Gragas.

Liverymen··1 votes·497 views

I play a lot of Gragas, hopefully some of these thoughts chime in with others'. Not all of these notes are here with the request of changes, but more to lay out some ideas on the table.

  • If Gragas Body Slams and someone is standing behind him (champ/minion/monster), he will "body slam" them with his bare back. Please slightly adjust the hit box more in front of him.
  • The current Gragas has much more polar qualities than before. Good situations are better, bad situations are worse. Some of these are GREAT changes (making his escape worse via cooldowns), some not so much, and some changes affect him in perhaps unintended ways. More details below.
  • Although I agree in making Gragas' escape worse via cooldown adjustments/giving him his lowest base movement speed in proportion to the rest of the cast he has ever experienced is a good thing for managing his escaping capabilities, the low base movement speed part doesn't work so well for someone who should be out there initiating. Perhaps a minor "move quicker when moving toward enemy champions" has a strong place in the role of a guy who loves to start fights. Perhaps it could tie in with his ultimate ranks and apply to drunken rage casts.
  • Having Body slam have it's lowest travel speed ever during the late game in a league where dashes are more common than ever pretty much reserves me to using body slam-> flash as an initiate late game. I highly doubt this is fun for opponents. It's very fun for me, but to be honest, I would rather have a more relevant late game initate that doesn't involve cheesing people by flashing on top of them for an automatic stun->ult. In short, his initiate is pretty polar now, too; It's super good good in early/mid game, very blah late game unless there's flash.
  • When Gragas can't reach a marksman in the late game (path is blocked by CC or champions), he could once affect them with an attack speed slow. Currently he has the fewest options he's ever had to deal with marksmen. I'm not a fan the attack speed debuff returning, but some compensation, such as Barrel Roll's slow duration being refreshed by his ultimate, would be a way to prevent damage from carries in a meaningful way if he could land both skills in succession.
  • Gragas currently has a nice situational role of carries since he can hinder tanks/assassins with his body slam/barrel roll/ult. How about some anti-tank damage for a tank Gragas so this big guy doesn't hit like a little guy when he faces other big guys (or girls)? Letting Drunken Rage ignore some % magic resistance would allow a tank Gragas' hits on tanks to not be minuscule. It wouldn't affect his damage vs squishies much since they don't build heavy magic resistance anyways. Would be nice to see those Maokais and J4s be a bit more intimidated by his % health damage.
  • The "All in the hips" tweak to body slam has made it more polar too. Baited whiffs by squishies can mean a failed initiate and an over-extended, soon-to-be-dead Gragas. This is good, since the obvious counter play is more pronounced, but still, seems like another reason to make that initial Body Slam have more reliability in the late game, since opposing tanks will be there to block it.

Anyways, post some thoughts about Gragas!

3 Comments

Ariaflux1 votes

Not really a Gragas player, so I am just wondering, are you OK with the channel time on his W? It seems quite clunky to use during a fight. How can it be utilized effectively?

Talamare1 votes

I played Gragas a lot after his change, and honestly I thought his channel on his W was pretty awesome but it's sad that he isn't more rewarded for it.

The damage reduction on his W is way too weak right now, and needs to be increased

Liverymen1 votes

I agree that it isn't quite the caliber of a move that should warrant it being counterable by interrupts (at rank one it's barely stronger than shen's passive), but I also think that Gragas losing a bit of damage in a team fight isn't nearly as big of a loss as some of the core issues as a drunkard who wants to bar fight with initiates/tanking. Keep in mind that having the channel interrupted also means that Gragas will be more tanky, because the cooldown for Drunken Rage will come back much sooner. Sometimes this is ideal, like when you're escaping, because it lets you get another refresh of the 2.5 second damage reduction much, much sooner, and sometimes let's you get a better timing to reproc your passive; TBH I really love having my channel interrupted when I'm trying to escape... strange, isn't it?

That said, does anyone have any comments about Gragas' ability to initiate in the late game? Or his large wins and large losses that come with hitting/missing body slam? Or his effectiveness in team fights where he has very little to fall back on when he can't hit a body slam against a squishy in a team fight?

More from Gameplay

More by Liverymen