Apparently the general consensus here is that people do not like what i had to say, however i have yet to read a solid counter argument. The most insightful bit i have read thus far was from hedgemonster who reminded me about Karthus and to consider that he is very often mid. Thus far no one has really discredited the rule of thumb i put forth.

@Eppa I ran the article through a spellchecker and cleaned it up a bit sorry about that.

also @Eppa there are times when kassadin does belong in middle, and Kassadin is a strong champion however he is not a carry. Yes, he can carry a team but any champion can carry a team if they are fed. Kassadin's late game damage is not comparable to that of ranged AD champs. In the end Kassadin is really more of an assassin ideally designed to take the AP carry out of the team fight and then like any assassin play cleanup afterward. In summary, yes kassadin has times he should mid he does not however have the same all encompassing claim of "I should mid" that Ashe or Tristana have. Also of note is that riot had intended for Caitlyn to be a powerhouse in the late game like all Ranged AD carries and they have been working to correct that, see recent patch notes or review her design concept.

Cuz completely slaughtering an enemy junglers jungling capabilities isnt a counter arguement at all. Warwick can also own even the best of carries, as he is near un-harassable and can quite easily towerdive. And really, so what if AD items cost more? Having a squishy AD carry doesnt always help, but having a fully geared AP Carry with a defensive item can assist you much more. And since many AP champions seem to dominate mid....

It's more important to counter pick lanes than to just blindly give it to your AD carry > AP carry > Others.

If the other team is putting say Nidalee at mid, what do you put there? Let's say you have a team consisting of Ashe, Malz, Alistar, Cho'Gath, Olaf. Who goes mid against Nidalee? Olaf will be in the jungle. Alistar will be roaming. So Cho'Gath, Malz, or Ashe? Ashe is the worse pick against her easily. She'll need constant help from Alistar/Olaf to keep up. Malz on the other hand can pressure Nidalee and has stronger farm. He'd be the better pick in general.

Now what if you had say Ezreal instead of Ashe. Nidalee won't be able to zone him very well as he can E->Q her from outside spear range. He might be good mid.

Similarly let's say you have Taric instead of Alistar, but still have Ashe. Now what do you do? Ashe mid? Why? She should be babysat by Taric without a doubt. She gets all the gold at bottom while Taric babysits. Her level will be slightly lower than if she was solo, but there's a higher chance that she can get kills with Taric there to stun.

The idea that you can just say AD > AP > Others for mid is silly. Hell, what about a melee champ like Nocturne which can dominate at mid?

Warwick should get zoned out by any decent ranged AP or AD champ not sure what elo you have been playing in. I'm pretty sure this holds true for other champs similar to warwick as well.

I have talked about having a babysitter in other lanes i called it playing goofy. There are times for this it is a total judgment call to be made by good teams however it does not mean that it couldn't have been the other way around with the assassin type scoring kills in the sidelane and the AD carry mid. (I just saw your second post go up while i was referencing some item costs, i'll look into it shortly)
The idea of this guide was to give an overlay on who has the general right to mid which i still support is the Ranged AD carry. Your argument about ganking jungle is largely irrelevant as you get higher in elo you will get shadowed by your lanning opponent, and it will create a mismatch for you (In other words ganking the jungler usually gets you killed or at the very least they get away and you wasted time.) I suppose if you want to try and bank on their team not calling mia's or shadowing you have a relevant argument abou trying to shutdown the jungler, but i'd say your relying on your opponenets being bad and that feels like a losing strategy to me.
Finally your point about ashe not being able to escape ganks like tanky champs is "true" she isn't as good but that is one of the reasons i listed she should mid (please read original post). The other point about them securing a kill at six while ashe can not is pure wrong, your opponent is not more suscpteible to ashe arrow then morde ult, Completely dependent on their skill level.

