Bellona Build Ideas

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Aaron is a lifelong gamer that loves a good challenge. Competitive multiplayer games like MOBAs have provided a perfect environment for him to thrive. Outside of video games, he enjoys doing anything creative, such as writing, creating art, or music. He loves to apply his outside-of-the-box thinking to competitive games, creating new tactics and strategies wherever possible

Abilities

Her passive ability, Master of War, gives her temporary protections and movement speed buffs when hitting or being hit by basic attacks.

Her first active ability, Shield Bash, is a dash that slows enemies that are hit by it. It also replaces her basic attack with a sword and shield, which builds stacks of blocks, up to three, on every third basic attack hit. A stack of blocks absorbs all damage from a basic attack hit, as well as reflects 30% of the damage to the attacker.

Her second active ability, Bludgeon, does damage in an area around her, followed by a line of damage in front of her. It also replaces her basic attack with a hammer, which hits all targets within her basic attack range. However, it also only receives 33% of Bellona’s life steal.

Her third active ability, Scourge, deals damage in a line in front of her and disarms any enemies hit, preventing them from using basic attacks for a short amount of time. It also replaces her basic attack with a scourge, which has an extended range and every third basic attack heals Bellona.

Her ultimate ability, Eagle’s Rally, is a leap that’s immune to crowd control and does damage and stuns enemies directly where Bellona lands. It also creates an area around where she landed for 8 seconds which increases protection and power for all allied gods.

Bellona has a focus on basic attack damage while also having the sustain of a Warrior. Berserker’s Shield is a favorite item for me to use with her, providing power, physical protections, attack speed, and health regeneration. The item is great for both basic attack damage per second and sustain, so it’s fantastic on Bellona.

Builds

General Build

My General Build for Bellona works in any game mode but excels in Arena, Slash, and Assault. It can also work well in Joust if you want to be aggressive. As for Conquest, you’ll probably want to tweak the starter item if you’re playing Jungle, but it otherwise works well in both Solo and Jungle as well.

To start, get Warrior’s Axe, which gives a small amount of power and protection as well as can steal enemy health and mana when hitting an enemy every 10 seconds.

You’ll also want to get Round Shield to upgrade, Purification Beads to make you temporarily immune to crowd control when you need it, and you’ll probably want mana potions with the extra gold because Bellona will typically run out of mana long before she gets low on health.

From there, upgrade the Round Shield into Berserker’s Shield, giving you physical protections, power, attack speed, and health regen. If you drop below 40% health, it also gives you increased damage mitigation. This item is all-around fantastic for Bellona, providing both significant amounts of sustain and damage dealing ability.

Next, get either Asi or The Crusher. Both provide power, attack speed, and flat penetration, but Asi also gives life steal, while The Crusher increases ability damage. I normally go for Asi, but if you want to be more aggressive, go with The Crusher. A lot of Bellona mains swear by it.

You’ll want to get a second relic at this point, and I think Heavenly Wings is a good choice for this build. It gives you and your surrounding teammates a movement speed buff, which is great for chasing down fleeing enemies.

From there, we’ll get Frostbound Hammer. This item gives physical power and health, but basic attacks also slow enemy movement and attack speeds. This is great since we’ll be using a lot of melee basic attacks and it will help us keep within damage dealing range.

Next, we’ll get Shoguns Kusari. It gives magical protections, health, mana regeneration, and cooldown reduction, and provides an attack speed aura. Around this time in the match, Mages are at their peak and will be controlling the game, so magic protections are very important. The attack speed it gives will also help with doing damage, as well as surrounding team members, especially the Carry.

After that, we’ll get Qin’s Sais. It gives power and attack speed, but most importantly, it makes basic attacks do additional damage based on a percentage of the enemies’ health. This helps significantly with taking out enemy tanks.

Finally, upgrade Warrior’s Axe into Sundering Axe, which has the same effect just stronger.

The final build should look like this:

Sundering Axe
Berserker’s Shield
Asi or The Crusher
Frostbound Hammer
Shogun’s Kusari
Qin’s Sais

As for upgrading abilities, it’s not too important outside of Conquest, but I typically focus on Bludgeon for its wave clear potential. Scourge is also really good for additional sustain, but focusing on it can make it harder to clear minion waves as fast.

Joust Build

This is my most defensive build for Bellona, designed specifically for being the tanky member of the team in Joust. This build should work for an aggressive Support role in Conquest as well, but I wouldn’t recommend taking Bellona into that role unless you’re a very experienced player.

Start with getting War Flag, which gives protection, health, and mana regeneration. Its passive effect gives attack speed and movement speed buffs to you and nearby teammates whenever you get an assist, and will restore health and mana to you and nearby teammates whenever you damage an enemy with an ability, as well as a bit of gold. You’ll also want to get Glowing Emerald to upgrade, and possibly mana potions.

