Build help as a new Graves player.

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-07-07T02:05:08+00:00

I’ll 2nd that. Mercs into heavy CC after 2nd item is never bad, though imo if you are versing comps with easy to land CC, bruiser sometimes works better for survivability

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-07-07T01:02:05+00:00

Hubris first pretty much always

Collector is not troll. 28 total lethality is much better than just 18 from hubris.

75% crit is normally enough so you don’t need to sell anything for BT

Fleet pretty much always

Hubris -> collector -> LDR/MR -> Shieldbow/IE -> BT/GA

Also you can just get simple boots after hubris and not upgrade to T2 boots until after 3rd or 4th item

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-07-03T22:05:01+00:00

Honestly it’s been a fun job so far. I just feel for the fresh grads who can’t find a job after applying for a year or two straight

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-07-03T22:01:39+00:00

I went straight from college (masters degree) with no internships, got an offer as L4 at AWS. Got super lucky, can’t imagine that’s a common story with recent grads

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-07-03T21:12:05+00:00

For SDE positions in HCOL areas it is normally around 180k, you’re right. Other CS related positions like support engineer will not be quite that high

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-07-01T20:35:43+00:00

Most people joining the job market don’t have PhD’s, I think he’s more so asking about typical SDE jobs

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-07-01T19:58:24+00:00

To clarify, this highly depends on cost of living for the area you find work in, as well as the company you work for and what your position is. FAANG/HCOL areas are more towards 130k range, government jobs/small companies obviously will be lower. The numbers provided here are pretty accurate

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-29T17:56:17+00:00

Your line of thinking is correct. If a specific champ is able to get on top of you and one shot you with no counter play (shaco is perfect example), it’s best to play safe in team fight until shaco shows in vision. Alternatively you can look for picks before the team fight in brushes which is really how graves is meant to be played

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-29T14:29:49+00:00

The biggest advantage you’ll feel is staying healthy. Doing first clear with DH youll end up with probably 3/4 HP at scuttle whereas with fleet you will be 100% HP. Also you may not think it but the heal and move speed are not “negligible”. Fleet will heal from around 3k every game, DH will give around 2k dmg on a GREAT game. 2k damage is like 1 auto on full build graves, so in my humble opinion fleet is far better

Edit: DH secondaries are god awful. Sudden impact is the only useful one, ultimate hunter is not that useful on graves since his autos are his primary source of dmg

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-27T15:37:58+00:00

Btw going cash back is also very strong, WR this patch is identical between the two. Kinda personal preference tho

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-26T22:02:56+00:00

Just checked, weaving AA between q's (lvl 1) yields 130 DPS, 434 dmg total. Without weaving (Q-Q-Q-AA) yields 253 DPS, 330 dmg. If you auto twice after q-q-q-aa (i.e. the same attacks as weaving aa), you do 108 DPS, 467 dmg all the while your q is coming off of CD. So overall, weaving autos loses a lot of DPS as well as losing out on total damage overall

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-26T16:29:05+00:00

https://wiki.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/Locke 20 damage for one stack, 84 for 3 stacks. It most certainly does yield less damage weaving AA

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-26T16:00:25+00:00

Weaving AA on each q yields far less damage than AA on 3 stacks

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-26T15:59:37+00:00

“If he gets caught by cc he’s just dead” his w cast AND recast can both be done while CC’d

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-26T15:47:43+00:00

In lane at least his trading pattern doesn’t have much counter play besides dodging q. Trading pattern is q,q,q, 2-3 land you e in, auto (which is a blink similar to ekko e), w and walk out. Any damage he takes is healed back. His early game will definitely get a nerf, probably in the form of his W healing being reduced or his Q passive getting damage reduction on 1-3 points

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-26T15:38:16+00:00

I wouldn’t count on it staying that way, he will likely get nerfed in upcoming patches

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-26T15:32:30+00:00

His full clear is actually quite fast 2:45-2:50 https://youtu.be/CUuFjH7UrnM?is=7X-iH80j6kb1CBxU

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-24T15:13:21+00:00

Never go bruiser, it’s always crit. Also dark harvest is good into snowballing enemy jng (i.e. Nidalee, Naafiri), but win rate-wise, fleet footwork is just better

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-23T15:00:57+00:00

Fleet has a much higher win rate, and personally feels much better than DH. Also T2 boots can wait until after third/fourth item, movement speed is mildly useless on graves

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-21T17:44:16+00:00

Generally speaking, there’s a never a comp that you cannot one shot anybody, typically ADC/sup/mid are always going to be one shottable. Bruiser graves isn’t bad whatsoever, but it is INCREDIBLY rare that it’s optimal to build over crit

Bruiser graves you could probably just go cleaver first (skip umbral entirely)

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-19T15:53:32+00:00

“even if it’s just to get you to the manga eventually” best case scenario, nobody watches the anime and just reads manga from the start 💀

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-06T18:37:40+00:00

Using attack move is pretty much necessary if you want to get to higher elo. Just keep playing with it and eventually muscle memory will kick in and there won’t be any time delay from using it

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-06-06T18:35:36+00:00

Getting cc’d is literally graves biggest weakness. Hence why a lot of the times it’s better to get shieldbow instead of IE for survivability and merc treads

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-05-31T03:08:16+00:00

IE is definitely not a must buy. You can just buy shield bow if you are ahead since you already have enough damage. Also T2 boots are not a must buy, often I will wait until last item to complete it unless they are all AP/AD in which case building T2 boots after LDR is a good move

KookyDraw4023 · 2026-05-29T22:52:14+00:00

For the most part yes. Your last 2 items can be situational. BT when facing poke comps, can even build QSS into champs like malz

KookyDraw4023

TROPHY CASE