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Xayah Build Guide by Amberdragon

ADC [14.11] Complete Xayah Guide to Dominate Your Games

ADC [14.11] Complete Xayah Guide to Dominate Your Games

Updated on June 10, 2024
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League of Legends Build Guide Author Amberdragon Build Guide By Amberdragon 1353 63 2,281,663 Views 61 Comments
1353 63 2,281,663 Views 61 Comments League of Legends Build Guide Author Amberdragon Xayah Build Guide By Amberdragon Updated on June 10, 2024
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Runes: Solid Game

1 2 3
Precision
Fleet Footwork
Absorb Life
Legend: Alacrity
Cut Down

Domination
Taste of Blood
Ultimate Hunter
Bonus:

+10% Attack Speed
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+65 Base Health

Spells:

1 2 3 4 5
Great Standard
LoL Summoner Spell: Barrier

Barrier

LoL Summoner Spell: Flash

Flash

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





I am an ADC main in the BR server and play a lot of different champions, but I consider Xayah and Kai'Sa as my mains, since I play them the most and the best!.

I have been playing Xayah since early season 10 when I started maining ADC (I was a jungle main season 9 when I started playing League). Xayah is my highest mastery champion!

She is my favorite ADC and I want to share with you how I play her to find success in my games. This guide can be useful for new people wanting to pick her up or veterans seeking new builds & ideas on the champion.





1.
Ability Rundown
A summary of Xayah’s abilities
2.
Pros & Cons
Champion strengths & weaknesses
3.
Summoner Spells
Best summoner spells

4.
Runes
Best runes
5.
Itemization
Best items
6.
How to ADC
The fundamentals to playing ADC

7.
Dealing Damage
How to optimize damage and Xayah combos
8.
Playstyle
Playstyle at all stages of the game
9.
Synergies
How to play around your teammates

10.
Matchups
Foes & how to deal with them






CLEAN CUTS

After using an ability, Xayah's next basic attacks will hit all targets along their path with reduced damage. At her maximum attack range, a Feather will be left in the ground. Xayah can store up to 5 empowered attacks.

Lover's Leap: If either Xayah or Rakan is recalling, the other may move nearby and activate their own recall to join them. Both reach base at the time of which the initiator's recall ends.




DOUBLE DAGGERS


ACTIVE: Xayah throws two damaging daggers that also drop 2 Feathers she can recall.

Targets hit after the first take less damage.




DEADLY PLUMAGE


Xayah creates a storm of blades that increase her Attack Speed and damage while also granting her Move Speed if she attacks a champion.

If Rakan is nearby, he will also gain Deadly Plumage.




BLADECALLER


Xayah calls back all her dropped Feathers dealing damage and rooting enemies. Feathers deal more damage based on her crit chance. Minions take 50% damage.

Enemies take 100−55% damage from a feather (depending on feathers hit) going to a maximum of 9 feathers and capped at 55% damage. Enemies struck by at least 3 Feathers are rooted.




FEATHERSTORM


Xayah leaps into the air, becoming briefly untargetable but still able to move.

After a short delay, she unleashes a volley of feather-blades forward in a cone, dealing damage to all enemies struck and leaving a line of 5 Feathers at the end of Featherstorm's maximum range, which she can recall.














PROS

+ Marksman with AoE CC
+ Decent scaling
+ Great at taking objectives
+ High damage
+ Strong teamfighter
+ Anti-divers



VS

CONS

- Easy to counter
- Easy to bully when out-ranged
- Does better with team set up
- There are better late game ADCs
- Simple kit, but easy to mess up
- Can be a niche pick





Xayah can be a monster when her team has good engage or reliable CC thanks to her AoE root. She excels against divers, melees in general, and champions on a similar range as hers - turning their engage into her favor.

She has a pretty decent laning phase compared to other ADCs. However, she is still not an early game abuser/snowballer like Jhin, Draven or Lucian.

She is in fact decent at all stages of the game, but I find that she does the best in the mid-late game after her core items. She may not have the highest late game numbers, but she compensates for it by having excellent objective control and teamfighting.
Being good against divers comes at the cost of lower base range, meaning it is harder to play Xayah against teams who out-range her and play for poke.

She is also easily countered by mobility and displacement interactions. Since her kit relies so much on her Bladecaller, champions that are too fast or that have a lot of dashes can be really difficult for her to deal with. In such cases you have to rely on your W as the rest of your kit won't be of much help.

The way her kit works also makes her a niche pick depending on meta. She is not as flexible as other ADCs because the way she deals damage is “specialized”.




How independent is she as an ADC?

She can be heavily dependent on her support and team to set her up for success, depending on enemy team composition. This is because her kit revolves around Bladecaller damage and some team comps make it very hard to consistently land it.

With aggressive engage/hook supports though, she has insane kill pressure from level 2 onwards thanks to her Bladecaller. If you snowball your lane you will have an easy transition into the mid game, but if you are behind or even you will need your core items to start doing decent damage.

Xayah is not the insane 1v1 hypercarry ADC like Vayne or Tristana, and can easily be killed by champions like them if she is on her own. But she compensates for it in other ways.


How safe is it to blind pick her?

Unless Xayah is strong in the meta, she is more of a niche pick into divers or CC. She's not like some champions that no matter the meta are always relevant regardless of team composition.

You shouldn't blind pick her every game unless you are confident - You are unfortunately weaker and harder to play than other ADCs if the meta doesn't favor you. You can observe that she might show up every now and then in pro play but if she is not strong she is rarely picked in high elo soloq.

At the moment, Xayah is a decent ADC to pick in the current meta. Not overtuned nor giga nerfed. A lot of this has to do with Navori Flickerblade so do watch out if this item gets nerfed.











Flash
This is a must have for most champions in the game - Always take it. Use it to dodge important enemy abilities, if needed you can also use it to get in range to kill an enemy or combo Bladecaller + Flash.







Heal
Heal is good on 2v2 and it does decently well into matchups in which you cannot use Exhaust well (like into Ezreal, Caitlyn, Varus, Xerath), matchups that either burst you on combos or you cannot get in range to Exhaust.

Ideally you want to use it before the enemy applies Ignite, but it can also be used for the burst of movement speed. Good early game summoner but not as good late game.


Exhaust
Imagine you are against a Lucian, Samira, Kai'Sa, Draven, Tristana, or the enemy has dangerous assassins - all these champions want to get on your face and burst you. This is where Exhaust usually becomes the best option. While your support can take it, most of the times I find it best for you as the ADC to take Exhaust, since you are likely to be the main target and your support will not always be nearby. Aside from reducing burst, the slow can also help you kite or run away.


Cleanse
Enemy has hard CC champions, like Leona, Thresh, Morgana or Ashe? Take cleanse. If you get caught, use it before it's too late. It's also a good summoner to remove Ignite and Exhaust.

Remember it DOESN'T work for Skarner R, Mordekaiser R or Malzahar R.


Ghost
Offensive uses: Chasing enemies, repositioning for E, going all-in.
Defensive uses: Kiting, repositioning, running from ganks, running from engage.

Ghost is overall a good spell in lane and in late game, unlike Heal. Though since its use is not as straightforward as Heal or Barrier, I would not recommend it to new players, at least in ranked until you get used to it.
It is a good option to take when your support takes Exhaust and Heal won’t really be that useful in keeping you alive throughout the game.










ATTENTION: SECTION STILL NOT UPDATED FOR RECENT RUNES AND ITEM CHANGES. PLEASE REFER TO THE BUILDS AND NOTES AT THE TOP OF THE GUIDE.








PRECISION




Lethal Tempo is overall the best and most consistent choice among its peers. It allows Xayah to gain a boost to her attack speed, allowing her to set up her feathers, DPS and make her W more effective. The range increase you get is helpful in kiting and chasing enemies. However, Fleet Footwork can be picked if you feel like you are going to get bullied in lane and will need the extra sustain. The movement speed is also nice on her. Otherwise, not the best choice.





Triumph is good once you learn how to manage your mana properly. You will get a lot of value from it in teamfight and lane skirmishes in the form of extra survivability and a little bit of gold.
Presence of Mind is a solid choice if you need mana sustain, especially if you have Navori Quickblades and a durable enemy team. In lane you can proc the passive mana regen when your Clean Cuts feathers hit an enemy champion through minions. This is very exploitable against melee supports especially! Use this trick to steadily keep your mana going throughout the laning phase.





Take Legend: Bloodline if you need more sustain and HP in your game. You will not build lifesteal in most of your games so it always has its value, but I find it a weaker rune.
Legend: Alacrity feels really good and it spares you from building AS items, but it lacks the late game sustain. If you don't get red buff, you may have to recall after a fight and end up losing tempo because of it.





Go Cut Down or Coup de Grace depending on your needs. Cut down against beefy teams and tank supports, Coup de Grace for the rest of the games. Last Stand does not fit Xayah's playstyle.




Rune Page Example










DOMINATION





I very rarely pick the domination tree as my primary tree. Hail of Blades is a decent choice if you plan to play more aggressively and snowball lane, but it is an early game rune and overall Lethal Tempo feels better for most games. Hail of Blade’s utility comes from the fact that it allows you to quickly set up 3 feathers and catch the enemy off guard, meaning you rely less on your support landing CC to perform a burst combo.





Taste of Blood is an option if you want extra sustain, you can consistently proc it by poking enemies with Clean Cuts and Double Daggers. Cheap Shot is not really that good.





Eyeball Collection is the best option among its peers. Ghost Poro sounds good in theory, but it is weak and takes longer to stack, and Zombie Ward is bad because your support will usually be the one to take down wards - meaning you would take forever to stack it.





My favorite part about the Domination tree! I advise you to get Ultimate Hunter if you want your Featherstorm on a lower cooldown - really good if the enemy team has a lot of burst or CC you need to dodge, like Katarina R or Malphite R. It is also a really good rune for making plays and my personal favorite.
Ingenious Hunter is good if you are going to buy items that have cooldown, such as Essence Reaver, Immortal Shieldbow, or Guardian Angel.
Treasure Hunter is good if you have an aggressive support to snowball your early-mid game.




Rune Page Example













INSPIRATION



When I take the inspiration tree, I am expecting to have a rough early game. To compensate that, I take Magical Footwear. Free boots make a huge difference when you are behind, it is a very gold efficient rune.





You can take Biscuit Delivery for more lane sustain. It gives you mana and HP. It will be very good in hard lanes where you need sustain.





You can take Cosmic Insight if you would rather have it over the other runes. It gives you ability haste on your summoners and on any items that have cooldown, so it is nice to pair it with Ingenious Hunter or for games where you will be needing your items/summs more often, for safety.




Rune Page Example








SORCERY



In the Sorcery tree we are usually looking into more damage and some utility. You can take Nullifying Orb against AP-heavy teams, and Nimbus Cloak is good in certain situations for self peel or higher kill potential..





All three options can be viable depending on meta. Take Transcendence if you want more ability haste and teamfighting power, Celerity for better kiting and mobility. Absolute Focus is okay if you are into a good matchup where you can easily harass the enemy.





Take Gathering Storm if you are looking for late game scaling. Scorch is viable if you want to focus on poking and harassing an easy matchup.




Rune Page Example










ATTENTION: SECTION STILL NOT UPDATED FOR RECENT RUNES AND ITEM CHANGES. PLEASE REFER TO THE BUILDS AND NOTES AT THE TOP OF THE GUIDE.





First thing I have to said is that builds are very adaptable, especially when it comes to late game items. Some items work really well in some games, then poorly in others. There’s also the player variable – Yes! You, the player, will naturally gravitate towards a specific playstyle or feel you play better by going certain items in a specific order. I will show you the meta build, some personal setups and I’ll go through some items and how they interact with the champion, but at the end of the day this is just a baseline. Once you’re comfortable with the champion, I urge you to experiment and have fun with your items!

PS: currently experimenting with Terminus to see if it can fit in the build anywhere.






Mobility/Speed

Stormrazor plus Phantom Dancer is an underrated combo in terms of speed. When you combine them with Deadly Plumage you become really good at kiting and chasing. The overall damage potential might be a bit lower in the early game since you have no Kraken Slayer and PD only comes third, but it is still a good build when you need speed – either because the enemy is too sticky or your own team is too fast with little CC. Go Navori Flickerblade always. Rapid Firecannon is viable in some games. Last items are situational!




(META) DPS & Tank-Shredding

If you want to focus on doing damage per second, this setup is perfect. You play as a hypercarry in the backline who is very good at punishing divers and thrives in longer fights. Good build if you need to handle tanks and melt single targets.





