Being both a Braum and Shen main it makes me sad how unpopular they are in Solo Q, since they have to be extremely selfless and must trust their own team, and we all know how unlikely you are to find people that are worth giving everything you got for them. In the end, you are more likely to succeed playing something selfish which will either solo carry, or solo int.
Also in my experience Braum is outclassed by so many other supports. Even playing for a great adc you're lock-down isn't as good as engage supports, and your peel isn't as good as enchanters.
@@Justin73791 braum isn't outclassed he is just very niche. he is extremely strong into dive bruiser comps like Renekton or wukong but ironically is bad into assassins because they oneshot the adc before passive gets off
@@biggiecheese2004 I guess that's what I mean, very few games reward his play-style and it's already a self sacrificial one. If you're going to make me play a team reliant champ at least let me work for the team.
@@Andmau2552 i swear to god everytime i try to use my ult as Shen my ally decides "hm, what a good time to walk away. My Shen is giving me a massive shield, coming here to taunt enemies and block damage while dealing damage. Im just gonna walk the other way so that doesnt happen"
Something I recently noticed about wardens is that they seem to be the only class able to effectively stop 1v9 death machines. This may not be a huge perk at high levels, but in scenarios where one person is singe-handedly carrying the enemy team and _"just kill them before they kill you"_ is simply not an option, wardens can give your team enough time to breathe and retaliate without suffering major casualties. Even if the (literal) enemy carry decides to focus them, they can resist for long enough for your carries to take them down, favourably trading your shield for their nuke
Mostly it happens that way, I jump to the teammate who's being targeted, raise my shield and use my ultimate to give my team enough time to either scape or turn the tides of the battle, however most of the time I end up dying which doesn't matter most of the time because my team is usually alive after that.
The point still stands. Having and enchanter still gives you much more value in this situation than a warden. I love Braum, easily my favorite champion, but against a fed assassin, I'd rather be playing Lulu, or against a fed diver, a Janna. It's unfortunate, but the current meta doesn't allow for creative solutions. You either have the tools or you don't. A Lulu W and R or a Janna... Well, everything, will solve your issue with no effort, while you have to put up a masterpiece of movement and skill with Braum, or Poppy, or Taric, to even stand a chance against a fed enemy.
@@cottardTV That's probably because you're against players who don't abuse his weaknesses well. He is a strong pick into ranged engage/damage focused comps but beyond that he doesn't keep up with other tanks in terms of dealing with all types of damage well
Don't you play with my emotions like this man, I love playing Braum even if I could just play brand and do everything myself. There's just a personal satisfaction to shrugging off that Morgana bind intended to one shot the ADC, or to tank a blitz hook and just jump back. Would playing Leona be more consistent? Probably. But Braum just feels great to play with either low skill teammates who need a guardian angel of sorts to pull them out of bad situations or with great teams who can really make the most of having me there.
-knockup -ranged poke -gap closer -self sustain -an ult that disengages enemies and allows allies to be inside and block all damage from the outside =xin zhao, the best warden in the game
"Wardens don't have much damage since they mainly focus on protection." Shen, Galio, Taric, Tahm Kench, and Poppy: 🙂🔪 (I edited this so no one would say about "what about Champion?")
I play lol because it's a team game, if I really wanted to show how good of a solo player I am, I would be playing starcraft 2 or street fighter. Supports and tanks play for the team. ADC and mages play around the team. Assassin are just edgy Faker wannabe.
Hey Vars. Vex was originally going to extend projectile ranges but it would've cost too much money in terms of VFX since they'll have create new or alter projectile animations.
I played Shen once. I got flamed for not ulting the jungler, when i was level 5. I mean it's my bad for not putting points into Stand United pre 6 but it was still rude.
Funnily enough, the idea at 13:00 was considered to be used with Vex, in the sense that she could create portals that could displace ally projectiles, but they didn't use it since it would have required to model and kinda recreate each a every single projectile in the game or something like that, it's mentioned in Vex's champion insight
are you going to do a "why no one plays: rell" video? I know she has 90% presence in proplay, but she has only like 2% pick rate in soloQ and around 0.8% ban rate. I often feel like i am the only rell player in soloQ
It’s because she’s a really good champ but soloQ players think why put time into learning big cc combos when I could just press WQ on alistar. People don’t want to put the time into her even though it is very worth it.
Because you have to play Rell very carefully. You can’t just go in whenever you feel like it, like Leona and Nautilus can. Mistiming your W is pretty much guaranteed death, and anyone with decent reaction time can dash away or interrupt it leaving her literally crawling on the ground waiting to die. Believe me I love playing Rell, have a 57% winrate with her right now but she is not a well put together Champion. Many players have told Riot of Rell’s shortcomings but haven’t addressed them.
Rell player here too. She has so much cc and even a heal yet you really rarely see her. She can even out damage enemies solo sometimes due to her Passive and her tons of cc.
I don't get why Thresh doesn't count? He's fantastic at disengage and his Lantern, E and R are very effective for that purpose, and he has an ally shield. He's also called "the chain warden", but that's more of an arbitrary reason.
partially cause unlike most of these he only really disengages one person not your whole team while also having his kit more in tuned with catching people out with a q w q e. thresh also has many parts of many different classes.
Thresh is a very unique case because he has been catalogued both as a tank and a catcher before. He's a mix of multiple champion types rolled into one.
Thresh has nowhere near the resistance to either sustained or burst damage to be a Warden. The only time he can is in meme games that are deliberately dawn out for him to collect 300+ souls
I've personally managed to peel an entire team of assassins and brawlers for a kog'maw on thresh before and allowed him to get a penta. The issue is that he can fill so many categories its kind of unfair to label him as so many. Ultimately I think he is a catcher for his hook due to it being the flashiest part of his kit, but the entire rest of his kit excels in disengage and/or lockdown.
I think that no champion is actually only a class, most of them work as 2 3 or more classes, you could say that kaiser is also a warden cuz he can disengage easilly taking someone out of the fight, and is pretty bad at engaging, but we say that that he is a juggernaut because he has more characteristics that fit him this way, same thing with tresh, he looks more like a engager than a warden.
2:40 That Braum is the only champ with that ability isn't entirely true, since Sejuanis E passive does same, though it only counts for melee attacks. If I'm not mistaken she doesn't actually have to AA the enemy first, simply being near allies is enough, but it has a per target CD on champions.
@@kamikazelemming1552 Thats the point; its intended to give Sejuani more synergy with melee heavier comps, and prevents her from just landing a skill shot and then having her Cait set up the stun from 600+ units away
At the current moment, including this one, I have six videos already made/being worked on by editors. I can literally disappear for 18 days (i release a video every 3 days with my new schedule now) and my channel will still have content. Since I'm now letting my editors take over all the video stuff, I spend about 3 hours on research (sometimes more or less if I'm already knowledgeable on the subject), 6 hours on scriptwriting, 2 hours recording/editing audio, then another 2 hours recording and collecting footage. I make 3 videos a week.
Poppy ult can be used offensively during laning phase to push an enemy from under their tower,denying them a big wave while you pressure them or you can go behind their tower, press r, pop your flash and you can get a guaranteed e in the wall to stun and land your full combo,its rare but there are opportunities to use poppy r offensively
Every loves a shen and a braum until the enemy assassin is so fed no amout of shield's gonna save the adc. RIP. srsly though wardens are much more consistent than vanguards cuz they dont run the risk of being killed over and over again.
I want a vanguard that rides on a motorcycle with a side sidecar, that lets you get an ally inside, kinds of like yumi, the ally would still be targetable and could attack and be attacked. The ally can not move by itself, instead the vanguard moves while carrying the adc, basically allowing the adc to focus on damage with out the need to kite while being carried. You can work with that idea to add some type of shield/buff/etc or limitation to either the vanguard, the adc, or both during the carry time
Wardens/Paladins are always my favorite class and agree they are underdeveloped and supported by Riot. Would love to see them lean into the class a little more. Really focus on the zones of protection aspect and also they are the only tanks allowed to have global ults (which makes sense).
As a shen main,once I was flamed by a Tryndamere when he is killed by a top Vayne.He said that he is waiting me to r him although he have his Ult that can let him unkillable. And after that,I quit League.
My vayne adc flamed me to not use my w on him when I clearly did (as lux). He must have thought luxs w was a haymaker from sett, cause he was tower divig at 30% hp
As a support Galio player, nothing is more disheartening than ult slamming their entire team, taunting them all and watching your team unable to get a single kill off it
and thats why warden and tanks are not viable under Gold elo, exactly this is why. usually it would been 3-4 kills......... Coming to this game from VG high elo feels like a monkey tree.
I have mained braum and taric for these exact reasons u listed at the end, "safe zones". Being able to win objective fights becomes so much easier if you are one of these champions who isnt majorly behind. Playing the macro game becomes so fun for this reason, to force the enemy into a situation where they have to challenge you vs having to challenge them is so stupid powerful in anything under diamond. With poke being really non existent now, its one of the best ways to achieve this I feel.... Or at least a really rewarding and fun one!
