i tried this too and my favourite variation was nightharvester nashors demonic rabadons. Being able to quickly get 3 stacks after spitting them out and having more dmg on aas. Felt much more threatening than with demonic post 12 mins and landed way more q W aa aa R aa aa Q(stuns).
Thank you for your videos! But I didn't see combo with 3 stacks+Q+R in your play. That allow you eat enemies from tounge distance! Maybe you don't mention it, but i hope you will use it in your games.
I discovered the pick from patch notes then started playing Then talked to Whatley and compared notes I am 100% certain no one invented this pick as 1000s of people are testing it.
@MrKevMouanot really, most people used him as tank because his absurd scaling he dealt lots of dmg while being tanky, was no reason to go full mage build
@@HappyChimeNoises I might be wrong about this, but isn't AP Kench Toplane worse than normal Tank Kench? Since you're building AP, you're far squishier and thus won't win all in fights vs the bruisers, so you would need to poke them ahead of the all in. But your Q is still a skillshot and toplane champs generally have more sustain than midlane champs, so I imagine it would be hard to poke them down enough. Additionally, there are many toplaners who have dashes and CC, which makes your W very hard to hit, which hurts you a lot more than on normal Tahm. And while the %damage of your ult is certainly better vs tanky targets, I'll imagine you would lose a lot of matchups vs bruisers which Tank Kench would normally win.
The last warning against playing him top lane made me crack up. I have told you this before but I must repeat it. You are such a cool dude. You are blending the fun and the competitive aspects of this game that has been so aggresivelly been turning to the competitive side only in the past recent years.
Shoutout to my diamond teammates who didnt even know that tahm does ap damage. If you arent in diamond yet you can at least know you are smarter than them
@@ironboy3245 Nobody itemizes against Tahm Kench's *damage*. Like, if You have an enemy Ornn or Shen or Mundo, do You really care if their abilities are physical or magical damage?
Whatley plays in masters and some people still complain about him not swallowing them before level 6 even though the swallow was changed to ult years ago
Based YT commenter not playing it in ranked first time I am also glad riot are doing these things. There is no reason tahm cannot be both a tank support, tank top laner and also an ap pick. (None of them are super op, even if they can be a little annoying) I love the variety
You didn't cover the ULT+Q undodgable combo. If the enemy is fast enough, he might scape ur Q after you spit them out. So, to avoid mistakes, you can hold the enemy in until the ult is close to expire and cast Q. Since you are going to spit the enemy anyways, you are able to cast Q while the enemy is still being vomitted. Animation cancel is one of the main mechanics of the game, and should be used almost everytime.
Someone on r/TahmKenchMains did some math, and it turns out that his passive AP ratio isn't actually an AP ratio. Instead, it gives more max hp scaling if you have more AP. This means that you want a mix of AP and HP. Therefore, I build him like Mordekaiser but with Night Harvester instead of Riftmaker
literally yesterday i tried ap kench and i found that building a tank mythic like heartsteel works very well because his passive gets more ap scaling with every 100 hp and heart steel has inf health scaling and then into demonic and then what ever else you need
Literally build heart into demonic then full AP and your autos will do way more damage since his passive AP ratio scales directly with his max HP. This gives you plenty of tankiness and you still burst the hell out of people since you go full AP after
Yes I agree an AP/Tank build is likely the 'Mathematically correct version' of AP Kench. I tried it a few times and am not certain it is the 'Best way to climb in soloq' as your early impact is much lower. I really really value that early AP power to impact the game fast, otherwise you might as well play an ap scaling control mage like Azir instead of Kench Imo. So overall I agree, but I dont think that overall build efficiency is always the best way to play in soloq when you often may not even get 2 full items before the game ends. (Kench is not the best farmer due to waveclear issues, so that is important to keep in mind too)
@@HappyChimeNoises this build is better for top lane imo. Kench can have 0 impact early cuz top lane is a useless role so going heartsteel into demonic then full tank items is really good cuz of how much ap demonic will give and the burn is also max hp magic dmg so still kills high hp targets.
@@HappyChimeNoises why not just build like an alternator/ blasting wand or large rod and dark seal then build heart steel? This way you get your early AP then start building HP to increase your ratio and still be able to chunk people.
Hello Chime, Semi OTP Tahm Kench player here, I'd like to point out that TK has an unique q passive which can extend his q range when he grows in size, so items like Heartsteel and elixir of iron are very underrated items since if you have atleast 2-3 items with elixir you have more range than caitlyn with lethal tempo stacked. It is a very important thing to know beacuse it seems that nobody knows about that. If you are going for ap kench, try out heartsteel rush with mejais second. It's the cheapest legendary item and it gives you that range extension on your q since heartsteel unique passive. Third always demonic, hp > ap and kench has that ghetto vlad ap hp hp ap scaling and it's really good on him. then rabbadons for that S L A P and finish off with whatever you like. You can use zhonyas, nashors or anything you need. I also wanna add that with grasp and heartsteel you heal for a lot of health and you deal a hell ton of damage due to heartsteel grasp and your autos dealing around 600-900 late game depending on your last item. Try this build path, it feels amazing, also for the mobility problems you don't have any zince your q range is so high you don't need extra dashes, ghost flash is the most optimal summoner combo. P.S. Sorry for my broken London B-) Have a nice day everyone!
