Kayn Shadow Assassin Change

CleverIGN·Feb 27, 2019·2 votes·2,461 views

The Passive should show the amount of damage kayn will for the first 3 seconds, its confusing the way its written and makes it hard to anticipate how much damage you will do when you engage. As is its a sloppy description with no clarity.

Kayn deals 12% − 44% (based on level) of post-mitigation damage dealt against enemy champions as Ability power bonus magic damage, lasting for 3 seconds upon entering in combat with an enemy champion, refreshing after 8 seconds out-of-combat with them or by using Umbral Trespass Umbral Trespass.

Where is this number being pulled from? if it exists we should be able to see what that number is so we can accurately assess our current strength.

If I have a misinterpretation of this ability and why it can't be shown as a constant then please let me know Or if you agree with me leave your thoughts.

19 Comments

VyntriusFeb 27, 20191 votes

The shadow assassin passive makes perfect sense. Your post, on the other hand, makes absolutely no sense.

HilsunFeb 27, 20191 votes

{quoted}

The shadow assassin passive makes perfect sense. Your post, on the other hand, makes absolutely no sense.

The passive does make sense--that doesn't mean it's not lacking clarity. I understand OP just fine.

VyntriusFeb 27, 20191 votes

{quoted}

The passive does make sense--that doesn't mean it's not lacking clarity. I understand OP just fine.

How is it lacking clarity? It's written fine as is. Besides, it's not like he's offering a better way to write it. How do you understand the OP just fine when he's saying things like this: "The Passive should show the amount of damage Kayn will for the first 3 seconds" (It does?) "Where is this number being pulled from? if it exists we should be able to see what that number is so we can accurately assess our current strength." (Wdym where it's pulled from, it's based on his level? You ARE able to see what number it is.)

HilsunFeb 27, 20192 votes

You're able to see what the percentage is, but I imagine OP is looking for a specific number per skill/attack. I don't see why it would be so confusing/difficult to add a tooltip in each skill to denote the amount of bonus magic damage each one is capable of based on the % denoted in the passive. You can include auto-attack bonus damage in the passive itself.

CleverIGNFeb 28, 20193 votes

This is exactly what im talking about, why would it be impossible to do? The number is already calculated in the system when you do the damage or use an ability, just let us see it so we can plan our engages better.

HilsunFeb 28, 20191 votes

Well I now understand--after some unnecessarily complicated digging/conversing--that the bonus magic damage works differently than just dealing flat bonus magic damage based on the damage of your abilities--it is essentially flat damage that is first mitigated by armor, and then also mitigated by MR. In another example from my discussion with Vyniadus, I pointed out that it IS technically possible to show a flat number; the trouble is accurately explaining in a concise way that the shown number is first mitigated by armor, and then by MR, because most damage in this game isn't affected by both armor and MR. Is there an easy, simple way to denote that information? I'm not sure.

Essentially it works like this: the bonus magic damage is calculated by how much damage your attacks/abilities actually do, which means that number will be affected by armor; however, that resulting bonus magic damage number will THEN be affected by MR. For example:

Max level W deals 270 physical damage without bonuses, so you would expect the max-level Shadow Assassin passive to add +119 magic damage. However, against someone with 100 armor (50% resist) Your level 5 W will only deal 135 damage, so it won't deal 135 + 119, even though 119 is 44% of 270. Instead, the bonus magic damage dealt is only 59 (44% of 135). This 59 magic damage is then subject to magic resistance, so against someone with 100 armor and also 100 MR, that's another 50% resistance, making the final number for the bonus magic damage a mere 29 (50% of 59).

In the end, I do think there is still benefit to seeing the flat bonus damage (119 in my example) even if it's going to be reduced by armor, and then MR. I don't suppose it would be too difficult to say: "Shadow Assassin: Deal an additional (+119) damage, reduced first by armor and then by magic resist."

CleverIGNFeb 28, 20191 votes

Exactly even something like that would be helpful. So you can get a base. I'm a numbers guy not a feeling guy but I also don't have the time to sit there and try to calculate the amount of extra damage lol. I've gotten over zealous plenty of times in the game and didn't do quite enough as I thought I would. Some would argue this makes me a bad Kayn, I would say I have learning to do. Thanks for all the clarification on the passive itself it does help me understand the way it works but it should give us just slightly more information

HilsunFeb 27, 20191 votes

I agree with this, for the most part. I think it would be helpful to have a real-time number appear for each ability to demonstrate how much bonus magic damage our skills will do if we're in Assassin form. That way we're more easily able to clearly understand our damage potential. It could look like:

Q: "Both the dash and strike deal 140 (+65) physical damage.

