Please use my guide and tips before you vote and comment. I repeat, PLEASE USE MY GUIDE AND TIPS BEFORE YOU VOTE AND COMMENT. Just because you may not like one of my ideas, or because it is different than yours, doesn't not make it a bad one. Please use the guide and base your decision of what I said, not from what you usually do. My guide is different than any others so far because I add a section that I guarantee no one else has, and that is Psychological Effects section. The section describes some of what a player experiences with playing against Volibear. Check it out to see what its all about!

I can't even begin to tell you how much JhoiJhoi has helped me with this guide. I give ALL credit to her for the format she helped me make. If your interested in making a guide, her Guide to Making Guides by JhoiJhoi IS A MUST! She gives SO much coding and format information it blows my mind. I really can't thank her enough for making this guide possible. I LOVE YOU JHOIJHOI!!

My name is Rusticus and I've been playing LoL for almost a year now. I've played a lot of champions but Tanky DPS champs like Irelia and Volibear are what I excel at. I have put a lot of time and effort into this guide and hope that you actually use it before you start to vote. Some of the decision may seem out of the ordinary, but that's why I decided to make this guide. This guide is geared towards punishing the team with good damage while being able to be focused for a couple seconds. This build was made with 3's directly in mind, but is also very viable with 5's.

Here is a list of pros and cons that I have compiled for Volibear.

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Pros +Major late game power +Great control over enemy champs, with slow and toss up. +Scales very well with bonus health and attack speed. +Can carry very, VERY, well. +Amazing chaser and finisher.

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Cons -Weak farm early game. -Requires 3 auto attacks for Frenzy . -Needs teammate for very early. -Countered by magic burst down. -VERY dependent on items.

I choose runes that will best help during early game sustain, keeping you alive, while dealing good burst with frenzy.

• 9 x Mark of Desolation or Mark of Attack Speed:
  I choose attack speed or armor penetration marks, these both help massively with Volibear because Frenzy is physical damage, causing the armor pen marks to deal more damage through their armor.
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• 9 x Seal of Armor:
  This is really I use for seals. I find that the extra armor gained here helps much more than the tiny bit of extra attack speed gained from Seal of Attack Speed.
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• 9 x Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist or Glyph of Scaling Cooldown Reduction:
  Playing Volibear, these two runes stand out to me the most. The CD and MR late game are helpful to the extreme, helping with spamming more abilities out and resisting magic burst damage.
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• 9 x Quintessence of Attack Speed or Quintessence of Health:
  Again a no brainer with the helpful attack speed bonus, but the health quints are something that I have found helpful as of just recently. That extra 78 health at the beginning helps you get out of the dangerous 4 bars of health zone. With the help of Durability and Veteran's Scars you will get a bunch of bonus health that helps with the beginning gank. Not only will it look intimidating to opponents, detracting from the appeal of focusing someone with low health, but that extra 100+ health really does help you stay alive.

Playing with Volibear, I have found that the 9/21/0 masteries work very well with my Volibear build. The help from Durability , Veteran's Scars and Juggernaut , benefit you the most evenly through out the game, giving you early bonus health, as well as an extra calculated 262 bonus health at the end. That's not bad considering you didn't have to do anything for it.

Flash: Great initiation and retreats with this spell. I pick this over Ghost because Thundering Smash is like a built in ghost. You can really surprise your enemies if you flash in to knock up.

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Exhaust: Simply amazing! Able to slow down champs to catch up, or to help get away in a tight spot. That's not even to mention the HUGE drop in attack damage and spell power. I consider this a must have for Volibear.

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Ignite: Not as recommended as Exhaust, but still has great use with the grievous wound that it inflicts, as well as the damage. A secondary choice, and really not a bad one at all, but I have just found exhaust to be more beneficial. It all comes down to personal preference.

I choose to max out Frenzy first, Sky Splitter second, and last with Thundering Smash, with of course picking up Stormbringer when you can. The reason I choose Sky Splitter over Thundering Smash in 3's you do not have as big of a map to chase on and really are only ever going to use Thundering Smash once while fighting early game. The increased slow is helpful from Sky Splitter in chasing down opponents, much more helpful than a few seconds less of a cooldown from Thundering Smash.
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I choose Thundering Smash first, because with the beginning gank, it is a serious must have. Many people like to argue that Frenzy is better, but here is where I shut them up. Frenzy is dependent on if the enemy team is focusing anyone BUT you, and your team being able to take it. If these two conditions are not met fully, you are of no use to your team with frenzy, and might as well camp at the tower. With Thundering Smash however, you are able to much more fully contribute to your team as well as well as getting into your opponents head, but I'll explain that aspect in the Psychological Effects section.

