How to build & play SMOLDER the CORRECT WAY

Smolder has much more reliable winrates going Riftmaker or Shojin builds instead of Navori and Essence Reaver. Build him as a Bruiser not as Crit!
0:00 Smolder Mid 1
25:14 Smolder Mid 2
52:42 Smolder Bot
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[@lolersthe4th880]

After spending a video complaining about him, I see chat actually baited him to making a full on commentary on this champ lmao.

[@jamsolid]

must have been a big ol dono XD

[@emilcastagnier391]

Lol! True!

[@shiah]

I mean, he's still complaining :)

[@kim-sp6ey]

I'm a simple person: I see an AP item on a Pekin thumbnail video of an AD champion, and I watch it immediately

[@alienchalseu7597]

lmaoo same

[@ShinYamiZakura]

The second I saw a random player start Doran Ring on Smolder in my game, I didn't think "What is this guy doing", but "Can't wait for Pekin to upload AP Smolder"

[@Zackapo]

im a simple person.

[@Artytanium]

8:40 so I guess we're moving on from meassuring damage in Lux ults to Smolder moms

[@jayson6360]

It’s just queer representation. Katarina has 2 moms and therefor a more fulfilled life.

[@karamellu]

@@jayson6360 hell nah

[@strongerthanever2039]

Your mom so fat she deals 5k true damage

[@decidueyezealot8611]

@jayson6360 as a queen this made me laugh xc

[@cxiuart]

29:55 the stunned silence after kayn q's LOL

[@KlickPy]

It tilted me and I wasn't even playing

[@chocobo4646]

Truly a vexing play.

[@jonathanrussell8998]

8:23 Smolder Q moving like a Zoe Q there XD

[@kerkefe6968]

That vex throw the game lmao

[@pqnet84]

Yeh but luckily she can't do that anymore with Vanguard. It has a thing that installs directly in your brain and will make sure it is not hacked.

[@Vorpalwarp]

A lot of the times when I've seen this build done, the Smolder puts 3 points W, then Maxes out the Q before maxing out the W to ensure that the sneeze never is one-shotting the caster minions. Idk if that would actually be good or not but figured I'd mention it. Thank you for the upload!

[@danthem9210]

he does this in games 2 and 3 so im guessing game 1 he made a mistake taking 5 into w

[@Sniper101Assassin]

Should do two points w max q then max E. You need the movement mid-late game.

[@QueenTheCossackTongued]

I like how Pekins, someone who is an amazing player. will still fight Katarina and be shocked when she hundreds to zeroes you in the middle of the wave despite tons of videos where he, Pekins, does the same to other people as Katarina

[@scrapox217]

To be fair that last game wasn't smolder being weak but your team throwing at every turn

[@StefanLopuszanski]

How? That was Vex's fault for not defending and Kindred for losing Baron.

[@En2AM]

​@@StefanLopuszanski that's what he said lmao

[@StefanLopuszanski]

@@En2AM : Must have misread

[@kyle709]

I think there is a high likelihood that vex was win trading or boosted. Who the hell TPs to baron there? That's some iron level macro and that may even be an insult to iron players.

[@carwithknIfe]

​@@kyle709yeah vex was paid by the chinese to lose the game

[@mathijsfrank9268]

"She can probably one-shot me" "Wow I died immediately"

[@legacy_moments]

THAT LAST GAME'S ENDING LMAOOOOO

[@ryanrodgers3099]

I think they could do just a few things on Smolder to "fix" him, or at least put him in a state where they can actually just tweak numbers. 1) Ult doesn't fizzle on death (honestly it feels like it should do *more* damage considering it's his *mom* and her baby boy just got murdered). It just feels dumb and un-intuitive that it fizzles. 2) Smooth out his power from stacks. It's so back-loaded with a huge spike at 225. I think if you split up the true damage burn from the execute to be able to offer that earlier in the game it would help with the pressure. Maybe it even starts as flat true damage before upgrading to %max hp or flat + %max 3) Give some kind of reset mechanic to E. Maybe. Might be a bit much, but if you lock it behind stacks as well that might be alright. Like on a take down it reduces the cooldown by a % scaling with stacks? I think the above would be huge for making him "balanceable" where they can adjust numbers etc. to get him in a good place. Right now I don't think the "pieces" are there. Feels like he's hamstringed by having so much power on that 225 stack threshold right now.

