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Toplane will never be balanced (rant)

Kazo Kurosu·10/28/2018, 3:06:03 PM·17 votes·8,655 views

Top is home for the most mentally unstable madmen in League, those completely out of touch with reality, and Riven mains.

Now add to that mix champions with range advantage.

Ever wondered what's up with range champions in toplane that always get out of hand?

Do you know why Irelia's rework introduced a way for her to dash more often than before? Because ranged champions. Do you know why Fiora resets her Q every time it hits? Because ranged champions. Do you know why Camille's E, single best mobility skill in the entire game is a part of a toplane champion's kit? Because ranged champions.

All of the bullshit every other league player has to deal with when playing against champions like these, is because Riot was forced to give them tools to stand up to ranged champions played in toplane.

Gnar is not allowed to become a healthy solo-queue champion. Not when his kit let's him to constantly kite his melee opponents. Panth had 54% winrate for over a year because his Q turned him into a ranged champion that doubled down as an assassin. Kennen will absolutely never be balanced. There are only three forms in which he becomes popular. Shitting on the lane opponent form, aoe nuker with ult ap scaling form and second adc if he decides to abuse adc items.

Meanwhile Jax has been broken for almost a year because he's the last purely stat-check based champion. You managed with Xin and Aatrox. Stop caring about what Hashinshin says and just rework him.

Why isn't Gauntlet melee only yet? Because fucking ezreal? He destroys the meta in which he's popular. He will never be correctly balanced. His Q makes him either complete ass or something that's impossible to play against.

Don't buff doran's shield because adc will abuse it again, as they always fucking do. Rework the ever-loving shit out of Gnar and Kennen. Make Gauntlet melee only.

Not once in it's history was top balanced. Everybody can be thrown there. When tanks are strong they ruin the entire game. Right now, top champs like Camille are degraded into the jungle because they can't deal with all the bullshit.

Fix this fucking lane Riot. I know you can't, you never could. But at least pretend that you care.

Sincerely, toplane player.

26 Comments

ValyrianBlade10/28/2018, 3:24:23 PM13 votes

[{quoted}](name=Kazo Kurosu,realm=EUNE,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=vGfkJLZf,comment-id=,timestamp=2018-10-28T15:06:03.963+0000)

When tanks are strong they ruin the entire game.

I was with you up until that comment.

Tank meta was BY FAR the best meta league has ever had, and likely ever will have. I have always come to these boards a lot, whether I was happy with the state of the game or not, and during the tank meta there were FAR FEWER complaints about game balance than I've ever seen.

The complaints were specific to Sejuani, Zac, and Maokai. THREE champions - that could easily be entirely banned out. Even if you include Skarner and Sion, it's still only 5 champions that a single team could entirely ban out. And when they were in games, they weren't single-handedly winning them. They were giving their team a solid advantage, but their carries still had to, well, carry.

The ONLY time top lane was balanced was when tanks were strongest. They could still be beaten in lane by bruisers, and there were avenues for non-tank champions to win games by winning their lane hard with that advantage.

Top lane is going to be imbalanced forever, not because of Iceborn Gauntlet. It's a lane where melee duelists want to belong, but anyone that's not a melee duelist hates that lane anyways. Melee duelists think everything is great when they're the strongest there, but EVERYBODY ELSE hates it - you all just fail to notice because you're happy and don't come to complain at that time. If anything, the problem stems from these melee duelists - champions that are designed to win 1 on 1 even if the person playing them is much worse at the game than their opponent (if their opponent isn't playing a similar champion). Further, for some reason these melee duelists think it's reasonable for their champion to win 1v2s with only a 1 or 2 kill lead and a 1 level advantage. The state where these champions are believed to be "balanced" by their mains often has them so grotesquely overpowered that everyone else hates it.

