EPT![[image loading]](http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120518022415/leagueoflegends/images/thumb/1/18/Darius_OriginalSkin.jpg/1039px-Darius_OriginalSkin.jpg)
+ Show Spoiler [Patch Notes] +
v1.0.0.141 - 2012-06-06
Hemorrhage (Passive) bonus Attack Damage ratio reduced to 0.3 from 0.4
Noxian Guillotine will now only refresh its cooldown when it deals the killing blow
Apprehend pre-pull animation modified to be more readable for enemy Champion
Fixed a bug with Hemorrhage applying Rylai's Crystal Scepter slow and Spell Vamp effects
Hemorrhage (Passive) bonus Attack Damage ratio reduced to 0.3 from 0.4
Noxian Guillotine will now only refresh its cooldown when it deals the killing blow
Apprehend pre-pull animation modified to be more readable for enemy Champion
Fixed a bug with Hemorrhage applying Rylai's Crystal Scepter slow and Spell Vamp effects
+ Show Spoiler [Stats] +
Health ............ 426 (+93)
Mana ............. 200 (+37.5)
Damage ......... 50 (+3.5)
Attack Speed . 0.679 (+2.6%)
Range ............ 125
Health Regen .. 8.25 (+0.95)
Mana Regen ... 6 (+0.35)
Armor ............ 20 (+3.5)
Magic Res ...... 30 (+1.25)
Mov. Speed .... 315
Abilities:
![[image loading]](http://leaguecraft.com/assets/images/icons/spells/spell_553.jpg){kind=icon}
Passive - Hemorrhage: Darius' basic attacks and damaging abilities cause enemies to bleed for 12/15/18/21/24/27/30/33/36 + 0.3 bonus AD magic damage over 5 seconds, stacking up to 5 times.
Darius gains 5% movement speed for each bleeding enemy champion.
This passive is the linchpin of your early laning strength. It does deceptively huge damage and maintaining passive stacks on your opponents is a big part of how you keep pressure up in lane.
![[image loading]](http://leaguecraft.com/assets/images/icons/spells/spell_554.jpg){kind=icon}
Q - Decimate: Deals 70/105/140/175/210 + 0.7 bonus AD physical damage to all nearby enemies in a circle. Champions in the outer half of the ability are struck by the blade, taking 50% additional damage.
CD: 9/8/7/6/5
Mana: 40
Range: 425 (last 155 is the blade that deals bonus damage to champions)
Short range PBAoE nuke with strong scaling. This ability is straightforward and very strong and the only thing that's at all tricky about it's use is getting comfortable with the range. It's sorter than you'd think at first, but eventually you'll get a feel for it and start butchering champions with the blade section of the nuke.
![[image loading]](http://leaguecraft.com/assets/images/icons/spells/spell_555.jpg){kind=icon}
W - Crippling Strike: Darius's next basic attack deals 120/140/160/180/200% damage and slows the target's movement and attack speed by 20/25/30/35/40% for 2 seconds. Crippling strike's base cooldown is reduced by 1 second for each stack of Hemorrhage on the target.
CD: 8
Mana: 30/35/40/45/50
Range: 145
Riot decided that it was too easy to trade with Darius's passive alone in prolonged exchanges, so they said, "you know what he needs? A MS/AS debuff on-hit modifier that has a downward scaling CD based off passive stacks. That's bound to be fair!" This ability is pretty good in a void. 40% AS/MS debuff is plenty strong on it's own, but then you tack on the fact that this is effectively @ 1-3 second CD based on your CDR vs. a target with 5 passive stacks and your opponent is up shit's creek due to the insane 100% uptime on the debuff. I have tested the abuse case of 40% CDR vs. a 5 stack target, and their is a floor on how low the CD can be lowered, so the minimum CD on this ability is 1 second. At least they managed to knock out that abuse case, *whew*!
![[image loading]](http://leaguecraft.com/assets/images/icons/spells/spell_556.jpg){kind=icon}
E - Apprehend: Passive: Darius gains 5/10/15/20/25% armor penetration.
Active: Darius pulls in all enemies in front of him.
CD: 24/21/18/15/12
Mana: 45
Range: 550
For such a brutal madman, Darius is extremely delicate when pulling his prey to himself. This ability deals no damage, just like Talon's cutthroat and as such is an easy 1-point wonder in most games. Free % armor pen ends up being pretty beast and for that reason I usually don't build any flat penetration on Darius. Between just this passive and the Weapon Expertise mastery, you hit 32.5% armor penetration.
The active pull takes some getting used to, but it's very powerful as it's just an AoE instead of a skill shot. Anyone who puts themselves in 550 range of Darius should be easy to pull and start wailing on.
