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I have hard time playing as Jax (and lesser extent Gnar)

Dpaladinx·11/1/2014, 5:46:50 AM·1 votes·1,133 views

I've been playing top lane a lot in Team Builder (really don't like ranked nowadays because most of the time I don't have the chance to play top lane, or force me to play outside of my comfort zone playstyle) and normally I play ranged top laners such as Gnar Lulu Kennen Teemo and evenAhri and Tristana (because ranged champions have better late game scaling than melee champions). The only melee top laner I play as is Jax because his kit excels at dueling and he's a good splitpusher.

However, the big problem I have here is that I absolutely suck at playing as Jax because his kit is too hard to use, particularly if you try to use his stun in teamfights.

That being said, here is my common strategy when playing as Jax:

  • I often take summoner 12 and summoner 4 . summoner 4 is for obvious reasons, but I take summoner 12 to get back into my lane quicker or try to make plays on other parts of the map.
  • My strategy is focused around splitpushing and trying to duel someone because Jax is considered to be the best duelist in the game (unless if you know how to kite Jax). I always on splitpushing regardless if I'm winning my lane or losing my lane because I put emphasis in putting map pressure and taking objectives. Because of this, my top three items I often rush are item 3153 item 3078 item 3146 .
  • I may sometimes build item 3074 and item 3087 for splitpushing purposes.
  • That being said, I believe Jax is one of the few bruisers that can easily get away building 100% glass cannon (the others being Riven Tryndamere Fiora Yasuo ) The reason being is because his active ultimate. His offensive stats grants him defensive stats with his ultimate. By building AP and AD on Jax, I get magic resistance and armor respectfully. The only defensive items I build on Jax are items that also give offensive power such as item 3022 item 3025 item 3091 item 3156 .
  • Spell vamp procs with his ultimate passive.
  • Other AP items I consider are item 3115 and item 3124.
  • Similarly, I build Gnar the same way as Jax , 100% glass cannon. My build path is very similar to Jax , item 3153 item 3078 item 3146. However, I may sometimes replace either item 3078 or item 3146 with item 3072 for the item 3072 shield and more sustain. In addition item 3146 spell vamp is useful on Gnar, his W passive scales in AP, procs in all of his abilities, and procs spell vamp. And much like Jax , I rely on Gnar natural tankiness from Mega Gnar in teamfights.
  • I may sometimes bring item 2049 when it comes to splitpushing, but I often sell this item when it comes late game.
  • As for boots, I always take item 3020 on Jax and item 3006 on Gnar.
  • Also, I find Gnar kit to be very similar to Jax, except Gnar's W passive scales better late game (it deals % health damage as opposed to Jax's flat damage from his utlimate passive). Also, Gnar is easier to play as than Jax because he has very strong poke and good wave clear and duel someone through kiting trades, including Jax . Hence it's a good reason why I build Gnar the same way as Jax (except maybe more emphasis on AD items and critical strike items and less AP items).

Anyways, can anyone give me some advice on playing as Gnar and Jax, especially Jax since I tend to suck playing as him.

I also have hard time why LCS pros build Jax and Gnar tanky items such as item 3143 and item 3102 even though they don't benefit from building tanky and scale better building pure offensive items.

2 Comments

67chrome11/1/2014, 7:07:56 AM2 votes

because ranged champions have better late game scaling than melee champions. However, the big problem I have here is that I absolutely suck at playing as Jax because his kit is too hard to use, particularly if you try to use his stun in teamfights. I also have hard time why LCS pros build Jax and Gnar tanky items such as item 3143 and item 3102 even though they don't benefit from building tanky and scale better building pure offensive items.

Ranged champions are better late-game than melee specifically because range is a really big advantage in 5v5 engagements. In 3v3 fights a very large number of melee champions outperform ranged ones.

That said - a solid chunk of defense often really helps melee champions compete in large-scale fights.

Sucking in team-fights with any fighter usually comes down to not building enough defense to survive that situation.

As for Jax's scaling:

The longer you survive the more damage you get to deal. Defense scales the potency of offense. Armor/MR/%AoE damage reductions also directly scale with HP.

Also, Hybridized damage is generally means "scales well with defense"

Pure-physical damage scales very well with things like armor penetrations, critical strikes, and attack speed. Pure magical damage scales very well with things like Rabadon's, magic penetrations, Lich Bane, and DFG.

Hybridized damage doesn't scale that well with either path, and it scales horrifically with hybrid damage. AP and AD don't multiply one-another's potency. They're just added on top of one-another, where pure-type damage builds grow exponentially into end-game. Have 100 base damage and get 100 AD and 100 AP and you're just doing 100+100+100 = 300. Have 100 base damage and get 100 AD and 100% AS and you're doing 100+100 x 2 = 400. Noticable difference, especially when tertiary multipliers come into play.

Inversely, hybrid damage is extremely hard to counter-build, so you don't have to worry about things like Banshee's Veil or Thornmail completely shutting you down and ruining your day. Ultimately you don't need to build as much damage with hybrid damage because you're opponents can't mount as much defense against it. Most defensive items target physical damage and auto-attacks or magic damage and abilities, which is a double-whammy to most marksman or mages, but 50% power against hybrid damage dealers.

Anyways - hybrid champions tend to be tanks like DrMundo , Shyvana , Warwick , Nasus , Udyr. They tend to deal close to 50/50 physical/magical damage if you look in end-game stats. Optimally built, they often don't focus on AD or AP items either, or hybrid AD/AP items. Usually it's big flat damage, no scaling chunks of stuff like Sheen Procs, Wit's End on-hit, Sunfire Cape's AoE burn, Kingblade's %HP shred, Feral Flare's on-hit magic damage, or so on for their actual damage.

So, hybrid damage is a scales-with-defense thing.

Only reason to grab a hybrid damage item like item 3078 item 3091 item 3146 item 3124 item 3115 item 3160 is because most tend to be unusually cost-efficient as a first buy to compensate for them having pretty awful end-game scaling. The no damage scaling means nothing if you just proceed to build full-tank afterwards, and higher-than-average in a first slot means such items can generally tapper out to still compete with an otherwise committed AD or AP build if you transition immediately into a pure-AD or pure-AP build directly after the hybrid item.

Anyways - most important take-away here is if you get a Hybrid damage item, ONLY GET 1.

Don't get T-Force and Gunblade on Jax together. Killing your scaling. Also get defense after the first 2 major offensive items.

Best build for him ATM is generally item 3078 item 3153 item 3068 item 3065

NoMonku11/1/2014, 10:03:44 AM2 votes

IMO for Gnar building him glass cannon is bad. It IS really good if you make NO mistakes, as you will complete DESTROY your opponent if you land all your CC ideally and perfectly, but in most cases I doubt you will be able to do this. An easier way to play Gnar is to go tank gnar rushing things like Sunfire and Randuins and winning out with your base values. If you are tanky, you shouldn't die 1v1 or if they can kill you, just join your team and be a monster in teamfights. Jax only really needs Tri/BotRK to be a monster, after that you should go pure tanky so you can live through the fights.