Hey there this my first guild on moba fire, so bare with me. However i have read a stupid amount of guilds on this website so i have a sketchy idea of what to do. Through my experience of league of legends i have become a maverick in the trades of the "tanky" dps, using character such as lee sin, trundle, renekton and riven. I was thrilled with riven as riot has essentialy released a new renekton, just more babin and powerful with a dash for an E a stun for a W an AOE for a Q and a buff for an R, loving the originality riot well done. With the recent patch i thoght they would be ruining my precious Riven but this was not the case at all. With the nerf to her stun and the buff to her Q she now benefits from increased maneuverability as your Q is maxed first thus lowering the cool down, that and it does a stupid amount of damage with a ki strike hit between each use (i'll explain later for new players).

Riven is "tanky" dps character that is spankin in melee combat. She is also highly maneuverable due to her E and Q. Riven is for a player that loves to deal some hurt but still get away with it, as well as a player who loves the herp derp tanky meta game, much like my self. Riven's play style is solid all game, and admittedly is fairly broken provided she isn't cc'ed. As a bonus she uses a giant shiv as a weapon and 50% of her auto attacks are i a spanking motion, always a +. Her farm is incredibly strong utilising her Q (Broken Wings) and W (Ki Burst). And finaly her ability the secure kills is second to only King Kill Steal Karthus, as the second effect of her ult is an AOE Demarsian Justice. I play Riven top lane solo for the most part with my friend playing jungle Shaco because Shaco's ganks are imbalance as tryndamere on twisted treeline. There has been some slight changes to her game play with the recent "change" (as i saw it as both a buff and nerf) the main thing being that her Q is now her primary damage ability.

Pros
Hits Hard
Babein
Maneuverable
Shield
Unconditionally castable abilities
Kill securing ult
Stupidly Good AD scaling
Free to Cast Abilities
Giant Shiv

Cons
Easily out classed by a good ranged DPS in lane
If she is CCed at all in particular silenced its gg
Butch
Early game cool downs are a *****.

Flabbergasting
Ghost
Exhaust
Teleport
Flash
Mediocre
Heal
Surge
Promote
Smite
Equivalent to using AP Riven
Clarity
Revive

I use Ghost and Teleport on my riven up top, Ghost of more maneuverability during ganks and being ganked, and teleport so i can at the very least keep up with the champion i'm versing.
Flash and exhaust are also two perfectly viable options as well how i choose not to use them as flash has had the **** nerfed out of it for one and i prefer the escape-ablity you get from the prolonged duration of ghost that and Riven can chase and land auto attacks over and over. i i usually don't take exhaust due to the fact that if i use exhaust only one person on the team is slowed were as with ghost relatively everyone is slowed.
I can see heal being handy as the only think Riven has to keep and eye on to stay in lane is her health, ain't got none of that mana ****. I ***usme surge is alright as it stacks with your ult but half of the spell is wasted with the ap. Promote could possible be viable due to Riven's incredible pushing power, it would simply made her back door more effective, and smite is of course good on jungle riven, but as a general statement a team with two smites gets so much more jungle control as your jungler takes blue buff incredibly quickly meaning fast ganks and it also makes dragon and baron are much more steal able. Its may also come in handy if you are getting dominated in lane and you fail at farming on the tower gives you some guaranteed gold... sort of.
Regrettably my favorite Summoner spell revive suffered a nerf in season two and still remains as enviable as before and clarity is clearly useless as it does restore enough of your massive mana pool thus it is made redundant by your mana regen.

My rune selection are set out in particular for top solo lane.

Marks Greater Mark of Strength

Seals Greater Seal of Resilience

Glyphs Greater Glyphs of Sheilding or Grether Glyphs or Warding

Quintessence Greater Quintessence or Strength

the reason i chose to use marks and quints of strength rather then desolation is due to the way all of her abilities scale; bonus attack damage. I found that the added bonus to her damage through a full cycle for abilities is much greater than with desolation, that and the extra strength it gives your shield greatly increases her survive-ability. I take flat armor because for the most part Top solo is an AD characters game as they generally out last AP characters in turns of sustainability, this is a very general statement though. it is for the same reason that i prefer to take MR per level Glyphs instead of flat as you level very fast when soloing and AP characters don't really start to hit heavy till they grab their ult and even then health is a fairly solid counter to AP characters which Riven has a deceptive amount of due to her shield. how ever you can still take flat because it makes for more solid game play... i guess?

