ITT: We discuss all things Jax.

Let's take a journey through Beta and right to the present. There once was an Armsmaster named Jax, his power was unrivaled. So powerful the league raised multiple sanctions against him, he even went so far as to restrict his own skills. To this day he fights with that trusty lamppost he forced upon himself to prove that he truly is the Armsmaster.

During Closed Beta, if the post I read aren't incorrect, Jax was able to chase you through all your towers, kill you at your fountain, and walk it off like nothing happened. Not to mention dodge's lack of diminishing returns. It didn't take Riot long to catch on and rectify the situation, Jax was brought down to Earth for the moment.

During Open Beta he remained reasonably powerful but this was during what I call "League of Melee Carries." Were you melee? Were you a carry? Well, you were in luck. HP stacking was easy to get and Warmogs was a common item on carry champions, casters were irrelevant and champions like Jax & Tryndamere gave you nightmares.

Then release came along and for awhile we all forgot about the Armsmaster. Let's fast forward to January 2010. By this time cleanse, flash, hp stacking, hp regen, damage, snowball items, and grossly overpowered champions have been nerfed or reworked. There were still issues but they weren't as absurd as Tryndamere soloing 5 people, Deceive having 1200 range, Kayle granting 6 seconds of invulnerability, promote stacking, or Black Shield cleansing all debuffs. By now we were mostly satisfied and people were calling for reworks/buffs of old champions and nerfs for annoying/"unfun" champions.

Enter Jax, The Armsmaster. Jax was no stranger to nerfs, he had fallen out of use because of nerfs and physical DPS Jax was passed over for AP or Tank Jax. It didn't take much to convince Riot Jax needed a rework but I guess the saying "be careful what you wish for" holds true. There were naysayers, they believed re-working Jax would just result in nerfs that would leave him weaker than his pre-rework state. Were they wrong? I can't say but I do know one thing: There are two ways to build Jax now: Hybrid AP/AD or Tank. Pure AP is dead and Pure Physical DPS just gives Tibbers lunch. Frozen Mallet, an Item Jax forgo for most of his rework has become staple again and straight Guinsoo|Double Elixir simply doesn't cut it anymore.

Introductions aside, what are your thoughts on Jax?

The biggest, best nerfs Jax needed were making special abilities that could be dodged (Gold Card, PaC, Parrley, etc.) undodgable, AP Ratio tweaks, and removing the heal when he boosts his health through other means.

Everything else was unnecessary and only served to make Jax, as he is, a lackluster melee carry who's still viable, just nowhere near your best choice.

He was without a doubt the most hated hero in League of Legends for a while, even after these nerfs.

late game hyper carry that can rape any1 1v1 w/ rylais (for the jump slow to catch the faster champs). same with olaf

I think he's a really cool character, but I'm so bad with him. -_-'
I dunno, I think he's on the level of the other melee carries now. But this could just be me, as I've never really had a successful game with him. =/

I used to play him pretty often. If you don't have like amumu or morgana on your team Jax is brought down so fast in teamfights.

Nice text , enjoyed reading it .
As Jax is now , i see him as a very stable , high dps champion , which can be extremely powerful if his skills and items are set up in the right order . Depending on which people you go up against , first blood is pretty much in Jax's hands . Combo'ing his W and Q is a deadly cocktail too if you're planning on initiating into the smaller fights , or have to kill somebody running off