Hey all, this is my first build with Mobafire. I've been playing TF a lot lately so I thought I'd give it a shot with making a build and guide. If you do it right, you should end up with something like this:

Pros:

Strong laner/pusher
Low cooldown and decent duration on stun
Amazing 2v1 champion (especially with a taunting tank or a high damage melee champ)
Good at fleeing and helping teammates escape
Ult removes fog of war (prevents baroning, checking on opponents, protecting/pushing turrets, etc.)
Ult allows instant 2v1
Ult helps snipe unwary opponents
Ult allows sneaky escape from dangerous situations
Ult allows for desperate backdoor attempts
Strong at managing mana
+2 gold per minion kill for team is nice

Cons:

Hard to pull gold cards for stun under pressure
Horrible at team fighting
Squishy early game
Targeted easily - CC and you're dead
Requires strong map awareness and opponent's health
Heavily dependent on team composition and competency

I picked all AS runes for increased damage and health quints for survivability. One of TF's main strengths is in his ability to stun and dish out damage during the stun duration and then run away to a safe distance or go in for the kill. Naturally, AS runes can help with that. I would consider getting some armor penetration for marks, but I'm still not clear as to whether or not this is the better choice.

I went with the standard 21-0-9 masteries to increase attack speed, overall damage, critical strike chance and decrease cooldowns. The experience bonus is nice to level up to level 6 quickly. I just have a point on greed to add to TF's passive.

I find that the most important part about TF, besides being smart about map awareness, is going the right item build. I am one of the proponents that TF should go strictly DPS. As you can see from the item sequence, I rush a B.F. Sword and buy normal boots before turning it into a Infinity's Edge. Hopefully, your runes will be sustaining you on the attack speed stats this far into the game. Then I turn boots into Beserker's Greaves and immediately begin building my first Phantom Dancer for the attack speed, crit strike and movement bonus. This is awesome makes TF better at getting in and out of risky combat situations. And as if TF wasn't fast enough, another Phantom Dancer is sure to finish your opponents. I'd guess you're dealing about 450 damage-ish at this point in the game at a rate of about 2 attacks per second, which is not bad. If you're really fed and the game drags on this far, I'd suggest a Bloodthirster for the lifesteal and damage. Otherwise, go for a Frozen Mallet or Banshee's Veil for survivability.

Pick a Card - press w to activate and w to select... the blue/red/yellow cards will go through a rotation above your character's head upon activation until you select a card. once have selected a card, TF will throw it at a clicked-on target. Red cards deal splash damage and a slow on the target. Gold card stuns the target for a duration of time. Blue cards restore the bonus magic damage back in mana to TF.

Destiny - reveals all champions (stealthed included) for 6 seconds... while it's active, TF can teleport anywhere on the map.



This part isn't really all that complicated. I get "Pick a Card" first for the stun followed by "Stacked Deck." Basically, I level those two abilities as fast as possible, getting the ult whenever possible. Pick a Card is pretty much the only spell I even bother using. I only get the "Wild Card" ability toward the end because it's basically useless for a DPS TF. I do find however, that it's useful for getting rid of the spell block on Banshees Veil or on Sivir's "Spell Shield". If I'm going in to engage and the opponent has the magic spell block up, I dish out a "Wild Card" before throwing my stun to nullify the shield and ensure that my stun isn't neutralized. Also, it can harass and keep opponents from blue-pill.

I like Flash and Ignite the most. Flash is useful and majorly broken as always. For a squishy carry like TF, it's awesome for fleeing during that split second or for buying some time to pull that gold card. It's also great for initiating... getting up close to mages with low health is great. I like ignite just because, from experience, it's gotten me loads of kills I would have never otherwise been able to accomplish.

I would consider taking these spells: Ghost, Clairvoyance and Teleport.
Ghost is good for the extra fleeing mechanism.
Clairvoyance can aid in further removing the fog of war (complements TF's ult well).
Teleport helps you to be even more annoying by being everywhere at once (complements TF's ult well).

Never, ever, ever get stunned or you're dead. :)
Don't use red card on turrets when enemy champs are nearby because the splash damage will hit the champion(s) and the turret will hone in on you.
Try to spam "Pick a Card" on turrets because it does a little bit of bonus damage.
During the laning phase, opponents aren't stupid enough to get in range of a TF with a red/gold card above their head. If you're sneaky, attacking a nearby creep next to the champ with a red card will harass and slow the enemy. The technique for pulling this off is kind of like Tristana's passive from explosive shot.