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What am I missing about Riven?

FroggySpit·8/29/2017, 8:35:45 PM·1 votes·847 views

I just started playing Riven and I'm getting the hang of her combos but I can't seem to do well with her. People are saying she's broken, which I can believe, but I'm not really seeing how. I usually end up having to lane against tanks like Garen or Ornn who have CC, deal decent damage and are incredibly tanky. Trades are rarely in my favor in these kinds of matchups, which is 80% of games since a lot of people are playing Ornn, Garen, or a ranged champ top (wtf?). I end up roaming for kills but then get blown up by ADCs who heal back to 100% hp off 2 minions. My only option at that point feels like killing the support or mid, but the support is usually a tank like thresh, or janna... leaving me with just mid.

Does anyone have advice on how to deal more damage to tanks in the current meta? I usually rush cleaver and then lord dominiks against a tank, but it doesn't feel like it helps much. Also, what should my objectives be when I'm playing as Riven? People say she's a bruiser but I'm getting blown up left and right. When I play as a solid assassin I feel like I can't really assassinate anyone because they are either really tanky or heal too much from lifesteal.

Sorry if this sounds whiney, I needed to vent productively. I'm at my wits end with trying to play assassins.

5 Comments

KVbqbFsC8e8/29/2017, 8:37:09 PM1 votes

You have to learn how to animation cancel in order to play Riven effectively.

48983507DEL18/29/2017, 9:32:52 PM1 votes

I'm not a Riven expert, but the amount of hours I've spent watching Dekar173 and BoxBox is enough to give you these basic tips. I recommend watching these two if you want to learn about her in depth.

Riven, despite what anyone may tell you, is an extremely mechanical champion with both a high skill-ceiling and a high skill-floor, the latter being the most important part. It's going to take a lot of practice to be able to play Riven at the same tier that most people can play champions like Renekton or J4, which is why a lot of people never touch her (like me).

The first thing you need to learn as Riven, however, is managing your cooldowns. You're a relatively fragile champion who relies on mobility and a 1 second shield to keep you alive. This means that you're extremely vulnerable when your spells are on cooldown, and thus need to get associated with the amount of time it takes for every spell to become available again. Once you've got this down, you'll be able to exploit her strengths like winning Top Lane trades by using your long combos, backing off or absorbing damage with your shield, and re-engaging when you're about to have your spells available again.

The biggest thing that separates a good Riven from a great Riven is animation canceling. Before you can even think about playing Riven at a high level, you need to spend a significant amount of time in the practice tool working on things like "The Fast Combo" and combining your damage abilities with your Shield. Look up all videos about how to properly accomplish these, and spam Adrian with "how do I shy combo" donation messages, then perfect them in the practice tool and norms until you're ready to take them into ranked.

Finally, you need to understand your role as Riven. You're a good combination of a Skirmisher, Diver, and Assassin all packed into one, with a unique mix of each class's strengths and weaknesses. You win most 1v1 fights, and are also great at 1v2s and possibly 1v3s, but only if you're snowballing. You have high mobility, meaning you can chase and escape with relative ease, but you also are completely useless if you're locked down. You have a healthy amount of CC and AoE burst damage, making it easy to set up team fights, but you're usually too squishy to survive if you're the only engager on you're team.

So where does that leave you? Well, you have different jobs depending on the state of the game, with variables including team compositions, early/mid/late game, ahead vs behind, and who's individually fed on each team. If you're the only fed person on your team, you could split-push if your team is able to hold off the enemy, or team-fight if you're confident in bursting down the squishy backline. If you're behind, you should build more defensive items and work on holding the frontline or suicide diving the backline for your fed teammates to follow up with more damage. It's up for you to make the right decisions based on how the game is going. Look up guides on how to play as a diver, assassin, and skirmisher.

This the best I can give you from my limited experience with the champion. Sorry it's so much text :P. I hope it was helpful.

KawaiiShroom8/29/2017, 9:56:29 PM1 votes

Riven is pretty complex both in mechanics and game knowledge. I don't think she is inherently over powered, it's just some times she is strong when certain items are strong (when lethality was good, when death dance was good, etc.) .

She is usually fest or famine because she gets her advantage from killing the enemy lanner. She is not like most bruisers that can heal or sustain trades (Darius q, Renekton q, fiora life steal, nasus passive). She doesnt have ranged waved clear skills that lets her play passive unlike some champions (sion e, cho'gath qwe, Galio q).

You get better mechanics from practice and learning the different combos. In terms of game knowledge, she is very dependent on windows of power. This includes both power spike from items and levels, as well as when enemy spells are on cool down. You have to know your match up with most meta top lanes in terms of skill cool down, amount of damage you can do, amount of damage the enemy/ minions can do.

For example, against jax you want to run away/ into bush when jax activates his counter strike, and then go on him when is counter strike is down. Save your 3rd q or e-w until he uses his q.

It's much easier against tanks since tanks are much weaker in lane than you. In addition your w can mitigate minion aggro. Use your e to dodge or mitigate damage from the tank's cc. Once the tank have his cc on cool down you can go on him with your full combo before disappearing in to a bush. You can kill the tank if he doesn't respect your damage. Then you need to stand within the minion wave to deny the tank from farming. This will make sure you stay ahead of him in lane. If the tank refuses to fight you, then you can roam and kill any of the other laners (as a top lane you have more experience than bot lane, and mid lane is usually very squishy).

woodvsmurph8/29/2017, 10:31:52 PM1 votes

You don't win the trades early vs such champs because they are tankier and have comparable base damage. Farm up, get items, then fight. Too many rivens these days try to just go heavy lifesteal or pure armor pen (lethality or death dance builds). Get a vamp scepter if they are being agro with you, then probably go cleaver first item for armor shred and hp to survive their base damage and keep trading. I'd do death's dance 2nd item. Then more lifesteal or armor pen as needed - maybe 1 tank item for teamfights if you are dying early in the fights. I know it's not the full damage build most people would say to go, but having a bit more survivability lets you make use of your lifesteal and damage more.

item 3071 item 3812 item 3036 or item 3033 item 3074 or item 3072 last item (not necessarily last item built) depends on opponents: armor pen if vs squishies and they lack a lot of cc armor or mr tank item if they have lots of cc and some good burst item 3156 if they have ap burst that you can't immediately delete but not enough cc to chain you in place and delete you - this way you still have resistances, but also extra damage and lifesteal.

Automated Riven8/29/2017, 10:39:15 PM1 votes

Add me in game. I would happily go over some combos and lanes with you. Any questions specifically feel free to toss my way and I will help out.