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Tips and Tricks for Dominating Dominion!
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Choose Champion Build:
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Bottom Lane Jax
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Trinity-Fulltank-Irelia
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AD-Carry Caitlyn
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Tanky-AP-Kassadin
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Ganker-Tank Rammus
Introduction
This Guide is a Guide for Dominion (NO SH*T?!?!?! O.O), and some general Tips for having great success.
I am soschar2050, and i have been playing Dominion a lot. I like it very much, at times even more than Summoner's Rift (in the following simply called "SR"). I personally think that every(!) League of Legends player should support a Competetive Scene for Dominion, but that's not the Point now.
There are a few things i have to say right out of the gate:
- I never made a Guide like this before! I have no idea how this coding works and have to get used to it at first!
- This Guide may or may not be hard to read at points, AKA Walls of Text, so be prepared for this!
- I'm german, and as such my Grammar may or may not be accurate, so be patient with my Grammar. After all, you're here to learn something about Dominion, NOT to be a Grammar Nazi ;)
- This is based off my own experience and my own opinion, what i think is good on Dominion, as well as some other Guides i read on the Internet! If your Opinion is different from mine,
cry me a f***ing Water Templefeel free to tell me your ideas in the Comments!
Just like Summoner's Rift has it's roles, Dominion also has different Roles. They're not exactly "roles", they're rather strategies and/or Item-Builds, which you want to use depending on the situation.
Usually, there will go 3 people directly to the top-point (called the Windmill), 1 guy captures your middle-point and 1 goes to the botlane, capturing his respective Tower and "laning" against the opposing botlaner.
Otherwise you can make someone fast like
Skarner or
Rammus with
Ghost rush to their bottom-Point, preventing him from taking it in the first place, forfeiting the Windmill but usually guaranteeing their Bottom-Point.
Or you can head directly for their Middle-Point (not recommended unless you REALLY know what you're doing!).
Theoretically there are endless ways to start the Game, but 4 Top 1 Bot is the Meta.
okay, now for the "roles" of Dominion:
Usually, there will go 3 people directly to the top-point (called the Windmill), 1 guy captures your middle-point and 1 goes to the botlane, capturing his respective Tower and "laning" against the opposing botlaner.
Otherwise you can make someone fast like



Or you can head directly for their Middle-Point (not recommended unless you REALLY know what you're doing!).
Theoretically there are endless ways to start the Game, but 4 Top 1 Bot is the Meta.
okay, now for the "roles" of Dominion:
The Tanky Melee-DPS (or, as Sauron would call it, "Tanky Derp")
The Tanky Melee-DPS is usually someone with good sustain, damage and/or crowd control. He is deep in combat and dishes out damage to the opposing team. Many Tanky Derps can hold the botlane quite easily and are the best choices to force 1v1's in the jungle, serving the purpose of a ganker if you don't have one (we'll get to the ganker later).
Examples:Riven,
Darius,
Pantheon,
Volibear,
Kha'Zix
The Ranged DPS
Also known as the AD Carry. They are very difficult to play in Dominion, due to their squishyness and they need to utilize their range. Normally they're good at poking at an enemy defending a point (Piltover Peacemaker,
Volley, etc.), while waiting for an ally to come and help.
Examples:Ashe,
Draven,
Quinn,
Caitlyn,
Varus
The Tanky AP
Before there are any misunderstandings, let me say one thing: Every mage can do at least "okay" if you build him tanky, so you shouldn't think "MUST PLAYRyze" or "MUST PLAY
Swain" or something. Tanky AP just scales better and does better in teamfights. Also, other than
Blackfire Torch and MAYBE
Wooglet's Witchcap there are almost no Glass-Cannon-AP-Items. Usually a "Natural Tanky AP" has some sort of sustain or natural tankiness due to stats. Depending on who you play, you might wanna focus on building CDR over defense, or defense over actual offense.
Examples:Maokai,
Vladimir,
Mordekaiser,
Kassadin,
Soraka
The AP Carry
This is something you should know, but on dominion, only a few casters can afford to go full glass cannon. Usually they have much area damage and some sort of escape method such asSpirit Rush or
Distortion and/or Crowd Control (
Cocoon,
Mark of the Storm) and have to be VERY careful when going through the jungle!
Examples:Ahri,
Zyra,
Ziggs,
Lissandra,
Syndra
The Tank
A Tank is defined by having sustainability and Crowd-control, with crowd control being optional. Their job is simple: Run in and be the one who takes all the CC and the damage. Sometimes they're also good at roaming, making them good gankers (we'll get to this later). Most of them are really good at defending points as well!
Examples:Shen,
Alistar,
Malphite,
Dr. Mundo,
Warwick
The Support
Supports always have some sort of heal, buff and/or Crowd Control, or in case of someone likeSona, all of them. Some supports like
Taric or
Leona can actually consider to go fulltank with a
Locket of the Iron Solari for extra resistances for their team.
Garrison is REALLY helpful on supports, as is building a hextech sweeper!
Examples:Sona,
Karma,
Janna,
Lulu,
Taric
The Ganker
The Ganker is a good roamer with hard crowd-control, sustain and/or damage. His job is to run around in the jungle and go to points where he's needed, help a friend killing an enemy or just being an a**hole and harass and delay enemies who want to, for example, stop a capture.
If someone wants to take the Storm Relic in the middle of the map, you should sit in a nearby bush to protect him from gettingmurderedganked.
Examples:Evelynn,
Rammus,
Rengar,
Twitch,
Nidalee
The Botlaner
The Botlaner is usually someone who is good at pushing, has good sustain, can poke/harass quite easily or is good at 1v1 duels. Your job as the botlaner is just giving the other botlaner so much trouble that someone has to come from top to bot, so your top has an advantage. This is acquired by forcing your enemy out of the botlane (so you can push without having to worry) or just out-push your enemy, causing them to give up the point so you can capture or at least neutralize it.
Examples:Malzahar,
Jax,
Urgot,
Yorick,
Karthus
A sample Team looks like this:- 2 AD-Physical damage dealers, preferably one ranged and one melee
- 2 AP-Magic damage dealers, an AP Carry/Tanky AP and a Support/Tank, if you will
- 1 Botlaner
To further make more specifications you want your team somewhat like This:- A strong Initiator, for example
Jarvan IV,
Rammus or
Kassadin
- A tanky Bruiser, like
Darius,
Rengar,
Singed or
Kassadin
- A bursty/sustained Damage Mage,
Zyra,
Brand or
Kassadin for example.
- And the 4th one could be anything. Another Bruiser, an AD Carry, a Support, or even
Kassadin.
- As for the Botlaner, you want someone who's good at Pushing (
Malzahar), has sustain and/or strong harass (
Yorick), or is good in 1v1 duels (
Kassadin).
More about all this later on in the Guide!
Your team should also not have too much focus on one damage type. If you have much AD, pick a mage, and vice versa. This is a good way of countering guys likeRammus or
Veigar
Now we're getting to an interesting part: the Summoner Spells you should pick! I will cover every single one of them.
Revive
Revive is arguably the most useful spell on Dominion! Yes, i am dead serious! It's discussed in its own chapter, which follows right afterwards. I believe Revive deserves an own Chapter.
Ghost
Everybody in the Low Elo's thinks Ghost is THE MUST HAVE SPELL FOAR DOHMINNION!!!!!!!! As it turns out: it's not as useful as you think it is... You see, there are Speed Shrines on the map which give you a speedbuff, so what's the point of having Ghost if you can just walk over those things and get basically the same effect.
Now you might be thinking "BUT IT ADDS UP AND MAKES YOU FASTER AND FASTER!!!". No. It does not. Well...yes it does, but...let me just explain to you what Movement Speed Soft Caps are.
Here's a quick excerpt from the League of Legends Wiki's Article about Movement Speed:
Spoiler: Click to view
Basically, what this means is the faster you go, the less effective speed-buffs become. This is bad, because you're wasting out precious stats you could use otherwise, you're basically "wasting" Ghost's potential Speed it could give you without those Speed Shrines.
Ghost, in Season 2 in High Elo's, was only used for champions who need kiting to be effective, and even then we're now in Season 4 with Enchantments for your boots, so you can just buy
Enchantment: Furor and have this thing help you kiting.
So yeah, let's leave the Crystal Scar a place free of Ghosts!
Garrison
Overall a great summoner spell. It allows you to interrupt captures from a far and save points that are about to go down, if a large minion wave is about to neutralize it.
On the other hand, if you're the Tanky Melee DPS Champion or the Tank, it can help you to dive a point together with your teammates.
Flash
Due to the big walls and the map layout of the Crystal Scar, flashing over walls won't work as well as it does in Summoner's Rift. It's still useful on some melee champions which just need to get in range for one last hit, for example
Cho'Gath who just needs to close the Gap a little bit to get into
Feast Range for a Kill. The other way it can be used is on some "flash-ult-initiators" such as
Amumu,
Kennen or
Galio. Also you can pull off some awesome jukes with it.
Exhaust
Really good spell, both offensive and defensive. It reduces the target's speed so you can catch up with it, and also reduces the target's damage dealt so you will survive it's burst. With this you can easily win fights and/or catch up to escaping enemies.
Heal
Heal is also good on supports, and is really good throughout the entire game. it can turn around fights, and save you and your teammates in more than just one situation!
Ignite
The damage of ignite itself is quite useful early on to finish off an enemy. The cooldown is also quite short. However, on the Mid-Game-Focused Dominion it's mostly used as a counter against annoying healer-tanks like
Fiddlesticks,
Dr. Mundo or
Warwick.
Clairvoyance
Good on supports if they don't take
Garrison. it provides you vision and can sometimes even save your teammates from getting ganked. However, it's quite situational, since most other spells have better uses than Clairvoyance.
Cleanse
Cleanse removes a lot of stuff! It can save you in clutch situations, and is often taken by AD Carrys, just like on Summoner's Rift. It's really good on Squishy Damage Dealers if the enemy Team is very CC-Heavy to the point that you can't deal any Damage. However it won't help you against Suppressers, like
Malzahar,
Warwick and so on.
Barrier
Just like Cleanse, often taken by the squishy damage-dealers, who can easily be killed otherwise. However it won't help much against Damage over Time abilities like
Ignite, since it can't block all the damage, but only 1 or 2 procs. It also has to compeet with
Flash,
Exhaust,
Heal and
Cleanse, which all are better in my opinion.
Smite
There's no point in taking Smite. You might as well take
Promote if we were still in Season 2... The only situations in which i think Smite can help you is if you're botlane against someone with pets, like
Heimerdinger,
Annie or AD
Malzahar, and even then it's very questionable.
Teleport
Teleport can't be used on Dominion anyways, so yeah... And otherwise it would be totally overpowered NOT THE POINT!
Clarity
In Season 4, Clarity is an ARAM-Exclusive Spell, so yeah...But even before that Clarity was pretty useless on Dominion, because the passive Mana-Regen due to the Crystal Scar's Aura is simply too high.

