A similar phenomenon to Season 10’s “Healing Fever” is happening right now, this time, it’s the lack of shield-countering items that is the cause.
Before this Pre-season 2021, League of Legends has been taken over by the “Healing” meta, which was solved by the introduction of anti-healing items for every class in the game. The same issue has risen again, and the game meta is now urgently in need of additional anti-shielding items as there is currently only one item that counters this playstyle: Serpent’s Fang.
While addressing the ability to create shields in the game at the moment, we must include Sterak’s Gage. This item’s absurdity is that it gives a shield for the champion based on the champion’s maximum health, even though Sterak’s Gage itself provides a lot of health. Not to mention the fact that this item has a passive that heals champions when you deal damage. Simply by purchasing Sterak’s Gage, you gain more health, AD, healing powers, and a substantial amount of shield, which is significantly superior to the majority of the items in the game at the same price.
Based on data from leagueofgraphs.com, Sterak’s Gage has the third-highest buy rate in the game right now, only behind Divine Sunderer and Zhonya’s Hourglass.
Lee Sin, Sett, Camille, Nocturne… and other Bruisers continue to be extremely powerful due to the large amount of shields they have, even if you buy an item that decreases healing, their ability to maintain in the fight remains to be extremely formidable. This imbalanced comprehensiveness is what has made the Bruisers one of the most difficult classes to deal with in League of Legends in this Patch. The fact that 4/5 of the top lane’s strongest champions are striving for Sterak’s Gage as their second or third item is the clearest indication of this.
Support champions, who have strong control and resistance, are also quite popular in the current meta. The Locket of Iron Solari, which also provides massive shielding, is the closest Mythical item to Tank Support. As a result, the ability to create shields grows in popularity in League of Legends.
Another evidence is the absolute dominance of Karma in pro-plays. Since there aren’t any viable ways of countering the shielding effect, with the sole exception of Serpent’s Fang, which belongs to Assassin – the class that always has been underused in professional matches, Karma, and champions with shielding such as Lulu, Janna become unstoppable in pro-plays.
Aside from Serpent’s Fang, the League of Legends store is severely limited in items that give the ability to counter shield. This item can only be obtained by a select number of champions that use Lethality. Players using Mage, Support, or Tank champions have no way to counter the domination of shield-making items and abilities.
Essentially, Riot Games has introduced a set of items in season 11 that limit healing and assist gamers in tackling overwhelmingly powerful healing effects. So, when the ability to generate a powerful shield becomes uncontrollable, Riot must design other items with the same effect as the Serpent Fang for the Mage, ADC, Tank, and Support.