In this build I will cover the two (big) Nidalee builds, AP and AD Offtank. Both are very different, and require a different approach in playstyle. I have mained Nidalee for over a year now, and played her in every single role. I will not say that I am the best Nidalee player, and I will not say that what I say is what should be done. What I will say is that I have a pretty good understanding of the game and this champion, so please read the entire thing and don't just look at the cheat sheet.

Smart-Casting helps alot, if you don't know smart casted abilities work, find a youtube video and learn. It precision to your shots but you will need to learn the range of the ability before you can execute it with beast presicion. The following is a brief explanation of how to set an ability to smart-cast (key word, brief); How to smart cast an ability.

This guide, as all good guides should be, is a constant work in progress. This section will detail what I am currently working on adding into the guide. Please be patient as I have to focus on college and other stuff too. I will accept any suggestions for sections or ideas that I can cover, which might be useful for this guide.

Currently Working On:

• A playstyle section for the Offtank portion of the guide.

I will cover two Nidalee builds in this guide and some general Nidalee knowledge that I believe to be useful for all playstyles.

Pros

Amazing Poker
Great Pusher
Awsome Mobility (especially through jungle)
Inmense Burst Damage (Javelin as AP/ Takedown as Offtank).
Fun to play as

Cons

Squishy (If AP)
Medium/ High Skill Curve
Easily brought down if CC'd

This is my AP Nidalee portion of the guide, it covers some basic aspects such as items, summoner spells, and runes, but also goes into specifics on skill sequence and playstyle.

NOTE: This style of playing AND building Nidalee requires knowledge and skill on the use of skill shots. If you can't land a Skill Shot for the life of you then you cannot pretend to do well with this style of play. As I said before I make this work for me and it can work for you if you work hard on learning to land those spears like a boss it will work for you.

This is the exact same runepage I use when playing Nid. Helps with my damage, cooldowns and mana. For this style of play this is what I'd recommend.


These are the other runes I'd recommend for the playstyle I use on this guide. I wouldn't vary alot on runes, since switching rune pages around (unless you have more than 3 or 4) is tedious, and not that rewarding IMO.

The best boots for Nidalee IMO. Adds some nice mr and reduces the duration of CC which hits Nidalee really, really hard. Other Boot choices are: Ionian Boots of Lucidity or Sorcerer's Shoes.

AP, simple as that. Boosts your damage by alot, needed by any and all AP carries. Really amazing early and late game, this item does not disappoint.

Nidalee's bread and butter. She procs Lich Banes passive with Javelin Toss / Takedown in cougar form.


So, why this build order you say? Doran's Ring for all the right reasons, AP, HP, and Mana Regen; this is THE starting item for Nidalee. Boots for the mobility, you can't cross the map just pouncing around as a cat. Sheen boosts your AP and mana pool, and also adds to your AA after using an ability. I always aim for a Needlessly Large Rod after Sheen; its tough, I know, but with decent farm and some nice Javelin throws, you'll be there in no time. Your next item will depend entirely on the enemy team, if they have a lot of cc, get Mercury's Treads early, if they don't have that much CC, but do have a lot of magic damage, get a Null-Magic Mantle to start building those boots and a Blasting Wand for Rabadon's Deathcap. After that finish up the core build and get some survivability, or counters to the enemy picks. There is one thing that I cannot stress enough. If you have 200 gold and extra space in your inventory, get as many Health Potion and Sight Ward as you need (don't exaggerate either). They help, ALOT.


All of these are very good end game items on Nidalee, Situationally, I hope it is clear that if the enemy is heavy on AD, you should go for armor, and that if the enemy is heavy on AP you should go for magic resist.


During late game if you have 250 spare gold you should be getting elixirs. The elixirs grant nice stats for a small price and do not occupy any space in your inventory. The priority order on your elixirs is:

As I stated at the start of this guide, I max Javelin Toss / Takedown first. This is due to the insane damage that is dealt once it gets to level 3. You can secure a kill pre-level 6 due to its massive damage and can drop people even at their tower. After some testing and thanks to a suggestion I took it upon myself to get 2 points in Javelin Toss / Takedown and 2 points in Primal Surge / Swipe and one in Bushwhack / Pounce before level 6. Why? Well, upon a suggestion by Pappfisk I got 2 points Javelin Toss / Takedown at level 3, to maximize its harass early on. Then I thought, why not put 2 points in Primal Surge / Swipe earlier too, this way I'll have a good harass and a good heal by level 4. I did so and it worked. So now I get javelin at level 1, heal at level 2, javelin at level 3 and heal at level 4, getting bushwhacks at level 5. Then I follow the priority order at the top.

