What is Karthus' niche?

SorinBlack·8/19/2015, 6:41:36 AM·1 votes·1,169 views

So we all know , he's the guy watching all the other lanes waiting for a chance to ult someone who's low. We all have our way to counter this , or mitigate its effects ; Not to mention you can simply use cc to stop his ult before it goes off (assuming he isn't casting while using his passive). But besides his ult, and standing in the middle of a teamfight with e and waiting to die so he can do it some more, i don't really feel like he has a real unique role in the current meta. He doesn't counter anyone in lane, but he has many counters. He has no cool or unique mechanics, and in my opinion is just generally underwhelming.

What can we do about this? I'd like it if there was more to playing than just anticipating where your opponent will step next.

Lets get some brainstorming going!

12 Comments

Trash MammaI8/19/2015, 6:49:20 AM4 votes

He's the same as Twisted Fate. You don't play him to win your lane you play him to get fed off other lanes and farm in yours.

(In thematic terms):

As Karthus in lane all you're doing is harvesting minion souls getting them to join your "chorus" then you see a low hp enemy so you cast your ult and get them to join you as well. He's the deathsinger. His job is to be sure you don't cheat death and make sure you meet your end.

In teamfights his job isn't to be some panzy in the backline spamming Q. His job is to get into the middle of them. Set down his W (acts as a gate) and spam Q with his E on till he dies. Then ults. Karthus doesn't see himself as dying but rather bringing people to the shadow isle with him.

TL;DR He makes sure your ass dies!

NemeBro8/19/2015, 7:39:32 AM2 votes

http://champion.gg/statistics/#?roleSort=&sortBy=general.totalDamageDealtToChampions&order=descend

Karthus has the highest average damage dealt of any champion in the entire game.

That is his niche. No one brings as much AOE damage as Karthus. His team fighting is absolutely insane. If even with any other mid laner, come late game he'll be more useful than almost all of them.

SaltyKracka8/19/2015, 7:41:27 AM2 votes

Karthus' whole thing is basically HOLY SHIT he's good at teamfights. He puts up his wall and dives into teamfights, deals all the damage and dies, then deals all the damage and ults.

Hasztalan28/19/2015, 8:06:31 AM2 votes

Ye calling one of the, if not the highest dps mage who can deal the damage even if he is dead "bad" and "non-unique" just shows you havent really playewd him. From my side i'm happy he is not really played apart from hardcore mains as it is a nightmare to play vs a good karthus as he literally has no counters.

Social Justice 18/19/2015, 8:18:31 AM2 votes

His trademarks are the global 5-man ult and magic crits.

His niche is in his consistent high damage and being the only lategame carry that embraces death.

NoMonku8/19/2015, 7:44:35 AM1 votes

He does a lot of damage. If the enemy team stands on top of him, he will be able to dish out tons of damage, even turning the teamfight if they are dumb enough to do it. All he really has going for him is burning down the enemy and as the game has transitioned towards teams taking more champions with CC, he has fallen off. He also is very low mobility compared to newer picks, making him less safe to play in lane and making it harder for him to scaled into the late game. Also his Q's are dodgeable, which is a huge portion of his kit.