Confusing Champion Design | League of Legends

[@dachi1318]

Pros : They don't know what you are doing Cons : You don't know what you are doing

[@lolmanboss]

Beeing unpredictable makes you a Surpris XD

[@mikewasouski3584]

The trick is be unpredictable, even for yourself The enemies will be too confused to act

[@sunnydargonnel]

This is what I feel like when I pick him. He is good! I like playing him. But GOD I feel like I'm going blindies.

[@gabrieljoseozanan6989]

Most Aphelios'es I've got on my team are fairly easy to tell what they're doing most of the time. Namely, inting hard.

[@swordyshield]

@@sunnydargonnel is it really still this confusing for most people? maybe since I played a good amount of aphelios (100 or so games) I understand basically what he is doing and how he is doing it everytime and I feel like most people could as well if they played about 5 games of him or watched a guide

[@bird5306]

Never forget with aphelios on release didn't show his off-hand by his health bar

[@thewolf7668]

Even if it showed his off-hand on release, you still wouldn't know what the fuck he is about to do.

[@wangyat5759]

Just like any champion, once you play them yourself, you will know what it does

[@Anon-yz1xr]

Never forget Akali rework on release that could use her shroud to invis under enemy turrets and block turret shots.

[@benedictdumaliang7478]

@@Anon-yz1xr oh God please no the PTSD I got from that nooooo

[@whyarewestillherejusttosuf5425]

And infernum doing actual damage.

[@streptococo4735]

Nasus passive: you have 12% to 18% life steal

[@julianpradarodriguez7336]

Garen passive: you heal. Epic monsters and champions stop that heal

[@Zero-zr6xx]

Yasuo passive: crit x2

[@ilyasfarhan1802]

@@Zero-zr6xx crit x2, crit does 10% less, walk grant flow when flow full grant shield

[@eloyrodier70]

veigar passive: you kill, you get stronger, enjoy late game

[@cazza710]

Vi passive: shield sometimes

[@miguelbenitezquintero7019]

If Riot has 200 years, Vars must have like 1000

[@miguelbenitezquintero7019]

Woooow I just realized this got so many likes, thank you all, I'm glad you liked it

[@LordangeloxD]

@@miguelbenitezquintero7019 Here, you get more xD.

[@AqUaiGamer]

I love the clip of a league pro match where the caster was trying to talk about aphelios and he was just like "Aphelios does his um......uh....."

[@zzwild6183]

Honestly, to this day, I have no clue what Aphelios does. And I don't think I ever will.

[@SaiKisaragi]

The sad part is that to explain him to you, I need a flow chart lol

[@SaiKisaragi]

Sorry, I was high when originally making this message.

[@ultratog1028]

All I know about his kit is "Focus him down"

[@bobbobobob9054]

I feel aphelios is an "all in one product" type of design, he had caitlynn range, jinx switzaroo, varus chain of corruption, ashe frozen arrow, miss fortune ult, he's basically all of adc combined into one champion well maybe except tristana and samira because they're both really mobile adc and aphelios is not

[@thomasalberto613]

I played with him a couple of times, and the only thing I understood was what each weapon does when not interacting with any other lol

[@WonderousLover]

You literally explained what his abilities do in this video. I even got to sit and watch the combos go off but I still couldn't understand what was going on. What I learned from this was I need to focus afelios the second I see him because I won't have to understand what he is doing if he is dead

[@radiahmed126]

Aphelios does........stuff

[@gamegaloo]

U mean.... *stuffs *lots of stuffs

[@infinitedark6158]

Correction: *Everything* Even getting 1 shot

[@whatthehalebru]

im stuff

[@radiahmed126]

@@infinitedark6158 I once solo killed aphelios as nautilus support

[@kepler2560]

@@whatthehalebru I do the stuff for you

[@AndyBrixton999]

Even in a fighting game (and we know those are very intuitive) as Street Fighter, designers made sure to make hands and feet bigger than necesary so every hitbox is as clear as posible. This shows how important clarity is.

[@VarsVerum]

Which is why Olimar SUCKS! >:(

[@BreadKrumb]

I think you got it all wrong, seriously. Aphelios clearly allows you to draw 2 cards

[@rickliao7259]

Passive: Pot of Greed has 5 moonstone weapons...

[@legromp2357]

What the hell does pot of greed do again? I forgot after 2 episodes.

[@elementmanexe8389]

Legends of runeterra kinda got you beat

[@Vario69]

Divination

[@atsukana1704]

Dude actually has a flipping yugioh style passive like what is even happening. Its one thing in a tactical turn based thing but league?

[@pmathewizard]

You win using these kinds of champions because of the lack of knowledge of the enemy team whilst you also don't understand the champion's kit.

[@mi-yl2nr]

That's why i was a heimer main in the early days

[@ma-cg1il]

Everytime I see yorick

[@GameBreaker1055]

And then you die anyway because in all of his kit, an hourglass was the thing they did not include.

[@Lusius8879]

Congrats, you just explained why people bitch and complain about every new champ being broken xD

[@kristianbojinov6715]

@@Lusius8879 ever since Zoe prettymuch every new champ is either broken on release or after 1 patch

[@bulletcola7890]

He changes his Auto attacks that go under an ammo system, with Q being said Weapon ability, W switches the two and R shoots out moonlight w/ effects based on the primary Gun.

[@nsotomayor6024]

And a nuclear reactor its just a building that smash atoms to make energy. Is not that complex guys

[@papertowels9162]

@@nsotomayor6024 I can only imagine having 2 tiny little atoms on a podium and 2 massive hammers both swinging down toward each other, colliding with the atoms, making them break open like eggs and shoot out all the electricity at once.

[@nsotomayor6024]

@@papertowels9162 This man is ready to play Aphelios, or work at Tesla if he want a smaller challenge

[@eggseed6543]

@@nsotomayor6024 Things are more and more difficult to understand the more you look into it. You can go from the workings of a spoon to advanced physics easily

[@MAMAJUGO]

I've often heard that Aphelios is the Invoker of lol, but I'd argue that it's easier to distinguish between a meteor crash, an ice wall and a minion summon, than between a turret or an ult with 5 different effects

[@Ahres]

And you can clearly see which orb are floating around him before he give himself a new spell

[@MilanesaConPure]

No he's not, Invoker has combos and mechanics that sync, lots of uses in various situations, and a learning curve that's a little hard, but if you learn it you are god basically. Aphelios for me is just an Invoker-wannabe, like Riot trying to make a champion with mechanics or complex abilities but in reality is just dumb, like Viego who is decent, but was very broken and sloopy when he came out.

