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(Rework concept) Mordekaiser the iron revenant

nelogis··3 votes·571 views

I know what you are thinking "not one of these again", yes I know I know, I have seen around 40 Mordekaiser rework ideas too. Some very good and some.... interesting let's say.

But give me a chance here alright if it is horrible just say it straight to my face I'm rather thick skinned.

So reworking Mordekaiser. First what are his actual problems? Why does he need a rework?

  • His general playstyle is very feast and famine. Which means he is very scary when ahead and literally the definition of useless when behind. Adding some cc to his kit or making him able to create chaos/distraction would be enough to lessen this effect so he can be useful outside of "tons of damage".
  • His playstyle is wonky. What I mean is the best way to play Mordekaiser is to build straight damage, which isn't a bad thing at all but you have to ask yourself "is this really Mordekaiser?“ Is Mordekaiser a pseudo ranged glascannon burst mage? Or a bulky undead front liner with a big ass maze ready unleash his tyranny.
  • He is way too reliant on his and the enemy team. If your team has no engage and the enemy has a peeling tank well you basically can't do anything in team fights. If your tank doesn't engage properly you can't do anything either. So adding some way to get in a fight outside of flash might be a good idea.
  • What role exactly is this guy? His W passive and R dragon says bot but he can't be played bot unless there is a Blitzcrank or Nauti support with him. Going into a solo lane is suboptimal since you are wasting your W passive and dragon power budget. I like that Riot tries to make role diversity but this isn't the right approach.
  • 200+ Bugs.... yeah..... and the Pizza/Dorito feet!

What should be the goal with the rework?

  • I have played some Mordekaiser (around 70 games or so) and the thing I have liked the most is the feeling of getting that 3rd Q off on a squishy. The "heaviness" of this spell is so satisfying and fits his character extraordinary well IMO. So heavy / high impact spells on longer cooldowns than usual. Not only does this allow for the opponent to see clear frames of power and vulnerability (a healthy back and forth in laning phase) but also rewards skilled players for using their abilities at the right time.
  • He is a Necromancer / Death knight that controls an army of the best fighters in whole Runeterran history. Outside of his existing ultimate and the dragon thing I don’t see this army. Changing the ultimate so it is actually a real army would not only look badass but also fit with his lore better.
  • Making him a pure solo laner. From what I have heard Mordekaiser mains didn’t really like this whole ADC thing Mordekaiser was forced into.
  • I always thought that his passive is a relatively unique way to survive in fights and would like to keep it that way. Rewarding aggressive playstyles, fitting to Mordekaiser.
  • Keeping the ability that he gets rewarded for taking down epic monsters (Harold/Dragon/Baron). I’m sorry but I don’t want to throw that flying mystic badass dragon away. Way too cool.
  • Making him more of a Juggernaut. Now if people still want to go full glascannon they still can. I want to keep the high ratios in his kit but going some tanky items will be needed since his spells won’t be instant anymore.
  • Still letting him be a hybrid champion. He is one of the few champions still able to go hybrid and it would truly be a bummer to throw that away.
  • Making him more of a late game oriented champion. I just thought that he would need some time to build an army so theoretically he should be more of a late game champion.

These are the points I want to address/keep with the rework so Mordekaiser still feels like Mordekaiser. Without further ado, here are the abilities:

Passive: Ironman

Mordekaiser shields himself for 10/25/40% of the damage dealt by his abilities, halved to against enemy minions and capped at 20/30/40% maximum health.

After leaving combat, Iron Man's shield decays at a rate of 1.5% base health per second down to a minimum of 5/10/15% maximum health.

Note: Pretty much unchanged outside of the numbers (Weaker early, stronger late game) and that abilities costs now can hit the shield instead of directly his health pool.

Q: Mace of Spades

Cost: 20/25/30/35/40 Damage Cooldown: 12/10/8/6/4 seconds

Mordekaiser's next three basic attacks deal bonus 10/15/20/25/30 (+20/40/60/80/100% AD) (+ 60% AP) magic damage. The third hit is the damage of the previous two combined. This spell resets the auto attack timer

Note: Also pretty much the same, just number changes. “Dude are you even going to change anything?” yeah yeah the next 3 spells are reworked.

W: Living armor

Cost 1: 30/40/50/60/70 Damage Cost 2: 60/65/70/75/80 Damage Cooldown 1: 16/14/12/8/6 seconds Cooldown 2: 25/22/19/16/13 seconds Cast radius: 700 Damage radius: 250

1: Mordekaiser may target an ally to give them a 60/80/100/120/140 (+60% AP) shield or target himself to double the active Ironman shield (before the damage cost). If the shield gets destroyed within 5 seconds after the cast it will explode and deal 30/50/70/90/110 (+50/60/70/80/90% AD) (+60% AP) magic damage around the unit.

