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marksmen itemization, item interactivity and statisfaction with critical strike items

Critmaster Garen··5 votes·4,030 views

after seeing the (pretty shitty) plans riot had for marksmen itemization, which is mostly just flat buffs to their items with bigger stats to swing around, i tried to take a stab at crit items myself.

#current issues with critical strike itemization:

  • scaling issues (slow to come online, incredibly overbearing when it happens too fast)
  • boring and uninteresting to use (most crit items are flat stat upgrades with barely any gameplay involved around them)
  • no interactivity and lack of counterplay

#goals of this rework:

  • flatten out the power curves of crit marksmen (stronger midgame at the expense of some lategame power)
  • make critical strike items significantly distinct from one another
  • add layers of interactivity to the different marksmen/critical strike items

item 3085 unchanged but important later

nothing more to say here. the item has it niche.

item 3095 (recipe unchanged - 2600 gold) 60 ad 35% attack speed

unique passive: basic attacks against the same enemy champion grants 6 bonus AD, stacking up to 5 times. this bonus is lost upon attacking a different target, unless you scored a takedown within the last 3 seconds.

pros:

  • very gold efficient when stacked up
  • great standalone item (graves and jhin might get adjustments to stack faster)
  • stat boost scales well as the game progresses and it gets multiplied with crit and attack speed

cons/counterplay:

  • forcing the marksman to switch targets resets the stacks

disclaimer: ONLY ONE ZEAL ITEM MAY BE PURCHASED AT A TIME

item 3094 (zeal + dagger + dagger: 2800 gold)

35% attack speed 30% critical strike chance

unique passive - Rapid fire: standing still grants 10% bonus attack speed per second (stacks up to 5 times), and at 3 stacks gain 20% bonus movement speed for 2 seconds. scoring a takedown immediately grants 5 stacks of rapid fire.

pros:

  • putting the rapid fire into rapid fire cannon. being able to position and plant your feet for a couple of seconds, grants a massive attack speed boost and dps increase
  • risk/high skill = reward gameplay (stop and charge above 3 stacks, move, stop and charge above 3, move)

cons/counterplay:

  • forcing the marksman to stop attacking and move decays the stacks (1 or 2 stacks per second decay)

item 3087 (recipe unchanged - 2800 gold)

35% attack speed 30% critical strike chance 5% movement speed

unique passive: Moving and attacking will make an attack energized unique passive - Shiv lighting: your energized attacks deal 60 - 140 bonus magic damage and pierce through the initial target with increased range (think twitch ultimate)

pros:

  • piercing attacks either over minions or onto enemy champions behind the enemy frontline

cons/counterplay:

  • dodging the energized bolt or positioning where the marksman cant hit more than 1 target with his empowered shots

item 3046 (recipe unchanged - 2800 gold)

45% attack speed 30% critical strike chance 5% movement speed

unique passive - Nightstalker: after being unseen for at least 1 second, grants a shield for up to 280 damage (scaling with level). the shield decays over 5 seconds upon entering enemy vision (5 seconds cooldown). unique passive: gain 7% decaying movement speed for 3 seconds when entering bushes

pros:

  • refreshing shield to protect against burst and engages
  • same name passive as duskblade, so yes assassins cant stack it without losing duskblades proc

cons/counterplay:

  • keeping vision on the enemy adc denies the shield

little trick:

  • clever use of item 3364 and item 2055 can guarantee the shield

item 3031 (recipe unchanged - 3100 gold) (this is where shit gets interesting)

70 attack damage

unique passive: Increases critical strike chance by 50% unique passive: empowers the abilities of other critical strike items

rapid fire cannon: attack speed per second gained increased by 5% and movement speed at 3 stacks to 25% runaans hurricane: generates 2 extra bolts and bolt damage increased from 60% to 90% depending on level stattic shiv: massively increases the charge rate and further increases the range of the piercing bolt phantom dancers: shield increased to 350 damage scaling with level, and movement speed bonus no longer decays over its duration

pros/cons:

