There is a good reason why AD are crowding out AP champions in mid lane

xJLx MCHammer·Sep 24, 2017·115 votes·5,294 views

AP itemization is more expensive
AP itemization is not as good. Outside of Zhonya, there is not a lot of good effects. Little to no sustain. No get out of CC effects. No GA. There used to be a time when AD champions may have required the actives from items to survive, they no longer do. Many of their kits give them more than enough survive ability.
Turret siege advantage. If you go back once in mid lane, a Lucian/Corki can take it down 10 minutes. One bad trade, one gank..etc.
Itemization against AP is more effective.
Scaling. A Lucian, Corki, hell even Varus seem to be scaling better VS many AP champions. No, im not talking about the few AP champions that are still good.

There are still naysayers, that's fine. I'm not saying ADC champions are the most picked in mid lane. That's not true. However, ADC champions are starting to crowd them out...slowly. Outside of 2-3 AP champions , there are not many AP champions left that can compete in pro-play. It's why so far in play-in stages, the amount of ADC champions compared to AP champions picked in mid lane is almost the same...

Meanwhile bot lane, still mandatory to picked ADC

117 Comments

Weiner the PoohSep 24, 201787 votes

http://champion.gg/statistics/#?sortBy=general.winPercent&order=descend&roleSort=Middle sort by middle, isn't it Interesting how all the highest win rates are mages. Interesting how they highest win rate mages also have higher pick rates. It's also worth pointing out that their ban rates are also higher.

Stop with this "mages so weak hur dur" bullshit. Are ADC items strong right now? Yes. Are ADCs strong right now? Yes. But are they pushing mages out of mid? No. Are mages useless? Absolutely not. The boards are currently on a circle jerk trying to say if you're not playing adc you're useless and that adcs are strong and the only thing that matters in a game. They're not, mages are still vital to any comp. Just because they're not baby guarded by a dedicated meat shield doesn't mean Riot wants them replaced..

And are AD champs not allowe mid? Since when did mid become mage exclusive? Are Talon and Zed taking over mid? Are their items super cheap? They're AD yet have they have it rougher than most mages, are you gonna say they're broken because they're AD? Because they can down towers so fast "cuz they're ad"?

It's also funny how the boards are in an uproar about adcs going mid. Yet the same people defended mages going top and bullying out any melee top who's name wasn't Darius. Top mains complained on the boards about it and were constantly told how "its diversity, why should mages only go mid". Funny how that argument only works when it's in their favor. Speaking of that, the top 3 top win rates are AP champs, funny huh?

AD champs are not crowding out mid, stop this hive mind circle jerk. This ADC bashing is getting ridiculous.

xJLx MCHammerSep 24, 20179 votes

{quoted}

http://champion.gg/statistics/#?sortBy=general.winPercent&order=descend&roleSort=Middle sort by middle, isn't it Interesting how all the highest win rates are mages. Interesting how they highest win rate mages also have higher pick rates. It's also worth pointing out that their ban rates are also higher.

Stop with this "mages so weak hur dur" bullshit. Are ADC items strong right now? Yes. Are ADCs strong right now? Yes. But are they pushing mages out of mid? No. Are mages useless? Absolutely not. The boards are currently on a circle jerk trying to say if you're not playing adc you're useless and that adcs are strong and the only thing that matters in a game. They're not, mages are still vital to any comp. Just because they're not baby guarded by a dedicated meat shield doesn't mean Riot wants them replaced..

And are AD champs not allowe mid? Since when did mid become mage exclusive? Are Talon and Zed taking over mid? Are their items super cheap? They're AD yet have they have rougher than most mages, are you gonna say they're broken because they're AD? Because they can down towers so fast "cuz they're ad"?

It's also funny how the boards are in an uproar about adcs going mid. Yet the same people defended mages going top and bullying out any melee mid who's name wasn't Darius. Top mains complained on the boards about it and were constantly told how "its diversity, why should mages only go mid". Funny how that argument only works when it's in their favor. Speaking of that, the top 3 top win rates are AP champs, funny huh?

AD champs are not crowding out mid, stop this hive mind circle jerk. This ADC bashing is getting ridiculous.

LMAO

Did I say AD champions are #1 I mean, it takes less effort and brain processing to just read the topic title than it is to go on OP.GG. I said AD champions are crowding out AP champions. http://na.op.gg/champion/statistics

Sort it yourself. Corki, Lucian, Jayce are played more than 20 AP mages. Lucian is behind 5 AP mages. 3 of which are considered strong in pro play. What i did say is that in pro play, outside of the 3 strong mid champions, ADC mid lanes are better. Even when counting all picks, AD and AP in mid lane are almost similar pickrate...

