[Guide] Specific Role: Bruiser (Part 2)
####Last updated: 6/27/14
Hello and welcome to my latest [Guide] post. I’m just your friendly neighborhood Gold player that wants to impart some knowledge about general League knowledge through tips, tricks and experience to hopefully help you or maybe a friend of yours through your games. This guide will be on the general role and actions taken by the Bruiser Role.
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###Part 1
####1) Bruiser?
####2) Who is a Bruiser?
####3) What do?
####4) Summoner Spells
####5) Runes/Masteries
####6) Champ Select
--- Survivability vs. Damage
--- Diving vs. Peeling
--- Considering the enemy team
###Part 2
####7) Laning Phase
--- Trading
--- Pushing
--- When to go back
--- Predicting Ganks
####8) Teamfights
--- Threat generation
--- Disruption
--- When to Dive / When to Peel
####9) Items ####10) Tips and Tricks
7. Laning Phase (Top Lane)
######If you like playing a Bruiser in the Jungle, head over to my Jungle Guide for more specific advice.
###========== Trading
Here we go, this is the real reason you’re reading am I right? Dueling is the heart and soul behind a good Bruiser and out-laning your opponent is the best thing you can do. As it opens up the possibility to roam and use your already hard-won advantage. Here are some easy and very useful tips to give you and edge.
#####Push early for levels
Push as hard as you can as soon as you hit lane, because getting a minion or two ahead of your opponent means you will be level 2 while he/she is level 1. Early game (lvl 1-3) that’s HUGE. Abuse that moment. More than likely they’ve revealed what ability they’ve gotten at level 1 and you can use your two abilities and free stats from the level to push him off the creep and probably pop a potion or two. This will immediately give you an advantage as him being pushed off means he will level even slower and have less access to gold. If you’re playing a high damage laner like Riven you may even get a very quick first blood. On the flipside if you see this being done to you don’t give them the chance to jump on you while they’re ahead in level. Back off just enough until you are even level and walk back in. You miss a creep or two from this but it’s not worth the high amount of damage you can take.
#####Bait minion aggro
Play the home advantage. While not as extreme (due to usually high level 1 armor from runes and such) in other lanes, minion damage can really add up. If you can bait a relatively even fight into the middle of your minions then you can get a respectable amount of free damage onto them. This really only applies pre-6, as past that minion damage becomes too negligible to matter.
#####Pop health potions earlier
I see plenty of people use health potions after a fight, which is all fine and dandy, but if you know a fight will bring you down enough at the end you should pop the potion during the fight (unless they have access to grievous wounds). What this does is gives the illusion of even higher defense than you actually have if they don’t notice, and if they do notice they will either back off or use their own potion to even it out.
#####Abuse Cooldowns
Some are easier to bait then others, but always always ALWAYS remember that if your opponent just used an ability they can’t do so again for a little while. If you’re still not comfortable trading directly you can take this window to farm a little bit safer.
###========== Pushing
Pushing is the term for your friendly minion wave gaining ground against your opponent’s minions. Pushing forward means getting your minions to their turret, getting damage on it as well as getting you experience and gold (depending on how well you last hit) faster than your opponent, at the cost of making you much more vulnerable to ganks and sudden unfavorable trading as you are farther away from your own turret. The same risks are had by your opponent of you are getting pushed back.
Pushing is sort of an art for a Bruiser. Controlling where the minion clash is happening is key to how a fight can go in-lane anywhere, but Bruisers not having the luxury of ranged auto attacks this means even more. A pushed lane means a lot, and can either be a boon or a hazard. Recognizing this is a hugely beneficial lesson to your play, here are a few tips to help you out:
- Watch the jungler, if he shows up somewhere else you can actively push relatively safer.
- Watch your jungler, if he’s wanting to come up top let your lane be pushed to give you more ganking room.
- Pushing your lane hard will give you a chance to go back or roam mid, giving you a further advantage and possibly helping out your team elsewhere. Your lane will be pushing during that time and ready to be farmed when you get back if you keep track of it.
