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ADC counter-itemization needs drawbacks.

WoonStruck··15 votes·1,383 views

What's the drawback of getting item 3139 ?

You don't give up damage. You don't give up lifesteal, you even get a cleanse with high tenacity, and double your MR.

There's absolutely no drawback to getting this item, making ADCs in their strongest state ever even more slippery than they've ever been.

item 3033 needs to last 1-2 seconds if its going to be on all physical damage, since it can constantly be re-applied anyway. Either that or only under 40% HP, or even an active effect for 6 seconds at the current values. The current values make sustain-based champions near-useless in teamfights if they get tapped even once by accident. Considering either this or LDR will be in EVERY SINGLE adc build, this powerful effect shouldn't be able to be thoughtlessly applied. Its nonsensical.

item 3036 gives a buff more powerful than Vlad's ultimate to pretty much anyone that isn't an ADC. Capping at +15% damage for only 500 health is simply stupid. Bring that up to 2000, the maximum health over an ADC anyone would usually end up grabbing. This gives us +.75% damage for each 100 health over you. Currently, if a mage grabs ANY health item to survive lane vs Zed Talon , gg, you just gave the ADC +15% damage. Making it so you can lane fucks your late game...with late game items (which most of the HP/AP items are). How is that good design? Better yet, make it only apply to current HP when determining the bonus damage, not max, and make it an active effect on a target for 10 seconds. Imagine if mages got +15% damage to anyone with more health than them. Imagine if bruisers or tanks got the same. You'd instantly nerf them. This item is literally absurd right now, and it more than counters item 3047. There's a reason Tabi is a non-factor now.

While we're at it..

item 3508 Gives an absurd amount of CDR without giving up anything. The CDR cap needs to be lowered to 10%. Hell, it'd still be absurdly powerful if you just flat-out removed the base CDR instead. This not only makes a lot of champions scale absurdly since it gives 30% CDR, which helps with steroids, damage, and poke, it makes them that much slipperier due to their escapes having such a forgiving down-time with minimal investment. Almost EVERY SINGLE OTHER CDR-FOCUSED NON-NICHE ITEM HAS NON-OFFENSIVE STATS item 3025 item 3165 item 3174 item 3110 item 3071. The only outliers areitem 3115 which only enables very specific champions to function (Its clearly not an abuse-case) and item 3508, which makes every ADC extremely versatile and dangerous, which is clearly an abuse-case.

29 Comments

TehNACHO8 votes

Wanna clear up a misconception about Giant Slayer real quick.

Say the ADC has 2000 HP and you have 2000 HP. Let's also say he does 1000 damage per second and kills you in 2 seconds.

Now let's say the ADC has 2000 HP with Giant Slayer, and you have 2500 HP. He will now do 1150 damage per second and kill you in 2.17 seconds. That's a diminishing return for Giant Slayer compared to the first 500 HP you just purchased. And then you have to consider that Giant Slayer doesn't continue to scale past that 500 HP point.

Giant Slayer doesn't scale stronger than HP necessarily, it just allows those who use it to better close the gap on enemies as they scale on tank stats, which is necessary for carries to do their job of shredding tanks.

Critmaster Garen6 votes

{quoted}

Wanna clear up a misconception about Giant Slayer real quick.

Say the ADC has 2000 HP and you have 2000 HP. Let's also say he does 1000 damage per second and kills you in 2 seconds.

Now let's say the ADC has 2000 HP with Giant Slayer, and you have 2500 HP. He will now do 1150 damage per second and kill you in 2.17 seconds. That's a diminishing return for Giant Slayer compared to the first 500 HP you just purchased. And then you have to consider that Giant Slayer doesn't continue to scale past that 500 HP point.

Giant Slayer doesn't scale stronger than HP necessarily, it just allows those who use it to better close the gap on enemies as they scale on tank stats, which is necessary for carries to do their job of shredding tanks.

youre only factoring in flat auto attack damage though.

if the enemy carry picks up a bork with giants slayer things look entirely different. any form of physical % hp damage puts a dent in that calculation, as this damage already scales up.

TehNACHO5 votes

Then the issue is BotRK and Giant Slayer together than one or the other individually.

Which I'd then argue is not a problem. The entire point of, say, an AD Carry is to multiply your glass cannon offensive stats together to melt tanks. If you are buying multiple items for the explicit purpose of killing a high HP tank, I think that you probably should be doing plenty of damage against them.

Critmaster Garen3 votes

{quoted}

Then the issue is BotRK and Giant Slayer together than one or the other individually.

