LoL Wild Rift Rakan Build & Guide (Patch 5.0) - Runes, Counters, Items, Ability Analysis

S Tier

Class: Support

Recommended Lane: Support

Best Rakan Wild Rift build guide for Season 11 Patch 5.0 of WR. With our Rakan guide you will learn which items to build, runes to select, skill order, who counters Rakan, and how to use abilities properly.

Recommended Builds

Starting Item

Boots

Core Items

Complete Build

Runes

Starting Item

Boots

Core Items

Complete Build

Runes

Rakan, the greatest battle-dancer of the Lhotlan tribe, is an infamous vastayan troublemaker. Few would suspect that this energetic, traveling showman is also a partner to the rebel Xayah, and is dedicated to her cause. Rakan is a support with a swagger unlike any other. His flashy playstyle along with his loaded utility kit makes him one of the best support champions to pick if you want to carry your team.

Rakan Wild Rift Build Recommendation

Here are Item Build Recommendations that works on this champion and which are the best build for Rakan Wild Rift in this patch.

The Offensive Charmer

This Rakan Wild Rift build is ideal and a standard one if you’re trying to go for a support with a bit of tankiness and utility.

Imperial Mandate – Crowd control grants additional ally damage
Protector’s Vow – After taking damage, you and your ally receives a shield
Zeke’s Convergence – Boosts allies Attack Damage
Frozen Heart – Reduces enemy Attack Speed
Randuin’s Omen – Attack to heal from enemy Critical Strikes

The Defensive Dancer

Use this Rakan Wild Rift item build if you are the only tank in your team. It is a mostly tank build composition so you’ll be able to control the battlefield independent from your ADC. You are still a support but you will be able to tank more damage reliably than if you are using an AP support build..

Deadman’s Plate grants you bonus HP, armor, and additional movement speed which are useful for Rakan. Your next basic attack on max momentum will also deal bonus magic damage and will slow down the enemy.
Protector’s Vow adds another layer of protection for your team as it grants a shield to you and a nearby ally when you or the teammate is attacked.
Randuin’s Omen adds an effective layer of defense against ADCs who are particularly strong in the late game. Other viable defensive item options are Thornmail to counter high sustain champions and Force of Nature to counter strong magic damage DPS.

Runes for Rakan in Wild Rift

Electrocute makes you deal so much damage with your combos. This is perfect for a Rakan player who loves to roam and be aggressive in the early game. Aftershock grants Rakan bonus armor and magic resist after controlling an enemy so it is great for surviving dives and initiations. It also deals AoE damage after a short while.
Weakness increases the damage the enemy receives after being controlled by you.
Hunter – Titan increases your HP and crowd control resistance. If there is no threatening crowd control on the enemy team, use Loyalty instead.
Pack hunter increases your movement speed when near allies and takedowns together with a unique ally will grant both you and the ally a little bonus gold.

Spells

In our Rakan Wild Rift Guide, here are the best champion spells that you can equip on him.

You can opt to equip Ignite if you believe that you will be playing as the lane bully. If not…

Equip Exhaust instead for the additional way to protect your teammate as it decreases the movement speed and attack damage of an enemy champion. You can also use this summoner spell to secure kills through the slow.

If your ADC decides to equip Barrier, equip Heal for your lane’s emergency sustain.

After selecting one of the above, of course, equip Flash as it grants a lot of offensive options for Rakan.

Skill Order

Q, Gleaming Quill is maxed first to increase its damage, range, and heal amount. 2nd, Grand Entrance is maxed next to increase its damage and knock up duration and decrease its cooldown. E, Battle Dance is maxed last as it is primarily used for mobility purposes, the shielding is secondary. Get a point in your ultimate whenever possible.

Abilities

Fey Feathers

Passive

Every 40s, gains a 31 health shield (31 +80% AP). Attacks and abilities on enemy champions reduce this cooldown by 1s.

Lover’s Leap – Xayah and Rakan can join each other’s recall. Both will reach the Summoning Platform at the time of which the initiator’s recall ends.

Gleaming Quill

Active

Flings a magical feather that deals 70 magic damage (70 + 60% AP) to the first enemy hit.

If the feather hits a champion or epic monster, Rakan restores 22 health (15 + 7 + 70% AP) to himself and nearby allies after 3s or when he touches an ally.

Grand Entrance

Active

Dashes to a location. Upon arrival Rakan leaps into the air, dealing 70 magic damage (70 + 70% AP) and knocking up enemies for 1s.

Battle Dance

Active

Flies to an allied champion, granting them a shield that absorbs 45 damage (45 + 80% AP) for 3s. Can be re-cast for free within 5s.

When cast on Xayah, the shield amount is doubled and the cooldown is reduced.

The Quickness

Active

Gains 50% Movement Speed for 4 seconds. Touching enemies deals 100 magic damage (100 + 50% AP) and charms them for 1s. This may only occur once per unit. The first champion charmed grants Rakan 100% decaying Movement Speed.

