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Can Elise Fulfill Her Fantasy Better?

Varnoc··3 votes·1,682 views

[EDIT:] I completely missed the implied meaning of the title. XD

I think so.

The problem lies in her current kit. Because she's designed as a generalist, much like Lee Sin, Vi, or Jarvan IV, if she's ever strong numerically, she crowds out the competition, reducing the pool of viable jungle candidates.

Currently, shes got the following:

  • Minions that can tank damage in the jungle for her, so she comes out relatively healthy for ganks
  • Ranged % current HP targeted Poke
  • Ranged AOE poke that follows you and gives Elise Vision
  • Ranged Stun/Reveal
  • Short gap closer + % missing hp execute
  • Attack speed increase + heal
  • Invulnerability + long range gap closer/situational escape.

The only thing she's missing, currently, is the ability to soak enough damage to get more than one rotation of her spells off. While these builds are effective, they feel (to me at least) very crappy to be pigeonholed into.

The following kit is what I think would put Elise into a healthy spot, in it, I've removed the following:

  • Ranged current % hp targeted poke
  • % missing hp execute
  • Invulnerabilty

To free up space in her kit's power budget to make her both easier to balance, and more fun to play as/against. Any thoughts and suggestions are more than welcome, as I have nobody to speak with about this subject in person, I rely on replies to fine tune the ideas proposed here. I am happy to answer any questions you've got in the comments below.

P - Queen's Gambit -

~ (Human) PASSIVE: Elise generates a spiderling when she hits an enemy with a spell in Human Form.

  • Up to 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 Spiderlings can be stored at once.

~ (Spider) PASSIVE Enemies hit by Elise's spells while She's in Spider Form are afflicted by Neurotoxin. Her spells that land while in human form consume any stacks of Neurotoxin on enemies to amplify their effects.

  • Neurotoxin reduces the vision radius of the afflicted target by 50 distance. (All Champions can see 1200 distance [100 distance is roughly equal to a Teemo] in any direction if not inhibited by brush or terrain. Each stack reduces that number by 50)
  • Neurotoxin stacks up to 5 times. (1200 - (50*5) = 950 sight radius)
  • Neurotoxin lasts 6 seconds.

This now lays the groundwork for Elise's kit. It is intended to encourage frequent form swapping using her Ultimate to get the most out of her skills. Numbers are rough, and scale with Ultimate Rank.

Q - Necrosis (Human) / Venomous Bite (Spider)

~ (Human) ACTIVE: Elise ejects a stream of caustic venom in the targeted direction, dealing magic damage to the target.

  • Because of the volatile nature of the venom ejected, it causes any stacks of Neurotoxin within the target to burn, dealing 2 / 2.35 / 2.70 / 3% of the target's missing health as additional magic damage. (Scales with Ultimate)

~ ACTIVE: (Spider) Elise and her active Spiderlings lunge towards the target, Dealing magic damage to the target, with additional damage based on the 5% of the target's current health

  • Deals 20% additional magic damage for each Spiderling that reaches the target.
  • Up to 120% bonus damage. (5 spiderlings + Volatile Spiderling)
  • 11% of the target's current hp as magic damage max, base damage scales, %hp damage does not.
  • Applies Neurotoxin Twice.

With the recent complaints of over complicating simple abilities, namely by turning targeted abilities into skill-shots, I argue that a skill-shot feels better for both the player and the opponent, because there is no set in stone outcome. With targeted abilities, if you get within a certain distance (ANNIE) you are struck by the spell, you have no say, and it feels crappy.

With her Human Q, Necrosis, dealing % of missing HP damage based on Neurotoxin stacks, it would make a good finishing move should enemies get away from her, but also allow enemies to bait the skill and dodge it, allowing greater ability to outplay Elise.

Spider Q deals significantly less % current hp damage if she has less Spiderlings active, naturally increasing the potential damage of the skill over the course of the game, gating her with levels in this way. Elise's summoned Spiderling, Volatile Spiderling, counts towards the bonus damage of Venomous Bite. This ability is your primary offensive ability in duels, as it allows you to quickly stack Neurotoxin on the target.

W - Volatile Spiderling (Human) / Skittering Frenzy (Spider)

~ (Human) ACTIVE: Elise sends a venom gorged spiderling for 3 seconds, moving towards the targeted location. The Spiderling explodes on contact with an enemy unit, dealing magic damage to nearby enemies.

