Can we just have Kench do what he's supposed to do?

Worst Kench NA·Jul 25, 2018·56 votes·14,241 views

I don't care if he does damage. I'm not supposed to be doing damage. That's the job of my carry.

What I'm supposed to do is:

tank for my team
save a teammate from a fight if they get too low
lock down enemies with my stacks and my Q

Nerfing all of that, and going even further to buff his damage is spitting in the face of his original design. Before Taric was reworked, I used to play him as my one tank support. They introduced a new stun mechanic that I'm not a fan of, and also turned him in to more of an enchanter, which made playing him pointless as I'd rather play Nami if I wanted to be an enchanter. I gravitated towards Kench because I really liked his character based off of his lore, and wanted to foster that in to making him my replacement tank support. All of these changes that he's going to be getting just push him away from that role in my eyes, towards top or jungle instead. I know Alistar, Braum and Leona exist, but I don't want to play them. I like Kench's unique ability to directly save someone from bad decisions. If the cooldown is increased by that much, why would I bother doing that when I'd just play him top and focus on damage instead? I don't want to do that. There's plenty of tanks played top already.

Nerf his damage. I shouldn't be the one killing everything anyways. Let me tank for my teammates and save them.

42 Comments

Killer of Night9Jul 25, 201822 votes

If tamh kench W was designed only for dealing damage, i would like this change but this ability was designed to SAVE ALLY. The damage and the poke part was just a "bonus". With the nerf of his CD they will nerf two part of his kit which will hit 2/3 of his W in the support role (Rescuing ally and poking using minion). This nerf is just basically killing his support role (which is where he's designed) for make him only playable as a top laner since it deal a tons of damage but has a high cd so he can't play in a duo lane because if he use the W to save ally, he can't engage because he has 1 of his ability (that deal the most damage on CD). I think Riot should stop nerfing lcs champion only because they're too strong here. Permadisable them on big games so they can feel satisfying in soloQ. Funny side: i just still don't know why they Always keep buffing the AP ratio of the tank with lower winrate (Eg Gragas, Sejuani, Zac and now tamh kench). When they will buff ornn we will see his W dealing bonus damage with AP?

Worst Kench NAJul 25, 20187 votes

[{quoted}](name=Killer of Night9,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=v22GEkQF,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2018-07-25T19:50:03.154+0000)

If tamh kench W was designed only for dealing damage, i would like this change but this ability was designed to SAVE ALLY. The damage and the poke part was just a "bonus". With the nerf of his CD they will nerf two part of his kit which will hit 2/3 of his W in the support role (Rescuing ally and poking using minion). This nerf is just basically killing his support role (which is where he's designed) for make him only playable as a top laner since it deal a tons of damage but has a high cd so he can't play in a duo lane because if he use the W to save ally, he can't engage because he has 1 of his ability (that deal the most damage on CD). I think Riot should stop nerfing lcs champion only because they're too strong here. Permadisable them on big games so they can feel satisfying in soloQ. Funny side: i just still don't know why they Always keep buffing the AP ratio of the tank with lower winrate (Eg Gragas, Sejuani, Zac and now tamh kench). When they will buff ornn we will see his W dealing bonus damage with AP?

Yep. Riot seems to want EVERY champ to be flashy and do tons of damage. This of course, has ramifications that make the game even more unfun. Garen is probably the biggest example of this. He basically takes over the ADC's job with how much damage he puts out. Add the fact that he's unkillable as well (which to be fair, he should be) and the fact that he can go fast. It's terrible design that I really don't want a champ that I genuinely enjoy to have to suffer through.

Marksmen. Mages. Assassins. Bruisers (kinda, I'm not really all that familiar with how they work tbh). They should be the ones that you rely on to do damage. Hell, I hate the fact that NAMI of all champs does as much damage as she does. I can't tell you how many times I've ended up KSing my teammates because my W does more than you'd think.