Which I'd then argue is not a problem. The entire point of, say, an AD Carry is to multiply your glass cannon offensive stats together to melt tanks. If you are buying multiple items for the explicit purpose of killing a high HP tank, I think that you probably should be doing plenty of damage against them.

yea, well. when were looking at the constant 3 adc teamcomps, then maybe theyre a little too good at their job anyways.

just because they should be able to kill tanky targets with sustained damage doesnt mean they should be able to just blow them up in less than 5 seconds. and then there is the issue of not just bork adding % health damage to every adc, but some of them have it already built into their kits.

WoonStruck4 votes

[{quoted}](name=Critmaster Garen,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=zL0sc9yq,comment-id=0000000000000000,timestamp=2016-03-02T18:48:02.737+0000)

yea, well. when were looking at the constant 3 adc teamcomps, then maybe theyre a little too good at their job anyways.

just because they should be able to kill tanky targets with sustained damage doesnt mean they should be able to just blow them up in less than 5 seconds. and then there is the issue of not just bork adding % health damage to every adc, but some of them have it already built into their kits.

Its because all of the updated/tweaked kits were over-loaded, barring maybe MF who's probably not contested simply due to teams being so mobile and engage-based. Considering ADCs are the ONLY champions that fill a niche successfully, powerfully, and without getting nerfed unlike every other champion that sees success, this seems to be the case. The itemization on top of it gives them such extreme counters (in combination, not any solitary item) to anything that can fight them that there's little most can do outside of play an ADC too, or play a hard-counter to squishy teams until it inevitably gets nerfed for fulfilling their niche...unlike ADCs who actually deserve nerfs.

Critmaster Garen5 votes

{quoted}

Its because all of the updated kits were over-loaded, considering ADCs are the ONLY champions that fill a niche successfully, powerfully, and without getting nerfed unlike every other champion that sees success. The itemization on top of it gives them such extreme counters to anything that can fight them that there's little most can do outside of play an ADC too, or play a hard-counter to squishy teams until it inevitably gets nerfed for fulfilling their niche...unlike ADCs who actually deserve nerfs.

its not just the adc kits. its also their items and masteries that are too powerful.

i mean essence reaver gives them 30% cdr basically for free. theyre not sacrificing auto attack dmage for it. they can get significant sustain from warlords, and a 100% crit build with 30% cdr at the same time right now.

most of the adc that were or are op right now are building essence reaver as first or third item.

bork got "nerfed" (if bought without dominiks), but the item was op on 8% anyways. it was too effective against targets that didnt even stack health.

mercurial is clearly too strong on certain adc and just makes them too safe right now. that and it has the side effect of making thornmail straight up worthless.

its like the update gave adc a ton of extra damage overall while making them unproportionally safe at the same time. one of those 2 things needs to get dialed down.

SP Dodgecity3 votes

Thats what we call a counter tank build... what do you want them to do? Literally without those counter tank builds, tanks would be.. unkillable.. unstoppable... and kinda OP

So an ADC having a counter pick available for a heavy front line team is completely necessary.

Critmaster Garen4 votes

{quoted}

Thats what we call a counter tank build... what do you want them to do? Literally without those counter tank builds, tanks would be.. unkillable.. unstoppable... and kinda OP

So an ADC having a counter pick available for a heavy front line team is completely necessary.

adc have existed in this game before those items, and they have been just as effective. they dont need them to be that strong.

WoonStruck4 votes

{quoted}

Thats what we call a counter tank build... what do you want them to do? Literally without those counter tank builds, tanks would be.. unkillable.. unstoppable... and kinda OP

So an ADC having a counter pick available for a heavy front line team is completely necessary.

The problem is that 'counter-building' still allows them to melt squishies just as much, if not faster. They do not trade a single thing for 'counter-building.'

This is because, atm, its not 'counter-building.' Its "let's give ADCs all the tools they need to destroy everything without giving anything up."

SP Dodgecity2 votes

That'll never work for one reason... adc's are supposed to melt everything... They're glass cannons.

The name is Attack Damage carry. Carry meaning "carrying the whole team". They're supposed to do that much damage, thats why the front line keeps em safe and why they have a support early-late game. They're meant to be super strong. But are very very easy to kill.

Like I was saying earlier, Champion kits are broken right now. Not items

Like a fed Talon/Zed/Xin/Master Yi/Jax

Those champions that when they get fed they're no longer any fun to even try to beat, they're the problem, not the items. Marksman ADC's really don't do all that much right now.

