So I saw a video about graves top a while ago and decided to give it a try and got my graves to mastery 5 doing it. And I gotta say it is pretty good. I don't understand why it is not more popular. He is pretty tanky with the free armor from his E and his Q lets him hit on the tier of guys like the dunkmaster. His mobility is ok with the E dash and his ult works as a pretty good execute as people don't often expect it's range and damage and try to recall in it's range.
Graves top is fine, but the issue is that he doesn't do his job better than other champions with the same profile in that position. He is a ranged AD champion that uses his range and burst to bully lower mobility melee champions. You know who has the same profile? Jayce, Gnar, Quinn, and even Vayne, and all of them bring more to the table in the mid to late game. Jayce is the gold standard in this sort of role, being a strong high damage lane bully in the early game and transitioning into a hybrid long range siege engine/dive assassin in the mid to late game. Gnar provides essentially the same bullying power, but Mega Gnar gives him a lot more utility in the teamfight stage of the game, as well as better gank assist to your jungler. Quinn is perhaps the most similar to Graves, having very high single target burst and a need to get in close to finish the job, but her ultimate gives her a massive amount of mobility allowing her to roam and impact other parts of the map. Last but not least there is Vayne, who has the best scaling of the 5, and is a particular nightmare for tanks due to the Silver Bolts passive. Vayne can get big enough to single handedly carry teamfights in the mid to late game, something all of the others can struggle to do.
