Hi there, I'm a support Nunu main. If there's one thing I don't like when I play support Nunu, it's not being taken seriously. I'm making this guide to spread out the news about Nunu being a perfectly viable support for the following reasons:

1.) Sustain - Relic Shield, Consume (Q), an innate high base hp with the %based health regen, and if you followed the runes and masteries part of this guide that gave some flat HP regen will all make Nunu able to stay in lane healthy at all times. Also, every minute/30 seconds (Relic/Targon's) you get to heal your ADC a little bit.

2.) Attack Speed - You and your ADC can really punish the enemy for recalling while the lane is only half pushed. Maybe you can go for their turret get more than halfway through their turret health or maybe even the whole turret if your ADC is someone like Jinx. This also scales off your ADC so if you have a late-game ADC that scales really well with attack-speed then your W also gets stronger

3.) Targeted CC - Not skillshot based so fairly easy to hit and provides good poke if you count on your passive in being able to spam this ability for free. It's no hard-CC i know that but the fact that it's point and click means you'll never really miss it.

4.) Alternate Exhaust - Since most of the time in bot lane you'll face an adc, taking away that adc's attack speed would greatly decrease their damage output and it lasts longer too. So basically an exhaust for champions that rely on auto attacks.

5.) Kiting/Disengage - Nunu gives movement speed with the W or a slow with the E whatever the you do, you will make it so they don't catch your adc and you can catch theirs. Your ult can also be used as a hypothetical wall for disengages where in a teamfight when your ADC gets jumped, go beside him and ult.

6.) High Burst - Some have sustain damage, some go all in Nunu can do both granted he hits level 6. Some supports fail to kill enemies due to just sustain damage without burst or not being able to poke before going all in but with Nunu you can balance a bit of both.

7.) Mid-Late Game scaling - This kinda goes with the Kiting potential and the attack speed buff. His skills aren't going to benefit him more than it benefits the adc. In short your abilities especially W would be better for the ADC than you and basically gives them X amount of Berserker's Greaves

8.) Tankiness - this is more for the team than just bottom lane but still. I'd rather be tanky than squishy although this kinda cancels out because he's melee and often has to get in close for fights. But if your team needs someone tanky then Nunu might just be the one for your team.

9.) Map presence - Nunu is extremely mobile with his W and also if you pair that up with Movement Speed Quintessences if you followed the guide you get a really fast Yeti that can gank mid anytime. especially now that the Rift Scuttler has been introduced. which gives even more movement speed. Nunu also has some Dragon pressure due to the Q and W you can probably duo it really early with a jungler.

If you like to be a mobile well-rounded support then take

This allows you to have the jungle buffs implemented as of pre-s5 which gives vision control form Razorbeaks, Murkwolves and Rift Scuttlers. Not only that but Smite also has some uses in lane. One really cool thing i loved when i tried it was to use it for the early level 2 for your lane. shoving the wave early would get you to level 2 faster. this can dictate the momentum of the lane and might also reward you with a first blood. Smite can then be upgraded with Stalker's Blade making your smite have a slowing effect for 2 seconds and deal True damage that scales off of your level.

If you don't like Smite, then just use Exhaust.


It's basically like the slow only it has a little more peel factor for your ADC. The trade-off would be less damage output and less vision control/map pressure for more peel and 750 more gold from the need of not purchasing a Stalker's Blade.

Lastly in combination with any one of those mentioned above take


This is just for basic mechanical plays, engages, disengages, chases, all that fun stuff that would be better with flash. I think if you're reading this guide and understood most of it, then you'll probably know what flash is for and why it's an overall great summoner spell

I run the scaling Magic Resist a lot because i usually just get Mercury's Treads and then build full armor this makes it so I have a good amount of both late-game. Health Regen to stay in lane longer than any other support as I've said before this goes great with Targon's Brace and Consume . 5% CDR is there because you have 5% CDR in Masteries from Sorcery, so you only need to build 30% to cap off your CDR. 1 Gold per 10 seconds.... Well if you wait for some gold in base, you get to wait less. Also, that 1 Gold per 10 with your Masteries will accumulate over time making you buy maybe an Elixir for the late-game which could very well decide a teamfight. Some base flat Armor so you can be tanky Early game against the enemy ADC but not a lot since you'll invest money on it anyway. Lastly, the 1% Crit chance rune. I do this for two reasons, one is personal and the other is a philosophy. "You can't win the lottery without buying a ticket"

Offense Tree:

5% CDR from Sorcery to complete the 10% from the 5% on runes. And most importantly, the reason why you need to invest at least 5 points in the offense tree is Expose Weakness . Think of it like this, when you guys both attack consecutively, you just get to damage them even more. One E is all it takes to do all that.

Defense Tree:

Pretty Straight forward for this page. Get some base/flat armor and also some flat HP regen just like what you saw with the rune page. Then some late game scaling stats like % increase in both health and armor/MR. Well rounded boosts in both early and late game.


