"Balanced with the assumption of he won't have an ultimate" Rammus against a team with no auto attackers: "Ok"

My biggest problem with sylas has always been how much damage he can put out at ALL stages of the game. Hes always strong.

"Oh geez, Sylas could potentially not have a good ult, we'd better give him crazy buff stats so he's always useful regardless of the enemy team composition. It'd be bad design to have champions relegated almost entirely to the role of a counterpick!" Said riot, ignoring roughly 1/4 of their cast who only see play as counterpicks.

i dont even think hes got a bad design, except for the fact that his copied ults most often are better than on the champion je stole them for. The problem i see on him is just HOW INCREDEBLY overtuned he is, most champs get either insane base dmg or sclaing, he gets both, on every ability

Also, the combination of Sylas being a melee champ, which means he gets higher base stats, and his insane scalings enabling him to build lower ap items for the same damage, means Sylas can consistently outtank every other burst mage while still dishing out the same or more damage than his counterparts. All of this, on his base kit alone, not even counting whatever ult he may get.

Honorable mention to his lore. To this day, Sylas's introduction and storyline is one of the most impactful additions to the game that got everyone talking. People sympathize with him and want to kick some noble ass as they hear motivational justice speeches. Not as relevant as the actual gameplay of course, but a revolutionary taking power of oppressors for himself by weaponizing the chains used to shackle him is the best power fantasy in the whole game

About the AP ratios on ultimates: Baron buff gives AP, even if you never built any. So those champions’ ults are meant to be empowered by baron buff. The reason the ratio is so high is because otherwise it wouldn’t be noticeable unless the AP given by baton buff was so much as to make it broken on a mage champion.

So basically, his basic kit is one of the most powerful and he potentially has the best ultimate, but he's "balanced" around not having one. Yeah, I can see why everyone plays the guy.

I remember when the devs were all like: "While we were designing Sylas, we knew what we were aiming for, and at the end of the day, if we had a scenario, where we would say: Oh we cannot put that ultimate on a champion, cuz remember Sylas! We failed in designing him." Crazy how things turned out, ain't it? Good times.

My biggest problem with him is that EVERY ultimate he steals will scale well with AP for him. If he steals Jinx's ult, it scales of AP for him. If Malphite is going tank, he sacrifices the damage on his ult - while Sylas will still have the knock up AND the damage. I'd really like to see how it would work if he stole the ultimate WITH the current stats the original owner has. That way he won't be able to use it better in terms of AP ratios.

i hate how there are so many no skill champs who are way too good

Sylas is "I'm you but better" the champ. Some ults in the game are absurd but their power is mitigated by having poor ratios or scaling or being on champs who otherwise discourage having damage stats. Sylas just says "lol. lmao." To that and does several champions jobs better than they do because of how Hijack and his kit work.

As a wise man once said "He's melee"

Id sincerely rather have sylas as a counter-pick with high base numbers and low ap ratios then how he is now.

uhhhhhh remember on release when his w did bonus damage against lower hp targets and his e had a shield LUL

"wow! he deals half of my hp with a support item" -Tobias fate

His number are insane and he isnt even punished for stealing ad ults. Plus not one is gonna see a sylas and think "lets pick bad ults for sylas to steal" its not feasible

A funny thing on Sylas is how he can literally become a half of the transforming ult champs. for nidlee you can transform into her cat form forever and your passive still procs.

W is just one of the most unfun abilities in the game

Cuz he's a slayer. No matter if he's behind, once he gets his items he then can proceed to miss half of his abilities and still manage to one-shot you. Peak Rito balance.

