The LoL Patches thread

Combo mage. Spams her Q. She feels like a cross between Orianna and Ryze. I've been playing Ryze lately and it just feels very very similar.

There is a very simple flowchart for whether a mage should get Chalice or Tear.

Do their skills scale damage off mana? If yes Tear, if no Chalice

Combo mage. Spams her Q. She feels like a cross between Orianna and Ryze. I've been playing Ryze lately and it just feels very very similar.

-All (or almost all of them, I can't think of one off the top of my head right now other than maybe Karthus) AP Casters are combo mages. Ryze is dissimilar from all casters in two ways: scales harder off mana (only caster in the game that does?) and is a sustained damage mage rather than a burst caster.
-Annie spams her Q as well, so does Diana, so does Orianna, so does Ahri, so does Cassiopeia, so does LeBlanc, so does Vlad, so does Gragas, so does Rumble, so does Zyra, so does Ziggs, so does Karthus. And those are casters that spam their Qs. Just because they spam a specific key doesn't mean they're related to Ryze.
-I can see similarities to Orianna in the sense they revolve around placement of a non-AI controlled "pet."

In short: Syndra and Ryze have virtually nothing in common short of being casters, and even then they're still not that related.

[MENTION=789]Rayquaza2233[/MENTION] has the idea when to buy a Tear and Chalice (which is almost always a Chalice). As mentioned earlier, there really is never a reason to buy Tear as a caster unless you're Ryze.

We need these skins. All of them. (Yes, even swimsuit Garen, Darius and Xin )

Is Swimsuit Xin wielding a parasol?

I like all the ladies

I like all the ladies

Honestly, I would pay Riot to make the swimsuit Ahri skin.

There is a very simple flowchart for whether a mage should get Chalice or Tear.

Do their skills scale damage off mana? If yes Tear, if no Chalice

Didn't know Karthus scaled off mana.

-All (or almost all of them, I can't think of one off the top of my head right now other than maybe Karthus) AP Casters are combo mages. Ryze is dissimilar from all casters in two ways: scales harder off mana (only caster in the game that does?) and is a sustained damage mage rather than a burst caster.
-Annie spams her Q as well, so does Diana, so does Orianna, so does Ahri, so does Cassiopeia, so does LeBlanc, so does Vlad, so does Gragas, so does Rumble, so does Zyra, so does Ziggs, so does Karthus. And those are casters that spam their Qs. Just because they spam a specific key doesn't mean they're related to Ryze.
-I can see similarities to Orianna in the sense they revolve around placement of a non-AI controlled "pet."

In short: Syndra and Ryze have virtually nothing in common short of being casters, and even then they're still not that related.

[MENTION=789]Rayquaza2233[/MENTION] has the idea when to buy a Tear and Chalice (which is almost always a Chalice). As mentioned earlier, there really is never a reason to buy Tear as a caster unless you're Ryze.

-how many of them absolutely have to do their combo a certain way? Cassio is QEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE or WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE which is kinda a combo. The thing is that she NEEDS to have her poison down to do something. Like Ryze with his Q's for reducing cooldowns, and Ori for having her ball in a certain place, and Zyra for having her seeds. In contrast, Malz hits 2 keys for an effective combo: W and R. Fiddlesticks hits 2 keys and that's it: Q and W. Morgana hits QW, maybe RQW. Compare those to a Ryze QWQEQ or a QWQEQRQWQEQ combo, or a Syndra QQWQER or QQWQRE combo (single target burst vs. teamfight utility), and the difference is pretty obvious.
-Low cooldown spam. You know perfectly well what I meant. Her Q is on a 4 second base cooldown at all ranks, most of those champs those champs are at a value quite a bit higher.
-k

Basically no. The similarity is needing to spam one spell throughout the combo in order to keep it going or make it effective. They need it for different reasons but the result and the feel is the same. Have you played Syndra? If you haven't, I don't really know where you're basing ANYTHING you're saying. If you do not have 3 Q's on the field when you're ulting then you are almost certainly wasting your ult. Of course, it's more or less impossible to get 3 Q's up and positioned correctly against a target in a teamfight without them being able to simply move out of the way unless you use your slow and/or stun.

