Click to open network menu
Join or Log In
Mobafire logo

Join the leading League of Legends community. Create and share Champion Guides and Builds.

Create an MFN Account






Or

MOBAFire's final Mini Guide Contest of Season 14 is here! Create or update guides for the 30 featured champions and compete for up to $200 in prizes! 🏆
Akshan Build Guide by SanyGame

Middle [14.16] In-Depth Akshan Guide [Mid/Top]

Middle [14.16] In-Depth Akshan Guide [Mid/Top]

Updated on August 15, 2024
8.6
15
Votes
2
Vote Vote
League of Legends Build Guide Author SanyGame Build Guide By SanyGame 15 2 36,581 Views 0 Comments
15 2 36,581 Views 0 Comments League of Legends Build Guide Author SanyGame Akshan Build Guide By SanyGame Updated on August 15, 2024
x
Did this guide help you? If so please give them a vote or leave a comment. You can even win prizes by doing so!
Vote
Comment

You must be logged in to comment. Please login or register.

I liked this Guide
I didn't like this Guide
Commenting is required to vote!
Would you like to add a comment to your vote?

Your votes and comments encourage our guide authors to continue
creating helpful guides for the League of Legends community.

Choose Champion Build:

  • LoL Champion: Akshan
    MID
  • LoL Champion: Akshan
    TOP

Runes: DPS // RESOLVE

1 2 3 4
Precision
Press the Attack
Presence of Mind
Legend: Alacrity
Cut Down

Resolve
Overgrowth
Bone Plating
Bonus:

+10% Attack Speed
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+10-180 Bonus Health

Spells:

1 2
AGGRESSIVE
LoL Summoner Spell: Flash

Flash

LoL Summoner Spell: Ignite

Ignite

Threats & Synergies

Threats Synergies
Extreme Major Even Minor Tiny
Show All
None Low Ok Strong Ideal
Extreme Threats
Ideal Synergies
Synergies
Ideal Strong Ok Low None

Champion Build Guide

[14.16] In-Depth Akshan Guide [Mid/Top]

By SanyGame

Pros

Low Ban Rate and Pick Rate
Has a lot of skill expression
Flexible pick (Top, Mid)
Very good at roaming
Strong early and snowballs easily
High mobility
High build diversity (Crit and on-hit with variations)
Revive teammates with [W] passive

Cons

Vulnerable to CC
Weak from behind
Falls off late game
Pretty hard to pick up

PASSIVE
ABILITY
Dirty Fighting (Passive): After each auto-attack Akshan makes a weaker shot. It can be cancelled, granting a brief boost of decaying Movement Speed.

Akshan's auto-attacks and abilities apply stacks to targets for 5 seconds. At third stack, all of them are consumed, dealing magic damage. If the target is a champion, Akshan also gains a shield for 2 seconds (with a cooldown).
  • Akshan is standing still while firing his second shot.
  • The additional shot applies on-hit and on-attack effects at 100% effectiveness and can critically strike for increased damage.
  • Due to this passive, Akshan has the lowest Attack Speed ratio (0.4) in the game, making Attack Speed less effective. However, it's still viable to build Attack Speed, as you shoot 2 auto-attacks and Heroic Swing scales with it as well.
  • Shield passive is very powerful, make sure to take short trade when it's up and play more passively when it's down.
  • Never forget about movement speed passive, it allows you easily to chase low health enemies.


Q
Avengerang (Q): Akshan throws a boomerang that increases its range with each enemy it strikes before homing back. Upon hitting an enemy champion, Akshan gains a decaying Movement Speed boost.
  • Avengerang is a strong poke and trade ability, as it applies Dirty Fighting 2 times. You can use [Q] onto enemy, getting bonus movement speed, and landing another [AA] to proc Dirty Fighting and back off with a shield.
  • Avengerang is Akshan's main waveclear ability, as it can hit all minions twice and apply 2 stacks of Dirty Fighting to each of them. However, it deals reduced damage to minions on early, making it important max out this ability first.
  • Gives vision briefly around projectile, making it good for checking brushes.