From my testing of ap kench, albeit I'm not a high elo player so take it as you will, you can buff his q range issue by foregoing some of the burst of night harvester in exchange for Heartsteel. Especially helps if you are going comet runes and the enemy doesn't have a lot of high mobility Champs. Heatsteel gives you size and his q range scales significantly with size buffs, plus if you're building demonic anyway, all that health you're getting from it is directly translated into ap so it's not a significant compromise for damage
I think my favorite Tahm Kench build is Heartsteel, Demonics, Titanic, and then basically whatever three other items you want because heartsteel gives demonics and titanic all the scaling they need. You can go Death cap for more overall AP to your already infinite scaling AP and AD or go Sunfire and burn and become tanky. You can build on hit on him too, which is wack cause depending on how much AP and health you have on him, his autos can do very easily 500 per hit and even up to 1000 and beyond. It seems people don't realize how wack his scaling really is, especially with heartsteel pumping everything infinitely.
For those who could ask, at 2:07 those images are captured from the Unreal Engine (4. something) it's a free engine that you can use to make your own games projects or cinema projects :)
Hey there, I've been watching u for a long time now and I just wanted to say tyvm for the videos, always waited forward for them and still will, love watching them, keep up the good work!
I encountered an ap tahm a few days ago , but he went for luden glass cannon build, with 1Q my adc lost 70%health. He played super smart never being the engage wait for cool down gone in team fight and all in when we lost our flash or dashes.And with my experience I think swiftness boot combo with 10stacks+ mejas will be very good against tahm as mages with no mobility, it make tahm very hard to hit his ability nor sticking and aa you for ult oneshot
I tried Ap kench for like 40 ranked games in Plat as soon as I saw the buffs. I came up with 2 builds First one is Everfrost, Rabadons, Zhonyas, and then whatever. The reason I go rabadons second, is because his AP scalings are so big, I feel it’s best to get as much AP asap for big burst. Second build is Heartsteel, Demonic Embrace, Nashors Tooth, and then AP+HP items according to game. This build works better if your team needs someone to tank, but also do some damage. (With just HS and DE you get close to 4000+ hp)
Okay so this actually happened to me recently, I was playing toplane because I got auto filled jungle and my friend decided to switch with me and I was up against a tahm, I was playing varus top lane, specifically AP varus. I thought the matchup would be easy but I was completely wrong, the second he got his first item he dived me with his knock up and then autoed me and ulted, I was not taking that much damage at the time but when I came out from him eating me, I had no hp and he finished it with ignite, I was so confused because my hp dropped too fast. I didnt realise that it was AP kench before watching this..
Rocketbelt over nightharvester, mp on max hp damage infinitely better than the ability haste, they do the same damage except for the magic pen you gain from rocket belt.
Mathematically - yes, but heartsteel is not very impactful early on. So I don't recommend it for mid kench where you want to go for kills. Top its fine
"Please don't play this toplane if you have a soul" I literally just finished a game facing this top haha. I was jax and was surprised by how much damage he did, he even solo killed me a few times. We ended up winning because jax is so weak (buff jax), but it's cool to see off meta stuff being picked more regularly now.
Fellas let me tell you a secret AP TK technology that is not in the video: phase rush with ghost ignite W behind them(even if he is near his tower), Q AA AA R turn on ghost(you cant flash with you R being active on tk) with you enemy in your belly the phase rush will be active, you can make to your tower and make the tower agro on them for a easy kill.
You can actually q during the ult spit out animation when the timer runes out to make it actually undodgeable rather than q'ing after the spit out animation :)
Love this. I have to say tho, all top lane tanks in the mid lane are strong. Since they are meant to fight bruisers and fighters they have enough damage to kill squishy mages and assassins early and you survive their burst with your tankiness
Have you tried rift maker? The percent max hp dmg is cracked with the true dmg of rift maker. And the bonus healing is always op on the kench. He would be a little less bursty but the healing and health make up for it.
I think because of the way his new passive works (his passive AP ratio now gets higher teh more health he has) heartsteel -> demonic -> nashors-> other AP is a really high consistent DPS build once it gets online. Also because of the health scaling riftmaker can be fun too. Without heartsteel you can go ghost to make up for less mobility from no rocketbelt
happy to see chime gain more popularity and now making his own builds, now onto my personal build for tahm, I build heartsteel, demonic, more ap like nashors or cosmic, or if needed more tank like gargoyle, heartsteel also increases his size adding to Q range, hope you see this chime :D
i googled to compare Malphite R with Tahm W, it's 400 (+90% AP) at level16, versus 240 (+150% AP) at either level9 or {level13?}. the point is that it only takes around 250 AP total for the Tahm W to reach the same strength as maxed Malphite R, and from thereon it becomes stronger. of course the malphite R is much easier to hit enemies with, and the aoe may be an inch or so larger. but aside from the fact that Tahm W scales better than Malphite R, the cooldown of W is practically nothing. i'll have fun trying it out as support. might have some sick early roaming potential with the W...
i decided to rush rabadon which put my AP at 290. i maxed W for the increased range. and hail of blades because i focus on all in. it was fun so i'll play it some more, maybe i'll end up playing it regularly. i was thinking to go void staff and ludens for max penetration, lastly into the 1100g wardstone. thank you for sharing. btw i noticed that tahm kench is extremely good at invading the tribush at lvl1 by W'ing from the dragon pit. could possibly W the RaptorRiverBush from the dragon pit as well i suppose, to then wait for W cooldown and repeat onto the next bush...
I am starting to like noArmWhatleys morelonimicon rush setup in the toplane. Item is so cheap, gives the best kench stats and actually makes aatrox and warwick matchup playable
I love this. Been a Tahm player for a long time. Was having difficulty enjoying him this season and really didn't like heartsteel. I think I'll try this build and style out top!
@@jimadler2430 I fell in love. ROA into demonic changed what I loved about kench and I had tons of fun half healthing people with my ult. I like heartsteel more now, (nothing beats the size increase and Q range increase from heartsteel), but I definitely play a game of ROA or night harvester for every game of tank now.
