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Long post so TLDR: Increase Yamato 2 travel speed during ultimate; or better yet let her animation cancel. I'll also bold some of the main points of my post if you want to just skim it, though it probably wont make any sense if you do that.
I think Yamato is such a fun character, and in a fine place balance wise, but could use some tweaks to make her feel a little less clunky to play. She is slightly uniquely placed within the current roster as a champion which looks to input many abilities (and I mean many) in frequent succession. At present, however, this style of design is hindered somewhat by the self "stun" effect that currently impacts basically all champions after inputting a spell or melee. I use the term stun, but really its closer to a silence/disarm where you are locked out of casting spells or even autoing (all characters have this). In a more classic MOBA, there may be ways around this such as animation cancels to raise the skill ceiling of the character, but also offer an opportunity for players to improve the characters fluidity and combo speed. While I'm sure the current design to lock characters for a moment after casting a spell or melee action is fully intentional, and I understand its merits, I think Yamato suffers the most from it and it holds back how fun or even fair she feels to play. Other fast input or combo champions, such as Pocket, can actually cast certain spells in faster succession (as long as you dont mash, both 2 and 4 can be cast almost instantly after 3, or vice versa with 3 and 4 after 2). Even non "combo centric" champions, such as Seven, can cast their spells in much quicker succession than Yamato. This is not simply an issue of having long cast times either. The damage from 1, 2, and 3 all come out noticeably before Yamato is able to cast another spell or shoot. The damage has been dealt, yet you are still stuck in the animation. Personally I think the 1 is fine, the 3 is quite noticeable and clunky, and 2 is the worst. Even pointblank, the time it takes to 2 and then 3 someone feels like you are stunning yourself for more than its worth, try it out in sandbox if you are curious. (This is even ignoring the current bug causing inputs done during 2 to be locked on arrival). Other characters have some clunky animations as well, so why is it more of an issue on Yamato? The first reason is related to her ult. Losing precious seconds inside of your ult to animations does not feel good. Being locked out of ulting because you are trapped in an animation does not feel good. It is at the point where in late game fights it is almost risky to cast a 3 before ulting because by the time you have un-stunned yourself, someone else has probably ccd you. Casting 2 before ult is even worse but I will get to that later. In League of Legends, Tryndamere, who has functionally the same ult, can press it at anytime even during enemy CC. This makes the QoL of the ability amazing, as you never have to worry about using it preemptively, and the skill instead comes from how long you can wait to press it. I dont think Yamato should be able to ult during CC, but I do think it would feel so much better if she could ult during her own animations. The last reason the clunky "animation stuns" feel particularly bad for Yamato, again, comes back to the speed and quantity of spells it feels she is designed to be putting out. A very common rotation for an end game spirit focused Yamato is as follows (order of abilities is of course situational):
2 > 3 > 1 > Echo Shard > 1 > Ult > 1 > 2 > 3 > 1 > Refresher > 1 > 2 > 3 > Ult > 1 > 2 > 3 > 1 > Echo Shard > 1
Obviously other champions can have some wild combos with refresher and echo shard as well, but they still will not look like this, and while Echo Shard may not be mandatory on Yamato, Refresher definitely is, and so similar combos will happen every game and not just on more niche builds. I say all this only to highlight the shear quantity of spells, and by extension animations, that an end game Yamato is going through. In the combo above, the only thing stopping this from coming out as fast as someone can press keys, aside from the channel time of ult, the *quickened* charge time of 1, and the option to wait for cd's to get a second 1 out before resetting cooldowns, is animations and the "self stun" they cause. These animations are so long that the combo above is by no means difficult to get off as fast as humanly possible, try it in sandbox, and even on your first try I doubt you will find it very difficult. Personally I wish there was more room for skill expression here and opportunity to get spells out faster. If that seems like it could get unfair, the natural balance in the channel time of 4 will always be there to keep things grounded. In the ideal world, I would love to see some form of quicker animations or opportunity for animation cancels on Yamato. If casting her base abilities feels bad, imagine how clunky things feel in the late game trying to get that many casts off. I completely understand if animation canceling is a direction this game does not want to take, or would feel like too much of a buff if given to Yamato, and her long casts are intentional to hold her back. That is fine and there isn't much I can say about it, but brings me to my final and potentially most realistic suggestion. Increase her 2 travel speed during ult. Ideally all casts could be increased during ult (1 already is), but again I am not saying she specifically needs a buff, and that definitely is one. So why specially 2?
