Vi Build Guide by Big Big Bubbles

Hi, I'm Big Big Bubbles,

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This Guide is to show you how to Be a complete BAWS with a champion Built For Destruction of the enemies through the art of Powerful Fisting. (tee hee)

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I happen to think that Vi can be useful in any situation regardless of team comp, just plainly because of all the damage and utility that you bring to the team. That being said she does work well with champions like Yasuo and his Last Breath, Orianna and her Command: Shockwave, Caitlyn and her Ace in the Hole, also Leona in general and Blitzcrank with his Rocket Grab. From the Fog of war Assassinations to initiations with your Ultimate. And of course The powerful execution that Assault and Battery brings, nothing feels better than picking up, that dumb Cottontail Teemo and slamming his cotton tail into the ground whilst Spamming Vi's Obnoxious Laugh, great times are to be had with this champion.

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Introduction

This is my first Guide on Mobafire, also I just want to get this out of the way; I'm in silver league. So if you are looking for high level advice or a guide on how to get to challenger, this isn't your place, I can't help you with that but I can show you my lolking and that in season 3 alone I played 117 ranked games with Vi. So far in season 4 I played all 10 of my placements with Vi and got back into Silver again. Currently I play Vi about 25% of the time in ranked. Vi is a damage dealer, well at least the way I play her and has been recently receiving a large place in the spotlight of the LCS / Competitive play due to her utility, initiates with Assault and Battery, damage capabilities and the wide variety of ways summoners can play her. (tank, bruiser and Assassin for example) Just One more thing I'm Canadian so we spell ARMOUR like that, I know I will get some comments on that.

Pros / Cons

PROS

• Solid Passive
• High Burst Damage
• Q Vault Breaker is Ridiculously useful
• Low cool downs if built correctly
• Very sticky
• Can build Bruiser for those games
• Great Mid game
• Fast clear speed
• E is an AA reset
• Game changing Ultimate
• Ganks after 6 will net you some nice kills and assists
• Promiscuous POLICEWOMAN
• Has epic ability names
• GET DUNKED
• Special Easter eggs with Officer Caitlyn , Jinx, and Jayce

CONS

• Cannot gank Pre - level 3
• Can cancel Q Vault Breaker if Hard CC'd
• Mana hungry Early game
• Can easily fall behind
• Ultimate can be canceled and go on full cool down by untargetable champions ( Fizz's Playful / Trickster Master Yi's Alpha Strike)
• Cannot counter jungle early game
• Junglers like Lee sin Destroy her early game
• Blinds Screw you over hardcore
• Jax top lane is ungankable for her early game
• Not that good at invades
• Starting to get regularly banned in low level and high level play
• Default skin isn't sexy :P #Boobies Pentakill Sona

My Vi Stats Currently

AS OF APRIL 19th 2014

AS OF JUNE 13th 2014

AS OF AUGUST 3rd 2014

Skill Distribution

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I recommend this order, as it offers early damage with Q Vault Breaker and Cool down reduction for plenty of ganking and chasing potential. If you are new to Vi, I recommend Maxing Excessive Force First as it offers more damage if you miss Q Vault Breaker or can't quite master it yet. It takes time to master Vault Breaker, as it is relatively easy to dodge (even for bronze league players) and is one of the slowest gap closer's currently. Nonetheless it does Insane damage when fully charged, one of the highest in the game now as most Q abilities max out at around 200-250 (+ magic or physical damage) ( Siphoning Strike excluded of course) where as Vi's Vault Breaker fully charged will deal 300 (+ 160% Bonus AD) for TONS of burst damage early and late game.

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Runes

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This is Pretty easy to say I guess, if you lack the funds for those pesky attack speed runes then just get damage reds it really doesn't make a difference in fights it just helps with clear speed and earlier ganks by like maybe 10-15 seconds, so if you care THAT much then feel free to use the 3 attack speed reds. They are only like 1000 IP for 3, so they are either really cheap for you, or you just spent 6300 on this champion for example, so runes may be really expensive at this current point.