[@N4chtigall]

@syao Well actually you pointed out problem with Dota. LoL is like ten times simpler and ten times more enjoyable. That's the reason why I stopped playing Dota even though I have played it for years. Sorry but I don't want to think about 20 difrent things at the same time just to not be slightly competitive.

[@shumanbeans]

I was thinking the same during this video. I haven't actually played dota but the orbs system seems like a decent enough solution for visual warning to the enemy. Also, his orbs only have "one" ability, unlike Aphelios who has Q and R.

[@Glambgu]

@@shumanbeans Invoker should combine this orbs while hes in action, imagine if aphelios player should press QQER to get gravitum to his hands and after all he should use it and press q to stun with it. Aphelios is fake-complicated champ. Love LOL for simplicity and high action, Dota is too boring for me (4 years in dota)

[@mayonnaise3793]

Aphelios has access to an arsenal of 5 weapons. He equips two at any one time. At the start of the game, he starts with Calibrum and Severum, with Gravitum, Infernum and Crescendum queued.Weapons spawn with 50 Moonlight ammunition, which is consumed by basic attacks or his Q cast. Once he has consumed all the ammo, his main weapon is moved to the end of the queue.Aphelios does not improve his abilities with skill points. He starts with Phase, gains access to Q at level 2, and gains access to Moonligh Vigil at level 6. Weapon Abilites Cooldown: 9 seconds ∙ Cost: 60 mana ∙ Range: 1450 Calibrum: Gains bonus range while this is his main weapon. Enemies damaged during this time via an ability are marked, revealing them for the duration. Aphelios's next basic attack against a marked target uses the current off-hand weapon and gains global range.Moonshot: Aphelios fires a bolt of energy in a line, dealing damage to the first enemy hit.Severum: Basic attacks don't use projectiles. Attacks heal himself. Healing at max health is converted into a shield.Onslaught: Gains bonus movement speed and attacks the nearest enemy- prioritizing champions.Gravitum: Applies a slow that decays over 3.5 seconds.Binding Eclipse: Aphelios expunges all enemies affected by Gravitum's slow and deals damage plus roots them for 1 second.Infernum: Sprays firebolts in a cone behind targets dealing damage to enemies hit.Duskwave: Aphelios unleashes a wave of energy in a cone, dealing damage to all enemies hit and locking on to each of them. After a delay, Aphelios then fires a volley of basic attacks from his current off-hand weapon.Crescendum: Basic attacks with Crescendum hurl the blade at the target, which lingers for 0.25 seconds before coming back to Aphelios. He is disarmed until he retrieves Crescendum, but the attack timer is reset once caught.Sentry: Aphelios deploys a lunar sentry for up to 20 seconds, reduced to 4 seconds after it starts attacking. Deploying a new sentry reduces the eldest's duration to 4 seconds. A sentry has 3 health and enemies can attack the sentry with basic attacks, dealing 1 damage per hit. The sentry autonomously attacks the nearest enemy in range with a clone of Aphelios' current off-hand weapon Phase Cooldown: 0.8 seconds ∙ Cost: 0 mana ∙ Range: 250 Aphelios switches between his main weapon and off-hand weapon. Weapon Queue System Cooldown: 0 seconds ∙ Cost: 0 mana ∙ Range: 1000 Weapon Cooling System Moonlight Vigil Cooldown: 120 / 110 / 100 seconds ∙ Cost: 100 mana ∙ Range: 1300 Aphelios casts forth a lunar spotlight that stops when it comes into contact with an enemy champion. It then deals damage at the center. After a delay, basic attacks will begin raining from the sky based on Aphelios' current weapon.Calibrum: Applies an empowered mark that deals additional physical damage per mark.Severum: If at least one enemy is hit, Aphelios heals himself.Gravitum: Enemies are slowed by 99%.Infernum: The initial blast deals additional damage.Crescendum: 3 additional spectral chakrams return to Aphelios from the first enemy hit, for a total of 4, on top of those from other enemies hit.

[@projectsanctuary7944]

yo that champ actually sounds very fun, might try him later, thanks for this in depth explanation

[@wanderingthewastes6159]

Dr. Mundo regenerates a percentage of his maximum health

[@lordtrollingson]

The problem with Aphelios is that I stopped reading this half way through.

[@rosheacarrington1604]

sounds about right

[@nsotomayor6024]

Singed leaves poison behind and moves fast

[@fe0emmm]

I know I’m not supposed to laugh but his description of angry gnar just killed me 8:33

[@gamegaloo]

What was it tho I didn't catch it all. Kaiju of what?😂

[@elementmanexe8389]

@@gamegaloo giant raging kaiju thing a ma jigy

[@meow6750]

It's funny I'm always fed on aphelios because my laners don't know what I do, it's honestly really easy to counter aphelios, just take note he's a really immobile champ and has low hp regen.

[@sunnydargonnel]

I HARDLY DISAGREE. He has a lot of HP regen with half an item, maybe it's the runes? But I can take him to solo lane and he's HUGE. Until you forget to count your ammo and screw the sinergy.

[@chrishull9232]

@@sunnydargonnel keep watch of when he is using his severum (red) that is what gives him lifesteal especially if he combos it with infernum (blue)

[@twolfblue5695]

you can take move speed in runes, you can buy life steal bruiser aphelios would probably dominate anything bellow gold

[@slavchems4759]

@@twolfblue5695 despite having one of the lowest hp as an adc, if u take overheal, lethal tempo, taste of blood, and ravenous hunter, u basically can solo kill almost any fighter in low elo, just make sure u have severum as ur weapon

[@percyreiling]

Imagine living in a world where everyone knows what Aphelios does, but we still don‘t know what Pot of Greed does...

[@AlryFireBlade]

Watch the YGO Series and you know. For real I dont understand the last part with Pot of Greed. How can you not know this?

[@AlryFireBlade]

@@samueltondreau4535 yeah I know like anyone else.. I mean it is used so often in the Anime.

[@laszlokaszas1003]

Yea I always forget the first half of pot of greed

[@bottlecapster9586]

@@AlryFireBlade "What does Pot of Greed do?" is a meme my lad. Specifically because every character explains what it does so often lol.

