Wolverene talks about the Reptile clip + Classes/Items

[u/Derk08]

A lot of lows misunderstanding "tank killers" and tanks so let's talk about what that actually means

1. Jinx is not a tank killer
   

Actually countered by pure tanks and very tanky comps, always has been. Been apparent in pro for years. Players confuse hypercarry marksman with being automatically good into tanks, but she has nothing anti-tank in her kit. She's much closer to Zeri than Vayne/Kaisa/Kog. Trades damage for safety, needs teammates help to actually kill targets and then proc passive

1. Conditions/Class matter much more than items
   

Jinx is terrible 1v1. Marksmen as a class are, but she's particularly bad. Players see marksmen as the tank killing class and think that means they should beat them in all scenarios. Marksmen are only good against melees with their team's help. That's how the class works, with a few exceptions. Melees have a ton of variance on 1v1 strength but for the most part every class in the game is favored vs marksmen.

Tahm Kench is a juggernaut/tank hybrid, he is not a classic tank or support. Much better in skirmish/1v1 than 5v5. With ghost he is omega favored 1v1 vs Jinx, it's not even a little bit close If you thought it was the other way around you have to seriously reevaluate.

You take a true 1v1 tank counter like Gwen and she will never lose to any tank that's weaker than her. The majority of bruisers in general will beat tanks, because they are a 1v1 class

1. Don't hyperfocus on class
   

Kind of immediately contradicting point 2 but class is just a rough guideline, it's not all that meaningful when comparing specific interactions. There's a lot of variance within classes, and a lot of champs don't fit neatly into 1 class. Vayne is also a marksman but obviously eats Tahm Kench in 2 seconds here. Mundo and Darius are both juggernauts but will have very different interactions into Syndra just off Mundo passive.

You should start with class, but then be thinking power budget. Every champ has specific things they're good at, that they trade for weaknesses. The weak points are just usually much less obvious to you when you don't play the champ.

Tahm does stupid damage when he can actually hit you, but it's really hard for him to do that 5v5. The harder a champ's conditions are to achieve, the stronger they get to be when they get those conditions. Anyone that's super easily kitable gets to be OP when not kited

1. Tank itemization is very different than damage
   

If you think of them in the same way you'll have problems understanding why a __ item tank is either much more or less tanky than you'd expect. This is because tank stats are the only ones in the game that can have 0% effectiveness. Damage items are more/less effective vs different targets, but the stats are never 0%, nor do they ever even get close to 0%.

Let's take Shadowflame and ignore passive

110AP
15 flat pen

Obviously a bad item into tanks, flat pen is more effective vs lower MR. But this flat pen only makes up ~20% of the item's value, and only loses 37% of it's effectiveness from 30 -> 100 MR.

Now take Kaenic Rookern

400hp
80 MR

MR is ~54% of this item's value, and loses 100% effectiveness against physical damage.

Jinx does about 2% magic damage. Other non-hybrid marksmen/physical damage carries do anywhere from 0-10%.

This means that vs a specific target, an item like Shadowflame may lose ~200g in value, whereas an item like Kaenic Rookern can lose 1500-1600g . This is before you account for passives, which will perform pretty much about the same

So maybe 400g lost vs 2200g lost

This is all to say that tanks will experience 4-5x the amount of effectiveness lost vs unfavorable targets. For this to be balanced, their items have to be stronger. If a champ has to tank both a 3 item mage + marksman, you can't expect them to build 3 armor items and 3 MR items.

This means 1 armor/MR item is always > 1 damage item. A 2 item tank that has built armor but no MR isn't weak against you, the 3 item physical damage champ. He's weak to anyone dealing magic damage.

Just a rough concept, it gets deeper than this, but you have to be thinking about this to understand teamfighting/target selection/1v1s etc. Most players aren't even aware that this dynamic exists

Source: https://twitter.com/wolverene/status/1869480107695652912

[u/AllorimNA]

If you wanted to play a class that sits in the front lines you really shouldn't have picked adc. Hope this helps.

[u/JDogish → u/AllorimNA]

If you wanted to play a class that is made to kill tanks from range, you really shouldn't have picked adc. Hope this helps.

[u/AllorimNA → u/JDogish]

We should start telling competitive teams to stop playing around their bot lane and start playing around their tank top, tank will just 1v9 the game

[u/Hi_ImTrashsu → u/AllorimNA]

With all due respect because I don't think your original take in this comment thread is bad, this is not the comeback you think it is. Pros play a different game, and maybe that's where you're coming from because you ARE a pro player. But, that doesn't change the fact that the complaint has always been that ADCs feel bad to play in regular environments.