W
Going Rogue (W Passive): Akshan marks enemy champions who have recently killed his teammates as Scoundrels for 1 minute (refreshes each kill). Securing a takedown on a Scoundrel within 3 seconds of damaging them gives 100 gold and revives all of Akshan's teammates who were slain by the marked Scoundrel, returning them to the fountain and removing the Scoundrel mark from all other champions.
(W Active): Akshan gets camouflage for 2 seconds that refreshes indefinitely near terrain or inside brushes. While camouflaged, Akshan gains the ability to detect trails leading towards Scoundrels within a range of 5000 units, receiving bonus Movement Speed and Mana Regeneration while moving towards them. The camouflage effect immediately ends upon recasting the ability or upon using auto-attacks/abilities.
  • Akshan can't trigger Going Rogue's passive while he is dead.
  • Camouflage can't be cancelled with CC or damage, making it a good escape tool.
  • Make sure to prioritize enemies correctly, as Scoundrel mark is removed from all other champions after killing one of them.


E
Heroic Swing (E): Akshan fires a hook that embeds into the first terrain it collides with. Once attached, Akshan can recast the ability to swing around the terrain, making him shoot at the nearest visible enemy. This ability ends upon recasting, colliding with an enemy champion or terrain. Scoring an enemy champion takedown reduces Heroic Swing's cooldown to 0.5 seconds.
  • Indicator range is a bit shorter than an actual ability range, so in reality it has longer range.
  • Akshan prioritizes enemy champions with stacks of Dirty Fighting, then those damaged by his targeted spells (like Ignite or Comeuppance) in the last 4 seconds, then the nearest enemy. So before engaging with this ability, start with Avengerang, auto attack or Ignite.
  • The shots can critically strike for bonus damage and apply Life steal at 100% effectiveness. Applies on-hit effects at 25% effectiveness per shot.
  • The fire rate is not affected by Attack Speed, but it increases ability damage.
  • You can swing around terrain indefinitely, as long as you don't collide with an enemy champion or terrain (it has a small amount of leeway).


R
Comeuppance (R): Akshan targets an enemy champion and begins channeling for up to 2.5 seconds, loading bullets into his weapon during this time. After 2.5 seconds or upon recasting the ability, he unleashes all stored bullets, damaging the first enemy hit, including minions or structures. The damage is increased based on the target's missing health.

This ability is mainly used to kill low-HP enemies at the end of the fight.
  • Heroic Swing is usable during channel, allowing you to shoot while swinging and making it easier to avoid obstacles like minions or towers.
  • You can freely move during a channel, but can't at all when shooting bullets (unless you're swinging with Heroic Swing).
  • Executes minions, making it good for fast-pushing if enemy champion is nearby.
  • Comeuppance is placed on a 5-second cooldown if the channel is cancelled (except after Akshan's death during channel).
  • Applies lifesteal at 100% effectiveness.
  • Reveals the target while channeling and for 2 seconds after, making it effective against champions like Akali, Talon, etc.
  • Does not apply on-hit effects, but its damage is increased based on Crit Chance and Crit Damage, making it strong in crit builds.

Starter Items


Doran's Blade is the only viable starter item, as 100 Health and 3.5% Lifesteal is a lot for marksmen.

Health Potions provide sustain and allow you to stay longer in lane. With health advantage you can force enemies to overextend and all-in them.

Refillable Potion is more valuable against poke champions. You can buy it after an early recall, but it's a bad starter item, as Doran's Blade is much better than Long Sword.

Boots


Plated Steelcaps are situational and viable against a lot of AD or auto attack based champions.

Mercury's Treads are also situational and viable against a lot of AP or heavy CC champions.

Berserker's Greaves are good in situations when you don't need any defensive boots, especially in crit builds that lack Attack Speed. It's also good for snowballing, but in that case you often want to buy defensive boots, as they're much less risky.

Core


Kraken Slayer is one of the best items for Akshan as it has great snowball potential, dealing missing health damage and providing good stats. It synergizes especially well with Dirty Fighting's double auto attack and Heroic Swing's large number of shots.

Crit items


Infinity Edge is core item for all crit builds (just like every crit marksmen). It gives high amount of AD and Crit Dmg%, amplifying his Comeuppance, Heroic Swing and auto attack damage really well, futher scaling with Crit Chance%.

The Collector isn't very strong item, but still a viable option in some games. Lethality is useful for ability oriented champion, and execute makes it easier to finish off enemies.

Rapid Firecannon synergizes really well with Akshan. With this item you can autoattack enemies from high range while using Going Rogue, marking them with Dirty Fighting and going all-in. It also has nice amount of Attack Speed, which is great in AD Crit builds that has almost no Attack Speed.

Lord Dominik's Regards is an amazing item and should be bought most games, as after some time champions' base armor is getting really high, making Armor Penetration% valuable even against squishies. It's also necessary against enemies stacking Armor, including tanks, bruisers, or squishy champions buying defensive items such as Guardian Angel or Zhonya's Hourglass.