Shadow Assassin: Deals (66) bonus magic damage."

That's all it would need.

VyntriusFeb 27, 20191 votes

{quoted}

I agree with this, for the most part. I think it would be helpful to have a real-time number appear for each ability to demonstrate how much bonus magic damage our skills will do if we're in Assassin form. That way we're more easily able to clearly understand our damage potential. It could look like:

Q: "Both the dash and strike deal 140 (+65) physical damage.

Shadow Assassin: Deals (66) bonus magic damage."

That's all it would need.

No, this change would only make Shadow assassin Kayn's passive MORE confusing. First of all, you can't just put "Deals X bonus magic damage" on all of Kayn's abilities because it is only against champions and only for the first few seconds of combat. If you just added this while keeping Kayn's passive the same, it would make it seem like that the passive and this bonus damage on abilities are different things. It's not like you can remove the shadow assassin's passive either, because it's supposed to also buff auto attacks and you need it in order to keep track of when it's back up. Imagine if you put "Heals for X% of damage dealt to champions" on all of Rhaast's abilities. Completely redundant and unnecessary, right? There is absolutely no need to change shadow Kayn's passive.

HilsunFeb 27, 20192 votes

{quoted}

Imagine if you put "Heals for X% of damage dealt to champions" on all of Rhaast's abilities. Completely redundant and unnecessary, right?

You're right, I completely agree--adding healing information to Rhast's abilities would be clunky and confusing, considering his heals aren't flat heals and are, rather, based on the damage he deals to enemies/monsters, which will differ vastly based on armor numbers etc. Totally unworkable.

Shadow Assassin's passive is not like that--it's a flat magic damage amount based on a varying percentage of your damage based on level. And while magic resist will cause this number to fluctuate, not providing the base numbers for this damage because of MR variability is about as reasonable as not providing the base numbers of any other abilities. Just because it's not true damage doesn't mean the numbers aren't helpful to know your champion's capabilities.

{quoted} There is absolutely no need to change shadow Kayn's passive.

No one's asking to change the passive. We're just asking for a display to be included to show how much bonus damage we're doing. :V

VyntriusFeb 27, 20191 votes

{quoted}

I agree with this, for the most part. I think it would be helpful to have a real-time number appear for each ability to demonstrate how much bonus magic damage our skills will do if we're in Assassin form. That way we're more easily able to clearly understand our damage potential. It could look like:

Q: "Both the dash and strike deal 140 (+65) physical damage.

Shadow Assassin: Deals (66) bonus magic damage."

That's all it would need.

Another problem with this that I forgot to mention is that the bonus damage Kayn's passive deals isn't constant like you make it seem. It's based on post-mitigation damage, so the amount of bonus damage you get from Kayn's passive depends on how much armor your target has.

HilsunFeb 27, 20192 votes

I already addressed this above.

{quoted} And while magic resist will cause this number to fluctuate, not providing the base numbers for this damage because of MR variability is about as reasonable as not providing the base numbers of any other abilities. Just because it's not true damage doesn't mean the numbers aren't helpful to know your champion's capabilities.

Essentially: the bonus damage starts out as a flat amount, and that amount is helpful to know.

VyntriusFeb 27, 20191 votes

{quoted}

I already addressed this above.

Essentially: the bonus damage starts out as a flat amount, and that amount is helpful to know.

The damage isn't a flat amount, as I already told you it's based on POST MITIGATION damage. Imagine a level 18 Shadow Kayn with no items. His w will do 135 physical damage to a target with 100 armor, and 90 damage to a target with 200 armor. Therefore, his passive will give 59 bonus magic damage against the 100 armor target and 40 bonus magic damage to the 200 armor target. Why are you even trying to argue with a Diamond Kayn OTP? If I say Shadow Kayn's passive doesn't need more clarity, then it doesn't.

HilsunFeb 27, 20192 votes

Well if it's post-mitigation damage, then yes, that's true! That would make the number calcs as complicated as the Rhaast healing. But I can't find anywhere that specifies it's "pre-mitigation"; is that just implied by "percentage of all damage dealt to champions"? At that point it's an interpretation issue, and I suppose that's where the clarity of its functionality is lacking. :0

However...could the bonus damage then not be denoted as magic damage that is mitigated by armor? It technically could be denoted as a flat number, it's just magic damage mitigated by armor rather than by MR. Using your example: W's base damage is 270, so the bonus magic damage if dealt unmitigated is 119.34. Therefore, the bonus damage lines up perfectly with your example, because against an enemy with 100 armor (50% damage reduction) the bonus magic damage would be 59. And against someone with 200 armor--you guessed it--it'd be 40 again if you take the flat number (119.34) and divide by 3 for the 66.66% reduction.