Didn't know Karthus scaled off mana.

Chalice and Rod of Ages are better for him. But it's quite amusing that you would suggest that since Karthus is a common tourney pick (if not banned) and I don't think I've ever seen Tear used. Naturally it must be good though since you say so. :>

Raul, get a Chalice, get an Athene's. Honestly, if you're going to be so thick as to not see why there's no point arguing with you. You grab a kill with Athene's. WOMG IS THAT 12% OF MY MANA BACK? COOL LET'S KEEP GOING

Raul, get a Chalice, get an Athene's. Honestly, if you're going to be so thick as to not see why there's no point arguing with you. You grab a kill with Athene's. WOMG IS THAT 12% OF MY MANA BACK? COOL LET'S KEEP GOING

Or get a kill and not have even used 12% of your mana because you have an enormous mana pool.

Chalice and Rod of Ages are better for him. But it's quite amusing that you would suggest that since Karthus is a common tourney pick (if not banned) and I don't think I've ever seen Tear used. Naturally it must be good though since you say so. :>

Check guides for him?
let's see on solomid, every one of the featured/approved guides except for regi's has a tear recommended.
Weird.

'course, I must be wrong because I haven't been playing for years on years like you guys. Forgive me for intruding on your circlejerk.

then regi's is probably the only one even worth taking a look at.

how old are these guides?

I remember when I bought tear on every ap mid. I only buy it on Anivia now, since I can't manage my mana on her at all. ; - ;

Check guides for him?
let's see on solomid, every one of the featured/approved guides except for regi's has a tear recommended.
Weird.

'course, I must be wrong because I haven't been playing for years on years like you guys. Forgive me for intruding on your circlejerk.

Well, you are wrong because every featured guide except Dyrus' doesn't have a tear in the build. Out of the approved guides, only the jungle Karthus guide has a tear in it, and that's slashed in with a Catalyst. Are we looking at the same solomid.net guides section for Karthus? And uh, who's one of the most famous Karthus players in the world? yeah.

then regi's is probably the only one even worth taking a look at.

how old are these guides?

Well regi's hasn't been updated in 5 months.

Well regi's hasn't been updated in 5 months.

i ask because grail came out 4 months ago, and was buffed 2 months ago
any builds older than 2 months are outdated

Or get a kill and not have even used 12% of your mana because you have an enormous mana pool.

Check guides for him?
let's see on solomid, every one of the featured/approved guides except for regi's has a tear recommended.
Weird.

'course, I must be wrong because I haven't been playing for years on years like you guys. Forgive me for intruding on your circlejerk.

-how many of them absolutely have to do their combo a certain way? Cassio is QEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE or WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE which is kinda a combo. The thing is that she NEEDS to have her poison down to do something. Like Ryze with his Q's for reducing cooldowns, and Ori for having her ball in a certain place, and Zyra for having her seeds. In contrast, Malz hits 2 keys for an effective combo: W and R. Fiddlesticks hits 2 keys and that's it: Q and W. Morgana hits QW, maybe RQW. Compare those to a Ryze QWQEQ or a QWQEQRQWQEQ combo, or a Syndra QQWQER or QQWQRE combo (single target burst vs. teamfight utility), and the difference is pretty obvious.
-Low cooldown spam. You know perfectly well what I meant. Her Q is on a 4 second base cooldown at all ranks, most of those champs those champs are at a value quite a bit higher.
-k

Basically no. The similarity is needing to spam one spell throughout the combo in order to keep it going or make it effective. They need it for different reasons but the result and the feel is the same. Have you played Syndra? If you haven't, I don't really know where you're basing ANYTHING you're saying. If you do not have 3 Q's on the field when you're ulting then you are almost certainly wasting your ult. Of course, it's more or less impossible to get 3 Q's up and positioned correctly against a target in a teamfight without them being able to simply move out of the way unless you use your slow and/or stun.

-Or you don't get the kill because you've used up all your mana stacking up your Tear, which even with constant spamming takes a minimum of 12mins and 30secs to max out. Then throw in that you're not probably going to be spamming the entire time.......

