Shen mains and fans! What exactly is Shen's theme?

Remlap1223·May 3, 2015·1 votes·767 views

So, as we are all aware, Shen is in a pretty rough spot. He's also got quite a bit of an identity crisis. He's a ninja, but a tank. The only thing really ninja-y about his kit is his ultimate. Outside of that he's this regen heavy sustain tank that gets zero benefit from building tank from his abilities. Now, I may have come up with a solution for this problem, but it involves taking away the tank aspect in favor of burst damage and taking carries out of the fight with hard CC. His kit is going to be more or less the same with some caveats, but one of those caveats is that being a damage sponge is being taken out. If a rework does come around, what parts of his kit stays as central to his theme, and what parts conflicts with the theme?

9 Comments

Trash MammaIMay 3, 20152 votes

If light travels so fast..how come it's never caught a ninja? You're already dead..you just haven't caught up yet.

These lines would better fit a speedster like Kennen than Shen

SEKAIMay 3, 20152 votes

{quoted}

If light travels so fast..how come it's never caught a ninja? You're already dead..you just haven't caught up yet.

These lines would better fit a speedster like Kennen than Shen

Shen can travel to anywhere on the map within 3 seconds as long as there is an ally there. I don't think there is anyone faster than him when he is using ulti on max range.

5000000000000000May 3, 20152 votes

TwistedFate U wot m8

Trash MammaIMay 3, 20151 votes

Well, I meant thematically :p nothing about him says "i'm fast" yet 2 of his quotes would imply he's crazy fast

SEKAIMay 3, 20152 votes

First of all, he isn't a tank, but a dueling bruiser.

Secondly, who says all ninjas have to be like Zed? Do all scientist themed characters need to look like Heim instead of Ziggs, Jayce, Viktor or Mundo? Same thing.

He benefits from building tank, both his passive and Q scale with HP.

If reworks are gonna come around, he should stay as a dueling bruiser with global presence that has at least a taunt somewhere in his kit.

AtheosisXMay 3, 20152 votes

{quoted}

First of all, he isn't a tank, but a dueling bruiser.

Secondly, who says all ninjas have to be like Zed? Do all scientist themed characters need to look like Heim instead of Ziggs, Jayce, Viktor or Mundo? Same thing.

He benefits from building tank, both his passive and Q scale with HP.

If reworks are gonna come around, he should stay as a dueling bruiser with global presence.

They don't all have to be like Zed, but they should probably be assassins since that's what a ninja is. Shen plays more like a street fighter or something. He definitely does not feel like a ninja. I'm definitely in the crowd who thinks he should be reworked into a proper ninja while keeping some of his defining traits like his ult.

SEKAIMay 3, 20152 votes

{quoted}

They don't all have to be like Zed, but they should probably be assassins since that's what a ninja is. Shen plays more like a street fighter or something. He definitely does not feel like a ninja.

Ninjas were mercenaries who were trained to all be jack of all trades, although primarily used to deal with shady businesses samurais didn't bother to dirty their hands with, it doesn't automatically mean they can't fight face to face.

Since assassinating VIPs in a lot of times, also means dealing with body guards or genuine guards all at the same time, all ninjas were trained to both sneak pass or simply fight head on in such an occasion. Such is why they each trained under many martial art types and used self devised tools for either stealth and direct combat.

Theme wise in LoL, the original 3 ninjas stand united as 1. Akali stands for the agility and assassination aspect of ninjas in public knowledge. Kennen stands for the idea of supernatural ninjutsu that is invented more recently in medias. Shen on the other hand, stands for their tradition and code of honour ninjas used to follow back in the days hence also to why he is geared for more combat centric theme instead of focusing on speed and damage.

But whatever the case, this is a game set in a fictional plain, who cares if we have a tank ninja or not? Do all martial arts (or hell aliens) fly and teleport around the universe while shooting OP energy blasts like in Dragon Ball Z? Do all pirates live like adventures of the seas in One Piece? Do all vampires across other literatures share the same properties with the ones depicted in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure?

Do all ninjas have to be using such generic focus of speed and assassination that frankly is just as overused as katanas in Japanese animes?

Artistic freedom, tank ninja isn't wrong.

NamelessKilljoyMay 3, 20151 votes

Shen's theme is regarless of your laning opponent just get health and armor/mr and then regen duel them too death :D

LifeCyclesTWAMay 3, 20151 votes

If they rework Shen, I feel as though there are 4 themes that must be in Shen's kit:

The Ki-strike, his whole kit synergizes around it... The dash-taunt, this in addition to.. His ultimate are iconic to Shen. Also, the Q that restores his health.

His kit is also weird in that he should be built tanky AP, similar to a bruiser, due to all of his AP ratios and whatnot, but all people do nowadays is go full tank. You benefit much more from that and there should be more of an incentive to build AP while also maintaining his tankiness. Similar to Singed.

How I would fix his kit?

