Nasus/Strategy

		"Some things must remain buried." Strategy is highly subjective and may become outdated without any notice. Because of this, the League of Legends Wiki has decided to retire strategy pages and would recommend using other platforms (such as YouTube) to find guides. For more information visit this thread. This page continues to exist for archive purposes.

Recommended Items

Summoner's Rift
Starting
Early
Essential
Defensive
Situational
Consumables

Summoner's Rift (Jungler)
Starting
Early
Essential
Defensive
Situational
Consumables

Twisted Treeline
Starting	2
Essential
Offensive
Defensive
Consumables

Twisted Treeline (Jungler)
Starting
Essential
Offensive
Defensive
Consumables

Howling Abyss
Starting	2
Essential
Offensive
Defensive
Situational
Consumables

Tips

Playing As Nasus

• Paying attention to last hitting with Siphoning Strike will have a large impact at the end of a game.
• If you're solo, Spirit Fire is a great way to farm a lane. It can be bad if you're in a lane with 2 and you push too far. Find the right balance between Siphoning Strike last hits and AoE farming.
• If you have low defenses, people will focus you down even during your ultimate. Try buying some survivability items even in your DPS builds.

Playing Against Nasus

• While transformed by his ultimate, Nasus is stronger than most champions in the League. Engage him only if you have a clear advantage.
• Max rank Wither is a very effective counter to attack damage champions, so try to avoid getting caught alone by it.
• Nasus is prone to being kited. Try not to engage him at full health.
• Try to all in him at lvl 2-3,he is weaker than most bruisers at that level and poking him is not enough. All in him once to take him to half hp, wait for your cooldowns, then all in again for the kill. Ignite is useful for this strategy. Don't pick champions with weak early game if playing against Nasus, it won't end up well. If you manage to kill him once earlygame, you would gain a significant advantage for the rest of the laning phase.
• Don't push against Nasus, his infinitely stacking Siphoning Strike makes it easier for him to farm under his own tower. Let him push and ask for your team's jungler to gank. He doesn't have a strong escape mechanism aside from the Flash summoner spell.

Playstyle

Ability Usage

Siphoning Strike [Q]

• • Nasus' strength derives from his incredible late game damage when allowed to stack his Siphoning Strike. With Wither to catch out enemies along with Spirit Fire and Fury of the Sands giving him great presence in teamfights, he is a formidable champion, though lacks mobility and hard CC, making him somewhat easy to kite.
  • Constantly last hitting with Siphoning Strike will have an enormous impact by the end of a game, and will be your primary source of damage.
    • If you are having difficulty last hitting minions with Siphoning Strike (against strong zoners), request a lane change or a gank.
  • The damage from Siphoning Strike will proc on turrets, allowing Nasus to be a very effective and dangerous split pusher once he gets more stacks.

Wither [W]

• • Using Wither on your targets will make it easier to land Spirit Fire before using Siphoning Strike, as Spirit Fire greatly reduces the target's armor and consequently increasing your physical damage.
  • Wither is best used to shut down auto-attack dependent champions, slowing them to a crawl and reducing their attack speed dramatically.
    • Choose your target wisely (usually a carry) when casting, as the moderate cooldown is fairly unforgiving since you will only be able to affect one person with it and most casters can shrug off the effects.
    • With high amounts of cooldown reduction, Nasus can almost continuously maintain Wither on the enemy team (5 seconds duration, 6.6 seconds cooldown). However, enemy Tenacity can counteract this.
    • Without any gap-closers or mobility, Nasus relies on his Wither to keep himself from being kited.

Spirit Fire [E]

• • Be careful when using Spirit Fire near your tower, as it will push the lane and you will likely miss several minions.
  • During the laning phase, Spirit Fire will discourage your enemies from farming, but it has a relatively high mana cost and will shove the lane if used too much. Do not spam Spirit Fire during the laning phase. All this will do is waste your mana for when you truly need it. Maintain your Siphoning Strike farm and save your mana pool for when your jungler is ready to gank. That way you can W > E > Q.