![[image loading]](http://leaguecraft.com/assets/images/icons/spells/spell_557.jpg){kind=icon}
R - Noxian Guillotine: Darius leaps to target enemy champion and DUNKS THE EVER-LOVING SHIT OUT OF THEM, dealing 160/250/340 + 0.75 bonus AD true damage. For each stack of Hemorrhage on the target, Noxian Guillotine deals an additional 20% damage, 320/500/680 + 1.5 bonus AD Maximum Damage . The cooldown is refreshed if Noxian Guillotine kills the target.
CD: 100/90/80 (I dunno why these are listed, it's really 0)
Mana: 100
Range: 475
Nothing makes me feel more skilled than doing 600 true damage out of nowhere to kill some unsuspecting idiot who just wanted to play LoL and not use a ban on Darius. This ability is simply unfair and allows Darius to murder pretty much whoever he pleases 1v1. Make sure that you use this ability as people are about to die or after you hit 5 passive stacks for maximum efficiency.
GUIDES
Top Lane Darius
Summoner Skills: Flash/Ghost + Ignite I like Flash, but Ghost is better for multikilling, since you can ghost -> ult -> continue chasing with ult CD refresh, whereas Flash is down once you use it. Ignite + your passive will randomly kill people who have disengaged 2000 range away with like 500 HP left.
Masteries:
9/21/0
Executioner doesn't affect true damage and flat pen is devalued from his E, so the higher tiered offensive masteries are less attractive than you'd think on Darius. For that reason, I like investing heavily in the defensive tree for the Creep Damage reductions so that you can pick fights even against massive creep waves. The few times I haven't specced defensively, I've gotten really sad when I've vs. 20 creeps + my lane opponent and I can't just pick a fight, so I like defensive. You could probably mess with the balance and do a 13/16/1 setup or something to get the AD/level mastery and the Flash mastery, but it's all kinda a matter of preference.
Runes:
Quints: 3 Flat Armor
Marks: 9 Flat Attack Damage
Seals: 9 Flat Armor
Glyphs: 9 Scaling MRes
OR
Quints: 3 Flat MRes
Marks: 9 Flat Attack Damage
Seals: 9 Flat Armor
Glyphs: 9 Flat MRes
You could spec more offensively, but there's really no need to. Just AD marks butchers people, so I just spec really safe since I know I don't need a let up on offense.
Skill Order: WQQE -> R > Q > W > E (vs. Melee) or EWQQ -> R > Q > W = E (vs. Ranged)
R and Q are your primary nukes and as such always get the focus in leveling. As for W and E, I'll explain further in playstyle, but essentially you need E to be threatening to ranged characters and as such sometimes need to prioritize it over W in lane to get the CD down to more reasonable levels rather than upping your W damage.
Item Build:
Starting Items
![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/boots-of-speed.gif)
+ ![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/health-potion.gif)
x3or
![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/cloth-armor.gif)
+ x5Boots vs. easy lanes or ranged champs, cloth vs. harder melee lanes.
Situational Early Items
![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/dorans-blade.gif)
Dblades are good items. I get them if I don't think I want or need wriggle's.
![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/wriggles-lantern.gif)
If I opened cloth I get a wriggle's. Item's pretty beast, it solves a lot of your sustain issues and keeps the wards up without having to back and let your opponent feel comfy enough to kill creeps.
![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/hexdrinker.gif)
Good vs. double AP setups or just generally when you want AD and MRes.
Core
+ ![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/heart-of-gold.gif)
+ ![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/phage.gif)
I don't rush this core before getting dblades or wriggle's, but one way or another, I always get Phage + HoG on top of my boots.
Boots Options
![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/mercurys-treads.gif)
or
![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/ninja-tabi.gif)
Can't see a reason to get any other boots. Just get the defensive ones that feel most appropriate.
Staple Later Items
![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/the-bloodthirster.gif)
Your AD scaling is nuts and you have sustain issues. If you can afford to spend 3K gold on an offensive item, this is the best one to go for and it's frequently a good idea to rush your BT after HoG + Phage in easier lanes. Conversely, if you got camped in lane and are a fairly low priority to the opposing team when the game shifts towards teamfighting, getting a BT before truly getting tanky can force the opposing team to go after you or suffer the consequences of you cleaning up teamfights. It's the evenish games where I typically don't force an early BT, as you're already fairly high priority in these games without an excess of gold to spend on non-defensive items.
