League of Legends regularly gets new champions. They tend to get banned a lot at the beginning. That’s what it looked like with the new champion Ambessa. But things aren’t getting any better for her, even though she’s already been nerfed and statistically isn’t even that good.
Who is Ambessa? Fans of the Netflix series Arcane already know Ambessa from the first season, which was released in 2021. During the second season, Ambessa also appeared as a playable champion in LoL. In keeping with her style in the series, she is a classic toplaner.
She is most reminiscent of Renekton. It’s just much more mobile. Her W ability and passive allow her to stay on target but also fight her way out of difficult situations. She can grab a solo target with her ultimate.
When it was released, with patch 14.22 on November 6th, 2024, she was a regularly banned champion. But even after various nerfs, this doesn’t seem to have changed much. She is currently still the most banned champion in the game.
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Players still hate playing against Ambessa after over a month
What is the current status of Ambessa? You can view current and past LoL statistics on the U.GG platform. Pick rate, ban rate and other numbers can be viewed. With its release patch 14.22, Ambessa had a gigantic ban rate of 50.1% across all ranks.
However, their win rate was negative at 47.13%. It has been weakened several times in patch 14.23 and the current 14.24. But the dislike for her doesn’t seem to go away. She currently has a still-extreme ban rate of 33.8% across all ranks. But their win rate hasn’t gotten any better so far. There she has 47.3% across all ranks.
She is currently the most banned champion. Directly below her is Warwick, but he is currently in a strong phase.
Lots of dashes in a slow lane
What could that be about? Of course, one can only speculate here, as there is no guarantee of knowing why a champion who is not successful is banned. One possibility would be all of their abilities. It’s hardly fun to play against them. There is a similar case with Yasuo and Yone, who have a negative win rate despite a high ban rate.
She can dash a lot and is very mobile. But there are a lot of slow tanks on the top plane that can’t necessarily keep up. You can also just ban champions you don’t want to play against, no matter how successful the champion is statistically.
Champions with a lot of dashes are already a controversial topic in the community, as the old champions obviously can’t keep up with their old design. Ambessa is a champion who primarily focuses on his mobility.
What can Riot do now? You find yourself in a bit of a dilemma. Of course, nerfing it will eventually ensure that it is banned less often. But if her win rate continues to fall, she could also disappear into obscurity. But of course you want the new champions to be played and seen.
The only option at the moment would probably be to simply wait. If your win rate stays this low, you can assume that the ban rate will also decrease. Another champion had a completely different problem and even had to be changed after a short time: LoL: A new champion has to be changed after less than 6 months because professionals are simply too good