League of Legends' Oldest Problem....and it's getting worse

[@Im-Eva]

as a xerath player ill run out of mana if i get zoned off the wave and not be able to use my passive which always happens cuz of these cancer dash champs and autoing anyone as an artillery mage in teamfights is like such a crazy idea. the recent ez accessibility to blue buff is the best thing thats happened to me so far cuz it actually lets me spam my spells with no care about running out of mana and i dont have to beg jungler to give the unreliable pussy champ a blue buff

[@zaferoph]

There are a few immediate issues with this. The first of them is that before we simply had different ways to make mana a non issue. I used to sit on Xerath in mid lane 1v5 with D-ring and Chalice of Harmony which not only gave mana sustain but also health sustain both unconditionally. Then just perma farm with abilities from tower until I could buy the full thing if everything was going well OR I could boost both my mana regen and health regen. To explain this for those who weren't there, chalice of harmony had 30 MR and 50% mana regen with a passive called Harmony which gave you 25% health regen for every 25% mana regen (it had variations of this before but basically it was THE mana regen item at the time) you had and this item was way cheaper than Lost Chapter that we now buy to regen mana on level up and for a time this upgraded to a really powerful mage sustain item called Athene's Unholy Grail with a Mana Restored over time and also mana restored on kill effect. This item later became a support item with a shield/heal based passive but for the Mana and Health regen passive (that did see a few changes but still remained strong) it was still worth it for a first item to get chalice for merely 800 gold. You could start Corrupting Pot or Tear instead of D-Ring too and often you'd just get all of these because you'd just be permanently in lane, especially as an artillery mage. Later, it became even better because while we lost the Health Regen from grail, we instead got more AP based on Mana Regen. 25% regen gave us 5 AP. I have more to say but I'm genuinely kinda tired. My point is, there was never a time when we didn't have crazy levels of mana sustain and arguably now it's weaker and more conditional than ever. No upgrades to the refill pots, no mana pots, mana regen is less available as a stat, mana items are less common and mana management matters more than before because of champs being stronger meaning every bit of wasted mana is wroth more in terms of power than before. Fact is, you shouldn't ever run out of mana if you're playing properly. That's the intended design, it's a skill check for casters and that's all it ever was meant to be. Secondly, manaless champions are not these ascended class of champs who have more relative power at no cost. Most manaless champions in league require micro management of some kind (like the cooldown management and skillshot nature of Aatorx, Riven, Yasuo and Yone Q) to get their full value. Energy based champions often can't spam their abilities and missing an ability is costing them like half of their fighting power in that moment and they have to back out because of it or use their unique regen mechanic that can be counterplayed. A gnar or renekton that manages their fury/rage poorly will lose lane. Mundo and Garen are meant to be noob champs so while they do display this as an issue since they're both almost always really strong champs, their lack of complexity is meant to allow newer players figure out and feel out tanks and fighters as classes in the game. It's not s simple as just "I'm manaless chamion, I do the same thing as champ with mana except for free".

[@Rhyolite-hyena]

Riot's philosophy is inconsistent, let's take a piss at Riven Riven have no business with having no mana, getting to spam dashes to go around map faster all the time. Ksante do run out of mana to spam, he doesn't go around fast like Riven, and he's still satisfying to play. Kayn also has short cd, and need mana to go around the map with Q E. And there is Riven: roam really fast around the map, farm everything, join every fight, heal back to full with hydra, and stack to 10k gold unspent if she likes. Riven players are just too spoiled to see it. And status quo excusers are dumb. If we take everyone to Riven's standard, being "as long as a champ's kit is their core gameplay with big need for AH, then they'll be manaless or never have mana issue", then 1/4 of champ roster may fit that, even Ezreal would gets free mana regen in his kit.

