Alistar (solo q/support)

[Dask]

 

 

 

Champion Overview

 

Alistar is an incredibly versatile/powerful support but he also has his fair share of weaknesses.

 

 

Strengths:

 

+ Scales with your SKILL

+ 2 Powerful, Versatile CC moves that chained together is a godly initiate.

+ Great defensive CC as well.

+ Top Tier level 2 bot lane fighter

+ FUNNEST support

+ MANLY

+ Naturally tanky/ can break CC through Ultimate

+ decent heal

+ good base damage/cooldowns on Headbutt/Pulv if you level them up 1st/2nd

+ Arguably the best tower diver in the game

 

 

 

 

Weaknesses:

 

-ALISTAR IS PRETTY BAD IF YOU SUCK

-Melee, thus prone to harassment

-Extremely costly to make a mistake

-True damage goes through ultimate

-No defensive/offensive steroids

-Headbutt can be dodged by flash/ cancelled by some CC

-Going too crazy might throw games

-JANNA(if she is good)

-Perfecting lane dynamics is extremely tough

 

 

Summoner Spells

 

 

 

Explanation:

 

 

Very essential. This allows you to make godlike initiates/ saves with pulverize/headbutt. I feel that you must grab flash 99%, maybe 100% of the time.

 

also good for running like a bitch sometimes

 

This is my preferred secondary summoner of choice IN SOLO QUEUE. Since every decent bot lane team tends to run heal i feel it is important for level 2 fights.

 

With the recent Heal nerf, however, more AD carries carry Ignite, never run DOUBLE IGNITE BOT LANE. In these cases I go to Exhaust.

 

 

Masteries

 

I have tried many different mastery pages and I like this one the best: 1/14/15. This was a mastery page suggested to me by Jpak and I find it to be top notch for Alistar.

 

 

 

 

If you want to sacrifice Movespeed for MR:

 

 

Offense:

 

Tier 1:

1/1 Summoner's Wrath- great with ignite/exhaust. Because you blow ignite as soon as you go in at level 2 the bonus AD/AP makes a difference to your auto attack/trample passive. Great with exhaust too for armor/mr reduction

 

You may say it's only 5 ad/ap, but I've seen kills/ no kills be decided by a few hp! But understandable if you do not pick up the mastery (for ignite, a must for exhaust)

 

Defense:

 

Tier 1:

3/3 Hardiness- Pretty essential. Alistar is Melee and will get harassed

 

0/3 or 3/3 Resistance-Get it if you prefer to be tankier vs magic damage. For 1/14/15 it's a decision between this and initiator.

 

2/2 Tough Skin- Minus 2 damage from minions may not seem like a lot but it actually is when you engage and many minions jump on you. Essential IMO.

 

* Take Summoner's Resolve if you take heal over Summoner's Wrath

 

Tier 2:

4/4 Durability: Not bad in itself but also a prerequisite to Veteran's Scars

 

Tier 3:

1/1 Veteran's Scars-important for taking harass early on

 

2/2 Indomitable- Combined with Tough Skin you take very little damage with minions/less from champs

 

 

Tier 4:

3/3 or 0/3 Initiator- 2 movespeed quints if over 70% health, very good. Take this or 3/3 Resistance.

 

Utility:

 

Tier 1:

 

1/1 Summoner's Insight- minus 15 seconds on Flash. Potentially game-changing if it refreshes at the right time/ better IMO than other options.

 

3/3 Expanded Mind- Helps for Alistar's mana costs.

 

Tier 2:

 

3/3 Meditation- See Expanded Mind

 

1/4 Swiftness- .5% is not mind blowing by any means but the best option if you go for mana/ mana regen

 

ALTERNATIVE TIER 2 BUILD: If you don't find yourself using a lot of mana then you switch out meditation for swiftness, but I often find myself taxed on mana in active lanes. Faerie charm alone won't cut it.

