Brand, the Burning Vengeance Review

Brand, the Burning Vengeance is the newest champion released by Riot Games in their release one champion every two weeks schedule.  This brings the grand total to 74 champions now.  The last two champions released were physical damage melee assassins, but Brand brings a change to that pattern as a magic casting nuker.  Brand is an AP caster that does AOE damage and nukes depending on the combination of spells cast.  Brand is a combination spell caster where each spell when combined with another has different effects.  For example using his Q ability on a target that is afflicted by his passive Blaze from being struck by one of his other three abilities becomes stunned for 2 seconds.  Brand’s abilities all differ in this regard but all work off his passive.  His W deals 25% more damage, his E does AOE damage, and his ultimate spreads to other targets quicker.  This makes Brand a bit more unique instead of an easy to use champion where it is just point and click to damage and nuke enemy champions.  Instead it gives the player a decision making tree to go one route or the other and have to decide in what order to cast one’s spells.
Brand is a solid AP caster that is capable of farming due to his AOE abilities.  This in some regards I consider his one and only OP aspect due to the fact that if a group wants to push they can easily be stopped by Brand’s ability to clear minion waves quickly.  This adds passivity to the game which is something Riot has stated they want to do away with in order to speed up games.  However, Brand also needs this ability as an AOE damaging caster to be able to do as much damage as possible by farming with his abilities.  Brand has no utility as a caster other then the 2 second stun effect of his Q ability if the target is Ablaze.  Even then this stun can be a bit tricky because his Q ability is a skill shot so the chances of it landing become smaller.  Therefore, he has an unreliable form of crowd control(CC) as a form of utility to help his team and himself in order to escape.  Brand instead is just that a magic damage dealing nuker.  If Brand is farmed whether by creep score or champion kills and has a lot of AP be on the lookout because his damage is no joke.  Brand’s main damaging abilities are his W and his ultimate, which can be easily dodged due to the fact it takes time for the AOE effect of his W ability activates.  Overall Brand’s abilities and kit make him a fun champion to play due to the fact he is a combination caster and damage dealer.  Brand also uses a lot of mana when using his abilities so getting Golemn buff or having mana items on him are a must if you plan to cast a lot in team fights and manage to kill people while anticipating chances for missing abilities.
In conclusion, I would like to say that Brand is a fun new champion that is one of my favorite AP casters of this moment.  He is a capable solo and laner that can harass the enemy champions well not only with his abilities but with the damage over time effect of his passive.  My only concern would be his ability to add passivity to the game by allowing turtle effects in losing games due to his AOE farming capability.  Brand is in no way an AP carry but he can definitely help change a team fight around if played correctly due to his AOE damaging abilities and kit.  Therefore I will say that Brand for the most part is spot on,  but I believe his AOE capabilities to be a bit high and need to be toned down.  However, this would have to be done carefully as to not destroy his presence in fights; let alone his ability to farm in order to become a presence that the enemy team should be wary of.