This is my first guide... be gentle. (I use icons that you can hover over to figure out what everything does. Typing it all out again is a bit redundant)

**People are saying this build is too squishy, if played correctly, end game people run from you and you dont have to worry about that. But I have already stated he is squishy and to adjust play style accordingly. If you dont want to do a dps yorick and would rather offtank this is not the build for you. Dont come in and try my build then say its squishy and vote me down.... THIS IS YOUR WARNING. THIS BUILD IS NOT FOR OFF TANKING. THANKS!**

I noticed Yorick was free this week and NO ONE was playing him. This is pretty sad and should be a signal to Riot that he needs fixing. Edit: THEY BUFFED HIM! 7/8/2011

I bought Yorick on day 1 and was very excited to try out the new mechanics, plus I always have a soft spot for necromancy in any game... unfortunately I found out, like everyone else, that he was under-powered no matter what I tried. I got very frustrated and quit playing him. After a few guides were posted on MOBAFire i decided to try them out. Same story.

Recently I decided to give him another shot. While I like this style of play for most of the other builds I felt something was missing. With his ghouls scaling off of AD I wanted more damage. All the damage builds I have tried do not work. No offense to those posters and maybe its just my play style.

I thought to myself, if I stack only AD I will lose. I need mana early on and if I want to spam my AD stacked ghouls I'll need a lot. I need survivability but I have to make trades somewhere for damage. There has to be a way to be a DPS Yorick and not suck. Here it is:

Plans:
- Finish color coding everything
- Change a lot of the icons to be Larger Icons

Changes:
11/27/2011
- Updated Masteries to reflect changes
- Updated Runes to reflect dodge change and decided to go with physical dmg vs ArP because we are spamming abilities that scale off of our AD.

7/7/2011
- Made guide and posted to MOBAFire.com

7/8/2011
- Started adding some color coding as well as included patch notes section.

7/16/2011
- Changed Masteries to include Archaic Knowledge for his ability spam penetration.
- Changed out ArP Quints for Pure Dmg Quints (good mix of both at start)
- Added options for which boots to get at end of items.
- Changed order to get skills based on playing.
- Changed order in which to get Trinity Force, this item is just too good on Yorick not to build before Inf. Edge. End game I am around 250+ dmg without inf edge Which is plenty to build trin first.

7/8/2011 v1.0.0.121patch notes
Yorick

Omen of War
Fixed a bug where the Spectral Ghoul would not spawn if Yorick was silenced.

Omen of Pestilence
Increased the cast range by 50
Improved the consistency of the AoE slow by increasing the radius and rate of application.
Mana cost reduced to 40/45/50/55//60 from 50/55/60/65/70

Omen of Famine
Mana cost reduced to 55/60/65/70/75 from 60/65/70/75/80

Omen of Death
Updated the visual of Reanimated Champions to better show when a Champion has revived.
Removed the health decay on the Revenant and Reanimated pets
Fixed a bug with the interaction between Chronoshift and Revenants
Fixed a bug with Heimerdinger's turrets and the Reanimated state

Unholy Symbiosis
Yorick now takes 5% reduced damage for each summon that is active.
Increased the Attack Damage and Health of ghouls to 35% from 30% of Yorick's Attack Damage and Health

Ghouls
Ghouls are now immune to slows.
Ghouls take 50% reduced damage from AoE abilities

General
Mana per level increased to 35 from 30
Health per level increased to 85 from 80
Armor per level increased to 3.6 from 3
Base Movement speed increased to 320 from 315
Slightly increased his base Attack Speed

Pros:
-Has an AoE dmg/slow spell
-All abilities stack with AD (and health but its worthless at the moment)
-Abilities do magic dmg even though they stack with AD... Which makes Yorick deal a lot of both kinds of dmg.
-Can add a 6th ally to the field and/or bring someone back from the dead for a few seconds
- Lots of burst dmg
- Great farmer/jungler later in game due to ghouls helping attack and AoE ghoul


Cons:
- Squishy (very squishy vs magic) in comparison to size... and other bruiser/AD of his type
- Sucks without items and must be constantly farming
- Targeted a lot in team fights due to the community perception that he sucks and is underpowered
- Not enough mana to go straight AD/AS which I would rather do heh
- Stacking health is worthless at the moment because ghouls die so quickly even without getting hit.

