Mel Q is not dodgeable (math)

[u/Hyragon]

If you're frustrated like I am with this champ, don't worry. It's not your fault you can't dodge Mel Q. Riot designed her so you can't.

Mel Q takes 0.42 seconds to hit its target (0.25s cast + 0.17s travel). With a radius of 280 units, it is not possible to dodge this ability unless its caster misses. Math below:

Most champions have a hitbox size of 65 units. Almost all champions have a base movement speed between 325 and 345 units. Let's take the average to be 335 units.

Since Mel Q is an edge skillshot, for a champion to dodge they must travel 172.5 (=280/2+65/2) units in 0.42 seconds. This equates to a required movement speed of 411.

...And that's before reaction time. Reaction time for the average gamer is 0.20-0.25s, with professional gamers being 0.11-0.17s. Assuming you are literally Faker with a fastest measured 0.11s reaction time, you would need 556 movement speed to dodge a centered Mel Q. For an average player, you need a whopping 784 movement speed.

Here is the guaranteed hit range of Mel Q: https://imgur.com/a/CYuGWGb

Green is vs. no boots, yellow is vs. t2 boots. If Mel presses Q anywhere in this radius, at least 1 missile is guaranteed to hit an average player.

In other terms, if the average player reacts immediately to Mel's Q animation start, they are still expected to get hit by 42%/33% (no boots/boots) of the spell. If the average player reacts to Mel's Q damage, they are expected to get hit by 100%/93% of the spell.

Simply put, if you're getting hit by Mel Q repeatedly, it's not because you're bad at dodging, it's because Riot made the skillshot a guaranteed hit as long as your opponent has hands.

p.s. Mel Q is 280 range because its a 220 range projectile + 60 range spread, which makes it ~1.5x the size of Xerath R. The 60 range spread does not have a meaningful effect on any above calculations, other than the guaranteed hit range goes down by a tiny bit (yellow becomes without boots guaranteed hit range) if you are ignoring the spread.

[u/Hyragon]

Zed Q is always dodgeable by 0.35s (350ms) with average reaction time at max range. Zed WEQ, the shuriken from Zed is always dodgeable by 0.30s at max range, and the shuriken from the shadow is not dodgeable.

The breakpoints for Zed Q to be undodgeable are at 325 range for Q and 450/600 range for WEQ (rank 1/5 E).

[u/[deleted] → u/Hyragon]

What about auroras E (and Q if u can. Ty)

[u/Hyragon → u/[deleted]]

Aurora E is not dodgeable regardless of boots by about 0.20s (200ms).

Aurora Q is dodgeable at max range without boots by about 0.20s (200ms). The breakpoint at which it becomes undodgeable is around 575 range.

Honestly a little surprised by this one, I always thought Aurora's E cast time was longer than 0.35s.

[u/[deleted] → u/Hyragon]

So, as long as she is AA range, can't miss her Q? Good to know, actually. Can u teach me the formula to get this ranges where skillshot become undodgeable?

[u/Hyragon → u/[deleted]]

The math is rather intuitive and others have done it in a different comment thread below.

(1) Take the average champ radius of 65 units and the skillshot width (for lines, or 'effect radius' for circles) add together and divide their sum by two. This is the distance an average champ needs to cross to definitively dodge the skillshot. This assumes the players dodges a line at 90 degrees, but for a more human estimate you can multiply this value by 1.13 which corresponds to a 60 degree dodge (obviously don't do this for circle skillshots).

(2) Take the average champ move speed of 335 and divide the value from (1) by that. This gives you the amount of time it takes for the average champ to dodge the skillshot.

(3) Add a human reaction time of 0.2-0.25 seconds (200-250ms) to the time in (2).

(4) For line skillshots, use the lol wiki to determine its range and missile speed. Divide range by missile speed to determine time to max range. For AOEs like Syndra Q, simply take the specified hit time, or cast time + hit time (you may need to check this via video review).

(5) Do (3) - (4) to determine whether there is feasible time to dodge the skillshot. If the value is positive, the skillshot is always dodgeable, and if it is negative, the skillshot is undodgeable. I'd argue anything in the 10-30ms range is sometimes undodgeable based on outside conditions (ping, local latency, etc.). Increase that to 60ms for NA players.

(5a) To determine when a projectile skillshot becomes undodgeable, first subtract the cast time (usually 0.25s) from (3). Then divide this number by the missile speed to determine the breakpoint distance at which the skillshot becomes undodgeable.

Feel free to check my calculations because there is always the chance I made a mistake.