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So old AP Kog was 'unhealthy' despite having a nearly zero pick rate

Rebonack··116 votes·5,406 views

But apparently Iceborn Ezreal, with a 30%+ pick rate for months on end is just fine?

Okay.

That makes sense.

I feel like a totally immobile champ with punishing mana costs and zero mobility is probably less frustrating than the guy with a bit less range in exchange for arguably the best mobility skill in the game. If you jump AP Kog, he's dead. If you jump Blue Ez he's just going to Shift over a wall and continue poking you.

I'm curious, Riot, how exactly are you quantifying 'painful to play against'?

EDIT since this keeps coming up: 'Unhealthy' by Riot's definition seems to be more or less synonymous with 'non-interactive'. What that non-interactivity looks like will be different from one champ to another. Though in the end, it typically manifests as feeling frustrated when the champ you're playing doesn't have the tools to deal with the asshole you're playing against.

As such, 'unhealthy' champs with a higher pick rate should be a higher priority for work since people have to suffer through their bullshit on a regular basis. Was/is AP Kog frustrating to deal with if your team isn't drafted to deal with his team protecting him? Totally. But it happens so rarely that it's a non-issue. You got out-drafted by a niche AP carry. Lose the game and move on.

But when a highly frustrating champ is in nearly every other game, that's going to be raising the community's salinity level quite a bit more.

137 Comments

ModCaptainMårvelous23 votes

Unhealthy doesn't mean "Wow broken OP everyone plays it all the time". Unhealthy often means "The playstyle of this character makes it either frustrating to play against or doesn't contribute in a meaningful way, even when fed" among other things. Old yorick could still work and be played but that doesn't mean he was more healthy than a high pickrate like Ezreal.

THAT SAID, Ezreal is a fucking problem and has been since Season 0. Riot seems to want to keep this long-range onhit style yet pigeonhole themselves in releasing on-hits, as the gutcheck is always "Does this break Ezreal?"

Either nerf his on-hit powers or do something about on-hit items because it's quite infuriating that a ranged carry can abuse something like IBG better than any tank.

NodirjonSattarov2 votes

Unhealthy like Teemo? Unhealthy like split pushers in the game? Have you played vs new Yorick? The dude never dies and his pet AFK split pushes. Stating that Kog is unhealthy is funny because he is one of the most vulnerable champions in the game. One of the lowest base movement speeds, terrible armor/mr scaling, always squishy and overall a burden for team. To see him succeed in lane is something that shouldn't happen.

ModCaptainMårvelous7 votes

Teemo is absolutely unhealthy, yes. His problems are numerous. Splitpushers? lol wut. Ah yes, the unkillable yorick sitting at a dastardly 50% win rate

Again, your problem is that you're seeing game health strictly from a success perspective. You don't account for other things like how it is to play with as or against this champion. You don't account for if the playstyle is problematic (AKA AP Kog doing Xerath-level damage and clearing ways because he pressed E in their general direction). You don't account for a lot of things.

You really have to analyze things from a global game perspective rather than the perspective of mere win rate and abilities.

NodirjonSattarov2 votes

Split pushers tend to have a lower win rate than team fighters. I commented on Yorick because he is a pain to deal with. Several other examples are tryndamere, signed, trick2g fanboys etc. Having to deal with a split pusher that begs for a 1v1 is a death wish but disregarding them will lose you the game. I can go on and on but I hope I've clarified

ModCaptainMårvelous3 votes

Yeah, everyone's a pain to deal with. Fiora is a pain to deal with. Singed is a pain to deal with, etc.

If we start classifying champions we don't want to play against, every game of League would be a 5v0 where you lazily walk to the Nexus.

NodirjonSattarov15 votes

To add onto this, Kog'Maw is constantly at a disadvantage at all points of the game. There is never a time when you can NOT kill him. Any slip up from his part, he will immediately suffer the consequences. The reason he can be played mid is if he "abuses" his ult. Repeated uses of ult costs him huge amount of mana. So if anyone complains about Kog mid, he usually doesn't build AP (AP tends to hover 200-350), has no hard CC, has 3 skill shots to land, has to build so much mana, very immobile, and always at a disadvantage. Is Kog seriously that much of a concern or unhealthy for the game?

