Introduction

• About me
• Why should I play Gwen?
• Overview of Gwen’s Abilities

Essentials

• Runes & Summoner Spells
• Itemization
• Trading pattern

Advanced

• Early laning phase
• Mechanics
• Split-pushing
• Teamfighting

Extras

• Matchups tier list
• Conclusions

About me

Hi! I'm Arthapsic, a Challenger gwen OTP on EUW.I've reached grandmaster EUW on midlane and challenger on toplane as only OTPing Gwen and mostly dodging if she's picked or banned. I'm in my twenties and currently in an university studying IT. I've played League since 2013 and I first reached Grandmaster in S9. I've been highest rated gwen OTP Season 13 ( at the end of the split ) and I have decided to make this guide. I also stream I've been streaming Gwen only and trying to reach Challenger.
I have about 5 accounts and around 2 mil + mastery points on Gwen as well. But enough about me let's get into the guide!

Also I have a spreadsheet on every single toplane matchup where there's tips and which runes/summoners to take so feel free to use it : https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1RocBfhNY7LU55DAxMwwO8gbftnRe4qB0pVqEpQejQxs/edit#gid=715131566

This is my account reaching rank 1 gwen on league of graphs

This is me being the highest rated Gwen world this season on onetricks.gg

This is me reaching Challenger this season

Why should I play Gwen?

PROS:

- Easy to play
- Can carry impossible games
- Shreds Tanks
- Satisfying AOE
- Very good teamfights
- Destroys towers
- Good duelist
- Can be played in multiple roles

Cons:

- Weak early game
- Easy to counterpick
- Skillshot based
- Easy to kite

Abilities overview

Q - SNIP SNIP! Gwen snips her scissors in a cone up to 6 times dealing magic damage. Gwen deals true damage to units in the center and applies her passive to them on each snip. Last snip deals the most damage so doing a quick trade with no stacks is fine but usually you want to have it stacked before a trade or stack it before a teamfight. Used with the combination with your E to easily hit all of the snips!

W - Hallowed Mist Gwen summons mist that protects her from enemies outside of it. She can only be targeted by enemies who enter the mist. This is what makes or breaks a good or bad Gwen player. The use of her W is very important. Use this as you would use a yasuo windwall to dodge very important skills (example ashe arrow syndra stun etc). When your W is down avoid every fight. Can be used with E to stand on the edge of your W and be untargettable while attacking but more on that later!

E - Skip 'N Slash Gwen dashes a short distance then gains Attack Speed, attack range, and magic damage On-Hit for a few seconds. If she hits an enemy during that time, this Ability's cooldown is partially refunded. Basically your mobility spell used to dodge abilities but also used on pair with your Q to engage or just poke targets. Can also be used in a WEQ combo but more on that in combos.

R - Needlework Gwen hurls a needle that slows enemies hit, deals magic damage, and applies A Thousand Cuts to champions hit. This ability can be cast up to two more times, with each cast throwing additional needles and dealing more damage. Gwen must hit an enemy between each cast to unlock the next one. This ability can destroy teamfights, if you hit a good AOE ultimate it can carry teamfights and potentially even make you 1v5 depending on how much they stack. Really strong in any choke point you can mow down any team and also heal yourself since it procs your passive and will make Gwen one of the most fun champions for you!

Runes

Gwen can use a lot of different runes and summoner spells and they usually change depeding on your matchup. To check which rune and summoner spell you take in different matchups check it in my matchup spreadsheet. I usually only stick to conquerer because it scales the best but you can take first strike for getting money altho first strike gave a lot more money before it got changed. For summoner spells you want ghost whenever you can fit it but sometimes you need the ignite to be able to survive lane ( more kill pressure so they can't bully you as much) and sometimes we take exhaust because we can't survive the burst (looking at you riven).

I never use flash but it might be useful with ghost nerfs as well.

Standard Gwen Runes

This is your standard rune page you can never go wrong with this rune page into any matchup. You only really change boneplating for second wind depending on the matchup (if it's ranged than second wind and if it's melee boneplating)

Conqueror - It's by far the best keystone for Gwen, you can never go wrong with conqueror on Gwen. Why? It gives her everything she wants. Ability power since Gwen has one of the best AP scalings in the game. Healing is very essential to her teamfighting as well, the healing can be so valuable paired with her passive it could make or break a teamfight. And lastly she stacks it pretty fast.

