League of Legends XXXII: Cupcakes and Kittens and Squirrels. Oh my!

[Eldariel]

Thanks for the advice.

And at the same time, is the new Maws item that builds out of a Hexdrinker any good?
I remember it being discussed a bit when it came out, but i cant remember if it were cost-effective or not.

It made AD casters more damagey. It's very much worth it in that you can actually itemize AD + MR lategame without giving up item efficiency now. It's virtually replaced all the MR items except for QSS on AD casters, and QSS is now used for its proper role instead of "just happens to be the most efficient MR item"-role on those champs.

[Maeglin_Dubh]

Yeah, haven't tried it yet on Talon, but I like that I don't have to replace a late Hexdrinker now.

[Thrawn183]

Every once in a while... just every once in a long, long time...

I feel like I got robbed.

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[Psychotic]

Hecarim revealed.

Twenty bucks says Phreak plays him as a jungler.

Jokes aside, before seeing any numbers, his kit looks very interesting. They've said before that a champion who gets any scaling from movement speed or vice-versa would be extremely hard to balance. I'm curious to see the base damages and ratios he's packing. Gameplay wise, he seems more like a "Bruiser Rammus" - bum-rush in and start pulping face rather than tank and peel.

[Math_Mage]

Hecarim revealed.

Twenty bucks says Phreak plays him as a jungler.

And wouldn't you? That is quite a jungling kit, with sustain and strong ganks.

[ex cathedra]

Hecarim revealed.

INSTABUY.

It's like I have zero self control.

[Qwertystop]

And wouldn't you? That is quite a jungling kit, with sustain and strong ganks.

And movespeed.

[Maeglin_Dubh]

And movespeed.

And a giant lance and DAMAGE BASED ON MOVESPEED AND I AM BUYING HIM RIGHT NOW AND HE ISN'T EVEN OUT YET.

Movespeed is my favorite stat in the game. More than cooldown. More than crit chance. More than AD itself.

[Psychotic]

Hey, who knows? Maybe Boots of Swiftness will be standard on this guy. Shurelya's for sure, if his ult is as impressive as it sounds. Sounds like a pretty surefire initiation. Add a FoN for that extra MS and beefiness, probably Atmog's/PD and you'll be rolling in like a juggernaut.

[Qwertystop]

Swiftness? Depends on the ratio of movespeed to AD. Phantom Dancers for sure, though.

[ex cathedra]

Ehh, Swifties wouldn't be better than Treads/Tabi unless the ratio was stupidly high, and you have to keep in mind that he's a melee initiator with zero damage mitigation so buying an item like Phantom Dancer is just asking to be disintegrated. Shurelya's, Trinity Force, and Force of Nature all have potential, but force seems iffy because you can get MR and AD from Maw instead and you can just get MR from Treads/Aegis/GA/etc.

I imagine that runes, masteries, and the kindness of strangers Lulu/Sivir/Galio/Janna/Sona/Gangplank will be your best sources of movespeed in a lot of situations. Obviously, Shurelya's is great on an initiator and has a lot of synergy with Triforce and Atma's. He also has a built in movespeed steroid so he'll hit the soft MS cap with absolute ease. Unless his passive is totally bonkers, it's probably better to treat it as a pleasant bonus than to build around it. Melee AD initiator, remember, there's plenty of itemization for that already.

[LordShotGun]

Depending on the passive's ratio, it would almost seem better to not allow MS buffs from other heroes to effect (affect?) your attack power. Only MS items would affect (effect?) your AD.

Otherwise you would run into problems where he is ONLY good when you have janna/sivir bottom, gangplank jungle, galio top/mid and possibly zilean mid.... or he becomes insanely overpowered with the above combo.

Also, ghost? If it affects(effects?) his AD then ghost will be a must have, perhaps even over flash.

[ex cathedra]

Depending on the passive's ratio, it would almost seem better to not allow MS buffs from other heroes to effect (affect?) your attack power. Only MS items would affect (effect?) your AD.

Otherwise you would run into problems where he is ONLY good when you have janna/sivir bottom, gangplank jungle, galio top/mid and possibly zilean mid.... or he becomes insanely overpowered with the above combo.

Also, ghost? If it affects(effects?) his AD then ghost will be a must have, perhaps even over flash.