This has nothing to do with what is allowed in mid or not. We aren't talking about bot lane that must have an ADC and support. it's also funny that you question what should be played in mid lane but seem to be turning a blind eye on bot lane that had a must pick adc/support since beta release....

The difference with people defending mid going top is simple, they are required anywhere else, unlike adc. ADC are already a requirement in bot lane. There is no point giving them viability in more lanes.

Weiner the PoohSep 24, 201715 votes

[{quoted}](name=xJLx MCHammer,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=BckFby0Y,comment-id=00070000,timestamp=2017-09-24T18:19:04.862+0000)

LMAO

Did I say AD champions are #1 I mean, it takes less effort and brain processing to just read the topic title than it is to go on OP.GG. I said AD champions are crowding out AP champions. http://na.op.gg/champion/statistics

Sort it yourself. Corki, Lucian, Jayce are played more than 20 AP mages. Lucian is behind 5 AP mages. 3 of which are considered strong in pro play. What i did say is that in pro play, outside of the 3 strong mid champions, ADC mid lanes are better. Even when counting all picks, AD and AP in mid lane are almost similar pickrate...

This has nothing to do with what is allowed in mid or not. We aren't talking about bot lane that must have an ADC and support. it's also funny that you question what should be played in mid lane but seem to be turning a blind eye on bot lane that had a must pick adc/support since beta release....

The difference with people defending mid going top is simple, they are required anywhere else, unlike adc. ADC are already a requirement in bot lane. There is no point giving them viability in more lanes.

No you didn't say adcs were number one, but you did say ads are crowding mages out, which is simply not true.

Jayce, Zed, Talon, and Yasuo don't count towards "crowding mages out" because they have always been mid, are balanced around mid and are expected mid. In no way is them going in their designated lane crowding anyone out.

Check Champion.gg(much more accurate and reliable) sort mid and look. Lucian is one of the lowest picked lowest win rate champs, as is corki. Jayce has aleays been a mid laner, he's not crowding anyone out. With mages beating everyone else out. Mages are far more picked, and are far more useful.

ModAcademy KaynSep 24, 201721 votes

Jayce is honestly just an AD mage.

LiteUpSketchersSep 24, 20174 votes

You're not wrong.

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20175 votes

Minor correction, Yasuo wasn't always mid. He was once designed as a melee ADC. And now he's generally top.

Weiner the PoohSep 24, 20175 votes

{quoted}

Minor correction, Yasuo wasn't always mid. He was once designed as a melee ADC. And now he's generally top.

But is still a mid champ who being picked does not crowd out mages. So no, no correction.

PennsSep 24, 201710 votes

its about higher elo and pro play tho. Lucian Corki and Galio are like literally 50%+ of mid lane right now, so yeah, they are "crowding ap champs out". Especially since the other ~50% are only the 3-4 top mages that have been played for months now xd

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20171 votes

They're only that often because everyone else bans the other midlaner's preferred picks.

PennsSep 24, 20173 votes

Theyre still played over assassins or Ap mid laners that arent lb syndra taliyah or cassio. And in 7.16 pro play Lucian is the third most banned mid laner lul

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20175 votes

They're played more than assassins because assassins generally suck ass in top tier, as far as I know.

And you missed Orianna in your list...

That's 5 into 2. Hardly crowding them out. That's not even a third of the picks.

PennsSep 24, 20177 votes

So far in worlds play-in games, Corki and Galio have 55-60% pick/ban rate and Lucian has 40%. Depends on how you define "crowding out ap champs"... Theres 4-5 strong AP mid laners, then above the other 30 and arguably above some of those top tier mages, there are 2 adcs and a tank.

Moonfall SaberSep 25, 20173 votes

Talon still has a higher win rate than Lux . lux is your traditional every day normal mage so yes crowded out. Talon can build also build item 3155 first thing and item 3157 isnt going to do much good.