So even if the tooltip said "Shadow Assassin: Gains (+119) magic damage against champions, affected by armor" I would STILL prefer that over not saying anything.

{quoted}

Why are you even trying to argue with a Diamond Kayn OTP? If I say Shadow Kayn's passive doesn't need more clarity, then it doesn't.

You lost me there. Your point is better made if you stick with the facts (pre-mitigated damage isn't flat damage) rather than fallacies (I'm a high-ELO player therefore I know everything).

VyntriusFeb 27, 20191 votes

{quoted}

Well if it's post-mitigation damage, then yes, that's true! That would make the number calcs as complicated as the Rhaast healing. But I can't find anywhere that specifies it's "pre-mitigation"; is that just implied by "percentage of all damage dealt to champions"? At that point it's an interpretation issue, and I suppose that's where the clarity of its functionality is lacking. :0

However...could the bonus damage then not be denoted as magic damage that is mitigated by armor? It technically could be denoted as a flat number, it's just magic damage mitigated by armor rather than by MR. Using your example: W's base damage is 270, so the bonus magic damage if dealt unmitigated is 119.34. Therefore, the bonus damage lines up perfectly with your example, because against an enemy with 100 armor (50% damage reduction) the bonus magic damage would be 59. And against someone with 200 armor--you guessed it--it'd be 40 again if you take the flat number (119.34) and divide by 3 for the 66.66% reduction.

So even if the tooltip said "Shadow Assassin: Gains (+119) magic damage against champions, affected by armor" I would STILL prefer that over not saying anything.

You lost me there. Your point is better made if you stick with the facts (pre-mitigated damage isn't flat damage) rather than fallacies (I'm a high-ELO player therefore I know everything).

Oh my god stop embarrassing yourself. Shadow Kayn's passive is reduced by both armor AND magic resistance. When I said Kayn's passive would give you 59 or 40 bonus damage, that's before taking magic resistance into account. Even if Kayn's passive was reduced by only armor or magic resist and not both, I would still be against the completely unnecessary change you're proposing. Completely pointless clutter, knowing the percent damage boost is good enough on its own.

How is it a fallacy to bring up the fact that I have way more authority than you on this subject? Once you get 830k+ mastery points on Kayn, maybe I'll give your opinion more weight.

HilsunFeb 27, 20192 votes

{quoted}

Shadow Kayn's passive is reduced by both armor AND magic resistance.

Ok. So where does it say that? That's kind of OP's point, and the longer this conversation continues, the stronger his point becomes--the Shadow Assassin passive is unclear.

{quoted}

How is it a fallacy to bring up the fact that I have way more authority than you on this subject? Once you get 830k+ mastery points on Kayn, maybe I'll give your opinion more weight.

It's called Appeal to Authority.

Not everyone is a diamond tier Kayn player with hundreds of games played and an intuitive sense of how much damage you'll be doing. "Because I understand it, it doesn't need to be made clearer for anyone" is not an effective argument toward someone stating that they don't understand it and who is almost guaranteed to be a less experienced Kayn player than you.

If anything, your vast experience with Kayn does the opposite in this instance: it eliminates you from having an unbiased opinion on matters of clarity, because you have put in a ton of time and experience with it to understand how it works. But it shouldn't require diamond-level Kayn players to understand the passive, and that's the point.

VyntriusFeb 27, 20191 votes

{quoted}

Ok. So where does it say that? That's kind of OP's point, and the longer this conversation continues, the stronger his point becomes--the Shadow Assassin passive is unclear.

It's called Appeal to Authority.

Not everyone is a diamond tier Kayn player with hundreds of games played and an intuitive sense of how much damage you'll be doing. "Because I understand it, it doesn't need to be made clearer for anyone" is not an effective argument toward someone stating that they don't understand it and who is almost guaranteed to be a less experienced Kayn player than you.

If anything, your vast experience with Kayn does the opposite in this instance: it eliminates you from having an unbiased opinion on matters of clarity, because you have put in a ton of time and experience with it to understand how it works. But it shouldn't require diamond-level Kayn players to understand the passive, and that's the point.

What do you mean "where does it say that"? The wording of Shadow Kayn's passive makes it very clear that it's reduced by both armor and magic resistance. "For the first 3 seconds of champion combat, deal X percent of all damage dealt to champions as bonus magic damage". "X percent of all damage dealt to champions" is clearly reduced by armor, similar to how the Darkin's passive of "Heal for X percent of spell damage dealt to champions" is also reduced by armor. Since the passive deals bonus magic damage and not bonus true damage, it is further reduced by magic resistance. The length of this conversation proves nothing except your lack of common sense.

