I do agree with chip on the phage/mallet. In addition to letting your team roll that melee hero who ran out just a little too far from his turret, it keeps those speedy mf'ers within range of your tremors. Nice. Oh, and 3 Sunfires is just generally ludicrous. As you pointed out, armor and dodge are going to give you diminishing returns; this is where it makes sense to beef up Rammus with a lil' HP. IME, HP and MR soak up nukes with about the same efficiency, and Warmog's is already one of the best-valued items in the game. There are few excuses for not having it.

Good Hands is a good mastery, but Rammus gets less utility out of it than most champs. There must be somewhere better to stick two of those points (leaving one in to get to the next tier of defensive masteries).

I play a pure tank Rammus and I must disagree with putting anything into dodge. After many games stacking armor runes vs dodge runes/matery/tabi... I've found my magic damage decreases dramatically. Not that I'm looking to dps, but all that missing damage is from reflected damage, which as you know as a Rammus player, adds up a lot especially against carries. That amount of missing reflected damage has led to many missed ganked.

Ghost/Mobility = +1

I thought even if the enemy misses, your DBC and Thornmail still deals damage.

Powerballing into a good team is asking to be killed.

NEVER powerball into a competent team--you cannot DBC if you're powerballing, and they will kill you faster than you can do anything.

Personally, I prefer starting with Warden's Mail (slow on hit is a real life saver for early tanking). You can start out with pendant, which allows you to switch to Spirit Visage without any penalty if your lane has a lot of magic damage.
@Garborg:
Have they changed reflected damage? Last I checked, dodge still gives reflected damage.

"At the end of end-game, you should have turned that Cloth Armor into a Ninja Tabi and have a Heart of Gold, along wtih some chump change."

Suppose to be at the end of early-game, i assume , last para, early game

Just started playing, picked rammus and love him. Great guide for anyone starting with him and probably the best I saw after reading 4-5 of the others. Good job

31 points in Masteries? Thats one special Rammus.

i disagree with just a couple of things. 1. why would you sell heart of gold??? it upgrades into one of the best tanking items you can have!! randuins omen! this is an amazing item that helps me every game i play rammus. The health regen is amazing and it gives health and armor.

2. Frozen heart i think is good on rammus. It gives plenty of armor and gives you additional mana, which is great for rammus cause he in very mana hungry. although i do not prioritize this over thornmail/sunfire cape

and just a shoutout to all rammus's who play this week. PROTECT YOUR SQUISHIES AND USE YOUR TREMORS ON TOWERS!!! i just played with a rammus who was always jungling or in another lane when our team was in a team fight. we lost one team fight after another because he prioritized farming over protecting his team, and later we had almost killed their turret until he chased a couple of their team in their base and got himself killed, thus allowing them to come kill us. Make sure you know what you're doing please!!!

what i see in this guide is a fairly decent player of rammaus, that forgot to mention somethings or it may just be a diffrence in playstyle,

1)no where do you mention any magic resist. personal prefrence is to get merc treads becuase of the cc reduction but i do not run with cleanse.
2) you may have a high EH but what happens when you face true damage or magic damage. You will squish this is one reason why stacking only mitigation is not the best idea.
3) No jungle for rammaus
4) I prefer dorans shield if i am to lane, you use your abilities a bit less but the extra health is always nice.