Should dragon buffs be more specialized?
There's been a lot of discussion about how water and especially air drake are much weaker than infernal and earth. I think the first question we have to ask is should all four dragons have equal value? My initial thought is yes because it minimizes effects of RNG and rewards all teams equally if they get an early lead. However, having power disparity between dragons does have a benefit of allowing teams to prioritize other objectives over dragon rather than feeling like they need to contest every dragon. I think ideally I'd like to see the benefit of drakes become even more specialized so that there is no best dragon in all situations and that which drake is best for your team depends completely on your team comp. For example, for one team Mountain drake may be the best but for another team Air drake may be the best. I think there also needs to be some changes to Rift Herald to make it a very difficult choice whether a team should go for herald or dragon. I think that as long as Rift Herald only provides benefit to one person and has a time limit on its benefits it will never be favored over dragon because dragon's stacking team mechanic will always be far superior.
My idea Infernal Drake: increases damages from abilities only. Would favor teams who play more caster characters. Mountain Drake: increases damage from auto attacks by a flat amount. Favors teams with more auto attackers and also allows teams to take towers faster. Water Drake: increases effectiveness of healing, shields, health regen, mana regen and life steal. Favors teams with sustain or who prefer poking. Air Drake: increases effectiveness of hastes and slows, provides out of combat movement speed and grants tenacity. Favors teams who want to generate picks or who want to split push or rotate around the map. Rift Herald: Have it respawn on a timer again. Gives a buff to the whole team that Increases minion stats when a champion is nearby. This stat buff can be stacked if the same team slays rift herald multiple times. Stat buff is increased by 50% if the team has baron as well. Gives teams increased pushing pressure and allows teams to split push and siege better. Also incentives stacking Rift Heralds to get baron buff.
So what are your guy's thoughts? Should the dragon buffs become more specialized? Should Rift Herald be given a stackable mechanic like dragon to incentive it more? Feel free to post how you would change the dragon/rift herald buffs as well.