Ekko MId

I still think he is underpowered, but I tried a couple of new things yesterday against an arcanist ziggs. (great skin btw but a bit distracting)

Basically, I started dorans two pots and spammed all of my spells and farmed to 430 gold and immediatly went back for a pot and another dorans. It was still a shitty laning phase compared to what I used to do with flask and pots. BUT. It felt comparable, bc the mana regen, ap, and extra hp. I just have to expect to be forced out of lane over and over in the early game and sacrifice cs.

The strategy cedes level 6 to my lane. Thats one of the things that makes ekko weak. I also felt like it was possible to do my little early sorc shoes and roam strategy. I was against ziggs tho so I didnt try it.

If I could experiment with ekkos numbers, I would rebalance his q overall, but increase early mana on his it. Then I would lower cooldown on his e and give him a mana and cooldown refund on killing a unit with it. He is so much weaker than zed in lane imo bc of the difference between their skillshots and bc of energy and mana, but they are the same class of champion.

Ekko's q can ruin farm and its much harder to use overall. Thats fine given it has utility, but I think that he needs to max q first right now and that hurts his laning in some ways. Im fine with champions that are hard to use, I play draven, but unlike draven, ekko might be in a bad place right now if you want to play ap mid.

Im not saying this is balanced, but what if ekko could double or tripple shot his e?! Ping, rewind, ping, rewind, ping. The visual would be really cool for sure. Maybe he could do that to anyone inside of the timewinder, even minions. That would help his farming out a lot. So like, q e aa q would send timewinder out, e to prep the auto, blink and proc auto, then hit q to rewind. Cooldown on e resets, then repeat e aa q.

So you just did a bunch of dmg bc your passive was proc'd but the cool thing is that you will then have two windows to use your ult if your shadow followed you thru this combo. Yea, its a little strong and a little like leblanc bc the teleporting, and four seconds is a long time for the shadow to catch up on a quick combo, but it would also make his ult into stun combo more reliable (bc the ghost will follow you in and out after you do this).

His kit would come together a bit more. Its too bad league isnt like mortal combat x. You could have slightly different combos available and have a less aggressive ekko that is balanced in such a way that his q is actually spammable.

Maybe ekko needs an upgrade mechanic like victor that will allow his playstlye to fork given his choice of combos and playstyle. He can buy one time item if he wants to put the rewind mechanic into his qe combo and that means his ult is closer behind him. Therefore he cant escape as easily and wont get back as much hp from ulting. If he buys the other item, his q is cheaper and idk, tank ekko is better in that item built bc the ult heals more. His stun is also easier to land for whatever reason. Its the utility ekko option and it sets him up with worse scaling in order to provide him with cc.

I think its possible thematically bc he is victors foil and "enemies tend to grow to resemble one another"-Prince of Thorns.