Erockandroll1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Critmaster Garen,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=zL0sc9yq,comment-id=00000000,timestamp=2016-03-02T18:26:17.992+0000)

youre only factoring in flat auto attack damage though.

if the enemy carry picks up a bork with giants slayer things look entirely different. any form of physical % hp damage puts a dent in that calculation, as this damage already scales up.

Getting 2 items to shred the tank, is really puts a dent in and ADC's flat damage, or damage based on Crit.

This would be the main trade off the Scimitar would have. It doesn't offer much in Tank shred, and it doesn't offer crit or AS, to help multiply the DPS. That doesn't sound like much in the long run, when you have a full build. But it means you have to make choices on your build paths. If you build QSS first, you won't have much shreding power.

WoonStruck5 votes

{quoted}

Getting 2 items to shred the tank, is really puts a dent in and ADC's flat damage, or damage based on Crit.

This would be the main trade off the Scimitar would have. It doesn't offer much in Tank shred, and it doesn't offer crit or AS, to help multiply the DPS. That doesn't sound like much in the long run, when you have a full build. But it means you have to make choices on your build paths. If you build QSS first, you won't have much shreding power.

So the Scimitar not being completely over-loaded by also including tank-shred stats is what they give up?

Have you considered comedy as a career? You are hilarious.

YCitizenSnipsY1 votes

I mean those two items bought together is a build made for killing a tanky target. I don't think they should be considered out of line for doing what they do.

LW isn't nearly as good as it used to be even with their little effects, and BoRK was nerfed was well. I don't think that dedicating 6k gold in order to have a real impact on tanks or tanky champion is all that out of line.

WoonStruck4 votes

{quoted}

Wanna clear up a misconception about Giant Slayer real quick.

Say the ADC has 2000 HP and you have 2000 HP. Let's also say he does 1000 damage per second and kills you in 2 seconds.

Now let's say the ADC has 2000 HP with Giant Slayer, and you have 2500 HP. He will now do 1150 damage per second and kill you in 2.17 seconds. That's a diminishing return for Giant Slayer compared to the first 500 HP you just purchased. And then you have to consider that Giant Slayer doesn't continue to scale past that 500 HP point.

Giant Slayer doesn't scale stronger than HP necessarily, it just allows those who use it to better close the gap on enemies as they scale on tank stats, which is necessary for carries to do their job of shredding tanks.

Tank stats ALREADY scale MUCH worse than ADC damage. They don't NEED giantslayer at all. The fact that its as powerful as it is on top of that only makes things significantly worse. You might say "X Y and Z tanks/bruisers are fine right now" but it leaves a LARGE majority of champions in both classes unviable. FFS, when Renekton is an unviable bruiser, you KNOW something is wrong. He's Riot's 'golden standard' for top lane. The only tanks/bruisers that are successful atm are overloaded compared to the rest of the roster right alongside ADCs, or they hard counter ADCs.Rammus Irelia Malphite. Or they counter those countersAkali . After that, good luck being 'viable.'

Ryuku Cruxis2 votes

{quoted}

Tank stats ALREADY scale MUCH worse than ADC damage. They don't NEED giantslayer at all. The fact that its as powerful as it is on top of that only makes things significantly worse. You might say "X Y and Z tanks/bruisers are fine right now" but it leaves a LARGE majority of champions in both classes unviable. FFS, when Renekton is an unviable bruiser, you KNOW something is wrong. He's Riot's 'golden standard' for top lane. The only tanks/bruisers that are successful atm are overloaded compared to the rest of the roster right alongside ADCs, or they hard counter ADCs.Rammus Irelia Malphite. Or they counter those countersAkali . After that, good luck being 'viable.'

I agree, dun need no giant slayer. While we're at it we can reduce LDR pen from 45% to 35% and make it total armor, and for lulz lets change the name to Last Whisper, that sounds cool, amiright?

SirPacifista1 votes

Will be honest, i dont care bout Giant Slayer,

it still dont make up for what the op said.

TehNACHO4 votes

Wow you have such a contradictory name to what you're saying.

Armor would have 0 effect in these calculations. For example, if the target had 100 armor (let's ignore Last Whisper for now), using the same numbers I've given above, it would take 4 seconds for the champ with 2000 HP to die and 4.34 seconds for the 2500 HP champ to die.

