Hi to all, and welcome to my Diana mid guide! I hope to give you some insights about how to build/play this champion and changes in the build according to the opponent team.

Pros

• High damage
• Becomes tanky
• Strong after level 6
• Can snowball
• One hard CC skill

Cons

• Melee
• Weak early
• No escape
• Mana problems

VS Ranged AP Mages

She is weak early so you may start with Crystalline Flask and Health Potion. Crystalline Flask is helpful against ranged AP mids. You will be taking lots of harass. The enemy won't be within your reach most of the time until you have your ulti.

One other option is to have hp seals for runes. While playing vs a ranged AP champ, this will make their magic damage seem low.

Stay defensive and don't push too much. Focus on farming and kite the opponent's harass as much as possible.

VS Other Assassins

The play style is changed if you play vs other assassins such as Katarina, Akali, Fizz, Kassadin etc. While playing against these champs play a bit more aggressive. Rank your W to level 2 before getting ulti. Try to force early trades and don't run away from the enemy. You can beat fizz if he decides to jump on you starting at level 3.

Use your E accordingly. This is the main difference between good and bad Diana players. You can prevent the full damage of some skills just by timing your E well. Diana's E prevents damage from Fizz's E, Akali's 1 ulti stack etc. While trading, this gives you the upper hand. You will prevent damage from one of their priority skill and will tank some more damage with your W shield. You also have your passive for some DPS. So don't be afraid of some longer trades.

Big question: Why do we build Rod of Ages for Diana?

Main reason: Because Diana lacks escape, she must be tanky not to die a lot.

Diana is classified as fighter mage. The other champs which are also classified like this are Swain, Ryze, Mordekaiser, Gragas. Except for Morde, Rod of Ages is a common item for the other 3 champs, right? So Diana is similar to them, just a bit more mobile with her ulti but she still lacks escape.

Diana also has some mana problems that she cannot spam spells, especially W. Rod of Ages will make things easier for us. The other similar champ to Diana is Akali. She has no mana. When she sees a low hp enemy, she can just ult them and start using skills all the time. But Diana needs to have enough mana. Diana also do not have any spell vamp like Akali. So we are giving some hp to Diana instead of this too. So all in all you can think Rod of Ages somewhat helps us Akalify Diana.

Why do we play Diana instead of Akali then?

Because Diana's burst can be dealt faster and she has one CC spell which can stop channeled skills (like Kata's ulti) for your team.

She is very strong. Maybe not the strongest but her damage is definitely top tier.

You can check from this website:

http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/Diana

Passive: 80% AP
Q: 70% AP
W: 60% AP
R: 60% AP

Normally since we can use R 2 times after landing Q, we can consider it 120% AP.

So at total: 330% AP.

From items and runes we have around 672 AP with the build aforementioned. We also included Lich Bane too. So our combo will include at least 1 Lich passive which will increase the scaling to 380% AP. If there are 2 Lich procs, then it will be 430% AP. You got the idea. Diana's damage is nothing to be ashamed. You can easily 100-0 squishy champs with your QRWR-some AA combo.

To be continued...