WE'RE BACK・To War with the "Warlock" [14.23・Mid/Top/Bot/Sup] (2024)

Regardless of where you choose to lane, your early game is relatively weak in the lane itself. During an invade, your early point in Nevermove will be gamechanging. But for now your primarily goal is to get levels as soon as possible by, at a minimum, being close to dying minions or by last hitting them yourself. Be a little cautious about throwing your Nevermove out willy-nilly. It's relatively expensive with our low mana pool and medium length cooldown. If you can hit a Nevermove, put your Vision of Empire in front of the enemy slightly and wait for Arcane Comet to land. Then pull the enemy with the second part of Nevermove into your Vision of Empire and potentially throw a complimentary Death's Hand on them. This is your standard trade pattern with Arcane Comet being optional. E1> Wcast > *Comet > E2 > Wexplosion > Q. And you'll keep this up for most of the laning phase. Nevermove and Vision of Empire will be your primary source of getting Ravenous Flock stacks.

However, watch your sidelanes. If you can afford the time to and an enemy died near your lane, they'll always drop a soul to pick up. In fact, from level 2 onwards it is worth it to click other lanes or jungle regularly. If there's a fight happening, see if you can get a cheeky Vision of Empire in. If an enemy champion dies after being hit by it, you'll get an assist, a Ravenous Flock stack for the hit and an additional stack for participating in the kill. Since Vision of Empire provides a hefty but short slow, it might be the difference maker in your allies catching enemies.

During objective fights, keep an eye on the enemy. If you're expecting 2 or more enemy champions to try to fight you for Dragon, Voidgrubs or Rift Herald, it might be a good idea to start Demonic Ascension as one enters the fight range. Always look to participate in these unless you're too low on Health or Mana to do so. You're amazing at teamfights and the enemy should be aware of that too. Stand between them and the objective, the idea of engaging you for the objective might be bad enough for them to back off entirely. If you do get engaged on, start Demonic Ascension and start walking towards your team subtly leading the enemy to your team with Nevermove and their chase.

And for the love of Raum, PING. PING. COMMUNICATE. PING. PING.

Ooohwebouddamakeanameforourselvesheah. Midgame is where we shine. This is where we peak. We'll have 3 items and boots around this time, and we're starting to decide on our post-key items. Rod of Ages will be highly stacked up. And it's time to make moves happen.

Let's talk simpler stuff first; Shoving lanes is pretty easy for us. We wanna get as close to a minion wave as we can and angle our Death's Hand blast to catch as much as we can. 2 will usually do the trick with maybe some stragglers, and our low cooldown by this point will make that easy.

But we're looking to catch and not get caught, We're gonna fishing with our Nevermove and looking to create uncomfortable zoning situations with Vision of Empire if we can. It's not an insignificantly sized circle that enemies will likely want to avoid. The damage isn't anything crazy if it does hit but the 50 to 70% slow is pretty great. With both build path's key items we're also quite comfortable with fights. Yeah, we're not looking to get blasted in the face by a full kit so keep dodging but look for teamfights where you can. Smart allies will have picked a stronger engage to go with yours. If you're the engager, look for a solid Nevermove catch or Vision of Empire zone that'll let you get in on the backline with a Flash if you have to.

If you're not there, assist with Vision of Empire and pings. Communication is key at all times. Even if they refuse to listen for whatever reason. And just like before, zone them out during objectives and stick with teammates. It's easy to get outnumbered if you're on equal footing. You're also pretty good at peeling for your carries. The distance a well timed Nevermove fully waited out followed by the pull of it can create is pretty insane.

If you can force them and it's not horribly dangerous for you, look for more narrow places where the enemy can only run in a tight direction or they have to stick to you while you hurt them with Demonic Ascension and spells. Fighting in jungles or rivers is typically pretty good. Unless... you know, you're standing in Rumble's The Equalizer ultimate. Or Hwei's Molten Fissures.

Our power starts petering out. It's not that we're terribly useless or anything, but other champions typically get much stronger whereas we primarily get more sustain and tankier. It's why I'm a big on the idea of building Liandry's Torment which will boost our damage regardless of our build. For an example as to how useful a Liandry's can be, the current 14.22 build for Udyr who likes to sit in the face of enemies too is going Liandry's, maxing his AOE spell and building full tank after because his spell and Liandry's will sort the damage.

Much of the gameplan that exists in the midgame exists here too, but with one major difference; You have to become extremely picky with the pick-offs you can do on the enemy team. See a squishy or carry entirely out of position? That's where you guys will have to make a move as a team. Your role also somewhat changes. Instead of being a primary damage source, we tend to sit more into the protector-peeler position now to protect carries. Factually, they'll be dealing more damage than us at this point. And we can survive the enemy's damage. So keep a closer eye on your AD/AP carries and throw a few more Nevermove's at the way of enemies targeting them as opposed to you. Frankly, the enemy targeting you over them is a good thing.

With Demonic Ascension active and our short cooldowns we will be doing damage regardless. But it's likely not our Damage that's going to win us the game anymore. It'll be our Tactics, Survival and Peel that'll be a much greater difference maker.