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Build Guide By RCIX
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15
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40,785
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Fiora Build Guide By RCIX
40,785
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32
Comments
Fiora Build Guide By RCIX
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Spells:
Exhaust
Ignite
Ability Order
Duelist's Dance (PASSIVE)
Fiora Passive Ability
Introduction
Welcome to The Renegade's Guide to Fiora! I made this guide because I already see so many people deciding to build her with generic tanky DPS items and that just feels wrong. Plus, there's a non-trivial amount of skill involved knowing when/how to engage with her, and her ult practically deserves a chapter on it's own :P
Please leave a comment stating what you do/don't like, and any thoughts you have on how to improve it. I would very much appreciate it!
Where, When, and Why?
Where?
Fiora is a situational pick for solotop, simply because of the number of counter champions you can run against her to shut her down. However, she works very well against the odd low-mobility/sustain champion top and (pretty much, anyway) the few AP champions that frequent top as well. She's great in the matchups she doesn't lose though!
See the next section for reasons on why I don't cover jungler or tanky DPS roles, but the short of it is I feel like it's simply not viable.
When?
Avoid the champions that can just shrug off your harass and sustain it right back;
Yorick, Cho'Gath, and Warwick are good examples. I won't go into detail here though, that's what the Matchups section is for.Why?
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Pros:
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Cons:
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What Fiora is NOT
Don't get me wrong, on the surface they look like they might work, but if you really examine what a jungler or tanky DPS is, then you can see that Fiora just doesn't fit. Don't worry, I won't keep those examinations to myself; what follows shows in detail why Fiora just can't cut it (pun intended) as either of those roles.
Jungler
I think the easiest/best way to help make my point is to compare Fiora to a popular jungler, namely Skarner. Below is a nice handy A vs B diagram showing you the character, their skills, and properties in the jungle:
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Fiora |
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energize
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Skarner |
| ........ |
Attributes:
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Attributes:
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These properties all flow into each other a bit, but:
- Fiora has poor ganks, since she can't stick to targets for long or slow them down in any way
- Fiora has poor jungle clear times since she's a single target jungler
- Fiora cannot counter-jungle well, and is prone to being counter-jungled, since her dueling abilities are average at best without farm (also, see next point)
- Fiora has poor innate sustain in the jungle, since she has no self-heal or spammable shield or anything
- She doesn't get dramatically better in ganking at level 6
Skarner, and doesn't specialize in one role at the expense of another like Shyvana. Soooo..... Remind me why we should put her in the jungle?
Tanky DPS
I can do something similar for Tanky DPS. Please, if you will, compare Fiora to Renekton:
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Fiora |
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Renekton |
| ....... |
Attributes:
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Attributes:
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It's definitely subtle differences that make the role here, but basically:
- Fiora has no disruption capabilities whatsoever
- Fiora has relatively low natural tankiness to hit the enemy team
- She doesn't have the same stickiness or chasing abilities as Renekton (no location-targeted dash, also see the no disruption point above)
- She uses mana, which puts a finite (fairly large for a mana user, but finite) cap on how long she can effectively stay in the field
- She doesn't have the high sustainability and/or damage absorption tools to really tank a lot of damage (W doesn't count, it's one attack).
I'm not saying to not build any health on her at all (quite the contrary; she needs some in any case since she's melee), just to not go "it's a melee champ with a gap closer, MUST-BUILD-METAGOLEM..."
Champion Profile
Where being rated 0-3 means that Fiora doesn't like this stat/isn't good at that task, 4-6 means that she's OK in that area, and 7-9 means this is one of her primary focuses. The purpose here is to give you an idea of the champion as a whole, and help guide your rune/item/mastery selection and tactics beyond what information i provide.
Stat Affinities
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OffenseADCritASLifestealMovespeed |
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Spellcasting
AP Mana Mp5 CDR Spellvamp
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Defense
Health Hp5 Armor Mres
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Champion Properties
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SoloDuelingSustainScaling with farmInnate damageRange |
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Team
CC Pushing Tankiness Escapes Utility
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Fiora is a very, very strong physical damage dealer, that can shred any squishy in seconds (even most AD carries when given the chance). She lacks in team contribution due to no CC, situational escapes, very little utility, and below average tankiness for a solo top though. Focus on building up her autoattacks, tossing in a touch of health and situational resistance as needed.
Summoner Spells
Primary Spells:
In general, you want to be running a pair of offensive spells top. Guardsman Bob had a great explanation of this on his stream once, which summed up to this: If they run 2 offensive spells and you don't, then they can bully you out of the lane and trade without fear of giving up FB (unless they screw up majorly).
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Exhaust |
............ | Since Fiora has no innate CC, I highly recommend Exhaust to slow your enemies while you finish them. It's also useful to make time to escape an unfavorable fight or stop a chaser. |
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Ignite |
............ | Ignite is extra useful top since you face a lot of natural lifestealers/heal spell champs, so you can shut that down when going in for the kill. |
Viable Alternatives:
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Teleport |
............ |
Teleport is quite handy for a number of things:
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Flash |
............ | I feel like Fiora has plenty of mobility (while it doesn't last very long, it is enough), so flash is almost overkill. Pick at your preference though. |
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Heal |
............ | This is a semi-defensive alternative for a bully summoner spell. You can win fights just as well via heal ignite as exhaust ignite, and it can also buy you more time to run from a gank or something. Select as preferred. |
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Cleanse |
............ |
Fiora is very allergic to CC and it synergizes with Blade Waltz a bit (pop, then ult to buy time), so consider taking this instead.
