Akali Build Guide : [14.23] The Ultimate Guide to Akali the Rogue Assassin

General

Introduction

Champion info

My Experience

Conclusion

Credits

Pregame

Pros/Cons

Summoner spells

Runes

Itemization

Matchups

Ingame

Abilities

Combos

Laning phase

Mid Game

Late Game

IMPORTANT NOTE : Make sure to load the whole guide using the Page Down key (PgDn) before browsing it to avoid any glitches !

Hi everyone ! My name is iwontdominatelol, and I'm an Akali OTP. I've been one-tricking her since I first started playing league back in june 2019. Thousands of games and 1 million mastery points later, I've finally reached plat 2 (EUW) earlier mid season 10 with only Akali. If I did it, then so can you !! I've always wanted to share my League of Legends journey and teach the basics but also all the little details about my favorite champion, so this guide is the perfect opportunity for me! I've compiled all the knowledge I've gathered in the past years to write this guide, in hopes of helping you reach your desired rank and learn more about midlane fundamentals and the best assassin in the game : Akali ~~

So, let’s start from scratch. Akali is a mid/top AP assassin. She is pretty weak pre-six, as her ult is her primary source of damage. However, coming into the mid game is where she shines best.
As an assassin, Akali can easily one-shot squishies, thanks to her burst damage. She also excels at snowballing leads: one kill leads to another, which translates into gold and therefore more stats to take over the map and destroy the Nexus. However, one bad fight can lead to her downfall.
Her playstyle is generally very aggressive, especially when she reaches her powerspikes at level 6 and later at 1 item. That’s when you want to look to fight for objectives and dominate your lane opponent (if you haven’t already).
Though it all goes downhill once late game starts. Even when fed, Akali has struggle to keep up with late game hypercarries.

is quite an interesting champion. Given her high skill cap and, to some, overwhelming kit, most people tend to give her a try once then never touch her again. The truth is, the more you will play her and get better at her, the more you will have fun and enjoy her.

Her high mobility and insane burst damage make her extremely thrilling and exciting. is very rewarding and fun once you actually learn how to play her. But, don't get too cocky ! One failed flashy combo or dive resulting in your death in the earlier stages could easily put you far behind your lane opponent and make the game unnecessarily harder to play.

Her role in teamfights is to shred the enemy backline into pieces, which could prove to be a challenge, as a lot of champions have hard CC in their kits. One mistake of engaging at a bad time could lead to getting CC-locked and result in an unavoidable death.

Being the assassin she is, thrives off one-shotting squishy champions, which explains why she is at her strongest in the mid game : most champions have not built MR yet, making them very vulnerable to Akali's strong burst.
On top of that, it's extremely easy for to abuse melee champions early on (pre-3), allowing her to get the upper hand on her opponent for the rest of the laning phase by having lane priority and, often, kill pressure.

spoiler

⦿ My team lacks AP damage
⦿ Enemy team has a lot of squishies
⦿ Against melee champs

As mentioned earlier, 's greatest asset is her ability to 100 to 0 champions, which, of course, you cannot achieve against tanks, especially if they have stacked MR. If you're an OTP, and your team comp doesn't match well with your playstyle (little to no engage/ no peel..), while the enemy team's comp is absolutely godlike, then don't hesitate to dodge !
One thing to keep in mind is that 's W can be revealed by True Sight. Here's the complete list of champions' abilities that grant True sight.

Abilities that can reveal you while invisible

⦿ My team has 3 or more AP champs
⦿ Enemy team is very tanky
⦿ Enemy team has tons of hard CC

FLASH: This spell is heavily relied on by the majority of champions, and is no exception. Whether it be to engage onto the enemy backline in teamfights with ult+flash combo, or to dodge a skillshot and escape from a guaranteed death, you will ALWAYS need this summoner spell.

		*IGNITE:* I personally take ignite every game, as a bit of extra true damage is always useful to secure kills. Plus most champions have some sort of health regenerating tool, so the 40% healing reduction ignite gives often comes in handy.
		*TELEPORT:* Usually taken by toplaners, but also good in mid. Teleport is basically a free out-of-jail card when you're getting constantly harassed by a lane bully. It also makes split-pushing a more viable option, as it enables you to flank and join in fights from the other side of the map.

TL;DR : To summarize, you should opt for if you're gonna play primarily on bursting down the enemy laner, or the squishy carries in general. If the enemy team is a bit less squishy, which would lead to longer lasting fights rather than quick burst downs, take . is exclusively for tough poke matchups where surviving lane would be near impossible without it. is a must secondary rune page, regardless of which primary rune you choose.

DOMINATION

Electrocute is my go-to keystone against a squishy team. Very useful in early game trades, as you will come out on top 90% of the time against melee opponents. Electrocute paired with ignite offers insane burst damage that your enemies often won't see coming. It gives you kill pressure on your opponent, allowing you to have complete control of the lane. I strongly recommend this rune in lower elos.

Sudden impact and Akali is a literal match made in heaven. It has a relatively low cooldown and can very easily be proc'd with the countless dashes you have and stealth.

Best option out of the three. Good snowballing potential and damage. Scales well with Electrocute. As an assassin, you are more than likely to pick up a lot of kills/assists here and there, so you'll have no difficulty stacking this rune and using it to its full potential.

Ultimate Hunter is a great tool to help you snowball even faster, even moreso with this Electrocute setup.

RESOLVE

Second Wind paired with Doran's shield will make your opponents lose their mind due to the sheer amount of health regen. Take Bone Plating against burst, Second Wind against poke.

Unflinching is insanely good to help deal with CC. Take Overgrowth if you don't need the CC and slow resistance.

PRECISION

Conqueror is such a good keystone on Akali. Not only does it grant insane amounts of sustain and healing in teamfights, but it also highers your damage output by a ton. You would generally take Conqueror in lanes where extended trades will happen more often, allowing you to stack it comfortably. It's great against bruisers and tanky teams aswell, but it's viable in literally any situation.

The extra energy you get from Presence of Mind works extremely well with Conqueror. More energy = more abilities you can use = more stacks = more damage = more healing. In short, don't think twice before taking this rune.

Haste allows you to snowball off of kills since it allows for lesser cooldowns. You could potentially run Alacrity, so you can proc your Passive faster.

Last stand synergizes REALLY well with Conqueror. I personally think it's better than Coup de Grâce in this case, but it all just comes down to preference.

RESOLVE

Second Wind paired with Doran's shield will make your opponents lose their mind due to the amount of health regen. Take Bone Plating against burst, Second Wind against poke.

Unflinching is insanely good to help deal with CC. Take Overgrowth if you don't need the CC and slow resistance.

PRECISION

I would only recommend Fleet Footwork in very tough lane matchups, against really heavy poke mages like Syndra or Orianna. This is not the type of rune you want to take to carry. But it's okay if your goal is to get through the laning phase and survive till its end without losing too much.

Presence of Mind is the safest option here. Gives you a little more energy to work with at all stages of the game.

Still the best option out of the three. You could potentially run Alacrity, so you can proc your Passive faster.

Poke mages are usually VERY squishy, so you'd wanna take Coup de Grâce over Last stand. Since your ult is an execute, it works really well with Coup de Grâce.

RESOLVE

Second Wind paired with Doran's shield will make your opponents lose their mind due to the amount of health regen. Take Bone Plating against burst, Second Wind against poke.

Unflinching is insanely good and matches well with to help deal with CC. Take Overgrowth if you don't need the CC and slow resistance.

/

Usually you're gonna be facing a lot of CC champions, so Tenacity/Slow resistance would be my recommandation. Take

Health Scaling if you don't need CC resistance.

NAME: Doran's Shield
COST: 450 gold
TYPE: Defensive

Perfect for sustain in the laning phase. I usually take this against poke mages (ex: / ) and burst champions (ex: / ).

NAME: Doran's Ring
COST: 400 gold
TYPE: Offensive

A more aggressive option. Take this in confident matchups, so basically most melee champs (ex: or ).

NAME: Amplifying Tome
COST: 400 gold
TYPE: Ability Power

On a badly timed first recall (or an unintentional recall aka death 👍), you might not have enough gold to get anything other than an Amplifying Tome, which is fine, since it builds into literally all AP items.

NAME: Needlessly Large Rod
COST: 1200 gold
TYPE: Ability Power

This is a great item to rush to get Lich Bane as a first item. If you don't have enough gold, just stick to the rest of items on this list.

NAME: Refillable Potion
COST: 150 gold
TYPE: Sustain

If you've used all your potions, and know you're going to need a bit of extra health for the rest of the laning phase, buy Refillables.

NAME: Dark Seal
COST: 350 gold
TYPE: Risky Gambit

You're stomping the enemy midlaner, and you know you can hard carry this game? Start snowballing even more and take Dark Seal !

NAME: Haunting Guise
COST: 1300 gold
TYPE: AP and Health Regen

Perfect first recall in a Conqueror build. Great early boost and builds into what should be your first item : Liandry's Torment.

NAME: Aether Wisp
COST: 900 gold
TYPE: Ability Power

Similarly to Haunting Guise, it builds into your first item, but this time for the Electrocute build, which is Lich Bane. If you don't have enough gold for Needlessly Large Rod then get this instead.

NAME: Control Ward
COST: 75 gold
TYPE: Vision

If you have 75 extra gold in your pocket, don't forget to grab a control ward ! Vision is a crucial part of midlane, something a lot of people tend to overlook.

NAME: Lich Bane
COST: 3200gold
TYPE: Burst damage

This is the item you want to rush with Electrocute. The effect on this item synergises perfectly with your passive, allowing you to proc it much faster all while dealing a bunch of damage. Great early game powerspike and you should aim to have Lich Bane ready for late laning phase skirmishes.

NAME: Liandry's Torment
COST: 3000gold
TYPE: Anti-tank

This item is extremely good against tankier teams. It's the perfect choice for a Conqueror, since you will be relying on longer trades, therefore more time in combat and more damage off of Liandry's torment. I generally rush this item on bruiser Akali.

NAME: Riftmaker
COST: 3100gold
TYPE: Sustained Damage

If you have Conqueror, Riftmaker is a solid choice, especially against tankier teams, as the more you're in a fight, the more damage you will deal. Offers a ton of sustain, thanks to omnivamp, and good defensive stats.

NAME: Stormsurge
COST: 2900 gold
TYPE: Burst damage

Get Lich Bane and Stormsurge on an Electrocute rune path and watch your enemies get 100-0 in a second. Both give you great AP stats but also movement speed. This is an item to prioritise against very squishy champions, so you can proc the 25% bonus movement speed.

NAME: Zhonya's Hourglass
COST: 3250 gold
TYPE: Invulnerability

Very useful stasis in teamfights as it allows you to gain some time when you get collapsed on by the enemy. Plus it's a great counter to some champions' abilities like 's ult or 's ult. Can sometimes be built as a 2nd item against AD.

NAME: Seeker's Armguard
COST: 1600 gold
TYPE: Invulnerability

If you're up against an AD midlaner (ex:, ) and an AD jungler (ex: , ) , rush Seeker's Armguard!! The extra armor will certainly come in useful as well as the stasis.

NAME: Shadowflame
COST: 3200 gold
TYPE: Ability Crit

Shadowflame is basically all you need. It's ideal for more damage and burst, serving as a great enhancement to both Electrocute and Conqueror. Since the ability crit on this item procs for enemies below 40% maximum health, it is especially good to take down squishy targets.

