i don't think marksman should automatically be the carry class

Big Lincoln·Jan 14, 2017·117 votes·4,733 views

especially not when you balance them only around laning vs each other

we have had a lot of issues around early game marksmen like becoming late game powerhouses while still being bullies, and the opposite for . it kind of muddies the point of picking a hypercarry when other marksmen don't fall off or a lane bully when "hypercarry" marksman aren't exceptionally weak in lane. it makes which one you pick a lot less significant than it should be.

i think they need to have a larger variance in power curve. not to mention itemization needs to change; maybe we shouldn't enforce the idea that they should all be 6 damage item glass cannons, or at least let the old 4 damage 2 defense builds be viable again so that they have an actual fallback pattern

what do u guys think

127 Comments

WoonStruckJan 14, 201734 votes

I agree.

Champions like Azir Jax Khazix Kayle MasterYi Mordekaiser Nasus Ryze Olaf Veigar Vladimir Yasuo should all be alternative 'hard carries' that can be carried through their early game in league by a babysitter.

BârdJan 14, 201720 votes

add to the list Aatrox Cassiopeia Fiora Gangplank Riven Tryndamere

A bunch of DPS champions who, when allowed to scale up, can be major threats if they are allowed to pop off.

It probably wouldn't take much.

A couple buffs to item 1054 and Tower HP could make alternative carries more viable.

WoonStruckJan 14, 201716 votes

Changes to experience distribution. That's key.

Melees rely on levels far more than ranged because they need that advantage in damage/tankiness to accomplish anything.

Minions aggroing when right clicking a champion or attack-moving to target a champion within X range of minions, as opposed to after damage occurs.

This makes ranged harass early MUCH less oppressive and actually makes ranged harass require both more thought and mechanical knowledge compared to melee.

Fixes the whole "I auto attacked you but I'm already ready to enter a bush to avoid minion aggro by the time the projectile lands" bullshit.

TerchioJan 14, 20171 votes

So, this implies experience would be heavier in bottom in general. I see this not helping because ranged can abuse the EXP as well as melee can get caught up. In fact, if it's that heavy, I feel if a melee was shoved out of lane, he may end up too far behind.

Only problem I see this solving is maybe the overwhelmed gank situation in bottom. Might just make it worse with the enemy carry/support getting heavier EXP. Hard to call.

WoonStruckJan 14, 20172 votes

Melee wouldn't end up shoved out of lane because the changes to minion aggro and a better D-Shield would allow them to lane vs ranged without pushing ranged out either.

Early game is supposed to be relatively neutral. Not heavily in favor of one or the other.

There should also be a "I concede farm for X amount of time to heal" potion; effectively would cancel if put in combat so you can't last hit during it; enemies could punish heavily by attempting to put you in combat/zoning EXP.

The explanation is that being forced to back early leads to snowballs that are far too significant. 'Skill' no longer becomes a factor after a single misplay/outplay...far too often, tbh.

Forcing someone to potentially give up gold...for let's say 30 seconds or so... is a lot healthier for game pacing on both sides than ending up several levels behind AND behind in gold.

The potion should obviously end up far too insignificant to be worth using after a certain point; either that or the regen low enough that it would not be worth using for sustain in lane unless absolutely necessary.

Snowman ArcJan 14, 20171 votes

Or, if there is more EXP bottom lane, maybe you can see a hyper-scaler like Jax moving to the bottom lane as a solo and become a monster way before intended.

TerchioJan 14, 20172 votes

To be fair, it'd probably be same exp solo bottom, they'd just increase the split EXP on bottom from 30% to maybe 50%. To be clear, 65% of a kill's EXP goes to the champions around if two were there in live. The suggestion is likely to raise this to 75%, or something of the like. Solo laning would be unaffected, if this were the method used.

