Marksmen need a subclass; Snipers

Ultîma··1 votes·220 views

After the release of new class and sub-class definitions done by Riot I found it strange that Marksmen were the only group that didn't have any categories to define different niches within the core group. I think Riot is being somewhat conservative about how they approach this subset because of the way they function (right click to damage things), whereas I feel there's a pretty obvious subset that should change the playfield for this archetype; snipers.

Jhin really gave us a look into how a marksmen with limited upfront potential can influence a matchup from a distance (namely with his ult and W), and I thought it would be very interesting if some of that philosophy was applied to other ADCs that embodied the sniper philosophy in their team. Caitlyn seems like she would be the ideal candidate, but most of her sieging potential lies in her ability to lay down traps and deny an area rather than making a head-shot kill from far behind her allies. Likewise Ashe has always been in a weird spot because she's defined by her crowd control ability, offering supplementary support-like power to hear team, rather than a brute-force ADC. What if, for both these characters, they switched around their current paradigm to really forge a new subset of marksmen that offer a clear strategic niche over the power-picks like Corki, Lucian, and Vayne that offer little more than sheer killing power? I feel like there's a great deal of opportunity here to make the bot lane feel less homogenized as, once again, there's a pretty established holy-trinity of picks that are good in every team composition and matchup.

2 Comments

Paroe1 votes

Marksman come in three catagories: Skirmishers (backline, dps) Seigers (they seige objectives) and AD casters.

AD casters dont fall into the skirmisher or sieger category because they use their abilities for most of their damage.

Lycanoon1 votes

Mhmmmm

Look at Quinn for example... Her ULT is my favorite map trolling skill...aside from twitch's stealth :P

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