Varus Build Guide by IAMANIKOLAS

Introduction

Hi and welcome to my first guide on MobaFire!

I'm IAMANIKOLAS and I play on EU West.

At first when I saw the leaks for Varus, I was very excited and started researching his abilities, and I fell in love way before his abilities were officially released, I had been waiting for an ability based AD carry for ages (Yes I've played Ezreal a lot, but playing him AD is not really my thing)

So when Varus got out, I bought him with the IP I had saved up in a long time, and after 30 minutes of people leaving the lobby cuz' they couldn't get to play him, I finaly got in my first match as Varus and believe me, that was NOT pretty, I had a terrible score and was more or less a huge disaster!

But this didn't knock me off, I played a few games with a few friends and started to get the rotation in my fingers, and everything was less confusing now, ever since I've been rocking botlane with my real life friend playing an awesome support!

That made me figure, that I should make an In-depth guide on how-to- Varus.

Please feel free to both up and downvote, but do me the favor and tell me what's good and bad about the guide, so I can improve it, and make this a better guide for all of you.

Happy reading


IAMANIKOLAS

Deadly Pro's and Terrible Cons!

Deadly Pros

Long range harras
Percentage based damege
Healing reduction
AoE slow
Game-breaking Ultimate
Synergizes well in teams

My thoughts on Varus

Ever since his small leaks a month ago or so, I was stunned, and as said in the introduction I researched his abilities and fell even more in love.

I personally think he's one of the top AD carries these days, because of his passive and amazing early game harras, he can easily zone someone, and has an easy time getting ganks from his Jungler due to his slow and ultimate, which have netted me a lot of early game kills.

If he's paired up with a CC-heavy support like Alistar or Leona, he can give the enemies a work for their money, and outfarm them.

I quickly found out that Piercing Arrow is not supposed to be charged when in direct combat, I genereally just instant cast it to proc my Blighted Quiver but more about that in the next section.

I also think that Varus is more of a Bursty AD-carry unlike a sustained DPS-Carry like Caitlyn the reasons for that is that his abilities proc Blighted Quiver which is around 10-12% max HP on a Carry since they wont be stacking a lot of defensive items, while other carries are more focused on Auto-attacks, you are a bit more Hybrid, and capable of doing both bursty damege, and sustained damege very nicely.

Mastery Explanation

TIER 1 OFFENSE
Summoner's Wrath I don't pick this mastery since it doesn't benefit neither of my summoner spells, now if you've choose to get Exhaust pick this over 1 point in Butcher
Brute Force I pick 3/3 in this simply because more AD = more damege, and we like that.
Butcher I grab 1/2 in butcher simply because I don't need neither Summoner's Wrath or Mental Force

TIER 2 OFFENSE
Alacrity Attackspeed is awesome for us, and it leads us into Weapon Expertise
Sorcery Cooldown reduction is decent if you've chosen the Greater Glyph of Scaling Cooldown Reduction glyphs, but otherwise I wouldn't recommend it.
demolotionist Take this if you need to take down towers faster, I wouldn't recommend it either.

TIER 3
Deadliness I take 4/4 because it increases my damege and it leads me to Lethality
Weapon Expertise This mastery is just pure awesome! 10% armor penetration, just something we love!
Arcane Knowledge This could work for you, to improve the damege of blighted arrow haven't tested this myself
Havoc Don't take this, the damege increasement is just not worth it for 3 mastery points

TIER 4 OFFENSE
Lethality 10% extra crit damege is awesomesauce!
Vampirism 3% Lifesteal is decent for early and late game, it gives you a bit more sustain in lane, nothing much.
Blast This is not an AP guide.

TIER 5 OFFENSE
Sunder +6 armor penetration, is very nice paired with your Greater Mark of desolation and your Greater Quintessence of desolation your enemies armor will be minimal!
Archmage This is still no AP-guide


TIER 6 OFFENSE
Executioner Simply amazing! 6% extra damege when the enemies are below 40% health! This helps you snipe down the enemies with Piercing Arrow when they're running off!