  • Enemies afflicted by Neurotoxin and struck by the blast detonate themselves 3 seconds later, 25% of the total magic damage received by this ability per stack of Neurotoxin
  • Up to 125% of the initial damage can be dealt to the target and surrounding enemies again with 5 stacks of Neurotoxin.

~ (Spider) PASSIVE: Every 10/9/8/7/6 basic attacks and spell casts while in Spider Form applies an additional stack of Neurotoxin to the victim of the attack.

  • While this ability is on cooldown, this bonus is disabled.

~ (Spider) ACTIVE: Elise and her Spiderlings gain bonus movement speed for a short time. If they are moving towards a target marked by Cocoon or Orb Weaver, the movement speed bonus is doubled.

  • Elise and her spiderlings gain twice their movement speed bonus as attack speed.

This ability has not changed much in either form. Human E can now transform enemies into living bombs with Neurotoxin, adding a little more strategic play to her kit.

Spider E, Skittering Frenzy, is intended to allow Elise to bear down upon ensnared enemies. Using Skittering Frenzy has a drawback however, disabling the passive bonus of applying Neurotoxin with every few attacks while on cooldown. If Elise wants to apply Neurotoxin more frequently during fights, she can now level that up specifically.

E - Cocoon (Human) / Orb Weaver (Spider)

~ (Human) ACTIVE: Elise lobs a ball of webs in the targeted direction, immobilizing and revealing the first enemy it comes into contact with for 1 second.

  • Enemies afflicted by Neurotoxin are stunned for an additional 0.2 seconds for each stack afflicting the target.
  • Enemies are first stunned, then immobilized. (Up to 2 seconds of CC total)

~ (Spider) ACTIVE: Elise Expends an active Spiderling to create a strand of spider silk starting at the targeted location and moving a fixed distance in any direction from that targeted location.

  • Webs that come within 75 distance of one another become connected, allowing Elise to form a large chain of webs
  • Webs are invisible to enemies until they come within 400 distance of them. Webs are revealed by True Sight.
  • Enemies that pass through webs break them, becoming briefly slowed for 0.5 seconds and afflicted by one stack of Neurotoxin. Enemies cannot be slowed by webs more than once every 4 seconds, but Neurotoxin is still applied for each web broken. Dashes that encounter a webs are stopped.
  • Breaking a web grants 5 gold.
  • When a web is broken, Elise is alerted to the disturbance by a White Ping on the minimap if she is within 750 distance of a web connected to the one that was broken.
  • If Elise is comes within 1250 distance of the broken web within 4 seconds of it's destruction, she can interact with her webs to crawl across them to the web ending closest to the broken strand.

Human E now immobilizes out of the gate, but can stun enemies you've been fighting in extended bouts, keeping them in place longer.

This skill easily has the most significant of changes. Spider E is completely new, and may take a second to process. The basic gist of the spell is that Elise expends her spiderlings to create a web. Enemies that run through the web are slowed and afflicted by Neurotoxin. The spell has very high utility because it stops dashes. If an enemy touches the web, Elise can 'sense' the disturbance, signified by a personal ping on the minimap, and can crawl to the Tangled victim if she is close enough by traveling over interconnecting webs.

R - Metamorphosis (Human/Spider)

~ TOGGLE: Elise Transforms into a menacing Spider, losing 425 basic attack range and gaining access to her arachnid abilities. While she remains in this form, she deals bonus magic damage with basic attacks and Elise gains 5 / 10 / 15 / 20 bonus movement speed.

Straightforward, same ultimate with a different name.

Let me know what you think!

17 Comments

Nin10do00144 votes

Title: BOW CHICKA BOW WOW!!

Yandere Carry3 votes

I have a couple of fantasies Elise could fulfill for me. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Martyrofsand2 votes

I think it is going more in the right direction, and I really like the E change in spider form. My thing is to me Elise has never really been much of a spider. Sure she uses some webs and has some spiderlings to do her bidding but if you look at her lore and think about how spiders function in nature they are not going to just run up to someone and beat their face in. They bide their time, waiting setting up webs to trap their prey and kill them. Elise's lore is similar in how she tricks people and feeds them to the spider god or whatever on the shadow ilses.

I would like to see her more focused on her webs and trap setting as oppose to spiderlings and venom while her webs are relegated to the realm of gimmik escapes and a stun.

Varnoc1 votes

Black Widows, in nature, tend to set up their webs and wait for prey, inject their venom, and then back off and watch them die.