2: Mordekaiser can select a champion and create a shield that blocks 50% of projectile damage and lasts for 4 seconds (90° cone). The shield will always face towards the selected champion and Mordekaiser gains 10/15/20/25/30% movement speed for 2 seconds if the shield gets hit.

Note: This ability is basically 2 abilities with 2 different costs and cooldowns. I imagined that the icon on the UI would be split in half and the cooldown was more of a bar than the circle thing.

E: Unstoppable Pursuit

Cost: 20/30/40/50/60 Damage Cooldown: 18/16/14/12/10 Cast radius: 800 Damage radius: 250

Mordekaiser charges forward and slams his maze into the ground dealing 20/40/60/80/100 (+100/110/120/130/140% bonus AD) (+60% AP) physical damage and slowing enemies hit for 20/30/40/50/60% for 2.5 seconds. Mordekaiser charges for 0.25 - 1 seconds depending on how far he casts this spell and becomes immune to cc while doing so.

R: Children of the Grave

Cost: Nothing Cooldown: 180/150/120 seconds Damage radius: 450

Passive: Mordekaiser collects souls upon killing large minions and monsters, champions and epic monsters. He can collect a maximum of 2/4/6 souls. Collecting a soul at maximum capacity will make it so if the soul is a higher rarity than a soul already stored then it will swap the soul with the least value one. The souls collected are portrayed underneath his health bar. Only one Epic soul can be stored at a time.

  • Weary soul (Large minions and monsters): Blue

  • 300/600/900 (+ 20% maximum HP) HP

  • 40/80/120 of each resistance

  • 50/100/150 (+30% AD) AD

  • 100% movement speed

  • Legendary soul (Champions): Orange

  • 500/1000/1500 (+40% maximum HP) HP

  • 100/150/200 (+20% (MR + Armor)) of each resistance

  • 100/170/240 (+60% AD) AD

  • 120% movement speed

  • Slow enemies on hit for 20% for 1 second

  • Epic soul (Harold/Baron/Dragon): Purple

  • 1000/2500/4000 (+100% maximum HP) HP

  • 100/200/300 (+50% (MR + Armor)) of each resistance

  • 150/250/350 (+100% AD) AD

  • 100% movement speed

  • Deals 200% damage to towers

Active: Mordekaiser slams his maze with both hands into the ground dealing 100/200/300 (+60/120/180% AD) (+90% AP) magic damage, slowing enemies hit for 20/40/60% for 3 seconds and summoning his collected souls. Souls prioritize champions then towers then monsters and minions and last for 20 seconds. Mordekaiser gains 20% movement speed when a soul is near him. All souls will be consumed and he will need to re-collect them after casting Children of the Grave.

Note: If there is nothing to kill, the liches start pushing down a lane like normal minions.

Playstyle

Mordekaiser is now a guy that wants to get in a fight and stay there as long as possible with his ult up (In a sense like Illaoi) and unleash terror upon the battlefield. He no longer is made of glass (well you still can be), follows up engages so perfectly like no other Juggernaut and keeps his groundthanks to his passive troughout the entire fight. His ability to engage a fight is no longer entirely team reliant because of the long range the E has and has some way to get to single targets outside of his E. If he choses not to fight then splitpushing with his ult is quite dangerous for the enemy team (especially if he has obtained an Epic soul).

The End

I thank you very much for reading through all of it and I would greatly appreciate any (if possible please constructive) critisism or feedback!

If you enjoyed this rework you might want to check out my champion concepts! (Yes I like to russel my own jimmies but who doesn't like to do that, like come on)

Champion concept (Battlemage): Mug'gri the hopes End Champion concept (Juggernaut): Beauty de Morknaut

Edit 1: Balance changes:

  • Passive nerfed: -5% less damage to shield ratio on all ranks
  • Q nerfed: -5% AD scaling off all ranks and -10% AP scaling on all ranks
  • E nerfed: -10% AP scaling on all ranks
  • R nerfed: +20 seconds cooldown on all ranks