TIER 1 DEFENSE
Summoner's Resolve I pick up this talent because I have heal as summoner spell, this can and will save your life when you're low on HP.
Resistance Pick this if the enemies team is AP heavy, or you're going mid where you will meet loads of AP.
Hardiness 3/3 this helps you out quite a bit a long with your Greater Seal of Armor making you take less damege from the enemy carry at bot lane.
Tough Skin ... Well.. If you plan on jungling I gues.. No..

TIER 2 DEFENSE
Durability 4/4 more HP pr. level.. Why not?
Vigor It has a minor effect, but it could work if you're solo lane and out of pots. Not worth it in my opinion

TIER 1 UTILITY
Summoner's Insight I chose this because 15 seconds off Flash is a life safer, I cannot count the times I didn't have this mastery and I died because I had a few seconds cooldown on my Flash this is a mastery I wont play without.




I have tried messing around with other different builds and nothing really fits me, you can feel free and try out some other builds, and if you manage to find something useful, please don't hesitate to link me the build and tell me why you chose these talents.

Skill Explanation

Passive

Living Vengeance

On champion kill or assist, Varus gains 40% attack speed for 6 seconds.
On minion kill, Varus gains 20% attack speed for 3 seconds.

This passive is simply AMAZING! Imagine this scenario, you meet the enemy team at baron and a teamfight starts, you got into a great position and got down one of the enemies, you now attack 40% faster giving you a very nice boost against the other team, and since you are or should be the biggest threat on your team, your threat is now 40% faster, and believe me, 40% matters A LOT!

It also helps a lot on last hitting minions in my opinion. Have you ever tried seeing two minions on the edge of death, but you can only get to kill one of them, well this sweet passive can help you change this. Kill the first one and your chance to get the other one is now better.

This can also be used for some more intensive harras on the enemies, and make one shot into two, giving you ~8% max hp bonus damege on your next spell cast.






Piercing Arrow


Varus starts drawing back his next shot, gradually increasing its range and damage, then he fires it, dealing minimum 10 / 43 / 77 / 110 / 143 (+1.0 per attack damage) to maximum 15 / 65 / 115 / 165 / 215 (+1.6 per attack damage) physical damage, reduced by 15% per enemy hit (minimum 33%).

While preparing to shoot, Varus cannot autoattack or use abilities, and his movement speed is slowed by 20%. After 4 seconds, Piercing Arrow fails but refunds half its mana cost.


Now this is your bread and butter skill, this is your harras early game and late game, and a way for you to proc your Blighted Quiver

I max this skill first because it's damege is simply superior to both Hail of Arrows and Blighted Quiverearly game

This spell can easily take 1/3 of the enemy carries HP when fully charged, and it's not that easy to juke in my opinion.




Blighted Quiver

Varus' basic attacks deal bonus 10 / 14 / 18 / 22 / 26 (+0.25 per ability power) magic damage and apply Blight for 6 seconds (stacks 3 times).
Varus' other abilities detonate Blight, dealing magic damage equal to 2 / 2.75 / 3.5 / 4.25 / 5% (+0.01% per ability power) of the target's maximum health per stack..

This is the ability which makes you bursty, and this is what makes last-hitting a breeze.
There's not really much to say about this ability.




Hail of Arrows

Varus fires a hail of arrows that deal 65 / 105 / 145 / 185 / 225 (+0.6 per bonus attack damage) physical damage and desecrate the ground. Desecrated ground slows enemies' Movement Speed by 25 / 30 / 35 / 40 / 45% and reduces their healing and regeneration by 50%.

This is your only escape tool outside of summoner spells and Chain of Corruption, a well placed Hail of Arrows can slow down the opponents enough for you to get away. This spell can also be used to reduce the healing of heal-heavy teams ( Dr. Mundo, Soraka, Sion among others) by a whopping 50%.