[@DustinHarms]

It was actually pretty cool to have 2 games of Smolder Mid against the exact same champ, exact same opponent even. Gave a real idea of 2 sides of the coin.

[@derechte6086]

I rlly like that u include several games it gives a better view into the champion and its pretty unique because not many people do it like u but its still very comfortable to watch

[@metuos.3651]

I feel like this is going to be another early-release Kayle situation. I've had several games where the enemy just free-stacks all game with zero interaction, and I can't do anything about it myself because he just E's away every time, no ganks, nothing. Even worse is that he's getting picked top to exploit the melees again, meaning that he's going to get nerfed in every other lane to compensate.

[@aironaspudymaitis3695]

Maybe I mean check vayne she dominate top but they even buffed her indirectly in both of her buffs

[@aironaspudymaitis3695]

Plus it's not like he wins top that hard

[@northlord804]

3 games in a row!!! Finally! I love it and I will watch every second of these videos.

[@DarkCha0s23]

Always thought that his elder buff after 225 would pair really nicely with liandrys. And since this champ has really low base hp, this build allows him to get tanky, while still having good dmg output due to his stacks, burn and riftmaker.

[@Sniper101Assassin]

Yeah I’m also a fan after those three to ignore damage items and even rapid fire. Just go full tank with either MR items or the iceborne gauntlet for armor. And finishing with high HP tank items. Just become unkillable with movement and health and do tons of true damage.

[@PaullyDM]

Thanks for the video Pekin! Just promoted to plat playing this champ, went 14/1/4! Laned against a TF, went -8 CS by 10m (He had 90 I had 82) then I solo killed him by baiting him to flash under tower, precasted mom to save myself. I love this build, because not even my team knew why I was building it. XD

[@APimpNamedSlickback09]

Wp! I love seeing tf as a yasuo main. Easiest matchup by far.

[@gridmatrix6364]

You can ult the way you wanna escape. It's kinda like if you play Janna and q the "wrong" way. Hard to see it comming :p ... And I got acceptance of using ults and such more defined.. You're such a great summoner.

[@bib1677]

Thx for the daily vids Mr. Woof. Have a great day.

[@kurofire6473]

With you buying dark seal. You could try starting doran's ring and try comet smolder. We don't even use pta with the champ and fleet is sustain, maybe you can trade that for early damage with scorch and have more pressure in a solo lane with w start too.

[@kwezcoma]

Honestly by the 3rd game there’s no way i wouldn’t have banned Katarina

[@user-vf8ki4yv4c]

I know it's high elo so it's common to have same teammates or be against the same people, but it's still surprising to be against the same mid player not twice but THRICE

[@ratlinggull2223]

pekin romance arc

[@aviewerman]

isn't gamergirl katarina the one from your clip where you STOLE baron with luden's proc?

[@PekinWoof]

yes

[@giovannidozzi]

