Lethality is in weakest spot since its re-rework in patch 7.14

Offtopic: This is like my third or fourth time (Not sure) when i post something here. So please be kind to how i organize and tell out information.

Lethality patch 7.22

1. Max lethality you get now is 70 // You can get 82 lethality with one more serrated dirk
2. Max lethality you constantly have is 60 (+10 with Sudden Impact rune for 5 seconds - cooldown 4 seconds)
3. Minimal lethality you can eventually get on level 1 is 10 for 5 seconds only.

Lethality patch 7.14 - 7.21

1. Max lethality you could get was 84
2. Max lethality you constantly had was 84 // You could get 94 lethality with one more serrated dirk
3. Minimal lethality you could have on level 1 was 30

Now that runes doesnt necessarily give armor you will most likely encounter targets that have armor 30 at the very least because there are no runes giving armor (except those from resolve tree). With 10 lethality that you have for short period of time you'll eventually ignore 6 armor by level 1 (60% from 10 lethality scaling off your level). Even though you have alot more ad early on. It doesnt make up for the loss of lethality that is in game currently. I used to run 30 lethality level 1 and i barely dealt any damage by that level, but i overcame it with buying dirk and increasing to 40 lethality and getting some ad.

Comparison of lethality rune pages pre pre-season Patch 7.14 - 7.21 Max. lethality level 1 = 30 * 0,6 (=60%) = 18 armor penetration --> You are ignoring 18 armor.

Min. lethality for lethality users by level 1 = 20 * 0,6 (=60%) = 12 armor penetration --> You are ignoring 12 armor.

By level 9 you often got one full lethality item that gave +18. Lethality item + 30 lethality runes = 48 // formula: LETHALITY × (0.6 + 0.4 × level ÷ 18) == 38,4 armor penetration level 9. Lethality item + 20 lethality runes = 38 // formula: LETHALITY × (0.6 + 0.4 × level ÷ 18) == 30,4 armor penetration level 9.

Clarification: Maximal lethality in rune page was 24, and often used was 14. With addition of mastery precision you got +6 lethality.

Patch 7.22 Minimal and maximal lethality by level 1 is and always will be 10 for short duration, that means that your armor penetration is 6. With lethality item by level 9 you get 30 lethality and if we apply formula ive written above, we get armor penetration of 24, which isnt that bad, but in comparison to lowest and highest possible average ive written, its really low.

If we keep in mind that the +10 lethality stays only for 5 second, you often see yourself fighting enemies with max 60 lethality which you often get by level 13 and thus you have 53 armor penetration. Although this statistic isnt as reliable as other ones mentioned above. It still provides information that is required for this post.

What am i trying to say is that lethality is not strong and is hardly below average. We have unreliable rune that gives really low lethality amount compared to old rune system. And in comparison with magic penetration the same rune gives, lethality feels hardly underwhelming.

Fun comparison Lethality by level 5 / magic penetration by level 5 Lethality: Serrated dirk + 10 from rune = 22 // armor penetration of 16 Mag. penetration: Sorcerer's shoes + 8 from rune = 26 magic penetration.

• Althought this comparison isnt something important, i just wanted to note that magic penetration got strongly buffed (+5% on voidstaff and +3 magic pene on boot) while there were no buffs for magic resists on any champion during patch 7.22
• Lethality got buffed by 2 on every item and got only +10 in runes. But ive never seen anybody get that low amount of lethality in runes.
• Highest base armor that you can meet in toplane is 39, on mid 32.

TL:DR Lethality in comparison to magic penetration during early levels is really weak, and even in later phase of game youre most likely to be thrown into void with how weak lethality feels.

Bonus: Almost every single game i was standing with lethal build against a person that rushed armor boot, with something else that gave armor and still, even with that much armor on top of his head, he was able to deal with me with ease (out-damage me). I always thought that when i get armor and any type of defense, i sacrifice my damage output for survival. But sadly, the guy against me sacrificed my damage output and not his. (hehe)

Possible solutions:

1. Change one of bounty hunter runes to one giving lethality/magic pene. (But since this post is mainly about lethality, id be glad for lethality)
2. Buff current lethality items to give 25 lethality each, with dirk giving 15. (85 lethality is max you could get with active Sudden Impact rune, with one more serrated dirk you can get up to 95 lethality, but thats sacrifice of one item slot)
3. Change how lethality works, instead of being 60% armor penetration, change it to 100% (revert to old armor penetration)
4. Add one more lethality item to board. (Ohmwrecker is the best competitor for this place since its active was always best for assassins or this type of champions, that dive in and dont need to take risk of dying to tower shots - with some tweaks it might be really good)

P.S: I'd really appreciate everybody honest idea and to try out playing lethality using champions by themselves to see how weak they are, in comparison to how they used to feel. Dont take in advantage that im rengar player, i dont write this because im tilted main or anything like this. But because i see that lethality is not strong, and it should be visited and taken time to see whats wrong. Even though most of you will react like i should be focusing squishies and not some kind of tanks... Guys, ive been playing against squishies that had 140 armor with armor boot, guardian and they even got randuin on top of it, reaching almost 200 armor. Good luck with crushing through that, with 2 thousand worth of a shield.

Personal thought: We're back in time when carries are the ones deciding the game and you, as an assassin, are unable to do much against it. Season 8 from this point seems like bruiser/tank/Carry again, and mostly. ++ I appreciate that you invested your time reading to this point. Have a nice day and thanks for any contribution to this subject. [slayer-pantheon-thumbs]