Geb: Master Distractor (Duo build)

So I want to begin by saying that this is my first guide. I have played many, many games with Geb, and he is definitely my favorite guardian, if not my favorite god. This guide is primarily based on conquest (Duo lane and team fights), but can also be used for joust. Arena Geb is a different thing altogether.

Let's start by looking at Geb's skills.

0. Passive: Hard as Rock
This passive is a tanks dream, even though only useful against physical damage. With the amount of people that build the Rage/Deathbringer combo, this ability will hardly ever go unused.

1. Roll Out This is Geb's most amazing and useful ability, for 4 reasons: A) It is a WONDERFUL escape, as long as there are not any enemy gods in the way. B)It balances out Geb's ultra slow movement speed. C)Pure intimidation factor. This ability is very scary to whoever is on the other end, mostly because of reason D)HOLY MOTHER OF KNOCKBACK! Once maximum velocity is achieved, whoever you hit will be sent flying backwards.
All of that being said, It does have 2 major drawbacks. 1) It can be easy to miss faster Gods like Vamana and 2) Before you reach maximum velocity, you are vulnerable to CC, which can make getting out of sticky situations very difficult.

2. Shock Wave While Rollout is Geb's most useful ability, this is his most effective. For that reason, it is recommended that you max this first. This is Geb's only minion line clear, and even then its a poor one. However, the knockup makes this especially useful for taunting enemies off of your teammates, or giving your ADC enough time to scamper away and cheat death. This ability combos very well with Rollout.

3. Stone Shield If you ask me, all of Geb's abilities are awesome, save his ult, which frankly could be better. Stone Shield is no different. This ability alone has the power to save lives, whether its yours, or your teammates. It is especially useful because it cancels any CC on cast. Its important to remember that this skill scales in power based on Geb's level NOT his health or magical power.

4. Cataclysm Kind of underwhelming if you ask me, but I understand why it works the way it does. The reason why I don't like it very much is because you can only use it at its fullest potential during late game team fights, and it ONLY affects Gods. Nothing else. However, the radial 2s (I rounded up, so sue me) stun is very useful to your team, as well as damage that Ignores defense. In my opinion, this ability would be much better if it did a percentage of the victim's max health as damage instead of their current health. But that's just me. Also, remember that this skill DOES NOT scale. You can build all the power in the world, and this skill will neither do more damage, nor stun for a longer duration, which frankly, is ridiculous. In a bad way.

So let's talk about Geb's natural pros and cons, without factoring in the build just yet. First of all, Geb naturally acquires a very large amount of health. Very good for a tank. Also, his passive greatly reduces the effect that critical hits have on you. He has moderately long ability cooldowns, very slow movement speed, and pretty slow attack speed. The only ability he has that doesn't have some kind of CC is his 3 and that's a shield that negates enemy CC.

You might be noticing pattern here. The best way to build Geb and play to his strengths is to build him into a damage sink. A tank in the truest sense of the word. It is possible to build him as a bruiser for solo lane, or even an unorthodox jungler, but it is duo lane and teamwork where he really shines.

Strengths that you NEED to exploit: Geb's most powerful tool is CC. Use that. A lot. Also, Geb can take a ton of punishment naturally. IF someone on your team has a healing ability, you can take even more.

Weaknesses that your enemies WILL exploit: His tragic flaw is the same thing: CC. If you get CC'd more than once while attempting to escape, you are downright screwed. End of story. The build mitigates this a bit, but we'll get to that. Also, be careful early game. While you are by no means squishy, you haven't built up any protections, and you move very slowly. This can be gamebreaking if you aren't cautious. Play very defensively early game, until you get two or three items in, then you can get a little more ballsy. Also, a ton of health means a ton of life to be stolen. Beware of Kali.

I figured I would do the overview of Geb first so that I could better explain my item choices.

My first buy is ALWAYS Breastplate of Valor. It gives you plenty of mana, a ton of physical protection for early game, and 25% CDR. This makes it a wonderful early game item, and helps you to spam your abilities more. I could go on for days about how awesome this item is, but we should probably move on.

