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Nidalee Build Guide by The Top Bear

Jungle I Will Guide You - Extensive Guide to Nida in EVERY ROLE

Jungle I Will Guide You - Extensive Guide to Nida in EVERY ROLE

Updated on March 6, 2020
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League of Legends Build Guide Author The Top Bear Build Guide By The Top Bear 1023 57 2,642,309 Views 50 Comments
1023 57 2,642,309 Views 50 Comments League of Legends Build Guide Author The Top Bear Nidalee Build Guide By The Top Bear Updated on March 6, 2020
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Choose Champion Build:

  • LoL Champion: Nidalee
    The Bear Supreme.
  • LoL Champion: Nidalee
    Healer Nidalee.
  • LoL Champion: Nidalee
    AP Tank Nidalee.
  • LoL Champion: Nidalee
    AD Tank Nida Jungle WIP
  • LoL Champion: Nidalee
    AD Nidalee Top. WIP
  • LoL Champion: Nidalee
    Midalee isn't Shidalee.

Runes:

Domination
Electrocute
Sudden Impact
Eyeball Collection
Relentless Hunter

Sorcery
Absolute Focus
Waterwalking
Bonus:

+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+6 Armor

Spells:

LoL Summoner Spell: Flash

Flash

LoL Summoner Spell: Smite

Smite

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

I Will Guide You - Extensive Guide to Nida in EVERY ROLE

By The Top Bear
*BIG UPDATE*
*IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT* Hi there! I am back after a long hiatus, and am hoping to get back into making guides. I will go back through and update this guide within the next week or so, paying specific attention to the matchup page, as that has changed a ton. Thanks to all of you who are coming back to my guide, and if you have any questions or comments, you can can add me on league or put it in the comments section, I try to respond to every one of them!
Introduction
Hi there! I am The Top Bear, a Diamond Nidalee player. I have over 700k mastery points on Nidalee, so I decided to make a guide on how to play her, so that others may enjoy this mechanically difficult champ that can carry a game easily. (Quick note: I tore a ligament in my arm, making it hard to type. This guide might not be updated daily anymore, but don't worry, I'm still on top of it :) Thanks for your patience.)
Pros / Cons
Pros:
Incredible early and mid game.
Can Hypercarry a game.
Phenomonal duelist and counterjungler.
Great objective taker and ganker.

Cons:
    If you fail early you can throw pretty hard.
    VERY mechanically difficult.
    Falls off late game.
Runes
Jungle:
I prefer Electrocute over Dark Harvest and Predator, it just provides more consistent damage since they changed Dark Harvest to more of a laning rune. Eyeball Collection and Zombie Ward are equally as good right now, I just take Eyeball since I'm a greedy, damage-hungry Nida main XD. I think Relentless Hunter works better than its Lifesteal counterpart as it provides better map pressure. I run ether Absolute Focus and Waterwalking secondary, or I go inspiration secondary and snag Magical Footwear and Cosmic Insight in order to be able to buy straight damage items and hit my powerspikes faster into matchups where I might need to fight. Cosmic Insight is also just nice for the CDR it gives. For the new stats, I just go damage and a resistance, but its purely preferential. The CDR rune might be better in some builds. Experiment and find your style!

Top:
AP: If you are planning on going Full AP Nida, I would recommend Electrocute, Sudden Impact, Zombie Ward, and Ravenous Hunter as your primary tree, and Bone Plating and Revitalize as your secondary runes. Along with 2 damage runes and Armor or Magic Resist.
For AP Tank Nida Top I would do the same thing, just change the secondary runes to Triumph and and Coup de Grace.
Skill Sequence
The only real way to level on Nid is to go RQEW, as it just gives you more healing and damage. There is no reason to get points in W as you trap count goes up by player level, and E has more use as a heal and damaging ability than W.

