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If you’ve had a Nasus in your game lately, you’ve probably noticed that instead of starting with the usual Doran’s Shield, they’ve been starting with Ancient Coin ... and it’s working.
After playing all of my placements yesterday (a mistake), I noticed that both Nasus’ I had in game took the support item and did way more than their fair-share of damage. I couldn’t quite figure out the exact reasons why they would take this item, so I asked the NasusMains subreddit Discord about it.
The answer to why this is a thing? The item just fits perfectly into what a Nasus needs to get rolling. The five percent cooldown reduction and gold increase makes Nasus a rich dog quickly. Pair that with the keystone rune Kleptomancy and you’re going to be getting approximately 15 gold per basic attack on an enemy, said Vancethan, a Nasus player from the Discord server.
Using this, you can get Trinity Force quicker, start pressuring your lane and farm until you have too many stacks for the other team to handle.
If you upgrade Ancient Coin fully to Talisman of Ascension, it gives the movement speed you need in order to help gank other lanes and prevents enemies from escaping, as they’d usually do after being Q’d to near-death by a scary dog.
There are trade-offs, though. Starting with coin is punishable, since you’ll have no health and mana regen early (since the coin drops do not appear unless an ally kills the creep). Vancethan recommended taking Celestial Body and Second Wind, runes that both offer better sustain for the champion.
Of course this is a build that will not last, as support items are seeing a big change in an upcoming patch. But hey, you still have time to get in on this Nasus fun.