My second buy is usually Sovereignty. This item is a perfect duo lane item, as it makes your ADC a little less squishy, giving you a little more time to save his/her bacon if he/she gets low on health. Also, the substantial increase in both health and physical defense is very nice.

I always get Magi's Blessing early in the game, because it allows you to be a bigger annoyance than before, which draws the attention away from your ADC, which in turn allows him/her to crank out more damage. Like I said before, Geb's tragic flaw is CC, but this item single-handedly removes that threat, and allows for much more aggressive play. However, it doesn't make you completely immune to CC, so be careful when engaging more than one God that has said capability. Another nice added bonus to this item is the health increase. This will come in handy. As for the added defense, it's nice but it's not all that effective, and certainly not the reason that I recommend this item.

The next three items in the build can be purchased in whatever order feels most convenient to you, but I would advise getting Gem of Isolation last, for reasons I'll explain in a moment.

You may have noticed that I haven't built much magic protection with the first three items. Bulwark of Hope is the item that I usually choose to mitigate that, obviously for the magical defense, but also for the health boost, and the passive that WILL save your life every now and then. This item can easily be swapped out for Pestilence if your having trouble against Hel, Ra, or even Chaac.

You may have also notice that I've built Geb to have a ton of health. The main reason for this, other than the fact that health is useful to tanks, is the presence of Ethereal Staff. This item gives Shock Wave and Roll Out a little more oomph based on how much health you have, and also gives you a whopping 600 extra health, plus thirty magical power. If all of that weren't enough, you also get 300 mana, which is just icing on the cake.

The final item in this build can be one of four items. I usually build Gem of Isolation in order to give my ADC either more time to secure the kill or more time to get away; however, there are better options available for other situations. If you want to go all out tank, I suggest running with Hide of the Urchin after Blessing, and then completing the build. If you want more sustain, and the lower magical defense isn't doing it for you, run Stone of Gaia. This item greatly compliments the others in that it allows you gain health insanely fast due to your sheer amount of it. If your going to get it though, get it either last, or before Staff. If you're still having trouble with CC, then get Spirit Robe.

One key thing here is the absence of a movement speed buff of any kind. Honestly, with Geb, boots of any kind are useless. Roll Out provides all of the mobility that you're likely to need, and he moves so slow when not rolling that boots wouldn't really make any difference. If you absolutely need it though, replace your least favorite item in the build with Midas' Boots. Why these above the others? Because it's very easy to fall behind in the gold department when tanking. So easy in fact, that it outweighs the usefulness of any of the other movement options available.

The alternate build progression is meant to deal with Ao Kuang mostly, but can be used to great effect against any team that is magic heavy. Just replace Sovereignty, and Gem of Isolation with Pestilence and Stone of Gaia, and you'll be good to go.

The actives might require a bit of explaining. Fist of the Gods is meant to be bought very early game, because it can act as a lane or camp clear if completely necessary. It also becomes very useful late game when trying to kill the enemy titan. Teleport to Gods is meant to be bought late game, and is used to drop into a Team Fight. The sudden appearance of a mountain that wasn't there a second ago can swing the fight in favor of your team, or give your wounded teammates a chance to escape if the battle is lost.

As for my reasoning behind the ability progression, it's mainly about being able to save your teammate's lives when needed, and holding the line while your duo partner recalls should the need arise. One point in Roll Out is enough for the majority of the game, because in Conquest it primarily serves as a means of getting around. Shock Wave will be what you spam the most, as it both saves lives and ends them. It's your only useful lane clear, and is very annoying to anyone trying to get at your ADC. As such, it gets Maxed first. Stone Shield gets maxed second for the obvious reason that it saves lives.
Go ahead and do the same thing with Cataclysm that you would with any other Ult and upgrade it whenever possible. While it's underwhelming for an Ult, you might as well still treat it like one.