Let. Supports. Be. Supports. Brand, Ziggs, Zilean, Zyra, Bard etc. I'm fine with them doing damage. They're AP supports. The job of enchanters, tanks etc. should be to PROTECT the carry who does the damage, not get kills themselves. If I had to guess, this design choice is part of Riot's inclination to make supporting feel more special i.e. like every other role. It's not supposed to be, though. I don't give a damn if performing the role as it's intended isn't popular. There were people that enjoyed the role as it was before, and it should get back to that status. If anything, this Kench change is worrying because of the effects that it could have on other supports, with the increase of damage to everyone. It's not a good design choice.

FlameHalbrdOkidoJul 25, 20182 votes

[{quoted}](name=Worst Kench NA,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=v22GEkQF,comment-id=00010000,timestamp=2018-07-25T20:23:43.006+0000)

Yep. Riot seems to want EVERY champ to be flashy and do tons of damage. This of course, has ramifications that make the game even more unfun. Garen is probably the biggest example of this. He basically takes over the ADC's job with how much damage he puts out. Add the fact that he's unkillable as well (which to be fair, he should be) and the fact that he can go fast. It's terrible design that I really don't want a champ that I genuinely enjoy to have to suffer through.

Marksmen. Mages. Assassins. Bruisers (kinda, I'm not really all that familiar with how they work tbh). They should be the ones that you rely on to do damage. Hell, I hate the fact that NAMI of all champs does as much damage as she does. I can't tell you how many times I've ended up KSing my teammates because my W does more than you'd think.

Let. Supports. Be. Supports. Brand, Ziggs, Zilean, Zyra, Bard etc. I'm fine with them doing damage. They're AP supports. The job of enchanters, tanks etc. should be to PROTECT the carry who does the damage, not get kills themselves. If I had to guess, this design choice is part of Riot's inclination to make supporting feel more special i.e. like every other role. It's not supposed to be, though. I don't give a damn if performing the role as it's intended isn't popular. There were people that enjoyed the role as it was before, and it should get back to that status. If anything, this Kench change is worrying because of the effects that it could have on other supports, with the increase of damage to everyone. It's not a good design choice.

ok lets be clear the support can save or protect ANY ally not just the carry, ur a bad support if all u do is protect the carry like past lane phase, but ur the BEST support if u help the whole team when every u can

The Space CowboyJul 26, 20183 votes

Ya if they want supports be be high damage they may as well just make SR a 4v4 map and buff all the supports into mid/top lane.

Sire HippingtonJul 26, 20183 votes

Actually, tham was designed as a toplaner, and the problematic part of his kit that causes him to get nerfed IS the ally-eating W.

ChilleeJul 26, 201810 votes

B-but tanking isn't damage.... all the balance team knows is damage. [zombie-nunu-bummed]

BlakiepugJul 25, 20186 votes

Or just don't nerf Kench at all. He is not really in a state where he needs nerfs right now and hasn't been for quite some time. I was actually thinking Tahm needed some buffs so I was surprised af to see some hard nerfs for him on the PBE yet again.

Dope SoloJul 25, 20183 votes

Shit-headed decision that.

Somebody Love MeJul 26, 20186 votes

We can't have any ways of preventing champs from taking damage. Oh nonono. Damage is king. We nerf peel, buff damage.

In a high damage meta, those who prevent said damage from happening don't deserve to see the rift. It makes LCS boring.

If you can't tell, I'm super salty.

KhristophorosJul 25, 20185 votes

I feel that you should be able to build damage on a tank if you want but then you should be giving up some durability. And you should be able to build durability and still be effective by providing CC and utility to your team.

So basically I agree except I think they should provide the option to build damage and give up durability if you choose.

Colton147Jul 25, 20184 votes

Give him the ability to devour large and epic monsters. item 3070

RaiyzaJul 25, 20184 votes

Not epic monsters, but large, yes.

BEK MakadurJul 25, 20182 votes

Dont you dare saying that, thanks for suggesting to nerf top lane tahm ffs.