ModJango MageSep 25, 20173 votes

I assume ur not playing mages nor you used to play them back then. They have just lost so much power over the years, hell, even riot confirmed that they will have an item rework update beacuse of this. "mages so weak hur dur" You know, maybe all the posts with reasonable points are not bullshit. Maybe they are right. Heres a few points that they made, might convince you. -Removal of DFG(after that they added ludens which is nothing compared to it, also it lost 20 ap) -Blue lost its ap bonus - When was the last time you saw an ap jungler consitently?(who is not elise) It was a huge nerf to them, and also the mages who were getting this troughout the game. 15% bonus ap is about half a rabadon. -Most ap items lost a lot of their ap.(While in the other hand ad champions got more ad in most of their items.) -Rabadon is too expensive for what it does. -Rylai's dmg and hp is too low and the passive is weak for it to be worth buying. -In mid season all champions got MR/LvL and they also removed abyssal scepter from the toolset of mages. Thats all that i could have tought of.

MyrkrvaldyrSep 24, 201720 votes

Let us just wait for the runes rework and see how chaotic things become. We might see AP champs rule again, we might see balance or we might see AD utterly dominate.

I've always believed that there should be more items, both AD and AP should have roughly the same amount of items, give us a lot more variety to avoid having many champs building roughly the same thing. To me, there are too few items.

Yara0Sep 25, 20171 votes

{quoted}

Let us just wait for the runes rework and see how chaotic things become. We might see AP champs rule again, we might see balance or we might see AD utterly dominate.

I've always believed that there should be more items, both AD and AP should have roughly the same amount of items, give us a lot more variety to avoid having many champs building roughly the same thing. To me, there are too few items.

I just hope they leave the jungle alone this preseason idk why they think they need to fuck it up every year.

AtanchanSep 25, 20172 votes

Now I'm mildly hoping that they make changes to every jungle camp, but it all just amounts to -1 AD on Big Krug and +3 health on miniwolves and such minor changes that just exist for the sake of the running gag.

bbQsauçeSep 24, 201714 votes

[deleted]

invisiblecat1Sep 24, 20174 votes

It isn't just that In general AP champions are less likely to win considering how bad their items are As people realize this they will slowly switch to play Lucian/Corki Mid rather than Syndra

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20176 votes

(x) - Doubt.

I mean, I dunno about you, but I was about three hits from winning a base race against a 5 item Twitch and his entire team as Ahri.

And I've always thrashed Lucian and Corki as mages...

DengedenSep 24, 201711 votes

They're not.

xJLx MCHammerSep 24, 20178 votes

{quoted}

They're not.

Except they are

AirKingNeoSep 24, 201710 votes

GO check a statistic site and give some playrates.

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20177 votes

They aren't. We can statiscally prove that.

Serika ZeroSep 24, 201711 votes

While I agree that AP itemization is very bad right now. Such as: item 3151 which is supposed to be a tank killing item, yet we buy it on ap assassins because its the only upgrade from item 3136 (which we get for magic pen that is targeted to kill squishy targets....... so, an item that attacks both squihsys and tanks???? wtf rito??). Or item 3089 which has a lower than 5% pick rate in mid lane, or less. There's no point in buying that trash item at this point, you are better off with getting a void staff if you want to fight tanks or a mask to burst squishy and tanks. Why is at times you see mask build in pro play on syndra for example.

But, its still viable to play AP champions in mid lane in soloq and normals. AP assassins are also viable. I'm having fun with Katarina and Akali for example. But i sure got tilted as hell when laning vs a lucien..... i took the wrong runes (no armor), and so, was under tower and out of farm most of the game and my jungler........ only came mid to steal farm (while i was in mid) and that tilted the hell out of me. But outside of this, if I don't fuck up in the champ select via masteries/runes and if my jungler isn't a moron that just comes to steal farm when you got a hard lane match-up. Then APs are still playable in mid :)

As long as you like the playstyle of your hero. You can play with them and still get a positive win ratio ;) Even morde mains.

RIP: Azir and Ryze mains.

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20174 votes

Akali sucks against Lucian because he's able to bully the hell out of her without remorse. Whereas, against everyone else, she can wait out their mana pool, he can just keep hitting her with auto after auto...

Not sure how you lost to him as Katarina, though. Unless it was just one game.

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 201710 votes

http://champion.gg/statistics/#?roleSort=Middle&sortBy=general.winPercent&order=descend

Top champion is Malzahar, at 54.84% winrate.
The first possible AD user is Kennen.
The first meta one is Talon.
The first champion possibly able to be considered an ADC is Jayce.
Akali's the first sub-50 champion in mid, at 49.99%.
The first champion designed to be an ADC is Yasuo, at #33, 49.27%
The first marksman is Corki, at #36, 48.96%
48 is Lucian, the only other "meta" midlane ADC, at 45.16% win rate, only above Ryze and Azir, who have been literally gutted by Riot.

