There’s a difference between “complexity” and “Hey, this guy just gets free shit”. Kallista’s movement is unique. Transforming champs like Rek’sai and Gnar have complexity. Akshan is “let’s just put all these mechanics together and call it a day”.
This^ also people complain about Kalistas movement yet she has probably the harshest drawbacks. Autos that do 90% and they can miss if target disappears like what 😂
True. As much as Vars hates on Yone, for me Akshan is the most problematic champion in my opinion. Yone still has to fight and still can screw up. Akshan just get's every thing in reward for doing usuall stuff. Free shieald for attacking enemies champions, free movement speed for kyiting, free stealth, free revive for takedowns. For Yone it's at least that while he is broken, you still need to pilot him well, because most of his broken parts of his kit don't come for free or even if are seeming to be free, still can backfire if used unproperly (the only free thing in Yone's kit is his hybrid dmg, but I can't tell that it's the most hated thing about him, as an ADC main I don't really care if Yone oneshots me from screen away with quarter of magic dmg). Senna is another example of "free win" but with her I believe it's a problem of trying to put the lore into gameplay to hard. Senna is a Sentinel as Lucian, so they wanted her to be adc. But she is also's Lucian's wife. So they wanted her to be in lane with him. So they made Adc that is enchanter support early, but gains free ADC stats to become relevant ADC despite not farming and not scoring kills (and problem is that she doesn't just become relevant adc, she literally is Veigar among ADC's, where past some point noone can compare).
@@mathuraphael9196 Senna's soul AD is combined with her not having level-up AD. So in a sense she is the only champion that doesn't get "free" AD. But yes she definitely is overloaded. Also ADCs are just a shit role as far as the eye can see. IDK i play ad a lot maybe im biased
Mann... I don't even *play* League really, least not on a regular basis (maybe ill load up solo q or group w friends once a blue moon), and yet I still very much enjoy the polish, effort, and high quality of analysis that goes into your videos. The end product is quite enjoyable to watch. keep it up
I mean honestly, I like how Riot is trying out new abilities and not just *"Hey guys! This is Draven 2.0 with some new skills!"* It is tantamount to explore and bring in abilities that can be exciting. However, Riot didnt get the assignment. Because not only did they put new abilities, they also found a way to make the champ broken. Not like Riot hasnt been doing that for years, but it seems every 200 year champ was quickly hotfixed, nerf, buff, etc.
The abilities are not new at all tho, champions are comprised of one new gimmick and then a bunch of reused assets from champions that were confirmed as viable. A real "new" champion would be something absolutely weird like Bard, Shaco, Rek'sai or ASol, thing is: these are so different they force you to re-learn the game, thus they're unpopular. We still don't have a champion that can temporarily remove terrain, a champion that can rig the interactables, a champion with an unique shop etc., it's just that these features are not what the players want. The players just want a lot of mobility, combos and/or big damage to do flashy plays, doesn't matter if the design is new, old, original, redundant, whatever.
I agree, it's nice when they try to explore and create something new and fresh, for example every new adc is so unique despite constraints adc role has and it's great. But they could sometime ask themselves if something isn't too much. Akshan W revive is ok, but does he realy need to also have all the Passive effects and W camouflage with more buffs (mana regen, realy?) Anyway it's much better than champion like Seraphine which for me is still exactly "Sona 2.0" with every aspect working the same way but better. Meanwhile Rito presented her as supportive midlaner who is much more different than sona, with argument "if had to play midlane i would pick Seraphine, if support I would pick Sona". Nowadays she got more pickrate as adc than midlane and still overwhelmed by support pick rate
i think part of why champions tend to be broken on release is so that players have incentive to spend time learning them, otherwise, why bother taking extra time to learn a new champion's kit rather than just play the champs you already know?
The latest champs weren't that broken on release tbh, in fact, they were pretty balanced. Compared to what we had to go through with release Aphelios and Samira, this is nothing.
Well imo the problem is that with almost 160 champions in the game its wayyy too hard to come up with new abilities without them being somewhat game breaking. I have no idea how they can still do it. Its really annoying to see a new champ come out and immediately the community is like "Wow thats just (insert champion) Q" or whatever. Zeri was an interesting and unique concept with her autos being an active ability but it immediately became game breaking and an absolute balance nightmare.
“Overloaded” champs i think were bound to happen. If you didn’t continue making new things every champ would just end up being reskins of the same stuff. They just need to balance them a bit better. For Akshan having a revive for example instead of making it his W passive which already gives invis as an active make it his Ult. His ult is largely terrible, so if the only way he revived teammates was killing the scoundrel with R people wouldn’t care much since it wouldn’t happen often
Megatron is right. Akshan just has too much, for no reason. He would still be fun to play with just boomerang, movespeed and grapplin. The chase + invisibility + revive should have been the base for another champ, designed like Evelynn, where you need to carefully plan your attack to give that revive without dying and then escape and wait for your CD. One hyper mobile ranged duelist One sneaky assassin that revives teammates I can handle one champ fitting one description, but not two at once.
Yeah true but maybe instead of making new champs they could ummm, do VGU/reworks for MANY of there old champs that have been around since beta. Like imagine if grag, vlad, anne and more were looking like champs that we’re getting now? Even updated abilities that can compete with the new champs. Ahri is one, NEVER used in pros but giving her a reset for her ult to snowball her kills makes her a top pick champ for pros.
Commenting before fully seeing the video: I feel like the champion design team has been trying to push for more complex and challenging to learn champions, and are taking Lee Sin as an example of this, but entirely in the wrong way. Lee Sin's kit is very versatile, with 6 basic skills that can work off of each other in innumerable ways, but somehow, it seems they have just taken the fact that at face value, each ability slot just has a lot of different effects, and thought that's what makes him a good champion design. They don't seem to understand that you don't need two paragraph in each slot for a champion to be unique and difficult to master. Just. Look. At. Orianna. Each of her skills are incredibly simple; Passive just makes her autos stronger, doesn't even synergize much with the rest of her kit, Q just moves her ball, E just moves her ball to shield someone, W is AOE damage and slow, ult is AOE damage and knockup+stun. Yet just the fact all her skills are centered around an external entity that comes with her, the ball, makes her a lot harder to master than any other mage, because you don't just have to check your own positioning, but also the balls positioning, and your distance to it. If Orianna was released today, would anyone think she was too simple of a champ for this era of champion design?
Simple but unique champions are the ones that Riot should be trying to design. There's obviously a lot more to champion design than that, but it makes champions interesting and fun for the people that they might appeal to, while preventing them from breaking the game. This is specifically why I like Aurelion Sol so much, as none of his abilities are really complicated, but there's no other champion that plays like him, which is why he is so adored by the few that do like to play him. Though we do have to remember that complex champions could still be balanceable and healthy, like Bard. The only problems with those champs is that it's extremely hard to predict how much a buff or a nerf will affect them, so you're gonna have to do constant adjustments (*queue a clip rolling through hundreds of Senna changes), whereas with simple champs, it's a lot more straightforward (Remember the last time Zilean got changed? Yeah, me neither).
@@cosmicbard6998 What matters is that the champion's kit and bonuses actually fit in and make sense. Yasuo's Q does a lot of crazy shit, but I'm fine with it because everything about it makes sense, it's literally a "second auto-attack" for him. But his ultimate? Why does it also tack in bonus armour penetration out of nowhere? Extending the knock-up makes sense, and the heavy damage it does also makes sense as he's slicing his enemy up and slamming them to the ground. Why did they also tack in his passive interaction and boosted ArPen? Why does Sett punching really hard also translate into gaining a shield? Why does Gwen cutting people with her scissors also tack on healing?
@@G1ingy I think the sett shield makes sense because W is meant to be used at the end of a fight anyways. You tank a lot of damage during the fight, you are low health, you use W for some damage to kill or turn things around. If he didn't have shield, he'd be a free kill during the W because he's immobile for like a whole second and you can just walk up to him and kill him during that time.
@@irjiiu1041 well see, that's still a difficult champ to master, because you gotta get really good at getting first pick and instalocking it and also at convincing the other 9 players not to just leave the game or ban it.
"If a Skirmisher has anti-ranged properties that's a problem. If an Assassin has AoE damage that's a problem." Mans just described Yone and thought we wouldn't notice.
@@mac1462 I apologise, I meant his 1 dash on q with a very low cooldown, his 2 dashes on e, the second being unstopable, and his dash on r. I was using an hyperbole.
I got fed on Vex today and I looked at the replay, in teamfights I covered more distance from my ult recasts than all the enemy dashes combined (enemy dashes included Kha'zix E, Akshan E, flashes).
vex is like the champ design team tried to make a mage but when they got to the ultimate they couldn't hold it in anymore and gave her an AOE damage resetting screen wide dash.
right, her ult could have been a time bomb that did more damage the further they moved in the countdown, and automaxed damage if they dash in that time
Watching this video made me realize how much I crave for a mixup in new content in league. Every new content in league is strictly kept to champions and skins while other games create new maps and/or different game modes. I know this argument isn't new or anything but with nexus blitz gone in the featured game mode rotation, league has been getting really stale for me for some reason and I'd like to experience something fresh.
One of the reasons why I play Azir is his old anti-dash ult because most of the time I always encounter a Yasuo, a raging Renekton, or a one-trick Lee Sin trying to insec you. Sadly they remove it and I was disappointed by that.
yeah too broken but I think it's quite a handy right now because even if Azir is a quite strong mid and late game he is still vulnerable to other champions. It's my opinion tho so I'm not sure what others think of it.
@@RadishHead7 I even thought Riot was done with the "revive" thing after they first remove the spell and then the passive skill of Aatrox but then they give it to a champion who looks like Jesus and freaking revives his four teammates after killing their killers. Damn I wish they revert those cool abilities.
"Zeri still dies if you get your hands on her." Big if there. She has insane movement speed with her ult, and builds Triforce and Titanic so she has a shit ton of HP, and dashes across any terrain once you "get your hands on her."
I think I liked your other take better: To me it's more about champions having abilities they really don't need. Sure, it's great if champ differentiates itself from others, but look at Akshan: His key recognizable abilities are his hook, his Ult and his revive. Is his double-hit passive something that makes him unique? I don't think so. Also can we please have less invisibility? It sucks.
Here's the difference between overloaded when it comes to rell vs others like Yas or yone. Rell isn't favored by riot. Some overloaded champs get absurd amounts of attention and buffs every single time when it starts looking like they might struggle. Yet others get gutted, both directly and indirectly, and riot does nothing. So champs like yone, Yas, graves, etc etc, are always popular because they are easy to make flashy plays on and players know riot will never let them feel weak for long. This is one reason why every "big play" montage has the same boring Yas/yone combo with some streamer who screams like a middle school girl and spams their mastery rank. Overloaded champs do get nerfed, but some overloaded champs are simply given an absurd amount of favor from riot.
Honestly as much as i love playing yasuo, his "hard combos" are piss easy and dont impress me anymore, its new player bait. ...... but hes just so fun man.
As long as it amplifies gameplay it's fine, my biggest problem with Akshan is that all his passives don't require you to think about how they'll work you just do things and the passives come out.
I love how everyone forgets how Azir was able to use his w on turrets - Not the Sand soldiers, he literally would just burst the turret for a nominal amount of damage by expending a charge of his w.
Yeah he was good in taking turrets without it through is Attack speed, but they thought he needed to oneshot turrets in the late game in release. Azir and Ornn are the two examples I can think of, who we're completly overloaded and Riot took one thing after another to make them possible to balance
Viego is easily the most overloaded champ. He gets EVERYTHING. (in addition to stealth, stun, AS steroid, %hp damage, sustain, gap closer, resets, item reset, heal,....) Like really everything in his base kit.
I personally have an issue with zeri simply because she is an adc you need to catch... but she has near-infinite dashes, non-targeted autos to attack out of vision, insane tempo, high magic damage, and galeforce if she builds it. I just think Zeri is a problem design due to being designed around filling the hole of every single adc in the game's weaknesses. Her pick/ban in high elo especially attests to this. I personally think if she just had less mobility itd be fine, but its downright oppressive. For the most part, overloaded champions I find are a problem because when they are ahead... what do you do? When ahead they are suffocating because then they have numbers AND options, nd that's why I think so many people dislike them. It is what it is though, great video!