NAME: Hextech Alternator
COST: 1100 gold
TYPE: Ability Power

When you're getting Shadowflame, you generally want to rush Hextech Alternator as iy gives a really good mini damage powerspike.

NAME: Rabadon's Deathcap
COST: 3600 gold
TYPE: Magic Amp

The perfect Akali item doesn't exi- Oh well.Rabadon's Deathcap has always been AP assassin's most emblematic item. However it's quite pricey, and gives no defensive stats whatsoever. I would generally build this as a 4th or 5th item.

Note : You can go any build path with , depending on the enemy's team comp.

NAME: Sorcerer's Shoes
COST: 1100 gold
TYPE: Magic Pen

I always complete boots right after buying my first Item. You can't go wrong with Sorcerer's Shoes. I personally take it pretty much every game. The flat magic penetration is really good against squishy teams.

NAME: Mercury's Treads
COST: 1300 gold
TYPE: Magic Resist

Great when against full AP team and/or a team with very heavy CC (ex: + , +).

NAME: Plated Steelcaps
COST: 1200 gold
TYPE: Armor

Great against full AD team, or enemy team has a lot of champions who rely on auto-attacks to deal damage.

NAME: Mejai's Soulstealer
COST: 1500 gold
TYPE: Risky Gambit

When ahead, you should always consider buying Mejai's Soulstealer. However, this item can very quickly go from giving you 125 bonus AP at 25 stacks to becoming a waste of gold at 0. Be careful !

NAME: Morellonomicon
COST: 2950 gold
TYPE: Anti-heal

VERY pricey item but sometimes necessary to counter extreme healing in the enemy team. Usually I just stick with the mini version of Morello.

NAME: Oblivion Orb
COST: 800 gold
TYPE: Anti-Heal

Mini version of Morello ! Build Oblivion Orb if you're laning against a healing champion (ex: , ) or enemy team has healers (ex: , ).

NAME: Void Staff
COST: 3000 gold
TYPE: Magic Pen

Usually a late game item. By this point, enemy team surely has bought a good amount of magic resist to negate your damage, especially hypercarries, so Void Staff becomes necessary.

NAME: Quicksilver Sash
COST: 1300 gold
TYPE: Removes Disables

Quicksilver Sash is the only item in the game that can disable suppression (ex:'s ult, 's ult). I only recommend building it when you're fed, and you know you're a high-priority target for the enemy team.

NAME: Maw of Malmortius
COST: 2900 gold
TYPE: Anti-Magic

This is exactly what you need against a full AP team, not only for the magic damage shield, but also for the additional Ability Haste and Omnivamp to complete a Riftmaker build. I wouldn't build this item in any other scenario.

NAME: Hexdrinker
COST: 1300 gold
TYPE: Magic Resist

Just like Seeker's armguard, you'd want to rush Hexdrinker early against burst AP midlaners (ex:, ) and AP junglers (ex: , )

NAME: Banshee's Veil
COST: 2600 gold
TYPE: Spellshield

Great against heavy AP, especially if enemy team has a fed mage or AP assassin for example. If there's a specific ability you'd like to block (ex: 's E, 's ult), Banshee's is the right choice.

NAME: Verdant Barrier
COST: 1600 gold
TYPE: Spellshield

This item serves the same purpose as Hexdrinker as a defensive early game item against AP midlaner + AP jungler, except that here it acts as a mini Banshee's Veil and grants you a spellshield early on.

Standard Electrocute

One-shot Electrocute

VS Full AP (Elec)

Standard Conqueror

Anti-healing (Conq)

VS Full AD (Conq)

IMPORTANT NOTE : All of these stats I have gathered from Crixaliz's sheet. All you have to do to use it is create a copy first. All credits to him for his incredible work on this algorithm ! I would strongly recommend toying around with it yourself if you're interested in comparing other builds (on any champion) for a deeper dive and better understanding. All of the builds down below have been ran through Crixaliz's damage calculator with fully stacked runes on a level 18 Akali with Ignite (that counts for 410 extra damage in 'All-in's).

.



AD : 118 Lifesteal : 0 Health : 2623 Armor : 153 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 738 AH : 10 Omnivamp : 0% MR : 72 MS : 420



Q : 1450 W : 0 E : 2787 R : 2145 Passive : 1283	Magic PEN : 42 Magic PEN% : 0% ATQ DPS: 114 Item DMG : 641 All-in : 10269

enemy team comp example

.



AD : 118 Lifesteal : 6% Health : 3237 Armor : 103 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 720 AH : 15 Omnivamp : 10% MR : 72 MS : 390



Q : 1307 W : 0 E : 2519 R : 1943 Passive : 1156	Magic PEN : 27 Magic PEN% : 40% ATQ DPS: 133 Item DMG : 0 All-in : 7714



AD : 147 Lifesteal : 6% Health : 3273 Armor : 103 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 768 AH : 15 Omnivamp : 10% MR : 72 MS : 390



Q : 1355 W : 0 E : 2601 R : 1986 Passive : 1199	Magic PEN : 27 Magic PEN% : 40% ATQ DPS: 133 Item DMG : 0 All-in : 7930

enemy team comp example

The number of stacks refers to Conqueror*

.



AD : 118 Lifesteal : 0 Health : 2723 Armor : 103 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 634 AH : 10 Omnivamp : 0% MR : 72 MS : 406



Q : 1033 W : 0 E : 1999 R : 1578 Passive : 910	Magic PEN : 27 Magic PEN% : 40% ATQ DPS: 114 Item DMG : 587 All-in : 7318



AD : 118 Lifesteal : 0 Health : 2723 Armor : 103 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 797 AH : 10 Omnivamp : 0% MR : 72 MS : 447



Q : 1200 W : 0 E : 2305 R : 1745 Passive : 1063	Magic PEN : 27 Magic PEN% : 40% ATQ DPS: 114 Item DMG : 698 All-in : 8237

enemy team comp example

The number of stacks refers to Mejai's Soulstealer*

.



AD : 118 Lifesteal : 6% Health : 3623 Armor : 103 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 723 AH : 30 Omnivamp : 10% MR : 72 MS : 390



Q : 899 W : 0 E : 1733 R : 1336 Passive : 795	Magic PEN : 12 Magic PEN% : 40% ATQ DPS: 185 Item DMG : 0 All-in : 5606



AD : 147 Lifesteal : 6% Health : 3623 Armor : 103 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 771 AH : 30 Omnivamp : 10% MR : 72 MS : 390



Q : 947 W : 0 E : 1815 R : 1379 Passive : 839	Magic PEN : 12 Magic PEN% : 40% ATQ DPS: 185 Item DMG : 0 All-in : 5822

enemy team comp example

The number of stacks refers to Conqueror*

.



AD : 178 Lifesteal : 0 Health : 2623 Armor : 103 Tenacity : 37%	AP : 608 AH : 25 Omnivamp : 10% MR : 132 MS : 406



Q : 833 W : 0 E : 1690 R : 1320 Passive : 780	Magic PEN : 15 Magic PEN% : 40% ATQ DPS: 172 Item DMG : 769 All-in : 6458

enemy team comp example

.



AD : 118 Lifesteal : 6% Health : 3273 Armor : 178 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 772 AH : 15 Omnivamp : 10% MR : 72 MS : 390



Q : 1128 W : 0 E : 2169 R : 1652 Passive : 999	Magic PEN : 15 Magic PEN% : 0% ATQ DPS: 191 Item DMG : 0 All-in : 6801



AD : 147 Lifesteal : 6% Health : 3273 Armor : 178 Tenacity : 10%	AP : 820 AH : 15 Omnivamp : 10% MR : 72 MS : 390



Q : 1176 W : 0 E : 2251 R : 1695 Passive : 1043	Magic PEN : 15 Magic PEN% : 0% ATQ DPS: 191 Item DMG : 0 All-in : 7017

enemy team comp example

The number of stacks refers to Conqueror*

Detailed Passive

❤ Every damaging ability can proc ’s passive which comprises : Q, E1,

E2, R1 ,

R2.

❤ This passive is very useful when trading in lane and deals tons of damage.

❤ When your lane opponent is going for cs, look to proc Assassin's Mark (usually with Q) to put pressure and to try and deny them the minion.

Description:Assassin's Mark basically gives an empowered auto-attack that provides bonus movement speed towards enemy champions and has longer range. Very useful for general trading in lane or chasing a low heath enemy to finish them off.

❤ If you are running Fleet, you can proc Assassin's Mark faster by autoattacking the enemy champion. This is especially useful when they are running away from you.

Faster Passive proc with Fleet

Detailed Q

❤ Hitting Five Point Strike at the tip slows the enemy, making it easier to land your E and the rest of your combo.

❤ During the laning phase, you want to look to harass your opponent with this ability, ESPECIALLY if they are melee. Do not let them cs for free without losing anything.

❤ This is your main waveclear ability, though it's not the most efficient in the game. But if you position yourself correctly, you can hit both caster and melee minions with your Q.

Description:Five Point Strike is Akali’s main ability and trading tool in the laning phase. It's also her primary source of damage pre-6 and the base to a large number of combos. It has very low cooldown, allowing you to use it pretty often, though it costs half your energy at ranks 1 -> 3.

❤ Casting Q at max range instantly gives you a Passive proc (only on blue side tho :( ).

Instant Passive proc with Q

❤ Casting Q diagonally will extend its range.

Casting Q Diagonally

Detailed W

❤ Your shroud is one of your two main tools to escaping ganks, along with Shuriken Flip, plus it got a relatively long cooldown. Care not to waste it in lane. Play safe and don't go for extended trades if it's not up, as you won't be able to do much without the extra energy and invisibility.

❤ You can hide in your W to cancel and dodge abilities, or when you're rooted to negate any incoming damage and gain time.

Description: Akali’s W is extremely important to her kit. Not only does it give her invisibility and movement speed, but also restores energy (enough for another Q+AA combo).

❤ Throwing your shroud in a teamfight in the middle of 4 or 5 people creates immense pressure, and allows you to reposition yourself correctly and choose your target (usually the adc).

❤ You can Teleport while in your shroud.

Old (and bugged) clip of me using TP while in shroud

❤ Your W will always adapt to the terrain's shape. So using it in the jungle will give you a huge advantage as your shroud will expand and therefore, offer you more room.

Examples of Akali's shroud expanding

Detailed E

❤ Your

E2 will follow anyone, anywhere, no matter the distance. This means that you can follow a TP, a Ult or even a Ult with the second part of this ability.

❤ Just like with his Q, you can hit jungle camps or minions with E to run away.

❤ Stuns and roots can interrupt your

second dash.

Description: Other than the insane amounts of damage, Shuriken Flip grants you ton of mobility and play making potential. This is your only skillshot, and missing it could be fatal. It's also a great escape tool.

❤ Hitting E is often crucial to landing a clean combo. Only throw it when you're 99% sure you're not going to miss it.

❤ Shuriken Flip is great when it comes to dodging projectiles with lower range, or escaping the area of effect of certain abilities in time.

Ingame example

❤ You can E backwards and W as you're coming out of the fountain to get back faster to lane. Another trick you can do when missing some gold to build a certain item and/or waiting to heal up, is throw your W outside of fountain, then marking it with E. DO NOT DO THIS and waste your abilities if there's a fight unfolding in your jungle / near foutain.