I did my best to keep Elise's current kit intact while adding these elements to her kit, and I'm glad you like the E change.

In your opinion, does the above E change in spider form get what you're going for? Or is there something about it you would change and improve?

Martyrofsand2 votes

I like the direction it is going, as it gives her an element of "you entered my web and now I kill you" but the way they are set up strike more as being very similar to Rek'Sai tunnels except she can use them to jump to people.

I like the idea of her being able to line the jungle with webs and being able to respond to them, but I'm not sure I like the implementation that you presented. It feels more like trip wires, or Rek'sai tunnels, as oppose to actual webs. Sadly though I'm not really sure how to implement this idea while making sure it creates a unique feeling for Elise.

Either way the concept is solid and helps create both the sense of being the spider that caught her prey for Elise, as well as that fear of being caught in a spiderweb as the spider makes its way to you.

Linna Excel2 votes

I'm pretty sure Elise's fantasy is BDSM (spider latex outfit) going into a full on a vore fetish (the spider)... not sure she can to do anything more and keep the game pg-13.

Or are we not talking about those kinds of fantasies?

While she has a spider theme (more of a hunting spider than a nest builder) I'm not sure what her gameplay fantasy really is. Her kit kind of wants her to be an AP assassin/bruiser however she is built as more of a tank. Her spiderlings also seem like a wasted mechanic.

Varnoc1 votes

I agree on the spiderlings being a rather wasted design mechanic as far as her overall kit goes. Thematically it does not make much sense, as spiders normally live alone. I did not remove them however, because they served as fuel for the new spider E, and they are iconic to Elise, so removing it would be blasphemous

CatSith2 votes

Wouldn't prefer these changes because it changes what I personally love about elise's kit. Her double health Damage Qs and her rappel is what makes her stand out from other champions. Sure its hard to balance her Q damage without making it too powerful, but they are in a good spot atm. she just needs work on the rest of her kit to bring her back without making her obnoxious like in her release state.

Varnoc1 votes

What would you suggest for improving the rest of her kit as an alternative to the changes to Q and Rappel? I couldn't come up with much to improve those skills, and Rappel and Q's were the problematic spells I encountered.

I could add %current hp damage to Spider Q, achieving the duality of HP damage you prefer and identify Elise with.

On the subject of Rappel: When it comes to improving the delivery of the theme of the Spider Queen, I would prefer the above to what we have currently, however that is a personal preference, and we are both entitled to that.

I appreciate your insight, as always CatSith

B3ER2 votes

I love your layout, makes it an easy read. Also completely in love with the new spider E.

My points of criticism would be the complexity of the marking systems and the plethora of CC that Elise would have with this kit. Stun from passive, stun from E followed by a root, slow from webs and a vision blocker (which on its own is more powerful than the others combined). She would have to be re-balanced into having almost no damage.

You have 2 marking systems (Neurotoxin and Tangled) Neurotoxin seems quite complex as it can be applied by every skill, while interacting with 2 skills on combo based multipliers. On top of that, there is the Tangled mark which doesn't really add anything special. Having Orb Weaver alone is enough. Essentially, what I'm trying to say is that the Tangled mark doesn't add any depth for the added complexity.

Finally, I counted 4 passives. That might be a bit overloaded.

Varnoc1 votes

Thanks for the insights, let me see if I can clarify anything:

...Stun from passive...

The stun is intended to reward achieving 5 stacks of Neurotoxin on a target. From a realistic standpoint, a Neurotoxin would immobilize the victim, making them unable to move or preform any kind of action. A stun would fit the bill here, certainly, but i was hesitant to apply it because of cocoon's existing cc attributes.

I can't think of anything else I could put here, damage would be out of place and problematic to balance, even with rough numbers it's a headache. I tried a silence at one point, but it didn't make sense. Perhaps a root+basic attack blocker? The victim can still cast spells, just not ones that move the victim. I'm rather at a loss with this. It feels like you should be rewarded for hitting that 5 stacks of Neurotoxin, but it's already heavily rewarded with her abilities. I may just remove the 5 stack trigger entirely. Thoughts?

...stun from E followed by a root...

Not much of an issue with this or any skill in particular, as her main source of crowd control, but when combined with other cc abilities, it becomes too much, so I will pass this one by.

...slow from webs and a vision blocker...

The slow is intended to be very brief, only half a second or less, enough to let the target know "Hey stupid! You ran into a web, be careful!".