I have been shut down so many times with a couple ganks midlane from the enemy team. He is not a problem at all.

notmarked7 votes

{quoted}

But apparently Iceborn Ezreal, with a 30%+ pick rate for months on end is just fine?

Okay.

That makes sense.

I feel like a totally immobile champ with punishing mana costs and zero mobility is probably less frustrating than the guy with a bit less range in exchange for arguably the best mobility skill in the game. If you jump AP Kog, he's dead. If you jump Blue Ez he's just going to Shift over a wall and continue poking you.

I'm curious, Riot, how exactly are you quantifying 'painful to play against'?

all they have to do is make iceborne gauntlet melee only. NO RANGED CHAMPION other than ezreal uses it effectively.

inb4 some unimportant random who strangely has games where he buys iceborne on other characters that are ranged posts about doing it or saying it should be still available for another character they don't even play.

WoonStruck5 votes

"But muh Ryze mana! With manamune it makes your autos hurt too!"

Cackles

Some players are actually serious about these things.

notmarked3 votes

{quoted}

"But muh Ryze mana! With manamune it makes your autos hurt too!"

Cackles

Some players are actually serious about these things.

and they are prowling the forums waiting to talk about it

ChaoticPinecone3 votes

Not in the current meta, no. But I remember times when Nidalee and Urgot used to use it.

And plus, saying something like "No ranged champion other than Ezreal uses it effectively" is a bit deceptive. A better way of saying it is "No champion other than Ezreal uses it effectively". Seriously - every other champion that uses Iceborn would rather have a Trinity. Ezreal is really the only one where you would actually prefer Iceborn over Trinity.

rtbf2256182414 votes

Honestly, i feel like Ezreal's Q should be removed. Fucking hate that guy so much. Or remove the Iceborn passive from him somehow at least.

Saianna4 votes

I'm curious, Riot, how exactly are you quantifying 'painful to play against'?

Dice roll or Morellos personal hatelist

Baron Perenolde4 votes

I don't particularly care about Kog, but Blue Ezreal is an abomination that needs to be gutted and should have been destroyed a long time ago.

Jadmaster53 votes

kogmaw. kills a 4000 hp tank in 6 auto attacks late game, you call him not painful as a front line tank? I'm reduced to hiding behind a support because be CHUNKS HARD aND SCALES

Big Lincoln45 votes

AP kogmaw doesn't hit hard from autos, it's primarily his E and his R spam

Auz the Ripper19 votes

That's not necessarily true, the % max health of bio-arcane barrage scales pretty well with AP and you can pretty easily get 10-12% max hp per hit.

NodirjonSattarov2 votes

At max rank W does 6% BONUS MAGIC DAMAGE from max health. The ratio is actually shit are you kidding me? 1% = 100 AP so by the time you have 10-12% you're already at 400-600 AP. Also, its not efficient if you don't have 2.0 attack speed

Auz the Ripper9 votes

You can get a little over 400 AP from just a RoA, a rabadon's and a void staff and you still have two free item slots excluding the slot for boots. Through in a nashor's tooth for a little more AP, attack speed, and CDR; giving kogmaw a nice 533 AP and 1.5 attacks per second at level 18 Finish it off with a seraph's embrace for a nice clean 738 AP and a crap ton of mana.

Now obviously don't follow the build order, but this build gives about 20% max hp per second (13.4%@1.5 ApS) which ignores 35% of MR while not gimping the rest of his kit. You could drop either RoA (most likely) or seraph's or Rabadon's for a defensive item or rylai's and still have decent damage.

AP Kogmaw's W is nothing to scoff at.

NodirjonSattarov1 votes

Cost wise, this build is REALLY expensive. I honestly don't think building towards his W is as efficient as it may seem. Also, you shouldn't be close enough to auto attack anyone whether if its intentional or not.