[@dolphinboi-playmonsterranc9668]

Socialism is when the government does things Pot of Greed is when the government does lots of things

[@DANNATOX]

I pose myself this question every time I face him 😅

[@phoenixflamegames1]

Best part is that when aphelios was released, the icons next to his health bar didn’t even exist. You had to figure out what gun he was using in a teamfight which was too fucking hard.

[@sgregory0753]

They should redesign him and let his off hand weapon be hovering next to him, preferably carried by Alune’s ghost hands or something. Add significant sound effects that can be heard by everybody when he switches weapons or fires them. Or perhaps a double halo under his feet with colors corresponding to his weapons, outer ring is primary and inner ring is offhand. There is so many ways to improve clarity for this character, and yet Riot does nothing with him after nerfing him to oblivion.

[@sandortojzan5409]

The thing about Aphelios, is that a lot of people like to compare him to Invoker from DotA, which is reasonable since both of those characters are meant to function with a completely different system compared what everyone else has to use. Aphelios has the whole thing with the 5 weapons that each have a different passive, Q and ultimate, while there's also the interactions between the main and off hand guns and how he gains stats per level. Invoker instead has 3 different elemental orbs that he levels up. He can have 3 orbs rotating around him, with each individual orb giving him a buff, and when he uses his ult, he gains access to an ability based on the combination of orbs that he has out at the time (and he can have two abilities ready at one time), which means he can pick from a selection of 10 different spells. And when you look at user experience, you can clearly see that Invoker's abilities are much better designed than Aphelios's. And for how complicated Invoker's design is, it doesn't really take you a long time to understand which ability he is using, and what will it do. They all have very different color schemes, so you can't really get them confused (blue is the CC, gray/white is the utility, and red is the damage). The only Invoker ability that feels badly designed is Cold Snap (the frost debuff that ministuns you every time you take damage), because there aren't many visual indications or animations to tell you that you've been frozen by Invoker. The rest of the abilities are pretty easy to understand though. For instance Ice Wall, Ghost Walk, Chaos Meteor, EMP, and Deafening Blast are all very easy to understand and you will quickly figure out what they're supposed to do, while you're also not going to have any problems seeing them in the heat of battle. Contrast this to Aphelios, whose abilities all get a slight change with his off hand weapons that are pretty hard to identify. And yeah, some of Phel's abilities like his Moonshot or his Sentry are pretty easy to identify, but what really ends up messing with you is the off hand weapon. Due to the off hand weapon interactions, it can be really hard to fully understand what he is going to do to you, as you might get CCed when he hits you with his long range shot, but maybe you're gonna take splash damage instead. That was the same reason why his Calibrum Sentries were killing people so frequently. Because people had no idea that every turret shot is gonna apply a mark to them that will let Aphelios hit them for free, while also giving him a mini chakram. Because all they really noticed is the turret, and they haven't noticed that it's a Calibrum turret, which makes it much more painful than a Severum or an Infernum turret, so they didn't treat it with the appropriate respect. That was pretty much the main issue with Aphelios. Not that his kit is complicated, but that he was subtle about things he had no business being subtle about. It's extremely easy to understand what he is going to do when he has Gravitum, because not only does it have a very visible color scheme, but it also doesn't have any synergies that happen with his off hand gun. His other Qs are basically Invoker abilities if they would gain a secondary effect based on the other ability that is currently available to him. That would of course be pretty stupid, since you can't expect players to track Invoker's other spell when he is throwing something at you, but this is basically Aphelios (to a lesser extent). I know this turned out to be a pretty long comment, and sorry about that. But as a fan of somewhat complex characters (Bard, Senna, Aurelion Sol, Sylas and Taliyah in League, and Rubick, Oracle, Visage, Ancient Apparition and Chen in Dota), I had a lot of thoughts to share about this. The video was really well done, and it captured most of my concerns regarding confusing champions pretty well. Keep it up!

[@LuckyS7venn]

Aphelios is kinda meh compared to Invoker

[@poom323]

Invoker is kinda meh compared to Magicka

[@RealMikPik3]

I know his basic abilities but his combos are a completely different thing😢

[@alexandretremblay120]

Most combos r easy, like Red White lot damage , Green n Purple for picks,

[@Atariusz_]

also blue white

[@brandospinelli8995]

The only real important thing to remember about his combos is calculating how you can chain your weapons based on the ammo left

[@jonathancaro828]

@@brandospinelli8995 yeah, in most of the time playing aphelios i really like having like 10,15 ammo left in two weapons to use 4 in a single teamfight

[@ChoccyMilkk]

As long as you keep the weapon order exactly like this: Gravitum, Infernum, Severum, Crescendum and Calibrum, you’ll get the most out of him, the only mediocre weapon combo being Infernum-Severum, but it’s still useful for using Infernum Q on the wave and healing a lot.

[@georgiarose575]

"Not to make the implication that people are stupid" *pause* "Most of them anyway" 😂

[@__lifeline__]

Given LoR and LOL it feels like Riot's game design logic is to pack a game with features and have characters gradually break said features so that everyone's OP (and when everyone's OP, nobody is). The problem though is that with LOL that wasn't their intention early on, and since they can't quickly rework old champs there's a large difference in power between different champions.

[@NTTofMistery]

Simple fix would be to just buff older champs

[@lucasdiassilveira9762]

@@NTTofMistery numbers and champion mechanics are two separate things, you won't make olaf complex by increasing the scaling of his Q, but probably breaking the meta because ou gave sacling to and opressive early game jungler, the champions that we receive nowadays have FAR more complex and loaded kits than before, so today's champions are hard to balance but older champions are mostly boring

[@NTTofMistery]

@@lucasdiassilveira9762 i never said make old champs complex. Just buff em

[@lucasdiassilveira9762]

@@NTTofMistery yes, and i'm disagreeing that just making the numbers bigger would solve the problem

[@NTTofMistery]

@@lucasdiassilveira9762 i understand what you're saying, but alternatively riot could just buff old champs

[@Lucas98M]

Did you mean Aph, Eli and Os, the three champions that got combined into 1 while keeping every ability, passive and mechanic? Dunno what it does :(

[@serezelveydawn]

Aph, the moon sniper, Eli, the Gravigun flamethrower, Os, Lifesteal chakram

[@PyraXadon]