Interestingly, Riot had to redesign their entire champion ability kit implementation to enable Hijack's existence. Sylas is probably the lone champion that required the most coding effort to bring to the game, as a result

Thank you for posting and making amazing content for league

I love ur content, its really good and i love ur edit style. Keep it up :))

I'm going to comment this before watching the video but I'm going to assume everyone plays him because he's a broken monkey brain champion who will never get any meaningful nerfs because he's popular and recently got a game where he's the main protagonist. He is one of the biggest fun killers in ARAM because once he gets even a bit of gold he's basically unstoppable if the person playing him has half a braincell. You know the "nerf" that Jinx got because of her popularity last patch where she got a slap on the wrist at worst? Yeah those are the kind of nerfs that Sylas will get and if his win rate somehow drops below 49% you can bet your ass they'll give him "just a little bump up" because he'll totally be unplayable without it.

Great quality video mate

Imagine you could play Rubick but guarantee stealing ults... the perfect counter-pick.

it doesnt matter what he is or what not and why an assassin/bruiser should not have such high base dmage AND such high scaling sure, some games you can have no ults or bad ults but honestly.. how often!?? there are only so many champs in the game, in a game least 2 and 3 ults you can use in a game on average. it is the common issue for modern assassins anyways, assassin level of base damage, mage level of scaling if not mroe, and control mage/tank levels of engage and teamfight cc. lets not forget this monster has a shield on release as well, yes on top of that 80% ap ratio heal.

Nice video man

There's no reason for why his ratios should be that high. If the enemy team has shit ultimate, that's your mistake for picking him in the wrong scenario.

Currently writing a report and I can see how much work you put into writing the script for this video. Awesome stuff

6:27 reminds me of the why everyone plays Pyrah/Mythrah. At base they're 90% of a champ and the extra stuff boosts them to like 150%

I just loved his lore, and gameplay was incredible fun too, suddenly i just had a ton of mastery points, goated champion

Probably one thing that people forget to mention is that he's just super fast with his combos, and fast champions are lots of fun

"hEs MeLEe" Meanwhile kassadin not existing until level +10 because he has no sustain aside mana and at best has one mana item with no regeneration. Also love mentioning how having a kassadin ult is "useless" as if being able to teleport across walls or teleport into a chain cast into an everfrost isn't ass cancer while being tankier than a bruiser. Like cmmon man, 420% AP on one rotation without an ult while stacking conq on top of it.

Just gotta say, using Stormblood OST to give the Rebellion touch to the video is chefs kiss

Really liked this video.

Hey really cool video. Are you going to release a video about neeko’s rework ?

You mention that most ultimates scale of ap thats why he can use them better than owners, but sylas makes all ultimates he takes scale with ap, even if it scales with ad normally.

You know. Id love to have a third version of these videos. we have: Why Everyone Plays. Why No One Plays. Id love to see a "Why theres an average amount of people that play this champion" or something. just to cover that middle ground of champs. Not sure how well it would perform, But id love to see it regardless. could highlight why some champs arent as popular as you might think. or why other champions might appear like hot garbage, but still get picked pretty often

it's like RITO is saying that most melee assassins don't fight the same enemies as Sylas so they don't deserve the overcompensation that Sylas gets for being melee vs ranged mages

as a sylas main yeah a big part of why i mained him was he wasnt too hard to pick up but i instantly had fun with his kit took me 10 games to not troll with him (meaning 10 games for his kit to click with me) and now i have 150k+ mastery on him and im still far from fully mastering him he has a LOT of options like do you e w e or do you keep your w and use it later (the less health you have the more you heal) if you are sure you can use it 2 times then w as soon as you can if your not sure then save it up for last its a beautiful dance with death when his ultimate works so well with his kit most of the time 50% of the ultimates feels natural on him and only 10% feels bad on him also another big part of why i mained him is his amazing lore he checks everything easy to learn hard to master ✅ fun gameplay ✅ replayability (meaning to play him over and over and not get bored) ✅ good lore ✅ is strong almost always ✅ is balanced (currently he is the most balanced state he ever is in so yeah he is ✅)

Could be because he is not played in low ranks, but it has been genuinely about a month since I last saw Sylas in any of my games.

