VLADIMIR
The Crimson Reaper
[This is the first of what I hope will become many Let’s Fix articles. Some elements of games which I play are fine in theory but lose something in execution. I’m going to examine how those mechanics play, compare them to how they should play, then suggest fixes to improve them (note that an improvement makes the game better, not the mechanic. Sometimes a mechanic is best improved by weakening it). I will not attempt to “balance” anything since that comes from rigorous playtesting and tweaking. Also, numbers are boring. This is an article about the core concepts, not the balancing points. Maybe some other day day I’ll talk about how some things can’t be balanced by changing only the numbers.]
Today, the League of Legends champion Vlad is on my chopping block. His defining attribute is his sangromancy, by which he fuels his magic with his own blood. We can see this both in flavor, as he’s dressed like Dracula, and in gameplay, since he uses his own health rather than high-falutin’ mana to cast. This concept really speaks to how Riot makes an effort to have every champion push some boundary.
I like Vlad, helped along by his constant puns. So why does he see such little play? I contend that his biggest issue is what I call the “K-Mart syndrome”. K-Mart couldn’t offer the quality of Target, nor the prices of Wal-Mart. Caught in this middle ground, it was unable to court audiences of either. This is a constant problem when hybrid mechanics are just worse than either extreme. Vlad doesn’t really have a definite role to play, so he poorly fills several roles. In other words, he has aspects of Tank, Mage, and Support, but isn’t great at any of them. I find him best played as a mage with some support elements, so I’ll modify his gameplay to encourage that style more.
His innate grants him AP for bonus health and vice versa. This prioritizes very well, it makes flavorful sense, and it’s always relevant. The only issue I take with it is that his abilities then go on to scale either with AP or maximum health. This is completely unnecessary since for Vlad there is a constant conversion between the two. Scaling every ability only by bonus health is the best way to go since it carries the proper flavor and emphasizes Vlad’s uniqueness.
This is the ability Vlad usually maxes out first. At no cost, he deals magic damage to a target and gains some flat amount of health. Vlad spams this as much as possible, on any target in range. Balancewise, the move scales very poorly when compared so the similar amount of lifesteal someone might gain wielding a Bloodthirster and autoattacking. Since Vlad is mostly defined by his lifesteal, that is a shame.
Sanguine Pool is by far his coolest ability in concept. By spending a percent of his current health he sinks into a pool of blood to become untargetable for 2 seconds, slowing and damaging champs while healing himself for some of the damage dealt. In theory it can be used either to escape or to chase, but the long cooldown and low dps generally restrict it to the former.
This is your basic AoE damage spell. It stacks up to four times, increasing in damage and cost while also improving Vlad’s regeneration and healing. Tides is great at clearing creep waves and has some effect in team fights, but against a single enemy the health cost usually offsets the damage dealt.
Vlad's ultimate allows him to plague all enemies in an area by spending a percentage of his current health. While afflicted they take increased damage from all sources, then are hit with magic damage at the end. In theory Hemoplague makes a great teamfight initiator and can slaughter a lone enemy 1v1. In practice enemies just back up for 5 seconds, then engage after the piddling magic damage hits. With no CC to speak of, it’s very difficult for Vlad to get the benefits from the enhanced damage.
The first and most major change is to switch Sanguine Pool with Tides of Blood. The pool is fun to use, it’s cooler, more unique, more creative, and more evocative. Obviously the numbers would need to be changed and rebalanced. The Pool would need to last longer and deal much more damage, allowing it to be used offensively instead of just defensively. As an ultimate it could also be buffed to break hard crowd control effects; after all, how can you be caught in chains when HOLY SHIT YOU JUST DISSOLVED INTO A POOL OF BLOOD.
Hemoplague suggests some synergy, and probably serves best as an enabler for combos. What if the plague actually poisoned them instead of waiting and then damaging them suddenly? Is it ebola, or is it surprise knife disease? It should infect an area for a time, applying the debuff to anyone who enters. I would suggest a transmission factor, but that would be stepping on Malzahar’s toes. The increased damage could be changed to either MR shred or to spellvamp debuffs, but those are more flavor concerns than things that affect gameplay.
