Graves
What are your thoughts on graves atm? Who does he typically go well against? What are the strengths and weaknesses does he have that makes him effective if so.
4 Comments
Buckshot costing as much as 90 mana on a champion with very limited mana pool severely limits how many times he can trade and how efficiently he must trade. Meanwhile, quickdraw costing 50 mana just to get Graves in range for a good buckshot adds to the mana issue.
Graves is still capable of doing very good early game damage, but he does not do well against early game sustain champions. He is better suited to have aggressive supports that can take advantage of strong trading potential instead of defense-based supports. Good combinations can be Thresh (no duh), Blitzcrank, and Leona. Pulls help Graves by reducing his mana stress when he wants a max damage buckshot; Leona's engage works well with locking a target in place for Graves to unleash his damage.
However, Graves only has 525 range, so it's hard to trade damage by himself against other ADCs. If anything, Graves encourages more teamwork between him and his support for optimal play than Kalista, because Graves isn't a significant threat when 1v1 against other ADCs.
Don't play him much mainly play 
as my adc but for me personally laning against 
is a living hell as . the passive and his smoke screen throw me off granted I suck so meh.
He has a short range but he can duel other ADCs extremely well due to his burst and slight tankiness from his passive.