Holy hell why would anyone do this? How could this possibly be confused for a decent build? Well it turns out it actually is. If you're a support main that wants to still support your team, but gets sick of having to rely on teammates that can't quite own a lane, this may be the build for you.

So right off the bat you may be asking, why the hell would I build portal and banner on a lulu? Where's the huge AP boost? Why keep rubys and frostqueens giving up a potential slot for rabadons? Well my inquisitive, imaginary friend here's why. Lulu may do some scary damage at full AP, but the core of what makes her so great are the utility of her abilities. Part of what makes her viable is the fact that she doesn't need heavy AP or tankiness to contribute to team fights. Glitterlance slows, Whimsy turns enemies into a bunny, essentially a silence, Pix shields and locks onto enemies, your ult can save an ally from certain death, you don't need the heavy AP to carry. So with that in mind I considered, what are some alternative builds to AP lulu can incorporate to add some different ways of supporting her team? That's when I came up with this. An item based build focused on dropping portals and banners to push one lane while the team pushes another.

Pros

-Weird and unexpected build sure to catch enemies off guard
-Push lanes on the other side of the map
-Still be able to support your team even if you don't do well
-Good CC
-Strong early game burst damage
-Heavy team fight influence

Cons

-Low damage mid and late game
-Covering a lot of areas, but none of them extremely well
-Kind of doomed if caught out by yourself
-Teammates will likely not approve of your build

So as mentioned earlier, lulu is a utility based support champion who doesn't need heavy AP or levels to be of use to her team. She has fairly strong CC, can change the course of the fight with a well times ult or bunny, and has pretty good movespeed potential to enter and escape fights. She's got the potential to be a scary DPS, but for this build our focus is her ability to contribute to her team and push lanes from a distance

I stated earlier that the runes aren't really set in stone, but I'd try to keep to the CDR and AP focus. Early game you actually do a good bit of damage with the small boost to AP, and can start off the match with 13% CDR just from that runepage. I put in armor just to help survive against the ADC in lane, but it should really be up to your specific play style

Masteries are kind of the same. You might want to ditch the ferocity branch and get wanderer and insight from resolve, but I would definitely keep points in cunning, and keep Thunderlords, Intelligence, and meditation. Thunderlords makes it so if you land a E, auto, Q on the enemy ADC, most will lose half their health instantly. Intelligence grants a bit more CDR, which is super useful on this utility based champ, and you'll want that mana regen to stay in lane longer

You shouldn't be venturing far from Exhaust and Flash. Yes some supports take ignite, but you're not a support carry (that's a guide for another time) You're the girl that handles everything from behind the scenes. You get kills handed to your teammates on a silver platter. You set up the enemy team to be ripped apart by even the most braindead ADCs you can get.

You'll want to start spellthiefs to get that nice bit of AP and mana regen. grab a ward and some biscuits and keep poking until you get at least 800 gold. Once you've gotten sightstone, swap out your ward for a sweeper, and push for another 800 to upgrade to a frostfang and boots. That's basically a standard approach to all supports (replace spellthief with whichever of the 3 support items you prefer of course)
Frostqueens is a nice item to have just from AP, gold, and Mana regen, but you also get to send out two ghost upon activation that hunt down nearby enemies and slow them upon impact. This can be used to chase, escape, or sweep an unwarded area. Late game, once you've finished buying everything, it may be more optimal to swap this for rabadons or rylais, but for most of the game, it's essential

Ruby gives you wards. Get it. Just get it. Why do some supports not grab it? What the hell? The other benefit of Ruby, and what makes it so essential to this build is that it gives CDR to items, so your portal, banner, claim, and crucible are all going to be regening that much faster.

Now normally many players will build mobis and switch them up later, but on this build, it's better to keep them for the long haul, since what you'll be doing is running off to uncontested lanes to drop a portal and upgrade a minion, and rushing back. You want as much movespeed as you can get to make it back to your team in time for a big fight. The one situation where it may be worth swapping them out is when the match is about to be over and you're basically skirmishing in one base or another, then sorcerers would be better since you shouldn't be moving too far from your teammates

This is basically what this build is focused around. Find a good bush in a lane that the enemy team is ignoring, drop it, and fight on the other end of the map. I wouldn't put this in midlane though, try to keep it on the edge. You can also drop it right in front of the enemy's nexus during a base race, under your tower to help prevent a wave from naturally taking it, or putting it on one end of the map while your team takes baron/dragon from the other. It's critical to try and divy up the potential threats of your team to keep your enemies from being able to focus on one area

