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I'm sick and tired of having ranged ADCs in every game

Pyro·10/13/2016, 12:01:22 PM·114 votes·9,545 views

I can stomach two in one team. But when you play three games in one day with Graves in top or jungle, and Jayce/Ezreal in a solo lane... it gets frustrating.

The quintessence of this problem is Vayne top. Sure, it's a legit pick that craps over numerous melee solo laners. But Vayne top players tend to carry over their 1v9 mentality from the bot lane, and are prone to heavy tilt when losing. ADC-heavy comps are downright useless when behind and annoying to play against when ahead. I'm a mere plat scrub, but I've already seen toplane Lucian and Jhin in ranked this week.

By themselves, champions like Graves, Jayce, Corki, Varus and Quinn are quite unique and interesting to play against. But there is a point at which it's too much. I don't mind playing a game with a ranged ADC overload from time to time, but the issue is that in every single game there's going to be at least 2 ranged carries.

#What is the problem, exactly?

According to Riot's new classification, there are 6 main classes in the game: Tanks (Vanguards and Wardens), Fighters (Juggernauts and Divers), Slayers (Assassins and Skirmishers), Mages (Battlemages, Burst Mages and Artillery), Controllers (Enchanters and Disruptors) and Marksmen.

  • You can have a game with no Tanks. Toplane and jungle is often taken by fighters, slayers or even mages. Support tanks are just one of four options.
  • You can have a game with no Fighters. Tanks, slayers and fighters are viable toplane and jungle options.
  • You can have a game with no Slayers. A fed fighter can do their job and dive the enemy backline, there's an entire fighter subclass "Divers" dedicated to it.
  • You can have a game with no Mages. Midlane has numerous viable AD picks, and the lack of magic damage can be remedied by tanks or disruptors.
  • You can have a game with no Controllers. There's always a pure mage support or two in the meta (Annie, Brand), and support Tanks have always been a thing.
  • But you can't have a game with no Marksmen. This is one rule of League of Legends that irks me.

Sure, we've increased the diversity of ADCs in the last preseason, but we failed to make it possible to play without them. That is due to several factors, but the problem can be summed up as: You ALWAYS need one ranged ADC in the bot lane. There is no alternative option.

#Why ranged ADCs are irreplaceable

Right now there's several reasons for it:

  • Botlane gives less XP, but safer gold. Marksmen are fine with that.
  • The ranged vs melee lane matchup has always been a nightmare for melee champions
  • You can't properly punish the squishiness of a ranged champion if they're protected by a support
  • Ranged champions are best at taking towers
  • Ranged champions can build AD glass cannon and still output damage from a safe distance

"Breaking the meta" and allowing for any non-marksman picks in the botlane would require enormous changes to the game. Marksmen dominate because the entire game is centered around them, with no alternative strategy available.

#Who could replace them in the bot lane

There are two types of champions that seem good candidates:

  • Mages. Some mages who scale hard into lategame could use a support help to get through the laning phase. This could be a good place for Karthus, Cassiopeia or Ryze.
  • Melee carries. Champions like Tryndamere, Master Yi, Yasuo, or the pre-rework Fiora. Xin Zhao would work here as well.

Of course enabling them to lane against marksmen would require some changes to the game systems. Stuff to consider would include:

  • Protection against ranged attacks in items (Doran's Shield, Relic Shield) and masteries - if we want melee carries
  • Changes to EXP distribution in duo lanes - if we want mage carries
  • Changes to tower damage - more damage from AP champions, less damage from ranged AD champions, more damage from melee

Marksmen would still remain the most reliable source of high DPS in teamfights, but such changes could open the possibility of non-marksman botlanes. there would be still an option to have a ranged ADC in solo lane.

#But what about ADC mains?

Nobody wants ranged ADC to be cut down in 50%. It would just be nice if we had an option of sending a non-marksman champion botlane, in let's say 10% cases. Something akin to how midlane is dominated by AP picks, but there are AD options available.

Riot has already made an attempt with Mordekaiser, but that was just silly. These changes need to be made at game systems level, not by breaking a champion.

How do you guys feel about it?

198 Comments

Malicious Metal10/13/2016, 1:21:11 PM17 votes

Remember Mordekaiser Do you really want THAT to happen again?

Ralanr10/13/2016, 12:45:04 PM11 votes

The only problem I see with items that reduce the damage of ranged AA is that they'd effectively make it near impossible for a marksman to solo lane because of how squishy they usually are.

Now while I hate fighting a solo lane marksman, for the sake of diversity I cannot say it shouldn't exist. Maybe my problem isn't really that big of a problem and such an item would work fine. Being able to allow non ranged carries to function in bot would be a great step in diversity.

Ahristocats10/13/2016, 4:04:54 PM11 votes

want to fixe the range vs melee problem?

increase minions ad from 7 to 14 increase minions ms from 325 to 350

boom, poking needs skill now.