Yeah, you cant really catch her. Ive often seen a zeri beingt caught somewhere in the jungle and she just pressed e and got out. Thats ridicolous. No other adc can do that and would always die
look up her cpunter list, its all adc and 2 ohter 200 years champs, only meele being yasuo and we all i know why. so if you have an adc with 3.5 k hp running around at 800 ms, and onehsothing assaisn to dare to jump on her, you have a design problem. rn it pick or ban ,or hope your bot laner ist mental, oh he is welp, go next. Only way to fix that is giving her actual cooldown where is is vulnerable, eg the 20 sec cd dash on diana after you miss or something, akshan dash early is also 20 min, 10 sec. reduce ms, same treatment as lilia,
Yeah not to mention damn near her entire kit has had to be nerfed or adjusted for 3 patches in a row, and few other champions have that streak. I think it's the combination of her attack range and mobility, most higher range ADCs have low mobility and vice versa for low range ones. Whereas Zeri gets the best of both worlds with her Q having 825 range. Then she also gets to build bruiser items, although that's getting nerfed and instead they're massively buffing how she scales with crit. Will probably backfire though given how 2x CD refund on E and double ult stacks on critical hit sounds quite broken. They only fixed half the issue.
I disagree pretty strongly, Zeri pays for her kits strengths with some very key weaknesses. Zeri has very limited target selection (her autos can be body blocked by frontliners), has almost no AoE (especially since her current Triforce+Hydra build is getting nerfed.), and her mobility has a pretty slow ramp-up time. She shares a lot of the strengths of the marksman class in general, if you ignore her she deals incredible damage over time, she shreds objectives and tanks, and she has high-ish range. Her personal strengths are very powerful kiting ability, great chase potential, and decent hybrid damage. You can compare her to Jinx in a lot of ways, they get stronger as a fight keeps going, gaining more and more movement speed, and attack speed in Jinx's case. Jinx has better DPS and AoE damage, but is less mobile and does pure physical damage, while Zeri is more mobile and has that hybrid damage but isn't gonna delete entire teams with a few rocket autos. Basically I think Zeri is a fine design and isn't really any more or less overloaded than your average marksman, she's just extremely overtuned at the moment. I think the upcoming changes pushing her more towards crit will make her feel a lot more fair.
You really hit the nail on the head here: overloaded champions are not necessarily overpowered, but they are utterly exhausting to play against or watch in action. I watch so much LoL (I don't play it anymore because I'm too old to be flamed by a 14 year old kid for being bad at a video game) and I can't tell you everything that Akshan can do just from memory. Compare this to Nasus or Renekton or even Quinn, all of whom have kits that I could easily explain to any gamer, even if they have never played a MOBA before. This makes things really confusing at times, which is never a good sign in a multiplayer PvP game. Even setting aside balance issues, abilities that do too much typically end up being net detractors to skilled gameplay; sometimes the people playing the character pull of great plays that they themselves don't understand or intend because their champion's overloaded kit just did things its own. I think that Riot should have a word limit for ability descriptions; such as "Once the ability tooltip reached 50 words, the designer has to stop."
All removed mechanics or range decreases for Azir. They did my boy dirty. E Shifting Sands V5.14 No longer knocks up the first champion hit. P Shurima's Legacy V5.14 Attack speed gain from cooldown reduction E Shifting Sands V5.16 Range reduced to 1100 from global Q Conquering Sands V5.17 Additional damage per soldier. W Arise! V6.5 Sand Soldiers applying Fervor of Battle W Arise! V6.11 Casting on top of turrets to damage them. R Emperor's Divide V6.11 Bonus movement speed to allies or Azir on pass-through W Arise! V6.14 Soldier vision range was reduced to 350 from 575. Q Conquering Sands V7.19 Cast range reduced to 720 from 875. W Arise! V7.19 Soldier command range was reduced to 660 from 800. W Arise! V7.19 Soldiers being able to attack wards or trinkets. R Emperor's Divide V7.19 The wall no longer knocks back any enemy who attempts to pass through once stationary, although it still functions as impassable terrain. Still knocks back during the charge. W Arise! V8.3 Soldier attacks now draw minion aggro to Azir.
I would love rito making more simple champions again, just like how sett is pretty basic but works wonders: Passive: punches 2 times, second time does more damage Q: punches are now harder, he runs at you W: you hit him, he hits you E: he brings you close, if he brings 2 people it stuns R: he just WWE your ass and the people near the landing spot
Since Exil hasn’t done recent videos of league cause his busy or just starting to be over the game, i’m glad you still do these types. Even if you’re not liking lol atm these videos are still top notch. But also do what you love if you just can’t with these videos.
I think that the problem with those releases is that riot looks like they have a checklist of "must be in the kit" and on top of the champion gimmick they force the whole list also in. Must have: dashes/flashes, resets, cc, stats boosts, sustain, executions/%health damage/true damage, etc... some of them like vex have the checklist in a more soft way and its ok but others like akshan have that list forced in a so extreme way that you sometimes forget that his actual gimmick is reviving people.
omg yes i think u explained it sm how i do, its like they threw way too many gimmicks into akshans kit its so overwhelming, they shouldve narrowed it down more.. probably renata too, i think if they swapped around her abilities a little and tweaked them she would honestly be fine imo
@@lottiederex In the case of Renata, i think is something less problematic because of the rol. If a enchanter is overloaded you can always Nerf his/her numbers to the ground and it could still be a good pick because It isnt his/her work deal damage, even if you remove the damage from the whole kit of Renata she can set be usefull because she will do her job as enchanter, helping other person to beat the shit out of you. When a tank is overloaded is the exact same thing, and if It is a mage or assassin you can always constrain It by the mana and CD, the real problem with overloaded champions is when they are skirmishers, adcs or ad bruisers because their job is dealing damage and they cant be really constrain by mana (they tried It with aphelios) or CDs (Samira) because their main way of dealing damage are the AA, so either you Nerf them to the ground and make them useless (aphelios) or is necesary remove things from their kits (Samira)
He is at least a little overloaded because each of his weapons does a vastly different thing than the others and he has just too damn many of them. We're talking about a champion where even the goddamn basic attacks have 5 different gimmicks in the form of unique passives...and by leveling up he only gains stats and nothing else. He's basically the only overloaded stat checker in the history of the game...and that's without even taking into consideration the different interactions between his primary and off-hand weapons... How many combinations are there for 4 Q abilities and 4 weapons (cause for Gravitum, it doesn't seem to matter what off-hand weapon you have) weapons? Oh, right...16 of them... It's...pretty insane. Although I will agree he doesn't feel as stupid and borderline ridiculous as Yone, Akshan or Viego.
You're misinterpeting the term "overloaded" that is legit explained in the video. Aphelios can be considered overloaded because he has multiple different passive and active effects on his abilities. But he is super undertuned after being nerfed into the dirt. Yone is honestly way more tame than some other champs. I feel like the ramping movement speed on E seems like a bit much and having a portion of magic damage is concerning. But he is overtuned af and scales like a monster.
I would say aphelios isn't overloaded. He can only use 2 of his 5 weapons at any one time while each weapon has only one q ability and a universal r ability. He was broken upon release because he was overtuned with stats.
@@MOONGREEDY Nope. No matter aphelios is overtuned or not, he is still considered overloaded. Overloaded means the champs have a lot of kits in his arsenal compared to other champs. Overloaded can be overtuned or balanced but usually, Overloaded champs are hard to balance because most of them have lack counters.
back in the day, you just pick a champion according to the splash art, and someone from the squad explains u what the champ does while in loading screen. I would need 10 minute intense lecture to fully elaborate on what alphelious and akshan do
@@Ellebeeby "Never played Aphelios before, What do?" "Red heal, Green long range, Blue AOE damage, White fast damage if close, Purple root. Passive gives AD, AS and Lethality" I left out about as much as you left out when describing Annies abilities, i dont think Aphelios is any more complicated than her.
@@zrevex1134 Annie Q refunding Mana is also a key element to her Laning Phase, that she can speed up Tibbers with her E is also important, that Tibbers deals AoE DoT is important, that you can steer Tibbers is important, that you lose all Pyromania stacks upon death isn't negligible either If you wanna take on Gun cycles, please don't forget that Annie's basic rundown left alot of important information on the table aswell
@@tatzecom Those are tips you can just say mid game, but now try to explain that aphel has 5 weapons and that if you dont cycle or have x weapon at y time makes you useless. Also explain how to fix a cycle of weapons mid game and have the person understand 1/5 of it.
7:19 Zeri literally builds bruiser and steals shields, making her probably the tankiest adc, has high mobility (E is dash/ wall jump and R gives her movement speed buff) and aoe damage (W and R). If you jump on her she can survive this thanks to her intended build and then gain distance while shredding your hp and shield (if u have any)
My favorite overloaded ability is PLayful/ Trickster (Fizz E). It is dash, AoE slow, that gives untargetability, deals massive damage, is Fizz´s main burst, safety and waveclear. And its balanced exactly because of all those atributes, because if Fizz uses E he is instantly wihout all those atributes. Which keeps him in check because while he can use E to always escape a gank, suddenly you are missing a big chunk of your damage. You can use it to waveclear, but now you are no longer safe and most midlaners can step up to you, as you are missing your main damage nuke and stick tool.
He still has a shit ton of damage without his E tho, his Q is a dash that can one shot adcs, his W is an empowered aa that can one shot, his ulti is a AoE knockup that can also do a shit ton of damage.
New characters abilities do not further differentiate from the others. They are simply 2 or 3 sometimes 4 or 5 abilities from other champions smashed Into one ability. This is why they are so obnoxiously overloaded.
I think Vel'Koz is a great example of well balanced and overloaded. His kit applies an on hit passive and can deal true damage with 3 stacks, his W procs twice, his Q fires in a parallel directions at the end of its firing line, his R applies true instead of magic if max passive stacks, yada yada. Point is, it's easy to understand, he does a LOT of damage, but relies on pretty easy to dodge moves and will evaporate if you even touch him. I really like Vel'Koz
You can say what you want, but the fact that jessica was: the Executive Producer & Vice President of League of Legends icon.png League of Legends at Riot Games Inc. She was responsible for the game state. When something wrong, the highest person on the ladder is the one who need to be blamed. That is how business works. They make and take the discisions, not the employee. The employee just follow what the boss say. Though i admit that these stupid changes over years is a bad culture of the company itself. Who-ever is in charged. That culture is something they need to CHANGE
The Lead Game Designer tells the employees how he wants the game. Not the highest person on the ladder. They only care about money from business partners. THAT'S how Business works.
@@sinnis4993 you have lead designer and designer. Though you are correct they care only about money, but that is another thing they fail at. More and more people quiting the game due the too many and too frequenty unneeded changes.
All champions has what i call the "power taxing". Power taxing ensures that even overloaded champions has something in their kit that the opponent can circumvent or even exploit when fighting against them, essentially their weaknesses. basic champs like Jax and Trynd solely relies on statchecking in short range, that means pokes or abilities that denies statchecking like Jax's own E softens their blow and impact (it goes with Riven too because of her passive). Yasuo power relies on the lane and his opponent's positioning and he couldn't escape willy nilly like his brother did, and thus his threat range is contained in the same place as his weakness. Thresh monstrous impact is solely based on his own team's cooperation value; if his team refuses to go with his play, then he will be outdone even champs like Aphelios is no exempt from this, all of his kit is still contained withing a modicum of an ADC; he's just as vulnerable as every other ADC barring Zeri and Akshan and can be immediately taken out by a competent champs that can dive him. if your champ power taxing is based solely on player's competency, then your champion basically has no weakness, because competent or high level players can circumvent or essentially remove said power taxing/weakness. Akali's real weakness is basically "she's squishy" while she can practically circumvent her weakness by simply avoid getting hit, which is easy for her due to multiple ways she can escape (and even so at launch, that obscure is just pain in the ass to handle). Yone is said to be fundamentally similar to his brother and share his power taxing, but the only similarity Yone had with his bro is his passive crit boost, otherwise his threat power is practically uncontained as not only he's easier to play, but he can easily escape in any situation when needed because of his E on top of of general sustainability and hybrid damage his brother has no luxury of, which simultaneously makes anti crit items ineffective because of said hybrid damage. as an engage support, Pyke wants to be as close as possible to his enemies but comes butt in for being "squishy" and can't reliably build tank items because of his passive on top of not being able to play solo due to being deliberately understated for a good reason, but the fact that most of his skills barring Q grants him mobility of some sort and the fact that he will always play together with his team to secure kills and grants one of them an equivalent of a full kill gold, means that what he got simply outweighs his weakness. I can list and explain many other champion's with this criteria but it'll probably be too long for my liking. time and time again they proven me right with this shit, yet Rito and the community didn't believe me.
