Essence Reaver and the Issue of Marksman Itemization

So there's been talk around about Everyone's favorite misplaced item . I started mulling over why the reaver fails its intended duty, and it got me thinking about how ADC itemization works as a whole, and where there are some pretty fundamental flaws. There are currently two major ways ADCs function: Those who are auto-attack reliant I.E. , and those who are more AD Caster types, I.E.

What i find interesting about this is that besides maybe one or two items, all carries build virtually the same, and while riot introduced to alleviate the mana-burn that the latter class uses, nearly every ADC build is the same. And it struck me, Riot built as the response to , Hence why it has its Lifesteal stat, and why they have the same build path. The inherant flaw here though is that essentially, ER is tackling an item that is already quite useful to AD Caster variants for its shield, High damage and LS, and is generally the more "Upfront" of the two major Lifesteal items carries have at their disposal. Instead of , ER should be in contention for .

Okay, but why? The base difference between the carry classes is their dependence on either abilities or autos for the majority of their damage. But because Crit is such a valuable stat, both types of carries get it regardless. a may not get as much value out of the crits as say , but both carries will innevitably purchase IE, because as an item and as a mechanic IE and crit chance/damage are just too strong. The base issue is that while Carries should be building around their strengths, and to a degree they do, they still find themselves in the awkward scenario of choosing items that philosophically don't quite matchup to their skillset. Items like and should primarily bought by AS carries, whilst items that favor raw damage and abilities like and should more reflect the need for bursts of power via a champion's abilities.

So Crit Chance QQ Thread? Not so much on the QQ side, but errs more on the side of game health. Its been said for a long time that Critical Chance and the factors of RNG mechanics should be removed from League, and things like the new rework only go further to seal the idea that reliability is what the community wants out of this mechanic. Because Ashe doesn't need to hope that she crits and instead knows she will, she is a more reliable carry, with more clearly defined Trading power. If we were to make Crit chance adopt something of a similar mechanic to how Ashe uses it, to make it More heavily identified as an AS item line, rather than a catch-all, then we'd have room to diversify the options that carries have to choose from, ironically enough by giving the items themselves more understood identities. And ER....? The reason that suffers as an item, is because it has a poor build path that goes hand in hand with a far more attractive item, it has no way to assist its Caster Carries through the times they are most vulnerable, and overall it lacks the oomph that a late game item should have, especially when compared to the other BFG items. While i couldn't tell you what kind of mechanic would set it above other than solving the glaring issue of Crit Dominance, essentially that is the location that ER belongs. Not contending as a LS item, but contending as a late game damage item for Mana-intense Marksmen.