Introduction

Hi, my name is Leo A.K.A TheMild1. I am a multiseason Diamond player with a peak of Low Master and I am currently one tricking this beast. I do not pretend like I am the best Sion player out there, but I do have much knowledge and understanding of the champion and his stengths and weaknesses. This guide is for people of any rank diamond and below, who are struggling at climbing with Sion and want to improve as a player. I am also making this guide for myself to put my thoughts down about Sion, my playstyle with him and League as a whole.

Tank/AD

I mostly play tank Sion vs AD Sion, and feel that this is the better build for Sion. Tank feels so much better than AD Sion at the moment. Riot nerfed AD Sion and made tank so much stronger. I would recceomend tank for less expirienced players and AD if you are comforatable with the matchup.

My Playstyle

I will be showing you how I specifically play Sion. There is no one correct answer of how to play this champion. I have been watching TheBaus for a long time and have taken some of his points into my playstyle, but I do not play the same way as he does. There are cetain points in which you are forced to die to get a good lane state but for the most part you want to play a relaxed safe game. I will be going over how to play out the game a little bit later but for now just know I do not play inting Sion.

Strengths
Sion has one of the highest HP scaling kits in the game, with his W passive giving him max HP. Tank Sion is just a massive frontline for your team. He is very easy to pick up as a solid pick. Sion is very strong in a side lane taking towers, or can preform very well in teamfights. He provides CC for your team and can either engage or peel depending on the situation.

Weaknesses
He has a bunch of problems recently. Sion has many matchups that are hard for him to deal with most games. He is too immobile and easy to kite, his ablities are easy to dodge/cancel. Building full tank with no fighting power is very hard to get a lead and carry. I reccomend tank items that also provide damage and fighting power.

For Runes there are two pages you will want to go depending on what style you are going for.

For your tank page you will want to run Grasp every time, with Shield Bash in the first branch. They have changed demolish so you have to hit it three times in order to proc it, so it can lead you to taking unfavorable trades, so I always reccomend Shield Bash now. I would always go conditioning as the other two just don't do enough in most games. For the last branch overgrowth is your standard scaling rune. Revitalize could be good depending on your build. For example, if you build unending despair it will give you added healing, and it also increases your W shield size. For your secondary page I would always go for approach velocity to help you be more mobile, and then you can go for cash back as your last rune. Always go attack speed adaptive forece and scaling hp.

Your Ad page is very different, but with many of the same ideas to lessen your weaknesses. Phase Rush is a must to help you kite and help you wait for your abilities. Mana flow is the best rune in this branch. Next you can go for either absolute focus or transcendence. In my opinion I prefer absolute, but transcendence can be good if you struggle bursting them. In the last branch of the scorcery tree you want to either go scorch for lane pressure or for gathering storm for ultimate scaling. By minute 20 gathering storm is already better for damage over scorch. I like gathering storm as it will scale better for late game dominance to take over teamfights. In the secondary tree I prioritize demolish to take plates early and destroy turrets late game. The other rune in this tree I take depends on my lane opponent. I go for one of three runes. Conditioning, second wind or boneplating; for the reasons I have stated earlier.

Current Meta

In the current state of the game building full tank is sub-optimal. You will not do damage obviously, but also the enemies will be able to build lifesteal or have conqeror and can perma fight you with their healing and tank shredding. This is why I reccomend building items that give you the ability to fight while still being tanky.

Starting Items

For your starting items you will always go for D-sheild as it provides too much help in lane not to take it. I would never start cull unless you think you can get away with it in like a malphite lane.

Frist Base

For your first back you can either work towards your boots, your first item, or cull. With that in mind, I would reccomend either going for bami's cinder first or if you cant fully buy bami's I would buy cull on your first back plus any basic items to work towards your bami's or boots. The reason I reccomend cull now and not in your stating items is that if you buy it first you wont be able to fight early, but because you first bought an item to sustain against enemies, you can now buy cull to scale harder. Rushing boots against a heavy AD or AP topside can help you out tremendously.

