Or I need to step up my AD Sion game.

I stopped playing Dominion for a couple weeks over break, and it seems like I have completely forgotten how to kick *** as my favorite AD zombie. My typical build goes:

Boots 1 + Dagger + Brawler's Gloves

Rush Zeal into PD

Finish Merc Treads

BF Sword into Black Cleaver

Second PD


After that, the game was usually over. Before my break, this build was usually more than capable of giving me a positive KDR and helping my team win the late game. In the past couple of days, though, I'm finding that I get absolutely shut down in the early phases. I'm more than able to occupy multiple enemies long enough that my teammates can neutralize or cap a point, but I'm surviving those encounters much less frequently than I was.

Any advice, as always, is welcome. Different builds or different champs are both possibilities.

Atma's and Sunfirecape are two good defensive items that still pack a punch, and are pretty cheap. Also, if the enemy team is all AD, Thornmail completely shuts them down. If they are all AP, Force of Nature wrecks them too. I play Garen, which is a similar AD champ, and I will rush IE unless rushing Thornmail, and then grab PD unless I am having a hard time surviving, in which case I'll pick up the appropriate defensive item.

Thats not really ideal...

First, start with prospectors blade and boots. Why would you pass up all that free health and tanky goodness? Teams usually need someone that can wade in and melee and soak some damage. Sion is a great candidate. The efficiency of Prospectors is just better than 2 basic items by far, even if not ideal stats.

Then work on attack speed by getting Phantom Dancer. Heck, Id get 2 of them.

Now you have enormous crit chance. Dont take CLEAVER! Take Infinities Edge! Put that crit work by boosting its damage to 260%. This is a way better DPS boost than cleaver.

Getting a frozen mallet in there sometime greatly increases survivability. Getting either thornmail or odins to counter the greatest threat.

What boots do you suggest building into, Warrrrax? Honestly, I've never considered Prospectors, but that makes a lot of sense.

AD Sion more or less has to buy mercs. I'd even go further and run Cleanse on him too, as Exhaust/Ignite during his ult really hurts him.

AD Sion isn't someone I'd break out unless you know the enemy team comp will have major trouble dealing with him. He auto-wins against cc light teams, but gets **** on if there's heavy cc or champions like Malphite or Nasus around. He's very risky in blind pick, and you might want a ranged AD instead like Vayne or Graves. I'd stop with the damage after your IE/PD, and start working on tankier items. Sion with IE/PD/ult up will already win nearly any 1v1 fight against another melee. At that point you simply need to live long enough to get in there and use that ult without exploding to burst damage. Frozen Mallet/Atma's is decent, with a Wit's End in there for more AS and magic resistance.

You know, that's the thing, though. I had a great win rate with him before I stopped playing for a while. In the last two weeks, though, I've been absolute ****. Now, several of those games have been due to being on the losing side of 4v5's, but that's no excuse for the other games.

I am, by no means, a good player. I'm average on a good day. But it's almost like the game changed in the two or three weeks that I was away, which is why I was wondering if there's another carry I should be using.

^ this

Though games dont usually go long enough to get you 2 PDs and an IE, so I might start the IE after one PD or after PD+Zeal. That crit dmg boost is really noticeable, and completing IE gives you +7% crit chance and the unique for free basically, so its very efficient if you can finish it.

Also to a point loss streaks happen in lol. Sometimes they are due to your play but sometimes its just the luck of draw, you will get out of it

^

I lost twelve in a row once. Not long after, I won twelve in a row. No joke. It was quite insane.

Man, I hope so. I will defend Dominion to the death, but the afk/leaver problem is absolutely killing it for me right now. And the missing player has been, every time, on my team. It's just so frustrating knowing that you could (and should) be doing much better. I am starting to think that I offended matchmaking somehow.

Anyway, in case I get games without leavers tonight, I'll make certain to try out a PD/IE build instead of what I have been using. I'm actually incredibly curious to see how a prospector's blade will change my early game, too. Which, if I think about it, is the real problem with Dominion. No matter how many times I get absolutely crushed by lopsided teams or better players, I just keep wanting to jump back into the fight.

Thanks for the help, everyone!

Dominion has shifted to champions with more kiteability and cc than before, sion is easier to deal with by the average team now