Boards›Gameplay

Why does balancing ADCs fail every season?

LVL 5 PORO·7/1/2017, 6:18:40 PM·1 votes·479 views

Across all roles there is usually a healthy selection of champs to choose from, except ADC. Usually, there are 2-3 overpowered ADCs and they get spammed in EVERY game. Why is it so hard to make multiple ADCs viable? Caitlyn and Jhin have dominated the meta all year, until Jhin got toned down and now he's been replaced with Draven. You might get the occasional Xayah or Lucian but that's it. And to make matters worse, Riot's balancing shows that they prefer it this way, that only a few ADCs may thrive at a time. If any ADC rises up to threaten the position of the top ADCs they get nerfed into oblivion. When Miss Fortune was finally good she was gutted and tossed in a dumpster, I'm sure Riot has forgotten Kalista exist, and Lucian was replaced by the most anti-fun ADC in the game -- Caitlyn, the Yasuo of bot lane.

Ugh.

I'm not saying we need another meta where ADCs are played in every role, but if would be nice if this role actually had some real selection for once.

9 Comments

Trap or a Trick7/1/2017, 6:23:39 PM1 votes

normally, the ''op'' adc's are based on the other op champs, if the meta favours tanks, chances are, you wont be seeing much jhin, if it favours ad champs, prepare for varus, corki and kog. if squishy assasins or mages are meta twitch, Lucian, jhin.

obviously this isn't the ONLY thing that counts.

also, adc's aren't exactly ''easy'' to balance, like rengar, he is either gamebreakingly broken, or utter garbage.

Aptest7/1/2017, 6:56:17 PM1 votes

I think ADCs belong to a number of broad groups, namely:

(a) "I am good at taking down tanks" (b) "I am good at nuking squishes" (c) "I can outplay assassins and divers and 1v1 them and i don't need peel"

this means that within each meta a number of ADCs will be the best, and those will be the ADCs that belong to the "good group".

the thing is within the groups the ADCs don't differ enough from one another. I mean Vasur and Jhin may APPEAR different but what they provide is ultimately the same. and because they are essentially the same only one of them can be the better one.

BlueBilberry7/1/2017, 7:15:29 PM1 votes

Ever tried removing something from one side of a balance scale? It tips. The problem is that some of the items that adcs use are also often abused by the ad top/midlaners. Improve Shiv? And yes, the adcs get waveclear but lo and behold Tryndamere has become a split pushing monster. I am sympathetic with the devs here in terms of balancing issues - but this is how Rito let the game evolve.

ZephyrDrake7/1/2017, 10:13:09 PM1 votes

there is always the top "2-3" champions in every role. The top 2-3 supports, the top 2-3 tanks, the top 2-3 junglers, the top 2-3 mages etc, etc, etc. ADCs are not the only ones with that trend

EndlessSorcerer7/1/2017, 10:20:54 PM1 votes

[1] There isn't really any competition to ADCs within their primary role. ADCs (with few exceptions) are the only champions to be played in Bot, so they simply have to lane against one another.

[2] The majority of ADCs provide the same quality to their team composition: reliable ranged DPS. While their method of dealing damage (and the utility they posses) may vary, they all provide roughly the same thing in the end.