ADC is not a Class. It is a ROLE

Woook3r··4 votes·1,257 views

I have read this fallacy too many times:

ADC is a class and the fact that we see this class in every game means that adc's are overpowered..

Its time to correct the misconception. I think it has come about because we so often see the adc bot lane and because no one calls out BOT in champ select. We either call out ADC or SUP, but thats only because there are two people in bot lane. Not because ADC is a class.

Additionally, the people saying this are a bit clueless because they say ADC's are overpowered, but really they mean lucian, vayne, graves, kog. Here is a list of some champions that "are adc's"

Ahri Morgana Soraka Janna Leblanc

These champions are just never built for the ROLE of ADC because the role of ap mid is so much more reliable in the mid game which is basically where the game gets decided (barring a throw by the winning team), or because of particular strengths as a support (in the case of jana). So how are you going to nerf my adc when Ill just start playing ad Soraka and out trade you all day long? Are you going to force all characters to be melee and let all the teamfights be clusterfucked?

The fact is that the main thing separating vayne from leblanc or ahri is that vayne has no ap scalings, is less mobile, and shouldnt build zhonyas. Ahri on the other hand has 100% ad scaling on her ranged auto attacks, the range of which is equal to vaynes. So how is it that they belong to a different "class" of champions?

Its time to stop bitching about the adc being in every game. So is the jungler and the ap mage. You know you need ap and a jg and an adc to win. The only thing you dont strictly need is a super tank and I think they should be re-rolled into waveclear and tower defense rather than cc and engage. You might actually need them if you did that.

45 Comments

The Sword Saint9 votes

Their kit synergizes with auto attacking. That's what makes them adc.

Dreadlocks6 votes

¿Uw0tm8? Ahri Morg raka janna and leblanc are NOT ADCs. No..No.....NO! they scale with Ability Power AKA AP, hense APC: ABILITY POWER CARRY. Then, my smart friend, we have ADC, which stands for Attack Damage Carry, because their spells scale with AD, AKA Attack Damage.

This is shit you learn like pre lvl 10 man jesus.

Woook3r1 votes

{quoted}

¿Uw0tm8? Ahri Morg raka janna and leblanc are NOT ADCs. No..No.....NO! they scale with Ability Power AKA AP, hense APC: ABILITY POWER CARRY. Then, my smart friend, we have ADC, which stands for Attack Damage Carry, because their spells scale with AD, AKA Attack Damage.

This is shit you learn like pre lvl 10 man jesus.

Kog maw scales with ap bro.

KONO RUBICK DA2 votes

{quoted}

Kog maw scales with ap bro.

Kog can be played as an AP or an AD

ahri can't be played as an AD or your team will have a no damage champ, your spells will deals 0 damage. your AA will deal 0 damage and have shit animation unlike most AD.

ADC is a role, marksmen is a classe ADC is dominated right by marksmen and you can't play any carry bot except a marksmen

Woook3r2 votes

{quoted}

Kog can be played as an AP or an AD

ahri can't be played as an AD or your team will have a no damage champ, your spells will deals 0 damage. your AA will deal 0 damage and have shit animation unlike most AD.

ADC is a role, marksmen is a classe ADC is dominated right by marksmen and you can't play any carry bot except a marksmen

Sure. ADC is dominate by marksman, but dont forget that bot lane is dominated by supports not marksmans..

HentRex1 votes

Double bruiser bot lane can still work, but has to be a duo queue for coordination. Main reason it phased out, way back when.

Sukishoo1 votes

ADC is dominated right by marksmen and you can't play any carry bot except a marksmen

Now that is incorrect. You CAN play any role bot that can carry if you're good at it. You don't NEED an ADC/Marksman.

Dreadlocks1 votes

Yeah and more often than not he is played as an APC mid. If he has a solid team comp built around him, he can be a good ADC too given his SPELLS allow him to destroy tanks.