- Don’t get led on by a smart player! If you’re playing in a decent skill level there’s always the chance they’re letting you push. Keep an eye on how often they normally want to trade. If they change up suddenly chances are their jungle or mid is nearby!
- Take advantage of AoE to either push or be pushed. Forcing a Renekton or Darius to trade with you in the middle of your wave will naturally push against you. Vice versa if you do so yourself with an AoE heavy champ.
###========== Predicting Ganks
This is where experience jungling yourself can be invaluable, but if you’re a normal person and don’t have time to just wander of and learn/master a new role and then come back to top lane here’s a tl;dr.
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Most Jungles follow a normal path buff to buff, resulting in a high chance of gank at either top or mid at level 1 and 3 (your level as a solo lane of you’ve been playing even). Level 1 if they’re greedy and want a quick first blood after theor first buff and 3 of they went for both buffs. The latter is more common. This has slight variance depending on clear times.
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Even if the jungler is Challenger tier, if you’re laning opponent isn’t you can tell when a gank is coming most of the time. If you trade well early and establish a good advantage (this is always suggested) is they suddenly develop a modicum of bravery chances are there’s a reason. Always watch you laning opponent’s behavior, if it changes think of why it did.
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Watch other lanes for ganks. This will be hard to do at the beginning and is still hard to consistently for me, but if a gank happened elsewhere that means it won’t be happening to you for a certain amount of time. If you’re really good you can even check his farm level and current buffs to estabalish where he is in his jungle clear and what buffs he/she might stop by on his way to you, giving an ETG Estimated Time to Gank. But iof you can do that, why the hell are you reading a guide? Go make one so I can read it! :P
Lane ganks are a particularly high threat in top lane. A Lane Gank is the practice of a jungler waiting in the lane bushes inside the lane and jumping into the fight from very close by. Tip #2 should help out with that, but one surefire but difficult way to notice is your opponent’s experience gain. If he’s leveling slower than you then that means something (or rather someone) is sapping experience for his solo lane!
8. http://i.imgur.com/Q7bgyCe.png Teamfights
Did someone say teamfight? Imagine a teamfight is a drunken brawl in a random tavern. A Bruiser is the huge bear of man in the center with 5 guys wailing on him while he just laughs merrily. Teamfights are a Bruiser’s paradise, and it’s your job to make sure you don’t only win them but you enjoy them. I want you to laugh and smile anytime they group, relish the challenge!
###========== Threat Generation Assassins get away with having massive burst and a lot of ways to circumvent team agro. Stealth, dashes, blinks, meh. Bruisers , however, don’t need those bells and whistles. Whther you’re going tanky or damage heavy you need to make sure the enemy team knows where you are during the chaos. They need to know where you are and more importantly, why they should be worried about that. Whether or not that’s through immense burst, annoyingly high cc or simply the fact that you’re unkillable is neither here nor there. The fact remains if you have enough agro you’ll do one of two things: Either make them kill you (instead not the rest of your team) or the squishes run away (which means they’re not contributing to the fight). Keep in mind though, someone who jumps in recklessly and dies meaninglessly is a nuisance not a nightmare. But if everytime you go in it results in an ace in favor of your team, they’ll be damn sure to avoid you next time.
###========== Disruption Running around flailing your arms isn’t going to do much, so while you’re in the thick of it think of how best to apply your damage in the immediate moment.
Damage is best used against squishy carries and assassins. Have enough to bring to bear and they’ll run away or get bursted by you or another teammate.
Crowd Control is circumstantial. The best possible use for hard cc is to be used against their Burst Caster before their burst. If you can even delay their burst that’s precious seconds that your team can do something that doesn’t involve losing most of their health, you included. Soft cc however is best used against people diving or people running away. Most teamfights are decided within seconds so a slow on a straggler or an enemy bruiser could respectively nab a kill or save a life.
A Burst Caster is a general term of my own for any damage oriented champion that is known for absurd damage from their kits that happens within a blink. AD or AP these include Mages, Assassins and some Fighters.