Play from Range

Good for situations when you are into a team comp where autoing enemies and catching them with your Bladecaller is harder. Stormrazor gives you a small boost in movement speed which can be helpful in chasing or kiting. Infinity Edge is better than Navori Flickerblade here in my opinion because in complicated matchups (usually high range ones) you will often not really be able to auto attack a lot, and will need more burst instead. However, Navori will be better if you are into melee assassins. Rapid Firecannon gives you a nice layer of safety with the extra range and it allows you to catch enemies a bit more easily with your higher range. Overall this build is more unforgiving when you misuse your abilities, but can be good into champions like Caitlyn or Xerath.












Doran’s Blade
VS

Long Sword
Starting with a Doran's Blade is great if the enemy bot lane is an all-in matchup (like Draven + Nami, Tristana + Leona, Samira + Nautilus). The extra HP is really valuable. Also good if you yourself have an all-in support. Starting with a Long Sword + 3 Health Potion is good if you need a lot of sustain in lane - good into champion that will want to take short trades and poke, like Nami, Lux, Caitlyn or Miss Fortune. However, you will be squishier.







Noonquiver
This is the ideal first back if you are going for Kraken Slayer or Stormrazor as your first item.


B. F. Sword
If you are going for Navori Flickerblade first your ideal first back is a B. F. Sword. If you can’t afford it though, it’s Caulfield's Warhammer.


Boots
If you have an awkward amount of gold, Boots are a decent purchase for your first back. I also highly recommend this if the enemy has champions with strong engage (like Leona), catch potential (like Thresh) or poke (like Lux). Also good if you are getting ganked a lot or spending a lot of time near the enemy turret.

Berserker's Greaves
This is a good first buy if you are in a lane of long trades - perhaps if enemy support is tanky (thus they last longer) or if you are against an ADC like Zeri who likes early boots to kite and take long trades. It carries the same benefits of the initial boots but obviously better.






Stormrazor
VS

Kraken Slayer
At the moment Stormrazor is mostly a situational item. It is decent when you need a bit more mobility, if you pair it with a Zeal item. Not really bad stats-wise but the alternative synergizes more with Xayah’s playstyle. Kraken Slayer is a really good item because it has good stats for Xayah and gives you more DPS – she loves attack speed! And KS has great synergy with another item Xayah loves, Phantom Dancer. She is a very safe ADC so you don't get as punished as other champions for prioritizing building damage over survivability, if you are playing alright.








Navori Quickblades
VS

Infinity Edge
Navori Flickerblade was made for Xayah, it’s perfect for her. It gives you reduced cooldown on your abilities and increased damage (as long as you can auto attack). It is specially good against melees and great for taking baron/drake as you can stack a lot of feathers and deal massive damage while kiting. It has also held a consistently higher winrate over IE for several patches. Infinity Edge is a good item spike if you are unable to consistently hit your abilities and auto your enemies. Basically, Navori empowers your abilities but a lot of its value is also allowing you to spam them, and for that you need to auto attack a lot. If you can’t do that because you just get one-shot or because you can’t get in range, you lose a lot of its power. Navori has way better synergy with Xayah, but for the reasons mentioned, IE is still a decent pick.







Phantom Dancer
This has great synergy with Xayah because its passive adds up with her Deadly Plumage super well, and attack speed is really good to get feathers on the ground faster. With Kraken Slayer and Navori Flickerblade you get a pretty nasty combo that highly increases your DPS. It lacks upfront damage but it is better for extended fights and kiting melees.


Essence Reaver
Essence Reaver has accompanied Xayah for a long time, and it's a good item if you want a bit more burst damage. However, it is not that popular because you don’t really have a place for it in a DPS build (the current meta). This is an item for when you are playing around combos and quick ability rotations with your autos… but with Kraken+Navori build your focus is on autoing a lot to get your abilities on a shorter cooldown, so Phantom Dancer or even Rapid Firecannon work much better.


Rapid Firecannon
Rapid Firecannon has always been a decent choice, situationally. Xayah has rather short to average range for an ADC and this item can compensate for that a little bit. If you activate Deadly Plumage before autoing someone while energized you can use the extra movement speed from Deadly Plumage to help you catch up and run them down.


The Collector
The Collector is very situational and can be bad if not chosen wisely. Only take it if the enemy won't build armor and if you are snowballing. It has synergy with Bladecaller but it only works if you are going with a burst playstyle, like by taking Hail of Blades with an aggressive support like Pyke.








Lord Dominik's Regards
Ideal late game item if the enemy has champions that stack both Armor and HP. It is also a generally good item if your team has other strong AD champions, like Irelia, Graves, Viego, Kindred, or Yone - this is because enemies are more likely to build armor items, and Xayah has no hybrid damage.


Executioner's Calling
This is a must-have if the enemy builds a lot of healing and for some reason your own team is not building Grievous Wounds items. Must-have in laning phase against Yuumi, Soraka, Samira and Nilah if your support does not buy Oblivion Orb early or if your lane has no Ignite.

Mortal Reminder
Upgrading your Executioner's Calling into a Mortal Reminder in the late game is a really good choice if enemy has champions that Heal and that build Armor - so bruisers like Fiora, Irelia, Aatrox. It can be a decent choice for tanks like Dr. Mundo, Maokai and Zac if they are the only tanks and your team has a strong AP carry. If your team has more AD damage or you are against more than one beefy tank, sometimes it is best to get Lord Dominik's Regards and either hold on to a Executioner's Calling, or ask nicely for your team to get the anti-heal instead.






Bloodthirster
Bloodthirster will give you an extra layer of defense and offense in the late game. If you are ahead and the enemy doesn’t have anyone who can one-shot you, BT is a good purchase. It is not as good if you are not ahead or if the enemy has the potential to 100 to 0 you. It’s also generally bad if the enemy has high poke potential, since you will likely be below the 70% HP threshold a lot of the time, thus completely wasting the damage buff you would get from keeping high HP.


Guardian Angel
This is a good option if you are carrying the game and if you are positioning yourself well in teamfights. For this item to be worth it is important for you to not die all the time. It is very good to get this when your death in the late game could mean game over! .


Hexdrinker
If the enemy has a lot of AP damage or a fed AP carry like Evelynn, Syndra, Ekko or Akali Hexdrinker is often a really good mid-late game choice. You might get this really early if you are against strong AP champions in the bot lane as well. You can sit on it for a while and finish another item, or build Maw of Malmortius.

Maw of Malmortius
Ideally build this only after your core items. Good purchase if enemy AP carries are fed or if enemy has 2+ strong AP carries. It might save your life.


Quicksilver Sash
This is a good item when you are getting focused by a champion with strong CC that you cannot counter with Cleanse, like Mordekaiser and Malzahar. You can sit on it for a while before finishing it.

Mercurial Scimitar
Let’s say you bought a Quicksilver Sash because the enemy Mordekaiser was focusing you but you needed to finish another item, one with higher priority for your game - like Mortal Reminder (because you dealt no damage to Morde and he was wrecking your team). You finally manage to finish your Mortal Reminder and that Quicksilver Sash is still looking at you from your inventory - it is finally time to build a Mercurial Scimitar.








This section will cover the most basic things to perform well as an ADC - how to farm, wave management and tips on how to survive as a squishy glass cannon. Of course there will be a focus on Xayah but the tips here can help you with pretty much any other marksman.

Everything I am going to share I have picked up over time both from personal observations and from getting tips from high elo players!


1.
Farming
Tips for steady income
2.
Wave Management
Types, how to’s, pros & cons
3.
ADC Survival Guide
Survival guide to Summoner’s Rift











1. Use abilities on high HP minions or dying ones only
If you cast abilities on mid-low HP minions, you won’t be able to last hit all of them at once. It is best to use abilities on high HP minions if you need to thin the wave, or to get low HP minions that are already dying.

Be very patient and thoughtful with your autos, sometimes if you just wait a bit a mid HP minion will become low HP you will get the CS without trouble. By being impatient or thoughtlessly autoing the wave you make it easier for you to miss minions.

Spare your Deadly Plumage. If you need to push waves or catch CS, Double Daggers is often more than enough.




2. How to farm under tower
If Melee Minion is full health; it takes 2 tower shots + 1 auto attack to kill them.

If Caster Minion is full health; it takes 1 tower shot, and 2 autos if you are very low level, 1 auto if you are higher level or with items.

If your minions dealt damage to enemy minions under tower, use your abilities to get them into last hit HP range. You will have to practice this a bit.




3. Farming safely
Sometimes enemies will harass you when you go for cs. This can be deadly at times, so always pay attention to enemy and ADC movements to see if they are going to harass you. If you think they are, you can use your Double Daggers to farm the most dangerous minions since its range is higher than your auto range. This is also why being patient with your ability usage is crucial.




4. Farming mid-late game
As an ADC it is important to farm consistently. Around the time where the first tower falls you ideally want to go to the mid lane and farm there while your team is not doing anything important.

If your mid laner wants to stay mid, farm side lanes (top or bot) then rotate with the team to mid. If your tower is down, make sure the entrances to your jungle are warded. If you have no vision you have to stay closer to your tower.

If there is nothing to farm, or nothing to do, or it is too risky to walk up to minions, farm jungle camps your jungler is not going to take.











I feel it is difficult to explain wave management in text format so I will try to keep this short and simple as possible for your convenience.

There are three main types of wave management and each one has their uses and a way to accomplish: Fast Pushing, Slow Pushing and Freezing.






This is usually what low elo players do constantly, especially newer players. This is when you quickly kill all minions, which results in a thin wave that crashes under the enemy tower.




HOW TO FAST PUSH

Fast pushing is easy - you auto attack frequently and use your abilities to kill minions as fast as possible, ideally without losing CS.

WHEN TO FAST PUSH

Ideally you want to fast push when you want to quickly crash your wave on the enemy tower to recall, fall back and/or make the enemy laner lose cs.



ADVANTAGES

Fast pushing gives you more freedom to rotate to your team faster. It is also good if you need to fix your minion wave or retreat fast.

DISADVANTAGES

Fast pushing can actually create a freeze (which I will get into soon) if you don't push the wave all the way into enemy tower - so basically when you don’t push fast enough or if you push the wave at the wrong times. This can make you lose a lot of cs. When pushing in a hurry you also run the risk of missing most of your last hits.








Slow pushing is when you create a big minion wave that slowly pushes to the enemy tower.




HOW TO SLOW PUSH

You can create a slow push by keeping the enemy minion wave smaller than yours, but not killing them too quickly. You can achieve this by killing excess caster minions, since they deal more damage, and only last hitting melee minions. If the enemy allows this to happen you will have bought enough time to stack 2 minion waves. Once that is done you usually want to fast push to crash them or wait for another wave to stack and then crash.

WHEN TO SLOW PUSH

A slow push is a really good way to deny enemy CS if you can zone them from walking up. Make them patiently wait when they are alone in lane.

It is also ideal to slow push when you want a big minion wave to hit the enemy tower. This has multiple functions: facilitating tower dives, rotating to skirmishes, creating good recalls, harassing enemies under turret while they try to farm.



ADVANTAGES

Tower diving. Your minions will also aggro enemy champions once they hit you and you are close to your minions.

Taking stronger trades. If the enemy trades with you and your wave is bigger, the minions will deal a huge chunk of damage in the trade. In early levels this is especially important!

It is hard for the enemy to freeze a massive wave especially if you have the pushing power to kill the enemy minions and crash the wave.

You can zone the enemy away from cs when you have a bigger wave to back you up.

DISADVANTAGES

The main disadvantage is when you are away from your push. If the wave is slow pushing into the enemy tower and you cannot get close to it, your minions will kill the enemy minions too fast and deny you xp and gold. Likewise, enemies can use the advantages of slow pushing against you.








A freeze is when the wave is stuck and doesn't push to either one side or the other. It is a great defensive move and can be very bad for the enemy.

In laning phase, you ideally want the freeze to happen just outside of your own tower range so that it can be beneficial to you. Having a freeze happen in enemy territory is extremely dangerous for you and puts the enemy in a safe position.

Freezing requires a lot of practice and attention, so if you are still new to this, just start by trying to avoid freezes from happening and learning fast push & slow push. Once that's more settled on your mind try to practice creating and keeping freezes!



HOW TO FREEZE

Freezing is the hardest to get the hang of because it depends on the position the wave clashes and how healthy minions are.

To freeze the wave outside of your tower range you need to have around 3 or 4 healthy minions on the area of the closest bush to your tower. To keep the freeze you want to last hit minions, but if you see the freeze is turning into a slow push (into your tower) you will have to thin the wave by killing excess caster minions.

If the wave is becoming a slow push into enemy territory, just let it happen so that you can keep denying enemy gold and xp. The enemy will stop this from happening if they auto the wave.

To freeze the wave in the middle of the lane you need only to keep an equal amount of minions on both sides.

