Calling ADC mains: Why do you main ADC?

Athenes Lulu·Apr 1, 2016·6 votes·4,333 views

Whether it's your only main role or not, why ADC above all other roles?

It's quite team dependent and mechanically intensive as compared to other carry roles... why?

30 Comments

Hayaishi2Apr 1, 201612 votes

Becauase i love getting 4 man dived at tower, theres no better feeling than that.

Athenes LuluApr 1, 20161 votes

As a support main I know how amazing it really is.

The good ol' days of the mid teleport meta.

GooberpApr 1, 20165 votes

My best two skills in League are csing and positioning, so it was kind of a natural conclusion. My map awareness is actually quite poor, so while I enjoy support and mid, I do not perform well in those roles; in bot lane a good support can handle 70%+ of the map awareness for me, and I can just focus on csing and trying to trade. I also like the feeling of doing a ton of damage in fights just by properly positioning. I feel like ADC is the role that best connects you to your team's ability to work together, because you ARE the heart of the team. Contrast that with supporting, which is like the "glue" that holds a team together, or the other roles - vital limbs that do work, but you can lose a limb or two and still function. If the support dies, teamfights quickly fall apart, but if the adc dies first it's generally just over. If the team doesn't mesh well, you are going to die. A lot. And lose. A lot.

My one major complaint with ADC role is that, while I enjoy the concept of being highly team-dependent with a very high payoff, it is next-to-impossible for an ADC to solo carry a game in the current meta. Even going 4/1 in bot lane, you get approximately 3/4 of an item up on the other adc, but because adcs have exponential power curves, the actual power difference is fairly low and you can't leverage that advantage into a victory until the mid-early late game. In the meantime, if anyone in any other lane gets fed early, they will power spike HARD and be able to push objectives and snowball in the early game. If our team has a 5/2 Jhin and the enemy team has a 4/1 Annie, (and everyone else is 0/X) the opponents, while having lower total gold, have MUCH more power. Carrying as ADC requires that everyone on your team be at minimum competent, even if you personally shine. It can be very frustrating to be 30 CS and 2 kills up on enemy bot lane, but because top is behind 2 kills, the enemy quickly snowballs a win before you finish your third item. Finally, everyone can kill ADCs early. Everyone. Even supports. The moment one of the ADCs starts doing well, all 10 players will converge on bot lane to grind them beneath their heels. It's very frustrating.

Even so, ADC is fun somehow? Even when I get dived by 6/3 LeBlanc with no recourse but to die for free, it's still fun to have that lategame fantasy. "Ooh you better not let this game reach 40 minutes or I'm gonna right click you so hard"

Athenes LuluApr 1, 20162 votes

That comparison and explanation, pretty spot on. Using that next time someone's asking me about general game flow.

As much as we think Rito loves ADCs so much and how they "have a boner for ADCs" (it's an actual quote, pretty sure some of you have seen it), it's just that the need for sustained ranged damage is so important in any given fight or objective-taking situation.

I don't really remember any meta where ADCs can just solo carry games, because well, when any specific class is OP, ADCs can get singlehandedly deleted anyways, even in a meta where ADCs themselves are strong and popular. Or even if it's the meta where ADCs are the sole indicators of carrying, there has to be at least another teammate or two backing him up, therefore making ADC meta the "ADC meta". Because of all that, they have been constantly team reliant, but not as reliant as supports because the ability to control how much damage output someone can dish out is powerful.

And you know those days where you just can't work with your random supports? Or even just your team? Those days. Sometimes I feel bad for ADC mains because of that.

9kPluzZApr 1, 20162 votes

Well they are the coolest champs in the game. What, you want to play a rock Malphite ? Or a dragon thing AurelionSol ? So cliche. Nahhh.... you want to play a sexy chick with a gun Jinx MissFortune Caitlyn

Roar of LegendApr 1, 20162 votes

And that is not cliche... o.o?

9kPluzZApr 1, 20161 votes

No, that's sexy chicks with samurai swords

Athenes LuluApr 1, 20162 votes

"Sexy chicks with guns" are just as cliche, though...

But again, a midget witch is just as stupidly cliche, and I have no regrets.

LazyW0lfApr 1, 20162 votes

ADC has always been fun to me, I love the experience kiting people around. One of my favorite moments from playing league is when I was able to kite a Trynd through two of my own towers and Jinx and live with ~10 hp. The role has it's highs and it has it's lows. The most humiliating thing is when you don't use attack move and walk towards them instead of autoing them to death. (I did this recently as Jhin, where a single shot could've killed 2 squishies and I failed not once, but twice, to auto and kill them, eventually dying). Also my best friend who got me into league is a support main and we duo quite frequently. Having a reliable support takes some of the stress off of my own play and allows me to concentrate on my own skill rather than focusing on self-peel at mechanics at the same time.

DeloricVIApr 1, 20162 votes

I just can't climb in any other roles other than mid. I didn't main ADC before, but now it seems to be the most sure-fire way to have a huge impact and climb without having to jungle and take the blame for everyone's mistakes, even if none of them are my fault.

Top is too isolated; TP helps but it's a major cooldown, and your effectiveness beyond occasional roams mid or doing Rift Herald is extremely limited. Not to mention, top needs to go tank, typically, and as a tank it's hard to carry a game because you can't exactly annihilate towers like, say, jinx with 2 attack speed items and 80% crit chance.

Jungle is hard. There is no set path for a jungler, and you have to work around your team's failings. If someone pushes the lane to the tower while asking for a gank, not only are they total morons, but you also get blamed for not ganking, and, subsequently, the overextender losing their lane. Further, jungleing is becoming more and more dominated by champions that I don't like to play. I like tanky utility/lockdown junglers, not assassins, which are so popular right now because of devourer.