Section was deleted because MOBAFire.com rearranged my entire guide and deleted stuff... so much fun, i'll update soon

just trust me... get mana runes not cdr and dodge for speed increase/survivability

I am going to go very in-depth here. Its important that I explain each item and why it is a must. The order is also important. Again this guide is all about building a Yorick DPS that doesn't suck.

***Wish I could fit a banshees veil and merc treads into this build but we need every itm listed. Maybe the buffs today will allow it. He is VERY susceptible to magic attacks so just be careful out there***

Start out with a Sapphire Crystal and 2x Health Potion. This gives you much needed mana and allows you to stay in lane longer without having to spam mana to heal. As soon as you can afford a Tear of the Goddess go back and turn your Sapphire Crystal into it. You can alternatively wait till you have enough for Boots as well. Just remember that we want to build our mana pool as quickly as possible so that Manamune has something to feed off of (as well as allowing us to spam our abilities more). Next build a Manamune and Berserker's Greaves. This gives us a nice boost to AD as well as some needed AS. I choose the Berserker's Greaves because this build has no other AS until the very end.

Now that we have a good mana base, AD base, and some AS, we need to work on getting our ghoul casting down as quickly and as much as possible. Build Glacial Shroud first. This gives us 425 mana which increases our AD as well as gives 15% CDR and armor to stay alive. Awesome! Next get The Brutalizer. More AD and CDR ftw PLUS more ArP!

Alright, now our cooldowns are much lower, we have a large mana pool to spam ghouls, and our AD is constantly growing from mana stacking. Now its time for an item that I wish we didn't have to get but we do. Sheen. This item is actually great for our DPS output but it has AP on it and I was trying to stay completely away from that. Low CDR, High Mana, Spaming Ghouls, means Sheen proc all the time. Now think about this: Omen of War activates Sheen. Now our next hit is doing Q (150(+100% AD)) + Sheen (100% AD). I know the Q tooltip doesn't show this properly but it does add 100% AD to your hit. This also spawns a ghoul that does dmg and speeds you up 35%.

With all this in place we need as much AD and Crit as possible packed into one item. You guessed it B. F. Sword into Infinity Edge. 80 AD, 25% crit, crits do 250% dmg... need I say more.

Now our item slots are full, wtf do we do? Finish all the items we started halfway through the game. I recommend in the same order you bought their components. Glacial Shroud into a Frozen Heart gives us a lot of armor, more CDR and slows enemy AS by 20%. Survivability. Next is Youmuu's Ghostblade. Makes The Brutalizer better and adds crit chance. Please remember that Youmuu's Ghostblade has a ridiculous active. 20% move speed and 50% AS for 4 seconds BUT every time you hit an enemy it goes up by 2 seconds up to 8 seconds of 50% AS 20% MS every minute.

Last but not least the Sheen upgrades into the Trinity Force. This is all around awesome. more AS, AD, MS, Crit, Health, etc etc. Also chance to slow enemy on hit.

These items combined with your abilities make for one hell of an Undertaker/Necromancer. Next I will explain your abilities, how they tie into items, and the proper combo's to pull off.

Passive:

Unholy Covenant - This is great for an AD build. Our ghouls deal 35% of our AD and we now take 5% less dmg and do 5% more dmg (autoattack only) per active Ghoul. That means up to 4 ghouls later on in game (yes your ulti Omen of Death counts) for 20% less damage taken and 20% more dmg done.

Skills:

Omen of War (Q) - Main damage Ghoul. -=Must Be Within Melee Range=- This spell makes you hit harder and run faster as well as puts out a damaging ghoul that moves fast with you. Remember you can get move speed from anything you hit. So if you need to run away or catch up it may be beneficial to hit a creep mob instead of waiting to hit a champion. I wait to get this till level 4 but once I do, I raise it straight to level 5. Explained below. Remember what I said earlier about Sheen (and Trinity Force later) making this spell pretty powerful. End game I usually have over 300 AD. That means 150dmg + 300dmg + 300dmg = 750dmg from Omen of War. Now crit that for 250% crit and you have 1875 dmg. If only this were true. Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think that all 3 of those numbers would be critted. Either way it does a hell of a lot of dmg. Of course Sheen can proc of any spell you cast, I was just giving you an example of the huge bursts of dmg you can do.