The Marsteries i have chosen are 21 - 9 - 0

I have taken 21 in attack because Attacking is what you are doing, riven plays can find them selves carrying in alot of games. thats that. the 9 in defense is purely for in lane sustainability, post patch i completely fill out vigor due to the nerf to her health regen as opposed getting the bonus 30 health

For the most part choosing the items for a tanky dsp should be a balance between damage and surviving. however due to riven mobility and her shield scaling on attack damage you don't really need that balance, or to a lesser extent.

For Top solo i open with abecause it gives you armor, extra health and regen, three things that will help in a fight for first blood, recoving from damage and harass, and countering a Attack damage based champion which you will often encounter when playing Top Solo.

I follow this up with
boots of speed. This is for mobility of course, if you know you will be encountering an AP character up top i recommend taking these first with 3 health pots and ignoring the dorans entirely. This is because AP character have long cool downs for the most part and thats how they do their damage the idea is you wait for them you use an ability whether it be to farm or hit you, then you counter attack with your E then Qx3 then W and run out, the boots let you deal this damage then get out before their abilities are off cool down.

When i back to get my boots i get a
sight ward to spot for ganks as well as as many of the 4
the build requires as possible. (Explanation for so many long swords) This is because all riven really needs is attack damage in the early/mid game because her evasion is so high you don't need to buy extra armor or magic resist or health because for the most part a riven player can choose when to take damage or not and even then, this emence amount of attack damage you get not only sets you up for later items but also adds to your sheild and survive-ability not the mention the attack damage it adds to your ult which is good for ksing :P, so you end up making the money for your survive-ability very quickly which you gain from madred's razor, and the phage, as well as the brutaliser because it lowers the cool down on your escape and shield. lots of attack damage early on riven is better then getting say 1 and a ruby for health, because if your taking damage generally its because "you" engaged and the more damage you have the faster they die and the more your shield absorbs. further more no matter how good or bad your going, you should always be able to afford these quickly to either get you further ahead or to catch up. Finally if you vs another ad based character who is going for a bf sword as so many do it takes alot of time to get that 1650 gold required, you will rarely get that much in 1 back out, usually takes 2 or 3 times depending on how good your farm is, however in the time they are saving you are getting a small but noticeable attack damage advantage before they get their huge 45 point rise.

I follow this up with second tier boots which are always conditional
Mercury's Treads are generally the boots i use most because CC is really the only ting that stops a decent riven player rolling a whole team. The less riven is effected by it the better, also gives a nice amount or MR with is lovely.
Ninja Tabi are taken when the enemy team lack hard CC like blinds, stun and silence (not so much slows as riven can just dash her way out of them) . But rather is heavy on basic attacks, such as a team with Two AD carries.
Ionian Boots of Lucidity are rarely used but when you are able to it is godly. only take these if the team really lacks CC you are fed as hell, the cool down reduction is amazing you become much more mobile and damage heavy. but even in taking these boots i would recommend also buying a for the mid to late game because you WILL be getting focused.

At point of the game it should be getting pretty midish so you need to start building your survive ability because your now beginning to fight their whole team at once. So get
The Brutalizer
more Ad = more shield and damage of course but the CDR is what really matters here as it means you can cast your dashes (Broken Wings and Valor) more often giving you more map presence and survive-ability in fights.
The Phage
this gives health and Ad more life in general yay, as well as the tasty passive which will make it near impossible for people to escape engagement with you in conjunction with your Ult Air Slash
Maded's Razor
damage and armor wooh sorted. This will also assist your team alot as it will make taking creeps down much faster in particular Dragon and later on Baron. This will also help with map control as it builds into,
Wriggle's Lantern
with which you get a free ward which in lower to mid ELO this is essentially a free eye on dragon all game because no one buys vision wards. this item will also give you life steal which is good for the sustain.

From Here you have a nice amount of tankyness and you should start building towards your Trinity Force
you will use the phage you previously built to make this otherwise you want get your zeal and Sheen. Preferably Your Sheen first because when it stacks with your passive your basic attacks hit as hard as your abilities.