From there, you’ll want to upgrade Glowing Emerald into Gauntlet of Thebes. This item gives health and health regeneration, and builds stacks on assists and kills of enemy gods that provide protection up to a significant amount. At max stacks, it even provides an aura of protection for teammates.

It’s a very strong defensive item, probably the strongest in the game actually, but since it provides nothing offensive, you won’t see it on Bellona much outside of Joust. Next, get Berserker’s Shield. It’ll make you a much more prominent force, being both an offensive and defensive item.

From there, get Shogun’s Kusari. This item’s attack speed aura is especially useful in Joust as the entire team is generally in the same area, and will greatly help with taking out enemy towers. Around this time, you’ll want to get Magic Shell to provide health and reduce basic attack damage to you and your teammates.

After that, we’ll get much more offensive with The Executioner. It provides power and attack speed, but more importantly, makes your basic attack lower enemy physical protections. This means any physical damage gods on your team will do significantly more damage.

However, if you’re the only physical damage god on your team, you’ll probably want to opt for a different item. Good alternatives are Toxic Blade and The Crusher. Toxic Blade increases health, flat penetration, movement speed, and attack speed, and reduces enemy healing. The Crusher provides more power, but an anti-heal item is often very useful.

Then, we’ll get either Qin’s Sais to try to take out the enemy tank, or Frostbound Hammer for more crowd control. Finally, upgrade War Flag into War Banner, which provides the same effect but is stronger.

The final build should look like this:

War Banner
Gauntlet of Thebes
Berserker’s Shield
Shogun’s Kusari
The Executioner or Toxic Blade
Frostbound Hammer or Qin’s Sais

In terms of abilities, I recommend focusing on Shield Bash for its slowing effect, a very useful crowd control effect that will help the whole team. It will also allow you to take more damage, which is important if you’re the team’s tank.

Solo Build

My Solo Build for Bellona is pretty interesting at the moment. It revolves around an upgraded starter item called Animosity that significantly increases basic attack damage based on your health. However, the starter item itself, Benevolence, isn’t helpful in this role. So, what do we do?

We start by not getting an actual starter item. If we get one, we can’t get Animosity later on. Instead, we’ll get Fighter’s Mask and treat it like a starter item. It gives a significant amount of power compared to its cost, and that early power will help you compete with enemy gods using starter items like Bluestone Pendant.

We will not upgrade Fighter’s Mask into Rangda’s Mask, however, as it increases damage taken and in turn, lowers sustainability. If you want to be a little more defensive, you could opt for the plain Mask and the Round Shield to upgrade later, giving you health, mana, and protections rather than the sheer power upfront.

We’ll also get Teleport Fragment to be able to quickly get back to our lane if we need to leave. With Solo Lane being the shortest lane, you can lose your first tower very quickly, so you don’t want to be gone for long. We’ll also get Multi Potions, which temporarily increase both health and mana regeneration, with the leftover gold to increase our sustain.

From there, get Berserker’s Shield if the enemy Solo does physical damage. If the enemy does magical damage, you’ll want Runic Shield instead. It gives power, magical protections, health, and an aura that reduces enemy magical power.

From there, get either The Crusher or Asi. I typically go for Asi for increased sustainability. Then, get Frostbound Hammer to keep enemies within attack range. It also provides health, which is very important for Animosity.

Be sure to get Purification Beads around this time.

After that, get either Spectral Armor or Contagion. Both provide physical protections, health, mana, and mana regen. Spectral Armor also reduces critical strike damage received by 30%, while Contagion has an aura that reduces enemy healing.

In the odd case that the enemy team is using neither critical damage nor healing, including life steal, nor just doesn’t have a significant physical damage presence, Stone of Gaia is a good idea. Stone of Gaia simply provides a large amount of health, health regen, and mana regen.

Then, get Talisman of Energy. It gives health and magical protections and builds stacks on kills or assists that provide attack speed, movement speed, and mana regeneration to you and your nearby allies. It’s a lot like Shogun’s Kusari but gives more health and movement speed instead of cooldown reduction.

Finally, sell Fighter’s Mask and get Animosity. It provides similar stats to Stone of Gaia but makes your basic attacks deal additional damage to the amount of 3% of your maximum health. This damage is also done as magical damage, and magical protections are rarer than physical protections.

The final build should look like this:

Berserker’s Shield or Runic Shield
Asi or The Crusher
Frostbound Hammer
Spectral Armor, Contagion, or Stone of Gaia
Talisman of Energy
Animosity

For abilities, you’ll want to get Bludgeon first since it’s your main wave clear ability. Get Shield Bash next because the dash is your main form of escape. Get Scourge after that, of course. I almost always upgrade Bludgeon once again at Level 4.

