Just because a character is flashy does not mean they are op...

Affinity2·Jan 25, 2015·2 votes·881 views

zed has massive counterplay especially when you compare him to other assassins. he has a way out and some pretty easy ways to peel him off if you dont have your head up ur ass. (huge as visual indicator X on his ult target and no way back in after disengage outside of w)

Just because u are frustrated with a champion doesnt mean they are overpowered or crowding out options.

Ive heard bs like zed is ungankable. Well if hes ungankable he cant be offensive either because his w is a huge commitment. the same follows for many mana users as well but its overt on zed because hes melee

In other words GD shut the fuck up and go play some fighting games to learn about counterplay and options because most people here have no idea what they are talking about.

6 Comments

Sozan5Jan 25, 20155 votes

Indeed. Just because a champion is flashy doesn't mean he's OP. And yes, I agree that his assassination pattern is giving enough counterplay options for enemy. The problem is in his non-flashy parts though.

Extremely good wave clear. Generally one of the disadvantage of assassins is their poor wave clear, especially early on and last hitting early as a whole - either because they are gated by resource or they just lack the tools to do it safely. Zed have both great and safe last hitting with his Q - and he will never run out of energy just by last-hitting (unless he spams Q every time it's available for 50+ seconds), which pretty much means that it's impossible to zone Zed out of farm, and that is usually what you do against assassins pre-6. Ah, he also have no troubles farming under turrets due to his passive.
Poke. Zed can poke with his whole basic ability combo from 700 range without commiting himself to the fight (W->E->Q - it will deal the same damage regardless if he swaps or not - and that is a large amount of damage). Again, he's by far the only assassin to be able to do that. Others have to either sacrifice some damage or commit to the trade - you know, taking some risks (which fits the general idea behind assassin's kit - High Risk, High Reward). And no - his W WOULD be a great commitment if he actually had to swap with it to deal his full ability rotation, which he doesn't.
Free stats. Obviously, his W passive. I never understood what Riot was thinking. It's not like Zed's abilities have low damage or scalings that he would need this to compensate. Especially since it's a rather large bonus.
His energy costs. They are extremely low. His combo takes at most 165 energy and a minimal of 125. To compare it to other energy champions: Akali 200-160 energy, Kennen 210-170, Shen 210, Lee Sin 240. This makes other energy champions actually reliant on their energy-recovery mechanic (especially Kennen, Shen and Lee - they can't even use their full comboses at level 3 unless they got the energy recovery) - and Zed is not. This wouldn't be a problem if Zed didn't have an energy recovery mechanic - but he have, and it's a very good one (maximum of 40-80 energy recovered (based on W rank) with a single W cast). This makes Zed more or less completely resourceless, unless you completely mess up few combos in a row.

Of course, there are other, minor problems with his kit (like the infinite range of shadow swap on ultimate, the fact that his passive doesn't have a cap against monsters or having a very high armor value) - but those 4 points are the main offenders. Neither of them is flashy. His flashy plays are actually the only things that are properly balanced with enough counterplay and high risk, high reward feel.

Affinity2Jan 26, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Indeed. Just because a champion is flashy doesn't mean he's OP. And yes, I agree that his assassination pattern is giving enough counterplay options for enemy. The problem is in his non-flashy parts though.

Extremely good wave clear. Generally one of the disadvantage of assassins is their poor wave clear, especially early on and last hitting early as a whole - either because they are gated by resource or they just lack the tools to do it safely. Zed have both great and safe last hitting with his Q - and he will never run out of energy just by last-hitting (unless he spams Q every time it's available for 50+ seconds), which pretty much means that it's impossible to zone Zed out of farm, and that is usually what you do against assassins pre-6. Ah, he also have no troubles farming under turrets due to his passive.

Poke. Zed can poke with his whole basic ability combo from 700 range without commiting himself to the fight (W->E->Q - it will deal the same damage regardless if he swaps or not - and that is a large amount of damage). Again, he's by far the only assassin to be able to do that. Others have to either sacrifice some damage or commit to the trade - you know, taking some risks (which fits the general idea behind assassin's kit - High Risk, High Reward). And no - his W WOULD be a great commitment if he actually had to swap with it to deal his full ability rotation, which he doesn't.