Saying you need to catch zeri it's like saying you need to catch jhin, you're not catching neither when they're moving a 2 ghosts worth of movement speed.
hits 4 , enemy shaco using gps pile sender he put in my pants while invis to find me on ohter side of the map rubbing one out in the shrub's. like seriously dashes are more ok in my opinion as long as they dont ho over walls then 900 ms bs
I honestly still think Vex and Lillia are the best relatively new champion releases. They're powerful, their kit simple and they're not broken or overloaded while still being original and fun. Their personalities are unique and their design as well.
me when he is explaining overloaded: he is gonna use ygo as an example ain't he? 10 seconds later: like modern yugioh... me: theeere we go. i'm glad my once favorite game at least remains relevant as a cautionary tale.
In hindsight, it's actually very interesting comparison between League and Dota 2 overloaded champs. For League, i think its mainly because of the core design where essentially everyone is a carry (practically everyone scales with items) and stat checks. Also the lack of proactive counters / defensive other than banshee veil variants, zonya, revives further strengthens the overloadedness of a champ. Also an interesting comparison, League moves away from press for profit abilities, while 99% of Dota 2 roster consists of impactful press for profit, to the point of saying : League ults is usually a Dota 2 basic ability
Would you say Karma is more overloaded or overtuned? Not sure if you'll talk about it in your upcoming Karma vid, but she is a champ who's had things removed and subsequently buffed compensate. The most egregious example being the removal of RE's damage, and the numerous buffs to her passive, mana costs, cooldowns and shield values to compensate it.
As you said in the end, champions CAN be made fun and different with a gimic of their own without having properties of 10 other champs. I would imagine it's hard to make an interesting champion that introduces something new, with a playstyle of their own while still falling in their class and having a finite amount of mechanics, but riot has like how many employees? One would think that they really work hard to find that balance...
Cant really put Zeri on the "now are healthy" state. I almost one trick her in soloq and i admit that the bruiser ADC is stupid. But riot is starting to give us Samira treatment and target mechanics that are not the issue after everyone who plays her stated the exact way you can get rid of the problem (remove q activating sheen)
@@pedrohenrique-db3xd ezreal logic, whenever you think about an ADC that "autos" with their Q, you think about ezreal and his builds are always around sheen q
@@delta_8870 I love that Ezreal has been a notorious balance problem for Riot for many many years BECAUSE of his Q applying Sheen from range, yet they decide to let another champ also do that anyways. Honestly they should take that away from GP too.
@@Limrick1029 Ezreal is a notorious balance problem who has the highest pick-rate (average) over the past 10 years in ADC by far at all ranks. Even when he's in a bad state likr rn he's picked. Giving Zeri Ez like mechanics seemed like a good idea because of that
Can't them just remove some of the "overload" and tune up the champ the amont he lost ? Like remove akshan passive shield and give him some bonus hp, &c.
You asked in the video why is there a pattern of growing overloaded champions? As an artist I can tell you ; over time all artists grow more skillful in their craft. In this sense, a video game designer is in a way an artist, a creative. That's why then League came out, champions looked ugly and played boring; if you are making a brand new game how do you know yet what will it be like when players play it? How do you know what kind of player-base you will have at all? How do you know the limitations of your game right off the bat? How do you know what you can create without trying first? You can design it all in theory, but when it gets into the hands of the users your design could be used in an unexpected way. Of course all the old champions were simple and in retrospect uninspiring. Same thing with other long-form video games, like Warframe. The "champions" or Warframes in that game were also all "cookie cutter" as you list it 9 years ago. You have 4 abilities, you shoot a thing, you have an AoE thing, you have utility thing, you have AoE ultimate. Not unlike many old League champions. Over time after the "normal" is established, the designer tries new things within the confines of their project (the game in this sense.) Over the years step by step each champion is a design a little more creative than the last. And this is welcomed progress, it makes things more fun, interesting, its only natural. Just like in any skill based profession. However there is an intuitive line that can be crossed where the experienced designer goes beyond the confines of their project, beyond the rules of their own game. That is where the original charm of the game is lost and its turning into something unwanted. That's a little conceptual but think about it this way.....a game is defined by its rules, if you disregard the rules, there is no game. Imagine Chess, maybe you can add a new Chess piece that moves in a new pattern, that would an example of adding a new design to existing rules. But if you add a new piece that....I dunno...says if you do a certain pattern you get to flip the board and whoever throws their pieces the furthest wins the whole game...that kind is an example of going outside the existing rules and it really doesn't feel like Chess anymore as the rest of Chess is entirely disregarded. That is the line I believe we feel Riot crosses sometimes and you begin to feel the original charm or rules of League of Legends are being disregarded. Kayn could be 2 versions of the same champion, but Viego turns into all 150+ champions. Aphelios has an entirely new unique HUD while literally no one else does, doesn't even get an ability level 1 like normal. It used to be when you chose a Champion and buy an item, that is it in the game - but then Zoe, Neeko, Sylas, and Viego steal your items and your champion/ultimates. How could you tell if a Champion is overloaded verses overtuned? One way is by pretending you are stripping their kit of effects and ask yourself, are they ruined by losing this or can they still function? Let's take a look at Warwick - if you take away his passive he can't heal with his low base HP, low damage, he can be kited or there are better fighters. If you take away his Q bite he can't stick onto the "prey" he's chasing for his hunting fantasy, can't heal, doesn't do burst damage, he can be outplayed and kited. Take away his W he can't chase or find that "prey" target, he loses massively on DPS and movement, he can't duel and thus he can't heal from passive so theres more mobile fighters. If you take away the E howl, he loses crowd control, and his only defensive ability, which without he has low base HP stats can be killed easily and can't duel or even gank without ultimate and can be DPS-ed down by his peers. Without his ult....you get the idea, Warwick can't do his " I'm hunting prey as a relentless hunter" fantasy game-play without any piece of his kit. Let's take a look at Akshan - the man of passives. If you take away his teammate revive he.....still plays exactly the same. If you take away the bonus gold and mana regeneration and movement speed he gets from chasing Scoundrels.....he can still play exactly the same and deal with resource management and positioning management like the rest of us. Maybe finally taking away his gimmicky passive he finally begins to feel weak since his entire kit is balanced around just proccing that bizarre three-hit passive over and over. Think of Irelia losing the Disarm on her ultimate, still plays the same. Akali losing the ability to hide under towers with shroud, still plays the same to all of our chagrin. That's an example of overloaded. They should strip these champions of UNNECESSARY effects until it gets to the point you can't strip any more without destroying the design, and then work from there.
to be fair he isnt ALWAYS all of those, one second he was a poke and life steal the next u see him changing to aoe masacre machine with root, but no longer poke and life steal. however, chances r u wont know whats coming. doesnt mean theres no counter to him tho
Sett, Renata, Lillia, etc, proves they can make simpler champions if they want to. One issue is that a slew of the champs since Yas have been duo class or role champs. When u make a duo role/class champ they need extra mechanics to work right. Akshan could be seen as overloaded; I'd agree he could have 1-2 mechanics moved, but those won't be the ones that actually make him a threat, bc he really does need pretty much every mechanic (especially in the passive) to function not only as Marksman Assassin, but as a solo mid laner, and not break him. NOT to mention the fact the revive is important to his identity. Could he NOT have the revive mechanic and function? Yes...but then there's barely a reason for him to exist. The Q isn't even a big deal. For Gwen Skirmishers have 1 strong defense ability, thats her anti range same as Yas. She deals More AoE dmg bc she's "supposed" to be an AP champ and that means "less focus on AA, more focus on abilities" And thus applies her dmg in a different Way; AoE bc that evokes the usage of scissors. This also means u can DODGE her biggest source of dmg unlike the AA skirmishers. She still lacks strong target access and is incentivized to go against beefier targets, so when her W is on CD u can still poke her down, bc she's likely to want to fight the front line.
I don't think anything is sacred in league. They took aatrox's revive, they can take akshan's. But I agree that most problems come with champions being made to play multiple roles/classes
Honestly people are saying champs are getting more insane, but imagine if they released Azir or Kalista or Karthus now, they would also be said to be 200 years
I'd rather die to getting mechanically outplayed by an overloaded character than Tryndamere ghost flash galeforce running me down under 3 towers autoing me to death while being immune to dying.
I'm halfway and suffering because if he was overloaded I wouldn't get destroyed every time I miss Q lol I'm exaggerating but not that much tho. He's easily punishable. Yone on the other hand... I can do stupid shit and live on him. And I'm bad.
@@sunnydargonnel Although I disagree with "look at his 80 paragraphs, a lot of his kit feels more like a hypothesis than an actually finished kit, like they put all the tools and tech in it but didn't make it something more ability-esque.
Hey Vars do you plan on making something of your own in the future? You have a lot of insight in game mechanics and design and I'd love to see something that came straight from your head.
I love playing Cho'gath because he is a funny dinosaur that can grow really really big. its a fun gimmick that ties to some great scaling, all while being extremely simplistic.
The thing with Rell is that she _is_ genuinely overloaded, but her numbers are low enough to not be a problem. Well not a problem to the enemy at least. I feel like Rell feels a lot worse to play, because none of her effects are very potent she just has a shit-ton of them. It makes her feel kinda useless even though she does a lot. When you hit your Q as Soraka you feel like you did a lot. You deal surprisingly competent poke damage, slow the enemy significantly and speed yourself up + heal quite a bit. When you hit Rell Q... I mean it might break shields, but aside if not it doesn't really deal damage, and it doesn't really heal and the resist shred doesn't really feel like it makes a difference. It has too much going on to feel impactful if that makes sense.
I like how riot proved to themselves that you still can release champions in s12 that are unique and strong, but not overcomplicated or overloaded with their last 3 releases. Busts that really popular myth of "powercreep is inevitable". Making overloaded kits is a choice and honestly just a symptom of a lack of creativity. If you can't come up with a unique gimmick or playstyle, just slap a bunch of unnecassary effects on a basic champ and call it a day. Thats how we get stale, boring to play messes like akshan. A lot of the "one overtuned ability" champions can be fixed so easily though where i wonder why riot is so hesitant with it. With tahm they showed they can do it, so why not for f.e: - Gwen: Swap her w and ult. Or make her w only a damage reduction/ms zone similar to old maikai ult. Or make her w at least not block cc like xin ult. - Yone: Just take the ms off his e so he can't run you down by just auto attacking you to death. Introduce a penalty for using it too freely like taking maxhp% damage when you snap back unless you get a kill.
Rell to me will always be a good example how how to balance a overloaded champion, and she well-designed at least in my opinion. Her q gives her a ranged passives, heals like taric q and breaks shields. Her W has two stances, The dismounts gives u ali's knockup, leona's e, leona's w, nautilius w and the mount gives a voli q with a knock up instead of a stun. Her e is and aoe stun that covers half the screen and part of taric's W granting not just armor but MR too. The drawbacks, the champ is literally unplayable if u get caught out and has a all in or nothing playstyle that if u messed up the engage, you gonna die. If they only remove the slow on rell's dismount, if only... And still no new rell skins. They really trying to keep her on the down low.
The worst part for me is that they removed, modified or nerfed many older champions abilities due to having "too much", never brought them back and now release champs that break this rule. Khazix evolved R used to give % damage reduction, it would be completely fine by today standards, but there's almost no reason to evolve R nowadays. Azir R used to block dashes...things like that
@@Jynx9921 I know... she didn't diserve that nerf.. infact they made mid lane so disriuper unfriendly that orianna was pushed out of mid... she needs a buff to deal with thies assassins better
I think what people tend to miss when talking about overloaded champions is that there's usually just one or two things they do that people really hate. Removing those things would often still leave us with a really cool champion with a unique identity. Samira's W could just be an AoE damage tool. Akshan's W could just be a stealth with no revive. Quiyana would be much less frustrating to fight against if she had an ultimate that provided single target damage or utility rather than teamfight burst and cc. Viego's passive would be really cool if it didn't arbitrarily provide untargetability, a heal, and an ultimate reset, which itself provides incredible mobility and unstoppable for some reason. Sure they might still be frustrating to some people, but with just a few small cuts, most champions would be really cool and fun to play against, instead of infuriating. Hell, even Yone could be fun if Riot tried to give him a different E so he wouldn't have free engage and disengage without any effort.
i love overloaded champions NOT ALL OF THEM but when its done right and it doesnt feel bad to fight them like aphelios rn they are the most fun champions for me there are ALOT OF options no matter how much i play them i will still discover new stuff unlike malphite q make them go slow u go fast w make u punch stronk e u mad so ground go brrr r u go weeee enemy go aaaa
Azir could also use his W on turrets to deal damage, I dont mean that his soldiers could attack turrets but instead of summoning it would use one charge to just chunk the hp on turrets.
