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Bard Build Guide by

[12.4] Bardjo's sus builds for Top, Mid, Bot and Support

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14 Comments League of Legends Build Guide Author Hayat Dolu Ozan

Bard Build Guide By Updated on

Guide Discussion (14) More Bard Guides

Choose Champion Build:

Celestial Artillerist
Explosive Warden
Cosmic Wizard
Nomad Hunter
Gentle Giant
Wandering Legionary
Timeless Traveler
Marathon King
Hide & Seek Master
Immortal God

Runes: Celestial Artillerist (9.5/10)

Precision

Lethal Tempo

Overheal

Legend: Alacrity

Coup de Grace

Domination

Cheap Shot

Ravenous Hunter

Bonus:

+10% Attack Speed
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+6 Armor

Spells:

1 2 3 4

Top

Flash

Teleport

Items

Celestial Artillerist

#1 starting items

#2 starting items

core items

4th item

5th and 6th item

full build example

Ability Order ultra aggressive lane

1 2 3 4

Bard Passive Ability

Threats & Synergies

Threats

Synergies

Extreme Major Even Minor Tiny

Show All

None Low Ok Strong Ideal

Extreme Threats

Ideal Synergies

Bard

Ideal

Ideal champion for One for All. Call your friends and share my builds with them.

Synergies

Ideal Strong Ok Low None

Bard

Ideal

Ideal champion for One for All. Call your friends and share my builds with them.

Champion Build Guide

Index

General		Gameplay

1. Intro 6. Builds' Cemetery 7. Outro		2. Lanes 3. Summoner spells 4. Abilities 5. Starters and Elixirs

Builds

6.1 Celestial Artillerist 6.2 Explosive Warden 6.3 Cosmic Wizard 6.4 Nomad Hunter 6.5 Gentle Giant	6.6 Wandering Legionary 6.7 Timeless Traveler 6.8 Marathon King 6.9 Hide & Seek Master 6.10 Immortal God

1. Intro

Hello everyone, I'm Bardjo.
I started playing LoL in the second half of S6 and my peak has been D2 90LP in the middle of S11.
In real life I'm an Italian jazz trumpeter that loves anime, so it's not hard to understand why I OTP Bard with 1.5M of points.
I started getting interested in Bard a couple of months after my landing on Summoner's Rift and I immediately fell in love with him. I've climbed from S2 to D2 one tricking the Wandering Caretaker and I'm still ranking only with him. Playing Bard, you understand that he is extremely versatile and has a unique impact on the game. This guide was not created to help you improve your Bard but to have fun with him once you are confident with the champion. As you can see from the rune and item sections, I’ve rated all the builds of this guide to help you understand the level of troll of each one of them. I also put in the rune and build sections a standard set-up that is good in most cases, read notes to understand how to build properly in every situation.

2.1 Solo & Duo Lane

Playing in lane with Bard is like playing : in most of the cases you just have to ignore the early game trading to wait for your items and your Meeps to come out.
In top lane you can abuse of range vs melee matchup, especially if you are playing with , and but remember to not extend trades: make the most of your runes and back to farm safely. The same concept should be applied to mid lane but be aware of your positioning: in side lanes you have a lot of good walls to escape with if you are in danger, while mid lane walls are pretty useless for Bard. Bot lane is really variable, your goal remains farming up for the mid and late game but, with a good support, you’ll be able to get kills in early game and start stomping even in the weakest part of the game for Bard (the laning phase). Support is obviously the main role for Bard, easier because you don’t have to farm, harder because you don’t earn much gold (worth for cheap builds, worthlessness for expensive builds); build a poke support item (AP or AD based on the kind of build you’ve chosen) and perma roam once you have boots to help your team get fed and to take objectives. The mid and late game playstyle is dependent on the current state of the game, the type of build you are doing and the kind of team you are playing with and facing; it’s difficult to give advice on such a situational thing but remember to:

never stop farming and collecting chimes
avoid useless fights if you are building for late game
play around objectives if you are not getting hard stomped by the enemy team

If you are going mid or top lane, remember that, if you don’t move from base in the first 35 seconds, the first group of chimes will automatically spawn bot lane and the third one will spawn in an uncomfortable position too.

