Overview
How to be a cool kid that plays Ravana at the highest level.
Ravana’s Many Talents
Ravana is a pretty flexible god, being a warrior and all. He can be built to deal hella damage, or be the tankiest and most annoying god on your team.
However, both of these builds aren’t always viable. It’s almost always a safer choice to build him with defense, but there are times where high damage would be much more useful.
For example, when facing gods that focus more on single-hit burst damage, like Poseidon, it’s almost always a good idea to focus on building power. Ravana’s second ability, Overhead Kick, allows him to fully immune any CC and damage taken during a short time. This means that with good enough reactions, avoiding taking damage from these bursty gods will be a cinch, and building more defense would be redundant. In this case, it would be much better to focus on dealing as much damage as quickly as possible.
On the other hand, if you’re having difficulty getting in, or are dealing with gods whose damage is difficult to avoid with Overhead Kick, it would be a better idea to focus on defense. This way, you can rely on Ravana’s naturally good base damage and CC to either kill or at least slow down your opponent so your team can clean up.
Ability Breakdown (Just in case)
I don’t think I really need to explain Ravana’s abilities, as they’re pretty simple in their function, but I’ll just put this here anyway. You can skip this one if you want.
“Successful Basic Attacks and abilities against an enemy add to Ravana’s Combo Chain. Each time his Chain reaches 8 he receives a Shield equal to 5% of his Maximum Health. This may stack up to 3 times.”
Don’t underestimate the utility of this passive. A shield equal to 5% of your max health doesn’t sound like this, but think of it this way: Imagine a god that could build a ton of attack speed, and has a naturally fast basic attack progression, and heals 5% of their max hp every 8 basics. Sounds broken right? Well, a shield is better than a heal, since it can exceed your HP cap. Additionally, hitting enemies with abilities will also increase your chain of blows, but you can only gain 1 stack per ability.
All in all, it’s not the most impactful passive, but it’s pretty good.
“Ravana throws a powerful punch, projecting his prana with it to damage and slow all enemies in front of him.”
This ability hits in a cone slightly larger than Ravana’s basic attack range, and is easily his highest damage ability aside from his ultimate. Not much to talk about here, other than it’s extremely low mana cost and 25% slow. It lasts quite a long time too, 2.5 seconds.
Ravana’s highest damage and lowest cooldown main ability, as well as his most consistent clear tool.
“Ravana performs a high kick, sending a shockwave forward to damage all enemies in a line, increasing his Movement Speed and rendering him CC and damage immune for the duration.”
This ability is really good. Like, it’s hard to explain why this ability is so good. There’s just so much to talk about, since it has so many attributes.
To start off, this ability makes Ravana CC and damage immune for exactly .75 seconds. It also gives him a 50% movement speed buff during this duration. On top of all that, it shoots out a small damaging projectile with good base damage and scaling. This makes it great for safely finishing off low health enemies, escaping high-damage abilities, or even getting out of tower dives. I often find myself hovering on this ability while backing, simply because of how safe it is.
The only real downside to this ability is it’s disgustingly long cooldown at rank 1-3.
This ability is just so good, I often finish off my enemies with this ability, or use it to get out of bad situations. It can be used to blocks some ultimates too, like Neith’s. It has so many different uses, and I would definitely recommend putting points into this ability once you can efficiently clear.
“Ravana’s fists fly forward, damaging and passing through minions and damaging and rooting the first god hit. Ravana heals for each enemy hit – with maximum damage sources of one god and up to three minions.”
This is the ability that carries Ravana’s early game. It’s unusually high base damage at ranks 1 and 2 makes it a very strong clearing tool in the early game. Not to mention that it heals him up to 3 times when clearing minions, and up to 4 times if he hits a god through some minions. The heal seems insignificant at first, but once you put a couple points into it, the heals gets pretty big combined with Bumba’s Mask.
It’s got all of these strengths, without even mentioning that it’s also a 1.25 second root. It’s also worth saying that this is his longest range ability aside from his ultimate, and can be used to catch up to retreating enemies if you lead it well.
However, the major downsides of this ability are it’s relatively low scaling, only 55% of your power, and an 18 second cooldown.