My biggest issue is that new champions tend to not actually have a main theme anymore. Champions just get a bunch of stuff thrown in on top of what was supposed to be their gimmick so their gimmick does not stand out. Like, what is Zeri's main gimmick? What is Arkshaan's?
Zeri was supposed to be a hyper mobile adc (which she is) akshan was supposed to be a mid lane adc/assassin with the gimmick revive (but ofc they messed akshan really hard because his revive has 0 conditions to happen, is not tied to an ultimate, and his passive is just too stacked wtf)
@@pedrohenrique-db3xd Zeri is a hyper mobile adc, who also steals shields, who also has max-health damage, who also deals more damage to lower health targets, who also slows alot, who also spams on-attack effects.
I don't mind Riot introducing new mechanics to the game. In fact, such are very much welcome. But there has to be a trade off for that gimmick, otherwise new champions will make old ones obsolete. Give the champion a gimmick, but release him lacking something a basic champion has. The easiest example I can give is a bruiser with some crazy new mechanic, but zero built in sustain, which is something bruisers conventionally have. That way you don't release, for example "a better Renekton", you release a champion that do something Renekton don't, but unlike Renekton, you have no sustain. I used Renekton as an example just because he was the first coming to mind. But there are even better examples. Riot has proven they can do it. Just look at Bard and Aurelion Sol. As you've said, it gets especially bad when it is a champion that excels at something that their relatives are tipically the weakest at. Assassins are notoriously bad at teamfighting. Then you have Qiyana. Skirmishers too tend to be single target oriented with low CC. Then you have Yone. But I agree, Vex, Zeri and Renata are a nudge in the right direction. I do think the later two are overloaded, but not nearly to the same extent of 2019~2021 releases.
@@pedrohenrique-db3xd that depends, it can essentially deny an execute, a veigar's ult or whatever damage comes as the killing blow, regardless of how big. And can potentially turn a 5v5 in a 5v6. Add to that that it can't be reduce like you can do with healing or shield (sure, shield is only countered by serpent's fang and kinda by shadowflame, but still).
@@Vly-nn2sv yes, but that requires the target to kill someone afterwards, and because of its long cooldown, she can only use it one per fight, 2 times at best, unlike shields and heals that can be used multiple times. So it's a situationally powerful ability, not a instant value ability like askhan revive. So it's a lot more balanced and well designed than people think.
@@pedrohenrique-db3xd But even on its lowest point, her W is still a movement and attack speed steroid, so it is a valuable ability no matter what. For how gamechanging its highest possible value can be, at its lowest, it is still a very respectable ability.
I am surprised you didn't mention Pyke, which to me, has been the most overloaded champion for a really long time. If you just mention the tools, options and effects he has, even just summing them up into as few words as you can still sounds like a lot. Recovers health if out of view, camouflage with extra movement speed, hook with reveal AND slow, dash with stun, an AoE execute that ignores shields while resetting AND giving extra gold but also teleports him. He is an assassin with an AoE execute that can be used on several people one after the other through shields that can also heal himself while having an easy escape since he can just dash without you being able to follow him and then turn invisible regenerating health.
I think Pyke is actually really interesting to discuss as far as overloaded goes. Pyke sounds overloaded when you say his mechanics, but you look at the class he fills and has been restricted to, and he actually fits pretty well. Most supports with a hook have a primary cc, followed by a seconds cc, and a way to survive the fact they are diving straight into the enemy team. Tresh and Nautilus get close to their target while applying cc with their hooks. Pyke doesn't get close with his hook, and his hook doesn't get gim close from a farther range. Tresh and Nautilus each have a secondary cc they apply after making their hook similar to Pyke's e. The only difference being Pyke doesn't nessecarily get close until his second cc. That may sound a bit out of tune with other hook champions, but Thresh also has the ability to push away and not take the recast on his q. Pyke does have stealth and a regen steroid, but it doesn't help him nearly as much against poke because he can only regenerate recent damage. Hook and engage supports need a way to survive diving in, but all are still weak to being poked down. Pyke just does it differently than Thresh, Naut and Blitz having shields, health, and armor/mr. Pyke also can't build health so if he does get caught by some type of counter engage, he has a good chance st dying. The only real problem with Pyke is his ultimate doubling gold. I think Pyke definitely can sound overloaded, but if tou actually compare him to similar supports, he does the same job mostly. His only real difference being a higher risk champion that is still vulnerable to common counterplay for asssassin's and engage supports.
For what i have seen before vex as u said was riot was too tunnel visioned on how a champ will feel while playing but did not consider how the champ would be to play against. If a champ is designed like that then the person who is playing will be the only one happy/have fun but the 5 members from other team and maybe there own team will not have fun
I was having so much fun with Aphelios 2 weeks ago and then it all went downhill again after they cut healthsteal. He is considered "overloaded" but it's so difficult for him to keep a good spot in the game. I wouldn't even consider him a problem when he's in a good spot because other adcs can deal damage with waaaaay less effort. It's quite difficult for riot to make a fun champ that isn't absurdly problematic.
I think the definition of overloaded has everything to do with extraneousness. Akshan's fantasy is a swashbuckling gunslinger. Kill me right now for saying it, but resetting the swing makes sense for that fantasy. Stealth makes sense for that too, I think. He shouldn't have infinite stealth, he doesn't need to revive people, he doesn't need extra gold and move speed and extra attacks, etc. That's all extraneous. You could remove that and he'd still be *the swingy guy*.
Aatrox was an autoattacking lifestealing reviving demon, and now is... something. I don't see why they can't remove those unrelated things from akshan and fix him. Why akshan revives i will never understand
Yeah they can remove those things and significantly buff his DMG to compensate and that would be absolutely great. Then he will be far easier to play and auto win lane phase. They should do that
Vars, I completely agree that it is fair for Sett support to soak up 5 people's worth of damage with 3 items, and that an over--the-wall reset hop, a mix damage kit that scales well, isn't trash in the early game and a 0 mana, low cooldown ezreal q is good champion design. All jokes aside (?), I think vex is a great champion, renata is incredibly fun to play as and against, aphelios is fair because you must be organised to play with and against him. Riot might make mistakes here and there with AOE assassin yone and samira, but if they can nerf them to the ground so that they are literally unplayable I would forgive them 100%.
I think Draven is the ideal sweet spot for a champion. His kit isn't super complex but his age juggling is a super unique feature that makes him play unlike any other champion in his role.
I don't know if I can agree with the idea that riot has learned from their mistakes when they keep buffing Yasuo and Yone while nerfing ADC items. There is a reason why Zeri and other ADC's have been buying bruiser or assassin items over Crit ADC items.
I don't know if this a coincidence or not, but this video seems to adress the recent Exil video. In it he consistently mixed up the term overtuned with overloaded, which really hurt the message of his video. Zeri is overtuned, not overloaded. Even Ekko had a way more overloaded kit on release, and it has been years since then. Glad you clarified it
It feels like LoL is having a similar issue to Yu-Gi-Oh. On Yu-Gi-Oh New archetypes usually want so sort of gimmick or style and to do so usually leads to the path of overloading. Same with new cards that support existing archetypes. Although Yu-Gi-Oh as a whole takes it more to an extreme with cards that can pretty much prevent you from playing or stop your bosses. If LoL gets to that sort of extreme just imagine a future where a champion releases with abilities that just stops you from coming out of spawn until 10 minutes have passed? It's just an extreme scenario but the point stands. Definitely would not want LoL to head toward that direction that's for sure.
New champions having a gimmick is not the issue. New champions having multiple gimmicks is the issue. Prime example: Akshan. 1- Evelynn's invisibility where he gets bonus mana regen 1.5- during which he has Warwick's passive (partly) 2- Can swing on terrain, with cooldown reduction on takedowns 3- Lucian's passive with added movement speed or shield 4- Another 3hit passive 5- an overloaded boomerang (grants sight, reveals enemies, grants more movement speed, no max range) 6- can get more gold from just getting a takedown 7- has a ranged execute 8- AND THEN the developers also thought it would be fair to give him the ability to revive his team. Pick two or three and that would have been enough...
I went back on YuGiOh a few months ago and the overloadedness of the modern card game did not surprise me, since I am already used to the one of the new champions in lol (Traptrix best girls)
There’s a difference between “complexity” and “Hey, this guy just gets free shit”.
Kallista’s movement is unique. Transforming champs like Rek’sai and Gnar have complexity. Akshan is “let’s just put all these mechanics together and call it a day”.
Bruh just jump on top of Akshan. Most popular bruisers cuck him hard. You don't even need cc. Akshan is not durable at all.
This^ also people complain about Kalistas movement yet she has probably the harshest drawbacks. Autos that do 90% and they can miss if target disappears like what 😂
@@summonslammer9361 dont forget how she is the only champ to have slows impact her attack speed since it fucks her dash speed
True. As much as Vars hates on Yone, for me Akshan is the most problematic champion in my opinion. Yone still has to fight and still can screw up. Akshan just get's every thing in reward for doing usuall stuff. Free shieald for attacking enemies champions, free movement speed for kyiting, free stealth, free revive for takedowns.
For Yone it's at least that while he is broken, you still need to pilot him well, because most of his broken parts of his kit don't come for free or even if are seeming to be free, still can backfire if used unproperly (the only free thing in Yone's kit is his hybrid dmg, but I can't tell that it's the most hated thing about him, as an ADC main I don't really care if Yone oneshots me from screen away with quarter of magic dmg).
Senna is another example of "free win" but with her I believe it's a problem of trying to put the lore into gameplay to hard. Senna is a Sentinel as Lucian, so they wanted her to be adc. But she is also's Lucian's wife. So they wanted her to be in lane with him. So they made Adc that is enchanter support early, but gains free ADC stats to become relevant ADC despite not farming and not scoring kills (and problem is that she doesn't just become relevant adc, she literally is Veigar among ADC's, where past some point noone can compare).
@@mathuraphael9196 Senna's soul AD is combined with her not having level-up AD. So in a sense she is the only champion that doesn't get "free" AD. But yes she definitely is overloaded. Also ADCs are just a shit role as far as the eye can see. IDK i play ad a lot maybe im biased
5:57 I'm just here laughing at the akshan and pyke finding each other in camouflage
lol
I’d say current Aphelios is the most balanced of the three shown.
of those three, it's probably Yone but only for this ONE patch
At least Aphelios requires some understanding
I would say its akshan
@@maxwu4145 With that revive passive, can he truely be balanced?😆
@@notgrinch Yes
Mann... I don't even *play* League really, least not on a regular basis (maybe ill load up solo q or group w friends once a blue moon), and yet I still very much enjoy the polish, effort, and high quality of analysis that goes into your videos. The end product is quite enjoyable to watch. keep it up
I wonder if playing wild rift is counted as playing league
@@nanomachines9872 no
I mean honestly, I like how Riot is trying out new abilities and not just *"Hey guys! This is Draven 2.0 with some new skills!"* It is tantamount to explore and bring in abilities that can be exciting. However, Riot didnt get the assignment. Because not only did they put new abilities, they also found a way to make the champ broken. Not like Riot hasnt been doing that for years, but it seems every 200 year champ was quickly hotfixed, nerf, buff, etc.
The abilities are not new at all tho, champions are comprised of one new gimmick and then a bunch of reused assets from champions that were confirmed as viable.
A real "new" champion would be something absolutely weird like Bard, Shaco, Rek'sai or ASol, thing is: these are so different they force you to re-learn the game, thus they're unpopular. We still don't have a champion that can temporarily remove terrain, a champion that can rig the interactables, a champion with an unique shop etc., it's just that these features are not what the players want. The players just want a lot of mobility, combos and/or big damage to do flashy plays, doesn't matter if the design is new, old, original, redundant, whatever.
