Hey there!

I'm Skæzó, a recently new League of Legends player and this is a guide how I play Skarner.
Some people find him to be under powered and some find him over powered, but I find him myself kind of in between. I guess we can all guess that he will be tweaked a bit more though. Which direction, who knows?

Like the title probably gives away this guide is not about jungling as most people do with Skarner that I have encountered. This guide is all about laning and tank the opponent while doing a bit damage. That's why I pick 9/0/21 in my masteries and some magic penetration in my rune page.

You could of course go for 0/9/21 for a bit more tank, or even 0/21/9, but I personally play him 9/0/21 because I like to give the enemy all I've got.

For better explanation about how you build the Skarner, look at this same guide by me here.

Energize:
Attack speed items are really good with Skarner's passive. Something that gives attack speed and ability power would be great if you want to take an advantage of that.

Nashor's Tooth would do great as it gives both ability power and attack speed with extra cool down.


Crystal Slash:
This spell is the only spell that Skarner has that scales with his attack damage. Additionally though he scales with ability power aswell if he uses the spell again while charged. All items that give AP works here. Be aware that the slow doesn't work until he's charged.

Rylai's Crystal Scepter would probably do some interesting things with this spell, as with the other spells of course.


Crystalline Exoskeleton
This works with Crystal Slash as it gives attack speed. It's also good to chase down guys that are running away or 'blocking' incoming damage. The more ability power you have, the more damage you can sustain. I'm not sure but it might give you that extra speed while dragging someone with your ultimate.


Fracture
The more AP, the more health you get back, the more awesomely you can stay alive ofcourse! Can save your life when you've no health left and incoming damage.


Impale
All ability power items work with this spell since it gives (x + ability power). Very useful to drag the enemy from their turret, drag enemies into your turret or drag someone into a fight or from a fight. This spell can not be used with flash or ghost (unless you maybe use the ghost first).

Note that you can disable and drag the guy for 1.5 second before he's out.
Works pretty well with any stunning and slowing champion like Annie, Taric, Alistar and so on if you drag them into your tower, but note that if they don't have aggro'd someone or they've to minions around they wont be hit by the tower.

Amplifying Tome + Health Potion is what I usually go for each time, but that gives me about 45 ability power when I get to the lane first time. That gives me more life steal when I mark minions with Fracture plus more damage to what ever you hit.
It's great for harassing the enemy and stay longer on lane though it isn't always much.

Fiendish Codex for early extra mana regeneration and ability power. That will be upgraded later into Nashor's Tooth which helps you a lot with spamming your spells while doing ability power damage.

Ninja Tabi and Mercury's Treads kind of explain them self. I personally love the Ninja Tabi, but if the enemy team has a lot of CC, I go for the Mercuty's Treads.

Lich Bane is something I prefer over the Trinity Force because of the ability power plus magic resistance I get. It also gives you a bit damage increase when you use your spells which isn't bad.
I won't argue that the Trinity Force is pretty good for Hybrid builds though.

Thornmail is something I like to take against attack damage guys, but one could argue to take [Frozen Heart of course and there's nothing wrong about that.

Abyssal Scepter is something I love to take when going for magic resist because it gives me that extra ability power as well as bringing nearby enemy magic resistance down by 20 points.

Rylai's Crystal Scepter is something that can be fun to take since it slows down your enemy champion with every spell you use (charge up your q spell - slow him down - use your charged q spell - slow him even more down - can't run away now!). But it also gives you that extra health and ability power which is nice.
Personally I've almost never used this item and went for something else like Warmog's Armor if I'm taking much beatings, or something like [item_text=Rabadon's Deathcap] if I'm tanking like a boss already or Morello's Evil Tome which gives even more cool down and mana regeneration (I've tried that book around mid game with fun resaults aswell).


Items that could be fun to try

- Morello's Evil Tome if you want to add to your ability power, get more mana regeneration and lower the cool downs for your spells.
- Void Staff if you want to add to your ability power and they've got magic resist.
- Spirit Visage for that extra life steal while using your e spell as well as some more cool down for you spells.
- Boots of Swiftness for the laugh of it. Imagine if you lock your ultimate onto your enemy and drag him back with that speed plus ghost and your w spell active! Add the item Force of Nature with that and drag him from their base to yours! ;)
- Chalice of Harmony is pretty good against that mana problem Skarner has. I've tried it before as well and it doesn't hurt that it gives you some magic resist aswel. Take that and spam your spells until the enemy is down.
- Warmog's Armor just for the beef of it!
- Malady for more attack speed and a bit of ability power.

+ Can disable ultimates with his ultimate and drag them away from the fight. Katarina and Warwick, watch out!
+ The spells cool downs go down faster as you auto attack the enemy faster. 1 second for an enemy champion, 1/2 second for a minion.
+ Gains a lot of cool down with his passive.
+ Some people underestimate him and his abilities.
+ Wins a 1vs1 against another Skarner that's playing the attack damage version
+ Is pretty damn good with the blue buff as it lowers the cool downs on the spells and keeps your mana running through all the spell spammings.
+ Ghost works with ultimate, more dragging distance!

- Not the best champion early game, unless you know how to use him and set him right up.
- Not as much cool down as the attack damage builds out there have.
- Is near always blue buff depending in early and mid game, unless you use your spells at minimum. Even late game can be a bit trouble, so get that blue buff!
- If you drag the enemy champion into your turret and he hasn't attacked you yet, the turret won't shoot him and keeps shooting his minions.
- Cannot use flash while using your ultimate (would be too over powered if you could do that).

12/07/11:

Played a game versus Anivia day or two ago. My team mates made me go for the middle instead of Caitlyn no matter what, so I just thought 'heck it', I'll do my best.
Couple of minutes into the game, around level 3 or so, I took that bird down to it's egg, and halfway through the egg she was starting to crack out and Udyr came to her rescue.
Later in that game after I finally took Anivia down they sent that jungling Udyr back to the middle for the moment. We started to fight in the center of the map until I took him out without using the ultimate aswell.
Besides that, they were winning and so they did.

12/07/11:
Changed the items list a bit, bringing ideas of the items to use and added a topic about why I'm picking these items plus extra items that can be useful and/or fun to use depending on how your game is going.
I fixed the mastery page as well just a little, and the skill order (which isn't holy, it all depends on how the game goes).

12/07/11:
So, I decided to publish the build as it is, but it's still a work in progress of course. So far it's just basic ideas that I've been playing with and testing (with good results, but you won't of course carry your team through the whole game all by yourself).