Revive is arguably the most useful spell on Dominion! Yes, i am dead serious! It's discussed in its own chapter, which follows right afterwards. I believe Revive deserves an own Chapter.

Everybody in the Low Elo's thinks Ghost is THE MUST HAVE SPELL FOAR DOHMINNION!!!!!!!! As it turns out: it's not as useful as you think it is... You see, there are Speed Shrines on the map which give you a speedbuff, so what's the point of having Ghost if you can just walk over those things and get basically the same effect.
Now you might be thinking "BUT IT ADDS UP AND MAKES YOU FASTER AND FASTER!!!". No. It does not. Well...yes it does, but...let me just explain to you what Movement Speed Soft Caps are.
Here's a quick excerpt from the League of Legends Wiki's Article about Movement Speed:

Basically, what this means is the faster you go, the less effective speed-buffs become. This is bad, because you're wasting out precious stats you could use otherwise, you're basically "wasting" Ghost's potential Speed it could give you without those Speed Shrines.
Ghost, in Season 2 in High Elo's, was only used for champions who need kiting to be effective, and even then we're now in Season 4 with Enchantments for your boots, so you can just buy

So yeah, let's leave the Crystal Scar a place free of Ghosts!

Overall a great summoner spell. It allows you to interrupt captures from a far and save points that are about to go down, if a large minion wave is about to neutralize it.
On the other hand, if you're the Tanky Melee DPS Champion or the Tank, it can help you to dive a point together with your teammates.

Due to the big walls and the map layout of the Crystal Scar, flashing over walls won't work as well as it does in Summoner's Rift. It's still useful on some melee champions which just need to get in range for one last hit, for example






Really good spell, both offensive and defensive. It reduces the target's speed so you can catch up with it, and also reduces the target's damage dealt so you will survive it's burst. With this you can easily win fights and/or catch up to escaping enemies.

Heal is also good on supports, and is really good throughout the entire game. it can turn around fights, and save you and your teammates in more than just one situation!

The damage of ignite itself is quite useful early on to finish off an enemy. The cooldown is also quite short. However, on the Mid-Game-Focused Dominion it's mostly used as a counter against annoying healer-tanks like




Good on supports if they don't take


Cleanse removes a lot of stuff! It can save you in clutch situations, and is often taken by AD Carrys, just like on Summoner's Rift. It's really good on Squishy Damage Dealers if the enemy Team is very CC-Heavy to the point that you can't deal any Damage. However it won't help you against Suppressers, like



Just like Cleanse, often taken by the squishy damage-dealers, who can easily be killed otherwise. However it won't help much against Damage over Time abilities like






There's no point in taking Smite. You might as well take





Teleport can't be used on Dominion anyways, so yeah... And otherwise it would be totally overpowered NOT THE POINT!

In Season 4, Clarity is an ARAM-Exclusive Spell, so yeah...But even before that Clarity was pretty useless on Dominion, because the passive Mana-Regen due to the Crystal Scar's Aura is simply too high.

You will never hear me suggesting


Let me make a Pros and Cons list of

- As the Botlaner, you can go back to lane before the enemy can capture/neutralize your point, even if you died to a Gank, and then you can annoy the enemies by forcing them into having to kill you AGAIN! (not fun!)
- The speedbuff is stronger than
Ghost
- Strong for securing the Windmill Teamfight, because if your entire team uses it, they basically have to win the Windmill Teamfight TWICE, effectively making it a a 4v8 (not fun either!)
- It can make up for a mistake, for example being bushwhacked
- The only ways to counter a
Revive are using
Revive yourself and not being dead
- Allows you to maintain a winning game if you die
- Dying on Dominion is bad, not because you feed the enemies with Gold and XP, but because as long as you're dead, there's nothing you could possibly do to stop them!
Revive allows you to instantly skip a 20 Second Respawn Timer to, for example, help your Botlaner who's just getting ganked.
- It allows you to distract enemies by running away from a lost Teamfight to their side of the Map, which may in the best cases result in sucessfully defending or taking a Point
- The other Summoner Spells won't save you out of most Ganks anyways, especially against the meta picks! Go ahead!
Flash away from the enemy
Kassadin! I guess he will laugh in your face, and you will end up
feedingdying AND wastintg yourFlash.
And now for the Cons:
- It has a Cooldown of 9 Minutes
- ...that's it.
As you can see, the Pros vastly outweigh the single Con

Like i said, if you're dead, you can't do anything on the Map, because you're...well...DEAD...And as long as you're dead, it's basically a 4v5 in the Enemies' favor! And now think about the Consequences of having an AFK on your Team, may it be on Dominion, on SR or on ARAM. Having an AFK is never fun to deal with, right?
As long as you're dead, for the duration of the Respawn Timer, you are basically "AFK", because you can't do anything!
CC and CDR can make up for the lack of a Gapcloser, Safe plays and map awareness can make up for the lack of an Escape, but NOTHING can make up for the lack of an entire Team Member! THIS is the Reason why you should use