2.2 Jungle

After several tests in the jungle, I have understood that you lose too much resources in the first 10 minutes to make it worth it: you take too long clearing camps and some camps must be ignored for many clears, so after 10 minutes you’ll inevitably be 2 levels below your opponent; he’ll have more gold than you and you’ll have to put yours on farming items like , if you are going for , or AS / AP stats, if you are going AP (I don’t wanna talk about tank and bruiser Bard jungle XD). The only way for Bard jungle to work is by perma ganking, taking XP from kills and a couple of minions in lane but it’s a coinflip: counter jungling you is easy, counter ganking you is easy and if you don’t gank perfectly you won’t kill the enemies and you’ll fall behind. Even if you find a kill, you’ll probably get assists because you prefer to gank early game champions and winning matchups that have more damage than you during the early game and although you got kills and got fed, you don’t have the same impact of a laning Bard with the same score.

3. Summoner Spells

Essentials

Always pick , it’s the most OP Summoner Spell. If you don’t pick it, you are trolling. You can pick in every lane to have fun and if you are playing ARAM.

Top Lane

My advice for top lane is to play with ; you can use it to gank a lane, to back top after a gank, to split push safely if your team is going to fight an Epic Monster soon and to look for some unexpected side map plays. is good if you want to secure some kills in early game, if you are perma fighting and if you are laning against a champion with a lot of sustain like or , but this way you lose map presence.

Mid Lane

In mid lane you are free to choose between and ; unlike top lane you have good map presence thanks to your . Pick if you want to secure some kills in early game, if you are perma fighting and if you are laning against a champion with a lot of sustain like or . Pick if you are sure that your laner is going to pick and to play passively.

Bot Lane

If you are playing ADC, I advise you to take ; go for if the enemy team has assassins and your support picked .

Support

As a support you can play with against team compositions full of sustain or if you want extra damage and Grievous Wounds. Go for if you want more utility against team compositions with assassins.

4. Abilities

Start almost every game with a point on : it’s the only ability you have to deal damage and set-up CC in early game; go for if you are going to invade with a good CC set-up. If you are in duo lane and you want to force level 2 trade, it’s better for you to walk close to a wall, unlock and use it to reach the enemy duo from the side; this should also be applied if you are in a solo side lane with a jungler that is going to gank you early. In all other situations, go for and begin to place altars. If you are positioned in the middle of the lane, most of the times you can choose whether or not to be aggressive or passive and at level 3 you should have all of your abilities unlocked; if you are under their turret you need to have 2 points on your for extra damage and 1 on your that's going to be used to disengage; if that's not the case and you're forced under your turret you don’t need and you should level up your and according to the situation. in these extreme situations you'll end up levelling up the last ability at level 4.
The first ability you have to max is always , while the second one is dependent on the kind of Bard you are playing: with support and AP Bard you have to max because the heal scales with AP; if you are not building AP, max like second ability. Obviously put points in at level 6, 11 and 16.

5. Starters and Elixirs

In this section I want to share with you my personal though about starter items and elixirs. I’ve ordered starter items in a sort of tier list so at the top you can see items that I particularly recommend. I’ve also associated every item to the builds in which I advise you to use it.

Starters:

Cull: it’s an evergreen item; since Bard’s power spike is in mid-late game due to Meeps’ scaling, this item helps him reaching it faster but also helps him surviving in lane giving him decent offensive stats. It synergises well with . I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.1 Celestial Artillerist - 6.2 Explosive Warden - 6.8 Marathon King - 6.9 Hide & Seek Master - 6.10 Immortal God.

Doran's Blade: it really helps Bard’s laning phase; with this item he should be able to 1vs1 trade a lot of matchups and to farm safely in untradeable matchup. It’s really good in ranged vs melee matchup and works well with runes like and . I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.1 Celestial Artillerist - 6.2 Explosive Warden - 6.4 Nomad Hunter - 6.5 Gentle Giant - 6.6 Wandering Legionary - 6.8 Marathon King - 6.9 Hide & Seek Master - 6.10 Immortal God.

Dark seal: it’s the best item if you are going AP or if you are going to buy ; it doesn’t give Bard many stats but it allows him to work on the build from minute 0 to reach mid-late game faster. It’s a risky item because you are fragile and it doesn’t help you farming but, if managed correctly, it’s still better than his competitor. I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.3 Cosmic Wizard - 6.8 Marathon King.