  • all of the effects amplified

as far as Tryndamere MasterYi and Yasuo go, these new versions of those crit items dont synergize with them at all.

so we could consider the possibility of designing a couple of melee only critical strike items specifically fit for melee carries.

i think decoupling Yasuo from regular critical strike items might provide a chance to smoothen out his power curve aswell.

im thinking of something like a possible big item 3122 item for them as a replacement for infinity edge, together with 1 or 2 new item 3086 items with 25% crit chance each, so Yasuo reaches his 100% crit chance and full strength at 3 items instead of 2.

another possibility would be to bring back a similar version of the old item 3142 when it was still a crit item.

20 Comments

Slythrin Umbreon2 votes

Upvoting just for name synergy, gonna actually read it now.

Critmaster Garen1 votes

why is the formatting broken. plz fix boards.

Fízz v21 votes

pretty shitty

ay as long as that hexdrinker change goes through im happy

Critmaster Garen1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Fízz v2,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=NGjvi7mM,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2018-12-28T22:12:51.500+0000)

ay as long as that hexdrinker change goes through im happy

their entire game plan right now for crit items and marksmen changes is basically "Moar stats! Moar power!"

none of those changes actually fixes the issues with the class and their itemization. plus, theyre basically going back to when marksmen were a fucking pain in the ass because they a) scaled too fast and b) still outscaled everybody else.

its just replacing one problem with another (that weve already been through in season 7).

Eedat1 votes

A couple of issues to consider

  • RFC should get a completely different passive tbh. You never ever want to be standing still. This item promotes the exact opposite of what you should be doing as an ADC. The only ADCs that could possibly use it are like Jhin and MF while their ulting. Other than that it would be trash tier

  • PD shouldn't rely on stealth to be used in combat. These changes would more or less make the item available to Vayne only and instantly gut it on everyone else. ADCs aren't the ones that hide in fog of war waiting to flank into the fight like an assassin with Duskblade. They're the ones standing in plain view behind their frontline attacking objectives

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

A couple of issues to consider

  • RFC should get a completely different passive tbh. You never ever want to be standing still. This item promotes the exact opposite of what you should be doing as an ADC. The only ADCs that could possibly use it are like Jhin and MF while their ulting. Other than that it would be trash tier

  • PD shouldn't rely on stealth to be used in combat. These changes would more or less make the item available to Vayne only and instantly gut it on everyone else. ADCs aren't the ones that hide in fog of war waiting to flank into the fight like an assassin with Duskblade. They're the ones standing in plain view behind their frontline attacking objectives

pd is supposed to play around bushes and vision as a defensive tool

i specifically put a 5 second cooldown on it after the shield decay to prevent exactly vayne from abusing it too hard, and generally give the item a window of weakness.

i dont know when you read it, but i did a couple changes to the rapid fire. the current concept is to stay still for 3 seconds and auto attack to gain the movement speed buff, then move with 20% (25%) additional ms while you get a decay on the rapid fire stacks, then stop and stack back up to 3.

with some room to get up to 5 stacks to really pop off when youre left untouched (and/or a takedown).

the passive is intended this way to be countered by putting a lot of pressure on the marksman. you dont want the item when youre sure youre gonna constantly get dived, arent able to kite well, and go for the other options instead.

Eedat2 votes

pd is supposed to play around bushes and vision as a defensive tool

I understand that but thats not how the class ends up being played. ADCs aren't the sneaky sneaky ones hiding in bushes. They're almost always forced to be in plain sight either waveclearing or attacking an objective.

i dont know when you read it, but i did a couple changes to the rapid fire. the current concept is to stay still for 3 seconds and auto attack to gain the movement speed buff, then move with 20% (25%) additional ms while you get a decay on the rapid fire stack, then stop and stack back up to 3.

I read it yes and it still is very counter-intuitive and is based around playing the role incorrectly. You never ever ever ever EVER want to be standing still as an ADC in a fight. Look at challenger ADCs. They never stop moving period in a fight unless they are forced to.

saltran2 votes

I will go with the full bias answer and say that you haven't played a single game as an ADC in a long time if you think that staying on turret mode for 3 seconds is something viable.