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Do Not Get:
(note that I'm skipping spells like Revive or Promote because it should be obvious why these are bad choices)|
Clarity |
............ |
Not only can Teleport serve the same purpose as this mostly, Fiora is one of the least mana hungry champs I've played. Not smart. At all.
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Ghost |
............ | Like with flash, I feel like Fiora has plenty of mobility, and Ghost is the less desirable of the two summoner spells for this. She has a minighost from E active (and you should always be maxing it's movespeed stacks if you use it right), so don't get it. |
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Surge |
............ | In the one hand, W does have good AP scaling and she can use a bit of attack speed; on the other hand, that's all the AP scaling she has and you can get plenty of AS from just one or two items. |
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Clairvoyance |
............ | You're not a support, and you don't have the kind of long range skill that would benefit from remote vision. |
Runes
These runes are selected to enhance key portions of Fiora's gameplay:
- Marks add AD. The benefit isn't enormous, but it helps a lot in last hitting early game and is fairly strong in fights before like level 8 or something (compared to arpen anyway).
- Seals add Armor. You'll be solo top and VSing other physical characters most of the time, so you want these.
- Glyphs are Mres/Level, for two reasons. 1 is that you need the defense against mages and it works with your scaling Mres to get you ~75 at end-game. 2 is that you don't face many AP characters (thus don't need a lot of magic resist right away)/mages damage output scales heavily with levels as well (so you get more out of scaling than flat).
- Quints are movement speed, since Fiora is melee with low CC, she needs to be as fast as she can.
Quintessences
greater quintessence of desolation
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Greater Quintessence of Fortitude
Primarily chosen for the health benefit early game. Use if you want a bit more health to work with. |
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Greater Quintessence of Strength
AD Quints are mostly chosen when you want early-game harass and last-hitting power. I don't have much trouble last-hitting, but you might want these. |
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greater quintessence of desolation
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Greater Quintessence of Desolation
Arpen scales a lot better than AD, so select at your preference. Note that you'd be better off with AD quints and arpen marks than the other way around (arpen quints worth 2 arpen marks, ad quints worth ~2.37 ad marks). |
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greater quintessence of desolation
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Marks
greater mark of desolation
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greater mark of desolation
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Greater Mark of Desolation
Arpen marks scale better than AD marks, though AD marks offer easier last-hitting and more early-game power. Select at your preference. |
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greater mark of desolation
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Seals
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Greater Seal of Fortitude
I don't know if I'd recommend these over armor seals since you're going top, but they don't seem that bad *shrug* |
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Glyphs
It's... yeah. I can't see any other glyphs that would be worth running on Fiora here.
Masteries
Items - Boots
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These boots aren't that bad on Fiora, I just feel like she has better options available. Lunge has good CD scaling with level, Riposte has a naturally low CD which gets lower as you level it, and Burst of Speed has a pretty solid cooldown which refreshes on a kill or assist.
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AS boots are OK, I just don't like getting these as much since you can AS cap yourself with just 2 Phantom Dancers and Burst of Speed's active. If you get more raw damage or defenses instead, these are viable.
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...... | As with Cleanse, Fiora is very allergic to being CCed. She also hates magic damage, particularly in bursts. Magic resist and Tenacity tackle both of these problems, so this is quite the appealing boots choice. |
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...... | Grab these if you feel like you're doing well and you want to gank a lot. They don't offer stats like the others though, so IMO this is the least attractive choice. |
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...... | Since you go top, I'd say these are the most common boots choice. around 80% of solo tops are AD, and the armor plus basic attack reduction makes it a heck of a lot easier to fight them. |
Items - Starting Purchases and Core
Starting Items
This is the usual start top, since most characters you versus are heavy physical damage, and the cloth armor gets you 5 pots as leeway for winning fights. There are a bunch of other options to choose, and the following lists them and coditions you'd want them:
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Doran's Blade I do usually take a couple of Dorans early on, but I dislike starting with one. Why? It doesn't offer you that much more defense per cost compared to cloth armor/null magic mantle, and it means you can't get any pots with leftover money. Potions can easily make the difference between a successful first blood and a death trade, or even just flat out dying and not quite killing your lane opponent. |
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Boots of Speed You don't see many skillshot champs top, so this isn't often a first purchase. I might recommend it versus, say, Rumble though (since he has Electro-Harpoon as a skillshot and is dependent on Flamespitter's short range to deal damage).
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Null-Magic Mantle The biggest reason you'd start with this is because you'd be VSing a magic damage champ with high sustain top, such as Mordekaiser or Vladimir. The first step to dealing with those champions is defensing against their damage, and this item builds into a couple of good choices for doing so.
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Don't forget to use the rest of your money on health potions! I'd recommend mana pots, but I rarely run out of mana with Fiora even when I'm fairly aggressive with her.