 

Even after I grab shurelyas I find myself low on mana in team fights. So i personally think you should go with Meditation.

 

Tier 3:

 

4/4 Greed- Supports are not supposed to farm creeps 95% of the time. gp10 is GOOD.

 

Tier 4:

 

2/2 Wealth- 40 extra starting gold allows you to start with 4 green wards or 2 green wards/ 1 pink if you prefer that. The extra ward can be potentially GAME-CHANGING EARLY.

 

 

Thus, the reasoning for this mastery page, combined with my rune page is to become bulky enough to shrug off harass and minimize minion damage for bot lane engages.

 

The 14 Utility allows more gp10 and an extra ward. An early extra ward at top can save top from a level 2 gank or turn buff steals from a fast counterjungler into a free first blood.

 

 

Feel free to make some changes to this mastery page if you prefer going deeper into defense/ having more from the utility page. You can even try a cheese build with 21 offense but if it does not pay off you will get harassed like hell in lane.

 

Runes

 

 

y standard runes for a Melee Support. You must be able to take harass vs competent laners/ block for your partner against skillshots.

 

Some say you should go gp10 yellows on supports including Alistar. But you sacrifice so much armor that I do not think it is worth it. If you want to run gp10 yellows I suggest picking a passive/ defensive... B1TCH support.

 

Glyphs are changeable, however. If you are facing a lane with no magic-damage then you can change it to your preference of cooldowns/ armor/ scaling mr.

 

Xpecial prefers a mix of scaling and flat mr. With the recent flat MR nerf I feel that in level 2 fights you should go all MR glyphs vs magic damage lanes (Corki, MF, etc)

 

 

Quints are also changeable. I use gp10 quints for with the Greed mastery you will have innate 5 gp10 which will serve you well in getting your Philostone/Heart of Gold/wards regardless of how the lane goes. I think it is often a very good and safe choice.

 

I like gp10 on the quints because I am already tanky enough, and even if I do not get a favorable bot lane fight I can still keep up on my build. This build also only gets 2 gp10 items and also buys shurelyas ASAP. As a support I want to be able to continue to buy wards/oracles even after I only have Heart of Gold.

 

Movespeed Quints also are an extremely solid good pick. Maybe armor quints/ flat HP quints are decent too. I just like 3 gp10 better because they are more stable for the flow of the game. Perhaps you want 1 movespeed quint, 2 gp10 or 1 or 2 armors+ gp10.

 

So, Rune/mastery accordingly to your playstyle! But just know that I feel that tankiness is a must vs. stronger opponents.

 

Skills

 

[/center]Passive: Trample

 

Whenever Alistar casts a spell, he gains Trample for 3 seconds ignoring unit collision and dealing 10-23 (+10% ability power) area damage per second (double damage to minions and monsters)

 

Explanation:

 

 

Personally a great passive. Extra damage+ ignore unit collision. Most people do not realize it ignores unit collision!

 

Also useful for pushing creep waves (when it is the right time to push)

 

A trick I sometimes use when my partner needs help last hitting at tower is to cast heal then 'trample' minions for 1 second to guarantee last hits for my BRO.

 

Q: Pulverize

 

Alistar smashes the ground, dealing 60/105/150/195/240 (+50% of ability power) magic damage and tossing all nearby enemy units into the air and stunning them for 0.5 seconds.

 

Cooldown 17/16/15/14/13 seconds

 

Cost 70 / 85 / 100 / 115 / 130 mana

 

Range 365

 

 

Explanation:

 

 

AOE knockup + stun. An Alistar trademark.

 

Max this first. The cooldown reduction is extremely important

 

If you are having trouble linking alistar's headbutt+pulv combo, try this method: after the headbutt is going out, MASH THE -beep- OUT OF Q.

 

W--> QQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQ generally works out pretty well.

 

W: Headbutt

 

Alistar charges at an enemy and rams them dealing 85/130/175/220/265 (+70% of ability power) magic damage and knocking them back (does not stun).