I agree, it's nice when they try to explore and create something new and fresh, for example every new adc is so unique despite constraints adc role has and it's great. But they could sometime ask themselves if something isn't too much. Akshan W revive is ok, but does he realy need to also have all the Passive effects and W camouflage with more buffs (mana regen, realy?)
Anyway it's much better than champion like Seraphine which for me is still exactly "Sona 2.0" with every aspect working the same way but better. Meanwhile Rito presented her as supportive midlaner who is much more different than sona, with argument "if had to play midlane i would pick Seraphine, if support I would pick Sona". Nowadays she got more pickrate as adc than midlane and still overwhelmed by support pick rate
i think part of why champions tend to be broken on release is so that players have incentive to spend time learning them, otherwise, why bother taking extra time to learn a new champion's kit rather than just play the champs you already know?
The latest champs weren't that broken on release tbh, in fact, they were pretty balanced. Compared to what we had to go through with release Aphelios and Samira, this is nothing.
Well imo the problem is that with almost 160 champions in the game its wayyy too hard to come up with new abilities without them being somewhat game breaking. I have no idea how they can still do it. Its really annoying to see a new champ come out and immediately the community is like "Wow thats just (insert champion) Q" or whatever. Zeri was an interesting and unique concept with her autos being an active ability but it immediately became game breaking and an absolute balance nightmare.
“Overloaded” champs i think were bound to happen. If you didn’t continue making new things every champ would just end up being reskins of the same stuff. They just need to balance them a bit better. For Akshan having a revive for example instead of making it his W passive which already gives invis as an active make it his Ult. His ult is largely terrible, so if the only way he revived teammates was killing the scoundrel with R people wouldn’t care much since it wouldn’t happen often
Don't forget his shield and move speed by just hitting you
Applying it over and over
Though, I would like to say it is still up to them how fast these overloaded kits expand. They have to know how much to hold back.
Megatron is right. Akshan just has too much, for no reason. He would still be fun to play with just boomerang, movespeed and grapplin. The chase + invisibility + revive should have been the base for another champ, designed like Evelynn, where you need to carefully plan your attack to give that revive without dying and then escape and wait for your CD.
One hyper mobile ranged duelist
One sneaky assassin that revives teammates
I can handle one champ fitting one description, but not two at once.
Yeah true but maybe instead of making new champs they could ummm, do VGU/reworks for MANY of there old champs that have been around since beta. Like imagine if grag, vlad, anne and more were looking like champs that we’re getting now? Even updated abilities that can compete with the new champs. Ahri is one, NEVER used in pros but giving her a reset for her ult to snowball her kills makes her a top pick champ for pros.
@@xxargonautxx9790 the problem with this is that VGU/reworks dont "sell" that well compared to new champion
Commenting before fully seeing the video:
I feel like the champion design team has been trying to push for more complex and challenging to learn champions, and are taking Lee Sin as an example of this, but entirely in the wrong way. Lee Sin's kit is very versatile, with 6 basic skills that can work off of each other in innumerable ways, but somehow, it seems they have just taken the fact that at face value, each ability slot just has a lot of different effects, and thought that's what makes him a good champion design. They don't seem to understand that you don't need two paragraph in each slot for a champion to be unique and difficult to master.
Just. Look. At. Orianna. Each of her skills are incredibly simple; Passive just makes her autos stronger, doesn't even synergize much with the rest of her kit, Q just moves her ball, E just moves her ball to shield someone, W is AOE damage and slow, ult is AOE damage and knockup+stun. Yet just the fact all her skills are centered around an external entity that comes with her, the ball, makes her a lot harder to master than any other mage, because you don't just have to check your own positioning, but also the balls positioning, and your distance to it. If Orianna was released today, would anyone think she was too simple of a champ for this era of champion design?
Simple but unique champions are the ones that Riot should be trying to design. There's obviously a lot more to champion design than that, but it makes champions interesting and fun for the people that they might appeal to, while preventing them from breaking the game. This is specifically why I like Aurelion Sol so much, as none of his abilities are really complicated, but there's no other champion that plays like him, which is why he is so adored by the few that do like to play him.
Though we do have to remember that complex champions could still be balanceable and healthy, like Bard. The only problems with those champs is that it's extremely hard to predict how much a buff or a nerf will affect them, so you're gonna have to do constant adjustments (*queue a clip rolling through hundreds of Senna changes), whereas with simple champs, it's a lot more straightforward (Remember the last time Zilean got changed? Yeah, me neither).
@@cosmicbard6998 What matters is that the champion's kit and bonuses actually fit in and make sense. Yasuo's Q does a lot of crazy shit, but I'm fine with it because everything about it makes sense, it's literally a "second auto-attack" for him. But his ultimate? Why does it also tack in bonus armour penetration out of nowhere? Extending the knock-up makes sense, and the heavy damage it does also makes sense as he's slicing his enemy up and slamming them to the ground. Why did they also tack in his passive interaction and boosted ArPen? Why does Sett punching really hard also translate into gaining a shield? Why does Gwen cutting people with her scissors also tack on healing?
@@G1ingy I think the sett shield makes sense because W is meant to be used at the end of a fight anyways. You tank a lot of damage during the fight, you are low health, you use W for some damage to kill or turn things around. If he didn't have shield, he'd be a free kill during the W because he's immobile for like a whole second and you can just walk up to him and kill him during that time.
'Unique'
Passive: Autos instantly kills the enemy champion on-hit
Ult: Obliterating all of the enemy structure, only leaving their nexus.
@@irjiiu1041 well see, that's still a difficult champ to master, because you gotta get really good at getting first pick and instalocking it and also at convincing the other 9 players not to just leave the game or ban it.
"If a Skirmisher has anti-ranged properties that's a problem. If an Assassin has AoE damage that's a problem."
Mans just described Yone and thought we wouldn't notice.
What’s anti ranged about yone? I mean yeah he can beat ranged but what part of his kit is actually anti-ranged?
E @@mac1462
@@mac1462 His 2 billion dashes
@@Gabriel_custodio195 Can you articulate without being overly dramatic?
@@mac1462 I apologise, I meant his 1 dash on q with a very low cooldown, his 2 dashes on e, the second being unstopable, and his dash on r. I was using an hyperbole.
I got fed on Vex today and I looked at the replay, in teamfights I covered more distance from my ult recasts than all the enemy dashes combined (enemy dashes included Kha'zix E, Akshan E, flashes).
Right the dash-hating champion xD
@@DamianSzajnowski fight fire with fire I guess
@@DamianSzajnowski Quite funny that Rito decided to make a counter-dashing champion a burst mage that plays kinda like a Diver.
vex is like the champ design team tried to make a mage but when they got to the ultimate they couldn't hold it in anymore and gave her an AOE damage resetting screen wide dash.
right, her ult could have been a time bomb that did more damage the further they moved in the countdown, and automaxed damage if they dash in that time
Watching this video made me realize how much I crave for a mixup in new content in league. Every new content in league is strictly kept to champions and skins while other games create new maps and/or different game modes. I know this argument isn't new or anything but with nexus blitz gone in the featured game mode rotation, league has been getting really stale for me for some reason and I'd like to experience something fresh.
One of the reasons why I play Azir is his old anti-dash ult because most of the time I always encounter a Yasuo, a raging Renekton, or a one-trick Lee Sin trying to insec you. Sadly they remove it and I was disappointed by that.
Because that's too broken amirite. Same with Aatrox revive.
yeah too broken but I think it's quite a handy right now because even if Azir is a quite strong mid and late game he is still vulnerable to other champions. It's my opinion tho so I'm not sure what others think of it.
@@UnNamed-8982 naw he needs anything he can get. Champs like Azir get some cool tech removed, but champs like akshan can revive teammates like what?
@@RadishHead7 I even thought Riot was done with the "revive" thing after they first remove the spell and then the passive skill of Aatrox but then they give it to a champion who looks like Jesus and freaking revives his four teammates after killing their killers. Damn I wish they revert those cool abilities.
Idk akshan is too overloaded, i wish to remove him from game, yone too
"Zeri still dies if you get your hands on her."
Big if there. She has insane movement speed with her ult, and builds Triforce and Titanic so she has a shit ton of HP, and dashes across any terrain once you "get your hands on her."
I think I liked your other take better: To me it's more about champions having abilities they really don't need. Sure, it's great if champ differentiates itself from others, but look at Akshan: His key recognizable abilities are his hook, his Ult and his revive. Is his double-hit passive something that makes him unique? I don't think so.
Also can we please have less invisibility? It sucks.
Put vision
Here's the difference between overloaded when it comes to rell vs others like Yas or yone. Rell isn't favored by riot. Some overloaded champs get absurd amounts of attention and buffs every single time when it starts looking like they might struggle. Yet others get gutted, both directly and indirectly, and riot does nothing.
So champs like yone, Yas, graves, etc etc, are always popular because they are easy to make flashy plays on and players know riot will never let them feel weak for long.
This is one reason why every "big play" montage has the same boring Yas/yone combo with some streamer who screams like a middle school girl and spams their mastery rank. Overloaded champs do get nerfed, but some overloaded champs are simply given an absurd amount of favor from riot.
Honestly as much as i love playing yasuo, his "hard combos" are piss easy and dont impress me anymore, its new player bait.
...... but hes just so fun man.
Mhh yes my favorite Champion "Yas"
I can already FEEl the vibe of the video based off the title alone
As long as it amplifies gameplay it's fine, my biggest problem with Akshan is that all his passives don't require you to think about how they'll work you just do things and the passives come out.
That's true in low elo, but you have to make choices as things get more complex
I think constantly releasing new champions might eventually kill this game, eventually it’ll be too much
ye
I love how everyone forgets how Azir was able to use his w on turrets - Not the Sand soldiers, he literally would just burst the turret for a nominal amount of damage by expending a charge of his w.
Good Ole azir
That got taken out so long ago I forgot it was ever a thing 😆
Yeah he was good in taking turrets without it through is Attack speed, but they thought he needed to oneshot turrets in the late game in release.
Azir and Ornn are the two examples I can think of, who we're completly overloaded and Riot took one thing after another to make them possible to balance
Really? When was this removed?
@@Idk_imagine_a_cool_name Patch 6.11
Edit: 1. June 2016
I'm expecting Vars talking shit about Yone 6 minutes in the video
Viego is easily the most overloaded champ. He gets EVERYTHING.
(in addition to stealth, stun, AS steroid, %hp damage, sustain, gap closer, resets, item reset, heal,....)
Like really everything in his base kit.
I personally have an issue with zeri simply because she is an adc you need to catch... but she has near-infinite dashes, non-targeted autos to attack out of vision, insane tempo, high magic damage, and galeforce if she builds it. I just think Zeri is a problem design due to being designed around filling the hole of every single adc in the game's weaknesses. Her pick/ban in high elo especially attests to this. I personally think if she just had less mobility itd be fine, but its downright oppressive.
For the most part, overloaded champions I find are a problem because when they are ahead... what do you do? When ahead they are suffocating because then they have numbers AND options, nd that's why I think so many people dislike them. It is what it is though, great video!
She is what Lillia could be if she had actual auto range and wasn't forced to run in a die (with a dash and no speed cap + good slows)
Yeah, you cant really catch her. Ive often seen a zeri beingt caught somewhere in the jungle and she just pressed e and got out. Thats ridicolous. No other adc can do that and would always die
look up her cpunter list, its all adc and 2 ohter 200 years champs, only meele being yasuo and we all i know why. so if you have an adc with 3.5 k hp running around at 800 ms, and onehsothing assaisn to dare to jump on her, you have a design problem. rn it pick or ban ,or hope your bot laner ist mental, oh he is welp, go next. Only way to fix that is giving her actual cooldown where is is vulnerable, eg the 20 sec cd dash on diana after you miss or something, akshan dash early is also 20 min, 10 sec. reduce ms, same treatment as lilia,
Yeah not to mention damn near her entire kit has had to be nerfed or adjusted for 3 patches in a row, and few other champions have that streak. I think it's the combination of her attack range and mobility, most higher range ADCs have low mobility and vice versa for low range ones. Whereas Zeri gets the best of both worlds with her Q having 825 range.