Fury of the Sands [R]

• • Fury of the Sands can be used at the start of teamfights as you will be doing constant AoE damage to enemies while gaining attack damage for an even stronger Siphoning Strike. It can also be saved for the end of smaller fights to bait enemies with the health boost.
  • A team with Nasus can kill Baron Nashor earlier because his Fury of the Sands and passive life steal from Soul Eater allows him to tank and kill it faster and more easily.

Runes

Items

Nasus can be itemized in many ways, including a melee DPS, tank, or off-tank bruiser.

• Generally speaking, a tank build is considered optimal due to his naturally high late-game damage from Siphoning Strike, which also makes him a priority target for the enemy team.
• When choosing summoner spells, either Ghost or Flash have their advantages, with the former granting Nasus more long term mobility to chase enemies down, and the latter to better survive the early game and aggressive ganks.
• As Nasus relies on Siphoning Strike as his primary source of damage, it is important to stay in lane in order to continuously farm Siphoning Strike.
  • Building early resistances like a Cloth Armor or a Null-Magic Mantle according to the main damage source can allow you to take a little more harass and stay in lane longer.
• For a high damage build, Infinity Edge and Trinity Force can make for risky but unexpectedly powerful combo if you manage to catch enemies out.
• The life steal from Soul Eater grants him decent sustain, allowing him to build other items. However, he can still benefit greatly from extra life steal as Siphoning Strike damage procs with it.
  • The Bloodthirster should not be ignored simply because of Nasus' innate abilities. In a more offensive build, The Bloodthirster synergizes well with his passive and Siphoning Strike, causing it to deal more damage early on. The shield will also provide a small defense against harass.
  • Blade of the Ruined King is a very situational item since it is designed for auto attack heavy champions such as Kog'Maw and Jax, while most of Nasus' damage comes in bursts from Siphoning Strike in a single strike rather than constantly autoattacking your opponent. However, the item's passive and active is useful when facing opponents that benefits from building health such as Volibear, Dr. Mundo, and Maokai.
• Sheen and Trinity Force go well with Siphoning Strike. With cooldowns nearly in sync with one another, you will almost always have a proc ready for your next Siphoning Strike.
• Trinity Force as well as its components work very well with Nasus. Wither and a Phage can keep an enemy constantly in melee range as well as the Spirit Fire area of effect. The Sheen's passive stacks with Siphoning Strike for more damage and providing more mana to better farm minions. Zeal offers some critical strike and attack speed to do more damage and movement speed to stick to enemies.
• Do not make the mistake of purchasing Tiamat or Ravenous Hydra on Nasus as the items have almost no synergy on him whatsoever. Not only do enemies killed by the Cleave passive effect not count towards increasing the damage of Siphoning Strike, but neither the Cleave passive nor the Crescent active apply any of the bonus damage of Siphoning Strike, since the damage they do is based solely on attack damage and does not include on-hit effects. More importantly, the splash damage will cause minions to die faster, making it considerably harder to farm Siphoning Strike effectively.
  • However, the passive and active do greatly help with his split-pushing abilities and also proc the life-steal both from the item itself and from Soul Eater, adding to his sustain in team-fights. All this makes it a relatively effective late-game choice in a more offensive build.
• Because Siphoning Strike's stack-based damage does not proc critical strike, this makes armor penetration the only option to increase the infinitely scaling bonus damage, making The Black Cleaver a very good item for Nasus' late game for the armor shred, cooldown reduction, health, and AD.
• Frozen Heart is an exceptional item on Nasus granting him a large amount of cooldown reduction and mana to use Siphoning Strike more often as well as giving him a hefty amount of armor and an attack speed debuff aura.
• Iceborn Gauntlet gives both the Spellblade passive from Sheen and the stats of Glacial Shroud. Whether buying it as replacements for Trinity Force and Frozen Heart being a better option is debatable.
• Nasus can also be used as an ability power champion, relying on items as Banshee's Veil and Rylai's Crystal Scepter for damage and utility with his Spirit Fire and Lich Bane for increased damage with his Siphoning Strike, while still building defensive items like Frozen Heart and Guardian Angel. This type of build is more focused on dealing damage to multiple enemies as both Spirit Fire and Fury of the Sands will deal more damage.
  • Whilst generally considered inferior on Summoner's Rift, this type of build is more favorable on other maps due to lack of opportunities there to farm Siphoning Strike particularly on Howling Abyss.
• Randuin's Omen is an excellent armor item as it makes Nasus more difficult to kite, which, despite Wither, is still one of his few weaknesses late game.
• When itemizing for defenses on Nasus, prioritize resistances over straight health, as this will make both your innate life-steal and the bonus health from Fury of the Sands more effective. With that said, do not neglect to purchase health entirely, as when you have built some resistances, these will cause it to scale rather well.
• Righteous Glory can be considered as it will allow Nasus to chase down the enemy and greatly increases his mobility, though it loses the sustain passive from Catalyst of Aeons.
• Dead Man's Plate, while a strong item on any tank or bruiser, is good for Nasus, allowing him to catch enemies out with the empowered attack's slow and increased mobility when not attacking in addition to its high defensive stats.
• Spirit Visage is a great item for Nasus when fighting magic damage heavy opponents, with the increased healing benefiting his innate lifesteal.

