f13.net

Elementz, 5v5 blind pick draft mode tier list, updated right after 1.0.0.99:

Tier 1: Ezreal, Amumu, Morgana, Garen, Taric, Shen, Kayle
Tier 2: Vladimir, Sion, Annie, Kennen, Kog'Maw , Udyr, Janna, Nasus, Warwick, Tristana, Nidalee, Shaco, Ashe, Sivir, Zilean, Xin Zhao, Veigar, Rammus, Pantheon.
Tier 3: Poppy, Twitch, Heimerdinger, Kassadin, Gragas, Twisted Fate, Anivia, Singed, Akali, Mordekaiser, Olaf, Alistar, Katarina, Yi, Galio, Gangplank, Nunu, Karthus.
Tier 4: Malphite, Ryze, Jax, Soraka, Blitzcrank, Corki, Fiddlesticks
Hard to place on a team: Urgot, Eve, Teemo, Mal'zahar, Tryndamere, Cho'Gath, Mundo

Suprised Blitz isn't higher, suprised Teemo is listed as fairly worthless.
I'm assuming Udyr so low is a result of his nerf.

Also I think we need a good Corki and/or Fiddle player in our usual lineup of players if we want to start winning more games.  I'd happily learn any champion, but I think for team play I'm probably better off sticking with Alistar and improving my TF game.  (still keep bouncing back and forth between AP and damage)

Prospero mentioned you guys are playin mostly nightly and I'll hop into the mix now too...I'm starting to learn Fiddle and should be up to speed pretty quick.  I also play a pretty mean Sivir.

Maybe I'm alone on this but I'd really like to start taking most of my team queue games more seriously.  Actually know who everyone is going to play before we go, have a good team figured out with lots of disables, have better communication etc. etc.

I always reach this point in most games I play, where I need to either start playing it more seriously or I'll just get too bored of it and quit playing.  :awesome_for_real:

Guess I'll give CM a go today or tomorrow.

I'm assuming from the first list he considers Twisted Fate, Fiddlesticks, Sivir, Alistar, Corki to be the "best" team.  :why_so_serious:

This one as worth reading too: http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=50751

/\/\/\/\/\/\  I looked him up and didn't post him.  While he's been around and isn't completely retarded I agree with Mesiah's response and judging from his viewable stats (7X wins 10 leaves, L24 - not ranked in the top500 last time they posted it) I figured it wasn't worth adding.  Its a good example of how the top is the top for sure but it gets more and more perception based on who/how you play as you go to the lower tiers.

I think the first list does go left to right on the individual tiers.  I should have linked the posts because both went into detail about what the tiers meant and under what circumstances.

Bottom line though TF is godlike (no surprise) since he does things nobody else can, ditto for Sivir with her pushing and her ult.  That we insist on playing even the majority of our five mans without TF, Sivir, Fiddle or Twitch is a bit silly.  Not that we need all four or people shouldn't play who they want just leaving out all of the best game changing champs every game isn't a great recipe for success.

I think my elo is where its at currently because of the week or two before the Twitch fotm started when Bhodi was playing a mean Sivir and we beat every team at the old elo easily which we couldn't have without Sivir's insane pushing power + ult + stupid easy to get spiral blade.  To me that is the annoying thing about the current system.  After my elo went back up to where it should be (around where it was in beta I'd guess) its not like I started losing horribly.  I think I've played 5 games total in the last month where we stood zero chance from start to finish.

Blitz can't grab good players, he just forces a team to stack veils and there are tons of hard counters to him esp with the new flash on a short cooldown.  His base attack damage and attack speed are awful and his tank stats were nerfed as well long before they took away the silence on his ult (typical Riot balancing, nerf everything but the real problem first often resulting in overnerfs when all changes are added up).

I think Schild can attest that against better players Teemo is just too easy to gib and at high levels where wards, clairvoyance and less opportunities to gank people wandering around like idiots his map control isn't anywhere near as big of a deal.