@@PekinWoof What do you think the nerfs to assassins should be? I, a while ago, made a post to Reddit about it. Here it is, there are a lot of words. Btw, reading over it again, there are quite a few grammar mistakes and other stuff, so sorry about that. Recently, it has come to my attention that the state that League of Legends is in is outright unfair and boring to play in. League of Legends has a few roles; some of these include assassins, tanks, fighters, and mages. Usually, assassins can quickly take out their enemies (but too, or get hit by an ability that ccs them, which is my focus on today; they should be killed); tanks that tank up a lot of damage, however, deal little; mages who are long-range providing CC, support, and burst damage or DPS in ability damage, preventing enemies from stacking just armour, and are squishy. In a sudden twist of events, some roles have become way too strong. Assassins, who are known to be risky and hard and require skill, suddenly do not require skill. Any assassin can usually auto-lock on a mage and quickly kill the poor mage within a second, without any counterplay from the mage's side. Now yes, that is the job of assassins, but let's see how they got there. In my example, I will use Yone, Yasuo, and Zed. Starting off, Yasuo will dash through a wave of minions (nearly unavoidable) and then CC the poor mage. Given the fact that the mage CCs Yasuo, his 2k+ hp, along with his high MR, will do little to no damage in a full burst. On the other hand, a single hit from a tornado from Yasuo will likely result in a quick death. Now this isn't the right thing for an assassin; they are not ameant to deal massive amounts of damage surpassing ADCs, but rather kill mages. They shouldn't have a dash, CC, a second dash, a lot of damage, and be tanky, but rather a select for portions: dash, CC, damage, but a lot of health bar, making getting CC'd fatal in most cases, or anything that does more than 2/3 of their health bar with a full ult combo from the mage. Furthermore, the skill shots of an assassin are usually very easy, especially when most of them are close-range champions, and it is almost impossible to miss dealing damage higher than an ADC. Overall, the current state of abilities that assassins possess is all across the board, making them too strong for everyone but tanks and requiring little to no skill. Currently, the state of tanks has taken a similar turn to that of assassins. Just yesterday, I was faced with a Mundo-I am Ezreal. He was by no means significantly stronger (I had 3 items, he had 3 1/2), and he was only two levels above me-highly usual as the support and ADC share a lane. Now Ezreal is regarded as the highest-dealing ADC in the game, provided that you land all your skill shots. Right here, the Mundo stood still dancing. I threw countless skill shots, all hitting, for 20s straight, but he was only 70% HP. He threw his suitcase at me, the one that slows you down (CC), and I am now 70% HP too. This example showing the pure overpowered nature of tanks and their overwhelming damage speaks for itself about how characters in one area shouldn't be strong in multiple other areas. Junglers share a similar problem to those of tanks and assassins, but combined. Many junglers have initiating abilities (as they should), but they also deal plenty of damage while having plenty of health. Let's look at Nafaari: an unavoidable ultimate, a shield of wolves that block plenty of damage, a large chunk of damage, fast clarity, and health that puts most top laners to shame; on the other hand, someone like Lux has just CC, burst damage (not DPS) that certainly doesn't kill you in a second, and requires a skill shot. This comparison writing in the sentences above highlights how Junglers do the jobs of mages often better than the mages themselves, with the honestly unnoticeable exception of slightly lacking in CC. Junglers, like assassins and tanks, are a horrible combination that shreds through all champions, creating a boring environment for ADCs, Supports, and half of the fellow population of mage mid laners. Now, one might say that mages are overpowered, but I think you are thinking in the past. The biggest concern people had was that mages were actually doing a nearly equal amount of burst damage (not DPS) as assassins. However, that item was changed: the previous 50% AP scaling with 100 AP base has changed to a 22% AP scaling, often only granting 300 damage magic damage at the end while dealing more than 35% (which isn't too popular at max level as junglers, tanks, and assassins have taken over the meta). Also, many propagandists often compare a normal assassin to a fed Lux, 'one shotting the enemy team with her 10s cool down laser'. Unlike these people, I am saying real scenarios, for any real Lux main will tell you that will an ultimate haste set up, the ultimate still takes 25s at max level, and does not deal anywhere close to 80% while super fed, especially not 100% for that matter. Many other people will also state that the fact that mages are still used in solo queues with a win rate near, and sometimes over, 50% means that mages are balanced, but this isn't true. Sure, mages have a 50% win rate; however, they are practically only valuable to the CC they provide, or the ADC-type mages who deal damage, along with low mobility and no CC unlike the others. To tally it together, mages are nowhere as overpowered as the evil alt-wing propagandists that assassins, tanks, and junglers appear to be, and they are actually underbalanced by far. I have a dream-a dream where all classes are equal and value skill-a dream where a mage can play and be a mage and score as close as an assassin. I dream of a world of equality. Assassins need their HP, CC, or dashes removed from their kits to add extra risk of engaging; tanks need to deal much less damage; and junglers shouldn't be able to have that much health and damage (maybe just 70%-80% of the health and damage they currently have). I believe in a future where people are equal. Aggregating it oxymoronically apart, removing the too-strong areas of classes, balances the game, ultimately resulting in a happier and wider community. Thank you for reading.

