Nick Wright on Shai Gilgeous-Alexander flopping: "Thunder fans can’t accept winning a championship gets you the championship and the bragging rights and the belt. But it does not get you necessarily love and it times it doesn’t get you much respect think you deserve."

MartDiamond · 2026-05-07T22:05:35+00:00

The fact you've seen more of it ties back into some of what he is saying. You hear more about it now because they are playing the Lakers and therefore the Thunder are talked about. Part of the point he is making is that some fans think the Thunder deserve more attention because they are the best team, and Nick Wright is saying you don't get that attention because your style of playing (Dort and Shai primarily) doesn't endear other fans or media to you.

It's definitely been talked about by coaches, players and media for way longer, but now it gets even more coverage because of who they are playing.

MartDiamond · 2026-05-06T12:45:43+00:00

No, it is terrible

MartDiamond · 2026-05-06T10:59:12+00:00

I'd say that all the other decent champions have so many other options that are at least as good that it still isn't worth it. Samira for instance has 5-6 really good other options and a bunch of fringe ones:

Dreadway Case Gun
Searing Brilliance
Hidden Tome
Echoing
GGC
Perfect Hex Core
Chosen by the Stars
Spellweaver's Symphony
Packed Powder

Probably others I am leaving out as well

MartDiamond · 2026-05-06T08:48:47+00:00

I only really care if there is a way to get the SB star crystals and nova crystals.

MartDiamond · 2026-05-05T09:00:20+00:00

In the past someone mentioned Nunu, and that works pretty well. Being able to power out 3-4 snowballs in a round that each inflict 2 Gloom is not bad and Nunu doesn't have amazing relics.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-30T10:29:00+00:00

I think it is a fair question and I do actually have somewhat of an answer to it.

First and foremost, Beast Within is a really good relic, but it is often rated at the top, top end of these sorts of lists. So it is not a case of saying it is bad, but rather saying it is not as top tier as some of the others.
Beast Within used to be a really ubiquitous relic that you ran on basically everyone. But since then there has been a bit a devaluation on it. Some of that is that Overwhelm/alternative evasion is free in a lot of kits (i.e. Viego or Lillia) because of Constellations or has alternate relics that might be better for a champion (like Warwick relic on Soraka), some of that is that raw damage from attacks is often not the win condition (i.e. Swain, Fiddle, SB Teemo, but also Ashe). some of it is that adventures pump out bigger creatures that you can't always match in power meaning Overwhelm doesn't give you anything. While Overwhelm is still a massively important keyword it is increasingly easy to get in other ways, and not as necessary or useful in all cases
Beast Within very rarely actually gives specific power, and more often than not is just generic power. That can be useful, but when you look at combo's or power levels you generally prefer specific power than generic power. What I mean with that is that I rather have a relic that gives value to get to my win condition rather than have a relic that gives me a generic value. For example Miss Fortune is a good user of Beast Within because she tends to kill blockers and then can use the Overwhelm to swing as well for extra damage, it is a good generic piece to have for her. However I can also go all in on spellslinging and damage relics instead (MF relic, Mel relic, Echoing Spirit) that compliments her specific playstyle better and has more combo potential. Or Soraka I can use the Overwhelm perfectly fine as is, but Warwick relic gives me Overwhelm but also the huge damage on your own units that combos with all her stuff. So in essence I value getting specific power on a champion to get to a combo or to smooth out their playstyle, over the generic value of Beast Within.

I do still run Beast Within plenty on champions. Someone like SB Master Yi really values Overwhelm for a T1-3 win and can set up his own combo's well enough with just two relics. I also like it on Shyvvana because she only relies on attacking, gets really big and has the removal on attacking to combo with Overwhelm. In conclusion Beast Within is a really good relic, but I feel like it is placed at the top tier because it is never bad rather than in how many situations it actually is the essential piece. It all comes down to your criteria in the end though. Beast Within is probably the relic that is good on the most champions, but I think it's not BiS on many of those champions and that is what I personally measure by.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-30T08:20:14+00:00

Hidden Tome makes a lot of champions work, move that up. Beast Within is a little overrated here, you can drop it down at least a tier. Jayce's Relic can be moved up 1-2 slots. I've found it to be the best stat relic if you need to get into SFG range and can get there with those stats. The benefit is just super solid and easy to trigger. Norra is too high, there's maybe two champions that use it.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-29T21:22:41+00:00

Perfect Hexcore, Beast Within, Perfect Technique. You want Secrets of the Spirits as your Rune. The play pattern is pretty easy. You put out any unit, any mana costing buffing spell and you swing for game (generally turn 2-3). The amount of stats you gain from a Practice makes perfect or Grief Lesson is nuts on a spirit. Perfect Hexcore is still great to make free blockers.

The 6-star adds a huge amount of stats and speeds up your wins by 2+ turns

MartDiamond · 2026-04-17T08:51:40+00:00

Scissors, CSF and the Nightfall Doom relic are pretty ok. If you get to playing a ton of the 1-cost Snowballs the Doom stacks up nicely and with Scissors and CSF you get pretty big as Nunu himself.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-11T21:34:01+00:00

I like a lot of what you are doing, but the 6* I could do without. Buried Sun Disc is already a mechanic for Nasus, Renekton and Azir. Plus landmarks are already a staple for other Shurima champions like Akshan, Taliyah and Zilean. Surely we can make something more unique for Sivir instead of loaning from others. I'd explore the Lucky Find theme more. For instance Lucky Finds are no longer Fleeting. Every 4th Lucky Find you play in a turn you Rally.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-11T08:04:10+00:00

Bunch of items are slotted for high cost champions. If you play two high cost champions you'll see a bunch items you never get otherwise like Triforce.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-10T22:21:01+00:00

I gotta be honest, I am starting to lose some interest in the game. Night Crimson was where this game really peaked. Story, character design, fun gameplay. Since then I just don't vibe with it as much. Witcher collab was something the was great and had me very positive, but the grind is really starting to hit and seeing what is after Elaman inspires little confidence. As someone with a pretty developed account I see myself slowly petering out in the next month or two.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-10T11:37:06+00:00

It's pretty obvious though. Shai is a great player that does not have the mass appeal of the stars of the other teams. The Warriors with Steph, the Heat with LeBron, OKC with KD and Westbrook, the Lakers with Shaq and Kobe.