Tankiness and Health is best thrown around between your team and theirs. I’m not saying to intentionally take damage, I’m saying to take damage that your friendly high priority targets (mage, adc) would have taken otherwise. Sometimes this isn’t possible, but if their team has to go through you before getting to your carries then you’re doing your job right positioning wise. If you went more damage heavy and don’t have health to throw around then this is a place to avoid.
###========== When to Dive/Peel
The classic conundrum. To dive or not to dive, that is the question. There’s really no easy silver bullet for this. It will come down to experience. But that’s not to say I don’t have advice. My biggest and most important bit is to make sure you COUNT HEADS. Never leave your team at a numbers disadvantage. If there are two people interested in you and the rest of our team is 4v3, good! You dove well. If you’re peeling a diver and it’s you and your marksman wailing into him while your team are able hold the rest off, good! You peeled well. Now very few situations will be that clear cut, but the idea remains the same. Make sure you either equalize or push the numbers game into your favor and the answer of whether to dive or peel should come.
9. http://i.imgur.com/ZNnL2pn.png Items
There are a few different options to build a Bruiser, and most will need to be in response to your opposing team’s strengths and weaknesses. However, a Bruiser’s main presence is obtained through their laning performance, so I’ll talk about the two general ways to go about building for your lane, the damage rush and the tank rush, and later about individual items.
Keep in mind that these are suggestions, and League matches by their very nature will not be done in the same way. And your build should reflect that. These are the items I find myself doing the best with the most often and the logic as to why they are good. It's up to you to decide which is the best purchases on a case by case basis.
###========== Damage Path
The damage path strategy is good against more fragile, damage focused opponents that you’ve gotten an early advantage on or passive laners like Shen and Nasus. The key around this build path is sustain, which almost always means rushing a Hydra, or in some cases a Blade of the Ruined King. Note that this is not a good idea to do against aggressive but naturally tanky champs like Darius or high damage champs you’re at a disadvantage with. This is a strategy based on laning momentum, of you don’t have that momentum you’ll simply lose more by being even more fragile in most cases.
####Start
Doran’s shield is always a good pick for top lane, and is usually the best option for champs that don’t auto attack often, and can’t utilize Doran’s Blade’s passive well. This item will give you a small time advantage with its flat health regen. Keep that in mind inn trading with your opponent if they don’t also have a Dshield, time is on your side.
Doran’s Blade is a good start as well, and goes perfectly with rushing a vamp scepter early, as the cumulative lifesteal will add up nicely. If you're having a hard time, don't be afraid to get a second Doran's Blade on your first back, it's very important for you to get your momentum back.
Cloth armor and 5 pots is an echo from previous seasons but can still be effective in some cases. This start is great against purely physical damage opponents and ones you want to kick down hard and and keep them down. The reason this is good for that is because the cloth armor will make trading with both minions and your opponent hurt less as well as giving you better sustain as long as you have the potions. Howver that’s where the risk is, the potions. Not only did you dump a respectable amount of starting gold into consumables you also effectively have a time limit. Once those potions are out you are at a disadvantage. I would also dissuade using this start at the moment because of cloth armor’s lack of build options. Pretty much just Glacial Shroud and Ninja Tabi right now.
####First Back
Vamp Scepter is a good buy if you can afford it, as I said before either Hydra or Botrk will be your main goal here. The lifesteal you get will be very important for getting you the more expensive bulk costs of the rest of the item. Tamat is particularly annoying to get fast with the pickaxe component price. Note: if playing Rumble, Vlad or another AP top consider either Hextech Revolver (if manaless) or Chalice (for mana sustain instead of health sustain)
Boots are always good to have, and more than likely you didn’t start with them so it would be good to grab them now. Boots come in handy for dodging slower spells as well as being a noticeable advantage over anyone who aren’t rocking the same footwear. Always remember as well that stat gains from boots are among the most cost efficient so you’ll be one step (aha, I’m hilarious) closer to that.