-I don't read guides, I personally highly discourage reading them. Partially because you need to be able to think for yourself; you shouldn't have to have some "pro" tell you to buy a Last Whisper/Void Staff if they're stacking defenses. The other half is that because when I started, I played plenty of games with people who were anal-to-the-max about the build order. OMFG I CAN'T BUILD THIS RIGHT NOW I HAVE TO FINISH THIS ITEM. IT'S THE FIFTH ITEM IN THE BUILD. Meanwhile they're feeding because they can't/don't/won't adapt.

-Annie has to lead her combo with a stun and maintain it; Diana (if at a distance) needs to open with her Q, and if she's melee already, her shield; I'm not going to list every single one of the combos, but they all have a combo or a specific "condition" that has to be met. Exception maybe for Ziggs. The only reason Ryze's combo is so "long" is because he's sustained damage. Also, a combo is a combo. It's like you're being pretentious about combos: "My combo is better that your's because I have to go QRQWQEWQWERQWEQWRQEWEQEWRQWERQWEQWEQWRERQWERQWERQWER and you, a plebe, need only go QR." A combo is a fucking combo. QWR (or just keeping her stun up) for Annie is just as important as QEWQWEQWEQWEQWEQWRQWEWWQWQWREQEQWEEQWWERWEWWREWQEWQREWQWREWQREWQREWQWEW for Ryze. Much more simple and requires less "skill," however still important.

-If I list all the spammy characters, or even just the spammy mages, it's worse for you.

-Syndra does not play like Ryze, nor should she build like Ryze. And you really undermine your argument as you explain how she is supposedly so similar to Ryze, as Ryze has to only worry about cycling through his spells properly while Syndra need only have the proper set-up. As I said earlier, Ryze is sustained damage and Syndra is burst damage.

I'm in the process of some mega data crunching. But unfortunately Excel doesn't provide nearly as much power as I had hoped in organizing data. So I might just end up programming my own software to further my research.

In the meantime, here's some interesting notes:
-- Champion base HP (base + growth * level) is roughly based on how "safe" the champion is when doing their job, among other considerations. Alistar, Nunu, Udyr, and Blitzcrank all break 2200 HP at lvl 18. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Anivia, Soraka, Sona, and Zyra are rather frail, sitting just above 1600 HP at level 18 (except Anivia, they also have a shytty base armor). Interestingly enough, Kog'Maw has more base survivability than the average champion, excluding escapes.
-- I think most of us know this already, but the majority of melee champions have base MR that scales at 1.25 per level. Everyone else has 30 MR that never improves without items/buffs.
-- I've probably mentioned this before. Average ADC attack range is 550, which is within the range of getting attacked by targeted spells (e.g. Dazzle, Rune Prison), with Caitlyn, Tristana, and Kog'Maw being obvious exceptions (Twitch's range can be juked ROFL). Average melee champion attack range is 125, with the occasional 175 (e.g. Fizz, Xin Zhao), with Riven leading the pack at 200 when ulting. In the heat of combat, this isn't really significant, but sometimes the extra range helps. Caster attack ranges not as consistent, with a good number of them hovering around 600.
-- Average health is 1950 (1943.4). Average Armor is 77 (77.15). Average mana pool is practically 1000 (997.9).
-- Health, Mana, MP5, and Armor all improve significantly as you level up. The rest of the stats merely double as you level from 1 to 18.

I remember when I bought tear on every ap mid. I only buy it on Anivia now, since I can't manage my mana on her at all. ; - ;

Anivia seems to be a special case in that she's part of the old champions (relatively high mana costs, relatively high CDs), and a lot about her screams "MANA BLACKHOLE!!!". Case in point, "I cast Flash Frost at the darkness!" turns into "owait it costs 160 mana to use, fk that shyt" if you don't build mana items. A significant portion of her damage output also relies on comboing spells, whereas most other champions don't get direct bonus damage output for comboing spells.

