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Years of conversation fill a ton of digital pages, and we've kept all of it accessible to browse or copy over. Whether you're looking for reveal articles for older champions, or the first time that Rammus rolled into an "OK" thread, or anything in between, you can find it here. When you're finished, check out the boards to join in the latest League of Legends discussions.
This guide is aimed at the Dominion player looking to improve their play and increase their numbers. It assumes you know the basics. If you don't know the basics of Dominion, check out Koravel's updated version of Nekrogen's guide: http://na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=3521564
Greetings, I am Sauron, the founder of the now defunct Point Defense [+5]: a competitive team that placed first in the NESL and DD Dominion tournaments many times. I am currently a player on the competitive team Clueless [???] For regular games, I almost always solo queue and hover around a +790 win difference, and lolmatches.com has me frozen in first place on the unofficial ladder worldwide at 2796 personal rating (peaking at 2818). Basically, what I'm trying to say is that I know my stuff and this guide is reliable and you can use it to slice bread and bake cookies.
Okay enough about me, let's get started on Dominion!
Section 2: General Improvements You Can Make:
(2–1). Attitude makes everything, or social situations you can improve
It's no secret (or at least it shouldn't be) that being a positive player helps you win matches. Got a teammate or someone who's feeding badly? Instead of harassing them about it, you should try to help them do what they're doing, or guide them otherwise. Teammate having lots of bad positioning? Just use a ping or two. Enemy assassin simply destroying you? Chances are they're simply taking advantage of your mistakes and are willing to point them out after the match, so don't rage at them.
Here are the types of things to do:
Situation: Teammate goes to their bot because they keep losing top, but he made it obvious to the enemy.
Bad response: Continue going top, or go bot as well.
Good response: Go through their jungle to harass and delay people that follow him.
Situation: Teammate pushing top minions because he keeps dying.
Bad response: "Go do something useful."
Good response: Neutralize their mid so one or two enemies recall from top in confusion, or try to get him to follow you to gank in the jungle.
Situation: Teammate keeps attacking Shaco clone.
Bad response: "Look at his feet for buffs."
Good response: *Pings real Shaco in fights*
Situation: Matchmaking pits solo versus premade.
Bad response: Yell in all chat about how unfair it is.
Good response: The premade is probably partial and willing to talk strategy after the match.
Situation: You're losing the game and there's no way to turn it around.
Bad response: Feed or troll to hurry it up, or just go afk.
Good response: Maximize your score for the lulz. Buy some defensive items. It's Dominion! You never know!
Situation: The #1 jerk (You know, *that* guy) is in your game and is being, well, a jerk.
Bad response: Incite your fellow summoners to rage against him!
Good response: Put him on ignore and file a quick report after the match before requeuing. The others can make up their own minds.
Situation: You went glass cannon and you're not doing so hot. Like, 0-10-0 cold.
Bad response: Keep buying glass cannon items.
Good response: Start stacking defense! It's cheap! Tank Ashe ftw!
Situation: Ally calls bot lane and picks a really questionable champion for it
Bad response: Queue dodge or avoid him all game.
Good response: Ask him if he needs an early gank, and do an early gank even if he says no. You'll get help whether you like it or not!
Situation: You're losing the game for reasons beyond your control.
Bad response: Blame Matchmaking.
Best response: Blame Nekrogen!
Not every game can be won no matter how positive you are. There will be losses sometimes. Remember to be friendly and not rage, and your enemies might send an invite or two your way. As long as you find a way to have fun, you win over time.
(2–2). General improvements to your runes and masteries
Your summoner's rune book only starts with 2 pages, so basically it's just a Table of Contents and an About the Author. You'll need at least a few more pages, and probably some more on top of that if you play multiple maps.
Anyways, at the very least you will want to use your two supplied rune pages for physical damage champs and magic damage champs, and a possible third for tanks. See below for a quick overview on a generic carry page:
(Note: This screenshot is from Season 2 so the numbers will be slightly different.)
Rune choices are fairly straightforward: You begin at level 3 so flat runes are situational, and you might want scaling runes if the breakeven point for them is low. Penetration runes will work well with flat penetration or % reduction builds, health seals are very generic and can go on any champion, and scaling magic resist glyphs are also quite popular. Quintessences, or "black" runes as they are called in the game files, are up to you but penetration and movespeed are both universal and strong for Dominion.
The big thing that stands out on this example page is that one of the marks was removed for a crit chance mark. That's because the crit chance mastery was removed, and Xypherous' RNG redesign is generous when it comes to low chances. It WILL cause crits to happen, sometimes against other champions, which can lead to you winning duels at low levels.
Spell Vamp and Life Steal Quintessences will not give you early game sustain. At all. Don't take them thinking they will and then get attritioned out badly in bot lane or something. They do help mid and late game though, just not early game. For fun times, try spell vamp quints on physical champions that don't normally get the stat!
Another odd rune page you might run is one full of mp5/level on a champion that gets Grail. The Dominion aura and the Chalice/Grail items (as well as Veigar's passive) all multiply the effectiveness of these runes. It's an option on those super mana hungry champs and the setup can potentially replace the traditional mana stacking of AA and FH.
Flat and scaling armor are also two very good sets of Seals to have. Given that many people will start the game with 31 ArPen, these go a long way in reducing their damage in the early game. Flat MR isn't quite as important as most abilities need to scale for damage, so I'd personally prefer scaling MR if you want defensive Glyphs. You'll probably want a set of flat armor Seals anyways so you can easily switch to Summoner's Rift jungling and Twisted Treeline should you feel like playing a different map.
A set of flat CDR glyphs is also very nice, if expensive, to have. You get 5.89% CDR from them, and with at least 9 in offense you're going to have 3-4% CDR from masteries. That makes itemization relatively easy for hitting the cap almost exactly.
Some champions like Udyr or Mordekaiser can make great use of health regen pages. Combined with a double Doran's start, this type of rune page can really keep them in the lane. Ryze will make good use of a full mana per level rune page with spell vamp, and Shen can also make great use of the costly energy regen page (considering how few options he has to improve that part of him).
Overall, every champion can get by using one of three generic pages, but when you have the IP to throw around, more rune pages can open up more options. Rune page bundles are pretty much the "best" investment of your RP if you're looking for gameplay performance, since you'll need to save your IP for the runes themselves. When you have lots of rune pages, clear them all and make a plaintext list of all the variations of the runes you'll ever need, then throw the pages all together at once. It helps to avoid duplicates by doing this.
Your rune pages can be called whatever. So long as YOU remember what they are, who cares how confusing they are to others. If someone asks which rune page you use for X champion, when your rune pages are called things like "kjdhgkhsd" and "jdfghskdjhgdf", just give them the page number.
You should always have 15-20 mastery pages ready to use. You should not have duplicate pages, and you should name your pages in a fashion that you can quickly figure out which one to use (Don't tie your mastery pages to specific champions). This allows for customization on the fly with respect to your planned items, which can change depending on team comps. Here's a screenshot example of what mine look like:
(Note: This screenshot is from Season 2 so the mastery trees will be different.)
In Season 3, most people will be running:
Basically there's not much to be gained from only partially allocating to the defensive tree unless you want 15 deep for the Tenacity. Not much to say about the new Season 3 masteries -- individually they're more varied, but their placements make for fewer viable setups.
(2–3). General improvements to your item builds
I will be covering specific item builds in the champion sections. Here are general item builds that can be used across many champions if you don't feel like delving into the individual choices:
Trinity Force + All defense items:
This works amazingly well on a lot of champions, most notably ones with *cough*broken*cough* abilities, such as Poppy. It can also work very well on champions like Irelia whose abilities generally don't scale. In Season 3, you can replace Trinity Force with Iceborn Gauntlet if your champion has AP ratios and mana.
Frozen Heart vs other armors:
I'll be frank, you want FH on at least one person on the team. The attack speed debuff applies to total AS, not additive AS, meaning it is extra effective. The 20% CDR is an excellent boost, and if you specced 9-0-21 as a mage with CDR runes, it's the ONLY item you need to hit the cap. I'm not saying the other defense items are bad, but Frozen Heart is REALLY good. Also, Glacial Shroud is a really nice component that allows for you to make a last-minute decision between FH and IG.
Stacking flat MPen:
This works wonders for burst champions that frequently target carries, as well as magic damage champions with bad ratios (such as supports and tanks). By penetrating their resists down to effectively zero, you do what is usually a fed burst mage's damage that went straight AP, except that you are tankier but only do this type of damage to squishies. I do not recommend this build for most bottom lane matchups, but it works very well for top lane.
Piecemeal Crit:
This build is any combination of the items: Trinity, Ghostblade, Atma's, and one other minor crit item. Rather than going hardcore crit with PD and IE, you can slowly stack it up with items that also have other purposes. It is effective on many melee champions, as it is cheaper and supplies you with actives and leaves room for QSS should you need a hard counter. This is one of the classic Dominion builds, though it was more effective in Season 2 where Executioner's had crit + lifesteal on it.
Last Whisper and hybrid defense items:
For champions like Kha'Zix that deal a lot of base damage of the physical variety, forgoing the conventional AD route can be the right thing to do against some matchups (such as vs Malphite). Hexdrinker, Atma's, Phage, and Glacial are all good choices on these champions as they come cheap, have some defensive stats, and have upgrades. Some of these champions can also add Trinity to the mix.
Warden's Mail:
I feel this item deserves its own section. For a cheap item that provides armor and has an upgrade, its proc makes it insanely good. The proc will debuff AS additively and MS multiplicatively, and while this means the AS debuff stacks with FH, it's nowhere near as strong. An upgrade being available for this item makes it all the more worthwhile of an early investment.
Health/Mana Potions:
You're probably thinking WTF am I putting these in here, but I've noticed something in my last hundred or so games: I seem to be the only person buying Health Potions beyond the 10 minute mark. Obviously not the reason I win games, but really, what else are you going to spend 105 leftover gold on? Just remember to use them liberally.
Berserker's vs Ionian:
Unless you're truly an autoattack champion, you're better off paying 150 (?) more gold for 15% CDR on your skills than you are paying for 20% AS. Attack speed is easy and cheap to come by, and only pays off if you're attacking non-stop -- something that's not likely to happen in many early and midgame situations. If you want offensive boots, get Ionian over Berserker's on most melee champions / AD casters / sometimes AP casters.
Merc Treads vs Ninja Tabi:
Chances are the enemy team is going to have both physical and magic damage, and in the case of someone like Jax they might have both, as well as CC. The answer is that unless they have a lot of non-knockup CC or you're playing the poke game heavily with their casters, you should be getting Ninja's Tabi if you want defense. It can be gotten earlier and the autoattack damage reduction (multiplicative) adds up really fast, as well as the passive on Ninja's cannot be negated by armor penetration.
Swiftness vs Mobility:
The answer is almost always Mobility unless you're bottom lane, in which case you should be going for different boots entirely. Swiftness should only be gotten on rare, slow-heavy matchups and you happen to be someone like Darius with little in the way of initiation.
Mobility + Ninja's Tabi / Sorc's:
This actually isn't a bad strategy for those that want to roam. You can get enhanced movement 5 while out of combat and still get the benefits of DR or stacked flat MPen. That said, building double boots is a situational matchup and you shouldn't be doing it without reason.
Alacrity vs Furor:
Except for a few champions that are aoe heavy or do lots of roaming, you always want Furor. The boost from it is about three times stronger than Alacrity and if you're able to keep it up, it is simply way better. You can also grab the movement buff from attacking a minion prior to charging at an enemy champion, which can give you that extra clutch distance that you might need to reach them for initiation.
(2–4). General improvements to your macro and map awareness
Turn this on for EVERYTHING. I am not joking. Skills, summoner spells, and items. Everything. You will need to smartcast ALL the things. ALL of them!
Learn spell ranges by hovering your cursor over skill icons, not by targetting them. Smartcasting cuts down an incredible amount of time spent clicking around. Smartcasting can save you in clutch ability uses and can really improve your play on spammy champions like Cassiopeia. It can ensure you get your spells off the moment you chase an enemy into the brush.
You can also learn spell ranges by clicking on the skill, which you'll probably only need to do to know the range of something like Lux ult when you're in no immediate danger and are just moving to the end point.
Smartcasting will also graduate from school whereas dumbcasting will not.
Map awareness:
You should glance at your minimap whenever you push a lane, go for a shrine, or approach brush. You should watch your minimap whenever you leave a capped point. You should put your camera over enemies with global ults in other lanes when you're capping a point.
