The meta is good* and can finally improve

stone the blacks·Jul 2, 2018·17 votes·5,657 views

balance isnt what i care about in the current meta, its the fact for the first time in 4 years its not solely balanced around adc

who can kill adc best
who can enchant adc best
protect adc best
soak adc damage best
etc

either way every patch was around how a class interacted with adc, people would inevitably get sick of it; only one role being mandory with no other option than to play a right clicking stat stick or loose if theirs gets 2 items

and finally we have other options raising, meanwhile all of the adcs bitch and riot will just revert everything till its back to balance solely around one class and make everything stale again

15 Comments

Mokiller5Jul 2, 201810 votes

{quoted}

balance isnt what i care about in the current meta

Dafuq? YOU WUT M8?

Nah but seriously, its good that we have diversity in bot lane, people are not against that. What people are against is how rioto did it in an improper way. There are 2 parts to an idea, 1) the planning, 2) the execution. riot keeps failing on the execution part.

All in all the meta itself is not good, its very unbalanced and broken. However, the DIVERSITY in the meta is good and we can build off of that.

Attticus FinchJul 2, 20189 votes

It is still based around who has the better ADC, the list of playable ADCs just dropped from like 15 to 4.

Anyone who says that there is a greater diversity in bot lane hasn't looked at statistics. There is no increased diversity, just increased troll-picks.

y0r1ckJul 2, 20181 votes

Show the stats plz

Malix FarwinJul 3, 20181 votes

[{quoted}](name=Attticus Finch,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=FJM77uyk,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2018-07-02T09:24:32.928+0000)

It is still based around who has the better ADC, the list of playable ADCs just dropped from like 15 to 4.

Anyone who says that there is a greater diversity in bot lane hasn't looked at statistics. There is no increased diversity, just increased troll-picks.

Actually you are wrong, there has always been around 4 meta ADCs with the rest being garbage. That has not changed at all. What has changed is that you can play stuff besides adc and it goes to show you just how many people go down there and do not want to be ADC.

Before the nerf to ADCs even happen all you saw were Kaisa Jhin KogMaw and Tristana . There was no diversity even among adcs in the bot lane prior to this.

List of ADCS currently doing really well in the bot lane right now are: Quinn MissFortune Draven Jinx Twitch Jhin

Ones that are doing okay are Lucian Ashe Corki Kaisa

Ones that need tiny buffs are basically everyone else but Varus and Caitlyn who already have big buffs on the PBE.

If you see someone not playing an ADC its because they do not want to.

JackMcSnipeyzJul 2, 20185 votes

Yea! i agree! who can 1 shot the other team is way better than building your team to have enchanters, front lines, and damage dealers. Who needs a meta? just pick w/e brain dead 1 shot champ you can find and mash your head into a never ending brawl of squishies who are competing who will get duskblade/gunblade first and start snowballing.

Also, kinda hard taking you seriously when you literally say in your post that:

balance isnt what i care about in the current meta

In no way do i want the tristana/vayne 1 shotting me meta, but getting 1 shot by everything else is literally just as cancerous.

Add on top of all this that most of my botlane roster is unviable in their only lane, and i'm gonna give a hard : NO to your suggestion

ParoeJul 2, 20183 votes

Actually... The meta has always been, since S2, "What deals with marksmen the best". Even now, the meta boils down to that; its just that marksmen have a very hard time coming back from failure now due to snowball mechanics.

ThefrostyvikingJul 2, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Actually... The meta has always been, since S2, "What deals with marksmen the best". Even now, the meta boils down to that; its just that marksmen have a very hard time coming back from failure now due to snowball mechanics.

What? O_O

Dude there should be a limit to how biased you can be.

For while you arent wrong that marksmen have often had a large impact on the meta, arent you ignoring the fact that powerful picks among the supports, junglers and roaming midlaners easily change the meta among marksmen as well?

I´ve been playing since season 3, i was watching since season 2.

And i´ve seen it, even if a marksman is OP they wont do squat if their counters outside lane are OP too.

Like even if kog got strong for some reason i season 4 he was still a bottom tier pick because pretty much any mage or diver could 2-shot him almost regardless of what he did unless he had a banshee's veil.

Then it took 2 people, and one of them only had to land 1 ability.

So sure, its fine to say that marksmen have shaped meta's.

However its really damn biased to say that they alone did it, the picks aside from the botlane carry shaped which carry was the best as much as their own strength.....after all, whats the point of a super powerful holy sword when the enemy has a railgun that you cant block with your sword.

Naturally, the one who can survive the railgun shot becomes the chosen one, this has been the relationship between marksmen and midlaners/Junglers and supports very, very often ever since i started.

