Bot lane Teemo?

Lord Graves III·Jun 30, 2014·3 votes·2,222 views

Why does nobody play Teemo in bot lane? I feel he has strong potential there.

He has high early game damage, strong lane dominance, a blind, and better than average late game single target sustained damage.

Teemo is an AP marksman. He uses the fighting style of an ADcarry but with the damage and build of a mage.

He out trades loads of marksman early game and he dominates them individually come mid and late game. He turns bot lane into a poisonous mess post 6, and with a support can push bot lane farther than most other marksman are able.

His only real weakness is that he can't make good use of lifesteal, and this is possible to account for and minimize with the right early game build and support pick.

Why do we never see bot lane teemo?

13 Comments

RiotPhreakJun 30, 20149 votes

A few things about bot lane dynamics and what-not:

It's actually fairly hard to force long-duration engages, meaning the blind isn't actually amazing, since your opponents are likely to get 2 attacks off before the blind takes effect. This is about how long trades are in the first place, so his unique CC isn't very useful. His damage in the trade would be decent, though.
Teemo is remarkably short-ranged. He's basically got the same reach as Vayne, and you'll have a similarly difficult time in lane, but a harder time in team fights, since she kites better (Awesome Shroom gameplay notwithstanding)
In general, without some way to clutch-save yourself or extremely long range, it's hard to be an auto-attacker in a team fight. Kayle functions with her targeted slow and ultimate, Kog'Maw makes do with 700 range, and Ashe just has no much CC it's worth it.
That said, Teemo is still a better choice than many other champions in a bot lane pairing. He's able to Shroom up for Dragons and such, plus he can blind someone like Fiora, Yi, or Tryndamere to ruin a team fight. Don't let difficulties dissuade you: Every champion has a down-side. And as long as the upsides are worth it, then Teemo bot can totally work :)

ThryaleJun 30, 20141 votes

Phreak, don't you think teemo's blind should be updated according to the new attackspeed buff/debuff mechanic?

I personally think that all aa's should perform the check for if blind is applied as it connects rather than as it is fired.

It's really annoying to try to pull off a clutch blind to save your (or an ally's) life or turn around an engage only to have the blind connect, but the enemy aa still follow thru even tho the blind duration is almost expired.

RiotPhreakJun 30, 20144 votes

Actually, it's currently checking when you start swinging. I think it should definitely check at the time the attack is launched. Checking when it lands is silly and... "unrealistic?"

Lord Graves IIIJul 1, 20141 votes

Wow. First time I've had a Rioter appear in one of my threads.

Anyway, perhaps its a novelty thing, but I find combined with a strong engage support like thresh or leona, teemo's early game is much stronger than the average marksman.

Perhaps the best part though, is that sending him bot frees up mid and top to be AD champs if desired without fear of your team's damage type being too lopsided.

He has issues in some matchups but I've found given the opportunity he can do real work functioning as a primary marksman for a team.

RiotRiot SotereJul 1, 20142 votes

I tried this in days past with decent frequency. I found my main weakness to be burst. He has a lot of tools for protecting himself from one target. Not so much from two, especially if the enemies are spell based.

Lord Graves IIIJul 1, 20142 votes

Holy cow. Two rioters in one thread. summoner 3

I agree, though would argue he is to an extent no more vulnerable to it than any other marksman. His issue is he has poor sustain options. (doubly so with the dorans changes)

Although this thread is starting to make me think that perhaps its just my good luck getting extremely strong supports like thresh.

Maybe its all in my head but I feel like teemo has better early damage than most marksman, and given a support who can find plays teemo can seriously put the hurt on. Also, it frees up top to be tanky which I cannot undersell. Its probably my favorite part about it. I'd argue a farmed/fed teemo can be more useful to some comps than a farmed/fed Trist or Caitlyn.

The Yetii RiderJun 30, 20141 votes

Teemo is squishy like a mage. Mages don't do well in duo lanes because of their poor early health sustain and susceptibility to ganks. Teemo can blind one of his enemies, but he can't blind 3.

Lord Graves IIIJun 30, 20141 votes

But everything you just said is also true of marksman. And marksman do fine in duo lanes all the time.

The reason you don't send mages bot is because of their superior ganking power compared to a marksman, and that they scale harder with levels than CS.

Teemo scales wonderfully with CS and isn't much of a ganker. And he gets out of ganks almost as well as a pre-6 Ashe or twitch, or Kog do with Teemo's movespeed. And post 6 he is basically ungankable thanks to mushrooms.

Sir ArmaMalumJun 30, 20141 votes

There are a few reasons, but the main bits being the trade-off is not worth it most of the time. You either replace the support and lose a lot of cc and/or range or your replace the adc and lose a lot of sustained physical damage.

The reason any adc will outdamage Teemo is two-fold. Physical damage burns towers a lot faster, which leads to easier objectives, and Teemo's DoT actually limits his sustained damage, as the DoT only refreshes. Granted he does also have an on-hit in his E, but most of the time an adc simply getting a crit will do better.

Now I'm not saying it can't work, in fact I've done it occasionally, but it's imply not as good as a normal bot lane match up.

Lord Graves IIIJul 1, 20141 votes

Not as good is a strong term. More situational or niche perhaps, but basically owning dragon, stomping any autoattacker out of the fight mid-late game, and strong early damage can make the weaknesses worth it.

Especially if you have a mid, jungle, and top that all want to AD.

I also find its easier to fit into a comp than top teemo which sacrifices a slot that would normally have a tank or off-tank.

CerbearusJul 1, 20141 votes

No poke, short range, no escape, only does well in sustained trades, is Satan, many reasons.

Linna ExcelJul 1, 20141 votes

Support teemo perhaps? Run around the map after laning and drop teemo shrooms everywhere.

IMO it'd work better if you were running an AD mid or a strong AD jungler because you don't want the other team to get only one resistance type. However, if fed, Teemo can get pretty nasty.

And as Phreak said, his lack of mobility is a liability in lane. You'd need someone with ranged hard CC like Lux or Morgana to pull it off better.