Woook3r1 votes

{quoted}

Yeah and more often than not he is played as an APC mid. If he has a solid team comp built around him, he can be a good ADC too given his SPELLS allow him to destroy tanks.

no. its definatly his items that allow him to destroy tanks. Try selling all your items next game and see if you can kill anyone......fuck

BluePolarizer4 votes

lolwut? Vayne has way more autoattack steroids than LeBlanc and Ahri, and most importantly, a far superior autoattack animation. That's why marksmen is a class and if they were nerfed more, probably they won't be mandatory every game because you could just dive with bruisers and win that way i.e. the way you do with a Morde bot lane.

Woook3r1 votes

{quoted}

lolwut? Vayne has way more autoattack steroids than LeBlanc and Ahri, and most importantly, a far superior autoattack animation. That's why marksmen is a class and if they were nerfed more, probably they won't be mandatory every game because you could just dive with bruisers and win that way i.e. the way you do with a Morde bot lane.

Ranged ad dps defines the marksman role. Not auto attack steroids.

Blazing Tenshi1 votes

{quoted}

Ranged ad dps defines the marksman role. Not auto attack steroids.

Ranged attack damage damage per second. Sure every champion has an auto attack but unless they have some form of auto attack steroid building them as an adc would be like playing ap mage lucian. Sure he has scaling but it's not optimal and thus not his class and when we are talking about what defines a champion's class we need to look at what they are optimal at. So when talking about what defines adcs, ranged attack damage champions that focus on doing damage per second as you have defined them, some sort of auto attack steroid is required and thus auto attack steroids are the basis of the definition of adcs.

StealthWarden2 votes

thats the worst list of adc's ive ever seen, and if you are going to name retard adc's at least put Machine Gun Lulu in there because its actually decent. Thats point 1

point two......Where the hell are you reading "ADC is a class and the fact that we see this class in every game means that adc's are overpowered.." This is the first time ive heard such retarded misinformed hogwash..so my suggestion is cool your jets, and go somewhere where people understand the game and read their stuff, cuz the motards that are writing the garbage you read dont have a clue.

and thirdly...

Ahri on the other hand has 100% ad scaling on her ranged auto attacks

** What on earth are you even???????**

Nahui1 votes

{quoted}

thats the worst list of adc's ive ever seen, and if you are going to name retard adc's at least put Machine Gun Lulu in there because its actually decent. Thats point 1

point two......Where the hell are you reading "ADC is a class and the fact that we see this class in every game means that adc's are overpowered.." This is the first time ive heard such retarded misinformed hogwash..so my suggestion is cool your jets, and go somewhere where people understand the game and read their stuff, cuz the motards that are writing the garbage you read dont have a clue.

and thirdly...

** What on earth are you even???????**

Deny that last statement, I dare you.

StealthWarden1 votes

dude what are you on? their base attack damage and their range arent even what makes them strong. I dont think you have even an elementary understanding of how this game works. Id stop blabbering idiocracy and start asking questions instead.

Woook3r1 votes

{quoted}

thats the worst list of adc's ive ever seen, and if you are going to name retard adc's at least put Machine Gun Lulu in there because its actually decent. Thats point 1

point two......Where the hell are you reading "ADC is a class and the fact that we see this class in every game means that adc's are overpowered.." This is the first time ive heard such retarded misinformed hogwash..so my suggestion is cool your jets, and go somewhere where people understand the game and read their stuff, cuz the motards that are writing the garbage you read dont have a clue.

and thirdly...

** What on earth are you even???????**

Its not meant to be a complete list. Its to point out that vayne graves ect is not a complete list of marksman. If you want to nerf marksman even further you have to nerf the range on their autos or their items and that feeds my point. If you want to nerf "marksman" you have to nerf everyone.

Lord Azır2 votes

The true AP hyper carries that do more sustained dmg than a ADC, don't rely on their ulti to do dmg and can go bot lane Cassiopeia, Azir,Teemo

Woook3r1 votes

{quoted}

The true AP hyper carries that do more sustained dmg than a ADC, don't rely on their ulti to do dmg and can go bot lane Cassiopeia, Azir,Teemo

upvoted

Ralanr1 votes

Attack Damage Carry.

Though why we need to say Melee carry to specify that they aren't a marskman is beyond me. Guess ADC is easier to type than Mark.

