Why is it recommended to increase Ashe's Attack Damage rather than Speed?

Question

I've been playing scrubby random games with Ashe for quite a while, using Phantom + Shiv + some boots that give a huge speed boost when out of combat (largely to avoid ganks). While this build usually works out, many people rather recommend going for Infinite Edge, and an attack damage + crit build. I've had more successes with the AS build than the AD build. Moreover:

1. Ashe has the highest AS in the game (among ADCs).
2. When I push champs, there is a trade between attacking high and slow (AD + crit) or attacking low and fast (AS). I find that it is better to attack low and fast, as this tends to annoy and harass players more than one or two high shots. Of course, this may also make players think that I'm not dangerous, and as such, more prone to use risky tactics.
3. I think higher AS also regenerates the shiv thing and the passive stack faster (not sure)

In the sad case that Ashe is indeed bad with high AS, which ADC would you recommend that has a high AS?

Answer 1

You can play whatever you want, I can't argue against that. But the role as an AD Carry is to deal high, sustained, AD centric damage in teamfights. Your build is useful to a point because of how much crit chance you get, but falls off once you pass 15-20 minutes. As the game goes on, enemies and minions passively gain armor and magic resistance. I'm sure you've noticed that in longer games it takes you longer to clear waves because you aren't hitting as hard anymore. The only point of building attack speed on Ashe is to increase her ability to kite, thats it. She has no on-hit utilities other than a slow. Champions that scale well with attack speed usually have an on-hit ability that deals damage for example:

• Kogmaw's w is an active, on-hit damaging ability that deals a percentage of an enemies health as magic damage.
• Vayne's w is a passive, stacking, on-hit ability that deals a percentage of an enemies health as true damage once it reaches 3 stacks.
• Varus' w is a passive, stacking, on hit ability that deals a small amount of additional magic damage and can be "detonated" with any of his other abilities to deal a percentage of the enemies health.
• Twitch's passive deals a small amount of true damage and stacks up to 5 times. He can use his expunge ability to "detonate" these stacks for damage based on how many stacks are on the target.

These are just a few examples, but on all of them you want to get some sort of AD and armor pen. Because if you don't, you will not be able to effectively do your job as an AD Carry.

Each ADC has a core item build that doesn't change no matter the situation. I like to think of it like this:

• Auto attack dependent: Infinity edge, Bloodthirster, Last Whisper
• Ability Dependent: Trinity Force/Iceborne Gauntlet, Infinity Edge, Last Whisper
• Duelist: Blade of the Ruined King, Infinity Edge, Last Whisper

This is a very simple example and honestly, you can build whatever you want, but this is the current trend of the meta.

Please don't build Boots of Mobility on ADC's unless you're roaming a lot between lanes. If you're having trouble being ganked, then you need to start buying wards so you can see the ganks long before they come. It's better to be preventative than reactive (good life lesson too ;) ).

Answer 2

I feel like the reason why you are better with high AS ashe is not only because of the higher Attack Speed but also because of the increased movementspeed provided by the AS items that makes it more easy to kite and reposition yourself. The problem is that you will miss one of the items that are necessary:without Infinity Edge you will lose alot of crit damage,without Last Whisper you will deal literally no damage to tanks or bruisers.The only somewhat acceptable item to miss out would be your lifesteal item(however if you want to stack AS you can still get your Blade of the ruined king instead of either Phantom Dancer or Statikk Shiv) or your defensive item(where you could get Bloodthirster to get atleast a bit of defense).

Point 3:Riot changed ashes passive a while ago,it does not stack anymore but rather increases your critical hit chance for each second your not attacking:

Ashe gains 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 Focus stacks each second while not attacking. These values increase every 4 levels. Upon reaching 100 stacks, Ashe's next basic attack will automatically critically strike. Ashe starts out with a number of Focus stacks equal to her critical strike chance value.

Technically you are wrong:your item choice does in fact make your passive not that good in a teamfight,where you are constantly attacking and where you can not stack your passive because of your high attack speed.However Phantom Dancer AND statikk shiv each have critical strike,decreasing the out of combat time you need to get a auto crit,making your preferred build actually pretty good for a siege team with strong burst damage and high mobility(like kha,riven) in it.

