Ezreal needs buffs--Justification and Potential Solutions

The Problem

Despite being one of the more popular adc's, a character that sees occasional mid play (except when Runeglaive is a thing), and a fairly popular champion in general, Ezreal's win rate is quite low, despite remaining fairly popular.

Win rates: ADC- -47.02% in the past week at all levels of play -49.25% in the past 30 days at all level of play (this data includes Runeglaive Ezreal) -48.5% average in plat+ games during this patch (which is significantly higher than it has been since at least patch 5.10--this may be due to insufficient data since the patch is still somewhat new; it is usually ~47%. It could also be due to the amount of practice people got recently as Ezreal Mid, slightly boosting his average win rate) [-46.94% in plat+ games during this patch for players who have 50-125 games played as Ezreal this patch]](http://champion.gg/champion/Ezreal/ADC) -50.74% in plat+ games during this patch for players who have 125+ games (quite low for such a high mastery of a champion--and again higher than it has been in a while) -27.3% win rate in the 2015 NA LCS Spring Split out of 11 games played. This data is still significant because Ezreal has received no buffs to his kit, stats, or build (not including the now reverted Runeglaive buff). -Ezreal was considered bottom tier on rankedboost.com for the Spring Split and is now considered to be tier 2, ahead of only Quinn, Varus, and Urgot. -Ezreal is considered Tier 2 on nerfplz.com, only ahead of Twitch, Quinn, and Lucian (and non-meta picks like Thresh and Twisted Fate).

MID- -53.84% win rate in the 2015 NA LCS Summer Split out of 13 games played. -49.99% average in plat+ games as Ezreal mid during the Runeglaive Patch (5.13) -41.67% average in plat+ games as Ezreal mid currently (Lower than usual, most likely due to tilting from the sudden drop in power after the Runeglaive change.)

From this data we can see that Ezreal ADC is not in a good place at any level of play, experience, or familiarity with the champion. He is an example of a champion that does not reward mastery. To make matters worse, he is an exceptionally popular ADC, which is a shame for players who are conflicted between wanting to have fun, and wanting to increase their chances of winning games based on their champion selection. I believe that Ezreal buffs are justified.

Some potential reasons for Ezreal's poor win ratio may include his inability to effectively deal with tanks, the fact that he is only strong during the mid game (AD Ezreal only), high mana costs (especially early), a slow start (due to a high cost core item on top of a need to rush tear), skillshot dependence, difficulty in coming back if behind, and arguably the worst waveclear of any ADC or APC. I will attempt to come up with potential solutions for these issues, and I hope we can have a discussion about which one(s) would be healthiest to implement into the game as, naturally, fixing all of a champion's flaws would be a poor idea.

Potential Solutions

Let me first note that , while I am well read in game design and game balance, and follow changes that occur in League of Legends and in a few fighting games, I'm not going to pretend to be as experienced as a Riot employee in understanding how buffing stat/ability x would alter the game compared to stat/ability y. Nor do I know what in specific they have in mind for the future of the game. For this reason, I will not be stating specific numbers, and will also avoid proposing a particular buff as the best solution. Instead, I will propose several buffs, explain the problem each addresses for Ezreal, and attempt predict the repercussions of making such a change. Note that I do not wish for all of these buffs to occur at once, but think (or at least hope) that each is worthy of consideration.

Potential Buff 1: Wavecontrol/Waveclear

Virtually every other viable ADC and APC can manage waves better than Ezreal. Whether it be through better attack speed, explosive damage (Tristana + Jinx), high damage without expending much, or any, mana (Draven, Kalista, Vayne), or skill shots that can hit multiple targets (Caitlyn, Lucian, Ashe, Corki, Graves, Sivir, etc.). It should be obvious that the problem gets even worse for AP Ezreal when he has to deal with the mid-to-late game waveclear of AP champs.

It seems to me that the champions with poor wave clear, and therefore proportionally weak early games, typically have a decent mid game, and scale very well into the late game. ADC Ezreal falls off in the late game, so his inability to manage waves feels unjustified.

My assumption is that Ezreal's passive was supposed to take care of this issue to some degree in the early game, but it's pretty clear that, at this time, it isn't doing that. His passive looks absurdly under powered once you consider that one of the best ADCs (Jinx) basically has it built in to her q at no mana cost. As for mid-to-late game, I assume that his R and Q cooldown reduction were intended to further help him with this issue, but honestly his clear still isn't on par with attack speed focused ADC's, and finding stuff to kill to get your ult back up in time for a team fight can be annoying, especially since you just cleared the lane you're in with said ult.

Wavecontrol Buff Option 1: If you're spamming abilities just to keep your passive up, you're going to run out of mana very quickly. And with the extremely high cost of Ezreal's E at early levels, it's way too risky to spam your abilities at that level. Especially since you're most likely going to need that mana to last hit under tower since your lane opponent are likely going to have more control over where the wave is. Reducing the amount max amount of stacks possible (to 3 or 4) on Rising Spell Force (his passive), while retaining the max % of bonus attack speed possible (50%) would allow for Ezreal to clear faster without expending as much mana. As a side effect, this would allow Ezreal to reach his maximum power earlier in fights, and increase his ability to take towers, but would basically only put his auto attacks on par with Jinx's early game attack speed.