 

Cooldown 14/13/12/11/10 seconds

 

Cost 80 / 90 / 100 / 110 / 120mana

 

Range 650

 

 

Explanation:

 

 

 

Despite the description of this skill, there IS a slight mini-stun after you punt them in a direction. A mistake I see many n00b alistar's make is deciding to do Q-W combo at the speed of light when doing W (against a wall), wait a moment/ auto attack, then Q offers more overall damage/ stun duration.

 

Phenomenal skill. Push them in a direction or combine it with Q to have them pop up in place.

 

Push enemy junglers away from dragon/baron when it comes down to smite.

 

Go through walls.

 

Also great for headbutting creeps to make a getaway

 

A fun trick you can use is headbutt + spam auto attack as soon as you headbutt so you can bitch slap them as they fly away

 

HEADBUTT CAN PUSH PEOPLE THROUGH THIN WALLS. DO NOT SAVE PEOPLE BY HEADBUTTING THEM TO SAFETY. Also hilarious to just headbutt people through dragon wall sometimes.

 

I max this second, once again reducing cooldowns on CC is more valuable than a 'stronger' heal on Alistar, unless your team/lane partner really needs it.

 

E: Triumphant Roar

 

Instantly restore 60 / 90 / 120 / 150 / 180 (+20% of ability power) health to himself and half of that value to surrounding allied units. Cooldown ticks down by 2 seconds each time a nearby enemy unit dies.

 

Cooldown 12 seconds

Cost 20 / 30 / 40 / 50 / 60 mana

Range 200

 

Explanation:

 

 

Decent AOE heal. Can save your life if you proc trample while running to avoid creep block.

 

A 'flaw' is that it also heals nearby minions, pushing the wave (not always bad) Besides not lowering cooldown/ reducing damage on Q/W, this is also why I prefer to keep it at level 1 until I can't level up anything else.

 

Level it up past 1 early ONLY if you guys are getting spanked beyond belief and have no kill potential. I don't believe otherwise in getting more than 1 point, or 2 points like Xpecial early.

 

R: Unbreakable Will

 

Alistar gains 60 / 75 / 90 physical damage, and takes 50/60/70% reduced physical and magic damage for 7 seconds.

 

Cooldown 120 / 100 / 80seconds

Cost 150 mana

 

Explanation:

 

 

 

Ultimate that turns alistar into an amazing tank, even after nerfs. In addition to massive damage reduction, it breaks any CC you are affected by. Allows you to tank tower hits without getting raped!

 

An often ignored part of this ultimate is that it grants SIXTY attack damage at level 1. Popping this ultimate just for the sake of damage could potentially tip a fight to your victory but only in desperation.

 

Most people are confused when to use Alistar's ultimate. My rule of thumb is to use it when your health violently starts spiking/ you are tower diving and tanking tower hits/ or you ABSOLUTELY must use your moves to save someone/ CC another person when you get CC'ed.

 

Another plus is it allows you to play recklessly and probably allow you to live unless you walk into 3-5 enemy champs.

 

 

[FinalGod]

Is this created by you?

[Dask]

Is this created by you?

No, copy/paste from league craft.

[GeneralKenody]

tl;dr

[HardCoreIV]

your mid late build will make him kinda low on hp and will get quickly killed

[xR3spawN]

The Gold Per Sec Runes Could Be Easily Replaced With Movement Speed Also Or Hp +72 I Think It Is. Very Good Guide (Copy Paste Or Not). Good Job.

[Matthew]

Ignite for a support. OK

[DjNanos]

Ignite for a support. OK

 

With the recent Heal nerf, however, more AD carries carry Ignite, never run DOUBLE IGNITE BOT LANE. In these cases I go to Exhaust.

 

[Intrepid]

i need 200 posts

 

stop spamming 1 more and you'll start to get punished.

 

On topic the guide is bad and outdated so locked.