And even if it was viable it would just make crit adcs turrets with even less agency, if now they rely on their teammates peel let's say in a 7 out of 10, RFC would turn into a 9.5 out of 10 in that term.

saltran1 votes

It was a good thread to read, here are my honest thoughts as someome who plays a lot adc:

item 3085 Fine

item 3095 Focusing on only 1 target for adcs like Vayne specially that already do it for her W would be nice but you have to think about which adcs would buy a 2600g non crit item, we cancel all crit adcs, then we go with the more AD caster style and neither them would buy it, the you go to on hit adcs and as a starter item you would rather buy BtorK for the lifesteal and the go Gunisoo since you need it, the only niche I see for your StormR is on hit adcs as third item considering that as a 2600g item it's also bad on lategame.

item 3094 I get the concept of making crit items more interesting, but the way that you made RFC more interesting is honestly horrible and no adc would buy it unless you want to cosplay Xpeke insane kite with Sivir. (Search YouTube for reference) And if it was strong it would be because the adc can sit and just melt everyone and do a 5as Kog'Maw cosplay which I think it's something that none of us want.

item 3087 I like the concept but I would be scared of a Caitlyn with it for example, in terms of gameplay level it can be greater than current Shiv but It comes with the feeling that it would also be way harder to balance.

item 3046 For how low the shield duratio is it can only be used by adcs with some stealth on his kit, the problem is that Kai'Sa and Twicht synergy too good with Runaan for their passives, Kai'Sa would never buy it since she never goes 2 Zeal items but Twicht sure would get It as second Zeal item.

item 3031 Love the idea of enabling the Zeal items and I'm not kidding, lets see exactly in the way you did it:

With item 3094 This interaction could make RFC viable but 3 seconds till the movement speed it's too long, I still dislike the idea of this RFC and it hasn't changed after reading the IR synergy.

With item 3085 having more aoe dmg seems as a good thing but it's too wide the gab between the good and the bad Runaan users, this synergy would make Runaan totally an on hit item that no crit adc would buy and every on hit would be forced to buy, and I repeat: on hit adcs would be forced to buy this.

With item 3087 well, your first idea seems good and this just explores into it further.

With item 3046 same problem remains, shield duration makes it that only adcs with stealth could use it.

Conclusión in terms of design:

Runaan is and was fine, this RFC can only be designed by someome that doesn't play adcs and it's horrible, StormR should be stronger and with higher stats (more expensive aswell ofc)) ifou want someome to use it but the idea is fine imo, Shiv is a nice way to make an item less bland and simple, PhantomDancer is gated by stealths unless I missed something so I dont like it, and IE synergy on Runaan seems the only one that makes up the loss of the true dmg on crit that IE nos gives but the idea of IE buffing other items is really good.

Conclusion in terms of power: This would be a massive nerf to the usual crit users because RFC is terrible by design, Runaan is on hit only and Shiv is the only one that keeps decent but there's a reason why no crit adcs goes Shiv now: it's outclassed RFC in every way. So, -removing- their main Zeal item (RFC) with your rework and making them forced to buy Shiv while losing the true dmg would be overkill. On hit adcs on the other hand would love the 5 bolts Runaan and trust me that they would need some nerfs because Kog Maw or Kai'Sa with it...nasty things.

I enjoyed this post, thank you.

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

It was a good thread to read, here are my honest thoughts as someome who plays a lot adc:

item 3085 Fine

item 3095 Focusing on only 1 target for adcs like Vayne specially that already do it for her W would be nice but you have to think about which adcs would buy a 2600g non crit item, we cancel all crit adcs, then we go with the more AD caster style and neither them would buy it, the you go to on hit adcs and as a starter item you would rather buy BtorK for the lifesteal and the go Gunisoo since you need it, the only niche I see for your StormR is on hit adcs as third item considering that as a 2600g item it's also bad on lategame.