Okay then, you want to go toplane and fight for the windmill?
Alright then, pick your champion out of the roles listed before, and go out!
Okay, who captures the middle point?
Well, the one who captures the middle point should either
the basic rule is always: The one with the lowest range takes the middle point, it's basically Melee-over-Ranged. If they're all at the same range, the one with the least amount of Poke, and if all have the same range AND are equally good at poking, the one with the least amount of Crowd-Control.
The Windmill Teamfight is pretty standard around all ranks/elos. Most of the time it will be a poking-war with everyone leveling up from the passive XP gain. However, ultimately someone will engage and the fight will erupt.
The Champions without
Revive are number 1 Priority! If they die, they can't just come back and keep fighting, they're gonna have to sit through the entire respawn-time, and when they're dead, you don't have to worry about them, and as such they should be killed first.
Once you see an enemy channeling on the point, make sure to interrupt him! Be it with a ranged poke or by channeling yourself, the guys have to stop capturing!
Alright, you've managed to capture the Windmill! What next?
Okay, the team who owns the Windmill has basically three points under control for a good chunk of the game, and because you want to keep it like this, your best defender should stay at the windmill! Good defenders are tanks or tanky champions with a good amount of Crowd-control. Those include, but are not limited to:
Alistar,
Maokai,
Lulu,
Swain,
Shen or
Ryze. More about defending later.
The rest of the team should go attacking their middle point. and as for attacking it comes down to two things: Patience and Organization! Wave of minions or someone with garrison ready? Team members alive and ready? Key skills ready? Consider all of this when attacking and THEN engage! And after this engagement there's only lose or win!
Follow the Initiator in, burst down the AD Carry and ignore their tanks, you know, all that stuff you know from teamfights in Summoner's Rift.
As for defending, you want someone with high amounts of CC and/or sustain on the point. Some counter-pushing and/or poke is also quite useful.
You basically want to keep the enemy team from getting a huge minion-wave up, but remember one thing: DO NOT sit AFK on the point where you're completely visible and think you're defending the point! If you do this, you're basically saying: "I'm here, so i can't be in the jungle or at our middle point, go there and grab our points while i can't do **** because it's too far away!".
If you have to stay at one point for a long time, make sure to stand in the Fog of War, so the enemies can't see you and/or assume that you have simply recalled.
Use
Garrison if you have it, but procrastinate it a little bit, until the tower has about half of his, i'll just call it "health" from now on, lost, and the minions are gone again. Also, remember to autoattack and/or CC everyone who tries to channel on the point.
Don't be afraid to leave the point defenseless to collect health packs, pick up the Storm Relic or just randomly scout the Area. Like i said earlier, the more you see from the enemies, the better, and the less the enemies see from you, the better too!
Also: If you see one of your Points being low on Health, don't be afraid to use
Garrison on it! If the Points has almost no Health left, you could treat it as if it's neutralized, basically, and it won't take long until the enemy
Rammus has captured it.
Who picks up the Storm Relic in the Middle of the map?
The one who should take the Storm Relic should be a ranged Champion with Damage over Time abilities.
Teemo and
Malzahar are great candidates for taking it, because
Toxic Shot (i THINK
Noxious Trap triggers it too, but i'm not really sure) and
Malefic Visions trigger the Storm Relic's Damage proc!
Alright then, pick your champion out of the roles listed before, and go out!
Okay, who captures the middle point?
Well, the one who captures the middle point should either
- have the ability to get to the Windmill fast enough (like
Rammus or
Garen) And/or
- lack good ranged poking abilitys, which would be useful at the Windmill in the first place
the basic rule is always: The one with the lowest range takes the middle point, it's basically Melee-over-Ranged. If they're all at the same range, the one with the least amount of Poke, and if all have the same range AND are equally good at poking, the one with the least amount of Crowd-Control.
The Windmill Teamfight is pretty standard around all ranks/elos. Most of the time it will be a poking-war with everyone leveling up from the passive XP gain. However, ultimately someone will engage and the fight will erupt.
The Champions without

Once you see an enemy channeling on the point, make sure to interrupt him! Be it with a ranged poke or by channeling yourself, the guys have to stop capturing!
Alright, you've managed to capture the Windmill! What next?
Okay, the team who owns the Windmill has basically three points under control for a good chunk of the game, and because you want to keep it like this, your best defender should stay at the windmill! Good defenders are tanks or tanky champions with a good amount of Crowd-control. Those include, but are not limited to:






The rest of the team should go attacking their middle point. and as for attacking it comes down to two things: Patience and Organization! Wave of minions or someone with garrison ready? Team members alive and ready? Key skills ready? Consider all of this when attacking and THEN engage! And after this engagement there's only lose or win!
Follow the Initiator in, burst down the AD Carry and ignore their tanks, you know, all that stuff you know from teamfights in Summoner's Rift.
As for defending, you want someone with high amounts of CC and/or sustain on the point. Some counter-pushing and/or poke is also quite useful.
You basically want to keep the enemy team from getting a huge minion-wave up, but remember one thing: DO NOT sit AFK on the point where you're completely visible and think you're defending the point! If you do this, you're basically saying: "I'm here, so i can't be in the jungle or at our middle point, go there and grab our points while i can't do **** because it's too far away!".
If you have to stay at one point for a long time, make sure to stand in the Fog of War, so the enemies can't see you and/or assume that you have simply recalled.
Use

Don't be afraid to leave the point defenseless to collect health packs, pick up the Storm Relic or just randomly scout the Area. Like i said earlier, the more you see from the enemies, the better, and the less the enemies see from you, the better too!
Also: If you see one of your Points being low on Health, don't be afraid to use


Who picks up the Storm Relic in the Middle of the map?
The one who should take the Storm Relic should be a ranged Champion with Damage over Time abilities.





Laning in the botlane is quite simple. It's not something which you have to think "great, now i have to go botlane! -.-' " like on summoner's rift the support role. Find a champion you enjoy playing, who fits the criteria listed above, of course, go there and have some fun! However, your job is not to sit around and wait for lasthits or AFK farm, oh no! If you're botlane on Dominion, you can take every single laning rule you learned on Summoner's Rift, and throw them out of the window! F*ck Lasthitting, f*ck Orb-walking (okay, this is something you should still do sometimes, lol), f*ck lane freezing, this is Dominion, NOT Summoner's Rift! On the Crystal Scar you can easily make up for not farming with the passive Gold/XP gain, so you can safely not-farm without having a loss or something.
Your number 1 goal is, however, giving the other botlaner so much trouble that at least one enemy has to come and help bot, so your top is at an advantage and has an easier time.
In order to accomplish this, it comes down to the following things you have to do there:
If you've actually managed to capture their point, just wait a little for some enemies to come. If you're low on health and you see two or more enemies approaching, back off! Give up the point and just let them capture it. You did your job, another enemy came bot to help, so your toplane is at an advantage!
If it's only one enemy, however, and you're low, you have to estimate how well you can deal with that particular enemy champion in a 1v1 situation and then decide whether to back off or to stay and fight him.
If you have like 3 Enemies botlane, don't ask for help from top! Just walk away and let them capture the Point. When there are 3 Enemies bot, this means there can be only 2 Enemies top who could defend their Points! Tell them to not help you and go for the Top-Points. Until then you actually might wanna help them, or back-cap their bottom Point.
Your number 1 goal is, however, giving the other botlaner so much trouble that at least one enemy has to come and help bot, so your top is at an advantage and has an easier time.
In order to accomplish this, it comes down to the following things you have to do there:
Pushing
Someone likeMalzahar or
Heimerdinger can do this really well. Use your Single-Target-Burst-Skills on the big minion and your AoE Skills on the smaller minions to push the minions. Lasthitting/farming is optional (as said earlier)! At the end you should have piled up a huge minion wave to neutralize and/or capture their bottom point. However, this is easily countered by counterpushing or
Garrison.
harassing and/or killing the enemy botlaner
Harassment is really important, because harassment leads to zoning and/or having the opponent forced to go back (so you can push safely) or just the enemy botlaner being afraid of your skills, so they can't push. Some champions likeXin Zhao or
Katarina just continuously jump the Enemy Botlaner to harass/kill him while ignoring the minions for most of the time (except sometimes to lasthit)
If you manage to kill the enemy botlaner, immediately De-aggro the enemy minions and head for their point and capture it UNLESS there's a huge minion-wave heading for your point!
Zoning
You want the enemy to be afraid to get near your minions, so he can't push because he's...well...zoned...and you have enough time to push. For Example: A sucessful Zoning can be achieved by aJarvan IV standing next to the Enemy Minions. There's no way the enemy can go in and kill the Minions without getting a
Dragon Strike or a
Demacian Standard to the face. This works best against melee-champions and may fail against some ranged botlaners. Also, it often requires you to overextend, meaning you're quite likely getting ganked, so this is something to be careful about!
Out-Sustain and wait for lategame
If you'reMordekaiser,
Vladimir or
Aatrox you can simply heal back up, push and outsustain the enemy, so they have to go back, so you can push safely. Or with someone like
Ryze you need certain items to be effective (
Archangel's Staff), so you just wait until you get your items, so you can actually DO something.
Support your Team with global ultimates
Everyone who has an ultimate which can cover a good chunk of the map likeZiggs,
Gangplank or even global teleports like
Shen,
Pantheon or
Twisted Fate can be used to help your team while still keeping some good pressure on your enemy with one of the methods stated above. If a fight commits in Toplane and the enemies see a
Mega Inferno Bomb blowing them up, this makes them think "Oh sh*t
Ziggs is still there! Must kill!"
If you've actually managed to capture their point, just wait a little for some enemies to come. If you're low on health and you see two or more enemies approaching, back off! Give up the point and just let them capture it. You did your job, another enemy came bot to help, so your toplane is at an advantage!
If it's only one enemy, however, and you're low, you have to estimate how well you can deal with that particular enemy champion in a 1v1 situation and then decide whether to back off or to stay and fight him.
If you have like 3 Enemies botlane, don't ask for help from top! Just walk away and let them capture the Point. When there are 3 Enemies bot, this means there can be only 2 Enemies top who could defend their Points! Tell them to not help you and go for the Top-Points. Until then you actually might wanna help them, or back-cap their bottom Point.
For the Roamer/Ganker you best pick someone with a good Speedbuff.
Rammus and
Skarner are good picks for that! You also might consider taking
Ghost instead of
Revive as your Primary Summoner Spell. Okay what do you do as a Ganker/Roamer?
Simple: Run all over the Place, randomly capture Points and waste the enemies Time.
Now i will go over some common Situations and what you should do in this particular Situation, and why you should do exactly THIS.
Situation: Ally calls for botlane and picks a very questionable Champion for it (for example
Shaco or
Evelynn, which are way better suited for the Roamer/Ganker).
Wrong response: Queue Dodge or /ignore him.
Right response: Ask if he needs an early gank, and gank even if he says no! He'll get help if he likes it or not!
Situation: Ally decides to help your Botlaner because he keeps getting murdered in Toplane, but he made it obvious to the Enemies by walking right through the Storm Relic Area.
Wrong response: Continue going top, or go bot with him.
Right response: Follow him through the jungle at a safe distance to Harass and delay enemies that might follow him.
Why? If he's alone, he's quite likely to get ganked, and if you show yourself, The enemies will know where you are and go somewhere else. The enemies will probably think "Okay,
Ahri and
Rengar are bot, so they can't be top, let's go top and abuse the gap in their defense".
If you're NOT visible to them, they will try to stop
Ahri and try to rape kill her. Tell Ahri to come to you and bait the enemies. This is the point where you pop your
Thrill of the Hunt and engage on the enemy, or just wait in a bush with some Ferocity Stacks.
Situation: The Windmill Teamfight turns out to be a complete Stomp right away, your Teammates died and the Enemies captured the Windmill.
Wrong Response: Try to capture the Windmill again.
Right Response: Once you respawn or
Revive, gank bot.
Why? They all will be top and trying to capture your Middle-Point, Or they have recalled to shop and heal back up, which means they have easy access to the Middle Point, since it's right next to their Altar, so your best bet is to gank bot to help your Botlaner.
Situation: A Teamfight with all of the Enemies Team and some (and with "some" i mean 2 or 3) of your Team breaks out at the Windmill.
Wrong Response: Run in and "help your Team".
Right Response: Back-Cap their Middle-Point.
Why? If they're 4 Top and the Botlaner is still Bot, where he SHOULD be, the Middle-Point is completely undefended, meaning you can lose the Windmill and capture this Point safely. There's no Reason to be clumped up in a Game Mode requiring global Map Presence!
After this fight, the Enemies will probably recall to stop you and you and your Team can go for the Windmill. If you know the Enemy Botlaner isn't Bot, but somewhere else, move to his Point right after you finished this Point.
Situation: Your allied
Brand wants to pick up the Storm Relic, and you're randomly nearby.
Wrong Response: Go away to "do something useful".
Right Response: Stay in a Bush to come and help him in case of a Gank, to countergank the Enemies. After he's finished, follow him a few seconds to help him in case of a Gank after he picked up the Storm Relic.
Why? The whole Area is visible to both your team and the Enemies, so it's quite likely that enemies will try to gank him because he's alone. This is basically the same situation as stated above, so you know what to do! If not: Countergank them!