IN THE DUO LANE:

In the lane, you are actually more important than the ADC. It is you who stops the enemies from gaining ground, you who allows the ADC to get fed, and you who keeps the ADC alive. If you do any of these things poorly, then it just might cost your team the win.

In order to accomplish all of these tasks, you must constantly be distracting the enemies by being the biggest pest possible. Always make sure that you are in front of the ADC, soaking up the damage while he/she kills the minions and gets a player kill here and there. Always spam that 2. To keep your ADC alive when he gets low, you can either harass his pursuers with Shock Wave and shield him/her, or you can go for a 4-3-2 combo. Stun the enemies with Cataclysm, shield your ADC as he runs like hell, and seal the deal by knocking back the enemies after they recover with Shock Wave. This combo will save your ADC from everything but an air gank from someone like Thanatos. Once the threat to your ADC's life has been quelled, its time to fall back to your tower with Roll Out. Once safely within range of your tower, do whatever you can to hold the line until your ADC gets back.

To push the lane, coordinate with your ADC. Start with a 1-2 combo. Use Roll Out from your tower, shoot up the lane and send one of the enemies flying, then once they hit the ground, shoot off a Shock Wave, further delaying their retaliation. After all of that, your ADC should have caught up with you, and you should be able to push the enemy back to their tower, if not to their base, so long as you make sure to shield your partner as the need arises. If your ADC has a kill shot ready to go, it never hurts to stun his target by rushing with Roll Out, canceling early and hitting the target with Cataclysm. If you and your partner execute the maneuver right, then he/she will have a two second window to line up and secure the kill.

TEAM FIGHTS:

During team fights, again it is your job to keep the enemy focused on you. Spam your 2, roll around like a maniac for distraction and intimidation factor, and hit 'em with Cataclysm if you think you can hit more than one enemy. If you start to get low on health, shield yourself, and hopefully that will delay your death long enough for your team to push back the enemy, or fall back to safety.

In team fights, its not so much your job to keep your team alive persay, but to be so annoying to the enemy that they focus on trying to kill you first. As long as the enemy is focused on you, they aren't trying to kill your team.

A word of caution: beware of CC during team fights. Almost every god in the game has at least one CC move, and Magi's Blessing can't shield you from everything.

So there are a few Gods that combo very well with Geb.

1. Aphrodite. When you pair up with Aphro, you become almost impossible to kill because she heals you faster than you can get damaged.

2. Ao Kuang. This ***** is deadly enough on his own, but with Geb everything just turns into a bloodbath. Geb has an uncanny ability to keep enemies within the radius of that scaly *****'s Tornadoes much longer than they would like, and this often results in a ton of kills for Kuang.

Any other god that can heal you will combo with you very well, such as Eset, Ra, or Hel.

Gods to Fear:

1. Kali. This one can literally shut you down if you aren't careful. Her CC will disrupt you if you try to escape, she can dish out out damage faster than you can run, and her sheer amount of lifesteal will draw from your massive pool of health and heal her very quickly. Never engage her alone. Beware of Arachne for that same reason.

2. Hades. This guy has the ability to pretty much cancel out anything that you might try to do to save your lane partner. He's not terribly dangerous to you, but you will be all but powerless in trying to save your teammate's from him, due to his crazy Ult, and high mobility. You just won't be able to keep up.

Gods that fear you:

1. Ares. Ares is almost powerless against you, since with one cast of your 3, you can negate the effects of his chains, which are the whole basis for his play style.

2. Mercury. Geb is one of the best gods in the game for shutting down this speed demon. Mercury is naturally very susceptible to CC, and Geb's 2 and 4 will absolutely wreck Mercury's face.

Well that should about do it for this Geb guide. I'm pretty sure I've covered everything that needs to be covered. Let me know if you feel like I missed something or made an error, or if you think there was something that I could've done better. If you find any of this helpful, I'm glad I could be of service.

Stay strong, my fellow mountains.
-Regulus