What’s up guys it’s me Jeremy.
A few weeks ago we caught wind that Ryze was actually going to be getting his next gameplay
update really soon, and despite his last one only being a little while ago it was actually
set for release before other expected reworks such as Yorick’s.
This was partly because his current kit wasn’t really healthy for the game and Riot wanted
to find a new direction for him, but also because he actually had a full visual update
& new lore in the works too that was finally finishing up.
Now it’s finally here so it’s time to figure out How Good the New Ryze really is!
As always If you guys enjoy the video don’t forget to hit that like button and if you
don’t enjoy the video hit that dislike, and let’s get started.
Ryze has always been the ability spam mage of League, but the problem was if you didn’t
know his spell combo then he’d be pretty much useless.
At the same time, experienced players were abusing him to completely destroy everyone,
and the difference between his skill floor and skill ceiling was a big part of why he’s
been reworked.
Riot actually managed to fix this problem though, by giving him the option to be to
use his abilities in different ways.
He can still spam pretty hard though, so he hasn’t really lost his identity in the change.
His old kit really revolved around timing his passive to get a window of power way you
could dominate an enemy, but that ended up being kinda unhealthy because in the hands
of an experienced player, they could use those power timings to destroy people and then retreat
to safety, until they were ready to do it again 10 seconds later.
Some of the aspects of his old passive have been preserved on his new Q, such as the shield
and the ability cooldown reductions, but for the most part that playstyle is a thing of
the past.
The other big change is to his ultimate.
It used to be mainly to give power in trades through spell vamp along with letting Ryze
deal AoE damage, for waveclear or teamfights.
It also offered him free cooldown reduction and a movement speed buff, essentially it
was just a super buff that he could use to boost his power even further.
The Ultimate has also been partially scrapped in the process - Ryze has totally lost spellvamp
and the free cooldown reduction, but he can use his abilities to give himself a movement
speed buff or to waveclear.
So his new kit takes the focus away from small windows of spam your buttons and kill stuff,
and turned it into a more conventional mage that can use his abilities in different ways
depending on the situation.
You definitely have to think about the best way to use his kit now, but overall it means
healthier gameplay and makes him a little bit more fun because you can actually use
strategy to compliment his skills.
His new Passive is Arcane Mastery, and it basically works like a Vladimir passive - but
with mana instead of health.
His spells deal bonus damage based on his total mana, and his maximum mana is increased
by 5% for every 100 ability power.
This really rewards building a mix of mana and AP, just like the original Ryze!
Way easier to understand than his last passive, that’s for sure.
Ryze’s reworked Q is still called Overload and it works in a similar way - throwing a
single target nuke in a line, damaging the first enemy it hits.
Ryze’s new kit is about using his abilities together in different ways, so it does come
with a few interactions.
First of all, it has a passive saying his W and E will reset Q’s cooldown.
Basically that means that just like the last iteration of Ryze, you can mix a Q between
every other ability cast to spam spells like crazy - kinda nice of them to keep something
familiar from the last kit, even if he is quite different overall now!
The passive also states that casting his W or E will cause Ryze to charge up a Rune for
4 seconds.
He can store 2 runes at the maximum, and casting his Q while he has Runes will discharge them.
That doesn’t do anything if he only has one, but he if has two runes then they Overload
Ryze, giving him a shield and movement speed buff - similar to his old passive and ultimate.
Ryze’s new W is still Rune Prison, and it’s the simplest ability in his kit.
It roots an enemy for 1 second and deals magic damage.
That’s it.
Well, unless you have have Flux active.
We’ll get into that in a second!
Ryze’s new Spell Flux is the biggest change in his kit and can probably be thought of
as the core of his playstyle.
The way you decide to use Spell Flux will change how effective you will be on Ryze.
Casting his E will cause him to apply Flux to an enemy, dealing damage to them.The enemy
is marked with Flux, and Ryze’s abilities will have bonus effects when casted on an
enemy with Flux.
I’m actually gonna start with his E’s bonus effect because it will explain how his
Q works.
The first time you cast Flux on an enemy, you’ll deal damage and mark that single
enemy with Flux.
If you target the same enemy with Flux a second time, it’ll spread Flux to all nearby enemies,
dealing the same damage and marking them all.
You can also spread Flux to nearby enemies by killing a unit affected with Flux.
Either way, you now have an entire group of minions or champions marked with Flux, so
what next?
Well, his Q will gain bonus damage against a target marked with Flux, up to 100% at max
rank, and will bounce to all nearby enemies who are also marked with flux.
Yeah, you heard that right.
You can mark a whole group of enemies with Flux, and then deal double Q damage to all
of them at once.
Pretty insane!