Chain of Corruption

Varus flings out a tendril of corruption that deals 150 / 250 / 350 (+1.0 per ability power) magic damage and immobilizes the first enemy champion hit for 2 seconds.
The corruption then spreads towards nearby uninfected enemy champions, applying the same damage and immobilize if it reaches them. The corruption will continue to spread until there are no further unaffected targets in range.


This skill is simply amazing! Consider it a ranged Amumu's Curse of the Sad Mummy!
When I read the ability description, I thought this would be a one-target immobolize because it would be easy to outrun the proc, well guess what? - It's not, pair this lovely spell with Hail of Arrows and this is almost a guaranteed hit on a clunked up enemy team.

Rune Explanation

The reason I choose Armor Penetration over flat AD-marks and Quints, is because they scale way better into lategame, and even earlygame this will make you hit most casters like they have no armor at all, remember this is my personal choice, you can pick whatever you feel is the better benefit for you.

The reason why I choose flat armor seals, is because the current Meta places an AD carry and a Support at bot, the support isn't much of a damege dealer, but the Carry is, and therefor I aim for some defense which scales decently into late game

The Magic Resist pr. level is because I tend to have troubles against casters, since they are able to burst me down in seconds, this may help me survive and take them down while they still have cooldowns.





Greater Mark of Critical Damage I had one look on these and on paper, these look very good for your lategame. I haven't personally tried them yet, but I could see this working if you're no fan of Armor Penetration.

Greater Mark of Attack Speed Some people swear by attackspeed, and I see the point, but for early game, I would personally not benefit from these at all since my main goal is to last hit minions, these could work to get your Blighted Quiver stacked up faster.

Greater Mark of Hybrid Penetration Not a set of runes I've ever used, but I could see this work on Varus as the only AD carry, because of his Blighted Quiver being such a big part of his damege, but it's dealing magic damege. I personally haven't tried this, but this is definitely something I would consider.

Greater Mark of Attack Damage The suggested runes by Phreak in the Champion Spotlight, these bad boys makes last hitting an even easier task for Varus, aswell as som early poke damege.





Greater Seal of Vitality These guys are gonna give you some extra HP every time you level up, and it ends up to 175 with 9 of these, this doesn't sound like much, but it can save your from the last tick of Ignite or even Karthus' Requiem, don't underestimate these.

Greater Seal of Replenishment Varus is a very mana-hungry champion, so if you feel you can stay away from harm, and you want to be able to spam your abilities a bit more, then by any means get these, as they will help your mana in lane a lot.


Greater Glyph of Scaling Cooldown Reduction I really tried to find more Glyphs for Varus but I simply couldn't find anything that could match either these or the Magic Resist pr. level that I use. Anyways, these guys can and will help you, get a few more Blighted Quiver stack proc, because you will be able to spam your abilities a bit more.


Greater Quintessence of Attack Speed Again some people swear by attackspeed, and if you pair these up with the Greater Mark of Attack Speed you will have a whopping 25% attackspeed at level one, not considering masteries.

Greater Quintessence of Hybrid Penetration Again as we saw on the Marks, these fellas will again increase the magic aswell as the physical portion of your damege. I still haven't tried these out yet, so please let me know if you try these out and how they work for you.

Greater Quintessence of Critical Damage More Critical Strike damege, these can work for your lategame, but the early game effect on these would be minimal, I haven't tried these out.

Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed Varus is generally very slow, these quints can help him out, whether it's from reaching point a, to b faster, chasing or escaping, these can help you.

Greater Quintessence of Attack Damage Again Phreaks personal choice, not really my cup of tea, but I wont be the judge, this is my personal preference and I wouldn't use these.

Summoner Spells Explanation

The reason I choose Flash + Heal is simply because, my teammate is usually support and he runs Flash + Exhaust giving our team the damege reduction, as well as giving me an "oh! sh*t!"-button to push.

If he would run Clairvoyance I would of course grab Flash + Exhaust

The reason I pick Flash is because, this is our get-outta-jail-card, we can teleport over walls to either chase or escape.