FOR NIDALEE MID & TOP
For laning with Nidalee, you can change things up a bit.
AP - When you are going AP Just keep maxing Q. It scales the best and the attack speed isn't that important.
AD - If you are going AD, I would put 2 points in Q for the early cheese, then Max E for the Attack speed. Or, you can alternate points between Q and E.
Early Clear
Normally, I go for a leash on Red, regardless of the side I am on, then go to krugs and scuttle or raptors and blue side.
However, you can also start W then go for raptors, to red, to blue, or start top and go for a bot lane gank early. Another strategy is to start wolves with W to throw of the enemy jungler tracking you. Honestly, just be creative. If you are good at Nidalee, you can start anywhere and make it work. For the new scuttle XP, you want to make sure you have control over the river. Scuttle has become a Semi-important objective in comparison to before.
Now, since it gives you more XP and gold, it isn't a bad idea to grab one level 2. Remember, always go for that scuttle!
Buy Pinks
Buy Control Wards. Not just one. MULTIPLE. I try to buy at least two if I have enough gold on my first back. I am being serious, these are the only reason most ganks are possible, place them down in bushes for lane ganks, invades, or in drag pit so that Warwick doesn't take drag at level 3. Buy Control Wards every time you back!
Farming
Farming on Nidalee can be tricky for beginners, and there a lot of neat tips and tricks to speed up your clears and make them healthier. First off, if you are new to clearing with Nid, take Hunter's Talisman over Hunter's Machete. Hunter's Talisman Gives you better mana regen, and allows you to kill aoe camps without kiting as much. After a few dozen games, you can switch to Hunter's Machete, which makes your three camp clear faster if you can kite well enough. However, the downside is that if you start red, you can not waste a single ability or it will slow down your clear immensely, as you will run out of mana during your third camp kill. Now, for some tips as to speeding up your already god-like Nidalee clears:
1. Starting camps on the way - you can start camps by hitting them with a max range spear on the way to them.
2. Pounce Resetting: Pounce resetting is when you hit a target with a spear and lead a trap in front of them, then jumping on them before the trap hits, effectively giving you a second empowered pounce almost immediately. This can make you do a bit more damage to your camps, and keep your pounce up more in the event of an invade.
3. Clearing two camps at once: When going to fight Blue Sentinel , around half-way through killing it, you can throw a max range spear at Gromp , and fight them both in between the two camps, speeding up your clears.
Intricate Jungle Pathing
One of the perks of playing Nidalee is her ability to jump over walls easily. This allows you to do some crazy pathing that will allow you to get the jump on (no pun intended) the enemy team. I'll add an image once I figure out how to put one in without a URL, but for now I will explain it. There are some cool ways to gank lanes by jumping through dragon pit or baron pit then either jumping over krugs or taking a bombplant over to gank top or bot. These aren't the only ways to sneakily gank, so just abuse your wall jumps and be creative!
The Intricacies of Ganking
Ganking on Nidalee can be somewhat difficult to pull off, but with knowledge of these tricks and practice, you can make ganks easy as pie.
1. Abuse the wave: When ganking as Nidalee, you should wait for your opponent to walk next to a wall or minion before you chuck a spear, so that they have less space to dodge the spear.
2. Predicting the enemy's movements: Everybody in League dodges a certain way, and generally they form the habit of, when given the option, dodging in the same direction. What you can do is look and see how each person dodges a couple of your spears, then start to throw them a little in that direction, in order to clip them with it.
3. Lane ganking: I love lane ganking! Lane ganking (especially in low elo) is a very effective and sneaky way of ganking abusing enemy vision. This only works in top and bot lane, but what you do is have your lane push up a bit in front of one of the bushes, so that you can sneak into the bush from behind the lane without being seen, then gank from there. A lot of times, the enemy will walk right into you.
Applying Pressure and Knowing Which Lanes to Gank
One of the hardest things to do in the jungle is figuring out where to be. How you answer this question is what makes the difference between a gold jungler and a diamond jungler. When you get into the loading screen of a game, you should immediately be thinking of the lane matchups. More specifically, what summs are in which lanes and which direction each lane will be pushing. From there, you will decide what lanes are worth ganking at certain points in the game. Say you have a Riven top with ignite, you know that their jungler will without a doubt camp them, however you also have early kill pressure, therefore if possible, ganking there first would be most beneficial and would likely net your team a kill. Or say that your bot and top are pushing up hard, or are feeding the enemy laners, and the mid lane is relatively even, you have 3 choices. 1. You gank mid and try to swing that lane in your favor, and attempt to bleed that lead in the mid lane to your side lanes. 2. Track where the enemy jungler is going to gank, and attempt a countergank while pinging your team to help isolate him and kill him. 3. Lastly, track the enemy jungler and 1 v 1 him in a place where he can't get help from his team fast enough. Be SURE you can win the 1 v 1 before you attempt it, as you cant lose precious time and map pressure when behind, or you will start to lose a ton of objectives.
Solo Carrying with Nidalee
With Nidalee (And most champs in general), hypercarrying is done mainly by doing three things:
Controlling objectives
Putting behind laners
Warding effectively
Tracking the enemy jungler and roams from laners

You have to be on the ball at all times, and you can not miss a single beat. Use Nidalee's early power to push out the enemy jg, and grab dragons, and try to get your laners to help.
Team Work
When it comes to teamfighting, Nidalee takes a lot of skill to be effective. Unlike other assassins, once Nidalee is in, she either dies or kill the entire enemy team. You are not likely getting out unless you get lucky and find a squishy on the outside.

