Chatting About Brand - #4 Highest Win Rate?!

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Brand

Release Year: 2011

Current Win Rate: 53.16% (#4)

Popularity: (3.89%) - Middle of the pack

Most Recent Changes:

Pillar of Flame

• Mana cost reduced to 70/75/80/85/90 from 70/80/90/100/110

Conflagration

• Mana cost increased to 70/75/80/85/90 from 60/65/70/75/80

Pyroclasm

• Mana cost reduced to 100/100/100 from 100/150/200

When Brand was first released, he was touted as the new Annie, better, faster, stronger, and generally superior in every way imaginable.

• He didn't need to charge his stun
• His level 1~3 damage was much higher
• His range didn't depend on a difficult to smart-cast cone
• He was FUN

After dominating most of Season One with his ridiculous damage output, Brand was hit by the nerfbat, falling into low play. With the release of the Zombie Brand skin he saw some more facetime, but for the most part, other mages like Ahri and Zyra stole the show with much better mobility and/or CC with similar early game and late game AOE burst damage.

However, with the most recent mana changes to Brand's kit, he's suddenly seen a massive surge statistically from a very average champion with below average win rate to...the fourth highest win rate in the game?

His popularity is still a little low, as it's been since he was last buffed (his ultimate prioritized enemy champions if hit an ablaze target), since assassins like Akali, Talon, and Katarina were extremely popular. As everyone knows, dodging skillshots is pretty easy with an instantaneous blink.

However, now that the assassins are out of favor (except for Zed), it seems like Brand's making a pretty decent comeback. While he still doesn't do well against champions like Kassadin, he's more than a match for popular weak early game mages like Twisted Fate and Nidalee.

I personally would like to see a resurgence in Brand play since I feel that he's a very fun champion to play, and also a very fun champion to play against. While his damage is strong when he hits, it's also very easy to understand what you have to do to prevent getting gimped...dodge skillshots. While this isn't always easy to do, it does make for some "OHHHHH" moments.

What do you guys think? Is Brand's win rate a fluke? Is he insanely strong right now? Comment below!

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July: Chatting About the Solo Queue Tier List

type='html'>There's been a lot of back and forth on the solo queue tier list lately, which I love! I'm not saying I'm always correct, which is why hearing feedback from you guys is definitely a strong component that moves the tier list day by day.

The tier list is evolving...

So this post is made to address some of the current "scandalous" champions that you guys think are *outrageously* high or pitifully low on the tier list and some Work In Progress (WIP) thoughts on movements.

Post in the comment section if I've missed anything~

Your Demands (Will update to keep in mind)
Move Up: Kha'Zix, Lissandra, Syndra, Ryze, Quinn, Swain, Karma, Rengar, Support Fiddlesticks, Fizz, Shen
Move Down: Wukong, Malzahar, Warwick
Add: Jungle Aatrox, Mid Soraka, Top Nunu, Gangplank Support, Swain Top

Thoughts
Building a tier list takes time. There are over 100 champions to order, and at the rate that champions and meta changes, it'll likely never be 100% accurate. Plus, arguing for your favorite champion is half the fun of tier lists!

I could always make a list purely based off of popularity, but then readers would always be behind the curve on the hidden secret OP champions.

Possible Ordering Methods
The way I see it, building a Tier List can be done through 4 ways:

• Win Rates
• Pick/Ban Rates
• Theorycrafting
• Observational Bias

Since any one of them alone is boring, my list is comprised of all 4 combined, with a heavy weighting towards solo queue win rates. Some of you have brought up that win rates are highly subjective, which I'm not sure what that means -  

Surely observational bias is more subjective than quantifying win rates over thousands of games no? For those of you wondering, yes, I do use LolKing's database whenever I refer to winrates and pick/ban rates. (They're awesome).

Comments on Unusual Champion Choices

Personally, whenever I read a tier list, it's never the FOTM champions that I find interesting, it's always the non-FOTM ones that strike me as "new-and exiciting" and encourage me to try something unique out. Of course I'm always hoping that my little secret that will someday snowball into an upset victory at a major tournament so I could say "you heard it here first!"

Examples:

Rammus - Homeguard boots + Mobility + Powerball + Teleport = Massive ganking speed unrivaled by any other champion.

Jungle Malzahar - Insane ganking power and ranged red buff compensated by a vulnerable early jungle.

Top Lane Kayle - Before Rincent posted his build, who knew that Kayle beat EVERYONE? 

Tier 2 and Tier 3 Champions

You'll sometimes see formerly popular champions drop into Tier 2 or Tier 3...everyone knows that they're strong, nobody wants to go toe-to-toe with them, and nothing they do catches people off guard. The element of surprise is definitely a strong factor in winning, especially in solo queue where players get cocky against non-FOTM champions.

They're viable, but nothing special anymore. *balanced* does not mean weak.

Balance.

FOTM Champions

Meanwhile, I know that I've dropped some popular champions like Lissandra, Syndra, Rengar, and Alistar into Tier 4. I've seen people say:

"You want a tier list? just look at the FOTM champions, those are Tier 1" 

I'm not that lazy.

Even though everyone thinks they're strong and they look strong on paper, considering how much they're played, they should really win over 50% of the time if they're actually strong champions...and they're not even *close* to that, and are instead competing with Olaf to see who can lose more.

Closing

I never shy away from a good argument, and in fact I enjoy it. I might be a little too busy to respond sometimes due to the sheer volume, but I try to do as much as I can and let you guys chat among yourselves on the rest. Just remember, keep it classy and have fun!

- SSJSuntastic, platinum scrub

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