Core
PLUS one set of boots
I prefer this core set of items since it gives you a nice solid amount of bulk without sacrificing damage output. I feel like a bloodthirster or infinity edge is too glass-cannon focused for early game, and Fiora's obviously not a bruiser or tank to want to build pure defenses :P
Items - Offensive
Early Game
Mid/Late Game
Dominion
Mid/Late Game
Dominion
Since Fiora is a melee AD carry that likes a bit of tankiness in her build, she has quite a bit of flexibility in what she buys. I've divided the list into 3 categories for your convenience: Early Game, Mid/Lategame, and Dominion:
Early Game
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Brutalizer This is a fantastic item for Fiora. She loves arpen, damage is nice, and while CDR isn't ideal Fiora can always use some. It also builds into a Youmuu's, which is also great midgame. |
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Phage A Phage is really nice early on to bulk you up without sacrificing damage, and works towards getting a reliable CC. |
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Zeal I'd be careful about buying this early in the game, but it does offer movespeed and builds into an incredibly cost-effective purchase later. |
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Vampiric Scepter This is a really cheap pickup that makes you a lot better in trades and skirmishes and gets you a lot more sustain. I like to get one around the time of my Phage. |
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Doran's Blade These are really cheap; for 950, you can have two, which gets you about as much stats as a Phage (minus the slow passive, but plus 6% lifesteal). Don't go overboard, but a couple really make Fiora stronger as long as you can hold onto them.
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Hexdrinker This is a really solid choice when VSing a magic character top, or when their mid gets fed. +35 damage, MRes, and an effective 300 more health versus any caster or hybrid character is very solid for 1800 cost. It's also really handy against the odd global/long range ultimate character such as Karthus or Ashe/ Ezreal, since it acts as a handy safety net.
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Executioner's Calling This is more of a niche choice, since it doesn't build into anything and it offers very mediocre stats for anything past midgame. However, it does make a surprising difference in the lane (36 + 4 damage per autoattack past 1, dealt over time to suppress regeneration). Also, it's virtually a must have when fighting any strong healers ( Vladimir, Dr. Mundo), and does wonders for duels with people that have lifesteal (even acts as a soft counter-counter to back up thornmail).
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Mid/Late Game
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Youmuu's Ghostblade This offers a boatload of stats Fiora wants: crit, AS, arpen, MS, and even the CDR helps. It has great synergy with your E and Q (they work together to help keep you stick to people), so I strongly recommend this being bought in most every game. |
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Frozen Mallet I like a Frozen Mallet midgame because it gives you as much health as you'd ever need, and also gives you a chance to stick to about 80% of the LoL champ cast. This really ought to be a common purchase as well. |
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Wit's End This one is definitely more of a niche choice. You mainly want it when you're about to build AS but also want Mres, and don't want to sacrifice damage for your autoattack. It has good synergy with your ult (extra 210 damage over the course of use) as well. I wouldn't buy it often, but do consider it if the situation calls for one. |
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Phantom Dancer This is a very focused and effective item. AS, crit, and movespeed are all great on Fiora, so you almost always want at least one. I'd avoid it as an early buy since Fiora has other priorities first thanks to her massive Burst of Speed AS boost.
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Infinity Edge The king of AD carry DPS items. Once you get this, you'll hit so hard it's not even funny. However, IE isn't very cost efficient unless you already have some crit chance and damage, so never ever rush it. |
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Black Cleaver I've tried this item on Fiora, and it's OK, but it just doesn't seem to have the oomph like you get with other items. It's up to you if you want to buy it though. |
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Last Whisper A Last Whisper is great if your enemies start stacking armor (NORLY?). It's not cost efficient for AD though; don't buy it unless 2 or more enemy champs start buying armor items. |
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The Bloodthirster This is the king of raw AD items; with the strong lifesteal bonus and up to 100 AD granted, this is really solid. On the other hand though, it might be hard to fit it into a build for Fiora -- I don't think it's super smart to rush expensive AD items as first purchases and by the time you get to being able to easily buy one there are other, more compelling options for her. In the end, if you get a Vampiric Scepter for your early game, this is arguably the best upgrade option for it.
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Dominion
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Entropy I really really wish this item was available on Summoner's Rift. It's fantastic for so many champions, and would really help give choices for build items on various characters (perhaps even make it into a standard AD carry build). In any case, take this over Frozen Mallet on dominion -- Fiora likes the AD over health, and the active/passive covers your stickiness needs pretty much.
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Sanguine Blade The dominion version of the Bloodthirster -- basically a pure-AD version of Guinsoo's Rageblade. Really nice since it's a potent source of AD and lifesteal, and since her ult can not only stack it but use the stacks, she comes out very ahead. I wouldn't build it right away, but as like a third item? Totally.
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The Lightbringer I really like this item since it makes finding stealth champions so much easier - if you get to them before stealth, then you probably won't lose them again. And since your ult procs it as well, you don't have to worry about it randomly fizzling from the mini-stealth champs! |
Items - Defensive
Health/General
Armor
Magic Resist
Generally you shouldn't be buying pure defensive items (
Armor
Magic Resist
Frozen Mallet offers you tons of health), but I've assembled a section here about them if the situation does arise to buy one.
Health/General
These are probably the most all-round choices you can get. You want one if the
Frozen Mallet isn't enough defense for you but there's no clear dominant damage type on the enemy team.|
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Warmog's Armor I don't know if I'd ever grab a Warmog's on top of Frozen Mallet for defense, but it might not be a totally bad idea in the right edge case. |
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Guardian Angel When you buy this, you're basically taking out an insurance policy on your life :P Really handy if they've caught on and start focusing you even after you ult. I wouldn't buy it on Dominion though; the passive is only gonna resurrect you, like, twice total thanks to it's long cooldown and dominion's short game length. |
Armor
Ever had a semi-fed
Caitlyn to deal with? How about a Gangplank who just won't stop Parrrleying you? You want armor then. Note that almost all armor items come with some very strong passives to help shut down AD characters.|
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Thornmail This is best bought when you happen to end up fighting other low-survivability autoattackers a lot ( Gangplank, Master Yi, most AD carries) and they start winning those fights. It's also the cheapest of the 3 options for armor, and one of the more cost-efficient choices if you just plain need armor.
