Just a little tip for playing Garen in ranked for those who really like Garen

Odinblaze·Nov 1, 2014·15 votes·3,640 views

As someone who finds Garen enjoyable and loves his concept, I tried to figure out when I should pick Garen during ranked. I came to a conclusion recently. Only pick Garen when the enemy team specializes in 1 type of damage. Garen's W passive increases his armor/mr by 20%. This allows Garen to take 2 offensive items while still achieving around 300 armor or MR as long as he only stacks one type of resistance. Basically it makes you an almost unkillable tank that can still deal massive damage. Against AD teams I take armor/level seals and flat armor glyphs. Against AP teams I take MR/lvl glyphs and hp/lvl seals. Also I always go 21/9/0 and ignite because as Garen you want to have kill threat on your lane opponent. Make sure to take enchanted armor in defense to increase the level of stackage. Give it a try and let me know what you think.

These are my results so far in high Platinum MMR. It remains to be seen whether it will work in Diamond, but I am almost there so I will update you guys after I have played some Diamond games.

http://i.imgur.com/V32xQGm.png

15 Comments

DeMenditeNov 2, 20142 votes

As a fellow Garen lover, thank you for the tip. That's a very sensible point.

The ChinNov 1, 20141 votes

what damage items do you build?

OdinblazeNov 2, 20142 votes

what damage items do you build?

I love rushing Yomuu's first since it has so many uses, but in reality he actually has a lot of options and it is heavily situational. Yomuu's+IE is my favorite combo. If they are stacking armor Yomuu's + LW. If you're team is heavily AD and they are stacking armor BC+Last Whisper because your spin applies BC to multiple opponents. If you are stomping IE+LW. Hybrid offensive items like Atma's and Hexdrinker are great on him too, so if you have enough damage on your team you can build a hybrid damage item instead of a straight damage item. They also made it so he can use hydra during his spin, so hydra is also a decent option if you are stacking HP regen items.

StarrowNov 2, 201413 votes

what damage items do you build?

item 3128

OdinblazeNov 2, 20142 votes

what damage items do you build?

The 1 true way to win.

logiqueNov 2, 20141 votes

tag #7989

GorgiolioNov 2, 20141 votes

I can't really agree with the part about only using Garen when he is against a particular type of damage. If anything, his w should make him more useful than most tanks against multiple sources of damage. Also, I think Garen synergizes better with 9/21/0 because of the extra armor and healing benefits. His W will boost the extra armor/mr from the defense tree and the extra healing components boost his passive even more. Personally I like to rush a brutalizer as a first item on Garen to build it into a Black cleaver. The rest of my items are normally tank items. In one of your other comments you talk about getting an IE. I think you should tell people to only get that when you are very far ahead. This is mostly my opinion, so take it with a grain of salt.

OdinblazeNov 2, 20141 votes

I can't really agree with the part about only using Garen when he is against a particular type of damage. If anything, his w should make him more useful than most tanks against multiple sources of damage. Also, I think Garen synergizes better with 9/21/0 because of the extra armor and healing benefits. His W will boost the extra armor/mr from the defense tree and the extra healing components boost his passive even more. Personally I like to rush a brutalizer as a first item on Garen to build it into a Black cleaver. The rest of my items are normally tank items. In one of your other comments you talk about getting an IE. I think you should tell people to only get that when you are very far ahead. This is mostly my opinion, so take it with a grain of salt.

I understand what you are saying, but you have to remember a % increase is more effective the more you have. Meaning it's efficiency stays the same, but it's overall usefulness increases. Say you have 100 armor. Garen's passive gives you a 20 armor increase. But if you have 200 armor, that gives you a 40 armor increase. Meaning the more you stack of 1 type of resistance, the more useful Garen's passive is.

You are correct, 9/21 does synergize well with his kit. However Garen really does well by getting kills to get ahead of his opponent and snowballing them. 21/9 helps you do that. If you are not that great with Garen, 9/21 is absolutely great. But for experienced Garens, I definitely think 21/9 is better.

Normally I would agree with you about IE, however if you can specialize in one resistance you can actually afford to get IE even if you are only even. That's kinda the point of my post :).

Xela SyabNov 2, 20141 votes

imo you gotta build garen as a tank with 1 or 2 bruiser items. I go 9/21 mostly for tank stats and cc reduction. Runes ad reds , armor yellows, mr/cdr blues, regen /ms quints. I always rush dorans sheild or boots and pots, I rush tabi or swift boots first for damage mitigation (tabi for ad swift for ap since most have skillshots) then depending on team comp I rush giant's belt items for ad(warmogs, sunfire, or randuins) and kindelgem/negatron cloak items (spirit visage, locket) for ap it's really recommended to get all these items. IF I am absolutely destroying the enemy in lane or get 3 kills ahead I might rush brutalizer but I usually get BC as a 3rd or 4th item. Rushing health and health regen items on garen is important because it keeps him laning longer, mitigates poke, and helps you survive ganks. However you also have to deal some damage and I feel that Black Clearver is all you need for garen, it syncs with his whole kit. Other damage items that work but are situational are Maw if they have alot of burst mages, Yomu (garen doesnt need attack speed), IE (really just a steroid for e kinda underwhelming on garen), and Atma's (it's ok but only good as a 5th or 6th item), Garen can fit in most teamcomps since he deals alot of ad damage, he has alot of damage absorb and mitigation, really strong laning and can survive ganks well. Also I'm not trolling but he can be played bot lane as a sup against thresh and blitz since he can survive most of their initiation and can continue dealing damage with e while being crowd controlled plus he's hard to push out of lane and duels really well with most junglers.

AdaloreNov 2, 20141 votes

Garen is a blast but... picking him to stack a resistance type is sort of discounting how scary Garen is normally. Though I gotta say he feels like a ball of stats that explodes a person...like once you get your infinity edge and start crit spinning targets to death it gets REALLY silly.