Master Yi Build Guide by TheMcDanee
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| Health | 2892 |
| Health Regen | 18.45 |
| Mana | 847 |
| Mana Regen | 14.6 |
| Armor | 125.59 |
| Magic Resist | 137.8 |
| Dodge | 0 |
| Tenacity | 0 |
| Movement Speed | 438.3 |
| Gold Bonus | 0 |
| Attack Damage | 459.47 |
| Attack Speed | 104.983 |
| Crit Chance | 65%S |
| Crit Damage | 50% |
| Ability Power | 0 |
| Life Steal | 32% |
| Spell Vamp | 0 |
| Armor Penetration | 19.2 |
| Magic Penetration | 0 |
| Cooldown Reduction | 0% |
Recommended Runes
Ability Sequence





Mastery Tree Is Outdated
WARNING: These masteries are still using the old tree and have not been updated to the new tree by the guide author. As such, they will be different than the masteries you see in-game.
Masteries
I. Introduction
Hello and welcome to my
Master Yi guide!
In this guide I will be teaching you how to play
Master Yi effectively and hopefully very good. When I play Yi I jungle, mainly because his early game is too weak to go to top lane, but he can go mid lane although I will not be covering it in this guide, as most of the time you take an AP Yi in mid, and not AD. But I have tried it out and I know it's viable.
Before I start I also would like to point out that
Master Yi is an easy champ to play, but harder to master, once fed you will most likely win, but if you are feeding you will lose, because Yi have such a hard time recovering from a bad mid game.
Lets get on with the guide.
II. Pros / Cons
Every champion has their strengths and weaknesses, I've listed all of those which I can think of for
Master Yi.
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Pros
+ Fast jungler if lucky + Immune to slows + 70 AD steroid spell + Great chaser/escaper + Q can proc like |
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Cons
- Stun = Dead - Weak early game - Gets focused in Teamfights - Blue dependent for fast jungle early - Can be slow in jungle - Ain't a ninja |
III. Runes
The runes that I have picked out for the tankier version of this build, also my main version for playing Yi uses the following runes:
| Runes | |||||||||||||||
Greater Mark of Attack Damage 9 |
Greater Seal of Armor 9 |
Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist 9 |
Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed 3 |
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Explanations here below.

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Greater Quintessence of Attack Speed 3 |
Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed 3 |
Greater Quintessence of Armor Penetration 3 |
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If you are going to play AP Yi these are the runes you should use to maximize your damage output:
| Runes | |||||||||||||||
Greater Mark of Magic Penetration 9 |
Greater Seal of Ability Power 9 |
Greater Glyph of Ability Power 9 |
Greater Quintessence of Ability Power 3 |
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Explanations here below.

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IV. Masteries
Now,
Master Yi masteries can be built in a few different ways, these are the masteries that I have chosen to use and I found that they work very well with Yi.
These masteries are set up to help you in the early game as well as late game
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Tier 1
Tier 2 Tier 3 Weapons Expertise for more Arpen and 4 points in Tier 4 Tier 5 Tier 6 |
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Tier 1
Tier 3 |
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These masteries are set up to help you in the early game as well as late game, note that these are for AP Yi.
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Tier 1
Tier 2 Tier 3 Tier 4 Tier 5 |
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Tier 1
Tier 2 Tier 3 |
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V. Skills
In this chapter I will be explaining how
Master Yi's skills works, and I will also add some tips on how you can use them for maximum effect.
You're going to want to max out
- Use
Alpha Strike to dodge abilities like
Requiem,
Dark Binding and
Light Binding
Alpha Strike Procs like
Wriggle's Lantern use when you start at a new camp as it might just kill one or two creeps there
Alpha Strike follows the target even if it flashes out of range, use it to catch up or confuse your opponent
You're going to want to max out
- Use
Meditate to negate dots like
Noxious Trap or heavy nukes like
Requiem
Meditate will also allow you to tank towers while your team attacks them as you get 300 Armor- Even though it's not that useful you can use it against
Ignite like said above to negate some of the damage
You're going to want to max out
- Activate
Wuju Style when you are taking your Red buff, as it will help you clear the camp a lot faster - Using both
Wuju Style and
Highlander is an extremely effective way of taking down towers - When taking Baron or Dragon don't forget about
Wuju Style as it will help you take it faster
You're going to want to max out
- If you are escaping don't be afraid of activating
Highlander to get further away faster - Activate
Highlander before
Alpha Strike to start attacking with higher attack speed directly when you land after
Alpha Strike - Don't always chase with
Highlander just because you can, you will easily be bursted down or you will get too far away from your team - If you kill someone with this on all your spells will go of cd, even this. Use this to your advantage of constant using
Wuju Style
In this part of the chapter I will be explaining how AP
You're going to want to max out
- Use
Alpha Strike to dodge abilities like
Requiem,
Dark Binding and
Light Binding, make sure that when you use it that you will hit a champion, you will get no minion agro if you tag a minion with it first.