[@imptwins]

Y'know, normally I don't pay people any mind when they say someone is win trading, but that final vex play sure is hard to explain with any other possibility

[@Boamere]

Yeah

[@peterhorton9063]

I have alot of succes with this build with phase rush and iceborn. For the reasons you said you have no peel, feels great for survival

[@KelyxTheMage]

learned recently that if you're in a skirkish and need to use your ult, it's better to ult behind you so the enemy gets hit faster since your ult starts a distance behind you.

[@pandanometa]

I love the 3 games in 1 vid!

[@kingbirdIII]

I'm convinced that you don't want to buy AD until you are essentially out of lane phase in most matchups. I like keeping that adaptive DMG as magic and getting more haste and mana just helps you more consistently win lane. Same items but I go Liandras first

[@jahuuuu9625]

4:05 the first hit of E against a champion and hitting champions with R also both grant stacks

[@dooddoingstuff]

So in simpler terms, hitting abilities against champions grants stacks

[@yGKeKe]

Yeah literally what the tooltip says.@@dooddoingstuff

[@jahuuuu9625]

@@dooddoingstuff yeah, I just worded it like this because you don’t get multiple stacks for hitting the same champ multiple times with one E

[@cmdrbailey834]

love how you play 3 games in a row against the exact same kata

[@jonathanrussell8998]

And this right after I saw a Twitter post from Coney about a win streak with bruiser-y builds and a Doran Ring start XD

[@SMARTasYOU]

going riftmaker first feels a lot better if you're maxing W then shojin, liandry

[@ruatahmar5987]

Hey Pekin, is lethality zeri w spam viable at all?

[@Mandragorn]

FYI - most of the time you only do 3 points in w, then max q, then finish w. This will stop you from one shotting the back line so you can easily stack

[@theycallmetiger7340]

Definitely gonna try this! What do you think about playing Lux again soon :0?

[@brandon952]

Out of curiosity, how do the retention stats look on these ~hourish long videos? I find myself watching 1 game and doing something else for a while, but obviously I'm not exactly a representative sample lol. I appreciate more games despite this, I've ended up coming back to watch your second games on the videos before bed, just at a different time.

[@PekinWoof]

Longer videos always do better. Just glance at my videos and you might notice that almost any video 25 minutes or under ALWAYS has less views. Why? I don't know. But since I do know that I try to always do 2 games.

[@pqnet84]

@@PekinWoof I think it's because people come back for the second game after watching one if they like it and that counts as two views? I do that sometime

[@crystxlgems]

i played against a smolder that went grasp, assuming bc his autos and q can proc it, then built semi tanky like with titanic hydra and shogin, could be a fun build

[@MarlonTaylandeur]

what about muramana too ? like ez ap or kaisa ap, it might make the character even stronger mathematically with this build no ?

[@Sylvine]

Looks like a minion demat angle to consistently get the WQ backline clear at 25 stacks.

