August - Perception of Power & Popularity vs Viability(SKARNER SMOLDER)/ Rise of Black Cleaver SENNA

[@boyboynova]

I think August is incredibly deserving of his status as a voice to the players. He’s very well spoken, informative and non-combative.

[@TheSorrowfulAngel]

Unlike Phreak, who is very combative lol Although, I personally like that about Phreak.

[@commettey]

as a game developer myself, i love hearing August and Phreak both talk about General Game Development, while i love league and like hearing about game balance, i also love hearing them talk about how its hard to fix bugs, you cant just snap your fingers and fix everything, its alot harder than it seems. i watch almost every one of these videos and his stream when i have the time. so thank you for editing his stream so i can watch it when i have the time or i never would have gotten to see these conversations he was having with his chat

[@zertrom1254]

any askers

[@Precigian]

@@zertrom1254 What do you mean bro wtf

[@HeWhoQuacksss]

I've loved learning about Game Dev for years, I watch loads of people speak on it like Tarn Adams and Tynan Sylvester, so I feel ya' on that! (and ty, these edits have started to take more time these days, especially the shorts lol) I try to pepper in dev stuff in the videos if I can, but I know some viewers don't love it, so I usually just throw that stuff towards the end

[@xat7824]

​@@HeWhoQuacksssThese videos are great!! keep it up please! These really help humanize the dev process for league its easy to shit on the devs for what they didnt do but oft its easier said than done to actually develope games

[@mikoshimusic]

I really like how you've started putting a background in (the pictures of August's champs), it really makes the videos look clean and a lot less awkward for desktop fellas like me

[@mllhild]

Left to right, a masterpiece, a failure, good, FEET

[@hudsonfoster456]

Love the longer videos please post them more👍

[@roganjohnston]

When I was in high school I'd always be on surrender at 20 looking at the latest red posts. miss having that being able to listen to these videos has been a great return to that for me. :)

[@emilemil1]

Skarner was really fun when he could actually fight people by himself, but then all his damage (and partly his survivability) got totally gutted in favor of keeping his CC untouched. I don't think that was the right call, I'd rather he'd be closer to a jungle Poppy that slams people into walls and beats them down with chunky Q hits.

[@JMQA1]

I don't see why Skarner needed to be nerfed so hard. Obvi some of the numbers were overtuned but I enjoyed seeing him in pro a lot

[@glacier_10_years_ago]

The moblity on scarner is disgusting, for a tank he should not be going through walls

[@Agdem_]

I think the skarner rework is really fun for those with an aggressive/engage-heavy playstyle. The issue is that even if I'm 8-1, this champ's scaling is so unbelievably bad that it does wet-noodle amounts of damage. Whereas, other tanks exist that do %health, true dmg, etc. Skarner's only damage comes from abusing heartsteel and other items. Yes he is a tank with CC on every ability, but his W is laughably horrible, especially for a champion that was recently designed and his ult is so underwhelming -- it doesn't last long enough to actually set up your teammates, unless you're in high elo.

[@oserodal2702]

Maybe tank items just suck?

[@baptistecochennec5956]

I mean you're not supposed to take all the kill with a tank

[@aldroydf35]

Damn, 25 minutes, August is really making it hard for you to farm on him Can't say I dislike it, though

[@HeWhoQuacksss]

I'm just experimenting with longer formats lol

[@TaconIStenen]

@@HeWhoQuackssskeep doing it, it’s amazing :D

[@carlosdumbratzen6332]

I dislike how the crystal theme of skarner has been removed. I didn't touch him before, but at least he had an interesting theme. Now he is just a tankier kayn

[@fuadtorres4599]

Ya, thats why i learn, because i want to understand the ideas of the devs

[@willo_wisp3798]

i think skarner is unpopular especially right now because he's a hard tank with weird buttons thats a little on the weak side. where a lot of tanks just get value out of hitting their buttons at their opponents, skarner has to take a smarter approach to bullying other champions(waiting for champs to use their dashes before ulting them, things like that.) i have a ton of fun with new skarner and i love his new thematics and game feel, it feels like his kit was made for me and he was never a character i even considered existed before.(even if new skarner and old skarner are "different" characters but theyre still pretty similar) i think people should really give him a chance to learn him but his fantasy might just be too chunky for most league players.(i find it personally fun but i know thats an uncommon opinion,)

[@the_don4671]

August is like DE, wanting to help players and be their voice, pretty cool tbh.

[@Plight_]

I want to ply naafiri in the jg and i miss the old movement speed skarner

[@joshbrucks]

I think high skill expression champs should be below 50%. Lee being a good example. In metas where he was pick ban in the past he was like 47% wr.

[@Delunkleus]

Skarner would be playable if you actually let him build move speed you cowards.

