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Zoe Build Guide by Vicksay

Middle [13.11] Vicksy's Updated Master Zoe Guide

Middle [13.11] Vicksy's Updated Master Zoe Guide

Updated on June 6, 2023
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League of Legends Build Guide Author Vicksay Build Guide By Vicksay 3645 128 6,978,490 Views 140 Comments
3645 128 6,978,490 Views 140 Comments League of Legends Build Guide Author Vicksay Zoe Build Guide By Vicksay Updated on June 6, 2023
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Vicksay's Featured Video
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Runes: Highest damage

Domination
Dark Harvest
Sudden Impact
Eyeball Collection
Treasure Hunter

Sorcery
Absolute Focus
Gathering Storm
Bonus:

+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+65 Base Health

Spells:

1 2 3
standard choice
LoL Summoner Spell: Flash

Flash

LoL Summoner Spell: Ignite

Ignite

Threats & Synergies

Threats Synergies
Extreme Major Even Minor Tiny
Show All
None Low Ok Strong Ideal
Extreme Threats
Ideal Synergies
Synergies
Ideal Strong Ok Low None




Hello everyone! My name is Vicksy, I'm a high Diamond/Master tier mid laner. I've been playing since the start of Season 3 on the EUW server, and I've been a full on mid main since Season 4. I have achieved at least Diamond 1 every single season since Season 4, hitting Masters in multiple seasons using champions such as Zoe, Aurelion Sol, Viktor and Ahri, with my peak being 224 LP. I am a partnered Twitch streamer and a partnered YouTuber, and I like to stream every single day! Feel free to come check me out and ask me any questions you may have, whether it be on stream or on my other socials below!

While I don't tend to play League daily anymore, I still like to keep up with my favourite champions by watching other streamers and tierlists to understand where exactly they settle in on metas, and I closely follow item changes. I also still like to guarantee that I get Master at the end of every season.






Season 12 main account winrate



My Zoe win-rate on my smurf account in Diamond 4 from a previous season



Zoe quickly became one of my favourite champions once I picked her up, I've racked up over a million Mastery points on her, and got level 7 on her 3 days after her release. She's a fun, unique champion that has features of both an artillery mage and a burst mage, and she can carry games solo due to how much damage she can dish out. She does have a lot of weaknesses however, her damage can be blocked by other targets (minions/tanky champions) and she has no mobility, so she's really weak to divers/assassins. This guide will show you step by step how to maximize your Zoe game play and climb the ranks!

I have just released an Aurelion Sol guide as well as I have played him loads, please feel free to check it out if you want some tips for him!










Pros


+ Extremely high damage
+ Great carry potential
+ Decent, safe waveclear
+ Huge range on her CC
+ Great at creating picks
+ Relevant all game
+ Free summoner spells and items

Zoe is a very fun, strong and unique champion, every game is different with her through Spell Thief. She has some of the highest damage output of any mage, even if enemies have a bit of MR you can generally oneshot them if you get a good combo off. Your damage is also comes from a very safe range, through Portal Jump and using Sleepy Trouble Bubble through walls. Because of this, her carry potential is some of the highest from mid lane if you can play her well, and her ability to be able to pick off someone before a team fight starts is very high. She is quite good early, mid and late game - being able to always be relevant is super strong.
Cons


- Super high skill cap
- No raw mobility
- Squish squish
- Enemies with mobility destroy her
- Highly reliant on hitting skill-shots
- Damage can be easily blocked
- Many counters to Sleepy Trouble Bubble

Because of Zoe having a super high skill-cap, there will ALWAYS be times in the game where you position badly with Portal Jump, or just straight up miss your spells, so you have to practice her a lot and be focused - and the fact that she is super squishy as well makes this a lot harder. Because her main damage sources are skill-shots, enemies that have extreme mobility can outplay Zoe really hard and leave you feeling like a sitting duck if you get countered - even more so with Sleepy Trouble Bubble, as there are many ways to stop it from being useful, through Cleanse, Quicksilver Sash, tank team mates blocking for others, and many more.


This is the best summoner spell in the entire game: there's a reason why 99% of the champions all take it and the amount of people that don't run it are very rare. It's the perfect offensive and defensive summoner spell, and it's a high skill cap summoner spell because you can use it for multiple ways, for out plays, animation cancelling, and more!

