I know and understand that balance is a very sensitive and difficult matter in most if not all games. I acknowledge the effort of Riot in all patches to try to balance the game while still making it interesting for all players. The fact that out of the 110 champions that currently exist, a large handful of them have never / will never see professional level play in their current condition saddens me, though this is not the point to my topic, merely an intro.

The topic of discussion I would like to inquire on today is what I refer to as the Ashe-Teemo Debacle. I would like to first state my case via linking and describing particular skills from their kits.

[CENTER]Ashe[/CENTER]

[CENTER]Teemo[/CENTER]

Do you see the fruit of my confusion? I fail to see the balance in making the extra damage from Teemo's ability virtually free (only costing him skill points) while make Ashe's ability that only causes crowd-control effects to cost mana per attack. I do not aim to make Ashe's ability free as I feel that would upset balance more than current. My aim is to get ones to consider the idea of Teemo's Toxic Shot to have a cost to it of some sort also, or some drawback to it. As it stands there is no reason not to take it at every available level-up.

I suppose another argument along these lines could be made in regards to Cho'Gath's Vorpal Spikes ability, though my view on that is that the damage from that is avoidable (perhaps not when he is directly attacking you, more research needed), scales less well with ability power, and creates less overall upset in balance as Cho'Gath is not primarily played as an auto-attack heavy champion.

In conclusion I would like to thank those of you who read and considered this for your time, and I would like to also welcome any and all constructive comments and discussion on this topic.

You can't compare Ashe's Q to Teemo's E. They serve two different purposes, one provides constant CC the other provides damage, you might as well compare Anivia's stun to Taric stun while we are at it too. Side note, when comparing ANY you need to look at ALL sides of the argument, not just focus in on one and go like "OMG, this champion is OP compared to this one." Not how it works. Like you have to take in the fact like Ashe has a good 100 range on Teemo, has two forms of CC, and also has a stun that can max up to 3.5 seconds.

teemos poison is just damage. Ashe's slow is is a slow. Slows are more expensive than damage especially when the slow can be refreshed over and over. Refreshing CC, or permaslows in this case, is even more expensive. Then you gotta look at the rest of the kit and consider her champion type. She's the carry with the most reliable stun in the game with 2 different abilities that can reveal area's within the fog of war AND she has a gold income steroid AND she has much better aa range than teemo and can autoattack in situations where teemo often cannot.

Teemo on the other hand is a support scout with a weak autoattack and no particularly hard CC.

I respect your opinion and input though I think your logic is very one-sided in view. You claim that Ashe deserves the downside because of her ability to create CC. But looking at Teemo's kit, his ability causes just as much while giving him just as many steroids. He can heavily increase his move speed at will, while being able to slow and BLIND opponents. Blind being one of the most powerful 1v1 CC's in the game (in my opinion). It's not a matter of comparing their kits though, I'm simply inquiring as to why his extra damage should be "free". As stated in original post, I feel Ashe's Frost Shot having a cost is completely justified as I do believe a perma-slow is scary. I do however disagree with Toxic Shot having no cost, no internal cooldown; No reason not to take it 1,3,5,7,9 no matter how you're building him.

That MS increase is rather subpar with most champions MS increases far surprassing him, the only advantage his has is that he gets a half way MS increase if he isn't being attacked, his MS increase also has the largest CD in the game for MS increases.

He can't slow on command and you have to run into a mushroom and the general consense for most players actually is that blind one of the weakest CCs in the game. The problem is blinds only stop AAs, they don't stop spells, just AAs and not even the applied CC of the AAs, just the damage. The fact that every champion in the game has moves to use outside of their AAs stops its useful, the only really advantage it has is that it last for so long. Though end game, that 2.5 seconds of useless ADC is a godsend.

Then why aren't you comparing to Fiora, Cho Gath's, Sion's, or Master Yi's extra damage, your post is being bias as well.

you are overlooking the fact of teemo's range.

you have to be purposely ignoring the fact of his god awful range that puts him in immense danger, easily punished, its pretty much suicide in teamfights. In lane every, and i mean every ADC has more range than teemo and/or can out poke him.

sivir has small range, but she can wave clear better + poke with Q at the same time and spellsheild his blind.