Make tanks great again. That's the answer to top lane. Bruisers can beat tanks in lane, even when tanks are strong. Ranged abuse can beat bruisers, but tanks can survive ranged abusers and provide great gank support while also contributing more to late game fights. It's a fair triangle of power that lets everything be relevant.

ff 20 please ty10/28/2018, 6:31:05 PM2 votes

Only reason i play top is to try to stop the rest of my team from inting them, point made

SithesisLord10/29/2018, 1:15:53 AM2 votes

When tanks are strong they ruin the entire game.

And when has that happened in top lane, exactly?

The last time i can recall was during the Season 5 Juggernaut jungle enchantment that created a Smite/TP top lane meta and even then it wasn´t a tank meta. It was Mundo/Shyvana/Trundle/Sion.

Tanks haven´t been popular in SoloQ ever since. One tank, two tanks, at best, maybe, but not 8, 9 tanks.

Also, tank metas are still the best metas, because people can actually survive more than half a second.

AirKingNeo10/28/2018, 9:16:53 PM2 votes

Top won't be balanced because Riot never really tries to balance it.

Same for every lane pretty much. Same for the entire game.

Thefrostyviking10/28/2018, 9:56:31 PM2 votes

Ranged tops are the reason picks like camilie and Irelia needed such high mobility? O_O

Then why were ranged tops needed in the first place?

I seem to recall there is a entire class of melee champs whose core design is "extremely powerful in melee but lack mobility to compensate" AKA juggernauts, and many if not most ranged picks were brought in exactly to deal with those.

Hells just this recent viktor toplane is something worlds produced to deal with......was it Aatrox or Urgot first? He beats both along with basically every other toplane juggernaut there is along with highly cheesy melee like Riven and Renekton too.

So what is viktor toplane actually? All he really is a perfect counter to half the toxic shit that has accumulated in the toplane since season 5 but mainly towards those recent pain in the ass cases of urgot and aatrox post reworks.

What toplane is really about is a game of rock-paper-scissors but it has more choices between juggernauts, divers, skirmishers, tanks and ranged picks, given how 5 distinctly different playstyles are all crammed into one lane its no bleeding wonder that if one class turns out hella OP and popular with high pickrates(juggernauts Aatrox Urgot Darius) then the moment someone brings out a solid counter Viktor then that one will instantly have its winrates shoot through the roof and into the sky with pickrates following shortly.

This has always been the case.....the moment tanks got OP before we had a bunch of em and then like 2-3 picks that countered them hard as hell, heck it worked for jungle too.

Like back in season 7 when jungle seju was OP someone was like "hey trundle R is pretty good against that fat passive" and all of a sudden sejuani has a matchup that she basically cant win.

Counterpicks exist for all lanes, toplane is just more extreme because its a long solo lane and its impossible to change, especially given that the juggernaut class is basically designed to only be weak against ranged which creates a need for ranged choices to be available.

Destello Azul10/28/2018, 10:19:26 PM2 votes

[deleted]

Modl Ryden l10/29/2018, 8:14:20 AM1 votes

You started off with a very interesting insight as to why and how things are with ranged top laners and other champs requiring frequent dashes to keep up with ranged top laners. But then you lost me towards the end when you really started to shift the topic from the title to more of blaming anyone who is ranged (mainly marksmen as it seems) for the state of top lane. You have to understand that Viktor, Vlad, and Ryze are part of the category as well it's not just AD champs. And then you ended how doing X, Y, and Z will balance the state of top lane, even though you said it in the title that it will never be balanced.

I'm sorry but are you Hashinshin's alt account? Bruh you're supposed to be suspended. Go take a shower!

Nhifu10/28/2018, 3:14:17 PM1 votes

I would love changes to the Doran starter items.. again..

item 1055 Kind of lackluster right now, probably the only reason we see Doran shield picked up. Because fleet footwork sustain on top of Doran shield is op. lol

AggressiveWolf10/29/2018, 1:29:51 PM1 votes

I literally made two posts about this sort of shit and they were on the featured for a while but I agree. I have two accounts right now. One where I main support/jungle champions and this one where I purely main toplane. The other account is honor level 3 checkpoint 2. This one is currently on a two week suspension. THAT IS HOW MUCH TOPLANE DRIVES ME TO INSANITY. EVERY CHAMPION UP THERE IS TOXIC RIGHT NOW.

