Orianna Build Guide by MRN.ecco

Introduction

Hey, guys! I am Tyler "ecco" Spesick and I am here with a guide for one of my all time go-to and favorite champions, Orianna. In my opinion, she is the second best designed champion on the game (second to Yasuo). She is incredibly fun, unique, good at all stages of the game, and most importantly, has an insanely high skill-cap. Even when you see the best players in the world playing Orianna there are /always/ things, however big or small, that they could be doing better. Hopefully this guide will help you refine your play and help become the best Orianna you can possibly be!

Pros/Cons

Pros

1. Fun.
2. High skill-cap.
3. Most consistent/strong laner in the game.
4. Is strong the entire duration of the game.
5. Has a game changing ultimate as well as consistent damage.
6. Brings a lot of utility and peel for your team.
7. Easy/safe farming.

Cons

1. No true escape.

Team Comps

The composition that I have built above is a fantastic setup for Orianna. There are multiple jump-in engages that can transport the ball into the middle of a team, leading for an easy setup for a very large shockwave. Jax is a beast in the current meta, as well as always being a strong pick in nearly every meta. He is a very strong snowball champion who scales well into the late game and as mentioned earlier he can also transport the ball directly into the back line of a team. Wukong is a fierce jungler who can get games snowballing with his incredibly strong ganks as well as his insane, AoE engages. Corki and Nami isn't the most meta bot lane but they overall have a lot of AoE damage, poke, and follow-up to engage.

As seen in the examples of this composition, you are wanting very strong lanes, overall late-game scaling, and team-fighting potential in an Orianna composition. The only one of these that your team can really forgo having is really strong lanes as long as your late game was that much better (such as having a Ryze and Vayne) on your team. You would be putting more of your eggs into the late-game basket though and making the game a lot riskier than you really need to.

Spells

With the changes done to summoner spells last patch it has made Barrier overall a fairly weak pick. Although heal does not block as much damage as barrier, it gives more utility by gives a small speed-boost, ridding yourself and your target of a healing debuff, as well as healing another target as well. It just brings /so/ much more to the table that Heal has become the main defensive summoner spell on mid-laners as well as ad-carries.

Typically you are going to be using heal to help you and/or your teammate survive a skirmish. If they have an ignite at their disposal and it is an all-in fight, then it is typically better to use it earlier rather than later to make sure you get the full heal amount. Other than being used purely for a heal, you can use it for the movement speed buff that it applies. You can use it on your adc to help both of you kite in a team-fight, on your amumu jungle to help him get in position to engage, or purely on yourself in a duel to help dodge skill-shots or position your ball in a better position.

There is another option to heal though. This is Exhaust. It has a lot of utility and is fantastic in use against laning against an assassin. It plays a bit differently than heal and barrier so make sure to get a good amount of practice with it to get a feel for when to use it and how it affects your laning. In most cases, you are wanting to apply the exhaust on the champion before their largest amount of burst hits. Such as if a Zed ults in on you, you should be spamming it on him right as he appears. This way even if he hits you with both shurikens and the rest of his damage, it won't be nearly as deadly as it would have been otherwise. This will also reduce the total damage coming from his ult popping as well.

Runes

9x 9x 4x 5x 3x

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greater mark of hybrid penetration Greater Seal of Scaling Health Greater Glyph of Magic Penetration Greater Glyph of Magic Resist Greater Quintessence of Ability Power

The above runes are the standard set that I run on Orianna. Because her auto-attacks are so strong, I put hybrid penetration into play to make the most use out of that for maximum potential of lane-bullying. I make up for the lack of magic penetration by putting 4 magic pen glyphs into play to create an equal amount as if I was only running magic pen marks.

I also run scaling-health seals to help Orianna's innate low health pool be a little bit higher going into the late game and just make it that much more difficult for the other team to focus you down. Since you shouldn't be vulnerable to any all-ins pre-6 (the point at which flat and scaling health seals are equal), it is always better to take scaling.

Masteries

These are the masteries that I have been running on Orianna and the majority of my mids lately. The main change that I have done compared to my last editions of it is that I no longer take double-edged sword. Definitely since I am running more of a utility-based mid-laner, I don't think it is worth it to make myself more vulnerable to damage for a boost in my own. I'd rather just stay in the middle and let the game play itself out without the mastery.

Other than that one point, the rest of my page is fairly straight-forward and standard.

Skill Sequence

Typically I take a point in Command: Protect at level 1 because it is the best for trading as it will block any type of damage trading my opponent does as well as ranged minion damage. Also, it gives bonus mr and armor while the ball is on me (which is has to be level 1) so I am very hard to mess with level 1. If my team is worried about an invade and I need to scout with my ball, then I would then put a point into Command: Attack to help with scouting.

