Kha'Zix Build Guide by

[14.13] Diamond Top Kha'zix - Artillery Assassin

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Guide Discussion (30) More Kha'Zix Guides

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Runes:

Inspiration

Unsealed Spellbook

Magical Footwear

Biscuit Delivery

Jack of all Trades

Sorcery

Manaflow Band

Transcendence

Bonus:

+8 Ability Haste
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+10-180 Bonus Health

Spells:

Barrier

Flash

Items

Start

Then

Example Finished Build

Ability Order

Kha'Zix Passive Ability

Champion Build Guide

The Author

Aquaired Skillset

Hi! I’m Aqua Dragon. I've been in Diamond for multiple seasons and I play Top Kha'zix.

I also play:

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Pros and Cons

Pros

Sustain during laning phase is insane
Powerful, constant poke allows teamfight impact
Empowered Void Spike has an excruciating slow
Great early dueling with passive
Excellent ability to escape ganks

Cons

Lack of map impact from top without teleport
Very mana hungry early with constant spikes
Not as much raw burst as a traditional Kha build
Poke takes time to whittle targets down
Requires hefty risk for optimal poke positioning.

What is Top Kha'zix?

Power Spikes

Kha'zix is most traditionally used as a jungler with hefty burst power, roaming around the map and picking off unsuspecting fools. However, Kha'zix' kit also supports becoming a monster duelist at top-lane with great poke impact with Void Spike.

The cornerstone of the build is Void Spike, which offers incredible sustain and powerful poke. Being the first ability maxed, at rank 5, it offers 135 healing per use. With the ability haste rush in the build, this translates to easily healing 16 hp per second. The range from the spikes offers a way to farm safely and harass opponents. The waveclear from empowered spikes can be easily coupled with a low-CD Leap to quickly clear waves without the need of Tiamat.

And of course the namesake of the guide: with a 5 second cooldown and crippling 2-second slow, Kha'zix is able to deal massive sustained AOE damage before teamfights even begin. Kha still retains sizable burst to pick off targets once they're within execution range, but there is substantially more focus on stalking prey, marinating their health bar, until it's time for an isolated burst!

Runes

Voided Off the Island

These rune choices are mostly predicated around gathering more ability haste, attack damage, and effective gold (to turn into more ability haste). Those are really the only two stats that Top Kha'zix needs.

If you find some of these choices giving up too much lane presence, you can consider tuning a few choices to more aggressive options.

Unsealed Spellbook

Unsealed Spellbook is generically good for Top Kha's unusual laning and function, which Arcane Comet simply does not do enough early to support.

Magical Footwear

Magical Footwear is a crisp 300g, which can be used toward building even more ability haste, and gives more immediate impact than Cash Back.

Biscuit Delivery

Biscuits offer exceedingly high lane sustain, especially since Void Spikes converts mana into more health, and Muramana converts max mana into AD.

Jack of All Trades

Jack of All Trades reaches its first threshold relatively early, giving a nice little stat boost to Kha'zix, though Cosmic Insight's generic applicability is also reasonable.

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Manaflow Band

Manaflow grants preciously needed poking mana and adds extra damage when Muramana is complete.

Transcendence

Transcendence aligns with Top Kha's goal of stacking lots of ability haste and is one of the main draws of the Sorcery tree.

Ability haste, Flat AD, and Scaling Health

Ability haste is the dream. Scaling health is more useful overall than flat, but flat HP is a good choice too.

Evolve Order

You Say You Want an Evolution

↓

Void Spike is maxed first because that's literally the point of the build. More lane harass, more waveclear, more teamfight poke, more setup for bursts, more slow utility...

What's more interesting is the lack of a evolution. The problem is that the poke-centric nature of the build makes the cooldown refund on Q Evolve much less useful. Top Kha'zix doesn't spend all that much time in the jungle, where the cooldown would ordinarily speed up camp-clearing time. Nor is the build particularly bruiser-esque, which would allow for a lot of Taste Their Fear hits during teamfights.