Back when I used to play, Aphelios was the kind of character I really liked because there was a unique complexity to him that in theory lets him do a lot, but only if you know how to pilot him. True he effectively has 17 abilities given how he has 5 different Q's, 5 different passives, 5 different ults, the W swap, and his actual passive which gives him bonus AD, AS, and Ar Pen, but in technicality, at no point did he have more than 6 abilities to use (8 if you count his passive stat gain and swap) unless the Aphelios player could time their ammo usage correctly and get Alune to spawn in a new weapon or two with fresh clips to keep fighting. Which is why I was kind of drawn to the guy; there was a weird method to the madness since while he COULD do everything, he couldn't do everything AT ONCE. But of course that's not really how it turned out. Often times when I was playing him, people didn't fully understand what he did, and while I personally understand all of his abilities, I'm in the vast minority that decided to put in the effort to even remember the weapon names let alone how each one meshes with the other guns. Riot tried to make it obvious which weapon he was holding by altering each of his walks and idle poses based on which weapon he was holding, but that's not really easy to see in a chaotic teamfight or see what his off-hand weapon is because they always sit on his back and mesh with his character model. Honestly, I think he's still a fun character with a high skill ceiling that rewards players for pulling off really cool weapon swaps and combinations, but because he does so much, countering him becomes so much harder unless the playerbase is forced to remember what he does. And not everyone has the will to do that.

[@tonti993]

I'd explain but I still haven't finished reading his passive.

[@zerozephyryum9131]

Man, i miss the old days. Remember when things were more simple? Like how passive were something like this: "You gain 1,5% mana regen per 1% missing mana"

[@VarsVerum]

Q did damage, W was a buff, E was a dash. Now it's like if Q's off cooldown then E's double the power but E can only be used when W is fully stacked and you have to stack up using Q but if Q's damage is based off of your %health and how far you are away which you can get stronger by using E and asof;hjas;lkfkjshfkjshk;fsakjgash;fkjasd xD

[@pedrodewaal7040]

Your English is just fine, fam. Don't bring yourself down

[@moranii1843]

You say that but if a champ was released like that people would be bitching that riot released a boring and lazy champ. People say that even now about older champs lol

[@gamegaloo]

@@VarsVerum that's actually how rek'sai abilities look like to me first time I played her Lolllll

[@spivotz]

Bro, you can't be serious. Like i get it yall got single-digit numbers of brain cells but you can't unironically say that the game was better when all champions were bland,f east or famine and did the same things like, do you even listen to yourself?

[@DavidBrocekArt]

I remember when Yasuo came out, everyone was initially confused by his complexity. You had to stack your queue, then you could use your Q as a tornado, and you could use your ultimate only when the enemy is airborne?.... Ah, the good old days.

[@AofCastle]

Chakram could have been its own unique champion and I'm sure it would be super fun. I've even read someone say that Aphelios' Chakram is what Sivir's basic attack should work like.

[@rasmusmalmberg6468]

Straight up Chackram _is_ Aphelios at this point. None of his other guns are an actual threat anymore. The others straight up don't matter.

[@Glambgu]

@@rasmusmalmberg6468 if they are not combined then yea

[@blackestmamba]

He's the only champ I don't have because after 3 in depth guides, the spotlight and your explanation I still have no idea wtf he does

[@lonerimortal8]

Vars: trying to explain Aphelios champ design. Me: this Aphelios in the gameplay has Severum and Crescendum ... That's a broken combo :^D

[@fitmotheyap]

i like severum infernum more tbh,at least when they are grouped

[@lonerimortal8]

@@fitmotheyap Severum hits multile times while Crescendum gives you a mini goomerang for each Skill hit, so having both means that you will have a lot of mini boomerangs for extra damage. NO ONE can outdamage hin if he does this ;^D

[@fitmotheyap]

@@lonerimortal8 ye ik I usually use infernum or severum ability then crescendum with the trillion bois

[@mazhaa3989]

@@fitmotheyap The best combo is to use infernum to get 6 or more crescendum with a minion wave when you 10 amo at max then you switch to severum (if you have the right order) to Q and then ult to max your dps with crescendum

[@Yvädastra]

He's clearly meant to be a typical Riot eBoy offshoot of Master Chief and Cortana, which is where he gets the weapon swapping thing from, but what purpose that all serves is still lost on me to this day. 😐

[@himisuda9589]

I think riot was trying to make a more lithe pretty boy champion as opposed to all the beefcake male hunks already in the game. I mean, are there really other men in the game who have the same body type as Aphelios? Maybe Ezreal or Kayn but even then they're not that close.

[@Yvädastra]

@@himisuda9589 Viego, Rakan, Varus, and arguably Yone.

[@himisuda9589]

@@Yvädastra viego's a little bit thinner- also he was released after. rakan's getting there i agree, varus too, not too sure about yone. but compare that small pile with the amount of bigger guys. also i don't think a character needs to serve a narrative purpose, i think that they just have to fit in well with the universe around them (unlike seraphine) and have a good explanation as to why they're there. aphelios gives us more insight into the lunari and i think that's good enough.

[@harciogexotic]

8:21 Kayn:am I a joke to you?

[@Seoul_Soldier]

I feel like both Aphelios mains and anyone facing him will ask themselves this question every match.

[@starryskies4284]

Like legit when I was playing with my schoolmates and they think that the order of the guns are randomised instead of just using all of the gun's ammos, I was laughing so hard lol

[@toni.686]

Personally, Aphelios is my favorite champion. I just love how he has so much potential, you can just really get creative with him. Though I have to agree that it must be pretty annoying to remember what he does when facing against him, I'm happy complex champions like him exist. And I mean he's not that good right now, so I guess it should be fine.

[@Kligor2]

I think Aphelios was a test run for making even more complicated champs down the line and maybe they took notes on what went wrong.

[@nootnoot8697]

I could never keep up with aphelios' kit 😭 and I love playing adc too. Looking forward to this!

[@thehalfrican1386]

I honestly think people overthink aphelios. Yea hes got alot of text to his guns but they are pretty simple all yhings considered. Green=snipe Red=healing Purple=cc Blue=aoe White=sustain damage. And his ult does the same thing the currently equipt gun does but to everyone it hits.

[@DavidBrocekArt]

Aphelios feels like if he was created after a bet between the designers to create something so ridiculous it would feel funny.

