League of Legends: How to Play Nunu Mid Like Faker

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League of Legends. Photo Courtesy of Riot Games. /

Playstyle

For skills, Faker will always start his W – Biggest Snowball Ever! He’ll take a point in Q – Consume and then E – Snowball Barrage, before maxing Q then E, taking points in his ult whenever he can.

As mentioned above, Faker plays Nunu mid as an aggressive shove and roam style and it all comes down to the ability he maxes last: Biggest Snowball Ever! Faker uses the W ability to instantly clear the wave, starting the snowball rolling behind his tower and letting it hit the backline minions.

He does this by exploiting the fact that the Snowball doesn’t explode when it hits enemy minions, but only when it hits enemy champions, monsters, or terrain. There’s a neat trick where the snowball does damage both when it hits the minions and when it explodes. Though it does reduced damage to minions it passes over, if you time it right you can get both procs of damage on the backline caster minions, which will instantly clear them while also taking the melee minions low enough to quickly kill them.

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From there, Faker will actually look to roam immediately using Biggest Snowball Ever! since the ability gives Nunu bonus movement speed as long as he’s rolling the ball. This means that Faker can roll the Snowball from the middle of the river into either one of the side lanes for an unexpected gank. If the gank doesn’t work, or if there’s no opportunity for a gank in either lane, use that Snowball to speed back to lane and kill the minion wave again. With a 14-second cooldown at all ranks, you’ll basically have it up on every wave to either gank or waveclear.

You can also use that movement speed boost from the Snowball to get back to your own lane quickly after recalling and even set up a kill on your lane opponent. With all the CC baked into Nunu’s kit, if you hit the Snowball the enemy should be locked in place basically forever, resulting in some easy kills. Just follow up with Snowball Barrage and then Ignite or Consume to finish off the helpless enemy.

In the rare instances where Faker falls behind in lane, he relies on Consume to not only keep him sustained in lane, but also to turn around ganks. If the enemy jungler comes knocking, Faker will just use Consume right off the bat to heal, then use his CC abilities as he walks to safety. If he has ult, that’s even better, as the shield gives Nunu more safety to survive ganks.

Speaking of the ult shield, that brings us to the mid-and-late game play style. Nunu is usually played as a zone-control teamfighter when built tank, but Faker plays him more as a pick champion. Your entire goal is to find someone isolated and hit them with your full combo.

Run at them with your Snowball (because the ability allows you to exceed the movement speed cap, the extra MS you get from Deadman’s will get you going a warp speed) and after you hit them activate your Snowball Barrage to layer the CC. Consume them and Ignite (if necessary to finish off the kill) and used Protobelt to finish if they flash away or create distance with a dash. With the insane movement speed on Nunu’s Biggest Snowball Ever! you can run at enemies farming in side lanes from way down the lane in fog of war, like an unannounced Sion ult.

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If a teamfight breaks out, your job as Nunu is to be that frontline tank, using your ult’s shield and Consume to stay alive as long as possible. If the fight starts to break apart, use your Biggest Snowball ever to chase down stragglers. It’s only advisable to break away from the teamfight if you see a vulnerable ADC or immobile mage that you can hit with your Snowball.

Make sure you play around your cooldowns in fights. If you don’t have Snowball and Snowball Barrage, play back a bit more and just use Consume to keep your health up before you re-initiate the fight.

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