Presence Of Mind - Initially had this as absorb life but I think it's just too bad to take. They buffed it but I just think it's way too little for it to matter. You can take it if you feel like you need the sustain in lane (sustain outside of lane is terrible anyway). Triumph is also a nice choice if you feel that you don't need the mana sustain. Like I said before the difference between these 3 runes is very small and taking either is up to preference.

Legend: Alacrity - Intially had this as legend haste but I think alacrity might be a little bit better It's hard to say which one is better I think it also comes down to preference. The attack speed is nicer for pushing towers and in some situations while the haste is nice for your cooldowns. Decide for yourself altho the difference between them is small! Never take bloodline.

Cut Down - Cut Down is crazy OP right now. It goes really well if you're ever the one to initiate the fight and it deals a lot more damage in lane than last stand. Last stand is better for the clutch moments and can deal more damage than cut down in some games. But overall I'd say 70%-80% cutdown will outdamage last stand by a large margin. It goes really well with Gwen and I've seen numbers on this rune that I've never seen on last stand (did about 2.3k one game)

Demolish - I love this rune. Again this comes to personal preference. You can take overgrowth instead if you dislike it. The reason I like it is you get a lot more plates and towers per game without it. Some games it will be useless and some games it will net you towers and more plates. My whole playstyle revolves around getting fed from taking T2 towers and plates so I always take this rune but if you splitpush rarely take overgrowth instead.

Bone Plating - Boneplating is really here so you can survive lane. It's really good into any all in champion which are plently in the toplane. It helps you with trades and it's irreplaceable into champions that want to all in you constantly(renekton darius sett etc.). It's useless into ranged since they will just proc it from range easily so into them second wind is the better option. If you feel like you don't need any of these and can survive lane just fine go overgrowth. Check matchup spreadsheet when to take it.

Double adaptive + scaling health. I usually just do this every game. Some games you can go tenacity and slow resist but only into hard CC comps. You can switch adaptive to attack speed it's about preference.

Situational Gwen Runes

Resolve

Overgrowth - It's a really nice rune and goes really well with Gwen. She has really high base health so it's a nice combo to make you tankier. It essentially gives you nothing in lane and that's why I don't take it since Gwen really just wants to get out of lane. If you think you don't need second wind or boneplating or demolish this is the best choice.

Second Wind - It's really nice in matchups that just poke you and run away. So any ranged matchup or something like Pantheon that just spams Q on you on cooldown it's really nice. Check matchup spreadsheet when to take it.

Sorcery

- Only take sorcery in matchups where you have a free laning phase. It scales the best but it takes a long time to scale so keep that in mind if you take it!

Transcendence - Really nice but takes time to ramp up. Our build doesn't have that much haste so this is a really nice rune to lower your cooldowns. The refund on kill is mostly useless.

Gathering Storm - Really nice for scaling. Gives Gwen her most desirable stat which is AP but takes at least 20 minutes to be worthwhile so keep that in mind.

Niche Gwen Runes

First Strike - Really nice for gaining gold and you can get magical footware, triple potion and cosmic insight which are all nice. It gives the best burst you can have as Gwen while it's active but it can be proced by enemies and then you don't have a rune. The previous version gave a lot more gold so now you get very little on average so I have been avoiding it.

Press The Attack - Really nice for laning but essentially really hard to get value out of outside of lane so I avoid it. Tried it a lot never liked it conq is a lot better.

Grasp Of The Undying - Tried it a couple of times it can be okay into matchups with a lot of short trading but essentially conq is better.

Summoner Spells

Teleport - Really the best summoner spell for Gwen. Gwen has a really weak pre 6 laning phase so being able to back and teleport back into the lane healthy means a lot. It's also very useful when splitpushing, impacting botlane after 10 minute mark and teleporting behind enemy team to destroy their backline. I've tried not running it into some matchups but it's irreplaceable.

Ghost - It got nerfed pretty heavily but still the best summoner spell if you can survive lane. Mostly useless in lane unless you're versing a ranged matchup but really good in teamfights since one of Gwen's biggest weaknesses is that she is very easy to kite.