So PLEASE tell me how "AD are crowding out AP champions in mid lane". Because all marksmen in mid are sub-50.

#Stop the circlejerk, marksmen suck in midlane, we can statistically prove that

xJLx MCHammerSep 24, 20176 votes

{quoted}

http://champion.gg/statistics/#?roleSort=Middle&sortBy=general.winPercent&order=descend

Top champion is Malzahar, at 54.84% winrate.

The first possible AD user is Kennen.

The first meta one is Talon.

The first champion possibly able to be considered an ADC is Jayce.

Akali's the first sub-50 champion in mid, at 49.99%.

The first champion designed to be an ADC is Yasuo, at #33, 49.27%

The first marksman is Corki, at #36, 48.96%

48 is Lucian, the only other "meta" midlane ADC, at 45.16% win rate, only above Ryze and Azir, who have been literally gutted by Riot.

So PLEASE tell me how "AD are crowding out AP champions in mid lane". Because all marksmen in mid are sub-50.

#Stop the circlejerk, marksmen suck in midlane, we can statistically prove that

You are only looking at winrate

Winrate does not mean crowding out. Crowding out was used to talk about the pick rate of ADCs in mid going

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20179 votes

Alright, then. Let's go at it with pickrate, instead:

Top champ is Orianna, at 8.89%
First AD champ is Zed, at 7.92%, #2
First DPS champion is Yasuo. 4.83%, #7
First marksman is Lucian, at 2.58%, #17
Corki is at 2.51%, #20

16 champs above all midlane marksmen. 13 of these use AP.

Tell me how having Orianna Zed Ahri Syndra TwistedFate Kassadin Yasuo Vladimir Katarina Lux Ekko Malzahar Fizz Leblanc and Anivia Talon ALL ABOVE LUCIAN is him crowding out mages.

#Stop the circlejerk, marksmen suck in midlane, we can statistically prove that

SeolhyunariSep 24, 20179 votes

AD items were randomly buffed because of a meme and AP items have seen constant nerfs for 3 seasons because idk Syndra and Ori are played???

Xion The XIVSep 24, 20178 votes

Well they were kinda nerfed because Ori after what 2 or 3 items can just ult a team and by herself the ADC dies the support dies and everyone else suddenly loses 60-80% of their health by her a lone. Now add in the others I can see why. While Syndra well at one point she could 100-0 people with her ult only. You don't even get a counter play you just walk into the lane and see a grey screen.

RainbowIceeSep 26, 20171 votes

Hey! leave syndra out of your nerf pls talk!!!!

Anyways if AP items are to be buffed pls nerf Anivia or have a look at her numbers before buffing AP. She deals sooo much fucking damage.

xJLx MCHammerSep 26, 20172 votes

{quoted}

Hey! leave syndra out of your nerf pls talk!!!!

Anyways if AP items are to be buffed pls nerf or have a look at her numbers before buffing AP. She deals sooo much fucking damage.

I main Anivia

She has the most telegraphed Q in the game. She needs so much time to scale. She also has no mobility.

She doesn't need a nerf. Her winrate is definitely high though so I do expect nerfs in the future

VeltoxSep 24, 20176 votes

As long Vladimir exists we can't add sustain for traditional mages unless it has extremely trash stats for him.

SwiftKitten88Sep 24, 20176 votes

i think you need to learn what "good reason" really means.

all the things you said are true.. and the logical conslusion of those events would be AD crowding out AP mid laners...

but the REASON why is this happening is riot completely fucked UP ap itemization and drastically over-buffed AD so much its beyond absurd. that's NOT a "good reason".

thats riot's balance team being shit. which is truly sad.. because riot has a great game... and MOST of their company does fantastic... its just their BALANCE team that seems completely out of whack. which is ironically the MOST important part of the game.

MiraweaveSep 24, 20175 votes

Another big part of it is the existence of Warlord's Bloodlust giving stuff like Lucian mid reasonable sustain on top of their absurd trades from really early on in the game.

xJLx MCHammerSep 24, 20176 votes

{quoted}

Another big part of it is the existence of Warlord's Bloodlust giving stuff like Lucian mid reasonable sustain on top of their absurd trades from really early on in the game.

That's just the add an existing problem....

