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Want Counterplay?? Want Skill to Matter?? Then Kalista's Passive Should Have Gone to a MELEE Champ

ESeTyRC··60 votes·5,599 views

Kalista

^ Stating the obvious of the above champion first, she's ranged, but is extremely mobile.

I'm sure most people that saw Kalista or even read about her passive knows how absurd the mobility is, especially relative to melee champions. However,** I don't think the passive itself is bad. Not at all. It's just on the wrong type of champion for the health of the game.**

I read a RIOT post regarding melee champs like Udyrs being able to "fake out" Kalista a little while back... yeah. That's another way of saying that she'll never be caught unless she can't kite properly, having the option to disengage as she pleases for the most part.

Ranged champs already have the advantage of range, so to give them additional mobility to the extent that Kalista has is, simply put, stupid.

But what if a MELEE Champ was given this passive? Then it would be a REAL mind game, from all players involved.

The melee champ with Kalista's passive would need to be given a less reliable engage to compensate(if any), but once the fight begins, I think the ability could be balanced for fighting both melee and ranged champions.

It would be a game of trying to stay within melee range to stick to the target or disengage, and vice versa for the opponent. Melee range is as short as range gets, so the champion will always be at risk in order to make use of the passive.

The disengage with the passive would also be more reasonable than on Kalista because, again, the champion would have put himself at risk and possibly taken a few hits already just to use it.

tl;dr RIOT made a mistake in giving what could be a great mechanic for MELEE champions to a RANGED Champion instead, further aggravating the helplessness that some melee champs already have against ranged opponents.

64 Comments

flibitydoo22 votes

There are melee champions with kalista-esque mobility in the game: Riven Yasuo Kassadin Fizz Rengar

If you've been to forums before, you'll recognize most of these champions as some of the MOST HATED champions in the game.

The problem isn't "ranged champion with extreme mobility creep".

The problem is "extreme mobility creep".

chumbler9 votes

There are melee champions with kalista-esque mobility in the game: Riven Yasuo Kassadin Fizz Rengar

If you've been to forums before, you'll recognize most of these champions as some of the MOST HATED champions in the game.

The problem isn't "ranged champion with extreme mobility creep".

The problem is "extreme mobility creep".

And Riot is going to continue to do absolutely nothing about it, just like always.

manbearswine9 votes

And Riot is going to continue to do absolutely nothing about it, just like always.

Oh come on now,it's clear they are doing something,they are making the problem even worse.

I wish they would just do nothing...

ESeTyRC11 votes

There are melee champions with kalista-esque mobility in the game: Riven Yasuo Kassadin Fizz Rengar

If you've been to forums before, you'll recognize most of these champions as some of the MOST HATED champions in the game.

The problem isn't "ranged champion with extreme mobility creep".

The problem is "extreme mobility creep".

No, none of them are the same as what I've suggested whatsoever.

First off, I addressed only Kalista's passive, the fact that she moves only after she AUTO ATTACKS.

Meaning: A melee character with Kalista's passive would not be mobile on demand like all the champs you've listed above.

It could easily be balanced such that the passive mobility is the only movement tool the melee champ has, and as such, the champ would ONLY be mobile after initiating contact at melee range.

I have a sincere hate for easily mobile champions as it is. I wouldn't go through the trouble of suggesting one myself that wouldn't have some severe limitations.

Omnipherious15 votes

I'm a big melee fan and my favourite champion is Garen so I can totally understand where you are coming from with this.

However, I disagree with you; not on everything, but a majority.

  • Kalista's potential mobility is absurd but passive is not bad by design. Agreed
  • Passive should've gone to a melee. Disagree
  • Range gives +1 advantage, so they don't need another +1 from mobility. Disagree
  • Melee champ with this passive could mind game, have better risk/reward, etc. Disagree

a) Passive should have been given to a melee instead Two things; First of all, this isn't going to solve anything or make the situation any better; Second, we already have a melee champion that does this.

Why won't it solve anything?

  • The melee roster is practically saturated with gap-closers already (47 out of 68 melee champs, 69.1% - *MS streroids not included, form-shifters included).
  • This in turn has already led to the proliferation of slows (83 out of 121 champs have abilities slows, 68.6% - *For simplicity, we'll ignore the fact that some champs have more than 1 ability that slows).

Just looking at those stats makes me feel sick. In case any of you don't quite get why those stats are a big deal, I'll explain it briefly.

League didn't use to have a lot of gap-closers. As they became more common, the idea was "Oh okay, we'll add more slows to counter the mobility.". Here's the thing, slows don't really counter dashes; slows hard counter MS steroids. This is why picking a champion with without a dash or just an MS steroid feels much worse than it actually is.

So trust me, adding another melee with a gap-closer isn't going to solve jack shit. It will just keep the cycle going.

