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We all know amumu as the cute but sad little mummy who's only purpose in life is really to use his ultimate in a teamfight. Amumu has traditionally been built as a pure tank, using his ultimate and then becoming almost useless until his cooldown recharged. This has worked well in the past. In fact, he was an insta-ban in solo queue for quite awhile because of this tactic. But there is a way to make this little mummy a true terror out on the rift, rather than just a one trick pwny.

Legend

(for any abbreviations you don't understand)

Start out with Despair level 1, followed by tantrum for jungle clears, and bandage toss for ganking ability. Max tantrum first because it helps greatly with jungling. The physical damage reduction keeps your health higher in the jungle, and the cooldown being lowered on each hit you take allows you to clear the jungle extremely fast. Bandage toss does more damage per hit, but with the low cooldown on tantrum allows you to use it multiple times during a gank, so it ends up dealing more damage in the end. For tank Amumu, maxing despair next makes sense, but with ap amumu, u want more burst than sustained damage over time, so max bandage toss next. Also, leveling despair does not increase the damage by a whole lot. So max tantrum first, then badage toss, leaving despair for last, while of course grabbing a point in curse of the sad mummy at levels 6, 11. and 16.

Early Game Goals:

-Philosopher's StonePhilosophers Stone (Great item for the health regen, mana regen (so u can give blue buff to mid) and extra gold).
- Sorcerers Shoes (Getting level 2 boots is important early game to keep up with opponents during ganks)
- Aegis of the Legion (Ideal item for early game tankiness)
- Giants Belt (This will build into Sunfire Cape later, but the health helps a ton early on in the game)

Mid Game Goals:

- Sunfire Cape (If the other team has a lot of AD champs, get this before abyssal. The Health, armor and damage is great on amumu).
- Abyssal Scepter (The magic resist reduction aura, when combined with your passive and sorcerers shoes, will be shredding enemy health. Get this before sunfire cape unless the enemy has a TON of AD).

Late Game Goals:

- Rylais Crystal Scepter (More health to make you tankier, more damage to make you scarier, and a slow so that NONE SHALL ESCAPE YOUR WRATH. great item to have all around).
- Rabadons Deathcap (At this point you are tanky enough, so you want to increase your damage output as much as possible. Any squishy hit with your full combo will either die or be forced to leave the fight before doing any damage).

Final Build:

Amumu's Bandage Toss and ultimate have 1:1 AP ratios, and his Tantrum is 0.5:1. These great ratios mean that he doesnt need a whole lot op ability power to increase his damage by a huge amount. If you complete this build, you can instantly destroy any squishy on the other team, while still living long enough to slowly melt people's health with your tears.

Optional Substitutes:

Aegis of the Legion ---> Guardian Angel (If you find yourself being focused in fights, (which isn't too bad considering that you are a tank), the guardian angel passive may be a good idea for you).
Sunfire cape --> Randuins omen/ Zhonyas Hourglass (Randuins Omen if you want more armor and the active slow, or Zhonya's If you are lokking for more damage and the survivability you gain with the active).
Sorcerers Shoes --> Mercury Treads (If the enemy is loaded with cc or has mostly magic damage dealers, get merc treads instead of sorcerers shoes).

Early Game:

Start out with Regrowth Pendant and one health potion. Your jungle path should be wolves, blue buff, wraiths, wolves again, Red Buff, and Wraiths again. Start out with Despair level 1, then get tantrum at levels 2 and 3 and bandage toss at level 4. At this point you should be level 4 at about 3:50 with double buff ready to gank. Look to gank lanes whenever possible, but make sure to keep up on farm as well. Max tantrum first, because it has decent damage and makes for very fast clear times with the cooldown being reduced on each hit you take. Faster clear times equals more ganks. More ganks makes happy teammates . Get an early Philosophers Stone. All around it is a great item with the mana regen (so you can give blue buff to your ap carry mid), health regen (to keep your health up in the jungle), and extra gold (to complete your build late game). After Philo stone, you will want to get level 2 boots. More mobility makes jungling quicker, which again allows for more ganks. You need to be able to keep up with enemies to ensure that they get soaked with as many tears as possible from despair. Mercury Treads are a good idea if the enemy team has heavy crowd control or is mostly dealing magic damage. If not, Sorcerers Shoes are the better choice. Aegis of the Legion should be the first item you rush, it is the only item in the game to give health, armor, and magic resist, and thus, it is a perfect item for early game tankiness (it’s also fairly inexpensive).

Mid Game:

Get a little more health with a giants belt (remember, tanky first, damage second). If the other team is AD heavy, build the giants belt into sunfire cape right away, otherwise, build abyssal scepter first and sunfire cape next. Abyssal scepter is the first must have item on le mummy. The aoe magic resistance reduction is perfect because 3 of his abilities deal damage in an area around him. Every time an enemy is hit with an ability, they will be in range of the abyssal scepter debuff. It also stacks with his passive that lowers a target’s magic resist already. Late game, the sad mummy’s auto attacks lower target magic res by 35, then with abyssal scepter, 20 more is removed. If you decided to get sorcerers shoes, that’s another 20, with another 8 from runes, totaling 83 magic resist shredded off of your opponents (Not to mention the 10% from masteries).

Late Game:

After sunfire cape for armor, and abyssal scepter for magic resist, it’s time for some more health with a rylais crystal scepter. Tankiness, damage, and utility via the slow make rylais another must have item on amumu. His aoe spells will be slowing every single enemy in a fight. At this point you should be fairly tanky and dealing pretty decent chunks of damage. Now it’s time for the most important item of all, rabadons deathcap. If you make it this far and complete your rabadons, the other team should just surrender before they get embarrassed any more. An ult from an amumu who builds zero damage is already devastating as it is, but when your ult is taking out almost half of the other team’s health, they don’t stand a chance. If you feel like you need more armor, you could get randuins omen instead of sunfire cape, or sell your aegis late game for a guardian angel. Keep in mind that this build does not make you an immovable wall, but rather just tanky enough to not be exploded instantly in a teamfight while still dealing massive damage. While pure tank amumu does work well, I feel that this tanky AP build is more effective as well as more fun.

Ganks

Always try to start off a gank by auto-attacking once to apply your passive, then just run next to the enemy with despair while using tantrum whenever it is available. Attack again only every 3 or 4 seconds to re-apply your passive. Bandage Toss is best used to catch the opponent just as he is about to get away (if he flashes or uses a gap closer) to catch back up, but sometimes its necessary to start off the gank with it.

Teamfights

Your main objective in a teamfight is to trap as many enemies as possible in your ultimate. If you have gotten pretty far along in your build, this should be devastating their whole team. After your ultimate, aim for squishy carries. Tantrum and despair alone chunk squishy's health with the insane amount of magic penetration you have. Bandage toss should be on a fairly short cooldown this late in the game, so make sure to throw that out whenever possible to damage carries as well as stun them to protect your teammates.

Farming

If you have blue buff it is pretty simple, just turn on despair at every camp and use tantrum as much as possible. When you do not have blue buff though, despair drains your mana very quickly. Despair is unnecessary to kill wolves and wraiths, so to save valuable mana, only use tantrum on those 2 camps. The camps with more health, like golems, red buff, and blue buff, despair works extremely well for, so it is worth losing more mana to kill them quickly.

While pure tank amumu does work well, I feel that this tanky AP build is more effective as well as more fun. Hope this works and helps everyone become a solid amumu player. First guide, so don't give me a hard time :) let me know if this works for you.