So League of Legends Season 3...

[chemical_art]

I just feel like voli has some huge squishy issues - He lacks the ms/ar/mr/tenacity of singed's ult (instead getting a pure damage ult). His passive is ok? its honestly not particularly amazing, particularly against a tristana/mf/varus(kinda), anyone with ignite or a tome or executioners.

I just feel that singed will, given the same farm, be a lot harder to kill over the course of a teamfight, and be able to actually use his fling and slow much better can volibear can use his.

I feel like the two present two different ideas, but one is focused on offense and the other defense.

A gank from a volibear, for example, is a nightmare. He speeds up to flip you, then proceeds to get steriods in attacking you. His ult is meant to tear up in teamfights, so this combination forces enemy teams to focus him. You can't ignore him or will be hit your hard and recover health, but a full burst does nothing for the team except distract the enemy for a few seconds.

On the flip side, chasing a singed is a disaster for the pursuer, but he's not so good at ganking. In a team fight he doesn't do particularly much damage, so a displined team will resist the urge to focus him (because he is the first target) but ignore him to attack the others that really dish out damage.

[Lancefighter]

I would disagree that singed doesnt deal damage in teamfights - thatd kinda be like saying necrolyte doesnt deal damage. Necro's abilities are an aoe heal/nuke, and some passives (mostly revolving around direct damage/healing necrolyte)

Sure, he doesnt burst particularly hard. Hes not really that great at killing someone independantly. But over the course of a teamfight, he continually gets stronger. Its been said that necrolyte gets stronger each moment that he is not dead in a teamfight, and I really feel singed is pretty close to this.

[chemical_art]

I would disagree that singed doesnt deal damage in teamfights - thatd kinda be like saying necrolyte doesnt deal damage. Necro's abilities are an aoe heal/nuke, and some passives (mostly revolving around direct damage/healing necrolyte)

Sure, he doesnt burst particularly hard. Hes not really that great at killing someone independantly. But over the course of a teamfight, he continually gets stronger. Its been said that necrolyte gets stronger each moment that he is not dead in a teamfight, and I really feel singed is pretty close to this.

Of course he does damage. But its advantageous to kill the person with low health / high damage before the champion with high health / low damage. Tanks who go mostly health are ignored by disciplined players. Singed is much more likely to be ignored in a teamfight because he doesn't do enough damage to be a threat compared to the other champions, while Volibear with his abilities and mult-ult is less likely to be ignored. No one is pigeon holed so that X champion can only do Y, but some are certainly better at it then others.

[Wingflier]

It's odd that you're comparing Singed and Necrolyte, as I think they're completely different heroes.

Singed is a melee tank/ganker, who deals his damage by spraying poison around and hoping the enemy team focuses him.

Necrolyte is a ranged support/nuker, who deals his damage through his heal/nuke and through his aura; he can also kill an enemy hero at low life.

But the point is, Singed is actually much closer to Bristleback than he is to Necrolyte.  The only thing Necro and Singed have in common is that they both deal more damage the longer the fight goes on; but if you want to get technical, this can be said of any hero.  There's a massive difference between the two in that you WANT to focus Necrolyte, where you don't really want to focus Singed.

In terms of Volibear - yeah, I know he's kind of underpar.  I still like playing him because of the concept.  Lancefighter is right on.  He's a decent ganker, he can stack health, and in team fights he does a lot of aoe damage with his ult.  The enemy team is forced to make the impossible decision between focusing him and just letting him rip your team apart.  Unfortunately with all the nerfs, he no longer excels at what he was intended to do (Tier 5 according to Elementz, which if I understand right is "useless" tier).

Still, in pub games he's a lot of fun.

[keith.lamothe]

Yea, pub games have a lot of downsides, but one of the upsides is that if you're good you can play basically anything "for kicks" and potentially have a chance at winning.

I wonder if anyone's tried to build Soraka as an AD carry for kicks

[Hearteater]

Yeah, I think Voli could use some tweaks.  On the other hand though, I haven't seen him with the new items, so there may be some new builds that work out better for him.  I'm just hoping they fix Black Cleaver soon.  Twisted Treeline is getting very annoying with everyone playing bruisers stacking Cleavers.

