Total Akali Overhaul
Reposting because I left out a VERY crucial thing and a would rather anyone who already saw it look again with the crucial thing in place.
TL;DR VERSION: Akali doesn't feel like a ninja. I set out to change that. Scroll down to the headers if you don't want to read my in-depth reasons for coming up with this rework.
Akali has lost her identity, if you ask me. In fact, I daresay she never had it. She's never felt very much like a "ninja" to me at all... Katarina feels more like a ninja, to be honest. Back when Akali was relevant, she felt more like a close-range caster to me. Now she just feels like a situational gimmick champion; someone who has an ultimate and little else. She has absolutely no laning power; everything comes from her ability to hold on until she gets her ult. In other words, she's not really an "active" champion, and that means she can be boring to play for the majority of a game. I think the proof of this is that no one really plays her much these days.
I think I feel like I know what Riot intended for her laning phase. She's an assassin, so she's supposed to deal her damage in bursts, not in pokes. Thus they gave her very little damage, even as far as abilities go. The problem is, she has SO little poke that she basically can't lane against anyone. Squishies tend to have range that she doesn't have, allowing them to back her off all day, while bruisers can get in her face and demolish her. Further, her stealth (a ninja's forte, by theme) is ONLY useful for complementing her ult in teamfights. Except for those rare cases in which you couple it with a flash or the like, it's pointless. You can't use it to get in and out in laning phase, because enemies will just need to stand at the edge of her smoke nearest to her tower. They know she'll either run back that way and reveal herself in front of them, or run the other way and be completely cut off from her tower.
To that end, I've devised what I think is a fairly solid overhaul for Akali. I'll probably redraw her at some point soon, too, but I'll post that when I do it. For now, the kit is the relevant part. Note: I understand that right now her theme is her dual disciplines. But given how much the lore of League as a whole has changed since Akali's original release, I don't feel that's important enough to hold to in my design. My thoughts on her potential "rework" will focus solely on how she handles, and that means sacrificing her AD/AP gimmick. (Let's be honest, I'm the only one who tried putting AD on Akali anyway.)
#The Summary From henceforth, when I speak of Akali, I'll do so as though we're talking about this fictional rework Akali of mine.
For all the reputation ninja have in movies and video games have of being these mystical assassins, what were ninja truly? In a battlefield scenario, that is. In essence, ninja were masters of circumstance. They controlled their environment, always keeping escape routes in mind, always positioning their foes to maintain that control over their surroundings. This is the basic premise I considered with this rework. I wanted to maintain Akali's ability to devastate enemies in short bursts, but I wanted to add something to her laning phase, and this is how I decided to go about it. Stay in control.
The basic mechanics for my Akali involve getting in and getting out at will, and that means setting up her plan of attack and retreat while she fights. Make no mistake, my Akali would be a little tricky to play properly, but I feel it's preferable to simply buffing her damage output. My premise for Akali is that she deals low damage with each single strike, but is capable of consistently harassing with that damage. Her ultimate is the exception to this rule; it's where her burst damage comes into play, and it's the only place it reliably does so.
#The Stats I'm not knowledgeable enough about League to lay out all her stats and growths in concrete values, so instead I'll abstract with relativity. Consider her stat listings to be on a "spectrum", comparing them to the general average of all League champions.
Health: Low-Middle Resource: Energy Attack Damage: Low Resistances: Low Movement Speed: High-Middle
Akali will still scale well with AP, but will no longer scale at all with AD (except in one exceptional case). This is because the point of my Akali is quick bursts of damage, not sustained fighting power, and discouraging players from building AD except for a gimmick build encourages that direction.
#The Kit
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Passive: Onmitsu Koudou When Akali becomes concealed from enemy sight. She becomes stealthed. This stealth is broken when Akali attacks, takes damage, uses an ability (including summoners), or becomes disabled (stuns, snares, silences or knockup). After 2.5 seconds in stealth, Akali's next basic attack is an automatic critical. While invisible, Akali can stand still to reveal enemy units and traps (but not wards) within a moderate radius for one second, continually refreshing while she's still. Champions within the radius of her reveal are marked with Mark of the Shrike.
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Q: Fuuma Shuriken [60/50/40/30/20 Energy, Cooldown 12] Akali throws a large shuriken as a short-range skillshot. It cuts through minions, dealing damage along the way, and stops upon hitting a champion. It sticks into the champion it hits for 4 seconds, inflicting a 10% slow and dealing 10/25/40/55/60 +10% of AP) magic damage over the duration. If the shuriken never hits a champion, it disappears in a cloud of smoke at the end of its range and stops all enemy champions within a very small radius, forcing them to look at it for 0.5 seconds.