Get Eagle’s Rally as soon as you can, at Level 5. From there, recommend mainly focusing on Bludgeon first. Focusing Scourge second can be a pretty good idea for the sustain. Focusing Shield Bash instead of Scourge is a good idea if the enemy in your lane uses a lot of basic attacks.

Warrior Meta Build

This is the build you will see most warriors in Solo build at the moment. It doesn’t build on Bellona’s strengths, but it’s an all-around solid build that can be hard to justify deviating from, regardless of which Warrior you pick. It’s tried and true.

This build resembles a build I used with Bellona in the Solo lane for quite a while before I started emphasizing her basic attack potential in my builds for her. She can still do a surprising amount of damage for the build being so defensive.

Start with getting Bluestone Pendant, which provides power, health regeneration, and mana regeneration, as well as additional ability damage. You’ll also want the Breastplate to upgrade, Teleport Fragment, and Healing Potions.

From there, upgrade the Breastplate into Breastplate of Valor, which gives physical protections, mana, mana regeneration, and cooldown reduction. This is just generally a great item for the Solo Lane, and you can upgrade it further with a Glyph, giving it a passive effect.

However, if the enemy in your lane does magic damage, get Genji’s Guard instead. It provides health, magical protections, mana regeneration, and cooldown reduction.

After that, get Runeforged Hammer. This item provides health, power, mana regeneration, and health regeneration. It also makes you do 20% additional damage to enemies affected by crowd control. Bellona has a handful of crowd control effects in her abilities already, but I find this item is most useful in team fights later in the game.

Next, get Genji’s Guard if you have Breastplate of Valor, or Breastplate of Valor if you have Genji’s Guard. This is just to round out your protections for team fights, and the additional cooldown reduction is great too.

Get Purification Beads around this point, and get Hide of the Nemean Lion as well. Hide of the Nemean Lion provides physical protections, mana, and mana regeneration. It also creates stacks of the block over time that reduce basic attack damage received. This item is great for surviving the damage of the enemy Carry.

After that, get Mantle of Discord, which provides a significant amount of both physical and magical protections, as well as cooldown reduction. It also has an interesting effect that if you fall below 30% health, you release a shockwave that makes you temporarily immune to crowd control while stunning enemies. This is great for those late team fights.

Finally, upgrade Bluestone Pendant into Bluestone Brooch, which is essentially just a stronger version of Bluestone Pendant.

The final build should look like this:

Bluestone Pendant
Breastplate of Valor
Runeforged Hammer
Genji’s Gaurd
Hide of the Nemean Lion
Mantle of Discord

Jungle Build

The most common role for Bellona outside of Solo is Jungle. Her Bludgeon ability is great for clearing camps and she has both a dash and a leap to chase enemy gods down. This is my favorite way to play Bellona at the moment. Getting behind enemies and using Eagle’s Rally on them while your team swarms them is so much fun.

Start with getting Eye of the Jungle, which provides power, health regeneration, and attack speed, as well as increasing damage towards jungle monsters and providing additional health and mana regeneration whenever in the jungle. You’ll also want the Katana to upgrade, the Blink Rune to travel faster and surprise enemies, wards to know what’s going on in the jungle, and possibly some multi potions with the leftover gold.

Then, upgrade the Katana into the Golden Blade. It’s a fairly cheap item that provides power, attack speed, and movement speed, all of which are super important to this build. The Golden Blade also has a passive effect that makes basic attacks do additional damage to surrounding enemies. This is great for clearing jungle camps very quickly.

After that, get Berserker’s Shield. It’s a great item for Bellona overall, but physical protection will typically help in battling whoever is playing Jungle on the enemy team. However, if the enemy playing Jungle does magical damage, you might want to get Runic Shield instead. Runic Shield will also help with taking out the enemy Mid, as they typically do magical damage.

From there, get Asi. In this build, in particular, Asi will allow you to singlehandedly take out stronger Jungle Monsters like the Pyromancer and potentially the Gold Fury really early.

You’ll want to get Purification Beads around this point.

After that, there are a lot of options. I recommend getting the Winged Blade if you already have Berserker’s Shield, or Berserker’s Shield if you have Runic Shield. Winged Blade provides magical protections, health, crowd control reduction, and movement speed.

It also makes you immune to slows, a strong form of crowd control. This will help a lot with the late-game team fights. Frostbound Hammer and Toxic Blade are also items to consider at this point. However, if you want to play aggressively, this would be the point to start building for critical damage, in which case you would want Wind Demon.