FalconPawwwwnch10/13/2016, 3:50:47 PM11 votes

It's absolutely astounding how many people don' see this as a problem at all

Imagine if you had to pick an assassin every game or you would lose the game by default

That's what ranged ADs are right now

Tank Masochist10/13/2016, 12:32:08 PM10 votes

Yesterday i played ranked with a naut/cho botlane (plat 4), not only did we win it broke a giant loss streak i was on. Not really relevant considering lack of consistency but yes, it is possible to play without marksman assuming you have ample burst and cc to render them useless

Meep Man10/13/2016, 12:34:25 PM8 votes

Honestly, is it that Marksman are mandatory, or is it that the LoL community has never been brave and open-minded enough to try and find a replacement for the Bot Lane ADC role?

Requiemsfire10/13/2016, 12:52:15 PM6 votes

When defensive abilities outperform defensive builds in terms of survivability ;)

USG Failsawce10/13/2016, 12:08:34 PM5 votes

ya know you could just L2Malphite

or any of the other dozens of tanks or anti-adc champs in this game, with a bunch of anti-adc items that also exist.

Rebonack10/13/2016, 4:45:48 PM4 votes

This could be fixed, but it would require fundamentally altering how primary objectives are taken in League.

It would take something like Towers being damaged via a ranged channel ala Dominion rather than with basic attacks, that way all champions would be equally proficient at destroying them.

Keti10/13/2016, 2:59:55 PM4 votes

Adc top is straight garbage. Jhin top just sounds like a free snowball for his opposing jungler.

TwitchInMyPants10/13/2016, 8:28:08 PM3 votes

Thing is you can't really remove ADCs from a team because AS/AP champs aren't good and the ones that are usually end up doing something like Rageblade to compensate for low base AD. Having rapid attacks at range is important for tower killing and as long as the objective of the game is to push even if the only adc is an escapeless autoattacker with no spells someone is going to end up playing them.

Is this inherently bad for the game? If you ask me hell no. It creates a staple role to play around, supports/tanks setting up the adc, assassins and skirmishers trying to kill the adc, and fighters and disruptors to fight off the assassins. There's a lot of counterplay between the classes and really the problem adcs are usually outliers that end up getting nerfed like Jayce and Graves being bruiser/adc hybrids or Kindred being this sustain machine with high level dps and a support ult having an absurd amount of utility as both a jungler and an adc. Its kind of the same issue of class mashing that you get out of trying to create a utility assassin like Ekko. They're pretty much always outliers in the whole of the game and just because we have a lot of adcs you can pick in other lanes doesn't somehow mean they're dominating the game, every role is still getting picked for. However having at least one adc is just a staple for having a successful push and its a fundamental of what league of legends is.

KoKoboto10/14/2016, 3:04:32 AM3 votes

I feel like tanks are just in a horrible spot. Played a game as full tank Nautilus, only 'damage' item was Sunfire cape. Tanks have a serious problem being that they like HAVE to be 'slow', if you ever get caught out as a tank you're gonna die and in teamfights if you make a bad engage or your team is sleeping on ya than you're dead regardless of how tanky you are. Where as fighters have mobility and can be threatening through damage rather than CC. Tanks SUCK

3tyson10/13/2016, 10:19:51 PM2 votes

they tried making morde a duo laner i say they need to focus on making some champs that do wel laning 1v2

SnugglePuggle9410/13/2016, 12:39:01 PM2 votes

Wait til you get a premade that decides to have their top laner take Varus top lane in a ranked match. UGH I hate people who disregard the team comp for their own selfish reasons. I as a support was the only one left to be the tank in the comp, as it was Varus top, Akali mid, Yi jungle, and Lucian ADC. Yay for me as Braum, but we still lost cause the team comp was awful.

Anywho, just sayin, I dislike people taking ADCs top too. That's all.

l Helios l10/13/2016, 8:37:38 PM2 votes

I thought this was a satire thread to respond to the "Yasuo every game" threads.

I'll see myself out.

https://media2.giphy.com/media/bQoBMCcw60MRa/giphy.gif

ViiLLAiN10/13/2016, 12:32:29 PM2 votes

I think the real issue is that all adc are essentially the same and none of them are different enough to not always play the broken or op adc

I don't think ranged carries should be in other lanes tbh there should be a clear weakness to champions who are ranged auto attacks who use that as their main source of dmg

Riot made Graves a ranged carry top or jungler. Why? I have no damn idea I loved playing Graves bot lane but now u can't and that sucks. Now we have this champ that's only good top or jungle who has a passive that can make him really tanky. I don't see how that was healthy for the game.

We need marksman every game yes but their weaknesses need to be easily exploited when they don't have someone protecting them all game like in bot lane

zaire9010/14/2016, 12:43:59 AM2 votes

i just hate when they go top or mid because depending on who youre playing its the most cancerous thing ever and vayne and lucian are the main problems when they go top/mid

Saianna10/14/2016, 10:02:01 AM2 votes

It always annoyed me how common ADCs are..

Some change to that would be most welcomed.

(Just do NOT rework a top/mid/jungle champion to fit in BOT cause it's EFFING retarded)

Miss Worthless10/13/2016, 3:51:08 PM1 votes

"You cant have a game with no marksmen at all"

cough Mordekaiser Rengar Tryndamere MasterYi Yasuo Darius Jax Kayle Riven XinZhao Urgot cough

Do you mean "You are unlikely to have a game with no marksmen at all"?

Because a lot of people want to play marksmen. The champions are fun, lasthitting is fun, killing stuff is fun. A working partner lane is even more fun.