League of Legends: How to Play Nunu Mid Like Faker

The Build

When Faker plays Nunu mid, he always goes for a first item Hextech Protobelt. It’s the perfect AP item for Nunu since it gives him that flat AP for his heal, shield, and damage, but also giving him the tankiness Faker still wants.

Along with Protobelt, Faker always opts into Sorcerer’s Shoes for the extra magic penetration (since he wants to make sure the damaging abilities do the maximum amount possible to squishy targets) and Dark Seal. Curiously, he always seems to prioritize finishing Protobelt before buying Dark Seal (he also starts Doran’s Ring and a potion, not mana pot).

After his first items, he always go for Deadman’s Plate as a core defensive item and for the additional movement speed to help him chase down opponents. Surprisingly, Faker doesn’t ever seem to go Spirit Visage, which is a core item on tank Nunu and synergizes incredibly well with his kit to give him MR and boost his healing on Consume. Instead, Faker will often go for Gargoyle’s Stoneplate and then finally Zhonya’s Hourglass to complete the build.

On rare occasions, you will see Faker also build a Rabadon’s Deathcap on Nunu. He’s also experimented with other tank items like Frozen Heart and Randuin’s Omen, but those appear to be more situational.

Runes

Faker always goes Dark Harvest as his keystone rune. While this may seem like an odd choice, it’s used so that Faker can stack damage while still building tanky. We see him emphasize this choice with his minor runes.

In the Domination tree, Faker goes Cheap Shot to add damage when he CCs enemies (which happens often when using his Biggest Snowball Ever!, Snowball Barrage, or Absolute Zero). Next, he takes Ghost Poro for extra vision because Nunu is going to be pushing the wave and roaming a lot, while also being very easy to kill in the early game as he’s fairly immobile, so he wants plenty of vision. Finally, Faker takes Relentless Hunter for more out-of-combat movement speed.

That movement speed theme also comes through in his secondary tree, Sorcery. Faker takes Celerity for amplified movement speed bonuses and Waterwalking for a speed boost in the river. All of these movement speed runes synergize with that “shove-and-roam” playstyle. For stat shards, Faker goes two Adaptive Force shards and whatever type of resistances he needs to survive lane.