There is no easier way to 1v1 as tahm kench than play phase rush (even with ghost) eat sb and go with him under your tower. For me it is the best way to play him doesnt matter, do u play AP, tank or hybrid.
It's sad how bursty he is with Heartsteel as his mythic, and then AP for the rest. It would also sort of help with your issues. Better range, because of size increase. Better tankiness, because... tank item. It doesn't help with mobility, but late game size increase gives you a long range slow. And obv the wave clear is just gonna suck, but you could use demonic embrace to help a bit.
This video makes me wanna revisit my old main, old Tahm is so powerful as a support, literally can save ur adc's flash by Eating them then you flash away from the fight yourself. I was sad when they made it grounded so you cant do it anymore but I adopted to it since you can still spit them out through walls. I would ult/flash into my team mate then eat them then spit them out through the wall away from the fight and let the enemy consume me as my team mate can live on. After that patch they nerfed him AGAIN, this time they added slow which makes it a lot harder.
I play a toooon of tahm kench and run inspire runes for approach velocity and it’s busted. Your q has such low cd that you can run down anyone you land a q on
I've been spamming this since the second buff. Hybrid is definitely the best but this is so fun I cant stop playing it. I'm also into ap nunu which is what got me interested in the ap buffs. Great video!
@@HappyChimeNoises I didn't even know about all the buffs! But the passive ap he gets from mandate is really useful. I can still build tanky items like sunfire and do a decent chunk of damage.
I recommend Heartsteel later in the build as Riot want it to be a later item and thus it is quite weak early on. Great item on tahm, just not ideal for early game impact
Would not recommend night harvester as mythic. Does less dmg than rocketbelt because you get both active wich does exakt same dmg + gives pen and a dash. And with magic resistance being so low to start on most champ compared to armor you do alot more dmg with ludens, protobelt and liadry than you do with night harvester. And the only benefit from night harvester is the 50hp and 10 ability haste (compared to hextech). But if you are not comfortable with active items go ludens or liandry (if you are only looking for the most dmg). But i would still always recommend everfrost or protobelt over night harvester. ( I know it's an off meta build but you don't need to intetionally buy bad items)
You are forgetting the Night harvester passive " Damaging an enemy champion deals 125 (+ 15% AP) bonus magic damage and grants you 25% bonus movement speed for 1.5 seconds, with the duration extending on subsequent triggers" Very strong with single ability champs like Tahm with his Q, also with Nidalee spears and stuff like that. THe flat damage + the speed you get is very valuable. I dont think that ludens or protobelt are bad items - I say that protobelt is a great idea in this video. I do think ludens is a big waste of gold as you dont care about mana at all, and I also think that magic pen on tahm is close to useless as his ult does %hp damage, so why both with magic pen if you can eat a tank and kill them. I appreciate your perspective but I think that some of your ideas are also flawed, and you have not given night harvester a proper rating. I dont claim that my ideas are perfect at all, this video is all about testing - but they definitly are not bad items. Night havester used to be terrible on every champ, so you may just need to update your knowledge on it Also this debate is not a 'Yes or no'. All items have good reasons why they can be used - even Everfrost just for the kill combo - that can be enough to get you to high elo I am sure. So I dont wish to say 'Build X or it is bad', I am open to testing everything.
@@HappyChimeNoises UNIQUE - SUPERSONIC: Dash 125 to 275 units in the target direction, though not through terrain, unleashing an arc of 7 rockets in the same direction that deal 125 (+ 15% AP) magic damage to enemies hit. Afterwards, gain 30% bonus movement speed while facing nearby enemy champions for 1.5 seconds (40 second cooldown). - Hextech Same dmg, more mobility, higher ms. The flat dmg is the same if you hit protobelt wich can be hard sometimes yes, but most of the time it's not. Magic pen is even better on tham than most because he does % dmg with ult. Because it is usually a higher result number that is calculated into a %reduction vs mr the dmg difference will be quite big especially later in the game when you get more pen. Night harvester is fine, but i as a person fixate on details and in the details it's worse in a lot of ways compared to the other ap items. and my ingame opinion "nightharvester shit rep tham" jk But dmg diff at lvl 6 with 1 item on a target with 30mr (which is lower than most base at lvl1) is 16 in favor of hextech and this amount is only more favored by belt the further in the game you go. you can test this with 1 ad rune and 0 other dmg sorces other than q and active i don't mean to sound like a duchebag it just happens unfortunetly.
Tham Q range depend of the champion hitbox to a 1:1 ratio, meaning that if you where to build iceborn gauntlet (or now heartsteel) you can increase he's Q range by quit a lot. (keep in mind the range indicator dosn't change so you need a bit of practise to understand where ur q reach)
Pantheon Ap is dangerously underrated. His ult ratio is massiv and zhonya is such a good item for him. With ap reduction gain from ap items, first of all he can at least stun twice or thrice in a single teamfight and his zhonya can allow him to use twice his E in a single fight and stall a lot. Plus his W has ap scaling. As a support or jungle, he became quite scary and unexpected. The thing being that people underestimate how rocketbelt with pantheon is a threat for them. You can use it while on E. If you use ur ult quite well, you can now easily chase those who used to flee away from you. I would highly suggest to try it out. P.s: coming from an azir supp and rengar supp main.
Agreed I have been playing AP Panth exclusively lately. His w cool down get so low you become a real pest hehe However ult placement/timing is essential for a real payoff compared to ad. (Managed to maintain a 60% w/r so far). Best first two items for me so far have been Night harvester and Dominic embrace, still testing for late game items.
your channel has changed my entire game! speaking of which-- -AP nunu mid might have been nerfed or is it just me? The snowballs can no longer 1 shot the 3 backline minions...it brings them down to 1 hp.