Spellthief's Edge / Spectral Sickle: it’s an aggressive support item; since Bard is a ranged and roamer champion with empowered auto attacks, I particularly recommend this item if you are going support; if your playstyle is passive or if the enemy duo / team composition is particularly problematic for you, go for the alternative passive item. I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.3 Cosmic Wizard - 6.7 Timeless Traveler.

Relic Shield / Steel Shoulderguards: it’s a passive support item; since Bard is a ranged and roamer champion with empowered auto attacks, I don’t recommend this item if you are going support; if your playstyle is passive or if the enemy duo / team composition is particularly problematic for you, go for this item. Currently, I don’t advise you to pick this item in none of my builds.

Doran's Ring: it’s the standard starter item for AP; gives good offensive and defensive stats but its passive is useless for Bard because he gains mana from chimes. I don’t recommend this item at all because for 500 gold you don’t get an effective trade or farming advantage compared to his competitor (you won’t kill the enemy thanks to +30 HP). Currently, I don’t advise you to pick this item in none of my builds.

Doran's Shield: it’s a viable item for Bard; I pick this item only when I play the tanky build and I’m 100% sure to won’t be able to kill the enemy in lane; play passive, farm and don’t trade your enemy because your AD is incredibly bad. I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.5 Gentle Giant - 6.6 Wandering Legionary.

Corrupting Potion: it’s a viable item for Bard; I pick this item in extremely problematic laning phases (like versus , , and ). If you are uncertain whether or not it’s better to build or this item my advice is: Shield if you want and able to farm safely, Potion if you have to stay 500 miles away from the wave. I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.5 Gentle Giant.

Tear of the Goddess: collecting chimes gives mana to Bard. Currently, I don’t advise you to pick this item in none of my builds.

Elixirs:

Elixir of Wrath: to increase your AD and life steal stats. I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.1 Celestial Artillerist - 6.2 Explosive Warden - 6.4 Nomad Hunter - 6.6 Wandering Legionary.

Elixir of Sorcery: to increase your AP stats and to deal true damage. I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.3 Cosmic Wizard - 6.7 Timeless Traveler.

Elixir of Iron: to increase your defensive stats and size. I advise you to pick this item in the following builds: 6.5 Gentle Giant - 6.6 Wandering Legionary - 6.7 Timeless Traveler - 6.8 Marathon King - 6.9 Hide & Seek Master - 6.10 Immortal God.

6.1 Celestial Artillerist

Introduction

Celestial Artillerist is the on-hit build: it offers you huge amounts of DPS (it synergizes extremely well with your ) and focuses on attack speed, ignoring your resistance. Once you get 1-2 items you can win 1 vs 1 against most solo laners. You are good in every situation of the game: farming, split pushing, fighting and taking objectives.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that , , , , , , , , , , and significantly increase the power of this build.

You can play it mindlessly in top, mid and bot: just patiently wait for your 2 items’ power spike and it’s GG.
I rated it 9.5/10 because you don’t suffer too much in the early game, your carry potential is incredibly high and you deal huge amounts of damage to all kinds of champions.

Runes

allows you to make the most of the build’s power -- is the best option because doesn’t help you and is useless due to -- gives you a good amount of attack speed -- is the best one in most cases / alternatively, against 2 or more tanks / juggernauts, you might prefer .
is really easy to proc because it stacks with both and -- gives you a good amount of sustain during fights.
helps you farming during the early game -- is a standard adaptive rune for damage dealers -- because most of team compositions deal more AD damage than AP / alternatively if the enemy team has 3 or more AP scaling champions.

Build

The first thing you need is attack speed, you need it to farm and it gives you more time to react, reposition and dodge skillshots: rush if you need sustain to face an early game champion or if you managed to get a lot of gold; go for if your laner is a mid/late game champion -- gives you good sustain for laning phase and it insanely increases your trading power -- gives you a lot damage against any kind of champion -- is one of the best on-hit items and gives you defensive stats / alternatively to increases damage on and -- improves the effectiveness of all on-hit items and allows you to reach an absurd amount of DPS -- has good synergy with and , allowing you to proc the Meep’s slow from a longer distance.

