If you remember, when Teamfight Tactics Season 4.5 was introduced, the Dragon Tribe created a real sensation. With the execution animation effect of the Elder Dragon from League of Legends applied to the Dragon Tribe, Riot Games made many people think that this would be an extremely powerful tribe. However, as we approach the end of Season 4.5, the Dragon Tribe has turned out to be nothing but a disappointment.
Basically, Riot Games’ goal in creating the Dragon Tribe effect was to make players invest a lot of brainpower in arranging their team. You have to calculate the positions of the Dragon Tribe units so that the main carry will receive buffs but won’t get eliminated too quickly. If the front line unit gets taken down, who will inherit the Dragon Tribe buff next… This sounds interesting, but in reality, it hasn’t been as great as expected.
To gain the Dragon Tribe effect, the unit must take damage from the opponent, usually from a tank. Unfortunately, the unit that protects the Dragon Tribe in Season 4.5 is Braum. With his Ultimate Ability, Stand United, reducing damage by up to 75% right from 1-star level, Braum can be considered the most dominant tank at the 2-gold price. However, his attack speed is incredibly poor, and he activates the Dragon Tribe effect extremely slowly.
The common situation when playing the Dragon Tribe composition early in the game is that Braum receives buffs but just won’t die, preventing the main carry like Tristana from gaining power. This makes the damage output of the Dragon Tribe composition in the early game extremely weak. Clearly, this will diminish the ability to accumulate gold, level up, and increase the strength of the Dragon Tribe composition compared to other team comps.
Furthermore, reaching the maximum strength of 9 Dragon Tribe units is currently an impossible feat. Remember that the Dragon Tribe only has 7 champions. To reach the 9-unit threshold, you need both the Dragon Tribe Chosen and the Dragon Spirit. This is incredibly difficult to achieve when the Golden Spatula is becoming the rarest item in Teamfight Tactics. Even if you possess a Golden Spatula, you have better options than trying to find a 9th Dragon Tribe unit; you can simply build a Mage Cap for Swain instead.
These limitations have led players to not use the Dragon Tribe as a winning condition in Season 4.5. People have gradually realized that the strong magic damage from Mages, the resilience of Brawlers, or the Butcher are much better choices. Thus, an ironic situation occurred in Season 4.5 where Dragon Tribe champions are incredibly powerful, yet no one wants to activate their tribe effect.
For example, the 7 Mage composition is still a relatively solid ranking strategy due to Aurelion Sol’s insane damage output. Even if you include Swain in this composition, the goal isn’t to get more damage from the Dragon Tribe. Basically, you want to utilize the “health hack” ability when Swain casts twice (with a Mage Cap) to make this champion nearly invincible in the late game.
In conclusion, the idea of arranging a team to take advantage of the Dragon Tribe effect by Riot is not bad at all. However, the design of the champions supporting this idea is simply poor. As a result, the Dragon Tribe has been largely ignored by Teamfight Tactics players throughout most of Season 4.5 as they discovered far more effective winning strategies.