[@Vario69]

He does everything While standing still with no way to escape lol

[@appleman1459]

Well Aphelios does nothing now cause he got nerfed to the ground

[@Yvädastra]

Perfectly balanced, as all things should be.

[@ibrahimcandogan7124]

Duh, this is easy: He gets nerfed

[@z4tqv]

as an aphelios one trick hes been far too over nerfed they haven't shown him some love for the longest while his win rate dropped badly its sad

[@JustAguy006]

@@z4tqv you can also say that with Sett and soon, Samira. But yeah Aphelios got it the worst lol.

[@z4tqv]

@@JustAguy006 sett is a bit decent and samria recently got buffed I mean setts winrate is higher than phels

[@JustAguy006]

@@z4tqv but what all of them have related is that they were overpowered af the became nerfed so hard, they’re barely recognizable from their released debut.

[@sighman9209]

@@z4tqv Kalista is arguably worse off...

[@niterise1479]

If it takes pros an long meet for just explaining aphelios we may have a problem on the lower end

[@z4tqv]

wow..I main this champ I thought he was forgotten by people and I'm surprised someone made a video on him now

[@mazhaa3989]

I love how you're talking about Aphelios like he's really strong

[@silan2233]

I don't find aphelios complicated or hard to understand, the hard part to learn is his combos and the interactions between his weapons

[@ratspew932]

I think he’s one of those champions which are easy to pick up and almost impossible to master due to his enormous kit

[@silan2233]

@@ratspew932 exactly

[@dzubmariner]

@@ratspew932 dont need much time on the practice tool as aphelios to play him optimally too vs an irelia,akali or lee sin

[@dzubmariner]

he missed out the part the guns need time to load, it takes about 1-2 minutes of auto attacks to rotate to the next one.

[@xaroin7991]

He's literally just Invoker from DotA, they have a lot of similarities with how their kits play out. Especially the part where you can only have only 2 active spells allowed at once.

[@L2D0]

-Aphelios main waiting for Why No one Plays: Aphelios -This Pikashock

[@ericeddy02]

If you're an Aphy main, I hate you xD

[@chrishull9232]

@@ericeddy02 u tryna fight ill fight you

[@buboniccraig896]

Jace and Jinx's weapon swapping on a whole another level. And I think those only affect auto attacks so aphelios is just on a whole nother realm.

[@cameronshorty3321]

God, the Aphelios theme just hits different.

[@codenomeeuforia]

Calibrum is long range and mark Serverum is heal+dps Gravitum is slow and root Infernum is aoe Crescendum is THE DPS/close range So you combine both weapons with his Q or the R gains the property of the weapon main hand.

[@pllatypusmeamo2388]

As someone who plays aphelios I mostly agree. When I started playing it took way too long for me to understand that his abilties used auto attacks as a part of their damage so I thought he sucked just by reading him and at first no idea how to even utilize because as stated I didn't know where most of his damage was coming from. I WAS PLAYING HIM and I didn't know what to do. That being said the one thing I do disagree with is how visible the weapons are. He very clearly has wildly different stances and animations based on what weapon he has and are as follows. Calibrum the gun is very close to him as if ready to take aim and he is kneeling during his autos and looks like he is handling a sniper rifle. Severum the gun is far away and his stance looks as if he is holding a whip and autos as if he is avoiding backlash. Gravitum is mounted on his shoulder like a really big gun. Infernum is near the as if its heavy and also a really big gun. Crescendum he has a martial pose that looks like he wants to engage in close combat. So based on my 5 year old explanation I think it isn't hard to discern his different weapons and their autos which coincidentally is also the part most people understand in lol but yeah he is definately a lot to take in. 200 years everyone.

[@mob1d1ck]

As an Aphelios with a lvl 6 mastery, I demand a PhD

[@chrishull9232]

SAME

[@baharalhamwi6898]

Lvl 7 in one month he is so good

[@hqhuy931]

honestly as an Aphelios main, I think it's not that important you just know everything he does, because 1. if he's fed, run away, he's so slow unless you're Rell dismounted he'll never catch you or 2. if he's behind all in and smash him, because he's so squishy. The same goes for every champion....

[@hypernova4725]

I'm an aphelios main and I mainly just roll my face on my keyboard and I do damage couldnt tell you how

[@aodhanmartinez]

I love aphelios, he's one of my favorite champions and hes so versatile. I personally have been playing league for about 7-8 years so when any new champion comes out I read about them a lot so I can understand what they do on all fronts. I also tend to play champions that have a high skill ceiling so I can better my mechanics (and those champs tend to be more fun).

[@irispounsberry7917]

As I recall, Jinx was their first foray into making a multiweapon champion that canonically wanted to bring the golfball bag of 'toys' to the Rift, but even she visibly changes stance from the low hanging minigun to the shoulder rocket launcher and her other weapons are tied one to a button.

[@grizzlyb9984]

This is what aphelios does: Red thing - Heals Green thing - Hits from a mile away Blue thing - Aoe + extra dmg Purple thing - Slows + binds White thing - The closer you are, the faster it hits. The more longer the fight, the harder it hits. The R just applies this to a skillshot that explodes and can hit multuple people.

[@ChoccyMilkk]

He’s not difficult to *learn,* but he’s a fucking pain to *master.*

[@LuckilyASMR]

Well made video, very useful for anyone that hasn't thought about it in depth.

[@saosaqii5807]

People can remember the abilities and skins of every champion but one champion a little too complex and it overwhelms everybody lol

[@okidoxb4846]

You make really gud points about how hard it is to tell what weapons he's using and that he can switch so often and so fast at little cost. I think riot knew about the 1st point which is why they tried to give him different walk cycles and the way he holds the each gun, but zoomed out and at the speed and chaos of the game? People just can't pay attention to such minute details. That's why they also added the indicator to his hp bar which helps, but they could go further. U raise a good point about color and how most of the weapons blend into to his color pallet. They could do more to desaturate the colors and highlight them, make them dominate the weapons more, or maybe perhaps make his whole character model glow the color of the weapon in use. Or better yet, take a page out of Gravitons book and give each weapon a floaty colored orb for him to pull his moonlight ammo from. And for the Switching animation add a burst of color around him to the guns color. I do hope they've learned thier lesson tho.

[@lonerimortal8]

Aphelios is a Jack of all trades who has everything a ADC could have.