Generally, what you need to do is flank from behind and wait for your team to go in, while taking precise shots to either hit the ADC or corral them into a bad spot. Then, jump in when a carry is caught out or you hit a great spear allowing you to jump in and kill the damage dealers before you get popped by them.
LANING WITH TOP LANE NIDALEE
*NOTE* I am not saying that Nidalee anywhere but Jungle is meta, I am saying that if you are good enough at Nidalee you can play it with decent success.

Laning with top lane Nidalee can be a bit tricky into certain matchups, and completely faceroll easy into others. To start, you need to understand the advantages you hold over your enemy. Nidalee is a high burst champion when going AP, and a consistent ranged threat when going AD, so abuse these attributes while you lane. She can also ward bush entrances and gank paths with her Bushwhack. Next, think about what the enemy laner has to hit you with. Let's use Nasus for an example. Nasus is a melee tank that can put out some dps if you let him touch you. He can get close to targets using his wither slow. Nidalee has high range and damage with her spear, and good mobility in cougar form. Her heal also helps if Nasus tries to go AP and whittle you down with his E.
So lets think about this:
If you are going AP: Nasus shreds at close range, so try to land your spears through minions and push him out of lane, making it hard to stack minions. Ward a bit deep into the enemy jg, so you have plenty of advance notice of a gank. I would also try doing some jungle invades for kills if you push Nasus out of lane and are healthy and confident enough in your skills. Remember: carrying the game is a lot easier if the enemy jungle is behind as well.
If you are going AD: This matchup is super easy, just poke him out of lane when he tries to go for minions, you can't miss auto attacks, and your spears still chuck early. If he tries to chase you down and you don't have the damage to instakill him, just Pounce away and keep autoing and laying down the law in the lane. The next part is the same as AP. Ward a bit deep into the enemy jg, so you have plenty of advance notice of a gank. I would also try doing some jungle invades for kills if you push Nasus out of lane and are healthy and confident enough in your skills. Remember: carrying the game is a lot easier if the enemy jungle is behind as well.
I will put out matchup details for every champ in the game within the next couple of weeks, so be prepared for that. Top lane is all about knowing your matchup and adjusting how you lane according to that.
LANING WITH MID LANE NIDALEE
*NOTE* I am not saying that Nidalee anywhere but Jungle is meta, I am saying that if you are good enough at Nidalee you can play it with decent success.

Laning with mid lane Nidalee is pretty straightforward on paper, but is a lot more difficult in the execution than top lane in my opinion. Just like with top lane, you must first see what advantages you have over your enemy. Nidalee is a high burst champion when going AP, and a consistent ranged threat when going AD, so abuse these attributes while you lane. Depending on how good your knowledge of gank patterns is (I'll cover this) she can either be better at spotting ganks with her Bushwhack than in top lane or be completely ineffective. For this section, I will be going over a harder mid lane matchup than what I covered in the top lane section. So for now we will cover a lane against Zed.
Lets take a look at both champions ability to lane, and what strengths and weaknesses they have:

Nidalee has some gnarly early burst damage and good health sustain, but is very mana hungry. She can ward gank paths with her Bushwhack and can use them in lane to zone. She doesn't powerspike super hard at level 6 since she has no ulti, and has great mobility early.

Zed is a one-shot assassin who has a great mobility move at level 2 with a large cooldown, high early damage, and a massive powerspike at level 6. He can shove waves better than Nidalee and can roam well. He is hard to hit important skillshots on once he gets ulti. He has no mana and can spam out abilities without concern for lane sustain.

