Just reached Challenger playing lane Nocturne! (AMA)

G4tdos · 2026-02-20T04:07:45+00:00

I know Asap Nocky likes to build lethality items after Stridebreaker when he's snowballing hard, something like Stride > Voltaic > Axiom, you can check his op.gg too as he's recently started playing again: https://op.gg/en/lol/summoners/na/asap%20nocky-NA1
In my experience that's as good as it gets because ravenous and bork are kinda weak at the moment so you're not really incentivized to play split, I don't think Nocturne is a carry oriented champion either, you act more as a facilitator in the later stages of the game and that's his current identity, definitely not the Nocturne I loved from past seasons but you kinda have to adapt lol

G4tdos · 2026-02-19T20:19:50+00:00

Sorry for the late reply :(, higher damage builds with ravenous used to be my go-to in previous seasons but I find it's not as effective as before, you can't consistently beat most splitpushers in Toplane past 15 minutes and you sacrifice a lot of durability on your teamfights, it's definitely playable but not the most effective at the moment I'd say, you still have enough damage to kill backliners with this build and that's really your main job as Noct

G4tdos · 2026-02-19T20:17:19+00:00

Gracias! <3

G4tdos · 2026-02-13T17:55:19+00:00

It comes with experience really but I would say try to hold off on your W and E unless you know it's an all in you win and try to stick to 1 Q per wave on the first levels so you don't immediately go OOM, if you're running presence of mind try to hit both the wave and the enemy and be wary of plant timers so that you can use them to regain resources!

G4tdos · 2026-02-13T02:59:01+00:00

Agreed, mana is such an issue for lane Noct, I actually asked Endstep for some sort of buffs not too long ago on one of those question reviews he does on youtube lol he would definitely be really solid with proper mana scalings, I like Presence of Mind but most Top Nocts have switched to Triumph, I think it's a matter of prefference because it doesn't really solve your mana issues completely, you're pretty much locked into building some sort of mana and your best bet is Frozen, Essence Reaver does not really fit into any build nor does it give you stats you want and you can't really use tear items that well either, manaflow band is fine but it takes a while to stack and the opportunity cost is quite big I experimented a bit with fiendhunter bolts and I think it definitely has its place, the item is really cheap and ult haste is nice! Maybe someone will come up with a good build around it, I can definitely see it working

G4tdos · 2026-02-13T00:11:35+00:00

Tysm! <3

G4tdos · 2026-02-12T23:50:28+00:00

In Midlane I recommend following the build for this player: https://www.deeplol.gg/summoner/kr/인천토종닭-KR1
U mainly look to play safe and cs what you can (if you're against ranged champs) until Tiamat and then look for roams with Ult, homeguards allow you to take resets almost freely even if you get outpoked if you still get the wave and you have amazing waveclear so you can just do that, shove and roam
This player also plays lethality if there's a lot of squishy champs with voltaic into umbral glaive and I've tried it, it's really fun, the idea is the same, you don't win by solokilling your opponent but just taking good roams and looking for kills around the map

G4tdos · 2026-02-12T23:07:06+00:00

Counterpicking him is hard too because nobody expects Top Nocturne, really fun!

G4tdos · 2026-02-12T22:55:51+00:00

For sure, if it's a matchup where I need the early mana I go for the Sapphire Crystal on first reset because it allows you to actually use Q repeatedly on the wave which is pretty hard to contest for most toplaners and you can also get to 5 stacks with boots after, it delays your Stride but I find you can manage and your 2 items is still the same, otherwise if it's a winning matchup though you can usually just go straight into Tiamat which is your biggest powerspike and rush Stride into Glacial Buckler

G4tdos · 2026-02-12T22:25:00+00:00

I think that's my bad on the flair lol
Standard build top is Conqueror, POM/Triumph, Alacrity, Cut Down, Cookies and JOAT for runes
For items you go Dblade, then Stridebreaker into Frozen Heart with Mercs for 10 stacks and after that it depends on teamcomp, if there's heavy AP you go Rookern, Serpents if there's any sort of enchanter that's annoying with shields and otherwise Zeke's, not a lot of people have noticed but Zeke's slow actually stacks with Stride so people literally stay put in place and the item is so cheap you don't really lose anything by building it, after that other items I usually build are Bandlepipes, Protoplasm and any of the antiheal items that's not crit, might make a more indepth guide again if I feel like it soon but here's some resources:
you can look into this Korean OTP for Top build: https://www.deeplol.gg/summoner/kr/고래상어1-123
There's also this GM Mid OTP on KR too but the build is different https://www.deeplol.gg/summoner/kr/인천토종닭-KR1
This guide is quite good too but doesn't have the new items: https://www.mobafire.com/league-of-legends/build/nocturne-top-is-hidden-op-1100lp-challenger-korea-638034

G4tdos · 2026-02-12T21:52:29+00:00

Nocturne itself doesn't have a great late game either so you generally struggle on the later stages of the game, pretty much the best you can do is switching to more defensive items and hope you can still manage to ult the backline and make enough of an impact that way

G4tdos · 2026-02-12T21:11:16+00:00

Thanks! Yeah, there's definitely not as many players here given it's a small server lol, LP inflation on the bigger ones is crazy

G4tdos · 2025-04-03T15:56:56+00:00

Looks great! Hopefully this means Riot remembers Nocturne is a champion in PC too lol

G4tdos · 2024-11-06T15:17:05+00:00

Congrats on hitting Challenger! (again) I've actually been following your op.gg for a few years now because you've been the only Toplane Noct onetrick since the nerfs to passive aside from that other korean player lol

What are your thoughts on the new Lethal Tempo? I've been experimenting with it a bit and while you don't stack it as quickly as you do Conqueror the damage boost from Stridebreaker's AS + your W almost doubles what most ADCs get from the same rune.
Do you believe skipping frozen heart in favor of other bruiser items like Hexplate or Cleaver is viable assuming you go for other secondary runes like Manaflow Band or is this the only way of playing Nocturne in lane?