Wavecontrol Buff Option 2: Having Ezreal's passive stacks wind down individually, instead of all at once as they do now, would address the same problem as option 2, but would change the dynamics of when and how Ezreal gains power. Ezreal wouldn't be able to reach full power as quickly if surprised, but would be able to maintain his attack speed more easily (at the cost of periodically expending some mana to keep stacks up).

Wavecontrol Buff Option 3: Allowing Ezreal's W to hit minions, but not to proc his passive would give him the ability to manage a wave without granting him any extra damage against opponents. If this buff occurred, Ezreal players would be able to make an informed choice based on how the game is playing out: max W for more wave clear, or max E for increased safety. Whether or not W would affect camps would be up to Riot, but I will say that right now, AP Ezreal attempting to take out any camp alone is a joke.

Note: We know that, even with Runeglaive giving AP Ezreal a significant amount of additional waveclear, his average win rate was not on par with top mid laners, even with the additional AP damage he received. For that reason, I do not think that giving Ezreal additional waveclear is a risky move.

Potential Buff 2: Less Mana Issues

Early Game: I recognize the importance of limiting how abusive a player can be with skill spamming with no fear of losing mana, but early game, managing Ezreal's mana is more difficult than it should be, especially if you are forced to use spells to try and control the wave. At early levels, one all-in can reduce you to almost no mana, even if you've been conserving it. If you haven't been able to conserve it due to the necessity of clearing under tower, you will run out of mana mid fight if you need to re-position or deal damage with E.

Since most Ezreal players max E second, Ezreal is more reliant on his 90 mana cost ability for damage output, than his 50-90 (50-60 when conserving mana really matters) mana cost W, which was actually intended to be his secondary ability. When facing top ADCs, who aren't reliant on mana to deal damage, this puts you at a big disadvantage.

A modest buff would lower the cost of Ezreal's E at rank one, and slowly increase it each level, so that at max rank it would be 90. This would help address early mana issues. Another potential option would be slightly reducing the cooldown of E at early ranks, slightly reducing the cost of W at higher ranks, and/or increasing the AD scaling of W would give players a reason to max W second--especially if any of these changes were coupled with the 2nd option of the waveclear buff.

A less modest buff would increase Ezreal's early mana pool on top of the E buff to increase his ability to poke a little more before going all-in, or slightly increase his early mana regen to decrease the need to conserve spells (this would allow for more poke spam, which I don't think is really needed--plus it's annoying).

Late Game: Ezreal is still exceptionally mana hungry in the late game due to his dependence on Muramana to stay relevant in the late game. I see no other way of solving this besides changing how he itemizes, which brings me to potential buff 3...

Potential Buff 3: Better Itemization (Essence Reaver Buff!)

If there is one item that has the potential to address Ezreal's issues without causing top tier ADCs to get even stronger, it is Essence Reaver. It seems universally recognized by high level players that Essence Reaver is a poor item to build. Even for the characters it was intended for. Changing this item into something Caster ADC's would want to make a core part of their kits would be awesome. What would it do? Combine the best part of Muramana and Essence Reaver so Casters can favor more damaging items? Give a good power spike at a cheaper cost than Trinity Force? Eliminate the need for Ezreal to get BotRK for additional tank busting (since Essence Reaver already gives lifesteal)? Do something totally new that addresses the unique problems casters have? Who knows? I'm not going to pretend to know the other caster champions as well as Riot does, but I think buffing this item is a great idea to address issues some of the ADC casters are having right now.

Potential Buff 4: Quality of Life

A more modern passive: Ezreal's passive feels like the "oldest" part of his kit. It feels like the power creep of newer ADCs has left it in the dust. As previously mentioned, this passive is basically a worse version of Jinx's secondary passive. Slightly increasing Ezreal's AD/AP scaling, crit chance, or even his auto attack range (not sure about that one at all--losing stacks and being forced to move closer might be really awkward), based on his stacks might make the passive feel much more "modern". The changes I mentioned in the Wavecontrol/Waveclear section are also (perhaps better) options.

E prioritization: This has been suggested many times by various people, but allowing Ezreal's E to prioritize enemy champions would be a nice change to see. Landing E during laning phase can be quite difficult, and since most players max it second, you're losing a lot of damage and mana if you miss the ability.

R cast time: Ezreal's ult cast time is extremely long. If you're on your enemies map, and they are paying attention to the screen or the sound, they have time to dodge. Most Ezreal players have learned to ult in bushes, when off screen, or when the opponent is too focused to move. That's okay, it's fine to have to think about when and where to cast it, but when you compare it to other AOE global or semi-global ults, it seems like Ezreal is getting the short end of the stick: Ashe's ult is instantaneous and gives her dueling power without expending potential auto attack time (maybe it should have a cast time... hmm...), Jinx's ult is way faster and instant, and Lux's ult casts twice as fast and doesn't have travel time. When dueling, if Ezreal isn't discrete about his casting his ult, worst case scenario, the enemy will have the opportunity to attack you while you wind up a shot for a full second that is guaranteed to miss.

Discussion

What do you think? Does Ezreal need buffs? What potential buffs do you find most feasible/healthy for the game? Do you have additional ideas? Tweaks? Discuss below, I will try to take the time to respond to constructive criticism, ideas, concerns, etc.

Thanks for reading! :)