Aatrox: Redeemable, or as Extinct as Most of His Species?

I know that the people behind Riot are busy supplying us with skins, new champs, and focusing on nerfing OP champs (some NOT needing nerfs because their only powerful if you know what you're doing and at pro level coughcoughcoughcough)

Yet there are still champs who are UP (Under Powered). For example, Aatrox.

He's extremely item dependent and has a play rate just about as bad as Urgot (possibly worse. I'd have to check.)

Aatrox has only been touched once on patch 3.13 and that was a nerf that has busted him for eternity since then. Compered to other top laners, there's ALWAYS a better choice. Want a Jungler who builds attack speed and life steal? Get Master Yi . Want a Jungler who can jump on someone and destroy them with a few hits? Kha'Zix. Don't even get me started on top lane.

As it is, without items Aatrox is useless. Before someone states that the same goes for every champ, Aatrox ONLY picks up once he has a few items under his belt. It doesn't help that most of said items cost over 3000 gold or just below it and can take a long time to build.

While a Guardian Angel passive is great, once it pops Aatrox is almost always done fore unless he's killed the enemy first, or he can fire a quick E to finish them off. The attack speed that's gained as the bar fills is extremely useful and gives more incentive to do more damage with your abilities, but once Aatrox loses that along with the revive it's back to the Fountain with him unless he's in a safe place.

His kit is clunky as Hell too. His Q has very little range and it is his only engage, knocking up one person. While that's good in top lane due to how often people 1v1 there, in team fights it leaves him with a death sentence unless his passive is up. The ability also doesn't do enough damage for it to cost 10% is total health per cast. All it's good for are 1v1 engages and short disingages that can be almost entirely closed in on by a simple flash or other jump attack.

Aatrox practically revolves around his W aswell. He gets his health and damage boost from it, and without attack speed it's essentially useless waiting to get that third swing.

Aatrox's E is his only source of poke and in some cases farm (or most cases these days). It gives him a slow for chasing those weak enemies who're running, but at the same time the further it travels, the harder to land it becomes. It doesn't help that it moves slowly enough that unless point blank it can be dodged easily.

As for his Ultimate Ability, it's probably the best thing he has going for him at the moment with the utility it gives. He attacks faster, has pretty good burst as he uses it which also fills his Blood Gauge which gives him MORE attack speed, and it gives him more range on his basic attacks (plus his sword looks really cool on his Classic and Justicar skins when it pulses colors).

The only thing he really has going for him is that almost nobody who's Bronze or below knows what he does just because of the fact that NOBODY PLAYS HIM, or the people that do play him rarely do so.

Honestly, it's more than possible to adjust him abit like what's done in the class updates. One of the things that make Aatrox interesting his his sword. It's both a sword AND a whip. Just look at the crit animation. He's the only champion at the moment with a weapon like that that I can think of. The possibilities with such a weapon are nigh limitless.

While the thought of him diving into battle with a better version of his Q are great, the extending whip-like animation is great. You could swap out his E for an ability where his blade thrusts forward infront of him to absorb health from minions, monsters and enemy champions instead of the cone of wind/energy blades. For an ultimate, you could have made his weapon stab into the ground like his splash art. It could slowly absorb health and slow enemies around him in a certain radius around him that slightly grows overtime with each level. His W could be an ability where he just slams his blade down in a manner similar to Blood Price.

I don't expect you to take any of the above under consideration, and when Aatrox was first released he was probably great (wasn't there for it. Joined late last season just before Illaoi was revealed.), but as it now he's extremely underwhelming for one of the last five Darkin and as an important figure who has shifted the course of history multiple times for millenia. He's a God of War who's work made Tryndamere. But with how he is in game, he's just the demon look-alike who's only good for item bases sustain.

I hope that some day in the future, Aatrox can get the rework or buffs he derserves...but as of right now, he's just another champ who's been almost entirely forgotten.

I, as an Aatrox-Main, hope that someone at Riot sees this and that hopefully it'll help change him for the better. Not just for myself, but for everyone else in love with this champion.