I just posted it them as food for thought, if I see more top players post lists (people are waiting for Dan to post one for example) I'll add them to the OP.  Also it was fitting after Schild and I played a 5-man game against a Kayle + Fiddle team where the players on their team were not very good at all but we barely barely barely won at all except for ace'ing them at Baron then pushing straight to Nexus only dropping one inhib after they had us down 2 inhibs.


I doubt it, remember most of them play draft so those are just considered the strong picks/bans that need to be accounted for.  I think you knew that though?  Crowstorm + Destiny is bullshit though.

Eh, I'm just taking a break from this game. I'm tired of the champion select screen be some sort of quiz that changes week to week, where if you pick the wrong hero you automatically lose.

Also, the "top tier" lists aren't really useful or relevant for 95% of the playerbase. I am also surprised ashe is listed as higher than teemo on both of those. It probably has to do with how the high game simply means staying in your jungle and doing 5v5 after level 6.

Once they revamp and rebalance and the new matchmaking system comes out, I'll give it another go. Or maybe when they add another game mode. Or map. I'm tired of doing "-apem".

I don't know, I watched a Fiddlesticks player literally destroy our entire 5 man team all by himself.  I think it could have just been him vs. all 5 of us and he'd still have won.  Some characters are just godly if you learn to use them.

Stopping Fiddle is second in difficulty only to stopping CM imo, Sivir and Twitch are up there as well.  That isn't a coincidence, champs that force the other team to make difficult choices are going to make them make bad choices some of the time.  With Fiddle getting the most out of dark wind determines how big your advantage is going into the fight.  You can win a team fight without Crowstorm if you hit a dark wind that silences their entire team + 2 fears on the right people.  Against fiddle you have to take veils because veil not only blocks dark wind but stops the bounce, which means now they need to drop veil (often with crow storm or some other aoe) before using the silence.  So now you've regained some of the initiative.

TF's gate alone makes accounting for him stupid hard to do.  Destiny + insane damage w/ AP at long ranges + stun is just icing on the cake.

I think Twitch is the third hardest to account for thanks to the range + stupid stealth mechanics but I'd believe it if people told me better players handle him easier then my teams do.

While I wasn't real serious about that comment as "thats the team we should run", I wasn't really aware that they were doing ban/drafts in tournaments and stuff.

Ashe vs Teemo depends on the fight. Ashe is probably - IF HER ULT IS UP - more useful than a Teemo in a 5v5. No Ashe could ever take a Teemo in a 1v1 with evenly matched players.

Pardon my noob ass, but what's Corki doing at the top there?  I can't get him to not suck, and (in the scrub rankings I'm in) I've never seen anyone else do anything with him, either.  He's got some decent AoE for farming, but has no real utility (except for revealing stealthers, maybe), crappy DPS, and is rather fragile... what do people use him for?

Crappy DPS?

Heh.

Corki has some of the highest dps in the game, doubly so in a world where teams don't line up with no disables to let Yi highlander through them or Trynd kill them one by one while he's unkillable.

Phosphorous Bomb is amazing, even post nerfs.  It blinds, blind is fantastic, it aoe blinds, that is even more amazing against some teams.  He has an escape and can do good damage from long range.  Ergo he's one of the best physical damage dealers in the game at high levels and has been since his release.  They have nerfed him, again, recently but I think he's still considered insanely good.  His farming is part of why he's so good as bomb and valk both wipe out entire creep waves or spawns with ease  giving him huge gold advantage which translates to more damage.

I know ME2 is coming out tonight but is anyone up for a few practice games around 8pm EST for me to hone my CM?

Too early for me, but I can do 8 PST.

I should get home around that time and I'm in for a couple.

I'll be on tonight as long as I can get a few things done at home by then.

TF sure is quite a pain to micro-manage for Pick A Card. Even Destiny isn't that big a deal on scrub level (where I'm at currently), because the enemy movement is pretty easy to predict (80% hang out at turrents until the creeps move or the go with the gank flow). At least he scales extremely with AP gained.

The other listed top-tier chars (mainly Sivir, Alistair, Twitch, Fiddle) seem a lot more accessible and straightforward, from my limited experience with them.