Saving time when leaving the fountain

❤ You can E first then instantly W and your shroud would still get marked.

E+W

❤ Even when Twilight Shroud ends, the marked section with E will still linger for the marks duration. You can also take advantage of the fact that you can mark your shroud with E to steal an objective/get kills and get away with it. This is a very important mechanic that every player should know.

Drake steal

Dive

❤ Shuriken flip's hitbox begins right behind your character. So even if someone dashes behind you (like a for example), you can still hit them with E.

E hitbox

❤ E'ing then Flashing will change Shuriken Flip's projectile direction, but it will not change the original landing spot.

E+Flash

❤ You can cast Twilight shroud and Perfect Exection during E1 and

E2, but not Five Point Strike !

❤ With E1, mark champions who can go invisible (ex: , ) before they disappear, especially if they have a clone so you can identify which one is which.

❤ Shuriken Flip now grants True Sight of invisible units, meaning that it can reveal stealthed enemy champions. Here's a complete list of champions' abilities that you can reveal.

Stealth abilities that you can reveal with E

❤ There are a lot of walls you can cross with E that you probably didn't know about. This could be very useful when you're stuck in a sticky situation and have no other way out, or if you want to join a fight faster. However the angle you throw your E in is very important when going through certain walls. *Note that you can hit the Baron, but not the Herald with E1*.

Map showcasing all the thick walls you jump over with E

Detailed R

❤ Since

R2 is an execute, you'd only want to use it at the end of you combo, or just before the timer ends.

❤ Wait for the enemy to use their dashes and mobility before

R2'ing them.

❤ If you position yourself correctly, you can go through walls with R1 and escape from an unwanted fight. To achieve that, you have to stand in a

Description:Perfect execution is composed of 2 dashes : The first one being targeted, meaning that you can only cast it on enemy champions. The second one is an execute, dealing magic damage : the lower health your enemy has, the more damage you will inflict them.

linear line between yourself, the enemy and a close thin wall. Direct Perfect Execution towards the other side of the wall, then cast it onto the enemy. You can use this same pattern to engage on an enemy who's on the other side of the wall, as long as it's within your R range.

R1 through walls

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❤ To guarantee hitting your E, you can throw it right as you cast your first point and click dash. This will used a lot in the combos section.

InGame example

❤ The hitbox on

R2 actually starts behind your character, just like Shuriken Flip. This means that you can

R2 before reaching your target and still deal damage on your way out.

❤ If timed correctly, you can dodge some abilities like Malphite's Ult with R1.

❤ You can extend both of your dashes with Flash, by casting it near their end.

R1+FLASH / R2+FLASH

❤ You can cancel

E2 with both of your dashes. This is especially useful with R1 during teamfights, when you've marked a frontliner with Shuriken Flip, and want to redirect the attack onto the squishy carry.

E2 CANCEL WITH R1

E2 CANCEL WITH R2

Ingame example

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W

This is the ability you will use the most, as it's your main damage and waveclear tool. Always level up and max Five Point Strike first.

A lot of people level up Twilight Shroud second, but I personally don't recommend it unless against tough matchups. You get so much more value out of leveling up Shuriken Flip instead. It gives you more pressure as you get to do much more burst damage earlier on. You always max it second.

As literally any other champion, you want to put a point on your ultimate whenever you can. You get more damage, more range, but above all, you get to use it more often due to lower cooldowns. You always max it third.

Even though your smoke is an important part of your kit, you don't gain much by maxing it, apart from an increase in the movement speed burst and in shroud duration. It's not worth maxing over the other abilities, which is why you always max it fourth.

The easiest and most basic combo you can do. You have no skillshots to land, just Q then passive proc. Keep your W to when you run out of energy, or to dodge a certain skillshot, utilizing the burst of movement speed. The more points you have in your Q, the less energy it will cost and therefore you'll be able to spam it more.

If the enemy is freezing the wave and you don't wanna miss the cannon minion, then you can use this combo to quickly last hit it and at the same time trade with your lane opponent. However this combo is very inefficient as you're wasting and not utilizing your E and your W.

This is the best and most common all-in combo before level 6. You want to E right after Q to give your opponent no time to react. Generally they would be running away from you, allowing you to hit a max range Q and slow them.

After you E1, you need to wait for your cooldowns before flying back in. Keep in mind that there's a 2.5 seconds interval between R1 and

R2. (Note: if you have low FPS just like in this clip, R1+E1 combo will look a bit iffy and won't be as smooth as it is in the other clips)

To do this combo, all you need to do is cancel R1 animation with E, and throw your Q as soon as you can. This a great combo for a quick and clean assassination. If the target still hasn't died, you can come back for a quick Passive proc to finish them off.

The reason you Q first then Flash is to give your opponnent less reaction time. This is the all-in combo you'd want to use against a tankier champion, as it requires a lot to actually take him down. Of course you don't need to flash if you're already in range lol.

When the enemy adc is clearly out of position, do not hesitate to instantly use this combo on him. R+Flash is such an insanely good gap closer, I use it often to catch my opponents off guard and take their health bar away while giving them no chance to fight back or escape.

Once you've gotten your enemy low enough, you can look to dive them with this combo. This is the easiest one to do. However, keep in mind that you will take two to three turret shots, so be careful !

Remember to Q right before Ult'ing away for more dps. Ignite is optional, but you will probably need it most of the time. As the ignite clock is ticking, leading your opponent to an inevitable death, the emote/Mastery 7 spam is very important.

Now this is a very hard to pull off combo. You could use it in case you're diving the enemy but you need to reposition yourself to avoid receiving a fatal turret shot or dodging a skillshot. But honestly you could stick to Standard Dive and Quick Dive, this is just for the highlight clips :D

Trading

Recalling

Map Awareness

Warding

Jungle Tracking

Jungle Syn/Matchups

Roaming

Wave Management

TL;DR :

• Don't let your opponent CS freely. Q them whenever possible and not risky.
• Look for mistakes (use of key abilities, overextending with no summoner spells) and punish them.
• Pay attention to your opponent's resources and backup before fighting them ( difference in damage output, sustain, jungler's position, resources, wave state).

Trading Stance

• What is the "Trading Stance" about?"
Trading Stance is a way to get the upper hand on your lane opponent, by harassing them whenever they go for last-hits. Essentially, it's about creating pressure, securing CS while denying it to your enemy. This is a quite simple yet extremely hard to master concept.

• How do you use the Trading Stance to your advantage in a melee matchup?

As , you often have a range advantage over your opponent, thanks to . Always keep an eye on your minion’s health bar. As soon as they’re about to die, just know that the enemy will try to go for it, which of course, you cannot let them do freely. Your main harassing tool will always be your Q+AA combo. Ideally, you'd want to secure cs AND at the same time deny last-hits. You should retreat right after you’ve finished trading successfully, to prevent them from harassing you back. But if you know you can go for more than just a simple Q+AA combo, due to the enemy jungler being on the other side of the map, and knowing that you outdamage your opponent for example, then you can look

for an all-in and potentially get a kill if you’ve gotten your target low enough from earlier trades.

• What if I’m against a ranged champion?
Now this is more complicated. You won’t always be able to utilize this concept, just like in this case, where your opponent is the one to have a range advantage. However, depending on the matchup, what you can do is create a freeze (go to Wave Management section). The enemy will be forced into a bad position and will often try to break the freeze. You can then zone them out of the minion wave and threaten an all-in if they go for cs. Akali excels at dueling and punishing mistakes, especially post-6, which gives her insane kill pressure and lane dominance, if played correctly. One particular mistake you're looking for, is when your opponent wastes their main escape/CC ability. (ex: 's or 's )

Retaliation Trading

Retaliation trading is technically the opposite of trading stance, as you’re not the one to initiate the skirmish, but the one to fight back. The point of it is to prevent your opponent from getting a lead, to have equal if not more pressure than your enemy. But you need to remember that there are a few things to take into consideration before choosing to fight back, instead of simply retreating.

• Who deals more damage?
This is all about knowing the matchup, your damage potential but also your opponent’s. At level 6, should be able to take down most squishy champions. But keep in mind that a lot of variables come into play, not just damage output.

• Who has more sustain?
Let’s say you’re up against a . Chances are, even if you choose to fight back and end up winning the trade, he’s just going to heal everything back up with

. Same thing will occur when your opponent has a potions or even a TP advantage.
.

• Where is their jungler? Where is mine? Is the 1v2 winnable ?
This all comes down to map awareness and vision control. Knowing where the enemy jungler is at all times is impossible, but you always need to at least have an idea of where they could be. Depending on your jungler’s champion and theirs, you should be able to tell who comes out on top in a 2v2 situation. However, you should always be mindful of Akali’s strengths, especially post-6. Sometimes, the enemy midlaner might try to bait you into what seems to be a free fight while their jungler is patiently waiting in the bush. What they don’t realize is how good your 1v2 potential actually is, and how easy it is for you to one-shot champions and escape, especially in lower elos.

• What cooldowns do they have? Do I have any? How much mana/energy do they have?
It’s extremely important to know what tools your enemy can fight you with, to determine whether a trade is worth taking or not. Let’s say both your and are on cooldown, while the enemy has both his summoner spells and has hit level 6 before you, then it’s always safer to just E out and hide under turret, rather than taking a clearly unwinnable fight.

• Who has a minion advantage?
One thing to watch out for is minion aggro, especially in very early levels. One trade might look good on paper but once you execute it, you realize that you’ve taken more damage from the wave than from the enemy themselves. As a rule of thumb, never fight when the enemy has a big minion wave advantage for two main reasons :

They will be able to hide behind their minions and protect themselves from your E.
You will take a lot of damage from the wave and most likely lose the trade.

TL;DR :

• Recall only on cannon waves as they're spawning and still in base.
• Recall when the wave is : pushing towards you, frozen in your favor, fully crashed under the enemy's turret.
• Don't recall when the wave is : under your turret, pushing towards the enemy, frozen in the enemy's favor.
• Favor recalling at certain gold values to buy desired items.
• Recall before Objectives spawns to make efficient use of your gold.
• Don't recall where the enemy can see you.

The Importance of Recalling at the right time

Recalling seems like such an innocent mechanic when in reality a lot more thought should go into it, which not many people realize. Recalling efficiently is all about gaining time and minimizing gold and xp loss. From wave management to proper objective control, here is all you need to know about recalling as a midlaner!

Recall Timers

• Wave state
Always recall on a cannon wave. You have probably heard it before, but it really is an important key to mastering recalling. Why is it so important, you ask ? Well, simply put, cannon waves take a lot more effort than regular waves to be cleared, either by turrets or champions. This then gives you a lot more time to recall, buy items and come back to lane. Before recalling, make sure the wave just spawning in your base is a cannon one, but also look at the current wave state and envision what it will look like after your recall.

Is it slow pushing towards the enemy ? Hard shove the lane. Otherwise, the enemy laner will be able to freeze on you.
Is it slow pushing towards you ? Now's your turn to look to set up a freeze by clearing the wave but leaving 3 caster minions alive near your turret. Once you come back to lane, the wave will remain be frozen ! Unless someone came in and cleared it to break the freeze, which will likely not happen the lower the elo.
Is the wave even ? Shove it ! Unless it is a cannon wave, (in which case you shouldn't be recalling) you can easily hard push the wave into the enemy turret and back !