We have a melee champion that does this already?? Wha...?

Yasuo

Yasuo moves around more than any other melee. His Q is basically auto-attack that can't be cancelled just like Kalista. He can dash around a lot and even E>Q to deal damage while moving. Kalista is the ranged parity of Yasuo without the same mobility limitations. However, if we ignore the other potential problems with her kit, it is not her mobility that makes her OP, it is her Attack Speed.

Yasuo can't just dash as he pleases unless the circumstances are right. Even in a duel, he needs to maximize auto-attacks + Q to be effective. This is why it is okay for him to have a 0.658 base AS and end with 1.016 AS naturally. It is not okay for Kalista to start with a 0.648 base AS and end with 0.978 at 18. Her dash distance can already be improved twice by buying then upgrading boots. She does not need her innate potential mobility amplified by naturally high AS values, rather she should be forced to invest in it.

Azir is a great example of what I'm trying to get at. Azir's power is directly impacted by the amount of AS he has and since it is naturally gated (2nd worst base AS at 0.6 and 5th worst AS at 18 with a measly 0.753), he is forced to acquire it somehow to maximize effectiveness.

b) Range provides an innate advantage, so ranged champions shouldn't get mobility as icing on the cake

I would have agreed with this but sadly, 1) there are more Melee champs with gap-closing power than those without (even worse with MS steroids included) and 2) the sheer amount of slows make it alright for the occasional ranged champion to have mobility. The crucial part would be to keep a good balance of mobile and immobile ranged champions.

So let's do a stat comparison:

Shapeshifters included, Kalista excluded

  • 16 out of 56 ranged champs have gap-closers (28.6%), 8 of which are Marksmen
  • it becomes 34 of 56 with MS steroids included (60.7%) 17 of which are Marksmen

Shapeshifters and Kalista included

  • 17 out of 57 ranged champs have gap-closers (29.8%), 9 of which are Marksmen
  • it becomes 35 of 57 with MS steroids included (61.4%) 18 of which are Marksmen

Would you look at that, 50-53% of both categories are champions classified as Marksmen which means the rest are Mage/Supports; can't say Riot is unfair or playing favourites. Seems pretty balanced as far as ranged with gap-closers go. When we include MS steroids, we start seeing a much more familiar picture; just like Melee, there are more champions with mobility that without.

This is indeed a big no-no, but considering melee mobility distribution and the prominence of slows, it isn't nearly as big of an issue. There are way less gap-closing ranged than melee. Even with MS steroids included, ranged still lose by almost 10%.

All this hasn't even taken into account the crapton of CC melee champs bring and the increasing number of Tenacity-immune CCs (knock-up/knock-back/displacements).

c) Melee champion with this passive make plays, has better risk/reward

The passive isn't bad, even you admitted this. The problem lies with everything else that affects the passive.

Fact is, anybody (ranged or melee) with this passive would be able to make plays and mind game the opponent; anybody capable of dealing %HP damage will have balancing issues; anybody with sustain/burst/poke can dictate engages/disengages well.

There is risk/reward for both melee and ranged when auto-attacking and spending cooldowns. Sure, ranged has an edge but it is ridiculous to say that melee are helpless.

You can't just tunnel on this passive and think it's the most OP thing ever. There are several things at work here (attack animation, attack speed, missile speed, dash animation). There are ways to tune it. Even with her high base AS, Kalista doesn't just auto-kite; you need bloody good input that is both quick and precise. She isn't some no brain, right-click to win champ. She isn't immune to stuns or gap-closers. She is single target damage with shitty waveclear. Her ult relies on both her and her soulbound not being complete idiots.

She may seem like she has balance nightmare written all over her, but honestly what the fuck did you expect? This is a CertainlyT champion. It's supposed to be new and exciting first, balance later. So far it looks like mission accomplished for the new and exciting part, give it two weeks or so and we'll start seeing some devs chime in on balance once she's had some real playtime. It's also preseason right now so we all need to suck it up cause there are going to be things which are bloody OP.

Mid-late game Kalista can move left and right more than a fish out of water, yes, that's her thing. She'll probably see competitive play, maybe get nerfed then buffed again. Who knows?

Just try to not bandwagon on the passive being broken. It hasn't even been a week.

Sammystorm2 votes

I like your post and agree with it. However I would say the problem lies 2 fold for kalista specifically. 1st (which you mentioned) is her base atk speed. 2nd is her passive on her w. The % health damage on that is silly because it makes her a lane bully with any champion. It also basically forces her to soul bind her laning partner (otherwise she misses out on 2 skills) So she is a lane bully that scales well into late game. We have been seeing a lot of these lately and everyone has been nerfed. This is why she is a problem not her passive.