I think a big contributer is that he is never the same. The games and teamfights will always play out difgerently. Alot of times, especially with more simple champs, when you keep playing the same champ it can get boting because it feels like youre doingvthe same thing over and over.

can't really play him too well but its very fun when i do try him.

When i think of sylas i think of a red crimsom banner, hammer and a sickle cross at each other and a red star with a golden border on top of it

It's kinda hard to balance sylas, his base kit has to be strong so that if the enemy team has shit ults that he's not useless but when he picks up an ult that's good on him he's suddenly really strong

Honorable mention swain ultimate, gl killing sylas with it

sylas is good at a lot of things that’s what i like. I can play him for one tap for poke for tanking or bruising or even for cc with after shock it’s insane versatility

Left out the part where any ult he takes is literally ALWAYS better than the champ he takes it from in terms of base value because of how he gains their bases scaling PLUS his own additional scaling. If they remove the additional scaling so that ults arent always better on him than the champ theyre designed for then MAYBE you could justify how strong his base kit is, but right now there is no reason for his stats to be that over tuned. If the argument is that a champ needs to be over tuned to be viable, then they need to change the way the champ functions, because thats essentially saying "we are willing to sacrifice the health of the game for 1/10 players' experience".

From the tumbnail i completely thought this was about talon

My biggest problem with Sylas is that he always seems to feed HIMSELF. As in, it doesn't matter how well his enemy plays. He'll find a way to get fed early game and just snowball. Never seen a Sylas player do badly.

You should consider dividing your video into a timeline with different sections, it would make navigating it a lot easier!

You should do a video on ksante as it has been perma picked in pro play while sustaining a good play rate in soloq

Hold on right there, 1:45. Before the new items teemo used to be a slayer/assasin. Not many people know this tho.

Man, it's 11:00 PM now here, i wanna watch the video but I'ma just sleep instead because i badly need it for tomorrow..

Could have mentioned play style though - with no frontline on the team everyone will expect you to go engage for them and you will just get crushed

I just don’t like how he can just is stronger. Simply. He just wins almost every fight. He does not even need to land his E and Q. He just has too much dmg in his W and passive. Also I feel that he isn’t hard at all

I’m contracting a tumour just watching the background gameplay

For me he feels like a assasin with training wheels and perfect for those who want to play assasin every now and then (like me). Strong lane. Sustain Easy to learn move set and combos. And usefull even if he falls behind in early game

Next April 1 you ought to release a video called "Why No One Plays League of Legends"

Riot games when you tell them not every champion should be ideal in every situation. Maybe if there's no good ults to steal he shouldn't be a good pick, how fucking crazy would that be.

Imo his ult needs to refer to the original ult owner’s ap - you get that ult, but without it being completely busted

I am intrigued at the fact that you have WEP Camille and Fiora (some of the top laners I see the least in my games) and you don't have Sion or Kayn (which I'd say are in top 3 in their respective roles

Hey Vars, can you do a "why no one plays Qiyana"? I feel like no one plays her, like one in every like 50 games (except for me ofc). I feel like she is underrated and few people pick her up. Even though the feeling of hitting a 4/5 man ultimate is incredible.

You didn't mention is base stats. Last time I checked Sylas has some of the most busted base stats and stat growth in the game.

the ability power seemingly random on alot of champs actually does hold a balance factor: baron buff. Even if it seems insignificant if ud take the ap ratio away from malphite itd be a nerf to his full tank playstyle aswell. Tho given itd be a small one.

music used at the end?

He's beyond a 200-years champ who gets to do everything better than whoever he steals from and also gets to heal half his HP AND take half of yours even if he's 1/6/0 Legit my vote for second-worst design in the game, right behind Yuumi

Not really relevant to the point of the video but, is Ahri really considered a burst mage now? I remember Riot specifically saying in the past she was not meant to be a burst mage, and was part of the bigger issue of DFG back in the day since it was turning nonburst mages like Ahri into burst mages

@Vars isnt Vayne also a marksman slayer?