Whenever an enemy is alive but not visible on the map, you need to make rough estimations on where they are or what they would be doing. When many enemies are not visible, it is simply not safe to push, extend, or roam into brush. Sometimes called "dude potential" for however many dudes that might sporadically appear and gank you, Dominion is a much nicer map than the others for predicting enemy movement. Learn to guess what the enemy is doing in fog of war, and never rule out the possibility they're waiting for a facecheck somewhere.
Don't be idle:
Don't sit on points. Go collect health packs or speed shrine, or scout the area briefly. If you absolutely must be near a point for a long period of time, be sure you're in the fog of war and to stay in the fog of war. It creates a "dude potential" for the enemy team as well as sometimes an assumption that you've simply recalled.
Backing and chasing backers:
When you recall, you typically do it at the very edge of brush to either provide vision or to avoid any skillshots that might enter the middle of the brush. If you are in no immediate danger and are simply backing to shop, do it on top of a speed shrine and then shop immediately so that you leave base with the buff still active.
When chasing someone into brush at a somewhat far distance where they could potentially recall before you get to them, if you have no skillshots to use on the brush you should use A + left click to do an attackmove into the brush. This causes you to automatically attack them the moment you enter, which can interrupt recalls that are just about to finish. Be sparing in using attackmove, however, because it will attack any minions or summons that are within a short range of your champion when you send the command.
Confusion can be an ally:
If there's 3 enemies top and 2 bot, backcapping their mid point could cause 2 enemies to recall or backtrack from wherever they are. Considering how at least one has to stop you, this helps your teammates more often than not -- just be sure not to get killed, and only neutralize the point if you must leave to save yourself. Some champions are very good at backcapping tactics like this, but try not to become too predictable with champions like Shaco.
Waste no time:
Whenever there is a lull in action anywhere on the map and you don't need to be paying attention to anything, such as leaving your base and walking to a speed shrine, open your shop and ready the next item to buy. This saves you time when you recall next, as you will neither click through menus nor misclick into wrong categories. It also helps if you're running Revive and can't afford to spend any time dead.
Know the timers:
Health packs spawn at 2:00 and respawn every 30 seconds after being taken. Relic spawns at 3:00 and respawns after 3 minutes after being taken. If you're in the area just a few seconds prior, stick around for them!
Always have a battle plan:
Whenever you expose yourself to danger you must have a plan of action should enemies show up. Here's an example of Jarvan in bot lane once he has enough CDR for two Q's to one E:
In clutch situations, you can suicide to avoid giving gold to an enemy. This opportunity does not present itself very often, but when it does you need to be decisive about it.
Keeping things neutral:
Using a long-range harasser or CC'er on someone on a neutralized point is a great way to just continually deny them until an ally shows up. Once that ally shows up, take off! Overall you'll have contributed to your team by pulling an additional enemy there.
Section 3: Strategies and Pathing on Dominion
(3–1). Typical strategies, movements, and pairing
Who's on first base:
I'll start this section off with a very simple move: The person who caps mid at the start of the game is firstly the person who has the least amount of poking ability on the team. If everyone is roughly equal on poking ability, it then falls to "melee over ranged" and then, if everyone is the same range, the person with the least amount of CC.
Pincer attacks:
The best way to chase someone is to cut off their possible routes of movement. In Dominion, the map is quite wide open so this isn't quite as easy to do as it is in the other maps. An example of a gank:
Swain here is low and has to cross the point, but remember you only pull turret aggro if you damage a champion. Swain can easily cross most of it, get off perhaps one or two spells and then begin a channel on the turret to nullify an attack before stopping channelling and continuing the chase.
Additionally, here is another good example of cutting off a person's escape path, because while they might be out of mana, they could still just walk away:
Rescinding ganks:
Here we have a Jarvan who mistakenly took bait and E+Q combo'd into Shen with his team not far behind (but out of vision range):
His teammate Teemo perhaps knew something was up, and was already going around the obstacle to poke at their midline. Though it doesn't seem like this would help, any confusion Teemo can draw from the two carries behind Shen is a great help to Jarvan. Teemo can generally run away while Jarvan can't, so if they decide to continue chasing Teemo then Jarvan may just survive the encounter.
Speaking of ganks:
This is why I said to not gank bot lane if you don't have a general idea where the enemy champions are. They may very well be thinking the same thing!:
Here, Swain tried to gank bot and was hit by a Q+W from Morgana, dropping him down a bit. The real killer, though, is that both Shen and Hecarim were already in unbeknownst pursuit because they wanted to gank Jax. Swain does not live through this.
Leading and baiting:
It's generally not a good idea to chase a champion that can place traps, because kiting in 1v1s can give them time to cycle cooldowns and engage on more favorable terms:
Yup, that's a dead Ezreal.
Who takes storm relic?:
The person with the most range, and then the person with DoTs takes the storm relic. A low health person should also never take it, as it goes to waste. Here we have an example of why Brand is a good choice for it; his passive triggers it:
When taking the storm relic, you should either have a good idea where the enemy top laners are, or you should have an ally in the top middle brush providing vision for you.
NEVER go into brush together, instead go in at a reasonable distance apart especially if Teemo is on the other team. Here's an example of what you might find in the enemy's speed shrine brush:
(3–2). Fog of War and team fights
As I said earlier in the guide, any time you spend in the fog is time you can use to either get into better position, or let the opponents move themselves into a worse position. In this example, Malphite went into the top brush at level 5 and emerged as 6, immediately ulting to initiate the team fight:
The ult catches Janna offguard who barely escapes, while the others move into a better position and Garen does exactly what he was picked for:
Later on, Malphite manages to cut Janna off from her team not far below the point. Janna wastes valuable time poking him back before realizing she should be up at top with her team. Malphite being down there also means he's not up there with his team, but his team is winning the fight and he can also ult to get there if need be:
Proper positioning and kiting to get there is very important. Here we have a team fight that initiated on Ashe, but she was able to ult and get away. That doesn't necessarily mean she should keep running, though, as she can still contribute with Volley at *very* long range and capping the turret. Meanwhile, Lux has something in store for all the people that conveniently lined up in chasing Ashe:
In a different game, the windmill fight starts with a pincer move by Riven, who was capping mid. Some poking has already happened:
Several bad moves are made in this fight, and though Vlad escapes, Ahri and Shyvana are both out of position from the rest of their team. Your positioning should be much more like Vayne's (if ranged) or Alistar's (if a tank) or Riven's (if a melee) in this screenshot:
Bushwhacking is a very good way to initiate fights, even if they don't completely facecheck it -- them getting close enough is usually okay for a gap closer. Here Riven bushwhacks 2 members of the enemy team, expecting her own team to follow up.
Ahri tries to be sneaky for some reason and ends up in a very, very bad position for a caster. Don't do this on AP carries, folks:
In another game, the importance of focusing targets is shown. Here we have a poke fight that results in Draven getting low, but instead of backing he decides to go around top to contribute in the most safe way possible:
It pays off as he is able to retreat when the enemy team attempts to initiate on him. This causes damage to be spread throughout his team, resulting in a 1v3 with two very low health members that can still contribute, but simply at a distance:
(3–3). Additional bottom lane strategies
Zoning is the act of keeping your opponent away from the minions due to the danger of your ability ranges. Typically called a zone of control in most video games, an example here would be the enemy Jarvan literally sitting by your caster minions, and you can't get close enough to last hit without taking at least his Q to the face. Some champions, like Morgana, require their skills to be off cooldown to represent any danger to the opponent. Here we have an example:
Here Morgana decided to use an early Dark Binding at her lane opponent, Jax. This is a mistake because now if Jax jumps her, the only thing she can fall back on is her W and E (Both ults are on CD in the screenshots). Indeed, Jax takes advantage of it before Morgana's Q is back off cooldown:
Fortunately she is Morgana so even if low on health she can still push the wave from a good distance away.
More on attrition lanes:
Sometimes both laners are harassers and they just keep going at it until one runs out of juice:
Humorously, their strategies are so similar that fights will often end up with kiting races to the health packs:
Attrition lanes are often best handled by stacking the defense type of the enemy laner.
Pusher lanes:
Champions like Udyr and Morgana and Janna are typically pusher lanes, where they focus on getting minion waves piled up and, for the most part, ignore trying to kill the enemy champion. That's not to say they don't engage the enemy champion, they just don't make a point of fighting to kill them.
Here we have a typical Udyr versus Ryze lane, with predictable results in the earlygame:
Can you guess what happens? I sure can!
Jjaja Binks demonstrates how Udyr wins bot lane.
(3–4). Champions that can hop walls, where can and can't they go
These screenshots will tell you what walls most champions can hop over. Note that they were tested with the champions hugging the walls as close as possible.
1: Nexus pit
Can hop: Kassadin only.
2: Base wall
Can hop: Most everyone with dashes.
3: Bot point southern obstacles
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Hecarim, Jarvan, Kassadin, LeBlanc, Malphite, Shaco, Shyvana, Tristana, Tryndamere.
4: Bot point northern obstacle
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Kassadin, Shaco, Tristana, Others at edges.
5: Bot point pit
Can hop: Kassadin, Ezreal at edges, Shaco, Tristana when slightly off-center, some ults at edges.
6: Bot lane wall
Can hop: Most everyone with dashes, part of wall varies with dash length.
7: Bot health pack wall
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Gragas, Hecarim, Jarvan, Kassadin, LeBlanc, Malphite, Sejuani, Shaco, Shen, Shyvana, Tristana, Tryndamere.
8: Bot lane speed shrine wall
Can hop: Kassadin, Shaco when off-center.
9: Nexus lane wall
Can hop: Kassadin only.
10: Side lane health pack wall
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Hecarim, Jarvan, Kassadin, Malphite, Shaco, Shyvana, Tristana.
11: Relic side wall
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Gragas, Hecarim, Jarvan, Malphite, Sejuani, Shaco, Shen, Shyvana, Tristana, Tryndamere.
12: Mid point obstacles
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Hecarim, Jarvan, Malphite, Sejuani, Shaco, Shen, Shyvana, Tristana, Tryndamere.
13: Mid point side obstacle
Can hop: Kassadin only.
14: Relic northern wall
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Hecarim, Jarvan, Malphite, Shaco, Shen (edge), Shyvana, Tristana.
15: Mid-top lane endpoint of brush
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Gragas, Hecarim, Jarvan, Kassadin, LeBlanc, Malphite, Sejuani, Shaco, Shen (edge), Shyvana, Tristana, Tryndamere.
16: Mid speedshrine obstacle
Can hop: Kassadin only.
17: Mid seperator from fog-to-fog
Can hop: Most everyone with dashes.
18: Top lane bottom corner
Can hop: Corki, Ezreal, Fiddlesticks, Hecarim, Jarvan, Malphite, Shaco, Shen (edge), Shyvana, Tristana.
19: Edge of top point bottom wall
Can hop: Most everyone with dashes, part of wall varies with dash length.
20: Top point top wall
(No screenshot)
Can hop: Most everyone with dashes.
Section 4: Champion Discussion and Strategy, A-F
Each champion is supplied with an example setup for those that are new to them, and a quick rundown on why they would be picked in Dominion.
Note that when items are listed in an example build with slashes, it is respective to other items in the build with slashes. Thus, if I listed "BFT/Void, Wooglet's/Sweeper" it means the BFT and Wooglet's are meant to be taken together, while the Void and the Sweeper go together for different situations/setups. The only real reason I'm pointing this out is that if you aren't following this, you'll probably exceed 40% CDR which would waste some of your gold.
Also, Sorceror's Shoes and Ionian Boots are the generic boots and are typically listed in the builds. If you're against a physical heavy team, get Ninja Tabi instead, and if you're against a non-knockup CC-heavy team, get Mercury Treads instead.
Disclaimer: The mastery/rune/item setups are not the end-all build for them, they're just good ones to get you started as you learn the champion before you start customizing what you want on them.
Quick explanation of the "roles" for each champion:
Section 5: Champion Discussion and Strategy, G-K
(5–1). Galio through Graves
Roles: Tank, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, flat MPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Merc's, Abyssal, Rylai's, Thornmail, Odyn's, Void
Strategy: Galio is taken as a counterpick to casters whether that be top or bot lane. With some AP his Q+E can clear caster minions and he is a dangerous champion to dive. Galio does not scale well so there's no way to work him around the tank role -- nonetheless a Void Staff will help him remain a threat when his ultimate is not up. The shield is of questionable use but just treat it like you would any shield and forget about it. Galio will want to be with at least one teammate at all times unless he is bot, and he should generally fight near turrets. That said, I don't prefer Galio being bot because he generally gets outscaled in 1v1 situations.
