A Review of a (poor) Karthus guide

A while back, I was on the League of Legends forum. I noticed a post asking people to look at this guy's Karthus guide. I gave it a look and replied. Here is the guide: http://www.mobafire.com/league-of-legends/build/a-million-ways-to-be-cruel-225866. Here is my response:

SUMMONER SPELLS: 

Honestly, those are based off of personal preference. Personally, I prefer flash and ignite/exhaust (ignite for champs that heal ie: fiddle/swain). Exhaust has great synergy with the wall, landing Qs, and keeping them in the E radius.

RUNES:

 I have never used Spell Vamp quints, so I am not going to comment on that part because I know some people swear by them. What I do know about spell vamp however is that it is more valuable early game and starts to show diminishing returns the longer the game goes.

I have a big problem with your CDR yellows. Karthus has an extremely short cool-down on Q, an average one on W, virtually no CD on e, and a VERY long CD on his ult. By picking CDR yellows, you are only specing into his ultimate, essentially. Health, Armor, and Mana Regen/5per lvl are all better choices.

BUILD: 

Should be Boots/3 health pots to start. The mana pot is POINTLESS because of the mana sustain from E. Tear is a good item for Karthus. Revolver is also a good item for him, but at this point you are committed to staying in your lane and farming to high hell. You won't be as beefy as a Karthus who chose to go the boots>RoA route (a route that is good for early teamfights) and you won't be doing as much damage as a Karthus who went boots>double doran>deathcap (a route that is great for lane dominance, if you managed to get ahead early).

You make the mistake of recommending the purchase of AA Staff and WoTA in early/mid game. AA Staff is not worth the money early/mid game and neither is WoTA (unless you have chosen to run a double WoTA comp).

Also, I would prioritize Zhonya's over Deathcap if you are playing suicide bomber Karthus.

Furthermore, you do not have a single defensive item in the build. Abyssal and GA are both great items on Karthus.

ABILITY SEQUENCE: 

R>Q>E>W (I typically get a 2nd point in W at lvl 10) Fix your guide for this change.

MASTERY PAGE:

Yikes. 9-0-21 is NOT GOOD on Karthus. You need to be dealing damage to high hell. 21-0-9 or 21-9-0 would both be better options for you.

Like I said earlier, Karthus doesn't scale off of CDR well. I don't think anybody uses Good Hands, honestly. Awareness is pointless because you are in a solo lane. At best, you're going to beat the other mid champion to lvl 6 and get a kill faster than him. Then what? Nothing.

MATCH-UPS:
Impossible matchups: I agree with all of them except Vlad. Vlad shouldn't really be a problem.
Yellow range: Ahri should be moved up, Veigar should be moved up.
Easy: Annie should be yellow (avoid harass and her combo is a win for Karthus, but he will lose if he tries to fight her), Ryze has to go to impossible (See Annie... but Ryze is scarier), Swain to yellow.

SUMMONER SPELL SECTION:
Ghost is odd to me. Anything ghost can do, flash can do better (unless you are olaf or vlad).
Heal is a preference, not mine though. I don't recommend it though because most AP mids run ignite. Ignite > Heal.

TP is great for ganks.

You recommend Revive? NO! I repeat: NO!

FINAL THOUGHTS:
You're missing the point of Karthus. Spell vamp is fine and dandy in lane for farming/sustain but once you get out of lane where the teamfights happen in seconds, you will not be able to sustain the damage being done to you for the amount of damage you are putting out (because your build/mastery combo is bad).

Great Big War Game Review

Let's start with the basics

"Great Big War Game" is a turn-based strategy game that pits the player against other people or the computer, depending on game mode. The player versus player is pretty standard and the campaign is challenging. Not only is it challenging, but the game guides you along the learning curve of the game. More specifically, units are introduced logically, the missions increase in difficulty, and the A.I. behaves well.

The actual gameplay is designed and implemented seamlessly. As one would expect, there is a variety units each with strengths and weaknesses. Because each unit is balanced around the fact that another will better it in combat, intelligent unit purchasing and movement (as opposed to a war of attrition style game) is the key to this game. In the end, "Great Big War Game" is a technically sound turn-based strategy game; I just have nothing bad to say about the gameplay.



So what could have been done better?


As a sort of warning, I cannot help but compare and contrast this game to "Advanced Wars;" both games come from the same genre and have a militaristic theme. Both games are great in their own right, but in order to get a clearer picture of "Great Big War Game" some comparison is necessary.

In "Great Big War Game," the units are individuals as opposed to the five-man squad in "Advanced Wars." I bring this point up for two reasons: design logic and game feel. Like in some turn-based strategy games, a unit does less damage when the unit itself is damaged. "Great Big War Game" sticks to this mechanic, but it does not make sense, at least not as much sense as the same mechanic in "Advanced Wars." Because a unit in "Advanced Wars" was a five-man squad, it made sense that the unit dealt less damage when the unit was injured because there was less man-power in that specific unit.

This mechanic not only affects design logic but also the overall feel of the game. Simply put, "Great Big War Game" feels small in scale because each unit is an individual. Not only this, but the overall feel of the game is purposefully silly. In this way, the tone of "Great Big War Game" disengages the player from a war experience. By making the voice-overs silly, the briefing comical, and art style goofy, I did not feel like I was playing a war game.

In essence, do not play this game if you're expecting an epic war waged by geniuses of battle. Play this game knowing you will be entertained for a long while, get a handful of giggles, and be ready for a challenge. This game is not easy, but that makes it enjoyable. If you are like me and not a fan of the feel, try to step away from it (muting the music did the trick for me) and play it while only focusing on the mechanics.

I won!

For those very, very few that follow my progress on this blog, you'll know that I submitted into a design competition a week or so back.

Well, I won!

Check it out here with the other two winners: http://www.gamecareerguide.com/features/1117/results_from_game_design_.php?page=1

What does this mean for me? Well I would love to keep putting in submissions for these competitions to work on my critical thinking skills. If you somehow come across any challenges or competitions of this sorts, please let me know!

Look for my review on "Great Big War Game" soon and more progress on the David Perry Challenge.