Garen is one of those champions that you can own pretty much everybody with. He is a great anti tank and will work well with the team. I recommend if you are a beginner with Garen to try this out. When you get more experienced, I strongly recommend that you learn to use more situational builds based off of this one. This build will assure you that you are tanky and that you are also a fearsome bruiser. You will start out very passive, and cause the enemies to get all cocky, and you will break their spirits and executing with Demacian Justice!

PLAY PASSIVELY!!!! You are going to want to go top. When you are top, make sure that you are playing passively. Do not over-extend your lane. Despite what people may say, farming is not as important to Garen as it is to most champions. You want to use your Demacian Judgement to kill the entire wave of enemy minions all at once. Demacian Judgement has the strength to do this. You can still kill minions one by one, but it is most beneficial to you to if you kill the whole wave. Also, if the champion is a brawler and becomes a problem for you, let him poke you, but don't let him engage. Use your Decisive Strike to silence him or her, and immediately run back to your turret. Make sure that you do not over extend your lane until you get Warmog's armor. Once you get Warmog's and Black Cleaver, you will become pretty much unstoppable. Keep this in mind when you are farming.

Garen is a great initiator. He is one of those champions that is the first one in, but last one out of the fight. Now, I am not saying to go crazy with Garen, but he is excellent to engage team fights. You will want to make sure that you have your whole team behind you before you engage, and make sure you are not in range of the turret. If the adc is not buried in his team, go right for the adc, then activate Judgement, and retreat back to your team. You will want to save your ult for the person who is either the lowest health, or the highest priority. Don't worry about kill steals when you are in a teamfight.

Make sure you play as passively as possible in the early levels. Do not go in, or do not turret dive. You don't even want to get kills, all you want to do is farm up and hold the lane when you are in ranked. If your team is doing decent, and you have enough items, then you can start pushing your lane. Try not to think too hard when you are playing as Garen, and don't be submissive. Passive! Not submissive.

Pros: Garen is excellent against squishy champions and against very tanky champions. He can easily clear everyone. He can take a beating, and then walk it off with his passive.

Cons: Against tanky champions at full health, it will take 2 or 3 engagements to kill them. That's about all of them.

Black Cleaver is almost essential! It will cut right through the enemy's armor, and make your judgement even more powerful. Garen has no mana, so all of his abilities are based off of cooldowns. 10 percent may not seem like a lot when we're talking about cooldown reduction, but those few seconds that is cuts off can either make or break your battle.

Warmog's is almost essential for you to engage in teamfights. You want to make sure that you can go in, and then walk out safely. Since your passive is health regen, Warmog's will be extremely useful.

In summary, you need to make sure that you use your judgement as a food processor for your team. Literally. You will make team fights so much easier for your team; you will basically be handing them over on a plate to them. If you ever get hurt, don't recall, just find a place to sit and heal with your passive (preferably the turret). Now go out and show the Noxians the might of Demacia!