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Randuin's Omen I'd almost call this a combo defensive/offensive item, since you can Lunge to someone then slow them so they can't get away as well. In any case, this works well when you deal with ranged as well as melee thanks to the passive. IT also builds from a Heart of Gold so if you want this you'd pick that up earlier in the game as preliminary defense.
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Magic Resist
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Force of Nature If your problem is being heavily poked by magic damage, then this is your item. Massive HP5, a regeneration passive, and 76 MRes are quite handy in that case. Fiora also appreciates the movespeed a lot! |
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Banshee's Veil Banshee's is great vs characters like LeBlanc who really depend on dropping a full, uninterrupted skill combo to be most effective. Health and mana are also handy, so if you need those consider this as well. Consider avoiding it if they have characters with really spammy spells on their team such as Soraka, Gangplank, or Skarner (as they can easily pop the spell shield for their allies).
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Quicksilver Sash This is best purchased when you're having trouble dealing with long CCs, such as puncturing taunt or Idol of Durand. Do skip if they only have short time CCs and you have merc treads, and/or you have Cleanse.
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Items - Bad Choices
zeke's herald
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Sheen The biggest reason I don't like a Sheen on Fiora is because she really shouldn't be staggering her abilities to get the use out of the passive. There's also the small matter of the fact that it only scales off base AD. See this bit: Unique: On cast, for 10 seconds, your next standard attack deals additional physical damage equal to 100% of your base attack damage. 2 second cooldown. So you could buy a B. F. Sword and quickly deal more damage than a sheen proc or two thanks to your AS steroid, and also have an item that builds into one of several great choices for Fiora. Also, Fiora doesn't really need more mana, and the only thing she has that scales with AP is her Riposte.
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Trinity Force We've established the passive isn't all that good. The other reason is that it's simply not as cost-effective even as a solo item, and it has poor synergy with other ideal purchases for Fiora. Here's the mathcraft: Let's start by listing the relevant stats of Trinity force vs a comparable alternative: Bloodthirster + the components of a Phage:
[assuming a half-stacked BT] The scenario we're considering is 12 autoattacks, both casts of lunge, one procced Riposte, and 2 trinity force sheen procs when applicable. Assuming fiora is level 13, with level 5 Riposte, Level 5 Burst of Speed, and level 1 Lunge, the numbers for the trinity force are: 260(+30) damage from 1x Riposte + 1740.18 damage from autoattacks (12 autos (126.1 damage per AA) * 1.15 for critical strike) + 80 (+36) damage from Lunge + 288.3 damage from TF sheen passive (2 procs of 144.15 each) For a total of 2434.48 damage. [the *1.15 is a shortcut for calculating critical strike bonuses :P] The BT + Phage parts will get you: 260(+0) damage from 1x Riposte + 2293.2 damage from autoattacks (12 autos (191.1 damage per AA)) + 80 (+114) damage from Lunge For a total of 2747.2 damage. As you can see, the BT scenario gets you ~300 more damage than the trinity force, and that's in a rush situation where there's nothing else to scale off of. Once you toss in IE/PD crits, capped AS, and the guaranteed passive slow from Frozen Mallet, the AD scales far better than trinity's sheen proc. Moreover, you get lifesteal from the BT, which is incredibly valuable in anything short of a full-blown teamfight.
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Atma's Impaler The main stats it gives can be better achieved via specialized items (I'd much rather have an IE or PD for crit, or a thornmail or something for armor), and the passive is horribly space-inefficient for damage output (to match a mere unstacked bloodthirster, you need a whopping 3000 health, which is gonna take you at least one health recipe + one health component). The one case I'd buy an Atma's is if I found myself with a Warmogs and Frozen Mallet already, but other than that, DO NOT WANT! |
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Wriggle's Lantern I dislike this on Fiora because it's a poor choice for actually fighting enemy champions (a couple doran's and a vamp. scepter will let you roll over almost anyone who bought a wriggles, and for cheaper), and the passive isn't really reliable for farming. You also (IMO) shouldn't be jungling, so you don't need it for that. |
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zeke's herald
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Zeke's Herald This is a bit more of a general "why does anyone build this on non-supports anymore". From an offensive standpoint, you're paying 2k for a Vampiric Scepter's worth of lifesteal and a bit more than a dagger's worth of AS. Yeah, it has defensive/utility aspects too, but a Phage and Youmuu's Ghostblade more than cover those angles for you.
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Tiamat Technically, you do have ult synergy here (wee AoE 2k damage ult in a teamfight), but the AoE radius is so small and you have to buy two to get the full effect.... Just skip this gimmick. |
I'd like to add a final note though, which is: Build what your team needs. Fiora won't implode if you build her tanky DPS, and done right it could actually work if your team needs one. Just try and avoid picking her in those situations :P
Sample Builds
Standard Itemsheet
Cloth Armor and 5 Health Potions, and get 2 Doran's Blades and Boots on your first back. From there, finish your Ninja Tabi and buy several cheap, cost-effective items ( Phage/ Vampiric Scepter/ The Brutalizer) to help pump you up for the mid-game, then your shopping begins in earnest.Finish the Brutalizer into a
Youmuu's Ghostblade and get a B. F. Sword before a Frozen Mallet to ensure you're spending enough money on staying relevant damage-wise. From there, a Bloodthirster is only logical since we have the components already, then a Phantom Dancer and Last Whisper fill your remaining slots.At this point, your
Youmuu's Ghostblade is a mid-game item on a late-game character, so you get the best slot value by replacing it with an Infinity Edge. After that, if the game somehow goes longer than THAT, you sell boots in favor of the second Phantom Dancer that AS caps you when E is on and still gives you decent movespeed.
