Hello everyone and welcome to my first ever build, for Shyvana! I purchased her when she came out and immediately fell in love with this champion, so I thought I'd share my build with everyone. I play Shyvana as a tank/off-tank, but I will be adding a section for a more DPS-ey build at some point. Enjoy!

Pros

-Very effective farmer with Burnout
-Can sway teamfights with Dragon's Descent
-She's a dragon.


Cons

-Harassable early game
-Not much in the way of ranged
-Skins are meh

For Runes, I like to take Greater Quintessence of Health x3, Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist x9, greater mark of desolation x9 and Greater Seal of Evasion x9. These will increase your survivability, make your abilities hit a little harder and make your role as a tank or off-tank more viable in teamfights.

For Masteries, I go with the 0/21/9 route, taking Nimbleness while ignoring Strength of Spirit , as you have no mana. In utility, I take 3 in Good Hands , 1 in Perseverence and 4 in Awareness . I end my utility masteries with 1 in Utility Mastery .

For skills, max Burnout as soon as possible, while grabbing a point in Twin Bite at level two and a point in Flame Breath at level 4. Grab Dragon's Descent whenever possible.

Let me go more in-depth with her skills now.


Fury of the Dragonborn: This is your passive, and it's an interesting one at that. The way this works is that each time you land a basic attack, your abilities are enhanced in some way. The cooldown on Twin Bite is reduced by .5 seconds, Burnouts duration is extended to a max of 6 extra seconds (this is great, because burnout is your main farming tool), you deal 20% or Flame Breaths damage to the target tagged with Flame Breath and, it generates Fury, 2 per 1.5 seconds in human form and 1 for each basic attack. I'll discuss Fury more when I talk about her ultimate.


Twin Bite: This is your main ability for last hitting minions and in fights. It's fairly self explanatory. On your next attack, you'll attack twice. Note that this does apply on-hit effects such as crit, life steal and the slow from Frozen Mallet. You should always be using this when pushing towers, as you'll get another attack in. The AD scaling for the first attack is 1.0 AD and 0.8/0.85/0.9/0.95/1.0 for the second.


Burnout: This is your press-to-destroy--minion-wave and I-need-to-get-there-fast button. It will increase your move speed by 30/35/40/45/50% and that bonus decreases over time. You take 1 point here at level 1 and immediately turn it on while running to your lane, as it'll be off CD by the time you get there, and it doesn't cost anything! Turn this on whenever you're going somewhere and in teamfights. This is also a great escaping tool, as you'll be able to outfun most champions. Please note that it is on a slightly long-ish CD (12 seconds). The AD ratio for this is 0.2.


Flame Breath: You should be using this to harass in lane and in the beginning of a team fight. It's a skill shot that shreds by armor by a 15% for 4 seconds and does magic damage. This ability is nothing to write home about, but it is helpful in teamfights for shredding the enemy tanks armor. This scales with AP and the ratio is 0.6.


Dragon's Descent: This is your ultimate. Your piece de resistance. Your defining trait. It turns you into a big dragon. This is what you'll be using on a fairly regular basis, as it has no conventional CD. The CD for this is your fury bar. Once that reaches 100, you're good to go. It passively increases your Armor and MR by 15/20/25/ and those defenses are doubled while it's active. Additionally, each of your abilities are enhances in Dragon Form. Twin Bite now hit enemies in a cone behind your main target. Burnout will leave a trail of fire that damages enemies that walk on it. Flame Breath is now a cone that applies the debuff to all enemies hit. When you activate Dragon's Descent, you will also knock all enemies toward your location and damage them. This scales with AP at a 0.7 ratio.

How to use your skills effectively:

Early game, you want to concentrate on farming tons of gold, and Burnout is there to help. Turn it on in between the space separating the enemy melee minions and casters for maximum efficiency. Remember to auto attack to extend the duration! When one starts to get low on health, activate Twin Bite for last hitting.

While pushing a tower, remember to activate Twin Bite for maximum damage. If there's an enemy creep wave fighting your creep wave at the tower, turn on Burnout while still attacking the tower and position yourself so you're hitting the max number of creeps.

Once you get Dragon's Descent, gauge whether you enemy in lane is low enough where you can take them down. Try to activate your ult when all your other abilities are off CD for max damage. Also, don't activate you ult at the beginning of a fight. Activate it to pull enemies off your teammates or to mop up the remaining enemies. Your sequence in a teamfight should look something like this:

E-W-Q-wait for burnout to be off CD-R-W-Q-E and rinse and repeat. Also, don't be afraid to use your ult. Since it has no CD, you can farm up enough Fury on jungle mobs or creeps for it to be ready for any fight.

For Summoner Spells, I prefer Flash and Ignite. Ignite is great while laning and in teamfights for picking up those opponents with a silver of health left as it does true damage and reduces healing. Flash is an awesome overall spell. It can be used defensively or offensively and works wonders when coupled with ignite.

Some other good choices are:

For chasing down enemies or weakening their carry in a teamfight,

Since you're building tanky, this one isn't bad to have.

Meh:

If no one else takes this, you can,

You already have a mini-ghost with Burnout,

I guess it could save you in some situations...

If you don't have much experience playing, this isn't bad but, there are better choices.

If you're solo laning, this could have its uses.

DO NOT WANT:

Why?? You don't have a mana bar!

No. Just. NO.

This isn't a jungle build.

Items

I like to start of with a Regrowth Pendant and 1 Health Potion. Transform that puppy into a philosopher's stone and buy some Boots and if you're doing good on cash, buy a Ruby Crystal. Upgrade your Boots into Mercury's Treads and then turn that Ruby Crystal into a Warmog's Armor and start on your Atma's Impaler. After that, you can start working on a Frozen Mallet, Banshee's Veil or Sunfire Aegis, whichever suit your purposes best. Please note that you should always change your items to counter your opponents. For example, if they're AP heavy, switch out Sunfire Aegis for a Force of Nature, or another magic resist item, which brings me to my next section:

Alternative Items:

I'm still testing out this instead of philosopher's stone.


These are a good choice, but make sure to buy a different tenacity item, like Eleisa's Miracle.


This is good if the enemy team is AP heavy.


Again, if the enemy team is magic heavy. I personally don't like on-use items, but that's just me.


If no one else on your team is getting this, feel free to get this. Getting this item earlier will be more cost-effective.


This is a good item, but as I said earlier, I don't like on use items. Also, you're already getting a slow from your Frozen Mallet.


This is another viable choice. If you feel like you're dying too much, get it.


If you're going to grab this, take it instead of Frozen Mallet as you won't be benefiting from both slows.


If the enemy team is auto attack heavy (i.e Tryndamere, Vayne) this is a good one to take.

Items that sound good, but in theory aren't:

This item is great, just not for you. You won't be getting the full benefit of this item as you have no mana.


This is an item that you don't see much. Since you're already building Warmog's, don't bother with this.

In summary, Shyvana is a very unique champion who brings a lot to the playing field. If you're thinking about buying her, I would highly recommend it. See you on the Fields of Justice!

~Andreievich

Please note that this build is not complete and I am still tweaking it. Thank you for your patience!

Also, please note that comment to vote is turned on. Thank you!

11/4/2011: Still testing out different items.