Alpha Strike Procs like
Wriggle's Lantern use it when a new wave comes, if you are lucky you can kill the first 4 creeps
Alpha Strike follows the target even if it flashes out of range, use it to catch up or confuse your opponent
You're going to want to max out
- Use
Meditate to negate dots like
Noxious Trap or heavy nukes like
Requiem or to heal full hp in a bush after
Requiem just struck
Meditate will also allow you to tank towers while your team attacks them as you get 300 Armor- Even though it's not that useful you can use it against
Ignite like said above to negate some of the damage
You're going to want to max out
- Activate
Wuju Style to activate the proc of
Lich Bane. - Using both
Wuju Style and
Highlander is an extremely effective way of taking down towers even if you play AP Yi - When taking Baron or Dragon don't forget about
Wuju Style as it will help you take it faster
You're going to want to max out
- If you are escaping don't be afraid of activating
Highlander to get further away faster - Activate
Highlander before
Alpha Strike so that if you kill someone
Alpha Strike goes directly of Cooldown - Don't always chase with
Highlander just because you can, you will easily be bursted down or you will get too far away from your team - If you kill someone with this on all your spells will go of cd, even this. Use this to your advantage of constant using
Alpha Strike
VI. Summoner Spells
There are a few summoner spells that works for
Master Yi, I use
Flash and
Smite because I think that a blink is always useful on yi, here are a few other.
-
: The reason I use flash is stated above, I think that it's quite useful having a blink on Yi, as that means you can run into a teamfight and when you see them changing focus to you, flash out.
-
: This plus
Highlander will make you faster than Usain Bolt, jokes aside. This does basically the same thing as
Highlander except it doesn't remove slows, it doesn't prevent you from getting slowed and it doesn't rise your attack speed. What it does is make you ghost like, it makes it so that you can move through units and ignoring unit collision.
-
: This will help you gank by slowing the movement speed of the target much like
Nasus'
Wither, and it also reduces the physical damage the target does with 70% and ability/item damage delt by 35%.
-
: If you feel that you don't need any of the above summoner spells you can take
Ignite, as it is a true damage dot, and it also reduces the health regeneration of the target with 50%. It's basically
Smite for champions.
If you are going to lane with Yi, you can follow the build above and all you need to do is to change your summoner spells to your liking, most of the time you want
VII. Jungling
When you are jungling with
Master Yi there are several routes you can take, and there are also two different beginnings on this route I'm about to show you.

Here I start at blue as you can see, it makes no difference on which side I am on, or what spell I start out with,
when you are level one you first of should buy
Boots of Speed and 3 Health Potions, with this setup I usually level
Alpha Strike first, as it will help you clear the blue camp faster if you proc with it at either the big golem or one of the lizards, next up I pick
Wuju Style for more AD and to get some health back from your lifesteal masteries. When you are going in for a gank with
Master Yi, and this is for both tanky or squishy Yi, you need to make sure that the lane preferably have some sort of CC or if you have Red, because you have no CC. Meaning that the best lane to gank early is actually bot lane, if you have
Alistar,
Taric or
Leona it basically is a granted double kill for either you or your ad carry.
Later in the game when you can start taking dragons you could solo it if you have your
Wriggle's Lantern,
Phage and
Zeal and a bit of luck. As you can proc twice on
Wriggle's Lantern with
Double Strike meaning it deals 850 extra damage in 2 attacks, but that is if you proc both attacks, if you also are lucky you might proc with
Alpha Strike as well, meaning you take down dragon extremely fast.
When dealing with dragon don't be afraid of using
Highlander to take it down faster as it will prevent dragon from slowing your attacks and you also get more attack speed from it.
VIII. Counter Jungling
If you are going to try and counter jungle with
Master Yi you have to know where the other jungler is. Is he ganking bot lane, is he at top lane or is he in mid? If he is in mid there is no use of trying to steal wraiths or wolves as any jungler gets there quite fast meaning its too risky as his team also makes it there quite fast, but if he is at bot or top you can take both his wraiths and wolves, but remember to leave on of the smaller creeps so that the camp doesn't respawn.
There are also a few champions that I recommend that you stay away from and don't try and counter jungle, here is a list of champions that you can and can't counter jungle.
If you are going to try and counter jungle
- Try and steal his wraiths when he is at bot and wolves when he is at top.
