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I’m probably stupid for not seeing the similarities between Vlad and new Swain gameplay-wise...

Kairoptra··16 votes·1,421 views

...so please enlighten me.

I’ve played him on PBE and played Vlad in the past, and I honestly can’t see we’re people are coming from. Please tell me what I’m missing.

For those wondering what I can’t see it:

Swain is very combo-oriented with his E-pull-Q and uses hard cc to get to his targets. He’s only a drain tank when he ults and his only other method of health regen is when he gets kills, and has very low mobility. He uses mana and even has a method of regen with his Q. He builds AP and health, but also needs other defensive stats and mana, with a core of RoA and Zhonya’s. He wants to get into the thick of fights and stay alive as long as possible and deal as much damage as he can with AoE. All that’s not even mentioning the soul and vision mechanics.

Vlad uses soft cc and movement speed to get to his targets and spams his q most of the time. He’s a drain tank 24/7 and uses health costs instead of mana. He also builds AP and tank, but his core will usually consist of Protobelt and Spirit Visage. He prefers to stay close to, but on the outside of fights, using both point-and-click AND AoE (the two overlapping with his ult) and only going in to make picks.

tbh, Swain seems more similar to Lissandra in terms of play style than Vlad. I see a lot of people saying the same thing in regards to opposite, so I am more than willing to listen.

I am being one hundred percent serious; I want to understand what other people are seeing.

33 Comments

Malicious Metal15 votes

It's just a meme.

Harden Stepback10 votes

i dont see it either... community just overreacting as usual

JJI74410 votes

Maybe I'm mistaken, but I thought people were saying he looked like Vlad, not played the same.

I agree with that sentiment btw.

Kairoptra5 votes

You see, that's what I thought, but then I saw all these people going on about how they made him a Vlad clone (in terms of gameplay, of course), but not going into why. The front page of the boards right now is a bad example, but it happened in the past, trust me.

Fondling Gems2 votes

Personally I feel like it was a mix of him sharing a lot of visual similarities with Vlad and his abilities being fairly similar in visuals. While their kits are not the same and play very differently (Swain is definitely a lot more combo heavy) their abilities do look similar and have some similar effects at first glance, especially if you haven't played them both, which most people haven't.

Swain has the same red themed ability look as Vlad and their abilities can act similar to each other at time.

Swain Q is similar to Vlad E. While one is a Cone and the other is a circle, they have similar range, very similar particles, are made of multiple smaller projectiles, and stop on the first unit hit (though Swain's will pierce on kill). In terms of Gameplay they are used quite differently but at first glance they do share a number of similarities.

Swain's passive allows him to heal from a single target, similar to how Vlad does, though the circumstances to proc it are different, CC vs a Q.

Swain's Ult reactivation is also quite similar to a fully charged Vlad E.

While they do draintank in different ways and at different times they do both draintank and deal some heavy AOE damage in teamfights. They are also both late game champions too which makes them fill each other's niches a bit (which is fair since that is what they currently do too.)

So while they play quite differently they do look similar, their abilities look similar at times, and they fulfill a similar purpose, which leads players to be more willing to ignore the differences between them.

Lets use some completely random numbers as an example. Say that Swain has to, between art and gameplay, be 60% similar to Vlad for people to call him a Vlad clone. If people feel that their gameplay is only 40% similar, but their visuals are 80% similar, then that will still average out to 60% and people will consider him a Vlad clone. Even though their gameplay wasn't super similar their visual were, and to them that means the champ as a whole is a clone.

Also there is this thing we call the "Boards Mentality", it means that something will get popular and everyone will leap on the hype train and blindly follow that idea. People saw that Swain and Vlad shared some similarities, they saw an upvoted post that they may or may not have completely read through about how they were clones, and they jumped on board. It is worse for stuff on PBE because most people here can't test it themselves. They have to take the word of others on what things are like.

Personally I don't think they play very similar, they have different goals and feel very different to play. That being said when I only saw the video preview for his abilities and thematic I did agree that they looked very similar, and if I hadn't had the PBE to test the rework myself I probably would have continued to think that because they look similar and both are draintanks with similar aesthetics.