Omnipherious3 votes

The post was mainly to address OP's concern about the passive.

There are numerous ways to tweak her W besides a straight damage nerf.

  • The proc time could be reduced from 1.5s to either 0.8s or 1s. This raises the coordination requirement and makes laning less abusive since the reduced time doesn't allow the soulbound to attack a minion/other champion and still have time to proc it.
  • Another way is to increase the time between procs. Either a flat increase from 8s to 10s per proc or a scaling approach like 12/11/10/9/8s.
  • Alternatively, the passive component could be disabled if Kalista has no Sentinel charges.

As it is right now, I agree W probably needs slight tweaks since it provides some unnecessary power especially in the early game. That said, I don't think it's not too far off.

Sire Hippington2 votes

a) U got the causality wrong, the dashes didn't lead to slows, the slows did lead to dashes. Two of the most dominant champions in S1 were Ashe and Anivia, the two queens of slow. there also was alot slow on other champions, and rylais+frozen mallet were stronger back then.

This made it really hard for melees without gapcloser to compete vs ranged champions, so new melee champions were released with a gapcloser. This however made lif for carrys rather difficult, especially in not so coordinated teams(no peeling), so more cc was given to everything, especially knockups/displaces as they interupt dashes, and slow generally become more longranged so u can slow melees befor they get into gapclosing range. The overabundance of slow caused mobillity creep, not the other way around.

Yasous E is pretty different from kalistas passive, it only works once per Target and has (far)more range than his AAs

Kallistas passive on a melee would not be a gapcloser, it triggers after ur AA, so u need to be already in melee distance to use it. It's a sticking tool that helps to dodge/reposition on close range or to disengage. Also, since Kallista is a adc, she will naturally go for as, the basevalues got little impact on her moillity, unless u nerf it to a point there she will be rather useless as carry, and Azirs AS is so low as he gains up to 60% from cdr(+ he's a mage, which usually have a below average AS, while carrys have above average AS(atleast lvl 18))

It's also a huge balance difference to a ranged champion, as u will always be in range of all your enemy got when u use it, while kalistra can stay out of range by useing it. If u get out of a melees range, the passive will be useless for him, which is also true for kalistra, but it's so much easier to get out of a melees range than getting out of 550 range.

b) The main problem here is that riot trys to balance for the normal players aswell as for coordinated teams. For unccordinated players, Carrys lack peeling, so they need alot selfpeel in their kit to survive vs melees. For coordinated teams, peeling from the team is added ontop of the selfpeel from adc, so they need even more mobile melees to deal with it(or simply play all ranged combs, or ranged with just peeling tanks) A melee simply needs more mobillity(or ranged cc) than a ranged to overvome the initial rangedisadvantage, and if peeling gets added, melees need even more tools to have a chance vs ranged. Also, ur statistics forget about the fact that marksmen are a bit less than 1 third of the ranged champs, most of the rabged champions without gapcloser are mages or supports.

U also act like the prominence of slows and cc is actually helping melees and hurts ranged, while it actually is the total opposite, as melees have to get into the range off all the cc in order to do their job, while carrys can rather easily avoid it. Especially the increasing number of tenacity imune cc is a huge help for ranged vs melees, as it can interupt gapcloser, create huge distances and melees usually the once building tenacity. How often do u see a carry with 9/21 masteries or merctreads? How often does it happen that they have enough gold to sell boots for zephyr? And most displaces are targeted against melee rather than ranged, as they push enemys away rather than pulling them in.

c) Kallista already got a really slow animation and not that great misslespeed, but that only matters earlygame. And as said early, ther is no realy good tweaking for as on her, as any as low enough to balance that passive would utterly destroy her. Also, range is a very very huge advantage, and going into meleerange is a very huge risk compared to a ranged AA(and thus usually gets a bigger reward...till the adc got gear). Snce PBE exists, it is more than a week that people can test kallista, and the pbe consens also was that her passive is broken on a ranged champ. Is she a no brainer? Certainly(t) not, but is she broken in the hands of a good player? Hell Yes, unless u really get her counterpicked(which is something that fits into DotA, but is against the designphilosphy of riot, atleast from their own statement)

Omnipherious1 votes

Seems like we have a couple of misunderstandings here. Perhaps I should've worded my argument better but nevertheless I'll clear things up here.

a_1) Slows and Gap-closers

Some clarifications:

  • My definition of gap-closer isn't just limited to dashes. Anything that brings you to your opponent or vice-versa counts (e.g. Rocket Grab, Headbutt, Spinning Slash); MS steroids are separate since they are not an instant-close.
  • Any ability that slows counts, even mini-slows and abilities that have slows as after-effects (e.g. Rupture, Powerball)

Let's have a look at champion release history. 1) Xin Zhao - S1 Start Slows (28 out of 55, 50.9%), gap-closers (23 out of 55, 41.8%). Gap-closing melee (18 champs, 32.7%) and ranged (5 champs, 9.09%).

