Cho’Gath’s current state

Cho’Gath is a champion that has had his times in the spotlight, but for the last year, he hasn’t been seen too much in competitive play. Patch 7.4 will give his ultimate, Feast, a sizable update in an attempt to bring Cho’Gath back to a viable status.

Before talking about the impact of these changes, let’s look at the way Cho’Gath works and what makes him “bad” in his current state. Looking to solo queue, Cho’Gath is currently played top most of the time, and on patch 7.3, he is sitting at a 44.85 percent win rate. With the top lane champion pool being pretty diverse, having room for both carries and tanks in the role, it would seem Cho’Gath could have his place as a tank. With Maokai, Poppy, Nautilus, Shen, Singed and even Gragas all making appearances as top lane tanks, Cho’Gath’s crowd control and burst focused kit should fit right in, but we haven’t seen Cho’Gath showing up in pro play.

The last time Cho’Gath was somewhat a common pick was in 2015 when champions such as Urgot and Zed were the more popular mid lane champions. Cho’Gath could do well into these picks because the sustain from his Carnivore passive allowed him to survive through their poke, and the knock-up from his Rupture would allow him to shut down predictable all-ins from moves such as Zed’s ultimate. With mid lane being predominantly champions who excel with sustained damage, it makes sense that Cho’Gath can’t quite keep up with the likes of Ryze and Corki, but what about other roles?

Cho’Gath jungle has shown up a few times throughout history, but currently, his relatively low clear speed and weak early dueling makes it simply not an option. When we look to the top lane, the tanks that are doing well are picked for their reliable crowd control. With Maokai, Nautilus, Poppy and Singed all having a form of point and click cc, guaranteed engages that these champions provide are very valuable. Even Gragas and Shen can combine their cc with flash to guarantee the hit, but Cho’Gath’s primary cc ends up being too difficult to land against players of the highest level. Despite how devastating a full combo from Cho’Gath can be to a carry, without a way to reliably get on the enemy back-line, Cho’Gath ends up being a bit too one-dimensional.

The changes to Cho’Gath’s Feast are as follows:

Changes to the rules around Feast stacks.

• FOOD MEMORY: Cho’Gath no longer loses Feast stacks on death.
• FEED THE VOID: Feast can now stack infinitely (only five stacks can be gained from minions and non-epic monsters, though they don’t have to be the first five).
• NOT THAT FILLING: Feast no longer heals Cho’Gath when it kills a unit at max stacks (nomming a sixth minion or non-epic monster doesn’t do anything beyond damage).
• INDISCRIMINATE DIGESTION: Feast no longer grants two stacks on champion kill or half mana and cooldown refund on minion kill.

FOOD CRITIC: Feast’s tooltip on the buff bar now tracks what Cho’s eaten.

RATIO: 0.7 ability power >>> 0.5 ability power and 10% bonus health.

BONUS HEALTH PER STACK: 100/140/180 >>> 80/110/140

BONUS HEALTH AT 6 STACKS: 600/840/1080 >>> 480/660/840

MAXIMUM ATTACK RANGE BONUS: +50 (175 attack range) >>> +75 (200 attack range).

LET’S NOT GO CRAZY HERE: Cho’Gath reaches his maximum size (and bonus attack range) at 10 stacks.

One of the best aspects of Cho’Gath is his large size, which allows him to provide more shelter for teammates than any other tank in the game. A big weakness of Cho’Gath was losing all of his Feast stacks upon death, and with that gone, he’ll be a lot more reliable in his tankiness later in the game, where tanks are bound to have a couple of deaths from just doing their job. These changes also make Feast an ability that requires a lot more thought than before. While it’s still optimal to stack up as quickly as possible, beyond five stacks, you have to use it to kill champions if you want to continue stacking the passive. While Cho’Gath will now need to get up to eight stacks to surpass his previous bonus health at six stacks, being able to continue stacking it up will give Cho’Gath unseen levels of HP without having to itemize for it. While Cho’Gath will still have the same issues as before, his new levels of tankiness might allow him to simply run through enemy teams with the assistance of items such as Boots of Swiftness and Righteous Glory. If Cho’Gath is unable to make it to that late game level of tankiness, without falling too far behind, the champion might need more than some extra HP to start showing up in competitive play.

What do you think of Cho’Gath’s new ultimate? Let me know @calvinbwitt and follow @GAMURScom for more League of Legends content.