[@luchomcmenu564]

Hey Pekin, have you tried Galio this season? There is a challenger main in euw running a super fun 1shot build, his name is 失敗者

[@YanelArez]

that vex tp in the end was really something

[@nuparuchi]

I think true damage feels really good this season so I can totally imagine that with some buffs smolder will have a real place in the meta

[@mariannapapikyan4123]

What's up with Katarinas? Both Asol games were against Katarinas and both Smolder mid games are against them

[@catfood4142]

ive met a smolder one day with this build, he lost lane pretty hard but mid late game with the liandry ap build his W R felt like corki thingy

[@happylegoleon9209]

It was probably me if it was in euw lol

[@HollowPaperboi209]

Do people think Riftmaker is even needed in this setup? It seems ok, but wouldn't Smolder be better off with Shojin then Liandry's then either Stormsurge/Shadowflame/Malignance/Imperial Mandate/Cosmic Drive? Not sure he gets the full value out of Riftmaker since he's not getting much health after Shojin and Liandry's. Maybe if we started with ROA first and then went Liandry's then Shojin, but then too heavy into AP. Thoughts?

[@amyt.7401]

yayy new video

[@gregrussell1787]

@8:33 Fulll on melee battle with the new ranged champ?

[@wesjanson6979]

katarina's ultimate is 2 mommies

[@alkeemist007]

Would this not be better with a triforce first? I like the concept of the build and the synergy of the items, I just feel like a sheen item still feels so good for him, and if you're doing a sort of bruiser build with middling ad anyway I'd suppose you wouldn't want an essence reaver at any point.

[@alkeemist007]

Ah, third game he tries it, I didn't watch it earlier.

[@LuckyLuke_94]

would be nice if you showed which runes were used

[@opheliayoung1122]

So what about a horizon focus, you can Q at max range & it will proc it. It's a much bigger % damage increase

[@nars290]

if im right all abilities when hit on champions give stacks so you can use your E to just tap them with it and back out to get even more stacks

[@kawaiimiku1]

Nice 1 hour 20 minutes of pekin

[@patriarchparamour]

“What a terrible sneeze that was”

[@benjaminfrost2780]

You get stacks hitting enemy champs with any of your abilities. All 4 of them. Just only 1 time per champion per ability. The only extra thing to state is Q last hit also gets a stack on top of hitting champs.

[@therogu3gam3r58]

For once I do somewhat agree with him. I think his stacks definitely should do something for his getaway move it just feels like it's missing something and everytime I hover it I'm trying to remember what the stacks do for it I'd rather something other then more damage for it cause it's giving i think 20% magic from stacks with crit scaling for amount of shots

[@derechte6086]

Yea I like using tp early u get more value out of the sum and u deny them early ignite bc its harder to use when itemwise 400-800g behind

[@nomoneynocry5308]

8:34 nice flash out from own heal

[@Boamere]

I’m saying adcs are too squishy to do start doing damage with how high damage is this patch, unless you’ve got high burst it’s probably better building a bit tanky (building on hit with terminus and jak sho feels pretty good on on-hit champs)

[@arielrr]

3 games in one video is fire, idk how to feel about smolder tbh he def needs a buff

[@jonathanrussell8998]

I feel like Sunderer would be so good for bruiser Smolder if it still existed. Triforce seems like a decent substitute but you don’t really use the attack speed. It’s a little crazy but what if Iceborn for tankiness plus slowing with your Q?

[@yGKeKe]

Icebourne is the second item in the bruiser build. Pekin just built some scuffed AP build instead of the actual bruiser build.

[@jonathanrussell8998]

@@yGKeKe Huh, noted. Is Spear still first in this build?

[@vonproperson8296]

Viegar bruiser build on Smolder ???

[@Apollow99]

One thing that's stupid is that after the 225 stacks, there is a period where your Q will clear the wave, but kill minions through the burn, and thus not give you a stack for it. Smolder doesn't have great sustained damage, he has barely decent burst damage, but requires to hit W and R, which are slow and hard to hit from range. He has potential, but atm he's just frustrating

[@sirtrixx]

"I wanted to bait but I didn't want to scare the Katarina off" bro you know full well what kind of people play that champ, scaring them off is the least of your worries

[@ceshadow]

Pekin, I think you are supposed to keep your W at 3 points so it doesn't one shot the back wave and you can keep prepping them.