Too bad you guys are on the US LoL servers. Is anyone here playing on the GOA servers?

Only twitch and TF are superpowered at the pug level. Fiddle sticks is a team player, pugs don't fight as a team, you lose. So is Alistar. Sivir isn't superhuman at pug level but defiantly a pug stomper.

A good Fiddle just needs them to make a ruckus and he can do the rest. The silence/fear/crowstorm combo is fucking brutal.

If you'd rather learn someone else Schild I'm already very comfortable playing TF, I just need more practice with him in pre-mades.

I started on the GOA servers but switched to the US shortly after beta, mostly because the friends system was completely non-operative for a few weeks and we got tired of solo queuing all the time.

If you haven't spent money on the EU version I'd recommend at least checking out the US one.  I haven't found ping to be much of an issue at all and queues are still fast, even at weird hours.

In unrelated news, I just got a quadra kill while playing as ... Kayle.  I don't see that happening again any time soon  :grin:

I actually even started on US servers for beta and went on to play there after launch, until I decided to buy the digital edition from D2D.co.uk. Turns out I need to play on the EU servers, so I made a new guy there. Then I bought the additional champion pack too (I figure I might as well give those guys €10 more for making such a fun game) so now I'm kind of stuck there  :?

Hell naw, love him.

Hard not to, just warp wherever you want on the map, stun anyone at range, reveal everyone on the map whenever you feel like it.  :ye_gods:

But so squishy. Most of the stuff that can stun/surprise attack you is really a huge danger. I can win or control most fights where I can enter the fight with gold card picked, but when they get the jump on me, it's over really fast.

How does that work, anyway, I suppose it is not blind luck, is it ? I could not figure out how this card drawing is supposed to work.

Hit the button again when you see the red card and you will draw a gold card.

Once you get good with TF it's very easy to grab a gold card the majority of the time even in the middle of a fight.  It's pretty OP as it currently stands with how fast the cooldown is and the fact that it's a damaging ranged stun on demand.  Unless they fixed it recently Gold card even stuns towers from attacking.

The think the rotation is Blue Card ~ 2 seconds > Red Card ~ 1.5seconds > Yellow Card ~ .5 seconds

It will start randomly one of those three when you activate the ability and when you hit the ability a second time it locks in whatever card it's on.  That card stays locked in until your next normal attack (you then throw the locked card) or until the spell wears off.

Like Thrawn said pretty much. The main problem is that when you're running away or desperately trying to get away from stuns/snares/being pelted with stuff it's pretty hard to concentrate on picking the right interval for locking gold *and* turning back to stun them.

It does work on stunning towers, too, although the stun is too short to be worthwhile IMO. Blue card spam is a lot better for towers (locking blue allows you for another "Pick a card" draw, you can keep picking blues for up to 15 seconds).

Also, the card cycling/picking is visible to opponents, so good opponents will just kite you until the gold card lock wears off.

I feel like any tryhard team (which I'm now a proud member of) should always be running Twitch and CM. Annie is always nice if they're a good Annie, but I think I'd prefer Fiddle in the long run of a game. Not sure.

A Sivir is always good. I might go back to playing Nidalee though, I miss the damage output despite Twitch being a murdering machine.

LoL is in trouble with how the hero balance is homogenizing high-elo play. eh oh!

Trouble?

Every single game ever has that.  Every CCG has only a handful of deck builds that represent 95% of the entrants to serious tournaments.

Table top gaming has certain units which are considered must buy for some armylists and other units/wargear that is considered overvalued and bad choices.

fps games have certain weapons that are acknowledged as being the best.  I think there are only like 5 guns in all of MW2 that see high level play according to something someone mentioned to me.  Not sure because MW2 is balls.  CS had this though.

High level play is at its core partly, spending enough time thinking about the game and playing it to recognize what works and doesn't and going with what works.