Abilities Analysis

Innate Passive: Fey Feathers

Rakan gains a shield after a few seconds have passed. The shield scales through AP so Rakan will be tanky even if you build him with AP support items.

The shield from Fey Feathers allows you extra room for absorbing damage when you are diving in using your 2nd, Grand Entrance. In the earlier stages of the game, you’ll want to wait for Fey Feathers to be active before going in to minimize the risk of diving as Rakan is not exactly that tanky especially in the early game.

Every time Rakan hits an enemy champion with his auto attacks or abilities, the cooldown for Fey Feathers is reduced by one second. Hitting multiple enemies with 2nd, Grand Entrance, and Ult, The Quickness reduces the cooldown of Fey Shield fast because each champion hit registers a one-second reduction in the cooldown of Fey Feathers.

Q | 1st: Gleaming Quill

Gleaming Quill is a short-range skill shot which deals magic damage to the first enemy hit. It has a short distance and a relatively long cooldown so it is unreliable to use as a poke harass.

If Gleaming Quill hits an enemy champion or Epic monster (Drakes, Rift Herald, Baron), it releases an aura around Rakan that heals him and nearby allies after a short duration or when he comes in contact with allies.

A reliable usage of Gleaming Quill is through Rakan’s basic combo which goes like this:

2nd, Grand Entrance+ 1st, Gleaming Quill + 3rd, Battle Dance

Through this combo, you will be able to damage the enemy team while healing yourself and your teammates using Gleaming Quill.

Gleaming Quill heals everyone around you in a small radius so it’s a way to affect multiple allies with Ardent Censer‘s buff. In comparison, you can only apply Ardent Censer on one ally at a time when using your 3rd, Battle Dance. Remember that you don’t have to wait for the heal to take effect, just come close to your ally, and in dire situations, dash to your ally using 3rd, Battle Dance to instantly apply a shield and the heal.

W | 2nd: Grand Entrance

Grand Entrance is one of Rakan’s crowd control and mobility ability. The ability has two parts. First, Rakan dashes to the target location then after a short delay, he leaps, damaging and knocking up enemies around him.

Grand Entrance has currently, I’m speaking out of my experience, a bug where he jumps away from enemy champions when the ability is simply tapped and there was an instance where it happened while the enemy is portrait locked.

To avoid embarrassing yourself like how I embarrassed myself, always manually aim Grand Entrance in the meantime.

Since Grand Entrance has a delay before it knocks enemies up, the enemy will have enough time to cast their mobility abilities, flash, or even simply walk away if they are near the edge of the ability. You can counteract this using these methods:

The very basic one is, of course, to cast in from brushes.
Stay behind your ally and cast 3rd, Battledance then immediately follow up with Grand Entrance. Practice the timing for a seamless effect and less time to react for the enemy.
Flash then cast Grand Entrance. Grand Entrance then Flashing does not work. I repeat, Grand Entrance + Flash does not work.
Activate your Ult, The Quickness to turn your combo into a two-part crowd control. Once you activate your ultimate, the dash of Grand Entrance will charm enemies you passed through then the knock-up will follow.

Combine these methods for maximum effect.

Grand Entrance makes it easy for you to land your 1st, Gleaming Quill.

The dash part of Grand Entrance can be used to pass through walls.

2nd, Grand Entrance+ 1st, Gleaming Quill + 3rd, Battle Dance is one of Rakan’s basic combo that allows him to damage enemies, control them, and then heal himself and a teammate.

E | 3rd: Battle Dance

Battle Dance is Rakan’s defensive mobility tool. It is a targeted dash that can only be used on allies and once used on them, they are shielded upon Rakan’s arrival. Battle Dance can be used twice.

Battle Dance can still be used offensively by hiding behind an ally, preferably out of sight, then charging forward using this ability to surprise enemies. Surprised enemies are easier targets and once you do a round of your combo, use the second cast of Battle Dance to disengage to safety.

The dash distance and shield amount is doubled when Xayah is the target. The shield amount does not stack so do not re-cast Battle Dance immediately on a single target in the hopes of increasing the shield value. Re-cast after a few seconds or once the shield has been used to maximize the ability’s value.

Battle Dance allows Rakan to pass through walls if the target ally is beyond the wall.

R | Ultimate: The Quickness

The Quickness grants Rakan a huge movement speed bonus. Enemies passed by Rakan during The Quickness’s duration are damaged and charmed.

Rakan can pass enemies through walking or by using his abilities, 2nd, Grand Entrance or 3rd, Battle Dance, and through Flash.

The movement speed bonus increases upon charming a champion for the first time.

Pass through as many champions as possible to maximize the value out of The Quickness. You don’t have to memorize who you have already charmed because champions who are not charmed yet have a yellow mark above their head.

Combos:

Basic Trading Combo: 2nd + 1st + 3rd

All-in 1 (long range with disengage): Ult + 3rd + Flash + 2nd + 1st + 3rd

All-in 2 (extreme range without disengage): Ult + 3rd + 3rd + Flash + 2nd + 1st

Rakan Early Game Guide

Rakan is slightly on the weaker side on the first two levels so avoid pairing with champions with weak wave clear as you’ll be a sitting duck when you are out leveled.