Blind only stops auto attacks it does not stop AD skills from hitting. ie: condem, volley, any and every ADC ability..you get point.


If you are bottom lane as teemo and your jungler comes to gank the enemies while theya re over extended, your 1 auto attack with poison wont really help secure a kill when they can easily run away, ashe can perma slow someone reducing the range of which they can gain ground, taking an extra 3 seconds to get to their tower can result in a kill otherwise you would have not been able to have.

it also lets her kite some assassins and 90% of bruisers all day long, and thats after they manage to squeeze through her volley pokes (usually its impossible, volley has like a cd of 2.4)


Teemo slow is not reliable, idiots walk into bushes when theirs an enemy teemo, smart enemies do not, oracles and pink wards -> your shrooms, your slow is not reliable,

Ashe has an on demand stun / teamfight initiation, permaslow, long range aoe poke dmg +thats also an aoe kiting spell, built in clairvoyance and increased gold gain,

i'd gladly sacrifice 8mana per shot for that...and why do you even care...you arent suppose to farm with it on anyways...you toggle it on actively only when you need to, right before a gank/commitment for a kill, the mana spent on having a perma slow is never an issue.


your logic would apply to singed having his 15mana cost per second reduced to 0 for having his poison on because teemo's poison is free.

As for Cho'Gath's I did cover, Sion's does have a cost. Master Yi's has a cooldown (only in effect while the skills is off cooldown). And Fiora's bonus damage is flat and minuscule in comparison.


Let me try to put my thoughts into a different sense and compare rough gold values of the effects of the abilities.

Frost Shot at max level applies 35% slow over 2 seconds which is just barely better than the passive ability of a frozen mallet costing a total of 3300g to build (which even gives other bonuses on top of that passive including +30AD and +700HP)

Toxic Shot's bonus damage at max level comes out to 170 without accounting for AP. This is very nearly 4 extra B.F. Swords worth of damage totalling to about 6200g worth of damage.

On top of the lack of effect of the Frost Shot in gold comparison it also costs mana, while a much more gold efficient Toxic Shot is free. I am being far from biased as I have looked into this from many different angles and have no particular taste or distaste towards either champ. This is simply a helpful and inquisitive thread about balance. I am not raging, I am not claiming something OP, just seeking answers and opinions.

You didn't factor in MR and let's be honest, end game, how much is 170 damage REALLY going to be? But when it boils down to it, if it was honestly too strong, why has Teemo only seen one tournament game since since last year where Ashe has seen a plethora? You even say it yourself, to get a permanent slow, most people have to spend 3300 gold, she gets it for free.

But you are still ignoring what we said before, you can't look at one piece of a kit and say something is too strong, you have to look at the champion as a whole.

170dmg over a duration is different than 170 instantly

you need to divide total damage / sec,

damage over time is hurt by innate health regen or even an hp pot, lifesteal etc

damage over time when speaking in a 1on1 case isnt very life threatening, and since it's ap damage it cannot crit, so its valued way less than 4 BF swords.

AD is priced high for a low ammount for a reason (1650g for 45ad compared to 1600g for 80ap)

why do you ask?
AD is always 1:1,
you get 45 AD, your auto attacks always do 45more damage, before being mitigated by armor, it suffers from 1 penalty/reduction (armor)
AD damage (autos) can also crit.

AP is rarely 1:1, AP suffers from -RATIOS- on skills
you spend 1600g for 80ap, you do not get 80damage on your spell.

your spell takes a % of it, sometimes its nice and high with a 0.8-1 or as low as .2 or .3

let's say its generous and you get .8..not only is that ''80damage'' you bought reduced to 64 damage towards your spell it also suffers a second penalty, magic resist
and anything ap based, cannot crit

I accept your inputs though I reject your reasonings as erroneous or irrelevant. That's not to be taken as offensive as I mean nothing personal by it I am simply stating my opinions on the matter and I completely understand if you reject my reasonings or logic.

Wrong, I can and that is in fact a valid way of balancing or searching for imbalance.

Irrelevant as, like I previously stated, I agree with how Ashe is set up, her cost is justified and balanced. Teemo's ability was the root of the topic and your post roughly covered nothing important on that aspect.