The build might not be outdated but the information is probably not on par with other guides.

Hello summoners! I'm Twodots and I'll be showing you how i build and play Lee Sin

Lee Sin a fast and versatile jungler, he can take many routes, have many different kinds of masteries and runes and can start with almost any item he wants. His ganks are great and since you can take so many different routes it's hard to predict when you are ganking

He's a great solo and duo laner, with his sustain he can stay forever in top lane and compete with almost every champion that usualy gets put there, and with his ability to jump to and from minions he will have few to no problems last hitting at bottom lane together with a support.

In the lane

Decent knowledge of how Lee Sins abilities work.
Okay last hitting skills
Knowledge about zoning

In the jungle

Atleast a few runes (like the armor seals) and masteries.
Knowledge about different paths Lee Sin can take and why you should take them
Decent knowledge about recovery paths, but since Lee Sin doesn't need any buffs to jungle recovery is easy to make
You must know when, where and why to gank

Here are some videos showing you basic zoning and recovery paths, credits to Shurelia and Stonewall008
Play Video Play Video

Pros

Great sustain
No mana problems
Decent AD
Awesome passive
Many escape mechanics
Ultimate is awesome for both damage, and positioning the enemy

Cons

Very hard to play
Not the worst, but not the best in teamfights
Since there are so many ways to play Lee Sin, peoeple might have trouble remembering it all and putting it into gameplay


Write in the comment section if you know any other Pro or Con :)

In lane max out first, it does great damage. Do not underestimate it

In the jungle i start with first, since you are almsot always facing more then 1 enemy you deal more damage with then with , and you get a free exhaust on the mobs. Then i get for the sustain, after that i max out again.
Rank up whenever you can of course :)

There are many combos for Lee Sin, i'll just list some of the basic ones

Bursting

If you can get close to them without you will deal much more damage with the ending of it.

When you are close: twice once then back to them

When you are at range use twice and twice. I don't recommend you using your immediately. If you have a teammate run past your opponent while they are slowed from and them back into your team.

You can use to finish of a enemy or knock them out of a channel (Nunu, Malzahar, Warwick)

Consistent damage

The most important parts about your consistent damage is:
1. you need more movement speed than the enemy or a slow/stun on them, either from you or from teammates
2. You HAVE TO use your passive. 40% attack speed is to much to not care about. Use first part of a ability, 2 auto attacks, second part of the ability, 2 auto attacks. This is extremely important.

When doing consistent damage there isn't any real rotation. Use if they are low HP or you need to get to them, use if you need a slow or more aoe damage and use in between or if you are taking damage

Since Lee Sin got his dashing abilities, he doesn't need flash, he can use any combo of these:

- Lee Sin is a good duelist, why not make you even better?
- to escape or position yourself for that last auto attack or .
- good for finishong of a opponent, just dealing more damage or reducing healing effects on them.
- good for chasing, fleeing, consistent damage.
- essential for jungling.

Dont forget to change your masteries according to your summoners.

Lee Sin can use manye different types of runes: Armor Pen, Flat attack damage or a combo between those.

Personaly i use flat AD mostly since i love the early game advatage and i usualy get . If you are not getting you will need some armor pen both from your runepage and items. You can get , , or . The only champion i know that combines flat ArPen together with percentage ArPen is Pantheon.

I go 21-0-9 because it's just the most beneficial tree for Lee Sin imo.
Some talents you might ask about:

- Perserverence or Good hands?
- If you get Warmogs Pervernevence is actually OK but I don't know the math about that. :P

- ლ(ಠ益ಠლ) Y u no get crit damage (lethality)?
- I don't get that much crit chance when i play Lee Sin. Only items with crit chance i ever think about is Trinity force and Atmas, but if you like the crit build get the talent, you decide :)

Here comes the big part...