I like this specificity about wardens being "territorial" tanks. It lets you look at some other champions in a different light. Consider for example that Singed is a tank that's very much about area control because of his gas, he just lacks incentives/tools to truly act as a warden.
I agree with this statement. Some characters I would place into this category would be ap shaco and gragas. Shaco can put boxes down which deny melee characters from walking in. Gragas can ult people who step up too far, put his q in places where enemies might go and use his e to disengage.
Taric is my main Support Galio is my one of my main midlaners And Poppy is my main Jungler I love each of them and kinda feel surprised theres not more champions like them.
I'd really like to see a warden which has a knight's vow effect, taking damage on themselfes their allies take, maybe in an area. That would kind of imitate taking aggro, as you take damage away from the others.
3:46 As a poppy pseudo main I have to tell you it is possible to use Keepers Verdict as an engage to knock enemy from dragon/baron pit into you, and to knock them from under first turret into space between them.
12:00 I think that's the problem with vanguards in most sense. They are mostly underpowered, BECAUSE they feel like aura items. Remember that, Riot stated that Taric is understated, because of funnel YI. Same goes for Braum in metas when he dominated as wall vs anything. And Shen/Poppy/Galio were the most anoying top laner because of their Utility and damage they could provide.
4:00 correction: there are still some shenanigans that go through his W. Gp can proc sheen and/or grasp on hits even shen is in his W. Hope the fix it but it seems to be intentional
For terrain manipulation, could be cool to have a bee champ. Create honeycomb pillars, areas of honey for healing allies/slowing enemies, AoE DoT of just BEES! Not wholy original, but could be neat.
I kind of think a warden champion that resembles the idea of knights vow would be pretty cool. Say you are able to take a set (or partial amount) of debuffs for an ally but in return you gain a different stat based on what debuff you acquired, so like say your teammate got slowed, therefore you get slowed instead, but you gain a slight armor boost. An ult for this champ would be like a team wide effect where they tank a portion of damage and debuffs (not necessarily all of it) for their team for a short while, but at the end kind of spreads that to the enemy team in a fraction amount. Some form of trade off between a teammate or the whole team would be cool, say the team damage heals this champ or the better they do their job the more value you gain for your team, so its not just a 1v5 tank link old mundo or high stack cho, but more of a defensive play maker.
I remember Maokai’s and Galio’s ult used to provide damage reduction for the whole team in an area around them but that ended up being too strong and got removed.
Please talk about the dying class of "Mage Assassins" since the removal of mana/mana regen items, they're pretty much forced to decide between having mana with Ludens or always running out with Dark Harvester but having more bursts. AD assassins and hybrid picks will almost always be the more optimal choice because even with abilities on cooldown their auto attacks will still hurt and most AD assassins don't use mana so they have more build paths they can decide to take without having to worry about running out.
12:33 you just described pre-rework Maokai ult. It was a little different, enemies could still enter the zone around Maokai (no damage reduction obviously) and afterwards the zone dealt damage based on how much damage was absorbed by it.
I didn't quite get what's the way for Taric's Bravado to be a warden thing, as it just reduces his Q cooldown and increses his attack speed. While Braum's Q and R, Shen's E (and kinda Q) being CC abilities don't count towards warden tools even though they can be used as ally protection more, than his passive. Braum's Q is sometimes and his R is usually used reactively, which makes them considerable as "Warden things", while Taric's Passive literally only affects himself and not his allies (contrary to what was stated in the video). My thoughts are kind of messy right now, apologies if I didn't get my point across clearly.
At the end of video you was taking about potencial new Wardens and I have one! (I just randomly few years ago started to create concepts for champions) This Warden was supposed to be oldest sister of Qiyana, one that lost movement in legs because of fight between them. She later saw that Ixtal nation is strong not because they are powerful mages but because they stand united (in contrast to Qiyana) and then she becomes Priestess of Mist. The idea of this champ was to create range support tank (somewhat similar to Thresh but Full Warden). Her main gimmick was almost same like one of Singed, but with a twist. After every ability, she would for few seconds leave a wide trace of mist that would increase Regeneration of Health and Mana and also give small damage reduction for allies that stand in mist. Q was medium range skillshot with delayed knockup after second, W was old Volibear's E (antidash disruption) with small shield for allies, E was long range dash that stack twice (without any damage or cc) that creates passive mist on the way. And then the Ultimate. I decided that I want something spicy on so utility focused champ that would offer great areal denial for enemy team. After short delay (with loud and visual indication) she would deal big chunk of damage on area similar to Nasus's E and then creates zone that last for 2-3 sec and cause Disarm and Silence on enemies (without any other CC). Furthermore zone would give movement speed to ALL Champions (even enemies).
Vars, a full power Poppy hammer can be used for 1 or 2 things. Sometimes it just to finish a kill on an enemy that's running away, but I use it to kick half the enemy team away from objectives, effectively singling out the jg.
an idea i've had for a while is a champ that all their abilities are shields. to me what i came up with felt like a warden, pass: converts portion of dmg on self an recently shielded allies by this champ into grey health which becomes a shield on killing blow or after time not taking dmg, converts remainder of shields provided by this champ is converted into hp. Q: holds charges, 1) shield, 2) aoe, 3) + heal, 4) blink to target, aoe from both locations, 5) double shield an heal amounts. W: pierce projectile, that shields allies & dmg enemies, gives all hit Diana orbs, that dmg your enemies, allies orbs shield, enemy orbs heal your nearest ally/self from them. E: sion shield but also gives to allies recently shielded by you. R: for time have aura that steals portion of enemy shield & heals, an deals dmg to them
What about a shaman type character that places totems with aoe's for allies and enemies. Their ult could be a protective field or boost totem effectiveness. Like one totem could be a speed boost while slowing enemies.
Wardens are probably the class with the greatest difference in play-rate between competitive and solo-queue. It feels much better to play something like Braum, when you have an insane team-fight adc on your team like lwx, teddy or upset. In Solo-Queue, there is no guarantee that the ally you chose to protect will actually will you the fight. Also: Wardens usually have pretty bad laning phases, and struggle to snowball, both qualities much appreciated in soloQ.
As an aspiring game developer and designer, I watch these videos mostly for the game design aspect than the gameplay and meta aspect. And I especially have a soft-spot for underrated character designs and class and as an avid Poppy and Braum enjoyer I would say it would be absolutely fun to design a Warden champ for LoL. I actually got an idea that is similar to how Blaze work in HotS where you summon a bunker where people can occupy it and attack from inside (melee champs would get a ranged attack with a fixed range while ranged attackers would retain their default) and while inside they are protected from damage and cc, that is until the enemy destroys the bunker or when it expires.
I think it would be cool to have a digger type character in which, everywhere they go they leave a trail which gives allies movement speed while on the trail but grounds enemies (without slowing them because that would be insane)
Simple, they are tanks that don’t have cc and aren’t good at protecting. Why need a warden when you can have Lulu or Yuumi as a sup and top or jg tanks instead? CC is just better right now. Plain and simple
@@Mossymushroomfrog18 He has a point though. Lulu is far better at peeling off an assassin dive than any warden. Tahm Kench is the only one who can do a comparable job.
@@holycrapitsachicken only thing i might add is that lulus low range can make her become the newprime target and the enemy rushes her down before she can do anything, with wardens their tankyness forbids that since the ressources it takes to kill them arent worth it to focus them unlike enchanters.
Counter point, Janna, Lulu etc. very much so have the risk of getting blown up and it's hard to keep people alive when you're dead, as well as that they are much more reliant on getting their items than a Warden. If a Janna goes 0/5 she can pretty much only try for max range tornadoes and have a 150 DMG shield. A 0/5 Galio still knocks up everyone who walks into the no no zone and still has a big ass taunt, A Braum can still walk in front of a veigar and block his Q and ult and possibly survive with E. Focusing an enchanter is a way to turn the game into a 4 v 5 with a mobile piggy bank, focusing a tank is just an invitation for someone to kill you.
That "accelerating ally projectiles like Jayce's gate" idea was the original concept for Vex, but it was scrapped due to it being impossible to implement without making Vandiril rich (again).
Hey, thank you for the video. I am waiting for terrain manipulation for a long time. Qiyana's E Terrashape gave me hope for that little bit with elemental magic. I wish they would follow up this idea to the endpoint. Like Braum not only carrying shield but also raise ice walls similar to Anivia to close off choke point for his allies.