Defensive/Anti Magic Sustain Itemsheet
Item Sequence
Health Potion
50
Health Potion
50
Boots
300
Vampiric Scepter
900
Phage
1100
Ninja Tabi
1100
Hexdrinker
1300
Youmuu's Ghostblade
2800
Bloodthirster
3400
Frozen Mallet
3100
Phantom Dancer
2650
Infinity Edge
3450
Force of Nature
2800
Mordekaiser, Vladimir, etc.) and you start with a Null-Magic Mantle and 2 Health Potions. From there, you get boots and a quick Vampiric Scepter/ Phage for lane sustain/bulk. The Null-Magic Mantle covers you for magic resist for now, so you pick up Ninja Tabi and then complete Hexdrinker to help push up your anti-magic stats and damage.From there, it's a fairly standard build with the exception of swapping the completion of
Frozen Mallet with Bloodthirster since we went with a more defensive early game setup. One other thing to note is that you'd want a Last Whisper over a second Phantom Dancer if they start stacking armor. Force of Nature replaces Hexdrinker since lategame we care less about 35 AD and are happy to have the health regen and movespeed along with MR.
Dominion Itemsheet
Item Sequence
Boots
300
The Brutalizer
1337
Vampiric Scepter
900
Phage
1100
Mercury's Treads
1250
Youmuu's Ghostblade
2800
Entropy
2700
Sanguine Blade
3000
Infinity Edge
3450
Phantom Dancer
2650
Prospector's Blade and Boots since that's a really solid combo and rounds out your capabilities nicely. From there, get your The Brutalizer, Vampiric Scepter, and Phage/ Mercury's Treads (or whichever boots you need, depends on the situation).After that, I find building straight offense is pretty solid, though since it's so dynamic never be afraid to toss in a couple of defensive items for the people who can beat you in fights. Anyway, complete
Entropy and Sanguine Blade so you deal Tons of Damage(TM). I rarely get past this point since Dom games are so short, but I'd probably end with either situational defensive items or the listed Phantom Dancer/ Infinity Edge.Here's the thing though: you should build what you need. I only did this section to describe my thought process around how I'd build Fiora in a few different situations, that way you might get a bit better at doing so yourself :p Also, here's a legend of what the colors on the items listed previously mean:
- Starting/Core Purchases
- Offensive Purchases
- Defensive Purchases
Skill Usage/Notes
This section will cover general usage and leveling order of your skills. Fiora's kit is quite focused but very strong in the right hands, and it's my mission to make yours the right ones!
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Duelist A very strong passive in-lane since it grants you a surprising amount of health regen (equivalent to 6 and 2/3rds Hp5 at level 1, increasing by 0.8333 per level). It also scales up when you attack champions, so it's great for trades as well. |
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Lunge This is your gap-closer. It has fantastic base damage numbers (when both casts target the same unit), two casts to catch people from far away, and very good scaling with level. Tricks:
Use for:
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Riposte I'd call this skill your one-point wonder. At level one, it has a nice low cooldown, and serves it's function just fine there. It's a fairly solid dueling skill, not as good as others (like Aegis Protection or Counter Strike) but still decent. The Passive AD bonus is just icing on the cake here.The list of things Riposte will and will not block is a bit convoluted, so I'll spell it out:
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Burst of Speed Fiora's absolute best skill. Even at level one, the attack speed bonus is insane, the movespeed bonus is fantastic for chasing, and what's more, it refreshes on a kill! Tricks:
Use for:
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Blade Waltz Your ace in the hole. Basically Omnislash but not stupidly balanced, this is a very strong damage, de-aggro, and last-ditch burst move which makes Fiora arguably one of the strongest duelists in the game (er, strongest conventional duelist; Master Rofl and Trynda-derp can face-roll because of how stupid their skill mechanics are). Tricks:
Use for:
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Leveling Order
- Lunge cooldown drops to 8 seconds at level 5 from 16 seconds at level 1 (and Fiora really needs that low CD for stickiness)
- Riposte starts at a much more reasonable 10 second cooldown, and doesn't drop nearly as fast.
- The damage scaling is the same on Riposte vs Lunge, but the latter isn't a reactive skill that depends on your enemy attacking you to deal that damage.
I also want to write a bit about my choice of skill order for the first 3 levels. I chose
Lunge > Burst of Speed > Riposte for a simple reason: It gets her ninja combo as fast as you can get it. Riposte is of minimal use at that first level in most matchups anyway, especially since Lunge gets you far superior mobility and lets you make up what you might lose by blocking an attack easily.However, If you're facing a champion that has an attack enhancer (
Nasus' Siphoning Strike, Garen's Judgment, etc.) you would be best served by picking Riposte as your second or even first level spell. Remember, mix it up as the situation needs it!For reference, here's R>E>W>Q:
| Ability Sequence | |||||||||||||||||
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 |
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Matchups
Win matchups are ones that you can easily zone and/or win your lane in. Skill matchups come down to who can leverage their situation/leveling/itemization over their opponent better. Loss matchups are ones where Fiora simply cannot compete and often get zoned out. I also provide notes on each matchup and recommended starts/goals for early itemization against each champ.
