Mordekaiser has ridiculously low HP for a Mid-frontliner

JetRam·Jul 1, 2019·12 votes·7,354 views

For a champion that is required to position relatively forward where he needs to be able to soak a lot of damage, Morde is inexcusably squishy. Morde is one of the lowest HP champions in the game.

So darius/garen/mordekaiser are the three 1 cost knights. Lets compare HP

Morde has 500/900/1800 [35 armor] Garen has 600/1080/2160 ** [35 armor]** Darius has 600/1080/2160 [25 armor]

Even champions with lower armor stats have more HP Warwick (30 armor) 600/1080/2160

Might I add, he is also quite essential for any phantom composition.

19 Comments

NTrumpWeTrustJul 1, 20193 votes

His power is shoved into the phantom synergy.

JetRamJul 1, 20192 votes

The phantom buff is great but doesn't make up for how squishy he is imo. He becomes reduced to a unit that buys your kindred or rangers an extra 2 seconds. For better clarity, I edited the post to compare him to his fellow knights in tankiness.

NTrumpWeTrustJul 1, 20191 votes

{quoted}

The phantom buff is great but doesn't make up for how squishy he is imo. He becomes reduced to a unit that buys your kindred or rangers an extra 2 seconds. For better clarity, I edited the post to compare him to his fellow knights in tankiness.

ive been running him in noble with kindred. Noble already has insane value so being able to instantly turn the numbers in your favor just further swings that value in your favor. Idk i think he's fine.

JetRamJul 1, 20191 votes

I agree that you can 100% make him work. My main point is that he feels nothing more than a "unit" there for the phantom buff. It's generally a waste to put items on him. All he does is get 1 ability off IF lucky.

I'm more arguing for his individuality.

The EcdysiastJul 1, 20192 votes

It does though. Being able to drop an enemy's starting health by 400/800/1700 HP (using Mord as the example) is for sure worth losing only 100 - 360.

JetRamJul 1, 20191 votes

You're thinking combination/buff power. Not individual.

The EcdysiastJul 1, 20192 votes

Which is fine for a combination that only requires two units. If it required all three, including a 5g, then it wouldn't be so fair for Mord to be weaker. But it's an incredibly powerful buff that requires only two units. So you can't just ignore it.

JetRamJul 1, 20191 votes

Kindred/Karthus are later game units though that don't have a lot of guarantee so the whole "the combo only requires 2" argument isn't that good imo.

The EcdysiastJul 1, 20191 votes

{quoted}

Kindred/Karthus are later game units though that don't have a lot of guarantee so the whole "the combo only requires 2" argument isn't that good imo.

Alright, so since your argument is that the combo isn't worth the cost because it's difficult to get, then simply ask that it be removed. They can't buff him while it's an option.

JetRamJul 1, 20191 votes

But you can just replace Morde late with Karthus who has more HP and an actual high impact ability. Once again, it's not about the phantom buff but how worthless he is individually.

Z3SleeperJul 1, 20194 votes

I feel like that's the wrong way to do it. Balancing like this kills potential diversity.

Essentially it means you can never have a case where Mordekaiser is your main boy you build your comp around, which sucks. There are tons of champions like this that are being heavily gated because of their classes/origins.

If that's so big of a problem, nerf other stronger champs in those origins/classes or nerf the origins/classes themselves so said champions can be buffed.

It's pretty sad that Morde and several others are being relegated solely to slot filler roles.

Even his ability is subpar. Deals around the same damage as Garen and Darius but Garen is immune to magic while spinning and Darius heals himself for every unit hit. Morde? Nothing. Not even more damage.

JetRamJul 1, 20192 votes

100% agree with this. You've tackled the bigger picture. I'm open to any ideas on how to fix this broader issue. The thing is that suggestions to fix this go beyond simple HP buffs and I wanted to keep it simple as I currently have no better idea. Just wanted to open up the discussion.

Z3SleeperJul 1, 20191 votes

Well here's an idea focused around balancing Phantom better:

Phantom already plays into the kind of ridiculously dumb RNG most of us hate as it essentially instakills a completely random unit. So instead it should lose a ton of that potential power and put it elsewhere.

Here's one I came up with, which heavily synergizes with all 3 Phantoms:

When a Phantom takes fatal damage, its would-be killer's health is reduced to 100 and it heals equal to the health that unit lost. This effect can only occur once per round (so only one Phantom will benefit from it).

You wouldn't even need to buff Morde at all if this happened as this would already be a huge buff to him. It also fixes the RNG problem while keeping the overall effect somewhat intact.

Karthus would simply just not die if killed while channeling (once) which could be gamechanging (also could kill his killer with his ult).

Kindred keeps herself from dying with her ult then "dies" then ults again (then actually dies maybe).

ThisName1sDumbJul 1, 20192 votes

For a sec I didn't realize this was about TFT and I was very confused haha...

But yeah, looking at the stats he probably should have a bit more health. Given the armor values, he's probably about as tanky as Darius, but Darius is effectively more tanky because of his healing from his spin, so a bit more hp is probably reasonable.

peacepagodaJul 1, 20191 votes

{quoted}

For a champion that is required to position relatively forward where he needs to be able to soak a lot of damage, Morde is inexcusably squishy. Morde is one of the lowest HP champions in the game.

So darius/garen/mordekaiser are the three 1 cost knights. Lets compare HP

Morde has 500/900/1800 [35 armor] Garen has 600/1080/2160 ** [35 armor]** Darius has 600/1080/2160 [25 armor]

Even champions with lower armor stats have more HP Warwick (30 armor) 600/1080/2160

Might I add, he is also quite essential for any phantom composition.

Ya I thought this to today. He should have 50 armor, lol just look at him.

iainB85Jul 1, 20191 votes

I've won several games investing items into him.

However, if I have a choice, I do NOT put him right in the front line. I put him in the middle line so he eventually takes damage but has a chance to get his swings in and get rolling. If you put him front and center he certainly gets focused down too fast.

FluffehJul 1, 20191 votes

If you hadnt noticed, all of the phantom units are aggressively mediocre. Phantom is extraordinarily strong for a 2 unit bonus. Simply the price you pay.

Jerry SeinfeIdJul 1, 20191 votes

aye and the phantom buff is probably the most broken thing in the game.

darius needs 6 other imperials to get his guaranteed double damage buff but all you need for morde is a kindred which isn't hard and you basically delete an enemy unit at the start.