ParoeJul 3, 20181 votes

{quoted}

What? O_O

Dude there should be a limit to how biased you can be.

For while you arent wrong that marksmen have often had a large impact on the meta, arent you ignoring the fact that powerful picks among the supports, junglers and roaming midlaners easily change the meta among marksmen as well?

I´ve been playing since season 3, i was watching since season 2.

And i´ve seen it, even if a marksman is OP they wont do squat if their counters outside lane are OP too.

Like even if kog got strong for some reason i season 4 he was still a bottom tier pick because pretty much any mage or diver could 2-shot him almost regardless of what he did unless he had a banshee's veil.

Then it took 2 people, and one of them only had to land 1 ability.

So sure, its fine to say that marksmen have shaped meta's.

However its really damn biased to say that they alone did it, the picks aside from the botlane carry shaped which carry was the best as much as their own strength.....after all, whats the point of a super powerful holy sword when the enemy has a railgun that you cant block with your sword.

Naturally, the one who can survive the railgun shot becomes the chosen one, this has been the relationship between marksmen and midlaners/Junglers and supports very, very often ever since i started.

Take a step back and look at the macro state of the game; Every meta revolves around what deals with ADCs the best. ADCs = marksmen.

Its not biased, its fact. every meta can be boiled down to x deals with marksmen the best because the game revolves around them. Atmogs? Atma tanks could kill squishies pretty reliably then fall back and heal up. Deathfire mages? Mages could burst squishies very reliably. Enchanter meta? Marksmen with the help of the more fed support could easily burst any squishy and non-fed tanky champ. Titanic cinder meta? Tanks could survive long enough to sustain squishies down. Any assassin meta? Assassins delete squishies very reliably. Gimmick lanes like ziggs and bruiser bot work the same way; deal with the marksmen, win before they come online.

Currently, due to snowball mechanics, when that marksman gets behind its very hard for them to recover because towers are made of noodles, early game champs spike at one item, and most marksmen spike at 2~3 items.

ThefrostyvikingJul 3, 20182 votes

{quoted}

Take a step back and look at the macro state of the game; Every meta revolves around what deals with ADCs the best. ADCs = marksmen.

Its not biased, its fact. every meta can be boiled down to x deals with marksmen the best because the game revolves around them. Atmogs? Atma tanks could kill squishies pretty reliably then fall back and heal up.

More like nothing could kill them short of a kog/vayne standing and shooting freely.

Deathfire mages? Mages could burst squishies very reliably.

More like everything short of a tank explodes in a single combo, i played it.

Enchanter meta? Marksmen with the help of the more fed support could easily burst any squishy and non-fed tanky champ.

Enchanter meta happened because their items were made grossly op and a stats funneling strategy became the most effective by far, if the support can with one item add like .... 2-3 k golds worth of stats to the ADC or even several team members on a regularly cast ability with little cost then how could this not dominate everything?

Didnt help that enchanters also were powerful by themselves at the time as all those items added bonus healing/shields and other states needed which effectively shutdown divers and assassins, add then the fact that tanks were grossly OP post the rework and you suddenly have the choice been a insanely tanky frontline that none except hypercarry marksman can kill, and everything else.

Then for supports......ardent censer or no censer, might have been a redemption meta with a similar thing too.

Marksmen.....who uses the ardent buff the best and who can kill tanks while staying far enough away to avoid getting dived on? (Varus/kog)

Titanic cinder meta? Tanks could survive long enough to sustain squishies down.

.......Pretty sure the cinderhulk meta and titanic hydra were different things, and even now titanic hydra is OP in the sense that it makes the lifesteal one useless by comparison.

Any assassin meta? Assassins delete squishies very reliably.

Duuuuuude.

The lethality meta resulted in assassins and assassins only, they could literally kill someone in under 1,5 seconds reliably and they scaled so fast that tanks/marksman/supports didnt stand a chance at scaling up to be relevant.

The two marksmen played at the time, Varus and Jhin, were based on the idea of AD xerath, stay so far outa range that nothing can hit you back.

Gimmick lanes like ziggs and bruiser bot work the same way; deal with the marksmen, win before they come online.

Ziggs was based on the fact that he scaled faster and had nowhere near as a weak early game as most marksmen at the time, between his jump and E slow he could reliably run away if ganked by the at the time very powerful early game junglers and roaming midlaners.

He also powerspiked quickly at 1 item which made him able to fight for lane dominance.

Melee botlaners are currently split, we have like Yasuo and mordekaiser and a few irelia's and then counterpicks.

Yasuo, morde and irelia all work into ranged picks for various reasons, but then we have picks like Darius/vlad/kennen which hard counter them.

Darius for instance was picked by faker to crap on some poor yasuo.

