The shadow items were one of my favorite mechanic. I don't think they were a mistake. They weren't on what Riot considers is the ideal spot on the game design graph of accessibility vs complexity for the core casual audience, but I do think the items allowed for exceptional potential fun, more so than other sets. I hope Riot reconsiders their design philosophy one day.
They've already addressed this, it's about trying to find ways to balance fun and broken, and honestly, I think they do a pretty good job, I just love the old sets more
I also feel like ever since the backlash on set 5 and set 7, really "crazy" interactions and fun chase traits started disappearing from set to set. I feel like set 10 and 11 are the best examples of this, where every game kind of feels "grounded" in a sense you won't see the crown of champions oneshot units with over 13k true damage anymore.
Yeah I agree. Traits feel less creative, set mechanics feel reused. I mean set 12 is literally a combination of set 10 and 11 set mechanics to begin with for example. And also because the game is already so complexed with portals + augments + new artefacts, the complexity ceiling is reached as mort has said before and I really hope in the future that they can possibly remove some of those small things to make way for more of that craziness I'm sure some of us feel we yearn for. (In my opinion, I wish the new artefacts would be removed out of the 3 I listed above since I think it's the one that would affect the game the least if it weren't to exist in the future)
Shadow Ap crit with vayne was really cool. Shadow JG made that you lose a % of your unit health on cast but since vayne didnt ult and had a pasive it never got hit by that negative effect.
Just found your channel today and watched all of your videos and now i see this video pop up ^^ Great content im sure this video will be as good as the rest of them. Thank you for your work:)
there used to be a bug for zzrot that would crash the game upon spawning the creature (it was in the game for like 2 days). Mortdog wasn't going to push the fix for another few days or something, but then my friend grieved him and slammed it at the last second in his pbe game so it crashed. He pushed a fix for it within the hour lmao That set was fun but there were so many issues with the balancing of shadow items. some were terrible but others were just insanely good. It's too bad we didn't see something like it again, but they'd need to reconsider making some blatantly good and others with terrible drawbacks.
I loved this set so much but it was more about the traits and units for me. I never used the shadow items because they were just so overwhelming and i didnt even know the normal items
i remember mixing soraka with the coven trait and putting her with triple shadow archangel. It was hella fun. I also remember ryze with shadow BT and shadow Blue. It was one of the most combos i have ever seen in my life. he litteraly stunned the hole board in like 6 seconds LOL. Good times.
I remember when I just started TFT back in set 5. I was so incredibly confused at first but I actually won quite a few games by just playing redeemed with 3 star aatrox having titans, bloodthirster and warmogs and it was surprisingly strong! Or even my favorite comp of all time- shadow blue buff, Jeweled Gauntlet and Infinity edge Kha'zix. It was one of the most fun times I ever had and I could still play it with radiant blue buff the set after. not to forget how incredible nocturne was aswell, being able to play assassins with Revenant... I miss set 5 and 5.5
Ngl i like Set 5. Shadow items are fun to use. Specifically, the Shovel. The ability to craft more emblems with the shadow components is very broken but also a very fun thing to do. Like, imagine set 10. You can craft EDM emblem, the chaos that would bring when put on someone like Thresh, Karthus or Lucian.
Shadow shojin was amazing on Viktor. The decreased damage didn't matter when your team was always shielded. Set 5 was the start of every trait having an emblem, which they couldn't do in set 5.5. I would assume set 6's uncraftable emblem augments was first thought of during set 5.
I actually really enjoyed Shadow items. I love trading power on one area for extra power in another, and I found it fun to have to try and figure out which dark bargain would work for my team whenever a shadow item dropped. However, I can see why people really didn't enjoy it. I think the only way to really make it work is to make it an opt-in sort of thing, like make it an augment choice that people can just roll over and ignore if they don't want the hassle. But it's probably just best if it stays dead 🤷
I think one of my favorite TFT games ever was a vertical 9 Redeemed game with Dragonslayer Varus Reroll (Riot would've removed the Pantheon + Varus interaction nowadays even if it wasn't broken) with an absurd reworked Trundle (you could have talked about the amount of reworked units this set had, was it like, Kled, Trundle, Nidalee and Kayle?) with shadow Ionic Spark and him literally 1v9 at the end with 4400 AD and 30k HP
I really have to agree with the whole thing about complexity because as someone whos trying to get a friend into TFT, the biggest problem is items. With all the items in the game the amount of reading required to find the best item even if you only have 4 components means that for new players they just see two swords and put them together praying that its good, and with shadow items making one of the most daunting things parts of the game more difficult I can see why replacing them with radiant items which are very intuitive would make sence.