WoonStruckJan 15, 20172 votes

To add on to this, a net EXP bonus for multiple champions laning together (at the very least 2; not nearly enough to be strong with 3) would create more diverse lane setups, making jungle an option as opposed to a necessity, which would introduce a new class of supports: roamers, in addition to solidifying an area for assassins to excel in.

Rogue BlitzwolfJan 14, 20172 votes

Yeah but what if the melee right clicks the whole way there he might be getting minion agro.

WoonStruckJan 14, 20172 votes

You solve that by...hmm...not unnecessarily clicking on the enemy champion?

Click around them until you're next to them...which is pretty standard already for anyone above bronze.

It would be a very, very easy adjustment for any player.

Baron of BreadJan 15, 20172 votes

My big problem is how un-intuitive the change would make minion aggro. Getting minion aggro for not actually interacting with the enemy champion would be very strange.

It also means you can draw minions and their aggro off of a wave by simply right clicking an enemy champion. Being able to draw minions away without having to get close would be a mechanic I am not sure on the implications of, but I don't really like it.

AnidanJan 15, 20172 votes

This is how minions work in DotA2, actually. The minions will only attack if you right click on an enemy hero if you're within a certain radius of them, otherwise they ignore the both of you. However, there is no distance that the enemy hero has to be within, so if you're, say, Axe, you can get in the middle of a large creep wave, right click an enemy hero on the opposite side of map and all of the enemy creeps near you will switch aggro to you instead of your own creep-wave letting you Counter-Helix them to death.

This change doesn't necessarily have bad implications, just a slightly different way of doing it. It would allow Rammus and Amumu, for example, to waveclear a bit better without requiring that they skip way ahead of their own minion wave to to kill the enemy minions quickly.

makes ranged poke less 'oppressive' by gaining enemy minion aggro as soon as the command goes out rather than after the hit, meaning they're punished for intent just as much as the action itself, just like a melee would be if he initiated his attack-command from a distance.
improves waveclear for anyone who wants to be hit or followed for their waveclear to be more effective.

On the other hand:

it punishes accidental right-clicks with minion aggro when you didn't necessarily mean to get it
it could cause squishy targets to take a bit more damage than they otherwise would in a minion wave, particularly impactful in the early game and around super minions.

The fixes: don't wantonly click on the enemy. Go in with clear intent since the minions will now punish intent as much as the action. Not a really big deal since it's not a good idea to just be wantonly clicking on the enemy anyway.

FriusJan 14, 20178 votes

aatrox scaling in 2017 LEL

Snowman ArcJan 14, 20172 votes

Thing is, most of the champions you mentioned already have some sort of dueling power early, to the point that they don't need a babysitter to soak up exp from them. There are champions who scale with items and there are ones who scale with levels. Most ADCs scale with items. Their abilities are only becoming really relevant after they get 3-4 items. Examples:

-Sivir. Her main damage spell is her W, which only gains damage if she has a lot of damage items. -Vayne. Her W becomes a monster ability after she can have a lot of attack speed to proc it often. -Jinx. Her AoE is only a damage boost if she has strong autoattacks.

I could go on.

Instead, Jax doesn't rely so much on items, rather than levels. Sure, they still make him strong, but Jax can still do a lot of things even without items. Corki also doesn't require a lot of items to be effective early, since he can spam spells.

6SfoolJan 14, 201714 votes

Almost every single one needs a nerf to their late game- they're all draintanks with warlords and 1500 dps. And most of them barring Caitlyn need a buff to their early game. They should always be relevant with peel, but just because the game reaches 40 minutes doesn't mean everyone should be target practice for the adc. Adc's are only weak because too many champs have so much burst. Basically, either the adc gets deleted instantly and they feel bad, or everyone else gets deleted pretty quikly and they feel bad.

Corrupt BlissJan 14, 20173 votes

The champions themselves don't need nerfs. In-fact, ADC is in a weak state as is and needs a buff.

What really needs a rework (or imo just get removed) is warlords bloodlust. Garbage sustain mastery doesn't belong in league.