Mimy1 votes

ADC in my term's is stupid.

It's supposed to be "Attack Damage carry" Well wouldn't that justify as any melee Attack Damage champions to be ADC as long as they're carrying the game?

There's a reason Riot changed the role to "Marksman" which by definition is a champion who relies mostly on auto attacks. and not just a ranged AD can carry bot lane( Melees can as well).. A ranged AP can as well Teemo Which will open up new comps of both mid laner and top laner could now be Attack Damage if they so chooses to be.

Say you have a teemo marksman at botlane.. Well now the midlaner can choose Zed or Talon. and the top laner can go Fiora or Darius. Jungle is usually a tank, or the support.. but even so..

That's a pretty even team then. not too much AD but not too much AP. Because if you got an AD top mid and ADC, and your jungle is going tank and your support don't do any ability damage.. they can just build armor and steamroll you.

I like to joke around with the term "ADC" because depending on who gets fed in botlane I call them the ADC...

Attack Damage Carry - A fed AD marksman. Ability Damage Carry - A fed AP marksman. Assist Damage Carry - A fed support who does damage to help their team.

I get silly with it.

StealthWarden1 votes

ADC in my term's is stupid. It's supposed to be "Attack Damage carry" Well wouldn't that justify as any melee Attack Damage champions to be ADC as long as they're carrying the game?

You dont understand the concept if you think attack damage carry is stupid. True, it doesnt "have" to be a marksman, however thats how it works best. Why? Because what an attack damage carry is, by definition, is one champion that builds nothing but physical damage (glass dps AD cannon) and serves the role of dealing tons of damage for the team. The only way that works is if you have people building tanky items in between the adc and the enemy team, because he has no defenses and will get squished. in order to deal tons of damage with your team mates in the way you have to have RANGE. Thats how it works. Its not stupid, its a strategy...its got nothing to do with "carrying the game" or "being fed" it has to do with having the sole responsibility on the team to deal the bulk of the physical damage and not dying because you have to do the damage, becuase nobody else is building any....

Mimy1 votes

Glass AD...

Yasuo

StealthWarden1 votes

Le'Sigh.....I suppose i should have just held on to my pearls. GG

Cruk1 votes

This was a hilarious read, thank you.

HentRex1 votes

ADC= "Attack Damage Champion" I.E. Any champion designed to build Attack Damage. Your list of champions that are adc's is incorrect on that. ALTHOUGH I do agree that ADC isn't just for bot lane it has just been generelly accepted that way. Zed mid? He's and ADC. Fiora top, another ADC. The difference between champions you had correct, that is the difference between an ADC(Attack Damage Champion) and an APC(Ability Power Champion) Why don't people call apc? Well because the ROLE of mid lane has AD champions. Why do people call ADC? Well because the role of bot lane carry is majorly ADC's. Sometimes you get a double bruiser, and even more seldom is an APC bot.

The Sword Saint2 votes

I am 100% sure that those terms stand for 'attack damage carry' and ability power carry', and refer to glass cannon autoattack focus champs and midlane ap casters respectively. Riot even changed the in game tag from adc to 'Marksman' to avoid this kind of confusion.

Riven is a light fighter, Zed is an assassin, Fiora is also a light fighter, yi used to be built like an adc but nowadays people go sated botrk ghostblade into bruiser tank on him, etc.

HentRex1 votes

Champion/Carry a word change there does not change what I said. Zed may be an assassin, He'd still be considered an adc(whether you want to call it carry or champion does not matter) The reason people call adc is it is shorter than typing Marksman.

The Sword Saint2 votes

Words mean things. They exist for a reason, to avoid confusion.

Zed's just... not an adc. Nothing you say will change that. He's an ad assassin. Go build him with infinity edge, phantom dancer, last whisper, bloodthirster, and zerker greaves and go auto attack some people to death if you think he's an adc.

HentRex1 votes

With that logic Tryndamere is an adc not a fighter. Marksmen, ad assassin, Most Fighters are all ADC's. Attack Damage Carries as you point it. My point is that people call the role adc in champ select is because it is easier and faster to type than marksmen. Also APC refer to any ap mage. Not just AP auto attackers.

