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Skarner Build Guide by Neoflashtv

Tank Skarner - Underrated, Overpowered

Tank Skarner - Underrated, Overpowered

Updated on February 24, 2015
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League of Legends Build Guide Author Neoflashtv Build Guide By Neoflashtv 3,076 Views 2 Comments
3,076 Views 2 Comments League of Legends Build Guide Author Neoflashtv Skarner Build Guide By Neoflashtv Updated on February 24, 2015
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Intro

Hi guys! I'm Neo, and I love playing skarner, I reckon I'm pretty decent with him, and he is ridiculously strong if played properly, though can be pretty weak if you can't play him correctly, after all, that's why guides exist, right?
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Items

Here I'm going to talk about good ways to itemize Skarner. He gets very close to the enemy team and forms part of your front line, his ultimate would be completely inapplicable if he was built squishier, the rest of the enemy team would nuke you in a second. So the juggernaut enchantment along with the armor and magic resist items are absolutely essential, I also take Mercury's Treads and the Tenacious mastery. I do this because being part of the front line means you'll get hit by a lot of cc. Don't get me wrong, his damage is less than disappointing, and if you get an offensive item as your 6th (I usually get the Wit's End) you can deal an impressive amount of damage. Now, for an important decision, trinity force or gauntlet? I almost always go for the gauntlet, though the sheen does slightly less damage, you still get an AoE slow, great armor, great mana and the 10% cooldown reduction that fits exactly to the 40% in the final build. However, I would recommend taking a Frozen Mallet as your 6th item if you did take Trinity Force.
Another important thing to note, is that in the example full build vs AP I gave up top, you only receive 30% cooldown reduction, if you wish to change your masteries to bring that up to 40. I usually go for the first build (or something close) as the frozen heart gets you 20% cool down reduction, and great armor, Really I tend to itemize more for armor than magic resist, as fed mages also struggle to get through large amounts of health, so the magic resist that you do have from Mercury's Treads and Banshee's Veil along with an excess of 3000 HP is easily enough, and you can more itemize against the enemy adc/fed jungler/top.
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Purchase order and Jungle Route

As a skarner, I always start at gromp and then move to blue and then wolves, as returning to base gets you just about enough for your chilling smite, which has now been nerfed in patch 5.4, big shame. After that I would recommend going to red and then ganking a lane (whichever is closer) if all lanes seem to be doing ok, I would try to continue farm or to sneak in a dragon early (you can solo dragon by level 3).
My build path is pretty standard, I get the chilling smite at the first back, and my next 2 items are usually a kindlegem and boots, I build into the juggernaut enchantment and then buy my mercury treads, then farm/gank up to enough gold for a sheen, which I then max into a gauntlet. From there, based on the situation, decide if I should get my frozen heart, or banshee's veil first. I then build the remaining item, and finish off with an offensive item, which is usually a wits end.
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Pros and Cons of Skarner

Pros
- Great chaser due to his W Crystalline Exoskeleton
- Good clear times
- Relevant for most of the game
- Very tanky when full build
- Amazing duelist due to Q Crystal Slash
- Ult the carry - win the teamfight
- Sticks to his target like glue
- AoE damage with Q Crystal Slash
- Great fun to play!

Cons
- No dash or immediate gap closer
- Pre-6 ganks are nothing special
- Not an insane amount of damage
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Runes and Masteries

As for runes, I like to have a good amount of ad as skarner does a lot of auto attacking. But alternatives to this rune page include attack speed quints, scaling magic resist glyphs and scaling health seals.

I go for a defensive mastery page for a good balance. You have great survivability with so much tenacity and the additional armor and magic resist is quite nice.
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Things to think about

You have to be aware of champions who excel at keeping their distance, especially if you do not have your ultimate up. A good Kalista will kill you, because no matter how much movement speed you have, you won't get close. Other champions who are difficult to chase include riven and vayne. The low cooldown on vayne's dash when maxed means it would cost you a little more to get to her. However neither of these 3 champions will deal much damage if you went with my initial armor based build, and it is likely you can escape if you need to.
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Outro

Thanks guys for reading through this guide, or some of it at least, constructive criticism is greatly appreciated and I would love to see your thoughts on this build!
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League of Legends Build Guide Author Neoflashtv
Neoflashtv Skarner Guide
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Skarner - Underrated, Overpowered

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