Hello, my name is Amoneychan and this will be an in-depth ARAM guide. I have been playing ARAM since it came out and have over 2000 wins! I mainly played ARAM because it was different and less stressful than ranked or normals. As I played more, my mmr increased and I found myself playing with challenger players from time to time. In this guide, I will provide a detailed overview of ARAM to someone that has never played before. While ARAM is mainly for casual fun, this guide will educate you on how to win and improve your ARAM game for those who played ARAM before. Note that this guide assumes you know the basics of League of Legends and have played in Summoner's Rift before. Also, be sure to check out the tier list down below to see how good the champion you got really is.

The reason I made this guide is to show ARAM is more than just a novel mode. ARAM, in my opinion, teaches players more about team compositions, itemization, champion diversity, and teamfighting than Rift. Rather than just learning how to cs and lane, ARAM jumps straight to the action. Along with winning more, I hope the guide will make you appreciate ARAM more and maybe put some thought into the mode itself. Feel free to leave suggestions for the tier list and ask me questions about build paths in ARAM.

For those unfamiliar with ARAM , ARAM stands for “All random, all mid”. Originally, ARAM was played on Summoner’s Rift in a custom game with all players having to get a random champion, go to mid lane, and not recall. However, in May 2013, the Howling Abyss was released and included the ARAM game mode that has stayed ever since.

So let's talk about the Howling Abyss map itself. You will see there are only two turrets before the inhibitor, but everything else is the same as one lane in Summoner's Rift. Also, on the lower edge of the bridge, there are 4 health relics. These give health and mana to any player who passes over them. Additionally, they drop a redemption like circle that gives additional health and mana to all those in the circle. The relics closest to the middle spawn at 1:45 and the relics closer to the fountain spawns at 2:30. All relics respawn every 90 seconds after being taken. You will also find Poro's and these can be fed Poro-Snax. If you feed the Poro enough, it will burst and make more Poros!



So what is ARAM on Howling Abyss? In ARAM, you will be randomly assigned a champion from a pool that includes champions you own and the last 3 free champion rotations. Instead of the lock in button, you will see a reroll button. Rerolls are earned from playing games in ARAM and is capped at 2. Using a reroll does what it says; you get a new champion at random. Like in draft, you can trade with people if you both have those champions. When you reroll a champion, you will see the old champion goes to a bar at the top. This is the bench. You and your teammates can freely trade with these champions, provided you have them of course. You will also notice there is no Smite, Clairvoyance, or Teleport, but there is a spell called Mark/Dash. This is similar to Lee Sin’s Sonic Wave in that the first move marks the opponent, which grants vision, and the second can be reactivated to dash to the target like Resonating Strike. You can also buy skin boosts for your whole team to have skins and extra blue essence!

Now into the game, you will notice you start at level 3 and with 1400 gold. You will also notice you cannot recall and must die in order to shop. Additionally, going back to the fountain will not heal you. The objective is simple; break down the turrets, inhibitor, and nexus just like in Summoner’s Rift. You will also notice some items are are not in ARAM. You will gain gold and experience passively in ARAM, so if you disconnect, you will not be behind that much. That’s basically the game, but there are a lot more intricacies in ARAM so keep reading!

So before the game even begins, you have to focus on team composition. Team composition is very important in ARAM and can often be the deciding factor. I have had plenty of games where the loading screen might as well been the end screen. The game is based off of sieging and teamfights. Having a composition with little poke, waveclear, and turret pressure will probably spell a lost. So the moment you get your champion, look at everyone else. For an idea of who is good and who is bad, you can check my tier list. Note that the tier list is a vacuum pick and does not take into account for your team composition. You may not be a fantastic Shen, but if your team has no tank, but lots of damage dealers, you might need to keep him. Use your rerolls wisely, but don't be afraid to reroll and save your teammate from a low tier pick. You cap at 2 rerolls and can gain rerolls in a few games. If one of your teammates has a horrible champion, you can reroll for them and trade back, hoping they have the champ you rerolled into of course.

