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So I'm curious about Bard's synergy with Nunu

Spacesuit Spiff··5 votes·9,578 views

Nunu is pretty bad right now, I could write paragraphs about why his playstyle doesn't work anymore. But if you forget that for a moment, it's kinda interesting to picture him with Bard. Blood Boil lets them run around the map together, the tunnel could be used to bait people into Nunu's ult, but what's interesting to me is the prospect of chaining their ults.

Bard ults, which lasts 2.5 seconds. Nunu channels his ult, which lasts 3 seconds. If they time it decently, there isn't much the enemy team can do about it except for the few champs with instant hard CC.

Nunu runs into the middle of the enemy team, pops Zhonyas, and just before the end of the Zhonyas, Bard ults the enemy team. I assume that his ult won't proc on Nunu while Nunu is in Zhonyas, meaning that he can freely charge his ult from the middle of the enemy team.

We haven't seen whether his ult can end ally channels yet as far as I know, so it's possible that Nunu could start his ult in the middle of the enemy team, then Bard could ult, and the channel would continue through the duration of Bard's ult. I kinda doubt this will be the case but I wouldn't be surprised if Riot did something about interrupting ally channels, since there's already been a lot of crying about Kalista stopping Velkoz ults and the like (even though I'm fairly sure she can't actually do so).

I hope antijungling becomes a thing again so that this can be a legitimate strategy (although maybe not enough to be seen in the LCS, otherwise soloq will be flooded with Nunus that just afk farm... again...)

19 Comments

RiotMeddler13 votes

Bard's ult will interrupt channels in progress, whether by allies or enemies.

As far as Nunu goes that's a combination we've tested a bit during Bard's development. Not enough to dig into all its implications, but enough to see some promise. Baiting the enemy team into a Nunu ult proved to be really effective in one playtest, with Bard using Magical Journey while he and Nunu were running from four of the enemy team. As soon as Nunu got through the portal he started channeling his ult while Bard waited nearby. All four enemies came through, unaware of what was about to hit them, since they didn't have vision of the portal's end point. Bard stunned the first two to come through, Nunu then got off a fully charged ult and they proceeded to clean up all four.

Major Sparkles2 votes

classic

Kouga1 votes

Hello again Medd. To what degree, would you say, were you guys hoping to encourage this kind of meta-breaking gameplay when you made a Roaming Support? Roamers used to be fairly common back in the day (having played since beta I've seen the metas come and go) but it hasn't had a strong presence in some time. Now, with the addition of things like the Poacher's knife and Bard's design, are you hoping to actively encourage these new strategies and comps, or is that just a side effect?

For example, I could see this starting to encourage different team comps with bot lane having champions who specifically flourish in 1v2 lanes, rather than just hoping your "standard" ADC pick can make do. If Bard is a hit, do you think we'll see more of these meta-changing designs?

RiotMeddler10 votes

One of our goals when we first starting kicking around ideas for Bard was to create a support that offered a distinctive style of play to his team, let them do some different stuff both in terms of team comp and strategy. Roaming support (or at least partially roaming, we're still predicting most Bards will spend a lot of time in lane too) seemed like a good fit as a result.

In terms of team comp we do think it's likely some champions will pair noticeably better with Bard than others and that's something we're fine with unless it goes to extremes (really overpowered with X other champion, useless without's not a good thing of course). Safe 1v2 laners, whether because of their range, escapes, lack of farm dependence, toughness or whatever are likely to be good fits with Bard (Caitlyn for long ranged farming or Sivir for strong waveclear+spellshield safety for example).

HigeR1 votes

Is there someone who's synergy with Caitlyn isn't high? using her as an example is kind of... wrong

ExecutorDill1 votes

I like the idea of roaming relic collecting support, that way it's easier for me to ignore my adc's CS (as we "non-support mains" tend to steal CS :3) because i have more important things to do than sit in brush xD.

+1 for Bard

Jesus is Savior1 votes

{quoted}

Bard's ult will interrupt channels in progress, whether by allies or enemies.

As far as Nunu goes that's a combination we've tested a bit during Bard's development. Not enough to dig into all its implications, but enough to see some promise. Baiting the enemy team into a Nunu ult proved to be really effective in one playtest, with Bard using Magical Journey while he and Nunu were running from four of the enemy team. As soon as Nunu got through the portal he started channeling his ult while Bard waited nearby. All four enemies came through, unaware of what was about to hit them, since they didn't have vision of the portal's end point. Bard stunned the first two to come through, Nunu then got off a fully charged ult and they proceeded to clean up all four.

And then one Nunu main is going to have a bard intentionally troll him and cancel his ult every time he tries to throw one, making the Nunu do no damage.

And then he will never pick Nunu into bard again.

DrCyanide3 votes

Zhonya's to avoid Zhonya's?! What madness is this!

Great thinking though. Alternatively, QSS might get you out of a friendly Bard ult.

RanmanReborn2 votes

I have a 70% win rate on Nunu and disagree that he is "pretty bad right now." Played correctly in the jungle, he's an absolute nightmare for the opposing jungler and his W is beast on an ADC that autoattacks well or someone like Jax.