• Gold value
Ideally, you want to back as soon as you hit a gold milestone that will enable you to purchase an item (or part of one). How many times has it happened to you that you recall at 1220g carelessly, then realize once in fountain that you are misssing just 80g for ? Or any other gold deficit for any other item ? Don't let that happen again ! Learn from your mistakes and, little mental math exercice, only recall when you have enough gold for x or y items.

• Objective Timers
Right before an objective, you want to maximize your input damage and efficiency to higher your chances to win the upcoming fight. You don't want to be sitting on 1k+ gold while fighting. If you're not spending the gold you're getting, then what's the point ? 45 sec or so before an objective spawns, recall and purchase whatever items you can and don't forget control wards to set up vision control ! However, if you don't have much time before Drake spawns, don't risk it. You don't want to let your team get into a 4v5 while you're in base at the shop.

Recalling Tips

• Don't recall in the open ! Don't just press B in the middle of the lane praying no one comes by. No point in risking getting interrupted or even caught. Just back off to your turret if healthy enough..
• Don't recall under your T1 turret if very low on health and in risk of getting dove ! The closer you are to your base, the safe you are. If I'm against a level 6+, I might even recall at my T3 turret.
• If in the jungle or river, always recall in bushes ! Plus ALWAYS make sure they are not warded and the enemy is not aware of you being there.
None of those rules apply if the whole enemy team is dead :D

TL;DR :

• Look at your minimap as frequently as possible.
• Information to pick up from the minimap : (enemy's/ally's) junglers' positions, missing ennemies, unfolding fights nearby, upcoming waves (expecially cannon ones).
• Open the scoreboard frequently.
• Information to pick up from the scoreboard : what your lane opponent is building, objective timers, your allies' resources.

The Importance of Map Awareness

Checking the minimap/scoreboard frequently is essential to having good macro. There's so much information you can draw that allows you to take more appropriate decisions. Having bad map awareness is failing to understand the state of the game. But taking a quick glance is not enough! There are a few things you should be focusing on to improve your map awareness and win more games.

What to look for

• Your jungler/The enemy jungler
During the laning phase, it's extremely important to keep track of the enemy jungler pathing, especially when playing a champion as aggressive as . It will help you determine whether to play safe or not, and prevent you from playing overly offensive and getting punished for it. Likewise, you'd want to pay attention to your jungler's pathing, and what their next move is. Are they looking to invade ? Can you help with the invade ? Is the scuttle crab fight winnable or should you ping them back ? Are they in a position where they can help you, or is it wiser to just not force a gank and wait for better opportunities ? This is what should be going through your mind when evaluating the situation.

• Unfolding fights

More often than not, your teammates will not bother pinging you to alert you of fights breaking down in river, or enemies roaming. Whatever the cause, a skirmish may be randomly taking place in the river. Even if her early game isn't the best, is an excellent skirmisher post-6, due to her countless escape tools and high damage output. Another reason for you to keep a close eye on the map, otherwise you might miss out on some kills, or cause the death of a teammate when you could've easily saved them.

• Missing Enemies
The jungler isn't the only person you should be careful of. Any one could be looking to gank your lane, whether it'd the support, sometimes accompanied by their adc, or even the toplaner. This is EXTREMELY important at all stages of the game, not just during the laning phase. Look at the map, and always ask yourself : Which enemies are missing ? How many are they ? Can my allies help or should I simply retreat ?

• Your opponents' items
It's incredibly important to press tab and check what the enemy is building.
Firstly, to be able to itemize accordingly. Is the enemy team stacking MR ? Start building Void Staff.
Secondly, to know what to expect. Your lane opponent has bought Stopwatch or Hexdrinker ? Don't get baited and go for risky plays where you dive them and expect to one-shot them, but end up dying instead.

• Upcoming wave
Knowing that the next minion wave is a cannon one enables you to suitingly make decisions. At this point, if the enemy laner is missing, you should look to quickly shove the current wave and choose to either roam, get vision, get picks in the jungle (if ahead and area is warded), create pressure or simply just recall if you have nothing else to do.

• ACTING rather than REACTING
Stop acting surprised whenever you all-in the enemy laner, get ganked right at that moment and start blaming your jungler for not being there. Instead, learn to anticipate your opponents' moves. Enemy jungler was spotted near botside scuttle crab at approximately 3:30 min ? They're probably mostly done with their jungle clear and are coming for you next. Your jungler is pathing topside to gank the enemy toplaner? They can't be at two spots at the same time. The enemy support was spotted by a ward in your jungle pathing towards midlane? Again, they're probably coming for you. All of this info you can only get if you're actively looking at your minimap and anticipating what the opponents' plan is, rather than reacting to it after it's too late.

Stealth Wards

•Blue side

•Red side

❤ The yellow wards are the most useful and common safe wards. Whenever you can, you'd want to place one of these. It's preferable to never sit on 2 trinkets.

❤ The purple ones are deep wards that you'd set in the jungle. These give crucial vision but are more risky and require more time to put down. Look to place these wards when your lane opponent is stuck under his turret clearing the wave. If you run into the enemy jungler, you can try to fight him, especially if no one can help him, or if you can simply one-shot him. I wouldn't recommend doing that if you're not familiar/experienced enough with .

❤ The green ward is a ward you'd mostly want to place against junglers who can counter the normal lane brush ward. This includes fast champions like , or , and other champions like (who'd E from the other side of the wall) or (who'd Q over the wall). Note that the raptors ward is also specifically good against and , but careful not to get caught as you're placing it!

❤ You could also put a ward in the middle of the lane, just outside of turret range against champions who love to roam like or , so you can determine which way they went.

❤ If you're roaming a lot, your opponent might use the same trick and put a ward in the middle of the lane. Don't hesitate to remove it with either or a ! Vision denial is super important.

Control Wards

•Blue side

•Red side

❤ The blue wards are neutral wards. When placing a control ward in the lane brush, you always want to put it the closest to you, so you can better defend it.

❤ The red wards are offensive wards. Only put these when you are ahead and able to protect them.

❤ The pink wards are defensive wards. If your whole team is behind, or the enemy jungler keeps invading yours, then warding defensively become necessary. Oherwise your control wards are just going to get destroyed over and over again.

❤ Always look to ward the side the next objective in on. As an example, if the drake is spawning soon, then you'd want to put your control ward in the bot side, and your stealth wards the deepest you can in their jungle. I will go more into detail about this subject later on (go to Establishing vision/map control section).

❤ If someone is removing your control ward, you can instantly put another one down to deny them the xp and gold.

TL;DR :

• Ganking Junglers : strong early game, gank as early as level 2 for some. Be mindful of their early skirmishes and ganks.
• Powerfarming Junglers : hyperscalers, can only gank effectively past certain powerspikes (levels, items). Abuse them while you can (invade them / ward their jungle).
• Control Junglers : fast clear + mobility, counter-jungle and ward. Keep your jungle warded and help your jungler when they get invaded.
• See whether the enemy bot or top leashed to determine the enemy jungler's starting point (Blue or Red).
• 1 camp = 4 cs. Scuttle crab spawn (potential fight) = 3:30 mins. Possible gank (before camp respawn) 4:30-5:00 mins. 1st buff respawn ≅ 7:00 mins.

Types of Junglers

• Ganking junglers
It's important to know what jungler you're up against to adjust your playstyle accordingly. Champions like , , , etc.. have very strong early game power and will most likely be looking to gank more than farm.
These junglers' gameplan is generally to get their level 3 powerspike first then gank. However, you should always watch out for level 2 cheese ganks with red buff, especially against champions like or . In this case, even if you're laning against someone you can abuse early on, do not play aggressive. If harassing with will make you push the wave, then don't do it. It's far from worth it.

• Powerfarming junglers
Now these champions will look to farm and get their level/item powerspikes as soon as possible to start making an impact on the game. This includes hyperscalers like and , but also champions that can only gank effectively once they get level 6: , , , etc.. You can look to ward their jungle, and

invade them by yourself (or preferably with your jungler) to delay their powerspikes. However, make sure you're not just going into a straight 1v3 against the enemy jungle and bot. Always watch your minimap and read the game state.

• Control junglers
These champions will try to make your jungler's life a living hell. Their main goal is counter jungling and maintaining map control, by constantly invading the side your jungler is not on, and stealing their camps all while establishing vision control. We'd generally put in this category fast farming champions with high mobility like , , , , etc.. Against these junglers, what you want to do as a midlaner is help your jungler as much as possible, by keeping your jungle warded and punishing whenever the enemy invades at a bad time.

Jungle Pathing

• Red/Blue start
In most cases, you should be able to tell where the enemy jungler started. Having this info will help you better anticipate when they might gank you and from where. As an example, if their toplaner came late to lane and/or with missing hp/mana, then you can safely assume that the jungler started topside. This often entails that if you get ganked next, it's most likely going to come from botside. In that case, ward and hug the topside of the map to give yourself more reaction time to escape and make it near impossible for the enemy jungler to successfully gank your lane. Keep in mind that sometimes, junglers like would start raptors or wolves, meaning that they won't need a leash, and therefore making it harder to predict their pathing.

• Jungle clear
You can determine what clear a jungler did by looking at their CS. Every camp gives 4 CS, this means that if they show up on the map and have 24 cs, then they did 6 camps, so a fulll clear. Knowing what clear they did will enable you to more accurately predict what their next move is, and be prepared to counter it. Usually, junglers would recall at 4:00 to match their camps respawn, which is 2 minutes for normal camps. This sometimes means that their next gank might come between the 4:30 to 5:00 minute window.

The 1st Buff respawn should be at the 7:00 minute mark. If the enemy jungler is behind while you're fairly ahead, you can look to

cheese him at his camp. Set up vision with control wards and first, then you can surprise him at his own buff and put him even further behind.
Make sure your laners have priority, or that his allies cannot rotate quickly enough to help.

• Bot/Top Scuttle Crab
At the 3:30 minute mark, the Scuttle Crab will spawn. If your jungler is doing the top scuttle, then you know for a fact that the enemy jungler is on bot scuttle. As this objective is coming up, you should be pinging your jungler if you cannot help them contest it. If a fight does occur and you end up winning the 2v2, then again, you can be 100% sure that the enemy jungler is heading to bot crab next.

Fiddlesticks - Hecarim - Amumu

PLAYING WITH HIM : ’ kit is such a good match to . As an assassin, all you need is a good CC-provider, and is exactly that. Plus, the lower elo you are in, the less people will be wary of a 's ult.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Yea. Don’t be those people. Be careful once the enemy hits level 6. He will always look to flank ult to join fights and hit the maximum number of people, or gank midlane from raptors. This is why warding that raptors area is very important. Before level 6, you should still be careful, in cases where your lane opponent has an easy-to-land CC skillshot or ability that will result in you being CC-chained with help, or has a gap-closing ability that will help them catch up to his engage. No other way to dodge his CC than not being in its range ._. Also, keep the area warded, so even if he ults he won't fear the targets hit.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Great engage potential and CC. His ability to bring people your way and sort of like spoon feeding them to you is very satisfying and makes him synergize well with . Post-6, you can look to help him gank other lanes and get advantages through the whole map.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : You can avoid his ult CC by ult'ing over him at the right time (before he reaches your character when he’s running at you with E). Pre-level 6, you can just E out of his E, again, before he reaches your character. Otherwise, you might still be able to get the damage off and mark him, but you will get knocked back. Beware of side flanks, s will often come from behind you, rather than taking the normal route through the side bushes. For that reason, you should also ward further down the river or in the bushes covering the jungle exit routes, rather than in the side brushes to see him coming from farther away. He will also prioritize ganks with , so you should definitely keep track of its cooldown.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Again, it’s really just about being able to CC the opponent consistently. Especially his ult due to its ability to stun multiple targets and amplify magic damage. Absolute beauty. Landing your combo is 10 times easier against a stunned target, rather than a moving one (duh).

