Rammus/Strategy

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Gameplay

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Tips

Playing As Rammus

• Powerball can be used as an effective escape mechanism.
• Using taunt on a champion by your tower can cause the tower to attack your enemy.
• Tremors and Defensive Ball Curl can be used late in the game to obliterate towers. If you're bogged down in a team fight, it is often valuable to break off and attack the buildings.

Playing Against Rammus

• Pay particular attention to when his Defensive Ball Curl is off. Rammus has slightly lower stats than a normal tank when he's out of the stance.
• Rammus often stacks high Armor, leaving him especially vulnerable to caster damage while not in Defensive Ball Curl.

Tricks

Ability Usage

• Spiked Shell is one of the things that make Rammus a good armor scaler: buying armor items is extremely good as Rammus autoattacks a fair amount.
• Powerball is Rammus' mobility ability, it is often maxed second or last for tank Rammus, but can be maxed first for AP Rammus. It grants a great movement speed boost, increased at the end of the spell, deals magic damage scaling with a 100% AP ratio, and Template:Cctip hit enemies for 3 seconds.
  • Powerball can be used to interrupt dashes such as Jax's Leap Strike or Tristana's Rocket Jump mid-flight.
    • Abilities such as Jax's Leap Strike, Garen's Decisive Strike and Xin Zhao's Audacious Charge will not stop Powerball if Rammus is accelerating in the opposite direction.
    • If an enemy Renekton uses Slice and Dice through Rammus while he is using Powerball, the ability won't be cancelled.
  • Powerball is also an escape ability. Furthermore, it has a slight Template:Cctip effect, which allows you to run into pursuers to momentarily disable them.
  • As Powerball speeds up continuously after the initial cast, it's sometimes better to let it speed up in a brush before rolling at an enemy champion.
  • Flash can be used while in Powerball to jump across a minion wave to catch your opponent off-guard.
  • Powerball can hit stealthed champions such as Twitch, Shaco, Akali, or Evelynn, dealing magic damage and Template:Cctip. It will also work against a Camouflaged Teemo, knocking him out of stealth. This can be useful for chasing them if they go stealthed at low health.
  • You can use Powerball then use Teleport to be at a high speed when reaching your destination.
  • Powerball will damage and Template:Cctip enemies reviving from pseudo-death ( Guardian Angel or Zilean's Chrono Shift Chrono Shift) or Zhonya's Hourglass, granting an easy kill.
• Defensive Ball Curl is Rammus' defensive ability, it is usually maxed first. It grants increased armor and magic resistance for 6 seconds, and a thorn effect: while in that stance, basic attacks against Rammus deal magic damage to attackers, scaling with a 10% Rammus's armor ratio.
  • Defensive Ball Curl increases Rammus' armor and magic resistance by 40 / 60 / 80 / 100 / 120, and at the same time his attack damage by 10 / 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 thanks to his passive Spiked Shell.
  • Defensive Ball Curl stacks with Thornmail, returning 15% of the physical damage received, plus 25 / 35 / 45 / 55 / 65 flat damage, plus 10% of Rammus's armor, plus 25% of Rammus's bonus armor, as magic damage per basic attacks.
• Puncturing Taunt is Rammus' offensive ability, it is usually maxed second. It allows Rammus to Template:Cctip one enemy, forcing the target to attack Rammus for the duration. It also reduces the target's armor for the same duration.
  • Puncturing Taunt used while under the effect of Defensive Ball Curl is an excellent combination, because the enemy is forced to attack you, thus dealing magic damage to himself because of the thorn effect of Defensive Ball Curl.
  • Puncturing Taunt can be used on enemies pushing your turret to make them attack you and causing them to take the turret's aggro. It can also be used to take the focus off more squishy allies, allowing them to deal more damage than they would have had they been the focused target.
  • Puncturing Taunt can also be used to 'pull' enemies towards your team as an enemy will be forced to get into attack range to hit you. This is more effective with melee champions whose attack range is shorter than ranged ones.
  • When using Puncturing Taunt, you can use all your spells to keep enemies in range of this spell in order to maximize damage. This is possible because the ultimate is not channeled.
• Tremors is deals great magic damage every second for 8 seconds around Rammus. Each tick of damage scales with a 30% AP ratio.
  • Tremors affects turrets, making Rammus a very good pusher, especially late game when he can tank the turret for his team.
  • Rammus can use Tremors while using Powerball, making it very useful for destroying towers or champions that are low on health and escaping.
• Rammus is a strong jungler, with exceptional ganks. Powerball allows him to initiate ganks suddenly, and Puncturing Taunt is a strong CC ability with a fairly long duration.
  • Note that Rammus' Powerball, whilst it still does damage, it has no crowd control effect on the Template:Moi or Template:Moi.
    • Also note that Puncturing Taunt now has absolutely no effect on the Template:Moi or Template:Moi (it will not reduce armor or Template:Cctip either to attack you). Both skills will still affect all other neutral creeps as normal.
  • Rammus' Powerball allows you to gank a warded lane since your enemies have less time to react as you are approaching them with high speed.

Mastery Usage

• As with most tank junglers, Rammus can utilise  Strength of the Ages very well. It gives free health to synergise with his high resistances and when fully stacked, provides sustain which Rammus lacks.
•  Grasp of the Undying works well for a Top lane Rammus as he naturally autoattacks a lot. It also gives another source of damage and helps Rammus' lack of sustain.
•  Thunderlord's Decree should be picked up if seeking higher burst damage or when playing AP Rammus.