This is a really good summoner for helping you get that extra gold towards your first few items to completely take over the game, and great for roaming to kill bot lane as they will always have a Heal. While Zoe already has huge amounts of damage, this rune makes you a dangerous threat really early in the game too, allowing you to start snowballing and killing people as early as level 2.



This rune is the best selfish choice to keep yourself safe. It's a whole MINUTE cooldown shorter than Heal, it protects you against more damage, and it is better vs. Ignite as it doesn't cut half the shielding power - you definitely want to be running this vs. assassin lanes such as Zed or Talon, or in an overall game where so much burst exists on their team.

Take this when the enemy team has very devastating CC that you need to stay safe from, especially from junglers like Elise. Rammus and Sejuani, mid laners such as Twisted Fate and Veigar, supports like Morgana or Braum, tanks such as Shen or Maokai, or marksmen such as Varus or Ashe. Keep in mind you do not have to take Cleanse versus only one champion that has CC, but if it's the enemy jungler or mid laner that has it along with it being unavoidable or easy to land, I highly recommend getting used to Cleanse and taking it.


These are in my opinion the best runes by far for Zoe, and they fit my play-style very well. I will cover why they are good individually below, and also there is a section underneath these runes talking about other keystones and basic runes.



It works so well on Zoe because when she tends to proc Electrocute she goes all out and lands a Sleepy Trouble Bubble followed by an auto and a long range Paddle Star, which usually brings people down to below 50% health anyway, granting a free Dark Harvest stack. However, Dark Harvest can proc from a SINGLE ABILITY alone, remember all of those times you Paddle Star'd someone for 95% of their HP and they got away? Dark Harvest will kill them. It's slightly worse for early laning, but this outscales Electrocute massively later, as it also RESETS in team fights!

This rune is an AMAZING choice for Zoe. With her ultimate Portal Jump being an extremely low cooldown blink, and an essential piece to her combo to get maximum damage, you can almost keep this rune up permanently. Because you use this rune so much, the damage you can get from this can be larger than Keystone runes such as Electrocute and Arcane Comet, which is completely nuts for a non-keystone rune.

Quite a straightforward rune, just offers you extra AP upon killing wards and champions. I've actually also been switching between this and Ghost Poro recently, great for when you're vs. passive lanes and you won't be getting many kills, and placing the poros allow you to have more vision up, which is quite important for an immobile squishy like Zoe. You can comfortably choose between the 2 here, whatever is your personal favourite.

With Ravenous Hunter gone, this is the next best rune for Zoe to take. Ultimate Hunter isn't great on her as her ult already becomes a super low cooldown later on, and Relentless Hunter /can/ be good on the match-up, but Treasure Hunter is universally better.



With lots of runes being nerfed over this year, we're no longer taking the Inspiration tree. My favourite combo to run recently has been Absolute Focus and Gathering Storm together for huge amounts of burst mid-game! You can stack up quite a bit of extra AP from these two runes together, and Zoe's AP scaling on her Paddle Star is really devastating.

As explained above, this is my favourite rune to combine with Absolute Focus for huge amounts of AP! You can also take Scorch instead if you're vs. a matchup that you can easily harass, like melee matchups.

Bonuses


Offense:
9 Adaptive Force
Offense:
9 Adaptive Force
Defense:
8 Magic Resist

The bonuses towards your runes are pretty clear cut here, you can opt for 9 adaptive twice for a total of 18 AP and choose between the MR or armour for the final choice, as the HP one isn't very good. If you're in difficult match-ups you can just double dip in the defenses, taking +16 MR or +12 armour, allowing you to get through lane a lot easier.



This is Zoe's 2nd best rune to take. It's very consistent as it always as high base damage throughout the game, so if you're in a counter lane where you won't get many Dark Harvest stacks it's a lot better. It's harder to proc than Dark Harvest but if you have a summoner or an item on Spell Thief then you're good to go.

This is another rune popular among Zoe players. Straight up, this rune is NOT WORTH IT IN SOLO QUEUE! A LOT of people will argue against me saying Summon Aery is her best rune without researching. Pro players will take Summon Aery because they will not gather Dark Harvest stacks as there will be very few kills, and laning phase is extremely important. They will also tactically pick Zoe into good match-ups where they can proc Summon Aery efficiently. You have to be super on point always using this rune off cooldown if you want to make the most of it - other options will out-scale this rune after first base, and with the damage being so subpar now and they buffs its shielding I would go against taking it altogether.