Roles: AD Carry, Tanky AD
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Tabi, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Gangplank is a decent enough melee pick for Dominion, but he doesn't scale anywhere near as well as the other melees. You'll generally want to use your ult for team fights, and you don't want to lead with its placement either -- plop it directly on top of where your tank is CCing. Gangplank is best built with piecemeal crit, in my opinion, and should rank E first because the damage increase for ranking Q isn't that great considering its ratio. If you ever use your ult to stop a capture, place the ult directly on center of the point. If you don't, people will just walk to the other side.
Roles: Tanky AD, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9 or 9-21-0
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Garen can struggle against cautious opponents, but if his team is capable of slowing or snaring them he will contribute a good chunk of damage. Building Garen as a damager (as opposed to tank) will help him contribute and scale a lot more in the match, and while he can get kited a lot in 1v1 situations, using brush near speed shrines (especially the brush below the top speed shrines) can allow him to hit-and-run before others show up. Garen is picked when a melee is needed and the team already has good CC.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-9-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Deathfire, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Gragas is a very good aoe/poke mage, and can handle many bot lanes due to his ability to clear minions. He has a lot of unexpected burst and can use E to keep up with running opponents, allowing him to finish the job. Gragas' E lets him go over quite a few walls and as such he's decent enough at jungle skirmishes even if his abilities aren't too suited for that. Just remember that Gragas is no tank, and while he can disengage he generally should keep his distance from combat.
Roles: AD Carry
Masteries: 21-9-0
Runes: ArPen, flat armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Berserker's/Merc's, Sanguine, Infinity, Statikk, LW
Strategy: If you're looking for ranged AD built for damage, Graves does a pretty good job. His smoke screen is by far his strongest ability, and careful placement of it can nullify a ton of damage. While Graves does do a lot of damage in close range, you still want to poke as much as possible and use E away from the enemy when they use any gap closers on you. Phage is an optional buy and will help him output more damage in a 1v1 situation by poking until it procs. Graves is picked when the enemy bot laner is either melee or not much of a damager, or he is picked for top lane when a ranged AD is needed and the team isn't huge on damage.
(5–1). Hecarim and Heimerdinger
Roles: Tanky AD
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, flat CDR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian/Tabi, Cleaver, Trinity/Iceborn, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker
Strategy: Hecarim is in kind of a bad situation in Dominion -- I've seen him do very well in TT and decent in SR. Hecarim excels at committing to 1v1 ganks and he will indeed carry a game IF the game is already in his team's favor. When it isn't, he's in a bad position and can't do very much at all about it. Hecarim will not solo Wukong, Jax, Darius, Jarvan, Riven, or pretty much any melee unless he has a gold/experience/health advantage to begin with. He does have the ability to Q and autoattack while kiting, but this utility goes away if the opponent actually sits there and fights back. Hecarim's E is probably the most noteworthy thing about his kit, and it can either be used to initiate a gank or to kite away from a lost fight, but not both because the cooldown on it is simply horrendous. His ult is largely used as a gap closer with CC, and for all intents and purposes his W can basically be treated as a minor shield.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Rylai's, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Contrary to popular belief, Heimer is as good of a top laner as he is bot. His turrets with his ult allow him to kite for a very long time, and diving him can be very dangerous due to his stun and his synergy with Zhonya's. Leveling W before E can be appealing, and may be the answer if you're new to Heimer, but so long as you can hit targets with E you should level that before W. Heimer's ult should be used whenever someone jumps on him, and when it comes to defending a point his turrets should be placed in a way so that one of them is 25% from the center, towards the enemy, and one is about at the center, and they shouldn't be next to each other. Away from a point, you want one turret in a brush and the other some distance away towards a point you own, so that if you get dived you can juke them into brush for an E and then continue kiting with your ult.
(5–2). Irelia
Roles: Tanky AD
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, flat CDR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Tabi, Trinity, Cleaver, Ghostblade, Hexdrinker, Mercurial
Strategy: Typically taken top when a sturdy melee with CC is needed, Irelia can either go the listed build, or go a pure tank build with Trinity (as was described earlier). This is largely because the nature of her abilities don't have her scaling all that much, although she does do a lot of damage. There isn't anything particularly difficult about playing Irelia in Dominion other than that she's more used for ganking past the earlygame than others are. Follow the tank in when he initiates and E a healthy damager the moment you start taking damage -- use your ult for additional damage. Irelia's ult is actually quite damaging in team fights given its relatively short cooldown, and should be used early. When not in team fights, the ult can be used to really harass someone trying to capture a point, and can let you hold out until help arrives when you're very low.
(5–3). Janna through Jayce
Roles: Support, Tanky Mage, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Mana Regen, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: E->W->Q
Items: Merc's, Sweeper, Grail, FH, Bulwark, Abyssal
Strategy: Janna is like, always top 5 in every game mode it seems. Janna can potentially go bot with an AP build but is usually taken top with an almost all tank/aura build. Janna's job is to CC the heck out of everyone around capture points and to CC the heck out of anyone trying to chase her carries. Her ult generally gets used when Janna herself gets threatened and Q is on cooldown. Janna's game really is all about kiting, which is an appropriate term given her theme. Basically, just watch the enemy and follow whoever they focus, and try to interrupt them while shielding their target.
Jarvan IV:
Roles: Tanky AD, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, flat CDR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: I broke into competitive Dominion using Jarvan, and prior to that people's opinions of him were pretty low. As it turns out, his capacity for burst damage and his insta-CC similar to Jax makes him an extremely capable bottom laner, and he only needs minimal CDR to Q twice to the same E. Ever since they changed his passive to physical, you no longer run the potential of reducing its effectiveness by Q'ing first, so go crazy with your harass. Two things about Jarvan that you should know, though: his E will not cast at beyond maximum range (that is to say, he'll move forward to use it at the location, not just use it at maximum range in that direction) and yet his Q will. This means that if you're not careful with his E range, you can easily accidentally end up burning your Q before your E is placed. The second thing you should know about Jarvan is that the knockup width for his Q+E combo is very wide and you can basically Q+E to yourself while inside someone, and unlike many skillshots it will actually hit them.
After Jax got his E and R remade, he's generally been picked over Jarvan. But if Jax is not available, Jarvan is the next go-to champ for physical melee burst in bottom lane.
Roles: Tanky AD, Bot Laner, Hypercarry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, flat CDR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Jax is one of the top duelists, as expected, and really does put the piecemeal crit build to good use. Jax is one of the hottest picks for both top and bottom lanes, and his abilities allow him to excel against all but a few matchups. Jax is not much of one for defending points, but when it comes to jungle and small team fights he is at his best. Jax pairs best with supports but he also works with tanks. His physical damage output is far greater than his magical, so you should be focusing on that. Do not build him as on-hit or hybrid, as it reduces his potential for making his passive go crazy on crits and lifesteal. Build up stacks of his passive on minions and leap onto an enemy when you're 2/3 of the way to an ult proc.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner, Hypercarry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, flat CDR or scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W->R
Items: Ionian, Ghostblade, Infinity, LW, Sanguine, Cleaver
Strategy: Jayce is one of the most OP champions across all maps and he's most effectively built the same on Dominion as he is anywhere else: AD carry. Ranking Q first allows him to have a very bursty early game and E will give him and his allies superior kiting due. While W will end up being the strongest skill in his ability set, it doesn't take off enough without items to warrant ranking it early. Unlike other champions, Jayce has the option to not bother ranking R until last, as his other abilities are so good, and many high Elo Jayce players on Dominion will indeed choose to rank it last.
If you're looking for a ranged AD carry that "has it all", as in, damage/range/cc/steroids/disengage/burst/sustain/utility/everything, then look no farther than Jayce. He's broken. Nothing can compete with him for this role. Goes for Jayce on all maps, too.
(5–4). Karma through Kog'Maw
Roles: AP Carry, Support, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Sorc's, Sweeper, BFT, Void, Wooglet's
Strategy: Karma gets a rework. Rework turns out to be really good in Dominion but not SR. Riot buffs Karma due to SR. Apparently it wasn't enough, so they buff her again and again. Now we have a near god-tier Dominion support champion alongside Lulu. Karma's cooldowns are low and she excels at doing absurd damage at long range and can really amplify melee allies. Learn to land the Q's, and save the W's and E's largely for special case scenarios -- the Q does enough damage on its own to play like this. Mantra when you know a Q will hit (often due to the root on your W) or you really need that overbuffed heal on W. Karma excels in Dominion largely due to open areas and lack of minions to block Q's, and she should be played very kite-y and just out of range of whomever she is fighting.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP or spellvamp quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian/Sorc's, Revolver, BFT/Rylai's, Rylai's/BFT, Wooglet's, Void
Strategy: Karthus is one of those mages that must be exceedingly map aware in order to work. Typically taken bot lane for his zoning and ult, Karthus should focus on simply farming and pushing back the minion waves against most champions. Once he is around 9 or so and can afford some items, he should be focusing more on keeping the opponent away from the minions. Karthus's W, combined with Rylai's on Q, allow him to avoid many ganks IF he was smart enough to be in a good position in the first place. That's the thing, Karthus's overall macromanagement and positioning are a lot more important than his micro and landing his Q. Use your ultimate when you see your team about to start a fight up top, but be sure you're in brush or out of sight so you can't be interrupted by your lane opponent.
Karthus is and has always been a notoriously buggy champion (almost all bugs being bad for him). Be sure to learn the ins and outs of this champion's scripting before taking him in serious play.
Roles: AP Carry, Hypercarry, Tank, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Merc's, Archangel's, FH/BFT, Void, Odyn's,
Strategy: The holy grail of "Overpowered" on Dominion. This particular build is something that lower or newer players will say "wat" about. Kassadin CAN be built as a glass cannon mage, but ZaberZ and I realized that if you build him as almost pure tank and use his ult very offensively, he contributes both tanky AP and tank roles to the team while being very hard to counter even by skilled opponents. This build sacrifices much of Kassadin's general midgame strength in favor of an unstoppable lategame. Use his ult to initiate and to escape, if you're taking too much damage. Use his ult to cross the map and splorge a ton of stacks on someone. Use his ult to be that ganker that the opponent can't do anything about even if he fights back.
Tank Kassadin's gameplay isn't quite the same as a burst "Glassadin" but it is definitely stronger as a team player.
Roles: AP Carry, Hypercarry
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Rylai's, Abyssal
Strategy: Just like in SR, picking Katarina in Dominion is a crapshoot -- it either works really well or it doesn't work at all. In team fights against opponents who seem to have a dedication for disrupting your ult, you can always just Q+E+W and not ult. This either makes them waste their CC on you immediately, or wastes their CC in the team fight if they keep saving it for when you ult. Since many people view CCing Katarina as some sort of autowin strategy, building her tanky so that it's helpful to your team if they focus you is a good idea. Katarina should stick with her team as she will rarely ever win a 1v1, and unless she went pure tank should go in after the initial aoes have been used. Avoid jungle skirmishes with this champion.
Roles: AD Carry, AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR or AP, MPen quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Sorc's, Nashor's, BFT, Gunblade, Wooglet's/Guinsoo's
Strategy: Thanks to her slow, splash, and her ult, Kayle gets to build just like a ranged AD or AP and often gets away with it. A surprisingly good bottom laner (or perhaps not so surprising, to you TT players), Kayle makes great use of all stats and can really force someone into a lose-lose situation. Kayle clears minion waves quite easily which gives her the ability to really focus down on the enemy laner. Is the enemy laner in range? Q and E! Is he running? Keep fighting! Is he fighting back? Kite! Is he actually a match for you? Use ult as a second Exhaust!
Roles: AP Carry, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 21-9-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Rylai's, Abyssal
Strategy: Unlike in SR and TT, Kennen in Dominion is no team fight initiator; in fact, Kennen will generally get killed if he tries something like that. Kennen is another poke and-kite-caster, but he does have a stun and escape so he's harder to kill than others. Kennen is a great point attacker and defender, though his E will generally let him handle jungle skirmishes pretty well. Kennen should be with his team until he has a reliable slow, typically Rylai's, at which point he can fare much better alone than before. Use your ult when you have at least two people near you, but don't burn it if it's not going to kill anyone around you. Let your tank initiate before deciding whether or not the ult is needed, or if E+W will do the job alone.
