Garen can be a tank or a dps but i prefer a tank as dps garens are focus down 1st and they are very squishy. However, a tank garen can deal tons of damage as well as taking tons of damage at the same time.

I use dodge quintessences to activate nimbleness more quickly so you can chase targets with ease. The other runes are just for tanking

Starting items: Doran's shield gives you decent regen in the beginning so i use it first. If you want to deal more damage, start with a doran's blade.

Boots: If you want to chase with more ease or they have a lot of dps, choose a ninja tabi. If the team has a lot of cc, pick a mercury thread.


After, go for a warmogs, then see whether there are more ap casters or dps. If there is more ap casters, go for a FoN, if there is more dps, go for a sunfire cape. After both of these, get an atma's to boost your damage and finally, a guardian angel to give you 2nd chances.

Why decisive strike at lvl 10? That is when you start to chase more and you want to chase with more ease, so we level up decisive strike again just for the movement speed.

R>E>W>Q

Ghost is good for initiating a battle or chasing someone with your spin.
Ignite combos well with your ulti
Flash works as well as ghost
Cleanse can help you get out of crowd controls so you can kill them more
Exhaust is good as well

The others, no.

Garen is a great early game champion, but he starts to fall off late game. So, try to get as fed as possible in the beginning so you can pwn late game. Hide in the bush if you want to harass.

There are 2 choices: If you think they are going to use a skill to escape after you spin, engage with q but don't hit them. Spin first then hit them with your q.

The 2nd option is to silence them and then spin if you think they are just going to flash away from your spin.

Start with your q and spin. Thats all you need to do! Simple right?