[@Karsteski]

Hurray content

[@otiagotiag]

dude whAT THE FUCK THAT VEX WAS THINKING??????????? holy shit i dont usually say that someone is wintrading but this guys must be doing it.

[@adelmosallami]

Have you seen the Dobby video on smolder? doran's ring with comet in order to actually be an early game bully, but I'm not so sure how it would work for mid

[@Xenellia]

that's what Pekin is building in this vid tho, no?

[@jordian2538]

Comet isn't his best rune. Pekin is playing him right. Only thing Pekin might have missed is Iceborn gauntlet first item into shojin has a higher winrate.

[@Siren--Head]

glad to see katarina is still broken after 15 years

[@jonathanrussell8998]

Wow, that Vex was actually unironically wintrading, huh?

[@Chris-rz3wq]

If you can actually go Kindlegem on first back, wouldn't Iceborn be a viable build? Use Q to setup for W and R. You might actually stack faster.

[@Son_of_a_Biscuit]

Tried it for some games, not very strong in my opinion. you miss the 30% crit damage on your Q

[@ZEUCOXFANTASTIC]

4:00 correction: u get stacks on every ability if u hit champions

[@ohreally6945]

The korean build is actually good ....and his winrate is actually becoming better ....many people are so used to characters with op kit and damage that they are not happy wih a balanced hero

[@LutraLovegood]

That Zed got me hungry

[@cosmicbrownie2312]

I have been otping smolder and I personally do not enjoy that build, tho i am playing him bot and he is fantastic maybe I need to try it again

[@moritzkemme8450]

Waiting for Pekin to build shadowflame when reaching 225 stacks for the critting true damsge

[@gabrielladias420]

I don't understand why the W doesn't shred. Every stacking or scaling champ with mixed damage (kog'maw, kayle, corki...) has a shred ability

[@briancaban930]

Yeah, that last game was 100% a wintrade

[@happydream1967]

Agree

[@FantomMind]

You're telling me an ADC getting hit by something immediately dies? No way.

[@zakariaeazzouzi2828]

3 games yaaaay🎉🎉🎉

[@randomthoughts23]

Can you try and play a game against smolder and try to show how to win early?? This guy freakin' wrecks me anytime it gets late game. I guess it's the same as Kayle though...

[@dragonborn6347]

0:50 i stopped watching the video after he said it just to comment this: who doesn't die to a 0/5 Irelia? :D okay i am ready to continue watching :D

[@sethb3090]

0/10 Yasuo obviously

[@juggernautdeath1]

You wait too long to ult the Kat. Just Ult as soon as she starts her's. That will either force her to shunpo early, cancelling her ult, or you deal damage and get the heal before you die. Holding it until she's about done channelling seems pointless

[@vxytor]

must be nice playing against katarina three times in a row, gez

[@kilianrettich3843]

I don’t feel like the last 2 games were correctly built and played but the first game was :)

[@YourVideosDogchitHeresWhy]

Why riftmaker ???? His ap scaling is chittt???

[@mocafrost]

These items have been money for me.

[@dirktrash3455]

That last game actually pissed me off.

[@rehazini229]

If smolder stacks give him on hit damage then it could be good

[@arbicula6617]

[@renarddubois940]

Smolder's mom should do triple damage if he dies after casting it

[@mrastronaut8181]

Comet is much better rune for that build or in general, smolder can really bully people early game with comet

[@eImisterioso]

29:51 lmaoo

[@ML-ze1ji]

I like smolders kit but the damage is bad

[@Dante-mw2ez]

Ya so turns out his early game is insane, start W with arcane comet and scorch and tag them with W and you’ll see

[@starliaghtsz8400]

i think smolder q should slow, nothing too crazy maybe like a 30% slow, maybe slow scales with stacks too by like 10%, it would not be gamebreaking i feel like

[@Poogimuns]

this reminds me of school

[@Ledenses]

Pekin still ranting about smolder