Is Zeri Riot's WORST Balance Nightmare? | League of Legends

At the start of Season 12, Zeri was our first new release for the year. But before that year even ended, she's gone through more balance changes and overhauls than some champions have in their entire career. Today we're gonna discuss exactly what happened that made her spiral out of control.

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#LoL #Zeri #Balance

[yoelpokeylora]

It's funny if you think that they accepted that they were going kinda hard with new champion releases and they said they were slowing down to make sure that they were being released with less problems and then they literally released Zeri

[grimlockgreg]

Ironically, the one thing that she was suppose to counter, shielding, was the most “ why is that there “ passive in the game, I wished they made her more focused on, but nope…. They had to go this go into the spell caster route and made her a balance nightmare ( also I really, really, REALLY, dispised her on hit build…. So much. )

[elise]

zeri has graduated to become riot's first 300 years champion

[vinnythewebsurfer]

I genuinely couldn’t have imagine how much of a problem she could’ve became back when she was first added. Only after awhile did a realize they made a Lucian that’s on crack cocaine even if said lucian didn’t have a bunch of other crap like invisibility or a mini windwall.

[Rncko]

As usual, a common theme for balance nightmare --> Mobility / Anti-mobility (CC)

I agree that Zeri has the same issue as Akali, difficult to find balance when her entire kit revolves around dealing damage while moving around.
Edit : Wow, didn't expect so many responses. Anyway I'll just sum up the comments below

--> Like all the previous cases of balance nightmare especially when involving pro-play vs solo queue, it takes MULTIPLE patches until certain point is reached. (Akali, Kalista, Ryze) Usually, by over-gutting solo queue to compensate for pro-play. Zeri is on her way.

--> However just because a champ is "kinda balanced" doesn't mean it's not delicate. Most often, they are easily tipped over the scale or under the scale when there's item changes / class changes (durability patch etc).

[Veolfen]

The Irony is Kalista was already a balancing nightmare many years ago because of 2 aspects, her objective securing power with her stacking spears... and her infinite mobility with her dashes. This design made her impossible to balance and at the nerfed state she's been in for years...
Riot released Zeri who happens to be even more of a nightmare to deal with than Kalista ever was.
Zeri needs to loose some range OR either her slow &/or her wall dash, if not both. The combination of her long range, high movespeed, dash & slow makes it that in the hand of a top player she is impossible to catch. Also she highly benefited from the durability update.

[FenrirAlter]

I remember her release where everyone said that she was useless because they didn't abuse ingenious triforce build. After that build was the norm the wr legit went up from 41% in dia+ to 52, 5%.

[masonz]

She will get Ryzed no doubt. We've all experienced it. She gets slightly ahead and there is literally NOTHING you can do. Ult and run away with her support you can't catch her or dash on her. If the only the only way to shut down a champion is to hope to get caught, that's bad design. I'm glad when she gets guttered .

[isaacdiaz]

I always felt that they really wanted her to be popular and mainstream and that's why they refused to actually nerf her. They cared less (than usual) about balance and more about her being as popular as Kaisa.

[EOMMunaware]

If we’re being real zeri is like destroying pro play, when she has an enchanter she stat checks the entire enemy team

[remiliaxx]

I feel like all they had to do when she came out was make each cast of Q only proc one on-hit per cast and damage numbers (I hated seeing a marksman have that much health). I still think having a spammable 850 range "auto attack" is stupid though.

[blazo]

background song is Grass battle from Pokemon Conquest for anyone wondering

[danha]

I was already suspicious of all the compensation buffs as they gradually came out, but O MY FKING GOD seeing all this back to back without 2 weeks of intense classes in between each patch really shows me how absolutely stupid Riot was with Zeri's changes

[tobiaserdt]

I still stand by my opinion that riot never tried to actually balance zeri, especially not for skilled/proplay.
Zeri has one of the most overloaded kits in league of legends with every ability having several numbers to adjust.
Aside of removing secondary zap attack and removing slow from charged zap attack riot NEVER thought of removing mechanics and therefore reduce possible skill expression (which is needed to close the pro/average player gap).

Aside of that zeri combines 2 aspects that you NEVER should combine which are one of the highest attack ranges combined with very good mobility that ramps up over the fight duration.

All in all: if I were at riots balance team I am certain that I would find ways to make zeri balanceable even if that would mean that skilled play would have less fun with her

[bmac]

I like Zeri. I like her theme, and shes fun and flashy to play. I really just wish they could balance her because her being pick ban in pro makes it rougher to watch.

[DAN-gfqx]

she gets rework every single patch, at this point i just refuse to read what she does because she is going to get "rework" again

[PixelRory]

If possible to extend this to your editor(s) assuming they're the ones who get the cinematic background footage, a piece of advice from someone who uses the creator suite a lot whenever a fights going down in river keep the height fog setting a little lower compared to whatever you'd have it on for fights in lanes. Makes things look much less cluttered! (easiest example is around 0:25)
Edit: I realised like midway through it could actually be a reference to zauns terrible atmosphere and air in which case, good job it works great!

[Mega]

I am pretty sure if they left zeri as she was (with different build paths on release) and just nerfed the numbers she’d be balanced now

[cameronb]

I don’t think there’s really anything salvageable about her in terms of balance. She will always have to be a glass cannon. The whole kit revolves around staying far away and moving so fast you can’t be hit. Ofc they have to nerf her into oblivion. She just another azir. There’s no way to balance those numbers with a kit so strong in the hands of someone who can use it well

[Peter-zgem]

my father is an SNHU grad. it used to be new hampshire college. it's come a long, long way. good school who has the online degree down to a science. obviously my dad didn't go to school online so it's also got the backbone of an actual brick and mortar institution as well. my dad is a very, very successful old goat. good looks on getting this sponsor.