Currently, due to snowball mechanics, when that marksman gets behind its very hard for them to recover because towers are made of noodles, early game champs spike at one item, and most marksmen spike at 2~3 items.

There are several that can spike at 1 item, issue is, many of those dont even survive that long or at least cant do so in the hands of even a fairly experienced player.

And even if they do scale up they explode anyway, because damage is insanely high and the enchanter meta is mostly gone, only raka,nami and morg still seem to hang on.

But that wont really save them as a weakened enchanter+marksman wont survive even enemy support+any top tier midlaner(they all have alot of burst except anivia.)

Marksmen are crap because they cant reach one item safely, and even if they do they are inferior to the other picks, although this is writing only for the "traditional" ones, AD casters like MF, jhin,Ezreal and AP kai´sa are still fine.

As are high power early picks like Lucian/draven.

But that still feels bad for my part as my preferred pick for the lane is Ashe x)

And while i can get through it feels like thrice the effort for the same reward, somewhat bad all in all.

tophitJul 2, 20181 votes

Its definitely great having bot diversity. Just imagine, the assassin mid thinking "I'm gonna get me some adc booty" roaming bot to dive tower, and as the dive begins, they think "wait, who am I diving again?" before they get destroyed by the Donger. Or ulted by Swain. Or feared by the Fiddlesticks.

I'm genuinely fine with ADC's having a place in this game. However, their late scaling is too good, and too many games were decided by which ADC won bot lane. I really don't want it to go back to this, on top of that the funnel comp needs to die too.

Its All SkillzzJul 2, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Its definitely great having bot diversity. Just imagine, the assassin mid thinking "I'm gonna get me some adc booty" roaming bot to dive tower, and as the dive begins, they think "wait, who am I diving again?" before they get destroyed by the Donger. Or ulted by Swain. Or feared by the Fiddlesticks.

I'm genuinely fine with ADC's having a place in this game. However, their late scaling is too good, and too many games were decided by which ADC won bot lane. I really don't want it to go back to this, on top of that the funnel comp needs to die too.

Sounds like assassins are the problem, not the ADC.

Tentacle AdvisorJul 2, 20181 votes

"Diversity", as you put it, should not be at the expense of completely neutering a class.

That being said, as a marksman main, myself (Ashe, specifically), the current bot lane "Diversity" is NOT (let me repeat, NOT) what Marksmen mains are complaining about. We aren't concerned with the current "diversity" of the lane, but rather the fact that practically our entire roster of champions (Crit ADC's) have been "gutted". And, no, I don't mean "gutted" as in (they don't do damage anymore). I mean "gutted" as in "it takes too long for them to get to the items they need to do damage, all-the-while being murdered by anyone they so much as breathe on".

As a Crit ADC main, I am content with having to scale with game time, only becoming a powerhouse during a 'late-point' in the game. HOWEVER, that doesn't mean I'm fine with being completely annihilated early on in the game, to a point where that 'late-point' never happens.

I'm fine with the idea that you can hold a Crit ADC back from their late-game fantasy by beating them early on, since before, you could come back by catching up in farm whenever possible and carefully planning any fights you make yourself a part of (assuming you ever did). Now, if you even attempt to go into lane against the current bot lane of Irelia/Vlad/Swain/Fiddlesticks [or any of the 4 non-crit ADC's being played] , you're just asking to be fed on. Ashe cant farm against them. Twitch cant farm against them. Tristana cant farm against them. And Caitlyn DEFINITELY can't farm against them, in her current state. They just get bullied and/or blown up for being in the only lane they can be played in.

On top of that, even Supports are feeling the sting of the lane, as half (if not more) of the Support champion roster is currently unplayable, due to the likes of Pyke, Fiddles and Brand. I mean, when's the last time you've seen a Leona, a Braum, a Lulu (not counting the stupid funnel strat) or any passive shield/heal support? Hell, Tahm isn't even played in the support role anymore, despite his kit screaming "Look at all this peel!".

TL;DR: ADC mains aren't "bitching" due to their champions NOT doing damage, because Crit ADC's ARE doing damage. ADC mains are complaining that they have to suffer through 20-25 minutes worth of hell to get there (assuming the game goes on long enough FOR THEM TO GET THERE).

Teridax68Jul 2, 20181 votes

[{quoted}](name=Tentacle Advisor,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=FJM77uyk,comment-id=0005,timestamp=2018-07-02T21:16:38.120+0000)

TL;DR: ADC mains aren't "bitching" due to their champions NOT doing damage, because Crit ADC's ARE doing damage. ADC mains are complaining that they have to suffer through 20-25 minutes worth of hell to get there (assuming the game goes on long enough FOR THEM TO GET THERE).