2) Vayne - S1 Finals Champion total increased by 21 (*12 ranged). Slows (45 out of 76, 59.2%), gap-closers (32 out of 76, 42.1%). Gap-closing melee (24 champs, 31.6%) and ranged (8 champs, 10.5%).

3) Volibear - S2 Start Champion total increased by 12. Slows (52 out of 88, 59.1%), gap-closers (39 out of 88, 44.3%). Gap-closing melee (30 champs, 34.1%) and ranged (9 champs, 10.2%).

4) Syndra - S2 Finals Champion total increased by 16. Slows (65 out of 104, 62.5%), gap-closers (48 out of 104, 46.2%). Gap-closing melee (38 champs, 36.5%) and ranged (11 champs, 10.6%).

5) Lucian (Patch 3.11) - S3 Finals (Champion releases slowed greatly, so jumping ahead) Champion total increased by 11. Slows (73 out of 115, 63.5%), gap-closers (58 out of 115, 50.4%). Gap-closing melee (44 champs, 38.3%) and ranged (15 champs, 13.0%).

6) Gnar - S4 Finals Champion total increased by 5. Slows (77 out of 120, 64.2%), gap-closers (61 out of 120, 50.8%). Gap-closing melee (47 champs, 39.2%) and ranged (16 champs, 13.3%).

7) Kalista + All reworks Champion total increased by 2. Slows (84 out of 122, 68.9%), gap-closers (62 out of 122, 50.8%). Gap-closing melee (47 champs, 39.2%) and ranged (17 champs, 13.9%). *Gnar and Quinn have gap-closers in both forms

Let's reflect. The Vayne era is the first instance where slows become prominent due to a large number of ranged releases. However, this is also accompanied by an increase in the number of gap-closing champions. While the % increase is minimal, the additions featured the likes of Irelia Renekton Maokai JarvanIV Nocturne LeeSin and of course Leblanc.

These champions changed the landscape of LoL. Less farmfests and wombo fishing, more ganks and skirmishes. It took almost a year for all of them to be released but only 6 months to double their ranks. By the start of S2, we now have Leona MonkeyKing Talon Riven Shyvana Fizz.

"Okay so we got a bunch of dashes, slows increased first." You don't get it. Slows became more common, yeah, but everyone was jumping on the gap-closing train. This was also at the height of meta-enforcement. If you weren't going to play an OP from competitive, you sure as hell weren't going to pick someone other than the solo queue god tier picks.

S2 finals roll around we already have Ahri Lulu Jayce Rengar Syndra. Look familiar? Champion releases finally slow down but things don't get better. Kits start getting complicated and power creep QQ is at an all-time high. We only get 11 champs in S3 but 10 of them have gap-closers, the only exception being Nami. By S3 finals we also got to see more soon to be familiar faces, our dear friends Khazix Elise Zed Thresh Lucian.

What's the point of the long story?

Slows were always a big part of League. Seriously, half the roster could do it at the start of S1. I say gap-closers led to more slows because it is plain to see from the timeline. So what if we got a bunch of mages in a row that ended up inflating the slow % by S1 finals? There were champions who could gap-close then slow or CC you and the number of them just kept increasing.

How do you beat someone that can get to you and slow? You need some slow of your own. That's why we see a steady increase in slow % in conjunction with gap-closers. With the latter being extremely effective, people needed more tools to deal with them.

It also doesn't bloody help when new or reworked champions get more slows and CC just because they need something. Does Sion Q really need a slow for the >1s channel? Do both Mega and Mini-Gnar Q need to slow?

a_2) Yasuo E compared to Kalista passive, ranged balance is a different ballgame

I wasn't comparing Yasuo E to Kalista's passive. I'm sorry if that's the idea you got. I was comparing their patterns since they are similar. Yasuo has a very mobile pattern because of kit, not just because of E;he wants to move for Flow; he wants to move to stay in Q range; his scaling smooths the build path, allowing him to AA less and rely on Q more. That's what makes him a mobile attacker. Kalista's passive allows her to accomplish similar task in a different way. Yasuo is movement focused to enable attacking, Kalista is the opposite.

I realize they are different and need to be balanced differently. My Azir example was supposed to be an example of working for the stat you want. I know what his passive does and that he gets AS for CD. Like Yasuo, his kit smooths his build path since he wants CDs as a mage and AS as an off-marksman. Kalista's only role is Marksman and she gets one of her most important stats (AS) mostly for free by levelling up.

She buys item 1001 item 3006 and automatically gets more value out of it than other Marksmen. She doesn't need naturally high AS to boot.

b_1) Balancing for normals, stats(?)

