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Choose Champion Build:
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Anivia MID
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Anivia's Natural Habitat (ARAM)
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Nestling For Your ADC (Support)
Recommended Items
Runes: Offensive/Burst/Winlanewingame
+10% Attack Speed
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+65 Base Health
Spells:
Flash
Teleport
Items
Ability Order
Rebirth (PASSIVE)
Anivia Passive Ability
Threats & Synergies
Kassadin
Yet another annoying match-up. He isn't much to look at pre-6, but once he gets his Riftwalk he is a NIGHTMARE. Combine that with his Q that cancels your ulti and his passive which reduces all incoming magic damage by 15% and you can forget about out-trading him. Depending on his skill though, this game could be easy early on, given that he's melee.
SEASON 11 EXTRA: He's been impacted pretty bad by the item changes as far as I've seen, obliterate him in the early game and he'll have a very hard time catching up.
Introduction
With this guide, I aim to help the player grasp Anivia's sometimes complex mechanics, while also recommending a solid build that covers for most of Anivia's problems, essentially turning Anivia into a force to be reckoned with. Whether you're looking to have some fun or trying to climb up the dreaded Ranked ladder, this guide is for you. Below, you'll find all you need to know about Anivia's strengths, weaknesses, match-ups and more!
LORE
-- Anivia
Anivia is as much a part of the Freljord as the never-ending frost. Long before mortals had ever set foot on the land's frigid tundra, she had lived countless lifetimes and died as many deaths. The beginnings and ends of her eternal cycle always heralded great change, from the calming of raging storms to the ebb and flow of ice ages. It is said that when the cryophoenix dies, an era ends; and when she is reborn, a new era begins.
Though Anivia's past lifetimes have faded from her memory, she knows her purpose: she must protect the Freljord at all costs.
When she was last reborn, Anivia witnessed the rise of a mighty and united human tribe. She guarded their lands with pride as they prospered, but such unity could not last forever. The great tribe fractured into three, and after that upheaval, Anivia watched the people of the Freljord become embroiled in battle. As she strove to calm the turmoil tearing her home apart, Anivia began to sense a greater threat: an ancient evil growing deep within the earth. To her horror, she felt the pure magic of the ice itself become blackened and corrupt. Like blood in water, darkness crept into the Freljord. With her destiny so tied to the power of the land, Anivia knew if such evil took root in her home, that same darkness would find its way into her heart. She could no longer remain a mere guardian - the cryophoenix had to act.
Anivia soon discovered an ally in Ashe, the Frost Archer. Ashe too believed in unification as an end to the Freljord's perpetual strife, and Anivia offered the tribal leader her aid. Now, with war on the horizon, Anivia prepares to fight for peace, but she knows the inevitable truth of her destiny. One day, evil will rise from the ice, and she must destroy it - no matter the cost.

Pros
+ Incredible Burst + Enemies don't expect your damage most of the time, letting their guard down + AoE Ulti with a convenient slow debuff + Your ![]() + ![]() ![]() + Very fun to play + Exceptional at teamfights + Can destroy the entire enemy team if not focused hard. + Her ![]() ![]() + Very low CD on your ulti, unlike most mages. |
Cons
+ REALLY vulnerable to CC - Missing your ![]() ![]() - ![]() - ![]() - Your ulti can be interrupted by most forms of CC, putting it in full cooldown. - Weak Early Game; farming can also be challenging. - ![]() - No "real" escape other than ![]() - Hard to master |
In general:
Anivia is a burst mage that truly shines in teamfights. Her kit offers amazing crowd control and can turn teamfights around with incredible damage and kiting potential. The nature of her
Frostbite, which deals DOUBLE damage to targets recently stunned by
Flash Frost or recently damaged by a fully formed
Glacial Storm alone, helps you remove carries from the fight in a heartbeat.
- Unfortunately though,
Anivia is fragile and easy to shut down. She is really weak to CC, has no reliable escape, and is severely punished in case she misses any of her abilities. The hardest part of Anivia to master is definetely her
Crystallize, which has the potential to make or break a fight. In general, her laning phase isn't optimal against the majority of her match-ups, and if you are not careful, you could fall behind very easily, putting yourself and your team at a disadvantage.
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Flash Frost (Q) RANGE: 1100 COST: 80/85/90/95/100 COOLDOWN: 11/10/9/8/7 |
By far the slowest skill-shot in the game, ![]() ![]() ![]() |
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Crystallize (W) RANGE: 1000 COST: 70 COOLDOWN: 17 |
A spell that makes Anivia a very fun champion to play. In theory, ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
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Frostbite (E) RANGE: 600 COST: 50 COOLDOWN: 4 |
This is your main trading tool. It is known for giving ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
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Glacial Storm (R) RANGE: 750 COST: 60 + 35/45/55/s COOLDOWN: 4/3/2 |
Your comfy ultimate. With a criminally low CD compared to other mid laners and a very helpful AoE damage and slow, this spell is full of utility. Upon casting, a small, well, Glacial Storm starts forming. After 1.5 seconds it reaches maximum size and deals 300% damage to all enemies caught inside, while also applying the chilling debuff to all enemies caught inside. A lot of people (especially in lower elos) tend to underestimate ![]() ![]() |
SEASON 11

