LOL. How to lane as Graves [closed]

This question is a bit subjective to be honest, because the answer depends on so many factors :

What kind of opponent do you have : ranged? melee? agressive? passive?

What is the ennemy jungler : Farmer? ganker? stealth?

Anyway I'll try my best giving you general laning tips for graves :

Graves is a champion desgined to win his lane and push his opponent. You must use his pushing power to put a lot of pressure early on, even stand on the lane further than your minions so you can deny the opponent a lot. You also need to get yourself used to the farm/poke graves mechanic. Never use Q only to get minions, except if the opponent isn't there. You always want to hit both minions AND the enemy laner with your Q.

Once you're level 6, you must surprise your opponent and burst him down. The classical combo is Auto -> dash -> auto -> Q right after the auto -> R or auto -> R. It is often enough to kill the guy, and if he isn't in the range to get killed, just overpressure him so he can not farm.

Here are the enemies you shouldn't pick graves against :

Renekton -> will survive your burst early on and may outburst you, plus you can't pressure him without risking a lot.

Fiora -> Even tho she got nerfed, she can use her huge trade potential to rush you once you got one or no ammos left and win the trade if she hits a weak point.

These are in my opinion and on my actual level (which is low diamond) the two champions graves can't give his best against.

In my opinion your runes should be :

Red : flat ad/armor pen
Quintescence : Flat ad
Yellow : flat armor
Blue : cooldown reduction / magic resist per level

First it's best to understand that you're a burst adc and not a bruiser so you won't be able to engage in sustain fights that typically happen in the top lane.

Farming

Last hit minions once they have taken residual damage from the opposing wave and use your dash to reset auto attacks if you are going to miss a CS. Be careful about using your Q to clear minions as this will push you in to the enemy tower and make you incredibly vulnerable to ganks since Graves does not have a reliable escape. Keep the lane even and gain a gold advantage by zoning the enemy champion with your auto attacks until you are ahead or confident in where the enemy jungler is.

Laning

Melee AD champions: You're in a pretty good spot to snowball the lane. Focus on last hitting the creeps and also aim to get the enemy in the cone damage of your auto attacks. When there aren't any creeps low enough to last hit (50hp~) you should be poking down the enemy and zoning them from their creeps.

Ranged AD champions: The lane plays out a lot like bot lane without supports, except you have the advantage early. This can come down to a skill match up but Graves should be able to come out on top due to his burst damage and how much more damage he can sustain as opposed to other ranged AD champions. Aim to out CS the opponent and go for early kills in order to start a snowball.

AP champions: This is such a wide category of champions and each champion gives creates a different play style based upon whether they are an AP assassin (Fizz) or a tree (Maokai). The best way to handle these is to assess each AP champion. My main advice here is fairly standard: Be aggressive early and aim to get a level or gold advantage that can carry you in to the mid game.

Going for the kill

The most important thing: Graves damage is proximity based

This means that the closer you are when you auto attack the more damage you will do to the champion. This means that when you dash as part of your combo you want to dash as close as you can for the next auto attack to do maximal damage. But remember, you don't want to give away your damage output on a failed kill attempt.

If you're ahead in the lane and you're confident you have enough damage keep a consistent play style and poke down the enemy while you CS. Once they step in dashing range you should start the combo. Here I would go with: auto -> Q -> auto -> dash -> auto -> R

This combo does two things: it disguises your engage until its too late and back loads your damage. If you have been playing properly and taking free autos or Q's on the enemy when you have a chance they won't necessarily suspect a full engage until you dash towards them, but by this time its too late. Once you dash towards them you'll get the free auto from animation cancel and your R should happen almost instantaneously.

if you're behind in lane Don't give away your burst damage potential. Instead continue to play consistently and try to take free auto attacks on the enemy when you can. This will allow them to feel safe with lower hp than usual since they won't suspect your burst from behind. Once they're within a health range that you think you can win at you don't want to engage. You want them to think you're farming as normal even though you're looking for a spot to engage at. This is where it is important to know the enemy cool downs. If they miss a skill shot or use an ability to clear minions you start your combo on them immediately. You can also feign your engage by using your smoke screen behind them. If they see this as an opening they'll attempt to engage at an HP level that you can in turn delete them at.

The Junglers

This isn't a huge part for Graves but I think it is still important to note. Because of his short range your play style can give away the incoming gank even if the enemy doesn't have wards placed. It is important to stay consistent in your playstyle. If you have been behind in lane and have stayed at max range while farming with your Q and taking last hits when available you need to continue to do this. By taking the step forward and standing near the minion wave while CS'ing it will look obvious that the jungler is near.

Side Note

All of this information is based off of my own personal play style and how I play Graves / believe he should be played. But a lot of this information is relevant for all champions. Also, I think Graves isn't considered a tier 1 top lane champion is because the direction that Riot is moving the meta. When other champions are buffed they can play into Graves weaknesses better and won't let him get the gold advantage he needs to be a dominate force in the game.

Source: Diamond ADC who's played the game for too long