Lee Sin Build Guide : Blind Rampage - An in-depth Lee Sin Lane and Jungle Guide

Introduction

-Travelling Lee Sin by Elagune

Hey Guys, This is my Jungle an Lane Lee Sin Guide. I know that there are many Lee Sin Guides out there, but the aim of this guide is to provide much more detailed information than other guides. In my eyes, every champion should have a a guide on mobafire for them that's at a rating of 90%+ and at the moment, there isn't one, and I plan on this guide being the first. This is the second full day that the guide has been up and I already have been experiencing some technical difficulties that I'm not quite sure how to fix so please bear with me, if the guide seems a little disorganized for SOME reason(my guide has been rearranging itself). So I really hope you enjoy Lee Sin and learn more than just Lee Sin from this guide.

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On a side note, I'd love to make this guide more organized, but sadly I have no real knowledge of how to do so. This is my second guide ever so If you have any way to help me format this, please put a comment down below since every help guide I've read hasn't exactly shown a way to reformat into that columned format that EVERY SINGLE top guide has(which baffles me to no end why everyone likes that format and it's basically become generic, to me at least.) So yeah, feel free to help me out with that.

ANOTHER NOTE:
I am no 1800+ ELO player so if you happen to see something that doesn't look right, please help me correct it to make anyone looking at the guide understand the game and Lee Sin better.
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NOTE: I got rid of the quick/basic overview of the guide, since it's kinda pointless, if someone can just look at the top of the guide for the same exact information. If a few people specifically request it, I will be sure to put it back up.

NOTE:

I'm not motivated to update this guide anymore since I'm just getting troll voted down. Many of the reasons that I'm getting for down votes are just childish and opinionated. I'd love to work hard on this guide but if no one will look at it anyways, I might as well just stop right here.(11/18)

Pros and Cons

Lane

Pros:

Cons:

Jungle

Pros:

Cons:

So to summarize, Lee sin falls off late game, he takes some time to learn(through experience), and you need to be able to position yourself well(as with all champions). With all of this in mind, you have to work to maximize your pros and minimize your cons. What do I suggest? you really should take advantage of how strong you are early on to make your late game better. You also need to just play Lee Sin a good amount to get a feel for his skill set and learn his role and positions. Even after your champion falls off at late game, you should always use your skills and knowledge to make that late game better.

Masteries

Lane

Jungle

Please Note:
You don't HAVE to play using my masteries, these are just my recommendations. I would give you more alternatives, but honestly, nothing matches up to these mastery pages in my honest opinion. Please feel free to experiment with different pages, and if something works out really well for you, please comment to help this guide out.

Runes

Lane

My Recommendations and Explainations:

Marks:
Greater Mark of DesolationGreater Mark of Desolation
These provide a nice early/mid game damage boost where, combined with armor pen quints, let you do true damage to people stupid enough to not bring cloth armor to lane against you(and do considerably more damage vs early armor stackers),and deal true damage to minions(for last hits.)
Seals:
Greater Seal of Resilience
These provide some decent armor for early/mid game. These will help you against the probable tanky dps top solos and will help you take less damage during ganks(yours or theirs).
Glyphs:
Greater Glyph of Shielding
These provide a good amount of MR later on for any magic damage soaking.
OR
Greater Glyph of Acumen(Sorry no pic of this on mobafire)
(+2.2 energy)
Flat 20 energy is a very good substitute if you're not a fan of the 24 MR at level 18. This helps you a lot, even with fast energy regen. Mostly, it helps you spam harass a bit more.
Quintessences:
Greater Quintessence of Desolation Greater Quintessence of Desolation
Brings you up to 31 Armor Pen (with marks and masteries) and gives you some early/mid game dominance.

Alternatives:

Marks:
Greater Mark of Strength
Gives you 9 damage at level one. Not sure if it gives better damage at level one(compared to armor pen marks) but it does give you a tiny bit extra sustain(with your W's lifesteal).
Seals:
Greater Seal of Evasion
Combined with the dodge mastery, and ninja tabi, you get very high dodge and can go faster with the mastery to chanse and run. It's not exactly "reliable" since it's chance, but it's still a good substitute for flat armor in lane.
Glyphs:
Greater Glyph of Warding
Gives 13 MR level one. Could be useful if you're sure that the person you're going up against is going to be a harass type with magic damage.
Quintessenceses:
Greater Quintessence of Strength
This gives you 7 AD at level 1 and it actually is more damage efficient than armor pen early on but falls off soon after.

Jungle

My Recommendations and Explainations:

Marks:
Greater Mark of DesolationGreater Mark of Desolation
Pierces all small camps armor to 0 which makes for true damage hits and faster jungle speed. Also very useful for doing extra damage during ganks.
Mixed with / OR:
Greater Mark of Strength
If mixed, can stop those annoying 1 hp monsters requiring another hit and slowing jungle time a bit and if exchanged, can speed up your very early stages of jungle slightly, and power up your Q for some extra powered ganks.
Seals:
Greater Seal of Resilience
Gives you the some good armor for help with jungle sustain. During ganks early on, can help you dive to a certain extent. These are mainly used for jungle survival.
Glyphs:
Greater Glyph of Warding
Since you'll be ganking every lane, you'll eventually run into a caster to gank, and these runes do the job of keeping the magic damage early on lower than usual.
OR
Greater Glyph of Acumen(Sorry no pic of this on mobafire)
(+2.2 energy)
These provide 20 energy and are a good substitute for the flat MR. These give your extra Energy for another skill during ganks so it can prove to be very useful.
Quintessenceses:
Greater Quintessence of Strength
Give you extra AD for extra sustain at early jungle levels. Since you hit for 7 more damage, it can give you a bit extra lifesteal while also providing 13 extra damage on your Q with it's .9 additional AD ratio.