Mortal Reminder is an alternative to Lord Dominik's Regards. It has a bit less damage output, but is necessary against champions like Dr. Mundo, Soraka, Vladimir, etc., especially if your team refuses to buy anti-heal or you 1v1 a lot.

On-hit items


Blade of the Ruined King is core item for on-hit Akshan build. It's good for fighting HP stackers (tanks, bruises, battle mages), has a slight slow for sticking to enemies and synergizes well with Kraken Slayer's passive (BotRK deals current HP% => harder to kill low HP enemies), and its stats are also quite good. Sometimes can be bought in crit builds for better tank busting, but delays crit items.

Terminus is really good fit for on-hit builds for Akshan, as he can easily stack it with single Heroic Swing or 3 double auto attacks. While it has less Armor Penetration% than Lord Dominik's Regards, it provides more survivability with resistances.

Wit's End is a defensive on-hit item. It's really good against a lot of AP or heavy CC champions, but has less damage compared to other options.

Guinsoo's Rageblade amplifies on-hit damage really well from items such as Kraken Slayer, Blade of the Ruined King, Wit's End, Terminus. Its stats are a bit of lackluster, so it's not recommended to buy this item too early.

Defensive items

Bloodthirster is my personal favourite item for last slot in most Akshan builds, as it gives A LOT of healing, while high amount of AD with shield passive is a good bonus. It's useful for extended fights where you really need sustain, or for healing off minions/monsters if you're low HP.

Immortal Shieldbow is situationally good against high amounts of burst damage, saving your life in a crucial situations and buying some time for escaping/killing enemies.

Mercurial Scimitar is a very situational defensive item and alternative to Wit's End, being useful against heavy AP teams with deadly CC abilities such as Nether Grasp, Frozen Tomb, etc. It also provides good stats, being around 116% gold efficient.

Guardian Angel provides almost no damage, but it's great against AD champions and in the late-game for winning teamfights, as you'll be much harder to kill. That's especially useful with Going Rogue passive, allowing you to revive teammates and end the game.

Jak'Sho, The Protean is a pure defensive item. It's good with Terminus' passive, providing high amounts of resistances. Not recommended to buy it until late game, as you're sacrificing a lot of damage.
This tree is good for DPS and combat power.

Press the Attack is BiS keystone rune, as Dirty Fighting allows Akshan to double-shot with every auto attack, applying two stacks each time. Heroic Swing also applies one stack every shot. This rune provides a good amount of damage and allows for short trades like [AA]>[Q]>[AA], dealing high damage and gaining a shield to back off.

Fleet Footwork is good against harder matchups (usually mages), providing both sustain and, most importantly, movement speed to kite. It synergizes well with both Dirty Fighting and Heroic Swing, as they allow Akshan to stack energized effects faster.

Triumph is good when you don't spend much mana and don't need Presence of Mind, as it offers good sustain during early all-ins and skirmishes.

Presence of Mind is our main choice, as Akshan requires a significant amount of mana for clearing minion waves with Avengerang and casting multiple Heroic Swings after getting takedowns.

Legend: Alacrity offers valuable Attack Speed, which synergizes well with Dirty Fighting's movement speed and Heroic Swing damage scaling. Since most players don't prioritize purchasing Attack Speed items outside of on-hit builds, Legend: Alacrity becomes a decent rune.

Legend: Bloodline offers lifesteal, but it's pretty overnerfed and weaker compared to Legend: Alacrity. It's still a decent choice in some scenarios, try them both to see what you like more.

Coup de Grace provides additional damage that helps in bursting down enemies more quickly.

Cut Down works well to poke enemies to make their HP low enough for combo threshold, and it also has a higher uptime compared to Coup de Grace.

Last Stand can be situationally useful, but generally, Akshan aims to engage and disengage quickly to assasinate the target without losing much health.

Absorb Life is much worse compared to Presence of Mind and Triumph.
Legend: Haste is useless, as Heroic Swing is reset ability, and Avengerang is low cooldown.


This tree is good for some extra survivability.

Demolish can be good sometimes in the early game for quickly taking down tower plates, especially in the top lane.

Shield Bash synergizes really well with Dirty Fighting, offering both additional damage and survivability after getting a shield.

Conditioning doesn't exist in the early game, but it becomes a good defensive rune later on, especially when paired with items like Terminus, Wit's End, Guardian Angel, Jak'Sho, The Protean or runes such as Overgrowth.

