Janna Build Guide by Halipupu

Introduction to the Guide

I play support characters a lot and I try out different builds for different characters. Unlike most of the support players especially in Ranked, I actually think about the character I'm playing and build accordingly.
That means I actually try make a build suited for the character, not just stack gold per/10 items and never make any difference which character you are playing.

There are many nice Janna builds on MobaFire and this is just how I play her. Most of the builds don't really differ much, but still there are some slight differences how people see she should be played. All of them are just as correct, but I'd like to share my way of playing her.

Supporting with Janna

Pros and Cons

Pros:

+ good disabler
+ very fast, therefore an escape artist
+ very good shield which also works for your own turrets
+ shield not only blocks damage, but gives a huge AD boost
+ even tho best as a support, can hold lane alone for a bit
+ doesn't need expensive items to be useful
+ versatile skins

Cons:

- early game very squishy
- full support babysitting can be boring
- don't have a real heal
- seriously low damage
- can't win alone/can't save everyone
- skins in game look like she has broken her hips

Masteries

Masteries are pretty much the same as all my other supports (excluding Soraka and Leona) use.

• From the DEfense tree get some extra HP from Durability and Veteran's Scars
• Some extra armor and magic resist from Hardiness and resistance]]
• Summoner's Insight and Mastermind for shorter cooldowns on your summoner spells, Artificer for shorter cooldowns on your usable items ingame
• More gold from Greed and Wealth
• Awareness as a filler mastery gives you some extra experience
• Lastly get Pickpocket for auto attack harassing.

Rune Choices

• Greater Mark of Attack Damage runes are great for harassing with auto attacks early game. Can be changed into armor runes.
• Greater Seal of Armor runes provide you the necessary armor needed when laning bot lane against a proper AD carry (who will harass you). Helps throughout the game as well
• Extra magic resist from Greater Seal of Magic Resist runes is useful throughout the game, but CDR runes are also very much usable. I just prefer defense since you get much CDR from items eventually anyway.
• As a support you don't farm so you'll benefit from extra gold income through Greater Quintessence of Gold runes.

Summoner Spells

I'm gonna make this short: Flash gives you a chance to escape from tricky situation where your fast movement speed doesn't help, but it also gives you a possibility to jump into enemies and ulti them apart for your allies to pick them up and kill them.
Even shorter: pick Exhaust or Heal depending on if you want to heal allies or disable enemies. Most people prefer Exhaust.

Skills and Using them Tactically

Janna's passive is what makes her so great asset to the team, it increases allied movement speed by 3%. So if you know your team will have slow characters, Janna is a good choice for support, or if the opposite team has speedy characters like Master Yi which will give your allies a slightly bigger chance of catching up on them or running away from them.

Howling Gale is your main disable skill, which you must not use for farming yourself. Use it to disable enemy masses to either allow your team to chase them or for escaping purposes.
Howling Gale scales quite well with AP and fully loaded will do a nice amount of damage so avoid hitting creep waves fully with it, because you don't want to steal minions from your carry unless they are back in the base and you're left alone. Remember that using this skill on minion waves will make your lane push, which you shouldn't be doing.
This is the last skill to level up, because you should only use it do disable.

Eye of the Storm is your main skill as Janna and should be always leveled first right after giving two points to Zephyr for a slight speed boost. The thing with Janna is that you really don't need much items, but she scales so well with AP - especially Eye Of The Storm.
With effective use of this shield you don't need to stack AP, but you can concentrate on supporting team with all of your skills. Always remember the order of importance when using Janna's shield:

• AD carry who gets most focused and does the most damage is your number one priority since your shield will boost their attack damage
• second highest damage dealer comes after, usually AP carry
• yourself only if the other ones are dead or beyond saving
• tanks like Leona and Amumu will be your last choice to save, because they don't deal much of a damage and should survive with their tanky items.

Eye Of The Storm can be used to protect turrets and you should be using it regularly when enemies are hitting your turrets. It doesn't make too high of a difference, but sometimes it's about a few hits whether or not you'll lose the turret.

Zephyr is one of my personal favourites on Janna and I always level it up second right after Eye Of The Storm, not for damage but for the slow and the passive it gives to Janna. This skill is what allows Janna to move so fast. I think it was nerfed, because last time I played it only gave 4% movement speed extra at lvl1 which is considerably less than what it used to be (or maybe I remember completely wrong), but as it scales you'll be benefitting from it regardless. Just that you're not as speedy with tier 1 shoes as you used to be at early levels, but it's completely fine.
Use slow on the enemy that will most likely try to escape, but if you're the one running you probably should NOT use this skill as it will drop your movement speed to the level of other characters while in cooldown.