I get what you're saying but I'm not sure how it relates? If the wording was poor, let me clarify: I don't think ranged should be denied mobility because they are ranged. The stats are there to show that as far as ranged go, things don't seem unfair. It looks unfair when you start comparing to melee.

b_2) Slows + CC helping melee and hurting ranged

I'm sorry if that is the impression I gave you, that's not what I meant.

I realize slows being common hurts everybody and so does an increasing number of uncleanseable + tenacity-immune CC. Like I said, I'm a big melee fan so naturally I'm well aware of how much shit gets thrown on melee. These are points for separate discussion though.

c) Kalista

You and I will have to agree to disagree that the passive cannot be balanced with AS. I am very confident that AS is the best balancing approach since it directly affects both her offensive and defensive power. One look at her kit tells you she wants AS for orb-walking and for E stacking.

Taking down her AS values will probably hurt her early game a lot, but as you said, late game her movement is pretty broken. I don't see a problem with her being broken late game since she has only 1 free-to-cast damaging ability and 3 others that either require help or set-up.

Can't do anything about PBE now. No matter what PBE says, Kalista is not a pick-up and play type of champion. She isn't going to magically wreck every lane.

Sire Hippington1 votes

a) Looking at statistiks only can often lead to wrong conclusions as they often lack needed informations.

  • the number of slows was higher in the beginning and went up faster than the number of gapclosers->slow-creep existed befor mobillity creep and therefor most likely caused it.

  • The number of slows does not show how easy to apply nor how strong and with what uptime they were. Ashe has a 100% uptime on hers, and if she goes for cdr she can apply it at long range on huge aoe with 100% uptime Nunu got not only one of the strongest slows, but also 100% uptime, same for janna we also have nasus in the passic rooster, the strongest singletarget slow in the game. It's also important to see that all off those slows are point and click, no room for counterplay. most newer slows have a way higher downtime and are bund to skillshots or close combat.

  • the reason for the higher amounts off slow later on is partially tied to reworks, but also to overall more experience on the design team. Champions that have not a single form off cc, especially movementimpairing cc, are hard to balance. They tend to be incredible snowbally, as all they can offer is stats(dps/tankiness) and mobillity. on ad-carrys thats ok, as they are itemdependend anyway and are ment to be the prime damage dealers of their team, however for melees it leads to a massive feast or famin cenario(Yi, Fiora). Either they are ahead and kill u incredible fast, or they are behind and are useless, as they have not fallback options once their damage isn't high enough. Since slow is the weakest form of cc, it was handed out more frequently, otherwise we would have even more hard cc in the game, or more feast ot famin melees like yi. another thing is that melees with out gapcloserr need still a more or less reliable tool to reach ranged, and since targeted hard cc is a rather unhealthy thing, slows are the only thing left for them.

c) Kalista already losses many lanes, probably more than she wins. She got below average damage and below average tankiness with average range. In a ranged vs ranged matchup she usually looses unless her enemy relys on skillshots, as she can't get mutch profit from her passive here(unless she's snowballing) However, besides beeing generally on the weaker side, she rofl-stomps every melee she faces(besides maybe a few assasins) That passive on a ranged will automatically lead to that binary power, she will either be weakish in generall while stomping on melees, which already have a hard time in this game, or she will be nearly useless in generall while still being atleast incredible annoying for melees. Having a champion that is generally weak but incredible strong vs a certain group of champions is bad. It doesn't fit to Riots 'counterplay' philosophy, as it is hardcounter in champselect, which would fit perfectly well to dota, but not league(not saying dota is bad, but simply different from league with a different design philosophy)

Aspynn12 votes

A melee with kalista would've been like irelia on steroids. A no CD decently ranged jump that doesn't even take the place of a skill on a melee would be insane. Not to say I'm in favor of it being on a ranged champ any more buttttt.... I have yet to seen someone play kalista well. However, same went for gnar and azir for the first few weeks they came out. We'll have to see what happens with kalista.

SmokingPuffin1 votes

A melee with kalista would've been like irelia on steroids.

A melee with Kalista passive would be the easiest champion to juke in the world. She only gets to dash if she's in melee range, and her dash isn't cancelable and is about twice the length of melee range.

In real world play, melee Kalista would jump herself out of melee range over and over and generally suck pretty hard.

Aspynn1 votes

o_o

Damn, that would suck. XD I just imagined it as being sort of targeted, but it isn't at all, and it's not like its a dash to where you attack sooo... I figured it'd be someone who required a flash or some sort of escape to really get away from. I also think if it was on a melee, it'd be less easy to juke and just require a lot of thinking on the part of the player. But I do bet it'd be hard to not out-juke yourself.

Sire Hippington1 votes

range and distance of the step obviously need to be retuned for melees....

