Hey guys! It’s RTO, and today I’m here to talk about the Scourge of toplane, our
very own Gangplank. He is a versatile top laner, who excels in teamfights - even from
across the map (post-six!). He has the built in ability to Cleanse nearly everything, making
him rather forgiving, and is easy to learn, but with a very high skill ceiling!
First, I want to talk about the Pros and Cons of playing Gangplank in the toplane.
Pro’s Strong level 1 into most matchup’s
Insane scaling Unmatched AoE damage
Global Map Pressure Superior Waveclear
Extra Gold Generation Built in Cleanse
Anti-Dive
Con’s Reliant on Items
Squishy Very Hard Matchup’s
Low Mobility Hard to Master
Abilities
Passive - Trial by Fire - Every 15s, Gangplank empowers his next basic attack to burn the
target for 55 - 225 (+100% bonus AD) bonus true damage over 2.5s, ticking 0.25s. If Gangplank
successfully hits a target with Trial by fire, he gains 30% bonus movement speed for 2 seconds.
Destroying a Powder Keg resets the cooldown, and grants the bonus movement speed.
Q - Parrrley - Gangplank shoots the target enemy with his pistol, dealing up to 120 (+100%
AD) physical damage, and applying all on-hit effects. If Parrrley kills the target, Gangplank
plunders up to 7 gold, and Silver Serpents, the latter of which can be spent to upgrade
Cannon Barrage.
W - Remove Scurvey - Gangplank consumes a large quantity of citrus fruit, cleansing
himself from all CC, and healing himself up to 150 (+90% AP + 15% Missing HP)
E - Powder Keg - Gangplank periodically stocks a powder keg, up to a maximum of 3. Gangplank
places a powder keg at the target location for 25s, which connects to other powder kegs,
with overlapping explosion radii (ray-dee-eye). Gangplank and his enemies can attack the powder
keg, dealing 1 damage per hit. Gangplank may also shoot the barrel with Parrrley. If Gangplank
scores the killing blow, it explodes, also triggering a chain reaction that explodes
nearby kegs. If killed by an enemy, the keg is safely dismantled.
An exploding keg deal the attack’s damage to all nearby enemies, plus up to 180 bonus
physical damage against champions, ignoring 40% of their armor, as well as slowing them
for 2 seconds, up to 80%. Enemies can only be damage once per chain.
R - Cannon Barrage - Gangplank calls down 12 waves of cannonballs in clusters of 3,
every 2 seconds, and revealing the area for the duration. Each wave deals up to 100 (+10%
AP) magic damage to all enemies within the area, and slows them by 30% for 0.5s. Gangplank
can purchase upgrades for his ship in the store at the cost of 500 Silver Serpents each,
which improve Cannon Barrage.
Death’s Daughter - A initial cannonball lands in the center of the barrage, dealing
a cluster’s worth of true damage to all enemies it hits and slowing them by 60% for
1.5s.
Raise Morale - The barrage grants allies 30% bonus movement speed while they are inside
the area, persisting for 2 seconds after leaving it
Fire at Will - Cannon barrage fires 6 additional waves of it’s duration.
Skill Order - Q > E > W Silver Serpents > Death’s Daughter > Fire
at Will > Raise Morale
Summoner Spells
There are three Summoner Spells available that have the most impact on Gangplank.
Flash (graphic) - Flash is the most important spell in League of Legends. It has multiple
uses in the way of engage, escape and gap closing. You must take this every match up.
Ignite (graphic) - Depending on what matchup you will be facing, you may have strong kill
pressure or want to play hyper aggressive. This is where Ignite comes in, allowing you
to output extra damage, helping you secure kills, and it also provides Grievous Wounds,
which is great into healing champions such as Vladimir or Dr. Mundo
Teleport (graphic) - Teleport is your primary summoner in place of ignite. It provides you
with even more map pressure, allowing you to splitpush, turn team fights, help secure
objectives and quickly return to lane.
Runes
The most optimal runes on Gangplank begin in the Resolve treeline. Our keystone that
we take 100% of the time is Grasp of the Undying. This provides us with extra sustain and damage
while in lane, and increases your overall tankiness. Every 4s in combat, your next basic
attack on a champion will deal bonus damage, heal you and permanently increase your health.
It works with Parrrley, so it’s one of the best keystones on Gangplank, and allows you
to proc it from afar into ranged matchup’s.
Demolish is the best rune to follow up with, helping you to melt turrets and their plating
quickly, and allowing you to further excel as a splitpusher.