Alternatives:

Marks:
Can't think of any other DECENT alternatives, comment if you have an opinion.
Seals:
Again, Can't think of decent or reliable alternatives. Giving up armor would force you to build cloth and 5 hps, and I like for you to have many starting options.
Glyphs:
Greater Glyph of Shielding
Not a bad choice if you don't think that you'll be fighting any ap early on or if their only ap champ is late game oriented(ex:)
Greater Glyph of Focus
Shorter CDs = Higher dps, but what's the cost you might ask? You'll probably run out of energy a lot faster, unless you manage it well. This would slightly increase your jungle speed at low levels but it would diminish over time.
Greater Quintessence of Desolation Greater Quintessence of Desolation
I highly recommend that you either mix in or use AD marks with this because you WILL run into too many 1-3hp jungle creeps and significantly slow down your jungle. Upside though is that you'll do alot more damage against the probable tanky dps up top.

Summoner Spells

BOTH:

Flash
This goes really well with Lee Sin, even if he has a ton of positioning skills to begin with. this can set you up for some pre-6 ganks if you can't get a clear in. You simply in then for the slow. This also sets you up for Kicks back to your team during team fights or post-6 ganks. Aside from all of that, is OP anyways. It can really save you from any situation, and set you up for good chases.

Alternative:

Ghost
It's not as good as Flash in my opinion, but it is a bit more reliable, since it has a shorter CD and is much longer in duration(derp). Again, this could set you up for all of your skills and ganks, but it's really not as effective as . It can help you escape in LONG run-aways but why not just flash out and be done?

(update 11/14): While flash did get nerfed, it's still better than ghost for lee sin. I will admit, however, that it's not a terrible idea to run ghost though. It's just personal preference at this point.

You Might be wondering why I recommend that both lane and jungle carry or , and I'll tell you that because of his skill set, you need something more to position yourself well during team fights. These are the only 2 that can do it instantly.

Lane:

Exhaust
Such a great summoner for lane. I like to call this the new and improved . Why you may ask? Well, First of all, it's useful the entire game and not just early game. It gives you a tool to shut down anyone in a 1v1 fight, ANOTHER way to escape, armor/magic resist reduction(which, in my opinion, is the reason why it's comparable to ignite early on), AND a way to shut 1 person down during late game team fights. Much more versatile than .

Decent Alternatives:

Ignite
Better than Exhaust at Early game but then falls off soon after, DAMAGE-wise. Why wouldn't it fall of in certain other ways? If their team has 1 or 2 heals, this can really help you focus one person down with the heal reduction. Early on it can add extra damage to your burst, to ensure some kills.
(update 11/14): Added a 5 AD bonus while on CD, so a bit better from that.
Teleport
You're good at taking towers, so teleport helps you split push. Free towers if no one is paying attention, but if you're playing with better players, obviously it won't work as much. Still, this can help you with getting to certain points on the map such as Sight Wards and help with getting places that you are needed faster.

Others:

: Not Jungling so....
: You don't really need this at all...Could save you but you already would have enough escapes with other recommended summoners. If used for sustain...you already have a lot of that with
(11/14 update): Got a pretty decent buff, not so bad anymore, but still I kinda don't recommend it.
: Lee Sin isn't really one of the best champions to use this.
: If you chose this, you were afraid of the CC on their team....but you could have just bought with similar effect.
(11/14 update):It's a bit better, but still not the most viable summoner on Lee Sin
: No Mana
: Let Supports take this.
: It's pretty good on some champions, but lee sin is not one of them.
: Kinda useless for you, it's only good for pushers

Jungle

Smite
An Absolute Necessity on a Jungler. You really need this to speed up your jungle and to even survive. You really need this for bigger Jungle Monsters but ESPECIALLY for securing Dragon/Baron. There's a Neat trick you can pull on Buffs/Dragon/Baron, Similar to the Half HP combo(sort of), when it's down to like 20-30% Health, use the first part of , then , Then Quickly use the second Part of to finish it off. This is similar to a double smite like 's + Combo and 's + Combo, but it takes a bit more skill to pull off.

I won't recommend any other Summoners for jungle since you already have 2 if you listened to me about the Necessity of /. If you wish to experiment with other summoners, be my guest. Again, If something works out really well for you, let me know.

Skill Explanations

Flurry(Passive): This skill makes energy conservation easy, whether it be in lane or in jungle. In jungle this give you some very nice jungle speed since it works both with the initial skills and the secondary skills, which makes 4 +50% attack speed hits per skill. What else can those +50% attack speed hits do? Take towers like like it's nobody's Business. You can take towers EXTREMELY fast with this. This passive makes it so you don't need blue buff to sustain your jungle, which means that you can give buffs out to people who could use it better than you. I will say that other energy based junglers don't need buffs, because they're on the energy system, but this makes it even easier to just give the buffs away.
Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike(Q): This is probably one of the better skills in the entire game. It may be a skill shot and require actual skill to hit, but after all of that, It has pretty much, a 1.8 bonus AD ratio since it's a 2 part skill with a .9 bonus AD ratio on each. The first activation is a skill shot with a long range. This alone can do damage comparable to 's . The next part lets you kick to the target you previously hit for similar damage with bonus damage based on % health lost. Not only is it powerful damage-wise, it's also a gap closer, and a finisher. There's a ton of utility in this one skill and just to make it even better, it has a very short CD.

