6 simple ideas on how to fix Lucian's W, Ardent Blaze to make him viable again (LONG)

Hi, I'm Teikanmi. I'm a diamond ADC main and I love playing Lucian. His kit and theme are really fun and unique, and he just feels good to play. I have hundreds of ranked games on Lucian this season across a few accounts.

However, he's currently not in a good spot. His champion.gg page has him sitting at 19th place out of 21 ADC champions in terms of winrate in Platinum+, barely above Urgot and Kindred.

I believe one of the reasons that Lucian's win rate is so low is because his W doesn't do as much damage nor have enough utility as other caster AD champions.

Currently, Ardent Blaze works like this:

> RANGE: 1000 COST: 50 MANA COOLDOWN: 14 / 13 / 12 / 11 / 10

> ACTIVE: Lucian fires a shot that explodes in a cross pattern upon hitting an enemy or reaching the end of its path, dealing magic damage, marking enemies hit for 6 seconds and granting sight of them for the duration. > MAGIC DAMAGE: 60 / 100 / 140 / 180 / 220 (+ 90% AP) > > If Lucian or allied champions damage a marked target with basic attacks or abilities, he gains bonus movement speed for 1 second. > BONUS MOVEMENT SPEED: 60 / 65 / 70 / 75 / 80

Essentially, this ability is currently used for three things: Checking brushes to make sure there's not an Evelynn sitting in it waiting to ambush, proccing his passive for towers, or executing minions with 50 health.

Alright, so lets get down to what could be changed to help him out. There are 2 sections - Damage and Utility.

Damage

1. PASSIVE - Vengeance: Ardent Blaze burns enemies for 10/20/30/40/50 magic damage over 2 seconds. Reasoning: This gives Lucian's kit some more thematic elements and a small damage increase to his late game. Thematically, Ardent Blaze is supposed to be a fireball that Lucian shoots in a target direction. Why not give him an actual burn to it? Typically Ardent Blaze is maxed last on Lucian, so I think this change won't be too overwhelming during the laning phase.

2. PASSIVE - Weak Point: Ardent Blaze lowers the bonus armor of any champion hit by 5/10/15/20/25% Reasoning: To me, Lucian has always done well dueling and kiting, but has very little in terms of tank killing power. A fed Lucian's Culling is still nicknamed "the back tickler" when going up against an Irelia with 200 armor in the late game. This change would benefit Lucian's ability to land skillshots and chain a combo together. By keeping this % bonus armor based, we can ensure that Lucian isn't completely overwhelming to squishies, but that he can actually make a dent in a late game Mundo.

3. A simple one - Give the ability AD scaling! MAGIC DAMAGE: 60 / 100 / 140 / 180 / 220 (+ 30% AD) Reasoning: At level 1, this would give the ability a small ~10 damage increase, and about 90 damage by the late game when the ability has 5 points in it. Simple and clean.

Utility

1. An easy one: Simply make Ardent Blaze castable while moving. Reasoning: Stopping to use his W actually LOWERS his overall movespeed. Essentially, it's simply not worth it to cast W to try and catch a fleeing enemy or run away as it currently is. This makes the utility of this spell far too conditional.

2. ACTIVE (changed) - Lucian fires a shot that explodes in a cross pattern upon hitting an enemy or reaching the end of its path, dealing magic damage, marking enemies hit for 6 seconds and granting vision of enemies and the surrounding area for the duration. Reasoning: This is a blaze we're talking about, and you're telling me it doesn't actually illuminate an area? Allowing this ability do things like check the area around it (similar to a Caitlyn trap or Miss Fortune's Make It Rain) would be an easy and helpful way to let Lucian do his job better, considering his tiny 500 range. Currently just illuminating the enemies it hits is really wonky and hard to predict and use correctly.

3. PASSIVE (changed) - If Lucian or allied champions damage a marked target with basic attacks or abilities, he gains bonus movement speed for 1 second. This movement speed is increased 20% for each champion marked by ardent blaze. Reasoning: Another simple fix, why not let Lucian move faster as he pursues or runs from his enemies? This change would allow good Lucians to be more mobile when dipping in and out of fights, and provide an incentive for aiming Ardnet Blaze correctly and tagging multiple enemies.

So if we buff Lucian, surely there must be some kind of compromise here in terms of his power. What could we take away? I suggest removing the AP scaling on Ardent Blaze. AP Lucian is a gimmick build that no one ever plays, so the 90% AP scaling is essentially useless and doesn't fit in with his kit at all. The most AP the someone would get from it is the AP from Baron Buff or Sheen, which is the only AP item a Lucian might consider buying. This cleans up the ability and doesn't have the same weird and confusing scaling issues that Miss Fortune used to have.

I'd like to know everyone's thoughts, especially AD mains. I'm tired of my favorite champ being called "Losecian" and feeling like every other marksman does the same things he can, only better. There are plenty of possibilities there to iterate upon. With the Season 6 marksman changes coming, let's not leave The Purifier in the dust.

Thoughts?