AD Carry Itemization: What to buy first?

 

 

As a support main, I am treated to a wide variety of carries to support. Such is the way of life that most of the time, I get the runts of the litter. I get AD Carry Teemos every so often, an ADC jayce every 30 games or so but what is the bane of my lane is really the fanboy AD Carries. You know the ones, they follow Doublelift's streams, they subscribe to his mentality of being better than every one else, and generally being a snob to anyone that says otherwise. They buy Blade of the Ruined King on Graves and expect to deal tons of damage without understanding the reasons for buying the item, or they rush Phantom Dancers on Caitlyn and proceed to only use her Piltover Peacemaker to deal damage. The reason for their behaviour always is "I saw XXX do it on stream so it must be good." before proceeding to finish 2/15/2 and shoot marshmellow pellets at the enemy bruisers. Now I am not condoning their behaviour, as with any sport you want to emulate those who you feel epitomize your gameplay in real life. You watch Alex Ich get a pentakill with AP Master Yi mid, and suddenly you want to do the same, following the exact item build. Truth is, no matter how much I like watching Kobe play basketball, I understand that I wont be able to dunk like him because my fitness level, height and overall experience arent even at 10% of his. 

 

Thats why this article is going to explore the item choices for AD Carries from the viewpoint of a support main and occasional AD player. I'm not going to talk about every item choice like dorans vs boots vs long sword at level 1, because that would take me forever and probably cure insomnia when I'm done. What really makes a difference in an AD Carry's arsenal is the first major item that he aims for. The choice between Blade of the Ruined King vs Bloodthirster would make the difference between a triple kill mid game or a safe escape for the enemy or even worse, an ace for your team. Exaggeration? How many of you have seen an Ezreal with a BotRK and deal no damage in a teamfight? Or a Tristana with a Phantom Dancer? I think those are self explanatory. So without further ado, lets look at the choices of items for ADCs

 

Bloodthirster 

The vanilla of ADC items. Every ADC benefits from having more lifesteal and damage, and when stacked up BT gives u the most lifesteal and damage available in a single item slot. Costs 3.2k gold and builds from a BF sword, making it easy to farm for with an easy build path (BF > Vamp if winning, Vamp > BF if behind). Undoubtedly every ADC can benefit from using BT, but theoretically every ADC can also benefit from Executioner Calling, yet not every ADC rushes Exec Calling, or BT for that matter. 

 

When to rush BT:
You rush BT when you have a lot of AD scaling spells, or if you need a lot of sustain to handle the lane matchups. Poke matchups like Lulu/Ezreal can normally be negated by amassing lifesteal through BT. Psuedo casters like Graves also benefit the most from a BT rush because their spells scale off AD. Most of their early-mid game damage comes from their spells before switching to their auto attack to finish off, 

Blade of the Ruined King 

Bloodthirster's hot cousin from out of town, BotRK is currently one of the hottest items in the shop, with junglers, top laners and even assassins buying it. Lifesteal, attack speed, % hp damage and a sweet active that speeds you up and slows the enemy down AND deals % Hp burst damage. Its pretty hard to argue that this item isnt good for any AD, carry or otherwise, but a closer inspection of the stats would help you understand why rushing a BotRK might not be the best item for some.

 

1. BotRK has 15% lifesteal, BT has 18%, barely negligible.
2. BotRK gives 40% attackspeed and a burst active
3. BT gives 100 AD fully stacked, while BotRK gives 25.

​

Now it seems as if both even out in terms of dps boosts, but not all games play out the same way. Take Varus for example, he benefits from both BT (synergizing with his AD scaling spells) and BotRK (synergizing with his W procs as well as providing him with an extra disengage/burst spell). However, if Varus is maxing Q first, BT would give him much better poking potential and a much safer way of dealing damage, while if he was maxing W or E, getting BotRK would significantly increase his dps through quicker stacks of his W.

When to rush BotRK:

BotRK synergizes best with AD Carries with attack speed steroids or on-hit effects (Kogmaw, Tristana) or scale better off attackspeed rather than pure damage (Vayne, Varus). BotRK is also the better choice when you need to peel bruisers/assassins off you in teamfights. The combined slow and speed boost should allow you to kite most, if not all gap closers when combined with either flash or cleanse. 

Infinity Edge

The mack daddy of ADC items, IE is by far the best in slot item for increasing AD Carry dps in the game. It is the only crit damage item in the game and exponentially turns pea shooters into killing machines. It is also the most expensive item in the AD Carry arsenal and rushing it early provides you an easier build path into other supplementary items like Phantom Dancer or Last Whisper. The components themselves are hard to farm for, but the damage you deal before and after buying IE is worlds apart. 

 

When to rush IE:

IE is excellent for late game but does not give any early-mid game utility so rush IE when you are looking at a late game situation. IE is also a great first buy for Ashe because the synergy between her passive crit and IE's crit damage passive. Many early game bullies like Caitlyn and Tristana rush IE to supplement their weaker mid game phase where they require an item advantage to remain relevant in teamfights

 

And that's it. If you're not rushing these 3 items as your first major buy, then you're doing something wrong. All AD Carries should be rushing a damage item early as early game skirmishes are more about hit and run rather than stand and shoot, therefore big damage items are the main order of business. There are some alternate builds for specific AD Carries (Trinity Force on Corki, Spirit of the Elder Lizard on Ezreal, etc) but all other ADC will rely on these 3 items to anchor their offensive abilities. Rushing attack speed like Phantom Dancer or Statikk Shiv will put you at a disadvantage in mid game trades, because even if you can shoot 4 times before the enemy ADC shoots 2, the enemy ADC with damage items will kill you in 2 while you take 5-6 hits to kill him.  

TL;DR  Take some time to consider what your champion needs and what you should buy instead of blindly following the pros. Your first major item as an ADC should be BT, BotRK, or IE, no exceptions. Some champions do better with one, some with the other. Choose wisely