Ignite - It's really nice versus champions that heal (Fiora,Aatrox,Zac etc.). Helps out in all in matchups to try to match their damage and sometimes net solo kills. Mostly useless outside of lane so if you think the lane will be of no interaction take ghost instead. Check the matchup spreadsheet when I take ignite.

Exhaust - Nice summoner but really have to know how to use it. You can use it to lower burst or as a slow. I only use it into the Riven matchup.

Flash - Don't really like flash but it is decent with ghost nerfs. Decent into Riven/Urgot/Malphite matchups. Can be used with Q to surprise enemies and get kills but I never take it since ghost has more value to me.

Itemization

My in general itemization is a bit different from most Gwen players. I skip Riftmaker. Why? It's near impossible to stack in 90% of situations. It's not a bad item but other items give you a lot more value. If you want to run it and feel like you're squishy without it then do so it's not a big deal but try not running it for 10-20 games and trust me you will never want to go back to riftmaker ever again.

In general your build path should be something like this:

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

/

>

Now it can change depending on gamestate and how much gold you have on your back. You really want refillable on your first back if possible so try to aim for that with your buy. You're not always going to get 1k gold backs so if you have 550 buy amp tome + refillable. It's really good to back on as well. Early boots help you survive ganks better and maybe even chase your target. Change ionian boots to mercs/plated steelcaps depending on what you need that game. I really like deathcap second altho it's hard to afford. Usually if I don't have needlessly gold after nashors I just don't buy until I have it. It giving 70 AP is crazy since AP is by far the best stat you can get on Gwen and it's why I love deathcap second. If you feel like you can never afford this shadowflame/riftmaker are cheaper options altho I highly recommend deathcap.


Early Game

Doran's Ring - Start into most melee matchups (those that don't have high poke like Pantheon) and 2 health potions.

Doran's Shield - Start into all ranged matchups and poke melee matchups and 1 health potion.

Boots

Plated Steelcaps - Use these when enemy team has a lot of autoattackers especially if you lane against an autoattacker.

Mercury's Treads - Use into hard CC teamcomps

Ionian Boots of Lucidity - Buy these if none of the conditions above are met.

Sorcerer's Shoes - Will give you the highest damage but counterted by MR stack

In general about items

Nashor's Tooth - By far the best item to rush, nothing can compete with this item for Gwen. It gives exactly enough attack speed (not too much and not too little). Gives you haste, gives you AP and the on hit is nice. 158% gold efficiency and you value every stat on it as well. Good for dueling, teamfighting, tower pushing you name it! If you don't build it first you are trolling.

Rabadon's Deathcap - My favourite 2nd item. All it gives is raw AP. Gwen has one of the best AP scalings in the game so naturally we want this item. It gives crazy damage and because of our passive and conq it also gives us a lot of healing. Naturally our W resistances scale with AP as well so the item also makes us tankier. If you don't build this item 2nd or 3rd on Gwen you are trolling.

Shadowflame - Really nice item, really good combined with Sorcerer's shoes for the flat penetration stack. It gives insane burst and combined with Deathcap it will make you nuke entire teams. Can be skippable in some games if they hard stack MR or if you really need Zhonya's/Banshee's

Void Staff - Really only build this if they stack MR. Either buy this or Cryptbloom both are good and the difference between them is minimal. Really good for tank shredding since they usually itemize MR.

Lich Bane - Really good item into slippery targets that can dodge your spells easily, and the movement speed is a really nice addition as well. Don't build this pre Deathcap since it does very poor damage without a lot of AP.

Zhonya's Hourglass - Really nice situational item. Good versus champions like Zed, Kayle, Tryndamere where you can negate their ulties with it's active. Very good in teamfights as well. 120 AP can't go wrong with it at one point in your build path.

Banshee's Veil - Really good into champions like Evelynn, Fiddlesticks or in general AP champs. Build this when they have a lot of AP champions in their teamcomp

Riftmaker - I've grown to hate this item a lot. It's a shell of it's former self and you don't really see anyone buying it anyway on other champions. It's impossible to stack after laning phase and even when stacked it doesn't feel that good. There's much better items try playing without it for 10-20 games and you will never want to go back.

Hextech Rocketbelt - Really nice to close the gap versus teamcomps that can kite you easily. Really cheap item as well. Tried it a little bit but didn't personally like it.

