Talk:Rakan/@comment-34781986-20180314124358/@comment-4091261-20180317011757

offers a concrete method for a battle mage style of to lane with a  rush. It's functional by optimizing his fair diving capability and also serving as an extension to his waveclear.

By increasing his / during a during a dive, +  becomes much more effective. He almost always gets a positive trade from it when he has the full shield from.

Having and another  ratio boosting item grants  formidable offensive scaling that he innately lacks.
 * 1) serves as a tool that allows him to self-carry much better. While it is not AOE, it does allow him to destroy turrets. Combined with  he can actually function as a carry, in the sense of becoming a force to actively win the game.
 * 2) further extends his waveclear into perfection while also offering a tool to eliminate his  issues with  that builds into it. The multi-target aspect also grants larger impact with his full combo.

Building afterwards essentially eliminates all issues that would physically interfere with a battle mage  success. Even though his issues can be fixed by items, the reliance on items is itself a handicap--which is typically the case of all off-meta builds.

Fortunately, unlike some other off-meta builds, has the capability to effectively lane. This alone bolsters his viability immensely as effective laning means greater capability of reaching sufficient levels of required to function properly. With an incredibly efficient trade of simultaneous defense and offense through and his combo,  has the ability to whittle opponents down if he has the patience.
 * However, if combo is interrupted for any reason, he will suffer greatly, especially if  is interrupted.

My evaluation of battle-mage is that it is a mid-game build focused on engaging and prioritizes taking down towers to win. The main benefit of this build would be taking advantage of innate slipperiness when it comes to engaging through a painful combo that one would expect from a bruiser.

It's pitfall would be that a choice needs to be made between waveclear and tower damage to maintain a level of that would be reasonable for diving. Having both is only viable for Full.