Lethality Varus is undeniably one of the strongest builds in League of Legends. It takes advantage of the champion’s fantastic range and the overwhelming combination of physical and magic damage. And with the right runes and items, you can always carry with lethality Varus!
The lethality build for Varus allows you to endlessly poke your opponents and deal massive amounts of damage from afar. You can also one-shot squishy enemies with your ability combo. And all the extra armor penetration makes lethality Varus a late game super-carry.
So if you’re interested in playing lethality Varus, then you’ve come to the right place!
In this post, I’ll go over all the necessary info you’ll need for playing lethality Varus in season 13 of LoL. I’ll talk about the runes and items you’re going to need, as well as how to actually perform with lethality Varus.
That said, let’s jump into the guide!
How to Play Lethality Varus? (Tips)
Practice Your Aim
Playing lethality Varus is all about aiming arrows. And frankly speaking, you can’t carry your team if you cannot hit your Qs consistently, even if you have a 20/0/5 score.
That said, it’s important to practice Varus’ aim. Head over to the Practice Tool and get used to his animations and timings. Believe me, it makes a huge difference.
Take Advantage of Varus’ Range
When you play lethality Varus, your primary source of damage is Q. Piercing Arrow is a long-ranged ability that allows you to stay in a safe position. You can use it to poke enemies on the other side of the wall, for example.
Additionally, both Varus’ E and R are long-ranged too. This means that you don’t necessarily need to enter an auto-attack range to deal your damage. And if you’re playing against assassins and fighters, it’s better for you to stay away from them and use your abilities.
In other words, make it very hard for the enemy team to reach you and shut you down. Stay away and keep poking!
Read Also: Lethality Caitlyn Build Guide
Know How to Combo Varus’ Abilities
Varus’ best combo is R + W + Q + E. This gives you the highest burst you can do at any point in the game. It’s a mix of magic and physical damage and it’s often overwhelming for your target.
The best part about this combo is that it immobilizes your target, allowing you to have a free shot at them.
But remember – when you use Chains of Corruption (R), you need to wait a bit in order for the 3 stacks of Blight (W) to appear on the target before you release your arrow (Q).
You don’t want to release your arrow instantly and miss the opportunity to one-shot your target!
Don’t Forget to Auto-attack
Even though I explained that lethality Varus is mostly about poking with Q, you shouldn’t give up on your auto-attacks.
The reason why this lethality build works so well is that it gives you a high amount of AD as well as armor penetration. In each game, you reach 300+ AD, so your auto-attacks actually hurt a lot.
This is especially true with Dark Harvest because one auto-attack can take up to 15 or 20% HP from your enemy’s health bar.
So, whenever your abilities are on cooldown, get near and auto-attack!
Read Also: Top 15 Best Off-Meta ADCs
Lethality Varus Season 13 Build – Runes
- Dark Harvest
- Cheap Shot
- Eyeball Collection
- Ultimate Hunter
- Manaflow Band
- Transcendence
DARK HARVEST is by far the best keystone for lethality Varus. It synergizes very well with the whole playstyle and allows you to scale for the late game. It’s amazing for one-shotting enemies, especially when you have over 10 or 15 souls already.
Dark Harvest works on soul stacks. You collect a stack when you damage an enemy champion with 50% HP or less. Each soul stack increases your Dark Harvest damage, so the next time you hit an enemy champion on low health, you’re going to do more damage.
CHEAP SHOT is another rune that fits Varus’ playstyle. It allows him to deal bonus true damage to his targets whenever they’re in some form of crowd control.
Varus has two abilities that can activate Cheap Shot – E and R. Combined with the fact that Cheap Shot has only 4 seconds cooldown, you can always deal more damage with Varus if you have this rune on.
EYEBALL COLLECTION is simply the best choice from the third row of the Domination rune page. It increases your AD for free during the early game, so you have no reason not to take it.
When it’s fully stacked, Eyeball Collection amounts to a bonus of 20 AD.
ULTIMATE HUNTER is a must-have rune for the lethality Varus playstyle. Since you’ll be focusing more on poking and one-shotting with your Q, you’ll also need your ultimate for assassinating enemies in team fights.
Varus’ R – Chains of Corruption is already a 60-seconds cooldown spell. But with Ultimate Hunter, this ability reaches 30 to 20 seconds cooldown.
Just don’t forget to get your 5 stacks from the 5 unique champion takedowns.
MANAFLOW BAND is an incredibly useful rune for managing your mana in LoL. It gives you 25 bonus mana when you strike an enemy champion with an ability up to 250 maximum mana.
Once it’s stacked, Manaflow Band grants you bonus mana regeneration for the rest of the game. And with this poking playstyle, you generally stack this rune very quickly.
TRANSCENDENCE is also a must-have rune for lethality Varus. Not only do you want the extra 10 ability haste that it offers, but you really benefit from the level 11 effect.
Once you reach level 11, Transcendence refreshes 20% of the remaining cooldown on your basic abilities upon a champion takedown. This includes Varus’ W which has over 20 seconds base cooldown.