Reckoning was so fun and chaotic, I was sad when they removed Shadow Items though I agree with the decision. I wish they would return some day as an event even wackier than before. I understand why they've made items less impactful over time but I miss the item shenanigans we could pull off in earlier sets. I wouldn't want to see them in Ranked but in a casual mode would be awesome
yeah i was reading the shadow items and they all look really cool, i wish i could have played it then I only really started tft in set 9, but tried a bit in set 6 and 8 yeah complexity unfortunately needs to be delayed, and depth (exploration) should be maximized I would have been much more excited if they announced a set 5 revival than 5.5, shadow items seem just too interesting (i am a massive Nerdge though who literally likes to cook in team builder and think of bis in my free time though so... probably an outlier) It does look like a bunch of staple damage items turned shadow downside just decreases their max hp instead though - also it probably still comes from a time where items were a lot stronger than they should have been - mortdog talked about this before about items being too strong and unit stars mattering less
I kinda liked Set 5. Didn't grind it much (137 ranked games, EUNE) but reached diamond and that was enough for me at the time. I liked that it wasn't all so optimized and allowed some room for imagination instead of allowing 3 people hard-forcing the same comp to stay in top 4 for entire game like last few sets with 4cost lottery after gutting reroll comps (warden snipers and invoker snipers from set11, yes, i'm looking at you). I feel like new artifacts bring something similar to the table but aren't that crazy and only fit 2-3 champs at max which is a bit sad as there's not much flexibility when you get one and can't reroll it. At least set12 charms that may give a reforger seem to be pretty common, so this might be an improvement of some kind but only preservers and sugarcraft seem to be somehow flexible comps.
You're absolutely right, but the point still stands, there are more support items now than before therefore playing for fine vintage is still completely griefing
Set 5 was magical, There was so much interactions with shadow items and learning it felt like a college level study lmao, But it was just too hard for average tft player IQ
I started playing in Set 5. I still like the set, the traits and units were so good and fun. I love Soraka, Velkoz, Lux, Karma, Vayne, Trundle, Ww, Vladimir, etc. Almost every unit was useful.
With 3 Sets a year, I wonder if we'll ever go back to these super ambitious, explorative, and vast Set mechanics. I actually miss some of the Shadow items, surely they could come back in form of an augment or something? As I said before, I feel like Riot are super hesistant to take risks right now because TFT will just naturally grow over time, especially with 3 Sets a year. I'm so eager for a Set mechanic like Shadow items again (sad to hear 5.5 is getting revived ngl) Regardless, great video as always! The editting at the beginning was great and love the humour!
I think Riot will always be focusing on competitive and having a thinly explorative game rather than what we had before, think prismatic traits rather than broken or wonky interactions... I dunno. But thanks for the feedback bro!
I still don't understand how 20 new shadow Items were "too complicated" for the player base while 50 new Augments, 100 Charms, Orn Items, Artifact Items, Support Items, Radiant Items seem to be fine...
sItems are not more complicated AT ALL compared to what we have today, they just needed a different way for people to access them Because the shadow items were frontloaded into the game, meaning when you killed PvE monsters you would get an item or a regular item, which is confusing if you don't know what the recipes are. Whereas with augments, charms and Ornn items, they're given to you holistically, so you just read it and "Oh I like that" or "Nope don't like that" rather than if you have Vest, sVest and Cloak, you have to figure out which one of those is more optimal.
set 5 may have been bad for most people, but it was the best for me. i liked the idea of shadow items, and i like seeing evil win way more than the normal good always win, kindness whatever.
Wait there was a set 5 ? But seriously, I played like 10 games and stopped playing TFT until 5.5 comes out. Set 5 was just horrible, especially after 4.5 one of the best set ever. (I'm still recovering from LeBlanc shadow bluebuff PTSD)
I liked shadow Items after I got the hang of it. It was a cool addition and despite everyone praising set 5.5 imo it was the worst set by far. I felt like the only viable comp was Velkoz Abom. and that comp was boring to play and play against. I would love for shadow items returning via augments or portals for example.