CM is godlike because there isn't a teambuild in the world that isn't better with him in it.  But you can't just fill with Twitch, Sivir, Fiddle + X that is too squishy and there are teams that can take serious advantage of that kind of build.  All Riot needs to do is add a counter here and there to whatever is fotm and the metagame will react to that.  Nidalee hasn't even caught on fully yet but she is beast.  The reason blind pick without bans is considered lame is because yeah, the teams are going to be 80% the same in most games.  That is high level.  In MOBA they get around it in a variety of ways.  Once Riot adds it we can all go play random pick if we want the challenge.

this is a problem circumstantial to the matchmaking system not having choices and the fact that regular games are limited to all pick all the time.

people I know are just not playing anymore cause they can't get a random game or a random draft or champion pick mode. It would be tight if we could get champ pick in this game because it would immediately entail a categorical ban on whichever characters are crazy nuts this iteration (bye, Twisted Fate!) and there would be some more semblance of diversity.

It isn't just people you know, it's a large part of LoL I'm assuming.  Riot has a good thing going but if they don't get their ass in gear regarding that stuff I really believe they are going to lose a lot of potential players.

Fiddle is for sure my new main, won my last 10 normal games.  :awesome_for_real:  (something like 17 of my last 20)

I will not be playing tonight, but this Nidalee build definitely moves her up a tier from the lists in the OP. Grats to HotShotGG for actually figuring out how to build her (our playstyles were already the same, his build is just vastly superior to mine which relied on Frozen Mallet instead of Infinity Edge late game).

Fiddle is amazing. Last night it finally clicked, and I went from getting my ass handed to me on a regular basis to spanking any fucker that looks at me sideways.

Last night I dinged 13 with my summoner (yeah I'm a newb) and I went from a 2-3:1 win/loss ratio to constantly getting my ass handed to me, as I read about someone else here too. It was unbelievable. All of a sudden I'm fighting level 25-28 guys with set teams who steamroll everything.

I'm kind of giving up on TF in solo games. I can do my thing on my own in the middle lane and hold the other guy off just to witness the enemy team constantly pushing forward on the lanes. Due to coordinated/skilled players the potential for gank kills and surprise destiny/gate combos is also very low, and usually they play with a fully built tank (seen lots of Nunus, Mundos and Sions, and surprisingly enough very few Alistars) which is often unstoppable no matter what I spam.

So I started learning Alistar from the tier lists Hoax posted - wanting a decent tank - and I'm finding him very slow (especially compared to Nunu for example). He's a lot more item dependant do be dangerous at start, unless you manage to headbutt enemies into your towers early game, and if the game goes bad early (like you facing a competent ranged harrasser) you're starved for gold and not advancing anywhere. I'm using this guide (http://leaguecraft.com/strategies/guide/181,The+Alistar+Surprise+(plus+team+tips)) so far, and when the team is decent, it works out okay - still losing a lot though. Does anyone have some good alternative strategies what to do early game with Alistar if your team is obviously not dominating?

I'm usually going for Chalice and then Sheen or Glacial Shroud->Frozen Heart, and Glacial Shroud already is too big an invest if money is not rolling in.

Twisted Fate is a laughably bad soloer against anyone that knows how to play against him. I'll just say that solo laning is a generally hard thing to do unless you spent hundreds of games getting the dance down. I started early beta and ended up solo laning due to he heroes I'd pick and it took me a good while before I would even trust myself in there. Expect to lose... a lot more.

Tanks are slow, buy boots. Alister is better than Nunu. Generally picking up a Guardian Angel early is a better investment if your team can at least sometime get together. Tanks are hard in general, I suck at them nearly every time I try.

You are right, forgot the boots in there, I usually just get the cheap ones and then forego mobility for armor. Guardian angel is an interesting option early, I build for that too, but usually at a later stage - which might diminish the proc usefulness given the 5 min CD.

Best mid soloers I've seen so far were (in no particular order): Tristana/Teemo/Corki and then after a noticeable gap TF/Ashe and even Heimer, although Heimer falls behind after mid-game.

Alistar definitely has some fun potential with juggling/stunning/headbutting though. I just have to find out if it is worth the bother!

I did not mean to say Guardian Angel. Rather, build an Aegis early.