Then she also gets to build bruiser items, although that's getting nerfed and instead they're massively buffing how she scales with crit. Will probably backfire though given how 2x CD refund on E and double ult stacks on critical hit sounds quite broken. They only fixed half the issue.
I disagree pretty strongly, Zeri pays for her kits strengths with some very key weaknesses. Zeri has very limited target selection (her autos can be body blocked by frontliners), has almost no AoE (especially since her current Triforce+Hydra build is getting nerfed.), and her mobility has a pretty slow ramp-up time. She shares a lot of the strengths of the marksman class in general, if you ignore her she deals incredible damage over time, she shreds objectives and tanks, and she has high-ish range. Her personal strengths are very powerful kiting ability, great chase potential, and decent hybrid damage. You can compare her to Jinx in a lot of ways, they get stronger as a fight keeps going, gaining more and more movement speed, and attack speed in Jinx's case. Jinx has better DPS and AoE damage, but is less mobile and does pure physical damage, while Zeri is more mobile and has that hybrid damage but isn't gonna delete entire teams with a few rocket autos. Basically I think Zeri is a fine design and isn't really any more or less overloaded than your average marksman, she's just extremely overtuned at the moment. I think the upcoming changes pushing her more towards crit will make her feel a lot more fair.
What do you mean overloaded? *our champions are not overloaded*
- Rito, the great book of camouflage mechanics
You really hit the nail on the head here: overloaded champions are not necessarily overpowered, but they are utterly exhausting to play against or watch in action. I watch so much LoL (I don't play it anymore because I'm too old to be flamed by a 14 year old kid for being bad at a video game) and I can't tell you everything that Akshan can do just from memory. Compare this to Nasus or Renekton or even Quinn, all of whom have kits that I could easily explain to any gamer, even if they have never played a MOBA before.
This makes things really confusing at times, which is never a good sign in a multiplayer PvP game. Even setting aside balance issues, abilities that do too much typically end up being net detractors to skilled gameplay; sometimes the people playing the character pull of great plays that they themselves don't understand or intend because their champion's overloaded kit just did things its own.
I think that Riot should have a word limit for ability descriptions; such as "Once the ability tooltip reached 50 words, the designer has to stop."
All removed mechanics or range decreases for Azir. They did my boy dirty.
E Shifting Sands V5.14
No longer knocks up the first champion hit.
P Shurima's Legacy V5.14
Attack speed gain from cooldown reduction
E Shifting Sands V5.16
Range reduced to 1100 from global
Q Conquering Sands V5.17
Additional damage per soldier.
W Arise! V6.5
Sand Soldiers applying Fervor of Battle
W Arise! V6.11
Casting on top of turrets to damage them.
R Emperor's Divide V6.11
Bonus movement speed to allies or Azir on pass-through
W Arise! V6.14
Soldier vision range was reduced to 350 from 575.
Q Conquering Sands V7.19
Cast range reduced to 720 from 875.
W Arise! V7.19
Soldier command range was reduced to 660 from 800.
W Arise! V7.19
Soldiers being able to attack wards or trinkets.
R Emperor's Divide V7.19
The wall no longer knocks back any enemy who attempts to pass through once stationary, although it still functions as impassable terrain. Still knocks back during the charge.
W Arise! V8.3
Soldier attacks now draw minion aggro to Azir.
i blame proplay
@@jajapoe2 that's all the balance team cares about
I would love rito making more simple champions again, just like how sett is pretty basic but works wonders:
Passive: punches 2 times, second time does more damage
Q: punches are now harder, he runs at you
W: you hit him, he hits you
E: he brings you close, if he brings 2 people it stuns
R: he just WWE your ass and the people near the landing spot
Since Exil hasn’t done recent videos of league cause his busy or just starting to be over the game, i’m glad you still do these types. Even if you’re not liking lol atm these videos are still top notch. But also do what you love if you just can’t with these videos.
I think that the problem with those releases is that riot looks like they have a checklist of "must be in the kit" and on top of the champion gimmick they force the whole list also in. Must have: dashes/flashes, resets, cc, stats boosts, sustain, executions/%health damage/true damage, etc... some of them like vex have the checklist in a more soft way and its ok but others like akshan have that list forced in a so extreme way that you sometimes forget that his actual gimmick is reviving people.
omg yes i think u explained it sm how i do, its like they threw way too many gimmicks into akshans kit its so overwhelming, they shouldve narrowed it down more.. probably renata too, i think if they swapped around her abilities a little and tweaked them she would honestly be fine imo
@@lottiederex In the case of Renata, i think is something less problematic because of the rol. If a enchanter is overloaded you can always Nerf his/her numbers to the ground and it could still be a good pick because It isnt his/her work deal damage, even if you remove the damage from the whole kit of Renata she can set be usefull because she will do her job as enchanter, helping other person to beat the shit out of you. When a tank is overloaded is the exact same thing, and if It is a mage or assassin you can always constrain It by the mana and CD, the real problem with overloaded champions is when they are skirmishers, adcs or ad bruisers because their job is dealing damage and they cant be really constrain by mana (they tried It with aphelios) or CDs (Samira) because their main way of dealing damage are the AA, so either you Nerf them to the ground and make them useless (aphelios) or is necesary remove things from their kits (Samira)
People should stop comparing overloaded to complex.
Aphelios is a complex Champion while Yone is a overloaded one for example
He is at least a little overloaded because each of his weapons does a vastly different thing than the others and he has just too damn many of them. We're talking about a champion where even the goddamn basic attacks have 5 different gimmicks in the form of unique passives...and by leveling up he only gains stats and nothing else. He's basically the only overloaded stat checker in the history of the game...and that's without even taking into consideration the different interactions between his primary and off-hand weapons... How many combinations are there for 4 Q abilities and 4 weapons (cause for Gravitum, it doesn't seem to matter what off-hand weapon you have) weapons? Oh, right...16 of them... It's...pretty insane. Although I will agree he doesn't feel as stupid and borderline ridiculous as Yone, Akshan or Viego.
You're misinterpeting the term "overloaded" that is legit explained in the video. Aphelios can be considered overloaded because he has multiple different passive and active effects on his abilities. But he is super undertuned after being nerfed into the dirt. Yone is honestly way more tame than some other champs. I feel like the ramping movement speed on E seems like a bit much and having a portion of magic damage is concerning. But he is overtuned af and scales like a monster.
I think you don't really know what overloaded kits is. Aphelios is also considered overloaded champ.
I would say aphelios isn't overloaded. He can only use 2 of his 5 weapons at any one time while each weapon has only one q ability and a universal r ability. He was broken upon release because he was overtuned with stats.
@@MOONGREEDY Nope. No matter aphelios is overtuned or not, he is still considered overloaded. Overloaded means the champs have a lot of kits in his arsenal compared to other champs. Overloaded can be overtuned or balanced but usually, Overloaded champs are hard to balance because most of them have lack counters.
back in the day, you just pick a champion according to the splash art, and someone from the squad explains u what the champ does while in loading screen. I would need 10 minute intense lecture to fully elaborate on what alphelious and akshan do
“Never played Annie before, What do?”
“Q single target damage W shield E aoe damage R bear. Passive stuns on 5th spellcast”
@@Ellebeeby "Never played Aphelios before, What do?"
"Red heal, Green long range, Blue AOE damage, White fast damage if close, Purple root. Passive gives AD, AS and Lethality"
I left out about as much as you left out when describing Annies abilities, i dont think Aphelios is any more complicated than her.
@@tatzecom Not even close man, you have to explain wtf is gun cycles as that is "basic" and fundamental of the champion...
@@zrevex1134 Annie Q refunding Mana is also a key element to her Laning Phase, that she can speed up Tibbers with her E is also important, that Tibbers deals AoE DoT is important, that you can steer Tibbers is important, that you lose all Pyromania stacks upon death isn't negligible either
If you wanna take on Gun cycles, please don't forget that Annie's basic rundown left alot of important information on the table aswell
@@tatzecom Those are tips you can just say mid game, but now try to explain that aphel has 5 weapons and that if you dont cycle or have x weapon at y time makes you useless. Also explain how to fix a cycle of weapons mid game and have the person understand 1/5 of it.
7:19 Zeri literally builds bruiser and steals shields, making her probably the tankiest adc, has high mobility (E is dash/ wall jump and R gives her movement speed buff) and aoe damage (W and R). If you jump on her she can survive this thanks to her intended build and then gain distance while shredding your hp and shield (if u have any)
My favorite overloaded ability is PLayful/ Trickster (Fizz E). It is dash, AoE slow, that gives untargetability, deals massive damage, is Fizz´s main burst, safety and waveclear. And its balanced exactly because of all those atributes, because if Fizz uses E he is instantly wihout all those atributes. Which keeps him in check because while he can use E to always escape a gank, suddenly you are missing a big chunk of your damage. You can use it to waveclear, but now you are no longer safe and most midlaners can step up to you, as you are missing your main damage nuke and stick tool.
I actually used to hate Fizz because of his E. But now Yone/Viego/Yuumi exist :) Now he is only slightly annoying
He still has a shit ton of damage without his E tho, his Q is a dash that can one shot adcs, his W is an empowered aa that can one shot, his ulti is a AoE knockup that can also do a shit ton of damage.
@@ukuviispert9599 if you max his E first, his WQ combo is a lot weaker. Plus, Fizz E is difficult to use correctly.
Actually Fizz isn't considered overloaded champ.
New characters abilities do not further differentiate from the others. They are simply 2 or 3 sometimes 4 or 5 abilities from other champions smashed Into one ability. This is why they are so obnoxiously overloaded.
I think Vel'Koz is a great example of well balanced and overloaded. His kit applies an on hit passive and can deal true damage with 3 stacks, his W procs twice, his Q fires in a parallel directions at the end of its firing line, his R applies true instead of magic if max passive stacks, yada yada. Point is, it's easy to understand, he does a LOT of damage, but relies on pretty easy to dodge moves and will evaporate if you even touch him.
I really like Vel'Koz
Not overloaded at all tbqh
And I never expected to spot Aphelios there yet again.
But this line got us off-guard at 2:52.
You can say what you want, but the fact that jessica was: the Executive Producer & Vice President of League of Legends icon.png League of Legends at Riot Games Inc. She was responsible for the game state. When something wrong, the highest person on the ladder is the one who need to be blamed. That is how business works. They make and take the discisions, not the employee. The employee just follow what the boss say. Though i admit that these stupid changes over years is a bad culture of the company itself. Who-ever is in charged. That culture is something they need to CHANGE
The Lead Game Designer tells the employees how he wants the game. Not the highest person on the ladder. They only care about money from business partners. THAT'S how Business works.
@@sinnis4993 you have lead designer and designer. Though you are correct they care only about money, but that is another thing they fail at. More and more people quiting the game due the too many and too frequenty unneeded changes.
I am nerves/excited to see what Riot will do with both the new Void Jungler, and the Taliyah changes. Great video
All champions has what i call the "power taxing". Power taxing ensures that even overloaded champions has something in their kit that the opponent can circumvent or even exploit when fighting against them, essentially their weaknesses.
basic champs like Jax and Trynd solely relies on statchecking in short range, that means pokes or abilities that denies statchecking like Jax's own E softens their blow and impact (it goes with Riven too because of her passive). Yasuo power relies on the lane and his opponent's positioning and he couldn't escape willy nilly like his brother did, and thus his threat range is contained in the same place as his weakness. Thresh monstrous impact is solely based on his own team's cooperation value; if his team refuses to go with his play, then he will be outdone even champs like Aphelios is no exempt from this, all of his kit is still contained withing a modicum of an ADC; he's just as vulnerable as every other ADC barring Zeri and Akshan and can be immediately taken out by a competent champs that can dive him.
if your champ power taxing is based solely on player's competency, then your champion basically has no weakness, because competent or high level players can circumvent or essentially remove said power taxing/weakness. Akali's real weakness is basically "she's squishy" while she can practically circumvent her weakness by simply avoid getting hit, which is easy for her due to multiple ways she can escape (and even so at launch, that obscure is just pain in the ass to handle). Yone is said to be fundamentally similar to his brother and share his power taxing, but the only similarity Yone had with his bro is his passive crit boost, otherwise his threat power is practically uncontained as not only he's easier to play, but he can easily escape in any situation when needed because of his E on top of of general sustainability and hybrid damage his brother has no luxury of, which simultaneously makes anti crit items ineffective because of said hybrid damage. as an engage support, Pyke wants to be as close as possible to his enemies but comes butt in for being "squishy" and can't reliably build tank items because of his passive on top of not being able to play solo due to being deliberately understated for a good reason, but the fact that most of his skills barring Q grants him mobility of some sort and the fact that he will always play together with his team to secure kills and grants one of them an equivalent of a full kill gold, means that what he got simply outweighs his weakness. I can list and explain many other champion's with this criteria but it'll probably be too long for my liking.
time and time again they proven me right with this shit, yet Rito and the community didn't believe me.