Recent Nerf:
Bonus AD Ratio Reduced from 1.0 to .9
CD at all Ranks increased by 1 sec

Safeguard / Iron Will(W):Provides a decent damage shield on first cast. This shield has a short CD and makes Lee Sin VERY durable, even without tanky items. He can cast it once more to gain an armor and lifesteal/spellvamp bonus depending on rank. In lane this can keep you sustained for a very long time. In jungle, it also acts as a way to keep you in the jungle comfortably for awhile. The spellvamp can be used with skills and, contrary to common belief, is NOT based off magic damage. Using this with Q can heal you for 150 hp with rank 2 and rank 4 Q.

Recent Nerf:
Range Reduced by 50

Tempest / Cripple(E):This is your only CC until 6 but is very reliable during ganks or get-aways. It's first part deals damage and reveals any enemy for a short period. This includes stealth enemies aswell, which makes it the perfect counter for 's . The next part is a Movement/Attack Speed slow that diminishes over time. So basically, this is an essential part of your early game farm, ganks, and jungle. Using the spellvamp that comes from your W's second part doesn't heal that much with this skill, so don't go crazy about getting every minion caught in the aoe.
Dragon's Rage(R): this is your second form of CC. This skill is SO useful in so many situations. In 1v1s, you can quickly kill people with it, in team fights, you can kick people away from your carries, and in general, you can kick people away to save your life. The Big thing about this skill, is that it does MASSIVE damage at each respective rank for the level you get it. I will include a quick trick section for specific skill combos related to this.

Skill Combos and Tricks!

Lee Sin is all about pulling combos off with your skills, here are some Tricks you can pull of with all skills with their own respective situations.

There are Utility based ones such as:

Need to get to lane a bit faster?
to Minions that are running to lane

Need to get out of a "sticky" situation?
to Sight Ward, , , Minions or Friendly Champions!

Want to deny a creep kill?
to the minion he's about to kill. This will make him, essentially, miss, and the creeps will finish it off, making him not get the gold!

Then there's the aggressive and offensive ones:

Need to harass them while they're in tower range?(or not)
to them and make sure it actually hits them, then to a nearby minion of Friendly Champion. (If you Safeguard / Iron Will away too fast, the kick from Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike won't actually reach them, and you'll waste the energy and damage from this combo.)

They want to fight you while at half health?
then auto attack a couple of times, then quickly Kick them away with and Kick to them with the second part of to finish them off. If they're still alive, since you kicked to them, throw in some auto attacks and maybe a .

Skill Sequences

Lane:

Ability Sequence
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18

Can't really see anything being better than this for lane. You need For your Early/Mid Game High Damage so substituting it with something else first would yield poor results. You can, alternatively, get the second point in earlier on for better sustain in lane.

Jungle Routes and their Skill Sequences:

There are many different starts and skill patterns, so just choose what suits you best.

Ability Sequence
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18

This is a standard double golem start. You start double golems with then after leveling, you get to do wraiths fast, then proceed to wolves where you will get your first point in afterward. You then proceed to prioritize then , obviously with as First Priority.

Ability Sequence
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18

This is a standard Wraith start. allows for a fast clear of the camp, of course, smiting the big wraith. After proceeding to wolves where you pick up after and go to golems where you pick up your first point of after clearing. You can, Alternatively take a point of at level 2 and go for an unexpected early level 2 gank. It's risky since you can't really escape unless you / Out after going in, but it would do a ton of damage early on.

Ability Sequence
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18

While not a big fan of this,this is a fast jungle speed sequence. Maxing First allows for extremely fast clearing of small camps, which would make for faster jungle speed. Since you're focusing on , Becomes just a gap-closing ability on a medium CD. You can alternatively prioritize over at the expense of not being as tanky mid game.

Both:

Ability Sequence
1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18

This is what you go with if your team is planning to do a level 1 team fight. This allows you to do high damage during the fight and afterward, do high damage to the probable buff that you'll steal after the fight.In lane: the earlier point in gives you a bit more control over you lane and also could help if your jungler decides to gank when you're at level 3.

Items

Lane

Starting Items:

AND x3/4(if you wait until after minions spawn.)
Against a normal lane or an aggressive magic lane
OR

Against a weak early lane(like or )
OR
AND x5
Against an AD harassment type (like , , etc.)

Early/Mid Game CORE:

OR
The two s give your laning a boost with the damage, health, and lifesteal, that can help your sustain, damage output, and tankyness. The Boots are just for extra speed, and more survivability since both provide good amounts of it for their respective areas. gives you the great early game damage output that you need to dominate your lane and deal extra damage if you decide to gank.

Optional Early to Mid Game Buys:

Get this if you either: Know that you'll be building a or if you aren't laning too well and are losing out on farm. The health from this also helps you survive some early/mid game conflicts so overall, not a bad buy at all.

Id's get this if I was getting shut down by some other early/mid game oriented AD champion. I'd also get this if I was outclassed by an obviously better laner. It's not too bad since you get a ward that you can use to hop walls with , and it can help you farm a bit with the 600 magic damage procs. It also gives you a good amount of extra sustain. This is also a MUST buy if you and your team decide to roll with 3+ s for fast Dragon/Barons.

I'd only get this if you're getting shut down by a early/mid game oriented Magic Damage Champion. It does provide decent damage and good MR along with the 300 Magic damage shield, it's easily an essential item vs casters that have high burst early on.

On a Side note:
You can get the two offensive items if you're dominating everyone, and you need something short term with damage and tankyness.

Jungle

Starting Items and Camps:

At Golems with
OR
AND X3
At Golems with
OR

At Wraiths with
OR
AND Helath Potion X5
Any small camp with at Golems
or at wraiths or wolves.

I didn't Recommend Because it's so unversatile(couldn't think of anything more clever). It really doesn't provide good speed, good sustain, or provide you with good tools for ganks, it's just overall below average. I only mention this because it provides the fastest item route to , so it COULD be something to consider IF you even want to buy a .