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : When getting ganked in lane, dodge his Q with your E by throwing it sideways(not linear to him because his Q range is higher) towards your turret. Good s will hold on to their CC ability and not throw it as soon as they see you.

Briar - Elise - Graves - Ivern - Jarvan IV - KhaZix - Nocturne - Nunu & Willumps - Rammus - Rek Kayn - RekSai - Sejuani - Shaco - Skarner - Trundle - Vi - Volibear - Warwick - Zac

PLAYING WITH HER : A very good creepy duelist with decent CC and great playmaking potential. Her kit is most valuable in areas with lots of terrain to be able to stun enemies against a wall. 's kit combined with 's high burst allows for great lockdown potential and easy picks on innocent careless bush-face-checking roamers.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : is a champion that just reaaally likes being in your face. She doesn't do well against kiting champions, which unfortunately isn't . If not ahead you don't have much to fight against her, especially post-6 since her ultimate reveals you in your shroud. If you don't know where she is, play safe under your turret, unless your jungler is nearby and has the necessary CC to lock her down in a 2v2 or 2v1 situation.

PLAYING WITH HER : Doesn’t have as much reliable CC as the others, as it's one-target only. Plus the enemy can counter your damage and her CC simply by buying , though that does have some downsides if the rest of your team is AD. Good diving potential, thanks to her W that resets turret aggro, and flanking potential. You can both hide in a bush and wait for a prey to pass by.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : is very active during the early game, looking to gank everytime she has a chance. If you get caught in her cocoon, you're very likely dead. Steer clear of bushes !! You should generally never facecheck, but especially against a champion like . Keep your distance, or a flying cocoon might find your way. If low on health, don't stay under your turret thinking you're safe, there might be a spider nearby..

PLAYING WITH HIM : Being a control jungler, benefits a lot from having an assassin such as that can help him successfully invade the enemy jungle and make their life a living hell. He doesn't necessarily have CC other than his Smoke, though that is often enough to destablize the enemy. With both of you having gap-closing abilities, you can easily collapse onto an enemy together and probably one-shot them before they could even react.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Ward your jungle !! is all about counter-jungling. He will look to powerfarm and invade as much as possible. In a straight 1v1, when he dashes towards you, instantly E him, and from that point he's very likely already dead. You can also get out of his smoke with E, and therefore avoid any complications. Thanks to , his auto-attacks cannot go through unit, which means that you can actually dodge his auto-attacks by hiding behind your minions or your allies.


	PLAYING WITH HIM : Shields. Peel. CC. Good dives with Daisy. In tune with nature. I just like having an Ivern on my team tbh. PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Who tf even plays ivern

PLAYING WITH HIM : A level 2 gank by when he has red buff is always welcome. He will just keep auto-attacking the enemy lane to death, while all you have to do is Q or hit your E (if you’re already level 2 aswell). His full combo with his ult does benefit you a lot, paralyzing the enemy so you can inflict any damage you want upon them. Though it is quite annoying when you get stuck in his ult yourself >:( (Pro tip : you can ult off of someone to get out of it, or use ).

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Beware of early ganks. You can dodge his whole E+Q combo with , since it has longer range. However, keep in mind that his combo has a relatively long range, and can do it from bushes without you even being that close to it, especially if he has

PLAYING WITH HIM : Quite surprising to see a non-CC champion in this category, but somehow x do in fact synergize pretty well. Their ability to both apply such huge amounts of damage in a short span of time is unmatched, especially post 6 when can lash out on the enemy laner out of nowhere.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : When he jumps onto you with , throw your E at him to guarantee hitting it. Additionally, you can mark him with E and reveal him with True Sight as he goes invisible, and then you can fly back to him and continue with the rest of your combo. One trick a lot of players use is ult'ing when still out of sight. Which means they would press R when still in the bush, then approach you without you knowing. Be mindful of his silhouette briefly appearing when he's invisible near you.

PLAYING WITH HIM : He cannot do much pre-6, but past that point his utility level sky-rockets. The lower elo you are, the less likely people will keep track of his ult. This means that you can pretend to be apprehensive of your opponent in lane and back off, which will give them the confidence to walk up and pressure you, and that's when comes in play.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : When he has a lot of bonus movement - from his Q or E passive - you cannot E out of his tether as he will be able to catch up to you, unless it was casted at max range. I would also recommend buying if necessary. While in stasis, you will still get feared, but at least will be immune to damage. He can also protect himself from your E with , so he will not get marked nor recieve damage. Beware of his ult at all times after level 6. A good habit to have is pinging your teammates whenever affected by it to let them know your location.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Insane amounts of CC and peel. He's everything you could ask for in a jungler to duo with as . He would 100% be in the "Ideal Synergy" category if his ult wasn't so easily stopped. Plus Willump is cute.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Ward further down in the river bushes rather than in the side bushes. This will give you more time to react to him and . To dodge his W, don't just go in a straight line ! It cannot turn very quickly, so use that to your advatange . Make abrupt quick turns and you should be able to dodge it pretty easily. Of course, don't forget to Ignite him if necessary to reduce the healing.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Relatively tanky champion with great CC. Cannot peel as well as other champions but does the job. Thanks to , his speed makes him very unpredictable which allows him to take opponents by surprise and CC-chain them to death.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Just like the other high-speed champions, you want to be warding further down the river and jungle to see them coming from miles away and not be caught off-guard. The faster he is while rolling in a ball, the closer to the end of he is. So if he is nearing the end of , you can throw E at him and very likely be able to dodge it. Otherwise, you can't dodge it with E as he will just keep running at you with faster and faster speed.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Unlike his basic and blue form, Red has CC, extremely high sustain and tankiness, which makes him a perfect match to . His ability to go through the whole map in seconds, thanks to , provides a lot of utility and overall good map control.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : When is going through walls with his E, a mark appears around the exact spot he's in, indicating his movement. His W range isn't long at all, making it very easy to dodge with . Before he ults, you can ignite him so he doesn't heal. Consider buying if necessary for his ult.

PLAYING WITH HER : , like any other champion on this list, has a good amount of CC, through her W and ultimate . All you have to do is hope your doesn't fall off early and doesn't become super useless for the rest of the game.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : The way the second part of her W works is that when she comes out of the ground, she knocks back enemies within a small radius. So when's she close enough to you to land her CC, throw at her to dodge her CC and at the same time hit her. When it comes to her ult, there's nothing you can really do to dodge it other than use or have Faker-level reflexes to dodge it at the right timing (which is like a 0.01 sec window before she comes out of her ult). One thing to note is that when she's navigating the map from the underground, her vision is limited.

PLAYING WITH HER : Considering absolutely ALL of her abilities have some sort of CC, it's only natural for her to be on this list. Additionally, she can provide the tankiness and peel you need to properly do your job as an assassin.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : When she dashes towards you, use your E. You've probably already noticed a pattern here. Usually, you should be able to dodge her whole combo with as most lower-elo s will jump on you with Q+W combo as soon as they see you. However once she gets a point in her ultimate, try to hit her with your E without throwing it perfectly linearly to her. Otherwise, it will be very easy for her to land her ult and CC you to death.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Not necessarily the most reliable CC-provider, but can be a lot of fun to play with as duos ; Being able to successfully lure your enemies into his boxes, or simply see your opponent get tricked by 's clone, leading them to getting CC-locked and jumped on by the rest of your team. Pretty fun, right ?.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Now the fun is over. Be VERY careful of level 2 ganks from . Those are very common, and I would also always recommend alerting your teammates in chat. For that exact reason, don't push the first wave. Always keep an eye on your lane, and keep in mind where puts his boxes. You can usually tell by how your lane opponent is playing. Are they always gravitating towards one particular side of the lane ? Yep, that's where all the boxes are. Before he clones himself, mark him with your E so you can tell which is which. It's often very easy to tell because 's clone takes a LOT more damage than him. Which means that if you have 2 s in front of you, just throw your Q at them and see which one takes more damage.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Can literally stun, suppress, and drag people around like it's nothing. How cool is that?

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Before level 6, there's not much he can do to you. But once that threshold is reached, don't play aggressively in lane unless you have your disengage tools available ( and ). His R is a pretty low range skillshot, that you can easily dodge with your E. If you are the main fed member on your team, consider buying to prevent him from suppressing you.

PLAYING WITH HIM : His kit not only allows him to slow and CC enemies, but also instantly be able to get to them at lightning speed. He likes to get early leads to build off of in later stages of the game, which he can achieve easily with you by his side, helping in early skirmishes.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Your mobility with abilities such as and , or even from your passive allows you to get out of pretty fast and therefore circumvent his territory. His ult gives him insane amounts of healing, so you should always consider buying healing reduction and/or igniting him.

PLAYING WITH HER : Strong CC. Decent tankiness. Gap-closing abilities. What more to say. When possible, you can help her invade and get leads, especially post 6. However if she is far behind the enemy jungler, then that's a bad idea. Don't do that.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : She has very strong burst early game and will look to take detours to your lane from where you least expect it. E her when she dashes towards you, as soon as the animation kicks off. You can kinda counter her ult with , like many other champions. If low on health, be careful of being able to hit you through minion waves and finishing you off. Wait for to wear off before going all-in on her.


	PLAYING WITH HIM : Not the best CC-provider, indeed. But he's a teamfighting beast and has great diving potential post 6 by virtue of Stormbringer. PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Not much to say here other than dodging his E with Shuriken Flip (or any other one of your dashes) and using any kind of healing reduction on him after level 6, so mainly Ignite.

PLAYING WITH HIM : I was pretty reluctant to add him to this list, but I feel like he deserves his place here. He's pretty useless pre-6, but after that he can provide a lot of utility with remarkable sustain.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : You can consider buying QSS if you're the highest-priority target on your team, to cancel his ult. When he's preparing his E, you can dodge the fear by casting before it ends. Don't get fooled by his low HP bar ! He can easily heal everything back up with . Igniting him to reduce the healing is always a good idea.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Another teamfighting beast with insane combo potential. One trick you can use if you have TP is TP'ing on one of his boblets. That way, you can not only save him, but also potentially get a kill or two :D

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : s usually start ganking around the level 4. Think about warding behind the walls on the enemy's side, because that's where most s will begin channeling their E. Always be on the lookout for it, and when you do see its mark appearing on the ground, instantly E away. When he decomposes into boblets with his resurrecting passive, try hitting as many at the same time as you can with .

Bel'Veth - Diana - Ekko - Evelynn - Gragas - Kayn - Blue Kayn - Kindred - Lee sin - Lillia - Malphite - Olaf - Udyr - Viego - Wukong - Xin Zhao

PLAYING WITH HER : She has a very strong early game that she can snowball off of, but very limited CC in her kit. Though it is possible to make plays happen early on if your lane opponent overextends and underestimates her level 3 gank potential.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : A good player will look to invade your enemy jungler and make use of her mobility and early game power. Make sure to ward both sides of the jungle and help your jungler if needed.