4 Comments

DrWooga4 votes

Although I really want to see a change to Mordekaiser, I feel like this is just too much utility and power. He is pretty much a Yorick without his weaknesses. Giving a champion high damage and survival potential. Normally a Mordekaiser builds Gunblade and gets it about 10-12 min. Looking at scaling and utility his E seems like a fine ability to max first as Mordekaiser's Q is mostly used for farming. His Max level E with just Gunblade and assuming same stats as now at level 10 would do (338) Damage with a 60% slow on a 10 second cooldown. This ability is too good for a regular ability. That's not even talking about his ult which is one of the most busted abilities, a Mordekaiser with full AP build at level 18 can deal 1200 Damage with just the Damage portion. That's not talking about his souls. I really like the concept just need tweaks to Ratios.

nelogis1 votes

A Yorick is for sure better at splitpushing than Mordekaiser, you have to see that once he uses his ult the souls are gone and he needs to re-collect them (I will clarifiy that better). Getting blue ones is easy but they are pretty weak, yellow souls can only be optained from champion takedowns (kills or asissts) and I don't think he will be getting much champion kills without ever using his ultimate.

Yorick's ult in the other hand is always strong for pushing. The ult also generates other units and lasts until Yorick or the ult dies.

That is WAY better than Mordekaisers ult. He needs to collect high rarity souls for him to splitpush like a Yorick (and that is just for 20 seconds, pretty much only takes down a tower maybe 2, kinda like Nasus R but on a longer cooldown)

I don't think 338 damage every 10 seconds on an ability that needs charge up time and one of the most expensive items sounds busted (this is 33.8 DPS). This is also just total damage, not the damage after Armor mitigation (around 20%-35% less). So the ability would deal 220 - 270 damage.

Maxed Ornn W + auto does 31% max. HP magic damage without having any items (for comparison).

To be honest this damage is rather underwhelming (since the rest of the kit wont hit hard because still level 1) but it should be that way since he is designed to be a late game champion.

Which brings me to the next point: A Mordekaiser going FULL AP and level 18 should be dealing this amount of damage (Fiddle ult deals around 3500-4000 when going full AP). He reachd his late game and went pure damage this is intented, I wanted to keep the glascannon playstyle. if people wanted to build him that way. And this is total damage again, now Tanks have high MR and some squishies have a half MR item too (so 30%-50% less). Which mean around 840 - 600 damage (I know I haven't calculated in magic pen or void staff just add like 100-200 damage to that and that should be enough).

Also keep in mind that he needs to be in the middle of the enemy team.... as full ap, he wont be surviving long (this is late game so Tristana is going to wreck his face if he does that). It's like saying Nunu ult is busted when he charges it up in the middle of the enemy team, yes it would be if this was even remotely possible.

But in the end I guess we would actually need playtesting to see if the numbers ar alright. Hey and if you liked the kit then thats job well done for me! :D The numbers can be changed easily.

Bootleg Gay1 votes

In the end, I'm not seeing anything that stands out.

The passive cannot be anywhere near his current passive. It's not interactive, and you don't play around it the way one would play around other shields.

His Q, while satisfying, is probably only okay to stick around for the fact that the third hit is nice. Unfortunately, the rest of the ability isn't as fun, and would probably need to tie that "Heavy Hit" to a passive, with an active on the Q that interacts with his play style and the Q.

I'm really sorry to point this out, but his W, E, and R that you proposed are just not will designed. The ultimate alone if far too various in design and is an issue that old Yorick had. (Too many passive effects on minions.)

His E could not be permitted in the game. You want him to keep his super high damage, but a jump like that is both thematically unjust, and crosses a fine line. Gragas is similar, in that he has to be balanced around the dash, because with a little bit of extra damage, he'll only be played like an assassin. Instead, he's played more often as a diving tank, one that boasts more sustain that burst.

The proposed W is very similar to his current one, but it's mostly just a different shield. Still a shield though, and it's not a good about to make decisions on. (If he's a solo laner, obviously you're just gonna cast it on yourself then dash in, take no damage, then get another shield and walk out.)

What Mordekaiser needs is a reason to be picked. You've got the idea right in that "Raising an Army" is a good niche, especially with Dragons, it's gonna have to be his focal point, not just a complicated ultimate.

I hope you take this as constructive criticism. I want the best for Mord too (mostly cause I don't like playing against him), and I truly believe a healthy and fun playstyle could only be met by an amalgam of community work alongside Riot. Best of luck to you and your games with Mordekaiser.

nelogis1 votes

I agree that the passive right NOW is not interactive. By making Mordekaiser melee only howere his passive becomes much more interactive than it was. Right now you can't knock his passive shield down since he never leaves combat through damage from his shield or his E poke and you can't quite engage on him since his Q will shred your face HOWEVER when he is all melle this is looking completely different. First of all he needs to stack that shield, which means you are just letting him freely hit minions or you without ever retaliating (keep in mind he is weak in the early game). Next thing if he somehow manages to get a big passive shield up in the early game you can just let him push to your tower (unless you made a mistake and he can freeze it now) and wait until the out of combat thing triggers and his shield is going away, keep in mind he can't keep the shield active if all enemies are under a tower he is all melee now.

