Varus build analysis with case study

Varus is a staple pick of season 8. His presence in botlane is undisputed and many teams have a priority on this pick. I’m gonna dive deep into analysis of his possible build paths, and I’ll analyse viability of each.

Table of contents:
1. Introduction to Varus
2. Explaining analysis method
3. Introduction to builds, building and price analysis
3.1. Full on-hit build
3.2. Guinsoo into crit
3.3. Price comparition
4. Case study: G2 Hjarnan vs Schalke04
5. Disclaimers

1. Introduction to Varus
   Varus has seen many build-paths throughout the patches. His kit allows him to build lethality and becoming poking nightmare (when lethality is viable), he can go full-crit route or he can opt into building Guinsoo for extremely strong 1-item powerspike.
   Currently everyone in proplay rushes Guinsoo, thus that will be the option I’ll focus on. Guinsoo-varus playstyle evolves around stacking his w passive and consuming it with e and q. It deals magic damage and has great synergy with Guinsoo. His e provides 40% healing reduction. Varus is one of the strongest 1-item powerspiking champions after acquiring Guinsoo.
2. Explaining analysis method
   I hopped into spreadsheet, “simulated” desired combo and recreated it in practice tool. I fine-tuned spreadsheet until it matched practice tool results with “good-enough” accuracy. The combo I used was:
   R-AA-AA-E(passive consumption)-AA-AA-AA-AA-quick Q(passive consumption)-AA-AA.
   I tried to reproduce circumstances when Varus’es engage opens up a full-on teamfight. By not dragging the combo for too long I achieved:
   a) Guinsoo has time to stack and lets on-hit build be effective enough. When going full on-hit after using all abilities there is significant downtime in terms of dmg, as Varus has no way of utilizing his w passive dmg
   b) Trade is long enough for crit-build to not overpower unstacked Guinsoo.
   DPS was determined by dividing full-combo dmg by the time it took ME to perform it with said items. Obviously I will be slower than proplayer but it doesn’t matter when comparing builds since I performed all the combos.
3. Introduction to builds, building and price analysis

List of considered items with their prices

First, on-hit build consists of Guinsoo-Wits End-BotrK-Hurricane. It provides MR shredding (mostly effective when hitting low-mr targets), lifesteal, current hp% dmg and aoe passive spradding. Majority of dealt damage is magic. Champions standing on his e have reduced healing.

Second, crit build consists of Guinsoo-RFC-Hurricane-IE. It allows for smooth transition from 1-item Guinsoo powerspike to strong crit build for the lategame. It lacks MR and lifesteal, which makes it more dangerous route. You are much more squishy and have to position accordingly.

Few things to acknowledge:
1. On-hit build reaches full power with fully stacked Guinsoo
2. On-hit build is safer with provided MR and lifesteal
3. On-hit becomes aoe on-hit build only at 4th item. If u purchase Hurricane earlier you sacrifice either MR or lifesteal. It’s viable choice when facing 2 or more frontliners, however you should play accordingly to lost stat
4. Crit build reaches aoe max hp% damage quicker, but if there is only 1 big tank you’ll probably be the weakest before purchasing IE.
5. Crit build is risky in terms of defensive stats and lack of lifesteal

3.1 Full on-hit build
On-hit build should be chosen if either lifesteal or magic resist is highly valued. Skipping Wits End is viable if there are no AP threats on enemy team. However if there is no MR on enemy team Wits End MR shred is highly impactfull and should be considered even vs no AP threats. BotrK is all-around good item providing stats usefull for adcs, this build spikes super hard after this buy. Next purchase is situational and should be:
a) Hurricane — when aoe proccs of w passive is highly valued
b) Void Staff — when facing single frontliner and quickly killing him is top priority
c) Mortal Reminder — when applying grevious wounds to the whole team is highly valuable (worth remembering: Varus e provides 40% healing reduction and in my opinion is enough in most cases).
Here’s single-target dps for these builds in various scenarios

As seen in these charts picking Void Staff for 4th item provides the highest single target DPS.

3.2 Guinsoo into crit
Building crit items after Guinsoo can be tricky. We definitely don’t want to build IE after Guinsoo, these are both very expensive items and with only 20% crit chance I feel it’s never right choice. The choices are either RFC or Hurricane. RFC provides slightly more single target damage, while Hurricane is better for AOE proccing of w passive. Keep in mind that while crit item scales better in terms of single dps, the moment before your IE buy is when you are the weakest relatively.

Here are graphs comparing crit to onhit build. I chose highest single-target dps from on-hit route for clarity.

As seen in charts highest single-target dps on-hit build doest provide more single target dps than IE option, but while building crit you are benefiting from Hurricanes AOE dmg and w passive proccs.

3.3 Price comparition

I highlighted item-sets with similiar price and their strength in the moment and usefullness should be compared to others in same group.

Crit build reaches 3-item powerspike faster, however provides much less single-target dps once on-hit build catches up.

All green end-game builds are really close to each other in terms of total cost, however building Void Staff may seem clunky and preferably would be done all at once (full buy Void Staff without building components). Mortal Reminder may be fast band-aid if grevious wounds are neccessary as full items isn’t that much different from Executioners Calling in terms of usefullness. Building IE may be difficult as we’ll probably be forced to sit on a BF Sword for a long time.

4. Case study: G2 Hjarnan vs Schalke04

I tracked HP, armor and MR stats for Schalke members throughout the game. When didn’t have neccessary info I took average from known data (if I knew certain champion had 1000Hp/100Armor/100MR 25 minutes into the game and 1200/120/120 27 minutes into the game I assumed he had 1100/110/110 26 minutes into the game). I tracked Varus’es items and assumed he would have finished alternative items (from same highlighted groups) at the same time. I did not take into consideration component items such as Bilgewater Cutlass, BF sword etc).

Hjarnans build was:

#1: Guinsoo -> Wits End -> BotrK -> Hurricane -> Mortal Remninder

My suggestes alternative builds are:

#2: Guinsoo -> RFC -> Hurricane -> IE -> Mortal Reminder

#3 Guinsoo -> Wits End -> BotrK -> Void Staff -> Hurricane

Now, lets see how DPS vs each member of Schalke looked.

Spike in DPS for #1 and #3 is caused by Maokai using Stoneplate (8180max HP)

During the game Hjarnan’s Varus was either dealing with frontline (mainly Maokai) or trying to kill Kha’zix. Let’s take a look at what each build brings to the table (‘high’, ‘low’ used in relation to other options).

#1: High Maokai and Alistar dps between 25:00–35:00, AOE dmg acquired around 35 minutes into the game. AOE grevious wounds 40 minutes into the game. High damage on Kha’zix until ~35:00 (Hurricane completed).

#2: Low single target Maokai and Alistar dps until 35:00. AOE dmg acquired around 28:30. Comparable dmg to frontline after IE (beside 4s of stoneplate).

#3: High Maokai and Alistar dps between 25:00–35:00, AOE dmg acquired around 40:00. High Kha’zix dps since 35:00.

In my opinion both #2 and #3 are superior to what Hjarnan brought to the table. #2 would bring AOE dmg faster and #3 would bring more single target dps. Whatever the focus would be, the mid-game would be stronger (playstyle adjustment neccessary) and that is when his influence was mostly needed.

5. Disclaimers
My spreadsheet isn’t perfect and these values are only approximation of what actually happened. In my calculations armor pen from MR is overrated since I forgot its bonus armor, not all armor. DPS after purchasing MR (~40:00) is a bit inflated.

Thanks for reading, follow me on Twitter for more builds analysis @ lolbuildsfreak