Liandry's Torment Was a Great Change, Now Keep Going
In patch 8.4, Liandry's Torment's Unique Passives were split up, as it had too much power against everyone. According to Riot, "Liandry's Torment was a bit of a contradiction: The percent health damage made it decent against tanks, while the flat magic penetration made it decent against squishy targets. As a result, it either didn't do either job exceptionally, or it ended up overturned, and doing both jobs too well." Now that half of it lives on as the new Liandry's and the other half went onto Morellonomicon, Liandry's now has more of a specific role for those who build it. But Liandry's Torment is not the only one who's power should be split.
The obvious one (and its precursor) is the item that basically ruined bruisers. The new thornmail and bramble vest just have too much loaded onto them. Instead of being good against just bruisers or marksmen, it is the perfect item against anyone who build AD or AS. For just 1000 gold, bramble vest not only offers a nice chunk of armor, but reflection damage and a healing debuff. Simply put, no AD champ can beat that. It makes a joke of sustain and hurts the enjoyment of playing top lane. Just to add on, thornmail's completion includes an attack speed slow. Instead of buffing every bruiser in an attempt to fix this, I believe the healing debuff and reflection damage should be separated into two items. While it does not stop tanks from eventually getting both stats, it slows down the pace, allowing for bruisers to shine and get the items they need in order to help out.
An item that I also want to include that people might be surprised about is Black Cleaver. It offers 20% CDR, on hit movement speed, and an armor shred. While this is coming from someone who is not the top of the elo ladder (currently in mid-plat), it seems that most AD melee champs builds this item. Even assassins build this item for their third or fourth slots. It is not a specialized item and is good for everyone, against everyone. While it is nice to see that Riot does care at least a little bit about bruisers with the new keystone in the PBE, I question why there is no new item instead. I am thinking a new item should be introduced, something like the item that was removed in S5: Zephyr. Instead of having its old tenacity, it should just be an item that builds from a stinger and a phage. Give Black cleaver's on hit movement speed to this item. This item would have a bit of CDR, attack speed, a tiny bit of AD, and health. Its Unique Passive could be that it offers some amount of true damage on hit. Ideally, it would be enough to be effective during long fights with tanks, but less so with ADCs, making it an anti-tank item. In the state which Black Cleaver is mainly used, the movement speed does not need to be there, and can instead be put onto a new item. This gives bruisers more options and to really think about how they want to build, instead of the common Titanic/AD Assassin item, BC, GA build.
I strongly believe the Liandry's Torment change was a smart move by Riot and should be expanded onto other items, specifically Thornmail and Black Cleaver. It will make building bruisers and tanks more impactful and specialized for a specific enemy team comp.
Thank you for reading my post. Sorry for any spelling mistakes or any points that may be confusing. Please let me know your opinions below or if anything needs clarification.
-Beebeeb123
