Hello there! My name is Luca and I play in the EUNE region.

I am currently in Platinum elo, but i peaked at Emerald I 87lp at the end of S13, while playing only Varus AP midlane.

Today I still play only Varus, only this time on toplane and sometimes on botlane.

The AP build is not as good as it used to be right now, so I do not recommend going for that in solo queue.

Please read carefully what I ve presented to you and let me know it the comments if I missed something.

PS: I am an ADC main at my heart(Varus,Jhin,Vayne,Ezreal my most played ones) and if you wanna check out my account (OPGG or otehr such websites) that is Luca195 on EUNE.

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Passive : Living Vengeance

On kill or assist, Varus temporarily gains Attack Speed. This bonus is larger if the enemy is a champion.

Q: Piercing Arrow
Varus readies and then fires a powerful shot that gains extra range and damage the longer he spends preparing to fire.
W
Blighted Quiver

Passive: Varus' basic attacks deal bonus magic damage and apply Blight. Varus' other abilities detonate Blight, dealing magic damage based on the target's maximum Health. Active: Varus empowers his next Piercing Arrow.
E
Hail of Arrows

Varus fires a hail of arrows that deal physical damage and desecrate the ground. Desecrated ground slows enemies' Move Speed and reduces their self healing and regeneration.
R
Chain of Corruption

Varus flings out a damaging tendril of corruption that immobilizes the first enemy champion hit and then spreads towards nearby uninfected champions, immobilizing them too on contact.

Most of the times you need to max W in order to get the maximum output damage. After that you usually max Q, but if you prefer you can also max out E.

Maxing W gives you more damage on your blight stacks which are the most important part of your laning. Also it gives you a better execution damage.

For the ADC build you can max Q,then W,then E(standard botlane Varus).

Can go with Absorb Life instead of Triumph, but i think Absorb life is a weak rune at this moment.

Legend:Alclarity and Last Stand are must so keep fighting even on low health you can still kill them with wq + Last Stand damage.

As for the secondary runes, Bone Plating is used for you to no get one shoted by the enemy and to use it to trade when needed. Overgrowth increases your overral health: add that to Hullbreaker health and/or other tank items and you become a 3000+ health beast.

#1: Lethal tempo: Genreally the best rune for this build, it sinergizes very well with it. Use this to 1v9 in teamfight, especially if you manage to get a kill/s to proc your passive for more attack speed. Do not use this if you plan to go AP.

#2: Press the Attack: You can use this for all the builds I presented. It s the standard rune. Use this in lane to trade by attacking your opponent for three times then use any ability.

#3: Hail Of Blades: This is only for the AP build. It puts 3 blight stacks on your opponent very fast, following one of your abilities. As for secondary runes, I recommend Sorcery: Absolute Focus: gives you damage when you are over 70% + Gathering Storm: in this case you give more AP as the game goes longer, helping you scale very well. You can also go with Resolve: Bone Plating + Overgrowth(for the reasosn presented above). You can also choose to go with Precision: Legend:Alclarity(for the attack speed) + Last Stand.

The best build right now(highest winrate) is the first one I presented(Rageblade+Hullbreaker).

If the enemy starts to stack up armor, you opt for the second one: after Rageblade, u go with AP items such as: Riftmaker and Bloodletter's Curse. This way you can still kill them, especially champions like Malphite and Ornn who rely on tank items for their build.

The Heartsteel build has a decent winrate as of now, but this build is mostly for fun. I do not recommend it in order to climb. I prefer to go the AP route.

The full AP build has the same winrate as Heartsteel. So it is not very good right, but hopefuly at some point it will be buffed.

The ADC build has a very good winrate and you can always go ready no matter the current meta.

As for the specific build, it always depends on the enemy team. For magic resist: Wit s End,Banshes, Mercury Treads. For armor: Zhonia,Plated Steelcaps,Randuin(against Crit). For both usually go for Jak So but in some cases you can rush Locket of the Iron Solari(and use the Cashback rune from Inspiration group) and then build full AP or AD.

For the boots, I usually go for Berserker's Greaves for AD builds and Sorcerer's Shoes for AP build. But your kit, items and runes provide plenty attack speed/AP so you can build defensive boots.

The standard spells are Flash and Barrier. Barrier gives you the edge in 1v1s and it helps you to no get one shoted sometimes.

You can also go with Ghost against low mobility champions as you can poke them more easily and you can all in against meeles. Ghost also help you survive ganks as you have no other tool of mobility.

Third, you can opt for Exhaust against high damage champions like Irelia,Nasus,Jax in order to reduce their damage and movement speed to all in them and defeat them.

Fourth, you can go for Teleport, the standard toplane summoner spell for obvious reasons.

First things first, start W. Try to get level 2 first while also autoing the enemy toplaner to get the three stacks. As you get level 2 immediatly hit your enemy with empowered Q(remember you already have stacks on him from level 1 auto). This way you create an early advantage by getting a kill or burning enemy flash or/and tp. After that simply poke your enemy with 2 or 3 autos(PTA prock) followed by either an E or Q.

After you get level 6 you have a big kill threat all the time and even if you are behind you can punish your enemy for their mistakes and kill them.

If you rush Rageblade, auto 4 times the minions in order to fully stack it and then pick a fight with your enemy toplaner.

Also don t forget to enter the bush to get rid of minion aggro any time you can as you can easily lose the fight because of minion damage.

Varus passive gives him attack speed so make sure that you have it activated when you choose to fight the enemy toplaner. Also don t forget about bone plating as some champions can easily burst you if bone plating is on cooldown.

Varus has no mobility so you can easily die to ganks. Don t forget to ward properly and always pay attention to the map to see where the enemy jungle is situated.

If you are safe from a possible gank you can poke your enemy when your wave crashes the tower but be aware of turret aggro.

From my experience, you can get out of ganks simply by using ghost(if this is of course one of the spells you chose). You can also use your ultimate to root your opponent and get away.

There are some situations where you are ahead and you can 1v2 so trust yourself, stand your grand and pick the target you think you can kill easier. Then, because of the Varus passive, you become a lot stronger fighting the second opponent.

Varus has some serious counters.

This ussualy consists of champions that have good mobility and can easily close the gap between you and the opponent.

Also a lot of tanks (it also depends on their build and yours) have sufficient damage to kill you so build smart and take into the account your enemy s build and choose the best out of the 3 build options I presented above.

Against no mobility champions, ghost is extremely helpful(if used properly, the enemy champions can t touch you).

Also in extreme casese, for example against champions like nasus, you can take cleanse.

Varus is extremely useful in teamfights thanks to his ultimate which can root multiple enemy champions.

So after the laning phase just group with your team in order to secure the objectives.

Sidelaning isn t one of varus strenghts as you have no mobility so no way you can escape(other than ghost summoner spell). But since you have hullbreaker you can melt down enemy towers quite easily.