Roles: Tanky AD
Masteries: 21-9-0
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, flat CDR or scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Evolution: E->Q->W or R
Items: Merc's/Ninja's, Cleaver, FH, LW, Maw
Strategy: The champion is overpowered, but he reaches a new level of OP when built like Darius: tanky+penetration. Tankhazix gives Tankassadin a run for his money at throwing matches and the usual KZ play is used: even though you're tanky it is still unwise to initiate teamfights. KZ can withstand so much damage with this build so he often gets to run through a teamfight unscathed to reach the enemy squishies, because people attack him once and realize they deal no damage so they switch targets. KZ is a great roamer and is an excellent gank partner to a magic damage bottom laner. If someone reveals you in your ult, just keep fighting because it hardly helps them.
Roles: AD Carry, Hypercarry
Masteries: 21-9-0 (dualpen)
Runes: Attack speed, flat Armor, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: W->E->Q
Items: Berserker's, Mallet, Sanguine, LW, Infinity
Strategy: The cute little void-puppy is the absolute terror of lategame. He needs farm to work, but he will not work terribly well in bot lane unless the enemy laner is a very passive one. Kog's E, if used on chokepoints, can often put enemies into lose-lose situations where you outrange them with W and they can't escape, or you simply kite backwards if they try to reach you. This must be done on chokepoints otherwise an enemy will sidestep the slow and you'll only remain a threat if you have Phage procs. Kog can be built in a number of ways, and while I see some people swear by AS/onhit or pure AP, I personally fear him when he goes AD and he has tanks to protect him from gap closers. If Kog goes AD he's dealing both types of damage, and while building for two penetrations is inefficient, you need to realize it is also inefficient for an opponent to counter you by building both Armor and MR.
Section 6: Champion Discussion and Strategy, L-N
(61). LeBlanc through Lux
Roles: AP Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Void, Rylai's
Strategy: LeBlanc is one of those champions that I see end games with very good scores and KDA ratios but often lose the match. That's largely because playing a glass cannon to counter glass cannons doesn't add up to a whole lot in team fights. It adds up to a good ganker, not a good teamfighter -- if you're skilled with LeBlanc, you'll show this stereotype to be wrong. Anyways, I highly recommend reading section 3 of this guide as it covers which walls LeBlanc can W over and which ones it looks like she can, but really can't. LeBlanc almost always mimics her Q for its huge damage unless she needs to cross a lot of distance, then its W instead. LeBlanc should disengage from fights the moment she is focused, and really should be playing like a slippery burst caster that looks for positioning opportunities and gets back out immediately. Though LeBlanc can't handle actual CC and damage sent her way, if you're able to instead grab their focus via positioning (i.e. getting two people to chase you away from a team fight, so that the remainder is 3v2), then you're doing a lot to contribute for your team. Also, W'ing over a wall and waiting for someone to follow you over it and then reactivating W will make them very frustrated.
Lee Sin:
Roles: Tanky AD
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W or Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, Ghostblade, Cleaver, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Not the easiest melee to use, but Lee's double gap closing really lets him move around in a team fight depending on what's needed. Though he has an almost-free poke, it's not very damaging even if you land it, reactivate it and then immediately W back out. Typically when poking, people are high on health and Q's bonus damage won't be too high. Lee Sin really shines with his E, allowing him to greatly slow the attack speed in the same manner as Malphite (drop to total AS rather than additive) which can slow an enemy to a crawl momentarily. Use R in team fights when you see people in a line -- the knockups are extremely helpful and it does quite a bit of damage. Typically when chasing you'll use W to close distance so that you can be sure Q lands, then finally E them once you reach them; when fleeing, always go towards an allied target for your W. Lee Sin is a great duelist so he shouldn't be afraid of starting jungle skirmishes but he should be cautious about reactivating Q the moment it hits someone in a brush, because their teammates are *probably* nearby.
Roles: Tank
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Merc's, BFT, Abyssal, Iceborn Gauntlet, Odyn's
Strategy: As a singletarget tank, you want to move to an enemy carry in a teamfight and stick to him like glue, spamming your stun. Use your ult when it will hit more than one person, don't wait for the optimal time, and simply keep using your Q and E on people. Use W when focused -- Leona is a decent enough point defender. Stick with your team and when moving through the jungle, E brush from around corners so that you can get close enough to anti-bushwhack someone without them backing out. Leona's strategy is straightforward but her micro is not, so get some practice in landing those E's and R's before using her for real.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 9-0-21
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP or scaling MR, MS quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Sorc's, Sweeper, BFT, Void, Wooglets
Strategy: One thing I've noticed with Lissandra is that she is great with movespeed. So great, in fact, that you can often combine a utility spec with an early Sweeper and get away with ranking W first. Using your E largely to escape bad situations, its cooldown does not need to be terribly low and the reduced cooldown on W will be a great asset to your offense. Learn the aiming on the Q and its range change when hitting minions -- it is crucial to land these if laning bot. A recent patch changed her self-target ult into a Wooglet's equivalent, and there's no denying its ability to cause a lose-lose situation for opponents when combined with Wooglets itself. That said, in most cases you will probably be using your ult on a foe to ensure a kill.
Roles: Support, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, flat CDR, MS quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Abyssal, Sweeper/Iceborn Gauntlet, Odyn's
Strategy: Lulu is basically the "best" support on Dominion because her base numbers are so high that the ambient gold gain makes the tanky/mpen build on her ludicrously effective. To top it off, she doesn't need ranks in W, which lets her level the base damages without sacrificing any actual support-ness. Her E and Q will give her a ton of control and damage at range and she can indefinitely stop someone from capping a point, and Q is basically a skillshot that a skilled Lulu will land every time with the enemy being unable to do anything about it. While she is strong and nigh un-duelable on her own until lategame, Lulu should still be taken top to be with the team. When W is at low rank, use it for the speed buff frequently, unless the enemy melee didn't go Merc's. Use your ult on anyone who gets focused and drops below half health, and basically keep spamming Q and E throughout the team fights.
Roles: AP Carry
Masteries: 21-9-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, flat CDR, MS quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, BFT, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Void, Rylai's
Strategy: Quite a few top Lux players swear by the tanky/mpen build, as it's generally what she needs to support her team while still being a threat, but if you have good tanks or a lot of CC on the team you can go more of a glass cannon route and simply just position yourself WAY back, backpedaling with Q if anyone beelines for you. Always use your ult when it will hit more than one person, and if only one is shoopable, at the very least apply your passive to them first. Lux's E is very hard to dodge due to it being larger than displayed, and W is often just thrown around in team fights without additional thought. Focus on landing your Q's more than anything else, stick with the team, and poke the heck out of people at turrets.
(62). Malphite through Morgana
Roles: Tank, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Merc's/Tabi's, BFT, Iceborn Gauntlet, Abyssal, Randuin's/Odyn's
Strategy: The final say in stopping autoattackers, Malphite makes great use of armor stacking and MPen to do tons of damage to the right clickers that would challenge him. Only Darius will give Malphite problems out of all the melees. Malphite's game is a bit different in that once midgame hits, his main job is to follow around the enemy Jax (and there WILL be one) and constantly try to 1v1 him. Q will allow you to disengage when other enemies show up, but his damages combined with E causing a total AS loss (rather than being additive) makes fighting him as an autoattacker almost completely futile. Do not be afraid to ult at point blank if the knockup will save your carry's life. The only time Malphite cannot take a Jax is when Jax went full hatemode and stacked lifesteal with LW and MR.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, scaling AP, MPen quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Void, Rylai's
Strategy: Thanks to the horrendous penetration changes in Season 3, Malzahar is now back to being AP. Malz hinges entirely on landing his Q, so back off if it misses. W is an excellent way to get a free BFT proc on the enemy, and try to use your Q in tandem with your E so that you zone the enemy champion into an awkward lose-lose area where they will either get hit with Q, or get hit with the E that is just about to jump off a nearby minion. Pretty much the king in zoning in bot lane, Malz actually doesn't do well versus ganks and will often need to back away to be safe.
Roles: Tanky Mage, Tank
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Merc's, BFT, Iceborn Gauntlet, Abyssal, Rylai's, Void
Strategy: Very few champions can deal with Maokai's insane base numbers, and while the tree does have problems finishing people off, he can easily push them out of the lane if they get too aggressive. Maokai gets to build almost purely defensive against the enemy bottom laner because of his base numbers, using the bigger mpen items to carry this playstyle into the lategame. Do not toggle your ult off prematurely for damage -- keep it up and stay in it and only drop it when the enemy is about to leave. Keep a sapling around the health shrine or speed shrine and you'll see most ganks coming.
When Maokai is top, he scouts and holds/attacks points with the team. Aside from that, he provides the standard repertoire of tanking, but without the focus on him normally present in 1v1s he will not do as much damage as he will in bottom lane.
Master Yi:
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, Deathfire, Void, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Lich Bane
Strategy: AP Yi is one of the best stalematers of bottom lane. As an opportunist, he uses his Q when his opponent gets in range of his minions and the bounces will damage him badly. Alpha Strike can also be used on a minion that's just about to die, so that when it dies during the untargettable status you end up exactly where you began when you cast it. Brush is very important to AP Yi who must wait on his Q cooldown, and Meditate should be done some distance away from enemies that have interrupts or healing reductions. Once midgame starts transitioning to lategame AP Yi can get a ton more aggressive with Deathfire and his Q ratio.
AP Yi's ult is primarily used for running away from ganks, unless there'a a possible reset.
Miss Fortune:
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Berserker's/Merc's, Sanguine, Infinity, Statikk, LW
Strategy: Miss Fortune is usually taken top when picked, where she can put her Q to good use in defending a turret. Her W is not bad, and E can help catch fleeing opponents. Due to the large number of DoTs and fights usually frequently happening with minions around, MF usually gets knocked out of her passive as soon as a fight starts. Her ult is largely used to clear minion waves, but it can sometimes be used when blinders are around or you're somewhat low in a team fight and you can't go back into autoattack range. With the lack of a strong slow or an escape ability, positioning is more important for Miss Fortune than it is for any other ranged AD, so keep an eye on that.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, MPen quints
Order: huE->Q->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Void, Rylai's
Strategy: Mordekaiser is a bottom laner and does not have a terribly strong start. Leveling his E first is an obvious choice as it lets him harass and push at the same time, while Q versus W is more of a situational decision. If you're dealing with someone you frequently get close range with, take Q, or if they keep getting close to their minions, take Q and use the splash on it to hit them. Otherwise, take W. Morde doesn't do a whole lot other than farm and harass until he's level 9 or so, when he can start to actually make moves on the enemy laner.
And if you didn't know, Morde's Q converts Lich Bane to magic damage, which can be devastating if they're alone and you decided to go Gunblade for some reason. Unfortunately both items are very expensive and so usually not taken.
Roles: AP Carry, Tanky Mage, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: W->Q->E
Items: Ionian, BFT, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Void, Rylai's
Strategy: Morg is one of the strongest counterpicks to melee in bot lane, and that is because she can push the lane with just W. Melee used his gap closer on you? Immediately Q him. Does he have a CC? Use E too. Her passive comes into play quite a bit, letting her do trading like this. Morg's ult should be used after Q's snare has worn off and you want to kill the laner -- cycle your CCs like this to get more sustained damage on him. Do note that even though your E only blocks magic damage, it will still stop CC effects making it useful. If you have Zhonya's, you can use its invulnerability as part of the wait for your other skills to be off CD (assuming they're committed to the fight, not running away).
Morgana can also do top lane, in which case you'll want to build tanky rather than go for Zhonya's, so that you can survive more damage in team fights rather than wait for that perfect focus moment.
(63). Nasus through Nunu
Roles: Support
Masteries: 21-0-9 or 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, flat CDR, MS quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, BFT, Abyssal, Sweeper/Iceborn Gauntlet, Bulwark
Strategy: Nami is not easy to play in Dominion but the narrow corridors do help her ultimate hit multiple people. It's hard to justify picking her over Sona or Lulu, but Nami's Q does bring some nice CC to the table. Like all supports, Nami should never be left alone and will enjoy defending points when the opportunity comes up. She will struggle a lot with gap closer assassins like Akali and Talon, so give yourself extra distance if against those types of champs.
Roles: Tanky AD, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 21-0-9 or 9-21-0
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E (Standard) or W->Q->E (versus autoattacker) or E->Q->W (versus pusher)
Items: Tabi/Merc's, Cleaver, Iceborn Gauntlet, Ghostblade, Odyn's/Randuin's
Strategy: Definitely a bot laner -- Nasus's Q won't farm up to anywhere close to what it does in SR, but I haven't seen Nasus do terribly well in top lane, ever. Once the icon of champion balance, Nasus has certainly fallen by the wayside but his Wither will still allow him to go up against quite a few melee champions in bot lane. AP on him is not wasted due to E being able to clear minion waves, and Q continues to be fairly strong with Trinity though many newer champions are also spamming onhit Q's too. Nasus should ult as soon as a team fight starts, or in a 1v1 the moment you know the enemy can't escape and can only turn and fight you. Use W to get in a lot of favorable trades.