Overall, this ability has a bunch of different uses, much Overhead Kick. It’s not only Ravana’s strongest CC, it also has high early damage and sustain. This is somewhat diminished by it’s 18 second cooldown, but this ability is still very strong, even after it’s recent nerf.
“Ravana leaps to a target location, damaging all enemies in the area and applying a debuff to enemy gods that increases the damage they take from all sources. After landing, Ravana receives a buff that reduces the damage he takes from all sources.”
Ravana’s Ultimate not only does a ton of damage, up to 500 + 100% scaling, but it also makes anyone hit by it take 10% more damage from all sources, and makes you take 40% less damage from all sources, even if you don’t hit anyone with it. As a result, this ability is not only strong for engagement, as it makes you deal more damage and take a ton less, but it’s also great for disengagement. If you’re low and need to run away, the damage reduction is usually enough to survive most snipes that you wouldn’t be able to dodge with your 2.
Other than that, it’s just a leap. You can use it to go over walls either for suprise attacks or emergency escapes in the jungle.
Ravana’s Ult is just a super flexible tool in his kit, it’s not only great to jumping on people’s faces, but also for running away from bad situations, just use it wisely, as it’s his only hard escape.
Building time!
Let’s get right into how Ravana should build to improve his effectiveness in whatever role he’s filling.
Keep in mind that these are the finished builds, I’ll explain effective build order and situational items in the Roles/Gamemodes section.
If you’re looking to be a bit more offensive, here’s a build I like to use for better damage output:
Masamune, Stone-Cutting Sword, Frostbound Hammer, Qin’s Sais,
Executioner, and Spirit Robe.
“WHERE’S THE BOOTS!?”
I hear you ask, and don’t worry, this build has more than enough movement speed to make up for the lack of shoes. The combined movement speed of Masamune and Stone-Cutting Sword is more than enough to make up for a pair of converse.
However, I would reccomend you start shoes if gold is a bit tight, or if you would just fall too far behind without a cheap power spike early. In which case, simply replacing Masamune with Warrior Tabi or Ninja Tabi would be enough to keep this build powerful.
This build mostly focuses on a mixture of raw power for Ravana’s good scaling abilities, and shredding protections with basics. This build has very little cooldown throughout the game, however, so make sure those abilities land! Ravana’s third ability, 10-Hand Shadow Fist has a lot of utility, make sure you manage it’s 18 second cooldown wisely!
Alternatively, if you’re in a position where you need to be tankier, here’s an aggressive bruiser build I like to use:
Warrior Tabi, Shifter’s Shield, Hide of the Urchin, Frostbound Hammer, and then Situational Defensive items.
The difficulty with building a god with an emphasis on defense is how situational protection items are. I could write an entire seperate guide on when you should build certain protection items, so I won’t get too far into it here.
This build prioritizes a bit of power at the start to take advantage of Ravana’s naturally strong early game, then builds into Hide of the Urchin relatively early to get those protection stacks. Then Frostbound Hammer helps you stick to enemies when they start to get their builds going, in order to keep the pressure on.
Different Roles/Gamemodes
Like I mentioned earlier, Ravana is a pretty flexible god. He fits in well in a suprisingly large number of roles and gamemodes, and I’m going to try my best to explain how to use him effectively.
Ravana was originally known as a decent solo laner, and as a warrior, is likely where he sees the most play. Personally, I don’t think that solo is a particularly strong role for Ravana, but here’s a few ways that you can play him.
The first playstyle I’ll mention is starting with a focus on attack speed combined with Death’s Toll in order to better sustain. If you like to start with Death’s Toll on Ravana in solo, I’d recommend building into Ichaival or Silverbranch Bow to improve your ability to box the enemy solo lane. Levelling your 3 and 1 evenly is what I’d suggest, as putting all your points into one or the other is too much of an investment. Ravana can’t clear lane with a single ability at any point in the game, so putting all your points into one of his abilities doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Once you hit midgame, investing into either the Masamune + Stone-Cutting Sword combo or Warrior/Ninja tabi into items like Frostbound, Executioner and Qin’s sais might be a good idea to take advantage of your attack speed focus.
Jungle is my personal favorite role to play Ravana in, as I personally think it’s always been his strongest role. When buying starting items, I always to go for Bumba’s Mask and Bluestone Pendant with one of each potion. I like to get Sunder for my first relic, but keep in mind that this is an extremely aggressive start. Starting Sunder means you’re going to be going for kills at level 1 or 2, and if you’re not comfortable playing that aggressively, you might want to consider getting a more defensive or utility-based relic.
