Why can Karma shield Creeps???

Cławhauser·4/12/2016, 3:36:58 PM·6 votes·1,248 views

I've been playing a lot of Karma recently in the support role, I can't think of a reason why you would ever want to shield a minion. It only seems to screw me up. For example, my Caitlyn (or whatever ADC I'm laning with) is about to die and is ignited. I try to shield her, but she's running through a creep wave and I accidentally shield the cannon minion that's walking right on top of her model. She dies, and now she's raging at me or typing "..." or whatever, and I'm left thinking, "Why am I able to shield those in the first place?" This happens to me all too often and when it does I always ask myself that same question. It's a small complaint, but I really think it's a useless feature to Karma's E that should be removed.

29 Comments

Abyssphere4/12/2016, 4:55:29 PM2 votes

Shielding a creep (especially RE) is great for pushing.
Shielding a creep can deny CS (iffy use but it matters)
Extending shield range via creeps is super clever

I rarely use 2 or 3 but 1 is a lot more useful than you think it is. After a couple of levels you can block a LOT more than one tower shot with your shield, especially if you use your ultimate shield.

RookPusher4/12/2016, 5:14:13 PM2 votes

I use portraits when shielding for this reason. But if she can shield minions, i don't know why they get skipped when she ults.

Shuyin1784/12/2016, 3:47:33 PM2 votes

It's to help with sieging (shield a cannon creep or a super minion) or to deny CS (shield as they go to last hit so they miss it).

cuddlykitten44/12/2016, 6:02:27 PM1 votes

There is an option to turn off/on whether an ability can target minions

Sogreth4/12/2016, 4:22:19 PM1 votes

It can allow you to reach an ally with Mantra + Shield that might have been out of range, but you can shield the minion and the AoE can reach an ally. That's just one use.

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Most of those listed uses aren't practical imo. Denying one creep for 60-80 mana isn't efficient, Shielding a minion under tower would only make the minion live for about one more shot, speeding up a single minion won't make the lane push faster

Denying a siege minion worth about 50g, is more than worth that 60 mana. That one extra hit is one more hit the turret needs to make to clear out those minions, and that much more time to take out the turret. And speeding them up, I do that all the time so the minion will reach the turret faster and we can start attacking it sooner.

Quepha4/12/2016, 3:49:02 PM1 votes

It's very efficient when taking a tower to shield a cannon minion. It keeps the wave alive for longer so all the minions are adding to the tower damage and the cannon minion's inherent resistance to tower shots makes the shield last against more shots than if it were on any other target.

Warden Karma4/12/2016, 3:50:59 PM1 votes

You can turn on an option so that your spells only target Champions (I believe its ^ by default but not sure). If you are having Problems to Shield Champions you can turn it on as you apparently wont use Shields on Minions and E is Karma's only Spell which one can accidentally miss.

I often see People complaining about Karma/Soraka being able to Shield/Heal Minions, but I can not understand why they do.

Karma can Shield Minions because she used to be able to Shieldbomb. This Feature still is very usefull in certain situations and Karma can use it to compensate Range over Shieldvalue. In addition you deny last hits of the enemy ADC, make minions taking more tower hits, pushing the lanes, even speed up Minions to block Skillshots. This also works as far as I know for Promoted Minions via item 3060 or Voidlings from item 3512 . As you can see there are plenty of possible situations where shielding a non-champion can be very usefull.

I as a Karma main find myself relative often shielding a Minion due to its flexible use.