And so, Transcendence allows you to reset Varus’ W and deal so much more damage. This ability is crucial for one-shotting opponents and you definitely need it as often as possible.
Read Also: Lethality Ashe Build Guide
Optional Rune Page for Lethality Varus
Lethality Varus has the advantage of functioning well with many different rune pages.
For example, you can sometimes switch Dark Harvest for Hail of Blades and you’ll still be able t one-shot enemies.
However, my second-favorite rune page for lethality Varus is the Sorcery one.
Even though this rune page is nearly the same as the Domination one, it’s more tailored for the early game. You get more poking power during the laning phase, so you can dominate your lane opponent and win early on.
Here you take Arcane Comet and Scorch instead of Dark Harvest and Eyeball Collection. Both of these runes allow you to deal more damage at the start of the game.
Ultimate Hunter stays unchanged in both rune pages simply because of how useful it is on Varus.
And lastly, this is the rune page you need to run when you play AP Varus too.
Lethality Varus Season 13 Build – Items
- Ionian Boots of Lucidity
- Manamune / Muramana
- Duskblade of Draktharr
- The Collector
- Axiom Arc
- Serylda’s Grudge
IONIAN BOOTS OF LUCIDITY are the boots you need to get on lethality Varus. They’re very cheap (only 950 gold in total) and they offer 20 ability haste. So, getting them early on is a huge advantage.
MANAMUNE / MURAMANA is the first core item and you need it as soon as possible. It offers everything that Varus needs in the early game, from AD and ability haste to bonus mana.
With Manamune, you simultaneously increase your attack damage and maximum mana. AD is needed for more damage on your Q, E, and auto-attack. And the more mana you have the more you can poke.
This also means that you need to start the game with Tear of the Goddess instead of Long Sword or Doran’s Blade.
DUSKBLADE OF DRAKTHARR is the best-performing mythic on Varus. It’s basically the perfect item for the lethality playstyle and that’s obvious from the stats – bonus AD, ability haste, and lethality.
But Duskblade’s passive is also a game-changer for Varus. It allows you to deal extra damage on your initial hit while also giving you invisibility each time you take an enemy down.
The invisibility will allow you to kite and survive longer in team fights. So, Duskblade is very useful on lethality Varus!
THE COLLECTOR is another core item you’ll definitely need. It gives you beneficial stats like lethality and attack damage, but also a bit of critical strike.
However, the real reason why you take The Collector is the execute mechanic. Damaging an enemy champion below 5% with The Collector allows you to execute them which is perfect for one-shotting with Varus.
AXIOM ARC is one of the most fun items in League of Legends. It’s a lethality item that also improves the general playstyle of Varus by reducing the cooldown of his ultimate.
Each time you score a champion takedown, Axiom Arc reduces your ult’s cooldown. And depending on how the team fight is going, you can use Varus’ Chains of Corruption 2 or 3 times!
SERYLDA’S GRUDGE is the perfect late game item for lethality Varus. It’s a great damage booster because it grants a lot of armor penetration. So, the item also lets you counter tanks.
Additionally, Serylda’s Grudge applies a slow effect on your abilities. It’s the AD equivalent of Rylai’s Crystal Scepter and it’s pretty useful in team fights.
Read Also: Full Lethality Jinx Build Guide
Optional and Situational Items for Lethality Varus
Aside from the full build you see above, there are a couple of situational items that work great on Varus.
First of all, both Eclipse and Prowler’s Claw can be good mythic options for lethality Varus in certain scenarios. Eclipse is generally better against tanks while Prowler’s Claw can be used to kite melee enemies.
Both Chempunk Chainsword and Serylda’s Grudge are cheap and offensive items that let you counter shielding and healing in League of Legends.
And lastly, Guardian Angel can be a good defensive item, especially against assassins. The same can be said for Edge of Night against mages.
Read Also: ADC Kennen Build Guide
Skill Order and Summoner’s Spells
There’s one big difference when you play lethality Varus as opposed to the traditional ADC Varus when it comes to skill order. Basically, you still want to max out your Q first.
However, W should be second here since you’re looking for one-shots with your W + Q combo. And E should be maxed out third.
Take a look at the image above to know how to level up your abilities.
As far as Summoner’s Spells are concerned, the combination usually depends on your role and matchup.
For mid lane lethality Varus, the best Summoner’s Spells are Flash + Ignite. Sometimes you can switch up Ignite for Exhaust or Barrier if you need extra defensiveness.
But if you’re going for bot lane lethality Varus, Heal might be a good option for the 2v2 skirmishes.
Conclusion
If you’re looking for a safe playstyle that also allows you to carry games in all elos, lethality Varus is definitely for you. The amount of damage this champion can squeeze out is honestly broken, especially with a full lethality build.
So, I recommend you to try lethality Varus in season 12 of LoL!
Also, check out my lethality Sivir guide if you want a similar pick to lethality Varus! And if you’d like to check out lethality Varus in action, watch this YouTube video.
Read Also: The Best Lethality Champions in League of Legends