- Never engage him one on one if someone on his team is mia, he will most likely win as you don't deal tons of damage yet, but he can tank tons of early damage due to his passive.
- Try and steal his blue as it will cripple both him and their mid lane.
I'd recommend not to counter jungle
- Steal his jungle when he is ganking in the early game as it will help shut him down.
- Red, take his red buffs as often as possible preferably have a ward there so you can smite steal it without having to take damage.
- If he steals your jungle consider getting items like
Avarice Blade or
Heart of Gold.
Try and get to him when he is taking his red early, this means that you need a very good pull early so that you don't have to use smite at the blue buff so that you can smite steal his buff when he gets there, or can you just kill him. When trying to counter jungle
- Kill him or take his red early as it will cripple him very hard especially if you kill him.
- Beware to flash as he uses
Twisted Advance as he will follow you all the way . - If he activates his ult don't fight him as he takes less damage
Even tho that most of the
- Never engage on
Shyvana 1 on 1 early game, she will probably win. - Take her blue at level 1, as
Shyvana doesn't have mana she starts most of the time at red. - Consider getting
Heart of Gold or
Avarice Blade as she will probably try and o****er jungle you as well.
Mainly the same deal as
- Catch him at red so you can steal his red and probably kill him.
- Watch out for his hooks, they hurt a lot as they let him place his entire kit on you.
Mercury's Treads are the recommended boots against him, as it will reduce all his cc and damage on you.
- Try and wait until his fear is gone before you engage him, as it will make you a sitting duck.
- If you see a bubble around him, don't waste any spells as they will be blocked by it.
- Catch him at red for easy kill and buff.
If you are against
- If he is farming a lot, gank a lot, and if he is ganking a lot, counter jungle him.
- Watch out for his ultimate, he will be able to drag you his team
- Kill him at his red, as he will be on low hp if he clears his jungle in a single streak
Even tho
- Gank as much as you can before level 6, as he will have trouble ganking before level 6.
- Cripple him by taking his blue early on.
- His ult has low cooldown, don't get caught in his jungle when he has it up.
That's about it for this chapter, I will be filling in more and more as I learn how to behave against certain junglers.
IX. Items
In this chapter I will be covering the items that work with
Master Yi in this build, note that if you don't see an item that you think fits comment or p.m me and I'll test it out.
-
: This is kind of the standard item for AD junglers, it's used on top lane quite a lot too as it gives lifesteal and a free ward every 3 min perfect for warding
Baron Nashor
or
Dragon
.
-
: These will give you some attack speed, it's not much but they are worth getting as you clear your jungle faster and letting you gank more often
-
: This will make you a pain in the ***, as you will be able to stick to your target for so long due to your high movement speed and the passive slow, it also gives a good amount of HP that is needed on Yi for not being to squishy.
-
: This item is going to make you a beast, you will hit so hard it's ridiculous, this is also a standard item for AD carriys, giving them a HUGE damage boost, letting them to crit more often and their crits does 250% of their ad instead of 200%.
-
: Aah.. The
Phantom Dancer, a very good item on
Master Yi giving you attack speed, movement speed and crit chance, it will boost your attack speed a lot more than
Zeal, and a good thing is it builds from
Zeal which you should already have.
-
: Ever thought of getting
Hexdrinker? but thought: No, that item doesn't build into anything. Well, now it does and M.o.M is a beast like item, giving you much needed magic resist, a shield if you drop bellow 30% of your HP and it's passive is that you get 1 AD for ever 2.5% Hp you are missing. Take it, it will save your life.
-
: Lifesteal, something we all love, swap Wriggle's Lanter for this, it will give you 22% Life steal when you have stacked it max and 100 AD, think about it, 22% lifesteal and 100 Ad when you bought this item and killed something 40 times, but beware, if you die you lose half of the stacks.
Here I will explain the items that I've recommended for AP Yi.
-
: This are the standard boots for most of the Ap carrys, Ap Yi ain't no difference, take these and you will hit hard with less AP and harder with more.
-
: This is the AP version of
Infinity Edge, there isn't much more I could tell.
-
: When you have casted a spell your hands start to glow with a orangeish glow, that means your next auto attack will deal 100% of your AP in extra damage, that is a lot of damage when you have around 500 ap.
-
: This item is going to make you more tanky and also add a slow to all your damaging abilities, in this case
Alpha Strike, making this a great item for chasing or escaping.
-
: When they are starting to stack Magic resist against you, just buy a
Void Staff and you will hit as hard as you did before, not really but you'll hit quite hard.
-
: This is the only item I ever buy on Ap Yi that contains AD, mainly because it gives you spellvamp, but it's active is so good on yi as it will help you chase a lot easier, much like
Rylai's Crystal Scepter.
