League of Legends equips its players with a very lengthy champion rooster of more than 150 different characters to play with. These champions often get divided into different categories and sub-categories such as fighters, tanks, supports, assassins, mages, and more. Riot tends to make certain classes more popular throughout all of them than others. So in this article, weโll go through some of the ones that are not so recognized. There is one group in particular in need of special attention because they make up a subclass and a playstyle โ poke champions.
Poke in League of Legends means dishing out significant damage consistently to your enemies from a safe distance just before any significant fight. Generally, all poke comes in the form of skill shots since, for obvious reasons, it wouldnโt be a good game designed to allow someone to attack you from afar with no way to dodge that attack.
There are many champions in the game with ranged attacks that can deal lots of poke damage. For example, ranged abilities from champions like Lux, Janna, Soraka, Viktor, and others serve as poke damage. In the laning phase, just about any damaging ability that can hurt your lane opponent without committing to an all-in count as poke or harass.
But the ones we will talk about in particular are champions specifically designed to do so; those are the dedicated long-range attackers. So check out these hand-picked poke champions in the world of League.
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1. Karma

Letโs kick things off with Karma, a versatile champion which can be used in almost any lane but mainly she is played as a support mage, with her greatest strength in the early stages of the game is her poking ability.
To be effective poke support you will need to focus all of your damaging abilities onto the enemy carry and not their support. Besides your poke, as Karma being a support champion will require you to keep your teammates alive and hold off any enemy that tries to reach them. Depending on your matchups, it is best to build up some hard Ability power items early in order to maintain high poke damage.
To summarise, lets show off Karmaโs strengths: she is very versatile champion; her kit offers loads of utility like crowd control, buffs, shields and more; shines the most during the early game due to availability of her ultimate from the first level, empowering all of her abilities; she is very efficient even If her team is behind and she doesnโt have much gold to buy items;
Letโs kick things off with Karma, a versatile champion who can be used in almost any lane but mainly, she is played as a support mage, with her greatest strength in the early stages of the game being her poking ability.
To be effective poke support, you will need to focus all of your damaging abilities onto the enemy carry and not their support. Besides your poke, as Karma being a support champion will require you to keep your teammates alive and hold off any enemy that tries to reach them. It is best to build up some hard Ability power items early to maintain significant poke damage depending on your matchups.
To summarise, letโs show off Karmaโs strengths: she is a very versatile champion; her kit offers loads of utility like crowd control, buffs, shields, and more; she shines the most during the early game due to the availability of her ultimate from the first level, empowering all of her abilities; she is very efficient even If her team is behind and doesnโt have much gold to buy items.
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2. Teemo

Scouting the peaks of hell, Teemo is best known for his ability to terrorize and dominate in the top lane. This character is designed to annoy his opponents with his blindness and slowly but surely kill them. If you step on a couple of his deadly mushrooms that he very carefully places in isolated places, you will be joining him in the depths of hell.
To make the most out of your poke, you need to start playing more aggressively from the very beginning of the game. Teemo has a significant advantage over many melee champions because he is ranged. Ranged auto attacks are mainly used to poke your opponent while saving your blindness and burst of movement speed for when they come close.
That will be making an effective escape from enemy bruise Teemoโs mushrooms are a great provider of vision and overall map control while also serving as deadly traps which take big chunks out of enemy health. He also has bursts of movement speed and the ability to become invisible if standing still for a couple of seconds. After exiting his stealth mode, Teemo receives a burst of attack speed which can help him drain enemy health to 0.
3. Neeko

With one of the best non-damage passive abilities in the game, Neeko can disguise herself as one of her teammates whoโs โlow on health and run to the nearby enemy that is thinking he is going to get an easy kill resulting in the opposite outcome. She is loaded with lots of AoE crowd control and damage, making her suitable for poke damage and one formidable champion to kill.
Learning how to use her passive ability can come with an excellent reward, as you will have the advantage of the element of surprise-making dents in enemy teams. Her E is excellent for rooting every target that she catches while dealing lots of damage in the process. Her Q is an excellent addition to the root, as it deals more and more damage to the rooted Neekoโs ultimate ability is a great addition to her kit, granting her a small shield before and massive damage and long stun after the explosion.
Neeko can be played as a mage in the mid lane or as lethal โsupport.โ In both roles, she will be dealing significant poke damage that is AoE, excellent crowd control that can be used to secure objectives and win teamfights. You can carry your team to victory no matter where you play her.
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4. VelโKoz

