Best ADCs to climb with in patch 12.15. Dominate the bot lane!
Season 12 is coming to an end in a couple of months, so this is the time if you are looking to climb. And what better role to climb with than ADC? There is a notion among the player base that ADC is one of the hardest roles to gain LP with, as you are too dependent on your team’s help. That is partly true, but it isn’t all doom and gloom.
Every one of us had our bot lanes lose lane so hard that the game is unwinnable, so why not be those other guys? These meta ADCs are strong enough that you can either dominate your lane and impact the rest of the map. Or they are one of the better scaling champions in the game that will win you any game that goes 25+ minutes. So let’s see what our picks are for you on patch 12.15.
Sivir
After crit Sivir was absent from the Rift for nearly two seasons, Riot brought her back to popularity with a midscope update on patch 12.13. While the change list is pretty extensive, the most impactful ones were the ability to double bounce on her Ricochet (W) and the reset-on-kill aspect of her new On The Hunt (R).
Sivir was already great if she were able to reach the late game, but it was very hard to achieve. Now, don’t get me wrong, she is still very weak during laning phase, so don’t expect to pick her and wonder why you can’t win level two all-ins. But her one item spike, Kraken Slayer, is much better and with her infamous waveclear, it is very easy to delay games to go late.
And enchanter supports being meta helps her as well. If you can convince your support to pick Lulu, you can mitigate most of the threat during your early game and you can be a monster in 5v5 fights. Also, remember to take Ghost as your second summoner spell. You already shouldn’t be fighting early, so you won’t need to Heal and with your Spell Shield (E) you won’t need Cleanse. Just get to late game, and you will carry most of your games.
Jhin
Jhin has always been a staple of these lists. He has one of the simplest kits in the game and a very simple ADC to begin with. His high AD and spammable Dancing Grenade (Q) offer great waveclear during all points of the game, and his range gives him a lot of safety.
Jhin also is a very good blind pick as he doesn’t have many counters and he is very hard to punish. Plus he has good synergy with nearly all support classes so you probably won’t have problems due to your support picking something you don’t want. He is great at playing with engage support as he offers great follow-up crowd control and has good range. He also likes to play with enchanters like Nami and Janna who empower his already strong auto attacks and give him much appreciated movement speed.
You can comfortably pick up Jhin as a one-trick in your climb as his only weakness, tanks, aren’t too common in solo queue. He has great build variety between Lethality and Crit, or a mix of both.
Samira
In solo queue, it isn’t guaranteed that the games will go late and let you scale as an ADC, so why not pick for snowballing and be the one that dominates from the start? Samira is one of the best champions when it comes to snowballing with a very strong level two or three spikes and she is almost incontestable after she finishes her Immortal Shieldbow. Her Blade Whirl (W) offers a great advantage if you master the timing as you can block a crucial CC or damage ability in a 2v2 and her Wild Rush (E) reset is great for tower diving.
The only problem with Samira is that she doesn’t synergize with enchanters well and she prefers engage supports that aren’t exactly meta. But if paired with picks like Amumu and Taric starting to be played more and more, Samira should be a champion you should look to pick up.
Seraphine
If you’ve been watching any professional play in recent weeks, you know how powerful a farming Seraphine can be. She’s been getting some small nerfs ever since the Durability Update, the latest being in 12.14, but none of these nerfs were enough to shut down her power.
She offers great utility with multiple crowd control abilities, heals and shields while doing a surprising amount of damage with a full AP build. Also, if you use your double High Note (Q) her waveclear is great which lets you have pressure and helps you poke your opponent under their tower. Of course, you can always get engaged on, but she has a lot of self-peel after her level six when she gets access to her Ultimate.
If you are playing with a duo partner, Senna/Seraphine is a dominant lane that scales well into the late game. If not, you can play her with most enchanters or engage supports too.
Swain
Swain is another champion that got a well-received midscope update. He was already best played as an AP carry, but after the changes, he only got better and better. There were some downsides to the updated version, like the removal of bonus heath gain on your Demonic Ascension’s (R) activation. If you are good at using your passive health gain, you can compensate for the difference in a very quick manner.
And the constant refreshing of your ultimate with reduced cooldown for your Nevermore (E) makes 2v2s and even 5v5s a lot easier to navigate. With a two item spike of Liandry’s Anguish and Rylai’s Crystal Scepter, you have a lot of DPS combined with sticking power.
Swain is at his best when played with engage champions but you can always play him with other scaling champions like Sona or Senna as well. If you’d like to give Swain a shot, remember to be careful during the early game as your first two levels aren’t good enough to fight most lanes, and try to wait for your level six if you can.
Honorable mentions
- Twitch
- Draven
- Karthus
- Zeri
- Miss Fortune
For more League of Legends content, including more guides, follow us on ESTNN.
