Hi, this is a guide about Orianna one of my few favourite champs. Orianna hit me with her gameplay style. She is very similar to Anivia -whom I mained for a long time- with the style(ap burst, team support, passive-aggressive approach, teamfight control, long range). I read some of the top guides in mobafire and decided to this. Hope you like it :)

EDIT: Pics of stats, some gameplay videos are on the way.
EDIT2: Sorry for spelling errors, hunting them down.

Other guides mentioned the mana hungry early game phase with Orianna. If you need mana in any stage of the game with Orianna. You're doing it wrong. Mana issue is definitely out of my cons list.

Pros:

- Good farmer
- Good harras
- Insane pokes
- Pretty low CD on Q
- High utility
- Hard to kill
- She is an AP CARRY / SUPPORT not just ap burst champ. (due to low cooldowns and combination variety)
- Speed buff and debuff (good for jungle fights)
- Extremely hard to follow mechanics (by the enemy ofc)
- Awesome range
- Nice teamfight kit
- Can fight from other sides of walls
- With blue buff, she's very very annoying

Cons:

- High learning curve (this is often misunderstood, this doesn't mean she's hard to play. I'll talk about this later)
- Kinda squishy
- People will want to see safer picks like Annie or Malzahar
- Different mechanic (controlling 2 objects)
- Due to this mechanic it can be difficult to position yourself(or the ball) in teamfights

I know some thinks that she need MPR or CDR runes, honestly I don't think they are bad ideas. However, I found my runes to be most effective. The reason is, she already has pretty low CD's on all spells (the cd on her q is insane) and I get the ionian boots almost always. Secondly, the mana regen issue just shocked me. If you're good with her kit and skillshots your mana till catalyst will be enough to kill your opponent twice. If you're going too aggressive on your opponent you will start to miss your q or w and that will lead the lack of mana. I will talk about this more on Gameplay Style section. So flat ap, ap per lvl, and magic penet runes make the most of her due to her low burst (in comparison to other casters).

Standart caster.

Early rod of ages rush can win you the lane easy. I sometimes get roa before lvl1 boots. Why? I used to hate roa on any caster, especially Anivia. It's all about the champions kit. Let's analyze Anivia, Orianna and Annie for this item.

- Anivia has great early game damage without any item. She drops out drastically at midgame and becomes godlike at lategame. So if I rush ROA for anivia, my mid game will be mediocre with only ~100ap. With long CD spells we can say 100ap anivia won't be any threat.

- Annie (now with basedmg nerf and ratio buff) has mediocre early game, very solid midgame, and good lategame. Rushing roa on her is a pretty good idea since she starts to shine midgame where ROA will be enough for her burst to instakill anyone.

- Orianna has mediocre early game, very good midgame, good lategame. She's more like Annie with her presence. She will have absolutely amazing midgame with ROA since she can rush it so quick(like Annie). Her passive helps her last hit very much and even if she gets zoned(which is most unlikely) she can farm at a great distance easily.

So after ROA, Rabadons and void staff for maximum damage output. Before these items are done usually you're at lategame where you will need a bit more protection from gap closers and flash bursters (annie,malz,amumu,xin..) so get banshee.

Last item is totally situational. I sometimes find my self getting Shurelia's, sunfire, warmogs, will of the ancients, randuins or more ap. (weird stuff but all are counters to specific team compositions or fed champs)

Why not Rylai's?

Well Roa gives you enough HP(some games you won't take single dmg due to her range and utility) until late game where you get some defense, and the slow is totally unnecessary. If you get ROA and Rylai's you're gonna lack damage and going to be useless for most part of the game.

I use q-w-q-e-q-r mostly. BUT if you're getting outdamaged, or outplayed(like LeBlanc) you can use q-w-w-e-w-r. What does this do? W has way more damage output than your q. If you're wining a lane, its easy to bully your opponent with q harras, but if a LeBlanc is on your *** constantly you want to burst her from a safe spot and discourage her to go QWREQRWERQWREQRW on you. (Also when facing leblanc getting 3 dorans always helps a lot)

Your choice. She sometimes needs ignite cause her burst is not enough for some champs. But teleport is solid choice too since her ganks are pretty awesome.

She is viable for both solo queue and 5v5. I go solo queue rarely but %100 win ratio on solo queue (im around 1500) with about 3-4 games now. Also in all of my orianna games, I never lost mid. I'll get some pics and stats soon for both ranked and normal games.

-About the learning curve : when playing her you have to be aware of your and your pets position constantly. You don't have the chance to flash and throw a spell on a low hp enemy. It's not about your distance but your pets unlike any other ap caster. But you have to keep in mind that the one is gonna take damage and die is your champion not your pet. So this sums to notion that Orianna is a champ that is divided by two where the high learning curve comes from(not the skillshot, skillshots are too easy to be included in learning curves).

One has to find the balance of passive-aggressive behaviour in laning for maximum effectiveness. Why I love Orianna is this exact characteristic which my other favourite Anivia also demands from the player. You cannot be always aggressive or always passive with Orianna. Why? Well I saw plenty of Oriannas getting very aggressive on their opponent. It has 2 cons. First of all, your ball hits everything it passes through so when you harras, you simultaneously push your lane very very fast. This is unwanted. This makes you lose your lane (can make you die with a gank, or even make you flash which instantly makes you disadvantaged). Secondly, almost all ap mids have more damage and a hard cc. You may seem crushing your opponent with your pokes but when she decides to jump on you you cannot now who will stay alive. On the other hand, if you're going to stay passive with Orianna you have to punish your opponents harras attempts with easy q-w-e or e-q-w combo (if she has boots you may have to e-q-w to avoid any dmg)

About skill combos

I don't want to write too much about her combos, any player who reads her spells can come up with these easily. Some of my favourites,

Maximum DMG
Q-R-W-E-Q

You will have another Q by the end of QRWE.(longlive cdr boots)

Maximum utility
E-R-W
E-W-Q-R

Throw E to an ally under focus, R to flip them away and/or W to boost him and slow the others then flip.

1v1

Q-W-E-Q-R-Q

Okay this can change with the champion your fighting against. Against casters I find this to be most effective since after you throw first Q-W you're gonna get hammered hard (harder than you hit) so E will help that initial burst. After surviving that finish your opponent with simple q-r-q. Ofcourse get some autoattacks and ignite in between.

Please rate&comment the best build out there ;)