Use this to get into a better position to get off your ulti or to get behind your tanks when caught out of position. The possibilities are endless!

Starting items

I generally tend to start with Boots of Speed and 3 x Health Potion simply because I need the movement, to chase and escape, and I need the potions for some sustain as well as countering Ignite or other Damege-Over-Time. These starting items generally give me enough sustain in lane till I can afford a B. F. Sword. If you happen to have a bad game and can't afford B. F. Sword at your first recall, go ahead and buy 1-3 Doran's Blade because they simply give you a lot more than what you pay for, and you can just sell these guys whenever you can get something else.

You could also start with Doran's Blade IF you play with a support that can heal you ((i.e. Taric, Soraka, Kayle or Karma among others) otherwise I wouldn't recommend it.

Other viable Items

Alright, you've gotten into the game and we're 15 minutes in and some people on your enemies team is fed, you will need to get some early advantages over him or her.

Here is a list of items, I would personally use against certain opponents.


Cloak and Dagger

These fellas will help you against enemies who are very CC reliant, and you just REFUSES to buy Mercury's Treads this can and will save your life against a very fed Sion using his Cryptic Gaze from afar.


Executioner's Calling

This item is godlike when fighting a heavy heal team (i.e. Swain, Dr. Mundo, Soraka and more) The on-use effect on this item is SO good, I cannot express it enough! You WILL need this against the above mentioned champions and a handful others. This will make their healing be reduced by 50%, that's an ignite without damege for free!


Frozen Mallet

Buy this item if you badly need the slow for kiting, or you really lack the extra HP it provides, I tend to buy this item when I need to kite certain assassins or good chasers.


Last Whisper

I know this item is in the main build, but sometimes people wont be buying armor to counter you, either because they don't see you as a threat or they're simply dumb. Anyways, this item will make you slice through their armor and is generally an awesome kit for you to have when you need to take down that Rammus or Shen


Madred's Bloodrazor

This item is sent from HEAVEN against HP-stacking tanks ( Dr. Mundo), you will shred through their HP and get high attackspeed as well, this item is GODLIKE (pun intended)


Maw of Malmortius

A rather new item to the League, and I see potential in this, extra damege when you're low on HP - this is a big "DON'T ATTACK THIS TARGET!!!"-sign. This item also provides a great spell shield, blocking magic damege when you get low on HP. I would get this item when I'm focused by an AP heavy team.


The Black Cleaver

I get this item when I'm playing against mostly bruisers or tanky DPS as Riven, Shyvana or Irelia as they wont be stacking that much armor against me, but generally i prefere Last Whisper over this.


Quicksilver Sash

Improved Cleanse + Magic resist in one item, this is amazing! Use this if you play against Malzahar, Warwick or other CC-heavy enemies.

Good supports for Varus

Leona

My favorite support for Varus simply because she has so much Crowd Control!
Zenith Blade is a 1 second immobolize, which a good Leona usually pairs up with Shield of Daybreak for a Stun. If you look at her passive aswell being Sunlight you can read that everytime she uses an ability on an enemy minion or champion YOU deal bonus damege by attacking that target, this is increasing your damege aswell as making lasthitting a lot easier if she uses abilities on minions. These 3 things alone are simply amazing just for you!

Pair up these 3 wonders with her Eclipse which is an armor + magic resist increase for her, aswell as some AoE damege will make her tanky enough to tank for you as well as increase the total damege output. Now, let's take a look at her ulti: Solar Flare this stuff just got serius! Imagin the CC-chain you two could make.

Zenith Blade into Shield of Daybreak into Chain of Corruption into Solar Flare into Hail of Arrows tell me, which champion is capable of escaping that early game?

I personally prefere to play with a Leona as support, simply for these reasons mentioned above, everything she has improves my game by a lot!



Janna

A very popular support champion, which is very understandable!
Janna also brings a lot of crowdcontrol to the team as well as an ultimate capable of turning a teamfight into your favour!