So, if you picked Nidalee you most likely are going solo top. It is where she shines and where you can play the passive-aggressive stle that she needs the best. Why? Simply because of the fact of the bush. Your passive Prowl grants you extra MS while in bush. This can be useful for evading skillshots, juking, or quickly fleeing the enemy. Also, the bush allows you the element of surprise. You can shoot spears at the enemy without him being awares, or jump on him as a cougar when you hit level 6. There are countless reasons of why Nidalee should be solo top, but these should be enough to prove my point.

Does this mean that going mid is forbidden? No, if there is no other candidate for the mid lane you are not a bad choice. You are a serius disadvantage though, because you cannot activate your passive, and the other caster will stay behind his minion line so harassing with Q will be difficult.

Does this mean that Nidalee can't play in bot lane? No, she can, but not very well. The current meta has a support and an ranged carry bot. This means that you will have to play Nidalee as a support and, lets be honest, were's the fun in that? For more on my opinion of support Nidalee: here.

Let me define early, mid and late game so that there is no confusion.

Early Game: Goes on until one tower has fallen from either team, because then that lane starts to roam.

Mid Game: Time between the first tower falling and everyone (everyone) being at least level 14. This is because at this point, most people already have part or their entire core build set up.

Late Game: Any time after mid game. Full fledged team fights ocurr, and Baron is of ultimate importance at this point.


Early game your job is to farm up and try to zone out the enemy. You should be taking solo top, so you will face tanky characters. Since your pre-6 burst is not that high you will want to focus more on last hitting and ocassionally harassing your enemy when you can. Last hitting takes practice and patience, you can't just be auto attacking minions because you will push your lane, and that is bad for so many reasons.

Something I tend to do when I have two minions that are low on HP is I focus on last hitting the one that is lower of the two and use my Q on the other one. That slight loss of mana won't hurt you and you will be up ~20 gold.

Never go back before level 6. You have a heal and you are ranged. This should be enough to keep you there as long as you don't play it stupid. One tip is to try to farm 1610 gold so you can buy Sheen and Boots on your first trip back.

Now that you have your Sheen and your lvl 6 burst, it is time to harass and push. Everytime the enemy tries to last hit, punish him by Pouncing and Swiping him. Try to get him as low as possible, below 50% usually does it a this point of the game. Throw Spears at him to show him that you mean business and if you hit one of those spears, act immedeatly, doing your full cougar combo.

Every time your lane opponent goes back, EVERY TIME, you push your wave and start getting some hits onto that tower. With your E Primal Surge / Swipe and Sheen you will literally tear that tower a new one.


So after the laning phase is when judgement calls are needed. What do you do after you have taken your turret (or the enemy has taken your's if that is the case)? You should go help your team mates. Gank mid, gank bot; but never forget to farm. Your lane might be pushed, but enemy minions still give gold.

Keep in mind that roaming to help other lanes does not mean that you can simply forget your lane. There is still an enemy farming there, there is still farm to be taken, and most importantly, your turret is there and needs defending. The less turrets thay have pushed the more map control you have.

This is a map that shows which areas are safe to farm at, in which you have to be wary while farming, and where you shouldn't be farming unless you know where all of them are:

Safe
Wary
Dangerous

This is a map that shows where it is ok for your lane opponent to be farming if you are not in lane, where you should be weary and heading back to your lane, and where someone should be at your lane defending the turret:

Safe
Get back to lane
Be in lane


By late game, your spears should be hurting a ton at max range and your heals should really be keeping you or your teammates alive. Use these as your tools. Poke with Javelin Toss / Takedown as much as physically possible, drain your enemies' health bars and heal your allies'. Winning team fights is crucial during late game because the respawn timers are so high that they allow for a free baron or tower kill.

Ward baron always, ALWAYS. Your team should always have visibility on him. If your team have no wards and you don't have any space for wards, Bushwhack / Pounce the hell out of that place. Make it so that if an enemy goes into the Baron-Nashor pit they will step on one of your traps. And for the love of god, don't go into their jungle if they are MIA. Chances are that they have wards and will find you.

Never be on the front line of your team, you are squishy and the enemy will jump on you like bees on honey. You want to be kind of on the back, shooting spears and healing your team. Only if the enemy is otherwise engaged and you have clear way to jump on their squishies in cougar form are you allowed to do this. Most of the time a team will not follow you in behind enemy lines or they will be otherwise engaged, so you have to be careful about this.