Simple: Run all over the Place, randomly capture Points and waste the enemies Time.
Now i will go over some common Situations and what you should do in this particular Situation, and why you should do exactly THIS.
Situation: Ally calls for botlane and picks a very questionable Champion for it (for example


Wrong response: Queue Dodge or /ignore him.
Right response: Ask if he needs an early gank, and gank even if he says no! He'll get help if he likes it or not!
Situation: Ally decides to help your Botlaner because he keeps getting murdered in Toplane, but he made it obvious to the Enemies by walking right through the Storm Relic Area.
Wrong response: Continue going top, or go bot with him.
Right response: Follow him through the jungle at a safe distance to Harass and delay enemies that might follow him.
Why? If he's alone, he's quite likely to get ganked, and if you show yourself, The enemies will know where you are and go somewhere else. The enemies will probably think "Okay,


If you're NOT visible to them, they will try to stop


Situation: The Windmill Teamfight turns out to be a complete Stomp right away, your Teammates died and the Enemies captured the Windmill.
Wrong Response: Try to capture the Windmill again.
Right Response: Once you respawn or

Why? They all will be top and trying to capture your Middle-Point, Or they have recalled to shop and heal back up, which means they have easy access to the Middle Point, since it's right next to their Altar, so your best bet is to gank bot to help your Botlaner.
Situation: A Teamfight with all of the Enemies Team and some (and with "some" i mean 2 or 3) of your Team breaks out at the Windmill.
Wrong Response: Run in and "help your Team".
Right Response: Back-Cap their Middle-Point.
Why? If they're 4 Top and the Botlaner is still Bot, where he SHOULD be, the Middle-Point is completely undefended, meaning you can lose the Windmill and capture this Point safely. There's no Reason to be clumped up in a Game Mode requiring global Map Presence!
After this fight, the Enemies will probably recall to stop you and you and your Team can go for the Windmill. If you know the Enemy Botlaner isn't Bot, but somewhere else, move to his Point right after you finished this Point.
Situation: Your allied

