What do you plan to do when she rushes hexdrinker and when you try to q her she e w 's you and get her 2 autos for passive then finish the combo regularly?
ooops i meant to say what are you gonna do when the riven is bronze 1200
Swollwonder4 votesFarm late game and get to almost 4k health with that same execute ult?
Byakuya Kuchiki2 votesso youre gonna finally be able to fight me when i can both of your carries? oh nice
or when i have exchanged hexdrinker for qss if you have no strong ap and then your silence is useless and i can fight you even more easily
Swollwonder2 votesYou haven't seen a good late game Garen then. Randuins, Warmogs, Spirit Visage for all the tank I need not to mention IE and Youmous.
Erijian3 votesYou don't even need to kill her in order to always be able to duel her.
Time your moves correctly, like Silencing her in the middle of her Q combos, popping W when she tries to Ult you for increased damage, etc. It's an easy lane.
SEKAI3 votesGaren is actually meant to be a direct counter pick for fighters with emphasis on cast spamming of some description, such as Riven or Rengar.
He would silence them all day, nor can he get bursted down easily without team effort.
Problem with Garen is that, his stats are mostly reduced to such an extent nothing, besides his unwillingness to die, on him is all that impressive in any way, so his supposed hard countered opponents nowadays aren't simply sent onto the chopping block when they face him.
But still, a counter is a counter.
InSingedWeTrust3 votesWreck her anyway by zoning her and outtrading here when she tries to engage, which isn't hard as Garen.
RouterSmiter1 voteshexdrinker gives mr garen has no ap scalings?
IcyPepper4 voteshis ultimate... to block the execute typically.
Byakuya Kuchiki3 votesdamage doesnt go off scalings it goes of magic or physical damage, his ult is magic damage so hexdrinker completely negates his ult leaving him with a tank spell, a spell ive already countered by e'ing so that leaves you with your e to do damage to me
redniwediS1 votesIf Riven rushes a hexdrinker I'll just spam laugh as I push her out of lane with my E/Q combo. Garen doesn't have to get greedy and go for kills, he can just farm and zone to grow his advantage.
Rueciel1 votesI also thought this was funny. Because a lot of people tell me to play garen against riven, because riven is someone i have trouble with top lane. A lot of websites list garen as a counter to riven, but its all utter bullshit lol. She has the ability to trade with you and then instantly dash away before the majority of your E can even hurt her. Garen has no chance of catching a riven if she doesnt want to be caught. Riven scales extremely well with a brutalizer and a last whisper, making your armor useless.
As for people wondering "Why hexdrinker?" The reason is because the ONLY way a garen is going to kill a riven, is if she is stupid enough to get low enough to let you ult her and die. But if you rush a hexdrinker against garen, it cancels out ALL of his ult damage, making his ult 100% useless.
You would think, on paper, that garen counters her, because he has a silence. However, his silence doesnt last nearly long enough before her EXTREMELY SHORT COOLDOWN shield comes back up and cancels out your trade. Not to mention, after each trade, a riven will just take her ravenous hydra to a minion wave and heal 100% of the damage you did to her back, while your still waiting on your garen passive to start working.
A Garen can only outrade a riven in the very early levels, like level 1-4. As soon as she gets a few levels, you will no longer win any trades. And you cannot AVOID trading with a riven when she can literally dash past your minion wave, stun, hit you a few times, and then dash back out before you can retaliate.
redniwediS1 votesGaren used to be a very hard counter to Riven, however in the current state of things he is just a soft counter. If you don't know exactly what you're doing Riven will have her way with you. That said if you actually do know what you're doing you will reliably win lane.
The majority of your post really shows your lack of experience in this matchup. I would suggest reading into why Garen counters Riven.