Category: Champions (Page 42 of 43)

Galio ability list

Galio.

I decided today that I’m willing to trade the minimal amount of time I spend on the Test Realm to instead leak the “confidential” information contained therein to the users here. I do think it’s important to get information on skills into the hands of players sooner rather than later so hopefully we can offer the kind of feedback that helps bring champions in line with where they should be.

So without further ado, here’s the Galio ability list!
Runic Skin (Passive)– Galio converts 60% of his total Magic Resistance into Ability Power.

Bulwark (Q) – Galio shields a friendly champion, reducing all damage suffered by that unit and converting a portion of the damage into health for himself.

Idol Of Durand (W) – Galio assumes the form of a statue, taunting nearby enemies and storing concussive energy as they attack him. Galio then bursts from his statue shell, releasing the stored energy to damage surrounding foes.

Resolute Smite (E)Galio fires a concussive blast from his eyes, slowing and dealing damage to enemies caught near the impact point.

Righteous Gust (R) – Galio claps his wings, unleashing a gust of concussive wind that damages enemies and leaves a directional draft in its wake that increases ally movement speed.

Rammus players will either rejoice or revolt at this list. You’ll notice he gets a taunt, a nice damage reduction skill, a slow, and what could be a really fun ultimate. He’s basically Rammus 2.0 without a powerball. His passive functions similar to Rammus, though it gives him a much more usable AP stack rather than the AD Rammus gets. An AOE taunt could put this guy on par with Shen for tanking. It really just depends how well his shield works and how easy it is to land a slow -> taunt/shield combo.

As you can see from his model, he is prime fodder for the recolor skins that plague new champions. Hopefully Riot will give him some cool model effects to make skins worth the cost.

Galio, the love gargoyle approaches

Galio, the gargoyle champ.Alright, his name isn’t “the love gargoyle,” but he sounds a little bit like he might try to hug you to death. Riot gave a cursory preview to this upcoming champion today with the usual limited information and disclaimers that he won’t puke on or bite anyone. He’ll be a monster. We know that, anyway.

Here’s the official post:

With this next champion we had a couple of goals in mind. For starters, we wanted to show our continued commitment to the monster enthusiasts by bringing those monstrous champions into the lineup. On the other hand, we wanted to appeal to those sensitive types who don’t identify with anything that’s capable of vomiting toxic bile, devouring its victims whole, or shaking the very ground on which it treads. We know that it’s a pretty tall order, but we’re pretty sure that Galio, the Sentinel’s Sorrow, should just be able to bridge that gap. If you’re a fan of monsters, just imagine a swooping, deadly predator perched on the edge of a building, waiting patiently to strike. And if you’re one of those artsy types who doesn’t appreciate the grotesque, well then, think of him as a piece of elegant statuary.

And here I thought monsters vomited by definition. Come on, Riot, learn your monsters. In truth, Galio sounds all right. I’m curious to see what his spell lineup will be like.

Should ranked games have free champions?

Champion splash.

Here’s something that came up today, mostly because I was seeing a lot of Mordekaiser players. Then I realized he’s free this week (I only looked because of the miserable quality of some of the Kaiser players). The question pretty much asks itself. Why do we have free champions in ranked matches?

The question I always like to ask regarding ranked matches is, “will this enhance or encourage more competitive play out of more players?” I have to say, I think the answer here is no. Most champions only come up on the free rotation once every few weeks, some even longer than that. Should ranked matches really be full of champions that a player might use for a few days at a time, once every few weeks? It seems to me that if you’re going to use an ELO system that doesn’t account for individual player performance, I would think a primary goal would be minimizing the attrition from bad players and maximizing a good player’s ability to carry a team. Having teammates who don’t know the champions is a huge problem in that system.

Granted, there are exceptions to this rule, but I think the only thing holding it back from being a great idea is the current 14-champion requirement to enter ranked play. Reduce it to ten, which will be an increase for some players, hopefully forcing them to play more games at the level cap rather than less before jumping in to ranked play.

Vladimir champion spotlight impressions

Well, servers are down. Suprised? I’m not. In the meantime, I figure I’ll post some impressions regarding Vladimir. As I’ve said in every post since seeing his skillset, I’m pretty worried about how broken he appears. Take a look at the spotlight.

I think his skill set looks pretty cool, but consider what Phreak says about him.

“Vladimir excels at controlling the lane…At 500 health Sivir will die to Tides of Blood, Hemoplague, and Transfusion, even though I have nothing but a Doran’s Shield and runes (remember, health runes – not damage runes) for bonus damage.” Okay. That’s fine if he’s a caster with caster stats. But he gets health from his AP and vice versa, making him highly durable and highly threatening – bad mix.

“Gragas, Garen, and Sivir all try to kill me.” If you watch that point in the video (2:02), Phreak is way out of position, but he gets away easily because of Sanguine Pool. So far we have highly durable, highly damaging, excels at lane control, and has an escape mechanism. Got it?

“The invulnerability from the turret also makes diving a breeze.” Turret invulnerability…add it to the list.

“Vladimir really shines in team fights,” and, “My extreme damage output allows me to chop up Sivir very quickly,” and “Then as I take turret aggro, I use Sanguine Pool to dodge Sion’s Cryptic Gaze just before it hits me, allowing me to escape the turret.”

So here’s my question – where is Vladimir weak? He seems like the strongest 1v1 champion in the game, the best turret diver, a great farmer, probably a decent jungler, an absolute monster in team fights, and can escape anything you throw at him with a skill that is 1000 times better than Cleanse on a 20 second cooldown, you know, just in case you overextend.

This really makes me wonder how Riot selects an ability set for a champion. Is there some sort of matrix of skills/mechanics? If not, why not? If so, how did this guy get past the first stage of design without someone, anyone, saying “now hold on, guys, this is absurd.”

Don’t get me wrong, I’m excited to play him, but I’m just as unexcited about playing against him, and that’s not a good thing.

Patch Day 7/17: An OP champion approaches

Vladimir.

It’s patch day once again folks, this time heralding the release of Vladimir, the League’s first true vampire champion (sorry, Eve, kicking people with spiked high heels makes you ridiculous, not vampiric). This patch is also highly anticipated because of the Xin Zhao nerf.

First things first, let’s talk about Vladimir. I am nervous as hell about his position in the game. Any time you give a toon the ability to increase multiple stats by buying one item, I’m concerned. That was (and to some extent continues to be) the problem with Jax, and it will almost definitely be a problem with Vladimir. If you haven’t seen his Champion Spotlight yet, you should. It’s a little unnerving to see how early he can ignore towers and just how much damage he can deal with literally zero ability power.

The other big news is the Xin Zhao nerf. His attack speed scaling is getting a serious reduction, the AOE on his slow has been significantly reduced as has the magnitude of the effect, and his ult got a 20 percent reduction in percent-based damage and a slight nerf to base damage. He’ll still be disgustingly strong, mostly because his mana costs are so low and the fact that his ult is always up from the Battle Cry synergy.

The rest of the champion changes are either bug fixes or very minor. Kog’Maw, of all champs, got a small range nerf to his Bio-Arcane Barrage and a bit of a buff to Caustic Spittle. Comparing him to someone like Xin Zhao it seems ridiculous that his mana costs are still so high. Heimer got a little grenade nerf and Shaco took a small Deceive CD nerf. I don’t think either change will be enough to bring them off the permaban list, but with Vladimir almost undoubtedly filling one of those spots we might see a little more variety.

Other than that this patch is pretty unremarkable. My guess is Riot wants to wait out Season One a little longer to see which champions need a shift.

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