Now I am no expert but it seems to me like Gathering Storm is the better choice seeing as it gives you more dmg in the long run than Scorch's 10-30 dot. Why is it that most if not all the guides I see say to take Scorch over GS?
on what champ?
Gathering storm does give more damage over time but not effective til 10 mins Scorch gives damage from lvl 1
Scorch does so much more in laning phase, and in the state that league has been in for this whole season - you pretty much need to hard win your lane and snowball to really increase your win rate.
If scorch earns you even ONE kill, that extra gold is going to get you similar stats to Gathering Storm until 30min (24AP at 20min, versus 20AP from an Amplifying tome at 435g [roughly equal to 1 kill]). And that's ignoring the kill xp, extra cs and creep xp from the kill, AND the damage scorch is still giving you. And the fact that you get that Amp Tome probably before 10min and definitely before 20.
Scorch also only has a 10sec cooldown, which is probably similar to your trading pattern. Your abilities are up, you trade, set off scorch, then back off. Wait 10 seconds and repeat. So you're getting an extra 10-30 damage on every trade. For champions that poke with a single ability a lot (like Veigar Q, Lux E, Ahri Q, etc...) you're stacking up a lot of damage from that rune.
Finally - scorch vs gathering storm really comes down to what part of the game you want to dominate. On late game champions like Veigar you can get away with Gathering Storm because he's meant to stall in lane until he reaches late and blows up anything. On early game champions like Ahri, taking Gathering storm weakens the strongest part of your game in order to get a little extra power in late game (if you happen to get there) - your weakest stage of the game. So a champion like Ahri is WAY better off taking scorch and ending the game earlier, rather than taking Gathering Storm to make her "kind of bad" instead of "quite weak" in the late game. Lux and Brand are both somewhere between Ahri and Veigar for their power spikes, but both I think spike hard in the mid-game and therefore having a better early game and more damage for those mid game teamfights will help them take control of the game.
At the end of the day, Gathering Storm may work in some comps, perhaps in games where you want to stall out to late anyways. These games are likely lower win rate games so statistics bring up Scorch as a better choice since games where you get a lead from Scorch are better win rate games. i.e. you're taking scorch when you can bully your lane, and gathering storm when you want to lane super passive in a counter matchup.
That's how I feel as well. You're not alone. I feel that the rune is not impactful. I always take gathering storm over it. If you cannot tell the difference between having scorch and not having it, stop using it is what I do. I seriously cannot tell the difference. I went on training mode to test it out and the damage difference is so small. And I only do around 600 dmg per game from it? That's basically only 200ish dmg in the first ten minutes than..? Sounds terrible to me. I'm probably going to get people disagreeing with me but I'm not changing my opinion on it :S
