Hey everyone, Konduit here. Today I've got a short article for you discussing the ups and downs of Swain's Mid-Year-Mage-Update. Rather than discussing winrates or aggregate statistics (though I will mention this here and there), I'll be analyzing the Master Tactition from a game design standpoint, noting how and where his play patterns have shifted and the impact of the update on his play experience in the holistic sense.

If I were to offer my opinion on the Swain rework in just a sentence, I would say: "The rework diminished Swain's treademark reliability, but in return granted a greater depth of decision-making in his gameplay as well as statistical power as compensation."

The lynchpin of Swain's update was the suite of changes to his 'Q' Skill, Decrepify. Previously, Decrepify was a single-target, tethered damage-over-time (DoT) ability that applied a slow, a primary part of his damage output in the lategame. The updated Drecipfy deploys Beatrice (Swain's pet bird) in an area, and Beatrice applies the same single-target, tethered DoT to the closest enemy (with champions as the priority). In brief, the new Decrepify deals significantly more damage than the previous iteration of the skill, but ONLY if you can hold an opponent in the (relatively small) AoE for an extended duration of time.

This change widened Swain's options and expanded his play patterns significantly. Now, Swain can deploy Decrepify as an extended-range engage tool, or even as an extended-range disengage tool (creating a zone that disincentivizes enemies from following - a dimension the previous Swain with a targeted Decrepify didn't have access to). Decrepify also provides significantly increased waveclear potential, as Beatrice switches targets when her previous one dies, in addition to doing double damage against minions. Swain can now pick up CS from a fairly safe distance, and combined with his tendency to max Nevermove (W) second, clearing waves has never been so (relatively) easy. This means that Swain can play a traditional mage's waveclearing role when defending turrets, which was a big problem for him before the rework.

Swain's new Q, Image credit to surrenderat20

The primary downside of the new Decrepify is that it is less reliable as a damage source. The previous iteration of the skill was renowned for its reliability in combination with Torment (Swain's E) - you always had a dependable 2 spell combo that dealt a significant portion of your damage...sometimes you didn't even need to hit your Nevermove, you could just E-Q-R! The new Decrepify gains a great deal of flexibility with the disadvantage of losing its trademark dependability - it can be avoided quickly, dodged (as there's a slight travel time for Swain's bird to arrive at the AoE), and gives the opponent a great deal of counterplay to avoid its (admittedly immense) damage potential. Some of my opponents have even charged through the AoE and jumped on top of me; in doing so, they not only avoided my primary damage source but also put themselves in melee range where they can easily dish out damage (with the previous iteration, the bird's tether originated from Swain's location, so diving melee attackers couldn't attack Swain without taking the full Decrepify duration).

Despite its drawbacks, the new Decrepify brought a great deal more flexibility (and potential power, as the damage ceiling on the ability is remarkably high) to Swain - and from a gameplay perspective, losing a little reliability is more than acceptable when the benefits gained are so attractive. Swain's other, more recent changes in patch 6.10 (namely Ravenous Flock's healing being calculated pre-mitigation, i.e. before magic resistance reduction) have given him some additional tankiness and beef to stick around in fights and provide some fallback if the now-less-reliable Decrepify goes awry.

Swain, before the MYMU, occupied a very odd niche in the game as a tanky, DoT mage. In return for some of his unique strengths (high reliability of execution, tankiness, etc.) he lacked a few of qualities that more or less define traditional mages - strong waveclear potential and zone control skills. If we were to consider Swain as on the far left of the spectrum and a traditional mage on the far right, I'd say that the update placed him in the middle of the scale, and then 10 units upward! Swain seems to have gained some of core mage traits that he was lacking, while still retaining a great deal of what made Swain the unique DoT mage.

After 6.10, Swain's winrate skyrocketed to the highest in the game (in contrast to the lowest in the game the patch prior when the MYMU arrived), and he received some nerfs in 6.11. These seem to be pretty appropriate as his damage-soaking capabilities with pre-mitigation healing are quite strong - but I've no doubt that Swain will remain the strong, newly minted dynamic mage that he's become (we'll see what the LCS pros do with him when the 6.11 nerfs hit tournaments).

That's all for today, I hope you enjoyed the article. If you'd like to discuss anything League, have comments/questions/feedback on this article, or just want to say hi, feel free to tweet me @k0nduit and I'll get back to you.

Until next time.

Konduit

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