Furthermore, if you're going to go out of your way to search up my match history, you are now targeting my character rather than my argument, which is the last thing somebody on the side of "correct math" and thus I'd assume logical theory would do. Though since you're so inclined to bring it up, please notice that I'm laning against a Lissandra and first item rushing Armor would've just been retarded.

Critmaster Garen4 votes

the next problem is, that dominiks doesnt have to be picked up by adc.

it also increases physical damage of assassins against health stacking targets, who just have slightly more health with them. this gets even worse with item 3147

they can build 3500 hp and a dominiks and would still fully profit from the passive 15% damage increase against health stacking tanks and bruisers.

i agree that the item isnt specialized enough. and for most adc not much would change anyways if they made the gap 2000 hp instead of 500. it would only really put a dent in the damage of adc who build steraks.

SP Dodgecity3 votes

I just diagree haha. I agree that adc's are strong but no where did you mention the insta win combo or

item 3124 item 3153 item 3931 combo Then you build counter items OR you build straight tank and you can't be killed.

This is the most abusive combo in the meta right now. ADC's might be strong but this season is also the season of mobility. Most champions have great engages right now as well, so ADC's might be strong but send one malphite at them or one lux combo and they're gone. They're still super squishy.

Now I agree with the whole Talon and Zed issue... but thats because of they're kit. The people who get most hurt from those two champs getting fed are other adc's.

You can build really tanky AP items and still get really strong IE: item 3029 item 3116 item 3157 (which completely counters zed btw) So really your mid laner shouldn't get rekt that hard if they counter build.

But there isn't builds that defensive with the ADC meta right now. Only really for AP counter items but not a single viable ADC armor and Damage item like the Hydra's or like sterak's or like dead mans plate. etc.

WoonStruck3 votes

{quoted}

I just diagree haha. I agree that adc's are strong but no where did you mention the insta win combo or

item 3124 item 3153 item 3931 combo Then you build counter items OR you build straight tank and you can't be killed.

What insta-win combo? The rageblade combo still gets you killed quickly. They aren't an issue, Xin, Yi, and a few others are issues themselves. Jax isn't terribly strong atm, and Shyv isn't really over-bearing due to the itemization either. If you look at win-rates, going Warrior/Cinderhulk often nets champions much better averages.

This is the most abusive combo in the meta right now. ADC's might be strong but this season is also the season of mobility. Most champions have great engages right now as well, so ADC's might be strong but send one malphite at them or one lux combo and they're gone. They're still super squishy.

Everyone's getting wrecked by Malph and Lux. Not just ADCs. These two champs aren't an excuse for their state.

Now I agree with the whole Talon and Zed issue... but thats because of they're kit. The people who get most hurt from those two champs getting fed are other adc's.

I don't think Zed and Talon are huge issues. I think people being stupid and not building HP while sitting on a seeker's is an issue. The problem is that those smart people that actually build vs those assassins don't actually get much done by counter-building because LDR shuts that down completely to the point where they're better off selling and going glass late game.

You can build really tanky AP items and still get really strong IE: item 3029 item 3116 item 3157 (which completely counters zed btw) So really your mid laner shouldn't get rekt that hard if they counter build.

This was my point, but the people who do so still get melted by ADCs due to giantslayer. There's no outplaying ranged auto-attacks.

But there isn't builds that defensive with the ADC meta right now. Only really for AP counter items but not a single viable ADC armor and Damage item like the Hydra's or like sterak's or like dead mans plate. etc.

Hydra and Sterak's don't give armor. And Sterak's is built on ADCs... I wouldn't call Dead Man's a damage item. Its more of a mobility item.

So idk what you're really talking about.

SP Dodgecity3 votes

Lol your making no sense bro.

#1 Xin/Yi combo with rageblade is literally unstoppable late game. I've seen teams with nearly 100% of there kills on a Yi or Xin, the rest of the team does nothing while they run around 1v5 destroying tanks and anyone else. With the combo you do Magic damage, Attack damage, and true damage, and extra damage to tanks with BORK... so yeah thats the strongest item set right now.

#2 I agree Malphite and Lux are strong... but we're talking about ADC's... I only mentioned them because they're items support strong damage and strong defense builds that can counter ADC's. Plus the player who is most affected by a fed Malphite or Lux is the ADC's since they die extremely quick.

#3 When I say ADC I mean Marksmen. I don't count any Melee adc bruisers or assassins because when they get fed again.. the most targeted player for them becomes the enemy ADC marksmen... so I'm only refering to Bot lane ADC marksmen.

