Hey guys prophecy here, been looking at many of the high rated guides to playing Tristana, i even used to follow a few between this site and leaguecraft. All guides i have seen Tristana seem to more or less feature the same items. 'Ranged carry rush IE! LW. PD. BT. and own!' (Glass cannon)

Been their done it... it works.... if the enemy team is insanely stupid and wont consider focusing you.

The game currently 109' seems to be about high life high damage champions that excel in escapes or being able to close gaps really quick..
Enemies like, akali,kassadin,leblac,xin zhao,irelia,WARWICK! (you see were am going with this)
The old Glass cannon style Tristana is not really cutting it anymore.

TL:DR : BASICALLY, Tristana now needs to be played more tanky while maintaining a high damage output.

I dont know about general layout, but please read before you write off.

Okay, the runes are in no way set in stone. I use the following:

9x Armour pen Marks
9x Attack Speed Seals
9x Attack Speed Glyphs
2x Armour pen Quint
1x attack Speed Quint

Reasons: The marks are pretty standard, your an AD character, you want to deal alot of damage. Armour penetration marks help towards this all game.

'AttackSpeed? why waste runes on AS when Trist has a +90% AS Q nub'
This part is personal preference, if you dont agree with what i am about to say, you are welcome to change seals & glyphs to dodge/HPperLvl/ManaperLvl or whatever suites your playstyle.

AS: okay,basically, i believe that runepages should help enhance a characters function, rather than give them new ones, this means i base my runes on their skills more than the items you may or may not get. What makes AD Tristana do the amazing things she does?

Q>AS+90%! so why not improve this making it 110%, (reason not good enough, itl explain itself later)

Like the Runes, Masteries are not set in stone. You do want alacrity, you do want sunder.
I run 21/0/9 Standard offence masteries.

If you feel that another method works for you, then use it. The point of my runepage & masteries is to have 16+4% AS and a fair deal of ArPen.

Okay. I start of with Vampiric Scepter. I am well aware of the problems with this, when i play a 5v5 and i see a level 1 with 4bars of HP, i think omg... feeding will commence. For those of you who wanna rock your Doran's blades, you may do so.. its almost just as viable, just means you need to farm a bit more to make your Bloodthirster.

Start with Vamp scepter, i then wait for the minions to spawn in base. When I hit 35gold I buy a health potion and rush to Mid(or were ever you are suppose to be).

If you are Mid, you should be able to buy the health pot and get their just in time to get EXP from the first minions death. (you may not last hit it, but that's fine).

Farm for as long as possible, if send home early, purchase boots and pots (as many as you feel you need) then return.
If you manage to lane for long enough, or acquire kills, then buy B.F. sword and boots on your recall.

Once you have your B.F. sword, their are things to be aware off.
1. You should be more farmed than the other two lanes.
2. You should be a higher level than the other two lanes.

If both of these are true, then be on the lookout for ganking opportunities, as this will increase the speed that you purchase your items.

Buy your BloodThirster and look to be purchasing Zeal next. (boots dependant on enemy team- Merc/tabi never swiftness)

Now this is the point that makes/breaks you. Tristana is super good at collecting BloodThirster stacks, you need to be able to keep these stacks at maximum at all times.

If the game is going in your favour, turn Zeal into a Phantom Dancer, this is not just for the AS, high movement speed is a huge part of what prevents your BloodThirster from being dry.

Once again, 'if' the game is going in your favour, look to be building a Last Whisper.
Once your have these three items, feel proud to know that you have completed the damage part of the build. With two slots left, you need to build defence.

Banshee's Veil gives you that extra bit of HP, and ensures that you don't get CC, by those enemies that are real good at closing the gap.

Finally, you want to give off the illusion of beefyness, Frostmallet makes the carries/assassins fear to focus you, because they have to get past: flash/jump/ghost/Blast/Banshee
This allows you to reach 3k+ HP (you should always have red/green pot active at this point)

TL;DR?
CORE: Vamp> Boots > Bloodthirster > lvl2 boots> Zeal.
Option 1: Banshee's Veil >Phantom dancer>Last Whisper > Frost Mallet
Option 2*: Phantom Dancer > Banshee's veil > Last Whisper >Frost Mallet
Option 3: Phantom Dancer > Last Whisper >Banshee's Veil > Frost Mallet

Skill Sequence I use is basically for the Three parts of the game.

Early game, E = priority for farming

Mid game, all about Q

Late game, lower Cooldown Escapes.