Domination: you can substitute Sudden Impact with Taste of Blood if you're in an attrition match-up and you need a bit more healing. Ghost Poro is a great choice instead of Eyeball Collection if you aren't going to be getting many kills early on, and it gives a lot more vision. Relentless Hunter is also a great pick up if you're focusing on a heavy roam style, and also if you're vs a lot of champions that rely on skill shots like Xerath.

Inspiration: if you're in a hard match-up, you should go Time Warp Tonic and Biscuit Delivery alongside a Corrupting Potion start to have huge amounts of sustain, and if you're in a hard counter match-up that you're going to be building a Zhonya's Hourglass second vs. like a Zed, you can take Perfect Timing for an early Stopwatch.

Sorcery: You can take Nullifying Orb is still really good into burst AP mids + heavy AP teams, Manaflow Band is still okay if you want a bit more mana regen, and Scorch is great if you're going for more of an early game scentric build

Resolve: While this rune tree is uncommon on Zoe, I LOVE it into some match-ups. Bone Plating is the star of the show here. It gives you a lot of reduced damage in a short amount of time and it's absolutely AMAZING vs. champions like Fizz that can't proc it off of you before all-inning. Overgrowth is the next best rune on this tree for Zoe, and it also helps greatly vs. being bursted down - the health stacks up and has saved me more times than I expect!





More Sparkles

More Sparkles! is Zoe's passive. After casting an ability, Zoe's next basic attack within the next 5 seconds deals bonus magic damage.

This is actually one of my favourite abilities on Zoe. It's pretty much a mini Lich Bane BUT this ability has NO COOLDOWN, as long as you have abilities to proc it you can keep it up. Two important things to note here, one being that both casts of Paddle Star apply your passive, and that your passive works on towers. Both of these functions together give you a lot of potent point and click damage early game, and it allows you take towers deceptively fast. Combined with Spell Thief you can really surprise enemies with large amounts of unavoidable damage.



Paddle Star

Paddle Star is Zoe's bread and butter ability. For the first cast of the ability, Zoe hurts a star in the target direction that collides with the first enemy hit, dealing magic damage in a small area, reduced to 80% to enemies hit beyond the first. The total damage is increased by 0-150% based on distance traveled.

While the star is out, Zoe can reactivate Paddle Star to redirect it to a new location near her, resetting its damage modifier on cast. If Zoe moves with the redirected star, it will keep moving along with her until it reaches Paddle Star's max range. If the star does not hit an enemy, it lingers at maximum range for 1 second on both casts.

Even though you want to be hitting the longest range Paddle Stars as much as possible for maximum damage, sometimes it's not always the best way to use it. If you see an easy opportunity to quickly harass your opponent, it's better most of the time just to do a short range hit. Don't forget that it also does a small area of AoE from the first target it hits, so it's your primary way of waveclearing, and you can also easily harass your enemy if they're standing slightly behind creeps this way.



Spell Thief

Spell Thief has both a passive and an active effect. Passively. whenever an enemy champion casts a summoner spell or an item active, they drop on the ground as a Spell Shard, which grants sight in a small area. Spell Shards last for 40 seconds. Enemy minions can randomly spawn with Spell Shards that drop to the ground for 20 seconds if killed by Zoe.

Collecting a Spell Shard allows Zoe to activate Spell Thief within the next 60 seconds. She can replace her current Spell Thief active by move clicking directly on another Spell Shard. Activating a spell shard grants Zoe movement speed and three bubbles that orbit around her for the next 10 seconds. The bubbles attack the nearest enemy in range, prioritizing Zoe's most recent target, and dealing magic damage.

This ability also does damage to towers, making you a serious tower pushing threat alongside a Lich Bane while proccing More Sparkles!. Don't forget to always use Spell Thief if you have a shard picked up if you can, as obvious as it seems you can easily click on another shard even though you can use your current one to get movement speed and damage - also when coming back to lane and your Spell Thief shard is going to time out just use it for the extra movement speed.



