ARAM or All Random, All Mid, is a gamemode that has been around for a while now in League of Legends. Originally, the mode was being played in custom games on Summoner’s Rift, guided by custom ruleset created by the community themselves.
In 2013, Riot announced the Howling Abyss, a game map with only a single lane which was specifically designed for ARAM. It was received with a lot of excitement from the community and would go on to become one of the game’s most popular modes, going as far as to grow a separate community of players who almost exclusively play ARAM. Let’s take a look at how the mode works in practice, because it can be confusing to new players at first and it doesn’t have to be!
Getting into a game
Let’s start with champion select. Going into it you should know that you can not return to base in ARAM to heal or buy items. This means that champions with a heal are at an advantage as well as champions who can deal damage from range without getting hit. On the same note, you don’t really want to play a melee character in ARAM unless they have a strong disengage but as the title suggests, the champion you get is totally random. However, you can influence this in a few ways:
- Champions only get chosen from those you own and the champions that are free to play that week. This means that you can create an ARAM only account and only buy champions that are considered powerful to get an advantage over your opponents.
- You can reroll champions you don’t like by clicking the reroll button. Playing an ARAM game will award you with a certain amount of reroll points, based on how many champions you own in total. 200 points will award you 1 reroll (limited to 2).
- Before rerolling ask if anyone on your team wants the champion you have. They might trade you a champion you think is more fun to play or you can simply do a teammate a favor if you were going to use your reroll anyway.
Next up are runes and masteries. While in theory you can use the same pages as you do in normal League of Legends modes and be successful with them, it’s advisable to create some separate pages specifically for ARAM in which you take out all the talents you don’t really need, such as jungler talents that increase damage against minions. Also keep in mind that without the usual healing that going back to base offers, sustain talents are a lot more powerful.
When it comes to Summoner Spells you’ll almost always want Flash. The second option is Mark (aka Snowball) because it allows you to tag an enemy and jump towards them, providing much needed mobility. If you’re a ranged character you can also opt for Ignite or Exhaust to boost your damage output or prevent champions from oneshotting you should you get caught.
Strategy
Once you’re in the game make sure to remember to pick up items because you can not return and buy something unless you die. An early damage item and some kind of sustain are usually a good idea, Refillable Potion for example will see you a lot of use during the game.
Howling Abyss is a pretty straight forward map. There are four towers per team, 1 inhibitor and 1 Nexus. The main strategy is to push the opposing team back under their tower while slowly chipping away on their tower. This is why ranged champions are so key in ARAM. You’ll rarely get to hit the tower as melee unless your team picks up 4-5 kills. It’s super important to make use of every chance you get to hit the tower as it will go down eventually. If you are defending, make sure to clear minion waves as soon as they get to your tower, so the enemy does not get a chance to do the same to you.
Don’t forget bush control by the way, each side has 1 bush that is a powerful tool for zoning the enemy team. Hiding a champion in the opposing bush will almost guarantee you to zone your opponent back under their tower. Free tip: you can use snowballs to check for enemy champions, if you hit them they will be revealed for a short while.
Health relics are also worth mentioning. There are 2 relics that spawn on each side of the map and taking them will give you some health and mana back. It is often worth preventing the other team from getting theirs, but a mistake that often gets made is people going all in on the relic and barely getting out alive. If it looks like a bad idea, it might be best to leave it for the enemy team.
Just as in a game on Summoner’s Rift, coordination in your team is vital. Make sure to only pick fights where you all have your ultimates up and ready to go. Ping if you decide to engage so you don’t end up 1v5 because your team couldn’t follow up in time. On that note, sometimes it’s okay to let your opponents take a tower when you’re 1v5. Sure, maybe you can grab a kill but if you die and lose the tower anyway you haven’t really won anything.
Top picks
To end our introductory guide, let’s take a look at some of the stronger champions in ARAM. These are the ones you want every single time because they are simply too good!
Ahri, Sona, Ezreal, Janna, Kogmaw, Nidalee, Vel’Koz, Ziggs, Xerath, Karma: These are champions you want because of their poke potential. They shine when both teams don’t engage by slowly lowering the enemy HP. You will want to build them AP mostly to get the maximum damage from your abilities. Don’t forget a mana regen item!
Blitzcrank, Thresh, Amumu, Annie, Veigar, Morgana, Nami: These champions offer a lot of crowd control from a relative range, meaning you can stay safe and lock a target down for your team to finish off.
Caitlyn, Tristana, Lucian, Ashe, Quinn, Miss Fortune,…: AD Carries are good in general and needed to dish out damage. Let your teammates do the work while you stand back and you’ll get rolling pretty fast.
There are a lot more good choices. You can play tanks like Mundo or Leona for example, or Braum. When the game drags on these champions become pretty much unstoppable and it will take multiple people to take them down. In general, just stay away from champions like Tryndamere, Udyr, Irelia,.. because standing around not doing much does not make for a fun experience.
Good luck in the Howling Abyss! If you enjoyed this guide on League of Legends ARAM, make sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter for exclusive interviews, content and more!