Worst Kench NAJul 25, 20184 votes

{quoted}

Dont you dare saying that, thanks for suggesting to nerf top lane tahm ffs.

And that's a bad thing why, exactly?

I think in general, the fact that tanks can put out stupid amounts of damage is dumb. If you're a tank, you're basically a support in your own right. That's how it is in pretty much every game as it stands. You sacrifice your own ability to be able to kill things, so that your damage dealers can better do that. Sure, tanks CAN do damage. In WoW, which I realize isn't exactly a 1:1 comparison to a moba, but there, tanks can do damage. They just don't do a lot though, certainly not enough to get the job done themselves. As a tank, your job is to frontline for your team and deny the enemy DPS access to your DPS. That's accomplished through you being tanky, causing their DPS to focus you, and utilizing CC to slow their advances on your DPS if all else fails.

Kench should be tanky. I'm fine with his E being strong in that regard. He has CC in the form of applying stacks to enemy DPS and slowing/stunning them so that they can't reach your DPS, and if worst comes to worst, he can eat his own DPS to take them out of the battle if they get too low. Whether that mechanic in its own right is toxic or not is another debate, but it's one that clearly marks him as being able to fulfill both his supportive role, and his tank role. Nowhere in the equation should his damage be any large factor in to how he works. And really, I think that should go for all tanks. If you bring a tank toplane, you should accept the fact that you sacrifice agency in lane against something like a bruiser or a marksman so that you'll have a better frontline when it comes to teamfights. How would you beat a bruiser in lane, then? Get your jungler to realise that your matchup isn't good, and have them react accordingly to that information, whether they choose to help your lane out, or get another lane fed so that even more progress can be made in a lane where the matchup is better.

Kench is a tank. He should not be a dominant force toplane. You're more than welcome to do that, but there should be counterplay afforded to classes that are designed to shut your class down.

BEK MakadurJul 25, 20182 votes

Kench is imo more like Mundo than he is like Malphite i.e. He relies on his stacks to be able to win fights, he can´t 1v1 most bruisers after the early game unless he is ahead. His dmg is high, but as he got no hard engage, he can easily be kited by any range champ and some meeles can even do that too. Having a champ only designed for one role is bad imo, take his dmg and he is a useless champ on top and can only play bottom and there his only purpose will be to save the adc most of the time. IMO making his kit more condiotional, like increasing his cd on w if used on an ally makes much more sense than nerfing his dmg.

oortoomeebreesuuJul 26, 20181 votes

if u play top lane tahm you're so cancer

Jerry SeinfeIdJul 25, 20182 votes

smfh and they still won't let leo out of the support role.

chipndip1Jul 25, 20182 votes

Saving allies shouldn't be as reliable and easy as clicking them and running off, though. Or rather, if it IS that easy, there should be some sort of realistic trade-off you have in comparison to others that have to work a little harder to do so.

FlameHalbrdOkidoJul 25, 20182 votes

agreed they keep doing this buffing dmg and nerfing durability either they are enforcing this dmg stuffed meta because they think people think its fun and make LCS more exciting (BIG SURPRISE everyone hates it and its doing the opposite), or they are making these changes as a precursor for another change that could hopefully fix all this

But yeah let tanks be tanks i mean they already did it with poppy and idk who else. I want to play tanks and get to be really hard to take down. Not gonna lie being able to deal damage is fun, but if im playing a tank i kno what i signed up for and lets be honest IF i am playing a tanky my goal is to be UNKILLABLE and id rather Never die than get a crap ton of kills laughing in the face of ur enemies as they throw everything they have at you while u just be a disruptive distraction for your team is more fun its what being a tank is supposed to be about.