A freeze in enemy territory usually hapens when you try to fast push, but your wave clashes with the upcoming minion wave just outside enemy tower range. This type of freeze is good for the enemy as it leaves you vulnerable, and if you recall during such a freeze you will possibly lose an entire wave of gold and xp.



WHEN TO FREEZE
Maintain a freeze in your territory if you want to hold a more defensive position in lane, which you might want if you have Flash down, if enemy jungler is nearby, or if the enemy has a very aggressive engage lane, like Leona + Tristana.

A freeze in the middle of the lane is very good if you have an engage or hook support, like Rakan or Blitzcrank, as it gives them the most space to find all-in opportunities.

A freeze in enemy territory is very dangerous and is best avoided if enemy can somehow engage on you or gank you.

BREAKING A FREEZE
To break a freeze in middle or enemy territory you need to get close and fast push. If that's too dangerous, ask your jungler for help. If the enemy fights it's a 3v2 in a best case scenario.

To break the freeze close to your tower you can just let the enemy wave stack and crash or you can thin it and begin a slow push towards the enemy tower.



ADVANTAGES
Freezing allows you to zone the enemy away from cs, set up for ganks (if done in your territory) and keep you protected from ganks. If you manage to freeze the wave in the middle of the lane you give more room for your support to engage or catch the enemy from the bushes or the alcove. Keep in mind the enemy support could do the same.

DISADVANTAGES
A poorly positioned freeze makes you very vulnerable to ganks, engages, and can make you lose a ton of CS and XP. Freezing defensively can also make ganking difficult for your jungler (if there are too many minions) and it can make it harder for you to rotate to river skirmishes. In other words, defensive freezes sometimes mean you hold less lane priority.










Golden tip #1: Free Freezes
If the enemy fast pushes to recall, watch to see if their wave is going to crash. If you or your support can hold 3-5 minions and the enemy recalls you will naturally create a freeze on your side and you can safely recall as you will only lose about 2-3 minions at most while the enemy will lose an entire wave. If you do it correctly the wave will not crash on your tower. Abuse this to get level leads especially in lower elo!!! If you just pay attention you will see enemies often giving you free opportunities to freeze.



Golden tip #2: Freezing after losing turret
This goes beyond laning phase. If your team is playing the neutral game and there are no objectives to contest, seek to keep a freeze on your side of the map once your tower is down. This is especially good if you are behind and needing to catch up on cs and xp. Many people just fast push at this point, but it is not always the best choice as if you have a frozen wave deep into your territory the enemy team will either
1: lose a ton of cs and xp
2: go there to stop the freeze (which puts them in perfect spot to get collapsed on)



Golden tip #3: Cheater recall
A cheater recall is basically when you create an early slow push with a cannon wave, crash it and instantly recall. This allows you to get an item advantage in early levels as the enemy will have to stay to farm under tower and then crash their wave on your tower. If they don't do this they will have to take a bad recall... and while they are forced to choose the lesser evil, you can seek to punish them using your item lead.
To have a cheater recall you need to get lane prio (ideally you want jungler to start top or leashless) and let the wave slow push into enemy tower in a way the third minion wave will crash and you can recall. You need a cannon wave to crash because this will give you more time to get back to lane and not lose cs & xp.



Golden tip #4: Instant level advantage
For this you need your jungler to start top/leashless and the enemy bot lane to leash.
Sit in the bush closest to the enemy tower, and when minions arrive, exit the bush and hold the wave there until your minions catch up.
What happens is that because the wave did not meet in the middle, your minions will focus on an enemy minion and kill it faster. So when enemy laners return, they will lose a melee and thus lose their level 2 spike. Get your level 2 earlier and pressure them!













It is common knowledge that Summoner's Rift is a very perilous place to the average ADC player. If you are not careful, no matter how fed you are you can still get solo killed by 0/10 Yasuo OTP player. Even the enemy enchanter support can solo kill you under the right circumstances (I’m not joking).

This is why this section of the guide exists. Hopefully you will be able to last longer following some of these tips!




KNOW YOUR LIMITS


You can only do so much when you have no summoner spells, when you have had a stressful day at work/school and you can't move your fingers because it’s too chilly outside. On top of that you could be playing against your personal counter - maybe you just can't play against Vayne with any champion because she tilts the hell out of you and you end up losing the game regardless of what you do.

It's important to be realistic and understand your limits as a player - whether you are against a champion you cannot stand, how much BS you can take before tilting and running it down, how many buttons you can press at once to survive a teamfight, how aware you are of your cooldowns. Play safe/cool when you know you are at a personal disadvantage.




KNOW YOUR CHAMPION’S LIMITS


I have repeatedly mentioned in this guide how you should play safe when your Featherstorm and Bladecaller are on cooldown as Xayah. You can only do so much without them - so pay attention to your champion's limits. Don't go to a teamfight or position aggressively when you don't have the tools to defend yourself.

You can be 10/1 and still lose to the average assassin player if your self peel is down and you are surrounded by 3 enemies.



RECOGNIZE BIGGEST THREATS


This is both champions as a whole and specific champion abilities. Malphite may not be a huge threat himself, but his Unstoppable Force is, so you want to be ready to react accordingly when his R is up. If you know you can't outplay a Zed then track him on the map and keep your distance. On champion select, instead of waiting for the game to start, stop and think about what abilities in the game can kill you and plan how you can avoid getting hit by them.





Example...


The enemy team is: Malphite top, Yasuo mid, Warwick jungle, Ezreal and Soraka in the bot lane.






STEP 1: LIST WHAT CAN KILL YOU IN A SKIRMISH


Malphite’s R + Yasuo’s R combo


Yasuo Steel Tempest (Q) + Last Breath (R)


Ezreal combo + R (trueshot barrage)


Soraka’s Equinox (E)


Warwick’s Infinite Duress (R)




STEP 2: LIST HOW YOU CAN SURVIVE THESE THREATS



Bring Exhaust for Warwick and Yasuo.
Bring Heal to not die from Ezreal combo.
Use Flash to dodge Warwick R, Yasuo Q, Ezreal R, Malphite R.
Build Immortal Shieldbow if you think you can't use Flash in time to dodge abilities (this goes back to knowing your limitations).
Time your Featherstorm to avoid all the listed abilities that can kill you.
Use your Bladecaller well to kite Yasuo and Warwick.
Build] Quicksilver Sash to cleanse Warwick R (not the best option since it won't be very useful against the rest of the team).


STEP 3: ADAPT TO YOUR GAME



Maybe Warwick and Ezreal are not fed but Yasuo is. What do you do? Well then your priority should be holding your Featherstorm, Exhaust and Flash to dodge Malphite R and Yasuo Q+R. You can also avoid being in the same lane as Yasuo and keep an extra eye out for him during teamfights. Maybe build a Mortal Reminder for Soraka and Warwick.

Go into the game with a game plan on how you will survive each and every threat.






POSITION WELL IN TEAMFIGHTS


Xayah is a backline carry which means you should be positioning fairly back in teamfights. You don't want to be the one going into fog of war to ward, or the frontliner, or the backline diver. Play the game around getting picks or waiting for the enemy team to engage on you.

If you play around getting picks, stay out of sight and just behind your support or team’s main engager so that you can quickly follow up their catch.

If you play around the enemy team engaging on you, stay back to avoid the initial engage and use your self peel tools to protect yourself from enemy divers/assassins. If there are none, you still want to avoid enemy engage and focus on killing the closest target to you or the enemy carry if they are mispositioned.




POSITION WELL ON THE MAP


Stay away from highest threat enemy champions if you are alone (usually the assassin or fed bruisers, but it can also be mages or enemy AD carry). Don't sit alone in lane and avoid pushing too far into enemy territory without vision. Be in position to rotate to baron/drake skirmishes.




USE BLUE WARDS, VISION PLANTS AND CONTROL WARDS


ADCs have to ward too. Be mindful of your wards since you don't have many - every time you want to stick to one side of the map, use vision control to make sure you are not getting flanked. Getting flanked is especially bad on Xayah since she often relies on positioning to deal damage!




GOOD RECALL TIMING AND GREEDING


If you are sitting on a lot of gold and your team is not around, recall. You are usually a key member of the team to take objectives so it's important you are there for your team when they need you - sometimes staying to push one extra wave or take a few jungle camps will cost you a baron because you had a late recall. Sometimes you will die for being too greedy!

Try to have your recall aligned with your support's in the early game. Recall when you have a lot of gold, when you need full mana/hp and when the enemy gives you an opening to do so (when you are not getting pressured/ when they are not looking to make plays on the map). Good recall timing is extremely important so that you don't fall behind and so you are not alone/mispositioned.











Here we will be going in-depth on how to optimize Xayah's damage through her abilities. Xayah’s kit is simple to understand, but it’s also deceptively easy to misuse. To play her well you need to pay attention to how you use your abilities and always be aware of your cooldowns and positioning.

Do keep in mind that sometimes the optimal is not always feasible - meaning that to score kills or outplay your opponent you may need to go against what is “optimal” for her Passive usage for example.

And especially players new to Xayah or who are not very advanced in their mechanics will struggle to use her abilities well all the time. This is FINE - take your time, practice, and have fun first and foremost. You don't need to play perfectly in order to have fun.









CLEAN CUTS
After using an ability, Xayah's next basic attacks will hit all targets along their path with reduced damage. At her maximum attack range, a Feather will be left in the ground. Xayah can store up to 5 empowered attacks.

Lover's Leap: If either Xayah or Rakan is recalling, the other may move nearby and activate their own recall to join them. Both reach base at the time of which the initiator's recall ends.




Each time you use an ability, you will get 3 out of 5 feathers ready to be set up, which means that for optimal usage you want to be auto attacking between abilities.

If you use Double Daggers, auto attack before using Deadly Plumage or Bladecaller. You will then get 5 feathers stacked, which means that to get as many feathers on the ground as you can, you will have to auto 3 times before using an ability again.

If you instead Q+W+aa, because you did not auto between abilities, you will have lost 1 feather. Likewise, if you already have 5 feathers stacked and use an ability, you will lose 3 extra feathers.

This is not optimal for every situation, but in teamfights you want to have as many feathers on the ground as possible.

Picking Xayah into cc heavy teams will further enable you as you will not need to root for cc chain, using it instead to deal more burst damage.



PLAYING WITH RAKAN


When it comes to your synergy with Rakan, if he is in danger try to get close to him so that he can use his extended Battle Dance range to run away. You can do this through walls too.

When shoving a wave or greeding for platings, ask Rakan to back while you finish off minions so that you can safely and quickly recall. Careful not to wait for too long and lose your recall.
















DOUBLE DAGGERS
ACTIVE: Xayah throws two damaging daggers that also drop 2 Feathers she can recall.

Targets hit after the first take less damage.



This ability can be used in a multitude of ways.


1. Its range is longer than your autos, so you can Q to farm minions safely and to poke the enemy ADC, especially if they have about the same range as you. If you want to poke low HP enemies use Q+E to chunk them harder. You can even score a few kills like that.

2. Your Double Daggers feathers will deal more damage to the first enemy they hit, or in other words, if it doesn't go through the minion wave.

3. In 1x1, especially against mobile champions, you will want to hold on to your Q until you see a good opportunity to root - usually after they have used their dash.

4. Double Daggers immediately sets up feathers for you, which means that it can be used to catch enemies off guard when you start your trades with Deadly Plumage.

5. You can Q to set up feathers on the ground, and when the enemy approaches you can catch them off guard by using aa+E on them. You can also use your Q and autos to zone the enemy off your wave and make them lose cs.



PLAYING WITH YOUR SUPPORT


If your support has any form of CC, such as a Morgana, Lux, Leona, Blitzcrank or Thresh,you should hold on to your Q unless you really need to push the wave or they miss their CC.]

Once your support lands their CC, immediately Q+aa+E to chain CC them, but only all in if you can do so without getting killed. If your support misses their CC, you can use Q to wave clear or poke.

If your support's engage is bad and dangerous for you to follow up, just use the Q+aa+E combo to chunk the enemy. Don't greed for this combo if it's dangerous for you to approach, you can still poke the enemy just with your Q+E combo.














DEADLY PLUMAGE
Xayah creates a storm of blades that increase her Attack Speed and damage while also granting her Move Speed if she attacks a champion.

If Rakan is nearby, he will also gain Deadly Plumage.



This is her most reliable form of DPS if you build crit, so avoid using it on the minion wave unless you want to hard shove and recall or take towers. It has a long cooldown and costs a lot of mana at level 1. Hold this ability to take favorable trades and all-ins.


1. You can use it to more quickly take objectives (turrets, drake, baron), but avoid fights while it's on cooldown.

2. Start trades with W to out-DPS the enemy ADC. You can take this ability level 1 if you have Rakan or another strong level 1 support to force early trades and gain level 2 priority, but in most cases you will want to take this at level 3.

