Is roaming as mid to a side lane actually that effective?

You could watch PekinWoof's youtube videos, he's a roaming mid/artillery mage kind of player that could help you understand roam timings. His recent videos are more troll-ish builds in normal games but you can go back a month to watch challenger gameplay. In this situation, iirc, he has mentioned several times that he likes to rush boots 2 because it helps so much for roams. What he also does is "semi-roams", where he'll hover to the scuttle crab position and see if the enemy commits, otherwise goes back to lane. Finally, he'll also just follow his jungler if he's near to setup a 3-man play/dive top or 4-man bottom, since the success rate for roams is way higher coordinating with the jungler.

I'm sure you can pick up more things watching him, I don't play mid lane so I'm not perfectly focusing on his explanations.

More minions crashing = more time. Cannon minions crashing = more time. Try slow pushing 2 or 3 waves before crashing and roaming. Don't waste time after a roam and make sure you reset and head back to lane.

Most of the time a high impact roam is worth more than sacrificing a wave and a turret plate, especially as an assassin.

Meanwhile Garen players running from top to bot to get a double kill then come back to lane kill the freezing fiora that lost 40% of her Hp trying to freeze 3 waves HOOOOLY

Top lane is super snowball. Bottom lane is super critical to your team's lategame. Both objectives depend a bit on those lanes. And if that's not enough picking up a kill personally is very valuable.

Don't forget you can just shadow your jungler for one play, vastly increasing the odds of success for ganks/invades.

If you're struggling to find timings for roams that's more about wave management, or your opponent might just have too much waveclear to roam unpunished; still if you decide an extra kill or objective, that's worth a wave.

If you haven't figured out how to actually complete the roams to side lanes, I'd start off by shadowing your jungler when you have nothing to do in lane. If you get the timings down (especially 3:15 for scuttle), you can have a huge impact without missing any CS, and even hiding off map in the river can force the side lane to play more cautiously.

Over time you might realize exactly how much time you have to do your roams and how to crash larger waves to extend that time.

As an adc main yes, it depends on the champion but after a certain point in the laning phase you get chills whenever the enemy alkali disappears, it definitely conditions your decision making, it's like a second jungler. If they are underfed it doesn't matter, they are probably trying to compensate by killing you so yeah.

Honestly, you don't have to go roam in top or bot lane when you have a lot to do in your lane. If there's not much left and you're almost free in the mid, maybe after killing the opponent or once you've cleared the wave and you don't have enough gold for an item, then you can think about roaming. You also have to keep in mind that when you go to the other lane, it has to be advantageous to the team. What you can't ignore, no matter what is the fights that happen in the jungle and when your opponent leaves your lane. And moving till the fight in jungle won't take a lot of time. Make sure you got your wards placed whenever possible. Make sure to watch the map often. Don't mute the chat preferably, because signals from the jungler are important.

if the roam went well then its worth having to answer their mids push. otherwise u would never roam, can't have your cake and eat it too

I only recently started roaming after picking up galio. It's definitely worth it. You get some gold and so does your other lane. and, if you set up the wave correctly, you can get back in time to catch the next

Yes, for example, your bot lane is pushed way in to tower and the enemy laners are low, but your jungle is top taking herald or ganking top. The enemy jungle is responding top, and you have your wave pushed. Your opponent is too low to follow or just backed. Potential double kill bot, or at least 2 kills you can be a part of that could mean the difference between your bot lane being successful or not. That kind of thing can win or lose the whole game.

Make sure you roam during a pushed cannon wave. The cannon takes significantly longer to remove, or will sap the enemy laners mana.

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I like to think of roaming as an investment into late game. Junglers dominate early game, mids early/mid game then adcs late. They are very easy to mess up but can be highly rewarding if you get a jinx for example a kill or two from a tower dive. Also really depends on the champ you play and the lane you’re roaming to if they have dashes, shields etc so it’s not always the correct play