Wind Demon gives you power, attack speed, and critical hit chance, as well as giving you a temporary attack speed, movement speed, and percentage penetration buff whenever you do critical hit damage.

Next, I typically get Serrated Edge. It provides power, life steal, percentage penetration, and movement speed. Whenever your abilities are on cooldown, you get additional power and life steal. It’s just an all-around powerful item but is hard to justify getting it earlier in the match.

However, if you got Wind Demon, you might want to get Envenomed Deathbringer instead to put your basic attack damage over the top. Deathbringer gives you power, and critical strike chance, and increases critical strike damage by 30%.

The Envenomed Glyph on top of that makes your critical strikes slow enemies and reduce the amount of damage they can do. The item is really expensive though, and you can lose the game before being able to afford it, so be careful. Spectral Armor is also a good defensive choice at this time if the enemy Carry has built for critical hits.

Finally, upgrade Eye of the Jungle into Protector of the Jungle. It provides a significant amount of power, a large increase in attack speed, and a fair amount of physical protection. It also has a passive effect that increases your power and protection in the jungle.

The final build should look like this:

Protector of the Jungle
Golden Blade
Berserker’s Shield or Runic Shield
Asi
Winged Blade, Berserker’s Shield, Toxic Blade, Frostbound Hammer, or Wind Demon
Serrated Edge or Envenomned Deathbringer

Fun Attack Speed Build

This build may not be the most practical, but it’s a lot of fun, and I love using it in casual modes like Slash. With Scourge, you’ll heal at a really fast right and be able to hit melee opponents from just out of their range.

The main problem comes from enemy Mages being able to take you out with burst damage from a good distance, but if you use Shield Bash or Eagle’s Rally to get close enough, you should be able to take them out. There are a ton of ways to tweak it, but the main idea is to reach the attack speed cap while using Silverbranch Bow to not waste any bit of attack speed going over as it will be converted into physical power.

To start, get a Leather Cowl, which provides a small amount of power, mana regenerations, attack speed, and life steal. You also gain additional attack speed when near teammates or movement speed when away from teammates. Additionally, you’ll want Round Shield to upgrade, and Belt of Frenzy for a temporary attack speed buff for you and your teammates.

From there, upgrade the Round Shield into Berserker’s Shield. You could always opt for something like Golden Blade instead, but I think Berserker’s Shield is just too good to pass up on Bellona. After that, get Asi. Again, you could opt for something else that provides attack speed like The Crusher. I think the life steal from Asi is particularly helpful for this build though.

Next, Ichaival is a good choice, but probably the most replaceable. It provides attack speed and power, and successful basic attacks increase your power and lower the enemies’ attack speed. You could go for critical damage and get Wind Demon here instead.

Hastened Katana can also be a good option, giving you power, attack speed, and movement speed, as well as removing the basic attack movement speed penalty on successful hits. You could even opt for Shogun’s Kusari or Talisman of Energy if an enemy Mage is giving you problems.

After that, be sure to get Silverbranch Bow. It gives power, attack speed, and percentage-based penetration, and of course, converts any attack speed over the cap into physical power. You also might want to get Purification Beads, or Horrific Emblem, which will temporarily lower enemy attack and movement speed.

From there, get Qin’s Sais to take full advantage of being at max attack speed. Finally, upgrade Leather Cowl into Leader’s Cowl, which gives power, health, attack speed, life steal, and provides a powerful aura to surrounding teammates. It’s great for team fights.

The final build should look like this:

Leader’s Cowl
Berserker’s Shield
Asi
Ichaival, Wind Demon, or Hastened Katana
Silverbranch Bow
Qin’s Sais

FAQs

Question: Can Bellona play as a Carry?

Answer: Yes, but it’s tough to play as a melee carry, and I don’t recommend it unless your Support knows what you’re doing ahead of time. Scourge increases her range slightly, but you’ll still have to get close to the enemies and near the middle of team fights, and that can be a problem since you won’t have as many if any added protections.

With the Fun Attack Speed Build or something similar, her basic attack damage output is really good though, so taking out towers and the Titan won’t be a problem. With good Support, you can pull it off.

Question: Can you build Bellona for ability damage?

Answer: Absolutely, and Bludgeon will particularly benefit from it. This is why so many Bellona mains swear by The Crusher, as it benefits both ability damage and basic attack damage. I don’t typically do it, but it might be what works for you. Play around with it if it sounds interesting.

Question: Is Manikin Scepter good on Bellona?

Answer: Yes, very good actually, and it used to be the starter I used for both Solo and Jungle roles. However, I recently discovered how to make a Solo Animosity build and I prefer it, and I like Eye of the Jungle’s early attack speed boost when playing Jungle. It’s all down to personal preference though. If it sounds good to you, try it out.