Boneplating is important, as it reduces damage taken during trades and skirmishes. It reduces
the damage you take from a single champion, for 3 of their next abilities or attacks - it
only lasts 1.5s, but it is imperative in helping us survive, it has a 45s cooldown, so it’s
not always going to be available, this is where Second Wind comes in. You can swap out
to second wind if you’re going into a poke matchup and need the health regen more frequently
than periodic damage reduction.
The last rune we take is generally Overgrowth, providing us with permanent health gain for
every 8 minions that die near us, and an additional 3.5% after 120. This provides a larger health
pool to play around, and as we know, health is the most vital resource in League of Legends.
If you really need extra sustain, you can always take Revitalize, which increases your
self healing by 5%, or 10% when you’re below 40% hp.
As for secondary runes, we generally pick the Sorcery tree for increased CDR and damage,
but if we’re against a hard, poke matchup, Inspiration with Biscuits and Time Warp Tonic
can come in clutch to helping us survive the laning phase.
As for the 3 stat shards, we always take double adaptive force, and then your defensive choice
depends on your match up, whether you need to choose based on what type of damage your
lane opponent does (AD or AP), or whether you are focused on the entire damage type
of the team comp you’re against.
Items
Gangplank generally has a very set build path, but some of the items do change, depending
on the match up and damage type of the team comp you’re playing against.
Boots are interchangeable depending on our matchup. If you need MR and tenacity, take
Merc Treads. If you need armor, take Tabi’s. Lucidity boots are a valuable option, but
it’s normally more optimal to focus on the defensive stats first. Normally you want basic
boots into Triforce, but you can complete them if you need the extra survivability first.
Trinity Force (Graphic) - This is your core item, you want to rush this 90% of your games.
It provides you with every useful stat Gangplank needs, along with offering a movement speed
passive on champion and minion hits, and also an increased damage passive after using an
ability. This is paramount to our damage kit, as we are reliant on using our abilities to
deal the majority of our damage. Build Sheen first, then Phage - generally, we never build
Stinger on its own.
Snowballing
In this section, I’ll talk about the best items to take if you’re winning lane and
want to continue to snowball your lead.
Essence Reaver - Increases critical strike chance, and provides CDR, 70 AD and refunds
1.5% of missing mana on basic attacks. Works well with Grasp of the Undying, as it just
adds to the extra return of stats on our basic attacks. Generally a good item to build second,
if you’re focusing on damage and have chosen to take Transcendence as one of your secondary
runes.
Youmuu’s Ghostblade - Fantastic second item after Triforce if you’re vs a lot of squishy
champions, providing us with an active movement speed boost, and lethality - spiking our damage
potential exponentially.
Infinity Edge - Infinity Edge provides us with an insane amount of damage on our crits,
while boosting the chance to proc one. We also gain 80 AD, giving us a flat amount of
damage. Very good item when snowballing, but not worth it if you’re going to start needing
defense!
Defensive - Mixed
Let’s go through some of the items we should focus on building if we’re going a more
tanky route, and need some mixed damage defensives.
Sterak’s Gage - One of the best items in a mixed, or tank, Gangplank build. It provides
extra HP (helping with our squishyness), and some interesting passives.
Giant Strength: Gain 50% of your base AD, as bonus AD
Lifeline: Upon taking at least 400 to 1800 damage (based on level) within 5 seconds,
gain a shield for 75% of your bonus health. After 0.75s, the shield decays over 3 seconds
(60s cooldown) Sterak’s Fury: When Lifeline triggers, grow
in size and strength, gaining +30% tenacity for 8 seconds.
These all provide us with amazing defensive properties, including extra tenacity vs CC
champs such as Morgana, or Kennen. Sterak’s does not have a specific defensive property
such as armor or magic resist, so we can take it into any match up.
Death’s Dance - Death’s Dance gives us a nice boost to our AD, as well as 10% CDR
- pushing us closer to the CDR cap for the extra Transcendence damage! Death’s Dance
also comes with 2 passives -
Instantly heal for 15% of all damage dealt, AoE damage only heals for 5% for every unit
affected. Although AoE is our primary source of damage, if we can reliably hit 3 targets
each time with our barrels or ult, then this easily pays off - increasing our sustain.
Stores 30% of all physical and magic damage received, and is instead taken as damage over
time true damage instead, dealing one-third of the stored damage every second.
A useful item if you need the extra healing, and if you’re against a bursty team, allowing
you to take the damage as a DoT instead of dying to burst.
Edge of Night - Not always the primary item taken on Gangplank, but if you feel like you
need a spell shield (potentially against Malphite, Blitzcrank, long range engage champions),
this is the Banshee’s Veil of AD. It provides lethality, AD, HP and, the main selling point..
