Views: 8293 Why Runaan's is bad and why you should never build it
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Hey there.
So, you like Runaan's Hurricane? When this item was released, many people thought it was very interesting - myself included. However, as time passed, there is a huge consensus in higher level play about the overall inneficiency of this item and how badly designed it is.
Oh my, why do you say this? It's an awesome item!
Well, the item by itself is pretty funny. I mean, who doesn't want to shoot three auto-attacks at once? Also, the animation is cool. And it gives a ****load of Attack Speed (70%!) And it also procs on-hit effects (so it looks good for Teemo, Twitch, Varus...)
Do you see what these champions have in common? Besides Teemo, they are all ADCs or AD Carries. They are ranged champions that have a damage output based on their auto-attacks. Usually, they have some sort of DPS steroid or DoT that has some aditional benefits the more you spread it across the whole enemy team. So, why wouldn't you build Runaan's Hurricane?
Opportunity cost
Now this is the main concept that newer or unexperienced players must begin to grasp and understand. Trust me, by learning this you will automatically gain Elo (because Elo equates partially to game knowledge).
Opportunity cost is a term that economists use to speak about the total cost of purchasing a good. It does not only include the monetary price, but the goods you are willing to lose to get the item. In LoL this is extremely important becuase you have item slots. So you can carry a total amount of 6 different kinds of goods at a single time, making the opportunity cost even higher than real life.
So you have 2800 gold. You've already finished your Infinity Edge, so your auto-attacks hurt a lot. Now you need to hit faster so you can benefit more from your increased damage. What could you buy?
Suppose you're considering Runaan's Hurricane. Which are the other options?
- Phantom Dancer.
- Statikk Shiv.
Which is the total cost of buying Runaan's Hurricane?
- 2750 gold.
- An item slot you could have used to buy either Phantom Dancer or [[Statikk Shiv].
To make it easier for a full comparison, let's make a breakdown of which stats each item has:
Runaan's Hurricane (2750 gold)
70% Attack Speed
On-hit double bolt passive.
Statikk Shiv (2500)
40% Attack Speed
20% Crit Chance
6% Movement Speed
Static Charge passive
Phantom Dancer (2800)
50% Attack Speed
30% Crit Chance
5% Movement Speed
Unit Collision passive
What can we notice here?
- Runaan's Hurricane doesn't add Critical Chance or Movement Speed. So when you're buying it, you're gaining a marginal benefit of Attack Speed (10-20%) at the cost of losing 5-6% of extra Movement Speed and 20-30% Crit Chance.
- You could save up to 250 gold if you bought Statikk Shiv.
- For 50 gold more, losing 20% potential Attack Speed and the bolt passive, you gain two extra stats (Movement Speed and Crit Chance) if you go for Phantom Dancer.
The total cost of Runaan's Hurricane
- 2750 gold you could have used for another item.
- An item slot.
- 20-30% Crit chance
- Another passive.
- 5-6% Movement Speed.
But I can buy those items later, and have a bunch of Attack Speed!
Can you? Well, I guess you could, but then you'll have to pay the opportunity cost elsewhere. ADCs need a bunch of stats: AD, Armor Penetration, Attack Speed, Critical Chance, Movement Speed... Would you give up a Last Whisper or Bloodthirster for it? Or a Guardian Angel that could save your life?
An average ADC build is something like this:
Infinity Edge
Berserker's Greaves
Phantom Dancer / Statikk Shiv
Last Whisper
Bloodthirster
Guardian Angel
Which item would you have to pay for Runaan's Hurricane? The most obvious choice is the Attack Speed option. You can't play without boots or you won't outrun anyone. You can't play without ArPen or your damage will be meaningless against tanks. Infinity Edge is your main damage amplifier and I think everyone will agree that you need at least one sustain item and a defensive one. So...
The main question is: is it worth to lose Critical Chance to get Runaan's Hurricane's passive? Each point of Crit Chance increases your DPS by 1%, as it will make crits proc more often.
