Azaan Guide: Playing the Best Champion in the Game
Azaan, The Eternal, is the best champion in Paladins — not our hot take, but the only verdict every community tier list agrees on. Our consensus ranking gives him the highest score in the game: a 4500 HP front liner with flank-grade dive, self-sustain, a stun combo, and an ultimate that is both an engage and an escape.
The engine behind it all is Ire — a rage resource that turns damage dealt and taken into damage reduction, bonus damage, and empowered ability casts. Learning Azaan is learning Ire; everything below is built around that loop.
All numbers are verified against the final patch and the wiki changelog — including the 7.6 buffs (4500 HP, faster cooldowns) that many older guides predate. If a guide quotes Tempering at +50% cooldown or Persistence at 40% lifesteal, it is describing a champion that no longer exists.
A light-light-heavy hammer chain, fully effective to 110 units. Above the Ire threshold hammers hit for 588/706 and explode in a 10-unit radius — your poke becomes area damage.
An exploding projectile covering a 50×30 zone that lifts everyone hit. Consumes 15% Ire; augmented, its cooldown drops by 3s — the combo starter comes back faster the angrier you are.
A semicircle of deployable walls (augmented: 3750 HP each). Blocks shots, movement, and sightlines for both teams; can be refired to demolish. Damage blocked counts as shielding — enemy Bulldozer melts it.
A 45-unit dash that carries one enemy with you. Slamming them into any wall stuns 0.75s; into your own Sanctuary — 500 damage and a 1.5s stun. Look up while casting to fly.
Rise into the air for up to 6s with crowd-control immunity and 50% damage reduction, then hurl the hammer (725 + knockback) and teleport to the impact (250 + a huge area knockback). Cancellable — the unspent 30% charge stays.
Gain 30% lifesteal on Judgement hits. The community all-rounder: 525-damage hammers become a self-healing loop that lets Azaan win extended brawls no other tank survives. (Older guides quote 40% + damage reduction — outdated values.)
The community core build: max health, plus Grim Deliverance turning every augmented cast into a 375–500 HP heal on top of the lifesteal.
- Play him as a diving off-tank, not a point statue — lifesteal only works while hammers are landing.
- Manage Ire like a resource: hold 85%+ and decide which ability deserves the augment before you spend it.
- The bread-and-butter combo: Sanctuary behind the enemy, Conviction them into your own wall — 500 damage plus a 1.5s stun.
- Ultimate is also a defensive: 6s of CC immunity and 50% damage reduction can simply tank the enemy’s engage.
Reckoning, Sanctuary, and Conviction gain +50% damage, size, health, range, and stun duration — for +25% cooldown. Patch 6.1 cut the penalty from 50% to 25%, so any guide still quoting 50% is outdated. Augmented Sanctuary walls reach 6375 HP; the own-wall stun hits 2.35s.
Everything shortens or armors the wall-slam combo, compensating the talent’s longer cooldowns where it matters most.
- This is the kill-combo talent: a 2.35s stun into your own wall is a guaranteed elimination with any follow-up.
- Augment Sanctuary before a fight — 6375-HP walls split the point into a room you own.
- The 75-unit Conviction reaches supports hiding two positions back; drag them into your team, not away from yours.
- Respect the cooldown tax: a missed combo leaves you ability-less for ten seconds — commit only on confirmed angles.
Ire no longer decays out of combat — but you lose the +12% damage bonus above the threshold. Augments become something you always have instead of something you race to maintain.
Built around guaranteed augments: every empowered cast heals, and Reckoning feeds both healing and wall cooldown.
- The learning talent: walk into every fight with a stored augment instead of rebuilding Ire mid-brawl.
- Open fights with an augmented Sanctuary or Reckoning — you no longer need to “warm up” first.
- Best on maps with long walks between fights, where the other talents bleed their Ire away.
- Once Ire management feels natural, graduate to Persistence — the damage bonus you gave up is real.
Matchup votes for late-era champions are thin, so treat these as directional. The mechanical truths: his hammers are slow projectiles effective at 110 units, so long-range hitscan outranges him — and his whole passive fades within seconds if he cannot keep dealing damage. See where Azaan sits in our tier list →
// COMMUNITY RESOURCES
Why is Azaan the best champion in Paladins?
Our 2026 tier list aggregates five community ranked lists — and Azaan is the only champion rated S-tier by every single source, finishing with the highest consensus score in the game (0.92). The note from ranked players: “oppressive dive, self-sustain, and an ult that wins fights on its own”.
The reason is coverage: most champions have a weakness you draft against. Azaan’s kit answers poke (Sanctuary walls), answers dive (a 1.5s stun combo), answers burst (Ire damage reduction plus lifesteal), and answers lost fights (a CC-immune ultimate that resets the engagement). The final patch froze the meta with him on top — permanently.
Is Azaan good for beginners?
Yes, with one caveat: the Ire system asks you to track a resource most tanks do not have. Start with the Eternal talent — Ire stops decaying, so you can walk into fights with an empowered ability ready instead of managing a decay timer mid-brawl.
Once the augment rhythm feels natural, switch to Persistence: the 30% hammer lifesteal is where his infamous “unkillable brawler” reputation actually comes from. Tempering is the expert pick — a longer stun and bigger walls in exchange for punishing cooldowns.
FAQ
What is the best Azaan talent?
Persistence for most players — 30% lifesteal on Judgement hammers makes Azaan nearly impossible to brawl down. Eternal is the best learning talent since Ire stops decaying, and Tempering is the expert playmaker pick with a 2.35s wall-slam stun.
How do you counter Azaan?
Outrange him — his hammers are slow projectiles fully effective only to 110 units. Mobile champions like Evie kite him, cripples cut his dive short, and knockbacks interrupt the wall-slam combo. His Ire passive also fades within seconds if he stops dealing damage.
Is Azaan a point tank or an off-tank?
Primarily an off-tank — his kit rewards diving and brawling rather than standing on the objective. He can hold point with Sanctuary walls when needed, but his sustain only works while his hammers are landing.
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