The Sword Saint1 votes

He is. He's a 'melee adc' like yi and fiora used to be.

HentRex1 votes

Yi and Fiora are still adc's regardless of how you define it.

The Sword Saint1 votes

Fiora is a light fighter. These are riots words and they mean things. Yi is not built like an adc these days though he functions similarly.

HentRex1 votes

Words mean things. Ok, so as you pointed out ADC means attack damage carry. Therefore anyone who build attack damage that carries the game is an ADC. All AD assassin are ADC, Not all ADC's are ad assassins. Do all fights build AD? No therefore Not all fighters are ADC's, If a fighter builds ad Then said figher is an ADC. ADC's consist of FIghters, Off-tanks, Marksmen, and Assassins. Might have missed something, but they are all ADC's. Under that pretext.

The Sword Saint1 votes

ADC is not a catchall general term. There's no point in trying to make it cover every possible ad damage dealer other than to try and convince yourself that you were right. Functionally, using adc or the new term 'marksman' to refer to ranged or melee glass cannon champions who build for attack speed, damage, and critical chance is more of a useful distinction than a literal interpretation. We have terms for assassin, fighter, ad caster, etc. to make the distinction and the term adc was turned into marksman specifically to avoid the confusion that you are trying to advocate.

That's the end of the discussion since you're just repeating yourself in circles. Feel free to respond, but I've suffiicently made my point enough that other people reading this chain of posts won't be confused by what a marksman is and why it's different from other types of ad champions.

HentRex1 votes

Only talking in circles because you keep saying the same thing every post. But whatever. Think however you want mate.

Mathbalnase1 votes

I want to upvote the first half of this, and downvote the second (I don't tend to see much fiora, but Yi is as much a mADC as he ever was, if not more)

Cindikle1 votes

It's Marksmen(Because ADC would imply you're including Yasou, Yi, Trynd and Fiora as viable bot lane players). And they are the only class with their own secure roll. Morde is the only one who actually disrupts this right now. And they had to break some things to make that work. Bruiser's bottom is a thing, but requires getting ahead to work. Something that can be hard to do vs ranged when you're a melee.

And the reason Marksmen are where they are has nothing to do with "because AP goes mid". They provide high sustained damage in fights without requiring mana and are generally the best at safely taking down towers.

Azir is probably as close as it gets to filling those rolls without actually being a Marksman. And doing so takes him his sustained damage from W charges as well.

ADC is a class. It includes more than the ranged AD pew pew champion who go bot lane. It's just not one supported by Riot anymore.

Gigahappytown1 votes

Um what? Adc means attack damage carry any phsyical champion that can carry

Your thinking of carry role or dps role

insaiyanbacca1 votes

warning wall of text incoming cause i might not have time to edit

the only real possibility of those champs that can be an adc is janna because she has an auto attack enhancement and a way to reposition fairly easily(her high ms with that zephyr thing) just because they are ranged does not mean they are really good or viable adc's most adc's have some way of enhancing their autoattacks and a way to reposition(the repositioning has a few exceptions like poor gapcloserless kog and varus). lets just compare some real adcs to your "adcs".


ahri and kog ahri does have a way to reposition easily between her ult and her ms boost q but has no way to enhance her auto's and scales completely with ap, kog has a w that enhances his auto range and gives him some %hp dmg he does have some repositioning issues but his e slow helps a little and his long auto range with w helps a lot to and he does have an albeit small ad scaling on ult. 

next morg and lucian morg has ranged auto's and the q snare for kiting an enemy and making her hard to get to a way to make herself cc immune to reposition easily but she also has a dive in the center of the enemy team ult which is counterproductive on most adc's and her abilities scale completely with ap, lucian has a passive to augment his auto attacks his w and e help him reposition and his ult and q scale off of ad(actually not sure on the ult but i think it does) and his w and ult do have an ap scaling but he is not normally played ap.


