Item Stats and Effects

7.2 Item Stats and Effects

Items are the primary way champions grow in power throughout a League of Legends match. They provide crucial stats like attack damage, ability power, health, armor, magic resist, and cooldown reduction, as well as unique passive and active effects that can drastically alter a champion's capabilities. Understanding how to leverage item stats and effects is fundamental to building an effective itemization path for your champion and adapting to the enemy team's composition.

Items are broadly categorized into several types, each offering different benefits:

• Basic Items: These are the foundational components of larger, more powerful items. They offer simple stat boosts and are purchased early in the game. Examples include Long Sword (AD), Amplifying Tome (AP), and Cloth Armor (Armor).
• Legendary Items: These are complete items built from multiple basic components. They offer a significant stat boost and often come with one or more unique passive or active effects. Legendary items are the core of most item builds.
• Mythic Items: Introduced in Season 11, Mythic items are the most powerful tier of items. Each champion can only build one Mythic item per game. They provide substantial stats and a powerful unique passive that defines a champion's playstyle or provides a significant advantage. The choice of Mythic item often dictates the direction of your entire build.
• Boots: Essential for increasing movement speed, boots can be upgraded with enchantments that provide additional utility, such as Glittering Stasis (stasis effect) or Quicksilver Enchant (cleanse).

Item Stats:

• Offensive Stats: Attack Damage (AD), Ability Power (AP), Attack Speed, Critical Strike Chance, Lethality, Magic Penetration, Life Steal, Omnivamp.
• Defensive Stats: Health, Armor, Magic Resist, Tenacity, Shield Power.
• Utility Stats: Cooldown Reduction (CDR), Mana, Mana Regeneration, Movement Speed.

Item Effects:

Item effects are what truly differentiate builds and create unique power spikes. These can be passive or active:

• Passive Effects: These are always active or trigger under specific conditions. They can be unique (only one instance of the effect applies even if you build multiple items with the same passive name) or non-unique. Examples include:
• Trinity Force (Mythic): Grants bonus damage on hit after using an ability (Spellblade).
• Guardian Angel: Upon taking fatal damage, revives the champion after a delay (Rebirth).
• Rabadon's Deathcap: Increases Ability Power by a significant percentage (Overload).
• Active Effects: These require You to manually activate the item, usually with a dedicated keybind. They often have a cooldown. Examples include:
• Hextech Rocketbelt (Mythic): Dashes forward, dealing magic damage and granting movement speed (Arcane Bolt).
• Zhonya's Hourglass: Makes the user invulnerable for a short duration (Stasis).
• Redemption: Heals and damages enemies in a target area.

Building the right items is a dynamic process. You need to consider your champion's strengths, your role, your team's needs, and the enemy team's threats. For example, if facing a team with heavy magic damage, building Banshee's Veil or Spirit Visage would be wise. Against a team with lots of crowd control, Quicksilver Sash or Mercurial Scimitar becomes essential.