Transfusion doesn’t make sense to me. Vlad deals damage to the target, then gains a fixed amount of health. Let’s ignore for the moment the fact that he can somehow extract blood from Heimerdinger’s turrets. That’s fine, whatever. No, I’m more confused about why the amount of blood sucked doesn’t affect the amount Vlad heals. How about instead Transfusion...transfers health, healing Vlad for a percentage of the damage dealt. This would have cool interactions with the suggested magic shred on Hemoplague too. Also, it just...makes logical sense.
But let’s go one further and make Transfusion briefly stun targets currently afflicted by Hemoplague. This would give him some desperately needed CC and also lend more synergy and depth of play.
Tides of Blood already works fine, and with the above fix to Transfusion we don’t care as much if it’s bad against a lone enemy. It could deal increased damage or spell vamp to plagued targets, but that’s not strictly necessary.
The above changes would make for a much more interesting Vlad by highlighting his strengths and shoring up his weaknesses.
Today, the League of Legends champion Vlad is on my chopping block. His defining attribute is his sangromancy, by which he fuels his magic with his own blood. We can see this both in flavor, as he’s dressed like Dracula, and in gameplay, since he uses his own health rather than high-falutin’ mana to cast. This concept really speaks to how Riot makes an effort to have every champion push some boundary.
I like Vlad, helped along by his constant puns. So why does he see such little play? I contend that his biggest issue is what I call the “K-Mart syndrome”. K-Mart couldn’t offer the quality of Target, nor the prices of Wal-Mart. Caught in this middle ground, it was unable to court audiences of either. This is a constant problem when hybrid mechanics are just worse than either extreme. Vlad doesn’t really have a definite role to play, so he poorly fills several roles. In other words, he has aspects of Tank, Mage, and Support, but isn’t great at any of them. I find him best played as a mage with some support elements, so I’ll modify his gameplay to encourage that style more.
How He Exists Now
 |
| Crimson Pact |
 |
| Transfusion |
 |
| Sanguine Pool |
 |
| Tides of Blood |
 |
| Hemoplague |
Suggestions for Improvements
The first and most major change is to switch Sanguine Pool with Tides of Blood. The pool is fun to use, it’s cooler, more unique, more creative, and more evocative. Obviously the numbers would need to be changed and rebalanced. The Pool would need to last longer and deal much more damage, allowing it to be used offensively instead of just defensively. As an ultimate it could also be buffed to break hard crowd control effects; after all, how can you be caught in chains when HOLY SHIT YOU JUST DISSOLVED INTO A POOL OF BLOOD.
Hemoplague suggests some synergy, and probably serves best as an enabler for combos. What if the plague actually poisoned them instead of waiting and then damaging them suddenly? Is it ebola, or is it surprise knife disease? It should infect an area for a time, applying the debuff to anyone who enters. I would suggest a transmission factor, but that would be stepping on Malzahar’s toes. The increased damage could be changed to either MR shred or to spellvamp debuffs, but those are more flavor concerns than things that affect gameplay.
Transfusion doesn’t make sense to me. Vlad deals damage to the target, then gains a fixed amount of health. Let’s ignore for the moment the fact that he can somehow extract blood from Heimerdinger’s turrets. That’s fine, whatever. No, I’m more confused about why the amount of blood sucked doesn’t affect the amount Vlad heals. How about instead Transfusion...transfers health, healing Vlad for a percentage of the damage dealt. This would have cool interactions with the suggested magic shred on Hemoplague too. Also, it just...makes logical sense.
But let’s go one further and make Transfusion briefly stun targets currently afflicted by Hemoplague. This would give him some desperately needed CC and also lend more synergy and depth of play.
Tides of Blood already works fine, and with the above fix to Transfusion we don’t care as much if it’s bad against a lone enemy. It could deal increased damage or spell vamp to plagued targets, but that’s not strictly necessary.
The above changes would make for a much more interesting Vlad by highlighting his strengths and shoring up his weaknesses.
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