Snowman ArcJan 14, 20173 votes

It's definitely weird, but what I'd like to see is the Lifesteal being implemented in the champion stats. Currently, you can see Lifesteal you gain from BT / BorK etc, but you don't see the Lifesteal you get from Warlord's.

Snowman ArcJan 14, 20175 votes

That's the point though. We already have a class that is stronger than ADCs early and fall off late. We don't need marksmen to be like that. They are supposed to be weaker than most other champions early and be monster late. That's why you try to get your bottom lane ahead. Get the late game for your ADC faster and slow it down for the enemy, which should be an assurance that you win the game.

EnlegacyJan 14, 201710 votes

The class as a whole only has one job, to do damage, from range, with a little bit of utility sprinkled in, be it stealth, or slows, or some cc. I think the reason why they scale well into the late game is because a lot of their power is by nature invested into their damage, where mages have a lot of their budget put into cc and utility, or mobility of some sort. Divers have some of their budget put into their mobility and tankiness, assassins have some of theirs put into mobility, and skirmishers have some of theirs put into all of the previous topics.

  So I don't think that it is really possible to not have marksman as the carry class. Admittedly, there are other late-game scaling champs who could be classified as hyper carries, namely ![Azir](https://ddragon.leagueoflegends.com/cdn/16.20.1/img/champion/Azir.png) ![Yasuo](https://ddragon.leagueoflegends.com/cdn/16.20.1/img/champion/Yasuo.png) ![Fiora](https://ddragon.leagueoflegends.com/cdn/16.20.1/img/champion/Fiora.png) ![Gangplank](https://ddragon.leagueoflegends.com/cdn/16.20.1/img/champion/Gangplank.png) , I think I am missing a few, but those are the ones who could replace a marksman on a team as a hypercarry.

I am basically just rambling at this rate and throwing out words though, so I would like feedback on my mainly non-coherent nonsense I just wrote. I am not really focusing right now tbh.

Big LincolnJan 14, 20176 votes

i would like for marksman to selectively have higher utility, too. like the title said, I'd rather see them move away from being a pure damage class, we could afford to see some more variety between what they actually do

perhaps some marksman have strong base stats but low scaling, which might encourage them to build a couple of offense items and then finish off sort of light bruiser-y to compensate for inferior late game output with survivability. other ADCs might still build glass cannon but they have the best scaling to compensate for it.

Corrupt BlissJan 14, 20171 votes

That removes them from the ADC class. There are already many champions that build just as you described- Fiora to name one off the top of my head. Even Yasuo currently builds four damage two tank items.

RalanrJan 14, 20176 votes

There is no ADC class. It is marksmen.

It may be better to actually separate those two entities.

Corrupt BlissJan 14, 20171 votes

Marksmen*

Still on ADC from over the years. Marksmen as a whole are suffering, and asking them to be remade into a different class is just silly.

Do you really want more Quinn in the toplane?

RalanrJan 14, 20173 votes

I want more diversity so that we can bruisers function in bot so I won't be pissed off at seeing Quinn in top.

Corrupt BlissJan 14, 20171 votes

That's the problem. OP and yourself are literally asking for more marksmen like Quinn.

RalanrJan 14, 20173 votes

No. We want bruiser carry bot.

Corrupt BlissJan 15, 20171 votes

That's jax quinn fiora. Those are all busier carries and imo I hate all of them haha. I do not need more bruiser carries

RalanrJan 15, 20173 votes

And they all suck in bot. Even Quinn was pretty much removed from bot lane.

Corrupt BlissJan 15, 20171 votes

Is the complaint then that bot lane is typically the marksmen+support lane?

I've seen my fair share of yasuo malphites bot, wukong pantheon, velkozby and xerath, sion jax, and I'll tell ya, they definitely have an opportunity to shit on a marksmen support bot.

The reason top champs do not typically go where marksmen go is because pre level 3 they like their gap closers and can be denied creeps and exp.

Pair a top champ with a strong support and you'll most likely do finr, provided you picked intelligently into your matchup.