Utility Tree:

Probably the Tree I would talk about the most so here I go. Starting with Wealth, the 40 gold it gives you can be spent on two things, an extra potion or ward. Now the only time i would take the potion over the ward would be when i know i can't sustain what i already have sustain for. like maybe an Ezreal and Zilean bot would be really poke heavy i get the extra potion otherwise i get a ward. Next are those Fleet of Foot and Phasewalker which overall gives you more mobility for mid lane ganks and map pressure also just generally getting to lane faster. Combined 3 points in Fleet of Foot and a point in Phasewalker gets you back to lane around 4-5 seconds faster which could mean a turret if you get there in time or not.

( Scout Mastery)

This basically allows a player to use the ward trinket to place a ward in the tip of the arrow from the dragon pit while standing from inside the yellow circle.

Of course this can also be done at Baron pit at the exact same positions. Just make sure that your cursor changes color before you place the ward. This is a general tip for all kinds of warding. It hit's the bush if your cursor changes color.

There's two parts to Champion Select. One is choosing your ADC and two is convincing your teammates that you're not jungling. First let's talk about what's most important. Choosing the ADC.

Here on GREEN are great ADC's that can synergize well with a Nunu. Most of these champions also scale well with Attack Speed from Nunu's W.

Ashe (Poke Lane/Kite)
Caitlyn (Poke Lane)
Ezreal (Poke Lane/All-in)
Jinx (All-in/Kite/Push)
Tristana (Push/All-in)
Twitch (All-in)
Vayne (All-in/Kite)
Kalista (All-in/Kite)

Here in YELLOW are champions that might work with Nunu but would require some cooperation. These are the ADC's that are casters and in some cases like Sivir who already has a strong self-peel and Mobility won't really gain much from a Nunu.

Draven
Sivir
Kog'Maw
Lucian
Corki

These in RED are the don't even try to make it work comps. Mainly because if ever they win lane, it's all because of maybe an outplay but never because of a really good synergy between the champions.

Miss Fortune
Graves
Urgot
Varus
Quinn

Lastly, the Champions you want to avoid are those that can interupt your ult in multiple ways like Blitzcrank, Nautilus etc. or champions that straight up counter you like Morgana. Note though, that even if they pick aa heavy CC champ don't be discouraged to play Nunu support as it will still work as long as you do the right things at the right times.

Part Two of Champion Select

Don't be afraid to call your role and clarify them after picking. Also, if you're thinking about getting smite, just change the summoner spell when it reaches around the last second. If you feel guilty about doing that, just calmly explain and if they don't listen, it's entirely up to you what you should do. That's about it for everything before a game starts so good luck on your game ^^

There's two ways to go into this. If your team chooses to invade, take a Sweeping Lens if you're on the blue side or a Stealth Ward if you're on the purple side and you got the Scout Mastery for the Dragon Pit ward. If you're not invading, start with the Stealth Ward anyway. The rest of your items should be a Health Potion, a Mana Potion, a Stealth Ward and Relic Shield.

If you're invading take Ice Blast first. Use your movement speed to catch someone trying to ward and get that first blood. Don't be afraid to follow-up flash for a kill as a gank wouldn't really come that early if you place the stealth Ward around 3 minutes in. When it expires, your flash would already be up. If not invading, then maybe leash for your jungler or ward the buff he didn't start with. Now comes the fun part, laning....

First thing you want to do when you get to lane is, Use 2 Relic Shield procs on 2 melee minions and Smite a ranged minion. This pushes the lane super fast and will take the least amount of gold away from your ADC. This will get you to level 2 faster and dictate the pace of the lane. Make them farm under tower and just let them play passive. If you get level 2 first, try for a slight aggression. If you took Smite and not Exhaust, you have a smaller chance of getting a kill out of the early level 2 but instead just burn up their potions.

After this, you have 2 choices. Sit back and just Blood Boil your ADC and play passive after that early aggression or you can keep attacking minions under Execute range and push the lane, this allows Visionary to stack and you get a free poke every 5 auto attacks, let them farm under tower and keep up pressure. The second strat is what i use most of the time just because it fits my play style but that's also because i can estimate Nunu's capabilities well enough. This can cause your lane opponents to recall while the lane is not pushed which gives you 3 choices. Dragon, Turret or Recall yourselves.

Now with the new Rift Scuttler, you now have 3 ways to contest for vision.

1.) Trinkets/Ward

You can use Stealth Ward, Sweeping Lens and Stealth Ward to keep up vision and to control vision in bot lane. Use the red trinket to set up a gank or the yellow trinket to avoid ganks. You sould also have that normal ward you bought at the start and that should help you keep up vision a little bit more.

2.) Brush pressure

Hiding in a brush forces out wards. Forcing out wards means less vision for the enemy. Less vision means more gank paths. More gank paths means jungler would come. Jungler gank means kills. Kills mean you win lane.

3.) Rift Scuttler/Murkwolves

Rift Scuttler

Gives both vision and mobility to mid lane and if you're a Nunu, it won't take too long to kill it. This is also great for Dragon Control if say they have a really strong jungler that can clear a Dragon Early. Only do this though, when your lane is really pushed like enemy ADC is tower farming pushed. Just ask your ADC to either back away for a sec or come with you.