6.2 Explosive Warden

Introduction

Explosive Warden is the critical build: it offers you huge amounts of DPS (it synergizes extremely well with your ) and focuses on attack damage, ignoring your resistance. Like most of the late game ADCs (, , etc.), you hit your power spike with the third item , which allows you to one-shot almost everyone.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that , , , , , , , , , and significantly increase the power of this build.

Obviously, the best lane to play it is bot lane, but top and mid lane are fine too.
I rated it 9.5/10 because, similar to Celestial Artillerist, you don’t suffer too much in early game, your carry potential is incredibly high and you deal huge amounts of damage to all kinds of champions.

Runes

allows you to deal a huge amount of damage in a really short time -- is really easy to proc because it stacks with both and -- is the only rune that gives you damage in its slot -- gives you a good amount of sustain during fights.
gives you a good amount of attack speed -- is the best one in most cases / alternatively, against 2 or more tanks / juggernauts, you might prefer .
helps you farming during the early game -- is a standard adaptive rune for damage dealers -- because most of team compositions deal more AD damage than AP / alternatively if the enemy team has 3 or more AP scaling champions or if you are laning against an AP champion.

Build

The first thing you need is attack speed, you need it to farm and it gives you more time to react, reposition and dodge skillshots: rush if you managed to get a lot of gold; if that's not the case, go for after building -- gives you a lot damage against any kind of champion -- has good synergy with / alternatively pick if you suffer too much from your limited auto attacks’ range -- is the essential item of every full crit build, improves effectiveness of all crit items and allows you to proc an absurd amount of damage in a really short time -- for the last two slots, you are free to choose between , , and the third item you didn’t buy; generally is good against tanks and juggernauts, against team compositions full of sustain and to increase your survivability.

6.3 Cosmic Wizard

Introduction

Cosmic Wizard is the mage build: it offers you huge amounts of ability power and magic penetration, ignoring your resistance. Unfortunately, new AP items are not that valuable on Bard and you don’t have the one-shot potential you had in previous seasons. If you are ahead, you get good amounts of damage against squishy champions, but if you fall behind, it will be hard for you to come back. Note that the 4th, 5th and 6th build path are interchangeable.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that , and significantly increase the power of this build.

You can test this build both mid lane and support: in mid lane you can farm safely, but you have zero impact on the map because your wave clear is terrible and there’s no way to fast push early game to roam; as a support you earn less gold but you can play more around the map and you leave mid lane to another guy probably more in meta than you.
I rated it 7.5/10 because the amount of damage you deal once you’re ahead is good, but your awful wave clear limits Bard from playing around one of his strengths: roaming.

Runes

Your Meeps count like singular spells so 1 auto attack gives you 2 stacks of and, if you hit , it’s impossible to miss -- is really easy to proc because it stacks with both and -- is the only rune that gives you damage in this slot -- gives you a good amount of sustain during fights.
is the most unbalanced rune giving you free ability haste -- since AP Bard is a late game scaling champions, is the best option.
helps you farming during the early game -- is a standard adaptive rune for damage dealers -- if you are laning against an AP champion or if the enemy team has 3 or more AP scaling champions / alternatively if you need to face an AD champion or team compositions with 3 or more AD dealers.

Build

is the first item you need; like in AD builds, you need help farming to have more time to react, reposition and dodge skillshots; take only if you need to rush boots -- gives you magic penetration and helps you taking chimes, counter roam your laner and dodge skillshots -- increases your and ’s damage and it gives you more magic penetration -- for the 4th item you are free to choose between an offensive item (like for in-fight movement speed and ability haste and if you are ahead) or a defensive item (like for the synergy with and to face AD dealers) -- 5th item must give you a lot of stats: gives huge amounts of damage and gives damage, health and magic penetration -- to complete your build with magic penetration.

6.4 Nomad Hunter

Introduction

Nomad Hunter is the assassin build: it offers you attack damage and lethality, ignoring your resistance and DPS. Your main goal is to rush boots and as soon as possible to be able to instantly reposition your squishy beard after a kill. helps you in the early game with small trades and it’s fundamental for this lethality build since your main source of damage comes from auto attacks. Your late game is not that good, but with , you may be able to make some good plays.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that and significantly increase the power of this build.