- If you have Infinity Edge, you will crit once every 4 auto-attacks.
- If you have Infinity Edge and Phantom Dancer, you will crit every 2 auto-attacks.
By the way, Runaan's Hurricane bolts don't crit and they apply only half of your total AD. AND they need to have aditional targets nearby your main target to actually shoot! They do not add to your total single target DPS.
Conclusion
- You shouldn't buy Runaan's Hurricane because the opportunity cost of the item is too high. It needs a rework. Even for Teemo is bad because he can use the gold for better items. There is no situation where Runaan's Hurricane is better than any other option (well, maybe an Ohmwrecker...).
Feel free to build it if you're trolling a bit, but you shouldn't expect to win often in a serious game.
So, you like Runaan's Hurricane? When this item was released, many people thought it was very interesting - myself included. However, as time passed, there is a huge consensus in higher level play about the overall inneficiency of this item and how badly designed it is.
Oh my, why do you say this? It's an awesome item!
Well, the item by itself is pretty funny. I mean, who doesn't want to shoot three auto-attacks at once? Also, the animation is cool. And it gives a ****load of Attack Speed (70%!) And it also procs on-hit effects (so it looks good for Teemo, Twitch, Varus...)
Do you see what these champions have in common? Besides Teemo, they are all ADCs or AD Carries. They are ranged champions that have a damage output based on their auto-attacks. Usually, they have some sort of DPS steroid or DoT that has some aditional benefits the more you spread it across the whole enemy team. So, why wouldn't you build Runaan's Hurricane?
Opportunity cost
Now this is the main concept that newer or unexperienced players must begin to grasp and understand. Trust me, by learning this you will automatically gain Elo (because Elo equates partially to game knowledge).
Opportunity cost is a term that economists use to speak about the total cost of purchasing a good. It does not only include the monetary price, but the goods you are willing to lose to get the item. In LoL this is extremely important becuase you have item slots. So you can carry a total amount of 6 different kinds of goods at a single time, making the opportunity cost even higher than real life.
So you have 2800 gold. You've already finished your Infinity Edge, so your auto-attacks hurt a lot. Now you need to hit faster so you can benefit more from your increased damage. What could you buy?
Suppose you're considering Runaan's Hurricane. Which are the other options?
- Phantom Dancer.
- Statikk Shiv.
Which is the total cost of buying Runaan's Hurricane?
- 2750 gold.
- An item slot you could have used to buy either Phantom Dancer or [[Statikk Shiv].
To make it easier for a full comparison, let's make a breakdown of which stats each item has:
Runaan's Hurricane (2750 gold)
70% Attack Speed
On-hit double bolt passive.
Statikk Shiv (2500)
40% Attack Speed
20% Crit Chance
6% Movement Speed
Static Charge passive
Phantom Dancer (2800)
50% Attack Speed
30% Crit Chance
5% Movement Speed
Unit Collision passive
What can we notice here?
- Runaan's Hurricane doesn't add Critical Chance or Movement Speed. So when you're buying it, you're gaining a marginal benefit of Attack Speed (10-20%) at the cost of losing 5-6% of extra Movement Speed and 20-30% Crit Chance.
- You could save up to 250 gold if you bought Statikk Shiv.
- For 50 gold more, losing 20% potential Attack Speed and the bolt passive, you gain two extra stats (Movement Speed and Crit Chance) if you go for Phantom Dancer.
The total cost of Runaan's Hurricane
- 2750 gold you could have used for another item.
- An item slot.
- 20-30% Crit chance
- Another passive.
- 5-6% Movement Speed.
But I can buy those items later, and have a bunch of Attack Speed!
Can you? Well, I guess you could, but then you'll have to pay the opportunity cost elsewhere. ADCs need a bunch of stats: AD, Armor Penetration, Attack Speed, Critical Chance, Movement Speed... Would you give up a Last Whisper or Bloodthirster for it? Or a Guardian Angel that could save your life?
