If you would like to learn about Lee Sin or Akali then please look up another guide on Mobafire as this guide is focused on Smart casting. I will probably be updating this guide at some point in December when my schedule is free!


This is truly an amazing guide to playing Akali -> 'Akali- The epitome of an Assassin' by Bryun. This Guide helped me and gave me inspiration in playing Akali.

Welcome to my guide on Smart Casting! In this guide I will explain what exactly smart casting is and how to use it. As you have probably noticed by now, Lee Sin and Akali are featured in this guide. Why? Because I see them as champions that smart casting (once mastered) will be really effective. Other champions can also benefit from smart casting, such as Ezreal but personally, I prefer to play as Akali and Lee Sin. Remember, any champion can use Smart Casting!

IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SAVE TIME SKIP DOWN TO "Smart Casting - A video I found to Sum it all up!"

I use lots of images and videos when I can because I am not that good at explaining things! Anyhow, a picture is worth a thousand words right?

The guide is laid out so you can read about smart casting first. Soon I will include a section on my Champion builds below that but I don't think they are that important for the purpose of this guide.

Before I begin, I would like to thank jhoijhoi for her amazing guide on how to make a guide, which can be found by clicking here. <-- Nice reference to look at for anyone wishing to create a Guide themselves.

Well, here I am ranting on about smart casting but I have yet to explain what it is. Smart Casting is a faster way to execute your spells/abilities. It allows you to use an ability without clicking! Beware though, this takes some time to master but once you have, you will never want to change back to clicking. The ability you use will activate in the direction or on the spot your mouse cursor is. Some champions already have skills with smart casting 'built in', for example Cassiopeia's Noxious Blast.

Smart Casting is using your abilities without clicking. The ability activates where your mouse cursor is hovering or in the direction of your mouse cursor. To cast a targeted spell on yourself (example, Safeguard / Iron Will), simply hover your cursor over your own champion. The default key binding for Smart casting is the Shift key plus the desired skill (i.e. Q, W, E or R).

ADVANTAGES of Smart Casting

• Implement your abilities faster (If you are a heavy nuker like Annie then you can use your combo faster).
• Hit an escaping enemy just on the boundary of your skill range (For example, you can Shadow Dance as Akali to an escaping enemy and not waste time clicking, a split second can count in these situations).

DISADVANTAGES of Smart Casting

• Hard to perfect and takes lots of practice.
• Targeting Spells can be hard in Team fights, when many Champions are cluttered up close together.

So now we know a little about smart casting and that it's default key binding is Shift + Q, W, E or R. What if we were uncomfortable with this layout? Well we could change it via the in game options menu! Now before we go charging on ahead, changing key bindings and what not, think about it first. The key bindings effect ALL of the Champions you play on that computer. So I will tell you how to change the key bindings if you would like to but please play a champion you are comfortable to learn smart casting with. Remember, you do not need to change the key bindings, unless you want to!

First of all lets open the In-Game Menu.


Secondly, click the 'Key Bindings' option and it should come up with this:


Third, lets scroll down until we reach 'Smart Cast Spell 1' through to 'Smart Cast Spell 4'


Fourth, now we will click on the current default setting and change it to our desired keys. You may not want to change Smart casting from it's default if you can press Shift and the Spell together quite easily. I, however, had trouble with this and seeing as I would be playing Lee Sin or Akali more often, I changed my Smart Cast Key Bindings. My preference was to make my Smart Cast keys just Q, W, E and R but you may have different key bindings that match your play style. If you want to REVERT your Key bindings at any time, just click 'Reset All'.


^These steps should be very straight forward! BUT REMEMBER: IT IS COMPLETELY UP TO YOU IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO CHANGE IT FROM THE DEFAULT OR NOT!

Okay, so Smart Casting seems pretty simple right? All you have to do is push a button with your mouse cursor over the spot/direction you want to hit. BUT WIAT! What about skill shots? When smart casting, the cursor will not change into the target marker for single target spells but it's fairly easy to hold your mouse over a target :) BUT this is when skill shots come in! The arrow for your skill shot or circle for AoE abilities will not appear either! This means you will have to Judge the distance it will travel.