Here is how to fight that matchup:

When going AP: Zed is heavily favored in this matchup, since he is great at engaging and killing champs who have to hit a specific skillshot. Try to push him out of lane at level 1 or 2. Then, adapt your playstyle to try to keep the lane frozen a bit ahead of your tower. Go and get traps and wards set up when he recalls, and ping him any time he is missing. Once he is level 6, be careful of his one shot potential. Use your Pounce to dodge his shurikens after he ultis you. Item-wise you're best bet is to get an early Zhonya's Hourglass and get an Iceborn Gauntlet.
When going AD: Zed Can be harassed relatively easy pre-6 in this matchup, as long as you dodge his skillshots. Get an Iceborn Gauntlet or Sterak's Gage early to cancel his damage, and just be an overall nuisance in lane. When he recalls or tries to leave lane, ping M.I.A. and use traps and wards to cover for ganks. Once he is level 6, be careful of his one shot potential. Use your Pounce to dodge his shurikens after he ultis you.
I will put out matchup details for every champ in the game within the next couple of weeks, so be prepared for that. Mid lane is all about keeping lane pressure and trying to influence the map with how you play.
LANING WITH ADC/APC NIDALEE
*NOTE* I am not saying that Nidalee anywhere but Jungle is meta, I am saying that if you are good enough at Nidalee you can play it with decent success.

Laning with ADC/APC Nidalee is honestly not that hard since she has good range and a nice heal. Playing it with your support well can be a bit tricky, however. Like in every lane, you need to evaluate what strengths and weaknesses you and your enemy have, only now, you have 4 people to think about. Since every game is different and there are endless combinations of bot laners, I will add matchup information on all of them in the matchups section within the next couple of weeks. Generally though the rules on laning apply to bot lane the same as mid lane.
Nidalee is a high burst champion when going AP, and a consistent ranged threat when going AD, so abuse these attributes while you lane. Remember to use her Bushwhack to spot out ganks and cover your sides. I would also recommend putting some in the lane bushes.
I will put out matchup details for every champ in the game within the next couple of weeks, so be prepared for that. ADC is about transforming individual strength into powerful teamplays, just because you are in bot lane doesn't mean you can't influence the map.
LANING WITH SUPPORT NIDALEE
*NOTE* I am not saying that Nidalee anywhere but Jungle is meta, I am saying that if you are good enough at Nidalee you can play it with decent success.

Support Nidalee is a bit more strict build-wise than other roles, but has 2 distinct playstyles that you will need to master and interchange between to be effective. Aggro kill Nidalee, and healer-poke Nidalee.
Aggro kill Nidalee: Aggro kill Nidalee is done best into lanes where executing the ADC or support immediately is your main priority and can be done effectively without much risk. Most notably against low mobility ADC's and Supports such as: Ashe, Miss Fortune, Lux, Sona, Nami. Your main goal is to make the enemy bot as irrelevant as possible, while getting info on potential ganks via traps and wards. Play up, wait for an enemy to waste their CC, then poke them down and push them out of lane. Just make sure you have an eye on the minimap and are constantly warding.
Healer-poke Nidalee: Healer-poke Nidalee is most effective into chmaps who can't be assassinated easily or can prevent you from playing aggressive. This build is safer and is more effective into champs such as Draven, Lucian, Alistar, Thresh, etc. Play a bit reserved, and use your spears to zone the enemy off of CS. Heal your ADC when needed, and ward bushes and gank spots with your wards and Bushwhack.
I will put out matchup details for every champ in the game within the next couple of weeks, so be prepared for that. Support is all about halping your team come out on top in skirmishes, and about setting up awesome plays with getting preemptive vision and crazy setups.

Shoutout to DutchWolf114 for helping me out with this section! He is a really great guy and you should check out his guide to Nida supp here.
Nidalee in the Current Meta
Nidalee is surprisingly in a pretty good spot right now! Winrate-wise she is hovering around 51%. Also, in terms of team comps, you don't necessarily need a tank and since ad bruisers mid and top are becoming more prevalent, you always need an AP carry on the team, and someone has to deliver.
Summary
For the best performance on Nidalee: Make sure you have 1 or 2 CC tanks on your team, and that you don't have over-excessive AP. Also, practice a while before you jump into ranked with her, and find the build path that truly suits you! Lastly, don't forget to have fun! If you ever need help that isn't covered here, preferably leave a comment on the guide! I will try to get back to you as soon as I can!
Happy Climbing,
- The Top Bear
A Great Big Thank You!
Holy ****! You guys are amazing! You guys have just made this Nidalee Guide #1 in EVERY SINGLE ASPECT, from views, to number of votes, and even overall rating! You guys are forking awesome! This wouldn't have been possible without the great feedback and constant trust in my guide from all of you. I just wanted to say thank you, and stay tuned for more updates! Who knows? This might be the first Nidalee guide to hit 1 million views! (Holy **** we actually did it, 1 MILLION VIEWS! thank you so much!) Happy climbing to you all! - The Top Bear
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