The vision blocker however, does not 'block' vision at all. It only reduces the range at which that specific target can see units. It does not block out allied vision like Nocturne's Ultimate, or Grave's Smokescreen. I can't think of any abilities currently in the game that reduce vision in this way, so I can't attest to the strength of the effect in any way. If you happened to misread this, let me know so i can reword it to be more clear to avoid confusion in the future!

The overall complexity, I agree, needs to be toned down. In your opinion, would you like to keep the aspect of Orb Weaver where Elise can crawl over webs to her target, or simply have the mechanic of drawing webs on the map?

To me, the ability to traverse over drawn and connected webs is central to the appeal of the skill, but I may be mistaken in that regard. I'll work on an updated version of the kit as I await your response.

[EDIT:] I've found a way to get rid of Tangled altogether.

Elise may interact with her webs for 4 seconds after a strand is broken, causing her to travel over webs to the location of the broken web. Elise always crawls to the most recent web destruction in the area within 1000 distance.

Thoughts on the idea?

B3ER1 votes

Darius has his bleed passive that doesn't exactly reward him for getting to max bleed stacks other than for the Ult damage amp. If I remember correctly, Riot didn't like the lack of reward there. Either way, Darius' design has him getting only the damage amp. While I don't necessarily think you have to follow the same design, I think it would be better to shave off a lot of the power and interactions you've got going here. You have a lot of cool ideas, but they can't all be on the same champion without having each of them feel underwhelming for balance purposes.

When it comes to the vision range reduction, I'm still not entirely sure how you intend this to work. Nocturne's paranoia keeps your vision range the same while denying you allied vision. Smokescreen restricts your vision to the cloud. The only ability that I know that truly reduces a champion's vision is Rek'Sai's Burrow. Would your idea be a lesser potent version of that?

Orb Weaver web drawing, alarm and travel should stay exactly as they are. They're perfect. My criticism was that I don't see why a Tangled marking system should exist to make it work. Without the mark, the skill can still work perfectly.

Varnoc1 votes

Alrighty, I've removed the CC from Neurotoxin at maximum stacks, removed Tangled and it's effects on both Human and Spider E, and added more concise wording for a few things.

The vision range reduction is intended to work as follows:

  • All Champions have 1200 distance vision radius in any direction (100 distance is roughly equal to one Teemo) unless impaired by brush or walls.
  • Each stack of Neurotoxin reduces the distance a champion can see in any direction by 50. This effect stacks up to 5 times, so the least a target can see in any direction while afflicted by the maximum stack of Neurotoxin is 950 distance.

Neurotoxin is basically a less potent version of Rek'Sai's self imposed vision reduction, as you stated. You can still see what allied champions, minions, wards, and structures can see on the map, which may give it more room to reduce vision, giving her an edge over isolated opponents, but I'd like to keep the numbers low to get the point across.

B3ER1 votes

OK, that's pretty clear now. What I've noticed is that it's really difficult to actually get to 5 neuro stacks. I might be missing something, but I can see the webs, the autos and the bite as neuro sources. What is your vision on the play pattern that gets you to 5 stacks? Two bites and lots of auto's during a gank?

Can you prime your auto counter? How long does that counter last?

Varnoc1 votes

I haven't decided if you can prime the counter or not yet. If you do prime it, your combo would look something like this for a planned attack

  • Open with Venomous Bite (Spider Q) -> 3 Neurotoxin Stacks (1 from W passive, and 2 from Venomous Bite)
  • Use Orb Weaver to draw Webs behind the enemy to funnel them into areas you want them to go.
  • Chase enemies into webs if possible, attack and orb walk with your target while you wait for Venomous Bite to cool down, as it will have a decently low cooldown (5 seconds?).
  • Swap to human form and smack him with an enhanced ability, either Q if they're low, or E if they're dangerous or need to be CC'd while allies catch up, and W for AoE damage in a teamfight.

Reaching 5 stacks of Neurotoxin isn't something that will happen very often against players because it takes time. Leveling up W second, or even first, to make this faster may be a valid decision if you're dueling early and often. On average, you'll probably have 2-4 stacks of Neurotoxin on the target before you swap forms to hit them with Human abilities.

Come to think about it, the ability to prime your counter like that could add another layer of depth to her, differentiating good and great Elise players when it comes to ganks. Elise is all about setting up before descending on her target with this kit, and I think that would fit well.

Venowolf1 votes

Her E Spider makes us feel as if we are playing like a spider

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