You did not explain how to get shadow items, how do they appear, do you get them via an anvil, do you craft them? Your video cannot be understood by someone who hasn't played set 5.
They functioned like normal items(this is before augments, encounters and so on) but occasionally you got an armoury that gave you a choice of a shadow item or a normal item
Okay i love all your Videos and This one especially very much, but there is on thing that triggered the living shejt outa me. Karma Not as good as draven? In which worldddd with jg ie and bluebuff she could oneshot entire boards in seconds, was one of the biggest sleeper-combs of that set ngl Oh and unrelated to this i loved this set sm Like holy another sleeper was Varus Carry, Like he could easily put out 11k+ with the right items, loved it smmmm
It was my understanding that Karma became that insane problem in 5.5 when Dawnbringer had that round of buffs and radiant JG was fucking crazy, but I could be wrong
@@Nomsynho hmm yeah that s probably what made it insanely op and made everyone Play it but am pretty confident it was pretty much a consitent top 3 if Not higher for the entire set(s)
Interesting. Honestly, some things just slip through the cracks or are just how I remember them (I'm dreading set 8 because I played actually ZERO games of it)
Well before doing that my video wasn't doing so well, after, it's now doing a lot better. It's not that I want to do this stuff, it's just I need to do certain things to ensure my videos does well and I can actually make some money. I'm just getting started so I'm still figuring it all out, there's not really any other creator that I can learn from who does exactly what I'm doing, at least for TFT, so I have to test and find out for myself what works and what doesn't, and that comes with rigorous testing and troubleshooting. It is what it is... I have to play that game. I'm sorry it's inconvenient for you
6:43 I disagree, There was Lux that shielded the entire team, I rememver playing her with shadow shojin, shadow guinso (it damaged her shield instead of health) and normal archangel for scaling shields, with 6 knight the entire team was literaly immortal It was truly glorious 🥲
We took for granted the scuffness back in those days. Sure, the idea of a one man army breaking the game is absurbly unbalanced, but its way more interesting that way. Tft has always lean toward the casual audience and we love goofy shit like the microwave Swain (coming back next set btw, can't wait), perma polymorph Lulu, the suicide bomber mutant Javan, the infinite clone water Zed, the hungry hungry hippo game of dragonamancer Nunu,..etc... Its the ability of doing those gooffy shit every now and then is what made this game special. The current set is personally, the worst one for me, cuz its hard or next to impossible to do off meta shit and make ut fun anymore.
The shadow items were one of my favorite mechanic. I don't think they were a mistake. They weren't on what Riot considers is the ideal spot on the game design graph of accessibility vs complexity for the core casual audience, but I do think the items allowed for exceptional potential fun, more so than other sets. I hope Riot reconsiders their design philosophy one day.
They've already addressed this, it's about trying to find ways to balance fun and broken, and honestly, I think they do a pretty good job, I just love the old sets more
I also feel like ever since the backlash on set 5 and set 7, really "crazy" interactions and fun chase traits started disappearing from set to set. I feel like set 10 and 11 are the best examples of this, where every game kind of feels "grounded" in a sense you won't see the crown of champions oneshot units with over 13k true damage anymore.
Yeah Tft got very stale lately, at least Ornn items still have cool interactions with some champions
Yeah I agree. Traits feel less creative, set mechanics feel reused. I mean set 12 is literally a combination of set 10 and 11 set mechanics to begin with for example.
And also because the game is already so complexed with portals + augments + new artefacts, the complexity ceiling is reached as mort has said before and I really hope in the future that they can possibly remove some of those small things to make way for more of that craziness I'm sure some of us feel we yearn for. (In my opinion, I wish the new artefacts would be removed out of the 3 I listed above since I think it's the one that would affect the game the least if it weren't to exist in the future)
Yes 100%, now i feel every set except 12 was the same with different names, tho set 12 is just so incredible damn
Seeing Warwick with the three AA staffs flying across the board really took me back. God I loved that strat lol
Shadow Ap crit with vayne was really cool.
Shadow JG made that you lose a % of your unit health on cast but since vayne didnt ult and had a pasive it never got hit by that negative effect.