Maknoon has been playing full ap nightreaver on stream almost every day since the patch released. Maybe add some analysis of his version for a quick pt2 of this video.
Yes I think that it is certainly a low skill floor pick, but very high skill cap - as with any full damage/low mobility pick. I put it in this tier as it is not amazing for climbing soloq with in any rank. It is really good at 1v1s and SUPER FUN, but it is hard to play consistently well in every matchup/vs every team comp. In comparison - most of the A/S tier champs you can pick against anything and win most games just with your own impact. I think that we may one day see a Korean everfrost tahm kench in Master+ similar to the Ap nunu mid we had. And I look forward to him proving me wrong
I am low elo myself and these enemies (at least from the clips), seem a bit more on my level if not lower. Twitch straight up standing still just autoattacking, zed not using his clones or when he uses them just to escape a W from you where he already had walked out of already, misses all of his Q´s thrown at you. Still a strongish weird choice
I went against this a couple weeks ago as Xin Zhao. It was the most miserable experience. Kench had a full stacked majeis at 20 minutes and he would destroy my team.
Play heartsteel braum top trust me it goes hard once you make it out of lane Heartsteel,steel caps or merc treads, sunfire, titanic hydra, then situational items 👌
I think that HoB would also be nice to proc the early Q poke. As you said, you will be more squishy, but I think this would be better than the Comet one.
been running bruiser ap kench with heartsteel + demonic combo, ap items after. infinite scaling with the two items plus all your built in hp/ap scaling. if im against someone i know i can stick to i run lethal tempo because your autos do insane damage. after two items just build ap and burst people while surviving any burst. also the increased size makles your Q range huge.
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(AD) Thanks so much to Alienware for supporting off meta content!
i tried this too and my favourite variation was nightharvester nashors demonic rabadons. Being able to quickly get 3 stacks after spitting them out and having more dmg on aas. Felt much more threatening than with demonic post 12 mins and landed way more q W aa aa R aa aa Q(stuns).
Yeah Nashors + Hail of blades is also pretty legendary for damage + instant ult setup
pekin plays it with lethal tempo you might wanna try it
Full ad,no mythic kog'maw,take it or leave it
Thank you for your videos! But I didn't see combo with 3 stacks+Q+R in your play. That allow you eat enemies from tounge distance! Maybe you don't mention it, but i hope you will use it in your games.
From covering off meta picks to making one himself, what a true chad.
This was his plan all along
No arm Whatley has been playing this a while. Wouldnt call him the creator.
Definitely didn't make this one himself. Others have been messing with is since the AP buffs
The student has become the master
I discovered the pick from patch notes then started playing
Then talked to Whatley and compared notes
I am 100% certain no one invented this pick as 1000s of people are testing it.
The official HappyChimeNoises off-meta pick, there it is
Glad to turn one of the most Anti Fun champions in Support -> into An actual fun pick :)
Became an off meta inventor by pure osmosis. What a legend.
No arm Whatley has been playing kench top AP for a while
@MrKevMouanot really, most people used him as tank because his absurd scaling he dealt lots of dmg while being tanky, was no reason to go full mage build
had to google what osmosis meant lol
Yeah this has been a thing for a few years now
@@3ricbae did you find osmosis Jones
“Please don’t play this top lane, if you have a soul” famous last words 😂
I had to fit it in somewhere for my top lane brothers
Please keep tahm out of that lane or we will lose too many players 💀
@@HappyChimeNoises telling us not to play it top will make us play it top
@@HappyChimeNoises I might be wrong about this, but isn't AP Kench Toplane worse than normal Tank Kench?
Since you're building AP, you're far squishier and thus won't win all in fights vs the bruisers, so you would need to poke them ahead of the all in. But your Q is still a skillshot and toplane champs generally have more sustain than midlane champs, so I imagine it would be hard to poke them down enough. Additionally, there are many toplaners who have dashes and CC, which makes your W very hard to hit, which hurts you a lot more than on normal Tahm. And while the %damage of your ult is certainly better vs tanky targets, I'll imagine you would lose a lot of matchups vs bruisers which Tank Kench would normally win.
@@lubue5795 just go normal tank with 1 demonic on toplane. You lose either way in the current drain tank Meta
Those teemo and adc top players deserve it
Combine this with Yasuke's early invade strat and You might have created a monster. Thankfully he doesn't have waveclear at least!
oh no
(Also thanks for sticking around for so long. Very kind of you to mention old strategies and still be here)
What is this strategy exactly 🤔
Could you give me some links if possible ?
The last warning against playing him top lane made me crack up. I have told you this before but I must repeat it. You are such a cool dude. You are blending the fun and the competitive aspects of this game that has been so aggresivelly been turning to the competitive side only in the past recent years.
Shoutout to my diamond teammates who didnt even know that tahm does ap damage.
If you arent in diamond yet you can at least know you are smarter than them
I have no idea how they don't know. Top kench wasn't exactly a long time ago was it?
@@ironboy3245 Nobody itemizes against Tahm Kench's *damage*.
Like, if You have an enemy Ornn or Shen or Mundo, do You really care if their abilities are physical or magical damage?
@@Sylvine yes, but I'm a juggernaut top player so that probably changes my thought process
@@Sylvineyou need to know his dmg type for your runes
Whatley plays in masters and some people still complain about him not swallowing them before level 6 even though the swallow was changed to ult years ago
Worth mentioning that champion size affects Tahm’s Q range. So you can increase your poke range in the late game with iron pot, for example.
nice+
I played ap kench a few days ago bot lane with my premade friends. he slaps even more than tank, I am glad riot made him a viable ap bruiser
Based YT commenter not playing it in ranked first time
I am also glad riot are doing these things.