Clockwork Windup (Passive) Clockwork Windup is one of the best passives in the game. It is one of the core reasons as to why Orianna is such an immense pain to deal with in lane. It causes her auto-attacks to hit as hard as spells do early game and in conjunction with her very fast auto-attack animation, she is able to just spit them out at ease. It also makes her last-hitting much easier as well. One thing to note is that it does increase in damage (up to three stacks) when attacking the same target repeatedly. It helps in prolonged trading as well as all-ins but it isn't something that requires a lot of thought or should get a lot of attention for the most part.

Command: Attack Command: Attack is the main ability in Orianna's kit. Is the ability that will set up where her ball is and therefore set-up the rest of her abilities (sometimes done with Command: Protect as well). It is very important for the user to be comfortable with this spell and be able to use this ability fluidly. Not being comfortable with your ball movements will hinder improvement and stop you from becoming a good Orianna player because this is what defines Orianna players. I know back when I originally played her when she was released it felt extremely strange and awkward. It is like an extension of her and you have to play it as so. It takes a lot of time to get close to perfection with this so if you are serious at becoming a proficient Orianna player then be warned that it will take a lot of time to get there. There isn't really much I can suggest to help reach a high level of proficiency with this ability other than practice. It is too difficult to put into words how to position the ball in most situations but on a grander scale and more simplistic situations such as dancing around dragon, keeping the ball near choke-points that the opposing team would want to be coming through is ideal. Use it as a zoning tool and it creates an impromptu wall that they will want to avoid.

Command: Dissonance Command: Dissonance is Orianna's main bursting move. It is a fantastic ability at influencing the field in a team-fight. This ability has a lot of different uses. It can be used as a burst/harass move, as a follow-up to Command: Shockwave, wave-clear, to speed up a front-line engager, to slow down the opponent's front-line engager, to speed up your adc to help them kite, etc. There is so much diversity and variety to this ability that knowing when to do what with it in the spur of the moment takes a lot of experience and practice. As you can see, Orianna is one of the most complex champions in the game both mechanically and mentally. Being a top-tier Orianna player really takes it all out of a player.

Command: Protect Command: Protect is a nice, defensive move that can be used situationally as an offensive move to set up your ball in position for a Dissonance or Shockwave. It does give bonus mr and armor in conjunction with the shield so it is amazing at helping a target survive through burst and trade more efficiently. Use this with your Command: Attack to move the ball around the field fluidly and to be hitting as many targets as possible. You have to keep in mind that always when your ball is moving it will do damage to any target that it comes into contact with. Mechanically, this leaves a lot of room to optimize damage. This can be seen with a Command: Attack -> Dissonance combo that is followed up with a Protect. If the combo passes through the target to where Protect hits them on the way back to you, it will give you more overall damage from the same amount of actions.

Command: Shockwave Command: Shockwave. The most impactful and game changing ultimate in the game. Just one perfect ultimate with shockwave can single-handedly swing fights incredibly to one side and end games. You are wanting to hit at least one high-priority target with your shockwave and, obviously, the more people getting hit the better. Use both your Command: Attack and Protect as viable options to position your ball correctly and remember that it isn't instant. It has a small delay from being activated to where it will go off so that is something that you have to always keep in mind. If you are really confident in predicting where your ally is going, you can actually activate it mid-dash/engage to time it where it will erupt upon them landing at their destination. The largest piece of advice I can give on Command: Shockwave is to not rush it. I cringe every time I see it used too early because people think that it is something that must be used at the start of a fight. Obviously if the opportunity is there at the beginning of a fight for a sweet ult then by all means take it but don't force it. The mere fact of having your ultimate available can scare off unfavorable fights or influence fights into your favor. Also, a lot of people will assume you used it earlier in the fight and forget that you still have it available so they'll position in an unfavorable spot, allowing for an easy, game-changing ultimate.

Items

The standard set-up of starting items on a mid-laner. Nothing to see here.



On the first back you're going to want to have at least ~955 gold. Obviously, the more you have the better but make sure to have at least that because you it will allow you to afford a Chalice of Harmony and a couple of health potions for sustain. Extra gold can be used towards either Boots of Speed, a second Doran's Ring, or an Amplifying Tome to be used towards a Fiendish Codex. Boots are the best option if you favor mobility (such as against a melee opponent or are getting a lot of attention from the enemy jungler. Doran's Ring If you think there might be an all-in soon or there is just overall heavy trading. Amplifying Tome is just if the lane is pretty standard and farmy.