Yamato 2 is long. Very long. Not just the animation, which is long even if you are pointblank, but the travel speed as well. I understand this is part of balancing her, but I think it creates some unfun gameplay choices. Here is a situation that is unfortunately all too common on Yamato. They have a fed carry who is difficult for others to get to (Grey Talon, Vindicta). Part of your role as Yamato is to get to these targets and burst them. A fight breaks out, and you immediately target the carry with your long range (level 3) 2. You are now locked in an animation as you slowly charge to the target, you stare solemnly at your greyed out, off cd ult as they move backwards and kill you before you even reach them.. Fine, they are ahead and you should have picked a better angle. The next fight breaks out and you adapt. This time you ult right away, it feels bad because you're full hp and didn't get the value from resetting CD's, but it doesn't matter someone needs to kill Grey Talon. At max range, by the time you ult someone and arrive to them with 2, your ult will be 2/3rds done. I tested this on a stationary dummy, on an actual person, who has movement options available, it is completely possible for your ult to be finished entirely. To me, this creates unfun gameplay decisions and patterns, where you choose between saving your ult and risk dying during the flight, or burning your ultimate ability as glorified airfare insurance. Whether you win the fight after you land is also debatable, as you may be arriving at 1 hp regardless. If Yamato could cast ult during her abilities, particularly during 2, the QoL improvements would be amazing. Maybe that would be too strong however, and remove too much of her counterplay, and while I disagree with that, would then propose simply increasing the travel speed while ulted. This would make 2 an actual ability worth using during ult, better fulfilling that fantasy of a character that dumps their spells then ults to cast them all over again, where as now it almost isn't even worth the time it takes. Additionally, it presents Yamato with a better option to the scenario presented above, where if she cant ult during 2, she can at least pre ult and not have it all wasted by the time she gets to her target.
This was much longer than I originally hoped, sorry about that, but I am very interested to hear others thoughts on this matter and find out if others also find her somewhat clunky, or if maybe I just need to get good.
Thanks for reading!!
I think Yamato is such a fun character, and in a fine place balance wise, but could use some tweaks to make her feel a little less clunky to play. She is slightly uniquely placed within the current roster as a champion which looks to input many abilities (and I mean many) in frequent succession. At present, however, this style of design is hindered somewhat by the self "stun" effect that currently impacts basically all champions after inputting a spell or melee. I use the term stun, but really its closer to a silence/disarm where you are locked out of casting spells or even autoing (all characters have this). In a more classic MOBA, there may be ways around this such as animation cancels to raise the skill ceiling of the character, but also offer an opportunity for players to improve the characters fluidity and combo speed. While I'm sure the current design to lock characters for a moment after casting a spell or melee action is fully intentional, and I understand its merits, I think Yamato suffers the most from it and it holds back how fun or even fair she feels to play. Other fast input or combo champions, such as Pocket, can actually cast certain spells in faster succession (as long as you dont mash, both 2 and 4 can be cast almost instantly after 3, or vice versa with 3 and 4 after 2). Even non "combo centric" champions, such as Seven, can cast their spells in much quicker succession than Yamato. This is not simply an issue of having long cast times either. The damage from 1, 2, and 3 all come out noticeably before Yamato is able to cast another spell or shoot. The damage has been dealt, yet you are still stuck in the animation. Personally I think the 1 is fine, the 3 is quite noticeable and clunky, and 2 is the worst. Even pointblank, the time it takes to 2 and then 3 someone feels like you are stunning yourself for more than its worth, try it out in sandbox if you are curious. (This is even ignoring the current bug causing inputs done during 2 to be locked on arrival). Other characters have some clunky animations as well, so why is it more of an issue on Yamato? The first reason is related to her ult. Losing precious seconds inside of your ult to animations does not feel good. Being locked out of ulting because you are trapped in an animation does not feel good. It is at the point where in late game fights it is almost risky to cast a 3 before ulting because by the time you have un-stunned yourself, someone else has probably ccd you. Casting 2 before ult is even worse but I will get to that later. In League of Legends, Tryndamere, who has functionally the same ult, can press it at anytime even during enemy CC. This makes the QoL of the ability amazing, as you never have to worry about using it preemptively, and the skill instead comes from how long you can wait to press it. I dont think Yamato should be able to ult during CC, but I do think it would feel so much better if she could ult during her own animations. The last reason the clunky "animation stuns" feel particularly bad for Yamato, again, comes back to the speed and quantity of spells it feels she is designed to be putting out. A very common rotation for an end game spirit focused Yamato is as follows (order of abilities is of course situational):