PhDs Nuts3 votes

Vlad's a blood mage. Swain had a bloody looking hand in the teaser.

"THEY'RE THE SAME GUY"

PhantomGG2 votes

The large majority of people are morons, don't bother trying to understand them, it will only confuse you further. As for post rework, the reasons they had any resemblance is for they were mages who could get tanky, get in the middle of the fight and drain some health off people as they fight you. Other than that, how they got their "drain" and how they killed you, were and even more so now are completely different.

no to toxic2 votes

Vlad is white haired vampire wich is why girls and homosexuals like him.(Prove me wrong) Swain is now becoming a sort of Emproro from Star Wars since he is a tactical genius who plans things and can read the minds of people. So to put it to perspective imagine if the Emperor became the Vampire in Twilight and Jacob became the Emperor in Star Wars. You wouldn`t really notice it without already knowing who was there before.

Chromatic Eagle2 votes

It's more of a visual thing than playstyle. Who said they played alike?

Kairoptra3 votes

Couldn't tell you who specifically, but I've seen it plenty of times.

MrPhamtom2 votes

this "community" is a joke

these kids don't actually play the game. They're more excited about circlejerking stupid shit that no one cares about

They raise "concerns" over the two being similar just because of the hair when they play nothing the same

ninjaroxas2 votes

You sound like the "kid" right now

ChaddyFantome1 votes

Legit the only reason make the comparison is because of the Red color scheme. Thats it. ....And it's stupid. Swains hair isn't even white, but Gray.

HomDon1 votes

If anything Swain's new Ult looks like Kayle floating around with those cheesy angel wings, with an exploding Sion shield. Swain's E looks just like Lissandra's E, and his W is a ripoff of Sarumon'e eye from LotR

LordGeovanni1 votes

I thougt it was character model wise not gameplay wise

KennysDreamGirl1 votes

Ive seen people say they play the same gameplay wise

Blåbæret1 votes

Mains will always complain. The moment the tiniest of detail doesn't adhere to their opinion their "sentiment" is violated and they enrage.

Ignore these people and move on with your life.

THE RlVER KlNG1 votes

he looks a lot like vlad not just in appearance but his particles and such too like on the pull and ult

there's no real gameplay correlation besides aoe damage and healing. it's a meme really.

Keepe1 votes

Minus the Q being essentially a smaller Tides of Blood, Swain's gameplay is pretty different. And as a player of the guy, I enjoy that. It's mostly just the visual aspects that people complain about.

KnifeCat1 votes

i don't think there's anything wrong with champs being similar. For instance Rengar/Kha, Akali/Diana, there's a lot of similar champs with similar playstyles

KennysDreamGirl1 votes

Don't feel stupid, there really isn't any similarities past base swain and black Vlad. People just have to reach for the farthest thing they can find some they can complain it out of proportion

Śhunpo1 votes

Vlad is actually fairly fun to play as. This new Swain feels like Riot just reworked him for the hell of it.

Snowplosion1 votes

I think it is the visuals, but even that I'm not sure on.

Teridax681 votes

As others have pointed out, it's mostly a meme based on visuals, though there are some surface-level similarities nonetheless:

  • Swain gets access to burst healing from level 1, which when comboed with his point-and-click pull looks a little bit like Transfusion.
  • Swain's Q projectiles are similar to those in Vladimir's E, in that both fire a thick spread of dark red-colored missiles from the champion where each missile gets intercepted by the first enemy hit.
  • Swain's new ult is now structured as a setup leading to a final burst of damage, like Vladimir's R, both of which also feature heavy self-healing.

So just to make this clear again, these differences are minor and have typically been exaggerated, particularly since Swain and Vladimir play nothing alike in practice. Both have also shared many things in common since before Swain's relaunch, namely a focus on persistent magic damage, self-sustain, durability, and an affiliation to Noxus. It is therefore not really the most salient criticism one can make of his changes.

