Ashe is one of the few crit-based AD carries that are viable right now (Riot Games)

With League of Legends Patch 7.5 dropping Wednesday, AD carry players are left wondering what happened to the buffs for their class. Sure, there are nerfs to LeBlanc and the holy AD trio of Jhin, Varus, and Miss Fortune, but crit-based ADCs have been left in the cold since the beginning of the 2017 season.

Last week, Yahoo Esports sat down League of Legends game director Greg “Ghostcrawler” Street to find out exactly what the problem is — and how to fix it.

With tanks so strong at the moment, Street knows that ADCs are struggling to keep up in the early game.

“We think [the tank vs. ADC issue] has a lot to do with ADCs not having good item builds, particularly early on when they need to deal with a tank,” he said. “If the issue is that an ADC can’t kill a tank early on, we think that’s really an ADC itemization problem. They need something.”

“The ADCs need a way to get an early power spike. Players have tried different things to mixed success. Some of it has been unhealthy for the game overall. We totally realize that’s a problem that we’re working on. We really think the right solution is to offer some item solutions, not just buff ADCs across the board.”

The result has been for players to lean towards ADCs that regularly build Lethality items in order to feel useful in the early and mid game while still providing utility later. In this case, that means Jhin, Varus, and Miss Fortune.

Street doesn’t want that to become the norm. But he doesn’t want to simply buff all AD carries that aren’t being played, either.

“The ADCs need a way to get an early power spike,” he said. “Players have tried different things to mixed success. Some of it has been unhealthy for the game overall. We totally realize that’s a problem that we’re working on.”

“We do want to fix the ADC problem, but we have to be careful,” he continued. “If we just buffed ADCs across the board and gave them some really good items, they’re just going to hit power spikes early and stay there. It’ll be about which team has the better ADC player and they’ll win every game.”

So what are they going to do? Well, it seems like we’ll have a new item in the shop to pick up soon, if Street has anything to say about it.

“I think the real solution to the AD carry problem is dramatically changing an early item or adding an item,” he said.

However, he warns that doing so is “a resource-intensive thing that is easy to get wrong and screw up the game.”

For more with Greg Street, including how he feels about the state of every other role in the game, watch the full interview below. For everything else League of Legends, stay right here on Yahoo Esports.





As a support main, Taylor Cocke is tired of hearing his duo partner whining. Follow him on Twitter @taylorcocke.