Your second post kinda trails off at the end and seems to reiterate what you had already said so i will not address most of it now. Your comment about Ranged AD being too squishy, in comparison to AP, and not useful really points to a general misunderstanding of team composition.

cheers,
Aly

Too lazy to construct an intelligible argument. So this. ^

It really depends on their mid. Sivir does not have much lane dominance nor gank potential but she does need farm. She also does not need a quick route to level 6 since her ulti is hardly gamechanging early game like TF or Ashe's ulti. It's a better choice to slap her with a support at bottom lane and let Anivia take mid. On a side note: Veigar needs farm as much as any of the AD carries to function effectively.

"Should" does not is "would". Nice choice of words. WW is actually an effective mid because his Q is great for ignoring harass, and harassing, and his E gives u many zoning capabilities. We arnt discussing skill levels because they vary too much, and are what really matter in mid. Which is another matter entirely, since really, shouldnt mid go to the most skilled champion, AKA the one who would dominate it the most? but who can tell that in solo queue? nobody. this whole arguement is kindof stupid, since thats what really matters. Screwing up the carries earlygame screw up their lategame, and 4v5 is much better than 5v5.

Also, if i can smell them and see them, then they are below half health, and generally my ult and my Q would kill them. And its not like im the only one that can gank, and i can also just scare him off or steal his buff or take his gold/exp. Interrupting doesnt necessarily mean killing.

our Kat was afk (for a few minutes) so I had to go mid against an anivia (I was alistar).
she was owned

we won too \o/

Akali shouldn't even be on that list.

1. The correct plural for Karthus is "Karthi" :-P

2. This is, of course, assuming your Karthus is competent. It is an incredibly difficult thing to attempt to compare how two champions would fare against each other if both of their summoners are at the same skill level: in this situation, we both believe that our own champion would prevail. Our only recourse is to look at their skills and stats, compare them to the goals of a midder, and try to determine who would win out. I would suggest Karthus here, both because his harass costs less, has much lower CD, and can be used even when the enemy is behind creeps, unlike Ashe's harass, and because while they both have global ults, Karthus' is much easier to hit with. I'd love to hear a response though, I'm not above changing my mind.

Up until now, this thread has mostly been solely a response to OP's post. Since a lot of people seem to have disagreements, however, I think it'd be very informative to try and compile a list of what are the considerations that should go into who takes mid, so that anyone who sees this thread can easily pick up that information. A large part of this will be which of the few goals do you guys think is most important, so feel free to weigh in.

To start us off, here is a brief list (largely adapted from gom99 in this thread: http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board...=671259&page=5)

What are the goals to mid?
1) Don't die
2) Level quickly
3) Farm a lot
4) Find opportunity to gank (side lanes)
5) Shut down the enemy midder

I would suggest that as far as priority goes, it looks like this four tier model:

1) Don't die
1) Shut down the enemy mid
2) Farm a lot
3) Level quickly
4) Find opportunity to gank (side lanes)

in short, first priority is gain relative advantage over their mid; second priority is money; third priority is getting stronger; fourth priority is helping the other lanes.

I haven't thought hard about this so it could be all wrong, that's just a quick starting place. What are your guys' thoughts?

Oh my god. Seems like you pretty much do not understand what mid stands for... Solo lanes offers faster level, more chance to get gold and a fast way to gank top or bot. Stating AD carry MUST mid is completely BS, since you measured only the gold gaining part. Stating that AD carries do not have escape abilites also a complete fail. Not to mention that if you have a jungler (and you really should) then top lane is also solo and usually much safer than midlane who can expect ganks from both sidelanes (though if its 1v2 only championswith decent satrter push abilites can pull it off like Mao, Morde, Cait, Kata, etc.).

Also it is really depending on who you face. A good teemo against a good cait on mid is almost hopeless while for example a veigar can melt an AP champions face easier. Not to mention that the 2v2 lanes should contain at least one ranged else you have to rely on luck and pray that the enemy do not have at least a single ranged there.

Imho the ideal staple is this:
1 jungler
1 AD carry on top
1 AP carry on mid
tank+support on bot

This way you have 2 magic, 2 physical and 1 tank.

If only mid is available as a solo lane
rule #1 The selected champion should have be a good counter against the enemy champion
rule #2 The selected champion should have a really good ultimate that can assist his/her team the most (ashe, TF, karthus, shen, etc).