PLAYING WITH HER : Not the best synergy between and in my opinion. She lacks a lot of utility pre-6, and even when she gets her ult, it's still not enough CC.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : s usually prefer to farm up till level 6 before ganking. Before that, if she does visit your lane, you can basically dodge her whole dash-in combo with . has a slight cast time before CC'ing and dealing damage. One way you could dodge it is ult'ing her as soon as she starts channeling her ult to get out of its range.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Very strong burst damage with great scaling. However, no reliable CC and pretty squishy early on.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : His W is very easily dodgeable, since he literally loudly calls it out whenever he uses it lol. "Step right up !". After his first dash with , be prepared to dodge the second part of it with your E. Usually, he will toss his Q along with his E, which allows you to dodge both of those abilities with just one. His W gives him a pretty prominent shield, if he enters the chronosphere. Wait it out before going all-in on him.

PLAYING WITH HER : Extremely squishy champion, though she has insane burst damage. That's not really what you're looking for in a jungler. The lack of CC in your kit prevents you from properly setting up a gank for , which limits the chances of her landing her charm. Nevertheless, you can play around her invisibility once she hits level 6, and go hunt down some careless preys in the jungle or river together if none of you have fallen behind by then.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : Buy s !! That is the best and most effective way to counter her invisibility. One simple can ruin all her plans ! If she gets way too fed, consider buying Banshee's to negate part of her damage and CC. Don't overextend (in lane, or in the sidelanes) unless you know exactly where she is, and if you can duel her or not.

PLAYING WITH HIM : is painfully underrated when it comes to champion difficulty in my opinion. I don't think I've ever seen a land a clean combo, where he makes the best out of each of his abilities and correctly knocks away an enemy to me, instead of catapulting him the other way. He has great CC output, but is too often misused.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Dodge his with your E. Keep in my mind that he can use it through walls, and take you by surprise. In teamfights, try not to stay clumped up, as that will make it easier for him to hit on multiple targets.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Two strong assassins that work pretty well together. Doesn't provide as much utility as Rhaast, which is why he's on this list.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Basically the same as his Rhaast form, with a couple differences. When is going through walls with his E, a mark appears around the exact spot he's in, indicating his movement. His most common mini-combo is the instantaneous W+Q, which has very limited range. For that reason, you can easily dodge it . Consider buying if necessary for his ult.

PLAYING WITH HER : A powerful skirmishing marksman with unique utility, thanks to her ult. Her kiting abilities combined with Red Buff, in addition to her burst damage really make her stand out. But she's very squishy. Too squishy.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : Careful of her early ganks and jungle invades. Make sure to cooperate with your jungler to always know where she is and predict her movement. Before level 6 she is very easily killable if you hit your E on her. The downside to her ult is that it heals ennemies too. When she drops it, don't use your damaging abilities on her if she's below 10% hp as she will be immune to it. Instead, hide in your smoke so she can't damage you (unless you too are -10% hp ) and wait for the heal.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Just hope your is mechanically skilled and can make plays happen. If he is in a delicate situation, you can get close enough to him to allow him to escape with his W, with no intention to join the fight.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Probably your worst jungle matchup. He can reveal with you half of his kit, using Q and E. You cannot dodge his Q with , as it has higher range. When you're very pushed up under your turret and getting pressured by the enemy laner, he can hop off the ally's raptors wall with . If you know he's there, either call your jungler for help or just recall.

PLAYING WITH HER : Her ult can be good if it hits multiple targets in a teamfight, but in my opinion its CC isn't as reliable as some other AoE CC'ing abilities in the game.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : Be careful of her E when low on HP ! Even if it doesn't directly hit you, it deals AoE damage when it detonates upon colliding with terrain. There's a slight gap between when she activates her ult and when it actually makes you fall asleep. You can use that meantime to activate , run to safety with your mobility or hide in .

PLAYING WITH HIM : Pretty much a minion before level 6, but with insane teamfighting potential later on. Wait for him to engage onto the enemy with and follow up with the rest of your combo.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : His ult can go through walls, so always be careful of that happening. Though there is a way to dodge it with , it is quite hard to correctly time it. You have to press R right before 's character reaches you.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Great at distracting the enemy by going full-on berserker mode on them while you deal damage. Very hard to ignore an angry running straight at you with . Before level 6, he's a bit too reliant on hitting his Q to gank and lacks CC.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Be mindful of early game fights and skirmishes, especially for scuttle, as in my experience those always happen against an . Depending on your 2v2 potential with your jungler, you should know before-hand whether you should take those early fights or not. When he's going after you with , run towards your team for help and don't try to fight him unless you're ahead. You have no real way of countering it other than dealing more damage than him in a shorter amount of time, and maybe igniting him.

PLAYING WITH HIM : You can help him invade the enemy jungler and manage to run away as you both have great escaping tools and good synergy (CC+damage) to fight the enemy in their own territory. Plus it's funny seeing this little guy run around the whole map.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Ward your jungle. Help your jungler when he invades. Basic gameplan against any control jungler. He's not the squishiest champion but not the tankiest either. Don't get fooled by his low HP ! All of his abilities have very low cooldown (6 secs for all of them), so he will often have the tools to shield himself and turn the tables on you.

PLAYING WITH HIM : For his W to effectively stun for more than 0.25 secs, it needs longer channel time. But the longer it takes him to channel it, the easier it is to predict its path and dodge it. Not-so-reliable CC. OP champion, but not what you look for in a jungler as .

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Relatively short-ranged champion. Your E can dodge his whole combo easily. His E makes his ganks predictable, as it materializes on the walls signalling his arrival. However, if you allow him to ever get in melee range to you, he will stun and auto-attack you to death. Always keep your distance and don't fight him if he's too close (and too fed).

PLAYING WITH HIM : Good gap-closing ability and CC with great burst potential, especially if he has Electrocute. That's pretty much it.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Throw your E at him when he dashes your way. His clone will continuously auto-attack any champion in range (prioritizing the most recently damaged champion), so if just stops moving and stands still, then it's not a clone, they're just faking it. Don't stay clumped up and allow his ult to hit multiple targets. Stay away from his clone, as it can also deal damage and copy the real .

PLAYING WITH HIM : Great early game duelist, with decent CC and engage, but not worthy enough to be on the "Good synergy" list, in my experience.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : Be mindful of his early ganks, starting from level 2. If he does come at you so early on in the game, just E him when he dashes towards you to disengage and avoid any complications. While he's ult'ing, you can R2 him and deal the damage as long as you're still in his ult's range upon inflicting it.

Karthus - Master Yi - Nidalee - Rengar - Shyvana

PLAYING WITH HIM : Horrible early game. No real CC. Very squishy. This combo has almost nothing to offer ._. All you can hope for is for you to get targets low enough for him to kill with his ult from a distance, and that's pretty much it.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : If you hit him with , he's dead. He's THAT squishy. Killing him is not the hardest part though, surviving after that is. You better be prepared to dodge all of his Q's once he's dead. His ult can do massive amounts of damage, the later the game goes on. One simple way to dodge it is building . Or just don't get low enough for him to kill you 🥴

PLAYING WITH HIM : Again. No CC and very squishy. is a hyperscaler champion, with a weak early game and limited play. If he can manage to get kills and reach level 16 quickly with a or a by his side, that's another story.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : In earlier stages of the game, when he Qs you, as soon as he comes out of it, throw your E at him and you could probably even kill him if he doesn't have any backup. Don't waste any of your abilities on him when he's meditating. You can look to abuse him with your jungler (if ahead) by invading him in his own jungle.

PLAYING WITH HER : Very reliant on hitting her spear, and you can't really help her achieve that due to your lack of CC. Not the best combo to invade the enemy either.

PLAYING AGAINST HER : Ward your jungle early on, as she will generally be looking to invade. Her spear has low travel speed, and its hitbox is extremely narrow, making it easy to dodge. She is very squishy and can rarely outdamage you in a fair 1v1 situation. If she falls behind early, it's quite difficult for her to recover. Use that to your advantage to invade her when possible.

PLAYING WITH HIM : Probably the best on this list. But I somehow just don't believe in this combo. needs a good CC-provider with great utility and tankiness, and just isn't that.

PLAYING AGAINST HIM : His only CC is when he has 4 stacks son his passive. He can only effectively stack it through striking from bushes. Keep one of the two midlane bushes warded and hug that side of the lane. Be careful when low on health if his ult is up. Recall in safe places and don't risk an aggressive cat one-shotting you from nowhere.

PLAYING WITH HER : Totally useless pre-6, and even after that, I'm not sure what to think of it. needs CC to be able to land her damage, and so does , and neither of them can fulfill that requirement for the other !

PLAYING AGAINST HER : Kill a in her own jungle and she will never be able to recover. Very easily invaded champion, with little to no escape tools pre-6. On top of that, she's extremely squishy and easy to one-shot. Use to avoid getting knocked back by her ult. Her E leaves a mark on the ground upon hitting an enemy, don't stand in it or you will take a lot of unnecessary damage.

TL;DR :

• Always push the wave before roaming. Preferably crash a cannon wave for more time to roam.
• Roam to : ward, deward, gank a lane, counter-gank the enemy jungler or help your own.
• Only gank winning or even lanes. If very ahead, you can look to help losing lanes.
• Before deciding to roam, check for : allies/enemies' resources (mana, cooldowns, health) and strengths, junglers' positions.

Why should you roam ?

• Have an impact on the map
Roaming is an excellent way to get ahead and help your allies. Even though 's has little to no CC in her kit, she's still really good at ganking other lanes and create leads for herself and her team. In fact, there are often high chances of you scoring a kill or two when roaming, which would greatly enhance and speed up your snowballing process.

• Secure objectives
Getting a double kill botlane just as the dragon is spawning would be completely detrimental to the enemy team. Additionally, you get to establish vision control and set a strong foundation for the rest of the laning phase and the game entirely.

• Apply pressure
If you're dominating your lane opponent, then suddenly disappear off the enemy team's minimap, you become a threat to them. They will be forced to respect you and play safe, until they know more about your whereabouts. Even if you're not planning to fully commit to a roam, you can just go ward/remove wards, or simply hide in a bush in case someone has the misfortune to cross paths with you.

When to roam ?

Committing to a roam that ends up failing for a reason or another could be a disaster for both you and your teammates. To avoid that, there are a few things you need to be careful of before deciding to roam.

• Lane state
First things first, ALWAYS push the minion wave before roaming, to minimize the loss of gold and experience. Plus, it gives you a head start on your lane opponent who will be stuck under his turret clearing waves. However, if an ally is fighting in the river/jungle very close to you, stop everything you're doing and go help them, unless you're outnumbered and the fight is clearly unwinnable.

The biggest green flag that an enemy is gankable is when they are constantly hard pushing the wave. This is your best opportunity to punish them for overextending by paying them a visit or two. Try to scout for vision first, you don't want to waste time ganking a well-warded area. But keep in mind that the lower the elo, the less the enemy will ward and watch the map, the easier it is to succesfully roam.

• Allies/Enemies' strengths
You always need to check you team's resources before ganking a lane. Do your laners/enemy laners have their ultimates/summoner spells ? Do you have yours ? How much mana do your laners have ? If the answers to these questions are favorable for your team, then you know what to do. Note that it's also better to gank lanes with good engage and especially strong CC, since you don't have any yourself.