First Item

For your first item you will be going for either Sunfire or Hollow Radiance in 99% of your games. You want the ability to fight enemies and waveclear, so these are the perfect items for you. Always go with the one which best suits the lane that you are in. I would only differ from this if they wont walk in your range for the bami's passive. In this case go Titanic Hydra.

Boots

Purchase boots when you have the gold for them and you want the extra movment speed. steel caps or merc treds are solid options, but also swifties are a good purchase. If your enemy laner and jungler are physical I would receomend steel caps, however if they are both magic damage I recomend merc treds. If they are mixed then swifties are a great option. However, if most of the enemy team is physical damage, but the jungler is magic, steel caps would be a great buy, and visa versa.

Second Item

After your first item being one of the bami cinder upgrades, go with Titanic Hydra. This item provides an immense amount of waveclear which is vital for moving around the map and being versitile. Waveclear is a great tool for you to use.

Last Items

Now there will be variation what you build as your last two. You can build any variation of the following items I reccomend, depending on the enemy team. I listed these items in order of strength at their currents state of the game.

Unending Despair: This item is great vs mixed damage and does good if your team doesn't have much healing. If you team has a bunch of healing, odds are enemies will be buying anti-heal. Very solid item even when they have healing reduction. This is your go to item when you don't know what to go next.

Thornmail: Thornmail is a great armor item. It gives a bunch of armor and HP. It also give some extra damage with its passive, which Sion loves. Build this when the enemy team has a bunch of healing and auto attackers, or AD champions in general.

Jak'sho: is the resitance version of Unending despair. Building this vs tanks is fairly strong. This item just makes you impossible to deal with and almost makes it not worth for the enemy team to come deal with you. I recomend building this item when you have a lead, as it will make it almost impossible for the enemy team to kill you when it gets stacked up.

Spirit Visage: This is a very strong MR item, and pairs well with your W sheild. It pairs well when you team has healing and sheilding abilities(Ivern, Soraka, Lulu), and also if you built Kaenic or undening. Always buy this item over other MR items when possible or needed.

Overlord Bloodmail: This is an insane item on Sion. With all your build in bonus HP scaling it just does so much work with your build, and pair it with hearsteal for extra HP you will be a raid boss tank.

Frozen Heart: This item does really well into champions that depend on their autos to kill you. I would not build Frozen Heart along with Thornmail, as you will slow their attack speed, but you want them to attack you for the thormail passive. Only buy this item if you are vs a typical ADC in bot lane and also a Yasuo, Tryndamere or Yone.

Heartsteal: Heartsteal is great when the enemy team doesn't have any max health damage abilities or items. This item does very well against ADC's and squishy champions that have a lot of damage, but no sustain. Against someone who does True damage(ignoring armor) this item's value increases as building MR or Armor gets worse.

Sundered Sky: This item is a rare purchase on Sion, however, it does not mean that this is a bad pickup. This item works very well with what Sion wants to do. Sion wants to be a front line tank for his team. Sundered does great with helping Sion stay alive with the healing and also gives him more damage. Pair this item with spirit visage and it becomes a very strong item to have.

Sterak's Gage: Steraks is an item that has a lot of value if enemies don't build serpant's fang, otherwise I would stay away from it. It provides survivability and damage, two things Sion loves.

Force of Nature: This item is a very strong MR item that gives mobility and resistances while in combat. Mobility is one of Sion's weaknesses, so getting this item will help reduce this problem. If possible, take this over Kaenic as it will be more impactful for yourself.

Warmogs Armor: Warmogs can be purchased as a last item if you have nothing else to build. This pairs great with an HP stacking build, especially with heartsteal and bloodmail.

Kaenic Rookern: This is an MR item that gives a big sheild from magic damage. It is a good buy if you are against bursty mages. For me this item feels weak, and non impactful and I would opt into other MR items for the same reason that I think full tank is not very good. I would only buy this item over other MR items if your team has a bunch of damage you need to block for.