[@elcroccante3112]

He doesn't have mobility thankfully.

[@femboygodblankkcu284]

@@elcroccante3112 Galeforce be like

[@elcroccante3112]

@@femboygodblankkcu284 He usually builds KS

[@femboygodblankkcu284]

@@elcroccante3112 he can build galeforce tho

[@takappa2272]

@@femboygodblankkcu284 galeforce is optional for him Kraken slayer is mainly his core item even if the enemy has no tanks he still takes it because all of his abilities can proc the on hit effect true damage especially if calibrum + crescendom combo

[@artsamurai-kun4647]

i started playing aphelios recently and his such an intresting champion to play like he became my fav adc

[@Nipotazzi]

Forget learning the character, just smash your face to the keyboard with auto aimlock to play him properly.

[@joshuajosephlabrador3708]

9:00 Well, he is a hitman so he must look unimposing until he knows he can kill you.

[@brendan8114]

Aphelios is a champion that looks difficult to play but after you really look at it he's just ranged udyr, its just a bunch of different attacks that do damage, except one of them slows and snares. So pretty much when you are trying to figure out what aphelios is going to do or doing, the answer is pretty much just "damage"

[@musso8767]

Clearly u don't have any idea of weapon's rotation control, combos and adc mechanics.

[@619corac]

Vars, you are one of the three league channels I follow religiously. Even though I don't always agree with your conclusions, your analysis helps me to better understand the game and its characters. With that said, I think that in this case you're overlooking a few key factors in Aphelios' design. While he can't possibly stand up to the likes of Jhin or Kalista (yes, I think Kalista is one of the best designed ADCs in League), he shouldn't be accused of being confusing. Overloaded, yes, in the sense that his kit has a lot of conditions that are simply irrelevant to his gameplay, but not confusing. The criticism comes down to two main points: 'Aphelios has 15 different abilities, [with] 5 passives, one for each weapon' and, 'only Gravitum [stands out], because he carries a purple glowing orb' (5:24 - 5:48). This is a problem, the video states, because there are too many things his enemy must keep in mind, yet his visual design doesn't telegraph his weapon combination properly. Aphelios might have 15 abilities on paper, but at his core, he is an immobile ADC. No matter the weapon combination, his win condition is the same any other right click Marksman's and he loses to the exact same things that an Ashe, Jhin or Varus would lose to. Tactically he has access to only one or two abilities at any given time. However, he can separate an ability's coverage from its effect. Consider his weapons in isolation: - Calibrum has a strong neutral game with weak all-ins. - Severum is good in trades but weak in extended fights. - Gravitum trades DPS for utility. - Infernum trades range for AoE damage. - Crescendum has a lot of DPS but is hard to confirm. Each ability, as well as passive, is an extension of its weapon: - Calibrum is all about poking, so the Q is a long-range skillshot, and the passive complements his multi-hit abilities. - Severum falls off once you've used the Q. - Gravitum gives utility, but its Q is self-contained, essentially removing half of his kit. - Infernum is about AoE, so both the Q and passive are very, very good against groups and nearly useless otherwise. - Crescendum is focused on conditional DPS, so its Q is very powerful but can be easily avoided in the neutral game (sentries are short-ranged and very fragile), while its passive requires setup to be used effectively. All of his abilities, except for Gravitum, do something with his off-hand weapon. In other words, the main-hand weapon determines what type of skillshot your Q will have, while the off-hand weapon determines what the Q will do if it hits an enemy. Even his ult follows the same pattern: you can dodge every single variation by not getting hit by the initial skillshot. And that's Aphelios in a nutshell. He's such a dedicated ADC that even his central gimmick follows on-hit mechanics With this model, fighting him becomes even simpler. If he has Calibrum, you have to engage on him. If he has Severum, you have to poke him from afar or bait his Q. If he has Gravitum, feint an all-in to make him waste his root, as it's on a pretty long cooldown, or just 1v1 him. If he has Crescendum, burst him down or run away before he can stack his chakrams. You don't have to 'calculate his off-hand interactions' (6:34) if you can play around his threat zones. Of course, a master Aphelios can exploit your ignorance, but it takes just as much energy for him to keep track of everything as it does for you, so by that point, it's a matter of skill. Moving on to the second issue, Aphelios' weapons aren't telegraphed properly. I might be biased because I have quite a few games on the champion, myself, but I have honestly never had a problem with his clarity. You get icons next to his health bar that show both of his currently equipped weapons. You can also see how long he has left until a swap, and his abilities drain ammo in a predictable way (each cast costs 10). Asking to see his queued weapon would be unreasonable, in my opinion. In addition, each weapon has a distinct set of animations and particle effects. It might not be as obvious as a Jhin fourth shot, but you have to consider that Jhin's theme, beauty in death, is infinitely easier to implement than Aphelios', a weapon-swapping bounty hunter. Riot did all they could here, given that they only have a human to work with. Clarity might be improved if the weapons were an extension of his body or of some suit, though that would contradict his lore. Ultimately, I think that Aphelios is just a victim of bad tutorialisation. His design is reminiscent of Dota 2's Invoker, who combines reagents to create abilities on the fly, as well as games like Magicka. In fact, our moon hitman looks simplified when you put him next to those examples. If Riot had shifted focus away from the paradigm of abilities and communicated his mechanics better, I think that players wouldn't be nearly as confused. If anyone makes it this far into the post, give yourself a cookie from me and have a nice day.

[@airiquelmeleroy]

If you ever watch an Aphelios guide, they actually don't explain all of his abilities. They only say "this weapon as main and this as secondary are broken rn, this is how you abuse them" followed by some tips on how to not suck while rotating out of the "bad" weapons Visually speaking, it shouldn't be that hard. Severum should be comically bright red. Calibrum can stay the same. Gravitum can stay the same. Crescendum should have some kind of effect like a draven axe, much like Gravitum's purple orb. And Infernum should be constantly spewing flames at the back of the weapon. With thse you should be able to recognize his weapons with a glance.

[@Rncko]

10:55 Personally I wouldn't say having 5 weapons is too much.....if you just cycle single weapon 1 by 1 Aphelios is just similar to Jinx. The dissonance happens when you give him 2 weapon nearly no lag interaction together with 5 weapons pool. That is when you see Aphelios cycle through 4 different weapons in a team fight and neither their teammates nor the enemy can follow up.