The Void Spike evolution is mandatory, leaving both Leap and Void Assault as the final evolutions. Choose if you are behind or your team has strong pick power, like stuns. Choose if you are significantly ahead, or the enemy composition is full of several auto-attacking champions.

Build Order

Choose Sooner or Isolater

Create Item Set

↓

→→→

Tiamat is incredible for Kha's wave management; Kha's AOE + Tiamat can instantly kill a wave.

Choose between the Hydras based on sustain vs damage.

↓

Stage of the Game

Adaptable Kharnage

Early

In the early game, your goals are to

Duel repeatedly with the passive
Sustain with Void Spike
Rush for Level 6

Duel with the Passive: Part of what makes Kha'zix Top so scary is their sheer damage from the passive. Proc'ing it on an enemy, combined with Void Spike, is difficult for even the most aggressive melees to trade with.

Leap Away After Trading: Going for hit-and-run is the way to go. After dumping the passive damage onto the enemy, just leap away! There's no need to try and fight beyond that.

Use Void Spike for Sustain: The sustain on Void Spike is what allows Top Kha'zix to function so well. Don't get so focused on hitting the opponent that you neglect to heal up!

Use Biscuits when Low on Mana: Biscuits regenerate mana based on missing mana. The closer to 0 you can get before using the biscuit, the better.

Be Patient When Needed: Some lane matchups are brutal until you can finally evolve Void Spikes. Don't get so greedy for farm that you take too much unnecessary damage, which would prevent you from using evolved spikes most aggressively.

Rush to Evolve Void Spike: When Void Spike are evolved, suddenly the amount of poke becomes much more oppressive and more readily gets opponents into kill range.

Use Tiamat to Instantly Clear: Kha'zix has great wave AOE damage with Void Spike, and can increase it further by Leaping onto the wave too. Combined with Tiamat, this can instantly clear waves, making it nearly impossible to dive you.

Use Unsealed Spellbook Regularly: In most cases, you can swap out your for at the 6 minute mark. If you're feeling greedy, you can even go .

Mid

As the laning phase ends, you will start taking on a more roaming role.

Whittle targets with Void Spike
Siege down turrets and objectives
Position aggressively for poke

Poke Poke Poke: Around this time, the 45% CDR dream is real. Use this chance to land as many Void Spike on opponents as you can, and leap in for a kill when the chance is ripe!

Abuse the Massive Spike Slow: Void Spike applies a massive 2-second slow onto enemies. Use this to chain multiple Void Spike into each other or even to just kite enemies while laughing in their faces.

Respect your Burst: Top Kha'zix won't have as much burst as a traditional Kha build, so you won't be able to go around and just delete squishies instantly. But the burst is still very respectable, readily able to bring squishy targets from 60-0.

Watch Your Mana: Once you're out of mana, you're spent. You have no real mana regeneration. Be cautious of your mana bar to make sure you won't overexert yourself before battles are truly done.

Use Leap to Clear Waves: With maximum CDR, Leap isn't on an oppressively long cooldown. Don't be afraid to use it to help clear the caster minions, though be careful not to strand yourself!

Watch for Split Pushers: Although Kha isn't amazing at being a split pusher, they're reasonably good at holding off people trying to split push. When a wave is crashing toward a side lane, watch to see if you need to go on Tryndamere Duty and prevent catastrophic losses.

Good Unsealed Spellbook Swaps: There's a small rotation of summoners with spellbook that are hard to ever go wrong with. Switch between , , , and on rotation.

Late

It's kind of just regular Kha'zix now

Poke
Kill

Do Kha'zix Things: In the late stage of the game, poke is still a priority, but the build now functions very similarly to a standard Kha'zix build.

Patience Before Teamfights: The best thing you can do in many teamfights is simply hitting them with Void Spike over and over to whittle them down. Bide your time, even if the enemies engage. There is no honor in leaping into four people just to die.

Aim for Resets: You should have your evolved wings at this point. When deciding whether to leap in for a kill, consider that if you succeed, you will be able to leap out quickly. Marinate enemies with your spikes so you can make a guaranteed cleap escape.

Thanks!

This guide was a lot of fun to write, and I hope you all have learned everything you would have liked.