Banner of Command works similarly to portal, in that you are using it to push a lane without being there, but it also provides the Aegis of Legion buff to your allies, and gives you a bit of AP. You might be tempted to switch which lanes have a portal and banner, but don't. Use them both on the same lane so it power pushes while you're away

One of the harder things about this build is the mana regen. If you get stuck in extended fights, you'll be out of mana fast, so crucible is pretty useful by the end, but what makes it even more valuable is the active shield that it gives your allies, healing them and removing all CC from them, and it becomes even more commonly used with the CDR from Rubys

The main problem with this build is that your spells won't shield or damage as well with the low AP. If by the end you want to get rid of frostqueens or mikael's Rylais and Rabadon's are both good options. Rabadons will obviously give more AP, but I usually prefer Rylai's for the extra health, making the armor and MR you're getting more useful.

You also may find yourself dying so much that you don't ever lose enough mana to justify mikaels. You're already pretty tanky with ruby, portal, and banner, but in those situations you'll want a randuins or banshees (depending on what the biggest threat it) to give some more health and armor/MR and keep you alive longer in teamfights.

As mentioned earlier, your abilities should be upgraded via Q, E, W, and R whenever possible. This will provide you with enough early game poke to keep you as the bare minimum of a viable threat
Pix works as lulu's little assistant that attacks anyone lulu autos. Not much to say with pix.

Glitterlance shoots two glittery rays of prozac binge inducing magic damage that slow anyone it touches. This is your main source for damaage, and can be used pretty creatively since one ray will shoot from wherever pix is located. A common trick is to shield an ally right when you get in range, and fire a glitterlance toward an enemy that would normally be out of range, but since the shielded ally has pix on them, glitterlance fires from them

Whimsy can be cast on allies to give them a movement and attack speed boost, or more effectively, cast on enemies to turn them into a bunny and silence and blind them, and slowing them by 60%. I try and save it on enemies that might have a game changer ult like tryndamere or mundo, and cast it right before they would ult.

Help Pix is like whimsy where it can be cast on both allies and enemies. On ally cast you'll provide a small shield that will be helpful, but also not that strong with this build. Just a word of warning (still shield allies though, it still helps). On enemy cast, the enemy is damaged, and you gain vision on them for 4 seconds. The important thing to remember is that whoever you E will get Pix on them for a short period, and one of your glitterlances will fire from them.

Wild Growth is such a tide turning ult. When cast on an ally, it increases their size, grants them a big health boost, and knocks up enemies around the ally, while slowing anyone within the aura of the casted ally. This is your saving grace. Use this to save allies from certain doom, or on a melee ally as they dive into the enemy team.

Early Game

I covered most of the early game things already. Just play it like an AP support normally does. Ward the two lane bushes and river bush when able, poke the enemy, try and land a E, auto, Q combo against the adc to get thunderlords damage, and feel free to roam if your lane is pushed. Get gold, get items, and more than anything, play safe

Mid Game

At this point you'll want to just rush portal and banner, while still keeping in vicinity of allies to help in skirmishes. Stick with melee fighters, or close range fighters. With your ult, you're most effective hanging out with them. Sweep wards, ward all the time, and always remember to drop a portal wherever the enemy doesn't have their attention at. If you want to take baron, drop portal and banner bot. If you want to take drag, portal and banner top. If your mid tower is getting hurt, drop portal on it and explore somewhere else. Make sure to try and put portals down where it would be dangerous for the enemy to try and kill it. Putting it right in front of an enemy tower may kill the tower faster, but the enemy has less risk in taking it out. Do your best to present a threat from multiple sides

Late Game

This is where things start getting tricky since you'll still want to try and run around the map warding and dropping portals, but you'll also want to stick with your team to contribute in huge 5v5 teamfights. This can actually work to your advantage though since the enemy might engage in a 4v5, but since you have mobis, you can usually rush back to your team, and use shields and wild growth to keep them from almost dying. At this point of the game you and your team will really want to kill any crab that comes up so that you can get that movespeed buff when running in the river. Just remember, push lanes with portals, growth on dying allies or melee champs, ideally when enemies are near, and whimsy the enemy that's doing the most damage.