Talk:Garen the Night of Demacia/@comment-76.2.102.23-20110613032345/@comment-3457312-20110613184556

He should never be built as a full-tank. You shouldn't have to if you have a true tank on your team, but if you don't and he's finding himself as the viable main-tank then your team composition is just not balanced and there's nothing you can do about it.

Garen finds most success going early DPS and then transitioning into tanky-dps or off-off-tank. Straight DPS means he'll get melted late-game and main-tank means you won't do viable amounts of damage to be considered a threat and your carries will just get focused down while you meander around with all your CDs blown. Again, early DPS (Phage and Brutalizer) for lane harass and brush ganking with lane partner, then start going tanky-dps with items like Frozen Mallet and Atma's Impaler. He'll be beefy enough to stick around in teamfights and do some viable damage against carries who didn't stack armor.