Tryndamere doesn't need buffs, he needs a rework. His theme does not match his gameplay.

Critkeeper·May 15, 2014·3 votes·1,066 views

He shouldn't be afraid of conflict he should thrive in it. His thematics and lore suggests that he is a battle hardened force of nature on the battlefield but his gameplay revolves around him avoiding fights and passively split pushing as much as possible, and only fighting when he can pick someone off who can't defend themselves.

Does a barbarian who traveled to all the tribes of the freljord and bested all their greatest warriors sound like someone who runs from a fight? See thats my point, and that is why Tryndamere should be reworked into a better team fighter.

6 Comments

Lewd YordleMay 15, 20141 votes

I would love to see Trynd transform from an assassin into a brawler or fighter. It dose not really seem like a "Barbarian King" would be an assassin....I always thought that someone of that title would LOVE fighting...against ANYONE.

Kinda how Jax does in his gameplay style

ThalesMay 15, 20141 votes

That's a problem with all melee carries prior to Yasuo. Because they have zero utility, their fallback pattern if they don't get super strong is to split push all day. If Trynd gets strong, he will take part in team fights, but for obvious reasons, no character's play patterns can be to dive into any fight no matter how lopsided. If anything, he's in better shape than Yi or Fiora, because he can at least contribute for a few seconds thanks to his ult.

Would you rather he be a bruiser than a carry? That would be one way to push him towards fights, but that would pretty much require the removal of all his current abilities. Honestly, your complaint isn't with Trynd but with the fact that melee ADCs just don't work in League.

CritkeeperMay 15, 20142 votes

Even if melee carries were given the itemization and general class changes so that they could work in team fights, Tryndamere would promptly break his role because his gameplay patterns offer no counterplay to enemies when they work. Something about his kit has to change.

I'm not suggesting we turn him into a bruiser, but I am suggesting we change him so that it is actually possible for the live balance team to be fine with Tryndamere as a team fighter. I don't want Tryndamere to meet the same fate that poppy will.

It is more important to me that Tryndamere feel like a barbarian king and keep his theme intact than to be powerful or to even keep his ultimate or his crits. Obviously, I'd really really really like for him to keep all of that AND be able to team fight, but if it can't be done then I am willing to make sacrifices.

I'd be willing to lose cheesy crits at level 2 and 3, for example by swapping his ultimate and his passive. I'd be willing to lose his tower diving and dueling prowess, for example by replacing mocking shout with something that doesn't violate every rule in Zileas' list of anti-gameplay patterns. I'd be willing to lose his pubstomping ability by making him far more dependent on his allies plays rather than his enemies misplays, for example by making his ultimate tied to proximity rather than time elapsed and making it self silence for the duration.

Those are just examples. I just want Tryndamere to not have to skulk in the brush like a coward and only go in when he can pick someone off who can't defend themselves. He is a manly man. A manly man deserves gameplay patterns that manly men mean for manly men.

ThalesMay 15, 20141 votes

So... Olaf or Jax? To get what you ask, you will have to sacrifice every single thing you enjoy about Tryndamere. He will be gone, and a new champion, similar only in name and flavor, will take his place. His ult, especially, is a squishy's ult. What's a few extra seconds to someone who can withstand twenty seconds of focus fire and CC to begin with?

To make any melee ADC not just a splitpusher, they need to have a very powerful selfless form of utility. You could give him something like Wukong or Irelia's passives, but those don't work on a melee ADC, and would probably just leave him with a bunch of potential power he can't ever actually use. In League, melee ADCs are pretty shoehorned into being one of (a) light fighters, (b) assassins, or (c) problematic.

CritkeeperMay 15, 20141 votes

The ability to absorb punishment and crowd control can be a form of utility. 5 seconds is hardly enough time to absorb enough CC to justify Tryndamere's abysmal team fighting. I suggest making Tryndamere less effective during each second of his ultimate than he is with his current ultimate, by making it so that he can't cast spells while he is in undying rage but making it last much longer. In order to reinforce the idea that your counterplay to Tryndamere is to get out of his threat area for a couple seconds, I would just have undying rage last until there isn't an enemy champion within 300 range. That way, with a lot of support from his team, he can lumber foward in a ponderous manner and absorb tons of punishment and exert a very powerful zone of "GTFO", but he likely won't actually hit a squishy or anything important with his auto attacks.

Nameless VoiceMay 15, 20141 votes

I think Tryndamere's kit is very badly designed, offering almost no counterplay other than either "I am a champion who can kill him 1v1" or "I am a champion who will die if I go too near him".

He's "balanced" by his poor teamfighting ability and his huge vulnerability to CC, but he's not a well-designed or fun champion.

If you are a certain type of champion (generally a squishy with low mobility), then you can't fight him because he takes away all your attack damage, you can't run away from him because he can spin after you and is faster than you (plus, he can slow you if you try to run), and you can't kill him because he's unkillable and probably out-damages you. On the flip side of the coin, if you are someone who is tanky enough to survive him, or has enough CC to disable him, or are just in a teamfight with allies who can CC him - he's completely useless.

His gameplay pattern is to basically just push a lane as much as he can, and if he gets piled on or attacked too much, to just spin away, ulting if necessary, then recall, buy some items, and come back and do it again.

Also, as you said, he plays very much like a "coward", running away from fights, only attacking if he can smash someone weak, and basically just using his ultimate to run away instead of using it to make a devastating last stand - not very barbarian hero-like behaviour.