Omen of Pestilence (W) - Slow Ghoul. This Ghoul had its range and radius increased recently and does AoE damage and slows surrounding enemies for 1.5 seconds. The kicker is that while the Ghoul is alive it continues to slow anything around it for half the amount of the initial slow. This spell mixed with the first ensures that no one will run from you without popping a summoner spell or two. I get this second. It is important for slowing enemies to either kill them/harrass them/or get the hell away from them.

Omen of Famine (E) - Healing Ghoul. Deals a good amount of damage and heals for the amount of damage it does. Great for early lane harassing as well as healing yourself in general. However do not spam this spell or any others until you have an established base of mana. Yorick suffers early on and must be played appropriately.

Ulti: Omen of Death (R) - ZOMG What Just Happened Ghoul. There are so many reasons to use this ulti and I will try to list them a bit further down. It creates a copy of whomever you cast it on with 50% of their AD. If target dies while copy is still alive then target gets reanimated for a limited time to exact revenge on whomever it so chooses. Please remember this can be cast on yourself as I do most of the the time. With our CDR this cooldown gets under a minute. Use it! Late game that means you can use it every single team engagement and if you die (which you probably will) it will be back up before you can even get back into the fight.

Situations to use Omen of Death:

1. To give yourself extra damage when doing 1v1 or 1v2 etc. Also to ensure that even if you die you have a huge chance of killing the enemy attacking you. Remember you come back to life with full mana and health. Drag them to hell with you.

2. To help take a tower. Does extra damage to tower and just like Morde ulti ghost you can use it to take a few tower hits by attacking an enemy near tower. Or just tower diving in general. (be careful though it can be squishy however they removed the health tic from Revenant when they buffed Yorick... EXCELLENT!)

3. To gain upper hand in a team engagement. I generally cast it near the start of a fight, hoping to do the most damage possible and take out a champ to turn the tide. Remember that it gains 75% of the targets AD so don't cast it on a squishy spell caster, either cast it on yourself, an AD bruiser, or a tank.

4. To save a champion who is about to die (at least till you guys can kill the attacker).

5. Kind of goes along with point reason 3 but casting this on a tank can do wonders in sticky situations. It gives you another beefy target that the enemy will be enticed to hit since it's a ghost. Which may allow your squishy's to finish them off.

Again I use this skill mostly on myself and a lot of times I'm full health when I cast it. Why? By the end of the game I have over 300 AD. And two of me dishing out damage (not to mention the extra boost I get for having the extra ghoul alive) is pretty awesome.

Remember that his Omen of Pestilence can be used to block skill shots, check in bushes for hiding enemy, dropped over a wall to slow a running enemy that you can't see, slow attackers from chasing you or save an ally.

Generally speaking this goes: Get in range W (longest cooldown) for slow, E for heal and extra dmg, and hit Q all while running toward them. Every combo should basically consist of you charging at them. The W will make them slow enough you can catch them with Q doing a good amount of dmg and speeding you up for a hasty retreat (sort of a high risk poke). Remember that you will have 3 ghouls doing small amounts of dmg to them as well if you pull this combo off.

If you plan on using your ulti. I suggest the following: W, E, Q, hit them, R then rinse and repeat.

Remember when running W slows them and if you get good at kiting you can hit them with E heal ghoul as well and just keep running. Hit a mob with Q if you can to get extra run speed. If it seems like you are going to die... just turn around, pop your ulti on yourself and bring them to hell with you.

W then E or just E are great for lane harassing however its best not to spam them too much early on as you WILL run out of mana. Be smart.

Exhaust - Great for slowing enemies down when Omen of Pestilence is on cooldown. Allows for a triple slow. Also great for all the usual reasons, helps team mates catch up, helps you run away if needed, etc.

Flash - Nothing beats waiting in a bush flashing out on someone, doing combo and watching them melt away since you got the drop and they can't run. Also helps in sticky situations where you need to get the hell out, or in team fights when chasing someone you can flash in range and slow with Omen of Pestilence and/or Exhaust.

Well this is my first guide. I know its not the prettiest but I tried to make it easy to read and worth while. Try the other builds, learn how to play Yorick, then when you get to the point where you want use all that AD goodness Riot intended for you to have, come here and try it out. Mechanics first, then dps :).