Some more metrics:
-- Rod of Ages extends your final mana pool by at least 150%. Holy smokes, that's nothing to laugh at.
-- Tear takes a minimum of 12.5 minutes to fully charge, but usually it'll take all game if you're not playing some ridiculously spammy champion like Skarnerssss (lol?) or Karthus. Yes, it's more mana than RoA, but the effort seems unworthwhile.

i ask because grail came out 4 months ago, and was buffed 2 months ago
any builds older than 2 months are outdated

Kinda related, but does anyone find it strange that I don't really get Athene's, but I rush Chalice anyways? The mana regen and MR are really bawss, but I don't value the other stats as much in that specific item path.

Chalice was always a good item, it just... never built into anything and that's always a detriment. I find that it's worth upgrading if you can snowball teamfights for the mana regen or if you need the CDR and can't get it in other ways.

Kinda related, but does anyone find it strange that I don't really get Athene's, but I rush Chalice anyways? The mana regen and MR are really bawss, but I don't value the other stats as much in that specific item path.

i dont play ap mid all that often, but in arams grail is the definition of OP on any mana black hole. so i dont really know why the other stats arent desirable for the opportunity cost of say a large rod, void staff, or sheen + blasting. however, i likely overvalue capping cdr w/ grail + blue + masteries compared to a lot of ap mid mains (or perhaps would rather play ap's that have short cds where pseudo-spammability is desirable..).

grail just... solves more issues. mana, that 1 cdr item youd like to get, survivability, and damage. most other ap items solve 2-3 issues at once. deathfire is 2, roa is 3, rylai is 3, deathcap is 1, void is 1, archangel is 2, abyssal is 2, zhonya... 2.5 (but not 4 for sure), lich bane is 3ish...

i can only attest that rushing it after buying a chalice is really good in arams.

i dont play ap mid all that often, but in arams grail is the definition of OP on any mana black hole. so i dont really know why the other stats arent desirable for the opportunity cost of say a large rod, void staff, or sheen + blasting. however, i likely overvalue capping cdr w/ grail + blue + masteries compared to a lot of ap mid mains (or perhaps would rather play ap's that have short cds where pseudo-spammability is desirable..).

grail just... solves more issues. mana, that 1 cdr item youd like to get, survivability, and damage. most other ap items solve 2-3 issues at once. deathfire is 2, roa is 3, rylai is 3, deathcap is 1, void is 1, archangel is 2, abyssal is 2, zhonya... 2.5 (but not 4 for sure), lich bane is 3ish...

i can only attest that rushing it after buying a chalice is really good in arams.

In ARAM's I usually go like this

RoA if you will need to soak up damage, require mana and can use the AP like Fizz, Maokai, Fiddlesticks or Singed.
Tear and Chalice if you play champions that get progressively better the more mana they can spend like Anivia, Ezreal and Kassadin.
Chalice in every other case.
Special cases are Karthus and Ryze who only need a tear in my opinion.

Tear and Chalice if you play champions that get progressively better the more mana they can spend like Anivia, Ezreal and Kassadin.

Tear on Ezreal? I would imagine that Chalice would set him up for the rest of the ARAM. I know that I don't need Tear on Anivia, and I'd rather prefer the RoA if mana does become an issue.

Tear on Ezreal? I would imagine that Chalice would set him up for the rest of the ARAM. I know that I don't need Tear on Anivia, and I'd rather prefer the RoA if mana does become an issue.

Just to clarify, I am talking about AP Ezreal who in ARAM has such range that he can keep spamming his q, which in turn lowers the cd on the rest of his skills. He also has to spam his q to make up for his poor wave clearing ability which is a huge pro in ARAM. He can kind of just keep using his q w and r everytime it's off cd because with his range you're bound to hit someone. It also synergizes a bit with the mana he gets on his core lichs bane. I prefer to go glass on Anivia as she can kite extremely easy due to how her kit works. RoA also scales badly on a short duration map like ARAM. I just use it on casters that need to go in melee range. Really surprised that you can maintain your mana with just a damn chalice. Don't you ever find yourself OOM? Tear and chalice just scale nicely with each other because of the mana reg % on chalice of the max mana that gets improved by tear.