Edit: On that note, you can tell what level you're playing at by your list of best mid soloers. In no particular order, the best mid soloers are Karthus, Nidalee, and Sivir. An amazing Heimer or Cho'Gath can solo mid, but I'd rather not let them (there's almost no such thing as an amazing Heimer or Cho'Gath).

If you're on later tonight I'll group up with you and go pubstomping. That's always fun. But only me, if I bring someone else, odds are you'll be the one getting pubstomped due to the ELO bump.

Edit: At your level I'd also be waiting on Frozen Heart as the last item you build. Your goal as a tank should be to initiate and not die. Especially as Alister. Get in the habit of building that Sheen though.

Here's my Alistar build that I find to be very successful:

-Mana crystal and 2 helath pots to start

You'll need to be a little more careful with your mana, but getting sheen earlier makes it all worthwhile

- Sheen

I go back as soon as I get the money I need for this. Once you get sheen you can do 500 points of damage against a champ. Pulverize -> punch -> headbutt -> punch -> roar -> punch. It's not uncommon for me to get first blood with this combo. Sheen is also your money maker; roar to charge sheen and then punch 1/3 health creeps.

- Boots -> Boots of swiftness

Generally I get boots of swiftness. Boots of mobility are pretty sweet for getting around the map, but I find the time when I need the speed most is when I'm in combat. You can always grab teleport if you need to travel faster. A big part of playing Alistar is headbutting people back to your team, and for that you need speed. Of course if they are running against an all stun team you should grab mercury treads.

- A defense item

At this point I grab my one piece of defensive gear. Usually I get Aegis because it covers both magic and physical damage and it provides that benefit to your team, but sometimes I grab Frozen Heart or Banshee's.

- Trinity Force

Start grabbing all the pieces for Trinity. If you need a bit more survivability go Phage first, otherwise Zeal. This will make you a killing machine.

For skills I generally level whatever I seem to need most at the time. Generally I level pulverize first, then headbutt, and then roar. Roar is a fantastic skill, but any more than 2 levels isn't necessary. Level 2 is pretty effective and you want to keep the mana costs low so you can charge sheen/tri.

For spells I take flash, and either ghost or clairvoyance. Smite is good for making extra gold and nuking Heim turrets. Rally is darn handy for pushing towers. I wouldn't advise Clarity; you should have plenty of mana. Most spells are useful for Alistar in some fashion.

For masteries I run 4/0/21. The extra XP, move speed, and various cooldown reductions make life much easier. My runes are flat cooldown so I can pulverize more often, armor penetration so I can last hit better, scaling magic resist because spellcasters hurt, and move speed quints so I can chase people down.

The big thing to remember about Alistar, and tanking in general, is that if your team sucks there isn't a whole lot you can do. You're not a carry. You'll get a few odd kills here and there, but generally your job is to make sure your carries can do theirs. When I have a crappy team I generally attach myself to the most competent person on my team and work to keep them alive and fed. Feeding your carries is a big part of being an awesome Alistar. You'll get plenty of money from assists, so try to let your carry get the kills.

If you are laning against decent ranged champs, level roar to two, grab level one headbutt, and then just level pulverize. Level 2 roar will let you shrug off most of their attacks. Hang next to your tower and punish them if they get too close. When a group of minions are close to death walk out and pulverize them to harvest them. Getting pinned isn't very satisfying, but you can keep your tower alive a long, long time as Alistar.

To make money use pulverize and sheen. With pulverize you can take most minions down to half health. You can either walk in, stun them, and then proceed to last hit them one by one, or if your minions are damaging a bunch at once, just walk in at the end and harvest them with pulverize. If you can stun a champ in the process, so much the better.

If you have any questions let me know. Alistar is my main, and from what I've seen watching some of the top Alistar's play, I'm getting closer to their level of play.

I'd love to group, but sadly I'm stuck on the euro GOA servers :(

If anyone is on the euro side or wants to get a game going, I'd gladly group, my summoner nick is Orlandeau. Usually playing at 10-11pm CET my time (4-5pm EST). I might even screw my euro invest and get on the US servers at some point, although I'm not much good for anyone playing there due to time zones.

