AP karma is actually rather amazing, the problem is getting people to let you play her in mid lane.

Its the fact that her level 6 abilities are equivalent to other champion's level 5 abilities.

I agree. Karma's performance is a statistical fact. She doesn't have the raw damage and hard CC of other AP champs. Her heal and shield and speed buffs are underpowered compared to everybody. And then she has mana issues and high cooldowns.

I mid Karma quite a bit. Usually successfully, using the Mantra shield, Heavenly Wave combo. The champs I'm having issues with are Morde (can't do enough damage to get past his shield due to cooldowns and mana issues), Akali (she has no mana, huge damage, stealth attacks and escapes, closer, practically non-existent cooldowns), Kat (huge damage, closer/escape, no mana. massive OP ult that Karma can't counter), Lux (range above 1000, hard CC to prevent closing), Ryze (hard CC, and can get damage boost from mana items, that's nice for him). Champs that bring a couple health potions usually mean I run out of mana before I can get their health down, and then they can just walk away since they have hard CC or escapes.

I've tried her as a support, and she's underwhelming. She does little damage with support setups, and has a very underwhelming heal, plus short range.

I'm thinking retooling her W is needed. Having it DAMAGE THE TARGET suddenly makes it useful. Since her Q is such short range, make her W a closer, consuming the spirit bond and moving Karma to the target on a second use, and a escape by allowing it to work on wards and towers. The current speed/slow is not enough to deal with the closers and CC that most champions have. This also allows Karma to be a more effective support as she can sneak up in the bushes to harass and escape when it gets tough. A small range increase would be good too.

Her main attack is her Q, but the cooldown is 6 seconds. Akali cooldowns at level 5: Q:4, E:3, R:1. So Akali Rs in, drops a smoke screen, R's again, Qs, Es, Rs again... then stands around safe in her smoke while her Q and E reset. Karma can Q, R, E... then stand around like a tool getting hammered. So I think a change to her Q cooldown is justified. Or maybe nerf Akali? I dunno. Your call, Riot. Oh, and Akali's Essence of Shadow has a lower cooldown than Karma's Mantra... That's nice for her.

I find her passive to be underwhelming as well. You get stronger right as you become a massive target in a teamfight? Doesn't sound like much of an advantage, especially as all your abilities will likely be on cooldown at this point. I don't really have an alternative I like.

So keep the mana usage and lack of hard CC and two Mantra charges (Akali gets three Essence of Shadow with her shorter cooldown, btw), since we don't want to make Karma OP, like Akali... But give her a third ability that can do damage reliably and a closer/escape to make her competitive and a shorter Q cooldown to make her useful in an extended teamfight. That still let's other mids counter Karma with health potions, as Karma will have mana issues still as a control on her damage.

I lane karma defensively or i push balls to wall and roam. Here is my karma build i find works very well in good order: boots, chalic,hextech revoler, cdr boots/ grail(preferebly), death cap,wota, zonyans/abby/void/warmogs (all situational) . i mainly sheild/heal/speed the person focused but she really excells in skrimishes at very low hp as she is clutch. i speed an ally and use him as a meat sheild keeping him alive is what i do.
Btw shield rank 5 with 400 ap (i usually get 500-600 in lategames) does 600 damage. Base surrounded by minions? 1 shot the regular minions and then focus on the super. lets say u got 2 waves around you. that 6 casters and 6 melees. 12x600x.2(spell vamp) =1440 hp. makes her a great defender when you ace the enemy team but have 2+ inhibitors down and u team needs to leave to push. She s almost as good as a defender as anivia. infinite clear. GREAT push too, lots of pressure for split pushing.

I seen this. Old news, and it sounds like Riot changed their minds in January... I don't like the ideas from November. Stun on Mantra Shield (like Amumu?), Root on Spirit Bond, with bonus health and armor and increased haste, Mantra CD increased to make it feel more like an ult...

http://www.surrenderat20.net/2012/11...s-twitter.html

http://www.surrenderat20.net/2013/01...dates-and.html

What is nice about her is you can mantra shield/Heavenly Wave to trade damage effectively with most mids. The proposed changes sound great for support Karma, with a ridiculous amount of CC, but I think she'll be way overpowered mid. You can flash in and stun them, then root them when they panic.

I'm thinking in addition to the changes I proposed above, hitting a Spirit Bonded target with an autoattack should refresh Heavenly Wave. This gives her a spammable Q attack for ridiculous champs like Xin, but it's limited by her mana and short range and Spirit Bond duration and CD.

And they want to get rid of her black and white dress... lol

Karma is underrated. Any serious Karma players will tell you that. Her only real issue is as support she is too dependent on her teams competence then any other support.

karma like Poppy has a really high learning curve. In a normal players hands she is lackluster but in a expert hands she is scary.

If you really want to see her potential play a All blind all mid game and build hp, AP, and some CD and watch the other team rage because they can't kill anyone on your team because of your heals and shield.

I feel like a good buff on her would be to make her W ability do damage on the enemy you use it on, not just the enemy's it passes through.

bump