This starts out my AD Offtank Nidalee guide, while not as fun as AP Nidalee, it has its uses and is more adapted to the current meta. I will go over runes, summoners and items. I will also go into specifics about playstyle (In Progress). I will not go over the skill sequence for this build, since I think it is pretty straight forward.

This is the runepage I use for playing Nidalee as an offtank. Helps damagewise and grants defensive stats to help you in lane. Variations are possible, I will list other viable runes


These are the other runes I'd recommend for the playstyle I use on this guide. I wouldn't vary alot on runes, since switching rune pages around (unless you have more than 3 or 4) is tedious, and not that rewarding IMO.

The best boots for Nidalee IMO. Adds some nice mr and reduces the duration of CC which hits Nidalee really, really hard.

This is almost a standar for AD offtanks at the moment, it gives good stats and the passive Sight Ward really helps alot. However, if you aren't facing a champion that does physical damage, another option is Wit's End, which grants MR and AS.

Tons of Damage. Need I say more? I'll say more anyway. Amazing source of damage and good utility item as it grants MS, and a 30% chance on hit to slow the enemy you are attacking.

For this build I won't go into specifics on the build order, it is pretty straight forward. Know that Trinity Force should be an end game item if you need survivability or can be a mid game item if you don't need that much survivability early on.


Note: These item's aren't set in stone, there are other possibilites, but these are the ones that have proven to be useful for me.

This is just some things that aren't specific to one build or the other, rather are general things that a person playing Nidalee should know.

After getting Lich Bane (and having a good amount of AP), being in cougar form is going to be deadly. Because of Lich Bane's passive, after every skill you use, your attacks will deal 100% of your AP as added magical damage (this has a 2 second CD). So, what is the trick to maximizing the damage output while in cougar form? Easy:

Bushwhack / Pounce +AA, then (read instantly afterwards) Primal Surge / Swipe, and finish off with Javelin Toss / Takedown. Remember, this is how to maximize damage output in COUGAR FORM only.

Even though Lich Bane's passive still has a 2 second CD, you want to AA after Primal Surge / Swipe, in order to allow it to be ready for Javelin Toss / Takedown.

Why does this maximize damage output? Well, Takedown works quite interestingly. The lower HP your enemy has, the more damage you will deal. So you want to take away as much of the enemies HP as possible before using it.

Javelin Toss / Takedown is a skillshot that requires good timing and planning on your part in order to hit. You can't just through it directly at an enemy and not expect him to move (especially since Javelin Toss / Takedown does more damage at max range, your targets will be farther off) when he sees this sort-of-slow moving projectile hurtled at him. Sure you might get him off-guard a couple of times, but thats not going to be useful.
The best way to throw this skillshot (and any slow moving skillshot *cough* * Anivia's Flash Frost*) is to predict movement. You have to time when your target will be at the best possible location for your shot (remember you want to maximize range).
I'll show you an example:


Essentially that is what you want to happen, that the target walks into your throw. Tough, but do-able. Generally most good players will be moving at all times in order to make it difficult for you to hit. Not to worry, they always (or most of the time) have a pattern. Keep track of this pattern and you will place some really epic shots. Another think that might help is if YOU get out of sight from him, but keeping him in sight through your creeps or a well placed ward. This can prove effective in getting a kill on an unaware enemy.


Another great thing about Nidalee is that you there is no need to facecheck a bush to see if someone is there. There are a couple of techniques that will help you avoid the need to jump headfirst into a bush hoping not to find Garen there.

First among these is what I like to call spear-checking.
Spear-checking consists of throwing your javelin down the length of a bush and wait for that sound that is our best friend. The re-known *whack* that means that our projectile has hit a target. This allows you to know that there is someone in that bush waiting to jump you.

Second is what I call bushwhacking (clever aren't I).
Bushwhacking consists of dropping a bushwack in a bush. The trick is that certain areas will show the entire bush and its contents :O. That's right, for a split second after you drop the bushwhack if there was an enemy there he will be revealed.


In my opinion Nidalee is one of those ungankable champions. A good Nidalee won't let himself get ganked simply because he covers himself with a handy tool. The bushwhack. When an enemy steps on this intricate boobytrap, it gives you vision of him and an area around him, therefore making it hard for people to gank you if you place these traps well.

I will demonstrate (with red dots) where are some of the best locations to set up bushwhacks in order to not get ganked. These are meant for people who are in lane, in the jungle, bushwhacking is much harder because of so many entrances. I will cover the basic lane trap setup, but the idea is to cover every possible entrance to your lane in order to avoid ganks.

Bot Lane, River and Outer Turret:This setup will show you if anyone walked up to the bush in river and is waiting to gank, or if someone is coming to gank from red.