Just because Monsoon heals a bit, doesn't make Janna a healer. I mainly use this skill to push enemies back from my teammates or closer to them. Therefore it's mainly for disabling enemies, not for healing. Sometimes when you are not focused too hard, let it channel and heal your teammates but most often it's simply used as a disrupting ability that can cancel other ulties like Malzahar's and Nunu's. Also this is a very nice skill to use to knockback sneaky enemies (assassins) that can get close using stealth (if you don't have your Oracle yet). That's your main focus with Monsoon - heal is simply a bonus.
Note: Be careful with the timing of your ulti - you don't want to ruin for example your teams Amumu's ulti or Kennen ulti by knocking back enemies when they use their skills.

Starter Items

Simply the best way to start as a support is to get 2 wards (with Wealth mastery) and Faerie Charm with Rejuvination Bead. You'll get mana and hp regen (don't need potions) and Philosopher's Stone costs 340 gold after that. You'll get it by the time you're lvl3-4. Just don't let enemies harass you and you won't need potions.
If you like to let your enemies harass you get Faerie Charm, 3-4 wards and HP potions.

Core Items

Buy wards.
Get Philosopher's Stone as fast as you can to get a good sustain and extra coins. Afterwards follow with either Ksge's Lucky Pick for some more coins or Sightstone or get both to get coins and free wards. Regardless of Sightstone...
BUY WARDS.

Items

Coming soon(ish)...

Your Role in the Team

People think usually that being a support is boring, because early game it solely consist of babysitting which people mistakenly think is only afk sitting in the bush. In reality you keep an eye for opportunities to kill your laning enemies, keep on eye for other lanes and ping if you see they're about to get ganked. If you know you can't kill the opposite laning champions, then you make it safe for your lane partner to keep farming by shielding them and harassing the enemies. Zoning the enemies would be the optimal thing to do, but I haven't been able to do it with Janna all that often, but if you manage to do that, you can keep harassing them under their turret with your Howling Gale.


Janna is a good character, because she doesn't need any gear unlike most supports, in my opinion. People don't by any real gear to Soraka, Sona, Taric even though they would be so much better if you bought even a slightly bit of survivability, AP and loads of CDR to help with skill spamming.
The good thing with Janna is that gear doesn't make that big of a difference. You can still disable and even though her skills have nice AP ratios, especially Eye Of The Storm, you don't need to get anything else than items that benefit your team most like Aegis of the Legion, Oracle's Elixir and Wards.
Therefore do not farm, because it doesn't make a difference to you. You can take minions whenever your lane partner is at base, dead or elsewhere and you should always try to defend your turret with Howling Gale. Otherwise don't farm.

Early Game

This is how I ward when I play Janna depending on which side I am.
For some epic counter jungling put Sight Wards on the opposite teams red buff and blue buff early till mid game. Mainly ward your own bot bush.
Vision Wards are slightly more expensive, therefore use those mainly for dragon and Baron to see their wards which you won't need after getting Oracle's Elixir.

Mid Game

You can ward the routes to dragon and your own jungle. If you dare you can go ward their buffs for some ganks. The spots for wards apply also for using CV, but mainly you should CV whatever your team wants you to unless it's on cooldown. This is when you start destroying enemy wards with your Oracle's Elixir.

Late Game

Ward Baron with Vision Ward as well as routes to Baron. Ward your own jungle and never face check, always use CV first to make sure it's safe to go warding. If you lost your Oracle, buy another one and another one and another one.

Summary

This is my way of playing Janna and even though there are other great ways of playing her, I wish you'd try this too. Regardless let me know how you feel about the build and comment on the guide. I'm open to critisism like always and suggestions to improve the guide are just as welcome.

Thank you for reading!

Update Log

7/5/2012
- Edited Item build section and added Items section
- Edited chapters order a bit - nothing major

13/1/2011
- Corrected the BBCode error in Skills section, obviously you can't cursivate and make a list at the same time with them both working
- Made Summoner Spells section
- Added Babysitting sub-section to Your role in the team -section

29/12/2011
- Quick edit on the runes, because I facepalmed hard when I realized all my runes were marks -.-
Note: More editing oncoming when I'm not semi-drunk and tired.

22/11/2011
- Edited Masteries to fit the current mastery tree and rewrote the masteries section
- Switched Item build slightly and removed first build
- Rewrote Runes section to fit the new runes I gave to her
Note: I'll be editing this guide further and make a separate section for Summoner Spells and add a sub section to Your role as a support -section concerning gameplay