#4 Of course you're going to get melted by an ADC, its the entire point of having a "GLASS" cannon. BUT you must have terrible mechanics if you're getting rekt by an ADC 1v1 and you're a mid laner. Most mid laners have huge HUGE burst damage that erases ADC's instantly. So idk what you talkin about there bro.

and your last point #5 I already addressed, you can't really build any defensive and AD oriented item as an ADC marksmen except for maybe item 3071 Other than that all your defensive items are built towards CC removal and MR. Nothing to really counter another ADC then maybe a Guardians angel which is usually the second to last or last item in an ADC's build soooo....

Mizaya3 votes

Also let's be real here - Essence Reaver isn't something bought on every ADC. The one thing it did was make Lucian way too strong, but I'll tell you that a lot of the ADCs got left in the dust this season. ADCs just aren't able to sacrifice one of their item slots for another crit/CDR item.

As for Mercurial, it isn't at all superior to bloodthirster. BT gives 10% more lifesteal and a shield that's strong against burst. It's a 3,700 cost item. I think we kinda forget how much these lifesteal items cost on ADCs, back in the day you got a solid 100 AD and 20% lifesteal from a 3,000 cost Bloodthirster once farmed up.

Mortal Reminder, again, is an item that really helps you only against sustain champions, as it's a waste against anyone else. The drawback is you literally lose a huge amount of damage against anyone who's not a tank, you're essentially paying 2,700 for 40 damage.

Partholonian2 votes

{quoted}

What's the drawback of getting item 3139 ?

You don't give up damage. You don't give up lifesteal,

Yes, you do. It has the same AD as item 3072 for the same cost... with literally HALF the lifesteal. So you'd better really like either MR or the active. And while it technically has 10 more AD than item 3031 for only 100 more gold, you're going to deal far less damage with it overall because it doesn't have 20% crit chance plus IE's unique passive. item 3142, which is actually cheaper than item 3139, also has 10 less AD... along with 20 arpen, which will again give you more damage.

Maybe the item is too good, maybe it isn't. But it definitely has less damage than a purely damage-focused item and less lifesteal than a heavily lifesteal-focused item.

WoonStruck1 votes

{quoted}

Yes, you do. It has the same AD as item 3072 for the same cost... with literally HALF the lifesteal. So you'd better really like either MR or the active. And while it technically has 10 more AD than item 3031 for only 100 more gold, you're going to deal far less damage with it overall because it doesn't have 20% crit chance plus IE's unique passive. item 3142, which is actually cheaper than item 3139, also has 10 less AD... along with 20 arpen, which will again give you more damage.

Maybe the item is too good, maybe it isn't. But it definitely has less damage than a purely damage-focused item and less lifesteal than a heavily lifesteal-focused item.

Its a defensive item that's on-par with IE, bloodthirster, ghostblade, etc for damage. ADCs have more of their core stats on their items than any other class. Its blatant favoritism how much better their itemization is than anyone else's.

They don't give up damage for it. They don't get a damage passive, but its on-par with their other items in AD while giving two of their most needed defensive stats, on top of a cleanse with tenacity.

Mizaya2 votes

As if the 15% damage amplification is going to make you do more damage to someone who's NOT building armor than the old LW. The difference between base and bonus %armor pen is huge. It's a 300 more cost to do more damage to tanks, if even, and less to other champions, really.

Alsek2 votes

You do realize there are AP items that offer defensive itemization, right? Rod of Ages for absurd health and no damage compromise? Zhonyas for, "I ignore your ult," best item active in the game + armor? Rylai's for additional health and self peel?

There are also split defensive and offensive items that are situationally more strong than their pure damage counterparts. Abyssal scepter, which also offers massive magic resist, provides more damage than a void staff against targets with low MR (for example, AD carries that don't have QSS.)

Having utility on damage items isn't bad. In a high mobility meta I think it's about time that marksman finally got the tools to help them hold their own.

It's all in the fine tuning. Because you're right. ADC's that can utilize essence reaver aren't quite fair right now.

Saianna1 votes

So you say all that CDR, Life steal, MR and shields are bad?

Dude, you want to be banned? @_@

Maximum Morde1 votes

{quoted}

The current values make sustain-based champions near-useless in teamfights if they get tapped even once by accident.

They actually don't, but I wish they did.

Biff Manly1 votes

I'd argue Mercurial can be paralleled to Zhonya's, which gives a crapton of AP and solid armor stats.

The big difference is the actives. Mercurial's is almost always good to use, while Zhonya's is more of a last-ditch attempt to save yourself.

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