Let's Talk About Twitch
#Preface
Twitch, quite the marvelous champion and a perfect example of what a balanced champion is. Every strong aspect about his kit has some sort of tradeoff. His Passive - Deadly Venom deals true damage over time, but it's such a small amount that it's okay for it to be true damage. His ability to stay in stealth for a very long duration is coupled with the fact that it has a long channel and people who get in melee range of him can see him. This creates a fun environment for both the enemy and the player, as the player has to think about how/when to use their Q - Ambush and where they position during it, and the enemy doesn't feel cheated by his stealth as they can take advantage of the weaknesses in it. His E - Expunge Contaminate deals a large chunk of damage, but requires him to stack it over six auto attacks, or by spending a large chunk of mana to stack it slightly faster. This creates fair gameplay as the enemy has a lot of counterplay in avoiding letting the Twitch get six stacks on them, but a Twitch who can keep the fight going is rewarded. His R - Spray and Pray gives him the longest range in the game, which the tradeoff for this is a lack of mobility in his kit. This allows safety to Twitch, but the lack of mobility is highly punishable by a large majority of champions in the current meta. His ridiculously weak early game is the tradeoff of him having such high damage late game. Anything Twitch has in his kit has an equal and opposite consequence. Honestly, Twitch should be looked at as an example by Riot for all of their balancing. He is the epitome of balance.
#Problem
That said, even though his kit is perfect, he hasn't seen any play in a professional competition world wide this split, and there are only two weeks left of it, nor has he received a balance change in 16 patches. Even though he has the second highest winrate of ADCs in Platinum+ elo, he's still completely ignored by Riot and professionals. If he's the epitome of balance, why is this the case? Well, simply put, it's because of the fact that he's balanced. Every aspect of his kit is outdone by another champion without the same pitfalls that Twitch faces. Albeit Caitlyn and Tristana don't have as long of range, they're still long range and have more overloaded aspects in their kit than Twitch has. Kog'maw faces the same problem with his lack of mobility, but his %health mixed damage and armor shred has made him more useful than Twitch in the exact same instances you'd pick Twitch. His stealth is outdone by Vayne and, more recently, Neeko. He is so easy to shutdown early compared to other scaling ADCs like Sivir and Jinx. Kai'sa has more mobility coupled with her passive dealing more damage than Twitch's Expunge Contaminate and ult that makes her more reliable in wave clearing then getting to the fight than Twitch. He doesn't have anything "broken" in his kit compared to the champions of our current meta that have at least one overloaded aspect added to their kit. His kit is just outdated. In a meta where there is no tradeoff in the abilities of most of the recent champions and reworks, it's tough for him to survive as more than a niche pick where the enemy team for some reason doesn't take any mobility or assassins.
Could this just be a meta issue? Well, of course. Twitch has thrived in many environments, such as the tank meta and usually does well in metas similar to the one we're in right now, with Crit, farm-heavy ADCs taking control of the game. Right now, though, every ADC has some form of mobility or escape, as well as high early damage. Twitch, Varus, Kog'maw, and Ashe are the only ADCs with no form of reliable in-combat mobility, all of which are either not played or only played in niche positions, and even Varus and Ashe have high early game damage. This is especially a problem in a meta of poke/burst supports, where Twitch can't compete with all of the harass he deals with from both the high early damage of current ADCs and the damage of poke/burst supports. He just doesn't have the mobility to avoid the dodgeball that is botlane, nor the damage to make reasonable trades back in most situations. He is very reliant on the support picking either a large amount of lockup, like Thresh, to stop the enemy from dealing their damage, or a large amount of damage, like Zyra or Nami, so damage is kept up in trades. As it looks in the current meta, it can be predicted that Twitch will not be able to be dominant or thrive in any meta as more than, as I've repeated, a niche pick. Mages have extremely long range and/or mobility and can 100-0. Assassins have a ridiculous amount of mobility and can 100-0. Tanks have huge amounts of mobility and deal a lot of damage. Everyone has mobility and high early damage. Twitch just can't keep up with any meta as he stands.
#Potential Solutions
There are only four ways to fix this--in order from most reasonable to least reasonable: Both a base Attack Damage and a scaling Attack Damage buff, a huge buff to his E and passive, a rework of his kit, or tweaking the entire meta to reduce the amount of mobility and damage output in a majority of champions using Twitch and Vel'koz as an example of perfect balance where each strong aspect of their kit has some consequence and nothing to bail them out of the consequences. Two of these are very simple and likely; the AD buff or E/Passive buff. The other two are complicated and unlikely, but considering how outdated Twitch's kit is and the amount of attention older champions in the game are getting (even Teemo getting a mini-rework and Kayle just getting a rework), it's expected that Twitch see a rework soon. He's one of the oldest champions in the game, and the only thing that has changed about his kit since Season 2 is his Q, and it was nerfed.
Potential reworks I see happening to his kit are putting his current passive as a passive on his E and giving him a new passive. Make his W a ground or increase the slow, maybe make it deal damage and apply extra ticks of his deadly venom if the center of the cask hits the enemy. Let his E reset on champion kill, but if his E resets (and only if it resets) it either gets rid of all stacks on enemies or half of the stacks. Just a few ideas to throw out.
#Conclusion/TL;DR
Twitch's kit is the epitome of balance, but because it's balanced it's outdated for what the current meta is set up to be. He will not thrive as more than a niche pick in any meta and either needs a buff, a rework, or every champion needs to be adjusted.