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Akali can activate the ability again while the shuriken is in flight or stuck in a foe to immediately take its place. The shuriken will disappear immediately, and any effects from being stuck in the enemy will instantly cancel.
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W: Twilight Shroud [80/75/70/65/60 Energy, Cooldown 20] Works more or less the same as it does now, with an added twist: Enemies who walk into the area of effect are marked with Mark of the Shrike. Further, the ability obviously works well with Onmitsu Koudou.
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E: Darting Shrike [10 Energy, Cooldown 10]
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Passive: Akali's abilities and basic attacks place a Mark of the Shrike on her targets for 4 seconds.
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Active: Akali targets an enemy champion or a ward within a short radius and executes a roll. If the target is an enemy, it places her directly behind the target and stuns them for 0.5 seconds. When used on a marked enemy, the targeting radius becomes much wider and any marked enemy unit can be targeted (such as minions and monsters). Akali instantly teleports to the target and, instead of stunning them, consumes the mark to inflict 50/70/95/115/140 (+20% of AP) magic damage. Once a mark is consumed, that enemy cannot be marked again for 8 seconds. Using Darting Shrike on a marked enemy sets the cooldown to 0.5 seconds.
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Ultimate: Perfect Instinct [65 Energy to activate, Cooldown 180] Akali pauses for a fleeting instant to reveal and mark all units within a wide radius with a Mark of the Shrike. The mark's duration is increased to 10 seconds. Any enemies already marked will have their mark upgraded, displaying in gold. Akali's next 3/4/5 uses of Darting Shrike within 10 seconds cost no energy and don't consume the target's mark. Striking an enemy with a gold mark for the first time deals 55/80/130 (+65% of AP) bonus magic damage, instantly places Akali in stealth, and downgrades their mark.
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The ultimate also marks Akali's allies, allowing her to use Darting Shrike to jump to them.
#The Strategy My vision of Akali has her continually marking enemy minions in lane as she works her way around the opponent. She then slips into melee range, pops her enemy with a light but meaningful attack, then uses Darting Shrike to get out. She immediately repeats the process as often as she can; bonus points if she can get farm with those Darting Shrike procs.
Akali would ideally be a toplaner with this kit, but she could still mid provided she made good use of her Fuuma Shuriken. Setting up an escape route with Marks of the Shrike, then using Fuuma Shuriken to get in close before slipping out with Darting Shrike would allow her to trade effectively with ranged casters and would make it rather difficult to kite her.
In the top lane, however, she has the added bonus of the bush. Unless the opponent wards all three bushes, Akali would always have a way to get into stealth and get in close on her terms. While it would also be possible mid, the distance of the bushes from the lane would be more apt to back the foe off once they saw her dip into the brush.
This Akali also makes a fine jungler, provided she can survive the early game and clear effectively. Her stealth would allow her to gank with relative impunity. She could stand still in lane long enough to mark her target, then Darting Swallow onto him before using Twilight Shroud to fade again or Fuuma Shuriken to create distance and escape. Her ideal jungle approach would not so much be ganks for kills, but rather keeping the enemy harried with hit-and-run attacks from lane to lane.
She'd be difficult to counterjungle, thanks to her ability to pause and search the area for enemies and her capacity to escape into stealth on a moment's notice. She'd be a decent counterjungler herself as well, using Onmitsu Koudou's passive to spot the enemy jungler taking a camp, then slip in under cover of stealth to steal his camp before going over the wall with Fuuma Shuriken, or simply finish off a low enemy jungler after a tough camp.
Her ultimate maintains some of what makes Akali powerful in today's late game, but doesn't allow her to use it quite so freely. It also gives her massive control of the battlefield, again holding with that mentality of a ninja owning their surroundings. It could be used to relentlessly attack a single foe in lane or to bounce between squishy targets in teamfights before jumping out with her copious amounts of marked friends and foes.
#Weaknesses and Counters
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Akali's ridiculous stealth mechanics would make her quite powerful in terms of trading or attempting to gank her. However, the fact that her stealth is broken by disables means a cunning enemy could predict her movement and rip her out of stealth pretty reliably.
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Akali is quick and can jump around quite a bit, but is still susceptible to hard CC. With her low health and resistances, if your team manages to stun her in the middle of her Perfect Instinct field day, her day could be ruined very fast. (Bring Tenacity, would-be Akalis.)
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Akali's insane mobility is undeniable in this build. However, it relies on her setting up properly. Even while her ultimate is active, she has to click the right targets at the right time to move effectively. This means her mobility is, in the end, limited to the skill of her player.
Thoughts, good or bad? I'd love to hear them. I don't expect any good feedback at this point, but I enjoy sharing my ideas all the same, so I'm willing to roll with any criticism.