So im not sure how good of a design this would be but im curious what people think. Consider a champ like senna, about medium range, but with less damage. This champ can be a medium range support mage. Its premise would be having ablities that debuff nearby enemies and buff allies. -The important first ability would be its E, which unlike other mode selecting champs, it would be a stance change of sorts (or could have the same premise as Hwei). This would allow for it to swap through the buffing and debuffing abilities. -A simple idea is for a buff side Q would be like Nami's W, or something similar but in an aura. The debuff side would be a wide AOE that cuts armor and magic by an amount. -The W would be an area denial like amumu's aura that damages opponents during its duration, and the buffing side would be a CC similar to tarics tether stun. -The R would get rid of E for a time and make both Q and W do both affects simultaneously. (If both affects are too neash to be used together, you could make R a near instant E swap and faster CDR on the Q and W)
3:40 if the enemy is running towards your fountan you can use the knockback and they will be sent to you, tactician has done this with poppy in toplane
An idea for a warden I had was a slightly-longer-than-melee range champion (Lilia rangeish?) with autos that marked enemies. If an ally attacked the marked enemy, or if the warden hit them with a spell while marked, they would be pushed backward, basically letting the ADC have access to a Vayne E as long as the warden moved in on the opponent to mark them. The rest of their kit would be designed around knocked back or dashing enemies, like summoning pillars that let out an electric shock when an enemy is pushed near or dashes near them. Maybe allow a kind of semi-insec like Poppy can do with another of their abilities. I wanted to have autos that marked to go in the reverse of so many passives that work based on your abilities marking and detonating with your autos. That way you would always have access to the mark for your teammates to use, and it would open up uses for spells without having to balance them around all of them marking the opponent.
Tank main here. I play a few vanguards, but I often find myself playing more Wardens(Poppy main) and here is why. The solo grind in league is complicated... I may own almost every champ and know most of their abilities, ranged, average dmg, etc; that does not mean my teammates do. Communication is key, but what if you and your teammates aren't used to cooperating... This often leads to a need for more defensive gameplay(where wardens shine). Besides if the enemy gets fed early you still have a chance if you can hold out. As a Poppy main I can deny the fed champs dash onto my carry and then go for hard cc(as you said) or charge ult their tank/carry out of a teamfight making it easier to win. Also an almost charged ult is good in a offensive way when you are being chased through jungle towards THEIR nexus. You can ult the chasing carry and they will fly over you land somewhere in front of you now so you can try to wall stun them.
Warden is a cool counter to aggressive teams or match up. - breaks momentum of aggro matchup/team - like in boxing. Counter puncher is effective to aggressive punchers. - warden enables thats strategy to counter
Completely different game, but in Paladins(the knockoff of Overwatch) there is a VERY interesting and powerful tank that completely epitomizes what a warden tank should be: the only reason I ever picked the game up was purely for Inara, who in my opinion is the greatest tank that I have ever played in any MMO, RPG, MOBA, or class based shooter. Inara's kit revolves around standing on an objective and making sure no one can get her off, coming with insane amounts of CC and self-peel. Most of it revolves around terrain-building, with a rock spike she can make that slows enemies and gives her damage resistance as well as a big wall that blocks chokepoints. Inara is ridiculously tough to kill if you time her cooldowns right and have a healer at your back, but her kit would fit perfectly into a warden for league: a terrain-making poke ability, an AoE slow and buff field made by a seperate HP item, a personal shield, and a charged stun ultimate. A warden with abilities like that could be incredible at zone control and also be able to make a, "You can't get out" area with a wall and zone field combo. Seeing as league is getting to be much more fast-paced and movement heavy, both aspects of modern class shooters, maybe this could be a new generation of Warden tank?
It's really interesting because even when they design a champion to be defensive, the players tend to try to find ways to make them more offensive. The classic "submarine" play with Shen ulting an invisible ally or turret diving with Taric or Galio's ultimates. Even Alistar's kit is really designed around peel and defensive disruption, but then QW became a standard instead of an accepted bug, and now we almost exclusively see him in an offensive role, despite the fact taht he still has almost best-in-class peel and protection, even healing his ally after sufficiently bullying their aggressors. I'd be really excited to see them design a Warden ultimate that was almost entirely defensive but incredibly exciting and rewarding.
I have some ideas on how to make Braum a relevant Warden. First, Concussive Blows needs rework. Instead of only Braum getting bonus magic damage during the immunity period, have everyone do an extra 10% magic damage to the target. Next, give Stand Behind Me the option to directly leap toward an enemy champion and apply two stacks of Concussive Blows. This allows Braum to stun an enemy after an auto attack and Winter's Bite. Next, give Unstoppable the option to be cast a second time. The second cast creates an impassable ice wall that completely blocks the lane for 15 seconds. This ice wall has the same HP as Braum's bonus HP. Enemy champions have three options. They must either attack and break segments of the wall, teleport, or use an ability like Rocket Jump to scale the wall. This allows Braum to save his allies that are losing a duel or team battle. If the enemy decides to reckless jump over Braum's wall, then Braum can easily get a stun with his other abilities and an auto attack. Champions that were fleeing may turn around and finish off the stunned opponent. Combined, these abilities allow Braum the ability to give his ability to regroup or give the marksman the ability to safely engage other ranged units.
12:54 Somewhere in Shurima Talya silently cries to herself. I agree that Wardens feel redundant to the point of useless. With skirmishers and assassins running amuck, and teamfights lasting maybe 10 seconds at the best of times nothing is going to be more valuable than the hard crowd control of a vanguard. The only real way to make them viable again would be for Riot to do something completely crazy and outrageous like, actually balance their damage champs.
Braum will always be one of my favorite champions for one reason, his W. You see that full damage built 6 item Kog'Maw? Well thanks to Braum he takes 15% less damage via Knight's Vow, and has 150+ of both resists because Braum has Locket and his W resist steroids.
I always enjoyed playing wardens and enchanters. There's a level of activity that happens in my brain when I have to worry about my allies on TOP of my enemies that I don't get when I play something like Renekton. It might not look like much to a spectator, but juggling so many factors before, during and after a teamfight on top of being the primary vision control for my team is just CRAZY satisfying. I'm currently climbing to Gold in the support role and I'm quite close to making it happen. I would love to see more creatively designed defensive/supportive champs in the game. An idea that I always had was that of a champion that can put up a wall or some other form of terrain that absorbs damage & CC from attacks and abilities that it intercepts, then discharges some percentage of the damage and CC back at the enemy team in a wide area. I have no idea if this would break the game or be really hard to balance, but I think it's a neat concept.
Well one thing that wasn't mentioned was that 2 of the Wardens give armor/mr to their allies which not many other classes can do. Granting temp stat bonuses and peeling would probably be a really cool concept. I know there are items that allow enchanters to do that but I would like to see a proper tank offer up something similar while still being in the front line
That idea with enhancing allies' projectiles has been thought and it was an idea for Vex, but, as they said, it would take way too much efford to accomplish. Theoretically it is, of course, possible, but it is not a realistic feature for a future champion.
Maybe a champion that can repair towers? Or one that had an ultimate like karthus/soraka except it temporarily flips the type of damage teammates do. So for 5 second AD champs do AP damage and vice versa This would make them pretty hard to build against and you could see more all AP or AD team comps. Just a thought.
I wish there was a warden with a skill like knights vow, which can be toggled. Like, you will absorb 50% damage your allies receive within 400 units around you. Then the ultimate can be, heal all damage you receive for 3 seconds, including execute. If you have 500hp left, if a pyke ult will exec u, instead it heals you 500 hp. Or if a veigar Q will damage u for 267, it heals you that amount.
I think you sort of nailed it. Playing a warden well typically is more work than a vanguard, while having even more of the problem of your good plays and hard work won't always translate into wins. Like, people also need to play around you doing warden stuff typically for wardens to be useful. If Braum is going to protect you, you need to know how his kit works, and it's different than if Taric is protecting you. I think Shen gets played a lot because of his laning stage and global presence. Like if Shen's W was changed to only affect him I think it would have almost 0 impact on his playrate, I think in practice he is more like a juggernaut than most wardens.
You can actually make use of a charged Poppy ultimate offensively ! If you're ganking or cutting off an enemy who's hugging their tower, and if you are between them and their base you can bump them out of their tower and then chase them down. It's tricky to pull off since you need to charge the R just enough to get the knockback effect and not send them too far away, but it's really satisfying when it works.
I'd like to argue that Rell is a borderliner between both tank subclasses, she might have the upfront engage of a vanguard but just as much teamwide utility as braum or galio, through the resistance shred on her passive/AA, the tether that she can "protect" an ally with and the healing from her Q (albeit negligible and on only one tethered ally at a time) as well as her engage being rather slow if you compare it to the likes of leona or alistar, her jump does take a while to land, similar to the rest of the warden's CC abilities (Taric Q, Galio, Braum)
I think Shen is a bit different because his pressure comes more throughout a teamfight rather than upfront, he has engage and disengage, but what he is mainly good at is negating the enemy pressure or attacks, it's why he's so good into dive comps, he doesn't let them get to the back, and most of the wardens do things like this, but the difference is that Shen's entire kit is extremely versatile, he can chase or stop you from killing his ADC with his e, he can set up to cover his teammates with his w or he can drag his q through you and then w to make you all of a sudden out of position and caught out against a target you can't damage, Shen is strong because of the way he can modify a teamfight like clay, when you play him the positions of you and your enemy become in a sense malleable, and it really does feel great catching the enemy team out 1 by 1 while they try to kill your ADC desperately, I love his gameplay, especially because during lane I can fix the int from my teammates, I can even out their lane with one good ult, it's amazing.