[@zaferoph]

@@Rhyolite-hyena My only point was that manaless champs don't get to be manaless for free. Sure, Riven is kinda scuffed but she is the only manaless champion who never recieved any sort of rework even on a small scale among those who existed when she was released except for rumble

[@jarjab2games]

Garen, a mana less champion, has been in the game since its inception. And is rarely complained about. I think the big difference here is as you pointed out. He has higher than average cool downs. Unlike yone. Yet i agree that an element of gameplay is basically lost once so many "energy" and no mana champions is introduced so heavily. A lot of the early no mana champs, spent their health instead. And whilst we have seen that compromise on someone new like briar, her kit is so full of sustain that her hp doesn't matter either. I feel like in some ways. Such as ability resources being mostly removed. League is turning into to more of a fighting game, like smash or mortal combat. I think thats the ideal that league developers are aiming for. But its doesnt seem right because it doesnt fit the core aspect of the top down gameplay mobas originated from. Rts games, where resource control, and the budgeting of them, is everything.

[@zaferoph]

"He has higher than average cooldowns unlike Yone who has completely fair and normal cooldowns of 13 seconds on his weakest ability, his core ability in his Q starts at 4 seconds which means at best he can only has his main ability once every 12 seconds at level one which also means before 2 AS items if he misses his second Q, it will reset before cooldown is up. Oh and 60% of his damage is split damage making it more worthwhile to buy 1 armour item and 1 MR item against him even if he is fed rather than 2 armour which means not only him but also his magic damage team mates will deal less damage. Oh and also if you mess up 1 q during an E all in you will probably not get the kill and you'll be pulled back way too far from the target without your R. AND half his kit doesn't benefit from CDR while the other half does so he kinda has to either sacrifice something to balance it out either by having less CDR for more Qs or less Qs for more ults and E. Point isn't that he is bad, point is that he is much more micro intensive than most mana champs who just have to land skill shots and whatever. Like he has to juggle his 3Qs which forces him to be more aggressive. That's his resource. Same with Riven, Aatrox and so on.

[@Im-Eva]

"rarely complained about" lol

[@japoprostuja7427]

sivir e doesn't give mana

[@neonplay786]

how am I just finding out they removed that

[@noiseisgold3n42]

@@neonplay786 because noone plays sivir

[@leagueencyclopedia3841]

You're totally right I forgot they removed that like 2 years ago :D

[@Rells2coolpeoplehavebadtastes.]

I personally think the lack of running out of mana is a good think, because considering this is a fast paced action strategy game running out of the thing you need to use your abilities while in the middle of a fight is not a good thing, and your not always in a position where you can ration your abilities. Also I personally find the game most fun when there is constant action on the map, so I find it better that no one has to worry about mana. Oh and here's a sub, good video.

[@antarath517]

This is a part of a bigger problem I've been noticing, which is that so much of league is focused on early lane. So many of the mechanics simply become borderline irrelevant once you hit level 6

[@zaferoph]

I'd like to know of like 8 for them.

[@RiverNunu]

Doesn't sound like a problem for me

[@noiseisgold3n42]

@@antarath517 what?

[@Shadow-bk1im]

The only champ in the game that really cares about total mana right now is kassadin. Since kassadin can actually use 4K mana and has to actually care about his total mana pool at any given time to figure out how many times he can use his r.

[@zaferoph]

try playing Ezreal while spamming your Q the whole time.

[@noiseisgold3n42]

@@Shadow-bk1im what about ryze?

[@noiseisgold3n42]

@@zaferoph ad champions in general struggle with mana.

[@zaferoph]

@@noiseisgold3n42 Yup cause they have 2 mana items and neither of them actually help most of them. TBH I think the main reason why mages don't really seem to worry about mana is that like 5 different core items for them give mana. Luden's, Blackfire, Malignance, ROA and Archangel's. They just naturally gravitate towards at least one or two of these items meanwhile most assassins and fighters kinda have to either benefit from a blue buff or the jungle item mana regen because they'll have like 900 mana and use 10% of it for one ability. Manaflow doesn't work for many of them since they don't poke a lot and POM generally means limiting your options since not everyone wants to go precision primary and among those who do, some would like triumph more to say in the fight.

[@Zenrikku77]

Give Soraka the ability to drain mana again problem solved

[@Rhyolite-hyena]

Garen, Riven do be laughing

[@maxogge]

What a coincident, Dota just nerfed arcane boots as it was a cheap item that let you never worry about mana again. One way mana can work is as anti snowball mechanic. If after a teamfight the winning team has to find a way to recover their mana then they cant abuse the enemy death timer as much.