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If you feel like tryharding super hard then feel free to pick up 6 Cool down reduction Glyphs (blue ones) and start the game with 10% CDR. I recommend doing this for experienced players though, as you now take more magic damage and have to manage your mana a bit better. This can lead to you needing the second blue buff that spawns. :C sorry mid laners

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Masteries

This is the page I've Had the most success with, this really is up to your play style though, so if you can make your own mastery page that's fine too. Feel free to switch one point in Warlord to grab Dangerous Game as it is a great mastery to have on an assassin.

Spells

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BLAST SHEILD PASSIVE

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This is a solid passive as it allows safe engagement, and re engagement in fights. It's On a low cool down and can more often than not save you in a close fight. Not much else to say other than It's a shield that comes right exactly when you need it. Also Cool fun fact, when playing against Vi, or you just want to know why she has a light on her back, if that light is lit up it means Blast Shield is up and will activate on Vi's next ability that does damage.

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VAULT BREAKER Q

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This in my opinion has to be one of the greatest abilities to have on a jungler, long range gap closer that can hit beyond the cast range indicator, high burst, Low Cool down when maxed, does double the damage when fully charged and has a knock up/knock back. (Yes Vault Breaker will initiate Yasuo's Ultimate Last Breath as well) Can be used for escapes and initiates. Using an instant vault breaker after an ultimate will knock them back also cancelling any ability they may be using to get away from you. It can also hit multiple targets for full damage. Oh and did I mention that it applies 1 stack of Denting Blows To all targets hit? Ya it does that too.

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DENTING BLOWS W

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This ability is unique in a way that it does percentage damage to the enemies maximum health and shreds armour at the same time but is based off of auto attacks and isn't a cast able ability. That being said it still has its uses as being the main finisher and damage dealing ability to tanks during the late game. If used correctly you can output all of the 3 charges stacks in a very short time frame and it will be enough, usually to kill your target. A quick Combo is Vault Breaker + Auto attack to proc the second stack of Denting Blows + Auto attack reset on Excessive Force to finish the damage burst. This combo alone WILL kill squishy AP mid's and the ADC nearly every time plus I haven't mentioned the Ultimate yet, use that for the finisher or the initiate because it does damage as well.

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EXCESSIVE FORCE E

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This Ability is really basic in the way that it works, there isn't really much difficulty using the actual ability. However timing is everything In League of Legends, so if you use this ability to the maximum potential it brings to the table it can really work wonders for you. Right off the bat if you know how to do a 1-2 combo with someone like Nasus or Rengar doing the same thing with Vi is no different, auto plus E to get 2 hits instead of 1 because of the AA reset. this helps with clear time in the jungle, but if you choose to lane with Vi you can do the same combo mentioned earlier for a really good harass potential and maybe even an unexpected finisher. E can also be used in lane for easy harass on the enemy especially if they are melee, it does more damage than you'd think and can easily scare them to their tower, just be careful not to use this too much in lane as it damages minions too, so you can easily push the wave resulting in ganks by the enemy jungler. Most players jungle with Vi anyways but if you choose to lane with her keep this in mind.

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ASSAULT AND BATTERY R

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This ability is regarded by most in the LoL community as one of the top 10 ultimate's in the whole game, it offers everything if done correctly. The ultimate itself does decent damage 450 (+140% of bonus AD) so that in itself is good in general, but if you choose a target in the back and hit multiple players on the actual charge in they all get knocked aside (once again not only the knock up but the knock aside will trigger Yasuo's ultimate Last Breath as well) which allows your team to get a safe engage/follow up play. This is a powerful tool to initiate with as well as chase down fleeing enemies after the fight if you haven't used it yet.

