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The current state of Kog'Maw, from a Kog'Maw main of 6 years

Best Kog NA·10/30/2018, 9:18:47 PM·16 votes·28,642 views

Kog'Maw has been in League of Legends since the release of the game, he's gone through a VGU and a rework / revert. However currently Kog'Maw is in a terrible spot balance wise and next patch will mark 10 patches that he's been this way. Here's a list of things that I believe is wrong with Kog'Maw as someone who's been playing the void puppy for 6 years now.

#Patch 8.12, where it all went downhill

##Analysis of the patch notes

Lets start off by looking at the pickrate and banrate of adc Kog'Maw If you look at both graphs Kog'Maw has been one of the least picked ADC's, and one of if not the least banned champion in the game ever since patch 8.12. Alright, so lets take a look at the patch notes for 8.12 to see if we can find a reason why Kog got punted out of the meta even though he didn't receive any direct changes. After analyzing the patch notes two possibilities show up:

  • Stormrazor and Infinity Edge buffs
  • Enchanter supports nerfs

The hit to enchanter supports and the buffs to crit ADC's can be pinned as the reason to why Kog was kicked to the bottom of the adc tier list. However as stormrazor was tweaked and rebalanced over the next few patches in patch 8.13 rageblade was nerfed with no explanation. This leads us to assume that it was nerfed to check Kai'sa's damage since she synergized really well with the item. However this hurt Kog'Maw along with Varus and Kayle, but this isn't reflected in the pick and ban rates because Kog was already at rock bottom so he couldn't have gone lower.

The reason why I'm bringing up these two patches is because I want to make the point that with the addition of Kai'sa into the game, not only does she preform extremely well with Stormrazor, but she also works with rageblade almost as good if not better than Kog'Maw does. Unfortunately since Rageblade is (and always will be as long as the phantom hit passive exists on it) Kog's core item if we buff rageblade that will only make Kai'sa stronger. This brings me to my first proposed solution...

##Potential solution one, directly buffing Kog'Maw's stats Since buffing Kog's core item is out of the question due to the effects it would have on Kai'sa, the next possible way to fix Kog would be to buff him directly, as was done in patch 8.19 where Kog's movement speed was buffed by 5 and his early levels ult range was significantly buffed. This was a huge change and the changes, especially the ult range buffs felt extremly good, however this was more of a Quality of Life update rather than a significant balance update. Kog'Maw still went back to being one of the least picked and least banned champions in the game.

While I believe Riot had the right idea and intention while buffing Kog, they buffed the wrong parts of him, if you remember we figured out earlier that the two main reasons why Kog fell out of the meta was the buffs to stormrazor and infinity edge, and the nerf to enchanter supports, adding some movespeed and ult range buffs doesn't buff the parts of Kog that was hit hard by these two changes.

#Kog'Maw and comparisons to other viable adc's

##Crit based ADC's

With the introduction to Stormrazor and the heavy focus around crit items with the infinity edge rework and zeal item changes it's clear that Riot is trying to enforce a Crit adc bot lane meta, however historically there's always been a few champs, like Varus and Kog'Maw, that have not built crit due to their kits synergizing much more with on hit builds. With Kog'Maw's main damage source being the massive amount of %maxhealth damage from his W that gets applied every auto building him on hit has been the way to go for a while now. However with the addition of Kai'sa into the game, an adc that has both %health damage and synergizes well with crit items, Kog'Maw doesn't have a good spot in the meta. Unless Riot reworks Kog into a crit ADC I don't see him ever being viable in a meta with Stormrazor.

##Non-Crit ADC's that still are viable

Varus, while he may be in the same spot as Kog'Maw this patch, was able to be viable alongside Stormrazor and Crit adc's, even though his build path is similar to Kog's, rageblade core due to being an on-hit ADC, Varus brings a few things to the table that Kog doesn't.

  • Varus brings hard CC to the table in terms of his ultimate, while he sacrifices some damage when compared to Kog for this, having an ADC with a way of initiating fights is huge
  • Varus also brings decent amount of poke with his Q. This gives him a tool that lets him survive pre-6 laning phase while Kog has to wait until level 6 to access his reliable long range damage source.