![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/randuins-omen.gif)
+ ![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/aegis-of-the-legion.gif)
+ ![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/banshees-veil.gif)
+ ![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/guardian-angel.gif)
+ ![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/quicksilver-sash.gif)
+ ![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/force-of-nature.gif)
These are your defensive items. Choose wisely. You have no innate defense, so you typically need some HP, making Omen, Bashee's and Aegis the most logical choices IMO, but GA and QSS can be situationally game-breaking and FoN makes a lot of sense after Mallet rush vs. AP heavy teams. All that being said, I have mostly been finding myself settling into Omen + GA as my defensive core.
![[image loading]](http://edge1.mobafire.com/images/item/trinity-force.gif)
or ![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/frozen-mallet.gif)
What to do with your phage later depends highly on the game. If you're laning vs. a slippery champ like Teemo/Kennen/Singed/Nidalee/etc, I would recommend rushing a fairly quick Mallet, but otherwise, I lay off on upgrading my phage for a long time and then I just make the decision between damage and tankiness.
![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/maw-of-malmortius.gif)
If you bought a Hexdrinker, do it. Item gives great AD and a lot of effective defense vs. Magic Damage.
![[image loading]](http://edge2.mobafire.com/images/item/last-whisper.gif)
For those situations where 32.5% ArPen isn't enough, why not boost that up to 59.5% ArPen? I've never bought this but if you're vs a bunch of dicks with like 300 Armor (Malphite + Ryze + WW + Urgot + Taric or something), it would make sense.
My Standard Final Item Build
+ + + + + Playstyle
Darius is an enormous bully in lane. His low level damage output is obscene, mostly due to his passive and as such, you should be looking to trade autos with anyone who's willing to do so with you. Try to prolong these low level engagements to keep your passive at max stacks on them, and then start unloading 3 second CD Ws on them, with an addition Q once they try to disengage. This is hard to pull off vs. ranged champs and as such, Darius's toughest matchups come in the form of good ranged solos like Teemo, Kennen and Kayle. In these lanes, you need to take your E first and bait them into 550 range, E them and then let your passive do the heavy lifting to out trade at levels 1-3. Levels 4-7 are probably Darius's strongest, as these levels are when you have an enormous Q nuke + both your utility abilities to stick to opponents and draw out these low level fights. Once you hit 6, take any opportunity to ult your lane opponent when they have 5 stacks on them unless you're getting ganked and will need to multi-dunk or if a full stack dunk won't be enough to even force them off the lane (if so, you're already in trouble). People like to pigeonhole Darius ult into an execute, but the fact of the matter is that prior to teamfights, it's OK if the ability goes on CD, so long as you're getting the max damage out of it. Once you get your phage, you're typically able to insta-kill anyone 1v1 once you get a proc, as 1 phage proc, typically gives you enough time to get 5 passive stacks on the opponent, which leads to minimumu CD Ws, which leads to more phage procs, which leads to dunks.
Once teamfights start breaking out, start making sure that you use your ult to get a kill on the first use or two. Not getting an ult refresh in teamfights is a big damage loss, and while it's greedy to try to ult their whole team, it's foolish to not at least try to get 1 refresh/fight. Even if you're just dunking their support, an ult that refreshes it's CD is essentially free damage. Whether or not you can afford to dive their team or should be babysitting your carry or waiting out the initial engage before playing cleanup is largely a matter of team compositions and the level to which you are fed. Don't underestimate Darius's usefulness as a babysitter though. Getting free hits on bruisers who try to dive your carry can lead to ezpz max stack dunks, which can be particularly useful vs. bruisers with massive resists, not to mention that Darius has a free mini-last whisper from his E's passive.
As the game goes on, your low range will become a bigger and bigger problem in fights and you'll eventually have a hard time finding the openings you need to dunk people. Don't let this discourage you though. Get a GA, stay off to the side and enter fights at odd angles to isolate high priority targets or play babysit the carry as outlined above. His late game is his biggest flaw, but Darius is still quite capable of getting some 4th quarter dunks.
![[image loading]](http://img404.imageshack.us/img404/9334/dariusmiles.png)
+ Show Spoiler [VODs] +
http://www.twitch.tv/smashgizmo/b/319253425 2nd Game
http://www.twitch.tv/smashgizmo/b/319264932 6th, 7th, 9th and 10th Games
http://www.twitch.tv/smashgizmo/videos.html I have been playing tons of Darius on stream recently, just dig around, there are sooo many games there.
http://www.twitch.tv/smashgizmo/b/319264932 6th, 7th, 9th and 10th Games
http://www.twitch.tv/smashgizmo/videos.html I have been playing tons of Darius on stream recently, just dig around, there are sooo many games there.
+ Show Spoiler [changelog] +
5/25/2012 - Created.
6/14/2012 - Guide updated
6/14/2012 - Guide updated