Early/Mid Game CORE:

(Optional)
(If you don't buy the , buy or )
It's not that many items mainly due to the fact that I just made this the point where you should be buying a lot of wards to control the map. While you do still buy wards while getting to this point, you really want to buy like 3-5 Sight Wards after hitting this point and maybe an.

Woah Buddy, wait a minute, why is Wriggle's Lantern optional?

Well, good sir, I will gladly tell you. It's just my personal preference to not build it. It isn't NEEDED since you already clear the jungle extremely fast and have a double smite type technique, but it would also make dragon and baron easier, and it would also speed up your jungle. I just feel that going 1600 gold for an item that i'd probably sell later, isn't that worth it. With that gold I could get and and be already far into my or .

AGAIN it's just my opinion, follow it if you wish to, and don't if you don't agree.

Consumables:
Sight Ward
I think it goes without saying that you NEED these for certain points in the game against varying skill levels of opponents. Obviously, Sight wards to spot ganks that could be coming, and for overall map control. The is a bit more advanced, but is very useful since you can get rid of wards on their team to limit their vision and hinder their ability to over-extend. These are good buys all throughout the game BUT I'd only recommend that Junglers get it early on to hinder vision, since they'll be roaming the map anyways.

Optional Early to Mid Game Buys:

I would get this only if I was getting a lot of the kills during ganks(even if I try to give them away). Like in lane, This provides good extra dps to your skill set and lets you do high damage during ganks.

Provides good damage, and depending on the point in time that you buy this, could be great damage. This give you that extra MR for dealing with those high burst champions(such as , , etc.)during early phases of the game, while also providing a 300 damage magic shield just in case.

Why I recommend 2 Doran's Blades for BOTH

You have a powerful early game and good scaling with all of your skills, so picking up 1-3 s lets you have good early game damage with a bit of tankiness and extra sustain. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BUY THEM IF YOU DON'T WANT TO. It's just my opinion that you should take full advantage of both your early game strength and good scaling.

Mid/Late Game CORE for BOTH

OR
These are needed for your late game damage output and tankyness, so you can go in and out of fights, surviving, and to be able to deal good damage to squishies.

You may be asking:
Should I get Fratmas or Atmogs?
Well, there's positives and negatives to both, and I'll properly list them:
What Atmogs has over Fratmas

What Fratmas has over Atmogs

early on for extra damage early game.)

What do I like? In my opinion gets it for me since I like to survive and 680 more health and 45 more HP regen per 5 helps me survive a lot more. I usually go with when I dominate early game since I can build a to enhance the domination early on, and when moving in to a Fratmas, I have a lot more damage for my Mid/Late Game.

Magic Resist

I didn't include any late game options for this category mainly because I only buy:

a Negatron Cloak If I NEED it sometime while I'm building my Atmogs or Fratmas. I'll usually build it into a:

If I even get that far. Mainly you'll only get to atmogs/fratmas with a negatron cloak anyways, but if you want to see my explanation for why I pick over , it's mainly because:

I will say that you get Health which would give you more damage but it's not worth it even if you get a spell bubble every 45 secs. I personally feel that more MR is more reliable than a spell shield that a, example, can pop with , where a caster can then proceed to burst you with less MR.

Don't know what to buy next for late game?

I have some suggestions.

Armor:

is probably the best tanky armor item in the game. It gives you a huge amount of armor and decent health. It also has an active with similar range to which makes for a very good control during team fights. If you are planning to build this, I recommend that you buy a Early on, although it's not needed.

While if I do need more armor, I'll generally always go with , This is a decent alternative. More health but a bit more than half the armor, with a passive 35 magic dps,but you lose the aoe slow from . On the other side again, it's alot cheaper.
icon=Thornmail size=32]
Again, I'd rather build a But if you really need armor fast, This is a very cheap armor item and with a scary passive if they're all AD. If they're not all AD(and they most likely won't), I can't say this is the greatest armor item against a balanced team.
Suggested by Slizer002

In my opinion, I'd say that this is the second best Armor item on lee sin. You get a nice Balance of Armor and MR so it's overall not too bad in the stat department, but the big thing is, you get a revive. The revive may only bring you up to 750 HP, but if you bring up, you can probably sustain yourself back up to full. The only thing I really don't like about it is the 5min CD on the passive. You MAY want to sell it while you're waiting on the CD for another item.

Magic Resist:

Like I said above, not a fan of getting this over But if you need even more MR, that's another story. While I did say that the bubble is easily popped, and it is, don't kid yourself, but it still works really well IF it does come up at the right time/no one popped it in the first place. As stated above, once again, the health does give you some extra AD.

This guy is pretty nice vs a caster who's reliant on some form of CC to get their combo off on you(Ex:, , , , etc.) or vs a team that has some form of aoe initiation (Ex: , , , , etc.). It's very cheap and provides decent MR. While the active has twice the CD than 's CD on the bubble, I still find it more 'reliable.'

Damage:

While it doesn't provide nearly as much damage, and a bit less lifesteal than , It does provide spellvamp, which, since you're a skill based, makes for huge heals when you have Iron will from up and you use on a minion. It has a decent active which offers a ranged slow, but if you already have a it'll be less useful, but NOT useless.

NERF 10/18(Graves Patch):
Gunblade has been nerfed, and many of the stats have been lowered INCLUDING the Damage decreasing by 20 and the lifesteal and spell vamp being reduced by 5%. It's still not a bad item on lee sin, BUT I honestly would rather buy a .

Probably the best Damage item for your skills. A possible 100 damage and 25% lifesteal calls for +180 damage on and +200 on . Uhh, nothing much more to elaborate on...Just try to keep it near full stacks if you tend to die more often.