There is no reason tahm cannot be both a tank support, tank top laner and also an ap pick. (None of them are super op, even if they can be a little annoying)
I love the variety
You didn't cover the ULT+Q undodgable combo. If the enemy is fast enough, he might scape ur Q after you spit them out. So, to avoid mistakes, you can hold the enemy in until the ult is close to expire and cast Q. Since you are going to spit the enemy anyways, you are able to cast Q while the enemy is still being vomitted. Animation cancel is one of the main mechanics of the game, and should be used almost everytime.
Yeah I think I explained it not perfect
That's the best way to do it :)
Kench player here, you can q at the end of your swallow duration to have it automatically spit them out into an undogeable q.
Fun build! Theory crafting and experimenting with unique builds is far and away my favorite aspect of League. Thanks for the great content 💛
Someone on r/TahmKenchMains did some math, and it turns out that his passive AP ratio isn't actually an AP ratio. Instead, it gives more max hp scaling if you have more AP. This means that you want a mix of AP and HP. Therefore, I build him like Mordekaiser but with Night Harvester instead of Riftmaker
literally yesterday i tried ap kench and i found that building a tank mythic like heartsteel works very well because his passive gets more ap scaling with every 100 hp and heart steel has inf health scaling and then into demonic and then what ever else you need
Ye i love second item demonic with heartsteel its just fun with the burn on q you could go more ap or hp after both items
Literally build heart into demonic then full AP and your autos will do way more damage since his passive AP ratio scales directly with his max HP. This gives you plenty of tankiness and you still burst the hell out of people since you go full AP after
Yes I agree an AP/Tank build is likely the 'Mathematically correct version' of AP Kench.
I tried it a few times and am not certain it is the 'Best way to climb in soloq' as your early impact is much lower.
I really really value that early AP power to impact the game fast, otherwise you might as well play an ap scaling control mage like Azir instead of Kench Imo.
So overall I agree, but I dont think that overall build efficiency is always the best way to play in soloq when you often may not even get 2 full items before the game ends. (Kench is not the best farmer due to waveclear issues, so that is important to keep in mind too)
@@HappyChimeNoises this build is better for top lane imo. Kench can have 0 impact early cuz top lane is a useless role so going heartsteel into demonic then full tank items is really good cuz of how much ap demonic will give and the burn is also max hp magic dmg so still kills high hp targets.
@@HappyChimeNoises why not just build like an alternator/ blasting wand or large rod and dark seal then build heart steel? This way you get your early AP then start building HP to increase your ratio and still be able to chunk people.
Hello Chime, Semi OTP Tahm Kench player here, I'd like to point out that TK has an unique q passive which can extend his q range when he grows in size, so items like Heartsteel and elixir of iron are very underrated items since if you have atleast 2-3 items with elixir you have more range than caitlyn with lethal tempo stacked. It is a very important thing to know beacuse it seems that nobody knows about that.
If you are going for ap kench, try out heartsteel rush with mejais second. It's the cheapest legendary item and it gives you that range extension on your q since heartsteel unique passive. Third always demonic, hp > ap and kench has that ghetto vlad ap hp hp ap scaling and it's really good on him. then rabbadons for that S L A P and finish off with whatever you like. You can use zhonyas, nashors or anything you need. I also wanna add that with grasp and heartsteel you heal for a lot of health and you deal a hell ton of damage due to heartsteel grasp and your autos dealing around 600-900 late game depending on your last item. Try this build path, it feels amazing, also for the mobility problems you don't have any zince your q range is so high you don't need extra dashes, ghost flash is the most optimal summoner combo.
P.S. Sorry for my broken London B-)
Have a nice day everyone!
From my testing of ap kench, albeit I'm not a high elo player so take it as you will, you can buff his q range issue by foregoing some of the burst of night harvester in exchange for Heartsteel. Especially helps if you are going comet runes and the enemy doesn't have a lot of high mobility Champs. Heatsteel gives you size and his q range scales significantly with size buffs, plus if you're building demonic anyway, all that health you're getting from it is directly translated into ap so it's not a significant compromise for damage
I think my favorite Tahm Kench build is Heartsteel, Demonics, Titanic, and then basically whatever three other items you want because heartsteel gives demonics and titanic all the scaling they need. You can go Death cap for more overall AP to your already infinite scaling AP and AD or go Sunfire and burn and become tanky. You can build on hit on him too, which is wack cause depending on how much AP and health you have on him, his autos can do very easily 500 per hit and even up to 1000 and beyond. It seems people don't realize how wack his scaling really is, especially with heartsteel pumping everything infinitely.
For those who could ask, at 2:07 those images are captured from the Unreal Engine (4. something) it's a free engine that you can use to make your own games projects or cinema projects :)
Hey there, I've been watching u for a long time now and I just wanted to say tyvm for the videos, always waited forward for them and still will, love watching them, keep up the good work!
Ty Marcos
I stopped playing League for years but playing TK again looks so tempting
I encountered an ap tahm a few days ago , but he went for luden glass cannon build, with 1Q my adc lost 70%health. He played super smart never being the engage wait for cool down gone in team fight and all in when we lost our flash or dashes.And with my experience I think swiftness boot combo with 10stacks+ mejas will be very good against tahm as mages with no mobility, it make tahm very hard to hit his ability nor sticking and aa you for ult oneshot
I tried Ap kench for like 40 ranked games in Plat as soon as I saw the buffs.
I came up with 2 builds
First one is Everfrost, Rabadons, Zhonyas, and then whatever. The reason I go rabadons second, is because his AP scalings are so big, I feel it’s best to get as much AP asap for big burst.
