LoL: Are Reset Champions Healthy For The Game?
Reset mechanics have been part of League of Legends for years now, but we are getting to a point where we have to think about how healthy they are for the game.
Resets come from abilities that have a way to partially or completely reset their cooldowns, allowing repeated usage of them.
They have been in the game since forever. The first version of Ryze had resets and so does Darius Ult. Some of the most fun characters have reset abilities and while some only partially reduce cooldown like Master Yi's Q or Zac W, some get a complete refund like Viego Ult or all of Katarina's abilities. Most of the partial refunds aren't the biggest issue and relatively easy to play around but kill resets are where all the hate for resets come from.
When Viego was released there was a huge argument whether reset mechanics should be in the game since Viego was arguably the best character to play. He had a high pro play presence and was in most ranked games at the time. The discussion has since died down, but I am here to open it up again.
LoL: Are Resets Balanced?
That's not really a question that can be answered since the reset is very champion specific. Is Ryze Q balanced even though it resets? Probably. Is Irelia Q balanced whenever she can dash around a wave? Some would say no to that. So people are not displeased with reset mechanics overall, just some characters that can be very annoying with them.
Irelia only needs to finish her Blade of the Ruined King to automatically oneshot caster minions with her Q and instantly gains 3 more dashes with every wave. This can be incredibly frustrating as she also heals from those Q's. But they are her main movement skills, and it is very hard to successfully pull it off in team fights. Is that balanced? Personally, yes I think so.
We aren't wrong:
Viego only needs to get an assist on a takedown to be able to possess the enemy champion. He then becomes the champion and can use his ultimate ability again, while also having all cooldowns of the champion he possessed reset. Is that balanced? Absolutely not. In a single team fight, he can become immune multiple times and can throw out multiple rotations and ultimates before he can be stopped.
Viego Is Not The Only Reset-Champion Problem
Viego is one of the biggest offenders of reset hate, but he is definitely not the only one. Especially if you play ranked you run into my personal two hate characters.
Katarina and Samira.
I'm already not a big fan of ADC balancing, but why can the champion that is already setup to Pentakill infinitely dash through an entire enemy team in 2 seconds? This is just game design to make the player feel cool (which is good) at the cost of balancing.
Katarina is an even worse offender. Once she gets a takedown her cooldowns get reduced by 15 seconds. None of her basic abilities have a 15-second cooldown. Once she gets a single kill in a team fight she can BLINK around at least 4 other times, probably more. It's frustrating to play against and absolutely not fun for anybody except the Katarina player.
Anyway, Rant over. Riot knows how to make cool reset abilities like Pyke Ult but is it okay that one of the 10 players has fun with Samira when there are at least 5 people who hate it?
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