Yes, and I'm still somewhere in newbie-land! I haven't seen many Nidalees at all so far, and Karthus only a few times. I think out of about 80 matches played I've seen 3 Nidalees in total, no kidding.

My usual build for Alistair so far is Chalice -> Boots of Speed -> Glacial Shroud or Sheen -> Boot upgrade (Tabi or Swiftness) -> Sheen/Glacial (whichever I did not pick) -> Frozen Heart and then Guardian Angel. I'm currently experimenting with moving Guardian Angel to earlier and picking Aegis at soome point when I see my team can work together. I'm skipping Haunting Guise, which most people suggest for stun spamming, because I hardly ever get the money for latter items  :|

Thanks for the comprehensive guide, Prospero, appreciate it! I reckon I need to switch to some more offensive item building, and to maximize Sheen usage. At the stages I was usually getting it, it wasn't that much of an advantage. And the mana thing, it drives me nuts. Couple pulverizes/bit of healspam and I'm OOM.

EDIT: Now that I look at Trinity Force, it's an interesting item, quite offense minded, while I was usually just focusing on defense, I'll try that out!

Move to the US servers. Koreans play with very little lag and frankly, you're going to want to be there when ranking and leagues and such kick in. It's also where ALL the top end players play. Not to mention, GOA sucks.

That's really the best advice I can give for your particular situation.

At your level an offense-oriented Alistar should clean house. They won't know what the hell to do. The key with Alistar is your ult is pretty much all the defense you need. He naturally has insane HP, so that plus the ult and you're off to the races. Also remember your ult can clear stuns. I don't want to admit how long it took for me to notice the icon was still active while I was stunned.  :oh_i_see:

Schild is probably correct with his assessment of GOA, so I thought, heck why not, not like I'd use that much money. I paid more for games I got less fun out of ;)

If anyone needs a referral in the US, PM me a referral link and I'll make a new account on the US servers.

Thanks for the link Prospero! I made an account with your referral, but I noticed I actually had King Rammus skin from my beta testing days unlocked on my old account, so being the collector junkie that I am I'll play that one for a start.

Summoner nick is Orlandeau.

Rammus is another fun tank to play. Once you get how to play Alistar, Rammus is really easy to pick up. I played him for the first time last night and had a blast. There's nothing quite like forcing Yi to kill himself on you.  :awesome_for_real:

Gave Sivir my first try ever today.  Went.....uniquely.

Feeding does not even begin to describe what I see here.

Buffet?

I have gotten semi-good with Evelyn in random games, but if I understand the tier lists correct, she becomes useless later on. I just hit Lvl 20 and have finally started to win more games than I lose. In which context is Evelyn usable later on ?

She's not.  She's one of those characters where she is ONLY good if they are bad and feed her early on.  Sad fact is some characters are just not good once you get beyond pub-stomp ELO levels.

Yeah she isn't at all.  If you are in love with being a stealth champ you must learn Twitch or Shaco with Shaco being more of a gank and run style to Eve.  It will take time to learn either of them though.

The thing is, champs can be good at everything but a highly organized 5v5 team fight and that means they aren't good.  Eve is even less usable then that because just playing against people willing to buy oracles can fuck so much of her game up.

You really don't need to worry about any of this too much but I recommend you play around with the free champs (pick two each rotation and try them) so that when you get to that level where Eve can't compete and people don't want to see her on a team you will have already been testing the waters for a replacement champ to main.

Good luck and if you need more advice yell at me in-game.

L0CUST's new tier list for 5-man premade blind pick MM games on SR (left to right within rows):

Superior: Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Janna, Ashe, Jax
Cardinal: Soraka, Sivir, Nasus, Shen, Annie, Twisted Fate, Alistar, Corki, Nidalee
Strong: Morgana, Amumu, Zilean, Tristana, Warwick, Katarina, Udyr, Gragas, Twitch, Kayle
Formidable: Malphite, Anivia, Poppy, Dr. Mundo, Kassadin, Singed, Rammus, Ryze
Circumstantial: Nunu, Cho'Gath, Karthus, Akali, Shaco, Blitzcrank, Gangplank

Overshadowed: Master Yi, Heimerdinger, Sion, Teemo, Kennen, Veigar, Garen, Taric, Pantheon, Mordekaiser, Tryndamere, Evelynn

He's obviously seeing heal teams as the strongest build out there right now.  I think this is post Ashe buff but not sure if this is accounting for the Teemo buffs which are more difficult to predict.