Support... well there's not much to say really. Your chances of success are directly proportional to your adc's ability to not suck. I don't like having to trust someone that much, because I already assume that everyone on my team is going to need my help; the last thing I want is a lane where I have to be directly responsible (in their mind) for making sure they don't die, while also not getting any minions, and putting myself in harms' way to scrape enough pennies together for a sightstone. And further, I will also be expected to spoon-feed kills to the Jinx that picked Jinx into Varus and Blitzcrank, while not taking any kills, and still have either as much damage as our mid laner or be tanky as, if not tankier than, our top laner. No thank you.

So, simple process of elimination, I have to pick 2. Mid first, ADC second.

DrShokingApr 1, 20161 votes

I like orb walking 0-0.

ModWulf HelhammerApr 1, 20161 votes

Because I like doing a lot of damage, and being a carry for the team. The main reason I consider myself an ADC main as opposed to a mid main is because of Quinn, who I've played as my main ADC since mid season 4

Athenes LuluApr 1, 20161 votes

Speaking of Quinn, what are your thoughts on her rework?

She's still a ranged ADC, but more mobile and burst-oriented.

ModWulf HelhammerApr 1, 20161 votes

When it first came out, I hated it.

Once they added the nearsight it helped her a lot. The recent nerfs I feel are completely unjustified and just done to please complainers here on the boards and Reddit

Hardstuck G4Apr 1, 20161 votes

Lucian

Woook3rApr 1, 20161 votes

because its hard.

disregardableApr 1, 20161 votes

There's no better feeling than destroying the entire enemy team and they can't do anything to stop you. The massive amount of power when I succeed is too rewarding to say no to: kill everything, take all the turrets, and laugh at them before I go solo dragon.

Now if you don't win lane, THEN the other people in the game matter. But when you do win lane...it feels so good.

Mysticman89Apr 1, 20161 votes

I've switched to support, but when I did main adc it's because I like having two people I can potentially outplay/take advantage of to get swole, and then once I'm huge I can roll around with a realistic chance of potentially getting a penta at some point.

MrBuffingtonApr 1, 20161 votes

A lot of the reasons I started to play ADC come from things that frustrated me when I was a support main. There's also some process of elimination involved; I realized just how much I hate laning against Assassins as a squishy champion, even if I beat them, so I stopped playing mid. My objective control is pretty average and I like laning too much to become a jungle main. Support is just frustrating to play without a competent ADC, especially now that they butchered Sightstone. I'm actually really enjoying top lane right now, but the sheer variance in the champions you face is kind of a turn-off, especially when you just want to play a fighter/tank and they're picking Teemo/Quinn.

I find CSing and orb-walking relaxing. You settle into a rhythm after a while. I also like how I can actually take objectives, instead of being Janna spam pinging a free turret while trying desperately to auto it to death.

Elisza KitsuneApr 1, 20161 votes

I like ADC because i generally play support (even if i may suck) because i know what and what not to do as an ADC since I've been in a supp's position before. I mainly play ADC because when I play a tank I can't carry well (really depends but I play tanks that can't carry), mid lane is scary with all the op champions (FIZZ) and overall I feel like ADC is pretty challenging and I like that about ADC. It also gives that great feeling when someone dives you and you get a double :3

DrehirthApr 1, 20161 votes

Because I would get mad at those adc who just walks back and forth despite being in ranged to shoot, letting their team take damage and die when they could just shoot the tower. It made me so mad I had the mentality "if you want something done right.. do it yourself"

Rockm SockmApr 1, 20161 votes

I wanted to main top. ADC was the only role besides support I could always get when I started in season 3 because they sucked so bad then.

I liked the mechanically challenging part and I prefer to focus on team fighting and objectives. Those items kind of make me enjoy the ADC role. Not of fan of this graves/quinn any lane bull.

DivewingApr 2, 20161 votes

Mechanically intensive is some rather generous wording. I'd give you positioning intensive, but for the most part mechanically intensive is somewhat insulting to basically all mid laners, quite a few junglers, and a few supports and tops. Some ADCs don't even have mechanics, let alone difficult ones.

Athenes LuluApr 2, 20161 votes

It's a lot harder because you have much less room to dodge anything, and that attacks rely on a lot of kiting/autoattacking, while for things like mages/tanks just land a spell, and you already did a large percentage of work.

I'm pretty sure botlane feels a lot more cramped than say, mid/top lane, because you are also sharing a lane with another person. And twice the amount of dodging skillshots too, because quite often both enemy laners have shit that you need to dodge. One of them is Lux/Vel'Koz/Brand? I'd find that pretty hard to eat none of that.

And there are supports that work better when their ADCs "tank" for them, so if they are tanking while trying to kill, to a lot of people that's already hard enough.

DivewingApr 3, 20161 votes

That's my point, don't get me wrong, I think ADC positioning is by and large very tough (unless you play graves), but mechanically they usually aren't. I think you've got mechanically confused with tactically. The difference being like talon and xerath, wherein Talon is super easy to play but hard to be effective with in the late game (because if you miss timings your are donezo), and xerath is hard to play but easy to make work (because you kinda just sit back and throw stuff).

A Bad MysticApr 2, 20161 votes

It suits my play style better than anything else. I love consistent damage, i like to know that my hits will do so and so every time i use them. The fact that they cant miss unless im playing kali or graves is also nice. Ive played quite a few mages where ive accidentally whiffed a spell and lost a trade cause it was necessary to win it. I just love the consistency the class offers. Also being beyond abysmal when it comes to melees also helped make this choice for me. The only other champs i like that arent adcs are champs like kayle, azir, and cass who can output damage in a consistent way that adcs do. Im just wierd i guess.