Samira is League of Legends‘ newest champion, an assassin-styled ADC with the ability to decimate the entire enemy team.
S Stands for Samira, or Style. ‘Balanced’ just happens to be one of the many things she doesn’t stand for. An ADC that plays like an assassin? Sure, why not.
League of Legends is notorious for pumping out new champions that make older ones seemingly obsolete until newer patches nerfs them into the ground. With that in mind Samira will be hitting the Rift in Patch 10.19, so let’s take a look at what she does.
Base Stats
No champion is undefined by their base stats (I mean, most of them at least) and Samira seems to fit the ADC shoes, on paper. With a base damage of 59, she joins the ranks of her marksmen comrades with good damage at level one. As per the recent HP buffs given to the role, she will have 600 base health, drastically improving her ability to survive.
Keeping in mind that her base armor and magic resist did not receive a proportionate buff, her low stats of 28 and 30 are a cut below the rest. Samira has a rather low attack range of 500 which is unusual for an ADC, given their role as marksmen. But this is well and good for Samira, as her abilities over-compensate for this minor shortcoming.
Abilities
Samira’s passive Dare Devil Impulse comes in two stages, with the first being her Style:
“Damaging basic attacks and abilities against at least one enemy Champion different from the previous damaging hit made against them grants Samira a Style stack for 6 seconds, up to 6 stacks, refreshing on damaging attacks and abilities against enemy champions.”
This means that Samira can continue to to ramp up her movement speed (0-21% bonus based on her Style grade) as long as she alternates her moves; weaving in abilities in addition to her auto-attacks. But wait, there’s more:
“Samira’s basic attacks against targets in 200 range use her blade, becoming non-projectile. Basic attacks on-hit within this range and Blade Whirl, Wild Rush, and the slash and explosives of Flair deal 2 − 19 (based on level) (+ 10% bonus AD) bonus magic damage, increased by 0% − 100% (based on target’s missing health).”
Additionally, Samira’s basic attacks against immobilised enemies deal the attack’s damage over six rapid attacks and knock up the target for 0.5 seconds. This causes her basic attack timer to reset and the attack to become unstoppable. If the target is not within attack range, Samira will dash into it from a certain distance and then attack. This effect cannot occur on the same target more than once every 10 seconds.
Essentially, Samira takes a crap all over her fellow marksmen by saying, “Look at me, I do more damage if I’m actually closer to them!”, edging her ever-closer to the assassin playstyle. Keep in mind that this passive applies bonus magic damage based on missing health, allowing her to shred tanks. With her passive abilities including a knock-up effect, auto-attack resets, and a dash, it’s almost as if Riot Games just made someone dump an essay in there.
League of Legends streamer, Professor Akali, described this as an “overloaded kit”.
Q – Flair
“ACTIVE: Samira fires a shot in the target direction, dealing physical damage to the first enemy it hits.”
Her Q is the standard ADC skill-shot; you take aim and fire. With 100% AD scaling and a low cool-down (CD) of two seconds at max level, Samira players will most likely abuse this at closer ranges rather than staying true to her supposed marksman archetype.
A low CD allows her to easily stack Style ranks, which will allow her to move comfortably around the enemy team. Additionally, she leaves a trail of explosives, dealing extra damage if she performs another ability in conjunction to this.
W – Blade Whirl
“ACTIVE: Samira slashes around herself twice over 1.25 seconds, the first slash occurring immediately and the second being performed 0.25 seconds before the duration ends, each one dealing physical damage to nearby enemies.”
We never imagined an ADC to have spinning blades. I mean, technically Sivir does have a spinning blade, but isn’t blade whirl literally Katarina’s one trick?
To think that we thought that Yasuo’s wind wall was broken; at least that didn’t deal two instances of damage with 80% AD scaling. This ability will certainly steal the identities of her fellow champions, dealing damage in more ways than one.
E – Wild Rush
“ACTIVE: Samira dashes in the direction of the target allied or enemy unit and slashes all enemies in her path, dealing magic damage and gaining icon bonus attack speed for 3 seconds.”
At this point, anyone that had hopes of Samira being a classic ADC has surely given up. Whilst it isn’t unusual for marksmen to have a dash/escape ability to distance themselves from the enemy, we can assure you that many players will be using this for more sinister purposes. With a CD-reset upon takedown, reckless behaviour is encouraged.
R – Inferno Trigger
“ACTIVE: Samira unleashes a torrent of shots from her weapons, rapidly shooting at all nearby enemies every 0.2 seconds over 2 seconds, slowing herself by 25% and dealing physical damage with each shot, reduced by 75% against minions.”
Behold, the disgusting love-child of Katarina and Lucian that’s Samira’s ultimate ability. Each hit can even critically strike and life steal some health back. As some consolation, this is only cast-able when Samira reaches Style S.
Meta Snapshot
Now, it’s not like we’re saying Samira is an unstoppable monster with zero counter-play. It’s just that right now, the state of ADC in 2020 is truly a sad one; melee champions can often pummel an ADC straight into the ground as long as they can close in on the unfortunate marksman.
This has left popular streamers abandoning their OTP champions and looking for other roles to play, with ADC standing as too oppressive for many within the community. Those who remain in the bot lane often see themselves playing mages or assassins, leaving their teams without an ADC.
Although ridiculously strong, Samira barely qualifies as an ADC. Her range is hardly impressive but her burst damage and mobility far exceeds the capabilities of a marksman. Lucian was League of Legends‘ designated assassin-ADC hybrid but even then, Riot Games had the decency to give him marksman-type abilities (let’s face it, his ultimate is only good for clearing minions after the 25 minutes mark) to compensate for his burst damage kit.
Whilst her fellow gun-toting champions maintains their distance from their foes, Samira players can run into the enemy team without a care. No honour amongst thieves; many will be seen playing Samira in the middle lane as Riot Games continues to leave the bottom lane in shambles.
If you want to know more about state of ADC in 2020, we recommend the video below.
While you’re here, check out our Lucian build guide.
