Tag: new masteries (Page 1 of 2)

      New masteries: the Defense tree

      November 16, 2011 /

      Ah, defense. The tree I used so little I hardly remembered it existed. I ran defense for a while with Kennen when he first released. I also used a 9-point defensive build on Jax and Singed, but other than that, I tried to avoid the tree as much as possible. It just didn’t have any pizzazz. Now, though, it’s a different story.

      The Defense tree got the most significant rework and will probably become the new favorite of Tanky DPS champs everywhere. The tree seems to be focused on staying power, which is perfect for that solo top lane. Bonus armor and MR, increased gold on kills and assists, CC reduction and health buffs – it’s a nasty, nasty tree. One of my biggest concerns is the 8-percent cooldown reduction near the top of the tree. Couple that with 4 percent more from Offense and champions can be much less reliant on gear to provide those significant benefits.

      Defense is also going to be a nice tree for several of the game’s junglers. The combination of survivability and extra damage from Blade Armor can make a dramatic difference in early game clearing speed. Defense is also now the place for improved Smite which grants 10 bonus gold on each use.

      I’ve already heard from a few of you asking about my current mastery builds. Honestly, I haven’t spent a lot of time on them just yet. I’m still getting used to the new system, so I’m slowly creating a few pages and trying them with some of my favorite champions. If you keep an eye on my page in the PvP.net client, you should be able to see some of he basic ideas I’m working with.

      I’m curious to see your builds, too! Drop your favorite new build in the comments and let me know how you’ve been speccing since the patch.

      league of legends, Patches

      New masteries: the Utility tree

      November 16, 2011 /

      The Utility tree was easily my most commonly used mastery tree prior to this patch. The skills were just too good to pass up. Extra cooldown on Flash, which I took on nearly every single character. Extra buff duration. Extra mana regen. More experience. Movespeed increase. Summoner Spell CD reduction. What more could you want? Well, how about something a little less AP centric and a little more focused on actual utility? That’s what we got with this patch.

      The new Utility tree is designed for support characters, scouts, and any champion that relies on a lot of cooldown reduction. I haven’t seen the occasion to go for the bonus gold masteries, but I rarely play support. You’ll notice the experience gain has been moved up several tiers. As a result, jungling has been granted more XP, which has given junglers some very quick clear times.

      Of the three new trees, Utility is probably the one I will use least. Don’t get me wrong, it has awesome skills, especially if you play support or a support jungler like Nunu. For those characters, I could honestly see dumping all 30 points into this tree. I know it’s a little strange, but the talents are so good. The one exception I might make is the 5 percent ward radius. I haven’t tried it in game, but 5 percent seems like a pretty weak boost.

      Support players, how have you liked the Utility tree? Check back soon for the Defense update.

      league of legends, Patches

      New masteries: the offense tree

      November 16, 2011 /

      The offense tree was never really one of my favorites. There were some decent skills in there, but I felt like I had a lot of wasted points for most of the AD champions in the game. There were also some weird AP talents scattered among the higher levels of the offense tree, points that I pretty much never used. With yesterday’s patch that has changed and changed significantly. The new offense tree is designed for anyone who wants to pump out huge damage, regardless of the damage type they deal.

      Each of the tiers of the Offense tree has options for both ability power and attack damage and the skills basically mirror one another. The 9-point talents grant penetration in the different damage types, which allows us to build 21 in another tree if necessary. Honestly, though, I think Offense will be my new tree of choice. The top talent grants some extra execute damage and there are little goodies along the way like extra damage to towers, bonus ability power, and extra crit damage. It’s an excellent tree for anyone who likes to blow up a target.

      As a couple of you have mentioned, the Offense tree is much better optimized for jungling, which could present a couple problems. With junglers getting faster thanks to better mastery options, they may spend more time working on turrets which, with the Demolitionist mastery, could mean towers go down even earlier in the game. As I’ve said before, that’s not really good for gameplay.

      Check back soon for the Defensive and Utility tree writeups.

      league of legends, Patches

      Mastery posts are inbound tomorrow

      November 15, 2011 /

      I know, I know. Mastery posts were supposed to be posted last night. Unfortunately that power outage and subsequent power supply failure really hamstringed my ability to get into League of Legends for a little comparison and discussion. But fear not! I’ve spent today gathering my thoughts and putting together what was originally a very long post about the masteries and has since turned into three separate posts, one for each tree.

      How are you guys liking the new masteries? At first I was overwhelmed, mostly because it seemed like there were so many good options for so many different builds. Granted, masteries don’t do a lot with each individual point, but drop 30 points in those bad boys and they actually make a serious contribution. After my initial shock, I started to find some builds that worked for me, though some were a little limited in scope.

      I think the new Summoner spells help a lot. It’s nice to have a couple more viable options to support some different playstyles. I’ve already rocked a game with Teemo using Surge. I’ve also relied on Cleanse while playing Tryndamere. This patch has done more to get me interested in playing LoL than any patch in recent memory.

      What do you think so far? I’ll have my full impressions in 3 separate posts tomorrow.

      league of legends, News, Patches

      New Masteries coming this patch

      November 14, 2011 /

      If you watched the patch preview or spent some time on the forums this weekend, I’m sure you noticed a serious change set to drop this week: new mastery trees. Yes, the old familiar masteries are getting a massive overhaul, as in nothing in them remains as it was. I’m going to give some quick and dirty overview of the new trees with a more detailed discussion to come later in the day.

      I’m excited to see the change, mostly because I have a few champions for which I just don’t like any of the Mastery trees in full. I end up with some strange, cobbled together mix of low level skills. I’m also glad to see some of the high-quality talents moving further up the different trees.

      There also seems to be a much greater focus on making each tree viable for each of the conventional classes. AP casters, for instance, have a much more compelling reason to take a full Offense build. The one tree I can see being potentially problematic is the defense tree, but more on that later in the day.

      For now, take a look at the new skills and let me know what you think.

      league of legends, News, Patches

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