I wouldn’t suggest Purification Beads or Sanctuary, since Ravana essentially has these relics in his kit, but beads can be useful to break chain CC if you need to. Shell, Sprint or Horrific Emblem are all useful relics, but getting a defensive relic ultimately comes down to what your team doesn’t have already.
Additionally, Hand of the Gods is simply not useful for Ravana, as his early clear is already really strong. Putting two points into his 1 allows him to clear the small minions in buff camps in one hit at level 3.
Ravana is all about the early game. A strategy I like to use for the initial mid lane engagement is to quickly help my mid laner clear minions with my 3, then immediately go for the enemy speed buff. More often than not, the enemy mid and jungle will try to stop me from stealing their buff, and will chase me into the jungle.
However, this is exactly what I want. Once they walk into the entrance of the jungle, i’ll immediately hit them with a sunder, and immediately hit them with my 3. Sundering first is essential, as the bonus damage makes a pretty big difference for your 3. After that, I’ll have my mid hit them with one ability, and they’re usually either dead after that, or too low-health to fight for their jungle buffs.
Ravana is excellent for bullying squishy characters at any point in the game, specifically Mages. His ability damage combined with his decent basic attack damage is usually enough to shut down characters with weak escapes like Poseidon or in some cases Janus, and avoid their damage output with Overhead Kick. As a result, you should try to focus on killing these gods to support the relatively expensive no-boots build. Just don’t forget to rotate, Ravana can mess up gods in the other lanes too with the right support from your teammates.
Personally, I don’t think Ravana is all that strong as a support, but he does have potential if you match him up with the right ADC. He synergizes best with gods that can practically full clear by themselves, such as Medusa, Ullr and maybe even Rama. Ravana’s lane clear isn’t that great when you build him defensively, so your ADC having good clear is great for helping Ravana be more aggressive.
As a Support, Ravana’s main goal is to poke down the enemies and set up damage from the ADC with his slow and root. His Ultimate, Mystic Rush, reduces all damage taken by 40%, which can be useful when tower diving. He can be much more aggressive than most supports, simply because of how much damage mitigation he gets from his ult. Not to mention how he can dodge tower shots with Overhead Kick.
It’s important to keep in mind when playing Ravana support that Ravana’s base damage midgame is mediocre at best. His godly 80% scaling on his 1 and his 100% scaling on his ult carries a long way in terms of his damage output.
The point is, remember that if you build a lot of defense, Ravana will tickle people.
Some supports can still chunk people with their abilities due to naturally high base damage, such as Ymir, but Ravana simply doesn’t deal much damage without some damage items. This is why I’d recommend buying Masamune, Shifter’s Shield and Frostbound Hammer even if you’re trying to support, simply because Ravana is not impactful enough without a bit of damage. Plus, all of these items have decent defensive application.
I grouped all of these gamemodes together simply because I find myself using the same builds and strategies between each of them.
Typically I’ll go for my usualy Masamune and Stone-Cutting Sword combo to start things off with a huge damage spike while everyone else is still getting warmed up, but then build into heavy defense. This is because all of these gamemodes are essentially 24/7 teamfights. Everyone is always grouped up, meaning that you’ll almost never get into a 1v1 where you can stomp on someone with a pure damage build.
As a result of this, I like play a bit of a mindgame with the enemy team.
I start out building some hefty power with Masamune and Stone-Cutting, so that when I start slapping people around, they know to respect my damage output. However, I then switch gears and build defensively to live just a little bit longer when I get inevitably focused. After all, who’s not going to focus the guys that halves your health bar with two abilties? Once everyone hits mid-game, and mages are starting to hurt, I like to build enough protection to force their damage dealers to use everything to satisfy their need to focus me.
The reason this is all is a good thing, is now the enemy team has to not get slaughtered by my teammates after they’ve spent everything they have trying to kill me.
It’s not a perfect strat, but it’s what I’ve found to be effective, since Ravana isn’t really that impactful in teamfights.
don’t play these
That’s it, go away
lemme know if i should add anything to the guide or if i should eat a ♥♥♥ for telling people to not build shoes
k bye