User blog:PurpleWii/The Evolution of the Tank archetype.

Introduction
Hello, It's this clown again. You know, the one who wrote the one thing before and it actually got a bit of attention? That was me! The guy! The...... yea. Anyway, I was quite happy with the reception of the last post, and now I'm back again(and about time to) with another topic up for discussion. This time, we're talking about the wonderful archetype of champions known as Tanks!

"Tanks? What's there to talk about? They're bork'd as hell right now!"
Tank ITEMS may be on the strong side, but tanks the CHAMPION ARCHETYPE are just chilling. Sure, there are a couple of tank champions that are smashing your head over with %health damage,cockblocking you harder with their cc than your mom when she finds out you've using less tissues than normal lately, and STILL being hard as hell to put a cap on with their durability, but it could be worse. Could all be playing in the season 4 Juggernaut meta, watching and  go at each other in the exciting Island known as "Top lane". Poppy and Gragas may just be new coats of paint over Shyvana/Mundo to most, but honestly, I think champions like those 2(more so Poppy though) are good for game health, and are actually quite a bit of more fun.

"Alright then, PurpleWii, hide your hard-on. You find Tanks fun and "balanced", get to the point already."
Well then now, I guess I should. So here's the cheese and wine. Riot's design philosophy about what Tanks are(and should be) has changed over the years. People are up in arms at the return of tanks to the meta, but everyone seems to forget that we haven't seen tanks be this dominate in the game for a LONG time; and when I say TANKS, I don't mean champions that build TANK(because that's always been a staple thing for when you wanna not get popped in fights), I mean the champion archetype. Like I said about. Get it? No? Well, that's understandable; there was nothing to get! Tanks are doing new things (like actually doing damage, as you are all reluctantly aware), and it's messy with peoples perception of "balance". I'm hear to give a summary (and a bit of a history) of where tanks are heading. Strap on your Strap ON and let's get heretical.

The Point:
As said by a user in my last post, when I make these topic (especially if it's pertaining to game balance) I tend to Ramble. Actually, I don't tend to ramble, I DO ramble, because that's just what I do. Rather than have everyone ready through what could be passed as a high school essay, I've made this handy dandy cut out space just for the people who don't like seeing my drawn out thought process. AKA 99% of people! With the 1% being me! Hooray! Anyway, enough rambling about rambling, here's the point:

Tanks have changed, and in my opinion, for the better. Tanks like, , and most notoriously, are starting to become self sufficient. No longer are the days that Tanks are glorified supports; they actually get to play same game that every other archetype(besides supports themselves) gets to play. They can get items, they can "carry" games on their own, they can(most importantly) KILL OTHER PLAYERS. Tanks having been starting to do more and more over the seasons, and people are up in arms about it. Right now, the carry players still don't see an interest in playing tanks because they still see them as the "boring second support role", and Die-hard traditional tank players are upset that their tanks are basically being turned into "Bruisers" What do you think about this?

In the Beginning, there was only darkness.... and wards.
Let's go back to a simpler time, the wondrous land of Late Season 1 to early season 3 ; a land where a new champion came out every 2 weeks,(barring a couple jarring bugs) and we paid $7(or your European equivalent) for a single chorma skin! The rift was still relatively new, but it had been cooking for a while; "The meta" that we all know and love today had formed not too long ago! A solo laner top and mid; a support in the bot laner, with a "carry", and of course, the jungler! Also known as the original "bitch boy!"

If you were to every ask anyone about where the saying "blame the jungler" comes from, someone would probably point back to Season 2 jungling. In the early days, the jungle was hard and unforgiving. Monsters did tons of damage, with minimal exp and gold returns in the long run. The point of jungling back in the day was to primarily act a "phantom" for your team. You would clear camps to get to your level spike as fast as possible, the pour on your signiture move; the gank! Not many champions could last long fighting the monsters over and over, or gank often enough to constantly attempt to save your hopeless teammates, but a specific archetype did jungling better than a cut above the rest. Can you guess it? Tanks!

Actually, because of the wards, it wasn't that dark; unless you were a tank of course.
,, (one of these things isn't quite like the other by the way), the holy trinity of jungling in seasons 1/2. The idea behind these champions was simple. These champions had enough early game durability/sustain to let them slog through the damage jungle monsters could put out, and eventually kill them. After obtaining their basic abilities, they would relentlessly gank lanes with their punishing CC abilities, and get their laners fed. After their lanes got ahead, they would effectively convert themselves into second supports. Tanks oozed with gold efficiently in their kits and stats; unlike other junglers at the time, they could make buy with the low amount of gold the jungle was giving them. They would buy GP5 items like (the "precursor" to the gold generation items we have now; but buyable on basically anyone) to supplement their gold income to they could give camps to their laners after a certain point, then finally, stock up on consumable wards and (an item that gave you see any invisible units until you died). It was common to see a tank with anything more than 1 or 2 GP5 items,, and maybe (if they were quite ahead) an.