So, toplane Warden idea, seems like it would thematically fit with the Shadow Isles too. The first idea I thought of was soul-shackle, probably the W, but when used on an ally it transfers damage from then to the caster, when used on an enemy it would transfer damage they deal to the caster back at them, obviously it would be a lot less when cast on an enemy that when on an ally. Because of this they would need a passive HP scaling associated either in their passive or on the ability itself. Some kind of CC would also be good, I was thinking a large AoE slow that also grounds (but doesn't interrupt dashes like Poppy) that they can place around themselves, around the size of a Rell ulti or Thresh ulti. This could be a basic ability or Ulti if, after a few seconds it applies a snare or stun/knock-up. Obligatory dash. And then another area of denial ability be it through terrain generation or hard cc.
"We can design a warden that has a oneway wall or barrier" - Poppy deep dogging a support and adc in the background. "Yes, wardens are fairly useful at protecting allies."
i kinda want to see a karthus like aura, where you turn it on and off for an aura that either heals slowly, or builds shields slowly or just increasing armor or MR while allies and the character is in the aura
even though i can agree with most of your points I feel like you have missed out on a major one. If I understand correctly your argument boils down to why be passive and reactive like a warden when you can be proactive and engage like a vanguard. The problem with that is the assumption that proactive is always better than reactive which contradicts your anticarry video. Many champions (almost always the scaling ones) do not want to be proactive as they win by default. Picking wardens against a comp that wants to be proactive and engage you is better than picking vanguards, as they cannot peel as well. I know this comment is not very well structured, but i hope it gets my point across. I thoroughly enjoy your videos, It's not a common thing to talk about league in a very theoretical and axiomatic way, which is why I enjoy your channel so much. Thank you!
Janna is a good example of territorial utility, with q flushing out entire corridors, r that provides a big heal and some light cc with a significant cooldown. But because of that she doesn't really use enchanter items that well, as her shielding and buffs are meh compared to someone like lulu or yuumi. Her lore also kind of aligns with the vanguard role (protecting multiple people in an area, delaying and possibly reversing the onset of doom) This leads me to another reason why vanguards are struggling, because there aren't enough items that work with protecting your teammates from dying, the only ones are redemption and locket. There's also moonstone that will help with single target protection for vanguards but that's trolling.
In high elo galio ult is used aggressively in combo with camile, or any dive, same works with shen/rengar combo or any dive and all of thease champs i see so much, because if you pick brand in high elo 5 people will be in your lane all the time since you have no defensive ability
Feels counterintuitive to me why Lamb's Respite is considered a disengage. Given engage is a way to initiate action/interaction between teams, Kindred's ult doesn't do the opposite. It's more of an opposition to Lockdown - as even if you're a marksman who is for whatever reason positioned in the frontline, her ult it prevents you from suffering the harshest of punishments (which is death) for being in a wrong position, thus making that position less unfavourable, i.e. making it a better position that it was without it. If anything I'd call in unlockdown or something, not disengage, because when the effect of her ult is over, not only the interaction continues, but it didn't stop at any point during it either.
Riot considered the "area that buffs ally projectiles" in designing Vex but they said it would take years worth of VFX work to make every projectile work with it so they scrapped that idea. You can read that in the Vex champion insights.
If lack of CC is a problem perhaps some of the warden's defensive abilities should also provide cc? If you dash in poppy's steadfast you eat get slowed, shoot braum's shield? the projectile bounces back and stuns you
I agree with your points in soloq but I'm still glad the wardena exist because of proplay. It adds another layer in draft where 1 team can for instance draft a braum vs the enemy comp that has to go in... you can counter the whole theme of a diving reliant team with a warden.
This video actually reminded me a lot of why supports are expected to DPS and heal/shield the min amount in Final Fantasy XIV. "A dead enemy is damage mitigation", as they say.
The entire video should have an Asterisk about Shen other than the mention at the beginning of the video. *Shen kind of breaks this mold since a lot of people play him.
Attack is not always the best defense and even defensive characters can be offensive. Jumping in front of your frontline with Braum and hitting the enemy team with your Ult, providing stuns for days and blocking every projectile lets you carry team fights alone, something a Nautilus would never be able to do. Same with Taric, simply W a Bruiser and hit a stun off of them once the jump in, give them a shield and let your ult drop on them and your backline basically renders the enemy team helpless. Believing that Champions with a lot of peel in their kit just wait for things to happen is a crucial misunderstanding of their design. Vanguards may be able to start the action, but Wardens make sure that the action goes well.
Say what you want about Braum, he’s the ultimate giga chad
Sett? I mean atleast same vibes theire both gymbros and hang out at poolpartys to vibe check.
Taric is the hottest tho
Yes he is the chad of lol
Galio too tho. Fly over to save you and wreck shit up.
@@theimmortaleye7511 just press w
Being both a Braum and Shen main it makes me sad how unpopular they are in Solo Q, since they have to be extremely selfless and must trust their own team, and we all know how unlikely you are to find people that are worth giving everything you got for them.
In the end, you are more likely to succeed playing something selfish which will either solo carry, or solo int.
thats just how it is in solo q tho. cant trust randoms tbf. different story in 5man q
Also in my experience Braum is outclassed by so many other supports. Even playing for a great adc you're lock-down isn't as good as engage supports, and your peel isn't as good as enchanters.
@@Justin73791 braum isn't outclassed he is just very niche. he is extremely strong into dive bruiser comps like Renekton or wukong but ironically is bad into assassins because they oneshot the adc before passive gets off
@@biggiecheese2004 I guess that's what I mean, very few games reward his play-style and it's already a self sacrificial one.
If you're going to make me play a team reliant champ at least let me work for the team.
how is Shen unpopular ?
"Wardens being defensive tanks" and I am looking at Tahm Kench diving my top laner for the 5th time with full hp.
@Botaro i will allow it XD
Tahm doesn't really belong
AND WINNING RAAAAAAAAAAH
Personally, I see Stand United less as a "save an ally in need" and more of a "join the fight at any moment while I split push"
The correct way to see it, an engage tech unknown by all of our teammates in solo q
@@Andmau2552 i swear to god everytime i try to use my ult as Shen my ally decides "hm, what a good time to walk away. My Shen is giving me a massive shield, coming here to taunt enemies and block damage while dealing damage. Im just gonna walk the other way so that doesnt happen"
@@themoralessmorax8638 and then they go in after the shield ends? yeah...
Its basically just a huge middlefinger to enemy jungle or anyone who tries to gank for that matter
I have always seen it as double teleport.
Something I recently noticed about wardens is that they seem to be the only class able to effectively stop 1v9 death machines. This may not be a huge perk at high levels, but in scenarios where one person is singe-handedly carrying the enemy team and _"just kill them before they kill you"_ is simply not an option, wardens can give your team enough time to breathe and retaliate without suffering major casualties. Even if the (literal) enemy carry decides to focus them, they can resist for long enough for your carries to take them down, favourably trading your shield for their nuke
Mostly it happens that way, I jump to the teammate who's being targeted, raise my shield and use my ultimate to give my team enough time to either scape or turn the tides of the battle, however most of the time I end up dying which doesn't matter most of the time because my team is usually alive after that.
Thats very cunning, I agree
Poppy R go crazy
The point still stands. Having and enchanter still gives you much more value in this situation than a warden. I love Braum, easily my favorite champion, but against a fed assassin, I'd rather be playing Lulu, or against a fed diver, a Janna. It's unfortunate, but the current meta doesn't allow for creative solutions. You either have the tools or you don't. A Lulu W and R or a Janna... Well, everything, will solve your issue with no effort, while you have to put up a masterpiece of movement and skill with Braum, or Poppy, or Taric, to even stand a chance against a fed enemy.
@@ThyFloorestFloor if RUclips have commend system, I will commend you for sure. For now, receive my like.
"Wardens are vanguard with extra steps" but the extra steps makes the game more fun -sincerely shen main
Trueee it’s not about the destination but the journey
@@cottardTV That's probably because you're against players who don't abuse his weaknesses well. He is a strong pick into ranged engage/damage focused comps but beyond that he doesn't keep up with other tanks in terms of dealing with all types of damage well
As another shen main, yes I agree. Shen isn't a warden, matter of fact he is an assasin. But tanky.
@Meun get a load of this guy... maybe he hasn't played against a good shen yet.... wait till you get three tapped by shen combo.