I'm literally just going to quote the page you linked to make the point I was going to make anyways: "Be very careful not to confuse "deferring to an authority on the issue" with the appeal to authority fallacy. Remember, a fallacy is an error in reasoning. Dismissing the council of legitimate experts and authorities turns good skepticism into denialism. The appeal to authority is a fallacy in argumentation, but deferring to an authority is a reliable heuristic that we all use virtually every day on issues of relatively little importance. There is always a chance that any authority can be wrong, that’s why the critical thinker accepts facts provisionally. It is not at all unreasonable (or an error in reasoning) to accept information as provisionally true by credible authorities. Of course, the reasonableness is moderated by the claim being made (i.e., how extraordinary, how important) and the authority (how credible, how relevant to the claim)." I'm not just saying my authority on the topic and nothing else, that would be a fallacy. I'm also giving reasons for my claim.

But you're right, it shouldn't take a Diamond Kayn main to understand how the Assassin passive works. Good thing it doesn't, since I've understood how it works ever since the champion was released. This was when I was still gold, and Kayn was the main reason I was motivated to get to Diamond.

HilsunFeb 27, 20192 votes

The only time Appeal to Authority is NOT a fallacy is when your expertise actually has a bearing on the topic at hand speaking with individuals who make counter-claims with none of the required experience to understand the topic. As you duly noted for me, you understood how the passive worked before you got to Diamond, therefore agreeing with me that stating your ranked status is a moot point. The topic at hand is "passive description clarity," which is something that should be understood immediately by anyone reading it with a basic familiarity of League of Legends, regardless of rank.

Your ability to personally comprehend information does not suggest the information was presented optimally. If people are having trouble understanding (which this whole thread is evidence of) then the description could be revised, or information could be added to provide further clarity.

To my (limited) knowledge, there are not a lot of similar, pre-mitigation effects in LoL, so expecting every LoL player to understand 1) pre-mitigation language and 2) how exactly that mechanic functions is hopeful at best, or ignorant at worst. What your argument essentially boils down to is: "there's no need to clarify because I personally understand it." What's the point of posting at all to a thread where someone says "I don't understand" if all you're adding to the conversation is "well you should understand"? That's not a rhetorical question.

VyntriusFeb 27, 20191 votes

{quoted}

The only time Appeal to Authority is NOT a fallacy is when your expertise actually has a bearing on the topic at hand speaking with individuals who make counter-claims with none of the required experience to understand the topic. As you duly noted for me, you understood how the passive worked before you got to Diamond, therefore agreeing with me that stating your ranked status is a moot point. The topic at hand is "passive description clarity," which is something that should be understood immediately by anyone reading it with a basic familiarity of League of Legends, regardless of rank.

Your ability to personally comprehend information does not suggest the information was presented optimally. If people are having trouble understanding (which this whole thread is evidence of) then the description could be revised, or information could be added to provide further clarity.

To my (limited) knowledge, there are not a lot of similar, pre-mitigation effects in LoL, so expecting every LoL player to understand 1) pre-mitigation language and 2) how exactly that mechanic functions is hopeful at best, or ignorant at worst. What your argument essentially boils down to is: "there's no need to clarify because I personally understand it." What's the point of posting at all to a thread where someone says "I don't understand" if all you're adding to the conversation is "well you should understand"? That's not a rhetorical question.

First of all, I just explained why the information is already presented optimally? Literally the only things you need to know in order to understand Kayn's passive is that armor reduces physical damage and magic resist reduces magic damage. If you know these things but still can't understand his passive, don't blame Riot for a lack of clarity.

Second of all, why are you mentioning "pre-mitigation effects" when Kayn's passive has NOTHING to do with pre-mitigation?

Thirdly, are you even going to suggest how to change the wording of Kayn's passive since I showed you why your first suggestion doesn't work? Basically the only thing I could think of changing with Shadow Kayn's passive is adding "(post mitigation)" after "all damage dealt to champions", but even that doesn't feel necessary. Rhaast's passive doesn't need to clarify that it heals off of post-mitigation damage, right? Because that should already be intuitive, and adding "post-mitigation" might just confuse new players. Shadow Kayn's passive isn't any less clear than Rhaast's.

Regarding your whole appeal to authority thing, rank and champion experience isn't necessarily a moot point on this topic just because I happened to understand Kayn's passive when I was Gold. Rank and champion experience also signifies that I probably have the game knowledge to know when an ability description is as accurate, concise and clear as possible. If people are still having trouble understanding it, that is 100 percent on them.