Janna Build Guide by NumberOneSupport

Janna, the Storm's Fury

Introduction to the Storm's Fury

Janna is possibly one of the most fun support champions to use. Her skills consist of a slow, shield, heal/AoE knock-back, and an AoE, guided knock-up. To use this champion efficiently and correctly you must find a strong/reliable laning partner for preferably bottom lane, use your shield on them and then use Howling Gale to initiate.

Janna can also use her abilities as escape mechanisms. For example: When being chased, Howling Gale, Zephyr, and Monsoon are all incredibly efficient at getting away unscathed. Zephyr also has a nifty Passive ability, it allows you to ignore unit collision and also grants a speed bonus! Along with Zephyr's passive, Janna's passive ability Tailwind, grants a global 3% movement speed to all allies!!!

If you have ever played Diablo 2, you can just compare Janna to an Auradin, you want to give her a lot of aura gear to buff your team or debuff the enemy team.

All-in-all, Janna is a very unique and well-balanced Support Champion.

Runes

1.) Greater Mark of Armor and Greater Seal of Armor both grant you a superb amount of spare armor at your disposal, with this being said, it strikes another nail on the head; Janna is basically an off-tank with benefits. Janna, like most support champions, is very squishy and is easily targeted down; using these runes will provide you with quite a bit of extra survivability.

2.) Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist, like the Greater Mark of Armor and Greater Seal of Armor, gives you the little extra defensive "oomph" you need as a support to stay alive long enough to actually support your team.

3.) Quintessences: I went with triple Greater Quintessence of Golds for one simple reason, Janna IS A STARVED CHAMPION! Since Janna is a Support Champ, she also faces the same fate as all the rest of the Support Champions; she doesn't get much gold... With this being said, 3 extra gold every 30 seconds may just be what it takes to give you the competitive edge you need.

Items

There are many alternatives for items for Support Champs, but what it all comes down to is this one question, "What does my team need most?". Whether it be extra Life-Steal or Mana Regen, all of the items I have chosen are designed to generically help your team. One of the items I use in replacement of Frozen Heart at times, is Zeke's Herald, especially if I have an AD heavy team.

Sight Wards and Health Potions may be bought at your own discretion.

EXACT Item Purchase order

From left to right respectively. Many of these items can be swapped due to the situation and scenario that you/your team is in.
Alternative Items:

Pros / Cons

PROS: A lot of Crowd Control! Ulti heals and knocks enemies back. Increased movement speed and no unit collision is wonderful! Easy to poke at enemies with your tornado. Shielding your carry can turn the tide of a team fight.

CONS: She is incredibly squishy early game. Takes a while to get used to her play-style. Timing on her tornado can be tricky at times. Laning with a noob can mean losing your 1st tower VERY quickly.

Team Work is Key!

If you are starting Janna after your main being a Carry, you're in for a lifestyle change! When you're in lane with creep in front of you and your lane buddy by your side, you always want your partner to get the creep kills (THIS ALSO APPLIES WITH KILLING CHAMPIONS). When a situation arrives where it's either you or a teammate that dies, always sacrifice yourself for the team.

Engaging Team Fights: Probably one of Janna's most important roles is helping with engagements. The way I usually do this is allowing my tank to rush in and I pop Eye Of The Storm on him so he stays up longer. At this point, the rest of the team rushes in. When this is happening is where it's your time to shine and give your team the win factor for the fight: rush in between the enemy team trying to separate the enemy team into 2/3 or 1/4 with your body, pop Monsoon and decisively hurl 1 or 2 enemies right into the middle of your team for easy kills while the the other 3 or 4 are thrown backwards away from the fight, where they can only watch as your team brutally murders their teammates, giving your team a win for the fight! Have fun :) -Derek

A More In-Depth Ability Break-Down

Tailwind, Janna's Passive Ability, is a global 3% speed aura that effects all allies. With this being said, it only works when you're alive.

Howling Gale, "Q", is a time or reclick triggered Skill-shot. When passing through creep or enemy Champions it will knock them into the air ((the longer you allow Howling Gale to charge for, the higher the knock-up will be on enemies)Does NOT work on Barron or Dragon)). This Crowd Control Ability is great for helping with engagements or catching fleeing enemies.

Zephyr, "W", is both a ranged attack/slow and a passive ability when it's not on cooldown.
The passive ability grants you a speed boost and ignoring of unit collision (this passive temporarily goes away while Zephyr is on cooldown). Zephyr is best used for killing creep and catching fleeing enemies.