So I don't agree on the part of his shield being NOT interactive, especially if you compare it to some other passive shields in the game: Rakan Literally just gets a shield without doing anything or interacting with anything Yasuo Walks around to get a shield Malphite Just has to not take damage to get a shield

The Q thing you mentioned, well "fun" is a relative thing. I for myself enjoyed the ability a lot. All of the strikes felt impactful the last one was just even more impactful and more satisfying to use. Making this ability a one time use high impact thing that synergizes with a passive just makes him more of a burst mage assassin. To get the most use of this spell you would need to sit in a longer fight which fits exactly what a Juggernaut should be doing (Darius with his 5 stacks or Jax with the attack speed ramp up and his 3 hit thing). The rework around his Q (made by Riot) is well done to make him more of a Juggernaut so I kept it as it is (If it does too much damage then that is just number changes).

But I got 2 comments regarding the damage part so I will lower the damage overall in his kit.

The souls have like a single passive effect? The 20% slow on hit from yellow souls, the 200% damage to structures from purple ones isn't really something that has to do with enemy champions (And I thought that the Dragon soul would just be the Dragon itself same as Harold but without all the additional effects they have. The Baron would just be another Harold). I know the old Yorick (slow on that, heal on that, damage and movement speed on that) but this ult doesn't really feel like having the same problems as him.

You can't compare this to Gragas that well, when Gragas hits you with his dash he can just cast his whole cobo while you are stunned and knock everyone away while doing so that are trying to kill him.

Mordekaiser doesn't stun, his shield needs to get destroyed for it to do the damage, he has to auto 3 times with the Q to get the max damage off and doesn't knock people away that are trying to engage on him. Plus he can't charge and use flash to cheese like Gragas. If he goes full damage he is going to get popped after engaging all himself. But again these are just number changes and if need be I guess you could remove the cc immunity while charging but I thought that he needs this to stick to people since he has no burst or instant abilities anymore (Like Darius and you see how problematic that is)

Well yes the W is similar since I wanted him to still be Mordekaiser ^^ To be fair the only thing similar is that it does damage and shields him.

The old shield only does damage when you are near the other shielded guy (not good in solo lane), heals him and he can recast it whenever he wants.

This shield only does damage when it gets destroyed, he can ONLY shield himself when he has a passive shield up otherwise this is a non-castable ability on himself (since it doubles the passive shield and doesn't give him a new shield), he can't cast it on an ally and himself and it doesn't heal him. You say that he can cast this and go into a trade but you don't realize that this is a perfect indicator for the enemy that he shouldn't fuck with Mordekaiser right now. The same when Illaoi ults you, or Nasus ults or Jax having his attack speed fully stacked up or a Kog / Varus having a rageblade stacked up. If his shield is down that is the time you can engage on him and in my opinion this is a healthy back and forth in laning phase where both players have to keep track of that shield and manage it well (shield management explained above).

I don't think you understood the ability right but the other shield doesn't actually give him a shield. It's like a mini Braum shield that faces the selected champion (If the enemy laner is all melee than this ability is useless in laning phase).

You pick Mordekaiser for his game changing ultimate that creates chaos in the battlefield and the high ratios for his late game damage output and tankiness he can buy thanks to those high ratios. He scales way better into late than most Juggernauts who are strong Early or Mid game but for that his early game is pretty weak. I get that the ultimate might sound a bit wonky (truth be told I think this is going to be hard to code so the liches don't just switch aggro every 2 seconds)

I thank you very much for the feedback! Hope you can see where I thought the abilities would have counterplay to them and feel free to say otherwise if you think that I may have forgot to think something entirely through!

Edit: Forgot to comment on a point whops: I don't exactly understand what you mean with "not will designed" (english isn't my mother language).

Well that's pretty much everything I missed..... "cough" ehmm... this edit is pretty useless isn't it?...

Edit 2: Maybe adding an aggro mechanic to his ult (like the liches focusing the guy he has marked with his shield) might be an idea to make it less clunky. But a dragon and 5 liches smashing your face in doesn't sound that balanced so I kinda hoped that they would just split up and go like 2 liches on a champion and the rest goes onto another one unless Mordekaiser casted it when only a single champion is around of course (But then he has "wasted" a huge teamfight ult to kill a single guy).

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