I am Split King a High Elo player with a Youtube Channel and Twitch account. At the end of season 9, I got to Grandmaster 400 points with my 3 Main Champions, Rek'Sai, Shyvana and Rammus. Therefore it is now time for Rammus to get some love with his very own guide.
I have never encountered another Rammus player above Diamond 1 so they are quite rare at the moment.

To get started you can watch my in-depth Video Guide: Play Video

This game is from the end of Season 9 at an Elo of Diamond 2. Play Video

The Powerspike:

Your first 3 items should ALWAYS be Boots Mercury's Treads/ Boots of Swiftness/ Ninja Tabi -> Stalker's Blade - Cinderhulk and Thornmail

But what if you are up against 5 mages? Well then you should not have picked Rammus in the first place, but honestly, in most cases, Thornmail is great even against magic damage (because you deal so much more damage yourself) also your boots of choice in case of heavy magic damage is Mercury's Treads. Check the "When to Pick Rammus Section" for more information.

The Fourth Item

After Thornmail I almost always get a Dead Man's Plate as it has all 3 of the stats Rammus wants: Health, Armor and Movement Speed.

The Fifth Item

After Dead Man's Plate it's usually time to get at least a little magic resist.

Those should be: Wit's End, Adaptive Helm, Gargoyle Stoneplate or Spirit Visage.

Wit's End is best if you are fed and want to push your advantage further by getting some more damage while still getting survivability through magic resist and healing

Adaptive Helm is great vs sustained magic damage that Rammus is so weak against.

Gargoyle Stoneplate is useful against most teams as 80 Armor AND 80 Magic resist makes Rammus almost indestructible in team fights.

Spirit Visage is rarely used but it can be useful if you have a healing support or if you get the Ocean Soul. ALWAYS get it if you get the Ocean Soul :D

Full Build

You rarely get to the point where you have to buy the 6th item as you have usually lost or won by then. But when you DO get that far I find Warmog's Armor to be a SOLID choice. In case of little to no magic damage on the enemy team you can skip the magic resist item and go straight for Warmog's Armor instead. Then the 6th item should be even more armor.


Situational Item:
Liandry's Torment

Sometimes my team really lacks magic damage so I decide to go for a Liandry's Torment. It obviously has great synergy with Soaring Slam but while in Defensive Ball Curl the damage people take when hitting Rammus applies Spell effects. So if you have Liandry's Torment and somebody hits you in Defensive Ball Curl they will also get hit by Liandry's Torment.

Since it only gives a little health but deals high amounts of damage you will find me building this item more often if I am playing at an elo below my skill level as I need more damage to solo carry.

Rammus is a tank. A tank that scales EXTREMELY well with Tanky Stats. Resolve should, therefore, be your primary tree (unless you want to have fun in which case Predator and Phase Rush is ideal :P )

Aftershock
Hands down the best keystone on Rammus. It makes you extremely tanky when you engage with Powerball or simply use Frenzying Taunt. It also gives you a HUGE damage boost since you will turn all that juicy armor into damage with your Passive Spiked Shell

Demolish vs Font of Life
Both runes are viable, for obvious reasons you should never consider Shield Bash
I prefer Demolish as I am the Split King and split push way more than the average player. In the end, the choice you make here will matter very little so pick what you like.

Conditioning vs Bone Plating
I ALWAYS go Conditioning since Rammus can never get too much armor. %armor increases also function weirdly with Rammus so that he actually gets a higher bonus for some reason. It basically double dips on his armor stat since it increases the amount before Defensive Ball Curl and then increases it AGAIN when Defensive Ball Curl is activated. You can see a pretty insane example of this in the main video guide. That being said Bone Plating is not a bad rune and obviously a better early game rune but I still suggest that you go with Conditioning it is STRONK

Unflinching
ALWAAAAAYS go Unflinching Slow resistance works on the self-slow from Defensive Ball Curl so it's a super solid stat, more tenacity is just icing on the cake. Overgrowth takes too long to stack in the jungle anyway and Revitalize does almost nothing for Rammus.

Secondary Tree

I always go Precision

Triumph best rune by far in this tree

Legend: Alacrity vs Legend: Tenacity
90% of games I go Alacrity, but sometimes there is so much cc that Tenacity is a better choice.

You can also go Domination as your secondary.

Then you can pick up Relentless Hunter which is also a great rune.

Cheap Shot is the best second rune in this tree but it is not great. If there was a better rune than Cheap Shot I would consider going Domination myself, but for now, I stick with Precision

Honorable Mention
Ravenous Hunter
You can actually heal a lot from your Spiked Shell and Defensive Ball Curl with this rune but it is only viable in lower elo.

