[Champion Rework] Irelia, the Will of the Blades

Teridax68·2/26/2018, 2:49:40 PM·3 votes·6,789 views

Irelia is next on the update schedule, and while she's perhaps not the biggest outlier in the game right now, her progression through League has been an uneven one. Originally designed as the new model for fighter champions, along with Xin Zhao, she very quickly dominated games by being one of the few champions at the time to have a strong mix of crowd control, steroids, mobility and sustain. While that in itself is no longer unique in League's current state, many issues have remained: on the gameplay side, Irelia has always fallen a little flat, with a one-note playstyle that mostly boils down to jumping on a single target and throwing everything at them, until either she or her opponent dies. With her thematics, Irelia stands out for having unique visuals and an amazing core idea, that of a telekinetic blade master, yet delivers very little on any of this in practice. She could be so much more, which is why she deserves an update.

#Problem Statement: What's wrong with Irelia?

Her playstyle lacks interactivity: besides the basics of trading against a top laner and not letting her outscale, Irelia has very little in the way of truly interactive gameplay. When she's too strong, she can bully her opponent out of lane just by sticking around and farming, and her current power curve is dependent upon letting her reach that point eventually. Irelia needs to offer her opponents more opportunities to outplay her, if she wants to receive more power.
Her playstyle lacks depth: just as important as giving options to her opponents is Irelia giving her player options too. However, she doesn't really deliver in this regard either, as there is very little variation to how she plays or fights overall. There isn't really much she can do except throw herself at her target, and while that in itself could be interesting, the way in which she does so, i.e. by autoattacking and R-spamming them to death, isn't. She needs to offer her player more valid choices, and while she should still be able to forge ever onwards in a fight, that should not be the only thing she gets to do, nor should it be determined solely by how fed she is at the start.
She doesn't deliver on her thematic and gameplay niche: In many respects, Irelia's lore has actually aged fairly well, in that it has some identifiable and unique core elements (namely, her blades and her sheer force of will). However, her kit hasn't, and doesn't really stand out at anything in particular, nor does it really allow her to contribute in a manner different from most other fighters. Whichever elements that do stand out, such as her innate CC resistance or ranged blades, haven't really been implemented in a manner that feels fun for everyone, either.

#Iconic Features: What should Irelia keep?

Her telekinetic blades: At the core of Irelia's fantasy is her ability to wield weapons without physically holding them. If her VGU takes this away from her, the resulting champion wouldn't be Irelia.
Her willpower: Also essential to Irelia is her sheer force of will, which allows her not only to telekinetically manipulate her blades, but also made her bring herself back from the brink of death in her lore. We can see a bit of this in her current kit with her innate. Irelia should be one of the strongest-willed characters in League of Legends, if not the strongest, and her playstyle should reflect that.
Evening the odds: An underlying thematic to Irelia is that at least some part of her strength comes from playing at a disadvantage, as represented by her E. She is a champion who should feel good even when she seems to be losing a fight, because that's when she gets to unlock a portion of her strength.

#Goals: What should Irelia's rework achieve? The goals of an Irelia rework would probably vary depending on the designer and intention: with that in mind, I propose an updated kit below that aims to achieve the following goals:

Develop Irelia's theme as a willpower-fuelled, telekinetic blade warrior.
Give Irelia and her opponent more options in fights, and a greater diversity of fighting patterns.
Cement her niche as a resilient diver who can power through enemy front liners and murder the back line.

#The Kit: Before reading, please bear in mind any numbers here are placeholders and are not meant to reflect exact or balanced values.

I - Indomitable Spirit: While under any of the following circumstances:
Movement impaired when casting Bladesurge.
Casting impaired when casting Transcendent Blades (W, see below).
Attacking impaired when casting Equilibrium (E, see below).

Irelia breaks free from all crowd control effects and casts the ability, becoming immune to all subsequent crowd control for another 0.5 seconds. Indomitable Will has a 20-second cooldown, not reduced by cooldown reduction, and cools down 100% quicker for every nearby enemy champion who outnumbers her, stacking additively (1000 range).