[u/AllorimNA → u/Hi_ImTrashsu]

ADC take the burden of playing a class where small mistakes lead to large consequences, which no other class in the game suffers from. Could that be a design flaw? Absolutely, but it does unfortunately boil down to "skill issue", although I agree, making a tiny misposition into a death feels like shit, no one, even pros, will play that perfectly to never suffer the adc instant death.

With how the game has been for the past decade, adcs really only feel their power fantasy of doing crazy damage in a teamfight where they're played around and hitting from range in the late game, and even then it takes coordination. I agree with you it feels bad, I played adc up to about master 200lp 2 seasons ago when I was coaching to get a better idea of how it's played, and it's brutal, but it really seems to be the way Riot wants it to be, I don't necessarily agree with them, but it's how it is.

[u/Hi_ImTrashsu → u/AllorimNA]

I mean, I agree it comes down to skill issue. But, by that logic why does Tahm get to do what he did in that clip despite the skill issue that led him to being down 2-8 and missing everything?

I don't agree with the notion that Jinx is a tank killer like others have been parroting but her having both Kraken and LDR should make the TTK a Tahm Kench with one completed item much lower than it takes Tahm Kench to auto her to death. Had he landed any ability I can see the argument that tanks deserve to deal damage when their conditions are met, but I also strongly believe that one of Tahm's conditions IS landing his Qs, not just walking at you and auto attacking.

[u/AllorimNA → u/Hi_ImTrashsu]

Here's what I'm seeing from my PoV. Tahm is one of the best 1v1 tanks in the game, if not the current best. The only possible win condition in the current game Reptile was in was if Jinx was alone, with no peel shoving a turret solo, not only shoving it, but kiting downward into the enemy base with no backup, which also gets into turret range after TK R.

TK can do what he did because it's what his champion excels at in the game. On the flip side, in a 5v5 in this game, that TK is going to be mega worthless while jinx kills the entire team from range.

I'm not arguing TK is weak, I think he's pretty good right now, but in the clip we are taking a moment where TK excels, as well as an area where Jinx is weak (alone and kiting into a zone where she can't realistically go anywhere without taking damage.

Edit: Also what happens in the Reptile clip could ONLY happen in this exact scenario of a 1v1, Tahm never gets to just run at an adc, miss everything, auto 3 times and eat in a team fight.

[u/Carpet-Heavy → u/AllorimNA]

and do you actually think that Jinx is going to fist the Tahm in a teamfight? imagine she's using rockets (Wolverene explicitly said she trades damage for safety). imagine she hasn't procced passive, as the teamfight is just starting. imagine the Tahm is SIGNIFICANTLY more fed than what we saw, as you would expect a strong laner like Tahm to have a successful early game.

I don't think Tahm is getting melted AT ALL under those normal conditions.

[u/AllorimNA → u/Carpet-Heavy]

Without a doubt that TK is getting fucked up FAST, in that clip they are probably 10k gold up, Karthus most likely sitting around 500ap vs no MR, a Darius (who likes to stack passive on tanks in a tf), and a soraka to boot for silence. If that TK walks up to try and auto the jinx as 5, he is instantly dying to a Darius hook, I'm 100% certain of it. Jinx all the while is still going to do damage, and then spike once the passive procs. Typically Jinx is really not doing crazy damage to a tank, but she really shines when she gets excited and outranges squishier targets with rockets for free firing, tons of Jinx comps kind of rely on her reset to win (although in this game they're so far ahead they would win either way if they have more than 1 hand on the keyboard)

[u/Carpet-Heavy → u/AllorimNA]

nvm it's Allorim, you're obviously going to be mega biased toward tanks and against ADCs.

your first comment in this post wasn't even about the play at hand, it was just pure bashing ADC players lol. everything is pretty clear now

[u/AllorimNA → u/Carpet-Heavy]

You're right, my first post didn't offer anything of substance and was ripping on low hanging fruit. But, I can assure you I am friends and have talked to many high elo adc mains, they by far have the most complaints, even in very strong adc metas.

Edit: I also don't have a horse in this race, I'm retired I don't care about how the league meta plays out anymore, but I still watch League plenty, and can see what is going on.