SmokingPuffin1 votes

range and distance of the step obviously need to be retuned for melees....

It doesn't matter how you tune the thing. That mechanic will be dramatically less powerful on a melee range champ, because you're going to have a hard time staying within melee range. For example, if you make the hops shorter so that you're less likely to overshoot or get juked, you're now less sticky against opposing counterplay.

A mechanic like Riven's is much more suited to making a high mobility melee champion than Kalista's. Kalista's passive is very much a ranged champion mechanic, in the same way that Yasuo's E is a melee champion mechanic.

Sire Hippington1 votes

ofcourse it would be less powerfull on a melee, thats the whole point off putting it on a melee instead of ranged, as it is incredible broken on a ranged in a melee vs ranged situation(even more than vayne)

Xtremey1 votes

A melee with kalista would've been like irelia on steroids. A no CD decently ranged jump that doesn't even take the place of a skill on a melee would be insane. Not to say I'm in favor of it being on a ranged champ any more buttttt.... I have yet to seen someone play kalista well. However, same went for gnar and azir for the first few weeks they came out. We'll have to see what happens with kalista.

what if it were a mobile tank to accompany rammus? barely any tanks have stickiness past an ability or two (which is peel-able).

ShakySurgeon10 votes

Pretty simple. Every Kalista I've fought against fails HARD against VarusVarus

  • He has both Hard and Soft CC, 25 Range over her, Slightly more armor and Health, along with 5 more run speed than her, More Mana and better Mana regen.

  • You have VERY slightly faster attack speed than her. Also she gets locked in place and cannot cancel auto-attacks. You can. Take advantage of that to poke/harass her and stack blight when you can.

  • If you stack Blight on her and proc. it with an ability, she's done for.

  • Only real issue is her dash to dodge his skill-shots. So if you can land them on her, she shouldn't be an issue at all.

  • When starting off, go with E then W then Q. Your E will allow you to kite her a bit easier and W to stack blight and pop it with either Q or E

  • If you wanna play more passively than aggressively, start with Q then W then E. Your ULT will absolutely take away any advantage she has over you mobility wise. Once she's rooted in place. It's GG for her.

HOPE THIS HELPS!

ESeTyRC2 votes

Pretty simple. Every Kalista I've fought against fails HARD against VarusVarus

  • He has both Hard and Soft CC, 25 Range over her, Slightly more armor and Health, along with 5 more run speed than her, More Mana and better Mana regen.

  • You have VERY slightly faster attack speed than her. Also she gets locked in place and cannot cancel auto-attacks. You can. Take advantage of that to poke/harass her and stack blight when you can.

  • If you stack Blight on her and proc. it with an ability, she's done for.

  • Only real issue is her dash to dodge his skill-shots. So if you can land them on her, she shouldn't be an issue at all.

  • When starting off, go with E then W then Q. Your E will allow you to kite her a bit easier and W to stack blight and pop it with either Q or E

  • If you wanna play more passively than aggressively, start with Q then W then E. Your ULT will absolutely take away any advantage she has over you mobility wise. Once she's rooted in place. It's GG for her.

HOPE THIS HELPS!

That's nice. Thanks for your input. I had no intention of addressing this as a problem from a ranged vs ranged perspective, however.

The kiting of melee by ranged carries is the issue at hand here.

Sammystorm2 votes

and is kind of a non problem for most champions. Is it a problem for champs like garen and sion? yes. Is it a problem for a whole host of other melees? No not really. The problem is that certain champions do not have a effective way to get to the target (Darius, garen) short of running at them. However many champions do (renekton, zed, yasuo, maokai, amumu, etc). So with or without Kalista melee champions will still be kited. So the question you need to ask your self. Is it worth it to change the melees that are having problems into something different that can compete more effectively? Or the other question, is it worth re-balancing the game in such a way that melee and range are equal?

The answer for me and I think a lot of other people is that I would rather keep champions how they are and that no it is not worth it to radically redefine the game.

TaoistMaster1 votes

Pretty simple. Every Kalista I've fought against fails HARD against VarusVarus

  • He has both Hard and Soft CC, 25 Range over her, Slightly more armor and Health, along with 5 more run speed than her, More Mana and better Mana regen.

  • You have VERY slightly faster attack speed than her. Also she gets locked in place and cannot cancel auto-attacks. You can. Take advantage of that to poke/harass her and stack blight when you can.

  • If you stack Blight on her and proc. it with an ability, she's done for.

  • Only real issue is her dash to dodge his skill-shots. So if you can land them on her, she shouldn't be an issue at all.

  • When starting off, go with E then W then Q. Your E will allow you to kite her a bit easier and W to stack blight and pop it with either Q or E

  • If you wanna play more passively than aggressively, start with Q then W then E. Your ULT will absolutely take away any advantage she has over you mobility wise. Once she's rooted in place. It's GG for her.