Lucian will just mostly defeat a majority of AP champions. Sure, there are a few he wont be able to beat. The saddest part is, the philosophy of LOL and most balance game is, a champion who is a bully early game, should NOT scale better into mid and late game. A Lucian, Corki, even a Varus can be bullies against many AP champions. They will outscale them as well into every game

All riot sees is that some of these AP champions have the potential to have more utility. Sadly, it looks as if Riot has decided that AP champions should be secondary supports utility/damage. A lot like how they pushed tanks to be secondary supports/defense for AD champions

Buzzkillington0Sep 24, 201710 votes

Lucian 45% winrate at midlane. Malzahar 54% winrate with almost double of Lucian's pickrate at mid But let's keep whining about "ADC's crowding out midlaners" Source: lolalytics

DisembarkSep 24, 20174 votes

Also Lucian falls off pretty hard after Bork + BC. He can't compete with Syndras 800 range stub or Oris ult. Maybe he wins the 1v1 but he isn't nearly as useful in teamfight especially when Maokai can just press W on him if he decides to get into range.

Jerry SeinfeIdSep 24, 20175 votes

Wait? when did this start happening? i didn't play today but yesterday i was still seeing mages/assassins mid.

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20175 votes

It started happening never. This is only coming up because Lucian and Corki are what you see most at top tier. Of course, though, OP's ignoring that that's because everybody bans the other laner's pick.

xJLx MCHammerSep 24, 20171 votes

{quoted}

It started happening never. This is only coming up because Lucian and Corki are what you see most at top tier. Of course, though, OP's ignoring that that's because everybody bans the other laner's pick.

And what about pro play? If Syndra or Orianna are not picked, Corki, Lucian, and Jayce are more viable than 35 of the other AP champions

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20175 votes

I just proved that to be bullshit.

Pickrate:

{quoted}

Alright, then. Let's go at it with pickrate, instead:

Top champ is Orianna, at 8.89%

First AD champ is Zed, at 7.92%, #2

First DPS champion is Yasuo. 4.83%, #7

First marksman is Lucian, at 2.58%, #17

Corki is at 2.51%, #20

16 champs above all midlane marksmen. 13 of these use AP.

Tell me how having and ALL ABOVE LUCIAN is him crowding out mages.

#Stop the circlejerk, marksmen suck in midlane, we can statistically prove that

Winrate:

{quoted}

http://champion.gg/statistics/#?roleSort=Middle&sortBy=general.winPercent&order=descend

Top champion is Malzahar, at 54.84% winrate.

The first possible AD user is Kennen.

The first meta one is Talon.

The first champion possibly able to be considered an ADC is Jayce.

Akali's the first sub-50 champion in mid, at 49.99%.

The first champion designed to be an ADC is Yasuo, at #33, 49.27%

The first marksman is Corki, at #36, 48.96%

48 is Lucian, the only other "meta" midlane ADC, at 45.16% win rate, only above Ryze and Azir, who have been literally gutted by Riot.

So PLEASE tell me how "AD are crowding out AP champions in mid lane". Because all marksmen in mid are sub-50.

#Stop the circlejerk, marksmen suck in midlane, we can statistically prove that

So stop making up bullshit, please. [slayer-jinx-catface]

S0NASep 25, 20174 votes

Honestly just expected a picture of item 3155

Black TidesSep 24, 20173 votes

Okay the problem that no one seems to see, is that THEY COMPLETELY REWORKED EVERY OTHER CHAMP WHEN THEY VENTURED OUT OF THEIR ASSIGNED ROLE. REMEMBER LULU TOP

DuskDaUmbreonSep 24, 20177 votes

Lulu top had to be stopped because nobody could fight her...

And you're ignoring that j4 and Gragas have remained viable flex picks...

Slice n Dice emSep 25, 20173 votes

Outside of 2-3 AP champions , there are not many AP champions left that can compete in pro-play.

Ahri Ryze Taliyah Cassiopeia Vladimir Viktor Leblanc

May be you wanted to say the opposite. It's been a long time since I saw Zed, Yasuo(not yesterdays troll match against WE), or Talon mid. Corki Lucian Varus Jayce , ohh wow you manage to find non priority AD mid laners. They do well in certain team comp's, with certain teams, but they have never been pick ban prioritized like LB, Orianna, Syndra, Cassiopia etc. Corki, Varus, Jayce have already been played mid a long time ago, only one champ which has recently entered in mid which is Lucian, and by his addition, does in no way mean that AD champs are crowding out AP champs in mid lane.