If you didn't get this 'vibe' from me before, I'm not really a big fan of getting an item with mana on it as Lee Sin. It is still very useful and actually really good, but to me, that mana makes me feel like I'm wasting gold. Well, the reason why this is really good, is mainly since you have a lot of low CD skills so that you can really just keep that +150% AD on at all times. On top of that, It provides a slow sometimes, extra speed, and good amounts of health for more damage on top of the damage you already get from it. I can't really say that I would recommend this if you bought but, it's really up to you.

With a damage item above:

As always, IF their team has, in general, a lot of armor, pick up this quick and cheap item to completely shut down that armor. I would generally get this by itself before one of the damage items listed above, but I always will go for both and not just one or the other.

As with all of the endings of my sections of my guide, test out new builds, you never know what will end up being the new best items for every champion. AND PLEASE let me know if you discover something that should be in this guide.

Play Style

Lane

Early Game(pre-6): Farm. Poke when you can, and attempt to deny creeps and exp by zoning or using on minions. You'll always have good sustain, so don't be afraid to take SOME damage. If you know that you can take someone in a duel and they want to fight you, then **** them up.

Early to Mid Game Transition(6-9): Be more Agressive. At this point, you'll want to take some action and force more fights. You still want to farm, but you really want to force them to either die, or curl up in the corner.

Mid Game(9-14): Start more team oriented fights. You really want to be aggressive, but don't be stupid, you're not a tank, you're tanky. You want to get into some 2v2 or 3v3 fights. This is where your damage potential peaks, so take advantage of it.

Mid to Late Game Transition(14-16): You start to fall off at this point, and since you're probably not done with either your or you'll be somewhere in the middle of your effectiveness. You can start initiating fights now, and the mentality is that, you're still a scary champion, and people will be cautious around you.

Late Game(16-18): You have fallen off and people have noticed. Your job now is to get good Kicks off during team fights. Whether it be kicking someone into their team to deal damage to all of them and keep them CC'd, or to kick someone important away from the fight completely, your job is simple, get good Ults off, and do damage to whoever you can with your skills.

Jungle

Early Game(1-3): Just Get through your initial small camps with whatever starting items and skills you use. You clear camps fast, so you should have level 3 before anyone else does. All of this is prep for your ganks.

Early Game(3-5):(You can optionally start this phase at level 2) Start ganking. You have so many tools during your early ganks, so make sure you land some good s and tear **** up. You do SO much damage early on, and you can easily get first blood for you or someone else. You can also start counter-jungling around this phase, but choose wisely who you counter jungle, some champions can mess you up if they catch you in their jungle. REMEMBER, give away buffs to people who need them. You can always keep Red buff to improve your ganks, but I would ALWAYS give away Blue Buff to my(assumed) Ap Solo mid.

Early to Mid Game Transition(6-9) Just got your ult and now your ganks are much stronger. You can easily get out of those ****py situations with another escape tool in your arsenal. Depending on where you are in your build at this time, you definitely already will have wards, but you may want to invest more gold into wards and maybe sneak in an . You may want to consider an early dragon, especially if you have

Mid Game(9-14): Keep ganking, keep jungling, and now, start to control Dragon. Dragon is such a crucial part of the game, giving 975 gold(190 to each person, 25 to the killer) which is a lot in a game that requires gold management. ALWAYS time dragon's spawn, a prepared jungler always succeeds. At this point, you'll start falling off, and you'll probably have started build your tanky items. You may even have your or already built depending on what you decided to build prior to them.

Mid to Late Game Transition(14-16): Keep Dragon controlled, jungle a bit, for buffs and levels, push lanes with your team, initiate team fights, and start worrying about baron. Keep vision on baron at all times or you'll lose. Most of the time, Baron in solo queue means auto win if you have it. You can try split pushing, but you want to make sure you have crucial points warded so you can over-extend to do so.

Late Game(16-18): Keep Baron under control and initiate during team fights. At this point in the game, it's the same as if you played Lane Sin, except you have smite. you must be as useful as you can possibly be during this phase of the game, since you have fallen off, and you need to compensate for that. get your good kicks, and try to do damage to their, squishies preferred, team.

Lane - Importance of Last Hitting

So why IS last hitting so important? Some may think that it's just for a BIT extra gold, when really, it's probably going to be your main source of income.

Here are some numbers to throw around:
(I'll get some pictures to make it look a more colorful.)
(Not sure when or if these amounts cap.)

Melee Minion
22g + 1g per 5min

Caster Minion
16g + 1g per 5min

Siege Minion (Cannon)
27g + 1g per 5min

It starts at a base value and after 5mins these value go up by one gold(Ex: Caster minions give 20g after 20min have passed.)

So if you're still wondering why it's important, up until level 4/5(while soloing approx:5min) regular waves will give 114g and siege waves will give 141g. If you don't miss any last hits or maybe miss one per wave, 3 waves is about the amount that a champion kill gives. So basically, if you're up by say 20 cs, you're up a champion kill. Of course every 5mins the waves will gain 6/7g so it'll take less and less creeps to equal a champ kill, but it's a good idea to keep an eye on your cs compared to his cs.

Late Game and Team Fights

I went a little bit into this in the Play Style Section, and now I guess I can go a bit more in to it, even though there's REALLY not much more to say.

Late Game

Basically, you become a squishy killer. You can dive on in and probably get out with your tanky build and decent damage items. You really want to be someone warding often, even if you have a support already warding often. You're also a good candidate for carrying the since you'll be harder to take down. IF you jungled, you want to always be there for baron, and while yes, you still SHOULD be at baron when your team is doing it, it's technically not needed while a smite to finish is absolutely needed.

