Welcome to my Nilah Guide!

Whether you're new to the champion or looking to refine your skills, this guide will provide you with all the information you need to master Nilah. From her abilities and item builds to in-game strategies and tips, we’ll cover everything that makes Nilah a unique and powerful champion in the ADC role.

Nilah's kit offers a mix of mobility, burst damage, and sustain, making her a versatile and exciting champion to play. Let's dive into the details and unleash the true potential of Nilah together!

Passive: Joy Unending
Nilah amplifies the healing and shielding abilities of nearby allies. Allies that heal or shield Nilah gain a bonus heal or shield for themselves. And when an allied champion heals or shields themselves near Nilah, she gives herself a bonus heal or shield.

If Nilah last hits an enemy minion, she and her nearest allied champion will gain the normal amount of shared experience, plus half of the experience that would have been lost due to sharing.

Q: Formless Blade
Active: Nilah’s Formless Blade strikes in a line, damaging all enemies hit. Hitting an enemy will briefly increase Nilah’s attack range and attack speed and empower her basic attacks, causing them to splash in a cone and deal additional damage.

Passive: Attacks and ability damage against champions ignore some of their armor and heal Nilah for part of the damage dealt. This effect scales with crit chance and converts any excess healing into a shield.

W: Jubilant Veil
Nilah shrouds herself in a Jubilant Veil and briefly gains bonus move speed, takes reduced magic damage, and dodges all incoming basic attacks.

Touching an ally champion hides them in the veil as well, but they’ll be protected for a shorter period.

E: Slipstream
Slipstream lets Nilah dash through a target unit, traveling a fixed distance every time and damaging all enemies she passes through. She can store up to 2 charges at once.

Cast Formless Blade during Slipstream to pull a wave in your path, dealing damage after a quick delay and granting Formless Blade's enhanced basic attack effect.

R: Apotheosis
Nilah unleashes a surge of power, lashes her whip in an area around her and, with a final burst, pulls enemies in toward the center.

Apotheosis heals Nilah for part of the damage dealt, converting any excess healing into a shield. This effect scales with crit chance and is granted to nearby allies.

Nilah goes all in and has a very short range, so she benefits greatly from using a fully stacked Conqueror rune in fights. She also needs a lot of sustain, and runes like Triumph and Legend: Bloodline really help with that.

As mentioned, you are likely to be low on health very often, so Last Stand is the best of the available choices in the Precision tree.

For your secondary tree, Domination offers you Sudden Impact and Treasure Hunter, which further enhance your all-in capability and reward risky gameplay if piloted correctly.

The ultimate damage core is guaranteed if you start with The Collector and Infinity Edge. If you can afford to go for Lord Dominik's Regards next, that's great. If not, enhance your survivability by buying items like Bloodthirster, Immortal Shieldbow, upgraded boots, or Mercurial Scimitar.

Optional Item Choices:

Guardian Angel: Provides a second chance in fights with its resurrection passive, making it an excellent choice if you're often targeted first in teamfights.

Phantom Dancer: Increases your attack speed, movement speed, and adds a shield, enhancing your ability to kite and survive in prolonged engagements.

Ravenous Hydra: Offers lifesteal and a cleave effect on your auto attacks, allowing you to sustain and deal significant AoE damage in teamfights.

Maw of Malmortius: Grants a shield and lifeline passive when taking magic damage, which is useful against AP-heavy teams or burst mages.

Death's Dance: Converts a portion of the damage taken into a bleed effect, allowing you to sustain in fights and potentially turn the tide with its healing upon securing a kill.

Sterak's Gage: Provides bonus health and a lifeline shield, giving you more survivability in extended fights and when engaging multiple opponents.

Edge of Night: Adds a spell shield that blocks the next incoming ability, helping you avoid crucial crowd control or burst damage.

These items offer different benefits depending on your playstyle and the enemy team's composition. Experiment with them to find the best combinations for your games!

Nilah works best with supports that have either healing, shields, or both. Check out the Synergies section for further information, but keep that in mind if you are unsure about picking her.

Never fight when your Q isn't active. You are literally a melee champ otherwise.

You can combine Q and your dash. Try this out in practice mode before jumping into ranked, as it can feel unfamiliar if you are new to Nilah.

Try to walk through your teammates when you activate your spell shield if you feel you can save them. You can protect them from high-ranged attacks (1000+ range) coming from champs like Aphelios or Caitlyn. Walk through them as late as possible to maximize the ability's duration.

You cannot dash while using your ultimate. Fancy moves like dashing in with 1 charge and then dashing out again won't work. You have to engage very carefully when going melee.

Remember that you can save your teammates from dying by healing them with your ultimate. This doesn't mean you should always play super risky and take every fight, but you have the option.

If you snowball, you can snowball even harder with a Nilah lane due to the EXP passive. This mechanic is very powerful, making both you and your support stronger compared to other ADCs. Situations like a level 6 Zed roaming bot to kill 1 or 2 level 4 botlaners become less common if you pilot her correctly.

Your early game isn't the strongest. Try to avoid significant damage sources like Caitlyn headshots or Jhin's fourth auto attack with your spell shield, as well as crucial abilities like Twisted Fate's gold card. Do not use it to initiate irrelevant trades.

Use your environment. If possible, pull enemies into Teemo's shrooms, Gangplank's barrels, or set up an amazing teamfight-winning ultimate for Qiyana. Feel free to engage and enable your team. If you're lucky (or fed) enough, you might survive and win the teamfight on your own.

Pros:

🟢🟢 Bonus EXP that allows you and your support to compete with solo laners if your lane goes well

🟢 Lifesteal, Overheal, and armor penetration built in

🟢 Spellshield that dodges auto attacks

🟢 Super strong late game

🟢 The ability to initiate teamfights as an ADC

🟢 Two dashes. That's pretty amazing!

Cons:

🔴🔴 Low attack range

🔴 Weak early game

🔴 Hard times against fed enemies because your ultimate ability forces you to go melee

🔴 Long cooldowns if you accidentally waste every ability

Nilah is a great addition to the botlane, especially for ADC mains like me. Her kit offers a ton of unique mechanics, and finally, we have an ADC besides Samira that wants to go melee against the entire team when the situation allows it. Her laning phase and attack range might not be the most fun to play, but if you start snowballing, the gameplay can be incredibly rewarding.

If you enjoyed my guide, I would appreciate a vote. Also, if you want to see more of my content, check out my other ADC guides.

Here are links to my other guides:
Caitlyn
Ezreal
Jinx
Xayah
Miss Fortune
Draven
Ashe
Jhin
Kalista
Kog'Maw
Lucian
Sivir
Tristana
Twitch
Varus
Vayne
Kaisa
Zeri
Samira
Aphelios
Senna
Nilah
Smolder