Baron samedi for the solo and support

Why would you want to play Baron Samedi? Let's look at it

Pros:

1.Baron is a well-rounded pick that provides a lot of utility for the team that he is playing with, from the Barons brew to his 2nd ability and ultimate also being great for team fights.

2.Baron is never truly bad at any point in the game, as due to his range he can bully most solos out of their farm, and come mid-late game, he is able to cause havoc in team fights with his abilities.

3. Let's be honest, who doesn't want to play as this guy :)

Baron Samedi

Charge Prey

Earthbreaker

Preemptive Strike

Early game: Whether in solo or support, Barons early game is really nothing to sneeze at. In solo, try to poke out your opponent using Vivid Gaze, and try to chunk them down by getting level 3 first and going for a burst trade ( Wrap It Up followed by Consign Spirits ending with Vivid Gaze). If they walk up to gain creep XP/gold aim for a kill or at least their TP, allowing you to be ahead in terms of gold and XP and totem control. However, your main focus should absolutely be on staying alive and getting gold as you do lose most matchups in the first 7 minutes

Mid game: Once you get your core items online ( Shoes of Focus, Stone of Binding and Lotus Crown), look to clear waves and rotate around the map to make plays. Join 2v2's and 3v3's if possible, you being there and landing your Life of the Party and Consign Spirits and Wrap It Up will be a massive help to your team.

Late game: You've counter built according to the enemy team, and now are able to dish out a ton of damage while still being a very tanky and annoying enemy to deal with. 5v5's are common at this point, and landing a 5 man Life of the Party and Consign Spirits will almost certainly turn the team fight in your favor.

Here I will cover why the items I have listed as core for Baron in solo/support are "core" for him.

STARTER ITEMS:
1. Warrior's Axe: Due to Conduit Gem being overall better, I would recommend taking this only into hard matchups such as King Arthur due to it providing more survivability. The upgrade that you should go into most of the time is Sundering Axe.

2. Conduit Gem: This item gives baron his early waveclear and poke damage, and also gives you a lot of MP5, which combined with the blue buff and totem of Ku, will allow you to stay in lane for a long time assuming you are not chunked too much. The upgrade Gem of Focus is a really good item as well due to it providing damage reduction too and health, perfect for a more bruiser mage like baron.

3. Sentinel's Gift: I think baron only has 1 good choice in the support role for his starter, that being this item. It provides everything that you would want for a poke god like baron with the mana sustain. The upgrades that you would choose differ from game to game (e.g Sentinel's Embrace for heavy teamfighting and Sentinel's Boon for prolonged fights where you can get multiple health and mana gains.)

SOLO:
1. Shoes of Focus: This is a core item on Baron due to the amount of mana and the CDR that it provides along with blue buff, allowing you to perform your 3->2->1 combo more often and poke harder.

2. Stone of Binding: Coming back to lane with this item, you basically get 10 magic penetration for free if you land your Wrap It Up, allowing your full burst combo to deal even more damage.

3. Lotus Crown: This item synergizes extremely well with Baron's Consign Spirits in a group fight due to the protection increase being extremely useful in the early-mid game, even coming in clutch in the late game.

SUPPORT:
1. Shoes of Focus: Allows for better 2v2's in the duo lane, think coming back to lane with like Freya with Ring of Hecate. Allows your poke to become better along with your buffs to the ADC.

2. Gauntlet of Thebes: Literally the best support item in the game for its insane value and is very easy to stack. The great utility provided by the HP5 is much appreciated. It makes you a tanky back liner who is hard to kill

3. Lotus Crown: Basically the same reason for the solo lane, but now you use it a lot more regularly due to the nature of Duo lane being a 2v2 in and of itself.

Here I'll be covering in which scenario you'd want to take any of the relics that I have mentioned


Teleport Glyph: A classic relic in the solo lane, TP is useful when you're forced out to back early against a high-pressure early game solo laner, say for example Sobek or Hercules. This allows you back with some sort of small item advantage, and also means you don't miss any creep XP/gold, which is the most relevant aspect of TP. Teleport Glyph can also be used to make plays across the map if your team wards, allowing you to quickly join a group fight in the early-mid game.

