The Concept of "Overpowered"

[quote=Hatted]Hey all, I've been away for a while but I'm back. Sorta kinda. Nevermind. So a bunch of my friends in League get super salty at champs (see Yasuo, Akali, or almost every assassin) and claim they're overpowered. For the most part I don't think champions have the capacity to be overpowered seeing as that happens because their kit hasn't received much needed tweaks and has been buffed almost consistently (fuck Tristana right now, srsly). Personally, I think Gragas is a stupid champing considering he goes super well it tank or mage and can excell in both roles (this is my own experience). And my first game as Yasuo I went something along the lines of 40/16/10; unrelated, I got an S- for that game. I nearly got two Pentakills while 1 v 5'ing. So I ask you humble Mobafirens, or my Mobafriends <3, who do you think is OP and who do you think just has a kit that's so good that it defies all statements of OP. I'd love to know what you think, maybe it'll help in Solo Q.[/quote]

[quote=OTGBionicArm]I think some champions are overpowered design wise, such as [[Thresh]]. Guys so powerful with just what his kit does, it doesnt matter what numbers follow. People often say "overpowered" to reflect champions that are frustrating to deal with. Akali's damage and stealth make her frustrating to fight 1v1 and Yasuo's wind wall denies a lot of engages, which is frustrating. These things aren't innately overpowered, just annoying. A champion having overly powerful numbers (see [[mordekaiser]]) does not also mean it's overpowered, it is simply overtuned, a much easier fix. Lastly, there are "broken" champions, which can be good or bad. These champions have some clunky, bad or otherwise not correctly working mechanics that are a detriment to either the player or the enemy due to lack of knowledge of the champion. Actually overpowered: [[Azir]] [[Maokai]] [[Skarner]] [[Thresh]] Overtuned: [[Mordekaiser]] [[Viktor]] [[Fiora]] [[Gangplank]] Broken (In a bad way for the player): [[Aatrox]] [[malzahar]] [[heimerdinger]] [[Galio]] Broken (In a good way for the player): [[Evelynn]] [[Kayle]] [[Rengar]] [[Nidalee]][/quote]

[quote=Vynertje]I think design-wise overpowered champions play the most prominent role in the meta. As OTG stated, [[thresh]] is a very good champion (some others: s1-s4 [[kassadin]], [[kalista]], [[lee sin]], [[elise]]) if you look at his kit without even batting an eye to the numbers. The champions mentioned will always be strong, even if their numbers are underwhelming, just because of the sheer power their kit gives them. Because their kit is so well-designed (read: incredibly well rounded and very well built around the role the champion plays), they are also immensely hard to balance against champions whose kit isn't as well rounded. Basically what happens is that these champs will either be tier-1 because of their kit, or bottom-tier because their numbers are just terrible. There is pretty much no middle ground unless they make changes to the kit itself: this is kinda what happened to [[kassadin]]. He needed several reworks and rounds of buffs/nerfs before he could actually reach a viable-but-not-broken state. This explains why Thresh and Lee have always been a top pick, why Elise went from tier-1 to garbage to tier-1 again and why Kalista is still a priority pick after so many rounds of nerfs.[/quote]

[quote=Latest Legend]As a [[blitzcrank]] fan, I have to repeat the heresy that is [[thresh]]. To name one we haven't seen yet: [[ekko]]. That's one hell of a kit.[/quote]

[quote=Kazega]I try to think OP is a myth. the main reason it exists at all is to give players a way to cope with a bad situation. it deflects blame on something else other than the actual person. Last night I went up against a hard core [[yasuo]] comp with [[Wukong]] [[Malphite]] and [[Braum]]. OP right? maybe, but my team won with ease. in 24 minutes at a score of 38 kills to 11. ([url=http://matchhistory.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/#match-details/NA1/1939303258/36197752?tab=overview]Pics or it didn't happen[/url]) bottom line no champ is broken to the point where they can't lose. Notice how you can make a legit team with OTGs "Actually OP" list and I can still see it loosing at any level of play, whether it be inexperience on one side or game knowledge on the other.[/quote]

[quote=Ekki][quote=Kazega]bottom line no champ is broken to the point where they can't lose. Notice how you can make a legit team with OTGs "Actually OP" list and I can still see it loosing at any level of play, whether it be inexperience on one side or game knowledge on the other.[/quote]That's the point. A champion "being OP" usually reflects in an unwanted win rate boost (win rates can't be analyzed by themselves, but being OP causes increases in the win rates of champions). I still agree in most of what you say, specially on people using "OP" as a way to cope with defeat. We're in a particularly well balanced season, with most champions becoming more niche and less "overall good". Right now the clearly most imbalanced champions are 2 of the 4 juggernauts that received a rework ([[garen]] and [[darius]] aren't that far off from balanced) and iirc [[skarner]] already got hotfixed to be semi-balanced, and [[mordekaiser]] is going to get his dose of nerf-hammering soon. Aside from that, if you're looking for OP you should look at the biggest win rates to narrow the subjects, then pick a champion from there and see if it's winning a lot because of being OP. Looking at the bigger win rates of your current ELO may be useful to see which champion might be good for you. Of course you should always remember that playing a champion that you're not good at is not worth it, no matter how OP it is. This might be sort of a buffer, making seemingly broken high win-rate champions be played by lots of people that don't know how to play them, only to lower the win-rate on that champion.[/quote]

[quote=The_Nameless_Bard]You forgot to mention the 60% winrate Warwick fiasco.[/quote]

[quote=OTGBionicArm][quote=The_Nameless_Bard]You forgot to mention the 60% winrate Warwick fiasco.[/quote] To be fair, that was more the items and not Warwick. Skarner did the same thing just by being Skarner last patch.[/quote]

[quote=The_Nameless_Bard]I'm aware of this, I was just saying.[/quote]

[quote=Hatted][quote=The_Nameless_Bard]You forgot to mention the 60% winrate Warwick fiasco.[/quote] RIP, gonna make a Tank Magewick build that will make him OP again eventually. Expect terror. [quote=Latest Legend]As a [[blitzcrank]] fan, I have to repeat the heresy that is [[thresh]]. To name one we haven't seen yet: [[ekko]]. That's one hell of a kit.[/quote] Thanks for bringing up Ekko, he's one of my favorite kits to work with and ironically goes perfect with Zilean. [quote=Kazega]I try to think OP is a myth. the main reason it exists at all is to give players a way to cope with a bad situation. it deflects blame on something else other than the actual person. Last night I went up against a hard core [[yasuo]] comp with [[Wukong]] [[Malphite]] and [[Braum]]. OP right? maybe, but my team won with ease. in 24 minutes at a score of 38 kills to 11. ([url=http://matchhistory.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/#match-details/NA1/1939303258/36197752?tab=overview]Pics or it didn't happen[/url]) bottom line no champ is broken to the point where they can't lose. Notice how you can make a legit team with OTGs "Actually OP" list and I can still see it loosing at any level of play, whether it be inexperience on one side or game knowledge on the other.[/quote] Same here, I just think that champions go through phases of strength at times, whether from nerfs, reworks, of neglect. And wp against that comp, it's something I'd love to do if ~50% of yasuo's knew how good Braum was for him.[/quote]