[Game][Feedback][Major] Season 3: Ionic Spark vs. Statikk Shiv and why it is terrible

There is controversy here I believe on the usefulness of Statikk Shiv and the removal of Ionic Spark.

I will go into length on why Statikk Shiv is a terrible item and why Ionic Spark is actually much more useful for Season 3.


Ionic Spark:

Item cost 2100g (575g)

+50% attack speed
+250 health
Unique Passive: Every fourth autoattack unleashes a chain lightning, dealing 125 magic damage to up to 4 targets. Targets cannot be hit twice by the same lightning. (400 bounce range)



Statikk Shiv:
Item Cost: 2450
Recipe Cost: 525

+40% Attack Speed
+20% Critical Strike Chance
+6% Movement Speed
UNIQUE Passive: Moving and attacking builds Static Charges. At 100 Charges, your next attack expends the Charges to deal 100 magic damage to up to 4 targets. This damage can critically strike.


With Ionic spark, you paid for health and attack speed with an added bonus passive to deal extra magic damage.


When comparing to wits end and using 4 auto attacks. You would deal 168 damage with wits end compared to Ionic sparks 125 damage. While the margin of damage is 43, you bought ionic spark if you really needed an extra cushion of health with a bonus of attack speed. Where as, the other option was wits end for the attack speed and extra magic resist.

For season 2, the players chose that wits end was far superior in the season 2 environment because there was better choices for the item slots compared against ionic spark.

Riot said they felt there was no need for Ionic spark because its under usage on champion builds and wonky desired stats for the champions to begin with. The idea was that people were buying it for the passive and disregarded it because the stats were undesirable which they translated as a "newb trap".


So Statikk Shiv was the new alternative to this flaw.

With attack speed, crit chance and a little movespeed speed it looks promising on paper. But then the passive is just terrible.

With internal testing on statikk shiv I have found that:

- You must either get 10 auto attacks to complete the charges
- or move constantly for 7-8 seconds
- Moving and attacking with stutter stepping takes roughly the same amount of time if not longer to achieve the passive proc
- While not reliant on autoattacks, if all you did was move. You could have a for sure mechanic to have the proc ready. But is much more inconsistent in a optimal environment of combat


You basically took Ionic Spark, desirable for the passive and unfavored because of the stats in Season 2.

Took the item, and made it completely backwards!

Statikk Shiv for the desirable stats, but unfavored for the passive.

Season 3 already shows so many options and viable build paths for champions tailored not only for the champions, but for the playstyle of the player with niche items and builds waiting to be discovered.

In season 3, health is going to be MUCH more desirable along with attack speed.

With all these items floating around on the PBE and waiting to be sent to the live servers, I urge you at Riot.

Do not remove Ionic Spark for season 3. There are so many options for the game.

By removing Ionic spark now before it has had a chance to see how things prevail in a new season environment with a complete overhaul on masteries, runes, penetration changes, item costs, new build path options from the start of the game, and lets not forget a new jungle change!

You cannot foresee what will happen in the meta of the game with how much has changed to how the players will now adapt to it. And believe me, everyone will have to shift the way they play from here on out in season 3.

We now have so many niche items to choose from. There is no reason to remove another niche item before it has been play tested more.

When Statikk talked about the reasons for removing Ionic Spark he stated that it was mainly about the passive not scaling (and the "wonky" stats). All they need to do is put in a ratio on the passive like they have done with Malady. My suggestion would be to make it have a small scale off max hp (say 1%?) this way the stats are nolonger "wonky" and suit the champions that used to buy it (such as Shen and Volibear) and open it up as a viable option to all auto attacking tanks/bruisers like Mundo, Irelia, Olaf, Sejuani, Warwick and many more. Even if they make it so you can maybe upgrade it to attain the ratio and perhaps more hp or as so it's of more mid-late game use.

TL;DR: Put Ionic back give it a ratio on an upgrade.

The Shiv is good, I think. Its PBE after all.

It could use one little buff, tho. If you make a critical hit, the amount of charge that you get from the attack should have your crit damage modifier applied. i.e. x2 or x2.5

IMO, Shiv doesn't feel like it's meant to be a direct replacement for Ionic Spark. It fills a completely different niche, the AoE AD Carry, a possibility that has been opened up thanks to Runaan's Hurricane. These two items combined deal a lot of sustained damage to a team. A complete build in my head would be Berserker's Greaves (Furor), Shiv, Hurricane, BoRK, PD, BT/Mercurial Scimitar. Shiv will proc on about every 4th attack and you have decent crit chance from Shiv/PD to multiply its passive. BoRK synergizes extremely well with Hurricane. BT would be for more damage, but MS can give you a good safety net with the QSS passive.

Shiv is better due to the stats behind it and the cost and you dont have to AA 4 times to get the passive

as the OP states it often takes more than 4 hits to trigger the passive. Also the stats don't fit on any champion, the stats would be good on ADC but the passive is something that's a waste on them and visa verse for tanks.

Actually... Statikk Shiv and Youmuu's Ghostblade work wonders together.

Grab Wukong or Xin or Irelia and get both of those items with any boots and then the movespeed addition.

You pretty much rush straight at them with the extra damage proccing twice.
That's 200 damage, which can crit. ATLEAST twice, mind you.

This here is what we call a "noob trap" its items that look good but in reality other choices are much stronger. There is a reason that there are 0 melee AD carries, its because they can't get away with building that squishy against a competent opponent. While the build you outlined may do ok, it doesn't mean its actually on a level playing field with the builds that the comp players have been running on Irelia (wits end, trinity, GA etc). There's a reason people worry about a "20 minute Trinity" because early and mid game are when it's most effective. Wasting time buying things like Ghost blade and Shiv are just going to slow down the core build and be a weaker replacement ie a noob trap. I'm not here to argue whether or not you can fit one into a build some how, I'm here to argue that other options are stronger 99% of the time and therefore the item is useless and offer viable alternatives.