This is why I must stress that you must learn your champion and his or her skills before attempting to smart cast!



I will use Lee Sin as an example of how important it is to KNOW your abilities!

Lee Sin's Abilities:

• Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike
• Safeguard / Iron Will
• Tempest / Cripple
• Dragon's Rage

Lee Sin - Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike

This is Lee Sin's Skill shot, Gank initiator and gap closing ability. It is essential that you do not miss Sonic Wave / Resonating Strike when preforming a gank!

As you can see in the image below, this is what Sonic Wave looks looks like before smart casting.



Now this is what you would have to do with smart casting!


As you can see, you must judge your skill shot very well. If you use it from too far, you will not hit the enemy of course!

Lee Sin - Safeguard / Iron Will

Well, this ability isn't a skill shot. This ability is a single target shield ( Lee Sin also receives the shield if he uses this on an ally) which can only be used on ally units. Simply hover you cursor over the unit you would like to shield/dash towards and use Safeguard / Iron Will.

Lee Sin - Tempest / Cripple

Tempest / Cripple is not a Skill shot or a targeted ability either. It is an Area of Effect (AoE) spell. This means casting it will effect champions in a certain area. With Lee Sin, you can't cast the ability just anywhere - it is an AoE spell but it activates around your champion, dealing AoE damage to nearby enemies. Knowing the range to this ability is fundamental even when not smart casting.

However, on the topic of AoE spells.

Certain champions like Malzahar can choose the area (within a certain range) for the AoE spell to be cast. Malzahar can use Null Zone. This is an AoE spell but unlike Lee Sin, it can be cast within a certain range.

Lee Sin - Dragon's Rage

Now, here we have another targeted spell, this one is just one that you can only use on enemy champions. It's pretty much the same as Safeguard / Iron Will (regarding smart cast targeting) except, as I mentioned, only used on enemy champions.

Be careful when using this though, as it knocks enemy champions away from Lee Sin and further more, knocks back any other Champions the initial champion collides with. The positioning of Dragon's Rage is very important.

After a few comments I have decided to add other peoples veiws in this section of the guide.

Self casting:

There is another key assignment wich you can use to automatically cast a spell on yourself. This should be named "Self cast" then the respective Spell number. For example using Lee Sin, you can assign "Self Cast spell 2" ( Safeguard / Iron Will) to a button, for example '?' or maybe 'X' (doesn't really mater, as long as it doesn't interfere with the main controls, you could even use the middle mouse button - the scroll thingy - to bind a spell to!). Now when you use '?' or 'X' it will cast Safeguard / Iron Will on yourself, hopefully in time to save your life! Self + Smart cast just means that if your mouse cursor is over an ally, using the spell will effect the target instead of yourself but if the mouse isn't over another target then it will be self cast.

Thanks to Cubby1313 for mentioning Self casting

Here is a video I found on Youtube, this video does not belong to me and is property of Ciderhelm.

We've just learnt there is a feature called smart casting. It is used by pressing Shift + Q, W, E or R simultaneously. It allows you to use an ability without clicking. The ability will instead activate in the direction of your mouse cursor or on the target your mouse cursor is hovering over. We now know that the default key binding (Shift + Q, W, E or R) can be changes to suit your comfort, using the options menu in-game.

Smart Casting is very simple. This guide is pretty much just a reminder to all you people that this feature is available. By reading this guide, I can't guarantee that you will become a PRO Smart Caster! You must practice because practice makes perfect :D

Next up will be the guides on how I play Lee Sin. A guide to Akali may or may not (probably not) be created since there is already an awesome guide out there and I am not a very good Akali player! But I will include a few videos of me playing Akali with smart casting once I get the hang of it XD

This is the end of my Smart Casting Guide so far. I may add a change log below, when I have time of course. I'm thinking of featuring an AP carry in my smart casting Guide, so please leave a reccommendation as to which champion I should choose! I chose Akali and Lee Sin since the way I see it, you want to execute your abilities in the shortest time frames possible as these two. Other champions with devastating combos can benefit from smart casting as well, so I am thinking of making a list of champions which would be ideal for smart casting sometime in the future.

I'm currently quite Busy so my Lee Sin guide may take a while to put up (IF I can get around to it!).