Talk:Shyvana/@comment-24049414-20140107084440/@comment-7707879-20140116123859

@Kwon260: "My opinion regarding why Shyvana is suddenly considered OP: exaggeration. Solo top Shyvana was probably one of the lowest tier, and people considered her as underwhelming and not so viable at top"

Shyvanna was regarded as a weak top laner prior to her passive being changed (she now gets a little extra defence early), her E being buffed (not incosiderably) and the defencive masteries being altered (which has favoured tanky champions). Exaggeration isn't the issue, she has received several direct and indirect buffs to her early laning, the E change in particular makes it very hard to trade with her as her sustained damage is immense - enough to make squishies run and the %damage helps greatly against tankier opponents. Since it's not worth trading with her, and her E melts the minion wave, so she will have more minions than you if you agree to trade, making it not worthwhile, she almost always farms to near perfection and pushes you to tower, effecting your own ability to farm and your turrets health (especially as a mana based champion) but not significantly imperilling herself since she has great mobility to escape any gank attempt.

Her advantages are numerous and not to be understated; any squishy, mana based champion would struggle against her (hence the current picks in top lane) since she's hard to trade with, can farm efficiently forever as a resourceless champion - she should be ahead of most opponents in farm - her kit also allows her to be mobile and high damage while building pure tank, so her build path is VERY straightforward, reliable and effective. I repeat, exaggeration has NOTHING to do with why she is considered OP, she is a top pick for countless reasons, and is up there with Mundo, Rengar, Nasus and Rengar, pushing almost every other champion out of top.

As for what others have said, "why not just take a ranged top", it might work in solo queue, but that doesn't mean Shyvanna isn't OP. Surely a co-ordinated team could just destroy the ranged champ with a gank, could they not? Most ranged champs are squishy and will not be able to deal with an all in from Shyv + a good jungler I imagine.