RalanrJan 15, 20174 votes

Yet it's not possible for that to be meta without being broken.

Meanwhile Quinn is expected to work top.

Big LincolnJan 14, 20173 votes

no it doesn't, it's how most of them were built in season 4 and earlier

There are already many champions that build just as you described

explain how it's a bad thing, then

Corrupt BlissJan 14, 20172 votes

LOL. Marksmen building Sterak's and Frozen Mallet was bull-shit. It made playing any other role useless. Literally as much tank as front line, sustain, and kiting. Those builds were complete cancer and part of the reason marksmen received their initial changes.

I highly suggest listening to pro player opinions on the state of marksmen, as well as heading over to The Rift Herald and reading their article with the QA on marksmen.

Big LincolnJan 14, 20172 votes

LOL. Marksmen building Sterak's and Frozen Mallet was bull-shit.

good thing they didn't build that way in season 4, because sterak's wasn't in the game in season 4. back then it was banshee's and a GA.

LordGeovanniJan 14, 20172 votes

I dont see marksmen as low utility Caitlyn Traps 5 of them over the lane and a dash and slow the dash is very long and slow is pretty strong considering how much damage she does from far away. Caitlyn is supposedly a sniper class but she plays nothing like a sniper at all same with jhin except his ult and w Ashe perma slows and 3 second stun on a high damage ult Azir technically a marksmen so the shurmia shuffle ult and perma slow even if he is only as good as other champions right now and still slightly harder than most marksmen to play. Ezreal attack speed buff that is pratically invisible you know that clarity thing that fighters are getting changed into tanks for and supports are getting changed for (taric) along with a blink that makes him almost impossible to catch but isnt tied into his damage alot like people claim with fizzes E
MissFortune slow is nothing to laugh at and tell me haveing to drop everything you are doing to move out of a wide range ult so that you dont instantly lose a fight isnt utility in addition to her being able to kite very efficnetly due to her movement speed buff

Snowman ArcJan 14, 20172 votes

Every champion has or can have utility in the game. When we say utility, we mean meaningful utility. You can't compare Sejuani's slows and ult to MF's E...

RavenMagusJan 14, 20171 votes

Azir is not technically a marksman at all. He's not AD and he doesn't build marksman items and he doesn't play similarly to them.

LordGeovanniJan 15, 20171 votes

Marksmen not adc go into the client go to champions and filter marksmen hell you can even do it right here under the champions icon he is the second champion from the left just type in marksman

RavenMagusJan 15, 20171 votes

Doesn't show up in my client:

http://i.imgur.com/B3tV1UG.png

Besides, there are people claiming left and right that Nocturne isn't an assassin despite it actually being his main champion tag, and he plays much more similarly to an assassin than Azir does a marksman.

Snowman ArcJan 14, 20174 votes

Then there is no point of a marksman class. The build that you mention is already built on fighters / bruisers. Not all champions needs to be perfectly balanced between attack and defence. Someone are purely defensive, some are purely offensive.

agbudarJan 14, 20176 votes

i will probably get downvoted for this but i thought it was good that adc build items such as item 3053 item 3026 item 3156 it made sense even mages build defensively when they are behind instead of rushing items such as item 3089 item 3285 opting for item 3027 item 3116 item 3157 item 3001 .

Cosmic WarperJan 14, 201713 votes

{quoted}

i will probably get downvoted for this but i thought it was good that adc build items such as it made sense even mages build defensively when they are behind instead of rushing items such as opting for .

adcs can't afford to build defensively early... why wont people ever understand this... if you build even one defensive item like steraks or GA on an ADC you're useless... you might as well become a frontline tank at that point because your dps falls like a rock. ADCs have items that synergize multiplicatively (crit, AS, AD, lifesteal), that's why they NEED to get to 3-4 of their dps items to reach their powerspikes while mages only need 1-2 items and can build defensively along the way because most mages aren't DPS champions and rely on casting spells for extended periods of time.