These allow Varus tools to still be in the meta while Kog suffers alongside Crit adc's. However giving Kog either hard CC or a reliable way to survive laning phase would completely break him since his weak laning phase and lack of self peel allows him to have his heavy hitting W, and if he would be given hard CC or a reliable way to survive laning phase some damage would then have to be taken off of his W, turning him into a clone of Varus.

#Meta supports and the effect that they have on Kog'Maw.

In patch 8.12 enchanter supports like Lulu, Janna, and Karma were hit hard along with nerfs to Ardent Censor. This shifted bot lane support meta to supports with more utility like Thresh, Pyke, Morg, and Leona. I'm not saying that this is an issue, hell seeing thresh in the meta always is fun, but Kog'Maw not only does poorly against these supports due to being incredibly immobile, but he also has sub-par synergy with theses same supports as well since they don't bring the peel to the table that enchanter supports bring.

#Final thoughts

If there isn't any changes to Kog'Maw in patch 8.22 then it will have been 10 patches that Kog'Maw has been one of the worst ADC's in the game. However balancing him with Varus and Kai'sa while also not making him super oppressive like 5.0 attack speed Kog requires bigger meta changes or a complete rework of his kit. Bringing him back into the meta in a balanced state through only direct changes to Kog may not even be possible, but with this post I hope to start the conversation that may eventually lead to Kog being viable in the current meta.

33 Comments

Carrie Pigeon11/5/2018, 3:46:14 AM3 votes

I don't agree with a good amount of things in this post. While it is true Stormrazor (You can literally type Item To Win in the shop and it will appear) is a great item it's also not the only viable rush item. As seen with Varus, Kaisa, Miss Fortune, Ashe, Lucian, and Kalista *Corki can be included but he's primarily a midlaner and thus ignored. Ignoring Kaisa and Varus who often opt for the item Ashe, MF, and Lucian all sport decent pick and winrates.

Several Sites Winrates. Using sites such as LeagueofGraphs (7th highest ADC WR out of 18), Champion.gg (12th highest winrate out of 21), U.gg (10th highest out of 18), OP.GG (14th highest winrate out of 19), Lolalytics ( 15th highest winrate out of 24), and Blitz (12th highest out out 21) While non of these stats are amazing Kog does show to be in a decent power balance averaging around a 50.2% winrate at least from the date of these sites. OP.gg does have him in the worst spot but even then Kog sports a healthy 49.07% winrate here although a low pickrate (As seen with every used site). The reason so many sites are used is simply for an accurate reading as all sights differ due to how Riots API works.

Communication Kog'Maws main issues is team reliance in a game with flawed communication systems when compared to other popular online games such as Dota, HOTS, and OverWatch where there are two forms of chat being Voice and Text. Voice chat imo would improve Kogs winrate simply due to how the Protect the Kog strat works. While this isn't a 100% Winrate OP thing simply due to players macro/micro differing and peoples ability to listen and communicate effectively it would be a slight bump. Team reliance as a champion without any form of self peel, escapes outside of Flash, and rather low defenses it puts a lot of pressure in protecting someone who can easily be blown up within half a spell rotation.

Directly buffing Kog to fit this Meta Now lets say Kog'Maw was buffed to compete at a higher level lets say around 4th-5th best ADC in the current meta. This creates a rather large issue in that Kog is now a dominant pick while playing with champions such as Thresh, leona, Pyke, Ali etc rather than enchanters. When the meta shifts and enchanters are the go to once more this puts Kog at a very dangerous power spot as he's gone from winning more than losing with champions he lacks synergy with to playing each game with someone who compliments his kit perfectly. This would overtune Kog and keeping him in this 50~% WR Spot in this meta is fine as is.

Spells Buffing any of Kogs AD/Base numbers on spells is also risky due to his power budget being heavily spent on his W. This ability simply is Kog'Maw (at least AD) and when it's inactive your effectiveness plummets drastically to where a good AD Kog is simply one who can properly position and have good W management. While I would love for Kog's Q E or R to be buffed (Biased as I did spend most of my time playing AP Kog'Maw) it would have to be at a hit to his W.