Just found your channel today and watched all of your videos and now i see this video pop up ^^ Great content im sure this video will be as good as the rest of them. Thank you for your work:)
I remember putting 2 shadow shojin on lulu with a runans and she was constantly casting. Got me the win once
I relly liked the shadow items :(
Me too bro... Me too. Unironically one of my favourite set mechanics to date
Me too😔✊️ Not playing more of set 5.0 during that time is one of my biggest regrets, but it was just too hard for normies unfortunetly
Brambulance was one of my favorite builds ever. It was so cathartic to see my Brand healing the entire team with Shadow Gunblade.
I miss this set! So happy it will come back soon. My favorite comp was the Ivern one with 3 Shadow Archangels. That was crazy OP!
there used to be a bug for zzrot that would crash the game upon spawning the creature (it was in the game for like 2 days). Mortdog wasn't going to push the fix for another few days or something, but then my friend grieved him and slammed it at the last second in his pbe game so it crashed. He pushed a fix for it within the hour lmao
That set was fun but there were so many issues with the balancing of shadow items. some were terrible but others were just insanely good. It's too bad we didn't see something like it again, but they'd need to reconsider making some blatantly good and others with terrible drawbacks.
I loved this set so much but it was more about the traits and units for me. I never used the shadow items because they were just so overwhelming and i didnt even know the normal items
i remember mixing soraka with the coven trait and putting her with triple shadow archangel. It was hella fun. I also remember ryze with shadow BT and shadow Blue. It was one of the most combos i have ever seen in my life. he litteraly stunned the hole board in like 6 seconds LOL. Good times.
Velkoz with 3 Shadow GunBlade is my favorite moment in TFT, my board can't die
I remember when I just started TFT back in set 5. I was so incredibly confused at first but I actually won quite a few games by just playing redeemed with 3 star aatrox having titans, bloodthirster and warmogs and it was surprisingly strong! Or even my favorite comp of all time- shadow blue buff, Jeweled Gauntlet and Infinity edge Kha'zix. It was one of the most fun times I ever had and I could still play it with radiant blue buff the set after. not to forget how incredible nocturne was aswell, being able to play assassins with Revenant... I miss set 5 and 5.5
Shadow guinsoo's on lux was my jam, miss this set haha
This reminds me of the days were I used to play Kata/Coven having her permanently cast .... One if not my favorite TFT comps:D
Ngl i like Set 5.
Shadow items are fun to use. Specifically, the Shovel. The ability to craft more emblems with the shadow components is very broken but also a very fun thing to do.
Like, imagine set 10. You can craft EDM emblem, the chaos that would bring when put on someone like Thresh, Karthus or Lucian.
Shadow shojin was amazing on Viktor. The decreased damage didn't matter when your team was always shielded.
Set 5 was the start of every trait having an emblem, which they couldn't do in set 5.5.
I would assume set 6's uncraftable emblem augments was first thought of during set 5.
I actually really enjoyed Shadow items. I love trading power on one area for extra power in another, and I found it fun to have to try and figure out which dark bargain would work for my team whenever a shadow item dropped.
However, I can see why people really didn't enjoy it. I think the only way to really make it work is to make it an opt-in sort of thing, like make it an augment choice that people can just roll over and ignore if they don't want the hassle. But it's probably just best if it stays dead 🤷
I think the 5.5 revival will bring them back in an augment form... I just really want sTitans back in my life
I think one of my favorite TFT games ever was a vertical 9 Redeemed game with Dragonslayer Varus Reroll (Riot would've removed the Pantheon + Varus interaction nowadays even if it wasn't broken) with an absurd reworked Trundle (you could have talked about the amount of reworked units this set had, was it like, Kled, Trundle, Nidalee and Kayle?) with shadow Ionic Spark and him literally 1v9 at the end with 4400 AD and 30k HP
FINALLY ANOTHER SET 5 ENJOYER (I love silly chaos)
i wish they would do temporary re-releases of old sets, kinda like how urf is for regular league
They do they're doing revivals, but and 5.5 is nect
Truly, the ruination ruined everything it touched
I really have to agree with the whole thing about complexity because as someone whos trying to get a friend into TFT, the biggest problem is items. With all the items in the game the amount of reading required to find the best item even if you only have 4 components means that for new players they just see two swords and put them together praying that its good, and with shadow items making one of the most daunting things parts of the game more difficult I can see why replacing them with radiant items which are very intuitive would make sence.