Countering

• Avoid going into a 1v1 battle against a late game Nasus. It's likely that he will have a lot of Siphoning Strike stacks, and built lots of tank items. This combined with his passive, Wither, and Fury of the Sands, means that he will be very difficult to take down alone.
  • Nasus is not particularly strong in teamfights as Fury of the Sands requires him to be in melee range to utilize its AoE damage and Spirit Fire is not very strong by itself, and he lacks CC other than Wither (which can only target a single enemy champion at once). Therefore, it is possible to ignore him and deal with the rest of his team.
  • Also, unlike some tanks, Nasus lacks damage reduction or defensive boosts other than the extra health from his ultimate, and the lifesteal from autos and Siphoning Strike are not particularly effective against tanks without armor penetration. Bursting him down before he can utilize his high sustained damage can be viable if you can afford to.
• Nasus' strength comes from his ability to farm Siphoning Strike. Try to zone him or deny his chance of last-hitting minions. Pushing him to his tower and making him farm there doesn't help your cause, your just giving him a safe place to farm. Best is to freeze your lane right before your tower, that way if he wants to farm he will have to farm out in the open and be open for easy ganks. Its really hard to shut down a good Nasus
• Champions with strong early game such as Darius, Renekton, and Pantheon can be very effective in denying Nasus his farm, but keep in mind that such champions usually fall-off, and once he does get stacks, he will be able to fight you.
  • You can also ask your jungler to camp Nasus to deny him or even kill him due to his lack of mobility.
  • Since at times, Nasus will inevitably farm and get to his late game, it may not always be a good idea to use an early game champion to try to deny him. An alternative strategy is to use a tank with reliable CC and waveclear such as Cho'Gath, Maokai, Tahm Kench, or Zac. While they cannot deny farm as easily during the early game, they can outscale him in terms of teamfights - just stack massive amounts of armor, and use their CC to peel him off a carry during the late game. Nasus may attempt to counter this by splitpushing, though. That's where waveclear comes in handy: they can clear waves quickly and delay his splitpushing, buying your team time to force the rest of the enemy to fight.
• Avoid using auto-attack reliant champions, as all of them are very vulnerable to Wither. Also, one of Nasus' core items, Frozen Heart, further reduces attack speed, and has armor, making any auto-attack champion a very poor choice unless they manage to kill him early, snowball, and deny his farm. The only exception is Master Yi, due to his immunity to attack speed slows.
• Thornmail is a strange, yet effective option. This is because all the damage from Siphoning Strike is reflected by its passive. Not only that, but Thornmail has high armor, mitigating the damage taken from the strike itself, as Nasus rarely purchases armor penetration items.
  • This item can be effective if your champion has a lot of sustain. For example, Vladimir and champions who can buy lifesteal items, such as Zed, and the aforementioned Master Yi (which can combine his build of crits and lifesteal, with a Last Whisper and Thornmail, to be able to fight a late game Nasus)
• Building Tenacity will reduce the duration of Wither. However, remember that its maximum slow will be applied quicker than usual due to the shortened duration.