As I discuss in my video guide I only pick Rammus into ideal enemy setups.

What is an ideal setup though?

The Point System

In champ select, I have a mini-game in my head that helps me decide if I should go Rammus

If I get at least 20 points I will consider going Rammus, if I get 25 or more I Always go Rammus. So how do I get points?

For each enemy ADC on the enemy team I get 10 points. Yasuo, Tryndamere and Master Yi counts as ADC's for this purpose. As an exception Vayne only gives 5 points.

For each Physical damage dealer on the enemy team I get 5 points.

For each sustained damage mage, I LOSE 5 points.

Everything else gives 0 points.

If there is a Trundle I NEVER pick Rammus.

If you are trying to learn Rammus or don't care about getting a high rank then ignore all this :P


REAL LIFE EXAMPLE TIME:

In order to demonstrate I just played 2 games with Rammus:
I would normally never pick Rammus against a team like this but I did it anyway FOR SCIENCE!

The only thing that gives points on the enemy team here is Vayne and Rek'Sai
for a total of 10 Points. It is a terrible team to pick Rammus against and as you can see I did not have a great time.


In this game, however, I get 10 points from Aphelios, 5 Points from Qiyana and 5 Points from Irelia for a total of 20 points. I actually played the game quite badly but still ended with a fairly decent score simply because Rammus was viable against this team. (Normally I would actually not pick Rammus against this team since I was the third pick and could only see Qiyana, Nidalee, and Irelia when it was my turn to pick)

I intentionally made it hard for myself to pick Rammus. This is because I started taking Ranked very seriously so now I only pick Rammus when he truly shines, the rest of the time I keep him on the bench.

TLDR: Rammus is viable even in the highest of elos but only against the right setups.

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Link: Solo Queue Shen
Shen: A tanky split pusher with a supportive Kit. This guide can teach you a lot about split pushing and map awareness even if you don't want to play Shen.
Viable Elo: Mid to High.
Shen is a weird champion since he actually gets stronger the higher rank you are. Throwing a well-timed Shen R on a Diamond ADC does a lot more than throwing it on a Silver ADC. I do not recommend playing Shen Below Gold.

Link: World Famous Shyvana
Shyvana: A tanky Split pusher with very high sustained damage. I am disgustingly good at this champion. learning to play Shyvana does not take long. You can become fairly adept at Shyvana even with limited time on your hands if you follow this guide.
Viable Elo: Any
Shyvana is a very stable Champion. She is viable in almost all patches and all ranks

Link: Control Mage Teemo
Satan: A squishy Satanic Hamster that can control the battlefield with his shrooms. The map control is amazing. You can use it for vision resulting in a safe split push, or you can use it to place a heavy line of defense that makes it very hard for the enemy team to finish. A full build Teemo is also very scary. If you have sold your soul to the devil this guide is for you.
Viable Elo: Low to Semi-High
I can only play Teemo effectively up to about Diamond 3. Most players above that Rank knows too well how to abuse his weakness. I will however highly recommend using Teemo for climbing if you are below Diamond. You can climb fast and reliably with Teemo because he does not rely much on his team. Be a one-man army.

Link: THE Rek'sai Guide
Rek'sai: A void monster that burrows underground to stalk her prey. I got to Grandmaster with this champion and it's possible that I am even better on Rek'sai than on Shyvana. Rek'sai is extremely fun to play once you master her but it does take some time since she essentially has 7 abilities instead of the standard 4. You should use this guide if your main concern is to get as high rank as possible.
Viable Elo: Mid to VERY High.
You could still use Rek'sai in low elo with great success if you become good at her, but since she is harder than most champions to learn I would advise against this. When I play ranked on a new account I rarely start out by playing Rek'sai as there are other champions that can carry better with enough kills. You can, however, reach any elo with enough skill because Rek'sai is so extremely strong right now.

LINK: Rammus Guide
Rammus: A Tanky Tank. Rammus gives zero ****s because he cannot die. This guide is ideal for newer or low elo players since Rammus is extremely easy to play. You can learn the basics of the jungle without having to worry about learning a difficult champion at the same time.
Viable Elo: ANY (If picked as a counter) or LOW-MID (If picked every game)
I played Rammus alongside Rek'sai and Shyvana when I got to Grandmaster the first time. BUT I only pick Rammus against certain setups otherwise he is just too weak. The guide contains a section about WHEN to pick Rammus. Rammus is designed as a Counter Champion to AD.