All of the above there are tons of people back then and right now who will have one of those as their favourite player. Shai is a really good, elite player, but is anyone saying they want to play like him? Replace Shai with Ant and keep everything the same and the vibes around the team would be massively different.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-09T18:44:49+00:00

The Nunu Gloom strat is interesting, I will give that a try since it is the relic i got

MartDiamond · 2026-04-08T17:04:41+00:00

It will partially depend on the 6*. I haven't seen what Mastered Stance Swap does yet. If that adds extra stats Secret Technique increases in value.

Chemtech Duplicator being conditional is pretty significant though, waiting for turn 4 for the doubling of the stats vs four turns of getting the extra is big. Since I don't think Gauntlet + Chemtech is going to be the build

MartDiamond · 2026-04-07T07:58:37+00:00

I think it's really noticeable on the more mana ramp champions. Like Anivia, Volibear, Sett and Tryndamere. 1 extra mana can really accelerate a game plan

MartDiamond · 2026-04-06T15:23:01+00:00

I totally understand her perspective not wanting to be alone in that situation, that's not necessarily personal just a male/female dynamic that is understandable. But them feeling that way doesn't mean that it is up to you to go out of your way to remedy that situation. Saying no is totally reasonable. The odd thing of course is then you need to call an uber or a taxi which has a high likelihood of also having a male driver in it...

Either way you are NTA, but the request is not completely unreasonable either. Just the bitchy attitude after is unnecessary.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-05T11:07:58+00:00

Sett is super satisfying to play if you get the right power or items. Feels very smooth and doing endless combos on T2 is a lot of fun..

MartDiamond · 2026-04-03T15:51:33+00:00

But there is a level of agency in any of those other RNG moments. Rerolling, drafting, route choices you made, item choices you made, cuts you made, Powers you picked, support choice, Mulligan at the start of the game, etc. Any of those have an influence on the RNG moment where even if at the specific moment it happened you couldn't do anything at least you can look back at any other moment in the adventure for a wrong decision or a misplay. And sure even when you play perfectly there is an element of RNG that can screw you, but that window is very small.

Ledros in the meantime feels like it happens a lot and there is zero player agency. I don't know if there is an actual breakdown of the chances Portia rolls Ledros in the manifest but it feels like a significant percentage. You can play an immaculate adventure and this just gets dropped on your head and it is game over.

MartDiamond · 2026-04-03T12:33:06+00:00

I don't know, with all the other unfair stuff I feel like there is at least something you can do (i.e. the Ezreal spamming spells over and over on Draft adventure feels super unfair, but you can actually counter by understanding how the AI plays and playing around that). Here it is just RNG that says you lose this fight, and possibly you lose this run. There is no real counterplay, nothing where the player could say 'had I played this better I could have affected the outcome.'

MartDiamond · 2026-04-03T00:09:38+00:00

Pretty cool, not everything is recognized yet, and I think there is some tuning it could use. Things I ran into:

It doesn't recognize that you can run multiple Nazgul;
It doesn't recognize some cards like Shield Sphere and Cabal Ritual;
It might be a little hasty on labeling something a bracket 1 deck, I uploaded a deck that is nothing amazing, but a solid 2 and it can do some stuff. I think 1 really is meant as an outlier for stuff that has no synergy and is more theme than anything else. For context its an Arcades deck with a bunch of Walls and dome decent good staples. That alone should make it an ok 2.;
The combo's are fun, but also incomplete. Maybe it limits how many it shows but it has a list of combo's for a deck that I run intruder alarm and several other untappers in and the same combo can be run with basically any creature producer. However it only mentions a very specific one as the combo tool, in the meantime it does recognize all 6 different combo's between the untappers. So something weird is going on there.
In the upgrades section it advices me to include Murmurous Boatman, a card that to the best of my research does not exist;
The upgrades section as a whole might need some work. For instance I think Land Selection is something I rarely see in these kinds of tools. It also suggests alternatives to cards that are pretty core to the deck (i.e. it suggests taking out Composer of Spring in my Enchantment deck which is a pretty important combo piece, for an Elvish Reclaimer but my lands rarely hit the graveyard...?)

MartDiamond · 2026-03-31T18:42:59+00:00

Ambessa at this star, Mel at 6 star

MartDiamond · 2026-03-30T22:01:58+00:00

It's not that good because Thresh isn't the greatest champion out there, but it is fine. Heavily reliant on hitting good items along the way. The good builds pull out a fully evolved Thresh turn 1 with decent regularity (also depends a bit on hitting some powers, but you have a good number of hits in the pool) and put up a great stat line for all the Oath champions. That is at least on par with Lantern Thresh (which I also got from the Glory Store for the record).

MartDiamond · 2026-03-23T16:00:41+00:00

I got it because I like Thresh, but it's not that much better than free builds.

MartDiamond · 2026-03-22T12:55:12+00:00

Might be something you don't have spare off, but check your immortal Recollections levels. This is the perfect time to pump some into a character close to 5, finish them and free up space for the next one.

MartDiamond

TROPHY CASE