HOPE THIS HELPS!

YAY! Someone THINKING

DaCush7 votes

You and everyone else is overreacting. Her damage doesn't compare to other adcs. You cant just dodge around someone like kog, he will kill you first. Her strength is kiting which means your either on the run from getting damaged from something and dont have the advantage in damage or she's running away from you and already has some distance on you and you dont have a dash. How about we give it a bit to see how she does rather than freak out not even a day after she has been released.

Long Dong Wukong6 votes

Just a pathetic design and balance job, honestly.

I thought Gnar was a shit job, but fuck me they keep one upping themselves. You're telling me your game is plagued with anti-melee mobility power creep and you make a range champion that Lucian dashes every auto attack?

What are you even fucking doing?

Stephenizgod2 votes

Well Fiora does pretty well against Kalista even though she is melee, 2 gap closers and a damage negation plus her Ult. That passive would be broken on a melee champion so i think it fits well on a ranged champ. Personally i dont think Kalista should have been given a slow on her Rend, if you cant use her passive to chase/kite then that is your fault. The slow makes it really hard to chase when combined with her passive, meaning punishing her for making a bad dash is a lot harder. If you are going to abuse your mobility, you need to be punished harshly for making a bad move.

Sinlaire2 votes

I'm sorry, but i logged in just to comment on this to the point that i was prepared to REGISTER just to comment on this because i couldn't remember having already done so.

so here we go.

Did you, like, NOT read your own post before sending that out. You just said a Champion with (2) TWO gap closers, (1) ONE run speed and attack speed boost, and (1) ONE ULTIMATE that is completely irreverent when it comes to distance so long as the champ is a certain range away and therefor gives the champ (3) THREE, also written as A THIRD gap closer that allows her to catch and kill this super mobile ranged champion.

And here you are going, "well Fiora kills her so i dunno why you guys are complaining about melee champs." well thanks for sharing that enlightening piece of information. we now have (1) ONE melee champion out of all of the melee champions that we now know does ok against Kalista. Well done.

But i do agree. with you on another point. Her rend does indeed need to lose its slow or have her receive some other movement nerf, such as an inherent dash CD timer or a lower scaling dash.

Stephenizgod1 votes

Did you not read the original post?

He said and i quote "I read a RIOT post regarding melee champs like Udyrs being able to "fake out" Kalista a little while back... yeah. That's another way of saying that she'll never be caught unless she can't kite properly, having the option to disengage as she pleases for the most part."

So i was just saying, Fiora does not have a problem with her passive due to her 2 gap closers attack speed and movement speed steroid and then her ultimate. There is no need to fake her out because you can just go ham on her. It was just a simple statement, but hey thanks for being an asshole about it for now reason and then making yourself look stupid, pretty funny for me.

Daedalus8711 votes

While I agree that she shouldn't have been given a slow, I want to hear your reasoning why her passive would be broken on a melee, but okay for ranged.

Stephenizgod1 votes

If a melee person had her passive it would be impossible to kite them, slows wouldn't work since they wouldn't need to move. Not only is this dangerous for ranged champions, but other melee champs would be crushed. Its hard enough getting away from someone with a gap closer, imagine if they could close the gap after each time they hit you. Its the same as if you were both standing still.

Daedalus8711 votes

If a ranged person had her passive it would be impossible to catch to them, slows wouldn't work since they wouldn't need to move. Not only is this dangerous for ranged champions, but melee champs would be crushed. Its hard enough catching someone with a gap closer, imagine if they could close the gap after each time they hit you. Its the same as if you were both standing still.

Stephenizgod1 votes

Lol i see good point... Its not really that OP on Kalista though, if she didnt have the slow i would have no complaints. Obviously any champion without a gap closer is going to have a tough time against her, but any champion without CC is going to have a tough time against Katarina, any champion without % health damage is going to have a tough time against tanks.

Idk i think if a melee champion had it, since they have higher AD and scalings usually, it would have a lot more impact. Ranged champs have lower base AD and they tend to be much squisher, this is the trade-off for range. Melee champs have higher AD and scalings, but they can be kited easily.

I guess in my mind i see the mobility on the ranged doesnt really counter the downside of being ranged (we already have super mobile champs), whereas the mobility on a melee does counter the downside of being melee (imagine if Riven never stopped her Q's).

gubigubi2 votes

Would have been an interesting passive on Fiora You know with the whole fencing lunge in and out thing you do while fencing.

iamthegoatofwar1 votes

Rather than her passive make that her 2nd q activation.

gubigubi1 votes

I'd rather keep Q as a double dive button. Without 2 dive ins Fiora would just get kited for years.

iamthegoatofwar1 votes

Yha but her ult makes up for that imo.

gubigubi1 votes

dat 400 range op

Sire Hippington2 votes

100% agree, i already suggested that on PBE.