Shen and braum most selfless champs, even tahm with those beautiful teammate ults, all of these guys can be so warming to see in the hell of soloq
ill forever miss old kench xd those 20 sec devours saved alot of my team mates
His ally rotection went from eating his allies to eating the enemy carry for half their health
Dont cry, Braum is always here.
As a Shen main who occasionally plays Braum i appreciate this
I love to play shen its so nice to safe your teammate and they saying "thx" thats why i play him ( and thise nasty combos on lane)
Don't you play with my emotions like this man, I love playing Braum even if I could just play brand and do everything myself. There's just a personal satisfaction to shrugging off that Morgana bind intended to one shot the ADC, or to tank a blitz hook and just jump back. Would playing Leona be more consistent? Probably. But Braum just feels great to play with either low skill teammates who need a guardian angel of sorts to pull them out of bad situations or with great teams who can really make the most of having me there.
i do that with vanguards, i peel my adc sometimes as zac, its kinda neat, i enjoy being useful and not recognized
Same!
Just that my adc for some reason does not know how to proc my mark
@@byeguyssry don't you just auto?
@@AGuy-0751 you'd be surprised how many people just walk and use abilities instead of using another auto to get a 4th stack off
When you save someone as braum and the survive with one 1hp you you're doing a good job
-knockup
-ranged poke
-gap closer
-self sustain
-an ult that disengages enemies and allows allies to be inside and block all damage from the outside
=xin zhao, the best warden in the game
This doesn't feel right, but I'll allow it
his ult actually only protects him
@@gamegaloo i guess knocking enemies away kinda counts
@@anti-mate407 not if you send them to yoir carroes 😂
Sounds like Galio
"Wardens don't have much damage since they mainly focus on protection."
Shen, Galio, Taric, Tahm Kench, and Poppy: 🙂🔪
(I edited this so no one would say about "what about Champion?")
Poppy plays like assasin, but you are much tankier.
The divine sunderer poppy one shitting you against a wall
Laughs in Whits end Braum.
@@shanecoffing Divine sunderer? Try Eclipse Essence Reaver. :)
What about Captain America Poppy with Galeforce, IE, RFC and Stormrazor?
me who mains all of them: im something of a pointless player myself
pointless and SELFless
I play lol because it's a team game, if I really wanted to show how good of a solo player I am, I would be playing starcraft 2 or street fighter.
Supports and tanks play for the team.
ADC and mages play around the team.
Assassin are just edgy Faker wannabe.
@@PrimarchRoboleonFrenchyman fully agree.
Hey Vars. Vex was originally going to extend projectile ranges but it would've cost too much money in terms of VFX since they'll have create new or alter projectile animations.
Damm for real that sucks
Never mind the months upon months of fixing bugs & unintended interactions.
Could've gone the Smite approach with Thoth, he extends the range of only his projectiles but otherwise grants bonus damage to all allied projectiles
@@Hellothere-ss4jq An interesting idea, it would be much like a more supportive version of Jayce's skill.
WOW.
I personally think that Thresh is hybrid between Warden and Catcher.
i mean he is the chain warden after all
Ah yes, WC Thresh... Warden Catcher Thresh
True
Thresh is more of a warden than a catcher. I would say he is WARDEN first
I played Shen once. I got flamed for not ulting the jungler, when i was level 5.
I mean it's my bad for not putting points into Stand United pre 6 but it was still rude.
Yes to all but Braum. Purely because Braum is literally the best champion in the game ever and no one can challenge me on that.
Samira + Braum = no skillshot allowed
@@indrickboreale7381 what about a morgana field. With a malzahar ult on samira. In a veigar e zone. As both veigar and a kow shoot them from above.
next is Ornn. Most wholesome champs
The chaddest Chad of all Chads
Don’t you dare target my boy Shen. I protect bot lane like nobody ever will
Funnily enough, the idea at 13:00 was considered to be used with Vex, in the sense that she could create portals that could displace ally projectiles, but they didn't use it since it would have required to model and kinda recreate each a every single projectile in the game or something like that, it's mentioned in Vex's champion insight
lazy... oh but then they buffed every single heal in the game intead of nerfing GW to a max of 50% or revert it to 40%
@@ultimatesonic47 I miss the times when my boy Aatrox wasn't countered by buying an 800g non-legendary item
are you going to do a "why no one plays: rell" video? I know she has 90% presence in proplay, but she has only like 2% pick rate in soloQ and around 0.8% ban rate. I often feel like i am the only rell player in soloQ
It’s because she’s a really good champ but soloQ players think why put time into learning big cc combos when I could just press WQ on alistar. People don’t want to put the time into her even though it is very worth it.
shes a champ succeeds on team coordination. good luck finding that in solo queue
TLDR in uncoordinated environments she's a shitty version of Leona. Reliant on teammates way too much.
Because you have to play Rell very carefully. You can’t just go in whenever you feel like it, like Leona and Nautilus can. Mistiming your W is pretty much guaranteed death, and anyone with decent reaction time can dash away or interrupt it leaving her literally crawling on the ground waiting to die.
Believe me I love playing Rell, have a 57% winrate with her right now but she is not a well put together Champion. Many players have told Riot of Rell’s shortcomings but haven’t addressed them.
Rell player here too. She has so much cc and even a heal yet you really rarely see her. She can even out damage enemies solo sometimes due to her Passive and her tons of cc.
I don't get why Thresh doesn't count? He's fantastic at disengage and his Lantern, E and R are very effective for that purpose, and he has an ally shield.
He's also called "the chain warden", but that's more of an arbitrary reason.
partially cause unlike most of these he only really disengages one person not your whole team while also having his kit more in tuned with catching people out with a q w q e. thresh also has many parts of many different classes.
Thresh is a very unique case because he has been catalogued both as a tank and a catcher before. He's a mix of multiple champion types rolled into one.
Thresh has nowhere near the resistance to either sustained or burst damage to be a Warden. The only time he can is in meme games that are deliberately dawn out for him to collect 300+ souls
I've personally managed to peel an entire team of assassins and brawlers for a kog'maw on thresh before and allowed him to get a penta. The issue is that he can fill so many categories its kind of unfair to label him as so many. Ultimately I think he is a catcher for his hook due to it being the flashiest part of his kit, but the entire rest of his kit excels in disengage and/or lockdown.
I think that no champion is actually only a class, most of them work as 2 3 or more classes, you could say that kaiser is also a warden cuz he can disengage easilly taking someone out of the fight, and is pretty bad at engaging, but we say that that he is a juggernaut because he has more characteristics that fit him this way, same thing with tresh, he looks more like a engager than a warden.
who knew that selfless champions aren't doing well on a game with one of, if not the most toxic community?
The irony
2:40 That Braum is the only champ with that ability isn't entirely true, since Sejuanis E passive does same, though it only counts for melee attacks. If I'm not mistaken she doesn't actually have to AA the enemy first, simply being near allies is enough, but it has a per target CD on champions.
She has to activate her E manually though
Really wish they'd change that. The fact that her E only works for melee champs can be very annoying if the majority/rest of her teammates are ranged.
she still has to activate it so she doesnt give the stun at all just lets her teammates stack it
@@kamikazelemming1552 Thats the point; its intended to give Sejuani more synergy with melee heavier comps, and prevents her from just landing a skill shot and then having her Cait set up the stun from 600+ units away
I'm actually curious how many videos you're working on at a time, and how long each video takes to make. Love your content!
At the current moment, including this one, I have six videos already made/being worked on by editors. I can literally disappear for 18 days (i release a video every 3 days with my new schedule now) and my channel will still have content.
Since I'm now letting my editors take over all the video stuff, I spend about 3 hours on research (sometimes more or less if I'm already knowledgeable on the subject), 6 hours on scriptwriting, 2 hours recording/editing audio, then another 2 hours recording and collecting footage. I make 3 videos a week.
@@VarsVerum Interesting, it takes, VERY roughly, 1 hour per 1 minute of video
@@VarsVerum Vars you made a mistake tank arent cut into 2 classes but 3
1) Vanguard
2) Wardens
3) The adult table with cho gath lone member
Poppy ult can be used offensively during laning phase to push an enemy from under their tower,denying them a big wave while you pressure them or you can go behind their tower, press r, pop your flash and you can get a guaranteed e in the wall to stun and land your full combo,its rare but there are opportunities to use poppy r offensively
Every loves a shen and a braum until the enemy assassin is so fed no amout of shield's gonna save the adc. RIP.
srsly though wardens are much more consistent than vanguards cuz they dont run the risk of being killed over and over again.
They do and if you die with a good engage to win the fight what does it matter?