Sleepy Trouble Bubble

Sleepy Trouble Bubble - Zoe kicks a bubble in the target direction that bursts on the first enemy hit dealing magic damage, rendering the target drowsy for 2.2 secconds, and then they fall asleep for 2 seconds. The next instance of champion damage taken by the sleeping target deals bonus true damage, equal to the post-mitigation damage dealt, capped at Sleepy Trouble Bubble's damage.

The bubble gains distance when thrown at a wall, traveling through it indefinitely. However, it cannot go through 2 sets of walls, so it falls short abruptly if it would enter terrain again. If Sleepy Trouble Bubble hits nothing it forms a trap at maximum range that arms after 0.8 seconds for 4 seconds.

Landing Sleepy Trouble Bubble consistently is going to be the key to winning games. Since it has massive range when traveling through walls, you can catch a lot of people out if they don't have vision on you, and generally sets up either a huge chunk of their health or a kill because of the extra true damage. It is vital that you have vision control when playing Zoe, buying Control Wards will help you set up a lot of bubbles. Also just using Sleepy Trouble Bubble to cover important walk-ways when doing objectives like Baron Nashor is a great way to use it.

With the whole "post-mitigation" true damage, it means that if the first part of Sleepy Trouble Bubble does around 100 damage after resistances, the second part can do up to 100 damage too.



Portal Jump

Portal Jump is Zoe's ultimate. Zoe targets a location then dives into a portal that she opens beneath her, blinking to the target location. After 1 second, she blinks back to her initial cast location.

A perfect ultimate to tie her kit together! Unlike other ultimate's, Portal Jump has a pretty low cooldown. During Portal Jump, Zoe becomes self-rooted and cannot move, but she can attack and cast abilities, and also see over walls. This means that whatever happens to her, whether she gets hooked by Blitzcrank at the intial blink or uses Zhonya's Hourglass, she'll always return to her starting cast location. The only exceptions to this rule is Camille's ultimate Hextech Ultimatum and being Devoured by Tahm Kench.

You can use this ability to dodge in-coming skill shots, you can use it to pick up a stray Spell Shard from Spell Thief during a team fight, you can use it next to a wall, to get closer to your enemy or jump over minions to get an easier hit with Sleepy Trouble Bubble, though one of the biggest things you will use this for is to gain extra range on Paddle Star, which increases your damage. This ability is so versatile!





You always take Paddle Star level 1 unless you are invading and combining Sleepy Trouble Bubble with other CC.

You take Sleepy Trouble Bubble 2nd to look for kill potential, help potential jungle invades, etc.

You then take Spell Thief at level 3. Leveling another level of Paddle Star doesn't make that much different early on, and being able to pick up a random summoner spell or item active to help you you during laning is INSANE. Also, don't forget you can't pick up other people's summoners until you level up Spell Thief, imagine fighting at level 3 and not being able to take the enemies Flashes and losing out on kills! It's a complete game changer.

Pretty much you want always want to be maxing Paddle Star > Sleepy Trouble Bubble > Spell Thief, while putting a point whenever you can into Portal Jump at 6, 11 and 16. A lot of people ask me if it's okay to ignore Portal Jump and level your other abilities, because it doesn't do damage, but the lower cooldown is crucial to your Zoe play later on in the game.




Doran's Ring is back! It's received some healthy buffs, reverting its mana regen passive to a previous state: giving you 6 mana for minion kills instead which I prefer a lot more, as it punishes people that miss CS! It also grants you health if you're max mana, which is pretty awesome.

Corrupting Potion is another starting item we can go. I personally enjoy running it vs. really heavy harassing lanes so I can sustain through the early game and have a good first buy.

Stealth Ward will be the only trinket you will be taking at level 1, and will be the main choice of trinket for most of your games. Because Zoe tends to push a lot, she needs to keep up vision so she doesn't get ganked, as she has no mobility.



With your early gold, you'll be building towards Luden's Tempest as soon as possible in every game, and you start building into it by getting a Lost Chapter. With 10% CDR and 20% of max mana refunded once you level up, the earlier you complete this the better - it'll be very rare for you to be able to base with the full 1100 gold, so you should be buying the early components ( Amplifying Tome and Sapphire Crystal as early as you can.