E>W>E. Then Prioritize : E>Q>R>W or R>E>Q>W

I like to keep 1 rank in R since i only use it to escape rather than for a kill. by doing this, i get my Q and E max'd faster.

Flash and Ghost... This is the only thing I say is set in stone.. Trist has her own version of Ignite, and has insane damage. You only need summoners to escape.

'Exhaust' This spell is not bad however, i feel it forces you to be in the fray. Exhaust to my mind is for Melee Heroes.

'Cleanse' If your not good at positioning, then yes you could pick this up over flash since rocket jump is like a built in flash.. I do feel that this is more of an early game summoner spell, if you should not be in a position to be caught mid>late game. You should be one of the last ones into the fight and one of the First ones out if it isn't going well.

Okay, am gonna answer this now cause am sure its the main thing people will ask.
'Why no Infinity Edge?'

Right, I will sum this up in 1... Tristana is not Ashe, she better (in my opinion)

Ashe rush's IE cause it works well with her passive. Tristana rushes IE.. WOW, GJ U HAVE 20% CRIT chance, the game is now 22+ minutes in (unless your insanely fed) and you have boots and IE. and while you do alot of damage (if you crit!) your squishy as hell.

Now lets see the blood thirstier. you have 100+dmg item at about 14-20minutes of play. 25% LIFESTEAL. You can stay in lane forever, level faster, generally survive better while still owning people.

Once you get Phantomdancer, providing you have my Masteries/Runepage. you pass the 2.***** AS when Q is activated.

Now think about this, your lifestealing twice per second (25% of the damage you deal) while dealing about 200+dmg a shot. AND YOU WILL CRIT!. add that to your E(ignite) Heads will roll!.

Any other Questions be sure to leave them on the posts, I will answer.

Okay, I will update this based on the questions asked etc. but for now:

Know your Role;

When in the loading screen, of a game, you should already have a good idea of who you can feed of, who you need to stop, who will most likely kill you and who you should be saving until last.

In case you don't know, il spell it out. Your their to kill the people who have the lowest HP but do the highest damage, these usually come in the form of 'Nukes' 'Assasins' 'Melee carries' 'Ranged Carries' (and somethings Supports).

YOU ARE NOT AND I STRESS THIS. YOUR JOB IS NOT TO KILL THE 5K HP CHOGATH or Rammus armed with Thornmail n godknows what else lol.

When i play Tristana, i look at all my opponents and when i say look at them what i mean is, i look at their HP, and i look at their Armour. Finally i look at their Items.
These three factors decide if your focus should be on them or not.

Farming:

The key to not being ganked during the early game is called 'last hitting'
For those that dont know, this is a process were you allow your minions to weaken the enemy minions, then you last hit them for the gold. Why do this?? Well for 1, by doing this your always moving. 2 by doing this you never push the enemy to their turret.

Dont you want to destory the turret?? : Yes, ultimately you want to destroy the enemies turret, thats generally how you win the game, however, you dont want the laning phase to end until you have your bloodthirster. If you score an early kill and destroy the enemies tower, this means that you have to venture further away from your own tower to farm, this allows you to be ganked by the jungling rammus/shaco/warwick hiding in the bush. While other lanes can push as far as they want, you want both mid towers to stay alive for as long as possible.
(This means, if your bot lane manages to push and destory their tower and they come to help you. kindly tell them to head top, your not done farming yet).

Tristana's Circle

Okay, this is the most important factor in my opinion, but its not something you can actually see, so use your imagination. All champions have a Circle around them, if they are melee, this circle is small, if your Tristana this circle gets bigger every time you level. That's right its your range.

Now, when fighting your enemy in a team-fight it is important to think about how big your circle is compare to theirs. If they move forward you move back. This is especially important pre team fight when their is alot of poking going on. I myself like to poke tanks who hack out in front when i know their are no risks (ashe arrow to the face). The idea is, that you get players into the range of your circle without being in range of theirs, when you can accomplish this, your chances of survivablity escalate..

You want to kill the enemies carries who are usually standing behind the tank, the question becomes, how do you get your circle over the enemy without the tankers circle. The answer is simple;

A. Element of surprise, if you emerge from a bush while the tank has engaged he shouldnt have time to think about you.
B. Waiting game, with all the poking that goes on before a team-fight starts believe me its only a matter of time before someone sticks their neck-out too far. don't let that someone be you. Punish the mistake maker!
C. Timing, come after the fight has properly started and a few AOE's have been thrown, this way you can pick off people before they realize you are their.