Personally been spamming sylas jungle and as someone with add it’s the most fun I can have. Constantly engaging and if I’m not switched on I’ll immediately fall behind lol.

I am sylas jungle main and i can say that u know alot

Is the music for the video from FF14??

Everyone plays sylas because he has a total of 150 something ultimates to use

For 11:05 if the enemy team has a swain, sylas is officially 1v9 auto win champ

Wait, you don't think Twitch is the first marksman assassin?!? I feel he fits it better than Kai'sa honestly.

Sylas became the first mage slayer ironic

No joke, i got sylas apc the other day (d1 EUW),i was about to dodge, but didnt go through.He built heavy ap and absolutely destroyed the enemies

Yeah, in the original design, most abilities used ability power (surprise, surprise). But ultimately, design goals shifted over the approaching 2 decades of development.

When Sylas is stealing my karthus ult and using it more than me 😢

Love sylas hes my main champion I often blind pick him. I love viego too, if sylas is banned I go viego. Love these champs for what they can do and what they offer, just too much fun and skill expression too

1:34 Remember when Jhin was actually deserving of the "Assassin" class? Yeah, Vars neither clearly 💀.

"that would make him critically dependent on stealing a good ultimate" Yes pls do that. He is by far to me the most stupid champion currently in the game. And 9 times out of 10 he gets a good ult anyways so he just just currently hella overtuned.

MY BOYYYYY

Kaisa ult doesnt even work with him which i learned the hard way

What if they tuned the power of the stolen Ultimate with the stats of the champion hit?

The last serie shouod be why not every one playes.

Isn't Ahri also a mage slayer? She's a mage and assassin, as listed by Riot.

AD Ultimates will scale with AP but giving AD damage for Sylas. Tho its not a very good Scaling, caitlyn ultimate can be usefull for finishing running enemies, kassadin can give him an extra dash and udyr ultimate i got no idea how that thing works. Tho, its very hard finding a game where the abilities are literally unusefull for sylas.

Every time i see someone play sylas it looks fun but when i play him i have zero fun even when stomping

can u do one on ekko?

The main issue with Sylas jungle, at least judging by a little training tool practice, is that the poor man *dies to his camps* I think you actually have to use a potion just to survive a full clear with barely any health, and I don't think it's that fast of a clear either but I don't recall for sure. It just seems strange for Riot to literally designate him as a jungler but stiff him like that. And it would be an easy fix too, just let Kingslayer heal him off of monsters and not just champs. There, now he has jungle sustain and it doesn't impact lane. Letting his passive do full damage to monsters that aren't his direct target would go a long way too, he doesn't seem nearly as good at killing multi monster camps as you would expect.

Can’t wait for why everyone plays pyke

my biggest issue with sylas is really just a pet peeve probably developed because I hate playing against him but god I HATE that he just has the same ult laugh voiceline for every ult he uses, especially if its something like corki ult and i have to hear it like 4 times in a row

Common Sylas W

can the next champion of this series or "why no one playс" be Shen, I don't know in which one he belongs to more.

Bashing ap Gnar is not okay. Who else is going to auto attack you 6 times, then become huge, slow, and useless for the rest of the fight?

Imagine champion effectivness being heavily reliant on what kind of teamp comp they are going up against. Thank god that totally never happens. Seriously tho. I want to like Sylas but my problem with him is his overbuffed base kit. Throwing out his reliance on hijacking the right ultimate and using it well is basically throwing out his main part of skill expression. He ends up feeling more like a gimmicky flashy statchecker

He is played by evreyone because of his insane basic abilities that guarantee his succes in lane and later stages of the game even without an ult :)

i was so hyped for Sylas. when he was annouced i was so sure that he will be ap fighter- his passive was such a set up for lich bane rush and entire base kit was perfect for fighter class. unfortunetaly riot and community force that bursty playstyle with focus on ap scalling on R- it was kinda deal breaker at least for me