Reign of Gaming

Over the last couple of months supports have regained some of what they lost in itemization. We got cheap sight stone and crystalline flask when S3 began. This was found OP, and prices where increased accordingly. Fiendish Codex had it's mana regen removed, which was also something supports could make use of. Riot still wants us to have some items that are useful alternatives to the aura stacking, and they are also interested in giving some low use items more life.

This means the support playerside has seen some stealth buffs with sustain items and GP/10. Last season Philo stone was very popular but would only build into 1 item, now our "basic needs" item builds into several things:

Mikael's Crucible yields plenty of mana regen, MR and an active that will allow your carry to escape a lot of perils.

Ohmwrecker let you become more aggressive. It gives AP, more health and the ability to put a tower out of the equation.

Shurelia's Reverie gives some health, some sustain, some CDR and the all lovely MSpd buff.

I'm a fan of Ohmwrecker, tho I can't recall I have been using it in a game.

Have any of you guys and gals philo stone and building it into something different than Shurelia's, if so what and why. And was it worth it?

I am tired of Heimer, he is seen so little and when I see him he almost always do badly.

Tonight things changed. This Heimer mid arrived in the middle of a premade 4-man team. He did well in his lane and bot lane was trying out an agressive burst lane of Talon and Lissandra, but I could still farm as Caitlyn. All in all the other team was very alternative with AD casters and AP casters. But onwards to the point...

Heimer threw up turrets to let me take down towers, his rockets hit more or less all the time, and several times 2-3 enemy champs. He kept up an impressive pressure with the rockets, and the grenades also seemed to do well. He had a fine mix of items allowing him to use abilites whenever it was appropiate  and cause massive damage (oh god the number of Heimers who go OOM when fights break out or "have rockets on cooldown"). He simply used the entire kit, and used it very well. He didn't get that many kills, as I took my share of the kills as Caitlyn, but that kit was simply essential in us winning the game.

From the ADC perspective I have to build more mana regen runes and masteries when playing certain champs, to have a good flow in the lane. MM would solve this... and allows me to build more resists and health. It will also allow more mana usage for the support. For some, like Lulu or Nunu and partly Sona it might work, making for an over all more aggressive lane.

When I am on Caitlyn and Ezreal the extra mana will be a nice start. But how much it sets back the supports build has to be taken into consideration, by the support player.

Extended for this very reason. 

*Happyface*

That sucked. I played on an alt on another server during most of the event so when the heads-up came I had plans for the evening, and now I missed out with my main account.

I can live without the twin axes, but Riot could have told of the end of the event a few days ahead.

*Sadface*

We read the article quite different. Ofc it's important what the author thinks of a situation he is basing his article on. Hashinshin says exactly what you say: People are using Rengar to his best and this is in a different way than Riot hoped for.

The problem is Rengar is quite the rollercoaster, either he is strong or he is weak. Rather like pre-remake Xin Zhao except Rengar is doing well at high elo and being bad at low elo (I choose to believe the author on this). Now the next issue is Rengar has received some dramatic changes during his existence, and this has caused people to turn away from him. So whenever he is building up popularity Riot changes him again...

Not long ago a high-in-design-decisions Rioteer said it was up to the community to decide how champions should be played, and Riot would not insist on forcing champs into one role.

If Riot finds Rengar to be too strong then he should be balanced (at same time schedule as fixing jungle Lee, he he he), if he is too weak he should be balanced. If he can work at high level, then it will seep down through the levels of play eventually - or quite fast even. I will question why Rengar must be fixed before many older champions, like dear old Heimer who have been in need for so long? That's pretty rude to the player base favoring old UP champs.

The best reason for "getting Rengar right" is because he uses a different resource that is worth exploring.

Why do you choose to forego building BT (more AD) which improves her burst from passive?

*Nods*

Also, I must agree with you on the innovate part during a tournament. When M5 tried unorthodox champs I viewed it mostly as trolling, but it could also have the planned side effect of keeping their hand hidden, and seed them against weaker opponents if/when they lost. However, sometimes such innovative tricks put them enroute to an early goodbye from the tournament.

Great article Gustaf. Your earlier S2 research into ADC and itemization comes together in a highly useful article. This will be my new go-to article for planning and panning out my ADC's.

Next: Let's talk runes. Mostly it's flat AD marks and quints, but maybe there is more to the individual champs. Weak scaling makes flat AD runes weaker than ArPen pretty early, and ArPen still helps with lasthitting.

Good job.

@Dalems44, you analyze too deep. In a normal game I (read: any player) don't need to know the effect of any given random item, I just need to know what is best.

Is Zephyr the best item in some common scenarios? Is BC? Is BotRK?

In Gustaf's article he explains nicely when BotRK is strong (when scaling is weak). He unfortunately forgets to mention BC on MF, which comes as a foodnote. I interpreted this as meaning that Zephyr and BC are being weak items (with one exception as noted above), compared to the ones mentioned. One main reason for BC being weak is due to LW outshining it when wielded by the ADC, and partly because a solo top or jungler might be using it. Understand me right: I would love to be able to carry a Zephyr and a BC too, but other items press them out. I need boots, I need a defensive item and sometimes I need wards. At this point I have no room for a Zephyr.

You might be on to something, tho in it's current form you are off the mark.