If you don't have enough gold to buy Amplifying Tomes, you'll be looking at these two instead. You'll go for Boots if you're vs. a very skill-shot intensive match-up, like Xerath or Lux. Getting an early Dark Seal whenever you have 350 gold is always my preference though, it's an amazing item. It is already gold efficient (123%) without any stacks, the +25% healing from potions has been removed and so has the mana, in favour of HP and also more AP from stacks. At max stacks, you can get a whopping total of 65 AP!! That's 1520 gold worth of stacks on a 350 gold item.. THIS IS INSANE!! It becomes 434% gold efficient, more than ANY other item in the game!

A Refillable Potion is great, if you have enough gold to buy this early after buying components, get it as soon as possible! Potions that refill every base makes for insane value, so much so that if you have a single Health Potion in your inventory, selling that just to buy this is super worth it. Don't buy this past laning phase however.

Control Wards win games - I cannot stress enough how important it is to make sure you get these on the map early, they stay placed indefinitely, and if you're strong enough to protect them you can an insane amount of vision the entire game through it. You shouldn't be only getting these on your early bases - every time have 75 gold on a base pick one of these up and place it around mid, in conjunction with your Stealth Ward you can get a serious amount of vision around mid, which I think Zoe needs to succeed as she is a champion that naturally wants to push the lane while also being immobile.



Sorcerer's Shoes will be your main boot of choice in over 90% of your games. Zoe has huge amounts of damage, and these only amplify it even further. Combined with these boots, Sudden Impact and Luden's Tempest if you decide to purchase it, you can get up to 54 flat magic penetration in a full build, and that does true damage to squishies that don't buy any magic resist.

Mercury's Treads will be your only other choice of boots. These become necessary when you're vs. high CC and high burst magic damage. if I have to run these I'll generally go Nullifying Orb in my runes and Barrier as well, with also possibly buying a Banshee's Veil if their burst is really high and unavoidable, like LeBlanc or Evelynn.














Here we'll discuss our Mythic purchases: Crown of the Shattered Queen, Luden's Tempest, Liandry's Torment and Everfrost, but first let's talk about what a Mythic item is: you can only buy one of these in a game, however you can sell it and buy another Mythic item later, however not recommended unless you make a huge mistake and have lots of gold to spare. It also gives special bonuses to legendary items that you purchase (boots don't count, but Mejai's Soulstealer does). This makes this first purchase really important, and you should take care and weigh up the options to help you decide which one to pick.

Luden's Tempest is by far the best Mythic item on Zoe, it gives her everything she wants - huge damage through its passive and magic pen. If you're unsure, you can't go wrong building this most games.

Liandry's Torment is an overall great tank busting item if you so happen to get countered by a lot of tanks, as it grants % health damage AND bonus damage vs. champions with bonus health, and its mythic passive also grants you a lot more ability haste. It's not great on Zoe, but sometimes it's mandatory.

Everfrost has very strong active ability, allowing you to root an enemy champion (or more!) if you hit it accurately, but if you don't hit the root you apply a slow instead. If you have a high amount of magic damage on your team already and little CC, this is a great option, and I also like building this vs. Yasuo as he can't windwall it, and it's great vs. mostly melee teams, allowing you to survive their burst with more health and land easier sleeps.

Crown of the Shattered Queen is also a great options vs. melees and burst champions. If you feel like it's almost impossible to survive the enemy team, take this.

Rabadon's Deathcap Deathcap has been buffed by 5% AP, woohoo! One of our favourite items for Zoe has just become a lot stronger. This item definitely should be purchased before Void Staff unless the enemy team has HUGE amounts magic resist on almost every member. Zoe has extremely high AP ratio's, and also combined with Lich Bane, this item is a great way to massively increase your overall damage.

Void Staff, along with Rabadon's Deathcap, should be built almost every game. It lost 5 AP in pre-season, but its job is still the same - shredding any MR that get in your way, and this is made a lot easier with the introduction of Blighting Jewel, which is a component that grants 15% magic resist, which is a super great addition to the new items, allowing you to pick up some % magic penetration earlier on while waiting for the full Void Staff buy. You need to keep track of what items the enemy champs are buying, and also take note on what champs they are and their usual builds to determine whether you need this item eventually in the game or not. Don't be afraid on skipping out on this altogether if the enemy team literally has ZERO magic resist, but that will be a very rare occurrence.




