-
1. Abilities
Trample A pretty sweet passive. It makes helping your team with towers very easy. Quite often the small amount of extra damage this provides has secured me a kill. Also decent for farming. 
Pulverize This combined with your Headbutt are your bread and butter. These two spells are what makes Alistar, well, Alistar. The incredible amount of CC you can lay down with the combination of the two is almost overpowered. A neat trick you can do is Headbutt and the instant Alistar begins the charge animation hit Q. Instead of knocking them back they will only go up, but will take the damage from both spells. This takes practice however so be careful not to knock enemies out of range of your team. 
Headbutt See Above^^ 
Triumphant Roar An excellent built in heal. Allows you to stay in the field for a long time, and can also save a teammate's life now and again. 
Unbreakable Will Click R, pow! You're almost invincible. 75% of Magic and Physical damage taken is gone. Just be careful of people like Vayne and Cho'Gath as they do large amounts of true damage in a short amount of time, which your ult does not protect from. -
2. WARNINGIf you are looking for a guide that will help you achieve a 6 KDR every game you play with Alistar this is NOT the guide for you! When playing a roamer you can not expect to have a great number of kills or even go positive. The goal is to make your team win.
-
3. IntroductionFirst off let me introduce myself. My name is With No Hands in game. Some of you may have seen me or even played with me. I'm new to the Leaguecraft community and this is my first guide. I do not have a degree in English so don't expect perfect or even close to perfect grammar or spelling (although I sure will try).
I've been playing Alistar for a while now, and I really enjoy playing him. I've seen plenty of guides for Alistar, but I have yet to see, in my opinion, a good roaming guide for him. Alistar is by far one of the best roamers in the game. His mana-cheap heal is great for long periods where you are unable to Blue-pill and his Pulverize and Headbutt
make for great ganking tools. This particular playstyle works amazingly
well with a jungler on your team. Giving your team 3 solo lanes. This
is a large EXP advantage for all of them and with you counter-jungling
constantly it makes your jungler's life a lot easier as all he/she has
to do it focus on ganks.
When playing Alistar this way you have to remember that you are a support character not a carry so if at all possible give your teammates the kills; an 0/8/30 win is a lot better than a 10/2/0 loss. You priorities are these in this order:
1. Maintain map control. If you have 150 gold and you leave the base without 2 wards you're doing wrong. This also means that if you see the enemy team start to buy large numbers of wards you should buy an
Oracle's Elixir
and go ward hunting. This is by far the most important thing you can
do. The less your teammates are being ganked the longer they can farm
and win their lane.
2. Counter the enemy jungler. Simple enough right? This goes along perfectly with priority #1. Not only should you be warding the river and certain key points throughout the map to prevent ganks, you should be warding enemy buffs to setup ganks which will put the enemy jungler even farther behind.
3. Gank the enemy lanes. Just because this is your 3rd priority does not mean that it is in any way unimportant. You should help your lanes out whenever possible by jumping in and stunning a few people. Remember the purpose of this style of play is to make your teammates win in their lanes, so when you go in for a gank and there's 1 hp left on that Tristana instead of killing her and taking the gold for yourself let your teammate have the kill, unless you're absolutely certain that she will escape.
If you can successfully perform all of these steps (assuming your lanes aren't total failures) 9/10 times you will win the game. -
4. Masteries + RunesMy Masteries for Roaming Alistar are fairly simple and I always be speced into Utility with either 9 points in Defense for a little more survivability or 9 points in Offense if I want more damage.
Here is an example of what I do most often:
You will notice that I am speced into buff duration. This is very useful when roaming. As stated earlier you're second most important job as a roamer is to counter the enemies jungler so assuming you pull that off correctly you should be picking up a few buffs here and there. I am also speced into
Clairvoyance. This summoner spell is crucial for roaming as it allows you to know where the enemy jungler is headed at (almost) all times.