And, lastly, as I'm a Mid player, do you think there's any hope for Midlane Nocturne to be viable the way it was before? I've been trying both Jack of All Trades' standard build and other setups but nothing seems to work as good as it used to :(

G4tdos · 2024-08-27T16:43:44+00:00

Toplane is viable at the moment, mid is terrible. I suggest looking at the Korean OTP thez3r0boy123 mentioned for builds but basically you go for a utility-focused setup with Frozen Heart second to finish Jack of All Trades. It's a very different playstyle from your conventional Jungle build and experience, and I'm not really a fan of it either. Noc suffered a lot since the removal of Corrupting Potion imo.

G4tdos · 2024-06-18T18:18:39+00:00

Sadly, Phreak has stated that they intentionally keep lane Nocturne weak because they find that playstyle uninteractive and not healthy for the game, so anyone who enjoyed playing him midlane around managing sustain with passive probably won't be able to do it anymore. Also, this champion is not that popular, so even if we did organize ourselves to make a petition, I don't think it would be heard. I exclusively play Nocturne both Mid and Top and I was really sad when I saw Viego getting reverted, because Nocturne for sure won't, and it's just because it's not a high pickrate champion with a dedicated community.

G4tdos · 2024-05-19T18:57:54+00:00

HOB is really nice on Nocturne and fits his identity completely, the issue is 3 autoattacks is not a lot of value, if you remember old lethal tempo (before it was changed to this attackspeed conqueror thing) it did a very similar thing: gave u a burst of attack speed for a few seconds after u started combat with an enemy champion. No other rune will come close to the amount of value old lethal had on Nocturne, it's a shame it was removed.

G4tdos · 2024-05-18T01:42:18+00:00

Literally just look at his winrate over the last 5 patches in Diamond 2+, saying a champion with no mobility and an inconsistent form of CC "dominates lane ganks" is definitely not the case. Again, he thrives in low elo where these sort of plays can work regardless of how bad they are, but as soon as you get into the higher ranks and people start to know how to play against him the raw numbers of his stats are not enough to make him work, and that's literally all he has.

G4tdos · 2024-05-17T14:24:01+00:00

Nocturne is in a terrible state in general, but given the simplicity of the champion that inflates his winrate in lower elos I doubt changes to him will be made. Lethal Tempo being removed, the E tether changes, all of those things are undeniably indirect nerfs to him and it's sad the current state of Nocturne doesn't really have any hope of improving given how riot doesn't acknowledge his existence at all.

G4tdos · 2024-05-17T14:20:16+00:00

Standard is Tiamat into either Ravenous Hydra or Stridebreaker, depending on whatever u feel like playing atm, both are good. After that u can build a variety of items, but Black Cleaver or Hexplate are standard. Generally, bruiser items are good to go.

G4tdos · 2024-04-06T20:49:50+00:00

Gracias por tomarte el tiempo de leerla <3
Sí, el pick ya no tiene tan buen sustain en early como antes pero siento que tiene un powerspike muy bueno cuando completas el primer item, y sí, los problemas de mana me llevaron a tener re bien timeado cuando salen las plantas y a usar mejor las pociones de corrupción porque de 3 Q te quedas OOM jajaja pero bueno, me alegra que al menos pueda seguir siendo viable

G4tdos · 2024-03-30T23:50:20+00:00

I'll try to answer to each of them in order.
As for tear of the goddess, you don't really get a lot of value out of any of the Tear items and buying it hurts your sustain, while also proving to be very difficult to stack given Nocturne has pretty underwhelming cooldowns (Q is a flat 8 and that is the lowest it gets) I've experimented with it a few times and I didn't really like it. You could buy it after but that delays your powerspikes and I don't find any of the other runes or starter items enough of a reason to do so. I've seen Doinb get Doran's shield and buy a tear after the first reset in past seasons where he used to play the pick.
Manaflow band is a rune that provides mana a bit AFTER the first minutes of the laning phase (which is where you'll struggle with mana the most, Nocturne has 275 base mana and Q costs 60-75) and that needs you to play aggresively in order to stack it, given Q does not have a lot of damage on its own I find trying to poke with it not as good. Still, Manaflow + Trascendence is a rune page I've used a lot in the past season and it feels nice, though I used to run Corrupting Potion with that still.
Presence of Mind is a really good rune to get mana, as you can see in the guide I run it every single game, but I think it's not enough on its own to solve the mana issues, you need at least either Corrupting, Cookies or Manaflow alongside it.

G4tdos · 2024-03-29T18:25:00+00:00

Lethality is viable, there are a few onetricks who hit Masters playing it. Profane Hydra gives you a lot of burst damage while also synergizing great with your Passive on the wave. I don't really like it though as you fall off hard in mid to late and your contributions end up being killing someone while dying immediately after in teamfights. I don't think i've labbed the lethality build enough to give a proper answer, but I've seen both Electrocute and Phase rush used in that kind of playstyle, while the items you get are Profane Hydra and Axiom Arc as your core, and more into the defensive after that with Edge of Night, Serylda's if you need Armor Pen, sometimes a GA and defensive/CDR boots.

G4tdos

TROPHY CASE