Team Fights

Like I said above, you can take down squishies pretty easily, but the problem is that they're hard to get to. What can you do if you're conflicted as to where your opening is? just keep people off your squishies. You also have to focus on getting good Kicks off since that in itself can be your initiation. Not only does it make the person getting kicked be disabled for like 1 sec, you pop everyone up in the air who get hit by that team mate for the same damage he took. You can also at the beginning of a team fight, kick someone important back and handle a 4v5 since he was disabled AND he has to travel back. Another important note: anyone on your team who goes in and takes good amounts of damage, you should always them, since that's a 200 damage shield for both of you and on a 8sec or less CD.

Dragon and Baron Control

Dragon Control

Dragon is a very essential part of the game, and it's important to secure more dragon kills than the other team.

Gold

First off, let's talk about gold here. I know I did mention this before, but i'm going a bit more in-depth here. Dragon gives 975g total. That's 190g per person, and 25g for the killer. You may be wondering why you should care, gold is gold. Well, technically if you have 2 deaths to the other team while acquiring dragon, your team gold is still up by 375g(600g to 975g) which sort of makes it worth it. Of course if someone has a kill streak or if you give both kills to their Magic Burst or Ranged Carry, it might not be worth it since you're giving more gold to important people. But overall, sacrificing for a dragon isn't that bad.

Postitioning

Next we move on to Positioning. Generally, you run 2 bot so you have more dragon control, but the thing is, some teams like to mix that element up to dominate lanes(top). But things to take advantage of are: if you force bot lane to go back, go for a dragon with you(jungler) and the two at bot. If you see 3 people top, it might be better, instead of you running all the way top just to not save the tower, to just take a free dragon since it's 4:2 in the bottom jungle area. If you happen to pick up a really early and You could try to sneak a dragon in, but chances are that they have a ready to use when you do so, so it's your call.

Warding Dragon

(Sorry if the pictures look weird, I just cut out the important parts of the SS)

General All-Purpose Dragon Ward

Placed outside of Dragon's Den in the middle of the river to keep an eye on ganks and dragon.

Blue Team(Bottom Left) Quick Ward

Used if you don't think it's safe to go around the long way to ward or if they have an Checking the exterior wards only.

Purple Team(Top Right) Sneak Ward

This is like the All Purpose ward, but if they try to take a tight corner to take the dragon, an won't be able to see it, and you can sneak a in for a team fight. It doesn't display dragon's health, but you CAN see if they're in there. Just incase you guys can't see, this is at the choke point that leads to Purple's Blue Buff.

Purple Team(Top Right) Defensive Ward

This lets you know if they're attempting to steal it via skill shot or and . PLEASE NOTE:it's a VERY good idea to pull dragon to his entrance on purple team to minimize steals.

Baron Control

Baron is easily one of the most important objectives for late game. The MAIN reason why people will organize for this buff, is for the buff it provides.

Positioning

Since it's not really about gold, i'll start with Positioning. The only real way to position yourself for this is to go in as a team, and maybe leave someone to keep enemies at bay. You SHOULD ward key points where the enemy team will pass through, but they aren't NEEDED. I still highly recommend that you do so to prevent steals or sneak attacks while doing it.

Baron Warding

General All-Purpose Baron Ward

A General Ward that provides the most vision of Baron and the Area around it. It is also the most visible and killable ward.

Under Baron Ward(No Baron)

Under Baron Ward

This provides vision of baron AND it's possibly unkillable to Carriers.

Baron Bush Ward

This provides a less vulnerable ward than the All-Purpose Ward but, provides far less vision and can still be killed.

Blue Team(Bottom Left) Defensive Ward

Like the defensive dragon ward, it provides a way to prevent skill shot steals and / Steals. It's best to block skill shots with your body if you can see them trying to steal, but if it's something like Finales Funkeln, you can't block it.

Purple Team(Top Right) Quick Ward

Helps if you need some quick vision on baron to possibly counter it while the other team is inside. It's pretty useful except someone from the other team with an can easily spot it.

Solo Tops to Watch Out for

This is all based off one assumption: That you're going up against a Tanky DPS / Offtank Top. I might add some odd solo tops if requested but for now, Just common solo tops.

