With plenty of stealth and mobility, Akshan can feel super strong against champions that lack CC or mobility of their own. He can kite tanky targets and burst squishy ones effectively. But don’t worry, like any other champion in League, he’s got disadvantages of his own that you can abuse.
Akshan’s Abilities
Akshan can be a pain to handle in the early to mid-game. To properly counter him with a premeditated champion selection or certain gameplay, you must first understand his spells correctly.
- Passive – Dirty Fighting: After hitting 3 times, he deals bonus physical damage with the next spell or auto-attack. If he’s hitting a champion, Akshan receives an extra shield. This passive works in the form of a bonus attack. If he cancels it, he gets extra movement speed with each shot. He can abuse this on creeps to constantly increase his MS and chase you down.
- Q – Avengerang: He tosses a boomerang forward, which hops from enemy to enemy in a straight line. It can hit each unit twice.
- W – Going Rogue – Active: When Akshan is near terrain like rocks or bushes, he is permanently camouflaged. If he passes through the lanes or open space, he would be camouflaged for a very short duration. When he’s camouflaged, he can see the steps of Marked targets.
- W – Going Rogue – Passive: If one of Akshan’s allies dies to an enemy champion, they get a mark on their head which gives bonus gold when killed. What is important here is that if you get marked and killed, the champions that you’ve slain would be revived by Akshan.
- E – Heroic Swing: Akshan’s bread and butter. His absurd mobility spell allows him to hook onto terrain and turrets and swing in any direction. If he uses the spell during the cast, he swings away in the direction of the player’s cursor. After takedowns, E’s cooldown refreshes.
- R -Comeuppance: He target locks an enemy champion and channels his shots into them. He can run or cast E during that time.
Also read: Best Support Champions That Counter Vayne
Countering Akshan’s Spells
Akshan’s Avengerang deals reduced damage to creeps. Picking a champion with a better wave shove than him would make your lane easier.
Akshan heavily relies on his E to reposition himself in fights and in laning. The best way to get a good idea of playing against the champion in fights is to play Akshan for a few games yourself.
Knowing when he’ll cast his E to reposition, you can interrupt it or precast your spells wherever he is going. You can stop it with any type of CC, or even with your own body. If you flash into the trajectory of his swing, it will immediately cancel. This way you can catch him off guard.
Most Common Akshan Combos
Akshan players most commonly use two combos. The damage of both of these has been estimated with a Wit’s End on Akshan and him being LVL 8.
- Auto-attack > Q > auto-attack, does an average of 620 damage.
- E, into Q, following up with an auto-attack. Which inflicts a total of 1100 damage.
By knowing these combos, you get a reasonable estimation of what to expect at this time of the game. Get to know your own champion’s combos well so that you can decide whether it’s the right time to trade or wait for the enemy’s cooldowns, and then go at him.
Pay attention to Akshan’s E, call out a gank from your jungler, and bait Akshan’s E. Without it, he is pretty vulnerable to ganks and might end up dying.
Also read: How to Counter Yasuo?
Akshan Weaknesses
1. Late game
Looking closer at Akshan’s win rate percentage as the match progresses into the late game, he falls off compared to some other champions.
Akshan lacks range, and his damage doesn’t scale into the late game as hard as most other ADCs.
During the late game, Akshan mainly focuses on reviving allies and sniping with his ult. His other abilities pretty much fall off.
Top Akshan players would sometimes even sacrifice themselves if they could revive the carry in their team. If it comes to the late game, pay close attention to whether the Akshan on the enemy team is thinking of doing this and don’t fall for that trap.
This means that if you focus him down first in fights, he won’t revive anyone.
2. He relies on beefy teammates.
Akshan is somewhat squishy and can’t reliably go first into fights. He relies on beefy teammates and strong, durable champions to go headfirst into danger.
3. Struggles against tanky champions.
As much as he likes beefy champions in his team, Akshan hates them if they are on the enemy side.
The Best Akshan Lane Counters in Season 12
There are lane counters, and there are champions that are super strong against Akshan during the entire game.
1. Irelia
Irelia is one of the strongest, if not the most potent, lane counter. With the highest gold difference of +220 gold at the 15th-minute mark, Irelia is the champion that crushes Akshan in the lane the most.
What you need to do in the lane as Irelia against Akshan is to simply play it safe until you hit level 3. If he kills you before that, he might snowball and turn the matchup around in his favor. Once you survive the first three levels and you grab a Vampiric Scepter, he can’t contest your farm that much anymore.
By poking from a distance and controlling the waves better than him, you would be safe to say you can come out on top in most of the games.
2. Yasuo
Yasuo’s Windwall is a fantastic spell against glass-cannon ADC’s. Not to mention, it also denies Akshan the ability to wave clear reliably by spamming his Q.
During the laning stage, Akshan hates poking, and Yasuo is pretty decent at that. The combination of all of his spells. With a 54% win rate across all brackets, Yasuo comes ahead with a better creep score and a better tower push, along with the above-mentioned more vital laning stage.
Also read: How to Play Against Vayne
The Best Champions to Counter Akshan in Season 12
As mentioned above, aside from lane counters with good wave shove, champions that bring a lot of stuns and CC, in general, can be a huge nuisance for Akshan’s game plan.
1. Nautilus
The Titan of the Depths has a reliable CC built into most of his spells, which allows him to properly set up Akshan’s death. Keep in mind that the passive of Nautilus allows him to root enemies with his auto-attack. He also has strong mobility, including his dredge line, which can reposition his enemies and himself.
Not to mention, Nautilus is pretty tanky for Akshan to solo takedown. All of this makes him a great Akshan counter in the game.
2. Pyke
If you are a support main, Pyke can be an excellent addition to your Akshan counters. His bone skewer is pretty much the same spell as the Q of Nautilus. Not to mention, Pyke has a camouflage of his own to hunt down enemies with. His E is also a mobility spell, making him match Akshan’s pace at all times.
3. Leona
Leona has more CC than these two combined. She can easily pinpoint a target in the fight and not allow them to move until they are slain. Not only does she increase the damage allied champions deal to enemies, which would make Akshan burstable, but she also has a reliable stun with her Q. She can immobilize targets with her E – Zenith Blade.
Oh, yeah, if that’s not enough, her ultimate is also a stun. So 3 CC spells out of 4 in total. If that doesn’t help you kill a mobile champion, what will?
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Conclusion
Akshan is a fun champion to play and easy to hate if he’s in the enemy team. Be prepared with your picks. Now that you know his weak late game and that you need to focus him in fights as the game progresses, it would be much easier to increase your likelihood of winning against him.
Pick a champion with reliable CC if you aren’t laning against him. If you are, Irelia, Yasuo, or Ryze. Winning the lane doesn’t always win the game. Structure a clear plan to victory against him, and go for it.
Frequently Asked Questions About Akshan
Is Akshan AD or AP?
All of Akshan’s abilities stack with physical damage, which ultimately means that Akshan is AD champion.
What lane is Akshan in League of Legends?
According to the data we’ve collected from numerous League of Legends websites, Akshan is primarily played in the mid lane, and then in the top lane or as an ADC. However, this can always change in the future because Riot Games often like to introduce new things into the game.