[@samuka7118]

As an Aphelios main, i get it, its a lot of habilities and intricacies, buuut, i dont think Aphelios is as problematic as people say he is. There are a lot of caracthers like irelia that have habilities that are so unintuitive to look at.

[@jessepitre2289]

As an aphelios main, although we have the element of surprise- managing our loadout really balances us out. If we don’t have the correct loadout for the right fight,, it’s just death

[@harciogexotic]

Vars:Aphelios has 15 abbilities Sylas:15 abbilities? I have 154 Ults Viego: Amateurs...

[@ifedoro6199]

best vars video by far

[@TheAzorg]

A year ago??? Holy, time flies by so fast :o

[@ew4525]

Quite simple 1)Calibrum or sniper rifle has 650 auto range(same as caitlyn) and most q interactions will mark the enemy for another long range shot(far more than 650) 2)Severum gives him some vamp on autos and his ult heals him for some solid numbers 3)Gravitum slows and roots on q and ult 4)Infernum does some aoe damage and his ult is a teamfight monster 5)Crescendum allows him to fight any champion point blank range and his q places turrets that will mark the enemy if you have gravitum or calibrum(btw other weapons stack mini chakrams that he will obliterate you with)

[@owa1985]

So THAT's why people seem to get confused when I nail them with / combo! A very well researched argument and video, I must say. And the only reason I don't get confused when playing against him is because I was one of the early adopters who bought him on release day and thus had plenty of practice with his weapons and what they, having combined, can do. As for his 5 ults though, you don't really need to know what each does other than getting hit by it is bad news, and having it hit more than 1 champion is usually catastrophic for your team. Although, I do miss the days of the ez infernum ult pentakill.

[@bcatgamering]

I find it strange that I basically learned what Aphelios does entirely in maybe two games? I also never had problems understanding what he was doing at any given time, aside from the situations where he'd swap to a new weapon mid-fight. After I scoped him out by playing against him and reading his toolkit, he quickly became of my favorite champions to play, even post-nerfs.

[@CorpseTongji]

playing aphelios feels like piloting a fucking space shuttle with four people yelling at you for not actually working at nasa

[@apunnojustice7475]

I learned adc with aphelios and doing that made it so the friends i play with have a pretty good grasp on what an enemy aphelios is doing at any given point in time, unless we get some sort of god who can do the like. 4 weapon combos. But since he was nerfed into the ground, really the only thing I feel like i have going for me when i play him is the other team having no clue what i do... Aphelios is a mess, but i still think he's pretty fun to learn

[@Senayoshy]

I'm glad you made this, I had such a difficult time understanding what he did that I decided to pick him up and hopefully main him. 80 games later I still have trouble remembering his skill combos or what he does at times, often I found myself hesistant to pick him in champ select because I'd think about how weak he was combined with his confusing kit and that would just make for a very unfun game.. and true enough most games resulted in just that So yeah when I used to played against him it was like "wtf just happened" And now that I play him it's also "wtf did I just do"

[@SaiKisaragi]

The fact that no one knew what goth boi does + the fact that he seemed pretty complicated is what made me want to play him. He's not that bad, but I also play Starcraft II (I'm sliver II) , so I can understand his underlying micro. However, you really did point out some bullshit that he has, in that you don't really know what you are getting hit with most of the time.

[@notanotherpyro]

One thing that is interesting, is to compare Invoker from Dota to Aphelios. Both break the game by having too many abilities, but Invoker doesn't feel like he breaks Dota. He sacrifices having a true ultimate to get his extra abilities(for those that don't know, invoker has 3 orb slots, and 3 orbs, the combination of his orbs when he presses his ult gives him an ability, e.g. 1 quas, 1 wex, and 1 exort is deafining blast, 1 quas, 2 exort is meteor), there is a clear visual que for what orbs he's using with contrasting colors, and while he has access to all of them, the way he builds heavily dictates which ones are the most threatening so you know which ones you most have to fear. Yes, late game he has access to the full repertoire in very threatening forms. Also all of his abilities look incredibly distinct with vibrant contrasting colors.

[@flippystudios7933]

I find that looking at his stance is the best way to know the weapon, or the icon indicator but that can be a bit confusing. The stance changes a lot between all of the weapons except for maybe severum and crescendum. Gravitum is over the shoulder, Infernum is held by the hips, calibrum is also over the shoulder, but very visually different from gravitum, and crescendum has a (imho) a different enough attack animation from severum that it's easy to discern. Combine this with the icons, and it's marginally easier to know what you're dealing with.

[@Arob4343]

Funny thing. I actually came up with a champion idea that’s basically a simple Aphelios, before Aphelios came out. Back then my idea was this: a marksman that switches weapons and uses those. I had thought it would be cool you have different guns that change your auto attacks. But it was simpler, more like this: passive=you have X number of guns and they all shoot differently, Q=an ability, W=another ability, E=swap your gun, and R=something cool that maybe makes use of your current gun. No secondary gun bull crap to think about. No combination of guns bull crap. The guns have different ranges and effects. Your q and w would be the same always and your e only swaps to the next weapon. No ammo shenanigans either. You can use any of the guns as long as you want because they don’t have the crazy synergies. If you like gun #3 and only want to use it, go ahead. I feel like this design is better and fits into LoL better. Like your analogy of only one champion reaching level 120 in a game, thus design still matches the level 100 cap. It’s more complicated but it’s still clear what’s going on. And the guns would all be distinct. I guess my champion could be compared to something like a hybrid of Aphelios and Jinx. More complex than Jinx but not as crazy as Aphelios

[@hondo10a]

Big fan of the upcoming Aphelios update where the devs plan to give him full access to the Valorant arsenal

[@VitorCalixtro]

I dont know if im that much of a nerd, but i dont think it is THAT hard to understand what he does. I think his stance change is pretty clear based on the weapon he wields, his animation for the w (gun swap) is also pretty obvious, and the combos are not that hard to understand when you get what every weapon does. But i mean, he is A LOT more complex than every other champion in the game, thats for sure. Also i play him a lot, probably thats why im realy used to his clusterfuck of a kit

[@TheTrueEnderLord]

I will be watching very closely. Aphelios was never that confusing in my opinion so im curious what your reasoning will be as I respect your opinion on many aspects of league quite a bit.

