Marksmen/ADCs are usually played around when picked in a team composition. Depending on their strengths and weaknesses, other roles usually adjust to compensate for their needs and depend on what they can provide.


Marksmen/ADCs as Classified by their Strengths

Generally, I classify marksmen according to why their teams pick them. These include Utility, Poke, Duelling, and Heavy Burst or Sustained Damage. These classifications also involve how much gold share the marksman has to have in every stage of the game, and how the team plays around it.


Utility Marksmen

These marksmen are generally picked for the teamfight or pick potential that they bring with their kit - hence, the term "utility." They are by no means lacking in terms of damage, but the great thing about utility marksmen are that they bring something more to the table than their damage. Additionally, utility marksmen don't require a ton of gold early because they can still greatly contribute to their team, thus allowing the team to funnel the gold on another lane. This is the reason why teams with utility marksmen often have carry top laners. To this extent, utility marksmen also don't need their team to play around them often - instead, they play around what the team needs - Ashe and Jhin for pick potential, or Sivir, Kalista and Kindred for teamfights. They are also effective with a wide array of supports because of their own utility. There doesn't really seem to be that big of a downside when playing utility marksmen except the lack of insane damage and the fact that you won't be the star of your team.


Poke Marksmen

These marksmen specialize in dealing insane damage from a very safe range. Every one of these champions has a form of long range ability that can whittle down enemy combatants long before the teamfight even starts. This makes them great in sieging objectives, because you can damage the opponent team enough for them to retreat instead of contesting the objective. One of the biggest downsides of poke marksmen is that they are not great in close-quarters teamfights, so it's great to have a disengage support every now and then to make sure that your enemies don't get close to you. It's also essential to ward your flanks, because the biggest weakness of poke comps is when they get engaged upon on all sides.


Wombo Combo Marksmen

Wombo Combo marksmen are what teamfight montages are made from. As their name suggests, these group of marksmen specialize in massive AoE damage, or setting up team AoE damage. Teams with wombo combo marksmen generally tend to end teamfights very quickly once set up properly, but in this comes a huge weakness - wombo combo teams are often one-dimensional and predictable, so it takes a lot of set up and decisiveness to pull off a good wombo combo. In addition to this, wombo combo marksmen are also cooldown reliant (this doesn't mean that they don't deal good sustained damage, they just rely a lot on their AoE abilities) so they need supports that can set up good combos for the team. Once set up properly though, a good combo can end a teamfight in a matter of seconds.


Duelling Marksmen

Duelling marksmen, or duellists for short, excel in dealing high amounts of single target damage, making them incredible in one-versus-one or one-versus-two skirmishes. This also makes them great at split pushing, being the only group of marksmen that are can do so. In teamfights, due to their lower than average range, it is important for duellists to know how to kite around because their auto-attack range puts them in range of many damaging enemy abilities. Protective and disengage supports work well with duellists, as well as a team that scatter enemies in teamfights to turn them into small skirmishes. Crowd-control-heavy teams usually put down duellists easily because it negates much of their kiting and outplay potential.


Glass Cannon Marksmen

Often called "hypercarries" due to their massive sustained damage in teamfights, glass cannon marksmen are the group the popularized the "jugger-" or "protect the adc" comps. They deal painful amounts of damage to the enemy team at great ranges, and are often what carry the team to victory in late-game scenarios. However, because they are very squishy and have little outplay potential, they require protective supports and team comps to be played around them. They also require a lot of gold to get to their power spikes as soon as possible, but if they are protected by their team and they play their role correctly, they can certainly win teamfights pretty easily.