What Can Be Done With Aatrox?

Aatrox- The Darkin Blade

Stats:

HP: 537.8 (+85)
HP Regen: 6.59 (+0.5)
Resource: Bloodwell
Resource Regen: N/A
Range: 150
AD: 60.376 (+3.2)
Attack Speed: 0.651 (+3%)
Armor: 24.384 (+3.8)
Magic Resist: 32.1 (+1.25)
Movement Speed: 345



  

TL;DR: Aatrox is boring to play, make him interesting to play by letting him gain things on minion kills (like AD or healing), letting him gain things on champion kills (like resets or size), or by rallying teammates (give lifesteal and spellvamp).

Aatrox has some issues and has not seen play for over a year; he has not been picked competitively since Season 4 EU LCS playoffs (although he did see bans in the Season 4 World Champions and IEM Season IX Cologne). While some believe that his problems are in the stats and that he needs rebalancing, others believe that Aatrox himself has issues in terms of identity.

Issues
In a recent post by Meddler, he agrees with the original poster that Aatrox has some issues, but he does not think it's a matter of balance. "He does ok, nothing special, but pretty middle of the pack." What Meddler thinks is the issue is that "[Aatrox] doesn't have a distinct enough gameplay identity." Meddler draws from other champions in the same "class" as Aatrox (diving fighters) and notes their specialties: Nocturne can dive from far away, Vi has guaranteed and uninterruptable dive. In his eyes, the solution for Aatrox is to give him that specialty.

Now that we have an issue at hand, the first thing we should look at before trying to fix a champion is the champion themselves. We need to know Aatrox's background and lore so that anything that is changed makes sense thematically. 

Background
In his Lore, Aatrox is stated to be a legendary warrior and is said to have played a part in many wars across time. Some interesting parts in his lore are:

"With each foe felled, Aatrox's seemingly living blade drinks in their blood, empowering him and fueling his brutal, elegant campaign of slaughter."

This statement gives ideas of having some sort of bonus when fighting and killing enemies. Now while this is already slightly in place (Blood Well Passive fills up when hitting things), he has no extra bonus for when he kills something. For a legendary warrior who loves to just murder people, it would make sense that there would be an extra bonus for killing champions or minions. 

Another interesting part is:

"With but a few words, he urged the soldiers to fight to the last before throwing himself into battle. His presence inspired the desperate warriors. At first, they could only watch in awe as this unknown hero cleaved through their enemies.... Soon, the warriors found themselves imbued with a potent thirst for battle."

To give some context, there was a fight going on between two factions called the Protectorate and the Magelords. The Magelords were winning these fights handily, leaving the Protectorate army in shambles. "On the day of their final confrontation, the Protectorate army found themselves outnumbered, exhausted, and poorly equipped." Aatrox then appears, rallies the troops and wins the battle for the Protectorate. The most obvious thing that comes to mind is the rallying of the troops.

Now from that background, we have two possible solutions

• Mechanic for gaining something on kills
• Mechanic for rallying allies

Riot tries very hard to make sure that no two spells are the same and that no two mechanics are the same (ex. 3 revive passives, but all very different). This means that in order to fully delve into these ideas, we have to compare them to what is already in the game. I want to explore these ideas separately and compare them to mechanics already in the game.

Gaining On Kills
There are a good amount of options regarding actions on kills. We have things like Nasus which gain damage permanently on a spell on kills, Katarina who gets her skill cooldowns lowered on kills, or Jinx who gains movement speed on kills. This is a list of the most relevant mechanics:

• Cho'Gath's Passive (Carnivore) restores health and mana on kills.
• Evelynn's W (Dark Frenzy) cooldown is reset on kills.
• Fiora's R (Grand Challenge) creates a healing zone on kill or by hitting all 4 vitals.
• Jinx's Passive (Get Excited!) temporarily grants movement speed on kills.
• Katarina's Passive (Voracity) reduces all cooldowns by 10 seconds on kills.
• Kha'zix's Evolved E (Leap) cooldown is reset on kills.
• Master Yi's R (Highlander) reduces his skill cooldowns by 70% on kills. It also extends the duration of Highlander by 4 seconds on kills (while it is active).
• Nasus's Q (Siphoning Strike) permanently increases damage on Siphoning Strike on kills.
• Nidalee's Cougar W (Pounce) reduces cooldown to 1.5 seconds on kills.
• Sion's W (Death Furnace) permanently increases health on kills.
• Tristana's W (Rocket Jump) cooldown is reset on kills.
• Varus's Passive (Living Vengeance) temporarily grants attack speed on kills. 20% bonus attack speed for 3 seconds on killing minions/monsters, 40% bonus attack speed for 6 seconds on killing champions.
• Veigar's Q (Baleful Strike) permanently grants AP on minion and champion kills.

In my head, Aatrox thrives in the midst of real battle against champions, not lame battling against minions, so I don't think minion kills should be a part of it, but I will still entertain the idea. In the lore, it seems that he just gets stronger and stronger with kills during battle, so I believe that is the route that should be taken. 

For something gained on minion kills there are a couple of options:

• Aatrox W (Blood Thirst/Blood Price) permanently gains healing/damage on minion kills. 
• Aatrox permanently gains attack damage on minion kills.
• Aatrox evolves a certain thresholds of minion kills (similar to Cassiopeia).

All of these options are definitely something interesting and new for Aatrox and fit the feel of Aatrox. These would be some interesting mechanics if going to the minion kill route.