Reckoning was so fun and chaotic, I was sad when they removed Shadow Items though I agree with the decision. I wish they would return some day as an event even wackier than before. I understand why they've made items less impactful over time but I miss the item shenanigans we could pull off in earlier sets. I wouldn't want to see them in Ranked but in a casual mode would be awesome
yeah i was reading the shadow items and they all look really cool, i wish i could have played it then
I only really started tft in set 9, but tried a bit in set 6 and 8
yeah complexity unfortunately needs to be delayed, and depth (exploration) should be maximized
I would have been much more excited if they announced a set 5 revival than 5.5, shadow items seem just too interesting
(i am a massive Nerdge though who literally likes to cook in team builder and think of bis in my free time though so... probably an outlier)
It does look like a bunch of staple damage items turned shadow downside just decreases their max hp instead though -
also it probably still comes from a time where items were a lot stronger than they should have been - mortdog talked about this before about items being too strong and unit stars mattering less
I kinda liked Set 5. Didn't grind it much (137 ranked games, EUNE) but reached diamond and that was enough for me at the time. I liked that it wasn't all so optimized and allowed some room for imagination instead of allowing 3 people hard-forcing the same comp to stay in top 4 for entire game like last few sets with 4cost lottery after gutting reroll comps (warden snipers and invoker snipers from set11, yes, i'm looking at you).
I feel like new artifacts bring something similar to the table but aren't that crazy and only fit 2-3 champs at max which is a bit sad as there's not much flexibility when you get one and can't reroll it. At least set12 charms that may give a reforger seem to be pretty common, so this might be an improvement of some kind but only preservers and sugarcraft seem to be somehow flexible comps.
ZZrot is a support item btw, so adding more Artifacts doesn't interact with your chances of getting them at all with Fine Vintage...
You're absolutely right, but the point still stands, there are more support items now than before therefore playing for fine vintage is still completely griefing
I love shadow item because of unique effect and more emblem you can build but i can see why competitive hate it
okay I admit... I never gave up set 5
best set ever
Set 5 was magical, There was so much interactions with shadow items and learning it felt like a college level study lmao, But it was just too hard for average tft player IQ
I started playing in Set 5. I still like the set, the traits and units were so good and fun. I love Soraka, Velkoz, Lux, Karma, Vayne, Trundle, Ww, Vladimir, etc. Almost every unit was useful.
vayne and miss fortune made the set for me
The hate for set 5/shadow items felt undeserved
Imo,Shadow Items can comeback but in the form of an augment
I absolutely agree, I hope with the set 5.5 revival that's what they do... I want me some sTitans action
With 3 Sets a year, I wonder if we'll ever go back to these super ambitious, explorative, and vast Set mechanics.
I actually miss some of the Shadow items, surely they could come back in form of an augment or something?
As I said before, I feel like Riot are super hesistant to take risks right now because TFT will just naturally grow over time, especially with 3 Sets a year.
I'm so eager for a Set mechanic like Shadow items again (sad to hear 5.5 is getting revived ngl)
Regardless, great video as always! The editting at the beginning was great and love the humour!
I think Riot will always be focusing on competitive and having a thinly explorative game rather than what we had before, think prismatic traits rather than broken or wonky interactions... I dunno. But thanks for the feedback bro!
@@Nomsynho yeah i get you for sure, set 12 definitely feels like a leap in that direction
@@GoodyTFT yea... anger issues xdd
That Leona is my top 1 unit of all time
The asumsauce of tft fr
hope you all loved set 5.5 cos its going to be the next revival (mortdog said it)
D: Don't remind me
I still don't understand how 20 new shadow Items were "too complicated" for the player base while 50 new Augments, 100 Charms, Orn Items, Artifact Items, Support Items, Radiant Items seem to be fine...
sItems are not more complicated AT ALL compared to what we have today, they just needed a different way for people to access them
Because the shadow items were frontloaded into the game, meaning when you killed PvE monsters you would get an item or a regular item, which is confusing if you don't know what the recipes are.