Note: At least half of the result of your laning phase is dependent on your opponent; you CAN win the Loss lanes if your opponent messes up enough, but don't count on it.
Win matchups
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Mordekaiser |
...... | Ok, so the deal with him is this: He likes to push. He gains lane dominance through maintaining shield to handle harass, and he does this by mulching minions very quickly. Guess what his achilles heel is though? Sustained harassment. It's kind of rocky at the early levels, but if you can pull off a kill on him or zone him well then he is starved of farm and you outscale him handily. | ...... |
Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Swain |
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As long as you can stay out of Nevermove, all Swain can really do is Torment Decrepify combo you -- which hurts, but given that he's slow and has no escape, gives you plenty of time to retaliate. Make sure to pressure him early, since he can't respond well and half of winning a lane is stopping the opponent's farm. After 6, it gets harder to fight due to his bird form ult, but Executioner's calling improves your chances. You also want Merc Treads so that if you do get caught by Nevermove, you can get out quicker. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Poppy |
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Poppy has a horridly weak laning phase, and is very tough to get farmed. Be sure to fight her as much as you can. Keep an eye on the angle between her and you to make sure she cant tackle you into a wall for a free stun. She can go hybrid, AD, or AP. Itemize based on that. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Skill matchups
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Akali |
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Akali relies on minibursts of damage followed by kiting/avoiding retaliation, so be sure to engage her in extended duels. Riposte blocks consumption of the Mark of the Assassin proc, so use that to spread out her damage and prevent her from hitting so hard all at once. Use executioner's whenever you can to slow her healing via the natural/purchased spellvamp she gets. If you're doing well versus her, get an oracle's elixer. If decent, get Vision Wards and drop them when Akali shrouds. If poorly, buy some hope. (;P) |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Gangplank |
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With his recent nerfs, he can basically choose between harassing you with Parrrley and farming with it. Riposte blocks Parrrley, so make sure to use that in your favor (for that reason, consider leveling W over Q). Your passive is a soft counter to his (makes it so you can come out well in trades). Make sure to deny GP his bullying power by standing up to him, and you're set (you scale much better than he does). He is almost all physical damage, so armor is a heavy early game itemization priority. In the end, it comes down to who has the better mindgames/reflexes and itemization. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Nidalee |
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Before 6, fighting Nidalee mainly involves dodging her spears and pressuring her a bit. Since most good nidalees go AD or tanky AD nowadays, It gets a lot tricker after 6. You should be on reasonable ground though if you can successfully time blocking the Takedowns. If she's AP, her in-the-face dueling capabilities are a lot weaker and your main goal is still to dodge spears though. In any case, you're mainly angling for getting the room to outfarm her over actually killing her. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization (AP):
Itemization (AD):
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Nasus |
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Fighting nasus mainly involves getting him to burn mana through repeated Wither casts and blocking Siphoning Strike. If you can do that, then he'll be low on Q farm and you can freely zone him/outscale him. He has a high probability to rush armor on seeing you though, so take that into account. Given that you'll be extending quite far to pressure him, make sure to keep the river warded. He's primarily a physical damage dealer, so grabbing armor and lifesteal of your own keeps you in the lane and lets you farm. Nasus can outfarm you and outscale you though if given the chance, so be careful. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Singed |
...... | With singed, it's not so much about winning the lane (easy to do that) as making Singed lose. He has ways of very effectively farming minions, even under lane pressure. There's not too much you can do about that except (carefully, don't want to be flung into tower range) dominating over him in the lane and being very precise about last hits. | ...... |
Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Renekton |
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You really want to be reactive when fighting Renekton. If you are the one starting trades, then he can stun you in his wave and lifesteal back what damage you did, leaving you losing the trade. If, however, you bait out an attack, then you can safely retalitate and at least even the score. Be very careful when trying to finish him, since his ult effectively acts as a fairly strong heal (which IIRC is not reduced by ignite). As usual, he's a bruiser, so armor and lifesteal is a priority. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Riven |
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She's got the mobiity and damage output to win trades, but low sustain and if you can get damage to stick then you're good. Space out your second Lunge a bit till after she pulls back with Valor and/or Broken Wings. Make sure damage sticks; it's very dangerous to let Riven win trades. Also note that Riposte is not too useful against her; consider not taking a level in it till 4. Same deal here, need that armor/lifesteal to compete. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Vladimir |
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Vlad is a little like Morde but less push and more poke. Press him hard; every trade that you force vlad to use Sanguine Pool in is one you very likely won. Don't let him use Q to heal. Keep on him at all times. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Volibear |
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Volibear is a solid duelist/trader in-lane, since he has a minion fear, mini-rageblade passive, and execution skill. If you engage on your terms though, then you can easily avoid his tricks. When you Lunge onto him, save your second for lunging to a minion to escape and try to bait his Thundering Smash. If you can avoid extended duels and fight a series of small battles, you should be able to do fine. You don't need ignite to fight him, but it's preferable. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization:
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Wukong |
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His primary combo is Nimbus Strike into Crushing Blow, which you can trivially block with Riposte. Lunge was practically tailor made for chasing him, just use the second cast to catch him after he decoys. Try to bait out Nimbus Strike, wait for it's attack speed buff to wear off, then return the harass. Need armor/lifesteal as usual. |
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Recommended Start:
Itemization :
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Loss matchups
Since there's not as much you can do in these matchups, I'm going to just list how bad the matchup is, and what you should end up hoping for as best case.
