League of Legends: I finally updated the player list in the OP!

[zircon]

Haha, well after seeing Zero wreck face with Twitch my faith was renewed in him. The thing is, even though his stealth is kinda useless and easily countered, he still has some nasty splash damage, big range and expunge. Eve can't do anything unless she's literally right next to you and even then her damage is single target and ultra low.

[eternal Zero]

I feel this is the same way with Eve (because I feel she is still a solid hero but just takes a lot more effort to do what she used to) as well but as long as you are better than your opponent as long as you have stealth you're going to win. Twitch is honestly a pretty bad hero but he's takes less effort than say Sivir or Ezreal so that does give him an edge.

[Tensei]

Haha, well after seeing Zero wreck face with Twitch my faith was renewed in him. The thing is, even though his stealth is kinda useless and easily countered, he still has some nasty splash damage, big range and expunge. Eve can't do anything unless she's literally right next to you and even then her damage is single target and ultra low.

Don't you think Zero would have wrecked face even if he played Eve? I think you're confusing individual player skill with how viable a champion is. If a player can dominate with Twitch, I'm pretty sure they can dominate even more with 'top-tier' champions that fulfill a similar role.

In a vaccuum, no Champion is outright bad, but there's just a shitton of overlap in roles, and some Champions completely outperform others (like Annie/Orianna vs. LeBlanc)

[Dexie]

The stealth update and the changes to his skills are going to make him quite strong, I think. Have you seen them yet? Shurelia previewed them on the forums a while back.

[zircon]

Don't you think Zero would have wrecked face even if he played Eve? I think you're confusing individual player skill with how viable a champion is. If a player can dominate with Twitch, I'm pretty sure they can dominate even more with 'top-tier' champions that fulfill a similar role.

In a vaccuum, no Champion is outright bad, but there's just a shitton of overlap in roles, and some Champions completely outperform others (like Annie/Orianna vs. LeBlanc)

No, I actually think Eve is downright awful and wouldn't be able to do the same thing. Twitch is sort of a hypercarry in that if the enemy team is grouped up fighting your team, you can just walk to the edge of your range and ult away at really high attack speed and splash them with ultra strong attacks (and then Expunge.) With Eve you have to attack one person at a time.

[Tensei]

Obviously you have never seen a good jungle Eve wreck face yet.

Seriously, though, I hope she'll be better after the stealth rework.

[Bleck]

The stealth update and the changes to his skills are going to make him quite strong, I think. Have you seen them yet? Shurelia previewed them on the forums a while back.

I saw the preview, and I'm pretty excited for it. Twitch has always been my favorite carry (even though he's awful and I never play as him because of it), so it'd really make me smile to see him actually useful again.

No, I actually think Eve is downright awful and wouldn't be able to do the same thing. Twitch is sort of a hypercarry in that if the enemy team is grouped up fighting your team, you can just walk to the edge of your range and ult away at really high attack speed and splash them with ultra strong attacks (and then Expunge.) With Eve you have to attack one person at a time.

A good Eve knows that she's there to finish people off, not be a target in team fights. That being said, she is still really bad.

[The Derrit]

this may be my last night playing for awhile depending on whether or not my laptop can handle league of legends; its pretty old so i'm not sure.

also just played a game as galio and went 1-0-19 while flaming a teemo who blamed his team all game

it was fun

[eternal Zero]

No, I actually think Eve is downright awful and wouldn't be able to do the same thing. Twitch is sort of a hypercarry in that if the enemy team is grouped up fighting your team, you can just walk to the edge of your range and ult away at really high attack speed and splash them with ultra strong attacks (and then Expunge.) With Eve you have to attack one person at a time.

Eve also heals whenever she gets a heal or assist and she gets to reapply her ult for free. As long as she isn't truly focused down quickly she is a hard hitting and annoying character to deal with. Like any other stealth character the opposing team requires stealth. While she is bad and I don't feel like she's as bad as people say I think this is my personal ability talking and not what is truly the balance of the game. She is best used to disrupt both solo lanes while giving bot a potential solo and maybe picking up a kill or two off of jungle. I only dare play her in a full 5 man because she requires team coordination.

A good Eve knows that she's there to finish people off, not be a target in team fights. That being said, she is still really bad.

Pretty much. Just some people are better at toying with death and getting in and out before dying.

[zircon]

Man, the one thing I hate about this game is that it's SO hard to carry a team. I know Zero can do it but I don't think I'm a bad player, and lately I've had these strings of game where I do awesome early and mid, but by lategame the enemy team is just winning every teamfight. I do everything in my power to win, get buffs, dragon, baron, max my items, buy potions, play my role, and we still lose. We usually lose a lane or two and even if we win a teamfight, the rest of the team is too scared (or dead) to push, so the enemy team just respawns and continues pounding us. This situation has happened over and over. It seems like there is no way out, no matter WHAT champion I play.