Free stats. Obviously, his W passive. I never understood what Riot was thinking. It's not like Zed's abilities have low damage or scalings that he would need this to compensate. Especially since it's a rather large bonus.

His energy costs. They are extremely low. His combo takes at most 165 energy and a minimal of 125. To compare it to other energy champions: Akali 200-160 energy, Kennen 210-170, Shen 210, Lee Sin 240. This makes other energy champions actually reliant on their energy-recovery mechanic (especially Kennen, Shen and Lee - they can't even use their full comboses at level 3 unless they got the energy recovery) - and Zed is not. This wouldn't be a problem if Zed didn't have an energy recovery mechanic - but he have, and it's a very good one (maximum of 40-80 energy recovered (based on W rank) with a single W cast). This makes Zed more or less completely resourceless, unless you completely mess up few combos in a row.

Of course, there are other, minor problems with his kit (like the infinite range of shadow swap on ultimate, the fact that his passive doesn't have a cap against monsters or having a very high armor value) - but those 4 points are the main offenders. Neither of them is flashy. His flashy plays are actually the only things that are properly balanced with enough counterplay and high risk, high reward feel.

yea but people bitch about the parts of his gameplay that have counterplay. dont tell me otherwise. this is less a rant about zed and more about how uneducated the vast majority of the NA scene is. its absolutely hysterical. This thread isnt even about the patch notes comment its mostly about lee sin and how hes a GD poster child about everything wrong with this game when in reality hes pretty healthy and balanced given the gold stream he gets in each game. he most definitely has counterplay people are just bad at it

Sozan5Jan 26, 20151 votes

Yes, they whine about wrong parts. That's because well... Flashy plays are more visible. Also, I don't know why you limited it only to NA scene, since it's the same on most of the other regions too.

And as far as Lee goes - while his kit is somewhat healthy, I do believe that his it's overtuned a bit. Mostly his Q and ultimate damage. They deal insane amount of damage for no reason whatsoever (340 +180% bonus AD +8% of Target's missing health on Q and 600 +200% bonus AD on ultimate). They should nerf either his base damage or his scalings.

Angry MonsterJan 26, 20151 votes

Lee needs to have a few things taken away to be in a good place.

base movement speed. If he is going to have 2 dash/gap close moves his base movement needs to be hit hard.

Identy- Either he is an assassin as listed by the client or he is a damn fighter. If he is a fighter the q execute has to go. IF he is an assassin his D values need a hit and he should be made to build damage to do damage.

Free life steal/spell vamp and shield. The spell vamp needs to go. His free sustain with smite is way to OP. The life steal is something i am on the fence about. Though no other jungler gets to shield theme self and life steal.

If these issues would be dealt with people would not bitch about how overloaded his kit is.

Also be nice if people stop thinking that he is a skill based champ. its not a skill to throw a q at a minion and then jump to a ward that you just placed.

Kuroi86Jan 25, 20151 votes

No, Zed technically isn't op, he is simply good in too many areas, Riot is looking to tune him back in one or two places while leaving his over all dueling potential right where it's at.

The WhamboozlerJan 26, 20151 votes

Flashy isn't what people are complaining about. No one is saying "Zed looks too cool! Let's nerf his look and cool animations!". They're complaining about his abilities. What most people mean when they say "flashy" is "mobile and with a lot of tools to outplay/escape/juke/kill people in exciting ways", and that IS something that makes a character strong. A champ with more mobility and options in their kit like that than another is markedly better unless those champs are vastly mismatched in raw stats somehow. Zed has more OPTIONS than a lot of his competition and his opponents and that is why people are complaining. He has a powerful kit that lets him do things that other champs just CAN'T do. You can mitigate his burst, yes. But that isn't going to put you AHEAD of him, just keep you from falling behind him. He's very safe and hard to punish for his mistakes, but he's pretty good at punishing YOU for your own. He's also an assassin and thus, snowbally, and even if he's NOT doing well, he has a fallback use as a splitpush/farmer due to his amazing waveclear.

ANY champ as mobile and slippery as Zed will be forever bitched about if he's ANYTHING close to strong, because it feels like he didn't PAY for that mobility with enough shortcomings. He does crazy burst damage like most assassins, but without many of their weaknesses. He can't run out of mana. He doesn't lack poke/harass. He doesn't lack waveclear. He doesn't lack speed. He doesn't really lack ANYTHING.