The Yetii RiderSep 25, 20171 votes

item 3027 - Sustain item 3102 - Get out of CC item 3100 - Turret siege

Additionally, AP champions have been powerful in all seasons before Banshee's Veil was made into an AP item. AP champions also had much greater access to spell vamp in previous seasons and simply did not build it, so sustain is much less important to mage players than it is to assassins and marksmen.

Itemization against AP is more effective - This is both accurate and inaccurate, so I will instead get annoyed with the way you've presented your (accurate) point while seeming to include the inaccurate way as well.

If, by "itemization against magic damage is more effective than itemization against physical damage", you mean when you look SOLELY at the items typically built by MID LANERS, then you are absolutely correct.

If, instead, you mean what you said, which is "itemization against magic damage is more effective than itemization against physical damage", then you are absolutely wrong. item 3143 item 3110 item 3075 are all fantastic. If you want to argue that itemization against magic damage is better, just look at how often item 3047 is built compared to item 3111 .

This is important. Laners are constantly arguing about laning phase on the boards, but Riot has to make changes based on the entire game, not just the laning phase. Yes, AD assassins are very powerful when you fight with fewer items and gold against a single AP mage in a situation where the AP mage is artificially disincentivized for leaving the area entirely. However, the game is not entirely based on the laning phase.

After lanes are over, mages will have tanks and divers surrounding them. They will have supports healing them and peeling for them. And most importantly, they can just flash away after you burn your combo on them, and then they can base and move on with their lives.

Meanwhile, against the enemy team as a whole, the mage has the advantage of range and AOE damage. It is easier for a mage to land their skills and they are less likely to die for doing so. Mages can soften up the enemy team from a range, and can follow up a vanguard's initiation with a giant blast that hits 3+ enemy champions while the vanguard holds them in place with AOE CC.

Now, you as players may feel this is not as relevant as the power of mid lane, but Riot doesn't care about player perception as much as they care about the reality of the game.

Scaling - The trade off between scaling and bases is definitely one of strangest levers to balance AP champions that Riot has at their disposal. I do think it might be more beneficial to the game if scaling was a bit more standardized like it is in AD champions.

JorenciceSep 25, 20173 votes

All of those items are Terrible when compared to the AD versions.

Roa offers next to none sustain if you compare it to the 400+ health an attack ADs can get.

The locket thing can easily be broken by a not important CC or a small spell. The AD version let's you target the most important CC AND give you MS to escape.

And lich barely fits in any mages item path. And is on a CD so it also pales when you compare that EVERY SINGLE AD item gives siege.

The Yetii RiderSep 25, 20171 votes

So don't compare them to AD champions.

AP champions have RANGE. Range. Range Range Range. Do you not understand that it is up to you to avoid being attacked entirely, and that if you were able to tank from range you would be extremely frustrating to play against?

ROA offers plenty of sustain. You can easily get 100+ health back over the course of a rotation, and that scales with your cooldown reduction since there is no cooldown on the Eternity passive. Additionally, ROA gives 500 health on its own, which makes mages more resistant to burst than a marksman who has not started attacking and thus cannot benefit from Phantom Dancer's passive.

So let's compare Scimitar to Banshee Veil. Scimitar offers no critical strike and it offers no lethality, which means it has a genuine cost when built by AD champions in the form of it not granting the multiplicative stats they desire (it gives lifesteal but lifesteal has become less valuable with the introduction of heal power). Meanwhile, Veil gives a whopping 60 magic resist at the cost of only 30 AP over a fully offensive item. Veil is actually rather popular in the mid lane where as Scimitar is generally team comp specific and there are many games where Scimitar is not built at all.

Then there's Edge of Night, which has the same counterplay of "use a weak spell at the start" for the enemy player.

Lich Bane has a 2 second cooldown. AP champions generally do not have so much attack speed that they really miss a lot of proc damage in the two seconds they aren't getting it.

But yes, mages have range and so they must be easier to kill than assassins, who have to survive as they go in so they can get a kill.

Marksmen have range as well, but it is much shorter. The longest auto range is Jinx with 700 when she has her rockets maxed out, and Jinx is squishy as fuck. Mages can deal damage from well over 1000 away, and they can hit multiple targets from that range as well.

If you compare AD itemization to AP itemization, yes it would seem that there is some level of inequality here. But that's the thing: you can't say x SHOULD equal y when x DOESN'T equal y. Mages have an entirely different playstyle and purpose than marksmen and assassins. They have their own tools and their set of strengths and weaknesses that itemization caters to. So no, the items should not be the same.