Item Preview - The Storm

Item Preview - The Storm

Another item preview has just been posted! Make sure to check out our red tracker for an easy way to follow the Q&A, or wait for tonight's news roundup.

Hey guys. If you haven’t already, check out my initial post about the itemization changes you’ll be seeing during the preseason. Today I thought I’d reveal a new item we can’t wait for you to get your hands on.

Ranged Carries traditionally have had the role of completely and utterly dominating a single target through high-capacity damage. However, many of our AD carries also have a substantial amount of Area of Effect damage that they currently are unable to specialize into. This leads them to an interesting paradox – I am a carry with strong Area of Effect damage, but I must itemize single target damage to stay relevant.

What if we could give you an alternative?

Runaan’s Hurricane
  • (Ranged Only)
  • +60% Attack Speed
  • UNIQUE Passive: Your basic attacks fire minor bolts at 2 nearby targets, each dealing (50% of Total Attack Damage) physical damage. These apply on-hit effects. 


First of all, let’s examine what this item actually does:



Hurricane allows your ranged basic attacks to fire secondary bolts at nearby targets. These bolts cannot critically strike but can trigger your other on-hit effects, such as Varus’ Blighted Quiver in the above example. This allows characters like Varus or Miss Fortune, already strong Area of Effect damage dealers, to specialize into Area of Effect damage if they’d like to do so.

Let’s delve further into specifics:

1. Hurricane triggers each time you attack.
2. Hurricane is not an on-hit proc, nor does it trigger off of spells or abilities like Mystic Shot or Double Up that apply on-hit effects.
3. Hurricane deals 50% of your total attack damage.
4. Hurricane applies the full effect of on-hit effects with each bolt.

Taking this further, let’s explore how Hurricane interacts with various champion abilities:

  • Varus – Applies Blighted Quiver on everyone hit, which can then get triggered by his other spells.
  • Caitlyn – Gains one stack of Headshot for each target hit. Fires Headshot only at the primary target.
  • Graves – Reduces the cooldown of Quickdraw for 2 seconds for each target hit.
  • Miss Fortune – Applies and stacks Impure Shots on every target hit. Activating Impure Shots will apply Grievous wounds to every target hit.

Champions that synergize poorly with Hurricane would be:

  • Ezreal – Doesn’t really have any effects that synergize with Hurricane.
  • Vayne – Silver bolts only applies on the primary target and requires consecutive hits to proc, thus Hurricane is mostly wasted.

We hope that Hurricane opens up some interesting build paths for AD carries looking to specialize in area of effect damage. While Hurricane certainly isn’t for every ranged character, we do hope that Hurricane allows carries to diverge from the standard path of single target damage in favor of a more AoE centric build they can use to gun down multiple opponents at the same time.

-Xypherous

Comments

  • Wraith
    monkyyy's avatar
    • Posts: 129
    #68 monkyyy Posted 11/15/2012 9:18:44 PM

    is lichbane considered ad or on-hit?

    well either way i smell abuse, think of ap kogs w

  • Baron Nashor
    Dj0z's avatar
    • Posts: 656
    #69 Dj0z Posted 11/15/2012 9:31:40 PM

    doesn't work with LBane.

  • Wraith
    monkyyy's avatar
    • Posts: 129
    #70 monkyyy Posted 11/15/2012 10:12:22 PM

    really? how does lichbane work if its not a stat boost or a on-hit effect

  • Baron Nashor
    Dj0z's avatar
    • Posts: 656
    #71 Dj0z Posted 11/15/2012 10:27:41 PM

    Riot calls it a "on-next-attack-effect" rather than on-hit. TF's stun card too. Those ignore Hurricane.

  • Wraith
    jim1608's avatar
    • Posts: 126
    #62 jim1608 Posted 11/15/2012 12:44:07 AM

    Twitch will love this

  • Caster Minion
    IconX's avatar
    • Posts: 37
    #58 IconX Posted 11/14/2012 8:25:46 PM
    Has Riot mentioned what the recipe/price is? I can only assume it would be a recurve bow + dagger, as this item is pure AS other than the passive... no damage, armor, health, etc. Also, what's the range for the passive (i.e. "nearby" targets)?

    Unless they nerf PD to the ground so that this completely out-shines it, I can't see this being built in too many games. First, it's champ dependent, so that already eliminates it from a couple ADs. Second, it's clearly a late-game, team fight based item; if you're against a team comp that revolves around being a bit spread out, this item loses effectiveness.
  • Melee Minion
    Tyranomaster's avatar
    • Posts: 6
    #43 Tyranomaster Posted 11/14/2012 5:32:24 PM

    Teemo... Poison...  Dear god...  AP on hit teemo...