Powerspikes A big change from S4 Kog to now is Kog is no longer the 6 item demon people feared once he got his T-rex hands on. Kog spikes hard at 1-3 items primarily Rageblade. The only way this could change is nerfing Kogs base numbers while adding better Ratios into his spells. Making Kog less reliant on On-Hit would also introduce Kog into Stormrazor based trades Similar to S4 Kogs Sheen empowered W auto every time it was up. As it stands now Kog'maw has some of the worst ability scalings in the game due to him being a primarily AD Champion with only 1 AD ratio and it just so happens to be Bonus AD at 65% on his R(100% HP) while Kog will rarely hit above 200 Bonus AD off of items. Changing Kog'Maws R to scale worse with AD but increase the execute damage would balance out this for AD Kog'maw and give some potential to give some scaling into Kog'Maws Q or E while being a slight buff to AP Kog.

While I do think Kog is overall fine although not the best/worst here are some things I've considered Buffs I'd like to see attempted Passive - Ghosted in passive or amping up MS. As it stands Kog'maw has one of the most confusing passives in the game and I don't mean confusing as say Jhins or Mordes. I mean confusing as in here we have a long range hypercarry who the team wants to protect so he can dish out as much DPS as possible. His passive completely contradicts this and makes him then go in after death. His passive lacks any actual scaling and is ironically his only mobility. Giving Kog'maw a ghosted passive will enable him to ignore creep block which while a small change would be a decent one without much impact on Kogs overall gameplay.

Passive2 Ramping move speed would make sense as his death is a semi chemical reaction. Having Kog'Maw accelerate similar to well Ghost would enable him to catch people who mistime dashes/flashes in order to escape this death passive.

NewPassiveIdea Corrosion - Reduce Kogs Q %removal and W% Damage in exchange for Spells/Autos shredding Armor/MR per spell/auto hit. This however would basically be Kayle passive.

Q Some flat shred. This would make the spell more effective against non tanks as someone with 50 MR losing 28% is a lot less drastic than someone with 180 MR losing 28%. This could also be a buff to Kogs early game as say 7 flat shred vs 12% level 4 versus say Kaisa you'd remove an extra 2.9 Armor and 3.2 MR. While this seems small when you lack any bonus MR/Armor this is huge.

W I personally loved 5.0 Kog'Maw however it was unhealthy. The idea here would be removing the %ATK Speed off of Kog Q and adding a mini Guinsoos into Kog's W where after each auto Kog would gain a bit of %ATK Speed up to a cap. This would also work towards the nickname of the whole machine gun Kog'Maw thing and force a protection based thing. The longer Kog autos the faster he gets. This would be a nerf to Kogs early but buff his late game should he well survive.

E Kog'Maw (and allies?) gains movespeed while on his E. Would increase his overall utility and I just think Kog vomiting up a slip n slide is cute.

R I'm leaving this empty as I am incredibly biased towards this skill as it is my favorite in this game.

Galiö11/5/2018, 2:18:30 AM3 votes

Tbh kogmaw Q is ok. It's better super late game. He is pretty much a 'one skill' champ.

You max W asap, you get Q cause w.e and scarcely use it, you never level E and when you do you have to let out a grunt cause you're forced to (I think that's in a tooltip somewhere), and R is... ok? At best.

He does insane max heath dmg but when most champions end the game at like 2000 healthish, its not worth doing 23% of their max heath per second with rageblade (400ish dmg) when a crit champion would do 700-800ish damage per second. (Those numbers are just based off autos, which is honestly all kogmaw does at this point).

I dont think he is a bad champ at all, it's just the game is a fighting game instead of a Moba now... so all burst dmg and he has no mobility, and no tanks because the game is all about burst and tanks just generally rarely played... even when they are busted.