For Runes I would recommend:
For marks:
9X
Greater Mark of Insight
For Seals:
9X
Greater Seal of Replenishment
but you could sub those in for these:
9X
Greater Seal of Defense
For Glyphs:
9X
Greater Glyph of Focus
or
9X
Greater Glyph of Shielding
Quints:
3X
Greater Quintessence of Insight -
5. ItemsStarting Items:
Boots of Speed
Sight Ward
Health Potion
Core:
Philosopher's Stone
Heart of Gold
Sheen
Mercury's Treads or 
Ionian Boots of Lucidity
Team needs more AP damage:
Lich Bane
Rabadon's Deathcap
Abyssal Scepter
Tanking Against AD Heavy Team:
Randuin's Omen
Frozen Heart
Sunfire Cape
Tanking Against AP Heavy Team:
Banshee's Veil Abyssal Scepter
Force of Nature
Against a Mix: Randuin's Omen Banshee's Veil
Guardian Angel
Obviously none of these are set in stone. If you want to mix and match a little go for it. Items are where you have a little lee-way since your main job is support not tanking or doing damage. Mold your build to what your team needs. -
6. Skilling Order
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 
x x x x x 
x x x x x 
x x x x x 
x x x -
7. Summoner AbilitiesThe God Tier:
Clairvoyance
This spell is an absolute must! I don't care what you prefer as a second spell, but if you aren't using this Summoner Spell you're doing it wrong! This spell is necessary for maintaining that total map control that is the reason for your existence as the God Among Cows. It will help you keep track of the enemy jungler, Dragon attempts, Baron attempts and even a level 1 Clairvoyance in the spawn can help your team figure out who goes in what lanes.
Almost Godlike:
Flash
An amazing spell I would recommend above all others (excluding Clairvoyance of course). This is great for escaping ganks that would potentially counter your counter ganks, initiate teamfights with your ult, and in rare cases allow you to tower dive with.
Ghost
Not quite as great as Flash, but it does have it's uses. The Movement Speed increase is excellent for maintaining that map control you so crave, but I would recommend taking Flash as it serves more of a purpose for the God Among Cows.
Good Tier:
Cleanse
A spell that has it's uses, but past level 6 you won't be using this often as your ult applies the same effect while also making your just shy of invincible.
Ignite
Great for ganking, but overall I would say steer clear of this as your primary purpose is not to get kills.
Exhaust
Another great ganking spell. Also good in teamfights because of the damage reduction that can be applied to the enemy's carry.
Useless Tier:
Clarity
You shouldn't be in the lane enough to support your teammates with this and with your runes/Philo stone you shouldn't be running out of mana to often.
Smite
You're not jungling 'nuff said.
Heal
Why use this? Alistar has a built in heal.
Rally
I don't care who you're playing this spell is useless beyond words.
Teleport
You're a roamer so there is no need for you to have this. You won't be in a lane, and it will very rarely come in handy other than the occasional gank or buff steal.
Revive
NO -
8. Actually Playing the GameEarly-Game:
Playing Alistar is fairly straightforward. Immediately Clairvoyance the enemy spawn pool to see what everyone's building and what direction they're heading. Grab your items and head out to protect your jungler, if you have one, if not head to a lane. Use your Clairvoyance to scout and find out where the enemy jungler is. If he/she is starting as blue you may want to either head to the enemy's Wraiths with your team and steal them, and maybe even the red buff. Another option is invading and forcing a level 1 teamfight. Take a look at your team comp. Do you have anyone besides yourself with a stun/knockup/fear? A good rule of thumb you can use to figure out which team will win is which team has more Crowd Control moves. If invading the enemy jungle didn't level you to 2, and you still have enough health to lane until level 2 go to your lane. Upon hitting 2 put one point in
and commence roaming. Assuming the enemy jungler was not killed and the
wraiths were taken it would be a good idea to Clairvoyance the area
around the enemy's red buff. This will also give your top/bottom
(depending on if you are purple or blue team) a heads up to watch for an
early gank. Should you spot the enemy jungler doing something like,
let's say, taking red buff you will want to ask yourself: is that a
jungler I can easily counter?
Two examples of junglers that are easily countered are Warwick and Amumu. Warwick doesn't have the speed or damage this early in the game to be able to repel a counter-jungle effort without teammates helping him. Amumu is fairly low on health all the time on his first run through the jungle. As an example let's say it's Warwick. As long as you can rely on your mid to help you and tell you if the enemy mid leaves you should head into the enemy jungle and if possible stand in the bushes by red. At this point you have two choices. You can either blow your cooldowns trying to steal the Red Buff which will prevent early ganks from Warwick, or you can blow cooldowns on Warwick trying to force him to have to back and not be able to take Red Buff.