Purification Beads: We're not exactly building Baron Samedi like a "squishy", but it should be noted that beads are still important on him due to his lack of CC immunity apart from his Life of the Party, which is not a great escape tool due to it slowing Baron down. This allows him to be saved from CC chains (think Kumbhakarna) and live to fight later on.

Shield of Thorns: Very, VERY situational pick up, but if you need to frontline for a bit and you know the enemy team will not resist on dropping all of their damage on you, Shield of Thorns is a great way to effectively harm them at the same time as well.

Blink Rune: A good pick up, this allows you to get the jump on unsuspecting targets, allowing for an easy time landing Wrap It Up or Life of the Party. Also good for engaging in rare scenarios.

Now, when we talk about support I think there's 2 choices when it comes to first relic. Magic Shell or Heavenly Wings. I usually end up going Horrific Emblem 2nd.

Magic Shell: One of the best support relics in the game no doubt, this allows you to live through many risky situations, and is generally taken when the enemy duo has a strong all in at any point in the game. It only gets better later on with block stacks.

Heavenly Wings: This is your relic of choice when you know that you'll be able to confirm a kill at the least with your ADC in the early game, as it will allow you chase down kills very quickly combined with the speedup from hysteria-buffed Consign Spirits.

Horrific Emblem: To be fairly honest, a Cursed Ankh or Belt of Frenzy can also be good pickups here into certain enemy team comps (Ankh into gods like Aphrodite, Hel, Sylvanusand Terra while you take Frenzy for major objective fights as regardless of who is on your team, an AS buff is good either way. Horrific Emblem Would be my option for a really really aggressive early lane into passive supports and carries, but it doesn't really scale that well in my opinion.

Baron Samedi is one of the best gods for team fighting, in my opinion. This is due to many things, such as:

1. Hysteria buffed Vivid Gaze can hit multiple people, decreasing their protections and attack speed, therefore putting them at a severe disadvantage in the fight.

2. Consign Spirits is a great way to sustain your team (especially if you land it on 3+ people), not to mention the Hysteria buffed version giving additional movement speed, which allows for better juking.

3. Hysteria buffed Wrap It Up allows for multi-man slows and roots, allowing your team to clean up easily (think Ra easily landing Searing Pain or Scylla landing I'm a Monster easily).

4. How can we not talk about Life of the Party? A large cone pull that does %health damage, applies Hysteria and can stun. Obviously, landing this on multiple people will allow you to apply Hysteria buffed Vivid Gaze or Consign Spirits. Not even mentioning the 35% damage reduction on this.

Now, if you've noticed, I've mostly been saying " Hysteria buffed" abilities are great in the team fight. Your regular abilities on their own are not AS useful to the team as your Hysteria buffed ones. Therefore, try to stack Hysteria on multiple targets to get the most out of your abilities.

It should also be noted that since Baron Samedi is not an actual tank, you will want to play objective fights (Fire Giant and Gold Fury) from the BACKLINE (unless you have Life of the Party and Shield of Thorns). This will allow you to poke hard and support your team as well while your support (possibly jungle if you draft something like Ymir or Cerberus) will be doing all the front lining. If you're the support, it becomes easier if you draft a tankier solo laner like King Arthur or Hercules who are able to frontline while you support in terms of heals, pulls, stuns, and roots.

In conclusion, Baron Samedi is not your traditional "me tank, get behind me" solo/support. He plays around his abilities buffing his allies and debuffing his enemies, therefore making the enemy's tanks weaker.

As a postscript, 40% CDR is absolutely necessary on Baron Samedi, due to his whole point being to apply his buffs/debuffs, which 40% CDR and a nice mana pool help him with. Items such as Shoes of Focus, Pridwen, Spirit Robe, even Breastplate of Valor if you need it.

Have fun with the God of Life and Death!