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Jungle Build

Spirit of the Elder Lizard is a great item early on Vi as it offers damage, 10% cool down reduction, and a true damage passive so it's like always having red buff and don't forget about gold conservation stacks. However Spirit of the Ancient Golem is very applicable as well especially early game for the tenacity it offers plus the health and of course awesome 10% cool down reduction. I recommend that new Vi players get Golem but it just matters on play-style, if you want to tower dive and get kills that way get Spirit of the Ancient Golem or you feel that you have enough burst them down with just Spirit of the Elder Lizard then that works too.

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Mid/ Top Lane AD Caster Build

The New Crit Chance Build

Infinity Edge

This is the main Damage item and gives the great passive of 250% crit damage. This item is first buy and will be in the laning phase if Vi is in the lead. Since Vi technically has 2 basic attacks in her combo (Q+AA+E) she WILL 100% of the time crit with one of those autos (provided you have 50% crit chance) and deal massive damage with Attack damage, Attack speed, Armour Penetration, Crits and not to mention the CDR and mana sustain provided from Youmuu's Ghostblade, Trinity Force, and The Black Cleaver.

Youmuu's Ghostblade

The order this item can appear is not really important, but it should be one of the first 3 items purchased partly because of the need for 50% crit and partly because of the 20 flat armour penetration it gives. Just with Youmuu's Ghostblade and armour pen runes Vi will have 30 flat armour penetration plus the 20% shred from W Denting Blows. This is significant vs mid laners who think they are smart by getting Seeker's Armguard first. The active helps a lot when going in as it allows for quick engage and disengage if you don't feel like following up the initial damage.

Puns of Damage

This item paired with Vi is just great, the Sheen proc on the First AA gives more damage and Vi's kit benefits from all the stats offered from Trinity Force. She has an AP scaling on E Excessive Force and can use the mana and on hit movespeed from Sheen and Phage. Those are all fine and dangy, but the real reason I buy this item in the crit chance build is for Zeal. Unlike the 2 other items Zeal turns into, Statikk Shiv and Phantom Dancer It stays at 10% crit chance when part of Trinity Force. This is the perfect number but also an excuse to include this great item in the build.

The Black Cleaver


There's literally no reason to skip this item.... ever. This item is Vi's bread and butter item and applies to 99.9% of every situation when playing Vi. The flat pen combined with Youmuu's Ghostblade and runes gives you a total of 40 armor pen. Add the Denting Blows 20% and The Black Cleaver's passive of armor shred on physical damage and you are won't be known as Vi, the Piltover enforcer, you will be known as Vi, the Piltover penetrator.

Why Not to get Pikachu Sword

Why not? Statikk Shiv seems like a good item on paper and the passive magic damage sounds really good too. It also offers a flat movespeed like Trinity Force and has a higher crit chance and attack speed increase at 40% to Trinity Force's 30%. These are all good points, but there is one major flaw, this item does not offer Attack Damage like Youmuu's Ghostblade and Trinity Force both do. So you would have to either swap out one of those core items and get no AD to deal damage with your abilities. The armor pen on Ghostblade and Cleaver is really good too just to mention as the flat pen is good for early/mid game and the active on Youmuu's Ghostblade gives the exact same attack speed boots that Statikk Shiv does (40%). Additionally Youmuu's Ghostblade gives 10% CDR, so partnered with The Black Cleaver you will have 20% CDR another thing Statikk Shiv doesn't have to offer.

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Summoners

Flash is the best summoner spell, as it has endless potential for escapes and engages such as the Vault Breaker + Flash engage or closing the distance to land your ultimate.




You are playing the jungle role.




If you are not playing the jungle role this helps tremendously in lane as it allows for the killing blow more easily in long drawn out fights.

Creeping / Jungling

I normally start red as counter jungling Vi can usually lead to her falling way behind early as she can't really fight until level 3, whereas someone like Lee Sin has the ability at level 2 to kill her. Camp order goes as like the following:

Red --> Wolves --> Blue --> Wraiths --> Gank lvl 3 --> Wraiths --> Golems --> Gank depending if the lanes are pushed. If not then feel free to keep farming the jungle. I like this as it provides early lane pressure to mid, and possibly burns a summoner on the other team this early is an awesome bonus if it happens.