@@yassinazarkan4207 this is literally my playstyle on every champ😂
@@mahatmaniggandhi2898 if it's not intentionali it's not int
Well then there is tahm that make it almost impossibel for an assasin to kill the adc 😂
I want a vanguard that rides on a motorcycle with a side sidecar, that lets you get an ally inside, kinds of like yumi, the ally would still be targetable and could attack and be attacked. The ally can not move by itself, instead the vanguard moves while carrying the adc, basically allowing the adc to focus on damage with out the need to kite while being carried. You can work with that idea to add some type of shield/buff/etc or limitation to either the vanguard, the adc, or both during the carry time
Wardens/Paladins are always my favorite class and agree they are underdeveloped and supported by Riot. Would love to see them lean into the class a little more. Really focus on the zones of protection aspect and also they are the only tanks allowed to have global ults (which makes sense).
As a shen main,once I was flamed by a Tryndamere when he is killed by a top Vayne.He said that he is waiting me to r him although he have his Ult that can let him unkillable.
And after that,I quit League.
Dude my jhin flamed me once for having my r on cooldown. Like bro wtf do you want me to do, it has like a 3 minute cd.
My vayne adc flamed me to not use my w on him when I clearly did (as lux). He must have thought luxs w was a haymaker from sett, cause he was tower divig at 30% hp
That same shit happend to me with a kindred and a trynda on the same game same result here see you fellow shen main have a nice day
As a support Galio player, nothing is more disheartening than ult slamming their entire team, taunting them all and watching your team unable to get a single kill off it
and thats why warden and tanks are not viable under Gold elo, exactly this is why. usually it would been 3-4 kills.........
Coming to this game from VG high elo feels like a monkey tree.
As a Warden main, you have described EXACTLY why i LOVE playing these champs
I have mained braum and taric for these exact reasons u listed at the end, "safe zones". Being able to win objective fights becomes so much easier if you are one of these champions who isnt majorly behind. Playing the macro game becomes so fun for this reason, to force the enemy into a situation where they have to challenge you vs having to challenge them is so stupid powerful in anything under diamond. With poke being really non existent now, its one of the best ways to achieve this I feel.... Or at least a really rewarding and fun one!
I like this specificity about wardens being "territorial" tanks. It lets you look at some other champions in a different light. Consider for example that Singed is a tank that's very much about area control because of his gas, he just lacks incentives/tools to truly act as a warden.
I agree with this statement. Some characters I would place into this category would be ap shaco and gragas. Shaco can put boxes down which deny melee characters from walking in. Gragas can ult people who step up too far, put his q in places where enemies might go and use his e to disengage.
Taric is my main Support
Galio is my one of my main midlaners
And Poppy is my main Jungler
I love each of them and kinda feel surprised theres not more champions like them.
I'd really like to see a warden which has a knight's vow effect, taking damage on themselfes their allies take, maybe in an area. That would kind of imitate taking aggro, as you take damage away from the others.
Or put a smell on them that makes you take 100% of that damage and then heal 50% of it
Why isn't it a thing!!??
3:46 As a poppy pseudo main I have to tell you it is possible to use Keepers Verdict as an engage to knock enemy from dragon/baron pit into you, and to knock them from under first turret into space between them.
12:00 I think that's the problem with vanguards in most sense. They are mostly underpowered, BECAUSE they feel like aura items. Remember that, Riot stated that Taric is understated, because of funnel YI. Same goes for Braum in metas when he dominated as wall vs anything. And Shen/Poppy/Galio were the most anoying top laner because of their Utility and damage they could provide.
Rell somewhat bridges the gap between a Vanguard and Warden.
agreed i swear i love engaging and then slowly walking back to my team with my r active as some bruiser is desperately trying to leave it XD
Yes, her ability are great to peel against other engage supports and assassins
4:00 correction: there are still some shenanigans that go through his W. Gp can proc sheen and/or grasp on hits even shen is in his W.
Hope the fix it but it seems to be intentional
For terrain manipulation, could be cool to have a bee champ. Create honeycomb pillars, areas of honey for healing allies/slowing enemies, AoE DoT of just BEES!
Not wholy original, but could be neat.
I kind of think a warden champion that resembles the idea of knights vow would be pretty cool. Say you are able to take a set (or partial amount) of debuffs for an ally but in return you gain a different stat based on what debuff you acquired, so like say your teammate got slowed, therefore you get slowed instead, but you gain a slight armor boost. An ult for this champ would be like a team wide effect where they tank a portion of damage and debuffs (not necessarily all of it) for their team for a short while, but at the end kind of spreads that to the enemy team in a fraction amount. Some form of trade off between a teammate or the whole team would be cool, say the team damage heals this champ or the better they do their job the more value you gain for your team, so its not just a 1v5 tank link old mundo or high stack cho, but more of a defensive play maker.
I remember Maokai’s and Galio’s ult used to provide damage reduction for the whole team in an area around them but that ended up being too strong and got removed.
I think Riot should make new warden whose main focus would be redirecting damage either to himself or even back to enemy.
Please talk about the dying class of "Mage Assassins" since the removal of mana/mana regen items, they're pretty much forced to decide between having mana with Ludens or always running out with Dark Harvester but having more bursts. AD assassins and hybrid picks will almost always be the more optimal choice because even with abilities on cooldown their auto attacks will still hurt and most AD assassins don't use mana so they have more build paths they can decide to take without having to worry about running out.
12:33 you just described pre-rework Maokai ult. It was a little different, enemies could still enter the zone around Maokai (no damage reduction obviously) and afterwards the zone dealt damage based on how much damage was absorbed by it.
I didn't quite get what's the way for Taric's Bravado to be a warden thing, as it just reduces his Q cooldown and increses his attack speed. While Braum's Q and R, Shen's E (and kinda Q) being CC abilities don't count towards warden tools even though they can be used as ally protection more, than his passive. Braum's Q is sometimes and his R is usually used reactively, which makes them considerable as "Warden things", while Taric's Passive literally only affects himself and not his allies (contrary to what was stated in the video).
My thoughts are kind of messy right now, apologies if I didn't get my point across clearly.
At the end of video you was taking about potencial new Wardens and I have one!
(I just randomly few years ago started to create concepts for champions)
This Warden was supposed to be oldest sister of Qiyana, one that lost movement in legs because of fight between them. She later saw that Ixtal nation is strong not because they are powerful mages but because they stand united (in contrast to Qiyana) and then she becomes Priestess of Mist.
The idea of this champ was to create range support tank (somewhat similar to Thresh but Full Warden). Her main gimmick was almost same like one of Singed, but with a twist. After every ability, she would for few seconds leave a wide trace of mist that would increase Regeneration of Health and Mana and also give small damage reduction for allies that stand in mist. Q was medium range skillshot with delayed knockup after second, W was old Volibear's E (antidash disruption) with small shield for allies, E was long range dash that stack twice (without any damage or cc) that creates passive mist on the way.
And then the Ultimate. I decided that I want something spicy on so utility focused champ that would offer great areal denial for enemy team. After short delay (with loud and visual indication) she would deal big chunk of damage on area similar to Nasus's E and then creates zone that last for 2-3 sec and cause Disarm and Silence on enemies (without any other CC). Furthermore zone would give movement speed to ALL Champions (even enemies).
I really like it, it's a very good concept
Vars, a full power Poppy hammer can be used for 1 or 2 things. Sometimes it just to finish a kill on an enemy that's running away, but I use it to kick half the enemy team away from objectives, effectively singling out the jg.
Vars' "on the fly" ideas are way better than anything I've seen from Riot in a long time
an idea i've had for a while is a champ that all their abilities are shields. to me what i came up with felt like a warden, pass: converts portion of dmg on self an recently shielded allies by this champ into grey health which becomes a shield on killing blow or after time not taking dmg, converts remainder of shields provided by this champ is converted into hp. Q: holds charges, 1) shield, 2) aoe, 3) + heal, 4) blink to target, aoe from both locations, 5) double shield an heal amounts. W: pierce projectile, that shields allies & dmg enemies, gives all hit Diana orbs, that dmg your enemies, allies orbs shield, enemy orbs heal your nearest ally/self from them. E: sion shield but also gives to allies recently shielded by you. R: for time have aura that steals portion of enemy shield & heals, an deals dmg to them
What about a shaman type character that places totems with aoe's for allies and enemies. Their ult could be a protective field or boost totem effectiveness. Like one totem could be a speed boost while slowing enemies.
Wardens are probably the class with the greatest difference in play-rate between competitive and solo-queue. It feels much better to play something like Braum, when you have an insane team-fight adc on your team like lwx, teddy or upset. In Solo-Queue, there is no guarantee that the ally you chose to protect will actually will you the fight. Also: Wardens usually have pretty bad laning phases, and struggle to snowball, both qualities much appreciated in soloQ.
As an aspiring game developer and designer, I watch these videos mostly for the game design aspect than the gameplay and meta aspect. And I especially have a soft-spot for underrated character designs and class and as an avid Poppy and Braum enjoyer I would say it would be absolutely fun to design a Warden champ for LoL. I actually got an idea that is similar to how Blaze work in HotS where you summon a bunker where people can occupy it and attack from inside (melee champs would get a ranged attack with a fixed range while ranged attackers would retain their default) and while inside they are protected from damage and cc, that is until the enemy destroys the bunker or when it expires.
