This tank meta has so many OP champs, it's impossible to ban them all

In League of Legends there comes a time when the meta is just dog shit. Just pure, unadulterated nonsense that makes the game absolutely no fun to play. Even when all you want to do is play League of Legends, you are reminded that hey, maybe this meta is terrible, so you better just log out.

We are in such a place at this very moment, friends. Tanks have run rampant in our matches, and Maokais and Mundos alike are unkillable monstrosities. Not only do tanks like this just extend the game forever and ever, they become must bans in order to save your own sanity.

Jumping into a game and spamming bans for every tank you can think of is already a negative experience, but when you focus on one role alone (which is practically mandatory at the moment), you leave way for the same semi-power pick to get picked up over and over and over again.

If you have played a game in the last several weeks, chances are you have seen a Tristana. In a lot of ways, the pick makes a ton of sense. When a tank is always knocking on your door, why not pick a champion that can jump away or blast the enemy back. Not only that but Trist does ludicrous damage in the late game, which you are almost guaranteed to hit. She is the perfect pick to deal with the current problem.

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Tristana being powerful isn’t actually an issue. The real problem here is that Tristana isn’t powerful enough. If Trist was OP not only would she be able to quell the tank meta a little (while also bringing up the hypercarry meta, if the items that hypercarrys build are good than so are most hypercarrys), but she would also get banned.

Right now Trist sits in that sweet spot. When you pop into a game all you can think of is, “Oh god, if I have to play against Maokai again, I am going to uninstall this game forever,” so you ban Maokai. Then you think of the dozen other Maokai adjacent tanks that should also be banned. With a sigh of relief, you still clench up trying to think if there are any more OP tanks you couldn’t ban. When the enemy (or your ally) picks up Trist, you just go, “Oh, again?” It’s boring and repetitive, especially for bot lane players.

League is a beautiful game and we all love it, but it is important to critique the things we love most. League has such a tight ecosystem that when one aspect is toxic, it can bleed out and pollute everything. Tank picks make games long, hyper carries are useful in long games, tanks hurt non-mobile hyper carries, Tristana is the most mobile hyper carry, Tristana is picked every game. This all adds up to make games long, boring and repetitive.

7.16 is one of my least favorite patches in recent memory and it makes me nervous considering that Worlds is so close. With the absolute destruction of so many damage dealers this patch, I am seriously hoping that things will be improved. I certainly don’t want to play three weeks of tank meta in 7.17 and I am pretty damn sick of Tristana.

I jungle tanks. I have played tanks top. I like tanks. But please, bury this patch alive and let’s all move on.

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