item 3094 I get the concept of making crit items more interesting, but the way that you made RFC more interesting is honestly horrible and no adc would buy it unless you want to cosplay Xpeke insane kite with Sivir. (Search YouTube for reference) And if it was strong it would be because the adc can sit and just melt everyone and do a 5as Kog'Maw cosplay which I think it's something that none of us want.

item 3087 I like the concept but I would be scared of a Caitlyn with it for example, in terms of gameplay level it can be greater than current Shiv but It comes with the feeling that it would also be way harder to balance.

item 3046 For how low the shield duratio is it can only be used by adcs with some stealth on his kit, the problem is that Kai'Sa and Twicht synergy too good with Runaan for their passives, Kai'Sa would never buy it since she never goes 2 Zeal items but Twicht sure would get It as second Zeal item.

item 3031 Love the idea of enabling the Zeal items and I'm not kidding, lets see exactly in the way you did it:

With item 3094 This interaction could make RFC viable but 3 seconds till the movement speed it's too long, I still dislike the idea of this RFC and it hasn't changed after reading the IR synergy.

With item 3085 having more aoe dmg seems as a good thing but it's too wide the gab between the good and the bad Runaan users, this synergy would make Runaan totally an on hit item that no crit adc would buy and every on hit would be forced to buy, and I repeat: on hit adcs would be forced to buy this.

With item 3087 well, your first idea seems good and this just explores into it further.

With item 3046 same problem remains, shield duration makes it that only adcs with stealth could use it.

Conclusión in terms of design:

Runaan is and was fine, this RFC can only be designed by someome that doesn't play adcs and it's horrible, StormR should be stronger and with higher stats (more expensive aswell ofc)) ifou want someome to use it but the idea is fine imo, Shiv is a nice way to make an item less bland and simple, PhantomDancer is gated by stealths unless I missed something so I dont like it, and IE synergy on Runaan seems the only one that makes up the loss of the true dmg on crit that IE nos gives but the idea of IE buffing other items is really good.

Conclusion in terms of power: This would be a massive nerf to the usual crit users because RFC is terrible by design, Runaan is on hit only and Shiv is the only one that keeps decent but there's a reason why no crit adcs goes Shiv now: it's outclassed RFC in every way. So, -removing- their main Zeal item (RFC) with your rework and making them forced to buy Shiv while losing the true dmg would be overkill. On hit adcs on the other hand would love the 5 bolts Runaan and trust me that they would need some nerfs because Kog Maw or Kai'Sa with it...nasty things.

I enjoyed this post, thank you.

it could be possible to change item 3046 dancers shield to a longer cooldown active that has a condition attached to become available.

how about the requirement to be within a certain range of an allied champion for the active to become available?

this would mean if the adc mispositions and isolates himself, assassins and fighters would still get their opening to dunk them.

as far as the other items go, im open for suggestions. but all of those items should be kept interactive in some way, and there should be reasonable counterplay to their effects.

i could see item 3094 attack speed have a proximity based bonus. meaning if youre at maximum auto attack range from an enemy champion, you get up to 50% attack speed bonus. but the closer you are to an enemy champion, the more you lose this bonus until its 0% (only the 35% base) in melee range.

as far as item 3095 goes, this is the only one of your arguments id actually challenge here. crit adc would gain a 90 ad 2600 gold item when they have it stacked up. attack speed and critical strike both scale the item up, since the as allows them to stack it faster, and the crit would allow them to multiply the high ad value. this version would scale better into lategame than the current stormrazor.

saltran1 votes

For the item 3046 and since I'm someome that thinks that the adc should always go with the supp I can think about a Kalista like link with a choosen ally (the supp) to trigger the shield,

What do you think about this idea ?

The item 3094 idea on this comment has the problem that it just increases the problems of the ranged vs melee dichotomy, I dont think that adcs should be stronger than how they already are on max range against melees and neither that they should be more shit once they get engaged.