Really loving your videos. So much information and analysis. Good job sir. Keep it up
I think it would be cool to have a digger type character in which, everywhere they go they leave a trail which gives allies movement speed while on the trail but grounds enemies (without slowing them because that would be insane)
Braum and Ashe is one of my favorite combos bottom though. Past level 6 the enemy doesn't get to move unless you say so.
Simple, they are tanks that don’t have cc and aren’t good at protecting. Why need a warden when you can have Lulu or Yuumi as a sup and top or jg tanks instead? CC is just better right now. Plain and simple
Braum, Taric, Poppy and Galio: Am I a joke to you?
@@Mossymushroomfrog18 He has a point though. Lulu is far better at peeling off an assassin dive than any warden. Tahm Kench is the only one who can do a comparable job.
@@holycrapitsachicken oh yeah absolutely, and even then Tahm has to waste his ult
@@holycrapitsachicken only thing i might add is that lulus low range can make her become the newprime target and the enemy rushes her down before she can do anything, with wardens their tankyness forbids that since the ressources it takes to kill them arent worth it to focus them unlike enchanters.
Counter point, Janna, Lulu etc. very much so have the risk of getting blown up and it's hard to keep people alive when you're dead, as well as that they are much more reliant on getting their items than a Warden. If a Janna goes 0/5 she can pretty much only try for max range tornadoes and have a 150 DMG shield. A 0/5 Galio still knocks up everyone who walks into the no no zone and still has a big ass taunt, A Braum can still walk in front of a veigar and block his Q and ult and possibly survive with E. Focusing an enchanter is a way to turn the game into a 4 v 5 with a mobile piggy bank, focusing a tank is just an invitation for someone to kill you.
That "accelerating ally projectiles like Jayce's gate" idea was the original concept for Vex, but it was scrapped due to it being impossible to implement without making Vandiril rich (again).
Hey, thank you for the video. I am waiting for terrain manipulation for a long time. Qiyana's E Terrashape gave me hope for that little bit with elemental magic. I wish they would follow up this idea to the endpoint. Like Braum not only carrying shield but also raise ice walls similar to Anivia to close off choke point for his allies.
3:47 I guess a full charge isn't used but her ult can be used to knock away a champ hugging tower towards the middle of the lane
Thresh, the Chain Warden is not a warden... False advertising
Similar case with Sion the "Undead Juggernaut" and Skarner the "Crystal Vanguard." Sion is not a juggernaut technically and Skarner isn't a vanguard.
So im not sure how good of a design this would be but im curious what people think.
Consider a champ like senna, about medium range, but with less damage. This champ can be a medium range support mage. Its premise would be having ablities that debuff nearby enemies and buff allies.
-The important first ability would be its E, which unlike other mode selecting champs, it would be a stance change of sorts (or could have the same premise as Hwei). This would allow for it to swap through the buffing and debuffing abilities.
-A simple idea is for a buff side Q would be like Nami's W, or something similar but in an aura. The debuff side would be a wide AOE that cuts armor and magic by an amount.
-The W would be an area denial like amumu's aura that damages opponents during its duration, and the buffing side would be a CC similar to tarics tether stun.
-The R would get rid of E for a time and make both Q and W do both affects simultaneously. (If both affects are too neash to be used together, you could make R a near instant E swap and faster CDR on the Q and W)
3:40 if the enemy is running towards your fountan you can use the knockback and they will be sent to you, tactician has done this with poppy in toplane
An idea for a warden I had was a slightly-longer-than-melee range champion (Lilia rangeish?) with autos that marked enemies. If an ally attacked the marked enemy, or if the warden hit them with a spell while marked, they would be pushed backward, basically letting the ADC have access to a Vayne E as long as the warden moved in on the opponent to mark them. The rest of their kit would be designed around knocked back or dashing enemies, like summoning pillars that let out an electric shock when an enemy is pushed near or dashes near them. Maybe allow a kind of semi-insec like Poppy can do with another of their abilities.
I wanted to have autos that marked to go in the reverse of so many passives that work based on your abilities marking and detonating with your autos. That way you would always have access to the mark for your teammates to use, and it would open up uses for spells without having to balance them around all of them marking the opponent.
Tank main here. I play a few vanguards, but I often find myself playing more Wardens(Poppy main) and here is why. The solo grind in league is complicated... I may own almost every champ and know most of their abilities, ranged, average dmg, etc; that does not mean my teammates do. Communication is key, but what if you and your teammates aren't used to cooperating... This often leads to a need for more defensive gameplay(where wardens shine). Besides if the enemy gets fed early you still have a chance if you can hold out. As a Poppy main I can deny the fed champs dash onto my carry and then go for hard cc(as you said) or charge ult their tank/carry out of a teamfight making it easier to win. Also an almost charged ult is good in a offensive way when you are being chased through jungle towards THEIR nexus. You can ult the chasing carry and they will fly over you land somewhere in front of you now so you can try to wall stun them.
Warden is a cool counter to aggressive teams or match up.
- breaks momentum of aggro matchup/team
- like in boxing. Counter puncher is effective to aggressive punchers.
- warden enables thats strategy to counter
Completely different game, but in Paladins(the knockoff of Overwatch) there is a VERY interesting and powerful tank that completely epitomizes what a warden tank should be:
the only reason I ever picked the game up was purely for Inara, who in my opinion is the greatest tank that I have ever played in any MMO, RPG, MOBA, or class based shooter.
Inara's kit revolves around standing on an objective and making sure no one can get her off, coming with insane amounts of CC and self-peel. Most of it revolves around terrain-building, with a rock spike she can make that slows enemies and gives her damage resistance as well as a big wall that blocks chokepoints. Inara is ridiculously tough to kill if you time her cooldowns right and have a healer at your back, but her kit would fit perfectly into a warden for league: a terrain-making poke ability, an AoE slow and buff field made by a seperate HP item, a personal shield, and a charged stun ultimate. A warden with abilities like that could be incredible at zone control and also be able to make a, "You can't get out" area with a wall and zone field combo.
Seeing as league is getting to be much more fast-paced and movement heavy, both aspects of modern class shooters, maybe this could be a new generation of Warden tank?
It's really interesting because even when they design a champion to be defensive, the players tend to try to find ways to make them more offensive. The classic "submarine" play with Shen ulting an invisible ally or turret diving with Taric or Galio's ultimates. Even Alistar's kit is really designed around peel and defensive disruption, but then QW became a standard instead of an accepted bug, and now we almost exclusively see him in an offensive role, despite the fact taht he still has almost best-in-class peel and protection, even healing his ally after sufficiently bullying their aggressors.
I'd be really excited to see them design a Warden ultimate that was almost entirely defensive but incredibly exciting and rewarding.
I have some ideas on how to make Braum a relevant Warden. First, Concussive Blows needs rework. Instead of only Braum getting bonus magic damage during the immunity period, have everyone do an extra 10% magic damage to the target. Next, give Stand Behind Me the option to directly leap toward an enemy champion and apply two stacks of Concussive Blows. This allows Braum to stun an enemy after an auto attack and Winter's Bite. Next, give Unstoppable the option to be cast a second time. The second cast creates an impassable ice wall that completely blocks the lane for 15 seconds. This ice wall has the same HP as Braum's bonus HP. Enemy champions have three options. They must either attack and break segments of the wall, teleport, or use an ability like Rocket Jump to scale the wall. This allows Braum to save his allies that are losing a duel or team battle. If the enemy decides to reckless jump over Braum's wall, then Braum can easily get a stun with his other abilities and an auto attack. Champions that were fleeing may turn around and finish off the stunned opponent. Combined, these abilities allow Braum the ability to give his ability to regroup or give the marksman the ability to safely engage other ranged units.
12:54
Somewhere in Shurima Talya silently cries to herself.
I agree that Wardens feel redundant to the point of useless. With skirmishers and assassins running amuck, and teamfights lasting maybe 10 seconds at the best of times nothing is going to be more valuable than the hard crowd control of a vanguard. The only real way to make them viable again would be for Riot to do something completely crazy and outrageous like, actually balance their damage champs.
Braum will always be one of my favorite champions for one reason, his W.
You see that full damage built 6 item Kog'Maw? Well thanks to Braum he takes 15% less damage via Knight's Vow, and has 150+ of both resists because Braum has Locket and his W resist steroids.
I always enjoyed playing wardens and enchanters. There's a level of activity that happens in my brain when I have to worry about my allies on TOP of my enemies that I don't get when I play something like Renekton. It might not look like much to a spectator, but juggling so many factors before, during and after a teamfight on top of being the primary vision control for my team is just CRAZY satisfying. I'm currently climbing to Gold in the support role and I'm quite close to making it happen. I would love to see more creatively designed defensive/supportive champs in the game.
