Ryze vs Darius Counter Pick

Darius has no way to shorten 375 units of attack range on his own. He walks at 340 move speed, exactly the same figure as Ryze, and his only reliable pull is Apprehend, so every trade begins with the question of whether that one ability lands. Over 262 games on patch 16.13.1 the answer has favoured the mage at 53.4%. Hemorrhage still stacks five times and Noxian Guillotine still deals true damage that grows with those stacks, which means one successful Apprehend into Decimate can end an exchange outright.

The itemisation picture is lopsided. Darius carries 37 base armour rising to 125.4 at level 18, easily the sturdier physical defence, and none of it applies to Ryze’s magic damage. Ryze sits at 22 armour growing to 93.4, opposite a champion whose entire output is physical and whose Apprehend passively ignores a share of that armour anyway. Health is the compensation, 620 to 2,728 against 652 to 2,590, the largest pool a mage of this class reaches. Both spend mana, but Arcane Mastery turns Ryze’s pool into damage while Darius only pays costs from his. Applying Spell Flux first turns Rune Prison from a slow into a root, and for Ryze that root is usually what buys the spacing back after a failed pull.