This sounds like a jungle post, but it isn't
That was the just of how tanks were in the early stages of the game. They were basically second supports. Their jobs were further simplified in teamfights, where they held onto their Crowd control abilities to lock-down priority targets. Once they had used those abilities(and those abilities were on DAMN LONG cooldowns back in the day), all that was left to do was to give their life for the cause. Once a tanks big disabling abilities were on cooldown, they became a glorified meat-shield. They had no items, no damage, and no power. They soul purpose was to give their lives for their carries. In the grand scheme on things, they were somewhat irrelevant. They say behind every good carry is a great support, but it sure didn't feel like it. No multi kills for your, no praise in chat, no gold or fancy items to your name; you were just a cog in the machine. Unless, you were playing of course.

Winter is coming...... for you that is.
January 17th, 2012. The (Original) Sejuani was released onto the live client in patch whatever. The release of Sejuani was the early birth of something beautiful. I'm mostly going off of muscle memory at this point, it's been a long time since I was just a lowly pleb in season 2, desperately trying to escape support hell and become a mid laner main like was! Those were the days. We were in the heart of Season 2 at this point, and some historical moment happend that I don't remember happened, but that doesn't matter! Tanks were still being Tanks. Tanks were still (just about) the only thing you could throw into the jungle and survive, Tanks were still gold effiecent as ever, and (of course) Tanks were still slaves to the carries of the team; and boring as hell at that. was not that at all. was the weirdest thing anyone had laid eyes on. Sejuani was hailed as a tank by Riot, but anyone looking at her kit knew one thing; she was the worst tank in the game by a long-shot.

Sejuani did none of that! Sejuani had no sustain, garbage base stats (and mana costs), and a higher than average level requirement. Sejuani got slaughtered by the jungle monsters, and had to back often. Sejuani was made of paper when it came to champion fights, and all of her abilities were terrible at their early ranks(whether it be terrible cooldowns, or poor bases). Whatever were Riot thinking when they made this monstrosity? Sejuani, by tank(and jungle) standards was terrible in every way...... aside from one.

She did a lot of damage.

The Cold Facts
was a tank that actually scaled really well into the late-game(if she could make it that far). She didn't have the base stats, but her level ups were amazing. The one thing Sejuani did that no other tank at the time could do, however, was be a constant THREAT. It was thanks to W,, which had a max health ratio(and still does today in her updated form). With this, she could build defensive stats, and still be a relative threat outside of being a ball-and-chain to the enemy carries. It was.....strange for the time, and people couldn't appreciate it. She was played in every role possible, with every build imaginable, but was just too misunderstood at the time. Without a proper lane to really call home, she drifted for awhile, until a majority of the player base just kinda left her to the northern winds (hehe). Because of lack of player support and a "questionable" character design(Chain mail bikini.I thought she was bad-ass in her own way, wearing that in the frozen Tundra. Other people didn't see it that way.), she was reworked into what she is now, today, about a year later. She kept her health ratios even then. I feel like Riot learned a lot about Tanks with their experience with Sejuani.

That sums up Seasons late 1 through most of season 2., fast forward time!
All good(and boring; like really boring) things must come to an end. Around the end of season 2, Tanks as an archetype are starting to fall out of favor. Champions such as, , and ; "Bruisers"(or divers if you want to be modern about it), are replacing tanks for their spot in the jungle and top lanes. Bruisers are widely seen as "tanks that do damage and are built "tanky", normally relying on 1 damage item to make sure they can still murder carries if given the chance. Tanks didn't have the ability ratios to be able do what //, etc could do with only a single damage item, and so, were upset by Bruisers in every way. When the more dominant Bruisers were banned, certain tanks were played, but that didn't happen often. Almost every Tank had some Bruiser variant that was above them, and picked (if not banned) instead. Riot was looking for ways to keep tanks and Bruisers in harmony, so they ended up doing something "different". Riot pulled out their secret weapon.

Let's bounce!

