User blog comment:Sagee Prime/Nidalee rework Final/@comment-5558329-20121002063356/@comment-3323227-20121002214909

Stagger is not something currently in the game and really doesn't compare to any actual CC very well. Imagine being hit with such force that you are winded for a second and stop what you are doing. That is basically what stagger is. It knocks you off your feet for a split second. It isn't a super strong for of CC and it would have limited usability but can be impactful in many situations.

You might argue that the Primal surge passive is too strong and that the bushwhack passive are too strong but they are in her kit in one form or another already.

Let me try to explain why I put her Primal surge the way I did. Nidalee's heal cannot be buffed due to the nature of it being a heal in Morello's world. So what I did was made it into a form of sustain that was much easier to balance and fixed other problems with it while also presenting different weaknesses.

Her old heal had high mana costs and a long cast time on it. This made it better for healing out of combat than for healing in combat because you lose about 1 second of dps just casting it and during that 1 second you could potentially lose all the hp you just healed.

With the changed primal surge it doesn't have a taxing mana cost but it gives very little at early ranks and requires you to be in combat to get any effectiveness out of it. This forces Nidalee to be aggressive and it doesn't have the cast time problem of her old heal. The sustain might seem strong but I only went of of number already in the game and how those numbers function. Sample abilities are Raise Morale, Hunters Call, Turtle Stance, and Soul Eater. Take a look at these abilities.

As for her Bushwhack passive I wanted her utility to actually be applyable and since she does hybrid damage you can't realistically build for both damage types and the way her kit works it hurts Cougar form to have to build items like Last Whisper or Void staff. Her kit is split apart in a way that she doesn't get all of this till late game where we are focused on making her stronger and she is not able to get off all 8 stack immediately but rather over time. The thing in my mind that makes this balanced is that Nidalee can only focus one target at a time and it requires 8 stacks. You are rewarded more for doing it with cougar but it is safer to do it with human. If you have to switch targets for whatever reason your new target has 0 stacks on them unlike the original target you were hitting. This is more like a black cleaver in effect but unlike black cleaver this is stronger late game and weaker early game and you would probably hurt your self allot by trying to max this first.

As for the unit collisions in cougar forms Nidalee isn't Jayce. Nidalee doesn't have any targetable spells. All her abilities fire off in front of her and making them go to the cursor ruins her combat flow. The biggest obstacle with doing well with Nidalee is whether or not your skills hit the intended target and the last thing you want to happen is for your melee abilities to fire of in the wrong direction because of a minions last second change of direction.