Roles: Tank, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Tabi/Merc's, Odyn's/Thornmail, Abyssal, Locket, FH
Strategy: Naut will fail in pretty much all 1v1s but excels in 2v2s. Use Q to make melees run back to their target over and over so that they miss attacks, use R when you see multiple people in a line, and just try to initiate advantageous fights. Nautilus shouldn't ever be alone, though with Garrison he can hold a turret for a decent while, and he is very good at bushwhacking. Nautilus will pair best with ranged ADs.
Roles: AP Carry, AD Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, MPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Sweeper, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Poker extraordinaire. Place traps at edges of brush and throw spears lengthwise at them. Your spears will be almost always be invisible to the enemy if you throw them from fog of war, so keep that in mind. You want to avoid getting in melee range as much as possible and good placement of your traps will let you escape many ganks. Stay in the back, and in fog of war if possible, and do your damage from there. Always heal your ranged AD or any other autoattacker if you do not have one. Nidalee is not a 1v1 champ but she can indefinitely stop a capture and she can definitely harass in the jungle.
Roles: AD Carry, Tanky AD, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Nocturne does a surprising amount of damage when building tanky, but nonetheless I prefer it when Nocturne on my team is building damage. Noc should be using his shield when he expects CC to come in, and not waste it on blocking standard damage. I feel lifesteal plays an enormous factor on Noc's survivability considering his buffs and his ability to lock someone down for a short while. Nocturne will generally be with his team, poking with Q and waiting for a real tank to initiate -- in the jungle he can hold his own especially when he uses Q to check brush. His ult is often used to gank the bottom laner, but it's useful all-around for getting to the action or chasing someone who got low in a team fight.
Roles: Tanky Mage, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: E->W->Q (top) E->Q->W (bot)
Items: Ionian, BFT, Revolver, Visage, Wooglet's, Abyssal/Void
Strategy: Nunu's Q will let him go bottom lane and his E will let him win many trades with physical champions. Nunu in bottom lane plays out as an attrition pusher, where he just keeps E'ing the opponent while autoattacking minions and Q'ing them when he takes damage. Nunu bot lane will defeat quite a few melee derps until they've sufficiently levelled, and focusing on CDR and spellvamp will keep them struggling. I hate you inFe eD, this champion is zero fun to play against lol.
Section 7: Champion Discussion and Strategy, O-S
(7–1). Olaf and Orianna
Roles: Tanky AD, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: W->Q->E (standard) or Q->E->W (versus tanks) or Q->W->E (bot lane vs pushers)
Items: Ionian, Ghostblade, Mallet, Atma's, Randuin's, Maw
Strategy: Olaf isn't very fast, but like Sion if he can get that distance closed he can do a lot of damage. Olaf's Q is amazing if you can reliably land it, and his E is extremely useful for taking out Malphite and ulted Alistar. His E combined with the passive armor penetration he gets results in an option of skipping LW, which is an interesting and situational choice to take. Olaf should be looking for 1v1 possibilities as well as for anyone that gets out of position; as a result he is a very good bushwhacker and ganker if his gankmate can apply slows or CC at the start. W is just a steroid and E will get spammed anyways regardless of target -- Olaf is very easy to use once you've figured a way into the fight without getting kited. Just practice landing your Q's against fleeing targets and you've got a foot in the door for using Olaf.
Note that there is a minor bug with Olaf. If he is under an allied turret and the turret is happily shooting minions (i.e. no enemy champion in range) and Olaf uses his E on a minion, the turret will get confused and stop firing until Olaf moves off the turret. This can cause a neutralize in some clutch situations. I assume it happens because Olaf deals damage to himself, rather than paying health to use the ability like Morde does, and the turret wants to target him because he's a champion but he's also an ally so it doesn't do anything until targetting is lost.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Void, Sweeper
Strategy: Orianna is still a decent pick, provided you know how to use her well. Typically sent bot, Ori does a very good job of pushing minions and general harassment of the enemy laner if they get too close, otherwise skip the harass and just farm. Use your Q for most of this, and if things get too frisky use W and E and kite back. Your ult should be used whenever the enemy laner thinks about doing something to your turret -- knocking them into it and combined with the slow from W can be very lethal. In top lane, play Orianna like you would any other mage: stay back, use turrets, and try to fight near the chokepoints.
(7–2). Pantheon and Poppy
Roles: AD Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Pantheon is one of the strongest AD casters in Dominion but he is decidedly an earlygame champion. In order to scale with everyone else he will need an early LW. I prefer ranking Q before E because Q can crit for 150% damage, generally letting me finish someone off one autoattack faster which is usually exactly what's needed to survive. Harass people with Q and position your E's after stunning people to hit more than just your target.
Pantheon's ability queuing bug has been fixed, so don't bother trying to queue W out of R now (you still can but it will no longer track outside of W's range). R.I.P. Grand Skyfail.
Roles: Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Mana Regen, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, Iceborn Gauntlet, Abyssal, BFT, Void, Odyn's
Strategy: If you're new to Poppy, I'll make this simple: Q converts onhit procs to magic damage. That's why you get MPen on her even on AD builds. Poppy is very dangerous to squishies and safe positioning or stacked MR is really the only counterplay you can have against her. Poppy is a roamer but generally not a 1v1 roamer -- she will excel in jungle skirmishes with small amounts of people in them. Poppy is also very good at kiting if things go wrong -- you can create uneven matchups in your team's favor by getting two people to chase you away from the main conflict. Focus on landing your stun and simply kiting with people using Phage procs until their allies show up; ganking bot lane is also an attractive option for Poppy. Surprisingly, Poppy runs out of mana very frequently.
(7–3). Quinn
Roles: AD Carry
Masteries: 21-9-0
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: W->E->Q or E->W->Q
Items: Zerker's, Sanguine, PD, IE, Maw
Strategy: Quinn wasn't really designed for this map, but after her buffs she got much better. E should generally not be used against anyone who has an orange outline as they're probably going to hit you with an onhit attack if you E them, and you may lose more in the trade. Getting E to go backwards over a wall is very situational, but if Quinn has vision she can at least go over some of the thinner walls for chasing -- this is one of those things that seperate good Quinn players from great ones. Use Q against other AD carries and W when your team goes through the jungle. Tag Team is typically used to initially cross some distance before fighting a 1v1 -- usually when an opponent is capping your turret and no one is nearby. Quinn becomes deceptively strong during her ult, but it is best used when both she and her foe are full health and that additional speed will allow Quinn to win an in-your-face engagement with them, instead of just a kite-fite.
(7–4). Rammus through Ryze
Roles: Tank, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: E->W->Q
Items: Merc's, Thornmail, BFT, Abyssal, Void, Odyn's
Strategy: Once considered a must-ban on Dominion, Rammus fell out of favor once people realized just how OP Malphite is against autoattackers. Sure, Rammus can still zoom and boom, but when it comes to multiple autoattackers in team fights he's at a bit of a loss. Rammus is an initiator at heart and is very good at starting team fights, so ping early and roll into them. Use taunt on the most threatening enemy (not always an autoattacker) and simply let the passive damage pile up. Rammus' ult has a very short cooldown so it will typically be up every team fight -- don't "save" it when you get into a jungle skirmish. Depending on enemies and their builds, Rammus is also a great roamer in the enemy jungle.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: E->W->Q or W->E->Q
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Renekton has troubles in top lane, but he can do fairly well in bot lane against some matchups. Long slated for buffs and long ignored, the gator suffers from bad scaling and slow fury generation. Like in TT, use your E+W to harass and Q to push minions, and use the brush a lot. It is important to get E and W leveled because their cooldowns decrease, while Q is just damage. Renekton, like Nasus, should ult when the enemy either commits or doesn't have an escape to use.
Gators gonna gate.
Roles: AD Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, Bonetooth, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Sanguine
Strategy: I really prefer it if Rengar goes the glass cannon route, using smart play and positioning for survivability. AD Rengar, as opposed to tankyderp or pure tank, doesn't really partake in team fights until initiation has happened and a good portion of the abilities have been used. The reason why I prefer Rengar like this is that if he can keep up the good play, he can use positioning and abilities to exit out of bad fights before any commit happens, while remaining uncounterable to AD and AP carries unless they group up... which most don't. Rengar is a champion where macro is much more important than micro, and good overall strategy and positioning will trump dextrous skill and reflex.
I see Rengar's use their ultimates best when low on health and forced to run away from capping a turret or just after a fight -- then hang around and wait for the enemy to move elsewhere before jumping on their squishiest target. My teammate ZaberZ plays one of the best Rengars I have seen, so look for some replays or tournament games with him.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Riven in top lane is played like any other melee, but do remember to autoattack between Q's if you can. Spam abilities, especially your shield, and ult early in team fights. That's basically all there is to it -- her kit is extremely roll-face-on-keyboard. Riven is one of the best bushwhackers due to her stun, knockback, and rediculous damage during it. Because a lot of her damage comes from her abilities, as well has movement, Riven is basically immune to attack speed and movement slows in team fights, and her Q will frequently activate even while rooted, stunned, or silenced. Pick her for the brokenness (wings) when you want a melee with lots of CC and earlygame strength.
Riven in bot lane plays out like TT at first: uncounterable, complete domination of almost all the champions in the roster and there's nothing they can do about it. Unlike TT however, Riven falls off in Dominion and by level 9 quite a few others will be able to hold their own against her.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-9-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Rylai's, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Rumble is not used for attrition or sustain here. In Dominion, he is picked to be a damaging short-range caster with a devastating ult when used correctly. Use E to poke and Q when someone finally initiates, but try not to overheat prematurely. Use W repeatedly for the movement speed and ult when people are either lined up or are fighting in a chokepoint. Rumble, like most mages, is best played around turrets and should be with at least one teammate to help solidify CC and damage on targets.
Roles: Tanky Mage, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 9-21-0 or 0-9-21
Runes: MPen, scaling Mana, scaling Mana, Spellvamp quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Merc's, Archangel's, WotA, FH, Odyn's, Void
Strategy: Do not start Tear first in bot lane, start with Catalyst instead. Play safe until you have boots and spellvamp, then you can start to play aggressively. You should always lead with Q, and then immediately W. If you have enough CDR, Q again before using E so you can Q again afterwards; if not, QWEQ and disengage. Once you have some CDR, you can do QWQEQRQ and eventually QWQE before disengaging. If you don't have CDR with your ult, then you need to do QWEQR, wait, then do one last Q.
In top lane, Ryze can go Tear first, and will need to focus on defense a lot earlier. Because he'll get no gold advantage, top lane Ryze will only 1v1 in jungles way late in the game.
With Ryze, you should be building lots of component items and only upgrading when you run out of room.
(7–4). Sejuani through Syndra
Roles: Tank, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: W->Q->E
Items: Merc's/Tabi's, Sweeper, Abyssal, Visage, Randuin's, Void
Strategy: Oh Sejuani, where do I start. Sej isn't all that bad on Dominion and can go through quite a few walls given her 700 range dash. Sej's problem is that all her numbers are just too low. Use your Q to initiate and try to stick to just one target with W and E. Fortunately people like to beat on Sejuani because she's fat and stupid and people don't like her, so use that to your advantage. You should generaly Q first before ulting a group of people to ensure you get the most amount of people hit. Sejuani is a tank, so she should be ahead of her team in the jungle and the first one to be facechecking brush.
Roles: AD Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Mobility, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Shaco is an excellent ganker, and his boxes will give escape routes for when people converge on him. When Q'ing to get away from enemies, it helps to be running in the wrong direction just before you do it, and to also do it in a weird direction. Many people will guess that you deceived on the standard flee path and chase there. When Sweepers start getting around, Shaco should focus a lot more on ganking bot repeatedly to avoid the stealth detection, though his boxes in the enemy jungle will still be helpful. He is an assassin, but his ult will let him do some pretty nasty 1v1 duels. Shaco generally isn't with his team when moving through the jungle, or at the very least out of sight to anyone looking to gank your team from the brushes.