Kog da MVP v211/5/2018, 3:40:59 PM2 votes

for me kogmaw went downhill only beacuse of 2% W nerf more like half year ago, 2 patches later riot noticed hes unplayable and buffed his 1% W but still he was 1% weaker than before. And it was ONLY beacuse LULU was too good with him AND after they nerfed LULU and PEELERS ITEMS they didnt buff his 1% W again to the state he was before. And its MOSTLY the reason hes in the bad spot right now. I may add that kogmaw was my first champ which i liked when i started playing in LOL and i main him to this day due to changes at other champion i liked to play/gameplay

super monchi11/7/2018, 5:24:20 AM2 votes

In mi opinion the major problem in kog is mana. W should not cost mana, E should cost less mana and scale with both ad and ap. I think 50% ap damage for so much mana cost is making his laning fase terrible, specially now that his late game is not as great as use to be. He is more a mid game champion that after 40 minute its win rate falls too drastically for a late game champion. The 7% damage on his w made him a great late champ, hi needs that back or compensate this in the other spells.

Dracocrash11/30/2018, 11:40:53 PM2 votes

imo kog'maws Q needs to be point and click hit , not a skill shot.

BLIGHTBRINGER11/2/2018, 12:10:44 PM2 votes

Varus also brings decent amount of poke with his Q

Honestly his Q has no real impact, on it's own anyway. Most of the time you will have to hit an enemy who are behind atleast 4 creeps, which reduces the damage of the Arrow by a massive ton. Though I find his W Active and Q interaction a little stronger, but having a 40 second cooldown on that W active kind of justifies I suppose.

Lucy Pyre12/1/2018, 7:08:38 PM1 votes

You're right, Kog/Maw is so terrible right now that he has a 52.5% win rate, placing him at the #4 spot by win rate for bot lane, and #2 behind Twitch if you only count ADCs and not mages in the bot lane.

[zombie-brand-facepalm]

ModKnightsKemplar11/5/2018, 1:19:26 AM1 votes

Approved!

Buttsubushi11/5/2018, 5:00:35 PM1 votes

I'd really like the return of the 5.0 AS kogmaw, currently kaisa has most of kog's strengths and niches: on-hit, scales with AD+AP, can be built full AP and still be just as a big threat as full AD, has execution damage. Only thing Kog has over her is the attack range from W. If the 5.0AS cap was back, but limited up to depending on either spell rank (3.0/3.5/4.0/4.5/5.0AS, increase total AS by 20/40/60/80/100%) or by Kog's level, it could work and be more balancable with current version of Rageblade (and Bloodrazor when he was #1 jungler for a brief while). Probably have to hard cap lethal tempo to 5.0 on him though.

TheSingularity11/6/2018, 2:02:37 AM1 votes

What if we changed his AP ratios to AD ratios and adjusted accordingly?

When I last played kog, Triforce BOTRK was his core. After losing the crit and AP from tri, and being reworked kog adopted an on-hit build to maximize his new W, which was then reverted. This would mean giving his Q, W and E AD ratios instead of AP ratios, and adjusting them accordingly so his damage from them ends up about the same. This would bring back his old build which synergises with his R for sheen procs and the tank shredding item. I honestly don't want rageblade built on him because it breaks everyone it is built on, resulting in harsh nerfs so not worried there

Potentially re add this aspect of his R. Living Artillery's damage is doubled against enemies below 50% maximum health and tripled against enemies below 25% maximum health." What is currently absent is the triple damage against very low health targets.

The goal with these is to bring back the feel of old kog, who instead of gatling gunning people down, was a slower firing but harder hitting champion.

super monchi11/7/2018, 5:04:37 AM1 votes

In mi opinion the major problem in kog is mana. W should not cost mana, E should cost less mana and scale with both ad and ap. I think 50% ap damage for so much mana cost is making his laning fase terrible, specially now that his late game is not as great as use to be. He is more a mid game champion that after 40 minute its win rate falls too drastically for a late game champion. The 7% damage on his w made him a great late champ, hi needs that back or compensate this in the other spells.

Gilgayu11/15/2018, 1:17:41 AM1 votes

Tbh many champions still need rework, and those who needed the most already received them (ww, aatrax, nunu, akali, etc.), Riot said next season they will do 50/50 split between rework and new champion. I guess we probably need to wait until season 10 for a full Kog rework ;-;

Item reworks might affect Kog sooner, though... Hard to say