To answer your actual question:AS ashe is not necessarily bad,she is just not as good as her standard build.ADC's that stack AS because of their passive abilites are:Kog'Maw(w),Twitch(passive+AD steroid on ult),Vayne(w+AD steroid on ult),Kennen AD(w),Twisted Fate AD(e) I started to use AS runes and it feels like I'm way stronger once I finish my first item(or get BF Sword),maybe this is something you want to try out.

Answer 3

Your build should always adapt to the current game situation / team combos

You can play whatever you want, but you should always adapt to the situation.

Pros for (early) Attack Damage:

It makes Last Hitting a lot easier:

It is easier to last hit minions. If you have more damage you can last hit minions ealier which gives you more time to react. It is really hard to gain CS if you have to lasthit every minion when they are lower than 5% because if you shoot too early, your minions will get the last hit.

It makes Harrasing more effective:

Most times, harrasing looks like this: The enemy is in range, you hit him with an autoattack and maybe with a W. Of course this depends on the skill level of your enemy.

Building attack damage will deal more damage with those 2 shots.

Attack Speed will not increase your W damage.

But dont build AD only!

Your build looks good to me. but those 11% movement speed help you less than you think when you are ganked. Ashe has no escape ability, which requiers you to play very safe when the jungler might be around.

I would build like this:

• First back get a BF sword
• After that finish your bersekboots (other boots are useless)
• Infinity Edge
• Phantom Dancer
• Last Whisper/Blood Thirster
• Blood Thirster/Last Whisper
• Hurricane (I really like it for the late game because you can siege very well and apply forst to 3(!) enemys in team fights almost permanent.

Answer 4

The real reason for this has nothing to do with whether or not AD, Crit, Attack Speed, Move Speed, or Armor Pen are any better than one another on an AD Carry, it is all about the multiplicative nature that these stats exhibit when built together. This means that while every one of these stats are valuable on their own, they each increase each others value when stacked.

Example:

AD is great for doing more damage. Each point of AD you buy (not counting resists) gives you an additional point of damage. If you buy 100 base AD and buy 100 more, you are effectively doubling your damage. Attack speed calculation is a little bit convoluted but to simplify the math let's say that buying 100% attack speed doubles your attack speed from .75 to 1.5. Both methods double your damage, and might cost a similar amount of gold too. It gets trickier when it is time to buy a second item!

Continuing with the AD example, we blue pill with more gold and want to increase our damage. AD worked great to double our damage the first time so why not get more? If we buy another 100 AD, we would have 300 now... Cool! It sounds like you would gain the same benefit from the second 100 AD as the first but that is not true. Since this time you had 200 to start, you are only increasing your current damage by 50% instead of 100%! That is HALF the amount of damage gain as you got the first time. Suppose instead you purchase attack speed this time. 100% attack speed will again increase your damage by 100% because you are hitting for 200 damage twice as fast instead of hitting for 300 at the same speed.

TL;DR: Mixing stats gives you more damage than buying just one!

Using this information we actually determine just why AD carries do more damage than any other role in the late game. This is because they have many more stats that multiplicatively contribute to their damage (AD, Crit, Attack Speed, Crit Damage, Armor Pen) as opposed to other roles that rely on only two stats (AP and Cool Down Reduction) to deal more damage.

Now that we know to mix our damage sources, there is still one problem: what do we build first? This matter is decided per champion and per game. I can tell you that Infinity Edge is the most efficient first damage item for Ashe without a shadow of a doubt but there are many more factors than that. You hit on one important one which is safety. Buying Shiv lets you harass from a distance and run away faster. Phantom Dancer has a similar effect. Both let you stack your passive faster. Youmuu's is yet another option, it gives you cool down reduction for your very powerful ult and hawkshot which both can increase your safety and kill potential.

If champion select was highly unfavorable I would probably choose Youmuu's or Shiv so I can use my ult more or poke from a distance. If I had a support with strong peel like Alistair, Thresh, or Zyra I would pick IE so I can bust out the pain without a care in the world. One of the differences that makes an average player great is the ability to change their builds based on the situation and not just what the guide said.