Second build is Heartsteel, Demonic Embrace, Nashors Tooth, and then AP+HP items according to game. This build works better if your team needs someone to tank, but also do some damage. (With just HS and DE you get close to 4000+ hp)
Always happy to see any of the monster champs wearing hats and nuking the enemy with the most hilarious part of their kits
Okay so this actually happened to me recently, I was playing toplane because I got auto filled jungle and my friend decided to switch with me and I was up against a tahm, I was playing varus top lane, specifically AP varus. I thought the matchup would be easy but I was completely wrong, the second he got his first item he dived me with his knock up and then autoed me and ulted, I was not taking that much damage at the time but when I came out from him eating me, I had no hp and he finished it with ignite, I was so confused because my hp dropped too fast. I didnt realise that it was AP kench before watching this..
8:55
more cool option is q into spiting them out (the animation gets canceled so you actualy can hit them that way)
Rocketbelt over nightharvester, mp on max hp damage infinitely better than the ability haste, they do the same damage except for the magic pen you gain from rocket belt.
heartsteel --> demonic --> nashors and/or cosmic drive ---> ap item of choice
Best build is heartsteal into demonic embrace for infinite ap scaling, then nashors and whatever you feel like after that.
Mathematically - yes, but heartsteel is not very impactful early on.
So I don't recommend it for mid kench where you want to go for kills.
Top its fine
E plus dorans plus second wind and you're actually getting healed from trades instead of losing hp due to E.
nice change of pace to see you shredding. hell of a youtube account my guy. cheers.
Ty!
"Please don't play this toplane if you have a soul"
I literally just finished a game facing this top haha.
I was jax and was surprised by how much damage he did, he even solo killed me a few times.
We ended up winning because jax is so weak (buff jax), but it's cool to see off meta stuff being picked more regularly now.
now yes i'm sure happychimenoises is the incarnation of off meta
6:43 twitch standing still the entire time.
9:52 "and this was in diamond"
I dont want to dox him, but that guy was literally Diamond 1.
I swear to god
I love the New format its very cool :)
Fellas let me tell you a secret AP TK technology that is not in the video: phase rush with ghost ignite W behind them(even if he is near his tower), Q AA AA R turn on ghost(you cant flash with you R being active on tk) with you enemy in your belly the phase rush will be active, you can make to your tower and make the tower agro on them for a easy kill.
You can actually q during the ult spit out animation when the timer runes out to make it actually undodgeable rather than q'ing after the spit out animation :)
Me when I realized I don't even have enough money to buy a PC, and I only have a laptop that produces 30 fps every single game.
Love this. I have to say tho, all top lane tanks in the mid lane are strong. Since they are meant to fight bruisers and fighters they have enough damage to kill squishy mages and assassins early and you survive their burst with your tankiness
I fell in love with AP twitch healing support with moonstone when i saw it in a zwag video
And i think its time to pick up AP tahm
you've made it, you invented your own off meta pick, so proud of you.
Yeah, like NoArmWhatley didn't start playing it like 2 weeks ago... Totally he's invention XD
Have you tried rift maker? The percent max hp dmg is cracked with the true dmg of rift maker. And the bonus healing is always op on the kench. He would be a little less bursty but the healing and health make up for it.
I think because of the way his new passive works (his passive AP ratio now gets higher teh more health he has) heartsteel -> demonic -> nashors-> other AP is a really high consistent DPS build once it gets online. Also because of the health scaling riftmaker can be fun too.
Without heartsteel you can go ghost to make up for less mobility from no rocketbelt
OK Riot now make Braum's abilities scale with attack speed
happy to see chime gain more popularity and now making his own builds, now onto my personal build for tahm, I build heartsteel, demonic, more ap like nashors or cosmic, or if needed more tank like gargoyle, heartsteel also increases his size adding to Q range, hope you see this chime :D
Ty :)
Hybrid tank ap is great
Oh boy, time to unleash the kench !
Phase rush rune might help with mobility, since tahm plays like an Alistar engage.
Yes Phase rush is very fun, especially good for kidnapping people and running them into your tower
You can also Q R before spews the enemy insted of R Q
Man really rose up and made his own off meta
i googled to compare Malphite R with Tahm W,
it's 400 (+90% AP) at level16, versus 240 (+150% AP) at either level9 or {level13?}.
the point is that it only takes around 250 AP total for the Tahm W to reach the same strength as maxed Malphite R, and from thereon it becomes stronger.
of course the malphite R is much easier to hit enemies with, and the aoe may be an inch or so larger.
but aside from the fact that Tahm W scales better than Malphite R, the cooldown of W is practically nothing.
i'll have fun trying it out as support.
might have some sick early roaming potential with the W...
i decided to rush rabadon which put my AP at 290. i maxed W for the increased range. and hail of blades because i focus on all in. it was fun so i'll play it some more, maybe i'll end up playing it regularly.
i was thinking to go void staff and ludens for max penetration, lastly into the 1100g wardstone.
thank you for sharing.
btw i noticed that tahm kench is extremely good at invading the tribush at lvl1 by W'ing from the dragon pit.
could possibly W the RaptorRiverBush from the dragon pit as well i suppose, to then wait for W cooldown and repeat onto the next bush...
I said this when they reworked him, he's gonna be a mage tank soon
I would love to see some Ap Irelia for christmas -
I am starting to like noArmWhatleys morelonimicon rush setup in the toplane.
Item is so cheap, gives the best kench stats and actually makes aatrox and warwick matchup playable
I love this. Been a Tahm player for a long time. Was having difficulty enjoying him this season and really didn't like heartsteel. I think I'll try this build and style out top!
Hey magicalmidget, how did trying AP Tahm go?