X. Optional Items
As a few pointed out in the comment section you wanted a chapter with optional items, here it is:
-
: This item should be taken if you need more magic resist, and you feel that you don't need
Phantom Dancer as it will have to be a replacer to that, I then recommend that you get that before
Frozen Mallet and just after
Infinity Edge, I recommend that you get
Recurve Bow before you start on
Infinity Edge. You should still take a
Phage after wriggles
-
]: Even tho nerfed it's still a useful item, the only time I would consider this is you need more armor then you already have, then I would swap out
Maw of Malmortius to this, it gives you both Armor and Crit chance both which you have use of, most use this in conjunction with
Warmog's Armor, but I feel that that item will make you lose to much Ad to be worth it on
Master Yi.
-
: This is an excellent anti-ad item, it has an passive that if they hit you they have a chance of getting their AS slowed down, it's active is a game changer, as it reduces Attack speed and Movement speed, take this item if you feel that you need to tank way more than you should.
-
: This is to most considered an anti-tank item, as it does percentage based magic damage upon the target, take this if you feel that they are too tanky, it will melt their hp away doing 4% of their max Hp as magic damage to them, it also gives you attack speed and armor, swap out
Phantom Dancer for this if feel that you need it in the late game, otherwise keep the
Phantom Dancer or swap it out for
Wit's End.
-
: This is a relatively cheap item, giving both AD, Cdr and Armor penetration, this should be taken early as it's not that great of an item late game as
Last Whisper does basically the same thing but better, the reason I don't recommend
Last Whisper is that it's more of a late late game item, when everyone has a
Guardian Angel.
Here I will tell you a few other items that work for Ap Yi, but often they can't replace the original items I recommended.
| Item Sequence | |||||||||||||||
Abyssal Scepter 2560 |
Archangel's Staff 2700 |
Athene's Unholy Grail 2600 |
Nashor's Tooth 2500 |
Zhonya's Hourglass 3410 |
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-
: This item is really good if you are facing an Ap heavy teamcomp, otherwise I wouldn't take it.
-
: This is a good item in general, but I feel that you aren't able to stack it as easily as
Kassadin or
Zyra, as you have longer cooldowns than them, you can take this item if you need mana, but build
Tear of the Goddess and stack it up too 800 first.
-
: This is a good mana regeneration item, as when you score a kill or an assist you get a percentage of your max mana back, it's great if you manage to use
Highlander and
Alpha Strike to get a kill as you get both of cd and you get mana back to continue doing that.
-
: If you feel that you need cooldown reduction you can get this item, it gives you both Mana reg, Cdr and attack speed, all three of them you benefit from.
-
: This item is great against teamcomps with a lot of cc, as it puts you into a stasis where you can't be hurt, but the downside is that you can't attack others while you are there.
XI. Teamfighting
When you get into the stage of teamfights in the game, your job is not to be the first in, because it will go bad, and fast. In teamfights you should go in after the tank and just before the AD carry, as it means that they will put little to no notice to you.
When you enter a teamfight activate your ult and run to their ad carry in the back, as soon as you get to him/her, activate
Wuju Style and kill them, after that you should go for their AP carry, when you have done this, you should immediately get out so you don't take too much damage from their tank, top and support, as they together will easily bring you down and then you can't do anything.
To summarize it all:
- Wait for tank to initate.
- Activate
Highlander. - Get to AD carry.
- Activate
Wuju Style. - If killed, activate
Highlander again, and go for AP Carry. - If not killed, get out as fast as possible
- Don't be the first one in, but be one of the first ones out!
Here is a list of what you are going to do in a teamfight if you play Ap Yi.
- Wait for the tank to start.
- Activate
Highlander - Activate
Alpha Strike on Ad carry - Use one autoattack on the ad carry then activate
Wuju Style and autoattack again. - Ad carry probably dead, activate
Highlander and repeat on all the targets left. - profit??
XII. The End
Well, now we have reached the end of my guide, I hope you liked it and if you do, don't be afraid to leave a comment and vote up on it, it helps more than you can imagine.
I am open to Constructive criticism, but the kind of criticism that's like: omg noob wtf you don't take
Frozen Mallet on Yi.
Thanks to JhoiJhoi for her amazing guide on making guides, most of the BBcoding in this guide came from there.
Here are my other mentionable guides, click the image below.
XIII. Change log
- 2012/8/12 - Pulished guide.
- 2012/8/13 - Added Optional Items, Summoner Spells. Fixed minor errors.
- 2012/8/15 - Added Ap Yi to the guide(including: Items, Pros/Cons, Masteries, Runes, Optional Items and teamfighting)
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