You also want to mix up your damage on the team. Even though poke heavy champions are usually good, they are often times all AP. This will work well in the early to mid game, but once the opponent gets tanky, they will be very hard to kill. Luckily, some champions can go either AP or AD. This makes champions like Ezreal and Kai'Sa very good picks.

Lastly, you want to identify whether your team will be engaging or poking. I have a section about this is greater detail further down, but you should be looking to see if you have any ways to engage a fight should you need to or what forms of waveclear and poke you have.

The next important decision in ARAM are summoner spells. Summoner spell selection are very important in ARAM and there is no set choice to which are the best. However, there are some guidelines you should follow:

Mark/Dash is great for dive champions including assassins, bruisers, and hard engagers. If your champion is melee, you should probably get it.

Flash is a common all-around spell that can be used defensively or offensively, so pretty much anyone can take this.

Ghost is a good spell for immobile champions like Orianna or Viktor. It is especially great for teamfights to run to the right when you have an engage ally like Malphite that snowballs and ults and is like ten miles away.

Ignite can be used to help take down healers and tanks. Great if no one on your team can build morello or mortal reminder.

Heal is good for ranged, poke champions to give sustain and movement speed to survive divers.

Cleanse is good for high damage dealers that are immobile.

Exhaust is a good supportive spell to counter the assassins diving onto the pokers. If your team lacks good cc, taking an exhaust can help deal with these assassins.

Clarity sees decent use as there is no backing and with the change to Morellonomicon no longer giving mana with takedowns. So, if you run out of mana, clarity can solve your problems. Mana hungry casters should take one of this.

Basically, all spells have some use and choosing the correct ones can make or break a game. You should know that summoner spells have a 40% cooldown reduction on ARAM, so don't be afraid to go for that flash hook!

With the new Runes Reforged, there are some runes that are very strong in ARAM. Noticably, any rune that benefits from kills are very strong in ARAM. I will go through each tree and say which ones to get and which ones to avoid.

Precision: Perhaps the strongest tree mainly for one tier. For the tier 1, I would get Coup de Grace. From tier 2, get whatever your champion benefits the most from. From tier 3, you HAVE to get Triumph or Presence of Mind. If this is your secondary tree, I would get Triumph or Presence of Mind and then if you benefit from tier 2 stats, take that. If not, take Coup de Grace from tier 1. For the keystone, both all options are fine, although I prefer Lethal Tempo and Fleet Footwork for the damage or sustain.

Domination: Also a very strong tree. Tier 1: Ravenous Hunter or Ultimate Hunter is probably the best. Tier 2: Eyeball Collection is the must because the others are not useful on ARAM. Tier 3: if you have a movement ability, Sudden Impact is great, otherwise Cheap Shot is pretty good too. You can also run Taste of Blood and Ravenous Hunter to get plenty of sustain, allowing you go forgo lifesteal. For keystone, Dark Harvest is a great all around keystrone, despite getting nerfed.

Sorcery: Tier 1: Scorch is the only good one. For tier 2, a I usually prefer Transcendence, but Absolute Focus is good if you have a poke comp. For tier 3, Manaflow Band and Nimbus Cloak are the best ones. And for the keystone, Arcane Comet is usually the better one, unless you have shields/heals, then go with Summon Aery.

Resolve: Tier 1: Unflinching is pretty good along with snowball for tenacity, while Revitalize is good if you have heals or shields. In tier 2, Second Wind is usually the best for sustain. Tier 3: Font of Life is good if you have cc, while Demolish is good is you don't. For the keystone, Aftershock is great if you have cc. Otherwise, Guardian is a good secondary option.

Inspiration: Probably the weakest tree. Mainly only for klepto users. Tier 1: Cosmic Insight is probably the best. Tier 2: Biscuit Delivery is pretty good for the sustain. Tier 3: Perfect Timing is ok. Hextech Flashtraption isn't as good as snowball is almost always better. Magical Footwear is typically the best for this tier, since boots aren't super important in ARAM and you won't need them early. For keystone, Kleptomancy is probably the only reason you would go this tree. Even then, klepto is worse on ARAM as gold is generated passively and you can't utilize the extra gold until you die and shop.