Spacesuit Spiff2 votes

{quoted}

I have a 70% win rate on Nunu and disagree that he is "pretty bad right now." Played correctly in the jungle, he's an absolute nightmare for the opposing jungler and his W is beast on an ADC that autoattacks well or someone like Jax.

Glad to hear you're doing well with him. I do actually like that champ. I suspect you're extremely good with him and you can make him work, but I imagine we'd agree that compared to how he was in previous seasons his risk is a lot higher and his reward is a lot lower. Mostly because buffs have zero impact outside of maybe Fiddles, and changes to the exp algorithm for jungle camps means that you can't just kill the enemy jungler twice and expect them to be 3 levels behind for the rest of the game. And the wolf ghost, and spawn timers, etc etc.

Of course, he has the funny soloq attribute of nobody knowing how to deal with him. Last time I counterjungled the enemy mid missed about 4 waves while chasing me through both jungles. I was useless for a while after that, but you can guess what happened in midlane afterwards.

Nyaruko Chan1 votes

{quoted}

Nunu is pretty bad right now, I could write paragraphs about why his playstyle doesn't work anymore.

What? Nunu isnt bad at all. Hes got extremely strong objective control, has a really strong buff to apply to your adc, can tank extremely well, and his ult allows you to create a massive zone of control for your team. Theres a reason you see Nunu played a lot in the LCS. If he was pretty bad right now you wouldnt be seeing people in the LCS play him repeatedly.

Spacesuit Spiff1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Kirito x Silica,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=w9wEhQJl,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2015-02-25T07:46:50.320+0000)

What? Nunu isnt bad at all. Hes got extremely strong objective control, has a really strong buff to apply to your adc, can tank extremely well, and his ult allows you to create a massive zone of control for your team. Theres a reason you see Nunu played a lot in the LCS. If he was pretty bad right now you wouldnt be seeing people in the LCS play him repeatedly.

Ok I'll rephrase, he's bad in soloq. In LCS, people don't just let you pick an aggro early jungler and cheese out 4 kills + dragon in the first clear, which is easy to do in soloq. I've tried Nunu, and farm junglers, in soloq, and it always ends up with the enemy Vi going Legendary because laners usually forget the jungler exists until said jungler is pounding their face is. You play Nunu and you're mainly impacting the enemy jungler, but the current meta ones can just ignore you and win the lanes while you take camps. LCS laners might actually deal with this properly, but soloqers sure won't. And that's assuming they're not just losing on their own.

His objective control is excellent, but it's already easy to sneak dragon as most of the earlygame junglers because people stopped warding it after the Panth nerf. Sure he's amazing at stealing it, but you can just kill the enemy botlane and then 1v3 him when he tries.

Basically from what I've seen as him, if you do everything absolutely perfectly, you'll be a massive pain in the ass to the enemy team. Other junglers can just do whatever they feel like and probably contribute pretty well too, and if they play as well as the perfect Nunu, they're probably a lot scarier (I've seen maybe 2 smurfs playing Lee and the impact they had was unreal). Is this the case in the LCS? No. But LCS isn't soloq, where complicated strategies tend to fail and the winner is the biggest cheese.

Kouga1 votes

I was just talking to someone about how Bard's niche, I think, isn't going to be his kit but his role as a Roaming Support. Teaming him up with a jungler? Awesome idea. He gets his own XP from his charms and think of what he could do to help a jungler out. Sejuani too slow to initiate a gank? BAM here she comes portal'ing through a wall. Although I agree that Nunu sounds like he has the greatest natural synergy. They both have a slow, huge zoning control, sustain...

Sincarnation1 votes

Meh it sounds like cool synergy, but it will probably have to wait until his release. I actually played Nunu and dominated on the PBE about an hour ago, but none of the Bards really roam gods. Like seriously you are laning 2 v 2 as a champion designed to move around the map.

Dokusei1 votes

apparently you didn't read the part where you can't damage the people bard ults

Spacesuit Spiff1 votes

{quoted}

apparently you didn't read the part where you can't damage the people bard ults

Bard's ult duration: 2.5s Nunu's ult channel time (does damage in one burst at the end of the channel): 3s The point is that if they start at close to the same time, Nunu can get a full ult off instead of being cc'd.

Ark Angel HFB1 votes

{quoted}

Bard's ult duration: 2.5s Nunu's ult channel time (does damage in one burst at the end of the channel): 3s The point is that if they start at close to the same time, Nunu can get a full ult off instead of being cc'd.

you have no clue wtf you are talking about do you?

If bard ults nunu... his ult will pop... instantly and deal next to no damage... not that nunu really cases about his ult. Nunu is best as a tank, and his ult is just there for the massive aoe slow.

Ximlee2 votes

Apparently you're an asshole

Hupsis1 votes

I am a bit curious about a concept where the support aids the jungler instead the adc. Bard could follow the jungler around and help him/her clear the camps and grant vision while gathering his chimes and gaining exp. He might even gank or pressure a lane (mid lane most likely) while the jungler is clearing easy camps. Only down side is that he might get a bit behind... awesome chance to buff the inspiration mastery right here.

The adc has to manage on his/her own against enemy bot lane though.

Zilean could also be turned into a "roaming support" with slight changes to his passive. Or that's how I feel.

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