his AoE?

I think he should be in the same boat as Gangplank (/pun), in that he should have good enough pushing power to split push, but should ultimately want to teamfight if he can. His E makes him a phenomenal pusher, but his relative slowness means he should be forced to fight if he gets caught.

{quoted}

Is Garen's manaless sustain passive, with all the trade offs his kit must have with it (no ranged abilities, no mobility), have to remain in it's current state? If you would change it, how?

I think it should change: right now, the issue with Garen's passive is that it basically means he gets massive rewards for inaction, and has neither the mobility nor the incentive to get back immediately into combat after retreating, so it clashes with his theme and his gameplay. I feel he could take a page from Tahm Kench and new Rengar's Grey Health mechanic, and only regenerate damage taken from enemy champions and large monsters. Perhaps his Q, instead of silencing his opponent, could instead regenerate all of that Grey Health instantly when used against a champion/large monster, which would really encourage Garen to charge at his opponents when they think they've taken him down.

Adding to this, I think a large issue with Garen right now is his Villain mechanic: the true damage does not feel appropriate and doesn't add to his gameplay, and Garen's complete lack of reach means he often can't target the Villain even when he wants to. I think it needs to be changed completely: perhaps this might be a bit too strong, but I'd be happy if Garen could globally target the Villain with his ult, or at the very least gain additional range on his ult against the Villain, and have that be his only bonus.

JerulEonOct 25, 20162 votes

He's my third most played and I have a 65% winrate on him in platinum. To me Garen is a mother fucking bad ass who doesn't take defeat for an answer. He inspires his troops and takes on the biggest baddy on the enemy team cuz that's how he reps Demacia.

I know why his identity is confusing because he is actually a combination of team fighter and split pusher but he's not the best at either. He can split push because he is a bully in lane due to his spam q which you can't beat unless you are either ranged or Darius. With Q active, ghost, and zz rot you are almost uncatchable. This speed also makes his mid game great and his strongest point. He roams around the map after putting a rot top and goes for objectives and villains.

This passive is actually broken. The RNG is frustrating to deal with for both sides. You have to pray for the optimal targets to be picked but when you get ulted for 800 true damage it feels bad. However killing the villain turns around a fight and makes Garen so strong mid game. Late game is a struggle tho.

His lane passive sustain needs to have the time duration to restart shortened. His W cool down should go down to 15-10 seconds to be more relevant. Make his E tick do the same damage as the isolation damage. Isolation damage doesn't fit into his kit since he isn't an assassin lol but sometimes you have to. Finally his villain mechanic gives him a permanent stack of health when he executes one with ult. Since Garen falls off and his health per level is also the lowest out of all the juggernauts, this will help him late game and reward for hunting scum across the map. He has a great kit but just needs some quality of life buffs.

Pierce The VealOct 25, 20162 votes

He is spin to win.

He is DEMACIA.

He is justice.

He is an Attack helicopter.

Troll for TrumpOct 25, 20162 votes

I can't really be called a Garen main, but I played a lot of the Old Garen and then kinda stopped.

What I liked about him was how he was a great way to counter all the "LC$ mechanics" champion as a way to shut them down early with summoner 14 summoner 4

Riven Yasuo LeeSin and whatnot, as he had higher early game base dmg, higher trading potential early, and a longer silence, which made him a great counterpick.

But he shouldn't be a bully like Darius

TotalJerkOct 25, 20161 votes

Personally I think they need to bring his W tenacity back, then design and balance Garen around being heavily resistant to peel. That tenacity meant that one of the few expressions of skill Garen had was timing his W to mitigate CC vs using it to absorb damage.

DarkomantisOct 25, 20161 votes

I'm not exactly a "main" but I have played Garen for some time in S4/S5 and a number of games this season.

What is Garen's identity as a champion thematically? Is he a hero that brings swift justice to his foes? Or is he one that perseveres through all hardship to bring justice?

I don't think he is a hero. I have a different opinion of Garen as a champion that is different from the Spin-to-Win(tm) and sitting in a bush that is everyone's heart. To me he is one that is similar to Gutts from the Berserk series. One who grew with a sword and always swung it against increasing challenges. Garen is a gifted soldier who worked at great lengths to get where he is while keeping in line with Demacia's rules and values and is highly respected. Though faint, there is something growing within him to look beyond the current Demacia and it's war which is largely caused by his interactions with Katarina. Should he stay as a honorable and skilled Vanguard captain or should he take his sword into an unknown road?

Also, there is two things that makes me think there is more to Garen: the way he fights in the League of Legends A Twist of Fate video and his rugged Garen skin.

What is his scaling as a champion? Is he a lane bully like , a mid game powerhouse like , or a late game hypercarry like ?

