Talk:Swain/@comment-3578129-20131011074541/@comment-15244341-20131014133728

The nature of his kit makes him highly unpopular with both pros and normal gamers. He has terrible mobility, no stuns, no pushing power until W has a few points on it (which is after E, most likely), he is higly blue and item dependant (buff will help in teamfights, but not solve the mana issues he has if he uses his skills to farm/counterpush) and his kit deals no burst damage except for his W. This means that he deletes a target slower than Orianna, Lux and all the other bursty mages, which means that he needs tankyness to be capable of doing crazy 3v1 Swain shenanigans. If he is falling behind, he only has okay-ish peeling to offer to his teammates. He is also fairly squishy pre 6.

TLDR: His burst is not instant, he needs expensive items (RoA+Zhonya's at least) to be fully effective in a teamfight, he is really weak to ganks pre-6 and needs to be ahead to survive in teamfights due to the nature of his kit (high damage over time on a short range).

Don't get me wrong. I play him any time I'm mid, or almost any time, but he has some pretty harsh counters in lane that are popular champions too and basically give him zero counterplay options apart from trying to farm and not feed. Those being, mostly, Lux and Orianna. Those matchups require you to be either better as a player than the other guy (and a LOT better) or get your lane camped 24/7, which will make other lanes weaker as a result.