####Core Item Choices
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Lifesteal options
Usually one or the other (lifesteal doesn’t mean much of you have no ad or mitigation behind it). Hydra’s better for more caster based Bruisers, Bortk for the few auto attack heavy ones (i.e. Aatrox, Jax). Bonus points in Hydra’s favor if you can get innate lifesteal from your kit (i.e. Lee, Udyr).
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Armor Pen options
The go-to counter to both your damage and sustain is your opponent(s) stocking up on armor. This can have serious repercussions against your lifesteal if you don't answer in kind with armor pen. The nice thing about getting armor pen is that it makes any future armor purchases less effective for your opponent. But be sure to save this choice for when they do actually have armor. Getting armor pen too early will sacrifice too much base AD and they can simply laugh at your damage via health or their own lifesteal.
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Defensive options
This is a core defensive choice, because no matter how well you do you will still need to be able to take a few hits to do the damage you've been enjoying so far. Keep in mind these options are in no particular order besides your first back, so use your own judgement on what you need at the moment. The sacrifice for getting these options is that they are expensive and your opponents will be able to start catching up to your damage with every purchase you make towards any of them.
Spirit Visage is a great buy because it synergizes very well with lifesteal, and gives caster champs that ever so lovely CDR. Spectre's Cowl is a decent item by itself, as it will help mitigate any poke you receive.
Randuin's Omen is by and far the most slot efficient defensive item in the game curently, and probably will still be even with the upcoming nerf. There are very times this won;t be an amazing purchase, and it can really do work with its active if used properly.
Frozen Mallet is a great choice for chase champs, as once a single melee attack is given the victim can't escape without a blink or dash of some kind. It also gives some of the highest health bonus in the game making it very nice gray area between damage and tank. Be careful though, unless you get this early enough you'll want mitigation to back up the respectable increase in health. % Health damage is always a danger.
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Additional Damage Options
There's no such thing as "too much overkill" so you should always plan on getting more damage if all goes well. These items are good to look out for if additional damage is on your wishlist later in the game, as they provide some of the best AD and miscellaneous effect for their slot.
Trinity Force literally has a little bit of everything except CDR and regen, so it's nice to have on really anyone. But what makes its absurd price tage truly worth it is the Spellblade passive effect. It's so much more than just another Sheen, this baby deal 200% of your base ad when used, and there are a few Bruisers who can sneak a few auto attacks in between their rotations to really hammer someone down. That passive is what you should be shooting for when going tri-force, if you feel you won't be able to use it well, then don't bother.
Bloodthirster is a great defensive option. It gives you a large amount of defensive presence that scales with your overall AD (lifesteal), as well as a shield that can really take the the edge of of, say, a sword being swung at your respective face. Keep in mind that the shield only comes into play when you're *over(healing, so very tanky champions usually wouldn't be able to use it well (or lifesteal in general for that matter).
Maw of Malmortius is a very vry nice item and I feel it goes under appreciated a lot of times. If you get knocked down to 30% of your max health, you get a whopping 95 AD from this single item, as well as a usually life-saving magi damage shield. This extra 35 AD bonus is usually short-lived though because of lifesteal bringing your health back up, but the brilliance is that that short-lived AD bonus goes into getting you a lot more health with that lifesteal, possibly being the sole reason you live through a lot of fights. Naturally it's better to go for other options if your opposing team doesn't have much AP, but if they do I highly suggest this item.
###========== Tank Path
The tank path has the defining logic of getting enough health and mitigation to truly negate your opponent’s efforts and ride largely on your champion’s kit damage. This is considered the safer way to build as it’s simply harder to be killed and so any mistake made hurts less. This build focuses on staying power and works very well with champs who also have innate sustain, like Renekton or Mundo.
####Start
Doran’s Shield again! It’s simply a great starting option for most bruisers as their kits bring a lot of damage anyway by themselves, so the survivability DShield gives initially can really go far. As well as the fact it gives health and regen instead of mitigation, meaning it’s a decent buy for both AD and AP opponents.
