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Kayn and the problem with Assassins/Marksmen currently

48983507DEL1·7/14/2017, 4:00:55 AM·4 votes·858 views

Riot has taken the design philosophy that assassins should not be able to quickly kill opponents under normal circumstances. In this meta, if everything goes according to plan, it should take approximately 2-4 seconds for a healthy assassin to eliminate a low %health ADC or Mage. The defining characteristic of an Assassin is the ability to evade those who would stop him/her from killing a target, otherwise known as being slippery.

Kayn's kit exemplifies this philosophy perfectly, boasting incredible evasion abilities with his E and his Ultimate while having his damage focused around 3 second time windows. His whole goal is to flank, attack a target, become invulnerable, disengage, meander around the fight, and re-engage when possible. He's great at constantly staying on the move and being difficult to lock down when played properly.

There's just one thing he struggles with: Killing a Fed ADC.

Analyzing the outplay potential that assassins offer, it's clear that they're incredible at fighting Spellcasters. Champions like Kayn and Zed are able to threaten the likes of Syndra and Lux because they have the proper tools to avoid skillshot abilities. It's a satisfying experience because of the high risk that you might straight up die if you misplay an all in.

However, Marksmen have almost no counterplay to their damage patters; they auto-attack you, and your ability to succeed is dependent entirely on stat-checks and the chance of a critical strike. So when I dive onto a Twitch, it's likely that he'll have enough lifesteal to survive my delayed burst, or just straight outdamage me entirely if he has the correct items. The worst part is that a successful kill in this situation isn't even satisfying due to everything I just stated.

It also doesn't help that every new item that gets added only increases the untouchablity of Marksmen. item 3812 item 3026 item 3109 item 3190 item 3046 item 3107 item 3072 Wasn't there a time where they were supposed to survive based on positioning and the skill of their Support? Now they can completely negate any Assassin's damage with just a few of these items. Hell, it's not very unlikely to see ALL of these items used in a single game.

In Conclusion, Assassins are really weak because of how safe the ADC role is right now. Marksmen are more powerful than they ever have been, and it's nearly impossible to assassinate one that's popped off. It's too easy to keep an ADC from dying because of itemization, and certain Marksmen are just overpowered. I'd start by nerfing Phantom Dancer honestly, but that's just my opinion.

7 Comments

midnight oil247/14/2017, 4:03:24 AM4 votes

ADC? Safe? In 2017? Surely you jest!

All joking aside, this is a very well thought-out and written post. You do bring up some good points, in that if the marksman gets fed than the 2 seconds you need to kill them is still shorter than the one second they need to riddle you with enough bullets to make even the most trigger-happy beg you to stop.

Bronze Demon7/14/2017, 5:01:12 AM3 votes

ADCs fulfill the role of the following at the same time

poking, taking objectives, pushing, DPS tank killing, assassinating squishies with RANGED burst!

all with the benefit of being safe because of range, support, and items specifically made to help them. also they have easy laning phase, and sustain thanks to lifesteal.

looks like the only thing they can't do is tanking item 3812 item 3190 item 3107 item 3046 item 3109 item 3026 item 3072

oh wait.

Big Lincoln7/14/2017, 4:59:40 AM2 votes

i don't feel like kayn is an assassin at all tbh. Shadow form feels more like a 'light fighter' than a full-on assassin because his burst doesn't worry me at all

and I don't think that that is a healthy assassin concept, to begin with; I think they should be more about good set-up and macro play, like Shaco tends to be with his boxes. i think shaco was a great assassin concept until they messed with his backstab (which ironically rewarded him more for longer fights than his new one does)

Necrothis7/14/2017, 4:56:25 AM1 votes

Yeah but Kayn is not even a good Assassin. I see what they wanted to do.. But the damage output is just not good enough to kill anything. He needs more damage or more tankyness. He right now is a lost game at the loading screen... one CC and he is dead. Ult during a team fight and the one you ult just walk closer to there own team or to the middle of lane... he is dead. His healing in darkin form is a joke and His Assassination power is a laugh... He can be killed one on one BY a support.

Doozku7/14/2017, 8:23:57 PM1 votes

This is just one problem with the Assassin class out of many. I'm basically gonna explain my thoughts on this problem.

Assassins are a gimped class because they are designed to outplay a class, ADC's, which is impossible to outplay, because their damage is point and click. Because of this, when they are strong, they feel oppressive because the only way they kill ADC's is just by outdamaging them or snowballing so hard that the ADC doesn't even have a chance to reach their lategame power. Not to mention the fact that this let's them easily kill other classes, like mages, that actually have viable counterplay. If ADC was a class that had actual counterplay, like skillshots and windows of power, instead of this archaic "I right click people and it does shitloads of damage XDDDDD" design, then Assassins could actually be allowed to be balanced.

Of course, there's the problem that Divers already exist which do the same things as Assassins while also bringing more cc and utility to the table, but that's another story.