As a first idea I thought about RFC and Shiv no longer being availeable to buy both at the same time and keeping RFC as it is BUT having his own energy that doesn't work like the energy we know: instead of charging by movement and atacks make it that you only get it by atacks and skills and that it goes down if you dont do anything for a while, so, in order to get the extra range and dmg aa you have to be in the middle of a fight and you cant just be walking and using the RFC to poke as it is right now.

Re-checking the whole changes I did the mistake of assuming that crit adcs wouldn't need a starter item that isn't a Zeal item but now I see that sure they would need one and yes, item 3095 would fill that hole. With that in mind I'll try to guess the effects if the StormR change on this girls:

Sivir No longer 3 crit W that she has with current StormR and really bad synergy with her gameplay of playing through bounces, she would start ER over StormR cuz you just cant land 5 aa's with 500range to the same enemy on a row.

Ashe cant say if she would start SR or BtorkK as she does now, I think that BtrK but anyway she would always choose the cdr option if she had one.

Caitlyn Her trade patterns are short on early she has no stack speed steroids, so she would buy it not because it's great on her but because she wouldn't have other option, nothing on her kit has synergy with it.

Jinx Current StormR is for Rockets, this one is for Machinegun, she would sure start with it and would be pleased since she stacks it easily even though she will miss the ms of the current one considering that shes a stick.

Kaisa It's perfect for her, nothing more to say.

Kalista Looks good but BotrK has lifesteal and with her range she needs it.

Kindred This would need a nerf for sure, Warrior into StormR would be insane.

Lucian The two items powerspike of BotrK and StormR with his passive would break the game for how cheap they are.

MissFortune Never

Quinn Melee toplaners would hate her more because in a 1vs1 lane the things you could do with that item...

Tristana Really good on Trist and her all in once she has it would be scary.

Twitch He's bullied in lane so BotrK is more safe.

Jhin Trash on him, I dont even know which item would he start with since he has no good option.

Xayah Decent, similar to Tristana case imo.

Varus On hit would still go with BotrK and Lethality well, with Lethality.

Vayne Similar to Twicht, is good on her but it's really risky, not sure.

Draven Massive nerf compared to current StormR, he would just start with a lifesteal item into crit.

Conclusion: your StormR enters on the field of disputing BotrK for on hit adcs but the lack of defense would probably make the choose the lifesteal option.

For crit adcs we have some like Jhin that would be trolling, (Draven that as a second thought it's too much ad for 2600g to miss it, he would buy it) In general the adcs that go all in and have stack speed steroid will use it way better than the ones that dont because if you stack it you just roll over the other adc.

This item would seriously create dueling monsters that would work better on Kindred/Quinn than on usual botlane adcs that are on a 2vs2 lane.

This design of being punished for changing focus will always be greater on solo lanes than on botlane by just the design.

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

The item 3094 idea on this comment has the problem that it just increases the problems of the ranged vs melee dichotomy, I dont think that adcs should be stronger than how they already are on max range against melees and neither that they should be more shit once they get engaged.

this is why i put up the original idea of rapid fire as an item thats forces you to stand still for a moment to deal carry level damage as marksman. (if you keep moving, you still get the base stats from the item)

the problem is, you see this as an isolated change.

but if marksmen gameplay was actually including some form of counterplay, we wouldnt have to rely on hard gap close + burst gameplay to deal with them and could overall reduce the extreme ranged carry vs. assassin relationship.

as you pointed out, you want to constanlty move and kite as a marksman when pressured. but this would reduce their damage in that case. on the other hand, if theyre left untouched, peeled for and protected well, theyd deal increased damage.

its not unlike Kalista auto attack damage being reduced as long as she moves.

i can see how adding counterplay to marksmen doesnt seem very appealing for an adc main, but the existence of counterplay would allow for marksmen to have more agency on their own, and they could be balanced to make their fail and success scenarios less extreme.

my version of rapid fire was exactly made to reduce this ranged vs melee dichotomy. so we can then make the game less binary in temrs of either marksmen being way too powerful and having too much agency, or having no agency at all.

i understand that these designs arent perfect, and some of them maybe outright bad.