Knowing which items to start with is important because 1400 gold is not a number you should be used to. Luckily, all items are under the starting cost. However, you do not know when you are going to die and get to shop again. Therefore, learning which items to buy and start out with is very important.

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First off, I will say at least 1 potion is highly recommended. Potions will keep you alive and useful through the early game. This is important because you want to stay alive long enoguh to score enough gold for those big ticket items. After around 10 minutes, potions will stop becoming of use, so you should stop buying them then. With mana potions being gone, you only really need 1 or 2 health pots. Just with whatever money you have leftover, buy a few pots. Refillable potions are an option too. Basically, if I have 150 gold, I get a refill, but if I have less, I get normal ones. If I plan on building Warmog's Armor later, I do get Rejuvenation Bead on tanks too.

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Boots have low priority on ARAM because they give zero combat stats and the movement speed isn't as important as there are no roams and returning to base. Mobility Boots are really bad as you are in constant fight mode, but the best boots are probably Mercury's Treads as tenacity is really good for teamfights. Again, don't focus much on boots and get your core items first. Only buy boots if you have the extra gold.

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If your champion shields or heals, then chalice is a great choice. Chalice is very good in ARAM as Athene's Unholy Grail gives both sustain for yourself and sustain for you team. Also, the small amount of magic resist can help deal with poke early on. Starting with chalice and an Amplifying Tome is a great start.

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Lost Chapter is great for any high damage mages that is looking for mana and cdr. The remaining gold allows you to get 2 pots. Luden's Tempest is usually the item you want to go if you start Lost Chapter and is great for the poke and splash damage for waveclear. In terms of Lost Chapter over Tear of the Goddess, if you champion cannot spam spells frequent enough, I would get Lost Chapter.

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Tear of the Goddess is good for champions with low cooldowns and may get in range to need a shield from Seraph's Embrace or can use the Muramana damage like ( Sona, Zilean, Jayce, Ezreal). Tear of the Goddess is a good first item as you can charge it right away, and it charges faster than usual because of quick charge. You want to upgrade the tear faster than on summoner’s rift because you don’t know when you can back to finish it. A good number to upgrade on is between 500 and 600. Therefore, it will transform for the fight and you are not sitting with no damage and a fully stacked tear. In addition to the tear, you can get an Amplifying Tome or Long Sword and some pots or boots.

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Finally, a Catalyst of Aeons is good for tanky champions who wants to scale with mana and health ( Karthus, Malphite, Maokai). Catalyst’s passive is good on ARAM as it gives you health and mana sustain. For champions that can get both tear and catalyst like Ryze, Singed, and Karthus, I recommend catalyst first as you can stack a tear fairly quickly due to the 6 stacks instead of 4 for ARAM, but want to finish rod of ages under 10 minutes or it will not reach the full stack by the end of the game. Rod of Ages is a powerful item on ARAM as the stats are great for almost any mage and finishes much faster than Summoner's Rift. Alternatively, you can get a Blasting Wand and Sapphire Crystal if you want more AP than sustain. Abyssal Mask is a great item too if you need the mr and your team is mainly magic damage.

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Now that I covered mana champions, let’s talk about ADC’s and AD assassins. With the ad item changes, the standard for adc's is a B. F. Sword. For ad assassins, Caulfield's Warhammer and Serrated Dirk are both strong to build into Youmuu's Ghostblade.

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For AP casters that do not have mana problems or would not benefit from the mana items like Katarina or if you do not need the waveclear and can use your spells to poke them. A Needlessly Large Rod is mainly for a Spellbinder rush, which is a great teamfight item. You get charges very quickly on ARAM and the burst damage it provides is substantial, especially early on. Also, your early game poke will hurt a ton so try to use your skills only to harass and not to clear.