Let’s not forget the new ap Kaisa who pretty much fires a single target ezreal ult every 3 seconds
Is Every Champion + 200 Years + No Bitches + Flex Pick + 0/10 Power Spike + Roll Face on Keyboard + FF15 = Balanced
Saying you need to catch zeri it's like saying you need to catch jhin, you're not catching neither when they're moving a 2 ghosts worth of movement speed.
hits 4 , enemy shaco using gps pile sender he put in my pants while invis to find me on ohter side of the map rubbing one out in the shrub's. like seriously dashes are more ok in my opinion as long as they dont ho over walls then 900 ms bs
I honestly still think Vex and Lillia are the best relatively new champion releases. They're powerful, their kit simple and they're not broken or overloaded while still being original and fun. Their personalities are unique and their design as well.
me when he is explaining overloaded: he is gonna use ygo as an example ain't he?
10 seconds later: like modern yugioh...
me: theeere we go. i'm glad my once favorite game at least remains relevant as a cautionary tale.
You two are hard coping, Dragoon ain't even good.
Great video brother, I love the quality of your videos.
In hindsight, it's actually very interesting comparison between League and Dota 2 overloaded champs. For League, i think its mainly because of the core design where essentially everyone is a carry (practically everyone scales with items) and stat checks. Also the lack of proactive counters / defensive other than banshee veil variants, zonya, revives further strengthens the overloadedness of a champ.
Also an interesting comparison, League moves away from press for profit abilities, while 99% of Dota 2 roster consists of impactful press for profit, to the point of saying : League ults is usually a Dota 2 basic ability
Would you say Karma is more overloaded or overtuned? Not sure if you'll talk about it in your upcoming Karma vid, but she is a champ who's had things removed and subsequently buffed compensate. The most egregious example being the removal of RE's damage, and the numerous buffs to her passive, mana costs, cooldowns and shield values to compensate it.
3:00 thank you for being one of the few to point this out to people.
I don't play League anymore, but I love your videos and always watch them. League theory is so much more fun than League prac.
As you said in the end, champions CAN be made fun and different with a gimic of their own without having properties of 10 other champs. I would imagine it's hard to make an interesting champion that introduces something new, with a playstyle of their own while still falling in their class and having a finite amount of mechanics, but riot has like how many employees? One would think that they really work hard to find that balance...
Cant really put Zeri on the "now are healthy" state. I almost one trick her in soloq and i admit that the bruiser ADC is stupid. But riot is starting to give us Samira treatment and target mechanics that are not the issue after everyone who plays her stated the exact way you can get rid of the problem (remove q activating sheen)
Finally someone that knows what they are talking about. I never understood why her Q activates sheen anyway.
@@pedrohenrique-db3xd ezreal logic, whenever you think about an ADC that "autos" with their Q, you think about ezreal and his builds are always around sheen q
@@delta_8870 I love that Ezreal has been a notorious balance problem for Riot for many many years BECAUSE of his Q applying Sheen from range, yet they decide to let another champ also do that anyways. Honestly they should take that away from GP too.
@@Limrick1029 Ezreal is a notorious balance problem who has the highest pick-rate (average) over the past 10 years in ADC by far at all ranks. Even when he's in a bad state likr rn he's picked. Giving Zeri Ez like mechanics seemed like a good idea because of that
Riot Games never run out of idea, they just ran out of good ideas
Can't them just remove some of the "overload" and tune up the champ the amont he lost ?
Like remove akshan passive shield and give him some bonus hp, &c.
You asked in the video why is there a pattern of growing overloaded champions?
As an artist I can tell you ; over time all artists grow more skillful in their craft.
In this sense, a video game designer is in a way an artist, a creative. That's why then League came out, champions looked ugly and played boring; if you are making a brand new game how do you know yet what will it be like when players play it? How do you know what kind of player-base you will have at all? How do you know the limitations of your game right off the bat? How do you know what you can create without trying first? You can design it all in theory, but when it gets into the hands of the users your design could be used in an unexpected way.
Of course all the old champions were simple and in retrospect uninspiring. Same thing with other long-form video games, like Warframe. The "champions" or Warframes in that game were also all "cookie cutter" as you list it 9 years ago. You have 4 abilities, you shoot a thing, you have an AoE thing, you have utility thing, you have AoE ultimate. Not unlike many old League champions.
Over time after the "normal" is established, the designer tries new things within the confines of their project (the game in this sense.) Over the years step by step each champion is a design a little more creative than the last. And this is welcomed progress, it makes things more fun, interesting, its only natural. Just like in any skill based profession.
However there is an intuitive line that can be crossed where the experienced designer goes beyond the confines of their project, beyond the rules of their own game. That is where the original charm of the game is lost and its turning into something unwanted. That's a little conceptual but think about it this way.....a game is defined by its rules, if you disregard the rules, there is no game.
Imagine Chess, maybe you can add a new Chess piece that moves in a new pattern, that would an example of adding a new design to existing rules. But if you add a new piece that....I dunno...says if you do a certain pattern you get to flip the board and whoever throws their pieces the furthest wins the whole game...that kind is an example of going outside the existing rules and it really doesn't feel like Chess anymore as the rest of Chess is entirely disregarded.
That is the line I believe we feel Riot crosses sometimes and you begin to feel the original charm or rules of League of Legends are being disregarded. Kayn could be 2 versions of the same champion, but Viego turns into all 150+ champions. Aphelios has an entirely new unique HUD while literally no one else does, doesn't even get an ability level 1 like normal. It used to be when you chose a Champion and buy an item, that is it in the game - but then Zoe, Neeko, Sylas, and Viego steal your items and your champion/ultimates.
How could you tell if a Champion is overloaded verses overtuned? One way is by pretending you are stripping their kit of effects and ask yourself, are they ruined by losing this or can they still function? Let's take a look at Warwick - if you take away his passive he can't heal with his low base HP, low damage, he can be kited or there are better fighters. If you take away his Q bite he can't stick onto the "prey" he's chasing for his hunting fantasy, can't heal, doesn't do burst damage, he can be outplayed and kited. Take away his W he can't chase or find that "prey" target, he loses massively on DPS and movement, he can't duel and thus he can't heal from passive so theres more mobile fighters. If you take away the E howl, he loses crowd control, and his only defensive ability, which without he has low base HP stats can be killed easily and can't duel or even gank without ultimate and can be DPS-ed down by his peers. Without his ult....you get the idea, Warwick can't do his " I'm hunting prey as a relentless hunter" fantasy game-play without any piece of his kit.
Let's take a look at Akshan - the man of passives. If you take away his teammate revive he.....still plays exactly the same. If you take away the bonus gold and mana regeneration and movement speed he gets from chasing Scoundrels.....he can still play exactly the same and deal with resource management and positioning management like the rest of us. Maybe finally taking away his gimmicky passive he finally begins to feel weak since his entire kit is balanced around just proccing that bizarre three-hit passive over and over. Think of Irelia losing the Disarm on her ultimate, still plays the same. Akali losing the ability to hide under towers with shroud, still plays the same to all of our chagrin. That's an example of overloaded. They should strip these champions of UNNECESSARY effects until it gets to the point you can't strip any more without destroying the design, and then work from there.
“Zeri seems overloaded, but she still dies if you get your hands on her”
Bro she builds shit that makes her tankier than the fed mundo on my team
also able to dash through any wall every few shots
Aphelios, the ADC mage tank poke mid jungler top support is def not broken!!!
to be fair he isnt ALWAYS all of those, one second he was a poke and life steal the next u see him changing to aoe masacre machine with root, but no longer poke and life steal. however, chances r u wont know whats coming. doesnt mean theres no counter to him tho
Sett, Renata, Lillia, etc, proves they can make simpler champions if they want to. One issue is that a slew of the champs since Yas have been duo class or role champs. When u make a duo role/class champ they need extra mechanics to work right.
Akshan could be seen as overloaded; I'd agree he could have 1-2 mechanics moved, but those won't be the ones that actually make him a threat, bc he really does need pretty much every mechanic (especially in the passive) to function not only as Marksman Assassin, but as a solo mid laner, and not break him. NOT to mention the fact the revive is important to his identity. Could he NOT have the revive mechanic and function? Yes...but then there's barely a reason for him to exist. The Q isn't even a big deal.
For Gwen Skirmishers have 1 strong defense ability, thats her anti range same as Yas. She deals More AoE dmg bc she's "supposed" to be an AP champ and that means "less focus on AA, more focus on abilities" And thus applies her dmg in a different Way; AoE bc that evokes the usage of scissors. This also means u can DODGE her biggest source of dmg unlike the AA skirmishers. She still lacks strong target access and is incentivized to go against beefier targets, so when her W is on CD u can still poke her down, bc she's likely to want to fight the front line.
I don't think anything is sacred in league. They took aatrox's revive, they can take akshan's.
But I agree that most problems come with champions being made to play multiple roles/classes
Dude all your videos are super under rated... Cheers for everything you do for the league community. You will have 1 mil SUbs very soon
Nice, you got the Alba Cavanich(Night) theme playing in the background
Man's just gonna call out my boy Red-Eyes Dark Dragoon like that
Honestly people are saying champs are getting more insane, but imagine if they released Azir or Kalista or Karthus now, they would also be said to be 200 years
i agree but i think it is because it has been fairly back to back insane releases vs then when it was a bit more spread out ykno?
I'd rather die to getting mechanically outplayed by an overloaded character than Tryndamere ghost flash galeforce running me down under 3 towers autoing me to death while being immune to dying.
Tryn ults toxicity is only nearly matched by Sions passive literally rewarding him for dying
Could you do a video on the item meta and how it seemingly going in a loop?
As a 200K Akshan main, I have my popcorn ready
I'm halfway and suffering because if he was overloaded I wouldn't get destroyed every time I miss Q lol
I'm exaggerating but not that much tho. He's easily punishable. Yone on the other hand... I can do stupid shit and live on him. And I'm bad.
@@sunnydargonnel Although I disagree with "look at his 80 paragraphs, a lot of his kit feels more like a hypothesis than an actually finished kit, like they put all the tools and tech in it but didn't make it something more ability-esque.
Hey Vars do you plan on making something of your own in the future? You have a lot of insight in game mechanics and design and I'd love to see something that came straight from your head.
yone on thumb = i watch
I don't think I've ever seen it commented on any of your videos but I love the Xenoblade music. I also love the video!!!!! Keep it up!
I love playing Cho'gath because he is a funny dinosaur that can grow really really big. its a fun gimmick that ties to some great scaling, all while being extremely simplistic.
Wen you said yu-gi-oh i was like heck ye hes gona talk about numeron gate or a ominegate
You know what Vars, this is the last straw! You mentioned him again and it's time he's gotten his moment. I demand a Perfectly Designed: Zac!
Man you make too much sense it's unfair
You can't keep pushing out bangers like these, with a calming voice like this too
Garen is Shapesnatch, Yone is Nirvana High Paladin.
The thing with Rell is that she _is_ genuinely overloaded, but her numbers are low enough to not be a problem. Well not a problem to the enemy at least. I feel like Rell feels a lot worse to play, because none of her effects are very potent she just has a shit-ton of them. It makes her feel kinda useless even though she does a lot. When you hit your Q as Soraka you feel like you did a lot. You deal surprisingly competent poke damage, slow the enemy significantly and speed yourself up + heal quite a bit. When you hit Rell Q... I mean it might break shields, but aside if not it doesn't really deal damage, and it doesn't really heal and the resist shred doesn't really feel like it makes a difference. It has too much going on to feel impactful if that makes sense.