but i wanted to provide an alternative design for marksmen items that makes their entire gameplay less flat upgrades on auto attacks. this isnt really something we have explored yet.

just look through 8 years of changes of infinity edge and crit items. every season riot has done nothing but either buffs to costs and stats, or nerfs. nothing else.

even the season 8 change to infinity edge is barely more than trading one form of bonus damage (+50% crit damage) for another (20% true damage conversion).

youd think after 8 years of not being able to get crit items into a reasonable spot, theyd go "alright, lets try something else".

but all of their crit item exploration that theyve showcased is again nothing else but giving marksmen a bigger stick.

saltran1 votes

but the existence of counterplay would allow for marksmen to have more agency on their own, and they could be balanced to make their fail and success scenarios less extreme.

But the change you suggest with the -turret- RFC is the opposite from having agency, it's being more at the mercy of your team and if you cant trust them you wouldn't be able to anything. Saying "counterplay" will make adcs able to have more agency is saying nothing if the change you make in order to get that "counterplay" reduces adc agency. Not to mention that the gab between pro play and soloQ would be bigger if that's the directions you like.

I will agree with the Chipndip1 comment below: you are targeting the wrong aspect of adcs, if you really want to change their playstyle to a -modern- playstyle you have to rework adc kits, not the items, or both, but only changing the items wont work.

Lets say Ashe, the adc that is usually seen (I know that not for you) by non ADC players as the healthiest adc in the game: Sure she has slows, can grant visión and has her iconic ultimate to engage from a screen away and they think that these are the aspects that define Ashe playstyle but they are half wrong, these aspects are the ones that difference her from the rest of adcs, but her gameplay at the end it's the gameplay of an immobile adc and when you play her that's what you play, an immobile adc.

Worth to mention that you like Draven (except passive) but you dislike the rest of adcs that buy the same items (or really similar).

Now take in count what really changes from Draven to Sivir (example) that makes you like one and dislike the other, the items ? No, the champion's kit.

What you really want is to rework adc kits, not their items, what you want to change it's imposible to be changed just by items changes so dont waste more time theorycrafting only about crit items and if you want to, start to "theorycraft" adcs reworks, and trust me that if you make a thread about it I will read it and in a civil way as we have done on this thread debate about it.

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

What you really want is to rework adc kits, not their items, what you want to change it's imposible to be changed just by items changes so dont waste more time theorycrafting only about crit items and if you want to, start to "theorycraft" adcs reworks, and trust me that if you make a thread about it I will read it and in a civil way as we have done on this thread debate about it.

youre 100% correct.

but the problem is, to rework the entire roster of the marksmen to revolve around individual mechanics with counterplay would take riot 5 years at the current pace.

i know putting this onto marksmen items isnt ideal, but since theyre all buying the same items it might be the more feasable option to actually get it done.

Lhuhz1 votes

Sorry for the spAm but, can you pLease Tell me if you saw that Riot wAs about to start to rework adcs to make them good oN solo lanes after 8.11 but it was frustrated by adc mains only wanting to be goon on botlane ?

It's because there's a mod that has this idea stucked in his head so hard and pretends that it was obvious and that everyone knows it.

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

Sorry for the spAm but, can you pLease Tell me if you saw that Riot wAs about to start to rework adcs to make them good oN solo lanes after 8.11 but it was frustrated by adc mains only wanting to be goon on botlane ?

It's because there's a mod that has this idea stucked in his head so hard and pretends that it was obvious and that everyone knows it.

adc are already good in solo lanes. just like with any other champion that you want to play in a solo lane, it depends on the matchup from game to game, if its a good pick.