Eye of the Storm, "E", is a temporary shield that you can place on an allied Champion or an allied Turret. This ability is best used for shielding your tank or carry for engagements or saving an ally or yourself while fleeing.

Monsoon, "R", is Janna's Ultimate, and it's a pretty interesting Ulti too! It can be used for a multitude of things. Monsoon is a circular (with you being the center of it) Area of Effect knock-back to enemies and a Health-Per-Second Heal to allies. Some of the many things that this Ultimate is AMAZING for are: splitting the enemy team into 2 small groups during team fights for easy kills while healing your team, saving your turret by knocking all enemies and creep backwards away from it, and knocking enemies backwards away from you or an ally while trying to escape.

Comparing Supports

As you can see in this overview of Janna, her Ability Power and Difficulty are pretty high. Despite what this says, she isn't THAT difficult, and no one really plays her as an AP Champ; she's a ranged support for a reason!

My 2nd favorite support champion, Sona, seems to have better stats than Janna; with higher Ability Power and lower Difficulty, why not play Sona instead? The answer is quite simple really, and it all comes down to her Abilities. Power Chord, Hymn of Valor, Aria of Perseverance, Song of Celerity, and Crescendo are her Abilities; I want you to take a long look at these and think to yourself, "What's wrong here?"...... THERE'S ONLY ONE CROWD CONTROL ABILITY!!! Despite Sona's heals and speed and armor auras, she only has one CC ability, and it's her Ulti so it has quite a long cooldown. But on the other hand, her Arcade skin is very nice :)

Soraka is one of those Champions that are amazing when used properly and will make you surrender at 20:00 if used poorly. I, personally, have never gotten the hang of playing Soraka and there are reasons for this too. Soraka has ZERO Crowd Control Abilities except a silence; this makes her an easy target since she has no real escape method. But despite having no escape mechanism, she has a LOT of heals and mana regen. Soraka also gives all allies a passive magic resist with Consecration and can reduce enemy magic resist with Starcall. Her other Abilities are Astral Blessing, Infuse, and Wish.

Taric, in my opinion, is a great support. He has a nice balance of abilities and is tanky enough to be alive long enough to use them all. Taric has heals, stuns, armor auras, and team buffs (and his Bloodstone skin is sick!). Gemcraft is great for laning longer, all you have to do is auto-attack minions and you regain mana to keep a nice sustain on heals. Taric's heal is Imbue, this can be a turning point in pushing or retreating. Possibly one of the best team-fight combos in the games is Taric's combo using Shatter, Radiance, and Dazzle respectively.
Despite all of these great support champions, my personal favorite and, in my opinion, the best support to use in any situation is Janna.


NOTE: The following "Support Champions" have not been listed due to no one in the game ever using them as support; Galio*, Karma*, Kayle*, Lulu, Lux, Morgana, Nidalee, Shen, Teemo, and Zilean*

* These Champions are only sometimes used as support.

Lore of the Storm's Fury

There are those sorcerers who give themselves over to the primal powers of nature, forgoing the learned practice of magic. Such a sorceress is Janna, who first learned magic as an orphan growing up admist the chaos that is the city-state of Zaun. Janna eked out what living she could on the streets. Life was tough and dangerous for the beautiful young girl, and she survived by her wits, and by stealing when wits weren't enough. The rampant magic that characterizes Zaun was the first and most alluring tool which Janna realized could both protect and elevate her. Janna discovered that she had an affinity for a particular type of magic - the elemental magic of air. She mastered her studies of air magic in a matter of months, almost as if she was born of it. Janna went from a street vagrant to an avatar of the air virtually overnight, stunning and surpassing those who taught her. Such a rapid ascension also changed her physical appearance, giving her an otherworldly look.

Seeking to right the injustice in the world (particularly the insanity that has become the city of Zaun), Janna has brought her talents to the League. She is a voice for the regulation of magical experimentation and a supporter of the development of techmaturgy, making her an indirect ally of the city-state of Piltover and the amazing techmaturgical minds that live there. Janna is also a new favorite of the League's many fans. She is often the center of attention at functions, fan appreciation days, and other celebratory events. There is something untouchable about Janna, however, and her affections can change as quickly as the wind.

Do not be captivated by Janna's beauty. Like the wind, she is one gust away from terrible destruction.

Summary of Janna