User blog comment:Kagimizu/Kha'zix: Adapt and Balance (Kha'zix balance ideas)/@comment-4481326-20140515093529/@comment-4481326-20140516142808

@Sjjtitan2019, @Deshiba: The TL;DR is there, bold and underlined. I'll try to figure out how to give it a colour and neon spotlights next time ;) This comment has no tl;dr, though. Just don't be lazy, it is for the cause-ix!

@Kagimizu: Agreed, of course no champion should have no mechanical counterplay at all. But not every champion should be able to be mechanically counteredplayed by any other champion (talking about champion mechanics, not player mechanics). Most assassins can't survive a tank/fighter dunk, most tanks can't survive a 1v1 with a marksman (that's my experience at least, playing as Twitch), so why should marksmen be able to survive an all-in from an assassin? A marksman (and the rest of the team) should try to avoid creating that window of opportunity in the first place.

Indeed, Malphite is a tank and his only really big power lies in his ultimate. But when used properly, it can easily lead to an ace or at least a won teamfight. People take that possibility into account when playing against a Malphite and adapt their play to it, avoiding creating a window. However, people don't seem to want to take assassins into account. My last game was as a fed Twitch (ended up 24/4/8, 3 deaths in the early game). One moment I forgot about the enemy Kha'Zix (avg to high farm), strolled a bit (1000 or so) too far away from our Nasus and Twisted Fate and before any of us even had the chance to react he had sliced my head off. In steading of begging Rito to nerf pls, I felt satisfied, because this Kha'Zix knew his job, the only job Kha'Zix shines in, and executed it perfectly (he did get killed afterwards though, but that's the high risk of such a high reward). That is what playing against a Kha'Zix being a squishy should be like. Adapt your play. We did that most of the game and prevented lots of assassinations by sticking together while Kha tried to roam.

"He is a pure assassin (...)" That is the problem of balancing Kha'Zix right there: he is an extremely powerful assassin, indeed one of the purest assassins I know, and I love it. But they also have made his identity to be an evolving, adapting, versatile assassin, capable of performing his assassination job through changing situations. Such a powerful assassin with such powerful tanking or poking tools is just too much, indeed. The most obvious solutions are either to nerf/flatten all of his aspects, making him not particularly good at anything (then just pick a bruiser), or to flatten out his non-hard-core aspects, essentially removing the versatile, evolving part of his identity.

For being able to execute such perfect assassinations, I do agree his team fight potential is too much. But in stead of taking it away, I rather see Riot putting more weight into chosing the different evolutionary paths. That way he can still be versatile, but not an expert in everything. If they shifted some power into the evolutions, I think more of his identity could be preserved. (Also, his R could me more interesting and fitting, as you suggest, by enhancing speed and slipperyness in stead of clunky tankiness.) The danger of this shift is that he could be getting great gaps in/around his intended powers and becoming useful only in very, very specific situations.

Change is good, destruction is not. I don't mind the change removing some overall power, I do mind it just roflstomping champions out of identity, fun and lane.

I am absolutely no expert in design, balance and changes and I am new to discussions about it, so I might just have said very stupid or overlooked obvious things. Forgive and correct me if so :D