League of Legends

[Kaden]

I don't mind Flash in its current form. It promotes active gameplay, first and foremost.

Without Flash, ganking would just be TOO strong. Yeah, there are things you can do to mitigate that, but that's far from 100%. And really, people should never be immune to ganking, it's part of the game.

When people's Flashes are down, they play passively. They sit at a tower and either make no forward progress or they lose their tower two hits at a time because they're afraid of a gank. With a "get out of jail free" card available, people are willing to take risks and chances they wouldn't otherwise, which gives all players in the game more critical decisions.

Is it frustrating? Yeah. Is it a crutch? To some extent. Do I think it negatively impacts the game? Mostly no.

The single most frustrating thing for a player is to watch someone get away with one hit of health left. People will go to STUPID lengths to keep that from happening (usually to the detriment of themselves and their team, even) and Flash is what enables that 90% of the time. That said, the act of chasing someone down and getting really into the "I have to get them" mindset is usually fun -- even moreso when you actually catch them -- and it's usually because of Flash.

tl;dr: Yes, its frustrating when people Flash away from certain death, but I think the active gameplay it promotes more than makes up for it.