I'm not exactly sure what his scaling as a champion is. I feel it largely depends on how well the early game went for him to do good later on. He use to be more of lane bully and could translate that into a good mid-game but now a lot of his good matchups from the past have become difficult for him. Garen being a Riven counter as some people still spout out today is largely a thing of the past as she defeats Garen at all points of the game. Riven simply outdoes him with quicker animations, higher mobility, better damage, hard CC, and more depth/potential.

As a Top Laner, what is he? Is he a split pusher like ? Is he a Teamfighter like with his AoE?

When Solo, Garen is a splitpusher and wants to go all-out on his laner granted if he is able to. He can't exactly 1v2 but definitely 1v1 if he is able to.
When in Teamfights, Garen works as an Anti-carry and his goal is to pick off a high priority target. He can't 1v2 or 1v3 but Garen's ultimate allows him to be sort of a Tanky Assassin. The Villian mechanic has enabled him to be able to deal with very Tanky champions if his team can knock them down to low health but it can be random at times.

Is Garen's manaless sustain passive, with all the trade offs his kit must have with it (no ranged abilities, no mobility), have to remain in it's current state? If you would change it, how?

Garen's passive is in a weird place at the moment. Early game, it can be helpful against melee champions or just hanging back but against competent players and/or ranged champions in can be negligible at times. If your laner gets lifesteal of some sort, then they just basically remain at higher health than you post-6 and you feel like your sustain kind of sucks in some cases. I know it works but I don't think it's as phenomenal as Malphite's passive and scaling. Late game, at level 16, it can be very strong and you can feel it when you seiging, but it isn't exactly reliable in teamfights as you can't jump and then immediately reenter.

Would I change it? I'm unsure. There are different options like:

If it is removed - Could fit a new passive to a attribute of either a damage aspect, a resistance aspect(courage's passive goes here), or a lifeline aspect(courage's active goes here).
If it is changed - I could potentially see something like health regen for being in combat with the scaling kicking up at mid and late levels with a mild form of regen on the side.
If it is kept - change the level scaling to be less reliant on reaching ultimate levels at level 11 and 16. Something like 8/7/6/5/4 seconds to activate passive and 2/3/4/5/6 regeneration at levels 1/6/10/13/16. More relevant scaling that's closer to home.

One idea I do have is putting his (W) Courage onto his innate passive and Perseverance (IP) onto his W while putting Garen's conditional E damage onto his W for a new ability. So his Innate passive would get bonus AR/MR that scales with slaying minions and a lifeline damage reduction passive which can go on cooldown. Garen's W passive grants health regen when attacking an enemy champion and monster(reduced regen) while he gets a low damage new ability.

it be lìke thatOct 25, 20161 votes

garen imo, is simply a brick you throw at Riven in low elo.

Off Meta EvanOct 25, 20161 votes

For me at least, (not a garen main just someone who used to main him and plays him a lot.)

Garen is being the hero of your team, the big heavy damage guy who courageously goes to the front and fights all comers, tanks, carries, assassins, fighters, all are welcome to try and beat you in the ring of combat. Granted i build item 3071 item 3142 item 3031 on the guy when ahead so maybe i'm not the BEST person to talk to about this but thats how i view him.

as far as scaling, i play him as an early game bruiser, getting as many aggresive trades in as possible to try and get a lead. I view him as a split pushing carry executer. where his team fight basically amounts to going up to the fed guy on the team and 100 to 0ing them. kinda like a make shift assassin. as far as i play him anyway.

i think his passive in the early game is balanced, it forces the enemy laner to play aggressive and try to actually fight him, late game its fucking stupid tho. i think a good way to balance it would be something similar to darius where you get hp back for getting your damage off because with item 3065 item 3083 its fucking stupid.

GULAG 4 UOct 25, 20161 votes

Gangplank plays as a split pusher because of his global ulti to what I know

ToastersaotOct 25, 20161 votes

{quoted}

Gangplank plays as a split pusher because of his global ulti to what I know

Im a GP main, and although global ults are useful, the majority of your damage comes from your barrels.

GULAG 4 UOct 25, 20161 votes

Thxs for dat correction m9

Bladerunner7777Oct 25, 20161 votes

Let's have another Juggernaut rework! :^)

Ariel the CruelOct 25, 20161 votes

What is Garen's identity?

Leblanc

(I'm not a Garen main.)

MLDzXnRRROct 25, 20161 votes

I think that Riot wants Garen to be playable character only for the new players. He is intentionally kept weak - remember that people complained when he was strong after the juggernauts rework. But all of his items got nerfed this season...

Critmaster GarenOct 25, 20161 votes

{quoted}

I think that Riot wants Garen to be playable character only for the new players. He is intentionally kept weak - remember that people complained when he was strong after the juggernauts rework. But all of his items got nerfed this season...

if they wanted that theyd have nerfed him directly.