3. Use Deadly Plumage to kite away from bruisers and tanks looking to get on top of you.

4. You can also use this ability to chase, and use it to close the gap between you and long range champions when paired with Rapid Firecannon, as it gives movement speed.


Having more attack speed makes this ability more efficient, as you will be able to auto more times and more quickly set up feathers. It is really strong in the early game so use it sparingly.



PLAYING WITH RAKAN


When you auto a champion, Rakan will gain the same effect as you, which helps him. This makes your trading much more powerful.

And just activating your W will give him increased AS, allowing you both to take turrets and push waves much faster when you are together. Use this to your advantage when sieging turrets.














BLADECALLER
Xayah calls back all her dropped Feathers dealing damage and rooting enemies. Feathers deal more damage based on her crit chance. Minions take 50% damage.

Enemies take 100−55% damage from a feather (depending on feathers hit) going to a maximum of 9 feathers and capped at 55% damage. Enemies struck by at least 3 Feathers are rooted.



This is the ability that will require the most patience of you and one of the biggest things separating a good Xayah from a bad Xayah. Her entire kit is based around this ability, so using it optimally is crucial to having success with this champion.

When using Bladecaller for damage, ideally you want to have as many feathers on the ground as possible and position accordingly. You should start trades with Deadly Plumage and autos, use Double Daggers, auto a few more times if possible and E to root/kill them.

To use E effectively you should only use it if more than 2 feathers hit the enemy. Q+E is only worth it for poking or killing low HP targets.

In situations where you need to lock down your enemy, you can use Q+aa+E to hold them and then burst them with Deadly Plumage. In most situations you will be tempted to do this, but always make sure to see if you really need the root or if you will need the Bladecaller damage to finish them off later.


TIPS TO MASTER THIS ABILITY


1. Always be very patient in teamfights with your E. Most of the time you will not need a 3 feathers root, and will end up missing having your E if you have to use your Featherstorm defensively or when you have a lot of feathers on the ground.

2. In early laning phase, be mindful of using your E to farm. You will have more lane pressure by using your feathers to zone the enemy, using E to catch them off guard or follow up your support's engage. In the late game, when your E is on a lower cooldown, you can freely use it to shove waves and group with your team.

3. When your Bladecaller is down, it is often best to play more careful because you will not have part of your damage and your peel.

4. E requires you to position well, but even then enemies can dash away or Flash. You can E+ Flash to quickly reposition in such cases.

5. Also keep in mind that the closer you are to your enemies, the easier it is for you to root them and deal more damage.



YOU HAVE A BUILT-IN SMITE

Your stacked Bladecaller deals a huge chunk of damage against drake and baron. To secure objectives for your team, especially when your jungler doesn't have Smite up, stack as many feathers as you can and wait for the drake/baron to sit at a lower HP, then E. In the late game, if you have Navori Flickerblade, you can stack many more feathers and out-smite junglers since your E can do over 1k damage if you are fed.













FEATHERSTORM
Xayah leaps into the air, becoming briefly untargetable but still able to move.

After a short delay, she unleashes a volley of feather-blades forward in a cone, dealing damage to all enemies struck and leaving a line of 5 Feathers at the end of Featherstorm's maximum range, which she can recall.



This is the ability most people use wrong after her E.

On its own, Featherstorm is okay. It deals decent damage, but the real reason why it is a threatening Ultimate is because of your E. When paired with Bladecaller, it has the potential to deal tons of damage, if all your feathers hit. In most cases though, you will want to use it as a defensive tool because you get untargetability while casting it.

To make full use of your ultimate you need to have your E up. Both when using it offensively and defensively, you ideally want to not have used your E just before R. This is where many new Xayah players fail to turn the fight around for their team.

Another common mistake many new Xayah players make is using your Featherstorm aggressively at the wrong times. Say, for example, the enemy is trying to run away and you ult to try to quickly catch them. Then either you don't hit your 3 feathers because they were too far from you, or they Flash away, turn on you, or you just don't do enough damage to kill them.



TIPS FOR THIS ABILITY


1. Keep in mind that every time you lose your ult, you are very vulnerable. It is ideal to play safe until your R is up at all stages of the game. Taking Ultimate Hunter will significantly help you lower the cooldown of your R.

2. If you get caught in a tight space, such as the jungle, you can R to try to avoid the enemy engage, and zone them from following you.

3. You can use Featherstorm to finish off low HP enemies in lane, if they have already used their Flash or dash.

4. You can also use your R aggressively in lane if you have a support that can lock down enemies for a long time, such as a Leona, Rell, Rakan or Galio.



In a teamfight, look to use your Featherstorm to dodge important damage or the enemy engage. Examples of this could be Malphite R, Miss Fortune R, Lux R, Katarina R, Maokai R, Fizz R, Yone R, Rell W+R. After dodging the damage/engage, use your autos and abilities to set up more feathers, and use E to deal a huge chunk of damage.

You can also use R when your team is first to engage, or when the enemy uses their dangerous abilities on a teammate instead of you. You can either kill them while they try to kill your teammates, or peel for your teammates by using E to give them time to run away.












Xayah doesn't have a lot of flashy mechanics - what makes her (relatively) mechanically challenging is having good positioning in order to use her Bladecaller well, but I figured it would be good to have a section to summarize some of her most important mechanics.

I made a video demonstrating some combos and I have also written everything down for reference. However, it does mention and use Galeforce, which has been deleted from the game. All combos using it can still be done the same way by using Flash! There’s also mention of Prowler's Claw, also deleted.

I really want to update this video, but since I’m currently running LoL in a potato-ish PC I haven’t been able to record anything in high quality. When I get to solve this issue I’ll update it.






Click to See Combos






Xayah is a close combat ADC - she has a shorter range and benefits from enemies being close to her thanks to how her E works. She also has high dps on her W and burst damage on E, which makes her an All-in and Trade ADC. She has a bit of poke on her Q, but it's mostly important during laning phase, and it's not really as strong as other ADCs in that department.

She does amazingly well with teams that have the same playstyle as her - teams that either want to all-in or fight in skirmishes. She can also make picks in the jungle with the help of her teammates.








The most reliable way to get a lead from level one is to push for level 1 first, poke the enemy ADC with your Bladecaller whenever possible and watch out for good trades with your support. If it is too risky to push level one, just concede prio and wait for level 3 to play more aggressively.


WHEN PLAYING INTO GOOD MATCHUPS


If you have an aggressive support in the early game, you will want to position more aggressively and be ready to make picks whenever the enemy positions poorly. With engage or hook supports you will want to stand close to them, usually parallel to their positioning in order to match their aggression and respond in time. Keep your wave frozen in the middle of the lane to give room for your support to engage, but let the wave push into you if you don't have vision in the river and bushes.

If you score a kill in the early game do your best to maintain your lead. Don't get overconfident. Play around your strengths and don't throw your lead. Use your R defensively especially in the early game because you will be very vulnerable without it.


PLAYING WITH RAKAN


When playing with Rakan you can position more aggressively to bait the enemy into attacking you, for Rakan to follow up with his extended E range and W. Just make sure you and him are on the same page before doing this, or you might get yourself killed. This also works best with other low range bot lanes. You shouldn't do this against a long range and CC bot lane like Caitlyn + Lux.





WHEN PLAYING INTO BAD MATCHUPS


In Hard or Passive lanes your main priority should be farming and scaling. Focus on farming and don't force plays if you don't have a lead or if the enemy lane has more kill pressure than you. Try not to die as to not give the enemy a bigger lead. Most of the time you should focus on wave management, focusing on macro gameplay and prioritizing keeping a steady gold and xp income.

In a passive lane, dragon rotations can be very risky, and it is often here where players will mess up their lanes.

Avoid rotating to dragon if your wave has not fully crashed into the enemy tower, and don't over commit to a fight. Don't thoughtlessly rotate without lane prio. Early drakes are not that big of a deal, by the mid game you can focus more on helping your teammates with dragons as you will either have destroyed the enemy tower or lost yours.








Mid game generally starts when the first tower falls. It is at this point where you have to be especially careful if your lane is going even, as the enemy mid or top laners will try to make plays on your lane. Your team will also start requiring your help to get drake, herald or baron.


PLAYING OFF YOUR LEADS



If you are ahead, focus on pressuring the enemy, farming, getting towers and pushing your lead further. Ping your jungler or mid to make plays bot and get yourself further ahead. Once you take bot tower, start rotating with your support to take more towers/objectives and make picks around the map to put yourself further ahead and put enemy solo laners behind.

By "making picks" I mean: you can ambush a lonely enemy or the enemy happens to misposition and your team can collapse without inting. Don't get overconfident as the enemy solo laners might be stronger than the bot laners and still kill you.



IF YOU ARE BEHIND…


If you are behind, it is especially important focus on farming and avoid making rotations unless it is absolutely necessary.

Before making any plays or rotating you will want to shove any lane you are farming, be it bot, mid or top. It is at this stage of the game where many players throw their lead - they stop farming and rotate to every single jungle skirmish.

A good rule of thumb for choosing when to rotate with your team or not is: is there something worth fighting for, and what do I lose for this play?

If your team can get something out of a skirmish, like drake, baron, or tower, then you can look to shove the wave into enemy territory and rotate. If your team is outnumbered, you probably shouldn't go as it is a losing fight. Pay attention at all times to see if enemies are missing - if they are, assume they are rotating or coming for you.



KEEPING A STEADY GOLD INCOME



To get the most out of the mid game as an ADC, solo farm whenever you don't have to be with your team. If you think your team will get caught, spam ping them off, or farm as quickly as possible for good rotation or to allow a disengage. And don't share farm with solo laners and jungler.

At this point in the game you should start seeing yourself rising to power, but keep in mind that unless you are absolutely stomping the game, you are still not at your strongest point. Your focus is to stay ahead and keep the enemy chunked with good rotations and good fights. If you are behind, your priority is to get strong enough to be useful to your team.

Also avoid ARAMing mid. If either your team or the enemy team ARAMs but no real fights are breaking out, farm jungle or side lane. Sharing xp with 2+ people will do nothing to set yourself further ahead.










This is where you should already have your core items. Most of the time you will keep the same playstyle as in the mid game - pressuring enemies if you are ahead, farming waves, getting gold and getting stronger to contest objectives or force plays. At this stage it is very important that you do not die, as spawn timers will skyrocket and your team will be at a great disadvantage if outnumbered and without your damage.

This also means making picks is more valuable as you get more time to take Baron and towers! When the enemy has a number disadvantage, always look to see if you and your team can take something for free.

You should have plenty of time and pushing power to always be there for your team, but PLAY SAFE when Featherstorm and Flash are down.

Also look to always be on the same side of the map as the objectives your teams want to contest - Don't split push bot if baron is up, don't be top when soul is about to spawn. Let the top laners be on the opposite side of the map, as they usually run Teleport.

This is the point of the game where you are usually the main carry. You will deal the most damage to towers and monsters, and in teamfights you should also do a lot of damage as long as you are positioning and building properly.

Your priority is to stay alive to carry your team. Don't wander around on your own.







In this section I will go into Xayah's synergies - her best and worst supports, as well as team synergies and overall class synergy. First I go into overall synergy with support types (enchanter, hook, engage, mage), then I go into each one of the usual supports, then lastly I go into class synergy for analyzing team comps and dealing with the occasional troll/off meta support.

If you have questions about a specific champion that is not included here just let me know in the comments and I'll see what I can do!

Champions are in alphabetical order.




SUPPORT SYNERGIES IN A NUTSHELL


TANK SUPPORTS
In lane Xayah she has great synergy with supports like Rell, Leona and Nautilus because they are all-in champions with tons of CC to help you land your E. If you have these more aggressive supports you should look to make plays and snowball if possible.


CATCHER SUPPORTS
Catcher supports like Pyke, Blitzcrank, Thresh and Rakan are great because they snowball harder, can chain CC and make picks just as easily as tank supports. They are the best to snowball lane. Some, like Rakan and Thresh have great disengage and peel for you as well. However, they are overall less durable than tanks.


ENCHANTER SUPPORTS
Xayah can do fine with enchanters like Lulu and Nami (who focus on trades) if played correctly. If you have kill threat try to snowball, if not just farm and scale that you will be fine.

With poke enchanters like Janna, Yuumi and Soraka Xayah does the most poorly, so in the end it depends more on support matchup and skill level. If you get a poke support it is usually best to try to match their poke if you can, but focus on scaling rather than snowballing lane.


