How does Riven counter Nasus?

JMoneyPro·Mar 20, 2015·1 votes·5,641 views

I'm new to Riven and lose nearly every lane i play her in, I am very unskilled, typical bronze, low cs, often feed first blood, etc. Now with that out of the way, I have never struggled so much to learn a champion as riven. It's as if no matter how much I play her, I always feed no matter what. As a result, I continuously play her to prove to myself I am capable of learning, and my elo has tanked nearly an entire division in only one day. But of all the matches I lose to that I shouldn't, I wanted to ask about Nasus.

People say that Riven is a "hard counter" to Nasus. But I don't understand why. Every time I go in to harass him, the creeps attack me, causing the wave to push to his tower, which lets him free farm. Last game nasus, I fed him first blood and at 15 minutes he had 250 stacks and double my CS because I couldn't manipulate the wave. I'm actually not a completely garbage player (at least at the adc role, every other role I'm "true bronze"), but I just can't seem to understand riven.

Should I just give up? I've watched guides, videos, etc, but every time I play her I feed. If I could learn to carry with her I would, as I am a vayne main now but the first 30 or so games with her I fed hard until I learned. Any tips would be appreciated. Thanks!

23 Comments

bad arcade kittyMar 20, 20153 votes

{quoted}

I'm new to Riven and lose nearly every lane i play her in, I am very unskilled, typical bronze, low cs, often feed first blood, etc.

it seems you are a typical riven mainer do you use bunny riven skin too?

disregardableMar 20, 20153 votes

Let's be clear here- Nasus should not be outfarming you. You're Riven. You farm as well as fucking Zed. Riven does not miss CS. If you're missing a lot of CS in a game, fix that issue first.

JMoneyProMar 20, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=The AFK Farmer,realm=NA,application-id=WEuoGbmp,discussion-id=NJuEJE49,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2015-03-20T00:47:27.054+0000)

Let's be clear here- Nasus should not be outfarming you. You're Riven. You farm as well as fucking Zed. Riven does not miss CS. If you're missing a lot of CS in a game, fix that issue first.

Right, I think the problem that game was that I had a jungle thresh trolling, so I kindly decided to tank krug to 1/3 health for him before going to lane, which was a bad decision... typically my cs is good when I'm playing adc (by good I mean bronze good relative to the rest of the game, not actually good).

I mean more generally though. Whenever I do my combo on Nasus his creeps attack me while my creeps attack the wave, causing it to build up a massive wave and push to his tower, leaving him to free farm under turret while I stand back and wait. As a Nasus player, I realize that under turret stacking q is probably the best place to be, as then I can't be harassed by riven anymore.

I guess my question is, how do I manipulate the wave more efficiently to avoid this?

VoidgolemMar 20, 20151 votes

Nasus' earlygame is terrible, Riven's earlygame is ridiculously good for how hard she snowballs.

The rest is a matter of practice

BluePolarizerApr 1, 20151 votes

as Nasus it is extremely easy to beat Riven. I just take full armor runes, 5/22/3 masteries and start cloth 5 with TP Flash instead of TP ghost to flash her executes. Take 1 point in W at level 2 in case of ganks, but go E max instead of W max 2nd to make Riven even squishier and to allow your Q to deal almost true damage to her.

See, the burden of making plays is on Riven, not Nasus. All Nasus has to do is farm Q under tower. Nothing else. Riven has to actually kill Nasus, which is alot easier said than done with cheese armor runes.

Innate TalentMar 20, 20151 votes

Do you combo right? You** e w, q, aa, q, aa, q then do aas** till your skills come up and it could be your build as well. For her ult your range on your skills is increased and gain bonus attk dmg, but her 2nd ulti activation is and **execute (mainly) so use it on low health targets **

JMoneyProMar 20, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=Inu Senpaii,realm=NA,application-id=WEuoGbmp,discussion-id=NJuEJE49,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2015-03-20T00:50:38.969+0000)

Do you combo right? You** e w, q, aa, q, aa, q then do aas** till your skills come up and it could be your build as well. For her ult your range on your skills is increased and gain bonus attk dmg, but her 2nd ulti activation is and **execute (mainly) so use it on low health targets **

I watched a video about the combos on riven, I prefer to start the combo you just said with w in case i need the e at the end to escape a jungler bank or something, but I feel like that's not why I'm losing so bad (as in there are bigger problems with my play style)

NamnomsMar 20, 20151 votes

Riven has a lot of mobility, minor CCs, and a very strong early game. Nasus has a weak early game, no mobility, and really depends on an AS/MS slow to keep him alive early. Riven can drop a CC on him and a few hits every time he goes in to swipe a minion, so long as you aren't pushing the lane under turret riven can cream him like a frappuchino and prevent most of his farm. If he tries to Q back as he should, the shield will prevent pretty much all his damage early. Dropping minion aggro isn't difficult so long as you don't dive a wave with none of your minions nearby.

