Graves

Been so long since I been on here. A lot has changed. I now live in China and as such I'm playing League on Chinese servers. It's a very different playstyle here, but I'm looking forward to the new ADC changes and Pyke.

I'm also engaged which is a whole other situation.

Seeing as people have been saying there's a lack of activity on the site, I thought I'd open up a discussion based on the new Juggernauts. And I'll start with an unpopular opinion:

I think Juggernauts are good for the game.

As an ADC Main, I've not had as much fun or felt as relevant as I have with the new Juggernauts. Before, there was these huge ass Tanks which you couldn't even tickle and then Assassins which killed you before you could say "peel".

Now there's Juggernauts, big walls of meat running at you, if they catch you, you're dead. End of story. That's the whole idea. But no self respecting ADC is going to get hit by Morde's 3rd Q or Darius' axe blade.

They help to deal with tanks and they also make assassins actually have to do a bit more than just delete the ADC. I also feel like it opens up RIot to more itemization options for Ranged ADCs now that we have what are essentially Melee Carries.

If you don't realise how easy it is to make a fool of these new Juggernauts and aren't very good at ADC, try play Blue Ezreal, Velkoz, Lux, Anivia against them. It's a meta shift and it'll take people a while to get used to it. Riot will inevitably nerf Juggernauts in the face of win rates but it'll just revert everybody back to the boring old meta. Plus I'm really excited to see new Juggernauts take the stage.

So I've got a new portfolio site design, bit more game to it then just a boring old website. Check it out and tell me what you think!

Card skins out now

Having a giveaway on my stream! Once I hit 50 followers Ill give away some riot points. At 100 followers Ill give away even more FREE RIOT POINTS!! Come hang out and have fun and reap the benefits!! haha spread the word my brothers!

www.hitbox.tv/purealchemy

Not an ADC :/ But he looks cool, awesome soundtrack and VO.

So it's been a while since I've posted a debate topic on theory crafting in League of Legends, but there's a new(ish) item and I've been playing around with the idea of it for a little while now.

Black Cleaver vs Last Whisper on Ranged Carries.

Here's a quick reference/tl;dr of the pros and cons of BC over LW:

Pros: +400 Health, +20% CDR, Rage Passive, Team Wide Armor Pen

Cons: -5% Armor Pen, +700g, Armor Pen needs to be built up.

Champions who like Black Cleaver: Tristana, Miss Fortune, Kog Maw, Corki(Maybe, I'm not very good with Corki), Graves*

Champions who hate Black Cleaver: Lucian, Ezreal, Draven, Graves*

When they first announced the new BC I thought "meh another bruiser item" until I actually looked at the stat comparison between BC and LW. Both have the same AD, BC has less Armor Pen that has to be built up, but is teamwide, BC costs more but also comes with 400 health.

So first off we'll look at The Bad:

Armor Pen has to be built up: This is an issue for some champions, Graves and Lucian lose a lot of upfront burst, Ezreal Q, Varus Q won't be as useful for poke and Draven's axes want to be killing people ASAP. These champions would much prefer having Last Whisper and I wouldn't advise Black Cleaver on them. There's still something to be said for Graves later though.

The other bad part to this is target switching, you switch targets you have to start all over again. For short ranged or immobile carries like Sivir or Ashe, this can be a problem if there's more than one tank diving you. Which is more than likely the case.

+700g: This is an issue, it delays your other items by quite a while and you don't get it as soon as possible. For champions like Graves and Varus, not having the early armor pen can stunt them greatly. I feel that the health however can offset not having a defensive until later which is great.

-5% Armor Pen: This isn't and is an issue. While you have less armor pen for yourself, there's more armor pen for your team as a whole. It's very situational whether this is good or bad.

With that all out of the way it all looks like doom and gloom. But here's The Good:

Rage passive: Probably the worst Pro. While it's nice to have more movement speed, Ranged champions only get 10 MS on hit, or 30 on Kill/Assist within 6s. It's nice for movement speed reliant champions like Ashe and Sivir, but not by much.

+400 Health: I've already touched on this earlier as it allows you to delay your defensive item slightly, but not only that, once you get that defensive item you're tankier than most other carries. Trinity Force users only get 250 health. It's not much, but with lifesteal and some resists you'll find yourself surviving situations where you would have died in seconds with a LW.

Team Wide Pen: See -5% Armor Pen. MF + heavy AD comp (If only MF was any good...)

+20% CDR: This is the most important part. And where the bulk of that 700 extra gold lies for the champions that use it. Remember when I said I'd be back for *Graves. While his buckshot will be doing less damage up front on the engage. He'll be able to get more buckshots per fight AND be able to dash more often. So while it limits Graves' burst, it can greatly increase his overall DPS if used efficiently. Kog Maw and Corki, unlike Ezreal, don't have CDR in their build but both are happy to take more if it's handed to them.

And lastly, Tristana. My love. With so much flat CDR built in to her kit, she loves BC. She's already very single target focused and she's strongest when her Q and E are available. If her E explodes on to the enemy team that's a nice 5% shred on everybody for 5s too.

So I know this was quite a wall of text but if you took the time to read it I hope it helps and I'd love to hear your opinions on the topic.

I've been playing a lot of Tristana recently, here's a quick clip. Hopefully get something more substantial after my exams

It's been a while since I uploaded a video of some ADC play, it's not impressive by any means but give it a look

Here's a nice Urgot pentakill I got posted up by a friend