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Moving on, we have tank champions. A common start is Spectre's Cowl as it gives regen, health, and mr. Giant's Belt is not bad as straight health is good early on. Glacial Shroud gives armor and cdr, which is good against AD comps. Overall, health is great early on and cdr is good at the beginning to lower your long cooldowns.

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Most fighters will get Black Cleaver, so you can start with a Phage. Hexdrinker is pretty good too for some offense and defense. Sometimes I would just get tank starting items at first, and get my offensive later as you cannot engage hard and expect to live at early levels.

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I am not a big fan of Guardian items because since you start out with so much gold, you should really rush your core items. Also, lifesteal from Guardian's Hammer isn't that good as you cannot reliably lifesteal off minions in ARAM as the wave dies too quickly from your teammates "helping" you. Guardian's Orb is decent, but I personally prefer just going Lost Chapter most of the time.

A mage and AP Assassin will typically build similar to Summoner's Rift. Finish your mana item and stack that AP. Also, if the enemy has a lot of tanks, a mage should get Morellonomicon, Liandry's Torment and Void Staff. These will help cut through their healing and magic resist. An Assassin should look to get Quicksilver Sash or Banshee's Veil to minimize getting caught in teamfights. For poke mages, Luden's Tempest is a strong buy as the narrow lane allows strong aoe poke to hit. Spellbinder is also good for assassins as well because the raw burst it can provide for teamfights.

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A marksman will, like a mage , build similar as in a normal game. Again, lifesteal is not as important on ARAM due to limited chances to hit minions. I recommend getting your lifesteal item as your third item or later. Lord Dominik's Regards and Mortal Reminder are both strong for killing tanks so make sure you grab one. Finally, Elixir of Wrath is very strong as getting assists is easy, thus extending the duration of the elixir.

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zeke's A support will build a bit differently than normal, since there are no standard support starting items on ARAM. Most supports will go full damage with more emphasis on cdr, so Athene's Unholy Grail is a great item if your champion has any heals or shields. Zeke's Harbinger can help increase your utility, especially if you have a strong ADC. Redemption is a very strong item. Redemption can be a first item rush and helps fix early mana problems, which is great. Also, as your AP ratio's are lower than a typical mage, you should aim for more magic penetration like Void Staff.

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A tank will build with more emphasis on aura items. For AP, Adaptive Helm is good for the emphasis on mr and damage reduction. Abyssal Mask is great if you need the mana and your team has a decent amount of AP. Also, you can get a Spirit Visage. Against AD, go either Randuin's Omen for the strong active or Frozen Heart as the aura is strong. Finish off with Thornmail if they have a lot AD. Also, Gargoyle Stoneplate is a super strong item for ARAM as the passive will always be up. Finally, Warmog's Armor is good all around and can counter poke very well. As a sidenote, I really hate Sunfire Aegis because the passive is really bad on ARAM. It is used as a way to push lanes, not a teamfight item. In most fights, the damage won't even matter and the base stats are very poor. Please don't get this item.

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A fighter will build similar to a normal game. You want to finish your one core offensive item like Black Cleaver or Maw of Malmortius or whatever your champion needs. After that, getting the strong juggernaut items like Dead Man's Plate and Sterak's Gage will give you tankiness and damage. Stay away from the hydra items because you should not the your teams source of waveclear and these items were made for split plushing.

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An AD Assassin will also build similar to normals. This includes lethality from items like Duskblade of Draktharr and Youmuu's Ghostblade. Getting more AD is also nice. Like AP assassins, getting a Quicksilver Sash is important to make sure you can kill the backline before you get cc for a million years. I also like Edge of Night because the cooldown is low and can be used to get free dives onto the backline.

So now that I have beaten item selection to death, you are probably wondering what to do in the actual game. While knowing what to buy and what spells to get is helpful, you must know how to put your champion to use. In this section, I will discuss one type of composition you might have: a poke comp.