Restricting the effect in such a way would be entirely unintuitive and you must realize that the opportunity for abuse is inherently limited by the movespeed soft caps at 415 and 490, respectively. Assuming a very favorable ratio such as .25, and base 320 movespeed, his passive would amount to ~80 AD in limited, super best case scenarios (i.e. Shurelya's active plus ghost) and to ~35 AD in average circumstances.

Use effect as a noun and affect as a verb.

[Blisstake]

So, everyone, what's your biggest win streak/lose streak? The reason I ask is because it looks like I might finally beat my lose streak record. About a year ago I lost 7 games in a row, mostly due to my own crappy performance, but I just got to 7 again! The difference is, this time, I've actually been doing really well for almost all 7, but losing regardless.

Win streak record is at 12, but I haven't come anywhere close to getting there again. That was mostly due to good luck and wonderful teammates

Also, how do you guys usually deal with losing streaks? Last time I nearly quit playing altogether, and these 7 losses have been spaced out over 2 weeks. Hopefully it doesn't happen again! I've been playing with friends to try and improve our chances, but they've been doing uncharacteristically poorly lately

Oddly enough, I'm completely unsold on Hecarim. Nothing about his kit really screams "I want that!" and he has another lame free stat passive.

[Math_Mage]

Affect can mean "to have an effect on," or "to display *some emotion* [usually falsely]." Effect can mean "impact," or it can mean "to create." I don't think affect has a common noun form.

Aaaaaanyway. Trinity Force obvious build on Hecarim. Could see a gp5-oriented build into Trinity Force like Shurelya's, Randuin's, Youmuu's, Wit's End/Maw of Malmortius, and Trinity. Only problem is no room in build for GA.

Also, consider the amplifying *cough* effect of teammates like Lulu, Sona, Kayle, Orianna, Galio, Gangplank, Sivir, etc.

[tyckspoon]

Aaaaaanyway. Trinity Force obvious build on Hecarim. Could see a gp5-oriented build into Trinity Force like Shurelya's, Randuin's, Youmuu's, Wit's End/Maw of Malmortius, and Trinity. Only problem is no room in build for GA.

Do you need one? Randuin's/Wit's/Trinity/defensive boots is pretty solidly tanky- 930 extra health, 75 armor, 75 MR from merc treads + a charged Wit's (or less MR + shield from Maw), Randuin's active and passive if your relatively lower amount of armor proves a problem and you need to hamper an autoattacker.

[Zen Master]

Hecarim revealed.

So .... now we have War. Think Pestilence, Hunger and Death will join too?

[Drascin]

Ah, nice. It's actually pretty good for me that the new champion is uninteresting and terribly ugly, I'm just getting to raise IPs again after Lulu was a day one instabuy .

[Dogmantra]

Affect can mean "to have an effect on," or "to display *some emotion* [usually falsely]." Effect can mean "impact," or it can mean "to create." I don't think affect has a common noun form.

Affects can also mean one's emotions or feelings but no one uses it like that so it basically doesn't.


Also, X to Y passive based on movespeed? What next, a champion who gains damage based on their mana/5 or their gold per second?

[fred dref]

damage based on their mana/5

Isn't that basically Kassadin?

[PersonMan]

Also, X to Y passive based on movespeed? What next, a champion who gains damage based on their mana/5 or their gold per second?

This is a wonderful idea. Totally.

New Champ:

Bluehorn the Ruthless Merchant

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Passive: Bluehorn gains AP based on his gold income per second.

Q: Stocks and Bonds

Passive: Bluehorn gains 0.5/0.75/1/1.25/1.5 gold per second.

Active: Bluehorn smacks an enemy champion with a sack of money, dealing 50/70/90/110/130 (+0.5 AP) magic damage, plus 10% of his current money.

W: Blackmail

Active: Bluehorn blackmails a nearby enemy champion, silencing them for 0.5/1/1.5/2/2.5 seconds and dealing 50/60/70/80/90 (+0.7 AP) magic damage.

E: Blank Checks

Active: Bluehorn throws blank checks in a cone in front of him, dealing 60/75/90/105/120 (+0.5 AP) magic damage and adding a Debt Mark to the target. Bluehorn's basic attacks trigger Debt Marks, slowing the target by 10/15/20/25/30 % for 1/1.25/1.5/1.75/2 seconds.


