Hi guys ! Im Johnnyboii an Challenger in League in the Philippines Im from the team Legion Which ALMOST qualify in the GPL here in asia. My first Hero i think Garen ? (EVERYBODY LOVES GAREN) because he is too tanky and OP SS lol . He reminds me of Axe in Dota (HELL TO DOTA)

Aatrox is one Scary dude . He is Too much OP in EARLY and LATE so be confident in him he will give you an early win !

Pros / Cons

Pros
Very OP Passive
MANALESS!
Ganks are very, very strong
High damage

Cons
Has to play smart when passive is down
Jungles around 50% HP average early
Falls off late game

Items

Starting



Aatrox can handle this item since he has infinite sustain when under 50% health with his Blood Thirst.

This item also gives more early game presence and you don't have to suffice on buying Hunter's Machete since Aatrox doesn't really need it.
Early Game

then + or

Once we achieve Boots of Speed and Bilgewater Cutlass we won't be under 50% most of the time in the jungle anymore and probably be around 70% or more before a gank. You should also try to chain slow with your Blades of Torment + Bilgewater Cutlass active when you gank. But at this point you should be a big threat when ganking lanes.

Mid Game

or or

So now you have some HP and resists, although it's a bit weird to put HP on Aatrox since his skills cost HP but we'll need HP anyways to survive. Also Aatrox's Blood Thirst will just sustain me in team fights so I CAN LIVE. You should be real hard to kill though with these items and we need tenacity as if we're stunned for whatever reason then we can't life steal with Blood Thirst.

Spirit visage scales really well with Aatrox as it gives him CDR, and his Blood Thirst synergizes with it along with his Blood Well passive which you can see restores more when you have Spirit Visage

If your feeling that your a team player though you should consider getting Locket of the Iron Solari instead of Spirit Visage.

NOTE: Do not get Spirit Visage or Locket of the Iron Solari if the enemy team is all AD, get a Randuin's Omen instead of Spirit Visage or Locket of the Iron Solari


Late Game

+

Now your 6 item build is complete, once you get Randuin's Omen you lessen the enemy ADC's DPS if he focuses you, and of course it gives a lot more HP. After we can get Guardian Angel and this increases Aatrox's team fight potential immensely with him having 2 revives. This will make him a real nuisance and will be highly tanky and can survive long with his Blood Thirst.


Buying notes:
Complete Blade of the Ruined King when you think your team needs damage.

Spirit Visage is a core item on Aatrox IMO.

Guardian Angel makes Aatrox annoying to take down, get if you want to win 1 team fight.

If you get to very very late game, replace boots with Zephyr.


An Alternate Items are this :
Alternative Items

This item is pretty good on Aatrox, making him a better exceptional duelist and can let him chase hard onto enemies. Also gives us more attack speed and the active on it has synergy with Spirit Visage. But the reason I don't get it on Aatrox is because I know I can rely on my team for damage and the only thing I need from this item is the slow from Bilgewater Cutlass for the utility it brings.
If you really want more damage and some life steal, sure you can get this item. It's a pretty decent item on Aatrox since all he does is auto attack so why not improve his auto attacks? Remember to use the active in-between auto attacks so that you DPS efficiently.
Last Whisperer I've seen some Aatrox's get this item and have seen good results. But remember getting too much damage items could be bad depending on your team's situation (need a tank). I actually haven't tested this item whether I like it better than ravenous hydra or blade of the ruined king but I can see it working since Aatrox has pretty high skill base damage.
Pick this up if you don't feel like getting Randuin's Omen and they have a lot of auto attackers and they want to focus you (ex: tryndamere).
This item seems to scale decently with Aatrox, AP is not wasted and you get a lot of burst and more movement speed from the phage procs. Although you won't be sheen proc'ing a lot since you don't have a lot of skills to activate every second, still decent item. I only like to get it when I want to have some fun or am really ahead but I feel there are better items than this.

Blood Well (Passive)

A passive that gives 30-55% attack speed when capped out, and the way it works is when you lose life from using a skill you gain HP for when you ressurect. This passive is what can make you do ballsy things with Aatrox when you want to gank or dive or soemthing. Usually you'll win in a 2v2 situation if you gank or counter gank since they can't really target you as you will just revive and you do a ton of damage. Also when you revive it synergizes with Spirit Visage.



Dark Flight

A great crowd control skill that gap closes and knocks up whoever is in the center of it, sort of like Jarvan IV's E-Q combo. It costs 10% of your current health but you shouldn't think about that a lot. This skill is used to initiate fights and to get out of sticky situations.



Blood Thirst

This skill is what makes the enemy team need damage to kill Aatrox and live below 50% HP and if they don't focus him fast he'll just restore it back up since it gives 3x of what it says when below 50%, the AD ratio on this is pretty useless and this skill is usually used to heal up HP in the jungle or in team fights when your below 50% HP to restore HP. My mindset is only to use it when I'm below 50% or preparing to gank a lane, otherwise Blood Price.



Blood Price

This skill is super powerful and what makes Aatrox's ganks strong, when it proc's on an enemy it will hurt and since you'll have a lot of attack speed you'll be proc'ing it much more than once and add on your ultimate to give even more procs. You'll want to have this on always when ganking an enemy even when your below 50% health and in the jungle you'll want to use it to farm creeps faster but once your below 50% switch to Blood Thirst.



Blades of Torment

Aatrox's only ranged skill, the reason we level it up 2nd is because of the base damage per point in it, which increases by 45 damage and also the slow duration increase per level is just a bonus. But also the cooldown on it can be decreased to 8 seconds. Even though its magic damage and we don't have any magic penetration it's still a better skill to level up than Dark Flight from my experience.