As always, check the "Patch Notes" and "Items" sections for general new season Bird changes/thoughts and Items changes respectively and have fun in the rift.
A look at stat-runes and what they mean for

Each rune page offers 3 small runes that give you extra stats. These are;
- 10 adaptive force (6 AD or 10 AP), 9% attack speed, or 1-10% cooldown reduction (lv 1-18)
- 10 adaptive force (6 AD or 10 AP), 5 armor, or 6 magic resist
- 15-90 health (lv 1-18), 5 armor, or 6 magic resist.
First things first, now that Attack Speed is seperate from Precision, I think Domination and Inspiration are good options. In general, a good setup would be to take 9% attack speed, 10 adaptive force and finally, either armor or magic resist, depending on the enemy team and the enemy midlaner.
The reasoning behind this is that the extra attack speed gives you an easier time farming as well as a bit more AA poke, while the adaptive damage and defense gives you a good bonus in the early game. You can always get more adaptive damage instead of attack speed, but

SORCERY




























So what's better?



Scorch on the other hand, gives you some good poke damage for the laning phase, but is nearly useless later in the game as it doesn't scale with anything. In fact, the most damage Scorch can do at level 18 is a mere 30 damage.

So what does this all mean? Scorch is only useful for an aggressive laning phase. This is because its damage was nerfed while its cooldown was reduced, which means that you have to poke as much as possible to take full advantage of it. Gathering Storm on the other hand takes some strength from your early game and gives you some powerful mid-late game scaling. The champion you're up against plays an important role on what you'd want to pick as well. If the enemy laner has lots of sustain in general, Scorch won't do much for example. In general though, it comes down to one thing. Want your laning phase to be slightly stronger? Scorch. Want to scale better later? GS.
DOMINATION


















I should note though, that despite all that, Sorcery is still the safer option when it comes to losing lanes, as it fares much better in the late-game and covers your needs for stats better, so it's definitely not a done deal. For these reasons, I'll be adding a Domination page to the runes, and I encourage you to experiment with it. If it seems like it's the ONLY way to go from now on, it'll replace the current rune page proper, but until then there's nothing wrong with choices.
OTHER VIABLE RUNE PATHS





























IDEAL







SITUATIONAL













STARTING ITEMS














EARLY ITEMS










CORE ITEMS




Details on the two I consider superior are right below this footnote, but in short, Mythic items are pretty much reworked versions of items that existed previously, but with a twist. You can only buy one Mythic item, and each one of them gives all your Legendary (full) items a small stat bonus. In the case of








So which one do you pick? It really depends on the game and the teams, but in general you'd pick










OR...







SITUATIONAL ITEMS









In that case...



