[Lancefighter]

From what I understand, necro is typically considered more of a carry than singed is. I never actually played dota1, so I cant compare heros until theyve been put into dota2 >_>

And yeah, cleavers atm are pretty broken. Not sure why riot forgot to put unique passive no them :\

[Wingflier]

From what I understand, necro is typically considered more of a carry than singed is. I never actually played dota1, so I cant compare heros until theyve been put into dota2 >_>

And yeah, cleavers atm are pretty broken. Not sure why riot forgot to put unique passive no them :\

Well neither of them are typical "carries" from my understanding.

Anyway, Bristleback is actually a really hilarious hero.  His design is in the same vein as Singed, but he does his job in a much more hilarious and interesting way.

See, Bristleback's name has a purpose.  He's an Armadillo who can shoot out spikes in a large aoe around him every few seconds.  These spikes don't do that much damage inidividually (say like 30 physical damage per hit), but they stack in intensity.  The more times you've been hit by the bristles, the more damage you take, up to some ridiculous amount of damage.

So now it's obvious what he wants to do:  Stay alive in a teamfight - the longer he stays alive and keeps spamming his spines, the more deadly he becomes.  However, he has a really unique way of doing this, which is what defines the hero, and gives him his name.  Any damage Rigwarl takes from behind is reduced by 40%.  Any damage he takes from the sides is reduced by 20%.  His ultimate gives him a lot of movespeed and attack damage, so this is what he does:

Runs into a battle, starts spamming quills.  Starts auto-attacking an enemy hero.  As soon as they go to focus him, he turns around and runs away, so that all the damage they do is hitting his back.  IN ADDITION, once he takes enough damage to his back, he releases another set of free quills; so in actuality, focusing him hurts your team even more.  Killing Bristleback is completely positionally-based.  If you can catch him while he's facing your team, you can kill him relatively easily, and without much cost.  However, if he can turn around before he gets stunned or disabled, or you can't attack him from his front, you're going to be bringing a LOT of pain upon yourself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-1mQg1l60s&hd=1

[Lancefighter]

thats fairly interesting. I would imagine someone like bat, with his turnspeed reducing spell (the napalm) is considered somewhat of a counter against him?

It would be quite interesting to see minor positional things like facings matter a lot. In league, the whole inf turnspeed kinda kills anything like that happening. (also, really messes with kiting - If you look at ashe's slow, its typically considered more defensive than offensive. Comparing to drow's slow, which is typically seen as offensive)

[Wingflier]

thats fairly interesting. I would imagine someone like bat, with his turnspeed reducing spell (the napalm) is considered somewhat of a counter against him?

Oh yes.  Heroes like Batrider are good for that reason.  Bat Rider's ult can also lock him down.  I think Disruptor is a counter since he can send him 5 seconds back in time, which means he won't be running anyway anymore (also the wall).  Anyone like Beast Master with a slow and a long stun.  Necrolyte obviously counters most STR heroes.  Zeus' attacks come from above I think, and he also counters STR heroes as well with his percent-based damage.

Bristleback isn't without his counters for sure (the best counter is just good timing and positioning against him, as well as not letting him farm), but in the right hands he's a monster.

[Cyborg]

I don't really like the new interface for the buy screen. It looked like they were trying to find a way to get out of the menus and move quickly between them. The way you do that is with cascades, not two different Windows that both need to be scrolled vertically to see the full list. Don't pretend to be Windows Explorer.

[keith.lamothe]

Don't pretend to be Windows Explorer.

I haven't seen the new screens, but it's gotta be bad to draw that remark.

[Hearteater]

If you know the icons pretty well, their is the tile button in the top (looks like 4 squares arranged in a...square).  That helps me avoid having to scroll.

[Lancefighter]

Using engima's recommended item switcher thing makes it REALLY good; https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3569927/beautiful.png

You just need to put like 6 things in each row

[relmz32]

Using engima's recommended item switcher thing makes it REALLY good; https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3569927/beautiful.png

You just need to put like 6 things in each row

I agree, enigma's is really helpful with the new setup, the only problem is that you have to setup by champ, but the power it gives you is amazing!

Also, that pic is well named.