I wanna get to point where even the Fed Vayne just gives up after a few AA's cause she KNOWS it will take her 20 min to ever take half my HP and at that point ive either found a way to deal with her, walk to my base, or my allies have showed up and i can lock her down for them to deal with.

but at least they succeeded in makes games shorter...which a lot of people also hate, because it nerf's scaling champions like certain marksmen and then guess what they do? Buff those marksmen who are supposed to be strong late cause they can't come online soon enough

lets face it no one wanted the extra damage, and making the game shorter in this way probably isn't the best but its what we got now hopefully they can kinda keep game times shorter while lowering damage and bringing some of the strategy back so its not a damage fest.

now i like being able to stun from my allies position, but I wouldn't mind them buffing Taric's armor either

but yeah I started MAXING W just so i could get those SICK ally saving outplays where i can save as many times as i can in a game snatching them away from death at the last sec. Did u kno u can eat allies and spit them OVER WALLS!!

And one time i got the BEST out play of ALL time, we had a Bard Mid lane, and we were running through the jg from the enemy team towards drag pit. The Bard used Magical Journey to escape through the drag pit, but i Ate him as he entered and turned the corner, the enemy team went into a bush and the enemy team went into the Bard Tunnel, then we recalled back to base!

Hexs FortuneJul 26, 20182 votes

I find it highly satisfying to digest enemies as tahm kench. I'd be ok with them moving his kit more towards that, since his ability to frequently and consistently save allies seems to be quite a problematic quality to balance around.

I understand though that his ability to make an ally untargetable is a unique feature to him and why some folks would be loathe to lose that identity.

GigglesOJul 26, 20182 votes

[{quoted}](name=Worst Kench NA,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=v22GEkQF,comment-id=,timestamp=2018-07-25T19:12:52.770+0000)

I don't care if he does damage.

Riot: "Flashy High Speed Damage or GTFO"

Crescent DuskJul 26, 20182 votes

Meanwhile anal cancer like Lulu run amok.

Rathar DashingJul 26, 20182 votes

uhh have you seen her winrates? Ever since they gutted shields she's been trash.

Crescent DuskJul 26, 20181 votes

[{quoted}](name=Rathar Dashing,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=v22GEkQF,comment-id=000e0000,timestamp=2018-07-26T04:58:46.544+0000)

uhh have you seen her winrates? Ever since they gutted shields she's been trash.

The shields are not what makes her strong. Her polymorph and ult pretty much hardcounters the assassin midlaners, which is incredibly useful in soloQ where assassins are being spammed.

FixHealsRemoveGWJul 26, 20182 votes

Seeing how Kench was designed with his bonus damage that scales with health, I doubt that he was ever supposed to not do good damage. This may seem trivial but we know that he is supposed to do damage simply because he does.

I'm not supposed to be doing damage.

That is entirely your idea and it seems highly unlikely. Now imagine you actually designed a champion that is NOT supposed to deal damage and some random player comes along and claims that it is supposed to deal damage. How would you like that?

DNFVixenJul 26, 20182 votes

[{quoted}](name=Worst Kench NA,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=v22GEkQF,comment-id=,timestamp=2018-07-25T19:12:52.770+0000)

I don't care if he does damage. I'm not supposed to be doing damage. That's the job of my carry.

What I'm supposed to do is:

tank for my team

save a teammate from a fight if they get too low

lock down enemies with my stacks and my Q

Nerfing all of that, and going even further to buff his damage is spitting in the face of his original design. Before Taric was reworked, I used to play him as my one tank support. They introduced a new stun mechanic that I'm not a fan of, and also turned him in to more of an enchanter, which made playing him pointless as I'd rather play Nami if I wanted to be an enchanter. I gravitated towards Kench because I really liked his character based off of his lore, and wanted to foster that in to making him my replacement tank support. All of these changes that he's going to be getting just push him away from that role in my eyes, towards top or jungle instead. I know Alistar, Braum and Leona exist, but I don't want to play them. I like Kench's unique ability to directly save someone from bad decisions. If the cooldown is increased by that much, why would I bother doing that when I'd just play him top and focus on damage instead? I don't want to do that. There's plenty of tanks played top already.

Nerf his damage. I shouldn't be the one killing everything anyways. Let me tank for my teammates and save them.