Roles: Tank, Tanky AD
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat armor, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: E->W->Q or W->E->Q
Items: Merc's, Randuin's, Mallet, Atma's, Wit's End
Strategy: Shen turns 1v1's into 1v2's, just because he can. Shen is taken top lane and is picked for his ability to cross the map, especially when used with Revive, and by himself is a moderately damaging tank. Shen has a lot of itemization options and Mallet is a staple for keeping one particular target slowed. In team fights this prevents them from escaping, but in jungle this forces their allies to respond, which is perfect for baiting enemies together with your own team in pursuit. Shen should be first when facechecking brush and should always use his ult in a brush so that nobody interrupts it.
Shen can also use energy runes in place of the standard tank ones and is the only champion I'd recommend them on. Because of his innate energy problems he doesn't make terribly good use of CDR, so it's not too important on him.
Roles: Tanky AD, Tanky Mage, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, scaling Health, flat CDR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Merc's, Mallet, Ghostblade, Atma's, Wit's End, Sanguine
Strategy: Shyvana has some fury generation problems but she's still a good pick for teams that have lots of CC but not much damage. Blitzcrank and Lulu are going to be her best friends, and Shyv is very good at team fights once someone else has properly initiated on or seperated an enemy. Her ult is largely used to simply cross a distance but her W is valued with it and her Q, in some very extreme scenarios, can really dish out damage as it applies onhit effects on everything it hits. Shyvana should generally be the second person to join a fight, and is certainly not much of a ganker unless her ult is up and she has Mallet.
In bot lane, Shyvana will struggle with ranged champs and she won't be able to take on the top melees like Jax or Wukong. But against everything that is neither, she can hold the lane pretty well.
Roles: Tanky Mage, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Archangel's, Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Rylai's
Strategy: It's Singed. He farts up bot lane and occasionally forces people to smell it. His ult is generally used when a gank is spotted though it can also be used for casual sustain in a drawn out 1v1. Lead slightly with your W and it will be used to its full effect. Singed is particularly good at gassing minions and walking off to the speed shrine brushes, where he can backcap a little bit to force his lane opponent to react. You're not ever going to neutralize a turret against a good player like this, but it helps stockpile a minion wave due to the majority of your damage being done over time whether you're around or not.
Roles: AD Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: Attack speed, flat armor, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Merc's, Statikk, Infinity, LW, Phantom, Mallet
Strategy: Right click to victory! Bushwhack whenever possible to save your stun, and take Cleanse for the inevitable Exhaust spam you will draw. Really, there isn't much to say about AD Sion. He's about as derp as a tankyderp can get. AP Sion can do bot lane decently, but he'll fail by lategame.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, Sanguine, Infinity, Cleaver, LW, Statikk
Strategy: Sivir is a very good poker and pusher so she can do either lane. The key thing to note is that she doesn't need very much attack speed because of her W resetting her attack timer. As long as you have CDR for that, you can omit most AS and go the damage route. Piecemeal crit is a good build for her, but you might want something more offensive and glass cannon-y considering how much life steal she can stack. Use your ult early in team fights and try to shield a CC -- try not to fight in the jungle so that you have more awareness of what abilities are being used around you.
Roles: Tanky AD, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Another melee with no gap closer, fortunately you have a speed boost and a CC if all else fails. Skarner deals a lot of damage and is very hard to escape unless the opponent has an untargetted/ally gap closer like Jarvan or Jax. Skarner is generally taken bot lane where he does best when either camping the speed shrine between waves or hiding in the brush against other melee opponents. Use his ult as a stun in 1v1's, rather than trying to drag them anywhere. When you do get into a fight, stay on them with Q and W and don't forget to aim E. Skarner is typically taken versus other melees in bot lane and his build reflects this.
Roles: Tanky Mage, Support
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: Scaling AD, scaling Health, flat CDR, MS quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, Iceborn Gauntlet, BFT, Abyssal, Randuin's, Odyn's
Strategy: Ult enemies when they try to initiate on someone and then just start hitting QWE at random. Seriously, it doesn't matter. Sona is also a fairly good point defender, and obviously being a tanky support she shouldn't ever be alone.
Roles: Tanky Mage, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, flat CDR, MS quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, BFT/FH, Abyssal/Randuin's, Rylai's, Bulwark (if top)
Strategy: Soraka's Q is pretty much all she needs to dominate a lane. She can have some early and late problems against people like Jarvan who gap close with CC, but Soraka will dominate the mid game by dealing gobs of aoe damage while kiting. Use Infuse on the enemy laner whenever you feel like it, and ult whenever an ally up top needs it. Basically, just QQ a bunch. Stack the defense of the enemy bottom laner and you'll be k in sustained fights.
Soraka is almost always taken for bot lane, but she can start at top for her earlygame aoe damage and then swap after the Windmill fight.
Roles: Tanky Mage
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->E->W (versus melees) or E->Q->W (versus rangeds) or W->Q->E (bot lane)
Items: Ionian, BFT, Grail, Rylai's, Void/Abyssal
Strategy: Swain has his ups and downs in Dominion, and is generally taken top as a solid mage with some survivability. Taking him top instead of bot frees him of a mandatory early leveling of W and lets him deal more reliable damage through Q and E. Use Q at anyone trying to close distance with you and walk away in ult form -- W if they keep chasing. Use E whenever applicable and generally just try to keep in that sweet spot of "taking some damage and focus but not too much." Also stay away from burst assassins if you can. Swain shouldn't engage in most jungle fights and if ganked, should use his abilities to kite/discourge it from continuing.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Grail/Wooglet's, Void
Strategy: Syndra is designed to be a lategame mage, and the midgame-focused Dominion has her at a weird spot, because it does give her a lot more mana to play with while generally not letting her reach a full build. Anyways, Q can potentially be ranked second if you think it is a dangerous matchup, otherwise position and target Syndra as you would a regular mage, like you would Veigar. Ult early, learn the range on E, and build component items as necessary (chalice and revolver are both very important).
Section 8: Champion Discussion and Strategy, T-Z
(8–1). Talon through Twitch
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: W->E->Q
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Talon is a pure assassin and should be played as such. Wait for the fight to start and then charge in and ult+kite as soon as anyone turns to attack you. Talon is fairly good at chasing though even if he builds as tankyderp he will fail 1v1 with many other melees. Stick to countering squishies and keep an eye on who has Grez/Sweeper. Kiting is definitely one of the most important things to be doing on Talon, and when engaging skillshot champions like Syndra make every attempt to juke their abilities before E'ing in, as killing them in under one second usually won't happen (skillshot detection at point blank is mostly random, so why risk it?).
Roles: Tanky Mage, Tank
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, flat CDR, MS quints
Order: E->W->Q
Items: Ionian, Bulwark, BFT, Abyssal, Thornmail, Void
Strategy: Taric is taken for his large teamfight presence, and is a good choice for dealing with AD teams that can't deal with splitting (perhaps you have superior splitters on your own team). His stun allows initiation on many ranged AD carries and helps quite a bit in 2v2 situations. Taric is not much of a point defender or attacker, but he's a good bushwhacker and can initiate many jungle ganks well. Taric pairs best with many melee damagers, especially ones that lack gap closers like Shyvana and Garen, or the ones with gap closers that don't prevent escapes like Sion. Take Taric when you feel your team should simultaneously be more tanky and fashionable.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, MS quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Sweeper, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Teemo retains his global taunt in Dominion, perhaps harnessing it even more with the prevalence of traversing the jungle. Teemo in high Elo is typically built as almost pure AP, though some onhit or attack speed is certainly not lost on him. Teemo has surprisingly good poking power with his movement speed and can kite or distract enemies in team fights very well if he's built as an AP for bursting and running. Movement speed quints and the 21-0-9 masteries allow you (in most situations) to avoid leveling W until last, letting you do much more damage in the early and mid game.
Roles: Support
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Mobility, Sweeper, Locket/FH, Bulwark, Odyn's
Strategy: His soul mechanic is an enormous hinderance here, and the map's layout makes his kit rather subpar. Wait for a patch to at least fix his soul mechanic and play someone else in the meantime.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, flat CDR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W or E->W->Q
Items: Ionian, Sanguine, Infinity, Statikk, Mallet
Strategy: Tristana is a ranged AD that scales a lot into the lategame. W and R will keep her safe, and E gives her some pushing power for bot lane. Q is where she can become very dangerous, and combine that with at least a Phage and Tristana can be very hard to escape in harassment scenarios. W is used both to engage on low targets and to escape ganks, while R is typically used as a disengager from very problematic ganks. Use E's active whenever an enemy gets in range for some additional damage. If you are top lane, you should generally try to save your W until you know whether or not you can use it offensively.
AP on Trist does not go to waste, and she can make a very effective burst caster in some situations -- nonetheless I prefer her going AD.
Roles: Tanky AD, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: W->Q->E or W->E->Q
Items: Ionian, Ghostblade, LW, Iceborn Gauntlet, Sanguine
Strategy: Trundle has some difficulty in Dominion largely due to being designed for low-gold environments, but building him very tanky can still be successful. Though Pillar is nice, due to the layout of the map the enemy can usually escape it with a gap closer. Pairing best with an initiator, Trundle should use the jungle chokepoints to his advantage as well as the general desire to fight on top of the speedshrine so that he can stay on his W. There isn't much to say about Trundle -- if you can find a way to close that gap without wasting Pillar, he will do well; otherwise he will struggle to deal with escape skills.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E or W->Q->E
Items: Berserker's, Ghostblade, Statikk, Infinity, LW, Sanguine
Strategy: Tryndamere has some issues on this map due to being dependent on his ult and a full set of items. In a 1v1 situation it is still fine, and Trynd will usually win these, but in the rampant-teamfights scenario that is Dominion he will suffer. Trynd's optimal act in teamfights is an odd one, in that he will want to take full focus about halfway through it, but not earlier nor later. Avoid using Trynd's ult unless you have to, and avoid jungle fights as there aren't too many walls near standard jungle fights that Trynd can spin over if the fight goes sour.
Twisted Fate:
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 9-0-21
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: W->Q->E
Items: Sorc's, Sweeper, BFT, Wooglet's, Lich Bane, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Though an AP caster, Twisted Fate's base numbers and ratios are so heavily nerfed it is difficult to make him work. TF must rely entirely on his W->Q trading and hang way back in team fights. TF's lategame is stronger than his earlygame for sure, but it pales in comparison to almost every other champion's lategame. Use his ult to join ganks where people aren't as expectant of it as, say, stopping a channel. TF is no 1v1 champion and using his ult to stop a channel generally gets him killed or the champion gets out of range before he arrives -- practice its placement use it liberally to chase and ensure kills for your team.
Roles: AD Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: W->Q->E
Items: Mobility, Statikk, Infinity, LW, Sanguine, Phantom
Strategy: Gank bot, gank top, gank bot, gank top. Twitch is one of the best gankers in Dominion, able to deal with defending a point from lots of minions simultaneously, and later on able to hold his own fairly well. Twitch should almost always be stalking or looking for people to stalk in the jungle while his teammates get into proper position -- teammates should ALWAYS be the ones to start the fights. Gank bottom very frequently and keep an eye on anyone who has bought Sweeper or Oracle's. As usual, the standard precautions apply when playing against champions with traps. Twitch is somewhat unique among AD carries in that CDR doesn't do very much on him, so you might choose to exploit this attribute and avoid spending gold for that category.
(8–2). Udyr and Urgot
Roles: Tank, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: Attack speed, scaling Health Regen, flat or scaling MR, flat Health Regen or Life Steal quints
Order: W->R->E->Q
Items: Ninja's / Merc's, Tear, Randuin's / Odyn's, Trinity / Iceborn Gauntlet, Sanguine, Frozen Heart / Mercurial
Strategy: Jjaja, pioneer and founder of Lame Builds Inc., stumbled across this build for bot lane. It focuses heavily on pushing minions so that the enemy bot laner doesn't get their farm, and then it transitions into a melee DPS to keep Turtle scaling. Urrdurr is only countered by enemy bot laners that also push minions very well, and when playing against this build you must ignore Udyr and focus on clearing minions. Urrdurr, like any Udyr build, will be very hard to gank even though he's almost always pushed to the enemy turret. Udyr can often just run out of his lane through the enemy health packs with his gankers chasing after him, thanks to Warden's / Turtle Stance / Bear Stance. Champions like Darius are one of the only direct counters to Udyr when he is built like this.
Roles: AD Carry, Tanky AD, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Trinity, Sanguine, Hexdrinker, LW
Strategy: Hurrgot, thrower of bot lanes. Well, some can stalemate against him, but this champion is in serious need of balance. Anyways, I see a lot of Urgot players go the Tear->Manamune route and while it works against an attrition lane like Maokai, you should make use of your excellent damage. Urgot's damage up close is ungodly once you get Trinity, and if you have that item then you should take every advantage you can get to closing that distance. If you take Urgot top lane, he gives a lot of poke and harass to the team but he won't have his farm which is really what sends him out of control. There really isn't much of a counter to Urgot, your team just has to focus him down first.