MAGE SUPPORTS
With mages like Xerath, Lux and Zyra, Xayah can do well because of their CC, however, depending on support matchup, it will be bad for her as she might not be able to get close without getting all-ined or taking a bad trade. If it is a good matchup where you have a lot of kill threat try to snowball, otherwise focus on farming and scaling.







ALISTAR - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Alistar is a bit of a tricky support for Xayah because while he has great engage and Xayah loves that, he has a really bad thing for Xayah that is a displacement interaction. If the Alistar is not good or if you are not on the same page, he can get champions OUT of your feathers. Plus, his engage goes very far, if you are not close enough you will miss the timing of your chain CC with E.

To play with Alistar either you need to catch someone and then he CCs them, or you have to play with your W before using Q, R and E (because again, displacement interaction). On most engage supports you want to get your Q out as soon as they catch someone, but if you are not coordinated with your Alistar, you will want to hold your Q most of the time in case Alistar throws them at a random direction.

You want to have your wave around the middle of the lane and have a slight minion advantage so that you have room to all-in the enemy safely (big enemy wave=more minions focusing you on fight).




BARD - DECENT SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Bard has great trading, peel and okay CC. There are better supports for Xayah surely, but he can do a great job if he is good. If he CCs someone you can immediately go for Q+aa+E combo to chain CC, then run enemies down with W.

You can also play solely off trades with W when bard gets to trade with his meeps.

Thanks to his portals and CC it is pretty easy to roam with him, disengage and make picks, which makes life easier for you. So play around him for easy picks throughout the game.

His R is a bit tricky though. You can tower dive with him and then use your own R to finish off enemies and get rid of tower aggro, you can R before or after his R to disengage from a sticky situation (if you R you don't get hit by stasis). You can time your R to go out right about the enemy leaves stasis, which guarantees you land all your feathers, but you need to train this a lot to make it work at its best.

Big enemy waves can actually be a good thing with Bard because he can hit stuns on champions through enemy minions. He can also harass enemies under tower. With a wave in the middle Bard can harass and zone enemies off wave, which eventually creates a slow push to you, which eventually leads to perfect tower dive setup.




BLITZCRANK - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Laning with a Blitzcrank is basically a walk in the park for Xayah. If he catches anyone you get your full combo off for free. Hold your Q for his hook or go Hail of Blades for better burst combo with your W. Mid-Late game you also play off catching mispositioned enemies with Blitz, so ideally you want to have vision control and play in fog of war. If your team doesn't have good engage you can go full burst Xayah and play only with Blitz to snowball and carry.

Ban Ezreal and/or Morgana to win lane. Samira, Vayne, Lucian and Tristana are also good bans because they have mobility or ways to counter Blitz hook.

Blitz does well into enchanters. If enemy picks tank like Nautilus or Leona and Blitz pulls them, you have to be ready to sidestep their engage. If they turn on you Blitz can't do anything other than bodyblock and especially if enemy has a Lucian or Tristana they easily kill you with an aggressive support.

For Blitz you want to always have a minion advantage so that Blitz has more chances of landing his hook on a champion. He is very scary close to enemy towers so try to build a huge wave and crash it and harass enemy under tower. Even if enemy plays back, Blitz should have Hexflash to make plays from bush.




BRAND - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
As with most other mage supports, Brand and Xayah can be an especially lethal lane, but that is only because Brand can basically solo kill the enemy ADC. You don't have great synergy - Brand wants to poke and hit his full combo on a lot of enemies. Xayah wants people to be locked down, and while Brand does offer CC, it is not very reliable as it is a skillshot with conditions.

If Brand is into good matchup you can most of the time just sit back and wait for him to carry your lane for you (just kidding, but not much). Use his pressure to get farm and tower plating lead. In teamfights you can use your R to self peel and if it is not needed you can use it to finish off low health enemies from Brand's R.

Late game you play for the teamfights and bursting enemies. Keep in mind though, that Brand offers you basically no peeling, so if the enemy has a lot of divers or burst you might have to go Immortal Shieldbow, as well as use your abilities more carefully. Also keep in mind that if your Brand is fed he himself might get focused and you can profit off that (you peel him with your CC/Burst/Exhaust/Heal and kill enemy diver).

Consider taking Exhaust for your self peel.




BRAUM - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
If you have a Braum support thank the LoL gods for him not being in the enemy team. Braum is not the best support to offer a good engage like a Leona or Rakan can, but he makes it up with peel. Braum has excellent peel and he basically counters the lane bullies that tend to harass Xayah in lane (Caitlyn, Miss Fortune, Ezreal, Lucian).

With his slows and passive you can easily run the enemy down and win trades easily. If trading is too risky you can go full poke and play passive, and if you want to all-in with Braum you can do so as well. In teamfights your ultimates and kits combo really nicely because Braum can keep enemies slowed for you to hit your stuff.

The main issue with Braum is that he is rather situational, he doesn't have the most reliable engage and it is hard to find good Braum players. It can take some time to get used to playing with him. But you can definitely have pressure in lane.




GALIO - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Galio’s engage can keep enemies still for long enough for you to ditch your whole combo. And because of his taunt, he can make sure the enemy hits him and not you. Basically play around him as you would with any engage support.

Galio is a good roamer, but the best part is that if you can count on him, you can play aggressive and bait the enemy. They think you are alone and helpless, but Galio can ult you, and you can R for self peel while his ult is channeling. Basically the same kind of bait you can do with a Rakan.

Mid-late game Galio can be a frontliner to set engages for you or they can stand close to you to protect you from divers. He usually does well into Yasuo, Yone, Katarina and Akali.

Ban Ezreal/Morgana/Vayne if you have Galio support. Vayne will make your Galio feel sad and miserable, Ezreal will just E away from his engage and kite him to death.




JANNA - BAD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
A good Janna will want to poke during the laning phase. Other than that she is more centered around disengage. She can be a nuisance to the enemy but playing around her can be difficult as she mostly focus on peeling for you and not necessarily empowering you like Lulu, Nami or Renata. Xayah has average damage early on, other ADCs can do better with Janna when they have more damage that is reliable.

Following up on Janna hurricane can be done, but it can be difficult because of its really long range. If you have a Janna support I recommend you play around poke or favorable trades with her instead of trying to all-in from the start.

Also bear in mind her R can completely ruin enemy positioning for your feathers.




KARMA - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Yet another enchanter who feels kinda bad for Xayah. Karma is a lane bully who provides utility but if not played well can feel lacking. You win lane by taking good trades and poking.

Her root is hard to land, especially if the enemy has mobility to run away from her. If she roots someone you can probably kill, but don't go too far if you are getting focused.

The good thing about Karma is her speed. You can trade with your W if you see the enemy laner kind of isolated and then run back or chase them down with Karma shield.




LEONA - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Leona is the typical dream engage support for Xayah. She not only has amazing CC and engage, but she also gives you damage on her passive (when she hits an ability on an enemy she marks them, and when you attack them it deals magic damage).

With Leona you pretty much want to play for all-ins. Avoid getting poked and work on having a minion advantage in lane. Then Leona can try to engage, and if the enemy plays safe, you can try to bait them by trading with enemy ADC or support.

Leona has more kill pressure in lane if she takes Ignite, so consider taking Exhaust for her when needed. If you think you can't use it well, Heal will still make a difference in keeping Leona alive. You can also use Exhaust if enemy Cleanses Leona stun, to slow them down.

You never want your lane to be frozen close to the enemy tower because then Leona can't engage. Build a big wave and after 6 you can crash it and tower dive the enemy (it's really easy with Leona and your R).

Throughout the game Leona will probably be the main engager. If the enemy has divers you should hold your R for them, because Leona will probably not be close enough to save you. If she is close or if the enemy has no good divers, you can make plays with Leona using your R together with hers to destroy teamfights. As with any other engage supports you can also play off picks in fog of war or cheese in bushes quite easily.




LULU - DECENT SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Lulu is great at empowering hypercarries and peeling for them, so if you have a Lulu I suggest you play for a more hypercarry playstyle. Your W will hurt A LOT even in laning phase while you have her E on you.

With Lulu you definitely want to poke with her when you can, and trade when you can. That is how you win your lane.

In all-ins and teamfights ideally you want to use your R to avoid any form of meaningful CC instead of waiting for Lulu R. That is because if you get CC'ed you can get chain CC'ed and bursted, and not even Lulu might save you from that. If you use R you will set your E up, avoid CC and deal damage. Lulu R will come in clutch when you are low, so your R should be used to preserve your health.

Play close to her and respect her cooldowns before making plays.




LUX - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Lux is pretty much the same as any other mage support - you have to play around their poke and pick offs. She can offer you some peel in fights with her shield but it is not very reliable.

If she lands her Q you can try to chain CC, however, beware that her range is much longer than yours - she can use her full combo from afar, but you cannot. Do not walk up to trade if you have to go too far and risk getting focused down by both enemy laners.

Throughout the game you can play around her by making picks around the map with your burst.

One final thing to keep in mind is that many Lux players focus more on being the carry then peeling for you. Because of that, consider taking a more reliable and selfish summoner spell for yourself like Exhaust or Cleanse if they are better than Heal for your game.




MILIO - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Milio is a decent peel in general – his Ultra Mega Fire Kick disengage with Breath of Life make his peeling really valuable when you are fighting for your life, trying to not get caught and trying to kite.

However, there’s not much else he can do for you. You are already pretty safe, there are supports who are better at enabling you. I find Milio to work the best with hypercarries. His range increase is not as good on you as it is on a champion like Caitlyn or Jinx.

Similarly to a Lulu, you’ll generally want to stay close to him. In lane you should look to trade and poke when possible




MORGANA - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Playing around Morgana is pretty simple - you chain CC enemy if you can, if you can't then you poke. You can bait enemies into trading with you while Morgana has her shield up. With her R she can bait enemies and set you up nicely.

The issue with Morgana is that she is not as reliable as an engage support and she is a very situational pick. She has good long range CC, but as you might have seen me mention with other supports, it can be dangerous to walk up. It is however safer than with a Lux, considering Morgana black shield is so good against a lot of stuff.

She is decent at countering CC, especially nasty ones like Leona CC, making you safer, but at the same time depending on the game and how good Morgana is she can be quite useless and it will be hard to play around her. Not bad synergy, but not the best either.




NAMI - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Nami is one of the top enchanters I consider to be best with Xayah. However, like the others, you both need to be on the same page and if Nami is bad it will be harder to play around her.

With Nami you want to be looking for trades with your W + her E. If the enemy misses damage or skillshot ability, you can use Nami E speed to run up, trade, slow, and use your W to keep running enemy down. If you have her E on you, you can also slow enemy with Q and possibly walk up to trade or land your E.

If enemy bot lane has no engage support you can ask her to trade with you, though a good Nami will seek to do that on her own and you can easily follow up.

If the enemy has an engage support you should use her speed to avoid engages and punish enemy engager for missing their CC if you can. A Nautilus for example, might miss his hook, not be in range to auto, so you and Nami have a window to punish him before his abilities are back up. After 6 though you should always be aware of Leona and Nautilus R because they can get you both even if they miss their hook and Nami can only hold them for so long.

Stay close to Nami, you two have similar range. If Nami lands a bubble you can easily chain CC and burst enemy laner especially if they are squishy. When Nami lands R, you actually do not have a lot of time to hit your R, so ideally your Nami should R+Q to give you enough time. Alternatively, if you think Nami R will hit the enemy 100% and they are close enough, you can R right after her.

Nami R is also a great disengaging tool, if you get jumped on you can R and then Nami R will give you more time to run away.



NAUTILUS - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Nautilus is pretty straightforward and easy to play around. If he lands his hook you go all in. After 6 you have a nasty combo. Play around vision to cheese enemy and roam with him with your lane prio if you feel like it.

If you don't get lane prio you and him can gank your own lane from the river if the enemy is pushing into your tower, it is much easier for Nautilus to hit his stuff coming from the river if enemy minions are under your tower.

He is also pretty easy to set up dives with because of his R with yours, as well as his tankiness.

Mid-late game Nautilus might be the main engager. Stay close enough to be in range to combo with him, but use your R for self peel. If you are the one getting engages stay close to him so that he can CC enemy diver to peel for you.




PYKE - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Pyke and Xayah can be a really nasty lane especially against squishy champions. With Pyke I found burst-focused builds to work really well.

Stand behind Pyke and it will be easy to chain CC enemies. He deals a lot of damage so the enemy should be pretty much dead. After 6 you can force trades with your R for self peel and Pyke can finish enemies off with his own Ultimate, but it is better if you can bait enemy flash or mobility before that to guarantee kill.

Ban Ezreal or Morgana as they can make it hard for Pyke to land hooks and snowball. Keep lane in the middle with a slight minion advantage to you or fully under enemy tower to pressure/zone the enemy and make it easier for Pyke to land hooks.