DrCyanideMar 20, 20151 votes

I'm only making some educated guesses here. Try them out with a bit of salt:

Wave Manipulation - You can get the enemies wave pushing against yours by auto attacking the enemy champion, then quickly dashing into a bush. Considering Riven's plentiful dashes, you can probably pull this off fairly consistently, preventing the wave from getting to his tower.
Slows? What Slows? - Usually when a Nasus wants someone dead, he Withers them then starts chasing. Riven has enough dashes to keep her moving through the slow, making it harder for Nasus to finish her.
Shields up, weapons online! - When you think he's going to use his Q on you, get your shield up.

JMoneyProMar 20, 20151 votes

{quoted}

I'm only making some educated guesses here. Try them out with a bit of salt:

Wave Manipulation - You can get the enemies wave pushing against yours by auto attacking the enemy champion, then quickly dashing into a bush. Considering Riven's plentiful dashes, you can probably pull this off fairly consistently, preventing the wave from getting to his tower.

Slows? What Slows? - Usually when a Nasus wants someone dead, he Withers them then starts chasing. Riven has enough dashes to keep her moving through the slow, making it harder for Nasus to finish her.

Shields up, weapons online! - When you think he's going to use his Q on you, get your shield up.

I'm definitely going to try the first one. After all this time, it never occurred to me that I could go into the bush to reset the creep aggro. The more I post the more clear it becomes I belong in bronze haha. Thank you so much for this.

DrCyanideMar 20, 20151 votes

Saw that tip in a video somewhere, didn't come up with it myself. Hope it helps :)

Denims Wrath666Mar 20, 20151 votes

Nasus wither is basically useless against champs that are casters for their damage. example would be riven, renekton,jayce,nid. also the slow doesnt do anything to the mobility of those champs. thats the real reason why those champs usually bully nasus. his whole kit is based around landing the q, and making it hurt more so if you cant get in range to use q you are just a walking meat shield. i know this is kinda bold but why dont you try playing some nasus to learn how to cs properly. go cooldown+ 5 % blues + some flat mr, armor reds with two crit chance runes, yellow armor with two flat healths, 2 lifesteal quints and 1 mana regen quint. start flask and 4 health pots, roll ghost and flash. rush frozen and spirit visage, grab bork and triforce, then ga or frozen mallet. simple as fuck build, works against all matchup games if you dont feed like a boss. masteries should be 4 in cd and butcher/feast, 3 in mana regen, rest in defense.

JMoneyProMar 20, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=Denims Wrath666,realm=NA,application-id=WEuoGbmp,discussion-id=NJuEJE49,comment-id=0006,timestamp=2015-03-20T00:57:08.031+0000)

Nasus wither is basically useless against champs that are casters for their damage. example would be riven, renekton,jayce,nid. also the slow doesnt do anything to the mobility of those champs. thats the real reason why those champs usually bully nasus. his whole kit is based around landing the q, and making it hurt more so if you cant get in range to use q you are just a walking meat shield. i know this is kinda bold but why dont you try playing some nasus to learn how to cs properly. go cooldown+ 5 % blues + some flat mr, armor reds with two crit chance runes, yellow armor with two flat healths, 2 lifesteal quints and 1 mana regen quint. start flask and 4 health pots, roll ghost and flash. rush frozen and spirit visage, grab bork and triforce, then ga or frozen mallet. simple as fuck build, works against all matchup games if you dont feed like a boss. gl

Thanks for this. I am usually fairly competent at getting cs (usually on adc roles, but basically better than most others in the game with every champ except riven and leblanc). I actually mained Nasus for a while, but I stopped playing him because I had a series of games (like 5 in a row) where by the time it was 20 minutes and I had my 300 stacks, my mid and bot had already fed too many kills for me to make an impact. The last game I played with Nasus, I had a total of 768 stacks and still managed to lose the game, so that's why I gave him up.