Massacre

An ultimate that gives attack speed, increases Aatrox's attack range and a flat magic damage AoE. It's a decent ultimate considering Aatrox's kit where he's an auto attack champion who relies on Blood Price & Blood Thirst and the damage just adds to his burst damage. The range increase is decent but nothing too special.

Early game

I feel that Aatrox is one of the best carry junglers who excel at snow balling a game easily, with his high base damages and crowd control he should be ganking often. He also has infinite sustain in the jungle with his Blood Thirst.

Jungling with Aatrox is very unique, as his kit is very weird in a way that you have to take some considerations. Alright so my mindset as Aatrox is when I'm killing creeps in the jungle I will use Blood Price until I'm below 50% health, that's when I can get the 3x bonus healing from Blood Thirst and then it works with efficiency. You'll want your passive to always be full while in the jungle as it gives you more attack speed which is needed to have fast clears in the jungle. Right before I'm about to gank a lane I will switch to Blood Thirst and have about 60-70% HP before I gank a lane.

Aatrox is definitely a great skirmisher as the sustain damage and heal he gets from his Blood Price/ Blood Thirst but he is definitely vulnerable to burst damage as he's always somewhat lower HP when going into a fight.

In a 2v2 situation Aatrox most of the time will come up on top as if they focus you, then you'll just revive with your passive and come back to kill them a bit. But if they don't focus you then you'll just beat them up.

When your passive is down though, you should be more cautious about making plays and fighting, since you'll be lower health than most junglers from doing your jungle. So make sure that you don't go in a situation where you have to die as this will set you back a bit.

Just remember that Aatrox's damage, burst, and sustained damage is high. And without his passive he's really fragile.
Always keep tabs on your blue buff/red buff and do them immediately or have some ward coverage so the enemy jungler doesn't steal it, he will steal your red buff (blue side) if you're ganking top and he notices you started there and it's 7:15 minutes and he's good.

Some Junglers out there will not keep tabs on their buff, and at 7:15 if you know he started blue on purple side and you see him ganking top, that's a free blue for you. Little notes like these will make you a better counter jungler and player.
Ganking with Aatrox is pretty simple, you go in a lane and then try and get in range for Dark Flight. Knock him up and always have Blood Price on in a gank so you can kill him faster, Blood Thirst is better in team fights. You don't have to knock him up but it helps a lot, even if you miss you still have your Blades of Torment to slow him and catch up with him, once you get 1 auto attack and you have a red buff he'll have to blow an escape or you'll just end up destroying him. Once you get your ultimate it just adds more burst and damage to your ganks.

A counter gank from Aatrox is probably the scariest since he has burst and it allows him to get an easy knock up (since your ally should be baiting into you) and you'll just have the upper hand since they didn't focus you first and you got da damages.

Aatrox is a very good duelist, as he starts Doran blade and has an upper advantage from that. The only thing that can probably duel him and win I think is Lee Sin since he has a attack speed slow and has a lot of burst damage but other than that Aatrox should be able to duel most people.

Mid game you should have either Spirit Visage or Locket of the Iron Solari. Unless the enemy team has high physical damage you should of built up to a Randuin's Omen.

Time for you to lead your team to push towers, maintain control over dragon/baron and win. So always have a Vision Ward on dragon. And if you feel real confident, do it on baron and try to secure it and estimate whether you should do baron or not (some of enemy team is around bot side, your grouped 5) etc.

Aatrox can literally tank the baron forever as long as he has the full attack speed bonus from his passive (which isn't hard to get) and having Blood Thirst on, he can't solo it since baron reduces your damage by 50% so you'll need some help from your team mates to take it down. Also I think you need a bit of armor maybe around 80 armor.

This is where also the best team fights come alive, since everyone is around level 13 and multiple variables happen instead of late game where it's peel for carries.

Late game

You should have a Randuin's Omen at this time as the enemy ADC should have a The Bloodthirster/ Infinity Edge + Phantom Dancer and will do tons of damage. Attack Speed reduction will cut a ADC's DPS massively, although once he gets that Last Whisper, he'll still be doing tons of damage. Just remember when you're chunked to disengage/retreat to an ally and let them switch focus off you to someone else, at least you can sustain yourself through there sustained damage with your Blood Thirst and you can disengage if you have to by burning a flash or a Dark Flight

Aatrox's late game is pretty weak, as he doesn't bring much crowd control or have a shield and as the game goes on late, the enemies AP and AD carries will have a lot of damage for you to not even sustain with Blood Thirst. The only thing that I like about Aatrox's late game is that he can literally win 1 team fight if he has a Guardian Angel. Since the enemy team has to kill him twice he basically is suited up for the tank role in this position for one team fight, so make that team fight count or wait until your Blood Well / Guardian Angel is up, just don't get caught and you use it's passive before a 5v5 starts or your investment on it was a big waste.

How to Effectively do Creeps

Level 1 : Blood Price until below 50% HP then switch to Blood Thirst.

Level 2 : Dark Flight + Blood Price until below 50% HP then switch to Blood Thirst

Level 3 : Dark Flight + Blades of Torment + Blood Price until yeah you know.

Start with Dark Flight as it's crowd control, a gap closer and pretty decent base damage and instantly gives your Blood Well 75% full for attack speed.

Find your enemy jungler, then set up in a place where he will come to gank a lane and you can come kill the enemy jungler or whoever is squishier with your allied laner, make sure to pick a target that you can burst and your ally knows it, or else the disperse damage could cause you to die or lose a kill.

Aatrox in counter ganks = OP, especially with his passive up since they can't focus you or else you just revive and kill them and if they focus your ally, your going to rip them apart with your auto attacks with Aatrox. High burst, high sustained damage.