Core

My core is A HP item or two then
Is a great item, gives you AD, armor, a ablility to brutaly murder all minions and monsters and a free wards with 100% uptime. **** yeah?
Is the most underestimated item in the entire game imo.
When you have 2250 HP it's a BF sword. And when you are somewhere around 2k-2.5k HP Atmas is the cheapest AD item in the game. (math anyone? :P)

Damage items

- Damage, lifesteal, why not?
- Oddly enough this works, lifesteal is a nobrainer, spellvamp works with your Q, E and R, the damage is a no brainer, the ability power is meh, and the active.... Play Video - good early game item for damage and defense from magic, i usualy don't get this very often.
- Great item, gives you LOADS of stats, HP, AD, MS, AS, crit, a slow and 150% extra damage on your autoattack every 2 seconds.

Health items

-Loads of health, and a bit of health regen on top of your lifesteal.
- Lots of tasty Health, a little damage and a nice slow.
- already wrote about this above.
- All around great item, who cares if it gives mana? But i would only get this item if you got trinity force and need more HP for Atmas.
Actually is a good item for Lee Sin, but i rarely get this.
- Early game you can stack these if you are doing bad.


- This item is great if you got warmogs or Frozen mallet.

There are 4 different choices of boots i would recommend:
- I usualy get these, reduces the duration all incoming cc by 35% and you get some magic resist on top of it.
- if the enemy is REALLY ad heavy. like 3-4+
- Cooldown reduction, why not?
- gives you great movement around the map to gank, i would switch these out late game for some other boots.

As i said in the introduction Lee Sin is VERY strong in the jungle, he can do LOADS of routes, he can start at blue, double golems, wraiths, wolves and maybe at red (haven't tried yet)

My usual route is:
Stonewall removed the vid... Ahwell.. My route i (usualy) use is Wolfes-Wraiths-Double golems-Back-Blue (can give it away)-starting rout including red. BUT since Lee Sin is a very strong ganker you should put in ganks as much as possible in these routes. Like: after wraiths give pressure to mid, after double golems gank top, skip blue and gank mid/bot, take red instead of blue and gank top/mid and so on...

You can start with many different items, you can start with Cloth Armor (not recommended), Vampiric Scepter for sustain, Long Sword for speed and Doran's Blade if you don't like Wriggle's Lantern

If you still don't believe me about Lee Sins power in the jungle here ya go: Play Video Credit to Stonewall008 for all the jungling videos (click the name for his youtube account).

Remember, this is not a build you strictly have to follow, you can change it as much as you like. This is just my way of playing Lee Sin. Happy ganking summoners!

Here is where i will post what changes i've done to the guide, what i've added, and what i've removed.

Build posted:
- late night 2011-04-02.
- hour later: added Boots section.

- Added the patch notes section 2011-04-16.

- Changed the item build to more specific choices 2011-06-12.

- Complete reconstruction and rewriting of the build 2011-08-11

Sonic Wave bonus attack damage scaling increased to 1.0 from 0.8

Resonating Strike bonus attack damage scaling inceased to 1.0 from 0.8

Tempest bonus attack damage scaling inceased to 1.0 from 0.6

Dragon's Rage bonus attack damage scaling inceased to 2.0 from 1.5

Flurry passive energy gain increased to 15 from 10 per hit

Tasty buffs :)

Item changes the same patch

Wriggle's Lantern
Combine cost increased to 150 from 75
Life Steal increased to 18% from 14%
Changed proc to magic damage from physical damage

The change of the proc decreased your sustain by LOADS!
but the lifesteal increase is tasty.


B.F. Sword
Attack damage reduced to 45 from 50
Gold Cost decreased by 200

This is kinda nice, if you are going Bloodthirster this will help ya

If you want to read the patch notes, click here


Energy costs on all spells reduced to 50/30 from 60/40
Safeguard shield no longer restores energy when the shield is destroyed
Tempest range increased to 450 from 400

Energy cost tweeks are always nice.
Can't remember that safeguard restored energy, maybe i didn't read the skills properly O.o
This makes is so much easier to gank, you don't have to use your Q to get close

The complete patch note is here