Hawkefire4 votes

Honestly that was always ap kogs weakness though. He always had a rough early game but if he was allowed to get going he would then become a very formidable opponent.

Personally I still don't understand why riot felt ap kog deserved to be removed because even when he did get going he was still very vulnerable and fairly easy to counterplay against.

Spaceman5pff1 votes

That and he couldn't really keep up steady artillery due to ramping mana costs, even with a heavy mana build.

It was actually SUPER windowed and seemed pretty balanced.

Battlecast Sona1 votes

uh.

Mana only seems like a good window until you get very good at managing it. Because of Kog's stack system, this is doubly incentivized (not letting your stacks build up too high before you're finishing people off with the damage, for example).

So certainly, if you just mash R and never pay attention to stacks, you'll run out of mana very quickly. But if you keep your R around 1 or 2 stacks and primarily use it to keep yourself safe/poke/farm, you can very easily keep your mana pool high for a long time (and this was, of course, further exacerbated by Athene's actually being a viable choice due to it not relying on a shield at the time).

Most of the reason I think people don't find AP Kog that unhealthy is because they haven't played against a really good one in a long time since it's not very good atm.

Spaceman5pff1 votes

Sure, mana doesn't gate you from cleaning up fights.

What it gated you from, was setting up constant artillery fire that makes it impossible for the enemy team to set up on objectives.

People seem to think that AP Kog could just endlessly force you off objectives, which he couldn't due to his mana ramping. That is not a management issue, that is just how the champion was.

Battlecast Sona1 votes

But he absolutely could.

I don't know if you're just not listening to me, but mana ramp is literally a non-issue. You have to wait 8 seconds for the stack to fall off, and an R every 8 seconds is certainly enough to push people off points. The problem is that in your mind people are complaining about this: R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>RR>R>R>R>R>R>RR>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>RR>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R>R

but what AP Kog'Maw actually does is this: Scout with R wait out stack Scout with R wait out stack Hit R Continue to chain R until you miss Wait out stacks

The first pattern OOMs Kog'Maw very quickly. The second pattern with intelligent mana management can be kept up almost indefinitely, or at least long enough for your team to win an advantaged fight due to the poke/siege. The problem is not that "oh Kog'maw is spamming his R constantly", the problem is that he has an 1800 range poke on a very short CD that can potentially have a very low mana cost if it's managed properly, THAT ALSO GIVES VISION and can slow for future R's. If Kog's R didn't give vision it would go a long way towards counteracting the toxicity of the skill, but it would be a severe nerf to AD Kog's ability to contribute scouting and utility to his team.

Basically, the only way to actually make AP Kog'maw exist in a way that is not awful to play against is to gut AD Kog and focus on AP. Without serious kit changes (again), there is no way for the dual build to exist in a healthy way. Kog's waveclear is too safe from too long a range as AP, and his poke can contribute too much even if he isn't doing a ton of damage (due to vision + range).

Spaceman5pff1 votes

IDK man, seemed pretty healthy before the rework.

Keep crying though,

Battlecast Sona2 votes

....

And this is why Riot goes to the reddit. =/

I'm sorry that I have been playing this game since Season 1 and have seen many, many iterations of AP Kog'maw (all of them unfun to play against), and I'm sorry that my detailed explanation of why is "crying", but you know, you're right! Clearly a Season 5 summoner has more game knowledge about the health of a champion than me, and my experience playing since 2 months after the game released are clearly biased and I'm just crying.

Do everyone a favor and go play a different game, please.

Spaceman5pff1 votes

"Season 5 summoner"

I actually had another account spelled almost Identically to this one, that I stopped using for reasons that are none of your business, and switched to this one.

I am only about a season and a half fresher than you buddy. Fun Fact, I actually play almost exclusively on the PBE now, been using my time to play borderlands and overwatch.