• Your jungler/The enemy jungler's positions
More often than not, it's preferable to gank the side your jungler is on, for better back up and higher chances of success. You should always keep track of where the enemy jungler could be, to avoid unpleasant surprises.

However, as stated earlier in this guide, starting from level 6 is an excellent skirmisher, that can take down multiple targets by herself. Let's say the enemy jungler was top not too long ago and your botlane is hard pushing, then there are high chances of him ganking bot next. In this case, you can look to roam to counter-gank, and potentially get a HUGE lead for your team, especially if you're already ahead. In a 3v3 situation bot(or even 3v4 if the enemy midlaner follows your roam) where both teams are even, you can undoubtedly carry the fight alone. But if you think that there's a slight chance of this roam failing, then don't commit and wait for better opportunities to present themselves.

Roaming Routes

• Roaming from lane

•Blue side

•Red side

❤ The blue and red lines on each side are the normal paths you would take when roaming from lane.

❤ The purple lines represent dangerous paths that you can only take when ahead and able to fight the enemy jungler and/or escape, or if you know for a fact their jungler cannot be there. Make sure your E is up to hop over any nearby wall in case you get caught.

❤ The yellow lines are walls you can cross with E to either get there faster, or to avoid warded areas. However if you think you might need your E to win the fight, then don't use it to go through walls when you're approaching your destination.

• Roaming from base
These shouldn't be your default roaming routes. However, you can take them if you have just respawned and :

There's a fight happening in river, so you want to take shortcuts to get there faster.
You're unsure if the lane you want to go to is actually gankable. So even if half way there you realize you can't make a play happen, you can just head back to midlane.
The enemy is overextending and won't see your gank coming. Usually, if your lane opponent has seen you recall, they don't expect you to go straight to bot / top right as you respawn. Therefore, they won't be pinging their teammates to back off, since they think they know your whereabouts, when in reality they don't !

Now this is the most complex part of the game. I couldn't make a midlane guide without talking about ✨The Wondrous World of Wave Management✨. However, I will not be covering every single aspect of it. Instead, I will list the 3 main wave control techniques and explain them in order to lay a solid basis for anyone who wishes to improve their laning phase. If you would like to know more about Wave Management, I'd recommend watching this Youtube video from Blitz Esports LoL, and if you got a little more time, here's a more detailed video with in game examples, made by Coach Curtis. Full credits to them ! No TL;DR for this section because it's already very simplified :D

Freezing

• What's Freezing ?

What's Freezing

• How to Freeze ?

How to freeze

• When to Freeze ?

when to freeze

• When NOT to Freeze ?

When not to freeze

Fast Pushing

• What's Fast Pushing ?

what's fast pushing

• How to Fast Push ?

how to fast push

• When to Fast Push ?

When to FAST PUSH

• When NOT to Fast Push ?

when not to fast push

Slow Pushing

• What's Slow Pushing ?

what's slow pushing

• How to Slow Push ?

how to slow pushing

• When to Slow Push ?

when to slow push

• When NOT to Slow Push ?

When not to slow push

TL;DR :

• Sidelane to not share gold and XP with allies and maximize income, to catch up when behind.
• Don't sidelane if ahead and your presence is required to win fights, unless your team is hard-losing anyway.
• Always collect waves on the sidelanes when no ally is already there. Push them the farthest you can without risks.
• Never match tanks in the sidelanes.
• Sidelaning turns into splitpushing once you go past the Collection Zone (check the image below).
• Splitpush if you team composition allows it (good waveclear).
• Don't splitpush if your team is not active on the map.

The importance of Sidelaning

• What's sidelaning ?
The word is pretty self-explanatory. It's about leaving the midlane and rotating either bot or top to catch and push waves. The point of sidelaning is to pressure turrets while taking gold and xp by yourself, instead of sharing resources with your teammates while minion waves are pointlessly dying on the other side of the map.

• Why should you sidelane ?
The two main reasons you should be sidelaning as an assassin is to maximize your income, but also to create pressure, forcing someone to respond and at the same time risk their lives, given how great of a duelist is.

When Sidelaning is a good idea

• When behind or even
You should begin sidelaning once the first turret falls. Generally, your ADC and support would rotate mid while you take over bot. It's the default play when mid is already occupied by someone else and there are no objectives up (therefore no reason to be grouped with your team), especially when you are behind and unable to provide valuable help in teamfights. In that case, you'd want to sidelane to catch up the best you can, and only build damage items. Don't try to go tank to "peel for your adc". Your role as an assassin is to deal as much damage as you can, especially when you are behind and the enemy team won't be focusing you in teamfights.

• When ahead
When you are ahead, sidelaning becomes a bit more situational. If the enemy has far better engage potential, and your presence is required to win fights, then you should be grouped with your team to prevent them from dying 4v5, especially in lower elo. If you are running , then this shouldn't be as big of an issue as you could even be splitpushing and still able to join fights from anywhere.

However, if your team is getting absolutely decimated and any fight they'll take, regardless if you are there or not, is without a doubt going to result in an ace in favor of the enemy, then you should stay in the sidelanes and farm up. When ahead, you can look to pressure the map even more by splitpushing.

How to Sidelane efficiently

• Catching waves
The Collection Zone is where you're going to be catching waves. You should constantly be paying attention to the minimap and look closely at where the minions are in each lane. If there's an upcoming wave slow pushing top or bot, and no one from your team is already there, then you should go pick it up, before it goes to waste and crashes under your turret.

• Getting kills
Sometimes, if the enemy's T1 turret (outer turret) is still up, their ADC might not rotate mid and stay farming bot, thinking they're safe.

What really ends up happening is, they either overextend and become very easy targets for you, or they simply just get dove. To increase your chances of getting picks in the sidelane, you should never match a tanky champion who can easily survive your burst and prevent you from getting/snowballing leads. As an assassin, always look for kill opportunities, and grab them whenever you can.

• Splitpushing

Splitpushing relies heavily on your team composition. If they're not able to waveclear and defend against strong pushes, then it's probably not the best idea. You also don't want to be splitpushing if your team is not active on the map. As an example, if they are playing passive in the jungle, or have just recalled, it's always safer to simply back off.

Splitpushing is when you go past the Neutral zone and enter the Pressure Zone. isn't by any means an excellent splitpusher like or . But when she's ahead, she can afford to use this strategy and force the enemy to send multiples members to stop her, therefore creating a numbers advantage for her team. Given your mobility, you have enough escape tools to safely farm in the Pressure Zone. When running , or your is on cooldown, you should push the side the next upcoming objective is on, so you can be there in time in case a fight breaks down. Another

strategy you can utilize is creating a slow push bottom for example, a minute or so before Baron spawns. This way, a big wave will build up on the opposite side and threaten the enemy's turret(s) while your team takes Baron. Either the enemy team will send someone to respond to the push , and therefore give you a numbers advantage, or they will have to sacrifice a lot in order to contest the objective. Either way, it's a win-win situation for your team.

When splitpushing, always keep an eye the minimap to know when to back off. Try to push as far as you can until you feel like you're in danger. You should retreat if :

You don't see the enemy on the map anymore, especially the main threat (fed member on the enemy team).
The area isn't well warded.
The enemy is threatning to end.

Note that if it's impossible for the enemy to end, and they are actually just going for an inhibitor for example, you can maintain the splitpush and look to trade objectives (turrets or even inhibitor).

TL;DR :

• ~1 minute before an objective, ward and deward the area around it. Look to get picks in warded areas.
• While doing the objective, zone the enemy when ahead. If the enemy has a way to engage on you, make sure your team has good counter-engage to help you.
• Look for a flanking angle if possible.

Neutral Objectives

(TIP: CLICK ON THE NAMES!!)

Preparing for an Objective

• Establishing vision/map control

Sweeper is absolutely essential to an assassin's playstyle. This is going to be your main way of clearing out wards. You can keep during the laning phase, but as the game goes, the more vision denial will gain importance. You will always need to scout for vision before going for plays, and make sure the enemy doesn't know where you are.

Repeat after me : ALWAYS. GRAB. A. CONTROL. WARD. These are literally permanent vision that can last for a while, as long as the enemy doesn't destroy them. They allow you to deny vision, but also reveal camouflaged enemies like , or stealthed units like 's . You should constantly be carrying at least one control ward at all stages of the game.

Vision is one of the most, if not the most important part of League Of Legends, and I cannot stress this enough. Vision is information that helps you read the state of the game, in order to make decisions accordingly. Having vision control over your enemy is crucial to prevent cheesy plays (such as the enemy setting an ambush) and unexpected engages in order to increase your chances of winning the upcoming teamfight.

1 minute or so before an objective spawns, put down wards and deny the enemy as much vision as possible, but also push lanes !! Before taking an objective, you should always have mid priority, and the sidelanes slow pushing towards the enemy's base.

That's how you create pressure and establish map control, which is essentially about restricting the enemy's movement and having the upper hand. Note that the more turrets you've taken, the more open the map will be in favor of your team, making it easier to establish map control.

• Getting picks
Now this is a very assassin-oriented playstyle. It's a pretty simple concept on paper, all you have to do is hide in bushes, wait for enemies to pass by and assassinate them. However, getting picks is not as easy as that. When trying to cheese the enemy before an objective spawns, you need to be VERY careful and make sure your teammates are in a position to help in case things go wrong. As an example, dying right before an objective as important as Baron spawns would be extremely damaging to your team and possibly cost you the game. To succefully get picks without dying, you should always hide in well warded areas, grab sweeper to check if enemies have vision of you, and most importantly have an escape plan in mind. This again all comes down to map awareness and vision control.

Fighting for an Objective

• Zoning
is pretty bad at actually doing objectives and deals very negligible damage. Hence why it's far more efficient and valuable for her to be zoning the enemy team. "What's zoning ?" you may ask. Well, it's a very easily appicable concept that revolves around keeping the enemy team out of a certain area. Simply put, your goal is to block the enemy from approaching your teammates while they are doing an objective.

Especially when you are fed, you can easily abuse this concept and make it impossible for your opponent to contest an objective without having to deal with you first. Given your insane mobility and numerous escape tools, you wouldn't be running too much of a risk when zoning. However, it could be very dangerous, depending on the enemy's team comp, . If your opponents have one or multiple extremely valuable engage tools that can allow them to collapse onto you, then zoning might not be the play (unless your team has good counter-engage and is in a position to immediately come to help). Abilities like that include 's , 's , 's , 's , 's or even 's .

• Flanking
Flanking is about hiding in the enemy's blindspots to expose them to other angles of attack, different than your team's. As an assassin, it's a way to bypass the frontline and dive straight into the backline. When you are fed, it's extremely frustruating for the enemy team to not know your whereabouts. Use that to your advantage.

and vision are mandotary to flank without getting caught. Make sure the opponent doesn't have vision of you, and preferably hasn't for a while in order to increase the chances of the flank working.

Typically, you'd want to look to flank when the enemy is grouped for a certain objective, but keep in mind that this concept is applicable to any skirmish / teamfight, and should usually be your default fighting strategy as an assassin.

Imagine this situation. The team compositions are as follows :
•Blue side : , , , , .
•Red side : , , , , .
To have a better understanding of our gameplan, we need to establish win conditions for both of these teams. The blue team wants to burst down the Drake as quickly as possible, while looking for an opening to engage on the enemy with 's , 's and 's . On the other hand, the red team is looking to do the exact same thing with its own engage tools, with and on the backline. Meanwhile, has taken another path to the enemy backline, through their own jungle, hiding in a bush ready to strike at any moment.