• : I choose this for the early game sustain, along with a health potion and your passive to help you stay in lane long enough to grab the Philosopher's Stone.
• philosopher's stone: I get this item for the early sustain in lane and for the gold per 5 seconds.
  
• : Right after Philosopher's Stone to help with speed in general.
  
• : Start gathering the bonus health, and the again stacked with Philosopher's Stone's gold bonus will really help you start raking in the gold.
  
• : More health is awesome, as well as the cooldown reduction.
  
• : Finish off to your Merc Treads once you finish Kindlegem, this gives bonus magic resist, as well as tenacity, which is incredibly helpful late game.
  
• Spirit's Visage: Use this for the bonus magic resist, health, and the unique passive helps a lot with your skills passive, The Relentless Storm.
  
• :Slow and bonus health helps increase both Frenzy and Sky Splitter's effectiveness.
  
• : I get this for the massive bonus to health that greatly increases Frenzy 's damage.
  
• Atmog's Impaler: This item in combination with all the bonus health in this guide is so overpowered! You get a TON of bonus Attack Damage just because of all of the extra health.
  
• or Situational. I will either go Rylai's if my team is for sure going to win and my team needs the extra slow, or Banshee's Veil if there is a lot of magic damage on the other team. Banshee's Veil should be implemented sooner into the build if you find that the enemy is dishing out too much damage, I suggest right after Mercury's Treads.
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  The reason I like this item build so much is because even if you are doing poorly, all of the items are still very viable, with the exception of the situational Rylai's and Banshee's.
  

This is one of the main reasons I made this guide. In my eyes, Volibear's greatest ability is to appear a lot more intimidating than he actually is. Utilizing this chapter will reap great rewards with your Volibear gameplay.

To begin I would like to discuss Thundering Smash and how amazing this ability really is. Consider for a moment you are playing against a Volibear and you see him activate this ability and starts running to you. Your very first reaction is to back away and not let him land it. This makes Volibear and incredibly powerful zoner, someone who is able to control how close to the minion waves he wants them to be. This is all happening without even having to land the ability. The real magic begins when you land your Thundering Smash. Whenever your champion is moved by another enemy champion, like with Blitzcrank's Rocket Grab, your first reaction is to want to get back to what you deemed your safe zone, the place you were comfortable at first. This is even happening if you aren't even in real danger, your first reaction is to run away, back to where you felt comfortable. This is the exact same case with Volibear. He has AMAZING harass with Thundering Smash because the second you land it, your opponents goal is to get back to where the were before, allowing you to land a few auto attacks and even maybe a Frenzy . For these very reason are why I believe that Thundering Smash is one of the best, if not the best, skill that Volibear has at his disposal.

Volibear has the greatest effect on AD melee carries. One of Volibear's greatest weakness is burst damage. Seeing has he does not have the armor or magic resist of a tank, he can get bursted down faster than you want. This is why I implement more magic resist into this guide. Reducing that magic damage is key to survival with Volibear. Sustained damage, however, has less of an effect on him because of the massive amounts of health that he has. With AD carries, it seems like too much of a task to try and take your health down, and will much rather focus other teammates in the fight.

All of this summed up and simply put is as follows. If you can convince your opponent in their head that they are going to lose the fight, even if they do have better abilities and damage, then YOU have won the fight. Teach them to fear your Thundering Smash and they will quickly fall behind in farm and in levels.

Volibear has a lot of cool tricks up his sleeve that you can use to quickly take down your opponent.

• The first and what I believe to be the most important is to try and have full Frenzy stacks when you initiate a fight in lane. Being able to use it when ever you want, instead of having to wait to auto attack and get full stacks, will optimize your DPS (Damage Per Second), tearing down opponents faster.
• Using flash to drop in on your opponent, followed up with Thundering Smash, Sky Splitter, and Frenzy is a great way to burst down a low opponent in game.
• Using the threat of Thundering Smash to force your opponent away from farming minions will give you the leg up later in game.
• If an opponent is very low and running away, but you can't chase them down, your ultimate, Stormbringer, is a great way to hit your opponent from far away with the chain lightning effect.
  
• If you feel like there are tips missing from here, do not hesitate to tell me so that I can add them in.

Here ends my guide on Volibear, I'm glad if you read through it all because I feel that I dropped some great tips that will really improve your Volibear gameplay. Follow my guide and you are almost guaranteed to have great success. Just remember to stick with him, you most likely will not do amazing the first game, but just keep practicing and someday you might become as good as me. ;)

• Will throw up screenshots of anyone who has had success with this guide. Just send my a picture of your record and I'll post it.
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Well that is all folks. I hope you had as much fun as I did with this guide. Another huge shout out to JhoiJhoi, making this guide possible. Good luck and happy playing!