[@Rhyolite-hyena]

And the first step to do it is to hammer down free roamers like Riven. Kayn has to spend mana to roam and farm, and doesn't heal to full. Ksante can be out of resources while his Q is spamable. But Riven doesn't give a shit, she could be up to 10k gold unspent no problem, roam fast around the map, & easily back to full hp with hydra.

[@AngelFrag]

Semi related to the mana issues. I'll forever be mad at riot for taking out half of Ivern's passive and adding it into the buffs themselves. Having an Ivern used to mean that your midlaner had a mana advantage after level 7 (?) which was a MASSIVE deal for some match ups. Now both teams have that advantage, which makes it irrelevant.

[@leagueencyclopedia3841]

Same, I hate the buff changes and the fact they removed some of what made Ivern unique also blows

[@zombiebear15]

awesome video. i havent thought about this issue till watching! if i can offer some critique , i feel like the music volume at times where just a little to high in my opinion truly a very minor problem still a fantastic and well thought out vid!

[@leagueencyclopedia3841]

Thanks for the feedback! I'm always looking to improve so I appreciate it

[@gunproduction9995]

I agree but also I don't like the idea of spending gold on mana every time I would back. Maybe just cause I'm used to the way things are.

[@morninstar_lucifer]

hi, just saw this in the recommended, not sure why u only have 126 subs lol, great video hope to see more

[@phonegamers799]

Reducing mana is just very anti fun and the best example is a champ like swain who doesnt need either malignance,blackfire or gun and would rather have a rylais into liandrys build which is way better in fights but it just makes waveclear an extremly unfun task as within 3 waves you are basicaly out of mana so you have to back constantly which at best is just annoying af and at wosrt loses you fights as you are out halfway through or are caught basing as you had to clear sidewaves. This would also give too muxh power to ad chaps as theu not only just do better without mana but also get a massive advantage through waveclear items like shiv and tiamat which could easily outlast any mage defending a splitpush very easily. And what problem does this solve anyways too much ability spam? Is that really a problem if everyone can do it

[@gecgoodpasi1654]

So mana is a interesting topic as the game simply became faster and shorter over time back in the day it was normal to have 50 minute games with people constantly running out of mana during lane but now games are alot more compact, TTK is shorter and this leads to a interesting problem if u design more mana hungry abilities how can u reward a champ for it currently ? -Range doesnt rly work as current poke champs already manage to snipe for their entire vision range -Damage would make TTK even shorter and it starts to get into a "feels bad" territory if u would give a champion even more baseline dmg in return for higher mana cost -Cooldown is a interesting topic u could make it rly short and instead limit a champ on its mana but there is a reason riot had to rework CDR to haste and using mana in this way would just make it a CDR 2.0 that would eventually need to get reworked too The big issue in the room is that LoL already pushed the possible boundries and limits of champs over the past years rly hard and mana has no real place in it anymore if one day Riot came out and said "yo we are removing mana and rework corresponding items" literally nobody would rly care and this should honestly be considered

[@zaferoph]

back in the day people were also just worse at the game meaning they were worse at managing their mana.

[@leagueencyclopedia3841]

yeah I do wonder if the behind the scenes removing Mana entirely has ever been discussed

[@MrSuggyBear]

It feels like mana management has dropped off in many games, guessing not being able to press buttons is not fun?

[@leagueencyclopedia3841]

This is honestly probably the simple answer to how we got here, it's not fun to tell people "no you can't do that" and Riot of course wants people to play the game

[@ItsNatJac]

I think mana is something of a problem. I’ve seen mana streams where people run out of mana but it’s because the “optimal” builds hardly recommend the two runes that facilitate mana regen (Manaflow and Presence of Mind). To your point, often times you only need to build one of these runes and if you play smart only some champs have mana issues. I think lowering base mana and having items that are cooldown & mana focused would be a solution. More spam & less power, or more power but less spam trade off.

