Rell who is that?
Why Doesn't Anyone Play Rell?
Usually when a new champion gets released, layers flock to them and desperately try to figure out how they work. They’re the new shiny toy in town and even champions that received a less than friendly welcome are part of this list.
Except one… Rell. This champion was forgotten two patches after her release. What is wrong with Rell and why does she have such a horrendous play rate, even though she’s got interesting lore and is one of the newest champions?
Today we’re going to look at Rell and why players seem to really dislike her… or well… forget about her existence in League of Legends.
Rell Is not Unique
Rell was supposed to fit into the same mold as Leona or Thresh and be a tanky, engaging support to play. Riot did get the engage and tank part right, but it was done in such a way that she feels awful to play and when you pick her, you realize, you could have just played Leona and had a much better time.
What do we mean by this? Rell has the same cookie-cutter engage kit as any other engage support and none of it makes her stand out. Would you pick up a new champion when you already mastered Leona, Nautilus and Alistar?
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Rell’s Crash Down, so her first W cast, is her engage and her E and ultimate, are for AoE CC. This is extremely similar to other engage support who are easier to play, so why bother learning Rell?
Rell Does Not Feel Rewarding to Play
What do we mean by Rell not feeling rewarding to play? Well, Rell is able to jump into the fray of danger thanks to her W. Then she can either use her tethered E to stun someone or her ultimate to pull opponents closer.
But, using her W means she becomes slow, clunky and if you don’t actually get the kill, well then you’re just the sacrificial lamb of your team, because her movement speed is so low that no matter how hard you click, she just won’t move any faster.
Leona, for example, does the exact same thing, but with much less risk. She doesn’t turn into an immovable champion once she goes into a fight. It feels much riskier with Rell and oftentimes, especially in a solo queue setting you’ll time your engage wrong and die.
Her Crowd Control Is Not As Good
Rell has two crowd control abilities in her kit. Magnet Storm, her ultimate and Attract and Repel, her E. But when looking at other engage supports these abilities just don’t measure up to them. Nautilus and Leona both have long ranged cc thanks to their ultimates, while Rell’s ultimate has no range at all.
Rell’s ultimate, while also not being long ranged, also has another issue. It’s not a full stun. Opponents can still get out of the magnetism if needed. It isn’t reliable against champions with dashes or blinks, making a Leona or Nautilus ult much better to use.
Also, the overall stun duration in her kit is extremely short in comparison to other engage supports. Rell has a bit under 2 seconds worth of combined stuns in her kit, while Leona over 3 and Nautilus, depending on level even over 4 seconds. This doesn't give your team enough time to react to the crowd control, even if you did everything right.
The Most Unpopular LoL Champions
Is Rell a Bad Champion?
Rell is not a bad champion. She has interesting abilities and Riot tried to make an aggressive all-in engage support, but with so many good and popular engage champions already in the game, it seems like they failed at making her unique enough to warrant someone to play her.
She is the type of champion that requires a lot of communication, something that just doesn’t exist in solo queue. She has a decent win rate in high elo since high elo players understand when to go in for a fight and when not to engage.
So, should you play Rell? If you want a fun engage champion that is all about going into fights, then yes, but if you’ve mastered Leona, Nautilus, Thresh, Alistar, then it might not be worth it, since they can do anything Rell does and that even better.