I strongly encourage experimentation, and even though


That being said, you'll want to balance the build accordingly. For example, if you're sacrificing the survivability of








Tl;dr - You should never consider every situation equal. Your damage won't mean much if you don't get the opportunity to deal any of it. Play smart and build depending on the matchup, this is the key to success with

Why it had to go I don't know, Riot wouldn't say





EARLY GAME
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Anivia is one of those champions that struggle a lot in the lane. Anivia requires a large mana pool due to her high mana costs and then nature of her ![]() ![]() ![]() That doesn't mean AFK farming of course. When you're in lane, you should always poke your opponent with your huge AA range whenever the opportunity shows itself. A Q+E combo also works great. For maximum effectiveness, try poking the opponent when they go for a lasthit, as there's a small window where the opponent can't fight back unless they lose the creep to run away or retaliate. I almost always go for a poke when the enemy is busy killing a cannon minion, as it gives lots of gold and many people would rather get poked than lose it. By poking the enemy laner, you are applying important pressure on him, and you might eventually force them out of lane. |
If they stay in the lane instead of going back to base, you should then attempt to keep your opponent zoned out constantly. You can achieve this by staying between him and his caster minions. If he gets too close in order to farm or receive the XP, go for the kill. You should always be careful however, as zoning the opponent requires you to over-extend most of the time, making you vulnerable to an enemy gank. Which brings me to my next point, warding. Warding is very important during the laning phase as it gives you all sorts of advantages. For one, you can defend yourself from a potential gank as a well placed ward will reveal the enemy jungler's whereabouts. In addition, a well placed deep ![]() ![]() |
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MID GAME
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During the mid-game, there's a couple things you can do. First, if you've gotten any kind of advantage over the opponent from your laning phase, you should look to share that advantage with your teammates by roaming. Anivia isn't the best roamer in the world, but saying that her ganks are oppressive is an understatement. She has a stun, a slow, a wall and an ability that deals chunks of HP every couple of seconds. If the enemy has pushed an ally to their turret, it's always worth paying their lane a visit for an almost guaranteed kill. Everytime you roam, you should keep an eye on the enemy mid-laner, as he could follow your roam and potentially outplay you. That's why it's best to push your lane (doesn't take long with ![]() If the enemy is roaming and you're still in the lane, you should always notify your teammates multiple times through pings (fun fact - the question mark ping isn't for being toxic) and through chat. Sometimes, pushing the lane and trying to take the enemy mid-turret down is better than counter-roaming, as the first helps keep the pressure up for the enemy team. |
You must evaluate the situation and choose what the best course of action would be. If you have ![]() Finally, during the mid-game, you'll succesfully finish your core and start dealing damage effectively. This is where ![]() Avoid getting caught at all costs, as your damage is very important for your team in case a fight breaks out. Keep on buying control wards whenever you have space in your invertory. You should also consider switching to ![]() |
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LATE GAME
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In this stage of the game, you should focus on a couple of things. Once again, vision control is extremely important, especially now that dying can cost you the game. You should always look for opportunities to take objectives and pick enemy champions. Normally you'd have to move as a team, but this is rarely possible in SoloQ or Normals, unless you're a team of 5. That's why you should keep an eye out for your allies and save them whenever possible if they get caught. And now for the most important part of the late-game, teamfighting. In teamfights the most important thing when playing as ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Also, you should avoid bringing the fight to the enemy team if possible, since you end up being positioned dangerously. If they bring the fight to you however, you should take advantage of the narrow spaces in the jungle, not only to kite more effectively, but to use your AoE to its outmost potential. If your team happens to lose a teamfight and you're forced to protect your base, you should try to slow the siege asmuch as possible with your ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Finally, as a side note, if your team has won a fight, and can close the game, you shouldn't bother with the baron, the dragon, the bot-lane outer turret or any of that. I can't stretch this enough I've won as many games as I've lost due to bad shotcalling. The late-game is all about capitalizing on your enemies' mistakes, and the longer the game gets, the bigger the possibility of your team making a mistake becomes. You should always focus on ending the game as soon as possible. |
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If you have any questions, ask away in the comments, and if you liked this guide, make sure to leave a like, it really helps. I'll also be adding more matchups with time.
Most of all, thanks for reading and have fun in the Rift!

I will make an effort to include changes that affect

Patch 11.7

Patch 11.3

SEASON 11 RUNDOWN

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