I was testing things in PBE… and I realized something.
Omnivamp is now reduced to a passive on Riftmaker… With Goredrinker gone, Divine Sunderer also gone… how are Fighters supposed to play the game? Hydra rush every game now? Yeap.
More importantly, how are AP fighter(s) supposed to play if Omnivamp on Riftmaker is so unreasonably bad?
Riftmaker:
- Void Corruption: For each second in combat with enemy champions, deal 2% bonus damage (max 10%). At maximum strength, gain 10% (melee) / 6% (ranged) Omnivamp.
You can’t use it on minions. You have to stack it on champions… and based on testing, the Omnivamp is there just as an ornament. Might as well remove it alltogether due to how long it takes to stack and how unreliable it is.
Gwen, Kayle, Rumble (it’s a secret build that I enjoy, don’t judge me), Vladmir are “supposed” to buy this item… and they do not fit the item at all, except late game Vladmir.
Gwen’s literall trade pattern is going in and out of combat, when the passive would kick in, you’re already disengaging. Kayle with only 6% OMNivamp feels like crap, might as well not build it. Vladmir’s playstile does not care about extended fights, not early anyway…
Now AD fighters… Goredrinker gone means other items may have a chance to shine… Right? Nope. Full damage it’s back on menu, because someone at Riot forgot about it.
Based on people on PBE, Riven will go all into Hydra then Lethality builds, Fiora and Camille will go all in on titanic Hydra, Aatrox will double down AGAIN on Hydra into Lethality.
Have they not learned? It’s comical at this point if they haven’t.
The pattern says it’s Hydra meta all over again. Lack of sustain from items will pivot players into buying the only option left… and if you can’t build it, like AP fighters, you’re screwed.
he balance team went out of their way to remove sustain from the game only for the game to pivot towards pure damage, then they see “why I’m being one-shot by X champion? Better make durability 2.0”. It’s funny to think about it because I bet that’s the pattern going in the balance team room.
Coincidently… Mages (MID and BOT) and their items are overtuned AF. Coincidence? I don’t think so…
PS: Over 40 games played on pbe, most of them jungle and top, IDK if seems biased or not.
Reminder when Season 11 hit PBE and everyone said Tanks were going to be insanely broken, and they ended up being the absolute worse champs by far? Just wait for actually good players to use the items before making judgements.
It’s really hard to judge anything on the pbe due to some bug exploits that Riot hasn’t fixed yet and Hwei being blatantly overtuned. The whole thing is a bug ridden mess right now and it’s even hard to tell when new items and reworked old items are even procing. I’m excited for some of the changes, but I don’t know what Riot is going to walk back or nerf into the ground, mostly on Tank/Jungler/Support itemization since some of this can easily gain tempo against your opponent in indirect ways and typically those are the first on the nerf block. I do think there is some favoritism towards mages and they are in a weird spot right now, both being bullied in some lanes and pushed to other lanes and Bruisers and Slayers are way over tuned right now but I think that’s due to the xp problems with the game involving jungle/botlane and champion snowball, some champions needing better readability on their kits for counterplay, teleport needing nerfs because of how powerful it is late game, Hullbreaker, and gold allocation on turrets. Season 14 is just adding more bugs and damage to the game that are probably having to be removed and we will be right back to Season 12.5 with a different map to play on.
OP forgetting Lethality got massive buffs since they are flat and no longer scaling. That alone will be enough to keep squishies in check throught the elo’s until they can skillgap.
As a player who plays Mages mostly I’m glad for this change however.