http://leaguecraft.com/strategies/guide/315

Cross posted so as to elicit forum debate. Constructive criticism both welcome and encouraged (though likely to be plagiarized in an attempt to improve the guide...).

For great justice!

(And because this thing isn't gonna get better without feedback).

Personally, I think singed is much more effective stacking 2 rods of ages, grabbing a banshee's and a lich bane. With that his poison deals about 150 hp / sec and fling does over 500 damage. With his ultimate you will be getting all the attack bonuses you need, so I think stark's is a waste on him. He will have over 3500 health and about 8000 effective health (with resist bonuses), so he will still tank very well.

Singed just benefits so much as both a tank and damage dealer from +mana / +AP items to pass up on it. Frozen heart is a good choice though if you find the enemy team has a lot of physical carries.

Edit: Didn't read the whole thing (now I see you wanted a tower pusher) but I think singed is much more effective as his tank/disable/fling role to be honest. He can still push down towers with the team with his ultimate anyway.

Gonna have to disagree with a few things here.

First, I'm sure Singed can be effective as a tower pusher, but other characters (Yi, definately Sivir as you suggested) are really better suited for this role. Especially because of Singed's skill set, he is far more effective in a team battle where you've got a disable snare, toss which is amazing for initiating and throwing a hapless enemy to your pack of teammates, and poison which does semi-decent damage all over the place in a team fight.

That versus, his ulti which is really his only useful skill against towers, really diminishes his role as a pusher IMO.

On top of that, the build you're recommending, Frozen Heart, Starks, Soul Shroud...All of these items are aura items that would be excellent as a team benefit, but really lose a lot of value if you're solo pushing a tower. And if you are pushing a tower, you need Damage, Attack Speed and Armor Penetration to really take one down, 40% cooldown on mega adhesive is great, but the tower's not going anywhere.

I agree technically that Magic Pen is better than AP (although fling does scale 1:1) but in either case, if you're pushing a tower instead of going for a gank or team battle, Magic Pen is going to do a whole lot of nothing.

Also, if you're primary purpose is going to be tower pushing, and you're putting a lot of stock in the value of Teleport, I would think that Boots of Mobility would be more useful than Mercury Treads. If you're not focusing on champions, the magic resist / CC bonus won't do you a lot of good, but +5 movement speed acts almost like a free teleport and means you don't blow your ulti getting to a tower faster since it's really your only DPS bonus.

Now this is the kind of commentary I can get behind; excellent post. I perhaps was not clear enough in the guide (and will make an effort to correct this today) that end game IS still essentially a game of 5v5 as there is very little that can keep LOL from devolving into this in a semi-balanced game as the groups by necessity must converge on one of the bases either to defend or to attempt to siege.

Since the Singe as I describe in this guide (and play in our static) intends to combat enemy heroes only in the early game (where the hp/5 and mp/5 items->aura items are surprisingly undervalued and good at keeping you [and optionally a lane mate] in your lane outleveling the opponent. ) and then again in the late game 5v5 environment where (as you point out and I agree) Starks + Frozen Heart + Soul Shroud provides almost as much utility as the aoe slow, fling, and poison which Singed provides in such an environment I find these items to be almost perfect for the character as I play him.

Now you have a very good point... these items are likely not ideal at pushing towers. My counter is not that they are ideal, rather that they are surprisingly effective. maxing your cooldown reduction (as this build does rather early due to masteries and build) puts his ultimate on a 72 second cooldown of which it is up 25 seconds of this. I have found in practice this means that if I am at a tower then the ultimate is up and able to be popped. With starks + ultimate singed destroys a tower in only a few seconds with creep aid (which he will always have due to the nature of how he pushes).

I actually really like your 5 move speed boots idea alot and need to test this more. To me it basically comes down to a question of Ghost + Mercury or Mobility + Cleanse but for the next couple of days I'll be testing out the Mobility + Cleanse. The primary reason I was reluctant to try it before is that you are basically ALWAYS in combat (because somewhere on the lane your poison is hurting a creep) but perhaps I overly discount the amount of time spent in the "switching lanes process" where Mobility could really aid.

I'll mention in relation to your AP versus Arm. Pen only that neither has any effect on the ability to tower push only the early and end phases where I build defensively early and use aura's and CC to take on more of a support role in the end. If I were to want to aid in tower taking the only method I could see beating cooldown reduction on ultimate + starks would be essentially building as a Yi or Alistair would build for the purpose; at which point I strongly suggest I would have been MUCH better off simply playing Yi or Alistair <.<

Very good points though and I'll definitely try out those mobility boots. I'd also point out that I made a basic assumption in the guide that anyone who would need such a guide would not be even at as high a level as I am much less many of the better members of the community. In practice your main group is going to almost always be pushing or defending mid while you tower run top and bottom--this means that there are TONS of opportunities while changing lanes; many times without even really slowing down, to throw a tar, have half or more of the lane poisoned, and toss a fleeing member back to your group all while continuing on your way to the next lane and getting a free assist or 2. If I were to post screenshots of our static you would see in any given game numbers with the general distribution of something like the following:

Solo Mid: 10/10/14 Buildings:2
Assassin/Carry: 21/7/3 B:1
Support: 5/5/10 B:0
Mage: 14/12/5 B:0
Singed: 5/6/11 B:3

(This example would be one of a fairly dominant win that did not end in /surrender. Creeps would have overrun their base as the Singed strategy succeeded on both lanes, middle was able to press due to an effective carry, this is basically what a typical ~20-25 minute win looks like) As you can see despite making every effort to avoid combat and run like hell from ganks they do happen, more deaths than kills in this example (not atypical) but due to the assistance thrown while changing lanes assists are second highest in the game (also not at all atypical). EDIT: You may note that for a tower runner Singed had few building kills; this is because due to the focus on creep line pushing and avoiding ganks rather than actual "tower killing" the majority of buildings in this game (and many games that I play) were taken by creep.

in a lot of ways I play singe the same way you do... however, I don't give up a chance at a good gank. I totally agree with your synopsis on how to level his skills. However, avoiding a team fight with singe almost seems counter productive unless you have high confidence in your teams ability to defeat the opposition in a 5v4... honestly - I know some teams are very effective at "kiting" the team fight as to make it last long enough for a backdoor yi or sivir to break down a turret, forcing the fight to change to a 4v4 or 4v3 and singe is no differnt.

However, I would say it's simply too one sided, singed should be doing all of that pushing plus backing up his team in ganks and coming into intiate for a 5v5, then bugging out halfway through leaving them slowed, poisoned, and flipped.

EDIT: PS - I am going to consider changing up a few items I get... very good guild.