This is a valid start for Tank instead of damage because Tankier champion’s early games are not usually won by aggression and numbers, but by clever use of minion aggro and health conservation/sustain. Boots can really help out with this for avoiding damage much easier as well as being a start that gives you a decent amount of potions. Just note you are sacrificing numbers for movement speed, which may be a good thing or a bad thing in hindsight, it’ll come down to experience to make the best choice.
This is a special start of mine. If you’re communicating with your jungle (duo que for example) and you’re confident in their early ganking skill then this is an option if you are playing a champion that profits from a Kindlegem or Catalyst (Rod of Ages) or another ruby crystal 2nd tier item well. In other words, if you can nab a kill before you have to burn through your paltry amount of potions then this will be worth it.
####First Back
Giant's Belt the sign of doing very well if you can get this on your first back. It gives a metric arse ton of health and can build into some of the best Bruiser item's in the game like Sunfires, Randuin's and Frozen Mallet. Get this before your opponent has a chance of really getting damage or health shred and they will have a very hard time in killing you.
Chain Vest is a great buy against an AD opponent, as not only does it decrease their damage but also decreases a good bit of minion and tower damage. Try to plan out what you'll build this into though, it could be a Sunfires, a Warden's mail into a Randuin's or even a Thornmail.
Glacial Shroud is not a good buy on manaless champs. You'd be paying for a wasted stat, but this item is great nonetheless. Champs like Nasus who are somewhat mana thirsty and also profit greatly from CDR can use this item to great effect on their first back.
Spectre's Cowl is useful even by itself. Be sure to pick this up against ranged AP opponents as soon as you can. The MR will massively help with the spells and the passive will almost cancel out their ranged auto attacks. I would suggest waiting to upgrade this in fact, until you know you need either Spirit Visage or Banshee's Veil as you will lose the consistent passive.
####Core Item Choices
My go-to favorite
Sunfire Cape is a great buy for a tank build, because it will still increase your damage done, but the damage it deals increases the more you can stay near enemies. Meaning the longer you can stay in, the more damage you can deal without having to build more for it. Naturally you can't ride on Sunfire's damage alone, and the damage itself is level based, so it will hurt more if you fall behind on experience.
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Black Cleaver's passive can be used to great effect, Tank or no, if you're a champ with AoE physical damage (looking at you Garen). Any physical damage dealt will decrease an entire team's armor if used appropriately. Which means your allies' damge is amplified even if you didn't deal that much damage. This si also a decent idea to have on a damage build, but it's much less effective for you alone and other armor pen items are better for your damage.
Frozen Mallet provides more of a benefit to tanks numbers wise, as well as giving a nice utility on-hit effect. While giving less effective damage for both you and your team, it can make your dive and peel a bit more effective as well as being a better defensive option.
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Warmog's Armor makers any mitigation purchase you do much more effective and is therefore great to have for someone who gets free mitigation form their kit, or gets % health based damage. This gives the most amount of health for any one item. If the opposing team doesn't have any or much % health shred then this will be a nice buy, as it will serve most if not all of your base health needs, but as I alluded to, it's lack of mitigation along with it can make this item a liability against %health based damage.
Spirit Visage is a great defensive buy, and in fact used to be the best option for ti's price. While not the case anymore, it still provides the highest MR in the game, tied with Banshee's veil. This goes quite well with Warmog's Armor's passive when it comes to passive regen. The main perk to this item however is the CDR. At 20%, this is a great source of CDR for manaless champions that can't justify a Frozen Heart.
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Armor options
Thornmail is a magnificent item to counter auto attack based....well anyone auto attack based. Two things to remember about this item is that it deals magic damage on the effect and that the effect is calculated before the mitigation calculation. Meaning that of you are effectively blocking 70% physical damage (taking 30% of the attack) then you are dealing back just as much damage as you are taking. This also counter lifesteal, as they will take damage anytime they gain it back if they attack you. Unfortunately this item does not come with any health or other defensive stat, so it does make you more vulnerable to magic damage burst.