Another terrifying creature that escaped from the Void and now is serving as a buy in the middle lane VelโKoz most certainly is the most annoying champion to deal with. Packed with lots of damage and hard crowd control, VelโKoz will be poking you with his tentacles where it hurts the most.
Starting from the early game, you will need to use his W to clear waves and to harass an enemy who is doing the same thing. His Q ability is a skill-shot that can produce tremendous amounts of poke damage onto your opponent. It is easy to master it, and once you do, you can punish any enemy by dumping lots of damage and crowd control to the enemy.
Saving your E is crucial. It can be used as the ability to initiate a fight when you see your jungler is setting up a gank or as an escape ability to disengage your thirsty opponent. After you deposit all of your abilities and proc that passive, it is time to bring out your ultimate and deal that true damage.
For strengths, VelโKoz can be listed as: he can deal massive damage from afar, great pick that provides true damage, he has lots of crowd control and AoE damaging abilities. Lastly, it opposes excellent threats for the duration of the game.
5. Lux

Garenโs sister and a loyal citizen of Demacia, Lux, is one fearless mage support that can erase your whole team when she gets like two kills. Even if you somehow manage to escape her full combo, she will be hunting you down until you give in and accept your fate. She is an excellent source of AP damage and a provider of many crowd control abilities for her teammates. She also has a decent shielding ability to increase her alliesโ sustain.
You only need to worry about staying alive and helping your carry do his job. Your abilities will make your ADC untouchable, as you can easily zone out your opponents and deal tons of poke damage while keeping a safe distance from them. Very annoying ability, her Q is a stun with a short cooldown that deals decent damages to those enemies who want you dead.
The common mistake Lux players make activating her E as soon as it lands. When not activated, it provides very strong slow and is doing a great job zoning your opponent, also giving you vision over large areas in the Fog of War. Another great way to finish off the enemy is by casting your ultimate will to disintegrate anything in its path, including those enemies that hug their towers. This is mainly used when the enemy just escaped all of your abilities.
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6. Xerath

According to the lore, one of the most powerful beings in Runterra, the artillery mage Xerath, is something you should be scared of. All of his abilities are ranged skill-shots, so be careful when facing a level 7 Xerath main, as they can make you suffer in pain.
His Q ability allows Xerath to charge a powerful blast attack that can deal fair amounts of poke damage. Charging this ability will increase the range and damage of the attack over the duration, making it a significant ability that lets u stay at a safe distance from your opponent while dealing damage.
His W is a great crowd control provider, slowing anything it catches and applying damage. Xerath is very much immobile, so to compensate, he can use his E, which stuns the enemy it catches, making some space for you to escape. And to finish off, his ultimate is a beneficial ability to use after you spend all of the others, dealing damage to finish low HP targets.
In conclusion, Xerath is a great mid-laner that can deal severe amounts of poke damage from a distance while also providing many crowd control abilities that damage your opponents.
7. Caitlyn

Combined with Rapid Fire Cannon, Caitlyn can provide the earnest amount of poke damage, more than any other ADC champion. Her whole kit revolves around ranged poke damage from long ranges that make your game easy as you have the most extended auto-attack range in the game.
To stay safe in the bot lane, you will need excellent vision control to depend on while demolishing your enemiesโ turrets for that extra gold in the early game. After some basic auto-attacks or against a target that she has trapped or netted, Caitlyn will unleash a powerful attack that crits and forces your opponents to back off.
Her Q ability provides incredible amounts of poke in the early game and scales up to the end of the game. Enemies that dare to step on your traps will be quickly dealt with as Caitlyn does more crit damage on them. Ace in the hole is an excellent addition to her kit, allowing her to finish any enemy that made a successful escape.
Caitlyn specializes in long-range attacks, making her perfect for poke damage. Great for zoning out your enemies and a decent supply of crowd control to hold off any enemy from killing her.