Twitch Graves Kindred in the jungle

Corki Ezreal Lucian in mid lane

Quinn and other mobile marksmen in the top lane. depending on their opponent.

if youre asking if every marksman is supposed to be viable in every lane, then no. not every bruiser or tank or mage is viable in every lane either. you can play some of them in other lanes, but no one ever expects to be able to play Garen mid, top, bot and jungle. so you shouldnt expect to play Ashe into every lane into every matchup. that would probably just mean ashe would be broken.

when were asking about champion diversity in bot lane, were just asking to be able to play some of the melee carries and mages in that position and give it as much champion diversity as the other lanes, and not just be dominated by a single class of champions.

the reason is so teams can form teamcomps around melee carries or apc if they want to and arent always forced to babysit a marksman every single game. the fact that marksmen are madatory and always take some of the teams resources, makes it harder to support other types of carries.

but if you would be able to play Darius Fiora or Azir in the bot lane, then it would be possible to build teamcomps around them as carries, just like you can form them around marksmen.

ModWulf Helhammer1 votes

Runnan’s: yep, fine as is.

Stormrazor: Eh. May be good, but stacking up to 6 times and only from the same target just isn’t good. Either reduce the stacks (4 is decent, like Trist’s bomb), or keep it at 6, but remove the “same target” clause. As is, you’re just never going to get the full worth of the item unless you do get that takedown.

RFC: Just....no. Absolutely not. It’s entirely useless unless the stats it gives from the buff make you literally god. No one is going to build that thing, it’s conpletely antithesis to what you do as an ADC: kite and move. (Also, it’s not “Rapid-fire. Cannon.”, it’s “Rapid. Firecannon.”. It’s not the attack speed Crit option, Runnan’s is.)

Shiv: Not really that great. The main point of Shiv is the burst power of it, that’s why its damage can Crit. Also removing the chain lighting and making it just basically a skill shot lowers the power of it significantly, where unless the enemy is just dumb you’ll maybe get like one extra hit off it? Twitch’s ult works because of his ability to jump out of stealth with it with bonus AS and AD. Just a regular piercing doesn’t do all that much.

PD: I mean, on its own, it’s nothing that bad, although the shield isn’t really anything at all. But tieing it to bushes basically just makes it a “I get a free shield at the start of the fight, then the passive is entirely useless”. The amount of times you’ll actually be able to use this item effectively in any sort of fight is practically nil, unless you have a Ivern on your team.

And again, I really don’t like both yours and Riot’s idea of removing the unit collision passive from it. That’s been the thing of the item. It’s the whole reason it’s called “Phantom Dancer” for heaven’s sake.

IE: There’s not really anything to talk about here given the other things.

“Only one zeal item”: Why? What is the benefit of that at all? One of the few actually good things to come out of all the meddling Riot has done with Crit Items is that it is reasonably possible to reach 100% Crit with a normal build. That removes the (admittedly pseudo) RNG aspect of Crit at late game builds. Why suddenly change that to only being able to reach 80%, so that the RNG stays the entire time?

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

Runnan’s: yep, fine as is.

Stormrazor: Eh. May be good, but stacking up to 6 times and only from the same target just isn’t good. Either reduce the stacks (4 is decent, like Trist’s bomb), or keep it at 6, but remove the “same target” clause. As is, you’re just never going to get the full worth of the item unless you do get that takedown.

RFC: Just....no. Absolutely not. It’s entirely useless unless the stats it gives from the buff make you literally god. No one is going to build that thing, it’s conpletely antithesis to what you do as an ADC: kite and move. (Also, it’s not “Rapid-fire Cannon”, it’s “Rapid Firecannon”. It’s not the attack speed Crit option, Runnan’s is.)

Shiv: Not really that great. The main point of Shiv is the burst power of it, that’s why its damage can Crit. Also removing the chain lighting and making it just basically a skill shot lowers the power of it significantly, where unless the enemy is just dumb you’ll maybe get like one extra hit off it? Twitch’s ult works because of his ability to jump out of stealth with it with bonus AS and AD. Just a regular piercing doesn’t do all that much.

PD: I mean, on its own, it’s nothing that bad, although the shield isn’t really anything at all. But tieing it to bushes basically just makes it a “I get a free shield at the start of the fight, then the passive is entirely useless”. The amount of times you’ll actually be able to use this item effectively in any sort of fight is practically nil, unless you have a Ivern on your team.

