The incoming ADC buffs are just reinforcing players suspicions of favoritism

Every group and every forum of League players has a ton of posts that Riot plays favorites with certain champs and certain roles. It's practically religious doctrine by this point that some champs like and are never allowed to be any worse than decent but are usually oppressive enough to be frequent ban targets, yet Riot has no problem seemingly-deliberately nerfing other champs so hard they're not even playable unless you're a one-trick and just leaving them like that ( ). is only committed to (maybe) leaving this list today despite being nigh-unplayable for all but a couple patches over the last 5 years. But no specific champion is viewed as more coddled than the entire Marskman (ADC) role. They also have the annoying habit of dominating other roles every time they get buffed, so catering to the ADC players always ruins the game for everybody else like a weed that Riot refuses to do anything about.

Since the Support/ADC meta began (before I started playing over 4 years ago) the ADC is, was and always has been the most influential class in the game over the long run. If you pick an Assassin Mid instead of a Mage or a Fighter top instead of a Tank, no large number of players goes "Great, I'm getting trolled in my promos again. Fml.". But on nearly every patch, not having a Marksman on ADC means you're probably screwed, getting trolled and about to have a very frustrating game even if the enemy bot lane is bad enough to feed anyway. No other class in the game has ever been allowed such complete and blatant dominance. This class is so coddled that it dictates the dedication of an entire other player to support it. Riot has never been shy about taking their sweet old time shoring up the Support role and was more than content to let it flat-out suck until the new matchmaking system made fixing it unavoidable to reduce queue times. It took years to get a Mage update that still excluded the champ who needed it most ( ). But the ADCs are kept dominant every season. S3 saw buffs, hp item nerfs and changed to a one-stop-shop high-damage/attack speed/lifesteal/slow+nuke item tailor made for marksmen. S4 saw and a host of ADC item buffs. S6 did it all over again. Marksmen now regularly get 70-100% crit chance now and yet more buffs are incoming. But let's get to a couple specific examples:

- dictated the jungle meta for about half a season and created the only brief time during my tenure as a League player that Lee Sin was not an S-tier jungler and had to settle for being A+

- same as with Kindred, but also did it to top lane. Still strong, just less popular

- the "ultimate late-game hypercarry" is also usually the "ultimate >13:00 hypercarry" because she has almost always been able to buy either or and reliably out-duel about 90% of the game's champion roster. The new invisibility changes only made her even less possible to counterplay

- another example of a late game monster that's far too strong at every other time. Like Vayne, if he isn't specifically counterpicked by the opposing bot lane, there's very few ways to punish him at all.

- Season 4 was League of Lucian. His professional pick/ban was near 100% in every region and he's only recently had his spell ranges brought down to reasonable levels. When Lucian isn't on top, it's because other Marksmen are more overpowered than he is, not because he isn't good. His kiting combined with his so universally-powerful kit forces riot to balance kiting items that other marksmen can have around the possibility of him getting them

- one of the worst champion designs ever. She has the unique "one thing" that a champion good...for 4 different champions, and her versions of them are universally superior to the champs reliant on them, plus she has other advantages of her own.

1. She has passive on less than half the stacks
2. She has more basic attack range than and can get it in half the levels (which is less than half the time). She's also a universally superior turret pusher
3. She has a fully-global AoE ult that scales off of her AD, is aligned with her penetration stat (garen's is usually magic damage), and has a 25% lower cooldown at all ranks
4. She has a non-ultimate -like AoE snare, but it stays on the map if she misses or gets blocked by a spell shield. She also has a superior version of his passive in addition to superior attack speed all-around and mana regeneration despite being a non-caster (see #5)
5. She has AoE basic attacks at her full range (which proc on , giving her unmatchable wave clear and in-class sieging), gains massive buffs to movement speed and attack speed on champion and turret takedowns. Oh, did I mention that she has the 2nd highest mana regeneration at 18 and is tied for 1st on growth/level in the entire game?

Whether Riot means to favor certain champs or certain classes over others isn't relevant: the player perception is what counts. But that being said, it is factually undeniable that the ADC players are given a massive guaranteed niche in the game that nobody else has and are consistently catered to at a much higher frequency than all others with only the junglers being a close second. Right now, Junglers are the most influential role in the game and yet it's being treated like a Greek freaking tragedy by the balance team that it isn't the Marksman still at the top. One non-marksman champ was re-designed to carry out of the bot lane ( ), then was quickly gutted and left for over a year as the worst champ in the game because his design actually worked. Honestly, marksmen need to be pushed out of the front row for a while, but I don't see the devs picking up on it because Riot is already talking about getting nerfed for the dire crime of bot-lane viability. My, wasn't that fast. Some champs can be perma-ban for more than a year with only slight adjustments to them while several others can be near-constant trash with nothing done, but the second something new threatens the ADCs? That nerf hammer comes flying down so fast it practically leaves a vapor trail. Almost every player has noticed it now.

Note: I'm glad those reading this got to the bottom, so thanks for the read. I'm already braced for at least 50 downvotes since I called out and the entire ADC role, so we all know those DVs are coming. I shall endure! :D

~Smitemuffin