Cosmic Drive - Nice item gives decent AP and really high haste and movement speed. I've tried it a lot but never seemed to like it.

Trading

Try to avoid trades with Gwen early since her cooldowns are really long and her all in is really bad pre level 6. You're really here just to scale. Especially avoid trades if your Q isn't fully stacked up.

Trading on Gwen is very simple. You stack Q and then you press E --> Q. But in some situations you have to be careful. An example can be the Jax matchup. If you E --> Q into a Jax He will then proceed to press his E and bonk you to death. Another example is yone that can press his E to dodge your E --> Q and then proceed to outrade you heavily. The way to avoid this is to look for when your minions are low and then Q them while they are last hitting and then E out or E --> Q when their cooldowns are down.

Trading into ranged champions is very simple. You just do the W+E --> Q Combo (Shown in mechanics ). They basically can't even trade back unless they enter your W. It's really OP and anyone that wants to learn Gwen should learn this combo.

Mechanics

Gwen mechanics are very simple and easy to learn. There's really only 2 combos and they're almost the same.

E+Q Combo: It's a really simple combo just press E and then Q. If you think they will try to dodge use Q then E after it will make it much easier to land but you will miss a snip.


E+W --> Q Combo: My favourite combo and it will be yours too when you learn it. It just takes a little bit of practice and it looks fancy and it's really useful. Some people tell me that pressing S helps them achieve it but I never really do that. You can also just not use Q and just start auto attacking with E, the Q isn't really necessary. You use this combo in trading in lane, to engage a teamfight. You can use it to tank baron for 4 seconds without taking damage if you know you won't need the cooldown. Playing Gwen with it is a much different experience.

Wave manipulation

Gwen's early laning phase is pretty weak so here are some tips that can make you get out of it much easier. You always want the wave to be pushing into you. To achieve this either tank 1 autoattack and then disengage (them autoattacking you in your wave will make them get minion agro so the wave will push into you) or bait them to use their AOE spells on you while you are in the wave (for example rumble Q)

When wave is pushing into you:
Unless really ahead do not trade when the wave is pushing into you. You have no access to the wave to stack your Q so your trades will be terrible, when the wave is pushing into you it's usually big so you don't want to risk dying. Give up a couple of cs, soak experience and let it crash under tower where you can safely farm it. Keep in mind your only goal in early lane is to get to 6 at least.

When you are pushing the wave into enemy:
This is where you have control of the wave and where you can easily stack your Q so usually you want to gain priority of the wave and safely shove it under tower. Be very careful of enemy jungle since this is when you are the most over extended so always remember to ward when you are pushing. If the wave is pushing into a very strong early game champions(Rumble,Darius,Jax,Riven etc.) always Q and then E out and let them tank minions and repeat until they back off. Sometimes since your champion is so weak early they can beat you even if you have a really big wave so keep that in mind. If this happens what I do is I go around and give up a couple of cs and then proxy one wave. It will break the freeze and then the wave will be reset and will push into you again. Be careful of proxying do it only if you know the enemy jungler is not top side.

When wave is even:
Depends on the matchup but here you just want to bait the enemy into pushing into you if they are stronger. Either let them autoattack you once or bait them to use their aoe spells when you are in the wave. Get them pushing into you so you can farm safely under tower.

When you are ahead in lane:
Try to set up a freeze on the enemy. Usually you can achieve this by slow pushing a big wave into enemy tower and their next wave will push into you. Do not touch this wave too much and do not trade. Let the wave be near your tower so you can ghost and run them down and get a free kill. This is how you get fed and get solo kills as Gwen and as most toplaners.

Splitpushing

Gwen is one of the best splitpushers in the game due to her really fast tower pusher, being a good duelist and having the potential to 1vX the enemy team. We splitpush to draw attention onto us and secure our team a safe objective. Usually if they sent multiple people towards you even if you die you get a dragon/baron or an inhib it's worth unless you are a huge shutdown. Don't get me wrong your goal is not to die but it's just a win/win situation for you and when you're really fed you sometimes might win those 1vX anyway!

When should you splitpush?