Randuin's Omen is, again, the best defensive item for it's slot with it's nice mixture of high health, high armor, useful passive and even more useful Active. It's active literally scales with how tanky you are, so tanky Bruisers love this item. I can safely say I get this item in near everyone of my games unless it ends too early. Just remember to use the active well!
Frozen Heart is an amazing blend of stats and one of the very limited options for mana right now (inb4 Essence Reaver) for AD, but mana based, champions. The CDR and passive aura are its two main string point, but the armor is nothing to dismiss. The main use of this item is that you can actively hurt the opposing team's damage output without even being hit. This is good for low threat Bruisers that simply can't get the enemy team's attention.
####If going against a Mage
Top lane is occasionally intruded on with ranged mages because of their reliable cc and powerful ults. On the flipside, mid-lane is occasionally rudely pounced on by Bruisers for their own lane because of mid-lane’s easy ganking opportunities. As such you may have a run-in with a mage during laning.
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Early anti-AP
These are your options for a first item, high damage, high sustain and niche counter choices respectively. I highly suggest to get these as quickly as possible, as mages have somewhat easy access to flat spell pen through Haunting Guise and Sorcerer’s Shoes.
10. http://i.imgur.com/sRutL8b.png Tips and Tricks
Bait a fight just before a friendly gank. If your opponent just used an ability or two to trade with you it might be much harder for him to get away. As well as being a good distraction on the off-chance he doesn’t see his mini-map. Make sure you’re not going to scare him off before hand though. It has to be a fight that your opponent has a good chance of winning without your friendly jungle’s help or else there’s no reason for him to stay.
Gank mid whenever convenient. Unless mid is pushing a glorious amount you probably won’t nab a kill but try to find reasons visit mid-lane when your lane is pushed in your favor. It’s more of a physiological thing really, they’ll (understandably) want to buy more wards and will think twice about pushing too far against your mid. Make sure you’re not hurting yourself though, roam too much without kills and you’ll start losing in the experience/gold race.
Finish items. This can be said for anyone, but Bruisers in particular have a lot of nice component items in their builds that can give a nice little boost but be wary of filling up your slots. Sometimes the best idea id to just buy a few health pots and sit on some gold. Not ideal sure, but a finished item will be much more useful than say, 3 ruby crystals.
Levels matter. The stats and skill levels one gets from leveling up are much larger than most give credit for. More so for Bruisers because they usually get MR/level naturally as well, a lot of champs don’t get that. Just keep that in mind when gauging your opponent. A difference of one level is workable, two is difficult and 3+ is getting out of hand and you may want to consider giving up the turret and helping another lane if you are on the lower end.
Outer Turrets are not worth dying for. Outer turrets are gold and an excuse for the winning laner to roam. If you are on the losing side don’t panic though, this means minions will push farther into your half of the map, making it a lot more risky for your opponent to harass you as you farm. I’m not saying outer turrets are useless, but they are held in a lot less importance than inner turret onwards because the advantage/disadvantage gained can be worked around.
Getting baited is easy. Bruisers, being largely melee and very chase heavy, are easier to bait than most. A combination of high power, usually high level advantage combined with the ‘thrill of the hunt’ feeling one usually gets when chasing squishies makes for a very easy death if you go too far. Just make sure you remember you are NOT invincible.
You are the best one to split-push. Bruisers are usually very good duelists, and knowing this you can splitpush fairly well. Some Bruisers can even take on 2 people at once for a respectable amount of time. If you manage to draw away 2 or more people, this should open up a great opportunity for your team to push themselves.
#Addendum
Holy crap this took a long time. Not the writing or formatting or anything, just Life getting in way. Damn Life, always coming up with things to do and stuff to see, so insensitive! Anyway, just got two more role guides to go, Tank and Mage. Or maybe you'd like to see something else? Maybe Streaming or a whole slew of Advanced Strategy Guides? Tell me by voting! I promise I'll be quicker this time, but I'm also going to go ahead and say soon(tm) instead of a concrete date.
