Free Champion Week 11: Analysis

Corki: I think Corki is the most skill dependent ADC. He probably doesn't have the highest "skill cap" as that honor falls to Ezreal. But, the difference between an unskilled Corki and a skilled Corki is huge whereas an unskilled Ezreal and a skilled Ezreal has a narrower margin. Corki's gatling gun is relatively straightforward to use (though choosing WHEN can be tricky) and he has a weirdly spammable ult. Relevant when playing against him is that his Phosphorous bomb grants vision for 6 seconds so bushes are less useful then normal.

Dr. Mundo: One of the two champs that you probably are going to build hitpoints, hitpoints and more hitpoints (the other being Vladimir). Mundo has oscillated in popularity in the pro-scene tremendously with periods of high use and periods of no use. I don't think he's a particularly strong jungler unless you're going to aggressively counter-jungle against a weak jungler (so you need to tailor both your play style and your picks to weak junglers... and, I don't put "slow" junglers in that category but rather junglers who are frequently low on health like Skarner or Maokai). He's a viable beefy top laner as well.

Katarina: Typically played mid but there's a bit of a rage right now playing her as a tanky top laner. She's not ideally suited to that but her lack of mana usage does give her really good sustain (especially once she gets a hextech revolver and a giant's belt). She's got a very high base speed and her shunpo lets her get around fast. Once you get homeguard and/or have teleport, she has a tendency to hop around the map and show up nearly instantly which is exactly how you want to play her. Don't automatically shunpo and ult against a team with decent CC. They'll be waiting for you to ult. Wait for 2-3 seconds in a team fight and then hop in.

Lulu: I'm excited to finally play her. She's probably the most aggressive poke support character in the game right now (with Sona being her main competition). Her skills are tricky to master. Her W and E are dual modal meaning they change when cast on enemies vs. friendlies. Whimsy is almost always going to be better cast on the enemies as a polymorph. If it had a lower cooldown, it might be okay to lead into a team fight with the ally buff and then polymorph someone but in its current incarnation, I think the CC on it is far more important. Help! is far more situational and you'll be casting it on allies and enemies frequently. Her ult is a very strong save/CC to throw on a tank (gives them temp hit points, a slow aura and a knockup). It's broad utility is what makes it so good. Throwing it on a charging Cho'Gath/Malphite/Hecarim can be terrifying to an enemy team.

Malzahar: A really fun champion. He has a tendency to control, control, control, burst. His abilities are well geared towards zoning out an enemy champion from KSing in the middle while also harassing. Can be devastating against more melee oriented middle champs.

Maokai: When I first started playing, Maokai was the jungler of choice for the big pro teams. He was one of a few junglers frequently banned in pro play. He gets played far less now and I'm not really sure why. His saplings give him good scouting ability and his ganks are solid. He tends to run mana starved and a bit hit point light in the early game and that susceptibility to counter-ganking may be the reason he isn't as popular but he still seems playable nevertheless.

Riven: A weird champion that I can't really seem to do well with. The trick with him is using his shields to trade effectively during the laning phase. He's another no mana champion (making four with Tryndamere, below) so be prepared for a spam fest of abilities. A good Riven will trade hard with you and try to bully. It's important to back off when you see him come at you and bait the shield then smack him around afterwards. If you have some kind of poke, you might be able to use it. If you can't, just stay back and try to get xp. Like many AD bruisers, he doesn't scale into the late game quite as well as other champions.

Sivir: The most push heavy ADC in the game. If your goal is to take a tower down early (say you're doing a lane swap, for example) then Sivir is the champion for you. Her team steroid late game can be really good in the bruiser heavy meta we currently find ourselves in, allowing them to close into range quicker. The skill cap on her comes in when you look at her spell shield. The fact that it flat negates a spell along with the fact that it returns mana can make it a really powerful counter to a lot of powerful abilities while also giving her very good sustain.

Tryndamere: Beefy and tough to kill. The trick with Tryndamere is to have CC. He's going to charge in and drop his ult making him unkillable. Stop attacking him. Throw a stun. Kill him when he's killable. That's the secret. Because of the way his mechanics work, he will try to heal up immediately after his invulnerability expires so be ready to pop him at this point. He's scary if you don't know what you're doing but manageable if you do.

Ziggs: I like Ziggs a lot. That doesn't mean I'm good with him, however. He does have the ability to zone enemies hard because of his area of control ability. All of his abilities effectively scare people away. You'll find yourself not hitting with the skills as often as other champions but you can easily push a champion completely off their lane. I'd strongly consider giving a hard leash and stealing xp on wolves so that you can get to level 2 before your lane opponent and try to milk that edge. His ult can be a lot of fun as well. It has a pretty long range (about the same as TFs ult) and drops a giant bomb on an area. It's particularly good in dominion where you can interrupt team's capturing points in a very annoying fashion. I played a game where we had Ziggs, Gangplank, Pantheon all on the other team. Capturing the top point was next to impossible when we lost it.