now soraka and graves, soraka has ranged autoattacks a q that can heal her as well as silence/snare for easier kiting and she has a global ult that heals her and teammates and her passive makes it possible for her to reposition in certain situations but her kit scales completely with hp and her w is mainly used for helping allies at the cost of your own hp, graves has a dash for repositioning that also gives him an attack speed boost a passive to make him tankier and both his q and ult scale really well off of ad and his e has good utility and kiting potential.


next up lets go janna and vayne, janna i think is the closest you got to listing a more viable adc champion as she has ranged auto's a shield that also buffs her AD a way to get enemies off her and high ms with zephyr to reposition/kite more effectively but her kit does scale entirely off ap, vayne has ranged autos a passive for chasing fleeing enemies a q to reposition and enhance her autos a w to enhance her autos and e for self peel and disengage from enemy champs and possibly even cc an ult that makes her better at repositioning chasing and also gives her an auto attack steroid of course with this good kit she does have a relatively weak early and low range overall but she is extremely effective as an adc.


finally leblanc now since you didnt list another "real adc" ill simply pick one myself and im going to go with draven here actually, so leblanc has a passive to confuse enemies if she gets low has her possible 2 dashes for repositioning her chain(s) for cc and self peel and her q for amped ability dmg and ranged auto attacks but her abilities scale entirely off ap, now draven has ranged autos and his q amplifies his autos to a near absurd extreme his w gives him a speed boost and auto attack speed boost that can reset its cooldown his e is ok cc and great self peel and his ult is global AD scaling damage his q scales with his AD as well.


so most ranged adcs are determined as adcs because they have some of the following qualities: AD scaling abilities, some sort of auto attack modifier, a repositioning tool, and in certain cases (draven) absurd amounts of auto attack damage when played right. so essentially most marksman are adcs with a few exceptions(like azir who is classified as a marksman but i mean xerath is also an assassin according to riot so yeah)

Woook3r1 votes

{quoted}

warning wall of text incoming cause i might not have time to edit

the only real possibility of those champs that can be an adc is janna because she has an auto attack enhancement and a way to reposition fairly easily(her high ms with that zephyr thing) just because they are ranged does not mean they are really good or viable adc's most adc's have some way of enhancing their autoattacks and a way to reposition(the repositioning has a few exceptions like poor gapcloserless kog and varus). lets just compare some real adcs to your "adcs".


ahri and kog ahri does have a way to reposition easily between her ult and her ms boost q but has no way to enhance her auto's and scales completely with ap, kog has a w that enhances his auto range and gives him some %hp dmg he does have some repositioning issues but his e slow helps a little and his long auto range with w helps a lot to and he does have an albeit small ad scaling on ult. 

next morg and lucian morg has ranged auto's and the q snare for kiting an enemy and making her hard to get to a way to make herself cc immune to reposition easily but she also has a dive in the center of the enemy team ult which is counterproductive on most adc's and her abilities scale completely with ap, lucian has a passive to augment his auto attacks his w and e help him reposition and his ult and q scale off of ad(actually not sure on the ult but i think it does) and his w and ult do have an ap scaling but he is not normally played ap.


now soraka and graves, soraka has ranged autoattacks a q that can heal her as well as silence/snare for easier kiting and she has a global ult that heals her and teammates and her passive makes it possible for her to reposition in certain situations but her kit scales completely with hp and her w is mainly used for helping allies at the cost of your own hp, graves has a dash for repositioning that also gives him an attack speed boost a passive to make him tankier and both his q and ult scale really well off of ad and his e has good utility and kiting potential.


next up lets go janna and vayne, janna i think is the closest you got to listing a more viable adc champion as she has ranged auto's a shield that also buffs her AD a way to get enemies off her and high ms with zephyr to reposition/kite more effectively but her kit does scale entirely off ap, vayne has ranged autos a passive for chasing fleeing enemies a q to reposition and enhance her autos a w to enhance her autos and e for self peel and disengage from enemy champs and possibly even cc an ult that makes her better at repositioning chasing and also gives her an auto attack steroid of course with this good kit she does have a relatively weak early and low range overall but she is extremely effective as an adc.


