How To Lane Against Renekton?

Renekton has always been a dominant top laner, built to handle one-on-one skirmishes with almost every other top laner. His ability to out-sustain and snowball the game with some early kills makes him a devastating laner to lane against. But with the right counter pick and some basic mechanics, you’ll make Renektons go AFK in no time.

Renekton is known as a “lane bully” and the best way to the lane is taking last hits on minions and going in with your jungler before he hits level 6. If you can keep him behind in gold and experience, you stifle his snowball potential and make him useless late-game. 

Renekton might not be your first choice as a top laner recently but those one-tricks will have you thinking otherwise. If you still struggle with facing Renekton, read on to learn more about how to counter and turn him into a cannon minion.

Counter-Picking

You are wrong if you’re under the misconception that you can one-trick a champion and go all the way to challenger. For challenger players, their winning strategy begins with champion selection, analyzing each champion’s strengths and weaknesses and picking accordingly. If you see the enemy top laner pick Renekton, avoid champions like Yone, Sion, or Gwen. These champions are fairly weak in the early game and can get stopped by a Renekton who knows what he’s doing.

Rather, opt for champions such as Urgot or Garen who can win short trades. The unparalleled best counter for Renekton though is definitely Poppy. Using her W to stop any dashes around her, she can nullify Renekton’s entire combo with ease.

This method may seem harder if you have a small champion pool or if you pick before the enemy top laner. To understand what to do then, keep reading ahead.

Long Trades, Short Trades, or Sustain? – Rune Setup

If you have a basic idea of how League works, you’ll know the importance of picking the correct runes. You can’t run the Sorcery mastery with Urgot and expect to come out on top. Renekton’s early game is heavily reliant on taking short trades and chipping away at his opponent’s health bar until they need to recall or take a bad trade and die.

To avoid this, pick up runes like Conquerer and Bone Plating for reduced burst damage and sustain if you can proc the Conqueror rune. This does not mean you should run the Conquerer setup on every matchup against Renekton, Press The Attack also works well for champions like Garen or Teemo. If you’re playing a tank like Ornn or Cho’Gath, the best setup would be to run Grasp of the Undying and Unflinching from the Resolve tree into Legend: Tenacity from the Precision tree. These will make you beefier as the game progresses while reducing the crowd control duration from his W.

Healing Reduction Is Key! – Build Path

Build paths against combo-reliant champions like Renekton are essential in order to win. There are really only a few ways to play Renekton so running into something totally new is unlikely. The best first item against Renekton would be a healing reduction item that applies the Grievous Wounds trait. The precursor for any health-reducing item such as Executioner’s Calling applies 25% Grievous Wounds on hit while upgraded items like Mortal Reminder apply 40% Grievous Wounds.

After you’ve cut down on his healing, start building your core items. These are champion-dependant so don’t change them up too much based on your matchup. Some mythic items that help more than others against Renekton are Frostfire Gauntlet and Sunfire Aegis for tankier champions like Ornn or Sion. If your champion pool consists of auto-attack champions such as Camillie or Olaf, Divine Sunderer is much more beneficial.

Know The Playstyle – Combos & Cooldowns

This is without a doubt the most critical factor in ranking up. If you watch videos of professional players, they somehow always know what the opponent is about to do. This is due to their high knowledge about every champion and how it is played.

We have glanced over this previously but let’s elaborate. Renekton hits his power spike at levels 1-3, 6, and as soon as he finishes his second item. Monitor your opponent’s items and experience, and avoid going in for trades when they’re about to level up. Never engage if you are at a level or item disadvantage as Renekton is extremely strong in lane.

The next step in understanding the playstyle is knowing his combo. How he trades, last hits, and cooldowns. Renekton’s basic combo is E> W> Q> E. The E is a gap-closer, the W is used to break any shields the opponent has, and Q heals him up while you stand there stunned. He will then use the second E charge to dash back. Since there is no way of getting out of his W once he’s on you, the best tactic against him is to keep your distance and avoid entering into E range. Since Renekton is a melee champion, staying out of his ability range can win you the game later on.

Communicate With Your Jungler – Lane Ganks

We all know the common phrase, “jungler difference”, but your jungler can actually play a key role in helping you win the lane. Renekton has only one escape tool which is his E. The way it works is that if he dashes through an enemy in his first E charge, he is granted a second. If your jungler mispositions, Renekton can easily E-dash through him back under his turret.

The best time to gank him in the top lane would be when he engages with you. Have your jungler stay in the tri-brush (if you are playing on the blue side) or the top river brush (when you are playing on the red side). Once Renekton engages on you and exhausts both his E charges, you can easily team up against him and cut off his escape. Although he can deal damage with his auto-attacks, he is pretty weak until his abilities are off cooldown, giving you a 7-10s window at level 18.

Stopping His Passive’s Fury Build

Renekton’s passive, Reign of Anger, generates fury that empowers the rest of his abilities. He gains more fury the lower he is in health. Just like Tryndamere, the easiest way to stop him from trading is to prevent him from gaining fury from minions. He will auto-attack minions for last hits until his fury bar is filled up and then jump on you to heal back from his Q.

If you are unable to stop him from gaining fury, take shelter under your turret until his fury dies down. If possible, freeze the way so he cannot get easy last hits without walking up the lane.

Crowd-Control!

Crowd-control, also known as CC, has been the name of the game for some time now. Champions without proper armor, magic resistance, or health are easily burst down. Renekton falls in that category.

With his high dependability on self-healing from trades, Renekton does not build too much armor and abysmal health items. If you can stun him before he gets his combo off and dashes out, you will definitely win the trade. If your jungler is coming up to gank him, try to stun-lock him until you burst him down. A point to note is that if you are engaging on him post-level 6, stunning him before he activates his R can greatly increase your chances of killing him. If he has activated his R, you can still stun him and wait for the duration to end before you engage again. Don’t want to give up a double kill.

Playing For The Late Game

No matter how proficient you are at a champion, every champion excels at different stages of the game. If you feel like you cannot match Renekton’s trades, back times, or laning phase in general, play under turret. Start adjusting your item build path and playstyle to out-scale him once the laning phase ends. Renekton is extremely strong in lane and there’s no shame in admitting you cannot match him.

Passively farm minions, freeze the wave, disrupt his recalls, stop him from rotating, and most importantly, don’t feed him! His utility falls off heavily if he is unable to snowball the early game meaning chances are you can kill him in a one-on-one after level 13. So if it feels hopeless, play defensive until you know you can kill him.

Also check: How To Lane Against Heimerdinger?

Conclusion

Renekton is a D-tier champ at the moment but we realize some people still struggle against him. If you find yourself having to waste your ban on him, try out these tips to stop him from being a nuisance. Make sure you allow yourself to understand the matchup and match progress before you make any decisions because one wrong move could lead to him ending up at your Nexus.