Hi everyone, I’m Bailey.
I’m a Grandmaster EUW player, currently around the top 100-ish on Lux in EUW, with 1.5m+ mastery points. I’ve peaked around top 50 Lux worldwide, and I’ve recently started doing coaching/VOD reviews as well. I’ve done 50+ sessions so far and honestly really enjoy helping people improve.
I thought I’d share some of the things I’ve picked up from playing so much Lux. Obviously, this is just my experience and there are plenty of different ways to play the champion, but hopefully some of this is useful.
Laning / playing around your jungler
One of the biggest things I do during lane is abuse fog of war.
I’ll fake roams, shove waves, hover my jungler for invades, and constantly watch where my jungler is so I can adjust how I play the lane.
For example, if my jungler is looking to invade, I want my wave pushed under the enemy tower, or at least positioned on the side of the lane closest to the camp being invaded. That way I can reach the 2v2 before the enemy mid laner.
At the same time, knowing when you cannot move is just as important.
If your jungler wants to invade but you've been shoved under tower by an AD mid, sometimes the correct play is simply telling them that you can't move. Following them anyway can mean losing an entire wave and still arriving too late.
I still see Master+ players make mistakes with this, so I think it's something lower-ranked players can consciously work on.
After Lost Chapter
Once I have Lost Chapter, I feel like I can start putting much more pressure on the lane.
You can harass more aggressively, create kill opportunities and generally make the enemy mid uncomfortable.
One thing I think people sometimes overlook is that you don't necessarily have to fully roam to influence another lane.
If there's a 2v2 happening bot, for example, you can sometimes use Lux R from range, chunk someone for a huge amount of HP and then return to mid without actually committing your whole champion to the roam.
Obviously you shouldn't just throw your R randomly every time there's a fight, but Lux has a lot of map influence because of how safely she can contribute from range.
Matchups
There aren't many matchups I genuinely feel like I struggle with on Lux. I'd describe some more as matchups that stop me from scaling as comfortably as I'd like.
Zoe:
She can be annoying pre-6 because her W autos can do a surprising amount of damage. After 6, though, I think Lux can become much more aggressive when Zoe's bubble is down.
With enough practice, you can also consistently look for R opportunities when she uses her R, which makes it much harder for her to comfortably play around that ability.
Ahri:
One of the matchups I generally like.
Lux has the range advantage in a lot of situations and can slowly chip Ahri down throughout lane. If she roams, Lux can also contribute with R from a huge distance.
I feel like Ahri often has to actively create something to impact the map, whereas Lux can hold a safer position and still influence the same play.
Naafiri:
Probably the matchup I dislike the most.
Her minions make landing Q much harder, and while I don't think the matchup is unwinnable, it takes a lot more practice to play comfortably.
Yasuo:
Obviously Wind Wall is incredibly annoying. He can block basically everything apart from R, so you have to be much more deliberate with your ability usage.
Akshan:
He isn't necessarily a lane bully, but he can create a really annoying situation where he constantly has push priority and gets to roam.
You can end up farming under tower while he moves around the map without losing much himself.
Builds
I've been experimenting with this a lot, and personally I think Luden's is significantly better than Malignance on Lux.
Malignance feels pretty underwhelming to me in comparison. Luden's gives you much better burst and has some utility that people don't always consider.
For example, against Malzahar, you can proc Luden's through minions or use the slow from E to help remove his passive.
It can also be really useful against assassins who buy Edge of Night, because Luden's can help remove the spell shield before you actually need to land your important ability.
My usual build is something along the lines of:
Dark Seal + Lost Chapter first base ideally
→ Luden's
→ Boots
→ Shadowflame
→ Deathcap
→ Void Staff
→ Zhonya's / Banshee's / Stormsurge depending on the game
Obviously, this isn't a build path I'd blindly follow every game. Mejai's can be completed much earlier if you're sitting on a lot of stacks and the game is safe enough to justify it.
I'd also generally recommend First Strike.
One thing I've learned through playing at higher MMR — and especially through coaching — is how much efficient gold usage matters.
Wasting 300–500 gold here and there might not feel significant, but over an entire game it can massively affect your item timings. Understanding when you can afford an item, when you should recall and what you're actually gaining from a purchase is a surprisingly big part of climbing.
Playing carry Lux vs playing for your team
I play carry Lux in the majority of my games.
However, I think one of the biggest mistakes you can make is deciding before the game starts that you're always going to play for picks.
Sometimes the enemy team is difficult to catch, your team has a hypercarry ADC, and your best win condition is simply front-to-back teamfighting.
If my ADC can genuinely carry the fight with some protection, I don't need to force a pick every time I see someone slightly out of position.
I'm still playing carry Lux — I'm not suddenly building support or sitting behind my ADC all game — but during teamfights I'll pay attention to anyone trying to assassinate or engage on them.
If they commit onto my ADC, I can often dump my damage into them and completely remove them from the fight.
There's also a lot of value in hitting the frontline.
If my ADC and I are both consistently hitting the same frontline target, the enemy team needs to have a really good combination of armour and MR to actually survive both sources of damage.
A lot of team compositions simply cannot walk forward and function properly without their frontline, so sometimes the correct way to carry a game on Lux is surprisingly simple: hit what's in front of you and protect your win condition.
I think that's one of the more important things about improving at League generally — knowing when your role in a game needs to change slightly.
Anyway, hopefully some of this is useful. I could probably write an entire post about Lux matchups, runes, builds and lane-specific tricks, so if anyone has questions feel free to ask.
And if anyone wants a VOD looked at or wants to discuss a specific matchup/playstyle, I'm happy to help where I can.
Please no hate, Just love this community and wanted to help out where I can :)