So what's a poke comp? A poke comp specializes in hitting the enemy with skillshots again and again, while not committing to a fight. The idea is to slowly chip away at the enemies health, while keeping a safe enough distance where the enemy cannot retaliate. This is very similar to a kite comp where you want to poke, back off and then re-engage. The main difference is kite comps have some anti-dive component to them, while poke tends to have more damage.

The objective of a poke comp is simple. First, use your wave clear to fast clear the waves so the enemy cannot hide behind minions. Then poke them under tower while slowly getting a few pop shots on the tower. Eventually the tower will fall or they will be too low to defend their tower. Rinse and repeat until the nexus falls. Better yet, you can use the threat of your skillshots to zone the enemy away. This is great for pushing the wave without using your spells as you do not have unlimited mana. The best skillshot is the one you don't have to use!

What are the strengths of a poke comp? First off, a poke comp has superior early game. Since the tanks are not tanky enough, your poke will be oppressive and make sieging easy. Secondly, if you have some ADC’s. poke comps can quickly take down towers. This can snowball your lead very fast and end the game in under 20 minutes. Also, poke comps tend to have high tier champions like Xerath and Lux who can hit multiple opponents. Poke comps can also have inherent synergy between champions with hard to hit skillshots. Say you have Ahri and Morgana. Morgana can hit a Dark Binding, which allows Ahri can follow up with a Charm or vice versa. This allows strong pick potential and cc chain.

Poke comps are of course not without their weaknesses. Firstly, they typically do not get to engage fights and are more reactive. Due to lack of dive potential, poke comps are at the mercy of the opponent and them hitting Mark/Dash. Also, poke comps tend to be squishy and can struggle against assassins and divers. Poke comps are also mana hungry and may lack peel to remove divers. Poke comps additionaly tend to fall off in the late game when tanks are unkillable. Poke comps also rely on exerting pressure early and shoving in the wave. If they can't, they can't poke. Finally, poke comps are great at killing one target at a time, but not all the enemies in one go. This can make the kill lead higher, but taking down turrets hard as a team can still defend 4v5. The poke comp might then be low in health/mana and the enemy they slain will be full and have extra items.

So, if you are in a poke comp, what should you do to improve your chances of winning? Firstly, I recommend taking Exhaust on one champion. Many poke champions are very squishy, so taking exhaust can help deal with assassins and divers. Second, try to focus more on seiging and your waveclear. Being able to push the waves fast in the early game provides so much pressure to the turret and you need to capitalize on your early game strength. For the most part, a poke comp is a race against the clock. Another important part of a poke comp is disengage. Champions like Janna, Alistar, and Varus are very strong in providing peel and cc for poke comps to battle the engages.

Ok, so how do I play against a poke comp? First, respect the early levels. Many champs lack cc without their ultimates, so don't go in hard expecting your team to follow. Second, your level 6 hard engage is where you will probably come back. Try not to get poked down that much early (easier said than done) and try to get an ace quickly at level 6. Taking down turrets will be hard, so try to bait them out of their turret, connect a snowball, and dive to the backline. Lastly, you can just turtle up to late game until you are too tanky to care about their poke and go straight onto them.

Dive comps are usually more intricate at the beginning, but can be very simple later. Firstly, you have to survive the early game and try to bait them into tower or find picks. Then, wait for your ultimates to come up and go in together. Next, land a snowball on a carry or on a minion and have flash ready. Last, focus the carries aggressively and leave no champion standing.

So what are the strengths of a dive comp? Well basically everything the poke comp is not ;). OK so the strengths are being able to kill multiple enemies on one go, deciding when to fight, and scaling well into the late game. When I talk about dive comps, I don’t mean just assassins. Dive comps include bruiser champions like Irelia and shorter range carries like Ryze and Graves. They just need the upfront burst to pop a squishy before they can kite back and peel. Additionally, some champions like Blitzcrank can provide the threat to create a zoning pressure. This makes the opponent hesitant to attack your towers and can keep them from poking.