But back to your argument against Kog: Let us get to the core of it. "One shot every 8 seconds is enough to force a team off of an objective"

Let us place ourselves at 30 minutes, where Kog has had ample time to ramp up his build. He likely has Archangel / Seraph, and Luden / Rylais (assuming common builds from PowerofEvils reign of AP Kog terror).

So if the enemy team sets up Baron, you are telling me they cannot survive 3 shots from AP Kog? If your answer is Yes, then you are delusional. If your answer is Yes BECAUSE Kog's team can engage during that time, then that makes Kog no more broken than any other poke champion (Varus, Nidalee, Xerath, Ziggs) If your answer is No, then you understand the fact that Kog'maw either throws out middle-of-the-pack poke (high damage for poke, but very long CD compared to Varus, Xerath, Ziggs etc) OR he runs himself so high on mana that the enemy team can engage without him being able to utilize full dps due to putting himself OOM after just a couple more ults.

I am not stupid, unlike you, I can see that there are others ways to be on the receiving end of poke than to just sit there and eat it like a loser.

BTW, you know who you ACTUALLY CANNOT set up objectives vs? Ziggs. Damn near impossible unless his ult is on cooldown. But that is ok, right? Ziggs can bully an immobile lane harder and earlier than AP Kog, but AP kog is the busted one.

Not saying Ziggs is busted, just saying that you need to see how he stacks up VS competition. Riot might have said "we need to remove ap kog bc hard to balance" or w/e, but he was no more dominant than Syndra right now, or Kennen and Jayce, or Jhin and Caitlyn.

Battlecast Sona1 votes

And once again, you have nothing to say about the actual content of my post.

Please do everyone a favor and stop logging into the boards. You clearly aren't here for any sort of actual discussion.

Spoofghoul2 votes

nobody built that on ap kog

ap kog needed mana first mana second mana third cooldown fourth and a bit of pen at last

he would not get high ap he would not get high attackspeed, both nashor and rabadon weren't great on him as they would only serve to cut into your mana utility options

What my usual ap kog built looked like

item 3020 item 3040 item 3027 item 3174 item 3116 item 3135

Rylais to ensure followup hits is kind of neccesary to make ap kog work a lot better becasue of the delay it was hard enough to hit someone even with rylais

You needed all the mana you could get too increase the barage limit, then you just built pen because the base damage was good, the ap helped but for his ratio's vs basedage pen was better. as you can see there isn't room for anything else

the W wasn't bad you would still do like 10% hp damage and you had some extra attackspeed and shred from Q

But ideally you would not even get remotely close enough to get in W range. Your ult would be your primary damage source since you were squishy and immobile and your range was your main defense

Speedphoenix3 votes

I agree with what you said about ezreal but when did riot nerf ap kog? If you're talking about the adc mass rework, I would like you to know you should have actually tried him. I've been an AP Kog'Maw main for most of the season

I already played him a lot before the rework but I started maining him afterwards the "new" ultimate really allows for a more complex play style. although I really liked the old ap kog, I think the old ult was too monotonous. For those saying that the new ult is useless, I'll let you know that when the target has <50% HP you will always deal a higher damage than before. You now have to focus on low health targets, and it is NOT restricted to squishies. Please also notice that you will sure kill any target below 25%HP, sometimes even tanks. The reworked ultimate offers, in my opinion, a more "competitive" type of play, where you need to take more care for your mana than before (each shot costs 50 mana increasing instead of 40), and where you need to choose your targets better, and know how to make them targetable

here is my mastery with kog maw BEFORE th DE-work: http://i.imgur.com/0o6suJR.png

now: http://i.imgur.com/Vzkoi1r.png

And here is my game history with Kog'Maw from BEFORE the DE-work: Notice how there is only one game in wich I played him AD (I lost that one Q_Q), and I played him ap supp a few times

(go to the source of the image (click on it) to see better) http://imgur.com/LHoaWNH

Rebonack5 votes

{quoted}

I agree with what you said about ezreal but when did riot nerf ap kog?

I didn't say anything about AP Kog being nerfed. Just that I take issue with Riot's stance that old AP Kog was unhealthy.

