Gameplay/Themes discussion - Irelia

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pretty much sums it all up.

Irelia is a champion with a weird/distorted identity. Why? Because she's an Ionian female soldier wielding epic hovering blades that should rip people shreds to shreds as she dashes around the battlefield, without giving up hope, with full determination.

BUT

Because of how her gameplay dictates her to do, she is instead, a SUB-TANK you bring out when the enemy team has 5 stuns.

Player 1: Hey, dude, wanna play irelia top?

Player 2: NAH, bro need stronk tank for top 4 mah rankd promotion, pick renek

Irelia: -sadface-

Irelia is a champion with distressed identity. She is supposed to be a fighter, but instead people build her TANK because guess what, her GAMEPLAY makes her build tank, otherwise she's irrelevant!

Irelia

the Will of the Blades

Primary: Fighter

Secondary: Assassin

See TANK up there? I don't see it.

Irelia's core gameplay is outdated and broken (from the repeated nerfhammers over the years). She is supposed to fit the fantasy of an epic, stalwart, swift fighter dashing over the battlefield, unrestrained with her tenacity to prevent her from being killed. HOWEVER, how she is ACTUALLY played as, she is INSTEAD a TANK that people use to do initiation and use Randuins for AoE slow. Where's the fantasy of an epic aerial blade-wielding feminine that cuts and dashes her way into the battlefield? OH right, it's INEFFECTIVE because at her current state, she needs to be a TANK to do ANYTHING, because unless she snowballs, she CANNOT build FAST enough to deal DAMAGE and thus FIT her DESIGNED ROLE of FIGHTER.

Irelia's play patterns go like this

dash > auttoattack > pray someone will let you autoattack them for 3 seconds, without getting hit by damage > pray that person dies so you have a second dash to get in further/get out

See the problem? Irelia is reliant on autoattacking. Thus, she is reliant on being in MELEE form with only TENACITY (WHICH HAS NO EFFECT IF YOU GOTTA STOP AND AUTOATTACK, LAWL) as defence. Thus, people build tank so she is actually playable. This is saddening because not only Irelia is mistreated in the past (as well as being outdated in terms of gameplay) she is not even ABLE to LIVE up to her fantasy that she is supposed to uphold. Its time to change this.

My suggestion: MOVE IRELIA AWAY FROM "gotta snowball or build tank" to "gotta be skillful, gotta be agile, gotta be fast". Sorta like Fiora, or Riven (bad example, I know) where they can build AD and still be successful. Irelia is not fun to play when you have to auttoattack someone for FIVE FULL SECONDS in order for them to get remotely damaged. And who in their stupid minds would let you hit them free for 5 SECONDS? People with instability issues, you know.

Passive - her core identity. Lest never change. #ForeverIrelia

Q - shouldn't be 99.98% of Irelia's damage (because lets face it, you're gonna get only 2 auttoattacks on the person you dashed on right after), instead, give power to R and/or W. Maybe, give (insert scaling here)/120 Attack Damage shield (+0.4 bonus AD) for 2 seconds if tanking becomes a problem? I dunno. Either way, she probably lacks scaling. And an ultimate that everyone barely cares to dodge away from does not count in this.

W - either needs a complete overhaul or be stronger. It has no scaling. I repeat. In 2014, it has no scaling. My thoughts are that it could maybe.. be a mini-R where you can instead get more projectiles to skillshot-passthrough throw, or make her range longer like Aatrox's ultimate (on a smaller radius)? Either way, something needs to be changed about this skill. Need innovations here. It's her backup power that people use for ~1.5 seconds or less (if they're lucky enough to get that many hits, the skill lasts for 6 seconds lawl)

E - Maybe instead of bottlenecking Irelia to be tank to be viable (SNOWBALL OR TANK, OR LOSE!), she can be given instead an AP SHIELD <------ (with AP ratios, of course) whenever she procs stun (i.e her HP less than her opponent). Thoughts?

R (Ultimate) - Needs power. POWER. This is Irelia's core fantasy, to be able to swing deadly blades around. Needs to be much stronger (as it's skillshot) with maybe more range. Instead of Irelia dash > autoattack (yeah I know, the most exciting gameplay pattern ever) she should be reliant on her ultimate to deal damage. Not saying that they should give her Syndra-tier burst, but it needs to have more power spreaded out to the point where she activates it, people actually cares to dodge the four blades she flings at them.

Less tank. More risk. More rewards. That's how Irelia (a fighter) should be.

That's my thought on it anyways. Anyone with ideas, contribute! What do you think Irelia's purpose is, and what would you like to see done in order for her to become that light fighter - blade summoning agile warrior she is supposed to be?