Season 10 was an exceptional season for Senna as she saw a huge amount of play in both the bottom lane carry and support roles (sometimes as both at the same time as fasting Senna in pro play) in the form of a lethality-based marksman (taking runes down the precision tree). However, we did explore the more utility focused variant of Senna which featured a core of a Grasp keystone, Athene’s rush, and Frozen Mallet follow up.

But where is the build now? Well, sadly reverse nuke Senna was killed by Riot with the item overhaul of Season 11 which saw the removal of both Athene’s Unholy Grail and Frozen Mallet. However, while items were radically changed, runes were not and so this meant that the off-beat train of thought that is Senna running Grasp was not dead, but had to evolve in order to survive. This has resulted in Reverse Nuke Senna becoming that of Anti-Nuke Senna, and in this piece, we shall break down this latest version of Grasp Senna.

So, what is Anti-Nuke Senna?

Well, the most common build for both support and carry Senna has been an on-hit AD damage item marksman build, with the core item being Kraken Slayer. The focus of this build is pure damage output with the ally healing and boosting teamfight potential.

However, with Anti-Nuke Senna the focus is on pure utility and damage diversion as you direct your resources towards setting up teammates to maximize their DPS while you soak as much damage up as possible by building HP to tank enemy cooldowns (this is centered around a Frostfire Gauntlet rush) and then using all of Senna’s kit to minimize impact to ally health bars.

The Rune Setup

Now, almost every Senna main you meet nowadays will tell you that the optimal rune keystone is Glacial Augment, and they would be right if you were playing normal Senna. But you’re playing Anti-Nuke Senna, and that means your rune setup should match. Instead of taking Inspiration primary, you go down the Resolve tree primary (with Precision secondary) and take the following setup;

• Grasp of the Undying – Senna makes surprisingly good use of this rune as she can proc it with ease thanks to her good range on her basic attacks and it can be even activated by her Q, Piercing Darkness, plus the bonus HP plays well into the upcoming rune choice as well as stacking on top of the HP she gets from items.

• Font of Life – This one is unchanged from the Reverse Nuke Setup, given the core item build that this variant goes, FOL is put in a position where it can be even more effective this time with more HP being bought from items meaning an increased heal upon allies activating the heal (not to mention that it can be activated by Senna’s W, Last Embrace)

• Bone Plating – Senna with the tankier build here isn’t as worried about poke as she can just out sustain it with Piercing Darkness in siege scenarios. Therefore, she really wants to optimize for maximum soak in teamfights and while Conditioning is a solid choice here, Bone plating allows you to soak up just that little bit more in burst damage situations.

• Revitalize – Since this entire setup is focused primarily on the damage mitigating aspect of Senna’s kit and this sets up your core item selection, taking any other rune than Revitalize in this slot makes no sense

• Presence of Mind – This rune is core to this variant of Senna. Since we’re not going to be rushing a Tear, the requirement for a steady source of mana generation is not a want but a need. This makes PoM, and in turn the Precision tree secondary choice, the required choice.

• Coup De Grace – Of the six remaining runes, you can choose from, there are realistically two options here that make sense, Coup De Grace and Legend Tenacity. Both are good and do what they need in either helping finalize kills or soak cooldowns. Switch between them based upon what you need.

The Item Build

• Spectral Sickle – Reverse Nuke Senna is an AD support who is looking to trade at regular intervals, Spectral Sickle is the support gold generation item that synergises most here and is the obvious choice.

• Frostfire Gauntlet – This is the core item of this build for two reasons, the first being the stats, the HP is fantastic as it allows you to soak up dmg for your carry (as well as amping FoL) which is a desirable outcome (while the resistances minimize the damage you take some too). The second being the passive, dropping a slow field under an enemy via an auto attack or Q is just an immense amount of utility which can not only proc FoL on one target but in AoE, and this is core to the whole setup

• Boots of Swiftness – Cheap, good MS stats, and slow resistance. Speaks for itself.

• Chempunk Chainsword – Anti Heal has become a core component in any League of Legends build this season and Senna is no exception here. Now, if this were normal Senna, the new Mortal Reminder would be the optimal choice but this is not normal Senna, the combination of AD, HP and Ability Haste makes Chainsword the better choice by quite a margin. It is noted that you can pick up Executioner’s Calling before one of one of the other items mentioned later if just the grievous wounds become needed sooner (it is still cheap at 800 gold) [unfortunately bramble vest is too inconsistent to make it and then Thornmail a good option here].

• The last two items – Your last item is entirely situational and should really change every game depending on what your team needs but you do have a wide choice not limited to but including: Infinity Edge, BotRK, Black Cleaver, Redemption, Sterak’s Gage, Warmog's, Serylda’s Grudge, GR and more.

Conclusion

Before I finish this piece there is one group of people that I want to throw some love their way as their feedback during testing/research of this build was invaluable and their discussions regarding this build (and even builds like it) are greatly appreciated. The group is the fine people on the Senna mains subreddit and if you find yourself picking the champion up, I would recommend following said subreddit here.

So, there we have it, a breakdown of the evolution to off-beat way to play the Redeemer in the support role. Now, as always, I will warn you not to take a new pick into ranked and this is the same here, even if you have played Senna before I would still advise playing her in some normal with this setup before you take it into ranked. With that I once again leave you with the thoughts of GL, HF, and GG.