Whereas with augments, charms and Ornn items, they're given to you holistically, so you just read it and "Oh I like that" or "Nope don't like that" rather than if you have Vest, sVest and Cloak, you have to figure out which one of those is more optimal.
yea radiant items r way more intuitive than shadow and harder to come by so theres less of a mental process involved
set 5 may have been bad for most people, but it was the best for me. i liked the idea of shadow items, and i like seeing evil win way more than the normal good always win, kindness whatever.
Wait there was a set 5 ?
But seriously, I played like 10 games and stopped playing TFT until 5.5 comes out. Set 5 was just horrible, especially after 4.5 one of the best set ever.
(I'm still recovering from LeBlanc shadow bluebuff PTSD)
6 redeemed my beloved
I liked shadow Items after I got the hang of it. It was a cool addition and despite everyone praising set 5.5 imo it was the worst set by far. I felt like the only viable comp was Velkoz Abom. and that comp was boring to play and play against.
I would love for shadow items returning via augments or portals for example.
You did not explain how to get shadow items, how do they appear, do you get them via an anvil, do you craft them? Your video cannot be understood by someone who hasn't played set 5.
They functioned like normal items(this is before augments, encounters and so on) but occasionally you got an armoury that gave you a choice of a shadow item or a normal item
The shadow items ruined that tft ngl it was a great tft i enjoyed it
This is the only set I havent played at all
Mine was 7.5 and 8.5.... hooo eeee imagine going from challenger to 0 games played
Me are 5.5 to 8.5 cause I need to study hard for my board exam.
Amazing and informative channel
Set 5 was some of the most fun I had in TFT. Personally, I don't get the hate
Okay i love all your Videos and This one especially very much, but there is on thing that triggered the living shejt outa me. Karma Not as good as draven? In which worldddd with jg ie and bluebuff she could oneshot entire boards in seconds, was one of the biggest sleeper-combs of that set ngl
Oh and unrelated to this i loved this set sm Like holy another sleeper was Varus Carry, Like he could easily put out 11k+ with the right items, loved it smmmm
It was my understanding that Karma became that insane problem in 5.5 when Dawnbringer had that round of buffs and radiant JG was fucking crazy, but I could be wrong
@@Nomsynho hmm yeah that s probably what made it insanely op and made everyone Play it but am pretty confident it was pretty much a consitent top 3 if Not higher for the entire set(s)
Interesting. Honestly, some things just slip through the cracks or are just how I remember them (I'm dreading set 8 because I played actually ZERO games of it)
Set 5 It was the definition of mid.
Vladimir ☠️☠️☠️
I hated that set
A lot of people did... It's okay, we're allowed to have differing opinions
i love how this guy changed the fucking title like 4 times i just didnt wanna click the video but this is getting annoying
Well before doing that my video wasn't doing so well, after, it's now doing a lot better. It's not that I want to do this stuff, it's just I need to do certain things to ensure my videos does well and I can actually make some money. I'm just getting started so I'm still figuring it all out, there's not really any other creator that I can learn from who does exactly what I'm doing, at least for TFT, so I have to test and find out for myself what works and what doesn't, and that comes with rigorous testing and troubleshooting. It is what it is... I have to play that game.
I'm sorry it's inconvenient for you
Insane garbage set
6:43 I disagree, There was Lux that shielded the entire team, I rememver playing her with shadow shojin, shadow guinso (it damaged her shield instead of health) and normal archangel for scaling shields, with 6 knight the entire team was literaly immortal
It was truly glorious 🥲
Oh man I missed that one, I feel kinda bad now, I love this kinda stuff
We took for granted the scuffness back in those days.
Sure, the idea of a one man army breaking the game is absurbly unbalanced, but its way more interesting that way.
Tft has always lean toward the casual audience and we love goofy shit like the microwave Swain (coming back next set btw, can't wait), perma polymorph Lulu, the suicide bomber mutant Javan, the infinite clone water Zed, the hungry hungry hippo game of dragonamancer Nunu,..etc...
Its the ability of doing those gooffy shit every now and then is what made this game special.
The current set is personally, the worst one for me, cuz its hard or next to impossible to do off meta shit and make ut fun anymore.
Jarvan was set 9 and YOU BETTER BELIEVE THAT HE'S GOING TO BE FEATURED