Talk:Swain/@comment-31872723-20180211233743

Swain isn't crazy good, but he's not bad, either.

From what my brother and I have seen, most of his matchups are skill matchups; though he is far more successful as a toplaner than a midlaner.

We run the same runes.

Sorcery:

Comet

Manaflow band

Transcendence

Gathering Storm

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Inspiration:

Magical Footwear OR Perfect timing.

(I prefer the free boots, and just avoid situations where I'd need stopwatch, my brother prefers to bait fights with perfect timing after 6.)

Cosmic Insight

The idea with this is build is that you play safe and poke occasionally until 6 and Rod of Ages is at 3-5 stacks. Then you try to bait a fight and kill the enemy laner, or get their sums by using your ult.

As long as you're smart about it and build enough mana, your Q will actually give you more mana than it used when you wave clear, so as long as you're decent, you never really have to leave lane.

In addition, because of Gathering Storm and RoA, you only get stronger as the game drags on, being very difficult to take on 1v1, and a monster in teamfights if you can reliably land your abilities.

If you play safe early and can land your abilities reliably, Swain is a very good AP carry in late game, and a decent duelist and teamfighter in mid game.

He's weak to people who outrange him, so he's not great in the midlane.

He's also weak early, as he needs items to sustain his mana pool, and to deal decent damage.

My brother and I seem to notice that Riven and Renekton seem to have trouble against Swain once he gets going, and while I haven't played Swain against him yet, I don't think Swain can win against Gnar. Just on paper, that sounds horrible.