If riot nerfs MP5, New champs will continue to overshadow old champs

Camoruso·10/7/2014, 1:17:51 AM·9 votes·1,504 views

Mana is a gate to champion power. Riot decides that gold tradeoff for more power is effective. While in its current state mana bound champs are relatively healthy, problems arise when comparing old v new champions. New champions rarely have appropriate mana cost/mana pool/MP5 balance relative to older champs. the simple way to solve this is to change the older champs to better suite the new way riot wants mana champions to be (get an item and spam spam spam). Even though the diversity is important, the perks of older champs aren't something that make them invincible to nerfs. Although knowing Riot they might just nerf MP5 items and call it even. further barring out old and mana hungry champs, furthering their need to invest in more mana items to keep up. further more putting manaless champs at an even greater advantage early-mid game.

Riot has put in effort by lowering mana costs throughout the season. specifically in ultimates. Yet they may over look this idea when they announce "major testing changes" that could potentially destroy certain champs from being viable during the major changes.

17 Comments

Madra10/7/2014, 2:17:01 AM5 votes

Mana regen and mana costs is an area where too much power creep has occurred. Looking at the mana costs for a champion like Vel'koz and comparing it to a champion like Zyra is pretty amazing. 75 Mana for Zyra to 40 Mana for Vel'koz? When they go bottom lane as support, they work the same way, yet three of Vel'koz's spells still cost less mana than two of Zyra's. Zyra's are lot more difficult to land as well that require much shorter range. Math isn't really supposed to be that hard.

HDPixel1080p10/7/2014, 2:33:52 AM3 votes

Honestly, it's not just mana pools. League of Legends suffers from a phenomona called "Powercreep" Essentially, powercreep is when new content becomes better than old content in games. This is rarely ever intentional, but as developers get better at making content, they will make better content, which just outclasses the older stuff. Like, would Riot have created champs like Zed, Gnar, and Yasuo 3 years ago? I doubt it.

Edit: I didn't actually see Madra's post while writing this XD

But either way, older champs need buffs, or newer ones need nerfs. This happens to just about every MOBA, but it's bad when nothing is done about it. I can't say this occurs as often in Dota 2, where every hero has been around for more than 3 years, and been meticulously balanced.

And uh, even though I used Gnar as an example, not really that strong as powercreep goes, except no mana costs. Can someone please explain why there are champs that don't use mana/health/energy?

ProfDrDeath10/7/2014, 2:44:09 PM1 votes

With the context Xypherous gave, I think it will be more likely that they're leaving the champions' base numbers largely untouched and concentrate more on blue buff and Athene's (finally) and their respective synergy.

CerealBoxOfDoom10/7/2014, 5:40:21 PM1 votes

didn't they already fix the mana gating on older champs?

Theorex4/12/2016, 3:30:28 PM1 votes

Hey Guess what!?! Nerfing Mp5 unless they completely change up what they plan on doing with the AP items lel

MontiR10/7/2014, 1:08:50 PM1 votes

Implying changes need to be made do you nerf new champs or buff old champs?

SeargentAnus10/7/2014, 1:30:22 AM1 votes

Why would they nerf Mp5? A change like that could completely invalidate some poke champions.