Talk:VPBE/@comment-26856034-20150804222743/@comment-24241876-20150805122412

I will say, there are a ton of buffs. Especially to his stat growths, minus his base AS. (Which might mean a bit, since other than Q/W, you have to AA to reach max innate stacks / grab a kill with Ult to trigger Bloodrage.) But there are also a fair share of changes that highlight Darius's power curve moving from early game to mid-late game.

His reworked innate. That's a lot of AD to be thrown onto someone who is already feared for the damage he provides in a fight. However, I'm a bit skeptical about his passive being changed to deal physical damage, rather than magic damage. On the upside, it now benefits from the armor pen on his E, as well as other armor pen sources, but, conversely, enemies can buy armor early in the laning phase, usually when it deals the most damage, to counteract it. Also, the removal of %mspd per bleeding enemy champion has changed his level of mobility from a little bit to absolutely none.

His Q is now delayed, which might mean be a small counterplay change, especially if the enemy is quick enough to escape it / dash at you to lessen the damage and commit to a fight, even more so now that getting hit by the handle doesn't provide an innate stack.

His W has a lower mana cost and cooldown, but no longer deals an additonal 20% to 100% damage. It also slows for less time, albeit at a much stronger level, and doesn't slow attack speed anymore, which was pretty crucial when going toe-to-toe with an enemy marksman or AS-dependant fighter.

His E is pretty much the same, plus an added brief slow to make the most out of the opportunity. Also the longawaited bugfix on his pull (which I myself have never really been a victim of, but am aware that it exists).

His R has a lower base damage now. But if you can score a kill with it, the damage will skyrocket due to the amount of AD gained from Bloodrage and the immediate max-stack effect. I'm also curious as to why Riot is deciding to abandon their recent change from refunding mana on-kill to simply costing no mana at late game. But the changes are still tenative, so who knows.

So yeah, while there may be a lot of buffs, there are also a fair share of nerfs that will (hopefully) balance it out. I would wager that there isn't too much to worry about his ult.