• Nasus is susceptible to crowd control. Ranged champions should invest in a Frozen Mallet or Rylai's Crystal Scepter to prevent him from getting into melee range.
• Stacking health will only make Fury of the Sands stronger. Build armor and magic resistance as well.
• As mentioned above, Nasus has insane 1v1 potential, but poor teamfighting potential. Because of this, most Nasus players will splitpush. Not only will they have a lot of free farm, but his Siphoning Strike can quickly destroy towers, and his dueling potential makes it difficult for enemies to stop them alone, making him a constant threat from across the map. Most champions will loose a 1v1 vs Nasus and will require 2 sometimes 3 other champs, depending how fed he is, in order to kill him.
  • This can backfire against his team, however. Because Nasus will splitpush most of time, he will have to leave his team with one less member for teamfights. Therefore, he will have to make sure his teammates can win teamfights without his presence, or at least stall and avoid losing towers to the opposing team. Your team can take advantage of this: if you force teamfights against his team and take their towers, and/or splitpush a different lane. This will force Nasus to either stop splitpushing and go help his team (therefore losing farm for his stacks) or risk losing the game without his presence in teamfights.
• Nasus does not have strong wave clear aside from Spirit Fire, has no gap closers (Except Ghost), and is a melee champion. As such, top lane champions with long range poke such as Jayce, Nidalee, Ryze, Lulu, Vladimir, Kayle, Lissandra, Gnar, and Kennen can constantly poke him early game and zone. In addition, many of these champions have either some sort of crowd control or escape mechanism to limit Nasus' mobility and make it difficult for Nasus to chase down enemies.
  • However, when playing a ranged top laner, it is important to note that most AP builds do not have any sustained damage (unless playing someone like Vladimir) and Nasus' late game strength comes from large amount of sustained damage with a single Siphoning Strike. As such, it is important to constantly poke to punish him getting close to a minion to farm and one should be cautious if s/he enters basic attack range as Nasus can punish you using Wither. It is recommended to go for AD sustained damage builds to counteract his lategame damage.
  • Teemo is considered to be a strong counter to Nasus. His Blinding Dart mitigates Siphoning Strike's damage and can also be used to constantly deny him farm and stacks. Wither's movement speed slow can be partially mitigated by Move Quick's movement speed buff. Teemo has better early game damage with his Toxic Shot and can slowly whittle down Nasus' health. Finally, should Nasus ever get close to Teemo, Teemo can respond by placing down a Noxious Trap to further hamper his already limited mobility. If you are playing Teemo to counter Nasus, it is suggested to start Blinding Dart, as to constantly shut down Siphoning Strike. Ensure you always poke him with auto attacks to make his laning phase as much of a hassle as possible. Watch his play style to predict when he is going for a Siphoning Strike stack. Also, try to make sure you keep a Blinding Dart ready for cannon minions, as these provide 6 stacks instead of 3 Ensure you rush magic penetration items to counter the almost insured magic resist he will build.
    • However, Nasus building AP may be more effective in combating him. Otherwise, he can attempt to shove him out of lane with Spirit Fire (no more than two ranks in it or the mana cost may be too high; For a better visual example from a Korean streamer usually a Teemo main)