[Champion] Skarner - Page 4

On October 28 2011 08:34 STS17 wrote:
Thoughts on running AP or CDR blues for jungle skarner? gtr suggested AS blues for speed but I feel like you'd get more out of either of these. I'd test this myself but I don't have AS blues so I have no way to compare them

On October 31 2011 13:18 WaveofShadow wrote:
Fuck this guy.
I don't know what it is I'm doing wrong, but every single game out of 6 I have played on him (jungling) I think I've gotten like 0 or 1 kill. 5+ deaths.
Can't gank worth a dick (especially when your teammates don't help; you can't even fucking reach your target without help). If you build Triforce first after wriggle's he is squishy as fuck and dies instantly.

I haven't regretted buying a champion this much in a long time. I dunno SV/TOO make it work somehow but even after watching them I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

On October 31 2011 13:18 WaveofShadow wrote:
Fuck this guy.
I don't know what it is I'm doing wrong, but every single game out of 6 I have played on him (jungling) I think I've gotten like 0 or 1 kill. 5+ deaths.
Can't gank worth a dick (especially when your teammates don't help; you can't even fucking reach your target without help). If you build Triforce first after wriggle's he is squishy as fuck and dies instantly.

I haven't regretted buying a champion this much in a long time. I dunno SV/TOO make it work somehow but even after watching them I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

On October 31 2011 17:34 gtrsrs wrote:


stop ganking at level 4
skarner won't lose a 1v1 if he has either buff, and especially not if he has both buffs
so when you clear your jungle at 3:30, run immediately to opponent's wolves. take them. if he comes, kill him. if he doesn't, go take your wolves then his wraiths. if he comes, kill him. rinse and repeat. save your flash (or if you use it, use it pre-level 2) for level 6. W from brush, flash ult pull = free kill, 100% of the time. snowball from there

build is razer -> boots -> wriggle's -> rageblade -> mercs -> negatron -> chainmail -> appropriate tank items -> triforce is not a part of this build from the jungle

skarner is a master creepcamp clearer so it's extremely important after every gank or gank attempt to clear your whole jungle again so you can max your income. this is especially true for skarner because of 2 reasons: (1) your gank without your ult isn't ballin' as a baller, and (2) you can lower your ult CD by attacking creeps

in teamfights if you catch someone out of position you have to W flash ult pull them into your team. if they initiate on you it's just best to lock down their AP or AD carry. teamfights come with practice they're definitely not intuitive like they are with amumu/udyr. once your ult is down, however, you just turn into sona. QEWQQQQQEQQQQEWQQQQQEQQQQEW use every spell on cooldown

On October 31 2011 17:34 gtrsrs wrote:
stop ganking at level 4
skarner won't lose a 1v1 if he has either buff, and especially not if he has both buffs
so when you clear your jungle at 3:30, run immediately to opponent's wolves. take them. if he comes, kill him. if he doesn't, go take your wolves then his wraiths. if he comes, kill him. rinse and repeat. save your flash (or if you use it, use it pre-level 2) for level 6. W from brush, flash ult pull = free kill, 100% of the time. snowball from there

On November 01 2011 00:41 freezaa wrote:
Personally i run MS quints on him, AS reds, armor yellow, mr blue. Go for movespeed and flash in utility, rest in def, one point in smite. Movespeed really helps with ganks, counterjungling, escaping, initiating.
Just do a full clear then gank when there is a chance to gank. If not just b and start clearing/counterjungling, you are a control not a ganking jungler. I go for Wriggels and Boots, everything after boots is purely situational, i really like shurelias on him because it helps a lot with initiations. Sheen is core, you dont need triforce too early. Viable items are fh, we, shurelias, triforce, fon, atmogs, gunblade, ga, aegis.

On October 31 2011 22:14 WaveofShadow wrote:


Haha appreciate the advice....let's see.
Stop ganking at level 4....lol. Makes sense since his early gank is shit, but so counterintuitive to all the jungling I've been practicing/learning thus far. Especially since I don't trust my lanes to ever win on their own. Ever.

Rageblade was the first thing I ever tried on him. Was even squishier than with Triforce, and lose MS/phage slow making ganking even harder. (Damage was decent, though loss of Sheen proc was pretty noticeable.) Also found that even with Q mana cost being so low, without blue buff he just eats through mana like nobody's business, leaving me with nothing a lot of the time.

I did notice he clears camps insanely fast which is really great, ut every time I would go invade I could never make anything happen because:
a) no help from team often making it 2v1 after I brought enemy jungler down to low health when their team came to help.
b) getting one Q off doesn't proc slow so they get away.
c) Skarner's damage is balls compared to like everyone early. AoE is great, but single target damage...ugh.

As for teamfights, I seem to do ok there, but nothing is more frustrating than trying to ult someone and them running into fog or out of sight or out of range and it just fucking fizzling. Happens all the time. Short range bullshit.

Ugh. I guess I'll keep trying because I don't want to give him up and people seem to think he's pretty good so it must be me. Inc 4 more 0-3-xx games.

