Shyvana’s biggest issue is that she’s totally item-dependent yet has no single core item that gives HP and Attack Speed (Triforce is meh at best, so I don’t count it). Every other champion similar to her has attack speed in their kit and needs to build AD + HP, or defenses and builds just AD + HP again or AD + AS in some cases. Shyvana has the damage but needs to build AS + HP. If her kit just had an attack speed steroid slapped onto it, she could just build straight tank and outdamage a Mundo. Which would honestly be fine if Mundo were considered the epitome of balance, which he certainly is not. Shyvana’s inability to build what she needs early in the game makes her laning almost impossible and her jungling incredibly non-interactive until she gets 2 items.
Another issue is that she has zero defensive tools, traded instead for a single moment of mobility in Dragon’s Descent. This ability got some work a little while back, reducing its range in favor of becoming Unstoppable btw (and causing many, many dragons to smash their head into a wall). This tradeoff would be fine, if the ability weren’t clunky as hell and just as easy to avoid/kite as without. Compare to Urgot’s dash, Disdain I believe it’s called. Either Dragon’s Descent needs to be more reliable, or Shyvana needs a shield or heal in her basic abilities. Adding a shield to Burnout or a heal to Twin Bite would make the most sense, but a heal from proccing the debuff from Flame Breath would be an interesting mechanic to see returned (Vorpal Blade).
Yet another point of contention is Shyvana’s hybrid damage. While she typically does a rather even mix of physical and magic damage, her physical damage is better versus squishy targets and magic damage vs tankier ones, but items can change that. I’ve always seen her ability to do mixed damage as her version of the true damage or armor shred that other similar champions have (or build with Black Cleaver). This also means she’s more adaptive to the enemy team and their builds, meaning she’s often a very reliable damage pick when she’s viable and the rest of the team has lockdown.
Yet another issue is Shyvana’s utter lack of crowd control outside of the unreliable Dragon’s Descent. Even Urgot has a couple potent slows outside of Disdain. Shyvana is instead forced to rely on her teammates for something similar champions have on their own, or mediocre substitutes in Crest of Cinders or Frozen Mallet (which really should build out of Phage again. More champions would take it as an alternative to Trinity Force or Black Cleaver, solidifying Phage as the Lost Chapter of Top lane).
If any power were to come out of Shyvana’s kit in favor of major changes elsewhere, it would be either her already-useless passive or Dragon form’s Flame Breath explosion/burn base damage or bonus HP. Possibly Burnout’s base damage at later ranks as well, or Dragon form’s Twin Bite damage. Human form Twin Bite and Flame Breath are already gimpy enough, but if one were to get a heal it could have its damage or cooldown nerfed.
-400k mastery Shyvana Main, played since mid Season 4, both jungle and top.