Adjective descriptors are much better than that number system from before.

Taric is bad now? Wow.

Also I'm looking forward to Schild's comments about Ashe being rated as better than Nidalee.  :oh_i_see:

Hoax, I think (I could be wrong) that he put that list out before the resist/penetration changes were scrapped, so tanks are getting adjusted down much harder than they should be (Sion, Taric, etc).

Ashe's ult is still ridiculous. Better than Nidalee though? Good luck. I'd call Ashe circumstantial, can the asshat in control hit her ult? Yes? Better than Nid. Does he miss? Yes? Doesn't seem to appear on the list at that point.

Ashe moved that far up not because of her ult, but because of the map control her new E ability gives.  Having an extra Clairavoyance on the team without having to take a summoner spell for it is amazing.  That COMBINED with her ult makes her absurdly dangerous as an assassin that doesn't even have to be near you to hit you for a 4 second stun that does decent dmg.

Oh right, the new ability. Yea, that helps.

Current Ashe - until the patch - still falls under precisely what I just said. I'm surprised Teemo didn't move up due to his new passive too.

Oh for sure, Ashe is useless if you can't land her ult right now. :)

Considering we literally lost a game because of 3 arrow hits on our carry all of which would have taken a really hard on reaction to avoid and that was before she came with built in claire I would say yeah she's fucking good.  Not better than Nid by a large margin but that is mostly because Nid can cover lots of ground and handle a 2v1 lane a lot better than Ashe + she has a heal.

Ashe just adds so much more though w/ all her slowing abilities and the ult then nid does w/ her 0 cc of any kind. 

As for that list which proposed changes its taking into account and which are not taken into account is confusing as fuck so I'll try to get the proper list after the patch is released and he updates.

Elementz has made changes based on this patch, I think its still way too early to be doing much beyond guessing but I like his list. So bumping this thread and putting it in the first post.

http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=109533

Hmm, I disagree with a lot of that list.  Maybe I'm just not in high enough tier games or something.

Yeah, ditto.  I'm currently riding my Elo like it's the last act of Doctor Strangelove, so maybe someone else can explain some of this to me:

- Ezreal at #1?  I mean, I don't think he's gimpy (unless you're trying an AP build), but the single best character in the game?  How so?  He's got excellent range and decent sustained damage, but aside from that, his burst is mediocre, he's got no CC, and his support ability is gimp now, too.  Hard to kill, yes, but doesn't seem to bring much to the team when he's standing in the back except an attack speed buff and Q spam.

- Amumu is #2?  I play him a lot, too, I just don't see it.  CC is his thing, he does it pretty well, but aside from his ult (which is nice, but on a crazy long cooldown) I don't see anything that makes him better than most other tanks.

- Taric is tier 1?  His heal is nice, I'll grant him that, but does he have something else I don't know about?  His CC is kind of crap, and his buffs don't really seem game altering.  Then again, I can't even remember the last time I saw a Taric.

- Vlad seems a bit high, to me, too.  He's virtually unkillable, and a farming machine, but at the end of the day, he doesn't contribute much until he's decked out with a ton of gear, and his early game efficiency was just nerfed with his Q being shortened.

- Kennen seemed awfully high to me.  I haven't played him since the patch, but I'm skeptical of it being that big of a buff.  His ult is now not completely useless, and the skills he can't spam for damage were increased in damage, in return for which his stuns were nerfed into a crater.  Was that really a great change for him?

- Blitzcrank way down in tier 4 seemed odd.  Rocket Grab is basically a free kill almost every time it connects.  On top of that, he's got a decent knock up, and solid survivability with Mana Shield, I don't know what exactly is supposed to be wrong with him.