Mid-late game you ideally want to make picks with Pyke from fog of war. Pyke players tend to roam a lot even before 6 so play safe when he is not around... you are too slow to follow him and may even botch his ganks if you follow him.

However if you are alone in lane and losing pressure because Pyke is not there, ask him to come back, kill enemy laners and try to take tower so that he has more freedom to roam. Remember that even if you have a lead you can still lose 1v2 and you lose your lane pressure if your support is always roaming instead of being there to scare enemies every now and then.

You can also ask to go mid after taking bot or putting enemies too far behind, since it will be easier for Pyke to be around to help you while also pressuring other lanes. This is also valid to other roaming supports!




RAKAN - GODLIKE SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Xayah and Rakan were designed with each other in mind. They are not the unbeatable bot lane they once were, but they are still unique. There are a few interactions you have to keep in mind laning with Rakan:

1. Level 1 spike: if against a bot lane you can trade, you can both start W. Your trades with Rakan W, movement speed, attack speed and extra damage is pretty nasty at level one. Not many Xayah/Rakan players properly exploit their level 1! You don't have to greed for kills but 8/10 times you will at least burn enemy summoners, which means you can go for kills on your level 3 spike.

2. Xayah baiting: Thanks to Rakan's extended E range with Xayah, you can sometimes bait the enemy into taking bad trades. Rakan can stay out of vision while Xayah baits, then he uses his extended range and speed to quickly gap close and engage. Alternatively, Rakan can use W to CC the enemy then disengage to safety when Xayah is nearby.

3. Cheating recalls: in lower elos people underestimate tempo and good recall timing, something that Xayah/Rakan can effectively cheat. Whenever you need to push an extra wave or greed for plating, you can ask Rakan to recall at your side while you shove the wave with your abilities, then recall with him. You can almost always manage a good recall if you and your Rakan can use your joint recalls correctly!

Good bans for Xayah and Rakan lane are: Morgana, Lux, Ezreal, Caitlyn, Thresh, Vayne, Senna - basically lane bullies, champions that can interrupt Rakan W or that have dashes.

Rakan is very flexible, you can play for poke and short trades (because he easily disengages) or you can go all in, which you usually want to do because you can play aggressive and score kills with your combined ultimates. Even if you are behind you can still use your combined strength to pick off enemies and destroy teamfights. Play around your Rakan!




RELL - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Playing around Rell is pretty much the same as other engage supports. You want to go all-in, exploiting the fact that Rell gets extra tanky once she jumps, she can stun melee divers and force enemies to stay still during your ultimate. She can also get rid of shields, which makes her extra useful against enchanters like Lulu, Karma and Janna who can often stop you from killing enemies because of their shields.

The issue though is that once she goes in, she has no way of getting out. You need the damage to actually kill the enemy. Your lane can also be miserable if you both get poked out. But usually, if you can catch someone you should be able to kill them if you are not behind. Rell is one of the supports I have found to be the strongest with Xayah in lane.




RENATA GLASC - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
You and Renata have really good disengage and you both work really well in extended fights. If you don't need it to dodge CC or important abilities, hold Featherstorm for Renata's Hostile Takeover as it is a really good form of CC. If she is in a position to potentially catch someone on Handshake hold your Q to combo and root.

You and Renata need to be on the same page because she can pull enemies out of Bladecaller but overall she is a really good enchanter support for you because of her utility and strong peel. She is a bit tankier and more aggressive than other enchanters and her Bailout is really good for you to all-in.




SENNA - BAD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Senna and Xayah don't have the best synergy. Senna wants to poke and have short trades while Xayah wants to trade and go all-in. Senna also prefers to scale and be opportunistic and her CC is not reliable. Her peel is also quite limited.

In this lane you will want to play around Senna. If she catches someone you want to trade if you can, but don't over commit. She has higher range than you so be careful about stepping up in a fight. In general, let her do her thing and scale. If she gets caught she has her Q and R to survive so focus on taking down the enemy ADC if you can.




SERAPHINE - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Seraphine is not the best support for Xayah but they can do okay into the right lanes. Generally Seraphine wants to poke and at level 6 start making plays with her ultimate.

During early laning phase focus on poking with her. If she manages to root or stun an enemy, see if you can capitalize on it without getting punished - remember her range is much longer than yours.

After level 6 your combined ultimates can do a ton of damage in teamfights, that is when this bot lane really shines.




SONA - BAD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
You and Sona have nothing in common - Sonna wants to poke and scale, while you want to all-in, preferably with a champion that can soak up damage for you. The best you can do with a Sona is match her poke and if you are forced to play passive, so be it.

Level 6 Sona can make plays with her R, but she is very squishy. Late game she offers a lot to your team and you will of course benefit from it, but you would probably get more value out of your laning phase with another support.




SORAKA - OKAY SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Soraka is a poke and scaling enchanter like Sonna but I consider her better in most cases. Soraka can be deceptively hard to kill and she is able to empower your trades a lot with her healing.

In this lane focus on poking when she pokes, and trade when you see a good opportunity. In the late game Soraka will be great help not only to you but to your entire team. Let her do her thing and focus on farming and scaling when there are no opportunities to get kills.

If you and Soraka are really in tune, you can even bait enemy into fighting you - only to outplay them with your R + Soraka R.




TARIC - DECENT SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Taric is generally a good support Xayah, his main issue is that he can be pretty situational and easily countered.

Taric has incredible stick potential once he manages to get on top of someone, but without Flash his engage is quite limited. You will need to position really well and it is good to use the movement speed from Deadly Plumage to help Taric land his stun.

At level 6 you are a great duo to execute tower dives. Hold on to your R until Taric’s R runs out.




THRESH - GOOD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIM
Thresh is a great support for Xayah - he has catch potential, he gets tanky, he has disengage and peel. He is an excellent support to plan baits and making picks in fog of war.

In lane you want to ideally keep the wave around the middle. Try to poke enemy and create an opening for your Thresh to land a hook. When he does land a hook you will want to be well positioned - close to him - so you can follow up with your root combo.

Please pay a lot of attention to his lantern. You might lose a free kill or end up dying if you ignore it exists. The lantern is really good during ganks - and remember that if you think you might be ganked, try to communicate that to Thresh so he can position further back to lantern you to safety.




YUUMI - BAD SYNERGY

HOW TO PLAY AROUND HER
Yuumi is a 1x2 lane in most cases. Sometimes you can do really well with her, but she is not your ideal support and you don’t really have synergy. As Xayah you will get focused, poked and kited if you are into a really nasty matchup.

You can't all-in during the early game unless the enemy misplays and gets low health. With Yuumi you will want to poke and take favorable trades IF it is safe. She is especially useful against poke champions because of her shield.

Her strong late game peel and ultimate are the best things about her though. Laning can be hard or boring, depending on matchup, until that point. If you see you can’t do much in lane to get kills and snowball, focus on farming and scaling rather than snowballing lane and play safe until you both get stronger.







Sometimes even in high elo games you will find supports that are not exactly considered meta, or that are only being played by koreans with some crazy build. This section will help you figure out what to expect of those champions' classes in your lane.

This is also useful so that you can know whether you should pick Xayah or not based on her synergy with the current team comp.




ASSASSINS - MOSTLY BAD SYNERGIES MATCHUPS

Assassins focus on bursting the priority targets and leaving alive. They often have a lot of mobility and burst, but are bad at teamfighting and have unreliable single target CC. Of course there are exceptions like Diana and Qiyana, but the majority of assassins don't even have good CC. And like I have mentioned throughout this guide, Xayah loves CC and teamfighting.

So as a general rule Xayah doesn't have a great time when her team has 2 assassins or more. They not only lack teamfight presence/aoe damage (most of the time), but are also highly mobile and Xayah cannot keep up with them.

To play with assassins you either:

1. rely on your team engager to skirmish/teamfight while assassins destroy the backline or pick off enemies (making it easier for you to teamfight with numbers advantage)
2. play for burst combos and pickoffs yourself



Assassins that Xayah can do well with:



Assassins Xayah has little synergy:









BRUISERS - MOSTLY DECENT SYNERGIES

Bruisers are less mobile than assassins, but more mobile than tanks. They are not as tanky as proper tanks but they are more resilient than assassins and focus on winning extended trades. They often have CC and a gap closer. While their CC is not always very reliable, it is often enough to peel for you or to hold down a priority target for you.

To play with bruisers you often just want to go in after the enemy is already focusing on them. Keep in mind they can sometimes easily jump out of fights ( Riven, Irelia, Lee Sin), which means that they can leave you exposed. Don't run around with them more than you need to, because they might be able to get out of a sticky situation but you can't.

They are usually good 1v2 champions so you don't want to be running around with them all the time anyway. Let them split push and draw attention to themselves while the rest of the team does something else. Rotate to help them if needed, and in teamfight you can work around their CC. They might remove the enemy carry or hold enemy bruiser so that you can focus on other priority targets. Overall you can get better synergies, but they can also be great if you know when to be with them and when not to. Take opportunities when you can!

Lastly be mindful that a decent amount of bruisers have displacement interactions of some sort. Because of that, they can sometimes mess up enemy positioning for your E.



Bruisers Xayah can do well with:



Bruisers Xayah has little synergy:









TANKS - MOSTLY GOOD SYNERGIES

Tanks have a team-focused playstyle. They are very resilient and win extended trades. Their CC and tankiness is perfect to set you up and peel for you in teamfights, making them the best class synergy for Xayah in my humble opinion.

Tanks usually have AoE CC, so their abilities are usually pretty easy to combo with your R. And if they pick a priority target they can peel for you or set you up to get them.

They can also play around making picks in fog of war and help you secure objectives, set up tower dives, etc. Most tanks work amazingly well with Xayah.

Tanks with displacements can mess up enemy positioning for E.


Tanks Xayah has little or weird synergy:








MAGES - MOSTLY OKAY SYNERGIES

Mages usually focus on bursting enemies from afar and CC. They often have AoE CC, which Xayah loves, however their CC might be very risky to follow up on because of your range, especially if you lack a tank or engager to go in first.

Because most mages want to stay far away, if your team has poor engage I suggest you go for burst/poke build to have better synergy with your team.

Also, if you have mage supports, you usually lack the peel you would be able to get from a tank or enchanter so you do have to be more aware of your safety.

Xayah does the worst with poke mages like Ziggs and Xerath if her team lacks engage.



Mages Xayah can do well with:



Mages Xayah has little synergy:









In this section I will go into Xayah's matchups - how the enemy wins, and how she wins. First I go into bot lane marksmen matchups, and at the end of the section I go into how Xayah can deal with other classes. If you have questions about a specific champion that is not included here just let me know in the comments and I'll see what I can do!

I have been thinking about including bot lane mages as well but let me know what you think about that, I personally don't see many mages that are not supports so I don't know if I should include them.

Champions are in alphabetical order.






APHELIOS - GOOD MATCHUP

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Level 1 Aphelios does not have his Q, so what he will try to do is auto attack you with Calibrum and push for level 2 first. After level 2 how he kills you will vary a bit depending on his weapons, but on summary he will want to use his rotations on you. When he has low ammo on both weapons he can get up to 4 weapon effects on a single fight if he is good, so avoid engaging at such times.

HOW YOU WIN
You will want to play around his weapon rotations to avoid his Chakram combos and his poke especially. Aphelios is squishy despite his sustain, so you will win by catching him and bursting him with your team. Avoid long trades and take advantage of him misusing his abilities - at level 1 his Q has a 10s cooldown, which means that once he uses it you will have a window of opportunity to fight and kill him. Also make sure to dodge his R and important Q combos with Featherstorm. Exhaust is good in this matchup.



HOW TO PLAY AROUND HIS WEAPONS


Calibrum, the Sniper Rifle: when he has Calibrum he will win by poking you. If he has Gravitum as a secondary weapon he can set you up for a gank or engage with his support using his Q or R followed by Gravitum Q.
If he has Chakram he will seek to stack chakram using the Q (turret), and then Calibrum Q you to kill you from afar.

Severum, the Scythe Pistol: severum gives him sustain which means that it is good for him to go for trades as he will recover from them faster than you in most instances. Extended fights are favorable to him and he will become deceptively harder to kill especially if he has R.
If he has Chakram he has the deadliest weapon combo for 1v1 as he can quickly stack chakram and he will have a ton of sustain. Avoid trading or going all-in on him with this combo. Try to bait his Severum Q and chain cc him. Be ready to dodge his ultimate. Ideally you do not want to fight him though.

Gravitum, the Gravity Cannon: this is the weapon he will use to make picks so it is important to have vision as to make sure he will not set you up for a gank. The weapon slows so it may be hard to chase and kite him. He wins if he can chain cc you and kill you while he is out of your range.

