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Xelnath, you still wanna talk about Super Minions?

koushırou·9/24/2013, 8:59:23 PM·5 votes·191 views

Or anyone else for that matter.

So I was reading this article the other day and the data in the first chart shows just how important Inhibitors are and how they can snowball a game. It got me thinking about super minions again and how strong and, well, odd, they are. I think they're two, maybe three things specifically that bother me the most.

  1. When Inhibitors respawn there are still 2-3 Super Minions in lane
  2. Although melee, Super Minions are at the very back of the wave
  3. When an Inhibitor is destroyed all other minions, regardless of lane, get buffed

The third one isn't really a complaint about Super Minions per say but just something I wanted to talk about here since it relates to how I think one destroyed Inhibitor can snowball games too hard.

First off, 2-3 more Super Minions in lane after the Inhibitor respawns means another two minutes of defending the base. Which means two more minutes for the enemy team to grab incontestable buffs and further dominate the map through vision control. It's pretty tough to defend for a solid five minutes against Super Minions and if your team is successful, and the enemy team failed to capitalize there should be some sort of reward. That reward being no more Super Minions. Well, until they destroy your Inhibitor again. My suggestion here would just be to make it stop spawning Super Minions one minute before the Inhibitor respawns.

Number 2 is pretty simple, you made a change earlier this year to how turrets targeted Siege Minions and I think, since the Super Minions replace the Siege Minions, that the Super Minions should be targeted first. Also these big beefy melee minions should be leading the charge, they tend to get creep blocked by their own wave when trying to attack and it's just, again, odd for a melee minion to be at the back.

The last thing though, the fact that all other minions get buffed for each Inhibitor destroyed, makes it way too easy to push into to their base from another lane. It also makes plays outside the base like stealing/sneaking Baron or actually fighting the enemy team 5v5 not only incredibly difficult but also way too risky. One lane of super creeps is enough trouble but with the buffed minions in the other lanes it becomes, quite frankly, a boring waiting game. Spawning Super Minions gives your team a massive, though well deserved, advantage. It seems unnecessary to push it even further by buffing the other minions, which is something that half the player base doesn't even realize is happening.

That's pretty much it, I hope I conveyed my thoughts well enough for you to see what I'm getting at and I really look forward to hearing yours.

Link to the article: http://lol.gamepedia.com/Articles:Snowballing_in_the_Group_Stages_of_the_S3_World_Championship

Thanks,

koushirou

3 Comments

koushırou9/24/2013, 11:18:41 PM1 votes

Nobody wants to talk about it? No? Just me? Possibly my dad? No? Okay, fine

:(

LoLByTheNumbers9/25/2013, 4:00:56 AM1 votes

Here you go.

Careful when looking at info-graphics. They're great sources of quick information but in a game this complicated, they can lead to some misunderstanding and confusion. The 100% win rate on first inhibitor has less to do with the inhibitor going down, and much more to do with the fact that you are already and have most likely been losing the game for awhile. Taking the inhibitor is just the proverbial nail in the coffin. Here's some more stats.

7 of 47 games or 15% ended >1 minute after the inhibitor went down.
16(9) of 47 games or 34%(19%) ended >3 minutes after the inhibitor went down.
30(14) of 47 games or 64%(30%) ended >5 minute after the inhibitor went down.

To break this down
In 7 of the games taking down the inhibitor had no actual impact in the games. Teams had gone from inhibitor to nexus before any of the stronger spawns could even reach the river, sometimes before they even spawned.

In 9 of the games (not including the under 1 minute finishes) the nexus fell in under 3 minutes. In these case it was normally one of 2 things. Either there was extended fighting in the base after the inhibitor fell but with teams still felling the inhibitor and nexus in a single push, or teams would back to baron/shop and then immediately go for a final push.

In 14 of the games (not including the under 1/3 minute finishes) the nexus fell in under 5 minutes, 5 minutes being when the inhibitor would respawn. Generally this time was used to push down the rest of the inhibitor and siege the base or to back out to baron dance for a teamfight catch.

What we can see is that while First Inhibitor does have a 100% win rate, its because the team who takes it is so much stronger, not because of the stronger minion spawns. Inhibitor's rarely snowball games. Teams are already snowballed by the time an inhibitor goes down. Inhibitor's are more like the crippling blow, as they should be.

Let me look at your 3 points now.

  1. This is because you don't get the benefit of destroying an inhibitor until your next spawn and until they reach the enemies creep wave. While it is a bit annoying to have to deal with that last wave of Super Creeps, it doesn't extend the actual benefit of a downed inhibitor. It does however, cause a very short window of extra threat for the 30 seconds or so that your inhibitor is up, but there are still super creeps. I'm ok with this, as it generally is not an issue, but adds another "contention point" to the game.

  2. I'm pretty certain that its better for the defending team that the Super Creep spawns in the back. This way it does not interrupt the defending teams ability to wave clear, aside from it being extra focus. Champions with good wave clear can still take out everything but the Super Creep without having to worry about taking a hit from it.

  3. This is a double edged sword. If you lose your inhibitor, you do lose map presence and pressure, but if you have lost your inhibitor, its extremely likely that you have already lost this even before it went down. With stronger waves in all lanes, it actually brings gold to you team, and takes it away from the opposing team. This gives you the potential for a comeback. Losing an inhibitor has limited you, but it has also decreased the distance/vulnerability you need to take to reach that creep gold. It's up to the other team to capitalize on the pressure, and they should be rewarded if they do (map control) and punished if they don't (gold loss from creeps not pushing).