Death's Dance: A great option for just being annoying. Taking less damage and increasing damage done. Makes it harder for people to run you down in lane.

Randuin's Omen: This is another item for auto attackers that are meant for crit based enemies. As most champions that are auto attack reliant also build crit it is fair to say that either FrozenHeart or Randuin's can be built interchangably. I reccomend FrozenHeart over Randuin's as the attack speed slow is great for teamfighting to apply that to most enemies. Although you could build both if the whole enemy team is AD auto attackers.

Preface

Laning phase is the most important time in the game. This sets you up for the rest of the game, weather you are strong or weak, especially the first 5-ish waves of the game. So I will break up laning into two categories. The first 5-ish waves and everything else, yes, it is that important.

Before your first base

On the first wave realize who has the better level 1 and pushing power. A lot of the time you will be able to push, but will be weaker than your opponent. Assess if you can push without dying or getting punished. For example, against rumble if he takes E level 1 you will be able to push in the wave level 1 with your supirior waveclear, but once he hits level 2 he will be able to fight and out push you. In this case push out first two waves so they can crash, and let the next ones push into you.

If you have the push

Try to get the wave into the enemy tower within 2-3 waves. DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT let the wave sit right outside of their tower!!! If this happens you will not be able to punish poor play from the enemy, and more importantly you are very vulnerable to ganks or all ins.

After you crash the first time the wave will automattically push back towards you, and this is what you want. Being able to set up ganks for your jungle, and be less likely to die from ganks from the enemy jungler. If your jungle is pathing top you may want to try to thin out the wave in order to fight with your jungle, but don't do too much damage to the wave so that it pushes back into your opponent. Setting up a freeze right outside your tower is the most powerful position you can be in. If you can prevent the minions from going into tower range to secure this position.

If the enemy was able to push the minions into your tower successfully, the next few waves will push away from you and into the enemy's direction. The key with this situation is to be able to build up as many minions as possible to help you fight your opponent and push out the wave. If you notice you are not able to push out the wave or else you will die, you may base and TP back to fix the lane state, and get the minions under the enemy's tower.

If they have the push

If they are stronger than you and also out push you, then let them do what they want. Watch out for level up timers, especially level 2. They will hit level 2 on the first mellee of the second wave, unless they got experience from a kill(wards no longer give exp). If you can hold it right outside your turret without dying this is the most optimal play. This makes them susceptable to ganks while you are extremely safe near your tower. Sion has really great gank set up. If it pushes into your tower try to preserve as much HP as possible in order to play out the bounce, otherwise you will have to base and TP in order to push it out. Sacrificing a death in this situation might also be worth it if you get one or both summoner spells from your opponent.

Other Helpful Tips

Look to play for your item spikes. For Sion these could be bami cinder, bramble, tier 2 boots, or any full item purchases.
For enemies this can include a sheen purhcase or any full items for themselves.

Mid and late game are almost identical in how you want to approach the game. As a top laner you want to be on the opposite side of the map that the next obbjective is going to spawn on. With Sion this is no different.

Your strongest time in the game is when you have two items, perferably Hollow/Sunfire with Titanic Hydra. With these two items you become a beast of a champion. Look to play aggressive, but also play around your team to help them secure a lead, either around an objective or killing an enemy to secure plates and waves.

Playing on top side when drake is spawning is your ideal senario, especially if you bring one person up with you, who might not have TP. The best case senario is when you bring one or more people up to you, and you rotate either by teleport or ulting to the objective. You want to force people to respond to you and make them stop you, this way your team can take the free obbjective or kill people trying to contest the drake.

The only times when I would group for an objective before pushing out top is when I am either too late to get on side before the spawning objecitve, if the objective looks too hard for my team to enter the area, or if I don't have TP to instantly get to the fight.

Timing is crucial when preparing for a neutral objective. I have found success with pushing out a wave and then instantly teleporting out of vision(as to not get stopped) with about 10 seconds left on the spawn timer. However, if your team looks like they are getting caught or trying to fight before then, then you have to TP early to prevent their bad fight or probable death.