Bone Plating is a good choice for surviving early all-ins, but it's worse against ranged champions who can easily activate it.

Second Wind is a viable choice against poke-heavy ranged matchups, offering good sustain when paired with Fleet Footwork.

Overgrowth, like Conditioning, doesn't exist early but grants additional survivability later on.

Grasp of the Undying is a tank/bruiser rune, worse version of Fleet Footwork.
Aftershock is tank support rune.
Guardian is a support rune.
Font of Life doesn't work.
Revitalize is worse compared to any other sustain rune like Taste of Blood.
Unflinching is an awful defensive rune.


This tree is good for snowballing.

Taste of Blood is a good rune that prevents you from overextending and is effective against poke champions or for hyper aggressive playstyle.

Sudden Impact does a surprising amounts of damage in the early-mid game, working with both Going Rogue and Heroic Swing.

Eyeball Collection is a good rune for snowball champions like Akshan, providing a decent amount of AD.

Treasure Hunter is like Eyeball Collection, a good snowballing rune, but it requires taking down 5 different champions to get max stacks, making it better in the midlane and bad in the toplane.

Relentless Hunter is a great choice for midlane Akshan who wants to roam.
Electrocute is worse version of Press the Attack.
Hail of Blades is worse version of Press the Attack.
Cheap Shot doesn't even work.
Ghost Poro and Zombie Ward stack much slower compared to Eyeball Collection.
Ultimate Hunter is not optimal as Comeuppance is not particularly impactful, and its cooldown is already relatively short.


This tree is good for free gold and stats

First Strike is rarely useful, but it can work in some unkillable tank toplane matchups, giving free gold with range advantage.

Magical Footwear grants free boots, saving 300 gold. Additionally, it grants a minor movement speed boost, helping with kiting enemies. This is particularly beneficial for Akshan players who typically delay purchasing boots.

Cash Back is an alternative to Magical Footwear and is a matter of taste as it gives much less gold value early but more as you buy legendary items.

Triple Tonic is a nice rune. It makes last-hitting easier (1st tonic) and gives nice powerspike early (2nd and 3rd tonics).

Biscuit Delivery provides extra mana and sustain in the early game, which is always nice against poke matchups.

Cosmic Insight is really an underrated rune, providing Summoner Spell and Item Haste. It synergizes really well with Teleport, Guardian Angel, Immortal Shieldbow, etc.

Jack of all Trades is fairly easy to stack as Akshan. For 5 stacks you need Doran's Blade, Rectrix and Dagger (finish it to Kraken Slayer or Statikk Shiv). For 10 stacks you need to also buy Mercury's Treads, Serrated Dirk and Cloak of Agility (finish it to The Collector). But on the other hand Ability Haste from this rune is kinda wasted, because this champion doesn't need it, making this rune mediocre.

Glacial Augment doesn't work.
Unsealed Spellbook is bad; you're not a Bard player.
Hextech Flashtraption is only useful for engage tank supports.
Time Warp Tonic is very bad rune.
Approach Velocity doesn't work.


This tree is good for scaling

Manaflow Band is weaker than Presence of Mind, but it can be a viable option if you've chosen Triumph instead.

Absolute Focus is a good combined with Gathering Storm or Scorch, providing nice damage boost.

Scorch is an early game rune for harassment and poke.

Gathering Storm grants significant amounts of AD in the late game, which helps compensate for Akshan's weaker late-game.

Summon Aery and Arcane Comet aren't good for marksmen champions.
Phase Rush is worse version of Fleet Footwork.
Nullifying Orb is worse compared to Bone Plating and Shield Bash.
Nimbus Cloak is wacky and gutted rune.
Celerity and Waterwalking may be good, but it's not worth playing sorcery tree for that, better take Relentless Hunter instead.
Transcendence is useless, same reason as Legend: Haste.


Rune Shards

Choosing rune shards for Akshan is a straightforward process. Always take Attack Speed, as you're an auto attack champion, and Adaptive Force for more damage. Health Scaling or Flat Health is personal preference, but I prefer first one.
FLASH
Taking Flash is pretty necessary for Akshan

IGNITE
Ignite is going to be your choice in most low elo games, as it gives you more skill pressure early on, helping you to snowball easily. Also, Ignited enemies are prioritized by Heroic Swing, making all-in easier.