Garen
Garen is a really hard match up for any solo top now-a-days. He's got better level 1 damage than you with either or . on-par sustain with , and extra armor and mr from . This guy is really a pain in the *** to deal with. You really have to rely on getting good poke off and stopping his passive from going up. You really want to go with and x5 or and x3/4, for him to either take less damage with the cloth armor, or outrun his Q/spin with the boots. Your main goal is to simply outplay him. It's pretty much an even match but you can't get careless. at 6, you want to be careful under 50% health, and while he does too, his finish is much more instant than yours.
Rumble
Rumble is what he was designed to be: A HUGE lane bully. The big thing about Rumble, is that he can just keep spamming skills at you. He'll always try to push you out of exp range, so you have to either get good poke in while he's trying to harass you, or you gotta get used to last hitting with and . Your fights could go either way depending on where you two are, so don't be careless. You can easily burst him, but you need to have a clear shot at him to do so. If you want to avoid death, always keep an eye out for his . Like I said before, you can burst him, but if he's behind minions, you're probably are just going to get pushed out of lane.
Gangplank
Gangplank is similar to you in lane, but his main damage skill is a target skill. The thing to remember about gangplank is that there are two common play styles with him, The Passive farmer, and the aggressive zoner. Yes, I know that someone of an advanced understanding of gangplank can easily do both, but if you can spot one of these play styles, here's what you do: The passive farmer will avoid conflict until level 6 or if his jungler is ganking, so always keep an eye on sudden change-ups in his playstyle, and just try to farm and poke. The aggressive zoner will always be aggressive, but not necessarily reckless. Try to gain levels, farm when you can, and ALWAYS take advantage of the slip-ups he will probably make. If the player is proficient enough to have a balanced play style, you really just have to watch for slip-ups, farm when it's safe, and poke if you can get it in.
Singed
Singed is a very common solo top, and is based around his farm. What's your job vs him? Keep him as far away from you as possible, and get free harass off on him when he tries to farm. He will ALWAYS try to farm so you have to stop that farm and force him to back up. At 6, depending on the play style of the player, he might try to fight you by popping and ing you into his . If you're tower hugging with 35% or less health, expect him to dive you. luckily, if you're about to die from a , you COULD just kick him away with . You should easily be able to out lane singed, but don't get sloppy, because singed is one of those champions where, if you make the slightest mistake, you're dead.
Cho'gath
Cho'gath is very hard to lane against. he can easily get his farm, he out-ranges you, he can, much like you, finish you at level 6 at 50%, and he can out-sustain you early on. MY advice? just try to get your farm in whenever possible. you probably won't be able to pull anything huge on him, since he'll probably be really tanky. Something to be aware of: if he uses both and to farm, that could be the opening that you're looking for, since you have, i'd say a 6-8 second window before his skills are off CD. Like I said with singed, don't get sloppy, he can easily take you out if you have one slip-up.
Yorick
Yorick is just that super harassment type champion who smashes anyone with less sustain than him in lane. Why is this guy scary to you? since you don't exactly rush your sustain skill first, he'll be able to get free harass off on you and completely keep you zoned off. I recommend that you get an early second point of for this guy since he'll be harassing you like crazy. It'll be harder to land on hims in duels since he can just cover up your vision with ghouls. Like with all of the laners who are stronger than you, get farm in when you can, and always try to catch slip-ups.
Udyr
Udyr is that immovable object in lane. He's really hard to fight because he has so many dueling tools and he also has a lot more sustain than you. He can just sit in the creep line and keep farming, he can escape ganks pretty easily, and he can set up ganks on you easily. Again, you have another champion that you don't want to be sloppy with. and are unforgivable.

Like I said at at the beginning of this section, I will be adding other champions to this section on popular demand. IF you want to see certain champions, feel free to request.

Counter Jungling and Junglers to Watch Out for

Introduction to Counter Jungling(Beginner section)

If you're newer to jungling, and have no clue what counter jungling is, I can help to fill you in. Counter Jungling is really only in play if the other team has a jungler. The point of counter jungling, is to hinder the enemy jungler's exp so that you can gain an edge over their jungler. The main goals are to reduce the exp gain, steal buffs from their team, and to hinder the opposing jungler's ability to gank.

There are two ways to counter jungle: Steal the camp entirely or to Steal the main exp providing monster and leave the smaller ones for them to kill and have to waito n the spawn.

I personally like to just leave them with 1 or 2 small monsters so that they not only get less exp, they now have to wait for them to respawn. If you take an entire small camp and he just comes back when it spawns, you didn't take any exp from him. If you take a buff however, you get his buff and he doesn't know the respawn time, and you do. You can still leave the small creeps behind, but then they get the respawn time, but on the other side, they have to wait even longer. To Summarize: both techniques have their faults so use both in moderation and get a feel for when it's best to use both.

Why is this necessary? jungling is a BIG part of the game along with buff management. If you make their jungler fail, that's like winning 1.5 lanes. How do you do this effectively? you need many Sight Wards and you need an ability that allows you to take a camp or part of a camp quickly.

What makes Lee Sin a Great Counter Jungle:

Lee Sin can Counter Jungle so well, he can really shut down anyone with a slightly slower jungle speed than him or anyone who can't fight him 1v1 in their own jungle. The reason why he can just walk all over weak junglers are because of his passive, and 2 of his skills:
Lets him have a fast jungle speed early and provides a faster way to take a camp.
Allows him to hop walls to possibly get to camps slightly faster and to get around wards.
Lets him take small camps fast, to imporve his jungle speed, and to increase counter jungle ability.

Junglers to Watch Out for

I'm only listing junglers to watch out for, anyone else has the same way to be handled in General.

Be Careful While Counter Jungling Against:

Trundle
If he catches you, you're done. You may think that you can take him, but his Gets rid of a lot of your bonus damage early on which makes you do **** for damage with your skills, and when you try to run, there's GOING to be a in the way anyways. Long Story Short, If you see him first, start running.
Udyr
He's probably going to meet you most of the time when you go in to counter jungle early on. His jungle speed with both and is fast enough so that it's dangerous to enter his jungle early on. Like I said in lane, he has many dueling tools and escape tools that you really don't want to risk wasting time or giving a free kill to fight him.
Gangplank
He's very hard to fight early game. He does have a slightly slower speed than you, and you can potentially get ahead of him in his jungle and steal a small camp(especially if he starts at Blue Buff). If he spots you although, it's definitely not a good idea to fight him. 3 stacks of may not seem like a ton of damage, but it adds up over time. If you let him get those 3 stacks too, you won't be able to get out unless you have something to to.
Nocturne
He has more damage than you early on. His jungle speed is about the same or faster than yours so you have a higher chance of running into him if you try to go 'ahead' of him. If you try to fight him, like i said, he has more damage, a way to block one of your skills, and a fear. You REALLY don't want to risk giving him anything since he already is able to put tons of pressure on friendly champions, so you don't want to give him gold to pressure them even better.
Olaf
I know he isn't good in general, but his jungle speed is lightening. He probably cleared all of the camps that you're attempting to counter jungle. On top of that if you fight him in his jungle, he WILL out dps you. So if you run into that rare occasion where their team has a jungle Olaf, at least I warned you. ;P

One thing that I didn't mention, is that almost all of these guys WILL call for help if they spot you in their jungle. I didn't mention this because it's a given, no one will just let you get away so remember to try to be stealthy. I always mentioned that the people would out dps you until you start to develop, but even if that wasn't true, do you really want to risk giving an easy kill to their AP in mid who can just go kill you while you're low?

