Graves is a ranged AD carry that has free Armor/MR as well as being decently tanky. Graves has a very strong early game as well as scaling into the late game as ranged carry. Taking graves top allows your teams to have 2 AD carries and allows graves to build decently tanky instead of going the standard AD carry build. Graves has good matchups and is a strong early pick due to the fact he is a popular AD carry. Graves is the best AD carry to use to learn how to play a ranged carry top, as he is safe with a strong kit.

(Passive) True Grit- Graves gains 1 / 2 / 3 bonus armor and magic resistance every second he remains in combat. This bonus stacks up to 10 times. Graves is considered in combat if he has dealt or received damage in the last 3 seconds.
This passive is nice for top lane as it gives you more armor/magic resist to help you in the early game.

Q: Buckshot- Graves fires three bullets in a cone, dealing 60 / 95 / 130 / 165 / 200 (+0.8 per bonus attack damage) physical damage to all enemies in their path. Enemies at close range can be hit by multiple projectiles, but each bullet beyond the first will deal only 35% damage up to a maximum of 109 / 173 / 237 / 301 / 364.5 (+1.5 per bonus attack damage) physical damage.
The damage on this skill insane early on. This is mostly just a part of your burst, early game this skill +Your smokescreen can clear a minion wave.

W: Smoke Screen- Graves fires a smoke canister at the target area, dealing 60 / 110 / 160 / 210 / 260 (+60% of ability power) magic damage upon landing and creating a cloud of smoke for 4 seconds. Enemies inside the smoke cloud will be slowed by 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 / 35 % and will have their vision reduced to only what is inside the smoke cloud and enemies attacking them, everything else will look like it is in the Fog of War.
This skill is strong in teamfights, duels, and for juking. The overall utility this spell provides is just amazing. You can use it on your enemy so your jungler to pass by the enemy's wards.

E: Quickdraw- Graves dashes forward, gaining a 40 / 50 / 60 / 70 / 80 % attack speed boost for 4 seconds. Attacking enemy units with autoattacks lowers the cooldown of Quickdraw by 1 second each attack.
A mini blink with an AS steroid, use it to avoid enemy skillshots and counter-trade.

R: Collateral Damage-Graves fires an explosive shell in a straight line, dealing 250 / 350 / 450 (+1.4 per bonus attack damage) physical damage to the first target it hits. After hitting a champion or reaching the end of its range, the shell explodes dealing 140 / 250 / 360 (+1.2 per bonus attack damage) physical damage in a cone behind the target.
A giant chunk of burst damage. Q-R can easily dominate most enemies health bars.

Skill Order:
Combos:

W-E-Q-R

Cho'Gath (Poke him down do not get caught), Darius (Out range him completly, youcan E his apprehend), Garen (He can't reach you), Jarvan IV (E out of his flag combo and away from his demacia range), Olaf (E from his axes if need be, Poke him with Q and autos), Nasus (Zone him early with your range), Singed (Beat him out early or you will fall behind), Udyr (Can't touch you) and Volibear (You can keep him away with your E until you get a phage, then you can kite him).

Akali (You will zone her pre 6, but then 6 your dead), Fiora (She has a double dash to keep with you), Fizz (To many gap closers), Pantheon (He can Q harass you to death, and his shield blocks your harass), Lee Sin (If he touches you, you are dead. His cripple hurts you hard.), Jax (He will dodge and hop), Malphite (At 6 be ready to dodge his ult, never let him ground slam you), Nidalee (She has range AND at 6 she gets the melee to kill you), Riven (To many gap closers) and Yorick (He will poke you to death).

• When running from enemies: run in a direction, smokescreen, then run in a different direction. JUKED!
• Save your E until the enemy reaches you/ uses their gap closer for the blink effect.
• Do not dash in to buckshot an enemy that has strong close range damage (IE: Darius).

• Try and fight/Poke him if you see his passive goes down.
• Get out of smokescreen ASAP the information you lose in there could cause your death.
• Get early Armor, as all of graves moves (Save smokescreen) deal physical damage.

Heart of Gold + Vampiric Scepter - This is a trend I say some AD carrys beginning to do, It does not work as well on bottom as it does on top lane. This allows you to use your range and farm to late while getting some hp early to survive enemies. Bot lane the enemy has ranged as well so you need the damage, but here you get free trades so it is less needed. This also allows you to scale into late game faster.
I would recommend double doran's instead if you are fighting a weaker early game champion to use your advantage.

Trinity Force- This item is nice on top graves as all of the parts are used (Save the small bit of Ap), this items components allow you to fight other top laners very well

Phantom Dancer- More AS, crit, and Ms.

Infinity Edge- Crit, Damage, AND CRIT DAMAGE INCREASE. NICE!

Bloodthirster- Sustain and Damage

Guardian Angel- Revive is helpful.

Last Whisper-Armor Pen for late game.

Graves top does decently in soloQ as he has decent matchups and you have a strong carry power late game. If your bot lane does well/Wins your team will have 2 strong AD carrys.

Graves works well here as you can run alt bot lanes such as Jarvan-Leona, you can run a strong early AD bot such as Urgot, and you will have a much stronger late game if your jungler is tanky.

This was my top facts graves. Graves is a good champion and a strong top laner. Graves is a good first step to learning how to play AD carries top lane. He is a good pickup for anyone's top lane roster. As always summoners have a good day and good luck on the fields of justice.

SERIES UPDATE:
I plan on releasing these every day/other day until I get all of the top lane picks in the league ( about 50-60 of them) if there are any requests leave in the comments below and ill work on them. I want to make this series for others to better understand the champions of top lane. Once I am done (Or once I have a few top facts out) I will release some Facts about top lane mechanics, eventually I will probably put everything into one generic top lane guide, however until I do that I will continue to watch and update my blogs as needed. Tips and tricks I missed under my Top Facts would be helpful if you put anything I don't have in the comments I will be sure to add it. I will be forming a guide called The complete guide to Top lane or something in that nature. The intention of this series is not as a "Build guide" or a "play guide", these are more like facts you should know about the champion. These are to inspire people to think of new champion possibilities they might not have thought of or to help a new player with the champion. I do not list runes masteries or a set build ( I give a kind of recommended items) in here due to the fact I want people to think of that for themselves and try new things. This series is an attempt for the LOL community to try new things and have fun in a fun game. Thank you for reading and have a nice day :P