I like how riot proved to themselves that you still can release champions in s12 that are unique and strong, but not overcomplicated or overloaded with their last 3 releases. Busts that really popular myth of "powercreep is inevitable". Making overloaded kits is a choice and honestly just a symptom of a lack of creativity. If you can't come up with a unique gimmick or playstyle, just slap a bunch of unnecassary effects on a basic champ and call it a day. Thats how we get stale, boring to play messes like akshan.
A lot of the "one overtuned ability" champions can be fixed so easily though where i wonder why riot is so hesitant with it. With tahm they showed they can do it, so why not for f.e: - Gwen: Swap her w and ult. Or make her w only a damage reduction/ms zone similar to old maikai ult. Or make her w at least not block cc like xin ult.
- Yone: Just take the ms off his e so he can't run you down by just auto attacking you to death. Introduce a penalty for using it too freely like taking maxhp%
damage when you snap back unless you get a kill.
I remember when vex released people were genuinely excited that she only had 2 sentences on her abilities
Rell to me will always be a good example how how to balance a overloaded champion, and she well-designed at least in my opinion. Her q gives her a ranged passives, heals like taric q and breaks shields. Her W has two stances, The dismounts gives u ali's knockup, leona's e, leona's w, nautilius w and the mount gives a voli q with a knock up instead of a stun. Her e is and aoe stun that covers half the screen and part of taric's W granting not just armor but MR too. The drawbacks, the champ is literally unplayable if u get caught out and has a all in or nothing playstyle that if u messed up the engage, you gonna die. If they only remove the slow on rell's dismount, if only... And still no new rell skins. They really trying to keep her on the down low.
The worst part for me is that they removed, modified or nerfed many older champions abilities due to having "too much", never brought them back and now release champs that break this rule.
Khazix evolved R used to give % damage reduction, it would be completely fine by today standards, but there's almost no reason to evolve R nowadays. Azir R used to block dashes...things like that
''we don't think that our champions have overloaded kits.'' , riot games 2021
"Orianna has been out performing in her early game."
Riot games 2021
@@Scudmaster11 Did they actually say that lol
@@Jynx9921 I know... she didn't diserve that nerf.. infact they made mid lane so disriuper unfriendly that orianna was pushed out of mid... she needs a buff to deal with thies assassins better
@@Jynx9921 and yes they did in a patch note
I think what people tend to miss when talking about overloaded champions is that there's usually just one or two things they do that people really hate. Removing those things would often still leave us with a really cool champion with a unique identity. Samira's W could just be an AoE damage tool. Akshan's W could just be a stealth with no revive. Quiyana would be much less frustrating to fight against if she had an ultimate that provided single target damage or utility rather than teamfight burst and cc. Viego's passive would be really cool if it didn't arbitrarily provide untargetability, a heal, and an ultimate reset, which itself provides incredible mobility and unstoppable for some reason. Sure they might still be frustrating to some people, but with just a few small cuts, most champions would be really cool and fun to play against, instead of infuriating. Hell, even Yone could be fun if Riot tried to give him a different E so he wouldn't have free engage and disengage without any effort.
12:53 A compliment for Yone. Didn't know this was your 1m sub special 850k before.
i love overloaded champions NOT ALL OF THEM but when its done right and it doesnt feel bad to fight them like aphelios rn they are the most fun champions for me there are ALOT OF options no matter how much i play them i will still discover new stuff unlike malphite q make them go slow u go fast w make u punch stronk e u mad so ground go brrr r u go weeee enemy go aaaa
Its like nobody ever looks at a design doc and just asks the simple question of "But why?"
Azir could also use his W on turrets to deal damage, I dont mean that his soldiers could attack turrets but instead of summoning it would use one charge to just chunk the hp on turrets.
Wow, you're really smart. Great content as alwayse. Well thought out
"Bard, a weirdo" my day has improved ten fold
My biggest issue is that new champions tend to not actually have a main theme anymore.
Champions just get a bunch of stuff thrown in on top of what was supposed to be their gimmick so their gimmick does not stand out.
Like, what is Zeri's main gimmick? What is Arkshaan's?
Zeri was supposed to be a hyper mobile adc (which she is) akshan was supposed to be a mid lane adc/assassin with the gimmick revive (but ofc they messed akshan really hard because his revive has 0 conditions to happen, is not tied to an ultimate, and his passive is just too stacked wtf)
@@pedrohenrique-db3xd Zeri is a hyper mobile adc, who also steals shields, who also has max-health damage, who also deals more damage to lower health targets, who also slows alot, who also spams on-attack effects.
I don't mind Riot introducing new mechanics to the game. In fact, such are very much welcome. But there has to be a trade off for that gimmick, otherwise new champions will make old ones obsolete. Give the champion a gimmick, but release him lacking something a basic champion has. The easiest example I can give is a bruiser with some crazy new mechanic, but zero built in sustain, which is something bruisers conventionally have. That way you don't release, for example "a better Renekton", you release a champion that do something Renekton don't, but unlike Renekton, you have no sustain. I used Renekton as an example just because he was the first coming to mind.
But there are even better examples. Riot has proven they can do it. Just look at Bard and Aurelion Sol.
As you've said, it gets especially bad when it is a champion that excels at something that their relatives are tipically the weakest at. Assassins are notoriously bad at teamfighting. Then you have Qiyana. Skirmishers too tend to be single target oriented with low CC. Then you have Yone.
But I agree, Vex, Zeri and Renata are a nudge in the right direction. I do think the later two are overloaded, but not nearly to the same extent of 2019~2021 releases.
Renata seems fine about most of her kit, but the revive mechanic?
Nah, too much.
@@Vly-nn2sv Renata's W is worst than a shield or a heal most of the time, people just get upset because it says the word "revive"
@@pedrohenrique-db3xd that depends, it can essentially deny an execute, a veigar's ult or whatever damage comes as the killing blow, regardless of how big.
And can potentially turn a 5v5 in a 5v6.
Add to that that it can't be reduce like you can do with healing or shield (sure, shield is only countered by serpent's fang and kinda by shadowflame, but still).
@@Vly-nn2sv yes, but that requires the target to kill someone afterwards, and because of its long cooldown, she can only use it one per fight, 2 times at best, unlike shields and heals that can be used multiple times. So it's a situationally powerful ability, not a instant value ability like askhan revive. So it's a lot more balanced and well designed than people think.
@@pedrohenrique-db3xd But even on its lowest point, her W is still a movement and attack speed steroid, so it is a valuable ability no matter what. For how gamechanging its highest possible value can be, at its lowest, it is still a very respectable ability.
I am surprised you didn't mention Pyke, which to me, has been the most overloaded champion for a really long time.
If you just mention the tools, options and effects he has, even just summing them up into as few words as you can still sounds like a lot.
Recovers health if out of view, camouflage with extra movement speed, hook with reveal AND slow, dash with stun, an AoE execute that ignores shields while resetting AND giving extra gold but also teleports him.
He is an assassin with an AoE execute that can be used on several people one after the other through shields that can also heal himself while having an easy escape since he can just dash without you being able to follow him and then turn invisible regenerating health.
I think Pyke is actually really interesting to discuss as far as overloaded goes. Pyke sounds overloaded when you say his mechanics, but you look at the class he fills and has been restricted to, and he actually fits pretty well. Most supports with a hook have a primary cc, followed by a seconds cc, and a way to survive the fact they are diving straight into the enemy team.
Tresh and Nautilus get close to their target while applying cc with their hooks. Pyke doesn't get close with his hook, and his hook doesn't get gim close from a farther range.
Tresh and Nautilus each have a secondary cc they apply after making their hook similar to Pyke's e. The only difference being Pyke doesn't nessecarily get close until his second cc. That may sound a bit out of tune with other hook champions, but Thresh also has the ability to push away and not take the recast on his q. Pyke does have stealth and a regen steroid, but it doesn't help him nearly as much against poke because he can only regenerate recent damage. Hook and engage supports need a way to survive diving in, but all are still weak to being poked down. Pyke just does it differently than Thresh, Naut and Blitz having shields, health, and armor/mr. Pyke also can't build health so if he does get caught by some type of counter engage, he has a good chance st dying. The only real problem with Pyke is his ultimate doubling gold.
I think Pyke definitely can sound overloaded, but if tou actually compare him to similar supports, he does the same job mostly. His only real difference being a higher risk champion that is still vulnerable to common counterplay for asssassin's and engage supports.
For what i have seen before vex as u said was riot was too tunnel visioned on how a champ will feel while playing but did not consider how the champ would be to play against. If a champ is designed like that then the person who is playing will be the only one happy/have fun but the 5 members from other team and maybe there own team will not have fun
Rito after this video: fine I will now call the 1000 years champions
I was having so much fun with Aphelios 2 weeks ago and then it all went downhill again after they cut healthsteal. He is considered "overloaded" but it's so difficult for him to keep a good spot in the game. I wouldn't even consider him a problem when he's in a good spot because other adcs can deal damage with waaaaay less effort. It's quite difficult for riot to make a fun champ that isn't absurdly problematic.
I think the definition of overloaded has everything to do with extraneousness. Akshan's fantasy is a swashbuckling gunslinger. Kill me right now for saying it, but resetting the swing makes sense for that fantasy. Stealth makes sense for that too, I think. He shouldn't have infinite stealth, he doesn't need to revive people, he doesn't need extra gold and move speed and extra attacks, etc. That's all extraneous. You could remove that and he'd still be *the swingy guy*.
Aatrox was an autoattacking lifestealing reviving demon, and now is... something.
I don't see why they can't remove those unrelated things from akshan and fix him.
Why akshan revives i will never understand
@@BertockLeg That is true but the Aatrox rework isn't exactly the best example to point to.
Yeah they can remove those things and significantly buff his DMG to compensate and that would be absolutely great. Then he will be far easier to play and auto win lane phase. They should do that
Vars, I completely agree that it is fair for Sett support to soak up 5 people's worth of damage with 3 items, and that an over--the-wall reset hop, a mix damage kit that scales well, isn't trash in the early game and a 0 mana, low cooldown ezreal q is good champion design. All jokes aside (?), I think vex is a great champion, renata is incredibly fun to play as and against, aphelios is fair because you must be organised to play with and against him. Riot might make mistakes here and there with AOE assassin yone and samira, but if they can nerf them to the ground so that they are literally unplayable I would forgive them 100%.
I think Draven is the ideal sweet spot for a champion. His kit isn't super complex but his age juggling is a super unique feature that makes him play unlike any other champion in his role.
no he does so much damage
Great vid as always :D
I don't know if I can agree with the idea that riot has learned from their mistakes when they keep buffing Yasuo and Yone while nerfing ADC items. There is a reason why Zeri and other ADC's have been buying bruiser or assassin items over Crit ADC items.
I don't know if this a coincidence or not, but this video seems to adress the recent Exil video. In it he consistently mixed up the term overtuned with overloaded, which really hurt the message of his video.
Zeri is overtuned, not overloaded. Even Ekko had a way more overloaded kit on release, and it has been years since then. Glad you clarified it
It feels like LoL is having a similar issue to Yu-Gi-Oh. On Yu-Gi-Oh New archetypes usually want so sort of gimmick or style and to do so usually leads to the path of overloading. Same with new cards that support existing archetypes. Although Yu-Gi-Oh as a whole takes it more to an extreme with cards that can pretty much prevent you from playing or stop your bosses. If LoL gets to that sort of extreme just imagine a future where a champion releases with abilities that just stops you from coming out of spawn until 10 minutes have passed? It's just an extreme scenario but the point stands. Definitely would not want LoL to head toward that direction that's for sure.
New champions having a gimmick is not the issue. New champions having multiple gimmicks is the issue. Prime example: Akshan.
1- Evelynn's invisibility where he gets bonus mana regen
1.5- during which he has Warwick's passive (partly)
2- Can swing on terrain, with cooldown reduction on takedowns
3- Lucian's passive with added movement speed or shield
4- Another 3hit passive
5- an overloaded boomerang (grants sight, reveals enemies, grants more movement speed, no max range)
6- can get more gold from just getting a takedown
7- has a ranged execute
8- AND THEN the developers also thought it would be fair to give him the ability to revive his team.
Pick two or three and that would have been enough...
"Bard a weirdo" Best description, hands down.
I went back on YuGiOh a few months ago and the overloadedness of the modern card game did not surprise me, since I am already used to the one of the new champions in lol
(Traptrix best girls)
I honestly don't really mind 200 year champions
I main one of them so i hope it stays like this