Q is by far your most important spell. It is your waveclear, poke, heal and main source of damage in fights. You should therefore always max this skill first. To be a good Darius player, it is important to constantly hit as many opponents as possible with the outer ring of Q to maximize damage and heal. If you are playing against an opponent at Lvl 1, then take Q to play a safe Lvl 1. If you are in a matchup where you can play aggressively, take the W Spell and try to get 3 passive stacks on your opponent with AA-W-AA instant. If he is far enough away from his tower, you can then activate Ghost and try to secure First Blood directly. At Lvl 2 you take the other spell.

Finally, on LvL 3, take the E, which you can use both offensively and defensively. After the hook, your opponents are briefly slowed, which you can use to escape from a gank. You can also use the E aggressively to entangle your opponent in an all-in. You max E as a second ability, as the cooldown is reduced and you also passively gain armor penetration.

You skill R whenever you can, i.e. at levels 6, 11 and 16. During your ultimate, you are unstoppable as soon as the animation of the spell has started. It deals absolute damage that ignores your opponent’s armor and does more damage the more passive stacks your opponent has. The ultimate is therefore perfect for finishing off your opponents and, as the icing on the cake, its cooldown resets every time you successfully score a kill with it.