finally leblanc now since you didnt list another "real adc" ill simply pick one myself and im going to go with draven here actually, so leblanc has a passive to confuse enemies if she gets low has her possible 2 dashes for repositioning her chain(s) for cc and self peel and her q for amped ability dmg and ranged auto attacks but her abilities scale entirely off ap, now draven has ranged autos and his q amplifies his autos to a near absurd extreme his w gives him a speed boost and auto attack speed boost that can reset its cooldown his e is ok cc and great self peel and his ult is global AD scaling damage his q scales with his AD as well.


so most ranged adcs are determined as adcs because they have some of the following qualities: AD scaling abilities, some sort of auto attack modifier, a repositioning tool, and in certain cases (draven) absurd amounts of auto attack damage when played right. so essentially most marksman are adcs with a few exceptions(like azir who is classified as a marksman but i mean xerath is also an assassin according to riot so yeah)

Im going to respond to your wall of text with something very simple someone once told me.

ADC's are useful not because of how much dmg they can do, but because they can build glass cannon, attack speed and ad, while still being useful in a teamfight. The reason the attack speed and ad is needed is to take towers and seige with that attack speed.

Ahir leblanc and ect can do this just as well as draven, bc the items and ranged autos do the job, not the champions. yes they do not burst riven mains down to the ground like draven, but they can live thu a fight doing at least some dmg and then take a tower.

insaiyanbacca1 votes

well you look at a lot of conventional adcs and see most of them have a way to take down towers faster then your "adcs"(with the possible exception of janna because of how big her ad steroid on the shield is) graves auto attack speed steroid means he can build the same items as that adc leblanc and still take down tower faster and be more useful, draven has his auto attack spped steroid(and possibly his q gives him more damage to towers but tbh idk on this), lucian has his passive that he can get 2 procs on towers without minions 3 with minions, kog has is q passive for more attack speed then average all of these conventional adc's are not only picked because they are good at destroying other champions but also because they can take towers faster then most anything else using the same build, and vayne is actually most popularly picked and considered a strong pick BECAUSE of her strong damage vs enemy champions and tanks. look at almost any traditional adc they have the tools to destroy towers and inhibs faster then nearly any champion using the same build as them, and that doesnt just go for ranged adcs either it also goes for melee adcs, trynd known as one of the strongest splitpushers around due to the fact that even when behind he can confidently defeat almost anyone that tries to stop him once he gets to a certain point, yi also has several bonuses to help both kill champions and towers. you look at any version of an adc and they are going to be pushing towers faster then any other champions that aren't traditional adcs(aside from a possible few outliers like vayne for example is honestly less build around tower pushing and more around 1v1'ing champions which actually does help her splitpush)

Woook3r1 votes

{quoted}

well you look at a lot of conventional adcs and see most of them have a way to take down towers faster then your "adcs"(with the possible exception of janna because of how big her ad steroid on the shield is) graves auto attack speed steroid means he can build the same items as that adc leblanc and still take down tower faster and be more useful, draven has his auto attack spped steroid(and possibly his q gives him more damage to towers but tbh idk on this), lucian has his passive that he can get 2 procs on towers without minions 3 with minions, kog has is q passive for more attack speed then average all of these conventional adc's are not only picked because they are good at destroying other champions but also because they can take towers faster then most anything else using the same build, and vayne is actually most popularly picked and considered a strong pick BECAUSE of her strong damage vs enemy champions and tanks. look at almost any traditional adc they have the tools to destroy towers and inhibs faster then nearly any champion using the same build as them, and that doesnt just go for ranged adcs either it also goes for melee adcs, trynd known as one of the strongest splitpushers around due to the fact that even when behind he can confidently defeat almost anyone that tries to stop him once he gets to a certain point, yi also has several bonuses to help both kill champions and towers. you look at any version of an adc and they are going to be pushing towers faster then any other champions that aren't traditional adcs(aside from a possible few outliers like vayne for example is honestly less build around tower pushing and more around 1v1'ing champions which actually does help her splitpush)

the point of this thread is not how good some characters are compared to others. its about the fact that any ranged character is a "marksman" and can build to push towers. That is why it is a role not a class.

Only Play Darius1 votes

You must be that guy that picks Yasuo ADC in ranked and cries about having no late game siege.

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