His current kit:

Ki Strike STATIC COOLDOWN: 9 Ki Strike Shen's next basic attack deals bonus magic damage equal to「 4 + (4 × Shen's level) 」(+ 10% of bonus health) and restores 10 / 20 / 30 Energy. Every basic attack reduces the cooldown by 1 second, up to 2 seconds while Feint.png Feint holds.

[show] Ability Details

Vorpal Blade RANGE: 475 COST: 60 ENERGY COOLDOWN: 6 / 5.5 / 5 / 4.5 / 4 Vorpal Blade ACTIVE: Shen throws a blade at the target enemy, dealing magic damage and marking them for 5 seconds. Shen and allied champions that damage a marked enemy will heal over 3 seconds, with the duration refreshing upon subsequent damage. MAGIC DAMAGE: 60 / 100 / 140 / 180 / 220 (+ 60% AP) HEAL: 6 / 10 / 14 / 18 / 22 (+ 1.5% Shen's maximum health) If Vorpal Blade kills the target, Shen heals for 33% of the normal amount instantly. INSTANT HEAL: 2 / 3 / 5 / 6 / 7 (+ 0.5% Shen's maximum health)

[show] Ability Details

Feint COST: 50 ENERGY COOLDOWN: 9 / 8 / 7 / 6 / 5 Feint ACTIVE: Shen gains a shield that lasts up to 3 seconds. While it persists, his basic attacks reduce the cooldown of Ki Strike.png Ki Strike by an additional 1 second (2 seconds total). SHIELD: 60 / 100 / 140 / 180 / 220 (+ 60% AP)

[show] Ability Details

Shadow Dash RANGE: 600 COST: 100 ENERGY COOLDOWN: 16 / 14 / 12 / 10 / 8 Shadow Dash ACTIVE: Shen dashes in the target direction, dealing magic damage to enemy champions he hits, Taunt icon taunting them for 1.5 seconds and restoring 40 energy per target. Taunted opponents deal half damage to Shen. MAGIC DAMAGE: 50 / 85 / 120 / 155 / 190 (+ 50% AP)

[show] Ability Details

Stand United RANGE: Global COOLDOWN: 180 / 160 / 120 Stand United ACTIVE: Shen channels for 3 seconds, granting the target allied champion a shield that lasts up to 5 seconds. If the channel completes successfully, Shen teleports to his target, placing himself between them and the nearest visible enemy champion. SHIELD: 250 / 550 / 850 (+ 135% AP)

Changes and why: The way he is currently built, when he is in a teamfight he feels a bit lackluster. He is very damn hard to kill, but what do you do inbetween taunts? Other tanks have % based damage so don't need to invest much in offensive stats to provide some sort of health to fights (Dr.Mundo's Cleaver, Sion's shield, etc...), multiple CC abilities (Nautilus, Leona, Alistar, Udyr's bear stance, etc..), or a major damage reduction abilty (Alistar's ult, Sion's shield which scales of max health, Nautilus's shield which scales off max health, Leona's defense buff, Udyr's shield, etc..). Shen is the exception. His shield is shit, a total afterthought. No % based damage. No CC aside from his taunt. As stated, his damage reduction is near non-existant. Lets compare him to another taunter, Rammus. His Q gives him high mobility and gives him a knockback, his curl gives him a huge defensive buff, and his taunt also reduces their armor in addition to taunting them. He also has a massive amount of synergy within his kit. Roll into a fight, Defensive ball curl, taunt, repeat.

This is how you fix Shen.

Basic attacks no longer reduce the cooldown of his Ki-Strike and no longer restore his energy. I gave the energy portion of his passive to his W, and the CDR to his Ki-strike. I always thought it was weird for him to have a passive that scaled with attack speed. Instead, every 9 seconds his next attack with stun the next target he hits. He can trade like this: When his stun is up, he pops his W, AA, uses his Q, AA until stun fades/they start running, E to effectively stun them again, etc... This will make him an effective peeler in addition to synergizing well with his kit.
Make his Q's damage work like an execute. In addition to scaling with AP, it should do additional damage that scales with the enemy's missing health.

Make the heal on his Q scale based on damage dealt instead of his max health. Hitting a minion or monster with his Q will reduce the CD of his Ki Strike by 1 second, hitting a champion will reduce it by 2 seconds. Landing a kill with this ability doubles the bonuses. Half the amount of the heal is applied to the nearest allied champion.

Make his W scale with his max health instead of AP. Also, instead of reducing the CD of his Ki Strike, make it to where he gains 2 / 4 / 6 / 8 / 10 energy per strike while his shield is up. His shield is currently lack luster due to the fact is scales with AP and most Shen's don't build much AP at all. It reduces this CD of his Ki Strike, which gives him energy when it lands. Give it to his W instead, This would also allow "Counter-play" -- "Oh shit, Shen popped his W. Better break his shield so he doesn't regen energy so quickly"
His shadow dash wouldn't need anything major.
Stand United doesn't need anything either. Perhaps lower the AP Scaling a bit and make it scale a bit off of Max-Health.