Infernum, the Flamethrower: with infernum Aphelios will usually push the lane and try to poke you through your minions. You will want to avoid that poke by using Q to farm and position in a way to avoid that as you would be avoiding a Miss Fortune Q bounce. In a fight you will want to avoid his Infernum R as Infernum deals aoe damage that splashes around champions it hits.

Crescendum, the Chakram: Most weapon combos are deadly with Chakram. Aphelios wins when he can get very close to you as he gets more attack speed and damage if he stacks mini chakrams. This weapon is especially bad for you as you want to fight in a close distance, which means you make it easier for him to stack this weapon. He is also harder to kill as he will usually build sustain, so avoid long trades with Aphelios. Either burst him or don't fight.




ASHE - DECENT MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Ashe will kill you by poking you and kiting you. She has superior range, built-in slow, good trading with Q and CC on her ult. She will seek to abuse her range in lane then run you down with her slow - if you are the one going towards her, a good Ashe will kill you by kiting. After 6 she will kill you by abusing her R stun to burst you.

HOW YOU WIN
Ashe is squishy and immobile, you kill her by sticking to her face and bursting her. Ideally you want an engage support so that you can chain cc her, but if you don't have one, you have to avoid her poke and find a way to catch her on your E. Phantom Dancer can help you catch up and out-DPS her a little bit, and Rapid Firecannon can help with range disadvantage. However, both items are still not enough to fully turn the tables to your favor.
To stop her pick potential with her R, dodge it with yours. Using R aggressively can also help you catch her but ideally you want to use it defensively yet getting in range to catch her on your E.




CAITLYN - BAD MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
She is one of the worst matchups for Xayah because it is very hard to get on top of her. She will seek to bully you away from farm and get a gold lead, and when you try to get close she will try to E+headshot you. It is honestly very easy for her to shut you down by just abusing her range in a way so you cannot even get close with Flash or R.

HOW YOU WIN
Caitlyn often wins through wave management, so try to use your W to not let her shove waves under your tower if needed. Use your passive feathers to threaten her.
Your best bet at killing her is managing to get on top of her avoiding her traps, her E and her poke. A engage support or a jungler with CC can help you with that. Rapid Firecannon is a good item against her, but only gives you a slight advantage for a short time. If you get kited you will lose. Use Double Daggers to farm caster minions.




DRAVEN - BAD MATCHUP

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Draven has a really strong early game trading power and he wins by abusing it. While his Q is active he will seek to auto you and run you down catching his axes (keeping his Q going). He will use his knock up to slow you and make it harder for you to get away.

HOW YOU WIN
First you have to respect his stronger early game. You win by not giving him kills.
Other than that, you will want to try and kite him and root him with your E so that he loses his Q. If you manage to do that and you have an engage support to help you, you can probably kill him.
Do keep in mind that trading 1 for 1 is really bad for you in this matchup as Draven will snowball harder than you. If he gets behind he is basically useless though. Exhaust for this matchup.




EZREAL - SKILL MATCHUP

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Ezreal will seek to do either 2 things: farm or poke. Any engage you might have he will avoid, and when he gets the opportunity he will seek to poke you with his Q. Once he gets strong enough he will easily burst you.

HOW YOU WIN
You win by dodging his poke and when you trade it is really important you dodge his Q and W. Try to catch him off guard with your E. You can avoid his poke with minions, so try to get a minion advantage to act as a shield and harass him using your Q. In trades he will probably use his E to dodge yours, so try to bait him and give your support an opportunity to catch him like that. Matchup is more favorable towards Ezreal, but a good Xayah can match him. Support matchup makes a huge difference.




JHIN - SKILL MATCHUP, SUPPORT DIFF

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Jhin wants to trade with you so that he can get you low enough to execute you on his 4th shot or snipe you on his ultimate. He is kinda like Draven, if he is allowed to snowball things can get pretty nasty.

HOW YOU WIN
You have to dodge his W root - this means you want to avoid going into his traps (pay attention to where they are), stay away from minions so that his Q won't bounce on you (once it targets you it is unavoidable), and you will want to avoid his support hitting any abilities on you. If he autos you be ready to sidestep his W. You will also want to avoid trading on his 4th shot and overall sitting on low health in lane.
Jhin is fairly squishy and immobile without Flash, so in early laning you want to get his flash. When you trade, use your W to out-DPS him and use the movement speed it gives to kite around his W. Once his mobility is down it is easy for you to root him and for your support to engage/catch him and kill him. Support matchup and synergy with Jhin will make a huge difference on how this lane goes.




JINX - GOOD MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Jinx will seek to abuse her range on Q to stack Lethal Tempo and keep her distance from you. Her traps, if well-placed, will force you to go around them, which buys time for her to do what she has to do to kill you. She will seek to poke you with her autos, W and she will R/run you down once you are low enough.

HOW YOU WIN
Jinx is squishy and immobile, her early game is also very weak. You want to shut her down early.
You can catch her on your R and E, use W to run her down but avoid going in when she has used her range to get her Lethal Tempo going. You win by catching her and quickly kill her, for that you can't let her kite you.
In early laning she doesn’t have a lot of range and you can easily bully her by poking with Double Daggers and leave her low without getting close enough for her to retaliate. You want to get a lead early because once she has a few levels she will be able to more easily keep her distance from you.




KAI’SA - GOOD MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Kaisa loves to burst immobile squishy targets who are isolated and mispositioned. The later the game goes on the bigger the threat she is to you - if she manages to isolate you she has the burst to kill you. Kaisa also loves engage/cc supports so getting caught is usually a death sentence to you. Plus, she has a lot of mobility to kite around your feathers or get behind your Bladecaller.

HOW YOU WIN
Kaisa is actually a fairly easy matchup for Xayah because you can bully her in the early game pretyt hard. Early on her mobility is limited and she is short ranged, so you can poke her with your Double Daggers. Aside from that, you also have great trading in lane, so to make sure you win every trade you will want to fight close to your minion wave (so she doesn't get isolated Q on you) and dodge her Void Seeker (W). You should also use your feathers to constantly zone her and avoid engages from her support and jungler. Use your early lead to close the game early so that she doesn't get the chance to scale.
If she does scale play around your team so she doesn't assassinate you. If you think you will lose lane, bring Exhaust for her. You ideally don't want her to get too close to you and when fighting her try to spread out your feathers to zone her. Don't fight her when your W is down or when you are on cooldown.




KALISTA - SKILL MATCHUP, SUPPORT DIFF

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Kalista is a very annoying matchup for Xayah if the Kalista is good. A good Kalista will play aggressively in the early game with an engage support and your lane will be hell until after level 6. Kalista will look for extended trades so that she can stack her spears and she will use her passive to constantly kite around your feathers while she is at it. After 6 she will have much higher kill pressure with her engage support because of her Ultimate. She will also build Immortal Shieldbow in some cases, which makes her both hard to catch and hard to kill.

HOW YOU WIN
Kalista usually wins longer trades because of her spears, sustain and mobility so you need to focus on catching and bursting her before she causes too much damage, but if the Kalista is bad you can get away with a lot.
Use your Q+E from range to poke her and work with your own support to try to catch and burst her. Pay attention when Kalista uses her R and prepare to dodge her team’s engage with your R. Her R has a fairly long cooldown especially in the early game so you should have your R up in time to always counter her engage. When fighting her your focus should be hitting Q, W and autos because she can easily dodge your E - don’t play around it if she is not CC’ed. If you want to poke her in lane, time your Q to hit after she has dashed. She is a low-mid range ADC but it is much harder to poke her with Q because of her passive, so if you see you are not hitting your Q save it and practice your timing to hit her while she is standing still to auto minions.




KOG’MAW - GOOD MATCHUP, SUPPORT DIFF

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Kog’Maw himself is generally an easy matchup for Xayah in the early game, the issue is always his support and team. If his team plays around peeling for him you will not be able to get close to him while he kites you from his superior range with his R, W and Lethal Tempo. Kog’Maw wins by staying safe and bullying you while out of your reach. Early on it can be hard to kill him when his support is around because people usually pick enchanters to babysit him the whole game.

HOW YOU WIN
You will want to poke him from range and burst him when he is mispositioned. Always play aggressive when he is alone (truly alone, not baiting) unless he is already fed. Early on seek to bully him with your Double Daggers and play aggressive to catch him, but don’t overcommit if he has summoner spells and a strong lane support babysitting him. Some players will build tank items in the late game, together with Immortal Shieldbow, so consider building a Mortal Reminder[/color]. To not die to him - focus on dodging his abilities, mainly his Q and his E+R combo. Avoid fighting him while his W is active as well. Once he dies be mindful of his passive exploding on top of you.




LUCIAN - BAD MATCHUP

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Lucian is one of the worst matchups for Xayah (also depending on meta) because there is not much you can do to counter him when he is strong. A good Lucian will seek to play aggressive in the early-mid game whenever he can. He can force plays and trades whenever he wants because he will win most of them - he has insane damage on his combo early on especially when paired with a support that plays aggressive as well, like Nami, Rakan, Braum or Thresh.

HOW YOU WIN
Lucian can’t do much if you just play safe and scale, although it is much easier said than done. Poke him early on with your Q and consider bringing Exhaust. If your support engages on him, you can follow up but be ready to pop your Exhaust because if he fights back he can probably still kill you. Never stay alone in lane with him. Time your R to dodge his combo or R. He can zone you from minions because of his early strength so do not let the wave freeze close to his tower - try to keep a freeze near your own tower to stay safe. If Lucian doesn’t snowball it is easier for you to out-scale him in the mid-late game so focus on not giving him any leads, much like you would do against a Draven.




MISS FORTUNE - SKILL MATCHUP, SUPPORT DIFF

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
How Miss Fortune kills you depends on her build to some extent, but overall she will seek to poke you with her Q or her E (if she is building tear of the goddess). She will poke you down and then run you down once you are low enough. A support with CC will greatly increase her kill threat as she will be able to freely auto you and use R. She build a lot of AD so she can really pack a punch.

HOW YOU WIN
I personally think that how hard this matchup is depends on her build and her support. In any case, you win by catching her and bursting her before she bursts you. Try to auto or Q her before going in in order to get rid of her W passive speed, this will make it harder for her to kite around your feathers. You will want to stay fairly close to her, while she should be trying to stay just out of your range. If she is building Tear of the Goddess and maxing E it is really hard to avoid her poke so if you see yourself getting low on HP use your abilities to push the wave and recall. You can make good use of Mortal Reminder in this matchup, as Miss Fortune likes building Bloodthirster early - especially because the shield she gets prevents her from losing her passive movement speed on W, which means it is much harder to catch her. Deny her ult with yours, you never want to tank it. If you can catch Miss Fortune she is fairly easy to kill, but do consider going Exhaust because she deals a lot of damage at all stages of the game. Early on, play safe if she has too much lane pressure.




NILAH - GOOD MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Nilah is a scaling all-in melee hypercarry champion. Early on she will seek to farm or trade by going in and out with her Slipstream and after she gets a few levels up on you she will try to all-in while you are at a disadvantage. Her E can get her behind you, rendering your Bladecaller useless. She can counter your empowered autos during Deadly Plumage with her Jubilant Veil but your feathers still land on the ground.

HOW YOU WIN
Nilah is generally a really easy matchup for you. Xayah loves it when melee champions come into her, Nilah needs to dive and stick to you but she is squishy and vulnerable to CC. Kite her with W and E, use Featherstorm to not get pulled into her Apotheosis and in lane always harass her with Q and W when she tries to farm. Use your feathers to zone her. Be aware that she will likely always be a bit ahead in xp if you can't keep her away from the wave so watch out for her level 2, 3 and 6 all-ins.



SAMIRA - DECENT MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Samira usually brings along an engage support, so she will seek to combo you once you get caught. She will also want to stay pretty close to you to deal more damage on her melee autos and Q. She will use her W to deny your E while she is fighting close to you. As Xayah you usually want enemies to come close to you because you can counter it, but Samira is an exception - you want her to be really far away from you because she is stronger and she can get behind you on her E. Once you are low and without self peel she will Ult you to finish you off. When she cannot get close to you, she will seek to stack her style points and poke you with her Q until you are low enough for her to dash close to you.

HOW YOU WIN
Samira is a feast or famine champion which means that in the early game your priority should be to not give her kills at any cost. Bring Exhaust to cripple her all-in combo. When you are half health, stay away from your minions because she can dash to them and kill you if you are too close.
If you get caught by her engage support, use Exhaust as soon as Samira jumps in. You will want to hold your R to dodge either her support’s CC or her own R. Phantom Dancer is good to help you stay away from her. Also remember she has no gap closers after using her E if she doesn’t get a kill, so if she uses E and you Flash to safety there is not much she can do. Samira is very vulnerable to poke, especially in lane, so try to always hit your Q whenever possible. She can’t all-in if she doesn’t have the health for it. Try to bait or force her W before using your E and R so that you don’t lose them.