Finish Athene's Unholy Grail first as it is your core item and overall most important to your early game due to the cdr and mana-regeneration. It gives you a little bit of everything you need. Next, finish your Sorcerer's Shoes and pick up the alacrity enchantment whenever you have a spare 475g laying around and aren't close to purchasing an important item. Rabadon's Deathcap and Void Staff follow to optimize your mid-game damage.



Okay, now that we have our core we go straight into a Zhonya's Hourglass. Zhonya's is very needed on every long-range AP caster because it gives them a way to break focus. It forces the other team to leave them alone for a couple of seconds while during this time your cool-downs are busy coming back up and your team is hopefully positioning around you to allow you to safely emerge from your golden statue. It also gives 120AP which will put your overall AP close to a staggering 600.

The very last item that you're going to build depends on how team-fights are playing out. If there are a lot of health-stacking or you're getting a lot of focus in team-fights then Liandry's Torment is going to be your best choice because it gives you the bleed effect on tanks as well as a little bit of extra health. Lich Bane is going to give no defensive stats but a lot of consistent damage with your auto-attacks as well as a lot of turret killing potential. If you're able to flutter around the edges of team-fights without getting jumped on by their entire front-line then Lich Bane is probably the best choice for you.



As shown at the very top of the page there is an optional build given where Liandry's Torment is the second completed item. This isn't a build I go often but when I am faced with an unnaturally health-stacking kind of team then I will get an early Liandry's to help deal with this. It will still give you decent damage against squishier targets due to the magic penetration while allowing you to bleed out the large health pools of front-liners.

Match-Ups

Orianna is one of the few safest laners in the game. She has literally no bad match-ups in the current meta and the only one that she used to suffer from was Gragas who recently got reworked. Feel free picking her into anyone or blindly.

On how to play out the laning phase against some of the more popular champions can be read below in the Gameplay section.

Gameplay

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Orianna is a massive bully. Due to the tankiness from your Command: Protect and the strong damage from your Clockwork Windup you're able to constantly force trades in your favor. These favorable trades will add up over time which will give you a nice health lead. This will cause your lane to snowball in your favor and potentially give you opportunities for kill-potential. Although killing your lane opponent is fantastic, it is definitely not necessary. Being able to bully them out of lane and have a cs lead while dwindling down their tower's health bar is all you need to do. Typically you don't want to be constantly shoving the lane but if you are against someone who last hits poorly under tower (such as Leblanc or Nidalee) then you want to be doing so. It will give you a cs lead for free, allow you to harass them under tower, and kill their turret fairly quickly. Just make sure to be warding on your sides to not leave yourself vulnerable to ganks. On the topic of ricing (farming jungle camps) it is fairly situational as you are giving up lane pressure to do so. Only do it if there isn't something better for you to be doing. Such as if you are laning against a Ziggs and you are literally just splitting cs and nothing else is happening then ricing inbetween waves is pretty much your best bet. Roaming isn't going to be something that you will be doing very often as Orianna unless you are following your lane or you know for certain that the route you'll be traveling on isn't warded. Orianna is fairly low mobility (at least more-so early game) and putting yourself away from a tower makes you very vulnerable to being caught, stuck on like white on rice, and then ultimately dying.

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Mid-game for Orianna can be an awkward time. Once laning starts to settle down and before she obtains her core items is when she is between power spikes. Don't get me wrong, she is by no means /weak/ during this time but she can just be out-shined at this point in time in the game by more mid-game heavy champions like LeBlanc. During the mid-game you want to be forcing objectives as a team. Although your damage won't be the most immense thing in the world, you bring a lot of utility and the potential to sway team fights heavily with your ultimate. Keep lanes pushed, farm when you can, and force dragon when it is up and move around the map and siege as a team. During the majority of team-fights you want to be staying on the out-skirts of the fray, dancing around with your little clockwork body, waiting for the right time to strike. Poking with your Command: Attack and Command: Dissonance, shielding your front-liners and potential poke with Command: Protect, and looking for the perfect opportunity to use your Command: Shockwave. Like stated earlier in this guide, /do not/ feel rushed to use your Shockwave at the beginning of a fight. Wait for the opportune time because this move being wasted can single handedly lose your team the fight and potentially the game just as easily as it can accomplish the polar opposite.

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Late game you are one of the strongest champions to enter the rift. You literally bring everything to a team. Utility/shields, burst damage, poke, game-changing AOE ultimate. What more could you ask for besides a little bit of extra mobility? Keep forcing things as a team just as you did earlier in the game and watch your positioning. When you are poking, be at the ultimate max distance that you can poke safely. If you ever get caught then you have some tools to escape getting bursted/stuck to but it can result in your demise and a lost team-fight or game. Make sure to use your Zhonya's Hourglass to cause the other team to lose focus on you and also buy time for your cool-downs to come back up.