My advice is to go for it in top and mid lane if you are last pick, if you see 4-5 squishy champions in the enemy team and if you want to test something new on Bard (Explosive Warden and Cosmic Wizard are better in this situation).
I rated it 7/10 because you have good amounts of damage but you are squishy and it’s a really situational build (applied to every single game, I would rate it 4/10).

Runes

allows you to deal a huge amount of damage in a really short time -- is really easy to proc because it stacks with both and -- is the only rune that gives you damage in this slot -- gives you a good amount of sustain during fights.
gives you a good amount of attack speed / alternatively if you don’t need attack speed -- is the best one in most cases / alternatively, against 2 or more tanks / juggernauts, you might prefer .
helps you farming during the early game -- is a standard adaptive rune for damage dealers -- because most of team compositions deal more AD damage than AP / alternatively if the enemy team has 3 or more AP scaling champions or if you are laning against an AP champion.

Build

Rush as soon as possible, you need to farm and they give you more time to react, reposition and dodge skillshots -- is the best lethality mythic item because it allows you to reposition once you kill an enemy -- is a cheap item with a really useful passive for roaming champions like Bard -- to fill the 4th and the 5th slot you can choose between , if you want more damage and mobility; , if you need HP and a spell shield; , if you need anti-shield and , if you need anti-heal and has good synergy with .

6.5 Gentle Giant

Introduction

Gentle Giant is the tanky build: it offers you defensive stats and size, ignoring your damage output. It’s like the most common utility-tank build, but you have less utility and you are less tanky than a tank. The main problem of this build is that you don’t have a power spike: you are just a useless cannon minion with a ranged stun.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that , , , and significantly increase the power of this build.

I advise you to play it in top lane because in mid lane you have lots of ranged champions to deal with and problems clearing waves while in a duo lane you don’t have enough damage or utility.
I rated it 6/10 because you are useless for the whole game but your size gives you a lot of style points.

Runes

is extremely easy to stack in a solo lane during the early game, it gives you sustain and passive health -- is a fun rune and the most useful of its group -- take if you are facing a ranged champion and if you are facing a melee champion -- is the most useful rune in most cases, go for against a team full of CCs (excluding knock ups).
is a standard secondary rune for tanks: tenacy is one of the most important stats for tanks and there are only a few ways to have it -- is another common rune for tanks that can exploit it thanks to their strength.
helps you farming during the early game and to take stacks -- / / depends on the enemy team composition and on the laner you are facing.

Build

Build if you are laning against an AD scaling champion or against an AP scaling champion or a team full of CCs (excluding knock ups) -- has good synergy with / alternatively you can go for if you want to have fun -- ’s passive has an obvious synergy with and it’s been a standard item for the support build for many years, it also has good synergy with and -- the fourth item must give you a huge amount of HP, if the enemy team has got one fed guy or a hyper late game carry, go for / alternatively you might prefer -- last two slots must be filled with situational items, depending on enemy team composition; gives you offensive stats by stacking health, gives you armor and has an useful aura effect, gives you mobility and MR and if you are the only frontline of the team and you are perma fighting.

6.6 Wandering Legionary

Introduction

Wandering Legionary is the bruiser build: it offers you attack damage and defensive stats, ignoring your DPS. It’s like the tank build but you are less tanky. I don’t know how to win a lane or how to carry a game with this build but send me your games if you do that.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that , , and significantly increase the power of this build.

I advise you to play it in top lane because in mid you meet lots of ranged champions and you have problems clearing waves and stacking while in a duo lane you don’t have enough damage or utility.
I rated it 6/10 because you are useless for the whole game and you don’t earn style points thanks to your mythic.

Runes

is an amazing rune key for Bard because your Meeps count like singular spells: 1 auto attack gives you 3 stacks of passive and in late game when you have 4-9 Meeps you just need to auto attack 4 times to reach max efficiency on the rune -- helps you surviving in trades -- gives you free life steal -- is another good item for a bruiser build.
gives you good defensive stats for extended trades -- is a good way to get tenacity due to the fact that you don’t take because you need life steal.
helps you farming during the early game -- is a standard adaptive rune for damage dealers -- because most of team compositions deal more AD damage than AP / alternatively if the enemy team has 3 or more AP scaling champions.

