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Kog'Maw's Q

ChaliElle·9/18/2013, 11:17:37 AM·3 votes·803 views

I'll keep it short - Kog'Maw's Q ability is in quite bad spot right now. I know that armor/mr reduction effects are overall strong, but not on skills with 625 range on champion who don't want to be closer to enemy than his 710 auto-attack range with activated W, 2000 range on ult and 1000 range on E. What's the point then?

Decrease/increase Q range to match it to Kog'Maw's autoattack range. So, basic range should be 500 with 130/150/170/190/210 range increase with activated W.
Balance damage - decrease base damage by 0-40 (from 60/110/160/210/260 to 60/100/140/180/220) - to decrease late-game possibilities of W+auto+Q poke/burst.
Decrease mana cost to 30/35/40/45/50 (or flat 40) to make AP players bit less punished for so much needed combo'ing Q with W. (This may be unnecessary and might buff AD Kog too much, as every AP Kog stacks incredibly big mana pool/regen for ult spam.)

This changes would make AP Kog much more viable, and also much easier to counterplay (when his W is on cooldown), and would make Q use-able for AD Kog.

PS.: I would also LOVE to have much more visible particle on Q-ed champion. Another QOL change - make it castable only on champions and big minions/monsters. Almost no one uses Q to farm (if they do, they are doing it totally wrong), and I'm always upset when I accidentally Q minion, not champion.

9 Comments

Mango0279/18/2013, 3:51:07 PM1 votes

Some times you need to use that Q to farm under tower. Not often, but enough where targeting a minion is good to have as an option.

NeekoTrap9/18/2013, 9:22:46 PM1 votes

Hey ChaliElle, I agree with you that Kog'Maw's Q isn't in the best place right now, however, keep in mind it also gives quite a bit of attack speed as part of it's passive, frontloading so much onto its active might throw balance off a bit.

I also disagree with your proposed changes, and will list my reasons below, corresponding with each individual change.

I disagree with this because it reduces the amount of game-play associated with Kog'Maw. Not having a powerful albeit shorter ranged tool with which you can deal a lot of damage with in turn really removes some of the risk/reward play-style associated with Kog. In addition, if it were the same range as his W, Kog'Maw's AD damage would actually spike, and a lot of counter-play would be gone. Essentially Kog'Maw would go from a moderately squishy Artillery type character that punishes you for coming close enough for him to hit you but not you to hit him, to a bland "stay out of his range or die" character. It also reduces a lot of his counter play by forcing you to only time one skill, his W, because if these changes were implemented no good Kog'Maw player would use his Q without his W.
Most of my opinions on this match-up with my opinions on 1. But I also think that the damage reduction late game is unnecessary, it's more of a laning phase tool anyway, and nerfing the damage wouldn't help AP Kog'Maw, only hurt it.
I don't find myself going OOM with Kog'Maw due to my Q. Personally unnecessary in my opinion. And an AP Kog still does most of his damage through AA anyway. If anything, given the above changes I think the Mana cost should be increased.

QOL: Unnecessary given the upcoming options screen changes. You'll easily be able to change his Q to Champ Cast Only wihtin the first few seconds of the game.

This is all my opinion, and as such it is just as valid as anyone else's. Hate to create more problems than answers, but I'd just thought I'd put my two cents in.

FilthyCasual9/19/2013, 1:34:36 AM1 votes

I think it needs a new visual effect in general. It's hardly discernible from an auto attack and it can make it confusing for both the Kog player and his opposition.

BardDecisions9/19/2013, 2:45:30 AM1 votes

The idea to match the Q range to Kog's AA range is good, and I proposed it myself in my balance thread. You'll most of the time be extremely annoyed because there's a part of your kit that isn't accessible enough for you to do a proper combo'in, especially later in the game when you don't want to come near the fray.

However, you have to take in account what it means for Kog. Not only does the spell gives a lot of innate Attack Speed, the shredding feature on it will skyrocket your -dual- Damage output if it becomes reliable. Nerfing the base damage or the ratio on it won't be enough to balance it out. So you would also have to tune something else in Kog's kit.

For the Mana cost buff, you make no sense here as you just said it's practically impossible to use Q effectively and now you say it costs too much to use ? That sort of utility spell NEEDS a high Mana cost to avoid spamming and abuse cases.

Ap Kog is already viable, you just don't see it because there are too many high mobility creeps like Ahri or Zed that would ruin his life easily, it has nothing to do with a lack of damage, FAR from it.

I agree it's hard to distinct the guy you just put your Q on, and would love to see a better VFX here.

As for the last part, I would hate it a lot if we couldn't use Q on minions. As you said, it's unreliable when you're hitting Champions, so why wouldn't you use it as an extension to your AA in order to farm better ? Kog needs a lot of gold to be effective later on, and those 10-20 CS you would have missed if you didn't use Q to last hit will help you a lot.