An idea that I always had was that of a champion that can put up a wall or some other form of terrain that absorbs damage & CC from attacks and abilities that it intercepts, then discharges some percentage of the damage and CC back at the enemy team in a wide area. I have no idea if this would break the game or be really hard to balance, but I think it's a neat concept.
Well one thing that wasn't mentioned was that 2 of the Wardens give armor/mr to their allies which not many other classes can do. Granting temp stat bonuses and peeling would probably be a really cool concept. I know there are items that allow enchanters to do that but I would like to see a proper tank offer up something similar while still being in the front line
That idea with enhancing allies' projectiles has been thought and it was an idea for Vex, but, as they said, it would take way too much efford to accomplish. Theoretically it is, of course, possible, but it is not a realistic feature for a future champion.
Maybe a champion that can repair towers? Or one that had an ultimate like karthus/soraka except it temporarily flips the type of damage teammates do. So for 5 second AD champs do AP damage and vice versa This would make them pretty hard to build against and you could see more all AP or AD team comps. Just a thought.
13:00 Ironic, there's a hero in Dota 2 who's called Arc Warden, who has an ability that works mostly the same, but he's not a support at all.
I wish there was a warden with a skill like knights vow, which can be toggled.
Like, you will absorb 50% damage your allies receive within 400 units around you.
Then the ultimate can be, heal all damage you receive for 3 seconds, including execute.
If you have 500hp left, if a pyke ult will exec u, instead it heals you 500 hp. Or if a veigar Q will damage u for 267, it heals you that amount.
I think you sort of nailed it. Playing a warden well typically is more work than a vanguard, while having even more of the problem of your good plays and hard work won't always translate into wins. Like, people also need to play around you doing warden stuff typically for wardens to be useful. If Braum is going to protect you, you need to know how his kit works, and it's different than if Taric is protecting you.
I think Shen gets played a lot because of his laning stage and global presence. Like if Shen's W was changed to only affect him I think it would have almost 0 impact on his playrate, I think in practice he is more like a juggernaut than most wardens.
You can actually make use of a charged Poppy ultimate offensively ! If you're ganking or cutting off an enemy who's hugging their tower, and if you are between them and their base you can bump them out of their tower and then chase them down. It's tricky to pull off since you need to charge the R just enough to get the knockback effect and not send them too far away, but it's really satisfying when it works.
I'd like to argue that Rell is a borderliner between both tank subclasses, she might have the upfront engage of a vanguard but just as much teamwide utility as braum or galio, through the resistance shred on her passive/AA, the tether that she can "protect" an ally with and the healing from her Q (albeit negligible and on only one tethered ally at a time) as well as her engage being rather slow if you compare it to the likes of leona or alistar, her jump does take a while to land, similar to the rest of the warden's CC abilities (Taric Q, Galio, Braum)
I think Shen is a bit different because his pressure comes more throughout a teamfight rather than upfront, he has engage and disengage, but what he is mainly good at is negating the enemy pressure or attacks, it's why he's so good into dive comps, he doesn't let them get to the back, and most of the wardens do things like this, but the difference is that Shen's entire kit is extremely versatile, he can chase or stop you from killing his ADC with his e, he can set up to cover his teammates with his w or he can drag his q through you and then w to make you all of a sudden out of position and caught out against a target you can't damage, Shen is strong because of the way he can modify a teamfight like clay, when you play him the positions of you and your enemy become in a sense malleable, and it really does feel great catching the enemy team out 1 by 1 while they try to kill your ADC desperately, I love his gameplay, especially because during lane I can fix the int from my teammates, I can even out their lane with one good ult, it's amazing.
So, toplane Warden idea, seems like it would thematically fit with the Shadow Isles too. The first idea I thought of was soul-shackle, probably the W, but when used on an ally it transfers damage from then to the caster, when used on an enemy it would transfer damage they deal to the caster back at them, obviously it would be a lot less when cast on an enemy that when on an ally. Because of this they would need a passive HP scaling associated either in their passive or on the ability itself. Some kind of CC would also be good, I was thinking a large AoE slow that also grounds (but doesn't interrupt dashes like Poppy) that they can place around themselves, around the size of a Rell ulti or Thresh ulti. This could be a basic ability or Ulti if, after a few seconds it applies a snare or stun/knock-up. Obligatory dash. And then another area of denial ability be it through terrain generation or hard cc.
For anyone wondering, the music is from FFXIV, called Far From Home, from The Drowned City of Skalla.
"We can design a warden that has a oneway wall or barrier"
- Poppy deep dogging a support and adc in the background.
"Yes, wardens are fairly useful at protecting allies."
i kinda want to see a karthus like aura, where you turn it on and off for an aura that either heals slowly, or builds shields slowly or just increasing armor or MR while allies and the character is in the aura
Dude, I love wardens and I would really want to see more kinds of them
even though i can agree with most of your points I feel like you have missed out on a major one. If I understand correctly your argument boils down to why be passive and reactive like a warden when you can be proactive and engage like a vanguard. The problem with that is the assumption that proactive is always better than reactive which contradicts your anticarry video. Many champions (almost always the scaling ones) do not want to be proactive as they win by default. Picking wardens against a comp that wants to be proactive and engage you is better than picking vanguards, as they cannot peel as well.
I know this comment is not very well structured, but i hope it gets my point across. I thoroughly enjoy your videos, It's not a common thing to talk about league in a very theoretical and axiomatic way, which is why I enjoy your channel so much. Thank you!
3:50 i sometimes use the ult in an 1v1 Or 2v2. Not to get them of me But as a knock up
love you man keep up the work!
Always nice to hear ffxiv music in your great videos :D
Janna is a good example of territorial utility, with q flushing out entire corridors, r that provides a big heal and some light cc with a significant cooldown. But because of that she doesn't really use enchanter items that well, as her shielding and buffs are meh compared to someone like lulu or yuumi. Her lore also kind of aligns with the vanguard role (protecting multiple people in an area, delaying and possibly reversing the onset of doom) This leads me to another reason why vanguards are struggling, because there aren't enough items that work with protecting your teammates from dying, the only ones are redemption and locket. There's also moonstone that will help with single target protection for vanguards but that's trolling.
Shen, Galio main. I LOVE wardens and how you save your teamates essentially and can turn teamfights with ur ults
In high elo galio ult is used aggressively in combo with camile, or any dive, same works with shen/rengar combo or any dive and all of thease champs i see so much, because if you pick brand in high elo 5 people will be in your lane all the time since you have no defensive ability
Feels counterintuitive to me why Lamb's Respite is considered a disengage. Given engage is a way to initiate action/interaction between teams, Kindred's ult doesn't do the opposite. It's more of an opposition to Lockdown - as even if you're a marksman who is for whatever reason positioned in the frontline, her ult it prevents you from suffering the harshest of punishments (which is death) for being in a wrong position, thus making that position less unfavourable, i.e. making it a better position that it was without it. If anything I'd call in unlockdown or something, not disengage, because when the effect of her ult is over, not only the interaction continues, but it didn't stop at any point during it either.
Pleasantly surprised to hear the Drowned City of Skalla music on a League video, took me a moment to remember I wasn't watching FF content.
Riot considered the "area that buffs ally projectiles" in designing Vex but they said it would take years worth of VFX work to make every projectile work with it so they scrapped that idea.
You can read that in the Vex champion insights.
If lack of CC is a problem perhaps some of the warden's defensive abilities should also provide cc? If you dash in poppy's steadfast you eat get slowed, shoot braum's shield? the projectile bounces back and stuns you
3:40 just the other day i used poppy ult to launch an enemy that tried to get himself executed in our base to our jungler
Thank you for this video. Wardens are an underappreciated class and there is little material on how to use them.
I agree with your points in soloq but I'm still glad the wardena exist because of proplay. It adds another layer in draft where 1 team can for instance draft a braum vs the enemy comp that has to go in... you can counter the whole theme of a diving reliant team with a warden.
This video actually reminded me a lot of why supports are expected to DPS and heal/shield the min amount in Final Fantasy XIV. "A dead enemy is damage mitigation", as they say.
The entire video should have an Asterisk about Shen other than the mention at the beginning of the video.
*Shen kind of breaks this mold since a lot of people play him.
Attack is not always the best defense and even defensive characters can be offensive. Jumping in front of your frontline with Braum and hitting the enemy team with your Ult, providing stuns for days and blocking every projectile lets you carry team fights alone, something a Nautilus would never be able to do. Same with Taric, simply W a Bruiser and hit a stun off of them once the jump in, give them a shield and let your ult drop on them and your backline basically renders the enemy team helpless. Believing that Champions with a lot of peel in their kit just wait for things to happen is a crucial misunderstanding of their design. Vanguards may be able to start the action, but Wardens make sure that the action goes well.