Do not attempt to use your abilities offensively until level 3 where you’ll have access to all your abilities. Even then, it will be better to play it safe until level 5 especially if the enemy has access to crowd control which they can use to stop your combo short and punish you for overextending.

If they use and miss their crowd controls, do your basic combo to decrease their HP while increasing yours.

Wait for the enemy to make mistakes and capitalize on them as you are a support who can snowball well.

Once you reach level 5, you can play more aggressively so you and your ADC can do an all-in which will work well most of the time thanks to your multiple crowd controls.

Rakan Late Game Guide

In the later stages of the game, try to hide yourself away from the enemy’s vision so you can surprise them with your all-in combo when they expect it the least.

One of Rakan’s greatest strengths is initiating from afar so take advantage of this.

After successfully pulling off a good team charm and knock-up, the enemy will be discouraged to group up and that will increase your team’s chance of picking off the enemy one by one and will make it easier for your team to control objectives.

Make sure to keep tabs on your allies so you can shield them on time using your 3rd, Battle Dance.

It can be fun to dive on enemies with your many mobility abilities but make sure that the enemy’s hard crowd control won’t be able to affect you first as you can be easily shut down if you are kept in place.

Rakan Video Guide

Synergies

For our Rakan Wild Rift Guide, we highly recommend using him with the following champions as they synergize well with him.

Xayah is Rakan’s partner and for a good reason. Rakan has a lot of crowd control which allows Xayah to set up a lot of Feathers and deal tons of damage through 3rd, Bladecaller, and her auto attacks. Rakan’s 3rd, Battle Dance has a stronger effect, longer range, and lower cooldown when used on Xayah.

Never-ending mayhem and mobility is the theme of Rakan and Tristana. They have strong level 3 and level 5 power spikes together so this duo is something to watch out.

Rakan’s crowd controls can provide a good setup for Miss Fortune’s ultimate, Bullet Time. Her strong early game also increases Rakan’s early game potency.

Varus and Rakan is a duo who can control the enemy team for days.

All Rakan Wild Rift Counter Champions

In this section, we’ll specifically show champions that can easily counter Rakan in Wild Rift.

Lux’s Light Binding can easily stop Rakan in his tracks. A controlled Rakan is a dead Rakan.

Janna can easily render Rakan’s combo useless by disengaging the fight using her ultimate, Monsoon. The knock-up from her 1st, Howling Gale, and the slow from her 2nd, Zephyr is also a pain for Rakan.

Pros & Cons About Rakan

Here are some pros and cons if you are playing with Rakan in Wild Rift.

Pros

Rakan is a support champion that does not feel like you are playing in the back seat. He is capable of a lot of agency in the game because of his loaded kit with lots of crowd control, mobility, damage, and utility.
He has high AP ratios which do not only makes him do more damage but also makes him tankier. Even so, you don’t really have to build him AP items to make him an effective team fighter.
Rakan’s extreme mobility and crowd control allow him to take control and carry the team on his back on team fights.

Cons

Rakan’s cooldowns are extremely high. He has extreme highs but long downtimes especially in the early game.
He is extremely vulnerable to crowd control because his survivability and effectiveness are highly dependent on weaving in and out of a fight. Even when he is played tank he is easily hurt by crowd control as he might be able to survive but when his combo is cut short by crowd control, his effectiveness drastically decreases.

FAQ's About Rakan in Wild Rift

How good is Rakan in Wild Rift?

Rakan is an (Tier S) champion. He has a lot of mobility and crowd control which makes him an extremely strong team fighter and team fight compositions are the meta right now so Rakan fits perfectly.

What role / lane should I play with Rakan in Wild Rift?

Rakan is traditionally played as a support. He is most effective in the Dragon lane and laning him elsewhere is not currently recommended.

What abilities do I level up with Rakan?

2nd, Grand Entrance is the ability first maxed on Rakan for the additional damage, knock up duration, and decreased cooldown. 3rd, Battle Dance is maxed next for the increased shield amount and decreased cooldown. and 1st, Gleaming Quill is maxed last as it provides the least utility in terms of Rakan’s playstyle.

What items should I build with Rakan?

In support champions like Rakan, build the boots enchant with the Redeeming Enchant or Locket Enchant. After that, build Deadman’s Plate for survivability and movement speed or build Ardent Censer to boost the damage of your ADC.

What Runes should I use when playing as Rakan?

Aftershock works best with Rakan as it increases his damage and survability when he’s initiating or diving. His other runes are Weakness, Hunter – Titan, and Packhunter.

What are tips with initiating and/or team fighting with Rakan?

Stay outside of the enemy’s vision and take advantage of the movement speed bonus from his ultimate, The Quickness and the mobility from 3rd, Battle Dance to surprise your enemies. If you caught the enemy unprepared, you can control more enemies.

List of all Wild Rift Champion builds

Last updated on May 15th, 2023