 * was literally(and figuratively; and metaphorically) the secret weapon of the tank Archetype, and Riot own "experiment" with the classification of champions. He pushed the definition of "Tank" to new heights, extreme proportions, and broken rules. To put it simply, was different, and he was POWERFUL. If Lee sin was The ranged-melee-tanky-assassin-mage-tank-support-jungler, Zac was all that and MORE. Sustain. Clear speed. Innate durability. Engage. Peel; and most importantly, DAMAGE. Extreme base numbers, and, He was a one man band and dub as this "Bruiser-Tank hybrid". No other Tank did anything as well as he could(especially when it came to damage.) He was the perfect TANK at the time. He was so good, he saw play in both jungle AND top, due to the fact that he scaled well enough with items. Zac had no flaw; Zac was perfection. He had to be dealt with.

was too good for her time to be appreciated properly, but was heard loud and clear. Most tanks didn't do anything flashy, but any game with Zac was exciting; for the player and audience(but not the enemy players, oh no. Watching him fly across the screen into a bunch of enemy champions was pure bliss. He got things done fairly quick as opposed to other tanks of the time (You could even say he was fast and fun!) Zac was a balance nightmare as Riot found out down the road(much like any champion older champion of course), but Zac was Revolutionary. Zac was the best thing that could happen to Tanks, and redefined the archetype.

Sharing the Secret of the Secret weapon
Zac had a lot of problems that kept him from being a fun-to-play-against champion, but Zac did one thing right, and that was the moderation of his damage. had a damage mod on it that deal bonus damage based on the TARGET'S MAXIMUM HEALTH. This was given to so his damage could be relevant at all stages of the game, against all targets, and not have it get out of hand. did damage, but she didn't have this component, and she dominated squishier champions by just stacking health. damage was a lot more consistent(if not properly tuned), and was great way of making Tanks more independent. Riot continued their experiment, and incorporated this feature into other Tanks. In patch 4.21, Sejuani received a change that added % of target's max HP to her W ability.(Sejuani TECHNICALLY had this feature since her Rework; it was just allocated to . The problem with this, was that her damage was split between her W and Q, which made level skills awkward. In 4.21, it transferred from her Q to her W to make her skill order smoother.). In addition to these changes, Sejuani also had her E abilities, cooldown lowered. A Standard with Tanks was give them a powerful form of CC, but put it on a high cooldown. That way, they had to choose what was the best time to use their ability, or risk being a meat-shield while it was on cooldown; like how tanks were played in earlier seasons. was made less powerful in terms of CC, but given a lower cooldown, so it could be applied more often. This made Sejuani even more interactive.

flew under the radar(again) with these changes, but after a couple touch ups to other parts of her kit,and FINALLY began seeing play. Just like with Zac, People began to start seeing the design flaws of Sejuani, and were up in arms. People were getting bodied by the Winters wrath, and felt that Sejuani was a balance nightmare. "Sejuani is the new lee sin! "Sejuani does a ton of damage AND takes a ton of damage." "Sejuani is a cockblocker!" Sejuani was only fun if you were the one playing her or watching her play, so Riot had to break her, and Bristles, legs after a few patches of an actual "League of tanks". Sejuani has never been the same since, but Sejuani was a necessary sacrifice. Riot had seen,learned, and figured out all the needed to know to make Tanks viable, appealing, and most importantly, FUN and HEALTHY for the game. As funny as this sounds, they actually figured it out 3 patches ago.

The Zero project.
Anyway, The champion I am talking about is. Sion is the one who ushered the era of tanks we are currently in today; the Herald if you may. Sion was a glorious combination of everything that represented tanks(Like zac, but not bonkers overtuned). gave him constant and interactive input, gave him durability, which he could trade off for much needed DAMAGE. wasn't anything special, but bold well with the rest of his kit and was solid ability on its own. was a game changer, was a blast to use. Sion is the current day Zac in that we was sort of a middle man, but his kit had more depth(If only Riot knew what to do with it, but I digress.). Sion was(and still his) simple on paper, but there was more input involved with him than any other tank at the time. Sion was the final test, the beginning of the end. The First Modern tank, The Zero Project, The Prototype.

I still can't believe even then, we called him a Bruiser.

Conclusion
Have you ever wondered where the term "Tank" comes from? No, not like a fish tank, an actual Tank. Like the ones used in wars and stuff. THOSE tanks, honestly, take as much damage as they deal; unlike tanks in the past. the People are still quite bothered that poppy is pinning their soft bodies into a wall and giving them the hammer, but I personally don't blame ; I blame Balance team and their fucking garbage concept of ". Tanks have changed drastically over that years, and I believe its for the better. Tanks have never been more enjoyable or interactive for me to play in league.... basically ever. Gone are the days where Tanks were just glorified third summoner spells for their carries; they now play an active role in the team's composition and can stand as their own body. Right now, the carry players still don't see an interest in playing tanks because they still see them as the "boring second support role", and Die-hard traditional tank players are upset that their tanks are basically being turned into "Bruisers". I'm in the middle of the crowd, waving my and  madly in the area, chanting "I DO DAMAGE, IT'S A Miracle!" . I for one, am quite happy with what Riot is doing for tanks, and I'm grateful to be living in such a time.

Afterpost
(I'm doing something different with this (this time around). To be added later!