Watch Out for These Guys Counter Jungling You:

Nunu
The definition of counter jungle. Nunu can easily come into your jungle, steal a golem from your double golems camp, kill the big wraith at wraith camp, or take big wolf from your wolf camp and get out without being noticed. You really want to have defensive wards when you see a Nunu jungling on the opposing team. You could probably force him out if you see him first, but that's assuming that you spotted him prior to entering, and you're in position to do so.
Udyr
Remember how I said that he has a fast jungle speed? Well he'll probably beat you one of your camps early on and take it entirely if he's doing Focus, or take a main exp giving monster if he went with a Focus. Again, buy defensive wards, and call for help when you spot him in your jungle, out of position.
Nocturne
he can get in and out in a flash and even if you have vision of him entering, it may be too late already. What does he have to do? then auto attack with and the Wraith/Wolf camp is gone. You really have to manage your wards for spotting him, and you need to be ready when he enters. As always Call for help when you spot him.
Shaco
Boxes. He might steal buffs or camps but the thing that you gotta be careful of, are es. If you run into them, consider yourself dead unless you have up or something to jump to with . Those things can dish out some serious damage when stacked in one spot so be careful. He can also get out relatively unscathed since he has to get out.
Tryndamere
Well he needs farm, and nothing will stop him from getting it. He has a lot of mobility, so he could probably easily get past your wards. Even if you're ready for him, he probably won't die and will also probably get away. The only thing that you could really do is push him away and force him to burn his ult. If you get help when you spot him, you can definatly get him pushed out and potentially killed.

Like I said before, There's more to come and especially on popular demand.

Wards

Warding is essential as both a jungler and a laner. It's more important for a jungler earlier on but at late game, you'll probably want to buy a few and make sure that your team has good map control with those wards.

Here's a Map of common ward placements for various purposes:

You may want to keep some of these key points in mind as you may be buying a to counteract enemy wards. Most of these points are just mirrored from one side to the other, but others are based around various map starting point advantages and disadvantages. Wards that are placed more toward your side of the jungle, are mostly for defense and keeping an eye on who comes through your jungle.

s are a peculiar situation since they provide stealth detection for only a certain area. I tend to ONLY use these for baron and dragon IF i don't have enough money for an . So just make sure that if you use a You make the most use of it since a Cost 150g and you're using it to get rid of a Sight Ward which is only valued at 100g(75g for cost and 25g on kill) with diminishing returns(the 75g value depreciates as it's timer goes down, 1min=25g).

Video Section

This section will contain video made by others that show how lee sin should be played.

The Hotshot Nidalee GG and da Lee Singuh:
-Xan and CLG post-game interview

Tricks with Lee Sin's Skill Set: /league-of-legends/ability/dragons-rage-373
by Sycho Sid

will be adding more as time goes on, and might start adding a few of my own.

Closing Statements

Thanks for reading my guide, I put a bunch of time into this and I REALLY hope that it gets good ratings from you guys. I'd Like to say that I'll be updating this for major changes in metagame and patches that buff/nerf Lee Sin; but will still update for suggestions and fixes in the comments. I'd also like to say that if you have any suggestions at all, relating to guide making, Lee Sin, and the whole theory behind counter jungle, PLEASE leave a comment to help me out.

Change Log

10/10/11 - Guide Published.
10/10/11 - Minor Grammar Fixes.
10/10/11 - updated guide to require comment to vote.
10/11/11 - Added Dragon/Baron Control section.
10/11/11 - Added Guardian Angel to Late Game Armor options -slizer002
10/12/11 - Removed the Quick/Basic Overview Section after restoring the first two sections.
10/19/11 - Updated Gunblade Opinion due to nerfs.
10/19/11 - Added Reasoning to Double
10/22/11 - Added Last Hitting Section.
11/12/11 - Added Sections for new masteries and new summoners.

Blind Rampage - An in-depth Lee Sin Lane and Jungle Guide

Blind Rampage - An in-depth Lee Sin Lane and Jungle Guide

Choose Champion Build:

Spells:

Exhaust

Flash

Ability Order

Flurry (PASSIVE)

Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike (Q)

Safeguard / Iron Will (W)

Tempest / Cripple (E)

Dragon's Rage (R)

Spells:

Exhaust

Flash

Ability Order

Flurry (PASSIVE)

Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike (Q)

Safeguard / Iron Will (W)

Tempest / Cripple (E)

Dragon's Rage (R)

Spells:

Smite

Flash

Ability Order

Flurry (PASSIVE)

Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike (Q)

Safeguard / Iron Will (W)

Tempest / Cripple (E)

Dragon's Rage (R)

Spells:

Smite

Flash

Ability Order

Flurry (PASSIVE)

Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike (Q)

Safeguard / Iron Will (W)

Tempest / Cripple (E)

Dragon's Rage (R)

Spells:

Smite

Flash

Ability Order

Flurry (PASSIVE)

Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike (Q)

Safeguard / Iron Will (W)

Tempest / Cripple (E)

Dragon's Rage (R)

Spells:

Smite

Flash

Ability Order

Flurry (PASSIVE)

Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike (Q)

Safeguard / Iron Will (W)

Tempest / Cripple (E)

Dragon's Rage (R)

Introduction

NOTE:

Pros and Cons

Lane

Pros:

Cons:

Jungle

Pros:

Cons:

Masteries

Lane

Jungle

Runes

Lane

My Recommendations and Explainations:

Alternatives:

Jungle

My Recommendations and Explainations:

Summoner Spells

BOTH:

Lane:

Jungle

Skill Explanations