On October 31 2011 23:38 TheYango wrote:

What are your thoughts on a rush-6 path then? Seeing as post-buff Skarner isn't blue dependent, it doesn't make sense to do a blue->minis clear when you're not looking to gank at 4.

invading is all about understanding which opposing jungler you're playing against
it sounds to me like the problems you're finding are just coming from lack of jungle experience, not from skarner. if your opponent is say, riven or pirate, who don't start blue as often as other junglers and clear a bit slower, you can go for their blue after your clear. if you're on the bottom half of the map, you just finished wraiths, you saw from initial CVs that enemy started wolves, and you feel an impending gank coming top lane, just bumrush their blue and take it. if they fail the gank AND you steal their blue, congratulations you just won the jungle. that's a crippling blow. if while you're finishing their blue, they fail the gank and start heading towards the blue, you pop a pot and wait in the brush with the last half of your red and a fresh blue courtesy of them, and they facecheck that brush? congrats you just won the game. if they blow flash to get away, don't chase - you're in enemy territory. you did your job now get out

i do agree with you that ganking with skarner pre-6 is hard, but i also agree with manbearpig that you're doing it wrong. you rush in with W for the speed, pop Q on them the second you're in range, slow immediately with red, and then they will not escape without flash. if they pop flash, you aren't catching them, so don't tower dive or chase just disengage and go steal some more jungle.

keep trying rageblade. yes it's a very offensive oriented item that will make you feel squishy, but no it's not comparable to triforce. first of all it's like half the cost so you can get rageblade + negatron + chainmail by the time you'd have triforce and that's your core so that's good. second of all once you have rageblade you are a dueling GOD because that AS and AP make your shield and heal come up constantly making you deceptively invincible.

i agree with the ult bullshit. one of the most frustrating things is ulting when someone is below you on the screen. the range for a pointing-down-ult is so bullshit tiny that it's retarded. twice in my game against jatt+co, i went for ganks on voyboy, flashed literally on top of him and ulted, and it fizzled because due to the weird camera angle i only thought i was on top of him when really i was apparently 1091023948 range away. i was raging

as for running out of mana, i don't find it to be true. Q is flat 15 mana always. rageblade gives you what, a 5s window to keep the charges up without resetting? 15 mp5 to keep it charged. skarner's regen is 6.45 + 0.45/level, you get rageblade by like level 9 or 10 or 11 usually, so you have anywhere from 10.5 to 11.4 mp5. so you're losing like 3-4mp5? that's 0.7 mana per second when you have a base pool of 600+. that's about 15 minutes of Q-spam before you go oom. don't spam your W and E out of combat, problem solved.

On October 31 2011 23:38 TheYango wrote:
Show nested quote +

What are your thoughts on a rush-6 path then? Seeing as post-buff Skarner isn't blue dependent, it doesn't make sense to do a blue->minis clear when you're not looking to gank at 4.


i rush 6 by taking enemy camps. in order to feel safe in the enemy jungle i want both buffs. i did try a mini-camp -> full clear once and i just felt like it was more vulnerable to counterjungling and i had virtually no impact on the game. plus delaying your first blue means delaying your second blue which hurts your AP carry IMO

also in case anyone is interested, you CAN start wolves before blue spawns, clear them and get to blue by 1:55 for an even faster jungle, but it does get you way lower and you clear SO fast that enemy camps won't even be respawned by the time you clear the jungle so you end up sitting in their jungle waiting for their camps at much lower HP and it's just not worth it IMO

On November 01 2011 01:54 WaveofShadow wrote:
I'm almost insulted here by the insinuation that I don't know how to gank. This isn't exactly my first rodeo, and also why I didn't respond to manbearpig. I am well aware of what should work, and what skills to use in what order, however wards are a huge preventative to getting within that 100 range that Skarner needs to successfully gank (or get the enemy to blow flash). Other champs often have something at range that helps them close distance/do damage; Skarner has absolutely nothing, so if the enemy isn't batshit retarded, you will never get near them pre-6. Even IF you somehow get to them pre-6 and they have flash down, the only way you're going to kill them is if they're having sex with your fucking turret. It takes forever for Skarner to kill anyone at low levels, and the chase distance to their turret is going to have to be huge in order for him to rack up enough to take down anybody. Post 6 is another story, but the only way you're getting in range for R-->QQQ is if you blow flash, and even then you gotta be on TOP of them. If they blow flash too (which often happens) it's a huge fucking waste and then you can't get close enough to anybody to ult until flash is up again or until a teamfight.

Definitely calling you out on this. If you're still clearing jungle after you pick up rageblade, hell whenever you're clearing jungle, you're spamming Q at a much faster rate than once every 5 seconds. Your autoattacks alone cause Q to come off cooldown faster, and then with rageblade, even faster. Q every 2-3 seconds is more the reality. Assuming you can spam Q twice every 5 seconds (which you can, especially with rageblade) then you're losing 30mp/5 while gaining only 10-11. 600 - 20per5 = 2 and a half minutes of Q spam to be out of mana. And that's if you NEVER use E for sustain or W for speed boost/attack speed. How can you jungle successfully pre-rageblade if not using W or E at all? And f you're telling me to slow down to conserve mana, then Skarner's farm slows down, and he becomes shittier.

On November 01 2011 01:06 WaveofShadow wrote:

Tried this exact runeset once and I ended up very low in the jungle after a clear (had to hold off a bit and heal as well)---> much slower jungle.
Better for ganking and CDR, but overall inferior to adding a little armor pen I think. Can't seem to find the right mix of AS/ArP/MS to be useful.

[...]