TELEPORT
Teleport is more suitable for higher elos or tougher matchups, as it's less likely that you'll be able to kill an opponent and snowball. It's better in the late game, prevents overextending, making you lose less EXP and CS.

Early Game

Level 1

Akshan is an early game champion and wants to play aggressively. Always unlock Avengerang first, as in the early game you should focus on short trades with [Q]>[AA] (or [AA]>[Q] combo). Try to lower enemy HP, don't waste this ability early and try to get level advantage.

Level 2

You'll unlock Heroic Swing, making it possible to delete entire enemy HP bar with [Q]>[E]>[AA]. Look for windows when their primary ability is on cooldown, and if they're low enough, you can take extended trade with auto-attacks to finish them off or dive them.

Level 3-5

It's not recommended to unlock Going Rogue at Level 3, as it allows you to get more combat power with upgrading other abilities. However, once you unlock this ability, you can shove minion wave and look for roams (either help your jungler to take Scuttle/fight enemy jungle, or head towards the botlane if there is an opportunity). That's especially useful if enemy is playing passive and you can't kill them. If nothing is happening on the map, you can fake your roam to take trades with enemy laner with Going Rogue active. If you're playing toplane, you can delay unlocking this ability even more, as you won't roam futher than Baron's pit.

Level 6

While Akshan's ultimate isn't particularly strong, it's still can be useful to finishing off escaping enemies, just make sure to position it correctly.

Mid-Late Game

The only thing you should remember is that you're not a regular marksmen. In teamfights, don't mindlessly engage on enemies and save your Heroic Swing for the right moment, before that poke your enemies, and after clean up low health targets and scoundrels.

You're also very good at sidelaning, as you have good waveclear with maxed out Avengerang and can escape pretty easily with Heroic Swing and Going Rogue. At this stage of the game you also can assasinate squishy targets pretty quickly if they're alone.

At the late game you'll start dealing obnoxious amounts of damage, but you'll also be more vulnerable once enemy team finishes their builds, so be more careful. Follow your allies with Going Rogue and remember about revive passive, as it becomes more valuable as game goes on.

Build on gifs: 12 level (5Q 1W 4E 2R), Fleet Footwork, The Collector and Infinity Edge against 70 Armor 1800 HP target dummy.

Short trade combos

[Q]>[AA]
[AA]>[Q]

Bread and butter combos for short trades as Akshan. It allows you to proc passive 1 time, get shield and movement speed to either back off or continue trading with autos (useful for procing Press the Attack). You should play around Dirty Fighting shield cooldown, as you win most trades early game with it.

All-in combo

[Q]>[E]>[AA]

As Heroic Swing prioritizes closest enemy (including minions), you need to mark them with Dirty Fighting stack to prevent this. Easiest way to do it is mark them with Avengerang, and then all-in with Heroic Swing and either continue to auto attack them or back off. You can cast defensive [E] to your side to end the trade. That's especially important if you can't finish off enemy champion or don't know enemy jungle location.

All-in combo 2

[E]>[AA]>[Q]>[AA]

That's another version of previous combo, but it doesn't work if enemy is standing in minions. You can either use this combo if there are no minions (for example in river), or use Ignite to make Heroic Swing prioritize them.

Ambush combo

[W]>[Q]>[AA]>[E]>[AA]

Good combo for ambushing enemies with your Going Rogue. If you're not sure about killing the eneemy, you can just stop after landing [Q]>[AA] and seeing their HP bar. If you have Rapid Firecannon, you can do [AA]>[Q]>... or just [AA]>... instead.

Avoiding obstacles with Comeuppance


When using Comeuppance, you can cast Heroic Swing during chanelling to avoid obstacles like Minions, Towers and other champions.

Avoiding turrets with Comeuppance


As you can't damage T2/T3 Tower before destroying T1 Tower, you can bait unaware enemies into thinking that they're safe, dealing damage with Comeuppance through Tower.

Using Heroic Swing correctly

Wrong

Right

If you want to swing as far as possible, you shouldn't use hook perpendicular to the wall. Instead, use it to the futherest point of terrain you can.

Heroic Swing indicator

Heroic Swing range indicator is a bit shorter than its actual range, as after reaching its maximum range it checks for terrain in small area around the hook (around 50 units). With that in mind, you can swing around much futher.
Download the Porofessor App for Windows
League of Legends Build Guide Author SanyGame
SanyGame Akshan Guide
Vote Vote
[14.16] In-Depth Akshan Guide [Mid/Top]

League of Legends Champions:

Teamfight Tactics Guide