Talk:Riven/@comment-25359568-20150207021018/@comment-4834593-20150208081138

Roznosiciel said most things already, but I think I can expand on that a bit. First off, the matchups: Nasus and Gnar are actually some of my least favorite matchups. A good Nasus just manages to stay alive and then farm, and for some reason I just can't get into Gnar's face.

For the rest, the mindset behind Riven is "play agressive". Riven is one of the best snowballers in the game, and needs early kills to be useful (except if she can steal a triple from her team in an early teamfight, then that gets her rolling instead). If you see an opening in lane where you can jump on your enemy and it's not a Renekton, Darius, Garen, Gnar or Olaf, you should. Those are the only ones that are simply BETTER than you. There are risky lanes like Nasus or Heimerdinger (post-6) where you have to take some additional things into mind (respectively not pushing the lane while fighting and keeping a way out for if he uses RQ). And even against those five that I mentioned, you can fight if you do it right. Renekton vs Riven is one of the most even lanes I've ever encountered in the game. I doubt you'd get closer to a skill matchup without having a mirror lane. Darius is just really strong, but you can fight him if his Q is down or you're ahead. Just don't get pulled in at the wrong moment. Garen... I don't know, I just don't know. All I know is that I know a fellow Riven main who apparently has no trouble with him, but I'm not managing to win lane against him. Ever. Gnar is just really hard and gets away when you finally get close, but it's been a while since I laned against him, so I can't say anything detailed. Olaf is just... Well, don't get baited by his low health if you don't have your Wind slash ready.

Next off, with your ultimate, generally it's indeed better to use it early, but there are exceptions. For example, I had a lane against Cho a few days ago, and when his tower was down and the lane pushed a bit, I just went in, without ulting, and kept going. Because he had no tower, I could stay on him and by that point I was enough ahead I could fight him if I dodged his Q (and if I could his W). When he got low, I knew he couldn't escape anymore, and THEN I ulted. It happens sometimes, if you ult when your enemy is full health, that he can run and you just wasted your ult.

When playing a matchup against a squishy - basically any squishy -, try to get in their face as much as possible. Riven is the best counter in the game to champions like Yasuo or Teemo. I don't think I've ever lost a lane against one of those two.

For build, go damage. My personal pefered build is Hydra - Guardian Angel and Last Whisper (which one first depending on which one I need more) - Bloodthirster - Infinity Edge. I tend to buy Brutalizer and CDR boots early, taking Brutalizer normally before Hydra (but if I back with a lot of gold I might skip it) and finishing the boots around the same time as Hydra. I then sell Brutalizer later in the game, normally when I'm starting my IE, but sometimes earlier. I am running a total of 20% scaling cdr from runes - 9 glyphs and 1 quint - to cap out with masteries and boots, or to cap out at level 9 if I have Brutalizer, because cdr is just too good for Riven. You want to be using abilities all the time.

Also, Roz already said it, but I'm going to emphazise it - autoattack after every ability whenever you can. It at least doubles the damage you do, if not more. If I just so think back of my recent ranked games, I can only think of ONE time where not using autoattacks in between (except of course when I wasn't in aa range of a champion) was a good idea. And that's like 10 or 11 games. Basically, do it never except if you absolutely need that Q knockup NOW because you're going to die otherwise.

And there was one more thing... Oh yeah, runes and masteries. You can run a standard AD runepage and 21/9/0 masteries, but I prefer the following:

Flat AD Marks

Flat AD seals

scaling cdr Glyphs

2 flat AD Quints, 1 scaling cdr Quint

19/11/0 masteries, in the offensive tree I take the CDR and everything that increases damage except Havoc (obviously) and the ones at the left except Double-Edged sword (which I DO take), and in the defensive tree I take the four at the top left and then the armor or mr depending on what I lane against (in blind or when unsure I take armor) to make up for not running defensive runes.