Kha'Zix sucks, Rengar rocks! Wait, that ain't news, that's the rule...

27/5/14: News is: Ravenous Hydra > Blade of the Ruined King on Rengar so my builds changed a bit. Also I added a cheat sheet about Ryan Choi. A synergies chapter. And stats tiers.

21/6/14: Kha'Zix seriously nerfed. Still strong but not op. Rengar definitely better ATM. As of 4.10, new seriously nerfed, consequently Ravenous Hydra way better. New gives shield to ADCs so our job is a bit harder right now. Also in previous patch, Rengar got a tiny nerf: His Savagery bonus damage isn't boosted when he crits. (Makes assassin even harder).

Yep we got at last the first skin (the one of the release doesn't count) on Rengar and it is really awesome! The color of the soundwave caused by his roar (lol that sounds so not scientifically right :P) is dark blue. Also while he is channeling for stealth, he glitters a bit like Mecha Kha'Zix but in darker colors which is pretty awesome. My favorite feature is, that you can put on and off your hoodie (basically it is a toggle) by taunting. If you wanna really feel the momment, just before stealthing to dive on the priority target, put your hoodie on!

21/6/14 Update: Ok the skin has nice features and an impressive shop image. Unfortunately, in-game, it is a bit Season 1 I would say :/ It is missing a lot of detail. Rito pls fix!

Hello guys, I am John (Crysis, Silver IV, EUNE) and welcome to my Top Lane Rengar guide! I recently started playing again and found out that our beloved lion suffered the torture of the Nerf hammer by Herr Morello. I want to be honest with you, he is at a much worse state than before. However that doesn't mean that he isn't viable anymore, at least with regards to top lane, where I play him. Pre nerfs Rengar could be played either as an assassin or a full tank. Now the assassin playstyle requires more experienced hands and a far riskier build, while the full tank is still good and there is potential for a bruiser rengar, depending on your team's (and the enemies too) line-up. They have minor differences but the actual role remains the same. I play Rengar whenever I can or whenever a teammate asks me to (Starting To build some rep as Rengar in silver)

As you can see Rengar is not dead yet Mr. Morello and he continues his path in the league without hesitation because:

Well this chapter is not a common pros and cons chapter. Here I use this:

• Strengths
• Weaknesses
• Opportunities
• Threats

Or in other words, SWOT analysis!

It is a method of fully analyzing a project and, to me, it applies to champions too!

Strengths

• Good base stats
• Very mobile
• AoE and single target poke
• Sustain in lane
• Strong self-buffs
• Special trinket
• Really op catchphrases
• Hard to kill
• Trophies are permanent
• Easy to play

Weaknesses

• Kinda weak right now
• You can't annihilate anything that dares moving as you used to
• Really hard to master
• Long cooldown on skills
• Not as snowbally anymore
• Mediocre to bad teamfights

Opportunities

• Great tanking potential
• Great ability to stick to carries
• Great initiation
• Ulti allows for great combos
• Can clear out half the enemy towers/lanes
• Great ganking potential
• He is overnerfed meaning he might get buffed
• Great juking potential

Threats

• Riot hates him (might nerf again)
• People will rage at you for playing him
• If you fall behind, it is really hard to get back
• Kha'Zix is much better now

This is the rune page I use for bruiser and assassin Rango. Good AD for last hitting and trades, plus armor penetration for late game insta-bursting. Armor is always necessary for laning. Scaling magic resist vs magic damage late game.

If against AP laner, change your glyphs to:

If playing tank rengar and you're gonna build Sunfire and Thornmail then change your marks to: Greater Mark of Hybrid Penetration. With these you will deal more damage with Battle Roar and items mentioned.

: Best utility in the game, crazy combos with passive and ult.

: True damage, reduces heal, adds to burst and gives more killing potential.

---

Alternative to ---> : It is nice on Rengar it is very fun to use it with your ultimate. It also helps sticking to your priority target.

Alternative to ---> : It is really helpful vs all AD teams or vs top lane melee carries. You should consider taking exhaust if no one else in your team has it.

Bola Strike and Savagery at first 2 levels are really strong since you can dish out much damage. From that point on, max out Battle Roar by level 9, E by level 13 and last Q. Grab a point in ultimate whenever you can of course.

If going for assassin build then your priority is R>Q>E>W

Let's move to how we dress our lion.

Before the last bunch of nerfs he got, Rengar could be played either as an assassin or as an off-tank, depending on player preference and your team needs. However, now, the assassin build is not worth it anymore (mostly because you cannot triple q anymore). You can play assassin Rengar if you really want but it is situational. These changes also led to the birth of bruiser Rengar which wasn't as effective pre-nerfs.

NOTE: I call off-tank rengar, the build with 0-1 offensive items and bruiser rengar the build with 2-3 offensive items.

At any case, I recommend starting your build with + + . These will give you sustain and durability, as well as dueling power.

As for the first item it should be one of the following:


If you are doing really well grab the tiamat first. If you are doing bad or just fine grab Sunfire Aegis. If the enemy is a stupidly strong AP burster and you need to sustain quickly, then go for Spirit Visage.

You should continue your build with:
+

The durability you get from randuin's and the ability to stick to enemies in early/mid game skirmishes thanks to this item is really remarkable. Your chasing/dueling potential is really good at this point and also you become somewhat hard to kite.