• Permanent gains to healing and damage on Blood Thirst/Blood Price could work, but the issue would be that with this scaling, Riot would have to inherently weaken his early game. Nasus has this mechanic essentially, so they made him weaker early in order to compensate for the late game strength. 
• Permanent gains to attack damage could work, but it would have to be implemented on a very small scale, for example +0.1 AD per minion kill. The issue is that it won't give Aatrox that individual feel that Meddler was talking about. Passive stat gains like this don't feel extremely impactful.
• Thresholds could work as you can see what it has done with Cassio. The evolution could also be well done aesthetically to make Aatrox look and feel more powerful. The issue is that this would almost certainly pigeonholed Aatrox to the lane instead of jungle since he would need to get minions. Having the jungle monsters give more as compensation wouldn't work because that would not stop top Aatrox from taking jungle monsters and getting extremely powerful.

Now, with the minion kill ideas done, we move on to champion kill gains. What immediately comes to mind is attack speed because that is mostly what Aatrox utilizes and would make sense considering his lore. Unfortunately, Varus has that passive already and would be way too similar of a passive. Instead, some options that come to mind are:

• Aatrox temporarily gain's size on kills during fighting.
• Aatrox Q (Dark Flight) cooldown is reduced by 50% on kills.
• Aatrox temporarily gain's attack damage on champion kills.
• Aatrox temporarily gain's attack range on champion kills.
• Aatrox gain's increased healing on kills.
• Aatrox extends duration on R (Massacre) for 4 seconds on kills.

My picks would be increased size, reduced Q cooldown, or extended duration on Massacre, and I will say why I don't like the other ideas.

• Increased size would be noticeable in-game and would definitely give Aatrox a more powerful feeling in fights, it could even make the knock-up size for his Q larger. The size increase I have in mind would be temporary and would proc on kills in fights. After he is out of combat for some time, he will shrink. The issue is that increased size is something that is usually made for tanks which Aatrox is not.
• Reduced Q cooldown would really reinforce the diving and fighting mentality of Aatrox. After picking up a kill, you can just jump again afterwards, making him the fighter version of Kha'Zix or Tristana. The issue with this is just straight up balance. While this mechanic would be nice, it would need some definitely balancing around.
• Gaining attack damage on champion kills would be interesting, but like with the minion kills, there would be no big impact that makes you feel stronger. It'd be a nice additional mechanic, but still does not give Aatrox a specific feeling.
• Gaining attack range is an option, but I don't like that as the path for Aatrox. He should not become like an ADC when he kills things, he should very much be in the middle of battle, hacking and slashing at his foes.
• Increased healing (like spirit visage passive) would give him some extra synergy to those with heals on his team, but Aatrox would only really feel it on his Blood Thirst. Getting a kill and then being able to heal a lot if using Blood Thirst would feel good, but he already has a similar mechanic for when he drops below 50% HP. 
• Another version of increased healing is just getting %hp back (like dangerous game). When I think about it in game, I would realize that it would be a frustrating mechanic to play against when losing because he just won't die if he keeps killing. Very snowbally feel.
• Extended duration on Massacre has potential as it allows him to fight in his empowered form for longer, which would definitely fit his lore. Pop on some cool visuals to Aatrox when he picks up the kill to show that he got a kill and that Massacre is extended and this can be sold. The issue is that it is very similar to Master Yi and it might not feel as impactful as the others.

Rallying Allies

Rallying to me is having a boon that is centered around a certain object or champion. So while Jayce and Karma both have AOE Movement speed boosts, Karma's feels more like a rally than Jayce's. The mechanics that are already in the game for rallying are:

• Alistar's E (Triumphant Roar) heals allies around him.
• Ezreal's W (Essence Flux) temporarily grants allies attack speed when hit.
• Fiora's R (Grand Challenge) creates a healing zone on kill or by hitting all 4 vitals.
• Gangplank's R (Cannon Barrage) can gives allies movement speed when in the zone.
• Jarvan's E (Demacian Standard) temporarily grants allies attack speed.
• Karma's Mantra E (Defiance) temporarily grants allies movement speed.
• Orianna's W (Dissonance) temporarily grants allies movement speed.
• Sivir's R (On the Hunt) temporarily grants allies movement speed.
• Taric's W (Shatter) grants allies Armor.
• Taric's R (Radiance) temporarily grants allies AD and AP.
• Warwick's W (Hunters Call) temporarily grants allies attack speed.

For rallying, it would make the most sense if it was implemented on his R (Massacre) as it is typically used in conjunction with his Q (Dark Flight). The dive in and ult is typically what Aatrox does. As for what happens in the rally, there are some interesting options

• Aatrox grants allies attack speed.
• Aatrox grants allies AD and AP.
• Aatrox grants allies movement speed.
• Aatrox grants allies armor and MR.
• Aatrox grants allies lifesteal and spellvamp.

Attack speed, AD and AP, and movement speed do not work as well because they already have very similar counterparts. The attack speed rally would be too similar to Warwick, the AD and AP rally would be too similar to Taric, and the movement speed rally would be too similar to Sivir. This leaves either armor and MR, or lifesteal and spellvamp.

• Giving armor and MR would be an interesting and somewhat new mechanic for a champion (Taric and Aegis are similar). An issue is that it does not give any umph to Aatrox. Instead of his team pumping out more damage, which is what his rally seems like it should do, it makes his teammates not die as fast.
• From all of these options, one stands out as the most interesting and definitely the most unique, the lifesteal and spellvamp. This fits well with his lore as the people he rallies shares the same bloodlust as him. The biggest issue is that it could easily be overpowered.

These are my proposed solutions to Meddler's issues with Aatrox. No balance changes, just some interesting things that can definitely give Aatrox a stronger feeling as a champion.