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Irelia |
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You can win duels in the first couple of levels, but after that Irelia just facerolls. She'll be up on you by multiple hundreds of health with better CC than you, far more sustain, and as much/more damage after just a little farm. Your best hope is to get a lot of ganks, leaving the Irelia underleveled and making it a fair fight. |
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Jarvan IV |
...... | The situation here is similar to Irelia -- he has the beef to handle you and the damage to out-duel you. His power is less sustain-based though. |
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Cho'Gath |
...... | Thanks to his passive, he's basically a brick in lane. This lets him zone/pressure you easily without fear of retribution. However, since his CC is on a long delay, if you can dodge that then you can farm as well. Grab boots early and some lifesteal and you shold be reasonably set. |
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Kennen |
...... | He's a non-mana user champ with good poke who becomes more dangerous when he's in your face. Yeeeaaah, not exactly a good opponent for a squishy melee autoattacker. |
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Lee Sin |
...... | Another non-mana user, but one of the relative few who are mobile than you. Also very beefy and a free lifesteal/spellvamp active. |
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Malphite |
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Malphite's domination over your lane is a lot more gradual. His combos are fairly expensive so until he builds a bunch of mana (possibly Glacial Shroud/ Frozen Heart), he can't really put out the harass for long enough to kill you. He does hurt though, and since he'll be stacking armor out the wazoo, he's basically untouchable. Grab some lifesteal and possibly magic resist, and just try and farm.
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Olaf |
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I used to have this listed under "win" matchups. Then I bought olaf. You will lose this matchup. Olaf eats all but something like 2 melee characters solotop. I don't care how skilled you are, there's nothing you can do when Olaf can chunk 200-300 health off of you whenever you lasthit and/or harass with axes. |
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Pantheon |
...... | His passive gives him a tasty advantage if he wants to fight you (o hai dere, i can has free riposte every 4 AAs/spells cast?), he has a stun, and he hits hard with his combo. Prepare to be zoned. |
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Garen |
...... | Do i really need to explain this one? (Early game bawss vs champ who needs farm and takes a good 4 levels to spin up) |
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Rumble |
...... | One of the most dominant top laners at present... |
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Shen |
...... | I debated putting this guy in the "Skill" matchups, since he doesn't hit very hard at all. On the other hand, good sustain/farming, super beefy, can choose to harass you at any time you want? Pass. |
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Shyvana |
...... | Another beefy top that can really lay on the pain. Seriously, don't try and duel her, she'll just turn around and make you eat stupidly high amounts of damage. |
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Tryndamere |
...... | This is less because he's beefy and more because he rolls face over pretty much anything that isn't a direct counter to him (i.e. can completely zone him from any sort of farm whatsoever). Doesn't even take much skill for him to do it... |
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Udyr |
...... | Too much sustain, he has on-demand CC for jungle ganks, and gets too beefy too quick. |
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Warwick |
...... | Wee look at all the bruisers going by! Warwick is super sustainy, so you can't really fight him =[ |
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Yorick |
...... | Much like Cho'Gath, Yorick is a brick in lane. The difference? He's a brick that bites. Boring to play as or play against. |
I'd like to note again that I have little experience with running her solo top (I'll do what I can to fix this, but...), so I would appreciate any information/corrections you can provide.
Tactics
Early Game
Win matchups
In any win matchup, Fiora can be very aggressive. Starting at level 1, you should use
Lunge on the enemy to aggress, spacing the casts a couple of seconds apart for maximum damage. This should scare the enemy nicely, providing they didn't spamstack armor against you (not impossible). Go start lasthitting, and when you hit level 2, unlock your Burst of Speed and attack the enemy again. If you're lucky and got a lot of damage in at first, then you can look at using your summoner spells now for an easy kill. If not, continue farming and harassing him down. Once you hit 6, you probably have another free kill, even if you have to tower dive for it.
Skill matchups
In the skill matchups, Fiora needs to be more careful. Aggression makes sense, but if you make mistakes your opponent can punish you. Be on the ball with
Riposte, and consider more defensive use of Lunge. Farming is more iportant here; don't sacrifice CS for harassment which might not even net you a kill.
Loss matchups
In a loss matchup, you need to generally stay back and try not to die. A lot of these characters can just shrug off even ganks, and though you should be asking for them (to get you the room you need to farm), don't expect to get any kills. If the top you're facing doesn't push well (lol, most of the loss matchups do :P), then consider shoving the lane when you can to roam gank.
In any matchup, if your jungler starts at blue (red for the purple team), then you can give him a few autoattacks and some lunge casts to help him out. You can get to your lane in time if you don't do too much, but it helps a ton.
Midgame is an interesting beast. While you might need to roam, it's dangerous since Fiora is a poor pusher and most other tops good ones. That said, if you CAN roam, you should; Fiora makes an excellent DPS boost in ganks and can tear apart towers quickly. If your team wants to contest dragon, shove the lane as much as you can and go for it.
If you've been dominating the lane, you should be able to grab top tower; doing so will make it easier to roam since generally your lane opponent will need to spend more time pushing before they can get to your tower. If a teamfight breaks out and you're in it, you can be fairly aggressive if you avoid CC. Ranged AD carries can't bring you down very fast, AP carries generally can't 100-0 you yet, and you're a small terror when you're attacking someone. Plus, you have your ult as a panic button to buy time if you do get focused.