SpoofghoulOct 25, 20161 votes

Garen's passive is pretty useful later in the game

The only problem though, his team doesn't have it so while everyone else is recalling your stuck there alone and garen isn't great at taking objectives by himself so you end up recalling

Which then makes the passive useless anyway

the passive just isn't strong enough in lane

and the villain mechanic is kind of gimmicky

Maybe he should be turned more into a soldier like he actually is, an elite demacian soldier. One who can endure lots of punishment and has powerful attacks that is what Garen is to me, the whole hero of justice thing can go as far as i'm concerned He is a soldier first one who upholds the standards and value's of demacia

He is a leader of demacian troops and a rolemodel for them so maybe they could give him an aura or something that would be fitting

Garen changes As far as i am concerned they could rework his passive.

Just give him more base health regen, something high like 30

Then give him the perseverance passive where allies can benefit from an aura which gives them Garens health regen as a bonus in combat, and also gives him the following bonus effects to nearby allies when in combat.

Activating Q gives nearby allies a small temporary speedboost based on a portion of Garens current speed
Activating W gives nearby allies temporary bonus resistances equal to a portion of Garens armor/mr
Activating E inspires allies and gives them a temporary bonus to Attack Damage equal to a portion of Garens AD
Succesfully executing someone with Ultimate temporarily Doubles the health regen bonus to allies or something

Something like that would make him a better team fighter without really changing his kit much, but it also has counterplay with armor shred grievous wounds and slows/stuns (speedboost for q is based on speed before activating)

It also gives Garen more dept in when and how to use abilities, selfish for own protections with W or do i inspire my allies around me, do i boost myself with q or do i safe it for when my allies catch up.

He will lose the villain and current passive and gets this change in return

I think it would be an improvement as he would have the same overall simple kit and his play style would not change much except there is now more dept to it overall.

This change would also be a buff in power, and he kind of needs that anyway

JerulEonOct 25, 20161 votes

I really like the interaction with Garen and his teammates. It fits his theme pretty well and gives him unique gameplay/utility.

CatastropOct 25, 20161 votes

I was expecting at least one comment saying "Justice" and nothing else.

ArcyyyOct 25, 20161 votes

Mains

Garen

And A Real HieroOct 25, 20161 votes

This is Garen's identity:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jw44JdK3p9k

BastionKrossOct 25, 20161 votes

You're going to get a lot of conflicting answers, since Garen's kit is conflicting and unfocused. He does some of this, some of that, some of that over there, etc.

Let's break his kit down:

Passive - You know, for a commander who talks a lot about "CHARGE!" and "BREAK THEIR LINES!" Garen's passive sure does make him into a pussy. If Garen gets hurt his passive dictates that the best response is to run off like a coward, suck his thumb in a bush for a bit, then come running back into battle again once the bad men stop hitting him. What the hell? Garen's passive needs to be the opposite of what it is now: the longer you're in combat, the more regen you have. Demacians don't retreat, they stay and win. Or die.
Q - Overall a pretty solid utility ability. MS boosts can be used offensively, defensively, or anywhere in between. Silence is also a very nice addition to the kit of someone who wants to stick to the target, since there's no escape for the length of the silence. The slow cleanse is nice, but it can go if it needs to. Also did you know this ability slows as well? It does, weakly, for half a second. That's just needless power that can be better served in some other form.
W - For someone who's supposed to be a lane bully, having a stacking passive really cripples. The sad part is that there's a cap, so once you reach the max stacks, this ability stops scaling completely. It's not early game, but it's not late game either. Garen is supposed to be an early lane bully with a late game fantasy of being able to kill the villain no matter what, so why is the W passive strongest around midgame? The active portion is good for what it was meant to be, but the tenacity is missed.
E - Spin to win. What seems like a straightforward ability actually contains a lot of hidden power. It can crit (because having a juggernaut scale with crit is a great idea with all the itemization that has both crit and defensive stats i.e. phantom dancer? And ummm... another phantom dancer?), it has isolation damage (because why would you want to spin on multiple people, that's silly), and you become ghosted for the duration. The ability also gains more ticks of damage as Garen levels up rather than by points in the ability itself, which is fairly unintuitive. What should be a simple ability became needlessly complicated.
R - The villain system was a great idea, but with bad execution. If it was more like Kindred where you can choose who you need to kill instead of leaving it up to the RNG gods, it would be a lot easier to manage and have the Garen player make decisions about just which one of his opponents absolutely needs to die for his team to win a teamfight. More interactive and tactical, less "Oh great, my villain just became someone all the way across the map". %HP true damage should be used sparingly in League, but it fits fairly well here to keep Garen a real threat to the villain no matter how fed they are.

All in all, Garen's kit is more confused than a blind man at a silent movie. Some of it is early game, some of it is mid game, some of it is late game. His primary damage ability scales with crit, something current juggernaut itemization doesn't support, and also with level more than rank. His kit is also full of sprinkles of utility that give hidden power.

If Garen's kit became cohesive and focused, he'd be in a much better place. Garen should be tuned to be a lane bully similar to Darius or Renekton, but also a late game threat to the villain.