The Ult changes were lateral, for the most part. Mana cost and stack timer went up. Poke potential went way down. Full combo damage (QER) went up, especially against soft targets. So Riot was trying to make Kog take more of a risk if he wanted to blow someone up. Late game Kog can still delete a soft target if he nails them with his combo, just like he could before the reworked Ult.

Have you seen the changes for Kog's Ult on the PBE? His execute damage is dropping to x2 in exchange for 30 more base damage.

Sinlaire2 votes

with also 10 less base mana cost, 10 less mana per use, and i think it was 3 seconds less on the time out before the ult scaling mana costs reset.

so they nerfed his damage a touch in return for less cost to spam more while also letting you reset you spam costs faster. you'll kill more slowly, but can seige for longer durations in extended trades and stand offs.

DunkinNoobs3 votes

AP Kog'maws E is absolute cancer to play against. I don't even particularly care about his ult by compasion.

And please, the AP Kog'maw to Blue Ezreal comparison is moronic. Blue Ezreal doesn't 1 shot squishies from 1000+ range. Ap Kog'maw did.

NodirjonSattarov8 votes

so now its his E? what next? his passive?

first they said no to the W, next people say his ult is too strong/weak, now you're saying the E is cancer. I guess his Q is aids right?

DunkinNoobs3 votes

Kog'maw has a Q?

And no, his E isn't cancer. AP Kog'maws E was cancer. Massive damage. Massive slow. Huge range. Basically made diving that fucker impossible.

NodirjonSattarov2 votes

max rank is a 52% slow on an 8 second cooldown if you don't build CDR (which I don't) at a 70% AP ratio. The slow lasts for 4 if you linger on it and an additional .25 seconds after you leave the area. if you can't engage on kog while he has cooldowns, maybe its not kog maw.

Odinakos4 votes

And how exactly you engage on a 11lvl Kog on his poke range with his team protecting him? Noc ult and get bursted from his team? Vi Q flash Ult and get bursted from his team? Tf ult... oh you understand where i am going? A team decently(not perfect, not well just decent) build around kog wont let you engage on their primary poking tool easily. And he is gonna poke you down. Then its 4v5 or free objective. Thats why his R was nerfed.

PS: Dont dare you tell me "Just dodge his R", ap kog was used by UOL last season and won games. Went exactly as i described. If they drafted semi decent and kog was 11 with tear and Ludens, it was siege time. First hit at a squishy, tower down due to 4v5.

NodirjonSattarov2 votes

Maybe Europeans play the game differently, but NA has the most garbage players in the world. These people do not give a shit about protecting the carries they prefer to carry themselves. The first 15 minutes of the game are the most dangerous for Kog because during laning phase he has no items, has no mobility, and has no damage. Once you close the gap to get to Kog, there is really nothing he can do. I do understand that his power is immense but I think people do not respect his range or his damage when playing vs him. I always respect my laners and have rune pages set up for specific match ups. I hope others do the same.

Odinakos1 votes

People dont focus the diver just to protect their carries, they focus him because its a free kill. One lone person alone into the enemy team spells death no matter if they are silvers or a pro team. Really the only person that could pull an assasination on the senario i described was prenerf Zed with all cds up and against a mediocre enemy team. Or a perfect engage with Sivir Karma and one hard diver (like heca). But the last senario needs good coordination and still is not guarantee to succeed.

Yes weak early game is an excuse for something better later(btw no item is not a valid excuse and his damage along his clear is decent). But not for this scale of absurd. Kog had an extreme spike at that exactly point. Lvl 11 with tear and first major ap item (be it Ludens Rylais RoA or AA stuff). And whatever else was weak, doesnt matter at all. You cant have a stupidly OP spell just because the rest is weak. The window of opportunity was too low. It's better to stregthen other areas (like base damage and scaling on Q? its a single target skillshot after all) and i actually support that.