Tailwind gives your team a global movement speed bonus, whenever Janna is alive, and this is really good for both chasing and escaping!

Pair her Howling Gale up with your Chain of Corruption and you have a very nice amount of CC. But that's not enough, Zephyr will slow down your opponents enough for her to reach the front of her opponents to Monsoon them right back to you, or getting them away from you!

Now take, all of the above and pair that up with Eye Of The Storm which at level 9 is a free B. F. Sword for you!

A very nice support for Varus indeed!


Alistar

Another great support for you! This bad boy can tank, he can damege and he can crowd control like no other! With his Pulverize he can knock up the enemies and with Headbutt he can either push them right back to you, or away from you! With his Triumphant Roar he gives you a nice heal, now he's no Soraka on that part, but this heal is strong enough for you to have decent sustain in lane as long as he has the mana.

Now with his ultimate Unbreakable Will he is the ultimate towerdiver, and able to Flash in and Headbutt an enemy right back to you, and then knocking them up in the air with Pulverize

This is a support I havent played with myself as Varus, but I've played him myself, and the combo's I can make with a Varus is unmatchable.


Soraka

Now this support is know for her healing, which is a job she does quite well! her Astral Blessing is healing you and increasing your armor, making you more durable in direct combat, and this is not to be underestimated and der Infuse gives you some nice mana, making her one of the (if not the) best support for sustain.

With Infuse she's also able to silence an enemy, imagin this a Soraka silencing an Alistar just before he Headbutts you away from your tower, giving you a kill.

Her ability Starcall is a low damege AOE spell, on a very short cooldown, which reduces the Magic Resist on enemies hit which stacks up, this gives you some bonus damege to your Blighted Quiver which is not something to pass up on.

Her ultimate Wish is another heal, but this one is global, and it makes her able to save your a.ss even when she's back shopping.

A decent support in my opinion, but I'd personally rather play with the 3 above.


Karma

A very underestimated support, she is capable of shielding you for nice amounts as well as healing you for quite a bit.

Her Heavenly Wave brings two effects, the damege portion and when Mantra is active, it's also healing any ally in a cone, so make sure to stand between her and enemies when you need to take someone down quickly as well as getting healed. Her Spirit Bond also brings two effects, when using it on you, Karma as well as you will have your movement speed increased, and anything struck by the line between you two, will take damege and get slowed. When she uses Spirit Bond on an enemy, her movement speed will increase and the enemies, slowed by the same amount, now any enemy striking the line between her and her target will take damege and also get slowed.

This can give you the speed boost you need to chase an enemy down and even slow them.

She also brings Soul Shield to the table, which shields you for a solid amount, but when Mantra is activated, it will deal damege around the shielded target, this makes her burst very scary and she is very hybrid. She needs a bit farm to be viable late game, so when you don't need it, you benefit your team the most by letting her get a kill or two, or even a few minion waves.

A decent support again, but I personally wouldn't choose her.


Taric

A support I am not too familiar with, he does seem to bring some benefits to Varus though.
Imbue is a healing spell, which is healing himself more than others, it's still good to help you stay in lane for a longer period of time. Shatter is passively increasing your armor whenever you are near Taric, when he activates the ability he will deal damege, and reduce the armor of enemies struck, now this is quite interesting, more durability for you in lane, and armor reduction for the enemies in one spell!

Now if we take a look at Dazzle we'll see a stun for us to chain with our crowd controls, this stun is dealing more damege the closer the enemies are to Taric this can easily be paired up with your Chain of Corruption, Hail of Arrows or just raw damege. Pretty deadly in my opinion! Taric's ultimate is Radiance on active Taric deals damege and creates an aura increasing AP and AD for his team! - Now this is great utility right there! Up to 70 bonus AP and AD! That's almost two [[B. F. Sword]s! Pretty nice if you ask me!