Build

Build if you are laning against an AD scaling champion or against an AP scaling champion or a team full of CCs (excluding knock ups) -- 's passive works really well with Meeps / alternatively you might prefer against tanks -- has good sustain and it insanely increases your trading power -- has a good synergy with Meeps and gives omnivamp and AD -- for the 5th item you need MR, you are free to choose between , for attack speed and in-fight movement speed buff, or , for ability haste and shield -- the 6th item is dependent on which defensive stat you need; if you have to deal with AD champions, the item that you didn't choose from the 5th slot if you have to deal with AP champions and if the enemy damage is balanced.

6.7 Timeless Traveler

Introduction

Timeless Traveler is the abilty haste build: it offers you huge amounts of ability haste (183 with runes and full build + extras), ignoring your damage output and resistance. The runes I’ve chosen are not the best but with a fun build you need a fun rune page; a good alternative to is if you want to have fun with attack speed and . The build path is extremely subjective depending on your play style, the enemy composition and the current state of the game.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that , , and significantly increase the power of this build.

You can build it only as a support because, to build , you need to hit level 13 and to complete the support item’s mission; once you’ve completed your build, sell the support item to buy the last item and reach 183 ability haste.
I rated it 8/10 because it’s extremely fun and useful. The downside is that you’re fragile.

Runes

is an extremely fun and useful rune page if used properly -- is a free that could help you with some plays in lane and in team fights -- is another funny rune that helps you completing the build as soon as possible -- gives you other kinds of ability haste, it has good synergy with and .
is the only rune you really need for this build -- gives you good stats for a late game with a Q every 2.38 seconds.
is obviously the shard you need -- you can fill the last 2 slots with the shards you prefer, depending on team compositions and your playstyle.

Build

Start with , you need a lot of mobility because you are a roaming champion and, after completing boots, you can start helping the team around the whole map -- is the best mythic support item that gives you passive ability haste and a lot of mobility -- is a good choice because it's cheap and you get HP and ability haste -- gives you ability haste and in-fight movement speed -- is the of ability haste -- gives you defensive stats and has a useful aura effect (remember to sell the support item if you want to build the 6th item).

6.8 Marathon King

Introduction

Marathon King is the out-of-fight movement speed build: it offers you huge amounts of out-of-fight movement speed, ignoring your damage output and resistance. It's been created to allow random runs through the Summoner's Rift, ignoring the MOBA aspect of the game. Despite the fact that this isn't a build focussed on active effects, we accept into our build because we use excellent out-of-combat runes and items ( and ) that have a good related movement speed active effect ( and ). The build path is extremely subjective depending on your play style, the enemy composition and the current state of the game.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that , Cloud Rift, , , , /, , , , , , , , , , and significantly increase the power of this build.

I advise you to pretend to be a top laner because otherwise you would be useless everywhere (top lane is a dead lane).
I rated it 8/10, no explanations, have fun.

Runes

In the current state of the game, there isn’t a key rune that gives us out-of-combat passive movement speed, so we are picking (I prefer to have an active effect than a fight-stacking effect like ) -- is really easy to proc because it stacks with both and , more damage helps completing the build asap -- is the only rune that gives you damage in this slot, more damage helps completing the build asap -- gives out-of-combat movement speed.
gives free movement speed in the river -- boosts movement speed bonuses and gives percentage movement speed.
helps you farm during the early game -- you can fill the last 2 slots with the shards you prefer, depending on team compositions and your playstyle.

Build

are obviously our boots choice gifting us huge amounts of out-of-combat movement speed -- is the best mythic item for this build because of its passive / alternatively has got the same passive but offensively you earn nothing, while defensively you are much more fragile -- grants defensive stats, percentage movement speed and a perfect unique passive giving us flat movement speed while out-of-combat -- has almost the unique passive of and has an extra active effect similar to -- since we’ve collected so much flat movement speed (from , and ), we need items to maximize the build effectiveness; is the best item to do this but it’s hard to keep stacks for the entire game with a troll build so you might decide to anticipate buying the 6th item as 5th -- is the second item with percentage speed of movement that we have left, if you have already built it as your 5th item, choose between , if you want to boost your auto attacks’ range, and , if you need anti-heal.

