Gaming

Don’t Ban Blitzcrank!

June 18, 2013

My dearest fellow summoners, I come to you today with a request.

It has come to my attention that the lunar cycle has once again aligned and that Blitzcrank, the ever-grabbin’ steam golem has made its way back onto the roster of free-to-play champions. Now, if you’re down on my level of gameplay then this most likely doesn’t affect you since poor ol’ Blitz is eternally banned from draft mode. But what if—stay with me—what if we just didn’t ban Blitz?

What if every time Blitzcrank is on the free champion roster every player made a point of not banning Blitzcrank?

I just want to play, too!

I’m sure this is a concept that has been brought up before, but goddamnit, I think it needs to be brought up again. I want you and all of your friends to go into every game you play, whether it be blind, normal draft or ranked and exclaim that you want to keep Blitz unbanned. I want Blitz to be picked and I want him to be played. I want the League of Legends community to finally overcome their fear of this yellow harbinger of death.

Now, for those of you that reside within the most sacred and sought after Leagues, I’m sure the concept of banning Blitz is a distant memory. For others, even some of those that live within the veritable “shit” of Bronze and Silver, perhaps you ban Blitz without even knowing why. It’s just what you’ve been trained to do. Let’s take a moment to discuss why this steamy beast is the bane of our existence.

On one side of the coin, the majority of players that desire the Blitz ban just can’t handle his kit. As mentioned an infinite amount of times before, a single landed hook can completely change the pace of a game. If an enemy Blitz is a full-on resident of Hook City, a lot of people are not mechanically skilled enough to avoid those cruel metal fists.

We’ve all been there.

Also, there are some of our dear summoners (myself included) that simply don’t hold the power of mind to constantly be aware of the ever-looming grab. Sometimes you’re tunnel-visioning on CS. Sometimes you’re on your phone. Whatever. The point is that while “just stay behind minions” is solid and applicable advice, some of us just aren’t at a level where we can keep that criticism on the front burner with all the other nonsense that goes on within a game.

Then, on the opposite side of the coin, you have people who ban Blitz not because they fear those deadly digits of obtaining but because they don’t trust their fellow teammates with such a binary champion. Let’s be real, if you are playing Blitzcrank and you aren’t landing grabs, you may as well be sitting at the spawn pool. A Blitzcrank that cannot grab is like a summer without delicious Barbecues, or a drawing of Taric without blatant homoerotic overtones. You just aren’t doing your job.

Real talk: I can’t write League articles without pictures of Taric anymore.

But landing those grabs can be hard, mang! I don’t know what nerve-cluster within my own brain is malfunctioning, but for whatever reason I cannot properly determine the full range of Blitz’s Q as well I can with Leona or Lux. I always tend to shoot my appendage and miss by mere pixels. I’m constantly only a fraction of a Teemo away from being best Blitz NA.

But I’m not a good Blitz. You know why? I never get to play him. Neither do you. His state of perma-banishment has festered into this haunting phobia that has solidified into the hearts and minds of every Bronze and Silver player out there. The problem is that we’ve created this vicious cycle of self-fulfilled prophecy in which you ban Blitz due to reasons A or B and then when you don’t ban him, reasons A or B occur simply because you never took the measures to alter the outcome. The only way to get everyone to stop fearing dear old Blitzy is if we actually play games with him.

How does Blitzcrank finally seeing the light of Summoners rift alleviate his (her?) inherent terror? Practice, yo.

The reason people don’t have the mechanics to read Blitz’s tells or to properly dodge those scary grabs is because they only see those skills once every fifty games. The reason we can’t get it into our heads that dem hooks could emerge at any second and you best be hugging a minion like its your estranged father back from the war is because we’ve simply selected to ignore the issue. Want to know why the one time Blitz got through the champion select he was chosen by the “worst fucking Blitz player” you’ve ever seen? That poor kid has only played Blitz a handful of times, and the last time was when he was level 15 in blind pick.

We avoid Blitz instead of dealing with the inadequacies he showcases within us. If you love this game and you are looking to improve, the first step is to man up and face where you need improvement. I think Blitzcrank is incredible at laying out the flaws of a player, whether he is on the enemy team and showing off your poor positioning or being played by your very own self and announcing to the world that skillshots be hard, yo. The only way we will see improvement is by letting Blitz through the ban gate.

Now, I’m not saying that we should release the beast permanently. If you’re in your promotion series and you don’t want to take the chance of having a good (or bad) Blitz muddle things for you then ban away. If you adhere to my request and after ten straight Blitz games you need a break, maybe put the golem away for a bit.

I’m just advocating that if we were to spend this once-in-a-blue-moon week not only allowing, but seeking Blitzcrank play I feel we could all benefit. Not to mention, think of all the hilarious hook montages!

So join me, fellow summoners. Join me this week by allowing Blitzcrank to step onto the fields of justice. Tell your friends. Tell your neighbors. Get onto Twitter and Facebook and hashtag proudly #dontbanblitz.

Let us show that big yellow monstrosity that he doesn’t scare us. Let us spend this week improving how we play.