Lulu

A rather new lille fella to join the ranks of the League of Legends, and she's doing quite well! Her Help, Pix! shields your for a nice amount as well as making Pix stuck to you for the duration of the shield, over that time Lulu's passive Pix, Faerie Companion is now active on your, which is simply making Pix attack every time you attack! Her Glitterlance is a skillshot nuke, dealing damege and slowing the enemies by 80% for a few seconds, this is amazing for you to pair up with any of your crowd controlls!

whimsey is a movement boost, as well as an ap boost for you! Although when Lulu uses it on an enemy, she will deal damege and show vision of them! This is great when playing against that nasty Twitch or Evelynn! Now let's take a look at her ultimate Wild Growth this spell is simply amazing! All though it's better on a Melee, but it can benefit you a lot! First of all, it's an on use HP boost, which knocks up nearby enemies and gives you an aura reducing the movement speed of enemies! AAAND! it makes you a lot bigger!

Early Game (1-10)

At this phase of the game, your goal is to farm, farm, farm and farm some more.
When occasions happen, and your enemies are overextending or pushing your lane badly, call for your jungler, and chain your crowdcontrols together, and take them down.

Generally aim for around 100-150 CS (creep score - minion kills) before the mid-game, so you can have some decent items.

Mid Game (10-15)

At this point a few towers have been destroyed, and you have some decent gear and you are starting to be a threat to the enemies.

The fights for dragon and baron now starts, remember to make sure they're both warded, if neither your jungler or support does it, or refuses to do it, it's your job as the better player to do it.

Your goal in this part of the game is to stick together as a team most of the time, so you're not getting 1 v 5'd making the next teamfight a 4v5 and with the lack of a carry.

Your goal is to push together as a team, win teamfights (more on this later) and control the dragon and baron.

Late Game (16-18)

Now everything just got serius, tanks are durable, carries hurt and assassins eats you in seconds. This is the part of the game where EVERYTHING matters, if you lose a teamfight, chances are you lost the game.

At this point you need to stay calm in teamfights and keep your focus, this is key to winning teamfights, you and your team needs to focus on bringing them down one by one, and it's your job to do the damege, by focusing down the other enemies heavy damege dealers, you have in most cases won the battle.

A rule of thumb is this priority list AD carry > Assassin > AP carry > Support > off tank > Tank

Keep that in mind before the teamfight, and figure out with your team who's the biggest threat, don't go for easy kills such as the hardly geared support, focus down the fed Vayne or Caitlyn because it's the carrys doing all the damege.

Last-hitting

Alright, most people know how this work out, but I've seen numerous of players not being able to do this, so I'll try to give a few tips and tricks on how to successfully last hitting, and let you know, why this is so important!

First of all, last hitting is relatively easy, try it out against bots, just for practice.
Don't hit the minion AT ALL before it's at very low HP, and low enough for you to finish it with just ONE attack. The reason for this is, you simply DON'T get gold from minions that are killed around you.

Now let's say that a kill on an enemy champion is worth 300 gold, now that's just two minion waves, two or three minion waves are worth the same money as a champion kill, so tell me, which way is the easiest to get geared?

Also when you see two or more minions low enough to one shot, don't hesitate to use a low mana cost ability to get one or two more, that's okay.

Considering the matches i watch on stream the carries usually have 250+ CS by the end of the match, you might say that that is rather hard to pull off and I'm certain that it is, but it's doable, and if they can, so can you!

It's all about the practice, and once this is figured out, it will be a breeze!

Summary

Well this is my guide for Varus, and it's in no way finished.

I spent a few hours to complete this, and I think the information should help the average player.

If you read through it all you have my deepest thanks, and please feel free to leave a comment below and either up or downvote depending on what you have learned, please feel free to give me some constructive critics, cuz' anything that can improve a guide can generally improve the Mobafire community.

I'd like to thank jhoijhoi for his awesome guide on how to make a guide on mobafire, please feel free to visit his profile, and read his guides!

Thanks to Bignokki for being an awesome support as Leona! Many thanks to you for making me publish this guide!

Thanks again for reading this

IAMANIKOLAS