Item Usage

• Building armor is necessary to put Spiked Shell to good use. Having a lot of armor will still result in a large amount of damage. However, do not disregard building magic resistance, as your high armor stat means nothing to the enemy team's mages. It can however be argued that building health will synergize better with the free armor and magic resistance provided by Defensive Ball Curl.
• Thornmail is a key item for Rammus, it is very effective as it reflects damage from basic attacks (which the enemy is Template:Cctip to use during Puncturing Taunt) and stacks with the reflecting damage given during Defensive Ball Curl, along with 25 bonus attack damage due to his passive.
  • Thornmail stacks with Defensive Ball Curl, returning 15% of the physical damage received, plus 25 / 35 / 45 / 55 / 65 flat damage, plus 10% of Rammus's armor, plus 25% of Rammus's bonus armor, as magic damage per basic attacks.
• Sunfire Cape or Cinderhulk (jungle Rammus) also synergizes well with Tremors and Defensive Ball Curl.
• Randuin's Omen in conjunction with Puncturing Taunt and Defensive Ball Curl allows you to Template:Cctip the enemy team heavily and make chasing easier. However, it reduces the enemies attack speed by 15% for 1 second when basic attacking you, so they won’t get as many reflected hits off you when you Template:Cctip them.
• Dead Man's Plate grants you armor, health, additional mobility and some bonus physical damage on basic attacks, it synergizes well with Powerball.
• Talisman of Ascension's active synergizes well with Rammus' Powerball.
• Rammus' Tremors and Powerball can deal massive damage with some ability power.
  • This makes Zhonya's Hourglass a rather potent item as it also provides 45 armor to scale with his Defensive Ball Curl and Spiked Shell. Another thing to note is that Tremors continues even through Stasis.
  • If you're against a magic damage team, an Abyssal Scepter can be very helpful for its combination of AP, MR, and its aura. Despite not being as powerful as a Zhonya's Hourglass it can be very effective against magic damage teams.
  • Rylai's Crystal Scepter can be a powerful item, causing Tremors to slow a massive area, Template:Cctip on Defensive Ball Curl if you don't have Randuin's Omen, very slightly increasing Powerball's Template:Cctip, and providing a high amount of health.
  • Another powerful item is Liandry's Torment, which is applied on enemies attacking Rammus during Defensive Ball Curl, and can also be applied with  Rammus' Powerball or Tremors. It synergizes well with Rylai's Crystal Scepter, and also provides a generous amount of health. Typically a Liandry's isn't a good item on Rammus due to his high AP ratios.

Countering

• Be careful when attacking Rammus while his Defensive Ball Curl is active. The damage you deal may be your own undoing, especially if you are a basic attack based champion such as Tryndamere, Vayne, or Yasuo.
• Try to purchase tenacity items early to reduce the duration of his Template:Cctip from his Puncturing Taunt.
  • A champion like Irelia who has natural tenacity can be useful against Rammus due to the large number of allies he usually has with him whenever he engages.
  • Be careful, for even with fully-stacked- Ionian Fervor levels of tenacity, Puncturing Taunt will last for up to over a second.
• Try casting a Template:Cctip or Template:Cctip when he uses Powerball so that way Rammus cannot initiate with his full combo by using Puncturing Taunt, Defensive Ball Curl and Tremors straight after hitting a target with Powerball.
  • Be aware that crowd control abilities will not stop Rammus' Powerball while it is active, but will Template:Cctip / Template:Cctip / Template:Cctip him in place, allowing you to potentially dodge the attack.
• Rammus is an excellent counter to all AD carries due to his Defensive Ball Curl and tendency to build high armor. It is wise to have a mage or a hybrid champion (e.g. Jax or Akali) take him down.
• Building armor penetration items like Lord Dominik's Regards and The Black Cleaver will reduce the effectiveness of his armor, allowing you to deal more damage to him.
  • The Black Cleaver is especially effective against Rammus, as it reduces his armor, thus reducing the AD he gains from his passive and the bonus damage from his Defensive Ball Curl.
  • Due to his Template:Cctip it may not be a good idea to duel him as a mage unless you can kite him.
• If Rammus is building AP don't let your guard down, Powerball and Tremors have great AP ratios and low cooldowns.
• Although picking AP champions can make Rammus less effective by forcing him to build magic resistance in addition to armor, be wary of picking too many AP champions, as the enemy can pick champions like Veigar and Galio to counter that.
• Quicksilver Sash is an excellent item against Rammus. Not only this item get rid of his Template:Cctip, but it also has magic resistance to reduce the magic damage that Rammus does with his abilities.
• Apart from AP champions, AD champions who have abilities that deal magic or true damage, such as Cho'Gath, Darius, and Vel'Koz can be good options against Rammus, as armor is a less effective option to deal with them.
• One of Rammus biggest strengths as a jungler is his strong ability to gank lanes thanks to his Powerball and Puncturing Taunt. However, as with most tank junglers, he is an extremely poor duelist. Consider playing junglers that excel in counter-jungling and dueling such as Elise, Xin Zhao, Evelynn, Shaco, Vi, and Lee Sin.
  • His jungle wave clear is also very slow as well, and he'll most likely spend his time ganking lanes than farming. As such, farm based junglers should have no problems against Rammus.

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