SIVIR - BAD MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Sivir after rework will seek to poke you with Q and pressure with superior wave control. When she is low on HP will try to bait your E to sustain a bit using her E spellshield. When she cannot kill or harass you she will seek to constantly push waves to pressure you and get tower plates. After 6 she has insane potential to run you down especially if she gets a kill reset.

HOW YOU WIN
You need to dodge her Q, otherwise she kills you. Be very patient with your E because of her spellshield - wait for her to use it to dodge your support’s CC or try to bluff. It is a waiting game. Focus on killing her with Q and W while she holds on to her E. Poke her with Q+E as it can be dangerous to get close. It is very hard to match her push, but try to not get constantly pushed under your tower. You are both strong late game champions and will be mostly playing around your team, if you have a tankier frontline you should have an edge on her. Avoid clumping up and ping your team to focus her.




SMOLDER - EVEN MATCHUP

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Smolder’s win condition is poking you the entire game and getting to his 225 stacks of Dragon Practice. He is generally weak in the early game so he will seek to poke you until you are low enough to kill or get lane control so he can farm safely. In the mid game he will start getting strong and look to shove waves and join fights to rush his stacks. Late game he should have enough to unlock the execute on Super Scorcher Breath.

If you try to engage him, he can use Flap, Flap, Flap to run away and if you are low his Achooo! and E will keep you from running away. MMOOOMMMM! heals him and if you are out of his range he can use it to kill you from afar, and it deals more damage if you are caught in the middle. After he gets Rapid Firecannon it becomes much easier for him to poke you.

HOW YOU WIN
Achooo! is his main form of poke and wave clear until he gets 25 stacks of his Q (which gives him AoE damage). It is especially strong if he starts with Doran’s Ring, has Comet, and/or puts points in W – That means you always want to avoid getting hit by it! You will want to punish him when he misses his E and R as well.
Since you have stronger laning phase in general, you’ll want to pressure him and make him lose minions while avoiding his poke. If you have more kill pressure you should try to kill him or force him away from your wave; though beware engaging on him can be pretty hard with his Flap, Flap, Flap. You might want to get Exhaust or Ghost against him. Don’t tank his ultimate, use Featherstorm to dodge it if you can.
You win if you can shut him down and close the game. If he gets ahead and scales he can kill you and your team rather easily. So try to not let the game drag on for too long or he’ll become an elder dragon.




TRISTANA - BAD MATCHUP, SUPPORT DIFF

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Tristana is basically an assassin marksman. She will jump in when you are alone and burst you. She can also freely jump on you if your support or team cannot peel for you. Her fully stacked E is what is going to kill you most of the time.

HOW YOU WIN
In my opinion, Tristana is one of the worst matchups for Xayah as you don’t have any effective tools to survive her. You don’t have any dashes aside from Flash, and even if you do have Flash, Tristana may also have it. You can root her but you probably won’t live enough to run away afterwards. Your R is not of much use against her either.
Against Tristana you win by basically surviving her all in - once she jumps in she is vulnerable, she can only get out safely if she can fully stack her E and reset her W (the jump). If she jumps into danger to get you and you survive, your team can punish her. In lane you have to avoid her support’s engage, and ideally you want to poke her with Double Daggers as much as you can - if she has a health disadvantage jumping in and going all in is much more dangerous to her. Meanwhile, you have to keep yourself healthy by avoiding her poke. When Tristana kills anything, that enemy explodes and deals a small amount of damage to nearby enemies. You have to stay away from your minions while she is farming, as the damage adds up over time.
You should zone her with your feathers and play safe - as soon as she jumps in you should seek to get away so that she cannot proc her E. If running away is not an option, you will have to either Flash or Exhaust her. To win the game you need to not let her snowball off kills in lane and you have to play close to your team so that you don’t get picked off by her.




TWITCH - BAD MATCHUP, SUPPORT DIFF

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Twitch can be a bit of a hard matchup especially later into the game. When he wants to go in he will go invisible and trade, after six he will all-in. With his R and Lethal Tempo it is impossible for you to get close to him fast enough to kill him, so your only option is to run away or die.

HOW YOU WIN
Your Q has a visual effect when it hits something, even if you cannot see it. You can try to guess where Twitch is by using your Q. If your support can engage on Twitch and keep him still for long enough you can quickly kill him, but he will win more extended trades. His usual supports ( Lulu, Yuumi) make him very hard to deal with. In the late game you want to be playing around your team so as to not allow him to assassinate you. If you think you can fight close to him, take Exhaust, otherwise take Heal or Barrier. Remember to buy plenty of control wards and stay close to them. If you are alone without vision Twitch can easily flank you so beware of that, even in lane. Treat him as a ranged assassin much like Tristana.




VARUS - EVEN MATCHUP

HOW HE KILLS YOU
Varus will seek to poke you from range and burst you. If you get too close he will R and burst you, so it is a pretty hard matchup to play. It is a matchup similar to Caitlyn. He will always try to keep his distance from you and combo you when you are low HP.

HOW YOU WIN
Your saving grace is that most people don't know how to play him well and he has a record of being a pretty nerfed ADC due to his proplay presence. Consider bringing Cleanse especially if he has a support with CC, otherwise you should focus on using your R to dodge his - but remember your R is on a longer cooldown. If Varus hits his ult on your support, stay away from them so that you don’t get rooted. His ult also gives Varus instant stacks to burst you on his Q so it is essential to avoid it. In lane you want to avoid getting poked by his Q and engaged on by his support. You ideally want to go in on Varus while his R is down, if you have an engage support it will be good for you as Varus is vulnerable to CC. If you have an enchanter you will have to focus on trading when his abilities are down. Seek to poke him with your Double Daggers when you can, to match his harass.




VAYNE - HORRIBLE MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
At early levels Vayne will seek to farm and occasionally poke you with her Q+aa, getting free autos off whenever she can. You both are pretty low range ADCs so she will seek to proc her W when she can and use her Q to avoid your root. Once you are low enough she will run you down. After 6 she can force fights with you and win because of her superior 1v1.

HOW YOU WIN
Think of Vayne as a timer bomb - the longer the game goes, the lower are your odds of winning. You have to focus on getting her behind, and that is fairly easy before level 6 - harass her with your Double Daggers whenever she goes for CS. If you see she is dodging your Q, wait for her to use Q to farm to hit her, or hit her support. You don’t usually want to trade autos with her, but if you do, do it while your W is active. Avoid being close to walls. After six, if your jungler ganks you should expect Vayne to turn on you - the good Vaynes will usually attempt to take you to your grave with her by ulting, using their invisibility to catch you while you and your team thinks she is running away. Always expect Vayne to turn on you so stay safe with your team and away from walls. After six avoid pushing into Vayne’s tower as she can run you down with her passive and R, even if she is behind you might not win. For the rest of the game you will want to play around your team to catch Vayne. I advise you to bring Exhaust in this matchup.




ZERI - EVEN MATCHUP

HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Zeri thrives in long trades but if she is fed she will have the damage to burst you. She relies on her speed, slow and range to run down opponents from a safe distance and also punishing anyone that gets too close by either kiting them or disengaging over a wall. Because of her more reactive playstyle she will seek to poke you from range if she can, and when you get close she will press R, gain a bunch of stacks and kite you/run you down to death. With her E and stacked R she will have plenty of mobility to kite around your feathers and still kill you from outside your range. In lane she will seek to trade with Q and aa if she can, and use her E to dodge yours if she's smart.

HOW YOU WIN
You win against Zeri pre 6 since you have a better push and your Q poke goes through minions. You also have more damage and better trading early on, but after a few items she will have a lot more damage and kiting. Since she cannot easily wave clear and her Q is blocked by minions you want to always have a minion advantage and stand behind them. If she uses E to trade with you or to push you can try to punish her with your own E as she will not have the mobility to dodge it early on. CC is very good against her, and Xayah is good with supports who have CC, so see if you can get your support to pick Rakan or another support with good, preferably reliable CC. When Zeri all-ins you with R try to fight close to corners so that she doesn't get a lot of room to kite around your feathers, and if possible try to disengage so that she doesn't stack her R. After it's down you can kill her more easily, but beware because it has a low cooldown. When trading in lane try to stand behind your support or minions so that you don't tank her damage (won't work while her R and E are active though.







In champion select you have to take into account not only the enemy bot laner, but also the entire enemy team. Here I will give you a brief explanation on how to play against other classes when you eventually leave bot lane!

Note I will be saying "good/bad/even" matchups but I am not referring to them in lane specifically. I am talking about how well Xayah can do into them - how well she can survive them and how easy it is to kill them.




ASSASSINS - MOSTLY SKILL MATCHUPS

Assassins focus on bursting the priority targets and leaving alive. They often have a lot of mobility and burst.

Assassins are the worst nightmare of most ADCs, but Xayah is one of the few who tends to fare batter than the rest if played well. This is thanks to her ult being able to completely nullify many assassins' combos if timed correctly. Pair your R with Exhaust and you will probably live!

You basically win against assassins by surviving their combo, then killing them quickly enough, before they run away.



Assassins that Xayah can do well against:



Assassins Xayah can struggle against:









BRUISERS - MOSTLY EVEN MATCHUPS

Bruisers are less mobile than assassins, but more mobile than tanks. They are not as tanky as proper tanks but they are more resilient than assassins and focus on winning extended trades.

Bruisers generally have a gap closer and CC to catch and kill you. You need to keep your distance at all costs - if they reach you, is it really hard to get them off you. When using R defensively your focus should be avoiding their CC or becoming untargetable to buy yourself some time. Bruisers often rely on auto attacks so your R is a way you can buy some time for your team to help you out.

You want to kite with Deadly Plumage and have items that help you kite. More often than not you should not get close to bruisers as they can turn on you. You want them to come to you and time your flash predicting their CC/gap closer on you.

Use your E when they start getting close to you to buy yourself more time to keep your distance. Exhaust also works well against bruisers.

Bruisers with displacements like Lee Sin and Sett can be really bad for Xayah since they can mess up her positioning for E.

Build anti-tank items against them. You will often need anti heal in your team as well, they can be deceptively hard to kill especially later on.



Bruisers Xayah can struggle against









TANKS - GOOD MATCHUPS

Tanks have a team-focused playstyle. They are very resilient and win extended trades. They don't have the damage to be a danger to most classes, but they are in fact a danger to most ADCs if they get close enough.

Tanks usually have AoE CC, so their abilities are usually pretty easy to dodge with your R. They are also very easy to kite in most cases! When they have point and click CC you can usually dodge it with your R. Use E to keep distance.

Problematic tanks to Xayah are the ones with good gap closers/speed and CC she cannot easily avoid, like taunts and point & click CC.

Tanks with displacements are also really bad as they can mess up her positioning for E.

Build anti-tank items against them.


Tanks Xayah can struggle against:








MAGES - MOSTLY BAD MATCHUPS

Mages usually focus on bursting enemies from afar and CC. They are squishy but have a crucial self peel tool in their kits.

In close combat you win against most mages, the issue is that getting close is very risky. You usually have to itemize against burst mages when you see one.

To get close to them you have to wait for them to use their burst combo/CC on someone else or time your R to avoid it.

Battlemages like Cassiopeia, Ryze, Swain and Vladimir are no exception, but they do have a catch - they excel in close combat. You usually have to use Exhaust on them so that you can not only survive them but also out-DPS them before they kill you.

Against most other mages you have no choice but to keep your distance. If you go for lethality build you can safely chunk them from afar.



Mages that Xayah can do well against:



Mages Xayah can struggle against:











That's all I have for this guide. Thank you for taking interest in it! I hope it was helpful.



This was my first guide and it has gone through major changes over the years. In the most recent overhaul I did, I wanted to stick to a theme and make my guide look overall nicer. Fun fact: I chose the Arcana skin line as my main theme because I used to be a tarot reader!

If you have any suggestions or feedback, please let me know. I will keep updating this guide and keep adding things to it.



Good Luck & Have Fun playing Xayah!








Last updated: Patch 14.10
Last changes: Updated runes and items at top of the guide for current patch.

Planned updates: Update runes and items sections once meta settles. Will update video at the end of "Micro Guide" Section once I get my hands on a PC capable of recording high quality games.





MY OTHER GUIDES!!!


My Straightforward Guide to Caitlyn


Complete Kai'sa Guide


My Unbeatable Crit Sivir Guide


Complete Zeri Guide


Complete Nilah Guide


Off Meta Kindred ADC Guide



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