Okay, but the crit marksman fantasy as has been defined so far is that said champions are late game-oriented, so weak early and stronger late. As it stands, crit marksmen are still the strongest thing in the game once they hit that 20-25 minute mark. The fact that many of these champions still have 50+ win rates in a metagame heavily dependent on early snowballing is an undeniable indicator that they're not nearly as bad as has been claimed, and the issue only lies with a select few cases. Champions like Karthus and Veigar have been in very much the same state for years, yet we don't see continued outrage from their players, because they've generally accepted the fact that late-scaling champions are going to have a tough time before their scaling hits.

Moreover, the issue players have taken with the complaints is that the requests frequently just boil down to purely reverting the item cost nerfs, and getting marksmen to scale quicker once more. Because of this, it very much feels like many of the marksman mains who have come here mostly just want to deal more damage earlier in the game, and regain their dominance of bot lane. Many of the complaints cite the presence of non-marksmen in bot lane as a bad thing, and completely ignore the fact that marksmen, including many crit-based marksmen, are still the most popular class there. One would think that more players would request marksmen being made viable in other lanes, but so far most of the requests I've seen revolve exclusively around bot lane, and wanting to keep it marksman-centric.

Personally, I think the issue here is simply that crit marksmen as a group are forced to scale late. Because everyone in the group is balanced in the same manner, they're going to swing really hard one way or the other depending on the meta. In a late-oriented meta, they'd absolutely crush, as they have in the past, but in early-oriented metas they just won't do well, as is happening right now. Retuning certain crit marksmen to peak at different points in the game, with appropriate tradeoffs to their late game, would allow crit marksman players to have a variety of viable options no matter which meta they're in. Additionally, having more pronounced early- or mid-game marksmen would give them a better chance at entering solo positions, which would allow marksman players to no longer be confined to bot lane. This is what I feel marksman mains should be requesting, which is why it irritates me to see so many knee-jerk threads complaining about how things weren't as good as they were before.

Tentacle AdvisorJul 4, 20182 votes

{quoted} Moreover, the issue players have taken with the complaints is that the requests frequently just boil down to purely reverting the item cost nerfs, and getting marksmen to scale quicker once more. Because of this, it very much feels like many of the marksman mains who have come here mostly just want to deal more damage earlier in the game, and regain their dominance of bot lane.

Honestly, I just wish Ashe could get a change/slight modification to how her passive works, now that Crit was changed, in functionality. Her passive no longer gains any benefit from rushing Infinity Edge, due to IE no longer granting Crit Chance. Runaan's is still really good on her, but with the price of the new Infinity Edge is too high for her to reliably buy it, to go with the Runaan's.

This is not me asking for ANY of the crit items' prices to be reduced. This is not me asking for Ashe to get some godly buffs that send her skyrocketing into top-tier status (if this is even possible with Ashe, in the first place). This is me asking for Ashe to get a modification to how her passive responds to her crit chance, given how long it takes for her to even get any, in the game's current state of snowball.

Personally, I like that ADC's have been toned down. But, I do still feel like they were cut down way more than what myself and others were hoping for/expecting.

As a Side Note: Just in case it may come up, I have been building Ashe differently than I used to with varying results.

item 3153 item 3085 item 3006 item 3026 (as core) With item 3031 being bought, if by some miracle I find time to build it

item 3071 item 3072 item 3033 item 3036 item 3065 (based on what's going on in game)

Teridax68Jul 4, 20182 votes

I can agree with this. Ashe's new passive has always been a way of making random crit on her deal non-random damage, with some weird functionally added to her slow later on. I agree that her passive could do with a rework, and at this point crit as a stat has become so isolated that it has become easier to potentially rework than it's ever been in the past. Putting aside the gameplay health issues tied to random damage, the stat's just very difficult to make fun or interesting, because it's very difficult to tack interesting effects onto a mechanic that is designed to double the damage of some autoattacks in a manner that's impossible to perfectly predict. Changing it to a damage bonus on certain good plays (e.g. every three hits, after landing an ability well a la Caitlyn innate, etc.) could make crit much more workable, while potentially giving the stat much more flavor.

I also agree that there are some improvements to be had in the short term with crit marksmen. We're seeing buffs to some of the crit marksmen that really suffered, so that should help, and beyond that I'd personally be okay with reducing the cost of Zeal, if its crit chance were reduced to 25%. 30% is a really awkward number when you're meant to pick an item that doubles your crit chance, because neither 60% nor 120% are particularly great numbers (60% is really unreliable for both the marksman and their target, 120% wastes a lot of stats). Overall, I'd rather scalings happened on champions, rather than items, so I'd personally even go as far as equalizing item costs across all classes, and retuning scalings on individual champions to make them peak at different stages of the game.