R: Capitalism Cyclone

Passive: Bluehorn gains 10/15/20 movespeed whenever he has more than 80*his level (caps at 1000) gold.

Active: A storm erupts around Bluehorn, granting nearby allied champions the passive move speed increase and dealing 100/150/200 (+1 AP) damage over 3 seconds to enemies caught in the area.

Gold gaining passive abilities, abilities based on having lots of unspent money. There was in no way, shape or form any attempt to more than semi-kinda-sorta-maybe-I-guess-it's-half-assed balance this.

[Dogmantra]

I was actually thinking this champion would be like Udyr, four skills no ult, one that scales with crit chance, one with health, one with AP and one with mana/health regen, but this was before Gold/5 was uniquified.

Flak and I also were tossing ideas around for AoS characters, and one of them was a rogue who used gold as his resource system (rather than mana or bullets or whatever) and had a skill that stole gold. We ditched it though. Bit silly.

[fred dref]

According to a Red, Classick is looking at some ways to buff Xin. It sorta scares a little, because while Riot has certainly gotten better at balancing kits lately, Xin seems to be one of those touchy champions who can become absolutely bonkers at the slightest provocation.

[LordShotGun]

Affect can mean "to have an effect on," or "to display *some emotion* [usually falsely]." Effect can mean "impact," or it can mean "to create." I don't think affect has a common noun form.

Yeah, I still don't see a difference in usage. Which is too bad because I enjoy proper grammar.

Also, I find it funny that you used effect in your definition of "Affect".

[Winthur]

This is a wonderful idea. Totally.

New Champ:

Bluehorn the Ruthless Merchant

Secret passive: Screw the rules

Upon collecting enough money, Bluehorn can't be touched by people who don't have it. He also passes through units and walls. He is also granted Dodge and Innervating Locket becomes available to him. He instantly resets cooldowns on any skills that rely on summoning monsters by his allies.

(Did you just summon a bunch of Tibbers in one turn?)

[Dienekes]

Ah, nice. It's actually pretty good for me that the new champion is uninteresting and terribly ugly, I'm just getting to raise IPs again after Lulu was a day one instabuy .

Huh, I actually like him.

Though that might just be because in my free time I once built a medieval knight champion that seemed to literally have 4 of the 5 abilities this guy has (everything except the heal). So Riot, how are you reading my mind?

Also what is this thing with Varus? Seems a bit early for another champion.

[Sila Prirode]

It seems that the Judgments are coming back. Varus is the first one to get a new Judgment. All explained here: Penny Arcade on Varus.
Now, fanboi mode: It's great to see this sort of work go on. Penny Arcade is probably the biggest webcomic about gaming out there, and LoL is shaping to be one of the biggest online games. This should bring more users to both fronts, which is always good. And since I have always liked Tycho's writing (and Gabe's art is sooooo fitting when it comes to gaming), this is a dream come true for me.

[fred dref]

Also what is this thing with Varus? Seems a bit early for another champion.

Lulu came out two weeks plus a few days ago, so it seems right on time.

[Mutant Bunny]

It seems that the Judgments are coming back. Varus is the first one to get a new Judgment. All explained here: Penny Arcade on Varus.
Now, fanboi mode: It's great to see this sort of work go on. Penny Arcade is probably the biggest webcomic about gaming out there, and LoL is shaping to be one of the biggest online games. This should bring more users to both fronts, which is always good. And since I have always liked Tycho's writing (and Gabe's art is sooooo fitting when it comes to gaming), this is a dream come true for me.

Another male AD carry. Fun. I guess we'll be seeing him released in about a month.

[Silverraptor]

Hecarim revealed.

Twenty bucks says Phreak plays him as a jungler.

Jokes aside, before seeing any numbers, his kit looks very interesting. They've said before that a champion who gets any scaling from movement speed or vice-versa would be extremely hard to balance. I'm curious to see the base damages and ratios he's packing. Gameplay wise, he seems more like a "Bruiser Rammus" - bum-rush in and start pulping face rather than tank and peel.

Did...Did they just actually create a character that "likes" stacking zeals on himself?