Nocturne Rework Idea

**Multiple Disclaimers : **

• These are just ideas for reworks in case Riot is planning one for the Champions I post these about. The goal of these posts is to hopefully give ideas and/or a direction for the champions compared to where they are now in the game. I sincerely hope these are at least taken into consideration as I believe they would change the champions I mentioned for the better, especially since the characters I mention usually have very one dimensional, outdated kits compared to more recent champions.

• I have not mentioned any numbers of durations, damage, or spells widths, etc. because I believe that numbers are only for balance purposes. Any champion can become overpowered or completely useless just with number changes, even the most one dimensional champions, and to assess whether a champion can be interesting to play and interact with or against, numbers are relatively irrelevant in comparison to the actual kit ideas, strengths and weaknesses.

• I would like these posts to become discussions, as I think it could be very interesting to see opinions on my ideas and how to make them better, what makes them completely unusable or anything in between, as long as these discussions involve constructive criticism.

Abilities : P : Dark Mist : Nocturne’s mist increases his Movespeed, Attack Damage and fears opponents if they stay long enough inside. Enemies feared once can’t be feared again for some time. Enemies have limited vision in the Mist. The Mist acts like a bush for Nocturne, not for his teammates. Nocturne gains attack speed against feared enemies. Q : Mist Bringer : Same as old Q but instead of dusk trail, Mist Trail. W : Shadow Shroud : Spell shield, when proc'd releases Dark Mist in a radius around him. E : Umbral Slash : AOE AA around him that heals 100% of the damage done, procs on hit effects. R : Umbral Assault : Same ult, drops Dark fog near in front of him.

Ideas behind the abilities :

Nocturne’s strength lies in the fear he instills in his enemies. To put it simply, if his enemies are afraid of him, he has the advantage, but if they act fast and decisively, they can avoid the crowd control and avoid the punishment from Nocturne’s attack speed boost.

The core component of these abilities, the Dark Mist passive, could also be a lore explanation of the mist we see during the Harrowing, which means that Nocturne could be a part of the Shadow Isles wink wink.

Like Akali, he would be able to put threat zones with his “shrouds”, and pressure opponents with zones covered by his Mist but unlike the latter doesn’t get safety in his shroud and has to all in once his setup is traversed.

As the usual assassin has a gap closer and/or an escape move to move in, kill, move out, Nocturne falls out of the mold and creates a semi unique playstyle of zoning people with more utility and cc possibilities, all the while having kill potential if his setups are well positioned.

In the cinematic “A Twist of Fate”, we see Ryze leaving Nocturne’s mist feared, running for his life while nocturne pursues him. But when Nocturne becomes too arrogant in pursuit of his scared prey, the tables turn as Ryze returns to normal and proceeds to body him. After watching that cinematic for the first time I thought that Riot didn’t really show what he was capable of to put a spotlight on Ryze’s spell slinging prowess. But I now realise that this can be used to show just how powerful he can be when used right, in comparison to when he is used wrong.

In summary, Nocturne’s base stat boosts from his abilities and “AD carry” like capabilities give him a scary front and entices the player to play aggressively, but when in an encounter, Nocturne’s fragility and lack of defensive abilities make him a sheep in wolf’s clothing. The idea is to play around his Mist and make sure he doesn’t over step his boundaries to properly enact his position as a zoning assassin.

Difference between old/new Nocturne :

As he currently stands, Nocturne is a strong champion in league, being able to jungle with great success. These changes only make his playstyle more versatile, therefore making his late game less painful with more possibilities for escaping and fighting enemies.

The main difference between the ability set up I’ve proposed and the one he currently has is that he would be more mobile generally without relying on a type of stasis to reliably apply pressure on the backline, which is an assassin’s job.

As where he currently is an initiation type of champion with his disorienting ultimate, he doesn’t have much he can do if he can’t one shot the enemy carry. He would therefore try to brute force his way to the backline without means of escape and a frail frame, relying on stasis effects, revives or flash to get out of a difficult situation or a cheesy one shot tactics to make himself work, unlike most assassin’s nowadays who have one or more escape tools, which also doesn’t fit his thematic of being a looming nightmare. This problematic way of initiating on his targets would also in some cases make him build tankier, which defeats the whole purpose of an assassin.

With this new ability set up, the idea is to take as much of what made him a pursuing assassin and put it into a safer and more adaptable kit, with more fear setups, keeping that as a part of his speciality, as well as being deadlier to feared targets.