Second path: Blue --> Wolves --> Red --> Wraiths --> Gank at lvl 3 --> Wolves --> Weight --> Golems --> Gank If there is like an Amumu or Sejuani on the other team you can definitely start blue as it will be less likely for them to counter-jungle you. this is riskier though, but it provides red buff longer for more ganks later.

The Big Debate About Junglers and Mid Laners Wanting Blue.

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ancient golem
Vi is a unique champion in the way that Blue is given. If you are fed as a fat man at McDonald's then by all means feel free to take Blue as the jungle Vi, as she loves both mana regen and CDR. (If you are at least anywhere between 2-4 kills and 1-2 deaths at the time that second Blue buff spawns) Blue buff, in my opinion should only go to the mid laner IF he/she is more fed than you are or is destroying the lane and can benefit more with that Blue buff to grab objectives and kills from roaming ect. If the mid lane Orianna is 0-3-1 at 7:14 when the second blue buff spawns then it's not such a hot idea to give it up to her unless somehow you are doing worse..... If however you are 1-2-1 at the 7:12 minute mark, the second Blue buff is spawning and your mid laner is 3-0-1 please just give it to them, as it will help the team more.

Vi's Blue. [*] At least has some assists preferably like 2-4 [*] Currently carrying [*] Already fed this early

Mid laner's blue. [*] Ahead in CS [*] Has an additional kill or assist on the enemy laner [*] More fed than you

If Both are true just take it, it's Solo Queue you should trust yourself to carry. But remember be nice, give a reason like: "i be taking dis blue Yasuo or Katarina for obvious reasons yo".

Why Feral Flare is not good on Vi

STYLE OF JUNGLE

With the introduction of the Feral Flare it has made jungleing really easy for champs like Nocturne, Xin Zhao, Master Yi, Udyr, and many many more. Most Junglers buy wriggles now and it is a great item still even with the nerfs in [4.7]. Vi is a ganking jungler not a farming jungler, she exells at ganking at level 3 and providing incredible snowball potential for not only just herself but for the laners she ganks for. This is a problem for the feral flare jungle style. Her early game shouldn't be spent AFK farming it should be spent ganking because that is what shes good at. I do realize that Feral Flare now stacks off of kills and assists but my argument still stands true. Vi, despite what some people think doesn't really land that many autos so Feral Flare is not really that viable on vi.


OVERALL STATISTICS OF THE ITEM

Feral Flare right now (as of patch [4.8]) Gives 12 AD and 30% Attack Speed those stats are not bad and the passive maim is also really good, but here is why this item is bad on an AD caster like Vi. Vi does all her damage with her abilities, especially the way that I build her, it is very very rare that you will have more than 4 seconds in team fights to get more than one proc of Denting Blows off on more than one target. There is simply an insufficient amount of time since you are not exactly the tankiest person on the team or in the game. There is a reason I skip getting Zeal as an item by it self, and opt for Sheen and Phage as the two early components for Trinity Force as attack speed really isn't necessary on Vi that early in the game.

Helpful Tips From Yours Truly

Utilizing the Power of Flash + Q Vault Breaker.
The popular streamer NightBlue3 has a video on doing this that I find is very helpful with learning the basics of this epic surprising engage. (He taught me how to do it through this very video :D) --> link here Nightblue3's Guide
This is my guide on how (it is in game!)

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Ulti Guide

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Ball delivery system at its finest

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Key Binding Vid

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Cool Stuff!

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This is a video I've Made showcasing the Assassin style, in this game I was top Vs Rengar.(I would have mid but this dumb Ziggs auto-locked) (Stole the penta too D:)

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Nerfs / Buffs To (Vi or Summoners Rift)

I will update this section the most, and inform you of the patch details to the best of my knowledge.