Splitpush when it's faster to end the game by splitpushing (only do this if you rely on your teammates having good macro).
Another example is when you are behind and your team is ahead. Splitpushing can get you a lot of gold and if you are behind you are mostly worthless to your team. Gwen has no crowd control and her only use is to deal damage so if you are extremely behind of the game your best bet of getting back into the game is to get T2 T3 towers. They give A LOT of gold and you can even draw pressure of enemy team making yourself very useful.
Another example when to splitpush is when your teamcomp is terrible and you just can't teamfight. If you can't teamfight just splitpush and try to end the game yourself. This is pretty rare but can win you some unwinnable games.

How to splitpush?

This is very simple, when your Teleport is up just go into the opposite lane away from the objective (Baron,Dragon, or just your teammates pushing).



Now this is the crucial part do you teleport? There is a couple of things to consider weather you should teleport.Do you have R? If you don't it's best if you keep pushing. Does your team need you? Try to keep an eye on how the situation is developing and your team might just win without you. Do you have a good flank ward with which you can carry the fight? Is there someone under the enemy tower clearing your waves ? If yes then usually you want to teleport unless your team really doesn't need you. Can you kill the enemy 1v1? If you can kill them 1v1 kill them and then push inhib+. Trading baron for inhib is never worth it but sometimes you just have to do it but trading a dragon that is not a soul is definitely worth an inhib sometimes even a T2. All of it really comes down to experience and it's hard to say but always count on the fact that your team can stop backs and you have a chance at ending. Gwen with 3 + items can end the game in a milisecond.
All this decision making will come natural with time and pratice!

Teamfighting

DO NOT TEAMFIGHT WITHOUT W. DO NOT TEAMFIGHT WITHOUT R. Ping your team back, wait for these cooldowns. Try to stack your Q on minions, scuttle crab, baron, dragon etc. before a fight if possible.

Teamfighting with Gwen can vary on teamcomps and who on the enemy team is fed. I will give you a couple of different scenarios but essentially you just want to stack up the enemies as much as possible and AOE them preferably priority targets (the ones that are fed). Gwen has one of the best teamfights in the game but she can rarely be a primary engage due to your CC being just a slow but if you have a primary engager your best bet is to follow them. Rakan/Rell etc. (anyone who can set you up for an AOE and CC's the targets for you) always follow them they are your key to absolutley nuking the entire enemy team. So always look for these engagers they are your best friends.

Front to back
Front to back? What does that mean? It means focusing enemy frontline first and then moving onto the enemy backline. Gwen is really good at these types of teamfights because she shreds tanks fasts and she has her W to ignore enemy backline. Essentially what you do here you focus the frontline and you use your R onto them but aim your R in a way where you hit both their frontline and their backline giving them very little space to move in teamfights.

Teleport flanking
Now if you get a really good teleport behind enemy lines wait for a fight first to break out. The enemy backline will not expect you behind them and this will net you probably the best outcome of a teamfight you can get. Always go for AOE here if there's 3 people stacked try to AOE them. If nobody is stacked go for the person that is carrying. Usually if you get their backline Gwen is so strong versus tanks that you can get them even without cooldowns. These teleport flanks can win games always look for them if possible.

When the enemy is engaging onto your team
Now this is probably the trickiest and worst type of teamfight Gwen can get. Gwen doesn't really have any peel for your backline. Gwen doesn't really function well with teamcomps that want to kite since she wants to fight in one spot where her W is. Essentially what you want to do here is wait for your moment. If you see a good AOE opening (like enemies chasing into a choke point) you can nuke them but other than that it's probably best if your team has a teamcomp like this to either look for flanks or perma splitpush.

Matchup tier list

Enemy favored skill matchup means that enemy should win the matchup but a slight mistake or a jungle gank can change who wins the matchup.
Gwen favored skill matchup means that you should win the matchup but a slight mistake or a jungle gank can change who wins the matchup.

Final Thoughts
I am pretty happy with how the guide is done, it looks very good and it has a lot of knowledge put into it. I feel like Gwen lacks good guides in both matchups and in general so I'm trying to give our girl some love! I will be updating this guide for as long as I will be playing league of legends. I will add new stuff that I find out and change runes accordingly. I will also change the matchup tier list depending on how the meta shifts with future patches. I will also add stuff that I maybe forgot.
Thank you for reading all of it and now that you are a Gwen professional good luck climbing!