What you need to realize here is that the enemy team doesn't really have any good way to prevent 's infiltration. No one can stop her from ult'ing onto and throwing her W in the middle of everyone, creating chaos and allowing her team to fulfill their duties (Make sure to ping your engage multiple times before going in !!). would need to have really good reaction time with aim-bot enabled to lock in time. This type of flank would never be possible if the enemy team had warded their own jungle before-hand.
However, envision this exact same situation but with instead of , standing in the backline along with the other carries. Well then, that's a whole other story. His point-and-click suppress kills all of your flanking plans. In that case, don't go for such big flanks and instead stand way closer to your team, and wait for him to be out of the fight or use his ult on someone else.

TL;DR :

• Focus carries in teamfights, or their support(healers/shielders) first .
• Engage (from a flanking position) or follow your teammates engage when : the enemy is mispositionned, has used their main cooldowns (CC, ults, dashes..), is CC'd.
• Use your AoE abilities (Q and R) on the most targets possible.
• Drop your W in the middle of most people possible. Use it to reposition.
• You can use your E to engage or disengage.
• You can use your R1 as a gap-closer towards your main target by casting it onto a frontliner.

Choosing your fights

• When to Teamfight

>> You have a better teamfighting comp

>> Your team has a numbers advantage

>> Your team has a resources advatange

>> Your team has hit Item/level powerspikes

>> You have a massive lead over your opponent

>> The enemy's carry has no way of joining the fight.

• When NOT to Teamfight

>> You're missing your main carry

>> There are no objectives to fight for

>> Your team is not in a good position

>> Your team is still sitting on a lot of gold

>> You don't have a good teamfighting comp

>> You don't have vision/knowledge of every single enemy's whereabouts

Initiating/following an engage

• Target Selection
Before initiating an engage in a fight, you should always have a target in mind. Who does the enemy most rely on to deal damage ? Is it the ADC ? Or their fed mage ? Who can you one-shot? Asking yourself these questions will help you figure out who's the highest priority target in the enemy team, and set a win condition. Keep in mind that if the enemy has a healer like or shielder like , then it's better to take them down first, otherwise these supports will make it a lot harder for you to assassinate their carries.

You should never focus a tank in a teamfight. Don't waste your time dealing with the frontline. Instead, you must be putting pressure on the enemy backline, as they are a lot squishier and easier to kill. As stated earlier, you should be flanking from behind to catch the enemy off guard. Hide in a bush, and keep a close eye on your target. Look for opportunities to engage : Keep track of your enemy's important CC cooldowns, wait for your target to use their key ability (their main escape tool : dash, invisibility, abilities that make them untargettable..), punish mispositionning etc..

• Following an engage
Now, most of the time, you won't be able to initiate an engage as it's usually far too risky. One of the most optimal way for an assassin to teamfight is to wait for their teammate to engage first and tank all the damage and CC, then look to follow up when you see an opening.

If you're not in a flanking position, and therefore unable to engage onto the enemy carries, stay behind your allies until opportunities to dive into their backline present themselves. As mentionned earlier, you need to be playing around your enemy's mistakes. All you have to do before deciding to go in is stay back and wait for your opponents to waste crucial abilities (especially CC abilities), or for your target to come in range for a + combo for example.

Proper ability usage

One important part of teamfighting is dealing as much damage to as many targets as you can. As , your Q and R are your only AoE abilities. Try to use them in such a way to hit multiple enemies. The more damage you deal, the more impact you will have on the teamfight. You constantly want to be utilizing your abilities in the best way possible, to be as efficient as you can.

is your best friend when diving into the enemy backline. Knowing

how to use your shroud will be crucial to properly executing an engage. What you'd usually want to do when going in is ult'ing in, then instantly dropping your smoke in the middle of multiple members (you don't have to cast the first part of your ultimate directly on your target, instead you can use a frontliner as a stepping stone to get into the enemy backline). That's how you put insane pressure onto the enemy, who will usually not know how to play around your shroud. Doing that allows you to zone them out of the fight, while the rest of your team takes care of the frontline. Additionally, you will be able to optimally reposition yourself, and find the right angle to jump on the highest priority target.

Clip Break Down

could also be a great engage tool. If your target is clearly mispositioned and is in range of your E, don't hesitate to throw your shuriken at them. If you're planning to commit and fly in with E2, make sure your team can follow up. One trick you can do is use in the middle of E2 to gain time, then instantly W right as you come out of stasis. You can also hold onto your E to dodge certain abilities or to disengage after you've successfully taken down your target (or at least taken a huge chunk of their health).

In this clip, you can see me swinging back and forth, waiting for the enemy to engage. Since this is a 1v2, I have to be careful until my teammates join the fight. As soon as uses his E , I instantly R1 onto to appear behind 's character and dodge the wave, therefore not get rooted.

Likewise, I use immediately as dashes onto me with his taunt . Now that I've dodged 's and 's most important abilities, finishing them off both is a piece of cake.

This is where things get serious. Any simple mistake resulting in your death could potentially cost you the game. Once the late game begins, you need to be EXTRA careful to not get caught, especially if you're the carry. Be more selective about what picks and fights can be safely taken, and which ones represent too great of a risk. Even though everything mentioned in the Mid Game section is still applicable here, you cannot allow yourself to go for plays as aggressive anymore. often gets outscaled, and can become very useless as the game progresses if she didn't aquire leads in the earlier stages.

Don't go into fog of war, always keep track of where the enemy team is, look to splitpush whenever you can, but most importantly, DON'T DIE! Keep in mind that the longer a game goes, the longer the death timers are. Plus, objectives like or should always be your top priority, and contesting these objectives is crucial. Play around vision, look for the perfect opportunities to engage, and disengage with E or R2 before it's too late whenever a teamfight doesn't seem to go your way.

DISCLAIMER : These are just my personal opinions on how to play different matchups, based on experience. More often than not, these will vary depending on your playstyle, but also your elo, as the lower it is, the more you can play off of your opponent's (numerous) mistakes. Meaning that even if a matchup is listed here as 'Hard', it can not always be the case, and vice versa.

AHRI

Difficulty: Medium

❤ Do not come close to her levels 1 and 2. She has more range than you and will come out on top of every single trade. Stay behind your minions, so she has no chance of hitting her Charm.

❤ You can also stay in range of her Q and dodge it if she throws it, to bait her into pushing the wave. This will put the minions in an ideal spot near your tower, allowing you to last hit safer with your Q.

❤ Level 4 is when you can start to trade. Watch out for her Charm. You can dodge it by running in zigzags, using your W (with the movement speed burst), or baiting it then throwing your E at max range.

❤ Post-6, you can easily all-in and kill her if she overextends.

ANIVIA

Difficulty: Medium

❤ Your only win condition in this matchup is to dodge her Q. It's fairly slow which makes it easier to sidestep. Punish her whenever she misses it. And if she does hit, then you can hide in your shroud to make sure she doesn't hit you with her E.

❤ Her Passive is pretty annoying to play against as an assassin. Chances are, you won't be able to kill her if she plays the lane correctly. Look to push and roam, try to get leads elsewhere before she hits level 6. Once she gets a point in Glacial Storm, she will constantly be pushing the wave and prevent you from roaming.

❤ Spacing is very important in this matchup. Take advantage of her Q's very slow travel speed. Don't get too close to her to make it easier to dodge.

❤ You can E her wall.

ANNIE

Difficulty: Medium

❤ has a surprisingly long auto-attack range of 625 (second highest in the game after ). Beware of that in the early levels. However, her abilities are very short-ranged.

❤ Only trade when her stun is down, but keep in mind she can stack it fast, since her cooldowns are pretty low.

❤ Play safe when her Passive is up, especially post-6 when she has her R and Flash. If you're below ~70% health, she can easily one-shot you. You can build Banshee's to protect yourself from her stun and burst.

❤ Her lack of mobility makes her very vulnerable to ganks. If she falls down early game, it's close to impossible for her to comeback.

AURELION SOL

Difficulty: Medium

❤ His early game is pretty weak as he has long cooldowns and is very mana hungry. He can poke you all he wants but you heavily outrade him if you get in range to hit your combo.

❤ 's greatest strength is his ability to shove and roam to bot or top very fast. Make sure to ping your teammates if he's missing.

❤ You can E out of his Q range, and if he's using W and Q at the same time he's significantly slowed making it easier to land your combo.

❤ You can E his ult aswell, though you do have to react within a 1.25 sec window. The more Stardust he has on his Passive, the bigger the radius of his ult, but then his cast time will increase to 2 seconds.

AURORA

Difficulty: Medium

❤ Just like any ranged champion, she will try to abuse you early and deny you cs. Don't let her stack her passive on you and rather farm from a distancce with your Q.

❤ Stand clear of linear range of her Q, meaning that if one of your minion's low in health, don't give her free poke and cs at the same time by being right behind your minion.

❤ Your E outranges her E by just a litte bit, making it possible to dodge at maximum range. Your E can also reveal her if marked during her W.

❤ She's very vulnerable to all-ins, especially when her W is down. Look to bait her abilities and if you hit an E on her, you can 100-0 her very easily.

AZIR

Difficulty: Hard

❤ Pre-6, this matchup is a nightmare. You can never get close to trade, as his soldiers will get a huge chunk of your health everytime.

❤ Stand at the opposite side of where he spawns his soldiers. Try to get as many minions as you can with your Q and E.

❤ Matchup gets much easier after level 6. 's very squishy and vulnerable to your burst. E him as he uses his ult to dodge it, then E2 onto him. Also keep in mind that his ult can cancel all of your dashes.

❤ Careful not to waste your ult on him if his E > Q combo is up.

BRAND

Difficulty: Easy

❤ Stay away from minions affected by 's Passive, so he cannot deal damage to you by using his E on your minions.

❤ If you are yourself affected by his Passive, stay behind your minions so he cannot stun you with Q.

❤ If you get hit by his ult, stay away from your teammates. It deals huge AoE damage and can instantly send all of your team to the fountain in a matter of seconds.

❤ When his Q is down, that's your window to all-in him and potentially kill him if you have your ult. He has no real way of escaping apart from Flash, and even then, he's doomed.

CASSIOPEIA

Difficulty: Medium

❤ Spacing is the most crucial part to master to win this matchup. Stay out of range of her Q, or try baiting and dodging it. Do not go in for a trade if you do get hit by Q. However, if she misses it, take that opportunity to punish her. Without Noxious Blast's poison, her E will only tickle you. Plus she won't have the movement speed to run away, making her very easy to kill.

❤ Try predicting her ult and turning around before she casts it. Better get slowed than stunned.

❤ Beware of her W ! If you get caught in it, you can no longer use your E nor R. Your only escape is your W in this case.

CORKI

Difficulty: Easy

❤ A matchup you can easily abuse throughout the whole laning phase. As any other ranged midlaner, you want to let him push first 2 levels, as he has more range and poke. Start

[14.23] The Ultimate Guide to Akali the Rogue Assassin

[14.23] The Ultimate Guide to Akali the Rogue Assassin

Recommended Items

Runes: ELECTROCUTE (vs squishies)

Spells:

Flash

Ignite

Flash

Teleport

Items

Ability Order

Assassin's Mark (PASSIVE)

Five Point Strike (Q)

Twilight Shroud (W)

Shuriken Flip (E)

Perfect Execution (R)