[Dhsu]

Sounds like that's part of the design to make it harder to steamroll, along with the fast respawn and regenerating inhibitors. If you wanna hard carry, play HoN with us again.

[The Derrit]

Man, the one thing I hate about this game is that it's SO hard to carry a team. I know Zero can do it but I don't think I'm a bad player, and lately I've had these strings of game where I do awesome early and mid, but by lategame the enemy team is just winning every teamfight. I do everything in my power to win, get buffs, dragon, baron, max my items, buy potions, play my role, and we still lose. We usually lose a lane or two and even if we win a teamfight, the rest of the team is too scared (or dead) to push, so the enemy team just respawns and continues pounding us. This situation has happened over and over. It seems like there is no way out, no matter WHAT champion I play.

i've been there before part of it is poor teammates honestly. i just had the blessing of playing 4 in a row with smart teammates and oh good LORD the difference it makes. in one of the games our 5th was pretty bad but because everyone kept their heads together we still won even with him feeding early.

if you get behind against a team who's better than you they'll always be ahead in gold and items and they won't give it back

[Bleck]

LoL (and DotA in general) suffers from a huge snowballing effect, I think; very rarely do games that start off badly for a team end any better for that team.

It also doesn't help that LoL is really badly balanced, in my opinion.

[zircon]

But I'm complaining about the opposite. I'm talking about games where I outfarm and outcarry everyone else in the game, but because of the way the game is designed, that isn't enough for my team to win. And don't even get me started about playing support with pubs. It works occasionally, but more often than not they run and die repeatedly then complain because I didn't help them (even when I do, I can't help if you run in 1 v 4).

[eternal Zero]

It's actually a lot harder to fully carry a team in LoL than in HoN and DotA because killing someone doesn't remove gold so you will always get built eventually if the game doesn't end. So no matter how many times you smack down their Trynd or Morde they'll eventually catch up to you once you've fully built out and are relying on elixirs as your advantage. The trick to carrying in LoL specifically is to be as far back from the action as possible, use your team strictly as meat shields and then have enough HP left over to kill any combination of dragon/baron/tower after a won (or lost) team fight with summoners at the ready to run if necessary. That way every fight no matter what will garner you some kind of advantage. It's a very selfish style and I don't prefer it.

Also killing speed is a lot slower in LoL than it is in DotA. Also towers do a lot more damage forcing your initial burst in carrying speed to be limited by how brave your opposing lane wants to be.

Edited August 30, 2011 by eternal Zero

[Bleck]

I think the lack of gold removal works better, because consistently losing gold to an enemy as they get more and more powerful until they are nigh undefeatable sounds like... really depressing.

In other news, I only just now discovered smart-casting, and subsequently used it to go from sort of liking Veigar to loving Veigar.

[zircon]

Yes, I don't like losing gold when I die and it's a main reason I prefer LoL to HoN now. Still, it's partly in the champion and game design overall which makes it very hard to carry a team, like Zero said. It seems lately all my games have been going very long and so all the farm in the world just doesn't do enough. This wouldn't be so bad, except that it's harder to push because towers are way stronger.

Edit: Seriously, I feel like giving up. I just played a game as Brand where I completely dominated mid (I had 2x the CS of anyone else, was getting kills/assists, not dying, etc.) We were hosing them early and then we just lost lategame primarily to fed tanky dps (Garen) and a Tryndamere with two Phantom Dancers. It's not that the game isn't fun but I just can't seem to win lately.

Edited August 30, 2011 by zircon

[Jamphibious]

Edit: Seriously, I feel like giving up. I just played a game as Brand where I completely dominated mid (I had 2x the CS of anyone else, was getting kills/assists, not dying, etc.) We were hosing them early and then we just lost lategame primarily to fed tanky dps (Garen) and a Tryndamere with two Phantom Dancers. It's not that the game isn't fun but I just can't seem to win lately.

All I can say is wait a few weeks for Dominion to hit. That'll spice the game up again!

But seriously, I hear ya. I rarely do solo-queue myself so even if I do lose I'm not too disappointed because me and my friends can still have a good time on voice chat, but I have had some terrible losing streaks in the last 2 weeks or so, and it sucks. I'm kind of banking on Dominion bringing some much needed excitement. I did have a good Lux game today though (went 14/0/15 or something silly like that) which felt good, but games like that are a precious commodity.

[kitty]

Simple solution: Don't let it get to very late game.

[Tensei]

Yes, I don't like losing gold when I die and it's a main reason I prefer LoL to HoN now.

If this is the main reason, I think you would like Casual Mode in HoN (a rework of EM). It doesn't remove gold on death, denies don't reduce experience gain, and gold earned for hero kills is higher. No double gold ticks or anything silly like that.