The example above is just that, an example. Do not expect this to happen every time. Often times the enemy jungler could be slow, back at the spawn pool, communicating extremely well with his teammates or going for an extremely early gank. You should take all this advice with a grain of salt. Yes you might run in and take the Red Buff, but if you die because the enemy mid watched his map like a hawk was it really worth it? The enemy jungler will be behind, but so will your team as a whole because you died.
Early game for a roamer is extremely important. Not just because of the counter-jungling aspect, but the ganking aspect as well. You should attempt a gank on the enemy's lanes whenever possible. In particular the solo lanes (middle and top for those that don't know). Alert your teammate(s) of your intentions and wait for the enemy's to overextend just ever so slightly and go for the kill. If you can close the gap quick enough a great ganking technique is to run in and a person then quickly position yourself so that
will knock the target into your teammates. We'll call this the Q+W
Combo. If the gap is to big for you to quickly close on foot you can
initiate with then
them to allow your teammates time to finish them off. We'll call this
the W+Q Combo. Remember, if you gank, but the enemy Flashes/Ghosts away
that's a victory. Next time you come to gank they won't escape.
After the enemy jungler is about level 5 or 6 is when the effects of counter-jungling become minimal at best. This is also the prime ganking stage for most junglers as they will be acquiring their Ultimates around this time. This is when I consider "Mid-Game" to have started.
Mid-Game:
Mid game is the period when most junglers will be ganking most often and lasts until the teamfighting or "End-Game" stage begins. This is when your Map Control shines most. You should really be laying on the wards heavy. Every time you back you will want to pick up 3-5 wards if possible. Key points you will want warded are shown in this picture:
The Red dots are wards that should be in place for the entire game. They protect your lanes from gank, prevent Baron steals, and prevent Dragon steal as well as jungle invasions from the enemy team. The Yellow dots are aggressive wards from Blue side and the Pink dots are aggressive wards from the Purple side. Aggressive wards are mostly used later in the game once the initial towers have been taken down to allow safer traveling through the enemy jungle. The wards by each buff can be used at any stage to set up ganks on people taking buffs and also to allow for easier buff stealing.
At this stage in the game the effects of stealing camps from the enemy jungler such as the Wraith camp are minimal at best. As such your focus should be on ganking and map control. This is when you will want to purchase your Oracle's Elixir
and go ward hunting to make it easier to gank and take dragon with
teammates. Ganking goes the same as before, but you have to be wary
because the lanes will be stronger (hopefully not to much stronger if
you did your job right) so ganking can often result in you dying. You
have to remember that even if you have your ult it doesn't negate all
damage and that you can still die. You will want to weigh the
Risk/Reward factors before pulling a risky move like tower diving. The
next stage of the game is the teamfighting phase.
End-Game(Teamfighting Phase):
This is when teams will start to pull together, often in mid, and one team the "aggressor" will attempt to push the towers; while the "defender" will attempt to repel the pushes. You will be engaging in large, sometimes drawn out fights, with the enemy team during this phase. Your main two jobs during this phase (besides maintaining map control) are:
1. Keep Your carry from getting wrecked. You see that enemy Warwick ult onto your frail little Ashe you best be knockin' them back...or up. However it works out just make sure that your carry doesn't die.
2. Initiate on the enemy carry. This is when your Q+W Combo really starts to shine. If you pop your ult, Flash into the enemy team, them all then the squishy little Tristana back into your team she can kiss her ass goodbye (assuming your team is focusing correctly).
In this phase of the game Alistar really is a game changer. The insane amount of CC you can dish out often can turn the tide of a bad teamfight or make a good one go even faster. The great thing about your knockup/knockback is that neither is countered by Tenacity, so they are both equally effective no matter what items they have (unlike something such as a taunt/fear/stun).
This stage of the game is also when teams start going for Baron. You should worry more about keeping this warded than anything else. The Baron Buff is another game changer. It's extremely difficult to go up against a well organized team with Baron Buff and expect to win. Whilst preventing the enemy team from taking the buff you should be using your Oracle's Elixir to take out wards watching it so the enemy won't know for sure if your team is taking it.
Assuming you performed your job well the game should be over quickly and you should have won. If not think about what you could have done wrong, and what you can work on in the future.