Bot Lane, Inner Turret and Outer Turret:This setup allows you to feel safer as you walk between these locations (in case you are pushing or the outer turret has been destroyed).

Bot Lane, Inhibitor Turret:Self explanatory by this point. One thing I want to point out though is that just becasue you are pushed back to your inhib tower, or have pushed back to the enemies inhib tower, it does not mean that you will be safe just putting bushwacks right there. Remember, ganks are more effective if they cut you out of your turret, so keep setting up traps along the way.

Mid Lane, River: This trap setup is to keep you safe in mid, will detect anyone who tries to come and gank.
Repeat on the top side too (inversing it obviously to keep the traps in the correct places.

I will not keep showing you were to put them, rather I'll let your imagination flow after you've seen the basics. But always remember, set traps on the entrances to the lane you are pushing. NOTE: Bushwhacks do not replace Sight Ward, wards give you visibility around an area, whereas bushwhacks give you visibility only if someone stepped on the trap. Do not think you are safe simply becuase you've bushwhacked the entire river. If the enemy is fast enough and you have pushed far enough into their side, bushwhacks won't save you.

Learn these locations like the back of your hand. They can and will save your life in dire situations if you use them right.

Original post of this map: http://na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=1072706.
Credits go to DanGR.

Nidalee's role in dominion is to capture. She is one of the most mobile champions and can move very quickly around the middle of the map due to her passive Prowl. Her item build for capturing should be:

You can switch the Mobility Boots for Mercury's Treads for higher CC reduction if need be, but essentially you want to be quick and tanky to be able to capture points quickly and survive. There is no need to build AP Nidalee and she just shines as a capturer (capper?) in Dominion.

After level 6 Nidalee is quite an effective jungler.

The way to attack the creeps in the jungle is very easy.
Wraiths, Wolves and Small Golems are pretty straight foreward. In cougar form, Bushwhack / Pounce in between all the creeps and then use Primal Surge / Swipe, finish off with Javelin Toss / Takedown and AA any creeps left.

For the Buffs:
The Buffs are more difficult since they are more durable and deal more damage. The proper way is to put a Bushwhack under the buff monster(lizard or golem) AA once, heal and switch to cougar form. Do the cougar combo 3 or 4 times (depending on CD). Turn back into human and repeat the process, hitting the monster(golem or lizard) with a javelin before healing and turning into cougar form. I will demonstrate with the blue buff, but the same concept aplies to red.



Where am I going with this? I'm saying that if you don't have a jungler and you feel you can leave your lane to jungle for a bit (get buffs mainly) do so. I'm in no way encouraging anyone to do a full on Jungle Nidalee.

I don't really reccomend playing support as Nidalee because even though her heal is good, that is really all you can bring to the table. No CC, no poke (if you have no AP you have no poke), and no real utility as support.

It can however be done. and I would reccomend switching the skilling order to this:

Maximizes your healing, your trapping and grants you some poke. In terms of items I would go for:

And then building situationally. As for playstyle, you want to keep your carry healed up over 75% at all times. This and keep spamming traps all around bot. Make sure that the enemy cannot walk into a bush without getting one of your traps. Another thing you should be doing is poking with your Q when you have a clear shot. Remember, your role for this is support, so you want to save your mana to heal your carry.
NOTE: As I said before, playing support Nidalee is not recommended at all. You will be outclassed by most supports and are far better with farm.

This is just a simple chapter to explain how smart casting works and how to map your keys to smart cast.

Smartcasting is basically used for skill shots. What it does is instead of having to aim and click with your mouse, the ability will instantly cast on the location/direction of your cursor.
If you have your cursor on an enemy and the ability is targeted, your enemy will be the target.

Mapping keys to Smart-Cast: To map your keys to Smart-Cast, you have to press Esc and click on the Key Bindings option. Scroll down until you see the Smart Cast Ability. There you simply map the ability to the key you want and voilà, you have your ability set to smart cast.

Well, from here on out it's all up to you (whoever you are). I've made this build work for me, and hopefully it will work for you too. This in my opinion is the most fun/versatile way of playing Nidalee. Have fun, good luck and good hunting. :D

10/4/2011 - Nidalee - Olympic Gold Medalist (Javelin Toss) guide re-vamped and re-published.

10/4/2011 - Added an Elixirs sub-secion in items section.

10/6/2011 - Added a section on Smart Casting.

10/18/2011 - Added a "Currently Working On" section.

11/19/2011 - Masteries redone.

03/29/2012 - Guide revamp. Added an Offtank build and a guide section.