(8–3). Varus through Volibear
Roles: AD Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Ionian, Sanguine, Statikk, Infinity, LW, Phantom
Strategy: Varus is pretty much what a ranged AD is supposed to be: lots of ranged damage and no escapes or dashes or anything fancy. He's usually taken top for his poking range and ability to ult anyone who charges him in a team fight. Varus does a mix of damage which is both good and bad for him, and you can go dualpen in the masteries -- nonetheless when it comes to item builds you'll want to focus on the physical side as that's where lifesteal and crit come into play. Varus can check brush pretty well but will still want to hang way back in the team where a ranged AD should be.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner, Hypercarry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E or W->Q->E
Items: Berserker's, Lightbringer/Statikk, Sanguine, LW, Infinity, Phantom
Strategy: Vayne is the AD carry whose damage goes nuts by the endgame, but she scales most off of attack speed. Can go either bot or top, bot is actually preferable if she is against someone easily bullied out by range. Use Q a bunch and never use E for damage -- ult frequently especially when you're being focused; that short stealth really makes it difficult to focus you in team fights. Don't take flash, but do try to have better positioning for using your E correctly. Vayne can 1v1 many champions by midgame but falls very quickly to ganks -- she'll do pretty well in the jungle but as with any AD carry she'll want a place with lots of vision.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->E<->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Sweeper, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Not much farming here, Veigar is largely taken for his trading power. He can contribute to team fights and ganks with good E placements, but Veigar is largely taken as a counterpick to other APs in bottom lane. Veigar is one of those champions who will often burst a ganker down before the ganker even gets his abilities off. Veigar should rank his Q first and then his W or his E depending on how much of a pusher his opponent is -- more pusher = more W ranks. If unsure, rank them equally. Veigar can be devastating in fights at the chokepoints if he is swapped top later in the game.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Punch things. Vi is a questionable pick for a conventional damage dealer, but she absolutely excels at ganking bot lane. Do it again and again -- come from behind and use your Q to close the gap and briefly CC the target. The ult is there if needed, but her Q and combo is usually enough for your bottom laner to catch up to them and help finish the job. In team fights, Vi should be focusing anyone squishy right off the bat, and it may be possible to use Q to escape.
Roles: AP Carry, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-0-21
Runes: MPen, scaling Mana Regen, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Aug Q, Sorc's+Furor, Sweeper, BFT, Wooglet's, Void
Strategy: It's somewhat humorous and ironic how the cyborg champion is the one who keeps getting exploitable bugs involving him, such as double ult bug or other champions gaining his gravity field as an ability, but I digress. Viktor struggles in Dominion because he's built around farming safely from a powerful turret that will protect him from trades -- however, building him to be a superfast kite-y mage works very well. With his W giving him an excellent card to play in 1v1 zoning games, Viktor can build up a lot of damage with Q+E trades or, if bot lane, hitting minions with the E at the same time. Viktor will use his R+Ignite if he knows it will win him the trade, but otherwise he's played conservatively outside of the trades. One thing to note is that his W can stop minions from damaging a point, if it is necessary to stop a neutralize.
Roles: Tanky Mage
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat armor, flat CDR, Spellvamp quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Spirit Visage, Wooglet's, Abyssal, Rylai's
Strategy: Vladimir is the classic example of a tanky AP, and I'm not going to go into why. One thing to note, however, is that in Dominion it is very effective to rank his E before his Q. Vlad's E does a lot of unexpected damage and works well if he goes the tanky/MPen route to get him through the early game. Another thing to note is that this build omits spellvamp -- early game it uses a lot of health potions and an early Warden's, while late game it uses max CDR Q with SV. Spellvamp items aren't necessary on Vlad, but they're there if you still want them. For his R, simply use it in team fights when it can hit at least 2 people. For his W, only use it when you get focused, and when the tanky derp's gap closer got used.
Roles: Tanky AD
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: Attack speed, scaling Health, scaling MR, MS quints
Order: W->Q->E
Items: Ionian, Lightbringer, Ghostblade, Hexdrinker, LW, Sanguine
Strategy: Abuse the speed shrines, a LOT. Volibear is a support-y melee that can do a lot of damage but has trouble initiating in this mode. He makes a very good team fighter and he generally wants to stay in top lane, but the shrine buff can let him gank bot depending on where the enemy bot laner is. Try to engage in team fights, using bushwhacks if necessary, and avoid 1v1ing other tanky derps until later in the game. A lot of people underestimate Volibear's damage, so use that to your advantage.
(8–4). Warwick and Wukong
Roles: Tanky Mage, Tank
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, scaling MR, MPen or MS quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Merc's, Spirit Visage, Frozen Heart / BFT, Frozen Mallet, Wit's End
Strategy: Often called Derpwick in the high Elos, tankwick begins weak but becomes very difficult to counter. Once Q is levelled and some CDR is had, Derpwick runs all over tanky enemies (which is many of them). There isn't much to it other than using R to initiate and help allies. Extremely basic and straightforward champion.
Roles: Tanky AD
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat Armor, flat CDR, ArPen quints
Order: E->Q->W
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: A classic example of Tanky DerPS, Wukong is very strong on Dominion due to short cooldowns and a bugged Q. Wukong gets to build Trinity and should generally be the second one into a fight. Decoy is a very excellent skill and should be used when rounding corners so that the stealth gives you additional gap closing. When not using it to gank, you can generally try leaving one behind in brush right before an enemy enters it, and they usually jump on it immediately. Always use his R after using E->Q, or else you're wasting a good chunk of damage by leaving out Q.
One thing to note is that you can hold down X or S in plain view to stand still and not perform any actions. While faking Decoy like this, the enemy doesn't actually drop targetting on you so it may or may not fool them. If forced to bottom lane, you can decoy during your E and omit your Q to get your opponent to respond to the decoy that's right on him. People generally don't expect this.
(8–5). Xerath and Xin Zhao
Roles: AP Carry
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Sweeper, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Xerath is one of those zoning farmers that relies pretty heavily on proximity to scary turrets, of which Dominion does not have. He can go bot against low tier matchups, but generally does better top because of his stun and brush-zapping. All in all, you'll want to avoid jungle fights as much as possible with Xerath and generally stay way back so that it's difficult for anyone to break away from a team fight and go after you. That said, you shouldn't be going glass cannon. You generally need enough AP to clear caster minions in one go so that you can hold points much better.
Xin Zhao:
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner (situational)
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, LW, Hexdrinker, Sanguine
Strategy: Xin Zhao can be hard to make work due to his nerfs and item dependence, but he's a great duelist later in the game even if he struggles heavily against CC. You'll never want to be first in the fight. Use minions in top lane to get your 2 Q attacks before E'ing to anyone for the knockup. With Xin you'll generally be wanting jungle team fights and probably won't have room for Garrison. If you're against other Tanky DerPS, prioritize life steal.
(8–6). Yorick
Roles: Tanky AD, Bot Laner (typical)
Masteries: 21-9-0
Runes: ArPen, scaling mana regen, scaling mana regen, ArPen quints
Order: Depends on matchup
Items: Ionian, Trinity, Ghostblade, Atma's, Mercurial, Randuin's
Strategy: Yorick is the iconic faceroller of bot lane. Spam ghouls to harass, farm, and get Q's in on the opponent whenever he gets close enough. You'll want to rank Q first if you're against someone you can reliably use it on, such as another melee. Against zoners, rank your E first for more sustain and harass. If you're unsure, rank Q and W evenly.
The key to Yorick is to buy lots of vamp scepters as placeholders until you get your real items. In some matchups, you can omit the defense that your opponent does not deal and get more life steal. Yorick doesn't have mana problems if runed correctly, and while you'll be slightly weaker out the gate, will allow you to avoid the Manamune trap that ends up a weaker build than the piecemeal crit / stacked life steal.
(8–7). Zac through Zyra
Roles: Tanky AP, Tank
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: E->W->Q
Items: Sorc's or Mobility, Visage or Randuin's, Randuin's or Visage, BFT, Abyssal
Strategy: With ranking E first, the jellyneck excels at engaging fights for his team. He will also excel at escaping them at low health once the enemy has wasted their focus on him, due to his tankiness. He can't be ignored, either, as the MPen and W/R will do too much damage. Try to start fights from just around corners, by E'ing into brushes when your team is nearby, or by setting up when chasing enemies through brush. Zac is a great pick for champions that have their own escape or CC such as Ezreal and Cassiopeia, as that will force the enemy team into a very bad position -- and Zac doesn't even need an ult to initiate like that! Go wild! He is also a fairly good ganker for bot lane.
Roles: AD Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: ArPen, flat armor, scaling MR, ArPen quints
Order: W->E->Q
Items: Ionian, Cleaver, Ghostblade, Sanguine, Hexdrinker, LW
Strategy: You want to rank W first because having it on low cooldown is extremely important to his kit. Use it to harass, use it to swap, use it to escape. His Q will largely be a waste of energy in most situations. Don't ult people when their Wooglet's or QSS actives are ready. Zed excels at overkilling one single person and he takes a lot of skill to play. There's not much for me to say about him other than that you NEED experience with him to be anywhere remotely good. One thing I will say, though, that isn't clear in his tooltips, is that his ult will generate an additional shadow that you can swap to by using R again, just like W, except that your W shadow can ALSO be out so you can double swap if really necessary.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, scaling MP5, scaling AP, flat AP quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Sweeper, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Ziggs is generally taken bot lane where he can put his aoe skills to use in clearing minion waves from a safe distance. He is a good zoning mage and defensive play with him can stalemate problematic matchups. Ziggs should be using his minefield as a way to keep the enemy out of a certain, blank area of the lane so that he is forced to get near his minions to last hit, while you're using Q on the minions. W is a good way to disengage a gank, though R's usage is pretty much confined to stopping caps on mid lane. Build and play Ziggs as a straight up AP carry and use his range to all advantages.
Roles: AP Carry, Tanky Mage
Masteries: 9-21-0
Runes: MPen, scaling Health, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: Q->E->W
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Grail, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: This is not POOTERSS Zilean. Legit Zilean is a tanky caster that does a good job of supporting his team. Use the bombs to interrupt enemy captures, and use his haste to get away from bad situations. In team fights, just use your bombs and then watch for whoever they focus, and ult at low health. When pairing with someone and ganking in the jungle, be sure to use your SLOW and not your HASTE -- it is tons more powerful this way in 2v1 situations. Zilean's instant, chainable slow is one of the reasons why he is so strong at maintaining a team advantage.
If all else fails, start backcapping with Zilean. Very few champions can deal with his speed buff / slow.
Roles: AP Carry, Bot Laner
Masteries: 21-0-9
Runes: MPen, flat Armor, scaling MR, MPen quints
Order: Q->W->E
Items: Sorc's, BFT, Wooglet's, Rylai's, Abyssal, Void
Strategy: Zyra is an excellent location-based mage, and excels in small team fights when people can't afford to take down your turrets. Zyra combines best with a CC machine but also works well with tankyderps. Use seeds/turrets to quickly scout brush or force opponents into bad positions, and wait for people to use their mobility skills before ulting immediately after. There isn't much else to say other than this supplied build is focused on making her turrets do the maximum amount of damage -- stacking AP can also work, but mpen is really what they will scale on.
Section 9: Competitive Coverage, Streams, and Miscellaneous
(91). TheFeedski's DominateDominion.com, social gatherings, and DD tournaments
TheFeedski is the Dominion player who founded the fansite http://www.dominatedominion.com. Often referred to as "DD", the fansite has forums for organizing competitive play, posting strategy and champion guides, and maintains a chatroom on the LoL client accessible by just typing in dominatedominion as a new chatroom. As with all chatrooms, you can have your client autojoin it upon login by pressing the gear icon in the top right of the chatroom.
DominateDominion also runs weekly Riot-sponsored Dominion tournaments, usually just referred to as "DD #". These tournaments do not have an entry fee and happen every Saturday at 7pm central standard time (Western time: 5pm, Eastern time: 8pm). To join, make an account on http://www.mobafire.com and either create or join a team for "League of Legends Dominion". All participants in your team need to be members of the team on Mobafire, and thus have their own accounts there too, so set some time ahead to make sure everyone is in the loop before signing up.
DD tournaments currently use 10 bans. Check the rules tab on the tournament's page for additional things you need to know.