But that would go against Ghostcancer's damage philosophy.

Teridax68Jul 25, 20181 votes

I agree with this. Even without its damage, poke, etc., Devour would be an extremely powerful ability already, for the simple fact that it's a long-duration suppress that also repositions an enemy. I'd much rather get rid of all of that, and focus on its ability to capture enemies and allies, rather than overload it with even more damage while jacking up its cooldown to near-ultimate levels. If Tahm needs damage, I'd rather that be expressed via his autoattacks, and even then, the combination of his damage, utility and CC has made him oppressive in many situations.

Worst Kench NAJul 26, 20182 votes

{quoted}

ok lets be clear the support can save or protect ANY ally not just the carry, ur a bad support if all u do is protect the carry like past lane phase, but ur the BEST support if u help the whole team when every u can

Well yes, that's implied. If you have another tank on your team, he's low and you don't save him, I'd agree that that's a bad support job. The general idea of tanking, though, is that you have the enemy DPS focus on you so that your DPS can do their job.

{quoted}

I agree with this. Even without its damage, poke, etc., Devour would be an extremely powerful ability already, for the simple fact that it's a long-duration suppress that also repositions an enemy. I'd much rather get rid of all of that, and focus on its ability to capture enemies and allies, rather than overload it with even more damage while jacking up its cooldown to near-ultimate levels. If Tahm needs damage, I'd rather that be expressed via his autoattacks, and even then, the combination of his damage, utility and CC has made him oppressive in many situations.

Yeah, basically. This W change just completely guts his ability to support well, with the intention to move him toplane or something. IDK, it's just such a dumb decision.

Nea104Jul 26, 20181 votes

[{quoted}](name=Worst Kench NA,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=v22GEkQF,comment-id=,timestamp=2018-07-25T19:12:52.770+0000)

I don't care if he does damage. I'm not supposed to be doing damage. That's the job of my carry.

I totally agree. Sadly, Riot has a completely distorted interpretation of "tanks": in S8 they don't tank; they have CC (ok) and possibly they need to deal tons of damage (what?), like Ornn, Sion, Leona some time ago. Then, people of course get tired of these abominations, and they just gut them.

Is that difficult to have tanks who actually can TANK, in this game? :/

Mokuto BunshiJul 26, 20181 votes

If you gave him less damage Id be okay if he could eat you TWICE.

TheKingOfBichesJul 26, 20181 votes

Lol? Fuck tahm kenches W,that shit is cancer to play against,glad its getting nerfed.

remakoroJul 26, 20181 votes

NO. HE MUST BURST PEOPLE

Done25Jul 26, 20181 votes

You want to play a no damage champ? Go play Braum. Tahm needs damage to survive in top lane, and to be a zoning threat in team fights. Udyr will just walk up and kill him if he's nothing more a meaty punching bag with highly conditional CC.

Worst Kench NAJul 26, 20181 votes

{quoted}

You want to play a no damage champ? Go play Braum. Tahm needs damage to survive in top lane, and to be a zoning threat in team fights. Udyr will just walk up and kill him if he's nothing more a meaty punching bag with highly conditional CC.

Alright then, is the intention therefore, that he shouldn't be played as a support, and rather that he should be a toplaner instead? I don't see him being able to reliably do both without being problematic. As it stands, this change will absolutely kill his potential to support, and it contributes to this awful trend to just slap damage on everything so they can compete with everything else that's had damage slapped on to it. And as I've pointed out, adding damage to the classes that are supposed to. by design, do less than, you know, damage dealing classes is not a good idea.

Done25Jul 26, 20181 votes

Yes. Tahm is a Juggernaut with a side of Warden. He orginally had a self speed up on devour when going into battle. This was so he could grab someone slow, Ex. Vlad, and ferry them into a fight.

But they removed the self speed for some reason that I can't recall. Now they're nerfing his ally grab again. It's very apparent that Riot favors his Juggernaut aspects (Durablity and sustain, at the cost of high conditional damage.) over his Warden aspects.