Their weaknesses include wave clear, poke, and early game. These can stack upon each other to a point where they cannot come back. If you have a weak early game, you cannot poke well and will lose towers because of your bad wave clear. This allows the opponent to snowball and keeps you behind. Additionally, even if you win a team fight, you might not have the minion waves in the right place or be pushed too far back. Then you end up not being able to take down the turret or execute, putting you and your team at a health disadvantage because you can't return to base.

So, if dive comps have such a bad early game, what the hell should you do? This is why I said dive comps are more intricate. They have to find small picks and use tower aggro to their advantage. Trading kills is fine as you are just stalling to level 6 and more items. You will win late game as long as you don’t mess up, so try to keep them off the inhibitor tower for as long as you can. Your nexus turrets provide a good place to catch up, but you can’t stall their forever because if more than 3 of your team die, the game is over. Also, even if you ace them, you have to push all the way to their turrets and once they come back, some team members will probably be low, so you are starting a fight almost at a 4v5. Once you win one teamfight, you will know your team is stronger and can really bully the enemy. Catch them off with a snowball and then engage hard.

To counter dive comps, you should pressure early on and take down the towers fast. Keeping them low and not killing them can be helpful as you can just force them off the tower and not let them buy. Kiting is very important so buy a Quicksilver Sash or Banshee's Veil to keep them from popping you. Make sure you get poke off BEFORE the fight because your burst isn’t that high. Even if late game comes, you can still win by dodging snowballs and poking their team low.

A special note for team comps: Very rarely do you get perfect team comps that fits into a poke comp or a dive comp. You may be a Lux in a game, but are the only form of poke. The enemy team might have Xerath, Jayce, and Ziggs. Your team is now a dive team because if it becomes a poke war, you will lose. This does not mean for you to dive to the backline though! As a Lux, your job becomes aggressively fishing for a Light Binding to lock down the pokers so your team can engage. You also provide wave clear and early game pressure so your team doesn't fall behind. While you are still a poke champion, you have to adapt to your team and know you can't just stay back tossing Lucent Singularity at them.

Some champions are on here twice as you can run different variants of them. For example, you can run AP or AD Ezreal. From the tier list, you will see marksman and supports are the strongest class as the poke, seige, cc, and utility is the most important for the team. You will also notice fighters being one of the worse as they specialize in 1v1 and not 5v5. Again, this list is my personal opinion, so there will be some disagreements with others. As for who I think is the strongest in ARAM, my pick is Jhin because of his poke, pick potential, and strong ultimate. The weakest in my opinion is Rek'Sai. She lacks strong engage, burst, tankiness, and sustain fighting as she is made to be a strong jungle champion and moving across walls, which is not what ARAM is about.

Tier 1: The "#Freelo! This is my ARAM only account"
Marksman : Ashe, Caitlyn, Corki, Ezreal (AD), Jayce, Jhin, Jinx, Kai'Sa (AD),Kog'maw (AD), Miss Fortune, Sivir, Tristana, Twitch, Varus, Xayah
Fighter : Darius, Gangplank, Galio, Garen, Wukong
Mage : Anivia, Annie, Cho'gath, Ezreal (AP), Fiddlesticks, Heimerdinger, Kai'Sa (AP), Kennen, Kog'maw (AP) Lux, Malzahar, Orianna, Swain, Veigar, Vel'koz, Viktor, Xerath, Ziggs, Zyra
Assassin : Master Yi, Pyke
Tank : Amumu, Alistar, Dr. Mundo, Leona, Malphite, Maokai, Sion, Taric
Support : Blitzcrank, Janna, Karma, Morgana, Nami, Sona, Soraka, Zilean

