What is it?

Not only has Guardian Angel picked up a swanky new icon, it's got a whole new stat line to work with. Picking up the new GA will get you 30 armor and 40 AD with the (mostly) same revive passive.

What's the big deal?

The inclusion of a BF Sword into the build path is a far cry from its original role as a tank item with a carry picking it up every once in a while as a sixth item. It's been changed into an item literally built for AD Carries. Not only does this make the item much more appealing to those greedy ADC players that never buy any defensive items because "you can't carry with armor", it also balances itself due to its phenomenal gold efficiency on bruisers as well. But what's stopping tanks from buying the thing anyway? Well remember when I said the revive passive was mostly the same? The calculation for the amount of HP you get back was changed with the rework. Previously GA healed 700 or 30% of total health, on the new passive it heals 50% base health. What this means is that whether you're Alistar with the highest base HP in the game at 2415 or Ashe with 1871 the heal difference at level 18 is only 300 hp.

Speaking of bruisers if you thought too many people were buying the old GA, you're in for a wild ride with the new one. The thought process behind buying it basically boils down to: Do I like building AD? Do I not like Dying? If the answer to one or both of these questions is yes, odds are you're probably going to buy it. So, while you're not going to have to worry about that 3000 HP Galio coming back to life for you spend the remainder of the match killing, you'll only have 4 seconds to say your prayers before that angry Riven main proceeds to wipe your whole team after you've used your CC and Exhaust.

But wait...

Why am I talking about GA and bruisers when I said this is an item for the ADC? Allow me to explain. While the thought process for buying GA I explained earlier is accurate for bruisers, it's a little more complicated for ADCs. The easiest way to describe the new GA is as a crutch. The thought process behind buying GA as an ADC boils down to three questions. The first is "Does the enemy team have a lot of diving and CC heavy champions (Riven, Renekton, Jax, etc.)?" The second is "Is the CC kiteable?" Something like a Darius pull or Jax Counterstrike can be easily dodged with good positioning or mechanics. The final question is "Am I confident in my mechanics as an ADC?"

The third question is definitely the most important of the three. As an ADC, your role in the team is to deal the most amount of damage possible while staying as safe as possible. If you're confident in your positioning and mechanics, nine times out ten you don't have to get GA because, while it does give AD now and your damage doesn't suffer as much for buying it, it still does set you behind. With good mechanics and reaction time, you can spend almost half the gold on a QSS or Hexdrinker instead to fulfill the same purpose. For that other one time when your Flash is down and the enemy Malphite and Orianna have had their eyes on you since the 20 minute mark or when the enemy Talon has gotten 8 kills from your smurf Zed and Yasuo one-tricks in Mid and Top, that's when you buy GA as an ADC. Now that we know what game to buy it...

Who and when?

While you can buy GA on any ADC you want, some use it better than others. Aggressive short-range ADCs like Lucian, Vayne, and Draven specifically tend to use the passive better than defensive ones like Caitlyn and Ashe. 550 range ADCs tend to draw more focus to themselves at the start of a teamfight, meaning the chances of them blowing a key cooldown at the start of a fight is much higher than a 600+ range back liner. Once that key cooldown is gone not only is your team at an ult advantage, you're coming back in to the fight with one less key ultimate to worry about. As for when in the game to buy it, you'll need to think about a lot of different factors. First: Are any of their AD based champions ahead? Second: Are there a lot of small skirmishes in the mid game? Three: How far in to your item build are you? Normally if you're going to buy GA, you'll want to finish at least two of your core items first. For Lucian this would be Blade of the Ruined King and Black Cleaver or Infinity Edge and a Zeal item on Vayne. If you were to get GA too early into your build, you'll put yourself too far behind and the extra life won't even matter. After those core items are done, you should consider whether you can outplay the aforementioned fed AD champs on the enemy team.

But what's bad about it?

While the new GA is a very cheap item at only 2400 gold and the build path is good with a BF Sword in it, the riskier alternatives are still cheaper. A good alternative to buying a GA is to consider is buying life steal if you think you can position well enough to consistently auto-attack and heal the unavoidable damage you'll take or buy a QSS or Hexdrinker like I mentioned before. By spending less gold you're able to accelerate your build and potentially hard carry a game but you're taking a bigger risk with the possibility of you getting one shot through Hexdrinker or chain CC'd without your Flash. GA also isn't exactly the answer to all your problems as ADC either. If you're caught out of position where you can easily just be killed twice, you're wasting a lot of the item's gold efficiency for a full 5 minutes and you've set yourself behind for no return.

In Conclusion

If you're new to ADC or you aren't confident in your mechanics quite yet, you can use GA as a teamfight crutch to absorb pressure for your team. If you're playing as a big play maker and you're looking to aggressively dive into the enemy backline to make that game winning play, you should buy GA. Otherwise spending less gold to accelerate your item build and carry the game with raw positioning and mechanics could be the way to go.

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