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[2.1a] Alistar Guide - HOW TO PLAY ALISTAR LIKE THE PROS

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LV. 6

Patch 2.1a

April 13, 2021 02:32

HOW TO PLAY ALISTAR LIKE THE PROS

In-depth guide to the unique build path of Alistar support with lots of tips on how to adopt it to your solo queue games

Alistar Build

Best Build Guide for Alistar

Full Build

Other Common Items

Item Build Description

Additional information on the items

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐁𝐮𝐢𝐥𝐝

[Locket Enchant] is what you rush, for constant movement around the map and providing a nice shield to your team during skirmishes increasing your teams effective health.

Dead Man's Plate is a really nice item for moving around and putting pressure on the map, provides your first defensive stats as well. The ᴄʀᴜꜱʜɪɴɢ ʙʟᴏᴡ passive also provides a nice slow to set up allies if you want to hold [Alistar:1] & Headbutt for a bigger group / HPT.

Zeke's Convergence is your first true support item, this item's passive ʜᴀʀʙɪɴɢᴇʀ is absolutely insane and crucial for keeping immobile enemies out of position or the enemies front line from your carries. If you find yourself in a situation where you are able to activate the ꜰʀᴏꜱᴛꜰɪʀᴇ ᴄᴏᴠᴇɴᴀɴᴛ passive the slow is doubled and this makes infinitely easier to hit your Trample when needed.

Protector's Vow gives you nice stats and helps keep your front line healthy when you engage together.

Randuin's Omen makes the enemy AD carries slightly weaker to you, nothing special about this item just another live longer item. If you're versus 3 or more AP carries and have a carry on your team you switch this with Abyssal Mask , otherwise switch it with Adaptive Helm .

Warmog's Armor is just an item with nice stats, nothing special.

𝐎𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐈𝐭𝐞𝐦𝐬

Thornmail can be built into an AD heavy team, if you notice the opponents are 3/4 man AD with no real AP threat you can take it in place of Zeke's Convergence .

[Sunfire Cape] & Spirit Visage is not worth the value to you as a support, never build.

Gargoyle Enchant is just "OK" as a standalone item, I personally think its quite slept on, but if you're being focused your team should be able to win a team fight anyway, your job isn't to survive its to get the opponents carries killed before they kill your carries.

Shadows Enchant is good for chasing down opponents, but this is why were rushing [Locket Enchant] and picking up Dead Man's Plate as our second item.

Redeeming Enchant is too slow for the heal it provides, the shield from [Locket Enchant] is instant and much better in its raw stats (extra ~25% extra health).

Alistar Runes

Best Runes for Alistar

Keystone

Aftershock

Domination

Weakness

Resolve

Loyalty

Inspiration

Pack Hunter

Aftershock: Buys you time to live through burst while your team gets to you if you engage

Weakness: The math works out that you end up giving an extra 1-200 damage per champ you immobilize for every fight, this also works with your items.

Loyalty: Gives your lane partner free stats, nothing else in this tree helps supports except Backbone or Conditioning, but our job is to keep our carry alive.

Pack Hunter: Nothing in this tree is useful, the next best thing to take is Pathfinder. -

Keystone

Font of Life

Domination

Weakness

Resolve

Loyalty

Inspiration

Pack Hunter

Font of Life: You can take this when the opponents team doesn't have 2 or more heavy DPS characters, this lets your team sustain longer against the enemies in return for giving yourself less survivability. (More effective HP for your allies in return for less effective HP for you)

Pack Hunter: - Pathfinder is not worth it since you already have Boots and Dead Man's Plate as your first 2 items.

Skill Order

How to distribute skill points

Triumphant Roar - Passive

Pulverize

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Headbutt

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Trample

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Unbreakable Will

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Summoner Spells

When to take which summoners

Flash

Very good for Flash + Pulverize Combo.

Exhaust

Will most likely be your common rune, use it when the enemy carry starts to dish out their damage.

Ignite

Alternative to exhaust you can run ignite if the enemy has a healing support.

Heal

If you're looking for something a bit more saucy your carry can run barrier and you can run heal, this is common when exhaust isn't the best option or there are 5 carries on the opponents team, but requires a pre made duo to plan it out beforehand.

Alistar Matchups & Counters

Detailed information on how to play matchups and counters

Easy

Blitzcrank

Easy

Lux

Easy

Seraphine

Easy

Sona

Easy

Ashe

Easy

Jhin

Easy

Jinx

Easy

Miss Fortune

Medium

Annie

Medium

Soraka

Medium

Vayne

Hard

Janna

Hard

Nami

Hard

Ezreal

Hard

Kai'sa

Skill

Braum

Skill

Malphite

Skill

Ahri

Skill

Varus

Rocket Grab hits you, combo the enemy carry for free.
If

Rocket Grab hits your carry, dive into their carry to let your carry peel back.

Essentially

Rocket Grab is a free uber ride to the enemy carry, to which you can

Headbutt back to your team.

VERIFICATION OF THE BUILD

In case you've come into this guide thinking "this guy is just talking random crap, why would you want boots before an item with actual stats, or something similar"

Here are 4 people from the top 10 Alistar's of SEA doing the same build with minor variations. The reason I went with the build above is because it should have the highest % of success across the most amount of matches compared to the other variants.

HOW TO PLAY:

Laning Phase: Between levels 1-5 you'll want to stick by your carry, looking for opportunities to engage and catch your opponents out of position. When your jungler comes for scuttle crab or a gank be sure to assist them by hovering between the jungler and your carry to respond to whichever one breaks into a fight. Be sure to use your pings so your carry and jungler know what your intentions are.

Teamfights: Depending on your team composition you will have 1 of 2 jobs:

1: Engage and start / force team fights when an enemy carry steps out of position and your team can follow up.
2: PEEL your carries and keep them alive for as long as possible, so they can dish out the most damage.

Key Terms:

As with any guide, if you have any questions or would like to discuss some things you can reach out to me on Discord: Paz#0737 or on my discord here: https://discord.gg/xp99TDD75j

Rush: Build / do ASAP, no matter the circumstances.
Skirmish: Smaller fight, think of it as a team fight but no one commits all resources to it.
Pressure: To create pressure is to do something that forces your opponents to react.
HPT: High Priority Target, usually the opponents carry.
Immobile: A character with no gap-closers.
Gap-closers: Abilities like Arcane Shift , Shuriken Flip , [Kaisa:ult]. Abilties that can close the gap by dashing / increasing movement speed.
Engage: The act of starting a fight, usually with an ability that provides CC.
CC: Crowd Control, Abilities that displace an enemy or stop them using abilities. Deadly Flourish , Apprehend , Decisive Strike , Unstoppable Force .
AD Carry: An enemy that builds Attack Damage.
AP Carry: An enemy that builds Ability Power.
Combo: Your champions expected combo. Headbutt > Pulverize / Silver Bolts > (AA) > Tumble > (AA).
Cancel: To cancel a champions ability means to stop it as it is channeling. For example Bullet Time and Curtain Call is a channeled ability and can be stopped by using CC during her cast, or by using CC during Headbutt will stop him from travelling the full distance. Keep in mind not all channels can be cancelled, for example Arcane Shift .
Effective Health: Effective health is the durability of a champion, taking into account their health as well as their armor, magic resist, any regeneration they could have as well as any shields.
X-Factor Play: A play that turns a losing fight into a winning fight.