Tank Items- Move Away From Balls of Defensive Stats/More Towards Damage Magnet Items

Meep Man··5 votes·1,065 views

What the heck do I mean by damage magnet items? While this example is a little OP, look no further than the Black Market Brawler item: Marty's Gambit.

Martyr's Gambit item 3801 + item 3067 + 400 Gold = 1850 Gold Cooldown reduction: +10% Health: +400 Health regen: +100% Active UNIQUE: Binds yourself to the target allied champion for the next 3 seconds, redirecting 60% of all damage dealt to them to yourself. 30 second cooldown.

THIS is what a Tank item should look like! Why? Because it's not just a ball of defensive stats that could potentially be abused by damage dealers because most of it's worth is in the Active that MAKES YOU TAKE MORE DAMAGE! A Tank's role is to direct damage away from their team and, while this example as I said may be a little OP, IT IS THE PERFECT EXAMPLE OF WHAT A TANK ITEM SHOULD BE! Huge shields for their team is what a Tank is! Not CC Batteries, although that can help. Not Fighters that are good at initiating. A Tank is a shield, and this is exactly what a Tank item should be. When the Tank Class Rework rolls around, please remember this thread and remember that Tank items shouldn't be about providing big balls of Tank stats to make some unkillable beast. Tank items are about assisting Tanks in doing their job and that is making damage go from their team to themselves. Besides, balls of stats are so easily countered these days.

12 Comments

Woodakoodashooda5 votes

item 3401 shields allies, heals allies, generates gold for you and allies item 3190 MR aura, shields allies. item 3222 increases the power of your shields and heals and removes debuffs from allies. item 3110 Debuffs enemies item 3143 Debuffs enemies item 3050 Buffs you AND an ally

Rip Rengo 20161 votes

agreed^ and speaking of "shielding your allies" xD Braum

Big Lincoln4 votes

but then it'd be a must-buy every game because you'd get flamed by your carry for not eating all the damage for them

how about we stop making tanks glorified damage sponges and just let them actually be tanky?

a tank's role is to force attention to them, not "oh you got past my carry but I'm gonna soak up all the damage for them anyway."

Critmaster Garen3 votes

awesome. lets give adc 60% damage reduction, and make everything but tank/marksmen teamcomps entirely useless.

have you ever thought this through? this would completely invalidate burst damage against squishy targets.

worst case scenario, tanks will just bind each other.

Meep Man1 votes

I tried to note many times that the example shown was OP and merely shown as an example

Critmaster Garen1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Inept Maverick,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=xnUXZAEs,comment-id=00030000,timestamp=2016-10-18T13:56:45.937+0000)

I tried to note many times that the example shown was OP and merely shown as an example

well, its a terrible example.

you should have mentioned items like item 3110 item 3190 instead. these items helps a tank to absorb damage for his team, or reduce damage towards his team without being entirely busted.

LankPants2 votes

If all tank items were more like this it would butcher offensive tanks and bruisers. Because this is not true for them

A Tank's role is to direct damage away from their team

There are tanks and tank like champs who build durability not to help their allies, but to survive longer under focus. This is any tank who you'd refer to as a dive tank, Sejuani, Amumu, Malphite, Zac, Skarner, any Juggernaut or any Bruiser. These champs need stat heavy tank items because, with the exception of Malphite they are selfish champions. I know it's weird to think that a tank can be a selfish champion but some are, there's a subset of Vanguards who have no team utility outside of CC. These champs don't actually want to take damage more than they have to. Their durability is a means to allow them to survive longer and output more damage. If that sounds like a bruiser it's because they are champions who straddle the line between an AP bruiser and tank.

You completely completely missed the nuance of the existence of different types of tanks. You can't serve them all with a single type of item design. The item design you suggest is fine for support tanks, but other tanks often need more stats to function, especially the tanks I listed before. You can't remove stat heavy tank items because some tanks are stat heavy.

Meep Man1 votes

There still should be defensive offensive options AKA balls of stats. See Randuin's Omen, Deadman's Plate, Spirit Visage, etc.. I'm saying we need more damage magnet items rather than balls of stats because currently Tanks and Bruisers share the same item pool.

LankPants2 votes

I'm saying we need more damage magnet items rather than balls of stats because currently Tanks and Bruisers share the same item pool.

Offensive Tanks and Bruisers will pretty much always share the same pool of items. There's nothing you can really do about it. The thing is, Sejuani or Amumu and Shyvana and Hecarim (for example) have the exact same goal in teamfights. I've mentioned this before, but these champs actually play more like each other than other traditional Tanks and Bruisers, so yes, they're going to want the same thing.

When the Tank Class Rework rolls around, please remember this thread and remember that Tank items shouldn't be about providing big balls of Tank stats to make some unkillable beast.

To be honest this was the main part of your post that seems wrong to me. I probably should have quoted it somewhere in the original text, so my bad on that one I guess. This is in direct opposition to what you're saying in your reply to me. Throughout your entire post you basically say that tank items are better as more utility orientated items and really seem to miss what stats actually achieve.

Tank Items- Move Away From Balls of Defensive Stats/More Towards Damage Magnet Items

That is also your title, so yes, I feel like my comments here were fine and applicable.

Erockandroll1 votes

The problem with that is, Riot is breaking the Tank class into "Vanguards" and "Wardens" in order to give greater clarity on the diverse Champion set.

But your suggestion only really Helps wardens, with soaking damage made for your teammates. (champs like Braum and Taric) Vanguards in contrast are going to be you primary initiators in a team fight. (Combining mobility and lockdown. Champions like Maokai, Malphite, Sion)

Now, what does Vanguards need from itemization? (Aside from the ball of stat defenses) Well, they want MS to help them start their engage, that's pretty well taken care of with items like Dead man's plate, and Righteous Glory. But they also are going to want a good amount of CDR, to allow them more up time on their Disabling abilities. (Frozen Heart is good for this purpose, though I with their were more options) But out side of that, Vanguards don't need a ton of utility. Their itemization is already their.

But we can't afford to condemn the Tank role as an HP battery that takes damage for others. The warden class is going to be a predominantly support role, as their features will be most useful in the duo lane) It would be even more problematic since Warmorgs exists, (they didn't like it on HP Raka, why would they enable another HP battery, who would actually scale better with it?)

ZT Xperimentor1 votes

Neat idea, but they'll need more stats to be worth while for some tanks; it's why most tank supports don't rush the sightstone component of their equinox eye, the sightstone offers too little health to be worth the gold investment more often than not. A mere 400 hp isn't remotely enough to be worth buying when an enemy marksmen can hit for ~150 damage, assuming said item is rushed after sightstone. This item would've been much better a couple years ago, before all the damage creep too.

Ralanr1 votes

This would actually be abusable for juggernauts since they can take this and effectively "tank" for their team while providing a decent damage output.

Why play a tank if a juggernaut can not only protect the carries almost as well but even do more damage? I wouldn't want to see Darius using this and have him and Draven be unable to die.

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