Also, LoL seems almost entirely geared towards making it impossible for any single person to carry a team (thus kinda defeating the idea of a carry-type hero who has a weak earlygame and a strong lategame). You can't ruin the enemy mid, control the river runes, destroy the sidelanes, and almost singlehandedly win like you can in HoN.

There's also the issue with every champion scaling linearly which means that even supports are expected to sit passively in their lane and wait until they get their Rabaddons. If at any point a champion seems 'unreasonably' strong in earlygame, you can quickly expect them to get hit with the nerfstick (Rumble). Contrast to HoN where you have supports that can take over their lane right from level 1 (Vindicator, Myrmidon) or nukers that peak in effectiveness between levels 7 - 14 (Pyro, Witch Slayer, Fayde, etc.) but very quickly become a mere stun dispenser after that.

Edited August 30, 2011 by Tensei

[bain_nick]

You play passively as Support? I always find that I do so much better as Sona if I'm aggressive.

That and Sona is far better with AD then AP.

[Tensei]

Even the most aggressive support in LoL atm (Soraka) has only a fraction of the inlane man-up potential of HoN supports like Glacius. So yes, on a relative scale, it's passive.

Also, AD Manamune Sona (my favorite build for her) isn't really a support build imo. There's a difference in what is considered a support in both games; In LoL a Champ needs to have a shield or a heal to be considered a support, and is expected to go bot with an AD carry to keep them topped off so they can farm, and having more than one support is a complete waste of a slot. In HoN a support simply needs to be a hero that requires a minimum of farm and/or levels to be effective and you typically want at least two on your team. This generally means that supports in HoN have a crapton of powerful nukes and stuns so they can destroy enemy carries early, but lack scaling skills. A support in LoL (like Soraka) can't reliably 1v1 a carry (like Caitlyn) at ANY point in the game, not even early on. A well-played Slither or Glacius in HoN will completely shit on carries early on.

Edited August 30, 2011 by Tensei

[zircon]

If this is the main reason, I think you would like Casual Mode in HoN (a rework of EM). It doesn't remove gold on death, denies don't reduce experience gain, and gold earned for hero kills is higher. No double gold ticks or anything silly like that.

Dhsu said the same thing. However, I also really prefer the way mana + regen is handled in LoL. In HoN, I generally feel very restricted with spell usage, and if you get low on HP or mana without the right items or heroes in lane, you have to go back. Regen takes place at a glacial pace overall. I don't like how I basically have to tiptoe around in lane, especially as various Strength heroes, as one spell usage can drain most of my mana. Dancing around for the laning phase just isn't that fun for me. Even though people say LoL is more passive, I find it to be WAY more active during the laning phase as spells are constantly getting thrown all over the place.

[Tensei]

There's a 625 gold item that basically all but fixes your mana problems, especially if you're a STR hero, and with a free courier there's never really a reason to go back to base from lane unless you're close to death and without money for potions. You also have a Power Supply, and a bottle if you're solo mid. I'd say the games are roughly equal when it comes to sustainability but LoL has a lot more 'freebies' like speccing for mana regen, alternate resources (HP, Energy, Rage, Heat), Clarity and various mana regen passives.

It's also a balancing issue. Behemoth and Hammerstorm have stuns that cost like 60% of their mana pool at level 1, but they're SO powerful that you have a very good chance of getting a kill when you do use them. The laning phase in LoL is more passive in the sense that you have to slowly chip away at your enemy, hopefully waste their flash, and then maybe get a kill (as long as you're out of tower range).

[prophetik music]

i've been having the same feeling, zircon, but for different reasons. i think we all know that i have very specific limitations in-game - i'm not the greatest farmer, and i have trouble communicating sometimes - but my frustration is that i tank in pub games, which is apparently something that doesn't happen often. most games i'll wind up with a score like 2-6-6, with a surrender at the 30m mark, and have most of those deaths come because i initiated when told to and then everyone backed off. then at the end-game screen, people will tell me that i did terrible, even though i farmed pretty well and had the items i needed at the level i was at. clearly the defining trait of a tank is not dying, and i understand that - but no character tanks well at level 12 when your team doesn't output damage. the point of a tank isn't to survive no matter what, it's to survive just long enough. if i play as udyr, it's even harder, because i'm expected to spend the whole fight using bear stance to stun everyone rather than using turtle stance. i had two players 'yelling' at me because i was trying to stay alive in a fight rather than using bear stance so they could fight without fear of getting caught. we then went on to get wiped, because i stopped using turtle and almost immediately was focused down and slaughtered.

i also have unreasonably bad luck with pubs. i've had seven straight games with at least one member of my team either unable to speak english (and being the jungler, or something communication-critical like that), or AFK for a significant portion of the game. particularly when i tank with a character like udyr, who is so dependent on not getting poked hard early to really be able to tank mid and late game, being stuck in a lane where my gold is exclusively coming from a HoG and a philosopher's stone really gets annoying fast.

Edited August 30, 2011 by prophetik music