Big LincolnJan 14, 20175 votes

early season 6 ADCs were building steraks and maw, they're actually the reason they have the same passive now

Cosmic WarperJan 14, 20176 votes

[{quoted}](name=Big Lincoln,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=0fsRXMkc,comment-id=000500000000,timestamp=2017-01-14T21:32:26.025+0000)

early season 6 ADCs were building steraks and maw, they're actually the reason they have the same passive now

Well yeah because both of those items were overtuned in s6. Maw gave armor pen (god knows why), and sterak's was nerfed in efficiency.

Big LincolnJan 14, 20178 votes

sterak's was fine, nobody complained about its usage on juggernauts

it ended up being a better item on marksmen because they were more likely to get bursted and actually activate the shield

Cosmic WarperJan 15, 20172 votes

[{quoted}](name=Big Lincoln,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=0fsRXMkc,comment-id=00050000000000000000,timestamp=2017-01-14T23:52:49.832+0000)

sterak's was fine, nobody complained about its usage on juggernauts

it ended up being a better item on marksmen because they were more likely to get bursted and actually activate the shield

I agree, i wish they just made it melee only or did something to prevent marksmen from building it instead of outright nerfing the stats

NodirjonSattarovJan 14, 20172 votes

Have you played against a Kog'Maw?

Big LincolnJan 14, 201716 votes

kog'maw being shit now does not mean he wasn't overpowered before

which is kind of the point of the topic; marksmen go in and out of meta at a moment's notice. wouldn't you like your champion to be good for a reason other than having stronger rightclicks than other ADCs at any given moment

TheIronRevenantJan 14, 20174 votes

sentry turret kog was cancer

Corrupt BlissJan 14, 20171 votes

Each marksmen has their own defined strengths and weaknesses, but that doesn't mean some just won't perform as well as others in certain matchups.

Kog'Maw at the moment has no defined strengths, but a lot of weaknesses. Kog'Maw used to be the tank shredder thanks to %HP damage and large range buff.

Caitlyn on the other hand has defined weakness and very strong strength. Large range and strong zoning potential make for a great lane bully.

Lucian has very strong burst and high mobility, but also has a brief gap in strength. Combined with his short range Lucian becomes a strong burst marksmen, weaving in and out fights.

Currently we do not see a large variety of marksmen because of the weakness their class as a whole holds. Caitlyn/Ezreal/Jinx/Jhin/Twitch are all meta marksmen because of their large range and ability to either zone or get out (in Jhin's case become a sniper). Other marksmen are outclassed because of their inherent weakness and the CC immune dominant junglers (I'm looking at Vi, Hecarim, and Olaf).

I do agree however, that the marksmen class update normalized builds and it's become a bit stale as far as build variety goes.

In all I think your problem is not with marksmen, but with individual champions.

AnidanJan 15, 20177 votes

I think the actual problem is itemization. There's no real distinction between early-game and late-game items for ADCs so they all pick up the same items, which means that later in the game they don't actually have to fall off very hard despite some of them being early-game champions. They don't pick up anything that emphasizes their early-game strengths, because a lot of their strengths come from right-clicks, and in the late-game right-clicks that are backed up by the proper items are some of the highest reliable DPS in the game, meaning even early-game-centric burst champions can do respectable DPS in the late-game.

The only ADC I've seen so far that's able to utilize League's items in a way that allows him to actually stand out among the other ADCs is Ezreal, and MF to a lesser extent because they can use their abilities as decent fallbacks or general gameplans rather than nothing but AAs after a couple quick spells have been thrown down.

That or I'd say the problem is that almost all Marksmen have incredibly heavy emphasis on right-clicks, which is, in itself, problematic because it means they're more interchangeable than their diverse abilities would lead you to believe. The itemization in tandem with kinda same-y playstyle of a lot of the Marksmen leads to a lot of them being interchangeable just based on their changing damage values.