Lich Bane is my favourite personal choice on Zoe, and it just got stronger! It makes your burst damage, push potential and objective taking a lot stronger. I honestly believe it's the best third item to go, Zoe weaves in a lot of autos because of her passive More Sparkles!, and these stack making you a scary auto attacker. With Spell Thief, Luden's Tempest, when combined with Lich Bane you have a scary amount of point and click damage. A really strong pick up when you already have Rabadon's Deathcap, and should NOT be built before it. If you have to delay this item, make sure you get it last or replace boots!

Shadowflame is a new edition to the game that is great on Zoe - a huge amount of AP and magic pen makes for a great item. This item is best build very squishy teams that have some shielding, like Karma or Yasuo, it's not a true shield negating item like Serpent's Fang, so it's not great vs. extremely tanky teams.

Mejai's Soulstealer is a nice pick up for Season 11, even though it's still a snowball item. With the buffs to Dark Seal, you'll be buying that a lot more often, so upgrading it will naturally be a lot more common. The cost has been increased by 200 gold and has had a slight stat change - replacing mana with health, which is overall a lot better, the counter to Mejai's is being killed, but the extra HP will help you to stay alive. This item, while only costing 1,6000 gold is considered a Legendary item, which means when you buy this when you're massively ahead, you'll also be gaining the passive for a standard Legendary item that you get from whichever Mythic item you choose. Combine this with Zhonya's Hourglass and you can preserve your stacks really easily!

Morellonomicon is a really overrated item. With the nerfs it's received over the past year, it's not worth to build it AT ALL unless there are enemies that have a huge amount of healing for it's Grevious Wounds passive, we're talking Sylas or Dr. Mundo terrority. You should buy Oblivion Orb and sit on it as long as possible, only upgrade to Morellonomicon last item if you still need the healing reduction. BUY THIS ITEM ONLY WHEN YOU 100% NEED IT!

Zhonya's Hourglass is a great defensive item. You don't necessarily have to build this vs. only AD threats, it is a great counter to many AP mid laners because dodging damage is a lot better than just soaking slightly less damage. It completely negates abilities such as Syndra's Unleashed Power, Veigar's Primordial Burst and even Karthus' Requiem. I don't recommend getting this early on instead of your core items unless it's absolutely necessary (vs. Zed, Vi and others) as it doesn't offer much damage. Buying it late game however is a great idea, as you already dish out tons of damage with a 4+ item build, and you just need something to keep you alive - a Zhonya's Hourglass can never go wrong.

Banshee's Veil is another great defensive item, I especially love combining this with Nullifying Orb or Mercury's Treads. Pick this up if you're afraid of an AP mid bursting you down constantly (like Fizz or LeBlanc), not only does this item have magic resistance but it has a spell-shield that blocks a single ability, helping to disrupt champions that need to hit all of their spells too correctly kill someone. It's also REALLY good vs. champions that really rely on hitting their crowd control straight up even if they aren't in your lane, such as Sejuani, Elise, Blitzcrank, Lux, heck this item is even really great vs. Zoe herself!


UPDATED! Here's a handy item set to help you out with the items listed in my guide, and more! I will look to update this whenever new changes occur.

Don't know how to add an item set? Follow the steps below.

Step 1: Copy the code in the spoiler box below.

ITEM SET CODE

Step 2: While logged in on the LoL client, go to Collection > Items and click import item set

Step 3: Paste the code into the bar

Step 4: Profit! Enjoy!



Zoe's laning phase in my opinion is the weakest part of the game for her, even though it's not that bad. Since minions block pretty must most of her damage, you always want to have your lane pushing. I highly recommend not picking Zoe into match-ups where you can't push the wave (like Yasuo) or match-ups where they out-shove you along with poking you very hard (like Xerath).

You can play her one of two ways: either hard shoving your opponent in constantly because you don't want to deal with laning vs. them and look to roam, or you can try to poke them out. After being buffed again, Zoe can almost 2 shot the backline of creeps at level 1 again. She has very very good waveclear and you can abuse this vs. a lot of mid laners to force them to farm under tower.

A standard lane combo you should be using early on is Paddle Star (1st cast) > auto with More Sparkles! > second cast of Paddle Star > auto with More Sparkles! again. This is the most efficient way to get early damage out, and you can half health people if you hit a decently ranged Paddle Star with both autos. Throwing constant Sleepy Trouble Bubble's are not recommended before your first base as you don't have the mana pool early on to do that - after getting Lost Chapter it's a lot easier to catch the enemy mid laner out with your barrage of bubbles. Do not forget to add in Corrupting Potion to your combo for that extra bit of damage.