Current Patch 4.15 August 26th 2014

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Alistar nerfs and Gnar touch-ups this patch [4.15]. This patch didn't really have much in the way of huge changes because worlds are coming up soon so they want to keep things as balanced as possible. so really nothing but a number that's closer to patch 4.20.

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Maokai nerfs this patch!! [4.14]. We are inching ever so close to patch [4.20], I believe in you rito. Anyways Kassadin still getting changed (that's new) Kog'Maw getting a VU and the Tree getting nerfed is pretty much this patch. There weren't severe changes as this patch or next patch will most likely be the patch for worlds. The Morgana changes are good but they really don't fix her core issue that's broken the Hit-box on Dark Binding, I hope Riot can at least address this issue as she has been pick or ban for months. Debonair Vi is a solid skin, probably not going see a lot of it though, as the skin is just a retexture with no particle effects. I guess less of a skin is good I suppose.

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They changed like 30 champions this patch [4.13], they didn't touch Vi so that's nice. She's in a good spot now, so hopefully they don't change her. They changed Exhaust (Thank god) and they also chamged Heal, which is nice for the ADC, and even some mid's that used heal. No jungle changes this patch, but there were jungler changes to the big 3 Evelynn, Lee Sin, and Elise. (Thank you rito!) This opens up more junglers for you to beat the piss out of early game. Lee Sin will still get picked but you can actually duel him with the removal of the attack speed slow on Tempest / Cripple. Overall nice patch Sona got a rework and a new Vi skin is coming out this patch, Debonair Vi.

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Jungle timers were added to the game in this patch [4.12], so that is a plus. We can just press Tab whenever we want to see when drag is up. This change is nice so we don't have to time things constantly. There were not really any noteworthy item changes this patch related to the jungle, I thought for sure they would at least tweak Spirit of the Ancient Golem but whatever it's a balanced item.


A noteworthy item change for laners however was the Essence Reaver MOAR AD! It now builds out of B. F. Sword and a Vampiric Scepter. (IK same build path as the newer way worse The Bloodthirster They toned down the only reason you bought this item in the first place...) IDK if ADC's will use Essence Reaver but Jayce certainly will, I'll expect to be ganking a lot of Jayce's this patch. I'll give the Essence Reaver a shot on Mid lane Vi, its the same amount of AD as all the other B. F. Sword items and it gives CDR, so what are the downsides? I'll update items when I've had a chance to test it out, if it doesn't work out and the regular build is still better then I won't change it.

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Many changes to the jungle this patch [4.11] with the addition of the new Spirit of the Ancient Golem and of course the new wave of tank junglers like Nautilus, Jarvan IV, Cho'Gath, Volibear, Nunu, Maokai, Amumu Zac... ect I dislike the tanks and the style of tanking so I really don't know how this will effect Vi, but if I took anything away from the Feral Flare days this item will probably get nerfed in a few patches. I'm still getting Spirit of the Elder Lizard on Vi.


They also made First blood much more valuable and in my opinion worth the death or Flash. you can actually afford Boots of Speed after getting first blood before 2 minutes. On the contrary they also made turret diving waaaaay harder, turrets now ramp up to their full damage from 25% every hit to 37.5% every hit. Additionally turrets now select targets faster, you basically can't flash out of turret range to reset the aggro anymore. This pretty much means that there will be less tower diving early game. I think this is a nerf to damage junglers like Vi but whatever, I'll suck it up.


Essence Reaver got buffed 10 AD, so that's good. Currently on the PBE the Essence Reaver is undergoing changes from being a sort of noob trap item to being a good item building out of a B. F. Sword and a Vampiric Scepter (aware that its the exact same build path as The Bloodthirster) either they want to replace The Bloodthirster or they want ADC's to make a choice between mana and CDR or a sheild, or both who knows. Anyways now it will give 80 AD and have the same lifesteal and passive, but cost 3400 gold. This works out really well for champs like Jayce (like damn he's gonna be strong with this change) I think its kinda bad on Vi jungle but its alright for laning and especially if you are behind with top or mid lane Vi Although I still prefer the "Shotgun" Vi build outlined by Flux N Flow in his Mid lane Vi video. Link Here