Lategame is the land of the teamfight. In teamfights, your job isn't to initiate. Let the tank/offtank do that, then once the party's started Lunge your way to wherever their highest threat/squishiest target is and pop Burst of Speed to shred them. If you get focused, no problem: Ult the guy you just took half health off of, or someone else splitting from their group; this gets you away from major focus and buys time for the rest of your team to clean up.
A lot of what you do lategame is not specific to Fiora, but do remember that you can shred a turret if you spy an opportune creep wave pushing. This might be smart if it splits the enemy team's attention. Also, at this point, any autoattacker eats minions like a bawss, so the concept of "bad pusher" is almost nonexistent.
At the windmill fight, you have a couple of options. If you went top, then you want to disrupt the enemy's attempts to cap as much as possible without taking damage; only jump in if you can significantly contribute to killing a champion and not die yourself. You're relying on strong initiators or enough poke to bring them low fast here.
If you go mid, on the other hand, then by the time you get to the Windmill, someone's likely low enough for you to come in from the back and snipe them. Only do this if your team is doing decently to well, otherwise you're just feeding the enemies a free kill.
If you win the Windmill fight, you can do a few things:
If, however, you lost the windmill fight, your first priority is to disrupt the enemy team. Either head bot and gank/take their bottom point, or try and help retake top. After that, I try to constantly throw the enemy team off balance; always running to points we can cap without (much) disruption, continually making the enemies regret their choices for engagement.
In a loss matchup, you need to generally stay back and try not to die. A lot of these characters can just shrug off even ganks, and though you should be asking for them (to get you the room you need to farm), don't expect to get any kills. If the top you're facing doesn't push well (lol, most of the loss matchups do :P), then consider shoving the lane when you can to roam gank.
In any matchup, if your jungler starts at blue (red for the purple team), then you can give him a few autoattacks and some lunge casts to help him out. You can get to your lane in time if you don't do too much, but it helps a ton.
Midgame
Midgame is an interesting beast. While you might need to roam, it's dangerous since Fiora is a poor pusher and most other tops good ones. That said, if you CAN roam, you should; Fiora makes an excellent DPS boost in ganks and can tear apart towers quickly. If your team wants to contest dragon, shove the lane as much as you can and go for it.
If you've been dominating the lane, you should be able to grab top tower; doing so will make it easier to roam since generally your lane opponent will need to spend more time pushing before they can get to your tower. If a teamfight breaks out and you're in it, you can be fairly aggressive if you avoid CC. Ranged AD carries can't bring you down very fast, AP carries generally can't 100-0 you yet, and you're a small terror when you're attacking someone. Plus, you have your ult as a panic button to buy time if you do get focused.
Lategame
Lategame is the land of the teamfight. In teamfights, your job isn't to initiate. Let the tank/offtank do that, then once the party's started
Lunge your way to wherever their highest threat/squishiest target is and pop Burst of Speed to shred them. If you get focused, no problem: Ult the guy you just took half health off of, or someone else splitting from their group; this gets you away from major focus and buys time for the rest of your team to clean up.A lot of what you do lategame is not specific to Fiora, but do remember that you can shred a turret if you spy an opportune creep wave pushing. This might be smart if it splits the enemy team's attention. Also, at this point, any autoattacker eats minions like a bawss, so the concept of "bad pusher" is almost nonexistent.
Dominion
At the windmill fight, you have a couple of options. If you went top, then you want to disrupt the enemy's attempts to cap as much as possible without taking damage; only jump in if you can significantly contribute to killing a champion and not die yourself. You're relying on strong initiators or enough poke to bring them low fast here.
If you go mid, on the other hand, then by the time you get to the Windmill, someone's likely low enough for you to come in from the back and snipe them. Only do this if your team is doing decently to well, otherwise you're just feeding the enemies a free kill.
If you win the Windmill fight, you can do a few things:
- Go gank bot, if you have the health
- Continue presing towards their mid if you have people with you
- Recall to heal and shop, only do this when the Windmill isn't actively threatened
- Stay and defend the windmill
If, however, you lost the windmill fight, your first priority is to disrupt the enemy team. Either head bot and gank/take their bottom point, or try and help retake top. After that, I try to constantly throw the enemy team off balance; always running to points we can cap without (much) disruption, continually making the enemies regret their choices for engagement.
Credits/Changelog
- Jhoijhoi, for a really great guide that helped me enormously when I started at Mobafire
- Everyone who gave feedback on my previous guide to show me what needed (and needs) improvement
- Riot, for hitting it out of the ballpark on another champ (except for that stupid accent... :x)
Changelog
- 3/15/2012:
- Published!
- 3/18/2012:
- Added Black Cleaver back to the Offensive items
- Improved advice for Volibear, Gangplank, and Pantheon in the Matchups section
- Added Akali and Poppy matchups in the Matchups section
- Added Riposte attack blocking rules to Skill Usage section
- Changed Dominion Masteries to 21/0/9 from 21/9/0
- Fixed guide category (shouldn't have been Dominion)
- Fixed rather stupid link error just below
- 3/20/2012:
- Scrapped Dominion cheat sheet (items were really the only thing different)
- Really changed guide type this time
- 4/3/2012:
- Moved Olaf from Win matchups to Lose matchups
Speaking of previous guides, if you liked this guide then you might also like my other one:
RCIX
Fiora Guide
The Renegade's Guide to Fiora [In-Depth]
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