Wolfeur1 votes

It's not that they play the same, it's that beyond being visually very redundant, they got have the same role as short-ranged, front-line battle mage and drain tank. Sure, Swain is less drain-tank than before, and far less than Vlad, but the basic idea is the same: Get in range, get sucked. Get closer, get fucked. The paradigms of Swain's Q and Vlad's E are identical, for example, even though the spells are quite different.

If they were visually very different, people wouldn't mind, but two people with the same role who look alike, that feels redundant.

Z3Sleeper1 votes

You got pranked bro, it's fake.

It's just a joke cuz they look similar.

GhaelWinds1 votes

I've always said that vlad and Swain occupy pretty much the same gameplay, an aoe ap drain tank. I feel the update helped to distinguish them gameplay wise a bit better but made them decently close in appearance. I still think they are very distinguishable but they will always be somewhat connected.

lolipopevelynn1 votes

Vlad has red abilities, swain has red abilities. Those are the similarities.

An Enemy Sutando1 votes

They both have red particles on the base skin. Must be the same guy.

Superspick1 votes

Because new Swain is what they told Vlad players Vlad would be, that's really what it is. The aesthetics are huge too, but its specifically the first point, where Vlad players didn't want a burst mage, they wanted a true drain "battlemage" and got the idea that's what they would get.

Think back before the rework, Vlad was NEVER supposed to be a burst mage, what? Then they changed his kit drastically and he became most effective as a oneshot mage, which is what we have now.

Currently they have zero in common, you're right about that, other than both their Qs hurt like a mofo -conditionally-; Vlad needs 3rd Q and Swain needs close range for all bolts to hit, but both Qs nuke hard af.

That's about it, really. It doesn't help that Swain looks exactly like what a lot of people imagine Vlad should look like - Long blond hair and an undying type of look, like he's been alive way longer than he should.

Yaskamasandwich1 votes

Wall of text incoming.

It's mainly due to looks. Base Swain looks very similar to Blood Lord Vladimir in terms of hair styles, particles, and effects. They even look roughly the same on terms of skin condition and facial structures, not exactly but very similar. Both occupy as short range drain tank and AP as well.

It goes beyond that though, all this would have been forgiven or looked over if Swain was more... Well Swain. This is the first major rework where Riot went full on just to fully replace the champion. Where previous reworks kept at least quite a bit of the previous champion in terms of looks and have their gameplay advanced.

Sion always had a weird jaw so it was replaced with the crown of the king he killed WITH HIS BARE HANDS! That is golden right there. He still uses an axe and has a healthy kit to boot. Most importantly he is still a zombie.

Gangplank got changed to a bad ass looking pirate in two skin forms. One a professional warlord look, and one roughed up gramps with a mechanical arm. Two awesome opposed choices, very nice.

Poppy got a bigger hammer, and interactive buckled, and most importantly kept her pig tails. However she acts less of a hero and more of a dunce looking for a hero. Don't like that part and maybe a lot more people agree o that not sure though. Also her kit is sadly hard to balance but much better than just keeping her far far in the gutter. The term "Poppied" came from her for a reason.

Galio still is chiseled from stone, has wings, a tail, a crown with horns instead of horns, and a more interactive kit instead of a poke mage. Unfortunate that his kit is having a hard time to be balanced sadly.

Warwick, well I don't need to say much really, just a fantastic rework all around. Needs some tweaks probably but tied with Sion in terms of the best.

Point is all these champions kept a piece of them that made them what they are. Most people say when a rework happens it's "just another champion with the same name." WHICH IS NOT TRUE. Except for Swain it is true this time. He doesn't have a cane and a limp (dance doesn't count and again he isn't limping), he doesn't have a bird form, he doesn't look old, missed opportunity from Riot. Riot really do not like old aged champions, something that was missed with Lissandra as well. Riot even mentioned they were close to removing Beatrice. BEATRICE! The one thing that was the biggest thing of Swain was close to removed. Even then she is kept around by flying around the battlefield and part of his temporary action or something. That is small as compared from before when she followed him and was on his shoulder pad that was made for her.

So long story short Swain looks very similar to Blood Lord Vladimir in terms of looks, particles, colours, effects, and role. He also lost a lot of things that made him what he was.

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