The mechanic it self is very engaging and fun, with a lot potential to master. However, on a ranged champion it is simply is massivly overpowered, as it prettymuch negates every hope of a melee to fight her, unless u got a very fast executed burstcombo, or point and click hard-cc on her AA range.

I truely belife that this mechanic would not only be balanced(or easier to balance), but also more fun and thematically fiting on a nimble melee(thinking of the eventual Fiora-rework).

Daedalus8712 votes

Again, the same arguments that can be made for ranged can be made for melee.

It appears that your main argument is that Kalista's kit balanced with having it in her kit. Well the same can be said about melees. Assuming the passive was the only gapcloser in the melee's kit, then they would still be vulnerable to kiting, right up until they got in range. Then because the melee did something right or the ranged did something wrong, the melee would be able to go to town. With it on a ranged champ though, the melee can't get to the ranged champ, because that's the nature of the melee/ranged relationship. I sort of see a melee champ with the passive playing like Udyr.

I do agree that the slow is completely unnecessary and makes Kalista go from a "Really?" to a "What the fuck were you thinking Riot". I believe that the overabundance of slows hurts immobile melees more than the overabundance of gapclosers.

PerishSoftly1 votes

Look up Shadow.Geminus from the Starcraft custom map Aeon of Storms and see what that might lead to.

ESeTyRC1 votes

Look up Shadow.Geminus from the Starcraft custom map Aeon of Storms and see what that might lead to.

Thank you. I'm familiar with it.

Now you can enter any game with a decent Kalista or look it up online to see what the current implementation has led to.

Kalista being allowed to dash after every RANGED auto and even after her Q is much worse in terms of gameplay imo. At least with the melee implementation every point and click in existence would be able to land.

Narasimha2 votes

You can enter any game with a decent Kalista

Any game with a decent Kalista

A decent Kalista

I'll do that right after I find Bigfoot.

DrCyanide1 votes

A melee champion with Kalista's passive would hate their life!

"Haha! I can attack now! Oh, wait, no, I just dashed out of my own attack range and they're running the other way, kiting me again..." over and over and over.

ESeTyRC3 votes

A melee champion with Kalista's passive would hate their life!

"Haha! I can attack now! Oh, wait, no, I just dashed out of my own attack range and they're running the other way, kiting me again..." over and over and over.

That's the idea!

Maybe you would hate it, but I personally would love it, even if I sucked with it.

I mean, there IS the option of not moving if they don't even attempt to escape, but should they try, with the passive, the melee champ has the opportunity to try and stick continuously for as long as he is successful, and the ranged champ has the option of juking them out for an advantage.

It would change the current scenario of the melee going "Haha! I can attack now! Oh, wait, no, Kalista just jumped back... and keeps jumping to the sides.. and there's no flipping thing I can do until my engage tool is available again." to..

Well, one where the melee at least has a chance of sticking to kiting adcs while generally bypassing the slows from red buff and the like once they make initial contact.

Emphasis on the "once they make initial contact" part.

Robot Beat Rally1 votes

[deleted]

Killer X 122 votes

She isn't tho. Her soulbound is part of her kit, its part of how she lanes. Percent health damage? up to 20 percent? An infinite stack Twitch E? A solid skill shot q that can also pass on rend stacks? Auto a cannon 3 times, q it pass stacks on to someone, support attacks them you attack again and continue to chase to tower. You'll have 8 stacks or so on them plus the percent health then you press E for an execute? One of her most fundamental and easily executed moves in lane. Also even if you only pass one stack on to them you'll win trade if you don't kill. ANd if for some reason your bad enough that you lose that trade, then you dash away and live.

iamthegoatofwar1 votes

Please bear in mind I'm so sick on and on several meds atm I had to read this several times to understand it I think. Basically kalista without her support might be kinda weak but if her support is close by she's a damn terror. Is that what I read?

Killer X 121 votes

It may also be how i worded it. I would say that early game without her support she is average (not weak). With her support early game she is very strong. Late game she is very strong with and without her support.

Knight Devout1 votes

So you want them to be ranged? Ok.

warpenguin5551 votes

just cant 1v1 her, which is a bad idea to try with any adc

Valaran Nara1 votes

That moment when I both won and lost with Kalista That moment when I heard people say she's awful, when I find myself kiting the enemy forever and never get caught. That moment when I heard people say she's OP even though I experienced getting crushed and deleted by junglers. That moment when she just been released, the most vocal cry OP, and people are just now learning how to play with and against her,

And then that moment Kalista gets buffs next patch...

Because she has a 37.5% win rate.

Kalista

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