[@drpygmr2416]

Rod of ages makes this man die

[@sadokdanger]

Insightful

[@TheRealSorav]

It's cause of how ADHD gamers are now. No one wants to use their brain and think, they rather just spam. It's some weird zoomer thing that's affecting alot of games, and life too in general with youtube shorts and whatever

[@craigferge4702]

lets talk about mental health problems lmao need a warning on this video sir. The jumpscare was insane

[@derbestimmer1148]

Sorry, but greatest problem by far is smurfing. Hands down. It feels like 50% of players are Smurfs these days. It is just ridiculous. Riot is gaslighting ppl into believing, that smurfing is good and does not hurt the game. (They want the account numbers and sales) And although they can't say that it is fine according to the Summoner's Code, they evade any real conversation about it and beat around the bush. A lot of content on KZbin is Smurf Content. That projects a completely unrealistic picture of the Game and its mechanics. All the guides are repeating themselves with the same points, while showing a Smurf beating weaker players, leaving out dozens of things, that a high elo player does subconciously. I am not saying, that guides are useless, but a lot of them miss the real points. League is a highly mechanical game and with all the Smurfs it is simply not enough to farm and know basic map mechanics. You will not beat a Diamond Lee Sin as a Silver Volibear. Even if you are an item ahead, what will almost never happen. And since you have no learning curve due to unbalanced matchmaking, you will not get to a level, where you can suddenly beat a Diamond Player as Silver player. Not a chance. You will not have real match application of concepts you simply can't learn in practice tool or bot games. Feel free to look around the world of real sports in the last view years, to come up with examples, where extremely unequal levels of power led to unfair advantages and unjustice towards athletes. There are enough to prove my point. So how are you supposed to learn from all the stomps in League? Look at activation curves by Yerkes-Dodson and tell me, that stomps are a good learning environment. Yes - you can hire a coach to go over the replays. Great. Then we are back at the point of how to learn these advanced concepts, that are far above your current level, without being able to slowly work up to them. Educational Smurfing becomes a complete oxymoron at that point. Dota 2 banned Smurfing, because Smurfs gatekeeping new players became a real problem. Obviously League still makes enough money that they don't care.

[@KrytenB]

banger. love your aesthetic and vibe. hope more ppl find your stuff

[@stavroskolliniatis9352]

Definitely have what it takes to be an upcoming icon in the community you are so great and different and iconic

[@leagueencyclopedia3841]

Wow, thank you! That's super kind of you to say

[@Sirqle]

sis, is the room getting more smokey?? lol

[@humemid]

U HAVE NO MANAAAAAAA

[@swigz2399]

What if they remove mana regen? 👀

[@vincemeat774]

I just think every champ should have mana and forget all the other shit like manaless or energy or whatever. it may not make sense in the lore of league but theres a few champs that can go on forever in lane. but i dont think this is a massive issue in the game.

[@zaferoph]

TLDR: Manaless champions are balanced around their lack of mana, if they had mana they'd be incredibly weak compared to every other champs. Energy champions are balanced around high costs on a low pool that regens fast so they can go back in again, with mana they'd just have like 3-4 times the resources and now they're permanently on you so they'd be nerfed and lose their playstyle identity. Conclusion, they'd have to redesign the whole game to make any of it work. Champs who have energy would instantly become top 1 in their roles because they're balanced around having to manage 60% resource cost abilities in fights but in return getting their resource back faster in general (better at short trades, worse at extended fights) but now they'd just have more resources available at all times and the only alternative would be to give them ways to regen mana while making their ability costs double or tripple of their current energy costs then shen Q could restore mana after all 3 hits based on damage done, Zed passive could restore mana based on % missing mana, akalis shroud and kennen energy ball would have to restore even more mana than they already restore energy. Meanwhile champs who were fully manaless like Renekton (yes, even if he keeps his passive boosted abilities with fury), Tryndamere and Yone would instantly fall off by huge margins because they're already managing so many odd and lowkey awkward mechanics that if they had to also manage mana they'd just not be able to do their job and realistically they'd need more damage to compensate. Like 600 mana Yone/Yasuo but 60 mana cost Qs would be crazy, that means theu realistically cannot use their core mechanic in laning at all. Their mana costs would have to be absurdly low (like 10 Q1, 15 Q2 and 20 Q3, or the reverse to reward active use of the mechanic) because they're meant to spam constantly to be equally effective as other champs but then they'd just go Essence Reaver, Steraks, IE and now they're tankier than usual with 100% crit and back on square one with infinite mana.