@@jimadler2430 I fell in love. ROA into demonic changed what I loved about kench and I had tons of fun half healthing people with my ult. I like heartsteel more now, (nothing beats the size increase and Q range increase from heartsteel), but I definitely play a game of ROA or night harvester for every game of tank now.
There is no easier way to 1v1 as tahm kench than play phase rush (even with ghost) eat sb and go with him under your tower. For me it is the best way to play him doesnt matter, do u play AP, tank or hybrid.
No arm Whatley moment :skull:
It's sad how bursty he is with Heartsteel as his mythic, and then AP for the rest.
It would also sort of help with your issues. Better range, because of size increase. Better tankiness, because... tank item. It doesn't help with mobility, but late game size increase gives you a long range slow. And obv the wave clear is just gonna suck, but you could use demonic embrace to help a bit.
This video makes me wanna revisit my old main, old Tahm is so powerful as a support, literally can save ur adc's flash by Eating them then you flash away from the fight yourself.
I was sad when they made it grounded so you cant do it anymore but I adopted to it since you can still spit them out through walls. I would ult/flash into my team mate then eat them then spit them out through the wall away from the fight and let the enemy consume me as my team mate can live on. After that patch they nerfed him AGAIN, this time they added slow which makes it a lot harder.
I play a toooon of tahm kench and run inspire runes for approach velocity and it’s busted. Your q has such low cd that you can run down anyone you land a q on
I've been spamming this since the second buff. Hybrid is definitely the best but this is so fun I cant stop playing it. I'm also into ap nunu which is what got me interested in the ap buffs. Great video!
Cool to see a HCN original in action. Looks like a lot of fun.
The things I would do for people to try phase rush
Man what about adding nashor as forst item?
Tons of ap and on hit that stacks with the one you already have
been trying this before I drag it into ranked and
ho-ly FRICK ap tahm kench DOMINATES
the damage output of this pick is so much higher than I expected
i played dark harvest tahm and he deals a lot of damage like a lot but its hard to play late game bc ur not tanky
I've been doing imperial mandate support kench this season. It's pretty fun and combined with swain apc it's almost free elo.
I was wondering how you could do AP tahm support. That sounds pretty good
@@HappyChimeNoises I didn't even know about all the buffs! But the passive ap he gets from mandate is really useful. I can still build tanky items like sunfire and do a decent chunk of damage.
Have you tried Fleet Footwork for extra lane sustain into ranged matchups and extra speed for all-ins and fights later on?
No but it's a pretty good idea
I've been playing this but instead of an AP mythic you just take heartsteel, then at least your q gets longer too
I recommend Heartsteel later in the build as Riot want it to be a later item and thus it is quite weak early on.
Great item on tahm, just not ideal for early game impact
I used to do this back in season 7🤣 when his ultimate was his w
Would not recommend night harvester as mythic. Does less dmg than rocketbelt because you get both active wich does exakt same dmg + gives pen and a dash. And with magic resistance being so low to start on most champ compared to armor you do alot more dmg with ludens, protobelt and liadry than you do with night harvester. And the only benefit from night harvester is the 50hp and 10 ability haste (compared to hextech). But if you are not comfortable with active items go ludens or liandry (if you are only looking for the most dmg). But i would still always recommend everfrost or protobelt over night harvester. ( I know it's an off meta build but you don't need to intetionally buy bad items)
You are forgetting the Night harvester passive
" Damaging an enemy champion deals 125 (+ 15% AP) bonus magic damage and grants you 25% bonus movement speed for 1.5 seconds, with the duration extending on subsequent triggers"
Very strong with single ability champs like Tahm with his Q, also with Nidalee spears and stuff like that.
THe flat damage + the speed you get is very valuable.
I dont think that ludens or protobelt are bad items - I say that protobelt is a great idea in this video. I do think ludens is a big waste of gold as you dont care about mana at all, and I also think that magic pen on tahm is close to useless as his ult does %hp damage, so why both with magic pen if you can eat a tank and kill them.
I appreciate your perspective but I think that some of your ideas are also flawed, and you have not given night harvester a proper rating.
I dont claim that my ideas are perfect at all, this video is all about testing - but they definitly are not bad items. Night havester used to be terrible on every champ, so you may just need to update your knowledge on it
Also this debate is not a 'Yes or no'.
All items have good reasons why they can be used - even Everfrost just for the kill combo - that can be enough to get you to high elo I am sure.
So I dont wish to say 'Build X or it is bad', I am open to testing everything.
@@HappyChimeNoises UNIQUE - SUPERSONIC: Dash 125 to 275 units in the target direction, though not through terrain, unleashing an arc of 7 rockets in the same direction that deal 125 (+ 15% AP) magic damage to enemies hit. Afterwards, gain 30% bonus movement speed while facing nearby enemy champions for 1.5 seconds (40 second cooldown).
- Hextech Same dmg, more mobility, higher ms. The flat dmg is the same if you hit protobelt wich can be hard sometimes yes, but most of the time it's not.
Magic pen is even better on tham than most because he does % dmg with ult. Because it is usually a higher result number that is calculated into a %reduction vs mr the dmg difference will be quite big especially later in the game when you get more pen.
Night harvester is fine, but i as a person fixate on details and in the details it's worse in a lot of ways compared to the other ap items.
and my ingame opinion "nightharvester shit rep tham" jk
But dmg diff at lvl 6 with 1 item on a target with 30mr (which is lower than most base at lvl1) is 16 in favor of hextech and this amount is only more favored by belt the further in the game you go.
you can test this with 1 ad rune and 0 other dmg sorces other than q and active
i don't mean to sound like a duchebag it just happens unfortunetly.
