Mordekaiser: That spiky metal guy no one plays (rework)
It's been on my mind lately that some champions really don't live up to their lore. Malphite is an example. A living mountain who in game is no more than 3 feet taller than Teemo, a squirrel. That being said, he's still a fun champion and fits well into league. On the other hand, we have Mordekaiser. In lore he's an ancient Warlord that can take on armies and is nearly unkillable due to his liches reincarnating him using his skeleton. In game he falls short. but unlike Malphite, he's got one of the lowest play rates and win rates. Although for a while i mained him, there's no doubt he's a toxic champion. Here's how i plan on fixing that.
If there's any role of champion that could suit Mordekaiser well, It's a juggernaut. Riot was bang on with that. But the only builds that work on him are full AP builds due to high scalings on most abilities (specifically his Q). I have no problem with an AP juggernaut, but there needs to be a way to fix this idea that hes built full damage without nuking his scalings. Enter Iron man, possibly my favourite idea for a passive in the game. a shield that scales off of HP and gains strength by dealing damage. By shifting power into this from his other a abilities, you get something that you can truly base his kit around. similar to Aatrox's bloodwell. With that being said, lets move on to the kit.
Passive: Iron Man Instead of a resource bar like mana or energy, Mordekaiser uses his own HP to cast abilities like Aatrox or Mundo. To compensate for HP costs he gains a shield where the two examples have ways of healing. Mordekaiser's shield currently scales off of 25% max HP. Not many changes to the actual ability itself here, but his other abilities will have more interaction with it. For now I've decided that a shield for 100-200 depending on level + somewhere between 30% and 50% bonus HP would be adequate. I say 30% to 50% because I'm not sure how strong it would be without a way to test. This encourages purchasing HP items, due to the base shield being be very weak come mid game.
Q: Mace of spades This is my bread and butter damage ability. Similar to the current Mordekaiser. Passively, Mordekaiser gains bonus resistances when he hits an enemy with his Q. This effect will be similar to Graves in a way but stacks infinitely. That being said, these bonuses are very small early game. a scaling of 3/4/5/6/7 Armour and MR per stack would be appropriate. The active component grants his next 3 auto attacks special effects. Each deals bonus damage, preferably Hybrid scaling. Not as high as the live Mordekaiser however. But also heals him when he kills a unit for a percentage of Mordekaiser's missing health upon impact with his Q (once again, no way to test this out but maybe 15% and only 1/5 the healing on creeps). The idea behind this is to have a spammy ability that gives him sustained damage against his target and tankiness that compliments his HP stacking. CD: 7/6/5/4/3. Converts all auto attack damage into Magic damage.
W: Harvester of sorrow More tank, less BS heal in lane, less damage. Probably the most interactive ability in his current kit, but nonetheless unhealthy as all hell. I'm removing the EXP bonus component because he just screams solo lane or jungle in my mind, removing heal from this because his Q already provides enough. This ability provided sustained damage in an AOE around him, which i liked, but is bland. Instead I think a slow AOE Magic resist shread would suit him better. you activate the ability and for 3/3.5/4/4.5/5 seconds the enemy MR is shredded by 3% every 0.5 seconds. Up to 18/21/24/27/30% at max rank. Once again the numbers are up to the balance team. I don't have any way of testing. CD: 16/14/12/10/8.** Deals no damage.**
E: Siphon of destruction Honestly I like this ability quite a bit as is. It's fairly unique ability and the shield it generates is perfect. maybe a little less due to this reworks shield being much larger than the current one. I still think this should remain the same. Maybe modify the damage numbers a little bit but other than that it seems perfect to me. CD: 6/5.75/5.5/5.25/5. This is the live CD of the current E. Deals magic damage.
R: Angel of death Okay, so if anything in this kit is bound to be broken, it's going to be this. In the lore, he reincarnates when he dies. I absolutely love this. now i want this to be special because there are already a fair amount of them in the game already. But since it's his bones that are responsible for his rebirth, how about this. When Mordekaiser dies, his bones are scattered around in an area (not too large, but far enough so it's a little bit out of the way) And allies need to step on them for 3 seconds each (I'm thinking 3 pieces to his skeleton) and after all 3 have been collected Mordekaiser will rise again from the spot he died. This provides something really unique and provides loads of counterplay. You see the bones of the enemy Mordekaiser laying about, wait in a bush nearby for an unsuspecting victim. These bones will be visible through the fog of war. Enemies cannot destroy them however. if the bones are not collected in 12/18/24 seconds, Mordekaiser will die, or if he respawns before the time runs out, he will be back at the fountain. This ult punishes being caught out heavily and not grouping late game. which pushes him to be great in teamfights. Now I know it may not be the best option but I believe this ult should be activated upon death no matter what. It will prevent the "well I could've won that if I didn't fat finger flash when trying to ult" and will punish you for dying early game. I want a low cooldown late game as this will really make full use of it. Last minute thought, a global laugh would be awesome when it activates. CD: 130/90/50 Deals no damage
Note: It's also obvious Mordekaiser needs a visual update. I trust the squad over at Riot is working on that now. Because Mordekaiser has potential to look absolutely insane. along with a cold metallic voice, there wouldn't be another champ I'd play. Any comments and or criticism are greatly appreciated.