[Almost] Every tournament features an official stream with at least two shoutcasters. The stream is at:
The stream has a basic IRC chat for people who bother to make Twitch.tv accounts, but if you're lazy it can also be discussed in the dominatedominion chatroom as well, as many of the viewers frequent both. The tournament participants are also usually in the stream chat, but they won't be paying any attention to it while in game.
If you are unable to tune in to the stream on Saturday evenings, Gandair usually records the streamed games and puts them on his youtube channel, http://www.youtube.com/vatoclan
(92). Dominion player streams that can be viewed at any time
In alphabetical order:
BeefJerkyHunter: http://www.twitch.tv/gameshoes
CleverAdvisor: http://www.twitch.tv/cleveradvisor
Digikid13: http://www.twitch.tv/namedakamada
Duelpower: http://www.twitch.tv/duelpower
Emperor Hick: http://www.twitch.tv/hickfarm
Fancy Wolf: http://www.twitch.tv/sirfancywolf
ForgedLife: http://www.twitch.tv/forgedlife
Golly: http://www.twitch.tv/lolgolly
Gormirn: http://www.twitch.tv/gormirn
H0L0: http://www.twitch.tv/holoshock
Koravel: http://www.twitch.tv/koravel34
Makestro: http://www.own3d.tv/live/21255
Michael Bay: http://www.twitch.tv/crimsonfury90
Nerdock: http://www.twitch.tv/nerdock
Nyx87: http://www.twitch.tv/nyx87
PracticeYellow: http://www.twitch.tv/practiceyellow
Rachael Passive: http://www.twitch.tv/rachaelpassive
Ragnaarock: http://www.twitch.tv/ragnaarock
RCIX: http://www.twitch.tv/rcix
Romantic Jaguar: http://www.twitch.tv/romanticjaguar
Ryxiora: http://www.twitch.tv/adhd_ryxiora
Sakuri Ono: http://www.twitch.tv/sakuriono
TheFeedski: http://www.twitch.tv/DominateDominion
Additionally, the DD channel is scheduled for use throughout the week during the day, so there's a very high chance something will be running then.
Are you running a Dominion stream somewhat frequently? Make a thread for it right in this forum and bump it up whenever you start streaming! I'll eventually stop trolling and notice it and put it here!
(93). Former NESL Dominion tournaments and Gandair's records
National E-Sports League used to host weekly Dominion tournaments as well, starting in October 2011, but they stopped running them at the beginning of May 2012. In total there were 29 NESL Dominion tournaments run. I personally participated in 19 of these tournaments, and got first place in 13 of them.
The tournament pictures were wiped at some point, and the earlier tournaments were not streamed, so NESL tournament results in regards to champion/item/ban statistics were hard to come by. Gandair, one of DominateDominion's shoutcasters, embarked on an unholy suicide mission of going back and watching all the archived streams to manually record as many statistics as he could. I don't know how he managed to live through that torture, but he managed to pull a lot of statistics from it. You can find some of these results posted on DominateDominion's forums:
So if you're inclined to check out statistics on Dominion's competitive history, read away!
Also, DD#??-40 were hosted by CSN and not Mobafire.
(94). My champion and item tier lists for Dominion, because why not
Yeah, I made a tier list for Dominion. Well, more like several tier lists. If you want my opinion (read: OPINION) on how I would rate champions for their performance in top lane and bot lane, and how I would rate items compared to each other, then drop by my tier list thread:
Remember that tier lists are not valid arguments to use in a discussion. You can argue Kayle is a better bot than Morgana because of such and such reason. You cannot argue Kayle is a better bot than Morgana because my tier list says so. If you do, I'll slap you, and Internet slaps don't really hurt (or do anything) but you'll feel bad anyways.
(95). Math! Which runes are the best and at what point?
For Season 3, the answer is penetration. To every question. Lol.
(96). Dominion term glossary
+5: Former competitive team called Point Defense.
AMPuT: Competitive team called Amputease.
Autoban: Some inhouses will have certain champions automatically banned.
BFT: Blackfire Torch, an item for AP carries on Dominion and Twisted Treeline.
Bot: Bottom lane. Anywhere below the storm shield relic.
BPB: Former competitive team called Blind Pick Bandits.
Camp: You gank bot so much that you're basically living there.
Cap: Capturing a point.
Clueless: Competitive team called Clueless.
Comeback: The mechanics of the map that make respawns +2/-2 seconds for every 100 point difference. Highly criticized.
DD: DominateDominion.com.
DD#: DominateDominion.com's weekly tournaments.
Elo: Now renamed to MMR.
FCJ: Username "FourCourtJester", sometimes co-casts the DD tournaments.
Feedski: Username "DD TheFeedski", the founder and maintainer of DD.
Flowchart/Flowcharting: Ganking bot lane repeatedly. Started as a joke.
FTV: Competitive team called Feel The Vibe. Often registers under different names.
Gand: Username "Gandair", the main shoutcaster for DD tournaments.
Gor: Username "Gormirn", typically the admin of DD tournaments and the person to contact if a dispute happens during them.
Grez: The item "Grez's Spectral Lantern".
Health/kit/shrine: The healing pickups around the map.
Hurrgot: Homegrown insult for an Urgot that keeps missing skillshots but wins anyways because he's overpowered.
Inhouse: A custom game typically formed in the DD chatroom that is almost always tournament draft mode.
Jungle: Anywhere within the circle of the map that isn't automatically revealed.
Kаsshole: Homegrown insult for any Kassadin spammer.
Meta: An established and generally accepted set of strategies within an approximate rating range.
Mid: The middle point outside of each base.
MMR: Matchmaking Rating. Is really just Elo rating and doesn't work any different.
MWAB: Username "ManWolfAxeBoss", one of the TT/Dominion balancers at Riot.
Neut: Pressuring a point with the goal of simply making it no one's.
Nome: Username "RiotNome", one of the TT/Dominion balancers at Riot.
NMUH: Competitive team called Cheese Enema.
OP: Usually used as a noun and a chat replacement for the name of any overpowered champion (i.e. Kassadin, Kha'Zix, Elise, etc.).
PECS: Competitive team called Pays Evelynn Child Support.
Pooting: The dedicated backcap strategy of Dominion, often utilized with support champions. It is named after the player "POOTERSS" who found ways to make it effective even at high Elo.
RJ: Username "Romantic Jaguar", sometimes the admin of DD tournaments and a person to contact if a dispute happens during them.
Rude: Going way out of your way to single out someone on the enemy team in fights or ganks. Can be used as a noun, adjective, and verb.
Sauron: The guy that wrote this terrible guide.
SF: Username "Skillfactory", sometimes co-casts the DD tournaments.
Skirmish: An incomplete teamfight in the jungle with lots of kiting on both sides.
Spammer: Typically used to refer to someone to uses an OP champ way too much.
Stall: The act of hanging around a neutral point to continually interrupt enemies trying to cap it.
Storm/shield/relic: The buff in the center of the map.
Suicide: A rare scenario where killing yourself with Revive up is more beneficial than stalling or escaping.
Syndrunk: When a Syndra player does the Q+E combo but places Q beyond the range of E.
Terror Queue: When you solo queue for Dominion at 1 in the morning.
Tier: A rough estimation of a champion's performance compared to others.
Tootulz: Username "DD Tootulz", sometimes the admin of DD tournaments and a person to contact if a dispute happens during them.
Top: Top lane. Anywhere above the storm shield relic.
Wave respawn: The first death in a fight creates a wave that can be caught by subsequent deaths of others, causing everyone to respawn at the same time (+/- comeback mechanics). Highly criticized.
Win difference: The number of wins over losses you have. Indirectly implies your hidden rating, but isn't the sole factor in it.
Windmill: The top center point on the map. The "Windmill fight" usually refers to the initial top battle.
Section 10, About the author
I might be slightly biased for very subtle reasons, but I think Sauron is a pretty cool guy that analyzes Dominion and writes good guides, and isn't afraid to share his secrets to success. Riot should totally hire him to work on Dominion. Wink wink nudge nudge.
Also, I'm one of the top rated players on ranked Twisted Treeline, alongside fellow Dominion players ZaberZ and inFe eD:
I've also hit challenger in ranked Twisted Treeline on two additional teams since then.
Anyways, if I were to suddenly be competitively teamless (somehow), unable to contact any other team leaders (somehow), and not wanting to form a new team (somehow), this is what my open application would look like if I were to post it on the forums:
Typical role: Bot lane, AP Carry, AD Carry
Champions unlocked: All
Rune pages: All
Current rating: 2900 (estimate)
Top recorded rating (lolmatches): 2818
Win difference: Around +790
Timezone: Pacific
Mic: Yes
Ventrilo: Yes
Skype: Yes
Teamspeak: No
Mumble: No
IRC: Yes
Stream: No
twitch.tv name: sauronplusfive
mobafire name: Sauron
NESL Go4LoL Dominion tournaments:
1st place in #11 representing Team One-Eyed Wonder Weasels [TOEWW]
1st place in #12 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #13 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #14 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #15 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #16 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #18 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #19 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #20 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #21 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #22 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #23 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #24 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #25 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #26 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #27 representing Point Defense [+5]
3rd place in #28 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #29 representing Not Point Defense [Not +5]
Dominate Dominion tournaments:
3rd place in #2 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #3 representing Doint Pefense [5+]
2nd place in #4 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #5 representing Line Offense [-5]
1st place in #6 representing Naught Point Defense [+0]
1st place in #7 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #8 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #9 representing Point Defense [+5]
3rd place in #18 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #20 representing Point Defense [+5]
3rd place in #22 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #24 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
3rd place in #25 representing Point Defense [+5]
3rd place in #26 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #27 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #28 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #29 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #30 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #31 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #32 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #33 representing Point Defense [+5]
4th place in #34 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #35 representing Point Defense [+5]
1st place in #37 representing Pays Evelynn Child Support [PECS]
4th place in #38 representing Point Defense [+5]
4th place in #39 representing Point Defense [+5]
4th place in #40 representing Point Defense [+5]
4th place in #41 representing Point Defense [+5]
4th place in #42 representing Point Defense [+5]
2nd place in #43 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
2nd place in #44 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
2nd place in #45 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
2nd place in #46 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
2nd place in #47 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
2nd place in #48 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
2nd place in #50 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
3rd place in #51 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
2nd place in #52 representing Jellynecks [FTV]
2nd place in #53 representing Jellynecks [FTV]
1st place in #54 representing We're Pretty Much A Big Deal [FTV]
1st place in #55 representing We're Pretty Much A Big Deal [FTV]
3rd place in #59 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
2nd place in #60 representing Feel The Vibe [FTV]
1st place in #62 representing Clueless [???]
2nd place in #63 representing Clueless [???]
Clueless [???]: Player
Pays Evelynn Child Support [PECS]: Substitute
Former Positions:
Feel The Vibe [FTV]: Player
Point Defense [+5] (defunct): Captain
Blind Pick Bandits [BPBan] (defunct): Substitute
Team One-Eyed Wonder Weasels [TOEWW] (defunct): Player
Champs played: (italics means strong)
Alistar, Ashe, Blitzcrank, Brand, Caitlyn, Darius, Diana, Draven, Evelynn, Ezreal, Fiora, Gangplank, Garen, Graves, Hecarim, Irelia, Jarvan, Jax, Karthus, Kassadin, Karma, Katarina, Kayle, Kha'Zix, Kog'Maw, Leblanc, Leona, Lissandra, Malphite, Malzahar, Maokai, Master Yi, Mordekaiser, Mundo, Nasus, Nocturne, Olaf, Pantheon, Poppy, Quinn, Renekton, Riven, Ryze, Shaco, Shen, Shyvana, Singed, Sion, Skarner, Soraka, Swain, Syndra, Talon, Teemo, Tryndamere, Twisted Fate, Urgot, Vayne, Veigar, Viktor, Vladimir, Warwick, Wukong, Xin Zhao, Yorick, Zed.
If you're a lone and honest wolf and you're looking for a team, you can use that as a template and just trim out all the stuff that doesn't apply to you. These forums and the DominateDominion.com forums are both good places to post in to look for teams. You can try the DD chatroom but top players are often afk due to their queue times so they might not see your message at all. There's nothing wrong in not having previous tournament experience under your belt -- just form up a team of random people and join in to see what its like. There's no entry fee and the worst that can happen is the casters randomly selecting your match.
So, that's basically me as a player. Yay. And that's basically what I would write for a guide. Yay! Feedback and suggestions and all that interactive stuff begins on page 2 of this thread.
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