Now you should pick 2 of the following (but only 1 offensive):

: Be sure to grab this if your support hasn't. You profit personally as well.

: If they have something like Veigar or a super initiator like Malphite or Amumu

: Good versus all kinds of damage. Best against balanced composition teams.

: If they burst you really hard or they focus you really hard. It makes it even more stupid to focus you.

: If they got a lot of right clickers...

: My personal preference as a second offensive item on bruiser Rengar. Really sends your dps through the roof.

: Good versus magic damage teams. Also you become even more lethal as you go down in hp.

: I suggest this if they have a beefy line-up. This helps sticking to targets. Along with ravenous, you can sustain like a maniac and split push like crazy.

: Good in general for champions like Rengar. I suggest it only in case that you have a hard AD team.

: If you are smurfing or boosting your brother's account. Ridiculously good if fed, grab this if you want to keep snowballing and close out games. Risky option.

: A ridiculously good item on bruisers, gives everything. The passive combines with Savagery for extra strong burst. I really like it on bruiser Rengar.

: My personal preference as a third offensive item on bruiser rengar (in case we have 2 more tanky chars in team). With it's active and Randuin's Omen's active, your single target damage and chasing potential go through the roof. It is also funny to see some random Savagery Crits. The cdr is also really strong, let alone the armor pen.

: If you have boots, other than Mercury's Treads but you still need the tenacity you should definitely consider grabbing this. The ad, attack speed and cdr are always welcome as well.

So if you would like to try out some new stuff then I am going to give you some stats tiers for you to considerate while you are theorycrafting :)

Tier 1: Attack Damage, Armor Penetration, Health
Tier 1,5: CDR, Armor, Magical Resistance, Movement Speed
Tier 2: Attack Speed, Life Steal
Tier 3: Critical Chance

Rengar has an ok lane phase and a really strong mid game. Most of the time you should start by taking a point in Savagery at level 1 and also get 1 ferocity by q-ing the buff your jungler decides to kill first.

If you are up against a hard match up, be sure to grab Bola Strike at level 1. Depending the enemy champion difficulty (and sometimes their build) you should force a hard trade at levels 1-3 at least once. Also, I suggest you play really aggressive when you have maximum ferocity.

Other than the previously mentioned, act normal, farm, freeze the lane, ward and play safe.

---

As far as mid game is concerned, you can apply too much pressure on other lanes with your ultimate. Ask them where they want you and have your jungler keep your lane. Before starting to roam, be sure to push your ally minion wave to the enemy tower. A well done mid game gank, can really win games. Also try to locate poor enemies being all alone in the jungle or other lanes. For example if that Vayne is trying to recover from her bad lane phase by farming top all alone, then go for her and kill her! She is squishy and she won't even expect you!

At this point you can either split push, or fight. I suggest you split push when your ultimate is down. Always have map awareness to notice missing enemies that might come for you. Also it is important to inform your team that you are planning to split push so that they don't force fights. A good way to split push, is to push the minions all the way to the enemy tower and then leave to join or initiate a fight, or even go push to another lane.

You should also continue searching for all alone enemies and burst the heck out of them! However if other objectives are on going such as inhibitor destruction or baron, don't do that. Follow your team...

Going into stealth mode with already 5 ferocity is now good, since you can dive the enemy carry immobilize it and start filling up your meter. You should always be afraid of pink wards, since that way they can locate you and expect you. As tank/bruiser being detected by pink ward doesn't mean instant death, but still you should have the element of surprise. If they somehow manage to get you really low, do your Empowered Battle Roar and let your hp bar fill up again. This would absolutely make them hate you and try to kill you instead of killing your team.

Whatever build you're playing, in teamfights when you try to do damage to the enemy priority target, do the following.

5 ferocity --> Ulti --> Jump-->Do Empowered Savagery --> Dr. Mundo SMASH your keyboard, activating everything you got, actives, abilities everything! --> Repeat!

This is not as effective as it would be if we still had the 3x Q but it is neat :)

A note on initiating:

It is always better to let your team's true initiator lead you. If for example you have an Amumu in team, tell him to initiate and ult 5 people! That way destroying the enemy target will be so much easier!

So let's see what we got here...

Rengar and Kha'Zix are both reference to the movie predator vs alien (respectively). So Riot has given they players are special feature for their rivalry. In order to activate this special, in-game feature, Rengar and Kha'Zix must be on opposite teams and must both be level 18. If Rengar kills or assists the assassination of the enemy Kha'Zix, his special trinket transforms into the head of Kha'Zix and all 20 stack effects are permanently unlocked. On the other side, if Kha'Zix kills Rengar or helps kill him, he gets a fourth point of evolution, permanently. After both champions getting their nerfs, the achievement rewards are not that game changing and op. However the situation right now is even since getting 4 points of evolution on kha pre nerfs was way more op than getting full effects of bonetooth (when it was still an item).

Yep that's true riot, we are always going to find a way to play Rengar. We expect you though to re buff him a bit since he is really weak right now.

Congratulations my friends, you reached the end of the guide. I really hope you liked it and that you plan on giving our lion a chance on top lane. As for a jungling section, I don't see this one coming soon since I really am a terrible jungler. Don't be afraid to try out new staff that's how the community results to the most efficient build, style of play, for every champion it is given. I expect any possible pictures of results. Practice hard and always do your best.

Sincerely yours,

Crysis

Note this is my second account, my first one, Plasma, was stolen.