And again, I really don’t like both yours and Riot’s idea of removing the unit collision passive from it. That’s been the thing of the item. It’s the whole reason it’s called “Phantom Dancer” for heaven’s sake.

IE: There’s not really anything to talk about here given the other things.

“Only one zeal item”: Why? What is the benefit of that at all? One of the few actually good things to come out of all the meddling Riot has done with Crit Items is that it is reasonably possible to reach 100% Crit with a normal build. That removes the (admittedly pseudo) RNG aspect of Crit at late game builds. Why suddenly change that to only being able to reach 80%, so that the RNG stays the entire time?

most of those downsides that youre critisizing here are put there in place on purpose.

right now crit itemization has the problem that there is barely any gameplay involved and its entirely uninteractive. all of the zeal items are almost the same, and replacable with one another. theyre all just flat stat upgrades to auto attacks for the most part.

a lot of other classes itemization has some sort of interesting passives or actives or other gameplay elements. most notable mage, assassin, fighter and especially tank itemization with items like item 3157 item 3814 item 3074 or item 3800

these strength and weaknesses are there for both the adc to play around, and their opponents to exploit.

for example item 3087 turning single attacks into piercing shots that have the ability to hit multiple enemy champions, with the counterplay of positioning for the enemy team. it becomes a game of the adc getting into a position for guaranteed multi target hits, and their opponents to evade them.

think about it like the interactive mechanics that most melee carries have built into their kits, like Fiora vitals. only in this case put on their items.

im willing to admit, that some might be too impractical to be feasable. but others like the shiv change, or the stormrazor change are fine in my opinion. the current stormrazor actually scales worse than the one i proposed. 5 auto attacks are not too much to ask either. lategame thats like 3 seconds of attacking the same target.

as far as the 100% crit chance goes. literally no one but yasuo does this right now, since youre overcapping on crit with 2 zeal items and infinity edge, which makes this build gold inefficient.

chipndip11 votes

Here's my issue, CMG: None of this really addresses the point that marksman game play patterns are the problem, not the items.

The items aren't what holds marksmen back. The kits do. You can't outplay what marksmen do best, which is hard scale their autos into a rain of hellfire. Balancing them around time doesn't fix this, either. It just makes them more useful or more worthless depending on the time stamp and who their direct competition is.

The main way we're going to see an end to this is if we start modernizing marksmen from the ground up. Stop the band-aid fixes (we've done more marksman item reworks than any itemization rework I've seen since I got here in season 5...at 3 reworks when the next one drops). Items aren't going to fix the issue with marksman kits. Making marksman kits more interactive and interesting than just clicking everyone dead is what's going to fix marksman kits.

Critmaster Garen1 votes

{quoted}

Here's my issue, CMG: None of this really addresses the point that marksman game play patterns are the problem, not the items.

The items aren't what holds marksmen back. The kits do. You can't outplay what marksmen do best, which is hard scale their autos into a rain of hellfire. Balancing them around time doesn't fix this, either. It just makes them more useful or more worthless depending on the time stamp and who their direct competition is.

The main way we're going to see an end to this is if we start modernizing marksmen from the ground up. Stop the band-aid fixes (we've done more marksman item reworks than any itemization rework I've seen since I got here in season 5...at 3 reworks when the next one drops). Items aren't going to fix the issue with marksman kits. Making marksman kits more interactive and interesting than just clicking everyone dead is what's going to fix marksman kits.

well, im fully agreeing. this is exactly what i tried here.

granted, i tried it by adding these mechanics to their items instead of kit reworks, which would take riot years to pull off. but at least there is an attempt and might end in an improvement.

the current plans that riot has for marksmen are basically "scale faster and harder than anyone else". if their plans go through, were basically back to season 7 and nothing has improved.

the loss of the true damage conversion for unique effects would at least shift some power from their lategame into their midgame and at the same time bind it to mechanics that you can play around.

making crit items more interactive is something that hasnt been tried yet. buffing crit items, enchanters and tanks at the same time, was tried and failed already. horribly so. the season 7 marksman meta was the worst ive ever seen.

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