Talk:Vladimir/@comment-25364408-20141226120533/@comment-25447003-20150110135830

Vlad early game is weak vs bruisers with gap-closer all in (like Wukong, J4, Pantheon, XinZhao, Aatrox; or Fiora, Riven, Irelia, ... but requires a bit higher skill). Vladimir will be easily zoned or First Blood then.

Agains long range champions he is not so weak, (given you can dodge some skillshots), but generally Vlad can not kill them without jungler help; and lost CS due to slow AA animation & being poked. So the time for him to be useful is delayed more. Post-6 the enemy can outburst him, or at least they can roam better (Vlad can not clear wave effectively until E rank 3+, slow mobility and unreliable escape).

The cases you are winning is probably the bad junglers trying to dive (not aware of Vlad W) and died, give you early gold to have items to have earlier advantage. If you can kill their laner as well you'll probably be ahead and then it's obvious "good early game", easily zone out the opponents and scale into a beast.

Regarding the Doran Shield vs Ring, the Ring is not bad now that the Shield was nerfed heavily in 4.3. Yet I think your calculation did not take into account that the HP regen is 6 HP5 -> which means 36 HP per minutes, and assuming you stay in lane for 5 minutes before Back then it's 180 HP gen.

The passive of Shield block 8 damages per hit, so it stills depend on how aggresive the trade goes, but probably something between 24-48 damage per minutes.

Hence, for Vladimir the Doran Shield is essentially more sustain than the Doran Ring. You'll see it more clear when vs strong harrasers like Wukong, Jayce, Ryze, ...