As for respecting his strenghts. Ok, respect his lvl 2 ult range. How you engage him on siege without getting in his range? Even on teamfights, a somewhat bad senario for him, he could snipe the backlines while he was safe from them. Even the prime poke mages could not have the dps and burst output he had at that range. His damage? Take all mr runes you want build all mr items you want, you just delay your death while becoming more useless. If all the backline had runes and items just to counter Kog, he just won the game because they were not focusing on performing their role. Think about an adc at the deaded senario. Even fed lvl 11 with two items completed and assuming scaling MR blues. Either he builds his crit/pen items to perform his role, or he build defences to counter Kog. First senario he gets poked down, second he vastly underperforms while entering the fight severely wounded. While the other adc with one and half item performs better. See how he could force a fed enemy into a lose-lose situation?

To sum up it was like the old Nidalee spears all over again. They were nerfed because of pro scene, one spear, free objective. Doing the same as nidalee is the most preferable solution, strenghten him somewhere else and leave the stupidly OP poke out of the equation. Better Q would help both versions, adding something weak to his passive (eg spells and W empowered aas) hit reduces armor and mr by 1-4 scaling on levels, stacking to 3 times. This where the discussion should go, not about bringing old R back.

DoktorKaiser2 votes

Old AP Kog was beyond broken in competitive play and thats why they reworked him, also I dont see how its the same for Ezreal and AP Kog since Kog's burst is higher range and can burst for over 1000 while Ez q pokes for 200-300 max and is 2 times shorter range. I dont get it why people lately use Ezreal as something broken beyond belief, he is one of the most balanced ADC since forever simply because he doesnt build crit and thus doesnt burst in 1 second late game, but I guess in bronze its hard to dodge q...

GayFluffyUnicorn3 votes

So true. I'd face five ezreals over one caitlyn. Just played a ranked against cait and i was the adc. God dammit i never had less fun against that shit.

CrazFight 2 votes

I miss the days where I could do ap kog / miss fortune mid ;c

Cronofuge2 votes

The problem with AP Kog was his ability to instantly clear a minion wave with E (and MAYBE an R) in addition to his poke. That means you have to instigate a tower dive to kill him. Ezreal on the other hand had to land quite a few IBG qs to clear a wave. Having a champion who can both clear and poke is very nice. At level 11 they are very comparable but once (old ) Kog hits 16 his poke outclasses Ez by a landslide.

Also you can't deny that riot has been trying to make it a less viable option to build IBG on ezreal. It's not like they have completely ignored him, sure they have in recent history, but I don't think it is as much of a problem as of late. Most of the Ezreal picks in worlds have used Trinity Force anyway.

NodirjonSattarov3 votes

Why is he allowed to freely clear an entire minion wave?

Cronofuge2 votes

{quoted}

Why is he allowed to freely clear an entire minion wave?

Because he can press E from 1200 range. If they try and dive you it's their funeral.

Akali is SO HOT2 votes

pickrate doesn't determine whether a champion is healthy or not. If we used pickrates to determine how healthy a champion is then Kalista and Pantheon are one of the healthiest champions in the game.

This post is actually kinda funny considering AP Kog is the highest winrate mid laner at the moment lmao.

Bonipherus2 votes

Unhealthy/Pick Rate

no correlation

Jeanne fan club1 votes

Its ok, EZ is a complete trash champion who's dps is miles below literally any other champion that crits. Unless you are fed out of your mind and 2 items up on anyone you won't be doing very well on ezreal. I mean he has a 49% winrate that drops off to 45% by late game. On top of that he has like a 33% winrate at worlds last I checked.

I'm not trolling he is genuinely a bad champion compared to the reliable dps of the other adc's.

Sure he is picked a lot, but his success is pitiful, and I attribute it more to how safe he is rather than how strong he is.

GayFluffyUnicorn3 votes

Thing is. Ezreal has his 2 months of being god tier every season before he returns to trash tier again. Dunno why but welp. He's an amazing kiter, fun to play, mixed dmg, amplfies AS and good AOE dmg on his ult but just not comparable to mf deleting your team in 2 secs or caitlyn three shotting the frontline.

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