This is Ryze’s new wave clear tool, and also a way to get down some awesome damage
in a teamfight against clustered enemies.
Hit E, hit E again to spread Flux to everyone, then follow up with a Q on any of the targets
marked with Flux to spread the Q to all of them.
Having played a bit of the reworked Ryze on PBE, I can tell you it’s just as crazy as
it sounds.
That’s not the only way to use Flux though, it also has a bonus effect for his W, although
it’s a little simpler.
If you use Rune Prison against a target marked with Flux, the root duration is doubled to
2 seconds.
This means you can quickly E->W a target to snare them for a long time, letting your team
follow up or giving yourself a way to escape.
Remember this will also give you two Rune stacks from your Q, so following up with a
Q will give you the shield and movespeed buff.
This is Ryze’s new chase or escape combo, and will let you lock down targets no matter
what kind of sticky situation you find yourself in.
The part of his rework that has me the most excited though is his Ultimate.
Pretty much all of the old Ryze’s playstyle has been preserved in some way in his new
kit, except the power timings, cooldown reduction and spell vamp.
This opened up Ryze to get a brand new Ultimate, and it’s the only part of his kit that has
a new name - Realm Warp.
This ability is INSANE.
Casting it will open up a portal underneath Ryze.
It channels for two seconds, and then every allied unit - minion or champion - will be
teleported to a new location a short distance away.
Yes, Ryze can now teleport his team a short distance.
The Ultimate escape tool, or the ultimate surprise attack?
Depends how you decide to use it.
I wasn’t sure if Ryze would see competitive play until I saw this ability, and I cannot
wait to see how the professionals manage to abuse it to create some super awesome plays
in teamfights.
An interesting feature of the new Ryze is that his Q has 6 levels, and his Ultimate
only has 2.
Riot didn’t want his Ultimate to be gated by allies needing to know so many different
ranges of the spell.
This means it’s less useful early game, but in its second rank it becomes considerably
more useful.
The most impressive part of Ryze’s new design is that he’s really well laid out to offer
something to players of all skill levels.
The first thing to learn is his Max DPS combo, which will be familiar for most people that
played the last Ryze.
His W and E reset his Q cooldown, so you can Q-W-Q-E-Q really quickly for some insane damage
in a short time.
This is pretty much how you’ll trade with squishy targets to burst them out quickly,
so it’s definitely step 1 for a new Ryze player.
The next step up is to learn his E combos and how to use them effectively.
E-E-Q for example lets you waveclear or damage a group of enemies, so poking with an E then
following it up with another one once it’s off cooldown is a sneaky way to push through
a ton of damage.
You can also quickly E-Q a single target for the bonus Q damage as a nice harass tool,
or E-W if you want to lock down a target long enough for a teammate to help you deal with
them.
This is also great for stopping people tower diving you - a 2 second root is no joke and
that’s a lot of tower damage to deal with!
The next level up for a Ryze player is to learn how to choose between using the max
dps combo by alternating spell casts between Qs like we mentioned earlier, or saving his
Q until you have to Runes stacked so that you can grab the shield and movement speed
buff.
It’ll take a lot of practice for this to become second nature, but it’s really cool
that you have the option to do it.
Of course, using his Ultimate is also gonna be super core to his playstyle, and deciding
whether it should be used to engage or escape will really come down to your decision at
the time.
Ryze’s rework will probably really shine in the same way he did before - dominating
lane with his burst.
He’s way more flexible than he was before though, so he’ll hopefully be able to bring
more to a team rather than just being sat on his own, crushing single targets.
Realm Warp especially is going to be a huge tool in Ryze’s arsenal, and we definitely
expect to see some team comps drafted around Ryze’s Ultimate to abuse it as much as possible.
Losing spell vamp really hurt Ryze though, and staying outside of his E reduces his options
in lane down to just pressing Q now and again.
This means it’ll hopefully be easier to counterpick him, using poke champions who
can stay outside his combo range.
Overall we’re really excited to see his new rework in action and personally I think
Riot did an amazing job finding a niche for him while preserving everything we love about
Ryze.
He does seem a little too powerful at the moment, but it should be a bit easier to balance
him with the new changes without rendering him totally useless, so that’s good.
We’re pretty excited to see the impact the new Ryze is going to have on the game once
he is released.
It was pretty expected that he’d keep his trademark mana scaling and combo playstyle,
but that new ultimate is kinda insane so we’re really hyped to see the awesome plays that
people are gonna use it to pull off.
As always we’re really interested to hear your thoughts on new reworks so make sure
you leave a comment and let us know what you think of Ryze’s new design!
And it looks like that’s gonna be it from me, if you enjoyed the video drop a like,
subscribe if you want, thanks for watching, and I’ll see you guys next time.