Only Play DariusMar 20, 20151 votes

A good Nasus will always rush item 3110 or item 3143 vs Riven. Once he has that there isn't much you can do to kill him, and once he gets his item 3057 it's over for you. When fighting Nasus just don't push the lane, which is difficult because Riven's Q's SHOVE the lane hard.

bad arcade kittyMar 20, 20151 votes

[{quoted}](name=Jelly Mac,realm=NA,application-id=WEuoGbmp,discussion-id=NJuEJE49,comment-id=0007,timestamp=2015-03-20T00:58:46.015+0000)

A good will always rush or vs Riven. Once he has that there isn't much you can do to kill him, and once he gets his it's over for you. When fighting Nasus just don't push the lane, which is difficult because Riven's Q's SHOVE the lane hard.

riven rushes brutalizer though

Trash MammaIMar 20, 20151 votes

I'm guessing you threw your keyboard down a slide instead of stairs?

Madman357Mar 20, 20151 votes

First things first, you should really be playing normals if youre getting stomped in every game. It would be a less stressful experience since you don't have to worry about ranked losses.

Second, if minion damage is the problem then you simply have to wait to harass until the minion wave is smaller. You should be easily forcing nasus out of lane early on, and if you get some kills early then you can continue to stomp him all game. A key note though is that you should try to freeze the wave as much as possible since nasus can typically farm under tower fairly easily with his Q, especially once he gets some points into it and some CDR.

Something to note as well is that minions will only start to attack you if you hit your opponent with an auto attack. If you just spam your abilities you can deal some damage to the enemy without fear of minion damage.

JMoneyProMar 27, 20151 votes

{quoted}

First things first, you should really be playing normals if youre getting stomped in every game. It would be a less stressful experience since you don't have to worry about ranked losses.

Second, if minion damage is the problem then you simply have to wait to harass until the minion wave is smaller. You should be easily forcing nasus out of lane early on, and if you get some kills early then you can continue to stomp him all game. A key note though is that you should try to freeze the wave as much as possible since nasus can typically farm under tower fairly easily with his Q, especially once he gets some points into it and some CDR.

Something to note as well is that minions will only start to attack you if you hit your opponent with an auto attack. If you just spam your abilities you can deal some damage to the enemy without fear of minion damage.

My problem was mainly that the wave would push to tower. I know that if I just use abilities then I won't draw creep aggro, but Riven's combo involves an aa after each ability for max (or really any) damage. I'm starting to improve a bit (not feeding and even carrying some), thanks to all, the advice was really helpful!

DonaldPlumpApr 1, 20151 votes

I used to have the same problem with Riven(if you want an easier champ that does just as good pick Irelia) but once I started weaving aa's into my combos I started to do a lot more dmg(because of passive). I then stared beating more of my lanes the issue I think you are having is that you might not have played a lot of top(correct me if im wrong) and you don't know the matchups well enough with Riven. Just keep playing her and you will get the hang of her personally I would suggest 3 combos to try: Number 1 qq(not engaging) e(into him) q(easy disable) aa(passive) w(third q allows an easy aa) then if u think you can you can add an r aa r aa Number 2: q aa q aa q aa w aa r aa r aa e aa(this one saves the e incase if u need to bail half way threw due to a jungle gank coming in from the enemy) Number 3: e aa w aa q aa q aa q aa r aa r aa. Now I realize im bronze 3 and that I fed a game of Riven in ranked(I tried her first in ranked it was a stupid choice) so take my advice loosely im just saying what helped me hope it helps you have a nice day. (>'.')>

Only Play DariusApr 1, 20151 votes

Early game a decent riven can 100-0 nasus. Problem is that a decent nasus will NEVER trade with riven early, and in order to harass, riven is forced to shove her lane due to AOE damage, and a decent Nasus will use this to his advantage to stack under turret at a perfectly good rate. Not to mention item 3110 is core on nasus so eventually he will have too much armor for her to burst him down.

BluePolarizerApr 1, 20151 votes

She doesn't. People are just bad.

Drunk RummateApr 1, 20151 votes

Nasus beats Riven actually. Riven naturally shoves the lane which he likes and after his first recall she loses all of her kill potential on him unless he was dumb and overextended for stacks.

Smart Nasus just plays safe levels 1-5, recalls for a gliacial shroud, teleports back into lane and then proceeds to get a million stacks. Riven can't stop him. Too much sustain and tankiness.

GaleWinUnleashedApr 1, 20151 votes

Basically Riven is unaffected by Wither if you use your abilities correctly. In that sense you counter Nasus. But otherwise, that lane isn't very likely to go anywhere unless Nasus is an idiot and overextends. Nasus should be doing everything in his power to create a situation where he can safely ignore you and farm his Q stacks.