Wrong Response: Go away to "do something useful".
Right Response: Stay in a Bush to come and help him in case of a Gank, to countergank the Enemies. After he's finished, follow him a few seconds to help him in case of a Gank after he picked up the Storm Relic.
Why? The whole Area is visible to both your team and the Enemies, so it's quite likely that enemies will try to gank him because he's alone. This is basically the same situation as stated above, so you know what to do! If not: Countergank them!
Okay, NOW we get to the REAL fun stuff!
Some Champions are OP on Summoner's Rift. Same goes for Dominion!
Some Champions are totally bad on Summoner's Rift. Same goes for Dominion!
Now i will go over several Champions who are good on Dominion, sometimes to the point of being OP, as mostnoobs players would call it, and several who are not! On Summoner's Rift, "OP-Ness" is easily countered by Counterpicking and/or Counter Strategies. However, on Dominion, there are some champions who synergize with the Map Layout too well. Or some Botlaners who can push AND harass without any fear of getting Counter-Harassed. And then there are some Champions which actually get countered by the Map Itself, may it be with the Crystal Scar's Aura, which gives Penetration to the enemies as well as a healing debuff for you, or with the wall and bush placement to pull off some annoying stuff.
Alright now let's check some of them out!
Kha'Zix
HOE LEE S**T! Kha'Zix reaches a new Level of OP on this Map! Remember the fact that you can be "Isolated"? Okay, When are you Isolated? When you're alone! And on Dominion, when are you alone? almost ALL THE TIME! This is really bad considering his
Taste Their Fear deals bonus Damage against everyone who's alone! (however it got nerfed recently) He already deals a s**tload of physical base damage, which means you can actually build him like
Darius with a
Last Whisper and Defensive Items, like
Frozen Heart. This Build is basically the same as Tank-
Kassadin, but with AD! His
Leap allows him, just like Kassadin, to jump every Wall on the bloddy Map, once it's evolved, and if you try to reveal him when he's stealthed (for example with a hextech sweeper), it will hardly help you, because he's just gonna fight back.
Taric
The best Tanky-Support-Mage you can have on Dominion.
The Season 4 Patch has pushed him WAAAY over the edge with his new passive, which reduces Cooldowns and empowers his Auto-Attacks. Give this guy an
Iceborn Gauntlet and he's set.
His huge Teamfight-presence also adds up to that and he really excels at 2v2-scenarios. He's also a really good point defender!
Yorick
"Yorick enters a bar. There's no counter." ...okay enough jokes.
Yorick isn't really good in toplane, because he can't really do much there, but in botlane, DEAR GOD! If you're up against Yorick in Botlane, you're already screwed.
Yorick has his counters, just like any other Champion, but no matter how you turn the cake he will push push push and PUSH like an idiot! His
Omen of Famine and
Omen of Pestilence will give him high sustain and harassment, and because he pushes so hard he will have almost guaranteed access to the health pack in the middle of the botlane, giving him even MORE sustain. His
Omen of Death can turn 1v1 fights into 2v1 fights, and even if you manage to effectively "counter" him, he has basically two more lives with his
Omen of Death and
Revive.
He will out-push, out-harass, out-damage AND out-sustain you, and there's little to nothing you could possibly do against him! Number 1 Pain to the face for every botlaner!
Urgot
He's basically Yorick with the ability to actually do something in toplane. If you're up against him botlane, he will spam his
Noxian Corrosive Charge, and if he hits with just one of them, he will
Acid Hunter away over half of your health. "BUT YOU CAN DODGE HIS GRENADES!!!" Of course you can, but while you're busy dodging his abilities you give him free time to push, slowly but safely.
If you're melee, he's able to spam
Sheen/
Trinity Force procs for extra damage in your face (if you have a Gapcloser), or kite you like a boss with his
Terror Capacitor (if you have no gapcloser), and if you want to kill him, he can use his
Hyper-Kinetic Position Reverser on you to get free armor and magic resist plus his
Terror Capacitor shield. Yep. Balanced, isn't he? He's not much of a problem as
Yorick though.
Wukong
I wonder why they didn't tag Wukong as an Assassin up to now, because he definitely is one! The main reason for im being so strong is that with his
Crushing Blow he bashes away so much armor that it doesn't actually matter if you stack much armor, if he gets
Black Cleaver and/or
Last Whisper, you're going to die! His
Cyclone also synergizes too well with his armor reduction. Not to mention the Armor reduction of
Crushing Blow+
Black Cleaver benefits the entire enemy team, not just Wukong himself!
Jax
Imagine if he had a REAL weapon! Jax counters almost every melee botlaner, with his high damage, especially post-6, when he gets his
Grandmaster-At-Arms, and he can easily force his enemies out of lane so he can push safely. Toplane he's actually quite good as well, if you build him fulltank with
Trinity Force and
Atma's Impaler for extra damage. Among the professional Dominion Players he's First Pick Material and sometimes even banned.
Lulu
Lulu is one of the best Supports for Dominion! She offers so much CC and kitability to your team that the enemies will often end up wondering how the f**k their whole team just got murdered. She's also is a really good Point defender as well as a good Point attacker, which makes her extremely versatile!
Shaco
Why is Shaco strong? Simple: he can very easily defend a point due to his skill kit.
Jack In The Box can hinder your movement through the jungle, his assassin-style gapcloser
Deceive makes him dangerous and super-annoying as well, and with his
Hallucinate he can stop captures while chilling out in the back. However, all of this can be avoided with a little bit of experience, positioning and buying a hextech sweeper/
The Lightbringer, which is why he's not AS strong as other Champions.
Jayce
Jayce is probably the most versatile champion you can have on Dominion! He can botlane, he can toplane, he can attack, he can defend! Even under their own tower the Enemies aren't safe from him, because he can either poke at them with a
Shock Blast+
Acceleration Gate combo while being out of tower range or even out of sight, or he can dive in with
To The Skies! and then bash your face in while tanking the tower with
Garrison and the
Mercury Hammers added armor! His good combo of offense, defense and mobility made him one of the most used champions in Season 2!
Warwick
You wanna know why i listed him as a "tank" earlier on? Simple. He's often played as a tanky-AP/AD-Lifestealer, and once he gets enough items, he will end up being unkillable and dealing WAY more damage than he should! He gets way too much health back with his
Hungering Strike, and his
Blood Scent allows him to provide vision in the jungle, so his team can assassinate low-health-champions (or he can assassinate them himself)
Malzahar
Malzahar can't really do much toplane, but botlane he's a monster! Pushing power? He has two AoE skills, a Single-Target-DoT that jumps to another enemy and pets. Check! Sustain?
Malefic Visions gives him mana when it kills something with it. Check! 1v1-capability?
Nether Grasp shuts down everyone in 1v1 who doesn't have something like Oranges
Remove Scurvy or a
Quicksilver Sash. Check! Both AD and AP can do really well botlane, and if you want to get started botlaning i highly recommend trying him out!
Rammus
U Need Moar Speed? Rammus is a tank/ganker with really high mobility due to his
Powerball, a puncturing taunt that lasts forever (not anymore, WHY RIOT, WHY!?!?!?) and with
Defensive Ball Curl he gets free armor and magic resist, as well as returning incoming damage. Give him a
Thornmail and a
Sunfire Aegis, and he will kill every single AD Carry on your team with his puncturing taunt+
Defensive Ball Curl+
Soaring Slam combo (or at least get him really low). He's a must-ban if you know your team will be very AD Heavy, and he's also the reason why you shouldn't be very AD heavy in Normal Matches!
But then Riot decided for some odd reason that his Taunt is too long...WHY DID YOU DO THIS RIOT!?!?!?!?!? For real, i don't understand why?
Nidalee
Nidalee has great mobility due to
Prowl,
Pounce and
Aspect Of The Cougars added speed-buff. She can also hide behind one of the dozens of walls to land her
Javelin Tosses while being out of sight and give your team vision through the jungle with
Bushwhack. Really solid pick for the ganker/roamer role! Keep in mind she lacks CC though...
Pantheon
Pantheon is probably one of the best AD Casters you could have for Dominion. He has really high Earlygame Damage, which always is a good thing and his immense Mana-Hunger is solved by the Crystal Scar's Aura and the Heath/Mana Packs all over the place.
His
Grand Skyfall might as well have global range due to the shape and map Layout of the Crystal Scar. Really worth trying out, but keep in mind that he's an Earlygame-Champion and he's behind = he's a Minion.
Darius
His whole kit is strong as a whole, he can easily execute squishy damage dealers with his
Apprehend+
Decimate+
Noxian Guillotine. Some people argue you can kite him with someone like
Ashe, which is true on Summoner's Rift, but the close quarters of the Crystal Scar don't allow much kiting! Also he deals Physical damage, Magic damage (
Hemorrhage) AND True damage, so itemizing against him is quite hard. He's as Derp as a Tanky Derp can be. After his
Noxian Guillotine got nerfed lastly, he's not much more of a threat though, making this Champion less strong.
Karma
Karma got a Rework, which turned out to be really good on Dominion, but not on Summoner's Rift. Because she's bad on Summoner's Rift, Riot buffed her...and buffed her again...and AGAIN...and NOW we have a Mage/Support for Dominion who currently runs around in the God-Tier!
Her cooldowns are quite low and she excells at doing absurd Damages at long Range and/or Kiting enemies to death. The Lack of Minions to block a
Mantra-boosted
Inner Flame makes her strong as well! Or she can use her
Mantra on her
Focused Resolve to get a ridiculously overbuffed heal.
Rengar
Rengar is a ganker and counter-ganker through and through! His
Savagery combo gives him really high damage so you can actually build him with some flat Armor Penetration like an assassin.
Thrill of the Hunt is, of course, his main engagement tool and gives him and his team vision in the jungle. You don't play rengar as an assassin or bruiser or teamfighter, but when it comes down to the ganker-role the enemy can't do much if the rengar player is playing intelligent and patient.
Nautilus
You need Sustain? You need a defender? You need crowd-control? He's your guy! With his FIVE(!) different types of CC (
Staggering Blows snare,
Dredge Lines wannabe-
Rocket Grab,
Riptides slow and
Depth Charges knockup+stun), he's arguably the best defender you can have! I've actually seen a Nautilus together with an Alistar defending the Windmill against five, and for quite a long time as well! Give the windmill in this guy's hands and they're gonna have a bad time! The only drawbacks: His cooldowns are anything other than good, and he is soooooo sloooooooooooow... However, this is easily compensated with the
Mobility Boots+
Moonflair Spellblade Tank build i created.
Caitlyn
Caitlyn is a strong AD Carry for Dominion. In the Windmill Teamfight, she can just sit on her
Yordle Snap Traps and fight them while the Tanks and Tanky DPS-Champs take all the damage. Enemy
Wukong jumping in your face? Shoot yourself away with
90 Caliber Net at the Moment he uses his
Nimbus Strike and he gets stuck on your Trap.
Fun Fact: I've seen a Caitlyn getting a Pentakill on Dominion once. And believe me guys: If someone like Caitlyn gets a Pentakill on Dominion, your team has done a LOT of stuff wrong!
Kayle
Due to her range and Splash damage, Kayle can often build Glass Cannon and even get away with it! She's one of those Zone-and-kite-Botlaners, where she's quite decent. Is the enemy Botlaner in range?
Reckoning into
Righteous Fury. Is he running? Keep fighting him! Is he trying to fight back? Kite him with help of
Divine Blessing! Is he actually a match for you?
Exhaust him and/or
Intervention yourself!
Tryndamere
Tryndamere is a Lategame-character who needs a lot of farming to be effective. On Summoner's Rift, there's this little rule: If he starts badly (and starting badly on Dominion as a lategame-character is quite likely), he will probably stay this way unless he can figure out how to procrastinate and stall the game until he gets enough gold.
Dominion compensates this weakness by giving you more free gold, so he should be good, right?
NOPE.
Keep in mind he doesn't just need gold, he needs ENOUGH gold! And he needs to find a way to stall the game until he has his
Infinity Edge, and that's the exact problem: Dominion can't be stalled!
If you lose a game, the clock is running against you and with each second passing by, your Nexus loses health! Saying "Let's wait until our Carry has enough gold and then let him murder everyone 1v5" is basically the same as saying "Let's waste 400 Nexus Health in 10 minutes and then hope we can pull a win out of our *** with a Tryndamere who just only bought his
Infinity Edge".
On summoner's Rift, it's a matter of how to carry Tryndamere into lategame and not getting murdered in Laningphase. On Dominion, it's literally about not losing before this phase even hits! So don't pick Tryndamere thinking "I'm gonna carry this game with all the free gold i get!" because this is the complete opposite of what will happen.
Cho'Gath
Cho'Gath is a very odd pick for Dominion. If he manages to land his
Rupture, he's just as good as any other Tanky AP Champion. If he misses it, however, he's pretty much useless. Also, on Dominion there are no scary Towers under which he can wait for his Cooldowns to refresh. And then there's the problem with stacking
Feast. I've seen some successful Full-AP-Cho'Gaths going botlane though!
Aatrox
Judging by statistics, he does really well on every Map other than this one, and i can clearly see why: He needs Minions for Sustain and to stack his Passive up, His health costs on his
Dark Flight and
Blades of Torment are too high and said skills are hard to land due to the Speed Shrines. If you try to go Botlane with him, you're quite likely to get zoned by champions with ranged poke like
Cassiopeia or
Karthus because, well, you're Aatrox...WHY are you Aatrox anyways? However recently Riot removed the Global Healing Debuff the Crystal Scar's Aura was giving you, so how did that influence Aatrox's effectiveness on Dominion?? ...He's...not...as useless as before? Mabye?
Xerath
People keep telling me that he's counter to several OP Botlane Champions, but i don't see it, or feel it. I always murder Xerath Botlane when i'm against him because he has to build Damage to do Damage, unlike several other Champions. He also needs the proximity of a scary Tower to hide under, which Dominion doesn't have. You're not safe at all under the towers, especially when they have
Garrison. Toplane he's also quite useless, for the same reason i just said about
Cho'Gath: he has to land one of his two Skillshots
Arcanopulse or
Arcane Barrage to trigger the stun from his mage chains to be useful. Buying a
Rylai's Crystal Scepter helps this guy a lot though! Let's hope his soon upcoming Rework will do better on here...
Fiddlesticks
Riot, WHY DID YOU NERF HIS FEAR DURATION!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?
Before this huge nerf to his
Terrify he was at least OKAY on Dominion for his ability to lock down single targets, but due to this change he's become pretty useless now...
He also has other drawbacks, like Fog of War Reveals and spammable Gapclosers being all over the place. Riot, you should have increased the Cooldown rather than reducing the duration IN CASE OF ANY NERFS to his
Terrify! WHY RIOT, WHY?!?!?!?!?!
Hecarim
I'm really not impressed by his cooldowns. Several patches ago, the long cooldowns on
Spirit of Dread and
Devastating Charge got nerfed, making them even longer! He falls short in 1v1 Situations due to his long cooldowns, so enemies can just outfight him with ease, and his kit doesn't let him do much more than any other Tanky-DerPS-Kit.
Anivia
Anivia has mana-problems Early-Game and survival-problems Late-Game, and several major problems with Gapclosers. Also, her
Rebirth is pretty much useless on this map. However she gets some bonus points for how much damage she can do if she catches someone in her full combo, and with
Liandry's Torment she has a chance against Tanky-DPS-Champions.
Thresh
Thresh might be OP and the most-banned Champion on Summoner's Rift, but due to the Map Layout, his Kit is rather Subpar. Riot KINDA fixed the Problem with his Soul Mechanic in the last patch, but he's still not that good on Dominion, due to the lack of Souls to collect.
Some Champions are OP on Summoner's Rift. Same goes for Dominion!
Some Champions are totally bad on Summoner's Rift. Same goes for Dominion!
Now i will go over several Champions who are good on Dominion, sometimes to the point of being OP, as most
Alright now let's check some of them out!
Rank "Breaking the Map"