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There were lots of changes this patch [4.10], there were two additional items, Essence Reaver and Ardent Censer. I haven't tad too much time to test the Essence Reaver on Vi yet, but on the games that I did get a chance to test it put it worked out pretty well. It really fixes her Laning Phase issues. This item sucks in the jungle but if it gets to super late game and it's time to sell Spirit of the Elder Lizard then Essence Reaver is a good replacement. So the overall item is really good for laning and has the best results I've had for the top and mid lanes in a while. I never really liked The Bloodthirster, and especially the new one on Vi jungle but Essence Reaver has replaced the BT in lane for me. I'll update the mid and top lane items.

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I reached Gold this patch! [4.9]
On another more relevant note the summoners rift VU is immanent as well as some changes to the items, one in particular caught my attention. It is a new item called Essence Reaver and it gives 50 AD, 10% lifesteal and 10% CDR, the passive is really cool its basically mana vamp,

UNIQUE Passive: You gain 2 to 8% of the damage dealt by basic attacks as Mana. Mana drain increases based on how much Mana you are missing.

This might be a good item on champs like Ezreal and AD casters like that. But I'm going to give it a shot on Vi for laning with her because she does get really bad mana problems early and mid game, plus I'm not a fan of Tear of the Goddess on her, and Iceborn Gauntlet is not my favourite item for the mid lane, plus this Essence Reaver is really cheap at 2650 gold, it sounds really good on paper. The build path is really smooth too, building from a Vampiric Scepter and a Pickaxe (plus 950 Gold) you never have to pay more than 1000 gold in any interval of this item.

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Turret Aggro has been changed in [4.8] to prevent early tower dives from champs like Kha'Zix and and Akali that can stealth out of tower aggro sometimes. This is kind of useless to Vi as when you tower dive you are all in at that point and flashing won't save you anyways. This is just a steady nerf to people resetting tower aggro with flash or going into stealth.

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So Vi received nerfs to her skills Vault Breaker and Assault and Battery in patch [4.4]. The Base damage of Vault breaker was reduced at all ranks, but received better scaling Bonus AD on the ability to compensate and it actually gives it more damage late game if you build offense (AD items). Also the knock aside that Assault and Battery had on its secondary targets got both its duration reduced and the actual distance of the knock aside reduced. THIS DOES NOT AFFECT THE DAMAGE TO THE SECONDARY TARGETS OR THE ACTUAL WIDTH OF THE HIT BOX ON THE KNOCK ASIDE THAT Assault and Battery PROVIDES

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Both these nerfs are understandable as Vi was permabanned in most elo because of her damage and ability to be tanky as well. In my opinion this nerf will not affect the way I play Vi, as I play her offensively oriented, but it will affect the players that play her as a tank. The lower base damage on Q Vault Breaker will be noticeable on tank Vi's. On the contrary late game Vi will actually deal MORE damage with Q Vault Breaker than in previous patches and have the exact same cool down. The ultimate at levels 1 and 2 are on pretty large cool downs which is fine as in my main jungle build I prioritize CDR with Spirit of the Elder Lizard, The Brutalizer, and of course Blue buff. BUT the level 3 ultimate will remain on the same cool down as before just with the nerfs to the knock aside's distance and duration.

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THANKS!

Thanks for reading!

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I hope My guide was at least satisfactory, and I receive some good and bad feedback, I will update this when nerfs/buffs happen or when the meta changes, as this is my only guide out right now. I made this guide because I haven't seen this build on any guides yet and this has worked out to be really fun for me, especially the perfect game I recently had (13-0) Vi, has been my favourite champion for the past 9 or 10 months now and I'm still finding new and exiting ways to play her like the Mid lane build. (seriously try that in normal's Its so fun) anyways making this guide was fun and I do hope I get some feedback good or bad.