6.9 Hide & Seek Master

Introduction

Hide & Seek Master is the in-fight movement speed build: it offers you huge amounts of in-fight movement speed, ignoring your damage output and resistance. There are so many items and runes in the game that increase your in-fight movement speed and they are similar to each other (4 legendary items and need only 3 auto attacks/abilities to be activated). The build path is extremely subjective depending on your play style, the enemy composition and the current state of the game.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that Cloud Rift, , , , /, , , , , , , , , , and significantly increase the power of this build.

I advise you to play it top lane but, thanks to its strength, you’ll also be able to play it in mid.
I’ve rated it 8.5/10 because it’s super fun to play: survivability is one of the biggest problems for Bard’s troll builds and with this one you are able to ignore the fact that you are fragile.

Runes

is obviously the rune we want to take, + auto attack with can easily proc its passive -- is another good rune for our build giving us movement speed once we use a spell -- boosts movement speed bonuses and gives movement speed -- is one of my favorite runes and it’s always good when you want to reach late game to look at the build’s full potential.
is another of my favorite runes, helps you reach the late game earlier than normal and gives you more game timing options -- is an incredibly strong rune for our build since you are supposed to hit your to quickly stack in-fight movement speed.
helps you farm during the early game -- you can fill the last 2 slots with the shards you prefer, depending on team compositions and your playstyle.

Build

is my mythic advice, it gives you good stats and obviously movement speed after attacking an enemy champion / alternatively go for if you want a bit more stats but keep in mind that its active is useless for you (differently from ) -- are the boots with max movement speed and you need them to increase passives that give you percentage movement speed -- is another good item giving you flat in-fight movement speed -- gives you in-fight percentage movement speed and ghost -- gives you in-fight percentage movement speed -- requires 2 more attacks to our standard + empowered auto attack to be activated but it gives you a huge amount of in-fight percentage movement speed.

6.10 Immortal God

Introduction

Immortal God is the survivability build: it offers you a lot of ways to survive, ignoring your damage output. The build path is extremely subjective depending on your play style, enemy team composition and the current state of the game. Like for items, runes are interchangeable, but keep in mind that , and are particularly good for this build, so try to take a key rune from or tree.

Lucky Synergies: keep in mind that , , , , , , , , , , , , , and significantly increase the power of this build.

I advise you to play this in top or in mid because in a duo lane you occupy a really important supportive or carry role.
I rated it 9/10 because it’s super fun to play: survivability is one of the biggest problems for Bard’s troll builds and with this one you are an immortal god of Runeterra.

Runes

is an extremely fun and useful rune page if used properly -- is one of most important runes for this build gifting you a free component for -- is one of my favorite runes, helps you reach the late game earlier than normal and gives you more game timing options -- gives you 10 item haste and has good synergy with .
increase your survivability giving you informations of the enemy team – is the most important rune for this build drastically reducing your items’ CDs.
helps you farm during the early game -- you can fill the last 2 slots with the shards you prefer, depending on team compositions and your playstyle.

Build

Build if you are laning against an AD scaling champion or against an AP scaling champion or a team full of CCs (excluding knock ups) -- gives you defensive stats and stasis for 2.5 seconds and could be strategically matched with your ult for some tricky escapes -- gives a free anti-damage shield and defensive stats -- is the best piece of the collection allowing you to revive from Death Realm –- is another good item that gives you defensive stats and a free spell shield -- looks like a troll item but it’s actually better than in our situation because it gives you defensive stats and tenancy / slow reduction once activated, remember that effect removes all suppressions so build that component if you are laning against , , , , etc… Learn more

7. Builds' Cemetery

In this section I want to give honour to builds that are no longer avaible on Bard due to game adjustments made by Riot patch by patch.
- Perma Meeps' Slow [RIP 11.23]
- 194AH Support [RIP 11.23]

8. Outro

My biggest thanks go to Pointless Nami for the help in English translation and in formatting this guide. I also want to thank FINCOTTERO and Maartenx25 for the valuable tips and you for reading the guide. I hope you can have fun with these builds and make sure to send me your best clips. See you in the Rift!