If Shatter buffs allies for 10% of total armor, but Taric still loses armor on cast, then using the ability offensively would hurt Taric's ALLIES as well as Taric himself.

For those that haven't seen or heard, Shatter is on PBE with the following changes:

So, the armor aura is nerfed unless Taric builds at least 300 total armor (base plus items). I've been pretty heavily against the cries for Taric nerfs over the past few weeks, so this part of the changes makes me want to give GD a gigantic middle finger.

But, on top of the reduced aura effectiveness, Taric still loses armor when he activates Shatter. So, since Taric's aura buff is percent based, reducing Taric's armor also reduces his aura's ability to protect his allies. So Taric has to reduce his ally's armor buff to use Shatter offensively, making his allies more vulnerable to damage when he engages.

The other side of the coin is that Shatter will now deal more damage since it scales with both armor AND AP now.

So not sure how I feel about the tweak. On the one hand it reduces his aura's defensive power pretty noticeably and I hate that, but it's offensive power has gotten a buff so Taric's initiates and engages will potentially be stronger now, but also riskier since his aura is weaker.

I guess the "adding more risk to gameplay" trend continues on. We'll see what the final numbers are, but personally I'd like the percentage on Shatters aura to be at least 15% since Taric, as a support, can't really afford to build 300 total armor in an average match, or to have the aura ignore the reduction on Taric's self armor so he isn't exposing his allies to harm.

Imo taric should lose the whole buff when shatter is down so theres an actual tradeoff, not just shatter whenever you can because your aura buff is never lost.

Well, that brings up the same problem I have with the percent change in the first place. Taric screwing HIMSELF to activate Shatter is fine, that's the player's choice, but why should Taric's ALLY be punished for the decision with an armor buff loss?

Personally, I'm not too happy with these proposed changes. They're giving scaling on a champion who never gets to scale, and opening up a massive noobtrap for armor-stacking Tarics.

On the other hand, I'd have more incentive Frozen Heart Taric after Philo and Sightstone?

Ya that's a big issue too. I feel like 15% or maybe even 20% would be better since Taric isn't usually "allowed" heavy gold farm. But that's more of a "restrictive playerbase" issue than a Taric issue; high numbers like that would probably mean top lane Tarics who stack armor like crazy.

Does leveling shatter only change the cool down now?

It still buffs Taric's self-armor buff I believe. Plus the base damage.

This is a pretty hard nerf for Taric. His W was one of the things that made him a really solid support choice. You could max W while still in early game and give your teammates a nice armor buff.

Now you have to reach 300 armor just break even. 300 armor. On a support. With the right runes and masteries Taric hits about 95 armor at level 18. His passive grants 10% of his current armor, so to reach 300 armor he needs to buy 158 armor. There a couple of combinations you can use to achieve this, but none of them are cheap and you're definitely not going to be able to do it before late game if you're a support. In fact, in most games you probably won't get the chance to hit 300 armor.

I'm not even sure why they added a .3 ratio on armor to W. As support, you never used W for damage. You used it to debuff nearby enemies. At max rank with 300 armor, W does an additional 90 damage. What's the point? As support you build little (if any AP), and now you build even less since you need to build more armor. So now you deal 330 magic damage instead of 240 magic damage, and that is only late game if you manage to get 300 armor (which by that point most players have magic resist items).

Good, you shouldnt get 3 free aegises for no investment.

You lose a whopping 3 armor for activating Shatter. I think you'll live.

Also, there's no point in making the ability convert 15%; it's just going to get abused late game to give teams a permanent 40+ armor aura.