HOE LEE S**T! Kha'Zix reaches a new Level of OP on this Map! Remember the fact that you can be "Isolated"? Okay, When are you Isolated? When you're alone! And on Dominion, when are you alone? almost ALL THE TIME! This is really bad considering his







The best Tanky-Support-Mage you can have on Dominion.
The Season 4 Patch has pushed him WAAAY over the edge with his new passive, which reduces Cooldowns and empowers his Auto-Attacks. Give this guy an

His huge Teamfight-presence also adds up to that and he really excels at 2v2-scenarios. He's also a really good point defender!

"Yorick enters a bar. There's no counter." ...okay enough jokes.
Yorick isn't really good in toplane, because he can't really do much there, but in botlane, DEAR GOD! If you're up against Yorick in Botlane, you're already screwed.
Yorick has his counters, just like any other Champion, but no matter how you turn the cake he will push push push and PUSH like an idiot! His





He will out-push, out-harass, out-damage AND out-sustain you, and there's little to nothing you could possibly do against him! Number 1 Pain to the face for every botlaner!
Rank "Mash Buttons, get Victory"

He's basically Yorick with the ability to actually do something in toplane. If you're up against him botlane, he will spam his


If you're melee, he's able to spam







I wonder why they didn't tag Wukong as an Assassin up to now, because he definitely is one! The main reason for im being so strong is that with his







Imagine if he had a REAL weapon! Jax counters almost every melee botlaner, with his high damage, especially post-6, when he gets his




Lulu is one of the best Supports for Dominion! She offers so much CC and kitability to your team that the enemies will often end up wondering how the f**k their whole team just got murdered. She's also is a really good Point defender as well as a good Point attacker, which makes her extremely versatile!

Why is Shaco strong? Simple: he can very easily defend a point due to his skill kit.





Jayce is probably the most versatile champion you can have on Dominion! He can botlane, he can toplane, he can attack, he can defend! Even under their own tower the Enemies aren't safe from him, because he can either poke at them with a





Rank "Everybody mains something here"

You wanna know why i listed him as a "tank" earlier on? Simple. He's often played as a tanky-AP/AD-Lifestealer, and once he gets enough items, he will end up being unkillable and dealing WAY more damage than he should! He gets way too much health back with his



Malzahar can't really do much toplane, but botlane he's a monster! Pushing power? He has two AoE skills, a Single-Target-DoT that jumps to another enemy and pets. Check! Sustain?





U Need Moar Speed? Rammus is a tank/ganker with really high mobility due to his






But then Riot decided for some odd reason that his Taunt is too long...WHY DID YOU DO THIS RIOT!?!?!?!?!? For real, i don't understand why?

Nidalee has great mobility due to






Pantheon is probably one of the best AD Casters you could have for Dominion. He has really high Earlygame Damage, which always is a good thing and his immense Mana-Hunger is solved by the Crystal Scar's Aura and the Heath/Mana Packs all over the place.
His


His whole kit is strong as a whole, he can easily execute squishy damage dealers with his







Karma got a Rework, which turned out to be really good on Dominion, but not on Summoner's Rift. Because she's bad on Summoner's Rift, Riot buffed her...and buffed her again...and AGAIN...and NOW we have a Mage/Support for Dominion who currently runs around in the God-Tier!
Her cooldowns are quite low and she excells at doing absurd Damages at long Range and/or Kiting enemies to death. The Lack of Minions to block a





Rengar is a ganker and counter-ganker through and through! His



You need Sustain? You need a defender? You need crowd-control? He's your guy! With his FIVE(!) different types of CC (








Caitlyn is a strong AD Carry for Dominion. In the Windmill Teamfight, she can just sit on her




Fun Fact: I've seen a Caitlyn getting a Pentakill on Dominion once. And believe me guys: If someone like Caitlyn gets a Pentakill on Dominion, your team has done a LOT of stuff wrong!

Due to her range and Splash damage, Kayle can often build Glass Cannon and even get away with it! She's one of those Zone-and-kite-Botlaners, where she's quite decent. Is the enemy Botlaner in range?





Rank "Can't find glasses while wearing them"

Tryndamere is a Lategame-character who needs a lot of farming to be effective. On Summoner's Rift, there's this little rule: If he starts badly (and starting badly on Dominion as a lategame-character is quite likely), he will probably stay this way unless he can figure out how to procrastinate and stall the game until he gets enough gold.
Dominion compensates this weakness by giving you more free gold, so he should be good, right?
NOPE.
Keep in mind he doesn't just need gold, he needs ENOUGH gold! And he needs to find a way to stall the game until he has his

If you lose a game, the clock is running against you and with each second passing by, your Nexus loses health! Saying "Let's wait until our Carry has enough gold and then let him murder everyone 1v5" is basically the same as saying "Let's waste 400 Nexus Health in 10 minutes and then hope we can pull a win out of our *** with a Tryndamere who just only bought his

On summoner's Rift, it's a matter of how to carry Tryndamere into lategame and not getting murdered in Laningphase. On Dominion, it's literally about not losing before this phase even hits! So don't pick Tryndamere thinking "I'm gonna carry this game with all the free gold i get!" because this is the complete opposite of what will happen.