A spell shield, which blocks the next enemy ability.
Defensive - AD
Guardian Angel (G) - While providing us with a nice chunk of armor, and some AD to boot,
we also gain the Revive passive, which allows us to restore 50% of our base HP, and 30%
of maximum mana, after taking lethal damage - every 300 seconds.
This allows us to play a little bit riskier, although it does come at a cost. We only revive
after 4 seconds of stasis, so if we get caught by multiple enemies, and our team are nowhere
near, we’re just going to die again after reviving! Good choice of item into dangerous
enemies that can deal a lot of damage in a short period of time, or that can shred through
you (looking at you, Vayne top players).
Randuin’s Omen - If you’re seriously struggling vs AD champions, Randuin’s provides you
with 70 armor and reduces the damage you take from critical strikes. It’s very useful
against fed ADCs, such as Sivir or Draven. It also provides a passive - that slows the
attack’s attack speed by 15% for 1 second after being hit by a basic attack - and an
active; slowing the movement speed of nearby enemies by 55%, for 2 seconds - this helps
with our lack of mobility, enabling us to stick to fleeing targets.
Defensive - MR
Maw of Malmortius - If the enemy team is primarily AP damage dealers, or there is a specific
AP carry that you need to survive damage from, Maw of Malmortius provides you with a shield
that absorbs 350 magic damage, if you’re to fall below 30% maximum HP - from magic
damage. We also gain AD, CDR and passive MR.
Spirit Visage - Useful for more HP as well as MR, and also increases the effectiveness
of all sources of health restoration by 30% - good if you need extra sustain.
Adaptive Helm - Very useful vs mages who spam their spells, as it reduces all magic damage
taken by the first magic spell you’re hit by; by 20% for 4 seconds. Meaning if you’re
against a Cassiopeia, who likes to spam Twin Fang, you’ll take 20% less damage from them
over 4s.
Situational
Mortal Reminder - If the enemy team has significant healers, and the rest of your team refuses
to buy grievous wounds, you can take Mortal Reminder, which reduces their healing by 40%.
Not ideal, but sometimes necessary.
Power Spikes
Gangplank has many power spikes that can be taken advantage of, and I will list a couple
here -
Sheen - Your Q damage basically doubles on proccing Sheen, allowing you to chunk down
your opponent, leaving them no choice but to play safe or recall.
Level 6 - You now have global map pressure, gaining kills and/or assists from other lanes,
turning fights without having to use Teleport, and zoning enemies off of objectives such
as Dragon. Trinity Force - This is your core item, and
doubles your Q damage again, allowing you to pressure your opponent, gain solo kills,
push in the minions to the enemy turret and potentially roam.
Combos
AA > Q > AA - Resets your burn passive E > Q > E - Chain 2 barrels to explode (from
hidden) E > E > Q or E > E > AA - Chain 2 barrels
to explode E > E > E > Q - 3 Barrel combo, use Q on 1st
barrel placed immediately after last barrel (after level 7)
Advanced Tips
As with every champion (other than Aphelios….), abilities are what allow you to play the game
to its full potential. I’m here to give you some advanced tips on how to play Gangplank
like a pro, and all his little niches.
Put 2 barrels in bush to use 3 barrel combo quickly and surprise your enemy.
Ghost Barrels - Place a keg further than your Q range, but
closer than max E Use Q outside of range, meaning Gangplank
has to walk into range to activate the ability As soon as Q animation begins, you proceed
to put the next E
Triple Passive Combo - Use first Trial by Fire if already available.
If not, use Powder Keg & hit turret with Sheen proc.
Reset passive and hit turret if no minion wave. If minions incoming, place second Powder
Keg Blow Powder Keg and hit turret in between
the explosives. Trial by Fire will reset after you hit the turret.
Mid and Late Game
You have 3 options in the mid game
Splitpush Group
Secure objectives
They all depend on whether you have a comp that wants to teamfight, or whether you’re
better off using your global ultimate in skirmishes. You can also choose to teleport to fights
when you’re splitpushing, or teleport to minion waves after winning a team fight. It
all depends on your team comp, and win conditions.
Late game, you can nearly one shot a squishy carry or support with one Powder Keg combo,
so don’t sleep on this!
Hopefully this intro to Gangplank has helped you with any queries you might have had about
Gangplank, and if you have any others I haven’t addressed, please leave a comment down below
or on my Mobafire guide, and I will make sure to answer you!
We have plenty of other mobafire guides for top lane, plenty more to come and you’re
welcome to catch me live on stream on facebook. You can also check out my gameplay videos
on Youtube. I’m RTO, your guide through guides and I will see you in the next video,
deuces boys!