- Trynd seemed awfully low.  He's useless at early game, I admit, but late game he's an absolute beast if you can avoid feeding.  I don't know that I'd call him OP, but he is definitely game changing in that if the game goes on for long enough, he will trump almost any other champ.

- Fiddlesticks at tier 4?  I haven't really been paying attention to him for the last three months or so, has he really been nerfed that hard?  He used to dominate, as I recall.

I agree with a lot of his picks. Fiddle isn't effective against teams that communicate and ward well. Blitzcrank is too squishy to tank effectively and semi-competent players will never be hit with Rocket Grab. Taric has a ranged stun, a killer heal, is a walking Aegis shield, and acts as a mobile BF Sword for the carry at high levels. Amumu is the best tank/initiator in the game. Ez is hard to kill, has great damage, chases well, can poke, and is just generally awesome. Kennen is like a slightly weaker Ez.

Rammus is pleased.

Ez is the best ranged physical dps in the game. Ranged physical dps is the dps that does the most dps. He is also virtually immpossible to stop in the hands of a good player thanks to a built in flash and good range. He also can poke very well, farm very well, push back a lane from base and hop around letting him get dragon safely and get in and out of buff spawns quickly and safely.

Also he does epic damage and literally shuts down the majority of other solo mid potential champs.

Tbh Kail, the rest of your list just means you don't play with good enough players, no offense or anything.

Blitz can't do anything against good teams and good champs early game against a good lane combo you hit a grab that isn't to deep tower range backed by a stun and you will take more damage than they do. Late game good teams will use Blitz for free initiation. There are some specialists that still make him work but its an insanely uphill battle.

Taric is a free bf sword for the team, can't be harassed by anything short of the nastiest lane combos will take your tower from L6 on for free if he forces you out of lane and generally is a tanky champ you have to kill. Also true stuns are godlike.

Amumu is the best champ, the only thing that is arguably more important then doing better/moar dps is initiation and nobody initiates a fight better than Amumu. The fact that his damage adds up over the long fights this current meta has produced just means that yeah he fucking rules.

Fiddle and Trynd are terrible against decent players and I dread to think what would happen against pros. Similar to how Jax is viable at low elo but I haven't seen one in for fucking ever at below average.

Kennen and Vlad are guesses at best its too early to tell.

I think Kennen is very viable now, but imo Vlad isn't good enough past lane phase except for being very annoying.

Yeah, Vlad is obnoxious but doesn't have the burst to be really useful in fights. I find him very easy to solo mid against and I'm generally underwhelmed when he's my lane mate.

He shouldn't be easy to solo against for most champs because once he can spam Q its almost impossible to overcome his pokes.

I'm usually Annie mid, so once I hit 6 I can :pedobear: stun his ass and burn him to the ground. I'm not a fantastic Annie but I've never lost mid to a Vlad. I dunno, maybe they are all terriVlads.

How does any individual 1v1 match up tells us any thing?  Ya, vlad isn't about burst damage. So what?

So what is he good for? Except for dying last he's not terribly useful in team fights. He's pretty good at harassing a lane but he doesn't have the damage to seal the deal, and he's easily chased off by any real carry. He's not quite tanky enough to fit in an all tank line up, and he doesn't have the damage to be a carry, and he doesn't have any decent support abilities.

It could be an ELO thing; Vlad's in my ELO might just all suck. I just haven't seen a Vlad that made a sizable contribution to his team.

I think you're overestimating the strength of burst damage.  People seem to be going more for beefy AE splooge teams, and for that Vlad's pretty powerful.  A lot of the tier 1/2 champions now are tanky disablers (Amumu, Morgana, Nasus, Sion, etc.).  They need someone to back them up with some strong sustained dps.

Amumu, Nasus and Sion are strong sustained DPS usually.  :uhrr:

Never said they weren't.

Team fights can be confusing messes where it's hard to single target. AOE super teams are very powerful for that. Amumu is the king of FUCK YOU initiation, stun, and AOE damage support and can jungle to boot to help his team power through.