Introduction
- I'm Gat, a Nocturne/Pyke OTP who, over the last season, achieved Grandmaster playing almost exclusively lane Nocturne, specifically Midlane. Here's a bit of proof I actually achieved it, as well as my current accounts in case anyone wants to check it out.
- https://www.leagueofgraphs.com/es/summoner/las/Black%20Silence-LAS
- https://www.leagueofgraphs.com/es/summoner/las/Gat-Noct
Why Nocturne Mid, and the state of the champion
- If you have played League for a long time, Nocturne in the Midlane shouldn't surprise you, as it was a powerful pick before, centered around getting priority and roaming with your ultimate. This is still the main strength of the champion: A powerful bruiser, assassin-esque diver that is able to push the pace of the game and get advantages on the other lanes.
- So why has it decreased in popularity? The answer lies in the nerfs to Nocturne's Passive, massively reducing sustain and the ability to push the wave quickly. Almost 2 years later, Nocturne's pickrate in what once was effectively his best lane decreased to the point it doesn't even show up in tierlists anymore. My goal with this guide is to show that, while not a Tier 1 pick like it used to be, Nocturne is still playable in the Midlane should you invest the time in learning the pick.
- So can you make it work still? Yes! Nocturne lost his sustain, but not his waveclear. With this strategy I'm about to show you can still play the push and roam style, albeit not as easily as before. I'm also going to explain some common mistakes while playing Nocturne, and your general gameplan.
- Without further ado, let's get into the runes:
- Second Wind and Bone Plating are interchangeable. You take Second Wind against poke mages, and Bone Plating into more burst-trading assassins.
- You can try both Conqueror and Lethal Tempo, since the nerfs to the latter made them both equally as good.
Ability Order
- You can get an extra point in Q at level 3 instead of leveling up E if you won't use it in lane, as it gives you extra AD. This is something I do a lot as it helps me push waves faster with the extra AD from the Q Trail.
Summoner Spells
- You'll want to take Flash and Teleport. Teleport allows you to get safer resets in harder lanes, and also have more impact when it upgrades to Unleashed Teleport. R-Teleport (to either a minion or a ward)-R2 is a very powerful roaming tool that makes you get really good at splitpushing and creating man advantage fights, which is why you should take TP every time.
Item Cores (Ordered) and Situationals
- As Tiamat is your main source of waveclear and your biggest early game powerspike, you should aim to get it at 5 minutes every game. Build boots after.
Item Rundown
- Nocturne has a lot of mana issues in lane. Given Cookies and other mana runes don't give as much as Corrupting and you don't have a need for increased stats in the form of Doran items as your Q gives you AD, I think Corrupting is the best option you can take, providing both 300 HP in sustain and 225 mana, refilling every time you reset.
Matchup Spread (S is hardest, tierlist is ordered)
Identity
Below is a list of what I consider to be Nocturne's main strenghts and qualities.
- Best waveclear in the game, and therefore, able to take CS really quickly. As you're heavily item reliant you wanna maximize the amount of CS you get as much as possible, including jungle camps.
- Prefers split fights and, ideally, man advantage skirmishes instead of 5v5 teamfights. This is because Nocturne's kit doesn't allow for disengage and is pretty straightforward. Ideally, you want to go into fights that you already know you can win without having to worry about getting focused by multiple people and dying before you can do anything meaningful.
- Heavily Ult Reliant, you cannot do a lot other than splitpush if you don't have Paranoia up.
- Loves the sidelane, you can create pressure there as most champions can't 1v1 once you have your core items completed, and make a gameplan after; either splitpushing and forcing for multiple people to come to you or pushing the wave and joining your team while someone else is busy taking the wave.
- Has access to a 6-second nearsight. Once you understand the implications of denying vision you can make a lot of creative plays with it that don't necessarily include using the second part of your Ult which is the dash. One that I do a lot is pretending to join a fight using my Ult while in reality I'm taking towers. You can effectively be at two places at the same time if used correctly, but this is something that takes a lot of practice and understanding of the Ultimate itself.
- Relies on teammates. Nocturne is not a 1v9 champion that can do everything by itself. You need your team in order to make some plays work and you need some other source of AP damage to compensate for the fact that you're going with an AD Midlaner, most of the time this is either Jungle or Top.
Gameplan
Speaking of the early laning phase itself, there are 2 types of matchups in the Midlane:
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Melee Matchups: A lot of the Melee matchups you win, but that doesn't mean you can kill them. Your goal is to get deep wards on the enemy jungle after you crash waves while also playing for your 1200 Tiamat spike.
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Ranged Matchups: Most of the time, you cannot contest priority so your goal is to farm what you can without dying, utilizing your Passive's heal and your Corrupting Pots. Much like the Melee matchups, your goal is to get to your Tiamat, and after that, the gameplan is the same. My first back almost always consists of two Longswords, and after that, I reset again to get Tiamat.
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Once you get Tiamat, your goal is really simple: Q through the minions, use your Passive and Tiamat active and delete the wave. After that, roam with your ultimate to whichever sidelane you can and create advantages that way. You do not have to interact a lot with your enemy laner, in fact, it's preferable to not do so: you get so much tempo from pushing the waves so quickly that you can focus on every fundamental, jungle tracking, and getting objectives such as Voidgrubs or Dragon. This is a very consistent way of getting leads.
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Into the midgame, your gameplan has some alterations depending on the build you chose: Ravenous-Hexplate has way better splitpush and thrives against melees that try to contest waves, as you heal a lot. Given you have a lot of sustain you can stay in the sidelanes longer, your goal is to make people come at you, but this isn't always the case. Stridebreaker-Cleaver is better at catching as you have a really good slow and a movement speed bonus from both these items. As you build tank after that, your goal is to absorb pressure and use the sidelane more as a way to join your team faster than whoever decides to get the minions.
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Nocturne doesn't really have a particulary good Lategame, but should you have a game that gets to this point, your mindset stays pretty much the same: playing with the waves as mentioned before and trying to build tank items so that you can prevent yourself from dying in teamfights while focusing key threats such as Carries and DPS Mages with your Ultimate.
Biggest Mistakes
- Finishing Tier 2 Boots before your first Core Item.
- Not being conscious about the enemy's selfpeel, this includes any ability they have AND items like Zhonya's, GA's and even Flash.
- Not calling off plays when you don't have Ultimate.
- Not hovering Nocturne so that your teammates know that they might have to pick AP.
- Not calling for objectives with your early game pressure.
- Not swapping for Farsight Alteration at level 9. This ward allows you to chase enemies that get out of vision so that you can Ult them, and is incredibly important to get.
Conclusion
- If you have read this far, I wanna thank you for taking the time to do so. I've been passionate about this champion for around 5 years and as it got nerfed and less people played Nocturne, I started to have less and less content to watch so that I could learn how to play him. This is where I wondered if anything I could make would be useful for other people, so that they may enjoy Midlane Nocturne as much as I do. I hope that I encouraged at least some of you to try Nocturne Mid, and feel free to ask me any questions in my Reddit, as I'm always available to that.