Q - Bladesurge: Irelia dashes a fixed distance through the target enemy, dealing 0 / 25 / 50 / 75 / 100 (+ 100% AD) physical damage and applying on-hit effects. Bladesurge's dash distance (750 units) exceeds its cast range (500 units). If the target enemy dies within 1.5 seconds of Bladesurge being cast, it refunds 25 mana and fully refreshes its cooldown.
Range: 500 Cost: 50 mana Cooldown: 10 / 9 / 8 / 7 / 6
W - Transcendent Blades: Irelia throws out one of her blades at the target location, which remains there for up to 4 seconds. The blade deals 30 / 35 / 40 / 45 / 50% AD physical damage to all enemies it passes through, and once it arrives at its destination, it attacks an enemy in range at the rate of Irelia's attack speed, prioritizing champions, then large monsters, and dealing the same damage per hit (this does not apply on-hit effects). At the end of the duration, or upon using Bladesurge, all Transcendent Blades in the air return to Irelia after a short delay, dealing their damage to all enemies they pass through. Irelia can hold up to 4 charges of Transcendent Blades at a time.
Range: 750 Cost: 25 mana + 1 charge Recharge time: 18 / 16 / 14 / 12 / 10 Static cooldown in-between casts: 1 seconds
E - Equilibrium:
Passive: Each of Irelia's strikes against enemy champions (and large monsters?) grant her 10 Equilibrium, up to a maximum of 100, and Irelia loses 20 Equilibrium each second after being 4 seconds out of combat. At 100 Equilibrium, Irelia can use the ability's active component.
Active: Irelia instantly heals herself for 25% of her missing health. Additionally, her next basic attack within 4 seconds deals 40 / 60 / 80 / 100 / 120 (+ 50% bonus AD) bonus true damage, increased by 1% per 1% of the target's current health.
Cost: 100 Equilibrium Cooldown: 20 / 18 / 16 / 14 / 12
R - Immortal Will:
Passive: Upon taking fatal damage, Irelia remains in a downed state on the battlefield for 4 seconds, during which she can use Immortal Will's active. Scoring a takedown against an enemy champion during that state revives Irelia at 20 / 35 / 50% of her maximum health at the end of its duration.
Active: Irelia launches her blades into the air, which land at the target location after 1.5 seconds, dealing 200 / 350 / 500 (+ 100% bonus AD) true damage to all enemies in a small area.
Range: 1000

#Concerns: What could go wrong?

The numbers are almost certainly off. Irelia potentially getting a Cleanse every 4 seconds in a 1v5 through the above innate could be a terrifying experience.
Choosing total AD ratios instead of bonus AD ratios could potentially push Irelia towards building Sterak's Gage, which I don't feel entirely comfortable with, due to how it would dampen her intended weaknesses (exceptional vulnerability in-between casts) and windows of downtime.
I might have gone a little too hard on enabling comebacks in her kit, which could risk worsening her current issues where she feels impossible to truly set behind. Her potentially getting an even better GA via her ult might require the effect to be saddled with a very large cooldown (which might itself not help if Irelia gets bullied and needs a backup option).
Giving Irelia ranged damage in lane might make her an intense lane bully, and therefore annoying to fight against for champions with less range, especially those who would be affected most by her zoning. It might be helpful to give a health bar to her blades, so that hitting them could send them back early.
There might be a little bit too much true damage in her kit, particularly for a champion designed more to kill squishies. If I had to drop one, I'd change her E damage to physical or magical. I stayed away from a mix of physical, true and magical damage because I feel that might muddy counterbuilding against her, as it does now.

The TL;DR here is that the above Irelia kit would still be very autoattack-focused, and would still have some true damage, sustain, and mobility, but would trade off some immediate upfront power, plus her CC, in exchange for much better target access, more teamfighting strength, and more options when playing from behind. Irelia would become a better pusher and teamfighter, but a little less of a duelist, though she should nonetheless be especially scary against a squishy back line. What are your thoughts? If you main Irelia or have mained her in the past, how do you think her VGU should approach her, and what would you do differently compared to the above? On the off-chance that any Rioter happens to be reading through this: what do you think of the problem statements, core features, and goals, if not the kit?

[Champion Rework] Irelia, the Will of the Blades

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