[@vincentvindevogel2368]

Manaless champions are a good addition to the game. Because it allows for other resource bars as well, which are usually great mechanics in the game. Mana as a stat is weird, as it doesn't feel like you can directly translate it into damage, but you can. You can use your abilities on the wave or the opponent with the knowledge that you have enough resources to use it again on the other one in a few seconds. It being a part of the game increases the skill expression of those with mana. The reason it is gated to be an early game constraint is because on the champions that have it, no constraint would break the way they get to interact with the game (think urf). A xerath with infinite mana early would legitimately be able to refuse interaction with his opposing laner without counterplay. Imagine a Twitch being able to W E every wave, clear it with no counterplay and then roam to another lane. Later in the game, they can do so and it's not much of an issue, but early, that is bonkers. Mana is very much so a meaningful stat with great reason to exist. But imagine a Riven being balanced around mana. Her abilities would have to actually be stronger than they are now, so would her base stats. Simply because she is forced to use mana for the casts. Idk, I haven't really structured thoughts on this to put into this comment. But I don't think you're completely on the mark here (although not far off). Mana gates are important. It's like energy. Energy champions can spam abilities during lane willy nilly and never really feel gated. But during an all-in, they get gassed out quickly. Mana champions have to be (more) thoughtful in lane, but in teamfights, if the ability is off cd, you can press it. Resourceless champions are tuned around the fact that they don't have resources. You bring up Yone, but I doubt he would be more fun to play (either as or against) if he had mana. They would have to tune his abilities around said mana existing, then you have K'Sante, is that balanced?

[@zaferoph]

The thing with Manaless champions (not energy based, they work on a different premise) is that they always have something else you're micro managing. Tryndamere fury is a choice between push power/damage and health. Yauso, Yone and honestly any other 3Q manaless champs have to manage their Q timings to get ideal results and with mana these abilities would just drain them too much.. Manaless champion generally means "here is a whole ability you have to micromanage 24/7 to be useful" and that's kinda part of the fun.

[@zombirk9927]

What I hate about mana is the comparison to other non mana champs... for example yasuo doenst have mana and gets a shield for it... like what? other example is renekton ... doesnt have mana but gets fury which makes him stronger? huh? tryndamere even gets crit chance for not having mana...

[@noiseisgold3n42]

you're misunderstanding those champions. Those things are resources for the champion, and they are balanced around it. Yasuo has no sustain outside the shield, renekton can't burst without fury, and tryndamere is a melee right click champion lol.

[@Adrian-ow6pr]

​@@noiseisgold3n42thank you, they are acting as if manaless champs are veigar level with added benefits.

[@zaferoph]

Alright let's talk about these champs. Yauso is weak before Shieldbow and crit cloak (90% crit chance) and his only defensive ability has a 20 second cooldown at rank 1, his dash is conditional and his Q is only as good as you are at managing its stacks, especially before like a full AS item like BORK and boots and his ult relies on first stacking Q and landing Q3 or a teammate has to set it up for him. Like fundamentally his kit is rather restricted and being good at Yauso is honestly pretty hard compared to being good at Lucian. Most of the manaless champions are like this, they have a whole set of additional micro you have to keep track of. Except Garen but he is meant to be the noob toplaner so he is deliberately designed differently.

[@zaferoph]

Manaless champions are balanced around their lack of mana, if they had mana they'd be incredibly weak compared to every other champs due to having a lot of spam based abilities that stands for a significant portion of their power (think Aatrox or Yasuo Q getting progressively stronger each time you use it until 3rd) and if they had to manage mana as well they'd not be able to spam these skill shots enough to really keep active and valuable.

[@okilydokily]

As soon as I saw what this "thing" looked like I turned off the video. Seek help.

[@etlam1]

same

[@zaferoph]

Why y'all getting triggered that someone has nice hair and a confident presentation of themselves. Are you that insecure that seeing a confident person makes you upset?

[@noiseisgold3n42]

@@okilydokily what about their appearance suggests mental illness?

[@Marios231]

what are you? homophobe? anti queer? transphobe? which one is it? or maybe just insecure because he looks beautiful as he wants and you cant because daddy will beat you up?