What’s up guys it’s me Jeremy!
So we initially thought the next class update was going to be for divers, but it looks like
there's going to be some competition as for what the mid season update for 2017 is going
to entail.
We don't have too much information about what the update may be focused on specifically,
but it's pretty clear from the ghostcrawler VOD that tanks will almost for sure be the
mid season update of 2017 and the next class update!
Today we’re going to talk about tanks as a class, why they should be updated and of
course, which tanks have the most potential for large or small scale reworks.
And if you enjoy the video definitely hit that like button because if this video hits,
let’s say ratings, then I’m gonna .
Tanks were originally picked for two reasons - first up, if you needed someone to engage
fights.
Tanks are normally pretty good at engaging since they can soak up a lot of damage that
would otherwise kill one of the squishies on your team.
Secondly is peel, tanks usually pack CC and have beefy bodies, so they can block skillshots,
lock down enemies that are targeting your backline, and generally just make things more
difficult for the enemy team.
As time has progressed and Riot has balanced the game to make tank items more powerful
and lower the burst window of a lot of high-powered champions, the result has kinda encouraged
tank-heavy metagames, because tanks have a lot of base damage, not much dependance on
snowballing and are strong at every stage of the game.
That’s not
necessarily a bad thing for individual champions, but when an entire class is outshining other
classes that are competing for the same role - say bruisers for example - you’ve got
a bit of a problem.
The other main issue with tanks right now is that they really don’t have much in the
way of individual identities.
Kit wise, they usually have big AoE initiation or CC, they have a way to boost their defenses,
and they have high base damages, usually involving AoE again.
You can pick a lot of tanks to do very similar things, and that blurred identity means the
ones that end up getting picked are just the ones with the strongest numbers at the time.
That happens regardless of role - say Amumu over Sejuani in the jungle, or Leona over
Alistar in the bot lane.
They do have very slight differences, but compared to other roles with a ton of diversity
- like the marksman class - there is too much overlap between what they offer a team.
A tank update would need to address the fact that tank champions are often just too good
not to play, while also cleaning up their individual identities to make sure every tank
has it’s own niche place in the game, basically the same thing Riot did in other champion
class updates.
So the question is which tanks most desperately need updates.
So far from what Riot have said, the biggest targets will be the tanks that just aren’t
seeing play - usually because they are kinda boring or just lackluster when compared to
the more popular tanks.
A few names that have been mentioned are Rammus, Cho'Gath, Dr.Mundo, Volibear and Nunu - all
of which have been confirmed for reworks at some point, so they could potentially be covered
with a class update.
There’s a chance that some of these champions could be receiving a full visual and gameplay
update rather than just a standard class update rework, but the likelihood is that at least
a couple of these champions can be sorted out without needing fully updated art and
backgrounds too.
Gameplay wise, Nunu is one of the most unique tanks in the game, since he basically works
by being THE counter-jungler, specialising in making sure the enemy jungler is more useless
than Nunu is.
He’s definitely outdated in terms of his background and art assets though, he’s a
seriously old champion so it’s pretty surprising that he’s still passable today.
It really comes down to Riot’s priorities - they could definitely do with freshening
Nunu up again, but to fix his gameplay he probably only needs changed to one or two
of his abilities, which would easily be doable in a class update.
They could for example keep Nunu’s iconic Consume and Ice Blast, and give him a more
interesting and useful ability than Blood Boil along with some quality of life upgrades
to Absolute Zero.
Nunu isn’t the only one walking the line between class update and VGU though - Rammus,
Cho’Gath and Dr Mundo were all original champions from back when League of Legends
was first playable, so along with Nunu they are some of the oldest champions in the game.
It definitely shows in their backstories and classic skins, and although more recent skins
have given them a fresh look, they could all do with a remodel and some extra love in the
art department.
That being said, all four have aged pretty well for the most part, and players still
seem to enjoy them enough that they aren’t in desperate need for a VGU just yet.
That could mean we’ll see all four of them being targeted by a class update, although
it’s hard to judge the scale of each project.
Cho’Gath is pretty unique because he is supposedly an immensely powerful void creature
that is also intelligent.
With all that in mind, he doesn’t seem anywhere near as intimidating as he should be in game,
so a VGU for Cho’Gath would probably be really well received.
That being said, Cho’Gath has pretty unique gameplay as a tank, since he also functions
as a mage, with a focus on ranged abilities rather than what you would usually expect
from a tank.
The makes him quite unique, so a few minor tweaks and a fresh backstory might be all
it takes to make Cho’Gath a bit more modern.
Dr Mundo and Rammus are both confirmed to be on the ‘high priority’ list for some
attention from Riot, but they haven’t been mentioned as targets for VGUs so it’s likely
that these two would be primary candidates for large scale reworks in the class update.
Rammus is played slightly more often of the two these days, but there was a point around
a year ago where Rammus and Mundo were not only the most played junglers, but they actually
had the highest winrates too.
It’s a good example of how champions naturally fluctuate in terms of playability between
metas, but the fact that they are rarely played unless ‘in meta’ shows that there is definitely
an issue with their design - either people aren’t finding them fun to play, or the
niche they occupy isn’t unique enough to promote them being played.
For Rammus, he’s an awesome jungler to go for when you want to be able to quickly gank
lanes or shrug off damage from enemy marksman champions.
He’s super tanky and gets a lot of resistances for free, but he also has a distinct weakness
- he’s really bad if he can’t get on top of a target with Powerball.
He does have a role in the game as a frontline tank focused on picking out one target to
focus, but the problem is he’s just kinda boring.
Take his W and Ultimate for example - W just makes him tanky and gives him a thornmail
effect, and his Ultimate just passively deals magic damage in an area around him.
These are super uninteractive abilities, so even though he has a pretty cool combo being
able to powerball into an enemy, and taunt them into his thornmail, that’s just one
combo that you rely on all game to be useful.
The same goes for his Ultimate - it does a surprising amount of damage overall, but you
push a button and it gives you some aoe damage for 8 seconds, it’s just boring.
A Rammus rework would probably need to find a way to keep his iconic abilities around,
such as his built in thornmail, powerball and damage to towers, but also make him a
little more interesting to play.
Riot don’t find taunts to be particularly fun mechanics to play against, so even if
it does interact well with his Defensive Ball Curl, it’s pretty likely it would take a
nerf or complete removal to justify improving other parts of his kit.
Dr Mundo on the other hand is actually a bit more fun to play - mostly because he has access
to a cool skillshot, Infected Cleaver.
Again though, like Rammus he’s super linear and can get a bit boring to play.
You run around, soak damage and regenerate it, all while spamming cleavers.
Hitting cleavers is a lot of fun, and it’s one of the most satisfying abilities in the
game to actually land on an opponent, but it’s definitely repetitive.
So again, like with Rammus, a great starting point for his rework would just be to make
the rest of his kit a bit more exciting, and maybe give him a new mechanic rather than
just hitting a button for bonus physical damage on his auto attacks.
Rammus and Dr Mundo are both super strong character concepts, it’s just about time
Riot fixed up their gameplay to be worthy of their personalities, so hopefully that’s
the direction Riot will take their reworks in the class update.
Anyway that just about wraps things up on the upcoming class update for tanks, as we
mentioned before it’s pretty likely this update will come before divers, but it’s
going to be a really hard one to figure out since tanks can become overpowered so easily
thanks to their lack of dependance on scaling items.
If there’s a tank you think should be looking at in the class update let us know in the
comments who it is, and what you would change about them so we can get a bit of discussion
going!
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.