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For anyone who doesn't know, in League there's a difference between on-hit and on-attack effects. On-hit effects are (mostly) just damage, and things like Wit's End, Kog W, Vayne bolts, Sheen procs, and Ashe slow are on-hit effects. On-attack effects are things that happen when you complete a basic attack windup, and generally include "fancier" effects. Things like Runaan's Bolts, Pix, and Kayle's damage waves are on-attack effects. A number of spells that apply on-hit effects also apply on-attack effects, like Ezreal's Q and Yasuo/Yone Q.
Now, with the exception of Kraken Slayer, everything behaves consistently. This does lead to some results most people wouldn't expect, but reading about on-hit/on-attack effects can explain the results. For example, Ezreal can shoot Runaan's bolts with his Q (even though they are still limited by his basic attack range).
And then along comes Kraken Slayer. It makes, legitimately, no f*cking sense.
It doesn't interact at all with Guinsoo's or Runaan's. Okay, fair enough. Maybe it's an on-attack effect? On-attack effects don't interact with those items.
But, as everyone surely knows by now, Katarina applies Kraken Slayer way too fast. For anyone who doesn't know how the interaction works, for each enemy hit by each tick of her ult or by her passive daggers, she gets a Kraken Slayer stack. That means if she hits 3 people at once with her ult, the first two people give her stacks and the third person consumes the stacks to deal true damage. This means that each tick of her ult can potentially do Kraken Slayer's true damage, and it ticks like a billion times a second for a grand total of three billion true damage. The most infuriating thing, however, is that her ult/daggers do not apply on-attack effects. They only apply on-hit effects, so the Kraken Slayer interaction means that stacks are being generated on-hit. This is also true for other melee champs. I tested it on things like Pantheon and Irelia; Irelia's Q gives her a stack, and Panth's triple attack will give him three stacks (dealing the true damage). Again, though, these abilities don't apply on-attack effects, only on-hit effects.
The wiki says that Kraken Slayer applies on-hit for attacks without projectiles, and on-attack for attacks with projectiles. This could explain it, as Kat/Panth/Irelia are all melee and don't use projectiles. IMO, it would be a really bizarre and unintuitive explanation, but at least it would be an explanation. However, that statement isn't even entirely true.
Senna Q, which applies on-hit but not on-attack effects, generates stacks, but only once, regardless of how many targets are hit. ?????????????? Senna's autos don't use projectiles, so to be consistent with Katarina, each target hit should generate a stack.
MF Q, which applies both on-hit and on-attack effects to the first target and only on-hit to the second, generates two Kraken Slayer stacks. It should only generate one. Meanwhile, Twitch ult and Kayle E (both of which modify basic attacks to apply on-hit effects in an area) only generate one stack, regardless of targets hit. Aphelios's "fake autos," (the ones from his ult and flamethrower Q), which also apply on-hit but not on-attack effects, each generate a stack. This means if he hits 3 people with his ult/flamethrower Q, he instantly procs Kraken. Again, to be consistent, they shouldn't generate any stacks. Same thing applies to his heal-gun Q (the one where he attacks a lot): the attacks don't apply on-attack effects, so they shouldn't proc Kraken Slayer at all. Except maybe they should, because his heal-gun doesn't use projectiles? I'm honestly not sure about this one. Sidenote, his heal-gun Q is also really inconsistent. It sometimes doesn't apply on-hit effects at all, and it stacks energized attacks (energized stacks are generated on-attack, so they shouldn't be stacked).
This is confusing, bizarre, inconsistent, and leads to a ton of broken interactions (ie Katarina). IMO, they should make Kraken Slayer an on-attack effect, which would make it more consistent with other 3-hit items (Guinsoo's), fix Katarina, and generally prevent abuse. But, at the very least, it should be consistent. What we have now is definitely not that.
TL;DR: Kraken Slayer behaves super inconsistently regarding on-hit and on-attack effects. It should just be an on-attack effect.
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