[@rubinrobo2265]

thefunny thing is that a league dev doesn’t need to make drama. the league community is enough of a hellhole to cause its own drama in the comments if you just tell them stuff about game design.

[@purpleshadz831]

Skarner went from having an incredibly unique, albeit weak, play style to just being a generic 2023 league champ that had to get nerfed hard. He's at the same play rate, but one version he was super unique, and the other he just has a disgusting kit when his ratios are even slightly good

[@stefanristic9245]

It would be really nice if we could get league on a new engine in s15 because of how outdated the one already in use is and how buggy its getting

[@KolomalakasPoutanas]

Only possible if they make a new game

[@jeanpierrepolnareff9919]

It really makes me sad that they balance the game around wirates and player satisfaction, instead of actually making a deep analysis of what makes a champ strong or weak, if its actually fair or not. Also most of the times its not the champs fault, its actually unbalanced items and runes.

[@lexsdragon1554]

The question is why do they nerf champs to the ground in a first place

[@killermurad5933]

He says why like 3 minutes in

[@patrikszabo4175]

nah smolder was fun even when he was nerfed, skarner just feels bad to play

[@riven4121]

Slow as hell One MS ability Every ability has a disgusting cast time Absolutely terrible base AD and base AS so his kit cannot scale One boring build path It's no surprise once people stopped metaslaving on him he immediately fell back to prerework pick rate. Honestly a waste of 2 years and was not worth completely screwing over piltover and its associated champions.

[@madobricktw6969]

yeah i still enjoy first pick smolder top when i deserve ban for half my games the execute sound is worth it

[@justaguy1304]

@@riven4121skarner was very extremely fun before they literally nerfed him to fucking hell. You just had to play really aggressive early game since his damage was actually truly disgusting early game. Even if it fell off late game, your goal was to make sure the enemies were so far behind that it didn’t matter your team was basically down a jungler after minute 25

[@Setonix1-.-1]

“Skarner after nerfs is not viable” my brother in christ, you made unfun to play tank from juggernout he used to be so he has 0 dmg now, who would play such bullshit until it is op, even skarner otps have dropped him after rework since he is just walking cc nothing else…

[@TheSorrowfulAngel]

Giving senna another build to abuse wasnt a great move. Since her release, she has been a consistent balance problem. Just look at her honestly gigantic patch history. She is obviously a character that is very difficult to balance - and then they add another build to this to make inevitably even more difficult to balance? Really, thats just asinine. In my opinion, they should just decide what Senna should be - supp or ADC - and force that. Personally, Id err towards support(as she is quite an interesting and unique support), giving her better AD scalings on her utility. Hard steering away from Crit and AS, Senna should have decent dps and good to great supportive capabilities.

[@isuckatleague745]

august seems like a cool guy but man drop the fucking support ad carry bullshit , not everyone has to be able to play a carry. Maybe pros use senna as a full adc for a reason. No offense but no one wants to play with a support main trying to autospace , do dmg and basically take on adc responsibilities while having played the game as a tank or enchanter player mostly.

[@Bomberman64x]

So you cater to Meta slaves and ignore the die-hard mains/otps i wonder what that will do to the game in the long run

[@Bomberman64x]

His old kit was fine just the passive was bad. The R stunning himself while every new champ gets at least 1 dash makes him already outdated. You can only play him tank so everyone that used to main skarner for his diversity won’t like the new skarner and everyone that wants a tank plays someone that can tank more and feels less clunky

[@bulletcola7890]

Hwei doesnt get a dash.

[@bulletcola7890]

Neither does Smolder, his E is a movement speed steroid.

[@glacier_10_years_ago]

​​@@bulletcola7890 smolder e is stronger then ezreal E it can go through bigger walls, it gives him move speed and deals damage and it is lower cd then ezreal e

[@arkhilean7427]

​@@glacier_10_years_ago Ezreal dashes gets him out hooks if it's start up is at the end of a swain/threshold trying to hit him and is a strong get out of jail free card Same happens to smolder its 300 gold. Smolder dash is not as good as as tristana jump or ezreal blink

[@Bomberman64x]

@@bulletcola7890 it doesnt really matter if its literally a dash or not they all can get out which was my point

[@madobricktw6969]

skarner just got nothing going for him gameplay boring af

[@einjharrelraca]

the fix to skarner was so easy, but nooooooooo. riot wants to pussy foot around the issue of his w range being SEVEN FUCKING HUNDRED and hitting everyone in a circle around him. for reference, that is 50 more than caitlyn auto range, in a giant circle around him, that slows, deals damage and shields him, and it falls as low as a 3.5s cooldown mid game. Did i mention it goes through minions and champions?

[@gggremlin]

he’s just not fun. is it just me that thinks skarner is awfully boring?