Cho'Gath is a very odd pick for Dominion. If he manages to land his



Judging by statistics, he does really well on every Map other than this one, and i can clearly see why: He needs Minions for Sustain and to stack his Passive up, His health costs on his





People keep telling me that he's counter to several OP Botlane Champions, but i don't see it, or feel it. I always murder Xerath Botlane when i'm against him because he has to build Damage to do Damage, unlike several other Champions. He also needs the proximity of a scary Tower to hide under, which Dominion doesn't have. You're not safe at all under the towers, especially when they have






Riot, WHY DID YOU NERF HIS FEAR DURATION!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?
Before this huge nerf to his

He also has other drawbacks, like Fog of War Reveals and spammable Gapclosers being all over the place. Riot, you should have increased the Cooldown rather than reducing the duration IN CASE OF ANY NERFS to his


I'm really not impressed by his cooldowns. Several patches ago, the long cooldowns on



Anivia has mana-problems Early-Game and survival-problems Late-Game, and several major problems with Gapclosers. Also, her



Thresh might be OP and the most-banned Champion on Summoner's Rift, but due to the Map Layout, his Kit is rather Subpar. Riot KINDA fixed the Problem with his Soul Mechanic in the last patch, but he's still not that good on Dominion, due to the lack of Souls to collect.
On Dominion, there are some Items exclusive to this Map, which you can't use on Summoner's Rift, and vice versa, some Summoner's Rift Items you can't use in the Crystal Scar. I'll go over every single one of those Items.
Summoner's Rift Items you can't use in the Crystal Scar
Stealth Ward and
Vision Ward
Scrying Orb,
Sweeping Lens and
Stealth Ward, as well as their upgrades.
Elixir of Fortitude and
Elixir of Brilliance
Hunter's Machete and all items it builds into
Doran's Blade and
Doran's Ring
Sightstone and
Ruby Sightstone
Sword of the Occult and
Mejai's Soulstealer
Needlessly Large Rod and all items it builds into
Enchantment: Homeguard
Banshee's Veil
Warmog's Armor
Ohmwrecker
B. F. Sword and all items it builds into
Say goodbye to those Items and say Hello to a new arsenal of Items you can use on the Crystal Scar!
Crystal Scar-Items which are unavailable on Summoner's Rift
Oracle's Extract
Rest in Pieces,Oracle's Elixir... However, since Oracle's Extract does the exact same thing as the Elixir for a cheaper price, it won't be an issue. Good to counter Stealth-Champions like
Twitch or
Shaco. But there are some better Items for that, i'll cover these in a second.
Prospector's Blade and
Prospector's Ring
The Crystal Scar Versions ofDoran's Blade and
Doran's Ring. They build into nothing and picking them up at the beginning is kind of nice, since they give you great Early-Game-Stats, but they're not totally necessary, just like the Doran's Items. I mean
Prospector's Blade gives you the Stats of a
Phage plus Lifesteal for only 950 Gold!
Grez's Spectral Lantern,
The Lightbringer and hextech sweeperHextech Sweeper
All of these Items are just great! They allow you to detect a nearbyNoxious Trap or
Jack In The Box, so you can safely destroy them without triggering them (if you're ranged, of course) and the Stealth-detecting active of these things give you Vision in the Jungle, allow you to check bushes and/or make an enemy retreat because you know he's here and he can't surprise you anymore. With the lack of
Stealth Wards and
Vision Wards you need more vision, and these provide you with it. Their stats are quite good as well...at least before Riot decided to nerf the stats they provided...
The Lightbringer was a good item, WHY did you weaken it's Stats? I can understand that with hextech Sweeper, this thing was really strong, but
The Lightbringer? COME ON!!!
Blackfire Torch
Say Hello to your newDeathfire Grasp! Okay item stat-wise and a great active for every Burst
and GTFOMage. I miss the old Blackfire Torch however, it was a really good (if a bit overpowered) item...
Crystal Scar-Exclusive Versions ofRod of Ages and all
Tear-Items.
You should know those items from Summoner's Rift. On Dominion, there are versions of these items which stack faster, which is a great thing due to the faster Pace of Dominion, this was needed a lot!
Moonflair Spellblade
LOVE! THIS! ITEM! In my Opinion it's the best Crystal-Scar-Exclusive item!
Before it's removal it was a pretty underwhelming Item, so it got removed, and then again added for Dominion and the Twisted Treeline, and when i read this thing's new Stats, my Jaw hit the floor at how strong this thing is! Giving you a little bit of Ability power, good Armor and Magic resistance make it a great Item, and to top it all off this thing gives you Tenacity, which means you can buy boots other thanMercury's Treads, for example
Sorcerer's Shoes! And all of this for only 2600 Cash!
You're a mage and need defense? Moonflair Spellblade.
You're a Tank and want a bit of damage while still remaining tanky? Moonflair Spellblade.
You're a Tank and can't decide whether to buyMercury's Treads,
Ninja Tabi or
Sorcerer's Shoes? Moonflair Spellblade and
Mobility Boots!
Wicked Hatchet and
Lord van Damm's Pillager
Those things got added to Dominion with the Season 4 Patch, and BOY are these good. Wicked Hatchet is a really good Piecemeal Crit Item to buy on guys likeJax Earlygame and upgrade it into Lord Van Damm's Pillager Late-Game, and Lord Van Damm's Pillager is basically an
Infinity Edge, but easier to build, due to the fast pace of the Crystal Scar, if you have to save for a
B. F. Sword you sit around with nothing you could shop (except for maybe some
Health Potions LOL). Wicked Hatchet fixes this problem! The small DoT it adds to your crits is pretty nice too!
Wooglet's Witchcap
Is there anyone out there who remembers the itemZhonya's Ring? This thing is basically a combination of
AP infinity edgeRabadon's Deathcap and
Zhonya's Hourglass. This addition was really needed since buying both
Rabadon's Deathcap AND
Zhonya's Hourglass is not worth it most of the time. This item makes up for this disadvantage for Mages.
Sanguine Blade
A Mini-Bloodthirster which gives you some nice damage and Lifesteal which stacks the more you auto-attack something. Good for increasing your Damage output, and an interesting counter to
Yorick. Stacking Lifesteal with
Vampiric Scepters makes you get more Health back than you lose by him. More on that later.
Odyn's Veil
Dominion's Response to Summoner's Rift's oldBanshee's Veil. It builds from a Catalyst the Protector, which is a good item, it's not SUPER MUST BUY ZOMFG good, but pretty decent. Odyn's Veil basically reduces Magic Damage, both with Magic Resistance and it's passive reduction, and after taking enough Magic damage, you can activate it to
go WTF-BOOOOOOOOMdeal damage to surrounding Enemies by the amount of magic Damage you've taken! Great Item if the Enemy team is very AP-Heavy or the enemyLeBlanc goes crazy, as it's the best Item when it comes down to reducing Magic Damage!
Entropy
It's basically a Stronger version ofPhage, kinda the opposite of
Frozen Mallet. On top of high Damage and a
Phage-Speedbuff it gives you a nice Active which causes your auto-attacks to deal Bonus True Damage, and any form of True Damage is strong! If you're a Squishy DPS Champion, for example an AD Carry, this Item is a good addition to your kit. It used to be VERY expensive, but then Riot made a great decision in removing the
B. F. Sword component and replacing it with a
Pickaxe. REALLY good Item now!
Dervish Blade
And, finally, asMercurial Scimitar had to go as well, Riot is giving us...this...thing...whatever.
Dervish Blade is an item which you can upgrade your
Quicksilver Sash into. However when it comes down to stats, it's not really a good item, because there are only a few Champions who could make good use of the combination of Attackspeed and CDR, and on those you shouldn't be building
Quicksilver Sash in the first place. It's only worth upgrading your
Quicksilver Sash into this thing as your last Item when you have everything else finished.
Okay, now that you know which items are good and which not so good, you should also know WHAT you should build! Let me explain more about Itemization.
Overall, you have to remember one thing: This is the Crystal Scar, NOT Summoner's Rift! You can't just Copy-Paste your Items over to another map and think it works! It might work of course, but there's more stuff you have to keep in mind!
As for Attack Damage Champions, you want to get close to true Damage. You want to build a lot of Armor Penetration. You should get a
The Brutalizer into
Youmuu's Ghostblade or
Black Cleaver fairly early. An early
Last Whisper will also ensure you don't fall off Late-Game.
"How do you play Urgot? You buy every Armor Penetration Item in the game and just kill everybody." -Gandair
As for Ranged AD Carrys, you want to build them similar to how you would build them on SR, with
Statikk Shiv,
Lord Van Damm's Pillager and
Entropy as big items, but also add some CDR in form of maybe a
Black Cleaver to the mix, but only if you need the CDR! Building CDR on someone like
Twitch for example doesn't add much to his Damage Output, so you should prevent building CDR on said Champions.
You want to build AP Carrys and other Mages also similar to the Attack Damage Champions, with CDR and Magic Penetration. A
Void Staff is really good because, just like a
Last Whisper, it prevents you from falling off Late-Game! Oh god i miss the old
Blackfire Torch :(
As for Tanks, you want to build them tanky, but don't feel bad about picking up some Damage. A
Void Staff on
Leona might sound stupid if you're from SR, but it actually gives her quite a good Damage boost!
As Support, you have the option to build AP or Support. Most Supports are easily able to duel other standard Midlaners if given the Gold, and with all of the passive Gold you get, it is very unlikely for you to not get about 3 or 4 big items finished! So yes, all you Support Mains get to build all the good stuff like
Wooglet's Witchcap,
Trinity Force and so on.
I'll now go over some Noteworthy Items and/or Item Builds:
Pseudo-Darius
This works really well on Champions with high physical Base-Damage like
Kha'Zix,
Rengar or...well...
Darius... if you have high Base Damage you can really add some damage with the
Last Whisper and
Black Cleaver and the defense Items are there so you aren't as squishy as you normally would be. It's also pretty fun to see the enemies trying to kill you, then switch targets because they deal no damage, and then get killed by your huge damage-output.
Roaming-Tank
This Set offers very good stats as well as tons of map mobility! It works on 95% of all AP-Tanks and is a very good choice 90% of the time. The Core here are
Mobility Boots and
Moonflair Spellblade respectively. I mean
Moonflair Spellblade gives you the stats of
Mercury's Treads,
Ninja Tabi and
Sorcerer's Shoes, but BETTER in ONE ITEM for 2600 Gold ONLY! YES, i HAVE to randomly write stuff in CAPS because i JUST want to emphasize how OVERPOWERED
Moonflair Spellblade is! With this Item you won't need the stats the other boots offer, so you can get
Mobility Boots to get around the Map faster! This Build also brings you to Max CDR, which is really good if you happen to be someone like
Nautilus.
Trinity-Tank
This set works really well on many champions, most notably on Raid-Bosses like
Shyvana or
Nasus or on Champions like
Irelia or
Jax which don't have general item-scalings.
You can also replace
Trinity Force with an
Iceborn Gauntlet if your Champion uses lots of Mana and has mostly AP Ratios like
Alistar does for example.
Stacking Lifesteal
This Build works on a lot of Champions who use a lot of Autoattacks for their Damage, like AD Carrys or guys like
Jax. The trick here is to buy 2 to 3
Vampiric Scepters and upgrading them later into Items like
Grez's Spectral Lantern. With this you will have a lot of sustain! It's also a good counter to Champions with high sustained Damage such as
Yorick, as you will end up getting more Health back than you lose by him.
Frozen Heart VS Other Armors
I'll be frank: You want Frozen heart on AT LEAST one guy on your Team! The Attackspeed-Debuff is really strong whether the enemy attacks a lot or not, and if you specced 9/0/21 as a mage with
Greater Glyph of Cooldown Reduction, or you happen to be someone like
Ryze, this thing is THE ONLY Item you need to hit the 40% mark! Also,
Glacial Shroud and
Warden's Mail are really good Items and allow you to adapt and build
Randuin's Omen or
Iceborn Gauntlet.
Twin Shadows
Oh my God! The new
Twin Shadows... For some Reason Riot decided to Buff those and turn them into a great offensive item for Mages. Now all Twin Shadows needs is Magic Penetration and a Burning-Effect like
Liandry's Torment and we have our old
Blackfire Torch back! The Stats are really good now, with a nice chunk of AP, CDR and some Movement Speed and a great Active that allows you to prevent Facechecking and chase Stealthers like
Shaco or
Akali. Oh, and the Ghosts benefit from Speed Shrines!
Mobility Boots VS Swiftness Boots
VS
Mobility. The answer is always
Mobility Boots, because you won't really need
Boots of Swiftness. If you want Map-Mobility, you should always take
Mobility Boots unless you're Bottom Lane, at which point you should go for entirely different shoes in the first place. You should only take
Boots of Swiftness if the enemy Team is very heavily based on slows and you're someone like
Darius who can be kited very easily.
Ionian's VS Berserker's
VS
Unless you're using a champion that Auto-Attacks most of the time, you're better off paying 100 Gold to get the 15% CDR. Attackspeed is very cheap and easy to afford in many ways but only pays off if you're constantly attacking, which is a very unlikely on Dominion, even as a Ranged DPS. That's why you should get
Ionian Boots of Lucidity on most Melee-DPS-Champions, AD Casters, and sometimes AP Casters.
Overall, you have to remember one thing: This is the Crystal Scar, NOT Summoner's Rift! You can't just Copy-Paste your Items over to another map and think it works! It might work of course, but there's more stuff you have to keep in mind!
As for Attack Damage Champions, you want to get close to true Damage. You want to build a lot of Armor Penetration. You should get a




