Caitlyn doesn't fulfill the Sniper power fantasy

Right now, Caitlyn has problems. She's a hyper-safe, poorly scaling carry who's an insurmountable lane bully and harder to catch than Jinx herself (Which makes absolutely no sense when you stop and think about it.) Between her range, traps, and recoil-dash, Cait simply isn't engaging to lane against.

But that's not her real problem. Cait's real problem is that she's a terrible sniper. Where's the carefully studying opponents? Where's the incredible short range vulnerability? Where's the lining up the perfect shot (Ace in the Hole sorta fulfills that, but it's pretty underwhelming) to take out a priority target?

Long story short, Caitlyn needs both vulnerabilities and abilities that actually fulfill the sniper fantasy, as opposed to abilities that fulfill the "Incredibly safe and aggravating carry" fantasy. She's not a huge priority, but I still think she needs a small-scale rework to get her in line with both Riot's design philosophies of interesting choices and her actual core concept in ways other than "Hurr durr she's got range."

• Passive - Keen Eyes

• Caitlyn studies visible opponents, discerning their weaknesses. Visible enemy champions within a radius around her are studied over 10/9/8/7/6/5 seconds (At levels 1/4/7/10/13/16), after which they are Marked. Against Marked enemies, Caitlyn gains 20% Armor Penetration and her attacks deal bonus physical damage equal to 20% of her total Attack Damage. This bonus damage is multiplied on Critical Strikes. Enemies aren't aware they're being watched unless they're within Caitlyn's vision radius.

• Enemies that Caitlyn loses vision of become unMarked after 3 seconds. In addition, whenever Caitlyn takes damage from an enemy champion, her concentration is disrupted, temporarily unMarking and delaying Marking enemies for 3 seconds.

• Marking Radius: 1100 (+50 per level)

• Q - Piltover Peacemaker

• Active - Caitlyn chambers a special round into her rifle, disabling her ability to attack or use abilities for one second but retaining her ability to move. For 5 seconds afterwards, Caitlyn's next attack fires an incredibly fast piercing round that deals 20/35/50/65/80 (+120/125/130/135/140% total AD) physical damage to enemies it passes through, reduced by 10% for each enemy it hits to a minimum of 50% damage. Caitlyn retains her normal attack range for the attack, but the shell travels to a maximum range of 1200. This attack can be triggered against structures, but doesn't deal bonus damage to them. On-hit effects and critical hits are only applied to the primary target of the attack, and critical hits don't count any of the bonus damage.

• While Piltover Peacemaker is primed, Caitlyn can reactivate it to fire it as a skillshot. This shot doesn't apply on-hit effects or crits to any enemy hit, but otherwise behaves as normal.

• Cost: 60/65/70/75/80 Mana

• Cooldown: 10/9/8/7/6 Seconds (Notes: Piltover Peacemaker loses a lot of its oppressive early and mid game damage but becomes a bit easier to hit at medium range. Also keep in mind that while the 20% AD on-hit effect from Keen Eyes is only applied to the primary target, but the 20% Armor Penetration applies against all targets hit.)

• W - Yordle Snap Trap

• Passive - Caitlyn generates and stores a trap every 20/18/16/14/12 seconds. This stock time is effected by cooldown reduction. Caitlyn can store up to 2 traps at a time.

• Active - Caitlyn sets a trap at a location that arms after a short delay. An enemy champion that steps on a trap is dealt 80/120/160/200/240 (+50% AP) magic damage and is snared for 1.5 seconds. Caitlyn also gains True Sight of the enemy for 8 seconds, and enemies are immediately Marked.

• Traps last for up to 4 minutes, and Caitlyn can have up to 3 traps out at a time. Placing an extra trap deactivates the oldest one. Traps can be targeted and destroyed with 3 autoattacks similarly to wards.

• Cost: 50 Mana + 1 Trap

• Static Cooldown: 2 second

• Range: 600 (Notes: YST loses range and damage but gains the ability to store a pair for quick deployment, allowing Caitlyn to quickly set up a small sniper nest. It also allows her to quickly Mark priority targets, though the traps still have a short arm time.)

• E - Kinetic Barrier

• Active - Caitlyn activates her shield belt, sending out a pulse of energy that knocks enemies back, dealing 60/100/140/180/220 (+50% AP) magic damage to enemies around her and slowing them by 30/35/40/45/50% for 2 seconds, with the slow decaying over its duration. Caitlyn also gains a shield that absorbs up to 60/100/140/180/220 (+50% AP) damage and lasts for up to 3 seconds.

• Cost: 80 Mana

• Cooldown: 18/17/16/15/14 Seconds

• Range: 325 (Notes: Caitlyn trades the hyper-safe net jump for a medium-low strength shield/AoE slow. Still very safe, but doesn't allow her to reposition herself, harass enemies from a distance, etc. On the upside it still grants Caitlyn a line of defense against assassins, which maintains her safe nature without making it completely excessive like it used to be.)

• Ultimate - Ace in the Hole

• Active - Caitlyn targets an enemy at extreme range, channeling for 1.5 seconds. If the enemy is Marked, she channels for 0.5 seconds instead. At the end of the channel, Caitlyn fires a special homing round that travels at incredible speeds, dealing 100/175/250 (+150% total AD) to the first enemy champion in its path. If Ace in the Hole hits its targeted champion deals 1.25% increased damage for each 1% of the enemy's health that's missing, up to a maximum of 200/350/500 (+300% total AD) damage to enemies at or below 20% health. If the targeted champion is Marked, Ace it the hole deals maximum damage to enemies at or below 40% health instead. If Caitlyn loses vision of the target, the target becomes untargetable, or she cancels the ability by reactivating it, Ace in the Hole goes on a reduced 10 second cooldown but doesn't refund its mana cost.

• Cost: 100 Mana

• Cooldown: 120/105/90 Seconds

• Range: 2000/2500/3000 (Notes: Ace in the Hole gets quite a few degrees more mechanical complexity focused around keeping it from being a "remove a champion from the fight" button. The longer channel time is counteracted by a drastically higher projectile speed (nearly instantaneous) and a reduced channel time for targeting enemies that have either been studied or have unfortunately stepped on a trap. In addition, the penalty for intercepting a shot is drastically reduced, and the ability is much more execution focused: Against low health targets, death is all but assured if the shot connects. In addition, the total AD scaling helps smooth out its power curve. It also gains more counterplay by forcing Caitlyn players to really consider when to fire. It's important to remember that while cancelling the ability puts it on a reduced cooldown, interrupting the channel with hard CC does not, and with the longer channel time using it at close range presents a huge opening.)

CHANGELIST:

• Cooldown on W changed to a static 2 seconds to help prevent chain CCing. (7/15/2014)
• Marking range on passive changed to adjust with level, 1100 (+50 per Level), 2000 at level 18. (7/15/2014)
• Removed double-speed Marking on targets that can't see Cait. (7/15/2014)
• Keen Eyes scaling reworked: Same at levels 1 and 16. (7/17/2014)
• Taking damage only disrupts Cait for 3 seconds, temporarily disabling Marks. (7/17/2014)