Tier 2: The "GGEZ"
Marksman : Draven, Graves, Kennen (AD), Lucian, Quinn, Urgot, Vayne,
Fighter : Camille, Fiora, Gnar, Illaoi, Irelia, Kayn, Kled, Renekton, Skarner, Vi, Xin Zhao, Yorick
Mage : Aurelion Sol, Azir, Brand, Cassiopeia, Ekko, Karthus, Kayle, Leblanc, Lissandra, Malphite, Nidalee, Nasus, Rumble, Ryze, Shaco, Syndra, Taliyah, Teemo, Twisted Fate, Vladimir, Zoe
Assassin : Ahri, Fizz, Katarina, Kassadin, Kayn, Talon, Zed
Tank : Cho'gath, Gragas, Nautilus, Ornn, Rammus, Sejuani, Tahm Kench, Warwick, Zac
Support : Lulu, Rakan, Thresh

Tier 3: The "Meh. Might Reroll"
Marksman : Kalista, Kennen (AD), Kindred, Teemo (AD), Twisted Fate (AD), Lulu (AD)
Fighter : Aatrox, Hecarim, Jarvan IV, Jax, Lee Sin, Olaf, Poppy, Shyvana, Trundle, Udyr, Volibear
Mage : Corki (AP), Elise, Gragas, Mordekaiser
Assassin : Akali, Diana, Kha'zix, Rengar, Riven, Tryndamere, Yasuo
Tank : Braum, Ivern, Nunu, Shen, Singed
Support : Bard

Tier 4: The "I'm out of rerolls. Please help"
Marksman :
Fighter : Rek'Sai
Mage : Evelynn
Assassin :
Tank :
Support :

• Poros are afraid of champions, so when they move out of a bush, someone must be in there.
• Place traps around relics to dissuade the enemy team from getting it. You can also place traps between the first tower and the right edge of the bridge. This dissuades the opponent from diving from the side and better positions your team.
• Champions that can summon mobs like Zyra can easily trigger traps. Look at the mana of the enemy to see if they used a trap in a bush.
• You can see when the relics spawn by pressing tab. When there is 10-15 seconds left until spawn, push the wave and get into position to contest the relic and threaten any enemy that tries to step in the circle.
• Value towers over kills. Towers are very hard to take down in ARAM, so focus them down hard.
• All melee champs start with an extra 10 MR. This can help you against those oppressive mages.
• The Howling Abyss has an outside healing debuff. This makes healers not as oppressive. But still take some form of grevious wounds!
• Dark Harvest was the most powerful rune on ARAM until it was significantly nerfed to drop only 4 Souls per takedown and only 2 per cannon minion.
• If you guys are losing, do not give up. ARAM can change very quickly. The enemy team might do a sloppy tower dive after getting impatient from your wave clear. Games can be won with a troll or even 4v5.
• Itemize against their team. Do not just build blindly. You have to look at their team comp and pick which items give you the best chance at winning. Getting a QSS for CC or hexdrinker for AP burst can make or break a fight.
• If you do have a an AFK, you can still win. Remember, you will probably hit level 6 first as a team. Engage hard before the enemy is level 6. Snowball the lead quick before the number disadvantage is too much.
• Give the relics to the healers as they can heal you and the extra mana allows them to heal more often.
• Clarity is actually a decent spell that I use sometimes. Clarity allows for strong early game and mid game poke, which is where poke teams shine. Clarity will diminish in value as the game extends, so treat it as an early game tool like ignite.
• Leaving the enemy low is sometimes better than killing them. If they do not die, the next fight will be like a 4v5 as the enemy is too low to really engage.
• Taking the dash part of the snowball reduces the cooldown by 25%. If you can safely dash, then take it.
• The toughest place to take down is the nexus turrets. Normally, you could go get dragon or baron in the meantime or push another lane. In ARAM, however, you cannot. Try to have everyone focus on one tower because once it is gone, the win is very close. If you are losing, wave clearing and stalling the game is good at the nexus turrets as they are hard to dive on.
• Backdooring is very possible with ults from Twisted Fate or Pantheon or stealth like Twitch and Shaco.
• Try to kill the entire team in one go, not one by one. I have lost many games where we had a lead early on. Although we were getting more kills than the opponent, we could not get towers off the kills because of the opponent's wave clear. The enemy then got to shop and kill us all from getting low from focusing that one person. They then get 2 turrets and an inhibitor and we are now behind.
• If you can, execute yourself. You can then buy and keep that killing spree. Don’t be that Nidalee in the back who hasn’t died in like 20 minutes, but does zero damage because you can’t shop.
• Try to get to the middle bushes first. This gives vision and can set early kills. Hug the edge of the bush near the middle of the lane to avoid getting hit by a Mark/Dash.
• Remember, although you may be playing a tank, you will not be tanky at the start. Don’t carelessly dive in and hope to make it out alive.
• Some games will be an uphill battle. If they have a super strong poke team with cc, you will have trouble winning regardless of how well you play. Relax and have fun because, hey, that's what ARAM was originally built for.