The spell shards you pick up through Spell Thief during laning phase can turn the tides of games. Pick up an Exhaust, Flash or a Chilling Smite to slow your laner or get in range to hit an easier Sleepy Trouble Bubble, Hextech Rocketbelt the ranged creeps to instantly clear them to look for another Sleepy Trouble Bubble, the possibilities are ENDLESS - it'll take a while for you to get used to using the Spell Shards correctly in most scenarios. As Kha'Zix wisely says, "consume and adapt".

Even though Zoe has great wave clear and poke, she is very susceptible to being repeatedly ganked over and over as she has no true form of escape. Taking the correct summoner spell and making sure to buy Control Wards early on and use your trinket efficiently is the way to safe laning. Keeping the wave constantly shoved allows you to assist your jungler better than the enemy mid laner, Zoe loves jungle fights because of Sleepy Trouble Bubble gaining range through walls.

If you manage to push your laner out or even kill them and you're healthy enough to not base and/or you know where the enemy jungler is, you can do a lot of damage to the enemy mid's tower to get first blood tower gold. Zoe's passive More Sparkles! AND Spell Thief do damage to towers, and it makes her a tower threat, combined with Sheen and Lich Bane later on in the game, you can almost 3-4 shot towers.

Zoe is also REALLY good at 2v2 fighting with your jungler, since it's the beginning of the game, no one has used their summoner spells yet, so you can guarantee always getting at least 1! Multiple uses of Spell Thief gives you a huge amount of early game damage, and multiple procs of Dark Harvest. If you feel like you can't pressure your laner much early on, pushing the lane and roaming to where your jungler is to secure the crabs or gank other lanes is ideal.

You pretty much want to be constantly grouping with your team outside of laning phase. Even though Zoe is not great in team fights, she is very good at poking and sieging in the moments leading up towards a fight. You pretty much want to stay with your team, get as much vision as possible with your Stealth Ward and buy Control Wards to make your life easier. Denying vision is so important with Zoe, that you should even look to sell your Doran's Ring late game to have a slot to purchase Control Wards. Concealing where you are will make it a lot harder for enemies to dodge your Sleepy Trouble Bubble, and poking one person low or outright killing them can lead to an easy won fight before it even begins.

Even though you want to be mostly grouping, there are some situations where you can split push. She's not super good at split-pushing because of how susceptible to being dived on she is, but if you're left alone on a tower, More Sparkles! combined with a Lich Bane does some serious tower damage.

You want to be poking with Paddle Star by using the first part of the spell backwards, then Portal Jumping forward while casting the second part to look for poke. If someone on your team is strong, you should look to prioritize hitting anyone that's trying to kill them with your Sleepy Trouble Bubble and trying to burst them out rather than try to go for any fancy back-line plays.

One thing to remember is how much damage your Spell Thief, passive More Sparkles! combined with Lich Bane does in team fights. TAKE NOTE of what spell shards drop to the floor via Spell Thief, picking up a casual Exhaust to stop an assassin or a Redemption can win you fights, and it's really hard for people to play around that. Sometimes just picking up Spell Thief shards off the ground and instantly casting them to get the damage procs is a good way to team-fight if there are so many on the ground.

The reason Zoe is better outside of team-fights is because she needs a while to set up and look for a Sleepy Trouble Bubble on a priority target like a carry, missing a crucial one can mean a lost fight and it's hard to one-shot a carry with a front-line running at you. She loves scrappy fights where she can land an easy bubble and one-shot someone quickly before a fight starts. You also have to be very careful with your positioning in team-fights as you don't have any mobility, and one wrong misstep with Portal Jump can lead to your instant death.


And that wraps up my Zoe guide! I will probably add match-ups in the future. I hope you found this guide helpful, and if you did please give it an upvote to make it more visible, and please post any questions you may have and I'll get back to them ASAP!

Special thanks to Jovy for the gorgeous banners, and for helping me with spots of coding. :3

If you'd like to see my Zoe gameplay, you can follow my Twitch channel - I play her very frequently, and if I'm not just ask in chat! I stream every single day from 6-7 PM until midnight to 1 AM GMT.


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