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Let's talk about Lucian, Riot's favorite son . . .

EvLoFo·10/26/2018, 5:15:59 PM·4 votes·1,937 views

He's the most picked champ at the moment. In plat and above, he shows up in about 35% of all games. Yep, that's more than Kai'sa. Right now, he's hovering around a 53% win rate, something that's absurd for a champ that's being played so much. He has almost no losing matchups against other ADCs.

How did Lucian get so stupidly good? A series of direct and indirect buffs over the last 10 patches. Here's a quick look:

#8.11

IE Rework and Zeal Item Nerfs. The changes to IE and zeal items basically kneecapped all of Lucian's competition. Only Kai'sa and Ezreal were spared because they don't need to build crit. It's true that some of the changes to IE and zeal items have been walked back and crit ADCs have gotten some compensatory buffs, but they're still in a weaker spot in comparison to Lucian.

ER Rework. I swear that whoever reworked this item was a Lucian main. The rework has his name written all over it. ER suddenly gives 300 mana in addition to mana regen, something very useful for a spell slinger like Lucian. Essence Flair lets him get his basic attacks off even faster after ulting and lets him get extra CDR. There's no longer a crit strike chance, but who needs that when you're a spell slinger who can go for CDR, amiright?

BoRK Buff. Cost was reduced by 200 gold. Lucian can finish his first item that much faster.

#8.13

Minor Nerfs. Given his dominance, Riot had to do something. But they let him off pretty easy. They trimmed Lucian's base AD growth by a small amount and made his ult a little weaker against minions so that it would be a bit harder to kill enemies who are hiding in their wave.

#8.15

ER Buff. Since ER became a niche item and only a handful of champions were taking it, AD was increased by 5 for no additional cost.

#8.18

Q Buff. This one was puzzling because Lucian already had high pick and win rates. He got + 0%/5%/10%/15%/20% on his Q AD ratio that he maxes first. So Riot took one of the strongest early game champs and gave him additional power for the early game that carries into the mid and late game as well. Good job I guess? Did I mention that his high noon skin came out shortly after this buff?

#8.21

ER Buff. Cost was reduced by 200 gold. The most common build for Lucian right now is item 3153 item 3071 item 3094 , but item 3153 item 3071 item 3508 already has a higher win rate. I'm pretty sure that build is going to become the most popular build again soon.

I like Lucian. I think he's fun to play. But this is getting out of hand. There needs to be better direct and indirect balancing around this champ.

6 Comments

I lit your baby10/26/2018, 6:27:07 PM2 votes

_It's true that some of the changes to IE and zeal items have been walked back and crit ADCs have gotten some compensatory buffs, but they're still in a weaker spot in comparison to Lucian. _ Lucian is crit adc and he is in weaker spot also than any crit adc.

_ER Rework _ No one buys this shit on lucian, only as 6- item, and believe me, no one will after pre season patch, because of free 20% cdr by runes and stats.

_BoRK Buff _ Wow-wow, one wave/kill faster. Changed nothing literally. This item was quick buy anyway because of its buying path.

_Q Buff. _ Does nothing, since his itemisation gave around 0 ad. We can even count: bc+bork 65, 70 by IE, other 2 slots boots and zeal item and last one GA/ER/Vampirism/Situation item. Even if we count this as 80 = whole bonus is 40 dmg in late game, literally nothing. This is just nothing even in early game.

_8.21 _ No one still goes er. Unless, there are no tanks, lets imagine this happening(no)

OtterlyLost10/26/2018, 5:41:36 PM1 votes

I wish that they'd revert ER. There was absolutely no reason to change it in the first place. I could accept all of the other 8.11 changes, even if they were stupidly heavy handed, but the ER one is a complete mystery to me, especially since so many champions basically hinged on having access to the crit, CDR and mana regen that it gave(Xayah, Sivir, Ashe, Varus, Crit Fortune).

MadNoff10/26/2018, 5:54:13 PM1 votes

I too like Lucian, he's a fun champion and the only ADC I enjoy. I agree that he has become dominant in bot lane.

Violent Hunter10/27/2018, 1:49:19 AM1 votes

Let me guess you are a vayne main that is crying that Vayne who is 5th most chosen isn't number 1 and has 2% less win rate than Lucian.

Modl Ryden l10/27/2018, 8:08:55 AM1 votes

I think he's fine as he is right now. Lucian has faced a lot of meta's where he was irrelevant to the point where other marksman were him but better. ie: prerework Graves, reworked MF, Ezreal. Right now I think it's good that he's dominant otherwise we'd have to go back to metas like protect the cait, kogmaw, tristana comp. All of which are comps only pro players will play and those in solo queue will tend to avoid. But when solo queue players face a protect the cait/kog/trist comp, they automatically lose.

With Lucian being top pick, along with other Ulti-teamfight reliant marksmen, it give agency to both the marksmen and team to 1) let the marksmen be able to go wild and pop off by themselves and 2) allow a bigger champion pool for the rest of the team to play.

ZT Xperimentor10/27/2018, 11:17:38 AM1 votes

He's a generalist so it's no wonder he stays a top contender; mobility, burst, area damage, focused damage, damage over time. Besides being able to build about anything physical damage related and still succeed thanks to good ratios. Kind of like a ranged leesin come to think of it.