Tham Q range depend of the champion hitbox to a 1:1 ratio, meaning that if you where to build iceborn gauntlet (or now heartsteel) you can increase he's Q range by quit a lot. (keep in mind the range indicator dosn't change so you need a bit of practise to understand where ur q reach)
Pantheon Ap is dangerously underrated. His ult ratio is massiv and zhonya is such a good item for him. With ap reduction gain from ap items, first of all he can at least stun twice or thrice in a single teamfight and his zhonya can allow him to use twice his E in a single fight and stall a lot. Plus his W has ap scaling. As a support or jungle, he became quite scary and unexpected. The thing being that people underestimate how rocketbelt with pantheon is a threat for them. You can use it while on E. If you use ur ult quite well, you can now easily chase those who used to flee away from you. I would highly suggest to try it out.
P.s: coming from an azir supp and rengar supp main.
It sounds crazy but I am convinced by your passion and will test it
Troll pick lmao
Whats your rank and winrate with AP panth?
Agreed I have been playing AP Panth exclusively lately. His w cool down get so low you become a real pest hehe However ult placement/timing is essential for a real payoff compared to ad. (Managed to maintain a 60% w/r so far). Best first two items for me so far have been Night harvester and Dominic embrace, still testing for late game items.
@@Cattildo Learn to read, he has two abilities scaling with AP including his ultimate.
@@Icegaze039
Oh i read alright. Lmk when you hit diamond +
Do this crap in normals. not ranked
your channel has changed my entire game! speaking of which-- -AP nunu mid might have been nerfed or is it just me? The snowballs can no longer 1 shot the 3 backline minions...it brings them down to 1 hp.
ty Tim :)
9:55 we all heard that giggle
Maknoon has been playing full ap nightreaver on stream almost every day since the patch released. Maybe add some analysis of his version for a quick pt2 of this video.
Ah damn I was looking for some to watch but never found him.
Do you have his Account name?
@@HappyChimeNoises 막눈_ (maknoonlol) on twitch
Gotta start playing this before it gets nerfed lol
you already know as soon as a big youtuber makes a vid on it its getting nerfed next patch
I'm surprised this wasn't an A build, tho maybe could reach it if anyone master the art of roaming with it, or maybe go disrupt jungle in mid game
Yes I think that it is certainly a low skill floor pick, but very high skill cap - as with any full damage/low mobility pick.
I put it in this tier as it is not amazing for climbing soloq with in any rank. It is really good at 1v1s and SUPER FUN, but it is hard to play consistently well in every matchup/vs every team comp.
In comparison - most of the A/S tier champs you can pick against anything and win most games just with your own impact.
I think that we may one day see a Korean everfrost tahm kench in Master+ similar to the Ap nunu mid we had.
And I look forward to him proving me wrong
Awesome video, HappyChimeNoises!
Try Hail Of Blades ! ^^
Phase rush might also be viable to icrease your all in potential when you hit w
You would like the last 10 seconds of this vid when I say the same thing 😂
@@HappyChimeNoises whoops xD
If you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back at you (c)
I am low elo myself and these enemies (at least from the clips), seem a bit more on my level if not lower. Twitch straight up standing still just autoattacking, zed not using his clones or when he uses them just to escape a W from you where he already had walked out of already, misses all of his Q´s thrown at you.
Still a strongish weird choice
The twitch is D1 euw soloq if you want an example
@@HappyChimeNoises bruh, how? And I am hardstuck, like cmon this is just frustrating :/
Props though for telling and amusing video never the less
Tyty
If you want to try out another off meta pick, try Seraphine tank support.
This player also had his carrier as a McDonalds agent and his boss fired him after losing a 1v1 match in Aram.
you should ve tried hail of blades for a quick ult
don't play it top if you have a soul
but i'm a bad person? should i do that?
Cant see a reason why not if youve already sold your soul for LP
@@HappyChimeNoises i've been trying it. jesus christ. what the fuck.
Vs Melee Assassin's i found Hail of blades a good option aswell!
I went against this a couple weeks ago as Xin Zhao. It was the most miserable experience. Kench had a full stacked majeis at 20 minutes and he would destroy my team.
AP Tahm is fun as shit, specially because of how he can scale on Heartsteel for for double scaling damage and defensive stats.
Hi @HappyChimeNoises, love ur content. Did u consider Hail of Blades on him for fast stacking for the Q stun into the W :D
Yes!
Mentioned it at the very end
I like it but grasp is easiest :)
no arm whatley has been doing ap tahm toplane for a while now. in challenger.
He's playing in gold but yes I talked to him and mentioned him in this video
Play heartsteel braum top trust me it goes hard once you make it out of lane
Heartsteel,steel caps or merc treads, sunfire, titanic hydra, then situational items 👌
That is what i like league, off meta picks
I think that HoB would also be nice to proc the early Q poke. As you said, you will be more squishy, but I think this would be better than the Comet one.
People need to stop sleeping on AP Kench. The ult is busted. Don't know why they buffed it tbh.
Heartsteel into demonic and nashors is way more powerful because of q
sweet to see your own build, Mister Chime. *eat them and spit them out to their death*
Enjoyed all the frogs with hats featured in this vid, as well
Ty Luna
been running bruiser ap kench with heartsteel + demonic combo, ap items after. infinite scaling with the two items plus all your built in hp/ap scaling. if im against someone i know i can stick to i run lethal tempo because your autos do insane damage. after two items just build ap and burst people while surviving any burst. also the increased size makles your Q range huge.
11:23 I can hear LS screaming.
Why don't I see Skarner top in this channel >:(
I did one on 2nd channel with everfrost :)
@@HappyChimeNoises NO, Everfrost is old, out if meta. Check the best skarner tops in the world