2 > 3 > 1 > Echo Shard > 1 > Ult > 1 > 2 > 3 > 1 > Refresher > 1 > 2 > 3 > Ult > 1 > 2 > 3 > 1 > Echo Shard > 1
Obviously other champions can have some wild combos with refresher and echo shard as well, but they still will not look like this, and while Echo Shard may not be mandatory on Yamato, Refresher definitely is, and so similar combos will happen every game and not just on more niche builds. I say all this only to highlight the shear quantity of spells, and by extension animations, that an end game Yamato is going through. In the combo above, the only thing stopping this from coming out as fast as someone can press keys, aside from the channel time of ult, the *quickened* charge time of 1, and the option to wait for cd's to get a second 1 out before resetting cooldowns, is animations and the "self stun" they cause. These animations are so long that the combo above is by no means difficult to get off as fast as humanly possible, try it in sandbox, and even on your first try I doubt you will find it very difficult. Personally I wish there was more room for skill expression here and opportunity to get spells out faster. If that seems like it could get unfair, the natural balance in the channel time of 4 will always be there to keep things grounded. In the ideal world, I would love to see some form of quicker animations or opportunity for animation cancels on Yamato. If casting her base abilities feels bad, imagine how clunky things feel in the late game trying to get that many casts off. I completely understand if animation canceling is a direction this game does not want to take, or would feel like too much of a buff if given to Yamato, and her long casts are intentional to hold her back. That is fine and there isn't much I can say about it, but brings me to my final and potentially most realistic suggestion. Increase her 2 travel speed during ult. Ideally all casts could be increased during ult (1 already is), but again I am not saying she specifically needs a buff, and that definitely is one. So why specially 2?
Yamato 2 is long. Very long. Not just the animation, which is long even if you are pointblank, but the travel speed as well. I understand this is part of balancing her, but I think it creates some unfun gameplay choices. Here is a situation that is unfortunately all too common on Yamato. They have a fed carry who is difficult for others to get to (Grey Talon, Vindicta). Part of your role as Yamato is to get to these targets and burst them. A fight breaks out, and you immediately target the carry with your long range (level 3) 2. You are now locked in an animation as you slowly charge to the target, you stare solemnly at your greyed out, off cd ult as they move backwards and kill you before you even reach them.. Fine, they are ahead and you should have picked a better angle. The next fight breaks out and you adapt. This time you ult right away, it feels bad because you're full hp and didn't get the value from resetting CD's, but it doesn't matter someone needs to kill Grey Talon. At max range, by the time you ult someone and arrive to them with 2, your ult will be 2/3rds done. I tested this on a stationary dummy, on an actual person, who has movement options available, it is completely possible for your ult to be finished entirely. To me, this creates unfun gameplay decisions and patterns, where you choose between saving your ult and risk dying during the flight, or burning your ultimate ability as glorified airfare insurance. Whether you win the fight after you land is also debatable, as you may be arriving at 1 hp regardless. If Yamato could cast ult during her abilities, particularly during 2, the QoL improvements would be amazing. Maybe that would be too strong however, and remove too much of her counterplay, and while I disagree with that, would then propose simply increasing the travel speed while ulted. This would make 2 an actual ability worth using during ult, better fulfilling that fantasy of a character that dumps their spells then ults to cast them all over again, where as now it almost isn't even worth the time it takes. Additionally, it presents Yamato with a better option to the scenario presented above, where if she cant ult during 2, she can at least pre ult and not have it all wasted by the time she gets to her target.
This was much longer than I originally hoped, sorry about that, but I am very interested to hear others thoughts on this matter and find out if others also find her somewhat clunky, or if maybe I just need to get good.
Thanks for reading!!