"How do you play Urgot? You buy every Armor Penetration Item in the game and just kill everybody." -Gandair
As for Ranged AD Carrys, you want to build them similar to how you would build them on SR, with





You want to build AP Carrys and other Mages also similar to the Attack Damage Champions, with CDR and Magic Penetration. A



As for Tanks, you want to build them tanky, but don't feel bad about picking up some Damage. A


As Support, you have the option to build AP or Support. Most Supports are easily able to duel other standard Midlaners if given the Gold, and with all of the passive Gold you get, it is very unlikely for you to not get about 3 or 4 big items finished! So yes, all you Support Mains get to build all the good stuff like


I'll now go over some Noteworthy Items and/or Item Builds:
Pseudo-Darius






This works really well on Champions with high physical Base-Damage like





Roaming-Tank






This Set offers very good stats as well as tons of map mobility! It works on 95% of all AP-Tanks and is a very good choice 90% of the time. The Core here are









Trinity-Tank






This set works really well on many champions, most notably on Raid-Bosses like




You can also replace



Stacking Lifesteal






This Build works on a lot of Champions who use a lot of Autoattacks for their Damage, like AD Carrys or guys like




Frozen Heart VS Other Armors

I'll be frank: You want Frozen heart on AT LEAST one guy on your Team! The Attackspeed-Debuff is really strong whether the enemy attacks a lot or not, and if you specced 9/0/21 as a mage with






Twin Shadows

Oh my God! The new





Mobility Boots VS Swiftness Boots


Mobility. The answer is always





Ionian's VS Berserker's


Unless you're using a champion that Auto-Attacks most of the time, you're better off paying 100 Gold to get the 15% CDR. Attackspeed is very cheap and easy to afford in many ways but only pays off if you're constantly attacking, which is a very unlikely on Dominion, even as a Ranged DPS. That's why you should get

Alright, Summoners, this ends my Guide!
Dominion is an awesome new innovative Game-Mode that requires skill, even more map awareness than on SR and FORCES you to think and act FAST!
Thank you so much for reading my Dominion Guide! I hope you enjoyed it and/or learned something from it!
If you liked it, feel free to rate this Guide positive, favorite it, and share it on the Facebooks or the Twitters or whatever.
If you didn't like the Guide, please leave a comment: Why didn't you like it? What could i have done better? Do you disagree with things i say? Tell me, please!
I'm having the dream of making this Guide THE Go-To-Guide for Dominion, and how everything works on here, so please tell me everything i could do better and/or did wrong!
I am soschar2050, saying Goodbye, and good luck on the Fields of Justice, especially on Dominion!
Dominion is an awesome new innovative Game-Mode that requires skill, even more map awareness than on SR and FORCES you to think and act FAST!
Thank you so much for reading my Dominion Guide! I hope you enjoyed it and/or learned something from it!
If you liked it, feel free to rate this Guide positive, favorite it, and share it on the Facebooks or the Twitters or whatever.
If you didn't like the Guide, please leave a comment: Why didn't you like it? What could i have done better? Do you disagree with things i say? Tell me, please!
I'm having the dream of making this Guide THE Go-To-Guide for Dominion, and how everything works on here, so please tell me everything i could do better and/or did wrong!
I am soschar2050, saying Goodbye, and good luck on the Fields of Justice, especially on Dominion!
23.11.2013:
Guide Released
07.01.2014:
-Added
Fiddlesticks on the Champion List
-moved
Rammus down on that List
-Moved
Thresh down
-Updated some of the Info on some Items
-Fixed (and maybe added) some Typos
08.01.2014:
-Updated the Info on
Ghost
-Added
Pantheon on the Champion List
20.01.2014:
-Updated stuff for the Season 4 Patch (Patch 4.1)
-Updated the Info on
Revive, and made an own Chapter for it
-Updated the Items (specifically
Entropy,
Wicked Hatchet and
Lord Van Damm's Pillager)
-Added more Infos about defending a Point
12.04.2014:
-added
Taric and
Lulu on the champion list.
-moved
Thresh up a bit.
-removed
Kassadin because his rework requires some testing.
-Changed a few of the recommended Summoner Spells on the Cheat Sheet.
-updated the Item Build for
Jax
-replaced the chapter "soschar ur itemz is garbage" with an "Itemization" Chapter, telling you some very effective Items and item-Builds on Dominion.
Guide Released
07.01.2014:
-Added

-moved

-Moved

-Updated some of the Info on some Items
-Fixed (and maybe added) some Typos
08.01.2014:
-Updated the Info on

-Added

20.01.2014:
-Updated stuff for the Season 4 Patch (Patch 4.1)
-Updated the Info on

-Updated the Items (specifically



-Added more Infos about defending a Point
12.04.2014:
-added


-moved

-removed

-Changed a few of the recommended Summoner Spells on the Cheat Sheet.
-updated the Item Build for

-replaced the chapter "soschar ur itemz is garbage" with an "Itemization" Chapter, telling you some very effective Items and item-Builds on Dominion.
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