Nami is one of my favorite units in TFT due to her unique ultimate ability which provides incredible crowd control and empowers allied attacks. While the interrupt and stun benefits of her Tidal Wave are pretty obvious, most players don’t realize how powerful the auto-attack buffing aspect can be, or really how it works. So let’s try to answer some questions like: How does Nami’s ult work with items? How does Nami’s ult work with class synergies? It’s time for a deep dive (pun intended) here.

Tidal Wave

50 / 125

Nami sends a massive wave toward a random enemy, damaging and knocking up enemies it passes through and granting allies it passes through bonus magic damage on hit for 8 seconds.

Damage: 100 / 200 / 300

Stun Duration: 1.5 / 2 / 2.5

Bonus Damage: 25 / 50 / 300

Class Synergies

To start off, blademasters, rangers, and berserkers can all leverage her auto attack buffs, providing some great synergy off the bat.

Beyond this, inferno is the unique one that might surprise most players. If Nami is given an inferno spat item, all allied auto attacks will also deal the inferno damage. This is super powerful.

Making Nami a mage is pretty popular as well. Mage Cap does indeed cause the wave to be cast twice, but it does not double stack the buff. It simply refreshes the duration.

Scarra showing off a double Nami mage ult

Item Synergies

Jeweled Gauntlet will cause all empowered allied attacks to be able to critically strike.

Next up is Morellonomicom, aka Morello. This one also applies to empowered allied attacks, causing the % burn to be applied! I highly recommend Nami as a “Morello applicator” – she’s great for this purpose. Not only does the ult itself apply the burn, but the auto attacks later on do as well. Arguably the best Morello holder in the game.

Finally, we have Rabadon’s Deathcap. This one was the most surprising to me because it actually causes empowered allied spells to also gain the 75% damage amplification, as long as it is applied before they cast their spell.

Fun Fact

During Set 2 development, Nami started as a 3 gold champion, with a different spell. She was one of the most changed units according to Riot.

Know any other cool interactions with Nami’s ult? Let me know!