If you're on Blue side, there's a new way to place a ward in their Blue buff area.

Murkwolves


If you smite it, it gives you a moving wolf scout that follows an enemy champ if it enters that side of the jungle. It lasts for a minute and 15 seconds (1:15) this would be a great ward to know if the enemy jungler would gank or for when you're doing Dragon.

These are all the vision you need until you get a Sightstone after gtting that, you're set for warding the entirety of the game.

This part will tell you how to manage your abilities in lane. A separate part would be put up for roaming and team fighting under Mid-Late Game.

So let's get to it. First, I'll list all the abilities and would then refer to them as
P,Q,W,E and R throughout the this chapter.

P - Visionary
Q - Consume
W - Blood Boil
E - Ice Blast
R - Absolute Zero

There's a mix of what you can do during laning phase I will categorize them to 2 parts I've previously mentioned. Aggressive and Passive. I'll start with aggressive.

(Aggressive Laning)

If you're above at least 25% or a fourth of your mana, keep spamming your W on the ADC. Keep pushing the wave at keep your opponent's under turret by auto-ing the minions. This will help stack your P and give you a free spell every 5 auto attacks. Whenever you get a free spell, use your E on someone (preferably the enemy ADC) and don't use W since W takes less mana to cast. Lastly, if you were gonna use Q to sustain and do not have stacks on your Relic Shield, then just Q either a full health siege minion or a ranged minion. this will take the least amount of money from the ADC. Now for some lane combos. you would want to probably leave lane somehow to get a speed buff with your Q. do this when you're lane is pushed out far to the enemy turret and you maybe wanna ward river thus hitting 2 birds in one trip. When you have the speed buff, a full combo would be like W your ADC and Q a minion that you are sure you're gonna kill with one Q. This will give you around 400+ movement speed without boots. Once you have all this speed, run up behind the enemies, as the distance from the center of your R and the outside is one Flash you want to advance a little bit. Then, E the least mobile champion or the champion you want to kill to slow them so they have a harder time getting of your ult then finally R while making sure you're a little further than them. Don't be afraid to cancel it when you think they'll get away with a gapcloser or something. This is the most ideal combo that uses your abilities to it's full potential but not the only way to do it. (Note: when playing aggressive, vision is extremely important if you feel like you've built enough of a lead already, and at the same time are running out of vision, then back away and switch to passive laning)

(Passive Laning)

So to start of, I would say that passive laning is much harder than going aggressive right of the bat but there are a lot of risk and reward involved in playing passive. Trust me when I say this but you'll feel a lot safer playing aggressive in lane. That is simply because if you do it right, you start to build up a lead and it would show almost immediately. When playing passive, what you basically do is react to whatever the opponent does or what your ADC does. Maintain W on your ADC. This makes it so that your ADC can do whatever he wants. You do not poke as much when playing passive as you will save your E for a disengage or disengage. If your ADC goes for a trade you go in with him. If the enemies trade with you, you try to take the least damage possible. One thing to note is your self-sustain is better than the sustain for your ADC so when doing trades, it's better to take most of the damage than share it evenly. Be careful though as your Q can push a lane. Too much pushing is always bad when there's no vision.

Pros:
Tanky, Targetted CC,Great Kite potential, Sustain, Attack and Movement speed steroid, Great disengage, High mobility/Map presence, Not so item reliant
Cons:
Melee, No Gapcloser, No "Hard" CC, Mana Hungry 1st few levels, Fall of a bit Mid-game

Nunu is a great overall support pick that isn't really that bad of a pick as it's not expected as much. Nunu offers a lot more than some supports in some aspects but definitely lacks some CC. Not so ironically, Nunu is countered by multiple CC and be wary of your ult getting cancelled too early. Do not pick into some of the Champions i mentioned above. Also, if the ADC has CC ex. Vayne or such, Nunu also might not be a good pick.

>Be mindful of the Q buffs from neutral monster camps. Speed buff is best early game and the others are better in the late-game especially in combination.

>Nunu can split-push as a support by using W on the siege minion it also increases that minion's attack speed. He has great disengage so he probably won't get caught too easily. This is more exceptional with Banner of Command / Iceborn Gauntlet.

>It's better you get focused than the carries. Your ult does a great job of diverting focus to you. Just make sure the carries are doing damage while you're ulting and you can cancel your ult, don't be afraid to cancel it if you think it's right.

That about concludes it for my guide, hope you learned something and have fun playing Nunu support^^

Play Video

4.18 - Nunu's ult got some minor fixes and now deals correct minimum damage and is now clearer how much the minimum damage can be.
4.20 - The big preseason 5 patch #BLAZEIT introduction of Smite the Teemo and new Jungle and some other items were introduced and taken away also some slight Nunu Q rework

10/10/14 - Added new Chapters (Video, Patches, Changelog)
10/13/14 - Added Lvl 1 Chapter and working on Video Guide
11/11/14 - Changed Runes and Masteries and added some Early game Flat Armor
11/21/14 - Started Pre-S5 construction