Caitlyn to me has always seemd more utility based than damage based with her kit containing slows, roots, amplified damage, and most importantly her increadible range. I wanted to find a way to create a build and playstyle for Caitlyn that mimicked playing Ashe or Senna support, long range, annoying, with a hint of surprising damage on the side!

In this guide I will address her potential rune pages, then her build, and wrap it all up with the playstyle for this build.

To play Caitlyn to her full utility potential, I decided to center this build around her range and the ability to slow enemies from jumping around during fights by building Iceborn Gauntlet and utalizing runes like Grasp of the Undying and First Strike.

For Grasp of the Undying runes you want to take Grasp of the Undying, Font of Life, Conditioning, and Revitalize, paired with Presence of Mind and Legend: Alacrity, or Cheap Shot and Ingenious Hunter.

Addressing the main runes of the page first, Font of Life is an awesome supportive rune and probably the best one for this build in the Resolve tree top row. It can proc off of your Yordle Snap Traps, 90 Caliber Net's, and Iceborn Gauntlet autos. Next is Conditioning which is usually the better scaling rune to increase your defenses into the later stages of the game. But this can also be swapped out with Second Wind or Bone Plating if you are into a poke lane or need more burst safety throughout the game. Finally is Revitalize which helps increase your Font of Life healing and any other healing or shields you might recieve in game. This final rune can also be swapped out with Unflinching if the enemy team has more CC and you feel like you need it. Overgrowth is somewhat useless unless you truely plan to build an item like Titanic Hydra later in the game because Iceborn Gauntlet will already increase your HP 10fold as you get items.

As for secondary runes with the Resolve tree as the main rune, you can split into Precision with Presence of Mind and Legend: Alacrity for more mana sustain and extra attack speed, or opt into more damage and slow potential with Domination secondary taking Cheap Shot and Ingenious Hunter.


Alternatively, you could rely solely on items for tankiness and opt into taking First Strike with Magical Footwear, Future's Market, and Cosmic Insight, with the same secondary runes as before.

First Strike helps Caitlyn play off of her range in lane and will help to provide a little more damage into the later stages of the game. This is effective against champions like Alistar, Nautilus, or Tahm Kench who cannot match Caitlyn's range, and she can also push back shorter range ADC's like Zeri or Vayne. Taking Magical Footwear is useful because it helps combat the higher cost of her items by granting her free boots after 12 minutes or lower if she gathers assists and kills. This opens her up to a faster mythic with finishing boots right behind it. Future's Market also helps to combat the high price of items a bit and lets her go into debt for wards and components if needed, though if you find yourself running out of mana in lane for any reason you can always switch to Biscuit Delivery. Finally Cosmic Insight gives you some extra haste to abilities and items which can help to proc your Iceborn Gauntlet slow more times within a fight. An argument could be made to take Approach Velocity instead for chase potential but if your team cannot commit or chase effectively this is not worth it over extra CDR.

The secondary runes remain the same and are interchangable like with the Grasp of the Undying pages by taking Precision and Domination.

For this build I have decided to base Caitlyn around being tankier and slowing people with the help of Iceborn Gauntlet. It provides amazing tank stats that a squishy support like her would want (event after the durability patch...) and comes with a great damage dealing passive + slow and health + size per item after it with its mythic passive.

This mythic item pairs awesome with a core of items like Rapid Firecannon to increase her auto attack range by a ton for some cheeky slows and ward removal, and Anathema's Chains to help reduce damage dealt by carries to her and increase CC time on said carry she is linked too! Overall Anathema's Chains is more of a situational item then a core item, but can be subbed out and around with items like Umbral Glaive for ward control, Black Cleaver for tank shredding, Redemption for more team utility, Mortal Reminder for anti-healing, or Serpent's Fang if youre into shield heavy teams.

In a lot of cases, Iceborn Gauntlet may be the only tank item you really need thus allowing you to build Rapid Firecannon into items like Stormrazor, Wit's End, or Titanic Hydra.

In some cases though you may need more tank stats to help frontline for your team and face check bushes with your range and health pool, so you can then build things like Frozen Heart, Thornmail, Randuin's Omen, or even Abyssal Mask if your team is heavy on ability power and you need some more magic resist.

My personal recommendation is to lean tankier while taking First Strike and more damage/utility focused while taking Grasp of the Undying.

Overall Caitlyn can be very mix and matchy with her items depending on enemy team and her builds.

There are two distinct playstles for this pick depending on your build.

If you leaned into the tankier side, you will act as more of a frontline deterent and bait for the enemy team. You will have ample health and resitances to facecheck and walk into objectives for your team, as well as help defend a front to back playstle with your utility. Your main objective is be annoying and apply pressure to enemy carries and make enemies misposition during fights trying to avoid your slows and poke.

But if you decided to go down a slightly more damage focused route you will be sitting a little farther back, probably in the middle of your team, laying down some nasty poke and setting up Yordle Snap Traps to take space during fights. You will also be tasked with making sure no one gets onto your carries so keep throwing Piltover Peacemakers and Rapid Firecannon auto attacks at the enemy team.

In general for either playstle I recommend taking a Farsight Alteration to maximize your vision and always make way for your ultimate Ace in the Hole. This can also be benefical to your team by scouting objectives or un warded brushes if you arent as tanky and cant facecheck them.

If you have questions dont be afraid to throw it into the discussion section of the guide and ill be happy to answer anything!

Im always open to discuss and edit this guide if people find certain things more playable or applicable while using this themselves so dont hesitate to drop any tidbits you notice in the discussion section as well!

Thank you so much for taking the time to read my guide!