[@VarsVerum]

I appreciate that

[@rosheacarrington1604]

true im an aphileos main and after a few games his kit was very simple in my opinion you just need to know gun synergy and positioning

[@Kousseau]

@@rosheacarrington1604 Imo the problem isn't as much playing him as playing against him. If it took you several games to understand what the champ you play does, it takes longer for, say, toplane players to understand that. And also the fact that when playing you always know what your two weapons are, it not always that clear for the enemy team

[@Rageniry]

@@rosheacarrington1604 obviously the problem isn't for players playing him, it's for playing against him. I'd argue aphelios is the only champion in the game currently that you actually need to play several games as to be able to play against. No other champion I can think of is so convuloted that you don't realize what happened on a purely mechanical standpoint. From someone who's not playing him, the 5 guns, the abilites and their interactions obfuscates a great deal of information. When aphelios does something to you, it's very hard to realize what of his weapons or abilites did what and why. Just messing with him in practice tool for an hour probably isn't enough because you need internalize that knowledge to some degree. I think you need to watch a guide and then play 10 or so games on aph to be able to play against him and not be taken completely off guard and not even realizing why. Every other champion i can think of have much clearer lessons for the opponent to learn on why they just died.

[@Homiloko2]

@@rosheacarrington1604 The problem is playing against him. Regular players will have to wait until he is in free champion rotation and then put in the effort to play a bunch of matches and understand him, even though they don't want to play him, just so they can have a chance figuring out what he's doing. Regular champions like Viego you can figure out just by going a few matches against them.

[@MrTalithan]

I only need to know one thing about Aphelios. Be nowhere near him when he's got white and red, and only be occasionally near him when he's got blue.

[@Tokumastu1]

Aphelios: The hand gun has life steal (Q is rapid fire), the sniper has extended range (Q is a skill shot that marks and allows for extended shot from a mile away), Gravitiy gun slows on each AA (Q roots targets that have been AA'd), Chakram is a boomerang (Q creates a turret) and Flame canon has the titanic hydra cone for each AA (Q is a large cone). No, he's not hard to figure out this whole joke about not knowing what he does was ran into the ground on the month of his release.

[@cookiecreep9204]

For a good example of extremely complicated hero that is still understandable, i recommend Invoker from Dota. He has to invoke his spells, and he creates them from combinations of 3 elements but you not only can see what he invokes if you pay attention and know his spells, of which there are just 10, he has to somewhat telegraph which ones he will be using throughout the game as he focuses on certain elements. Somehow Aphelios is incredibly confusing but Invoker isn't... Might be that his abilities don't change what they do on a whim, even if they are some of the best spells in the game.

[@mktc6522]

Played against someone who seemed like they knew what they were doing and it got worse because it the first time me and my support were going up against him so we were confused for the entire game as he proceeded to snow ball us into oblivion

[@maxusgamer8515]

Q are 2 to 4 abilities if you are low bullets in both weapons in fight. The side effects of R are basically off weapon effect, but with main weapon. (The only one that change is severum that heals you more than one auto) These are the AA and off weapon effect Slow Heal Ranged damage AoE damage Melee damage He has 5 Q and all Q have off weapon effect. Q is based on main weapon. I mean, for me is pretty intuitive, because I played MMOs with like 40 abilities.

[@William-Afton_jejcjschheiqx]

I think it would be cool for him to just have two weapons one Solari and one Lunari where one if offhand and one is his main weapon and he can switch instead of 5 weapons

[@katromore1421]

Aphelios is only understood by the person playing him. I play Aphelios pretty regularly so I know what he can and can't do but when I possessed his body as Viego in one of my games, it took me a few seconds to know the status of that specific Aphelios, like what guns he has at that moment, which is a first for me because when i possess someone as Viego I already know what the champ I'm about to use is capable of doing only Aphelios needs that much time to know the basics. Even when I'm laning against him, the only time I know what he was doing was at the start of the game when he only had two guns.

[@WickedLepz]

Thank you for this video. As someone who only plays league on and off every few months (bc of school) this was the thing that I found most challenging when I returned to the game. I struggled a lot against Sylas, Seraphine, Viego (those came to my mind first) because all the abilities kind of looked the same? Sylas had chains spinning all the time so it was hard to distinguish. Seraphine was fast af projectiles and I couldn't tell which one was which. And Viego idk I literally can't tell what he's doing. Perhaps if I played regularly rather than once every 4 months it wouldn't be as bad. Heck I still don't actually know what Sylas does ngl.

[@theduskmonarch6207]

I think this video is not thought through. It's a simple math question. There are 5 weapons with simple characteristics: we have long range, cc, lifesteal, aoe, cqc. There is a fixed weapon order. And only 2 active weapons at the same time. Since the abilities are tied to the weapons, we only have 4 active components (excluding the ult but I will get to it). Even with weapon swapping you have 2 abilities and two weapons between which you can toggle. This is less complicated than any other characters 3 abilities. Jinx is a good example. She has her q which toggles between 2 modes and 2 abilities. And the ult is a joke... It's a damn projectile that is followed by an auto attack of your active weapon. Each individual element is extremely simple and it's just a matter of looking at the cute lil icons in distinct colors to see what his current characteristics are. Also his stance changes with each gun. If we are fair then viego has thousands of abilities because under some circumstance he can use someone else's. Sylas has over 100 ults... That's just sooo much complexity. It's a bit ridiculous to me that people don't spend the 5 minutes to read the weapon characteristics and the abilities. Anyone who isn't new to the game who complains that they don't know how aphelios works is just too lazy to read. And don't even get me started on Renata w or comparable abilities. This video aged so poorly.

[@NoName-ts8eo]

Jinx sylas and viego r different from aphe, 3 of them r easy and foward to understand, u can "choose" what to use when to use not like aphe, aphe is in a different category, if u can master aphe then good for u, but if u cant play other 3 then u r below gold, your comparison is wrong

[@theduskmonarch6207]

@@NoName-ts8eo if what you took away from my comment is that aphelios is simpler than viego, sylas or jinx, then you fundamentally misunderstood me. I think most champions are easy and intuitive to understand like jinx, viego and sylas, so is aphelios. There is nothing unintuitive about him as any of his mechanics are already known through other champs or follow a really simple structure. So I am mainly mocking the reasoning displayed in the video.

[@callmeandoru2627]

It's always a nightmare trying to explain League to your friends who are starting to play the game and then they ask about Aphelios