• If Braum feeds a poro, they will have a mustache.
• After killing the first tower, you get another poro snack!
• If you leave the victory or defeat screen up long enough, Lissandra will tell you a story!
• If you have one of the Freljord sisters (Ashe, Lissandra or Sejuani) and the opponent has the another, you can get a special quest to activate!
• The hole with the fallen blocks next to your first tower acts like a wall. Bard Magical Journey and Vayne Condemn can be useful there.
• The Mark/Dash is based off the poro toss from Legend of the Poro King, which was a featured game mode in the winter of 2014.
• Mark/Dash used to be the most broken spell ever. It did high true damage, the cooldown was low and the range was equal to a Nidalee Javelin Toss. It has been nerfed ever since.
• The shopkeepers (Gregor and Lyte) have unique interactions with many characters in ARAM.

Now that you know how to play, build, and win in ARAM, why should you even bother playing it to begin with? You don't learn how to cs, jungle, objective control, or lane in ARAM. So why bother playing it over normals? Well ARAM teaches you things Summoner's Rift just can't. Probably the most notable is skillshot dodging. Man do you get good at this from playing ARAM. With limited places to run and long range poke champions being king, you learn very quickly to sidestep. While normals does teach you this, ARAM takes it to the extreme. Conversely, you learn to better aim your skills because of ARAM. With no blue buff and limited mana, you have to make every skill count. This is actually the reason why Xerath and other long range mages are my best midlaners.

Additionally, you learn to have a BIG champion pool. Just from playing ARAM, my champion pool is quite large and I can play almost any champion at a decent level. Of course you need to play normals to learn to master a champion on the rift, but playing ARAM forces you to play all the champions. Having a large champion pool allows you to counterpick your opponent and switch to the meta picks with relative ease. Also, you know who else is known for their wide champion pool? FAKER!

You also learn the importance of team composition. You learn the value of mixed damage, what a seige comp should do, what a dive comp should do, and having enough cc. Being able to look at your comp, decide whether to reroll, and itemize effectively are important factors for any map. While AP Ezreal is incredible on ARAM, if you have only AP damage on your team, it might be wise to go AD. Things like this gives you knowledge of how to play and build in ARAM and all other maps.

And finally, you learn how to teamfight. ARAM is all about teamfighting. Knowing to save cc for the yi or kat or knowing how to kite and protect you carries can all be learned on the rift, but not always. See, on the rift, laning phase can blow certain champions out of proportion. This makes some fights one-sided and partially decided from just who won lane and snowballed. In ARAM, if someone is on a killing spree, they are actually not stronger than you for the most part. Unless then executed themselves, they have not bought yet and are just sitting on gold. ARAM produces closer fights and more back and forth action to really learn the skills needed in teamfights.

While ARAM does not teach laning and jungling, ARAM is the BEST in teaching teamfighting and compositions. Also, you might learn you love a new champ you never even considered before.

And that wraps up my guide to ARAM. I know it is a long article, but that just shows you how much ARAM can offer! I hope you either want to try ARAM out or found new techniques to improve your ARAM experience. Feel free to add me on League if you want to do some ARAM or see if I really know what I'm doing ;). This is my first guide so any feedback would be appreciated. Again, thank you for reading and I hope to see you on Howling Abyss soon!