  • Caster Minion
    pvans's avatar
    • Posts: 39
    #42 pvans Posted 11/14/2012 5:03:39 PM

    I don't see how this helps Ashe that much at all.  She can already perma kite teams with Volley, every 4 seconds.  In fact, I believe it leaves Ashe farther behind than other ADCs.

    This actually opens up more build paths for AD carries - notice how they mentioned it applies on hit effects - like Phage / Frozen Mallet.  It would actually allow ADCs other than Ashe to perma kite teams, but use their other advantages.

    Maybe you decide to build on hit Kog with a Frozen Mallet (or Phage probably, since you will be spitting so fast, you will proc the slows non-stop) and a Storm.  Now you're permaslowing the other team.  It may also synergize with whatever they decide to do to the MBR (if there is another rendition of it).

    I think something like this would work well on Tristana as well.  Why pick Ashe when you can build Phage on Trist with the Storm and have all the utility she already has?

  • Caster Minion
    SpacianEU's avatar
    • Posts: 46
    #41 SpacianEU Posted 11/14/2012 4:53:15 PM

    Depending on it's cost, it is a very viable item, at least on some champions (in particular Kog, Varus and Graves). Kog and Varus gain heavy AoE-%-health-damage, while Graves gets extremely mobile by having E up every like 3 AAs. Furthermore, it may work pretty well with new Black Cleaver and Blade of the Ruined King.

    Overall there seem to be some great new combinations and builds available for ADCs then. It may turn out as 1 special build for every AD, but that's still way better than now, having almost the same build for pretty much all ADs, only changing the build order around (BT+IE+TF/PD+Boots+defensiveItem+PD/LW).

    After the changes, just imagine Kog with The Storm + Blade of the Ruined King, so you get huge AoE-%-health-damage, while you may pick up The Storm + Trinity Force on Graves, because you dash every 3 seconds anyway and you get even more mobility and kiting potential. Ezreal will probably stay with Trinity Force + Infinity Edge, just as Ashe will probably go Infinity Edge + Phantom Dancer (if Phantom Dancer still offers most of the current stats, but Ashe needs mobility [MS] for kiting, ATS and Crit for DPS). That's 4 different builds for 4 different ADs then, while we got like 2 builds rights now (IE+PD for Graves, Kog and Ashe and IE+TF for Ez).

  • Caster Minion
    dreammorpheus's avatar
    • Posts: 26
    #40 dreammorpheus Posted 11/14/2012 4:53:00 PM

    Will it get Sheen/Tf procs?

    We might see the return of MBR builds too. This will be really rape on Kogmaw.

  • Cannon minion
    ChaosBloodterfly's avatar
    • Posts: 64
    #44 ChaosBloodterfly Posted 11/14/2012 5:45:10 PM

    I would imagine not. It's like the new tiamat, only based off your AD (and Arpen/their armor I guess), nothing else changes damage.

  • Cannon minion
    TheFaller's avatar
    • Posts: 72
    #39 TheFaller Posted 11/14/2012 4:35:00 PM
    "Graves – Reduces the cooldown of Quickdraw for 2 seconds for each target hit." He defenitely is gonna need a nerf pretty soon.....
  • Cannon minion
    ChaosBloodterfly's avatar
    • Posts: 64
    #46 ChaosBloodterfly Posted 11/14/2012 5:46:32 PM

    It's actually one. The rioters sometimes get numbers mixed up. 14s CD, 4s AS boost, 3s reduction for each AA (assuming there are 2 targets to splash). 4 AAs to have 100% AS uptime.

  • Cannon minion
    TheFaller's avatar
    • Posts: 72
    #61 TheFaller Posted 11/14/2012 10:15:28 PM

    point being, not only will he easily have 100% AS uptime, but also will become the new "kassadin" version of AD carry. (dash every 4 seconds)

    As if one wasnt annoying enough to chase after, now there will be2 of them :\

  • Melee Minion
    Blastronaut's avatar
    • Posts: 8
    #38 Blastronaut Posted 11/14/2012 4:15:57 PM

    So is AoE meta making a triumphant return, then? This thing looks absolutely insane on characters like Kog'Maw and Vayne.

  • To post a comment, please login or register a new account.