TrollsShouldDie10/28/2018, 6:27:43 PM1 votes

Kennen will absolutely never be balanced. There are only three forms in which he becomes popular. Shitting on the lane opponent form, aoe nuker with ult ap scaling form and second adc if he decides to abuse adc items.

I thought this was a serious post until I got to here. Kennen is bottom tier, one of the weakest champions game, gets craped on top lane.

Larriet10/28/2018, 10:57:03 PM1 votes

Meanwhile Jax has been broken for almost a year because he's the last purely stat-check based champion.

I don't play him so I wouldn't know; what about Udyr ?

Beerstein10/28/2018, 11:02:05 PM1 votes

As long as ranged and melee champs use the same items, Riot will never be able to refine balance, and if I'm honest, I don't think they care. That wouldn't play into their "Big plays" meta for worlds.

ChaddyFantome10/29/2018, 3:30:54 AM1 votes

Iceborn isn't broken on non-Melees tho. only Ez really abuses it.

Biggest MO3 Fan10/29/2018, 5:33:15 AM1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Kazo Kurosu,realm=EUNE,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=vGfkJLZf,comment-id=,timestamp=2018-10-28T15:06:03.963+0000)

.

Meanwhile Jax has been broken for almost a year because he's the last purely stat-check based champion. You managed with Xin and Aatrox. Stop caring about what Hashinshin says and just rework him.

People keep saying this and sincerely it pisses me off... Jax is not broken , because of item scaling and what he becomes , hes a versatile champ. Look at it this way , as of right now HE HAS TO BUILD TRI FORCE , because of all the dmg in the game , he has to build dmg too , because hes SUPPOSED to be this late game carry... Lets look at it like this , they have 3 tanks wether its top,supp,and jg , or top,jg and mid.. doesnt matter 3 tanks , and they have a hyper carry like Vayne ,Tristana ,Kaisa .he has to choose between , Do i go for the back line so they dont burn through our front line and then our back line , or do i go item 3153 so i can shred tanks while being squishier... As of right now his best and most popular build is item 3078 item 3748 item 3111 item 3053 item 3508 item 3026 , makes him last longer but not enough resistance against a fed adc or mage. All he has is his ult and steraks shield , he cant one shot an adc because of supp shields and peel (as it should be , because someone building health shouldnt one shot) , thats because an assassin should be able to , or op mages who can one shot from the back line. So if jax wants to shred tanks , he needs a item 3153 or item 3124 , which makes him squishier ,and if wants to go for back line , he needs to find a way to get back there. Due to the fact that if he jumps in , he will be met with cc , adc flashes away , and a disengage. As much as Mages and Adc's bitch , jax inst over powered. Unless He gets REALLY ahead , he wont one shot. Even late game he doesnt one shot. He still gets kited really hard because he only has 1 dash , counter strike even with 40% is still on a semi-long cooldown. What Jax excels at is at 1v1's because hes a dualist , you SHOULDNT try to 1v1 a jax at any point in time. And depending on the opponents he can even 1v2 , thats because hes supposed to be this dualist (i say again) and you also have to account what you sacrifice to have Jax , you sacrifice a tank. Tanks are so useful late game , theyre engage , peel , disengage ,cc, shields , frontline. And what you get with Jax is someone who is somewhat tanky , and does t good amount of dmg. You cant just look at Jax and say this champ is op , you have to see how he affects his team , and what he brings. Because if you say,Jax is op by his split pushing and 1v1 potential , youre ONLY looking at his strengths , that are REALLY GOOD , but his weaknesses really show too. As of patch 8.21 he has a 52% winrate , and you dont even see him in pro play. So people can bitch all they want about Jax being broken , but hes a unique champ ,that is one of riots few good designs that has lasted this long. There are no stats indicating jax is broken , hes just in a really good spot. Dont take that away.