Let’s talk about Draven.

Welcome to the League of Draven. If only 😦

Draven is an Attack Damage Carry (ADC) that possess excellent poke, a steroid as well as nuke. However, you hardly see him in the current meta. Why is this?

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A quick run down on his abilities:

His Passive makes his Crits (and any AA empowered by his Q) to deal bonus physical damage over the next 4 seconds.

His Q empowers his next AutoAttack to deal extra damage, also creating a ricocheting axe that, if Draven catches it, continues empowered his next AA until he eventually drops his Axe (trust me, you’ll forget to atch it eventually…)

His W is an Attack Speed and Movement Speed steroid, the cooldown being refreshed if he catches an axe from his Q. This means that he can essentially always have the steroid up in teamfights, mana permitting.

His E is a skill shot knock-aside (is that a thing?) that damages rather significantly, and pushes to the side, any enemy hit. As this essentially stuns any enemy champion hit due to the travel time of being moved by the E, it’s great to initiate onto enemies, or pick off fleeing foes.

His R/Ult is a delightful whirring of axes sent straight forward that damages all hit and then – either once it’s hit champions and moved a bit further or it has reached the end of the map – it returns, enabling you to deal the damage twice to a target if positioned correctly.

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Despite having a base AD on the lower end of the spectrum, Draven can do some of the highest damage level 1 on an enemy thanks to his Q. A little maths time I think. I’m going to be assuming some standard runes and masteries pages that a typical ADC might choose. Que gratuitous maths.

Draven’s level 1 damage on a single AutoAttack = Draven’s total AD at level 1 + His Q damage + his passive damage.

To find this: ((Draven’s base AD at level 1 = 50) + (AD granted by ‘Deadliness’ mastery = 0.664) + (AD granted by ‘Brute Force’ = 1.5) + (AD granted by runes = (( ‘Greater Quintessences of Attack Damage(2.25) x3 = 6.75) + (‘Greater Mark of Attack Damage (0.95) x9 = 8.55) = 15.3) = 50+0.664+1.5+15.3 = 67.464

Also factoring into this is the fact that I often start Longsword + 2 health potions, so this gives a bonus 10 AD to me. This, it is now 77.464. Obviously, on certain matchups it’d be wiser to start the more conventional boots + 3 pots, and I’ve even seen some ADCs starting goddamned flask for the sustain, but I’m calculating this with my most common starting item.

To this magic number we add the damage of Draven’s Q. At level 1, his Q deals an additional 45% bonus physical damage so to find the damage of Q it’s simply 77.464*0.45 = 34.8588 + 77.464 = 112.3228

Bare in mind that you need to include the percentage damage of 2% from the Havoc mastery! This now becomes 112.3228 * 0.02 + 112.3228 = 114.569256

As if 112.3228 damage wasn’t enough, we ALSO need to factor in the damage from his passive, which does 30 + (4 x level) = 34 damage over 4 seconds. I am a little unsure if Havoc mastery also applies in this scenario, but I’ll include it anyway, as it’s honestly rather negligible. 34 * 0.02 + 34 = 34.68

Thus, one AA from Draven now becomes 114.569256 + 34.68 = 149.249256

So, that’s almost 150 damage from a single attack. That’s some immesne first blood potential, no doubt. Of course, we need to consider a target’s armour, so with that in mind we’ll just take a typical AD’s armour value and factor in any armour penetration we have.

A level 1 Ashe has 11.5 armour. Assuming a standard 3 points in the hardiness mastery (6 armour) and 9 Greater Seal of Armours (1.41 * 9 = 12.69) , her level 1 armour becomes 11.5 + 6 + 12.69 = 30.19

Draven also has 8% armour penetration and 6 flat armour penetration thanks to the ‘Weapon Expertise’ and ‘Sunder’ masteries. % Armour Penetration is calculated first, so Ashe’s armour becomes ((30.19 * 0.92) = (27.7748 – 6)) = 21.7748

With 21.7748 armour, Ashe will take reduced damage from Draven equal to (Damage multiplier = (100 / (100 + 21.7748) = 0.82118796335

So, after all this damn maths, a level 1 Ashe with typical armour values will take 149.249256 * 0.82118796335 = 122.561692566 physical damage.

And, considering that Ashe only has a total of 395 health, that means that after a single Q-empowered AutoAttack, Draven has dealt (122.561692566 / 395 = 0.31028276599) 31% of her health!

(Note: Some people prefer to take Armour Penetration runes, rather than the flat AD runes I take. I have yet to try them out, so please someone correct me if this method allows you more damage)

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So, I’ve established that Draven does a very large amount of damage level 1. He also possesses fantastic poke on enemy champions in lane, thanks to his ability to do that very same damage every time he catches his axe from his Q. The reason he possesses very safe poke is due to the fact that, after poking an enemy with your Q, you can quickly click to move behind you to a safe place – possibly behind your minions – and your axe will ricochet to where you sent Draven. On top of that, his steroid, his re-positioning of enemies thanks to his E and also his high damage Ulti enable him to win most trades if played properly.

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The complaints I usually hear against Draven are:

1. His lack of a re-positioning skill,

2. His axes are difficult to catch in a dual, let alone a full on teamfight,

3. He has no conventional initiation onto his enemies, or a way to allow him to pick one out / catch them up considerably (Ezreal’s E covers both 1 and 2, for example),

I find that the player’s own skill with the champion, and confidence in the champions abilities and limits, can answer the first two complaints.

Although he does suffer from not being able to alter his position quickly in combat, he possesses a way to speed himself up (his W), as well as a way to move his enemies away from him (his E). Used correctly, and with proper positioning in a teamfight, he shouldn’t suffer from not having an escape.

With Draven’s axes, a player first picking up Draven will likely find the mechanic of catching the axes too hard to perform consecutively. A good trick that was realized a long time ago, and many pros such as Aphromoo made famous, was to click in the direction you wish the axe to go after right-clicking to fire it at an enemy. Normally, the axe would come back to you exactly where you were standing when you fired the axe, or just slightly to the side. If you click to where you wish to go (usually behind you, after poking an enemy champion) the axe will follow you and often come to exactly where you clicked to move to.

In team fights many Draven players will obviously have some difficulty in trying to maintain their axes, but it is important to remember that – Attack Speed permitting – it may be better to simply auto attack more rather than walking the distance to your axe before you attack again. This is often the case mid-late game, where your AA’s possess critical strike chance. To waste time moving to the axe is to sacrifice one, two or even three more AA’s which could win you the trade.

It is a difficult balance to try and both AA and catch your axes, not to mention dodging enemy skill shots and aggression, which makes Draven a harder ADC to play than many others. However, his huge amount of both burst (from his E, Ult and initial Q) and sustained damage (from the steroid on his W) makes Draven my favourite ADC by far.

Please note that I am in no way some kind of expert on any of this; I just really enjoy playing Draven and thought I’d do some calculations his damage. If I have in any way messed up any calculations on this, please let me know and I will fix it ASAP.

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Talk to me, people; why don’t you play Draven? Why isn’t Draven seen more in the competitive scene (you know, besides Aphromoo)? Leave a comment and have a discussion, I’d seriously like to know!