An average ADC build is something like this:
Infinity Edge
Berserker's Greaves
Phantom Dancer / Statikk Shiv
Last Whisper
Bloodthirster
Guardian Angel
Which item would you have to pay for Runaan's Hurricane? The most obvious choice is the Attack Speed option. You can't play without boots or you won't outrun anyone. You can't play without ArPen or your damage will be meaningless against tanks. Infinity Edge is your main damage amplifier and I think everyone will agree that you need at least one sustain item and a defensive one. So...
The main question is: is it worth to lose Critical Chance to get Runaan's Hurricane's passive? Each point of Crit Chance increases your DPS by 1%, as it will make crits proc more often.
- If you have Infinity Edge, you will crit once every 4 auto-attacks.
- If you have Infinity Edge and Phantom Dancer, you will crit every 2 auto-attacks.
By the way, Runaan's Hurricane bolts don't crit and they apply only half of your total AD. AND they need to have aditional targets nearby your main target to actually shoot! They do not add to your total single target DPS.
Conclusion
- You shouldn't buy Runaan's Hurricane because the opportunity cost of the item is too high. It needs a rework. Even for Teemo is bad because he can use the gold for better items. There is no situation where Runaan's Hurricane is better than any other option (well, maybe an Ohmwrecker...).
Feel free to build it if you're trolling a bit, but you shouldn't expect to win often in a serious game.
The main reason Runaan's Hurricane is not used is because of the bruiser meta. This means AD carries are forced to itemize for single target dps rather than AoE dps.
Here are some numbers to prove the viability of Runaan's Hurricane:
Runaan's Hurricane (3 targets): 788dps
Runaan's Hurricane (2 targets): 615dps
Runaan's Hurricane (1 target): 442dps
Phantom Dancer (1 target): 525dps
Source: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/15xeN-CSaXx5yq62oCiVR-yh1ANhto597fpe1kVDeV_M/edit#gid=1203637511
Runaan's is not a bad item. Aphromoo uses it on his Jinx to great effect. I personally don't, but that doesn't mean you cannot use it.
I've also heard of alternative builds like Bloodthirster Runaan's Hurricane Last Whisper Blade of the Ruined King, but I haven't done the math so don't rely on this one.
edit: seriously though,does ez q proc hurricane? :D
I won't tell this item is so usefull but you ignored it's passive. This is REALLY usefull on some heroes like Jinx these are doing 210% AD single target damage after taking that item.
As a former Teemo player I have never built it in my life. I think that presenting opportunity cost as a concept is enough reasoning to advise against building it on him (or anyone). Why would you pick it when you can go Nashor's Tooth for Attack Speed (and CDR, and more damage from your autos), etc. ?
Anyways, thanks for the feedback guys. I'll try to make more articles like this one in the near future.
What I mean though is that he doesn't benefit from crit - it makes more sense to build non crit items on him. Runaan's is a non crit item, and you're only comparing it to crit items, because those are what ADC's build. But you don't compare it to an item like Nashor's for Teemo, leaving viewers to probably still build it on him. :P
Not sure if I made sense though.
Already wanted to rep u there.
If MOBAFire had an option like 'See guides with Runaan's Hurricane', I'd go and downvote all those guides.
People tried to make it niche for Kennen's Mark of Storms or Caitlyn's Headshot, but it just didn't work out in the end.
It sucks **** and should never be built on standard ADC's. However you don't really debunk it as a bad item for non ADC champions like Teemo.
As a former Teemo player I have never built it in my life. I think that presenting opportunity cost as a concept is enough reasoning to advise against building it on him (or anyone). Why would you pick it when you can go Nashor's Tooth for Attack Speed (and CDR, and more damage from your autos), etc. ?
Anyways, thanks for the feedback guys. I'll try to make more articles like this one in the near future.