Worst Kench NAJul 26, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Yes. Tahm is a Juggernaut with a side of Warden. He orginally had a self speed on on devour when going into battle. This was so he could grab someone slow, Ex. Vlad, and ferry them into a fight.

But they removed the self speed for some resonance I can't recall. Now they're nerf in his ally grab again. It's very apparent that Riot favors his Juggernaut aspects (Durablity and sustain, at the cost of high conditional damage.) over his Warden aspects.

So I guess I should just find a new tank support to play, then?

I don't even feel like I want to at this point. I'm not good at Nautilus, Blitz or Thresh. I don't like playing Alistar, Braum or Leona. Taric used to be my favorite tank support, but he's not really a tank anymore. Kench had the one kit I liked in a tank support, and it seems like Riot doesn't want that to be a thing anymore. Do I just tell someone who'd like a tank support that I'd just rather not do that?

I do feel for the people that wouldn't like to lose the value that top Kench has, I really do. But I guess I'll just have to suck it up then that they (Riot) don't want support Kench to be a thing?

KoKobotoJul 26, 20181 votes

Hmm, I disagree. One thing that makes Tahm Kench so interesting to me is how he's a demon and his kit reflects that. In that, he has these weird tools that no other champion has. He's this really slow guy but CAN BE a really dangerous threat if he's close. While also having this teleport mechanic and his ally saving mechanic. I think him having damage should remain because if you remove that you're removing a bunch of playstyles for no reason at all.

Tahm kench is a supportive champion but I think him to be more like Blitzcrank, or Brand, or Nunu. They don't just sit beside a carry all day, nor are they forced to be with their teammates to gain value. They have other things in their kit they can do and I feel that's part of their identities.

For instance, in how they removed Malzahar's AD build for NO REASON AT ALL.

Worst Kench NAJul 26, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Hmm, I disagree. One thing that makes Tahm Kench so interesting to me is how he's a demon and his kit reflects that. In that, he has these weird tools that no other champion has. He's this really slow guy but CAN BE a really dangerous threat if he's close. While also having this teleport mechanic and his ally saving mechanic. I think him having damage should remain because if you remove that you're removing a bunch of playstyles for no reason at all.

Tahm kench is a supportive champion but I think him to be more like Blitzcrank, or Brand, or Nunu. They don't just sit beside a carry all day, nor are they forced to be with their teammates to gain value. They have other things in their kit they can do and I feel that's part of their identities.

For instance, in how they removed Malzahar's AD build for NO REASON AT ALL.

That's fair I guess, AP supports do have agency. If his damage were kept the same, I would be okay with that, honestly. The thing I'm concerned with, is that this is a direct nerf to his ability to support by making it much harder to handle devouring teammates away from poor decisions that they make. Also, he is a tank, and I still believe that it is problematic to give tanks more inherent damage than actual damage dealers.

Let's say this change goes through, as it is. How would you be able to support as him with that change?

MOLTinaTORJul 26, 20181 votes

I know that riot wants to see Tahm played more in top lane, but gutting his support potential completely is not the right approach.

Worst Kench NAJul 26, 20181 votes

{quoted}

I know that riot wants to see Tahm played more in top lane, but gutting his support potential completely is not the right approach.

I saw the guy who's working on Kench's changes post that the cooldown is halved if you use W on an enemy, which I guess is an okay compromise for people that think that his W is unhealthy. I know that there's people that have issues with that ability in particular, and I suppose some of what I initially posted was hyperbole. The core of what I'm saying is that I really enjoy playing Kench support, and I'd like to continue doing that to the point where picking him wouldn't be considered trolling. I do still have reservations about characters that are tanky doing tons of damage, and I think there is a big problem with damage creep in the game, something that I think Kench's new W damage would exacerbate. But really, that's just indicative of everyone doing too much damage, and those that have difficulty applying their damage (ex. Braum) falling to the wayside because of it.

MOLTinaTORJul 26, 20181 votes