This is my carry; my carry is my best friend. A Sobek guide.

Sobek is a very powerful, tanky-style God who brings incredible control to team fights. Unlike Ares or Odin, who are very dependent on their ults, Sobek's strength is in his other abilities. His throw makes him one of the best initiators, and he can follow up with a knockback and slow, giving him great control so that a carry may do its work. Furthermore, well built your Sobek can even do some damage and again, unlike all of the tanks, is not dependent on his ult for kills. This gives Sobek, over I think any other tank, the ability to pick up kills as well as tank like a boss.

Sobek is one of the few gods I am playing right now (him, Freya and Ao), but I feel I still have a lot to learn about the subtleties to his abilities. As such, this build is more or less a work in progress which I hope to update as frequently as I change my own style. I value any criticisms you might offer. I also intend to add some VODs from my stream to demonstrate play in the near future.

If I'm in a side lane with a carry, then I like to get Hand of the Gods so I can exploit the nearby buffs. The first two items of the build I pretty much get unerringly, simply because I play a tanky Sobek style and I want to get those stacks early. Following that, my opponent in lane will determine which defense item I'll get first (ie, is their carry PP or MP). Void Stone I'm not sure about. It gives more damage, which is nice especially since I like to get some extra damage late game as well, but if you're getting bullied or countered hard than I think Stone of Gaia will be better.

Stategy-wise, early game is pretty basic tank paradigm. Let your carry get the last hits and protect him from damage. Sobek benefits from being able to sustain both mana and health using his abilities ( Lurking In The Waters and Sickening Strike respectively), so I try to stay in lane and passively gain gold as long as possible. Your best combo here is a lead in with Charge Prey, followed up by Tail Whip in order to keep him back, and finally sickening strike] and then [[lurking in the waters to chase if needed. In combination with a carry who knows this combo, you can get a lot of damage in.

In this case I skip the Hand of the Gods and just grab my core items in pretty much the same way I do with a carry.

Strategy is really the main difference, since here you don't always have the comfort of a carry. You'll need to play defensive since you don't really have much damage. All is not lost however, because Sobek has pretty good sustain and starting only with reinforced boots leaves enough money for five consumables. I like to get at least one mana potion to get me to level 5, after which I'll just use Lurking In The Waters to sustain my mana. But yeah, you may be fighting at the tower a lot if your opponents have a lot of push. The important thing if this happens is to be ready for ganks since Charge Prey can at least close the distance if not toss one of them under the tower.

Once I've pushed my tower, I feel free to leave my lane and help gank and push the other towers. Its about this time when I'll will acquire either Creeping Curse or Heavenly Agility. I prefer Creeping Curse, especially since you can proc it with your ult in order to increase the effectiveness of the slow.

Which additional items I take tends to depend on my team. If we're getting crushed and I need to build some more tankiness, then I'll go for Sovereignty or Stone of Gaia and then Gem of Isolation. If we're doing alright I'll pickup the breatplate of valor then Gem of Isolation again. Divine Ruin is only if ops has Hel or Ra and is being annoying as **** with their heal. Then I might get that instead of the defensive item, and stack the passive with my Sickening Strike.

So into the midgame and late game Sobek will play the role as initiator in team fights, meaning you need to balance good communication so the team knows your intentions, as well as taking the time to line up your throw nicely as you may **** yourself if you miss. It's best to initiate on a squishy, although this is a challenging task as ops' tank will likewise be harassing the **** out of you and your team. In a difficult situation, I think pulling the tank out of the way (to the side, but not towards your team), because then can at east start the team fight as a 4v5. You might then follow up with an ult to try to limit where the enemy can go with the tank out of the way so your team can have a clean engage.

If instead you get luck and grab a squishy for free, then I like to use my abilities to try to herd the enemy, and as it breaks up I ult for some easy cleanup.

I don't foresee many changes to this build with the latest patch, however I do see the opportunity (with the +15 PP/stack buff) for a more bully-type build which I'll experiment with and post if I find something. What I've got in build 2 is basically just a sketch, while I'm waiting for the patch to be implemented.

Change history:
Published: 2012/12/1