UPDATE: I AM TRYING A NEW RUNE FORMAT, PLEASE GIVE ME YOUR OPINIONS ON IT TO SEE IF I SHOULD MAKE IT WIDESPREAD ACROSS ALL MY GUIDES.

Hi! I am Sassya and I am an ADC (forced by premade) main on the EUW server. I main Rakan, Xayah, Evelynn and Varus but recently picked up Neeko.

I love Neeko because she is a mage who goes into ADC, like Ezreal. Recently, I've been asked to make a guide for her and decided to try mid and god she is fun. What's your most AP on her? Mine is around 1400 where I got Rabadon's Deathcap, a fully stacked Mejai's Soulstealer, Luden's Tempest, Lich Bane and two Spellbinder.

Obviously you need Flash as everyone but Yuumi and a few junglers. As an ADC main, I am not a huge fan of many summoner spells so I take Barrier when I am playing mid, is quite defensive, which most mages lack, and her chase and poke is quite good to clean up kills. You can use Ignite if you are more comfortable with it. If you are playing ADC, take Heal

Firstly, looking at Precision, we you can take either Press the Attack or Lethal Tempo, I personally prefer Lethal Tempo as it is the only keystone that gives you attack speed (other than Hail of Blades but Precision is best in ADC). Press the Attack is also just a good all round talent as it helps you with your burst damage along with comboing nicely with Guinsoo's Rageblade. Then we take Overheal, especially if you take Legend: Bloodline, this talent is generally best considering your first item is Blade of the Ruined King. Next, you will take Legend: Bloodline with Lethal Tempo and Legend: Alacrity with Press the Attack. When you have the bonus attack speed with Lethal Tempo, the Legend: Alacrity attack speed doesn't feel like so I take Legend: Bloodline. Saying this, against high CC comps with high CC champs like Leona, Legend: Tenacity is also an option. Generally, Coup de Grace is the best talent and Neeko is no exception, (if you are interested, Quinn takes Cut Down and Tryndamere takes Last Stand) Looking at Domination now, I like to take Electrocute over Dark Harvest because I feel she isn't pokey enough for Dark Harvest and each Blooming Burst helps Electrocute which makes it great, though both are good builds. Secondary, I like to take Cheap Shot for its bonus to blow-up and Tangle-Barbs or Pop Blossom follow-up. Next, I like Ghost Poro, I prefer this to Eyeball Collection on non-jungleres and Zombie Ward is irrelevant. My final suggestion on this tree is Ravenous Hunter, the lifesteal is essential for me to play any mage but on Neeko the alternative Ultimate Hunter isn't too good because Pop Blossom can be kind of hit and miss. For inspiration, Glacial Augment is key as this is what the build is centred around. This rune is seeing a lot more Korean play and hence people are starting to play with it. As a person who played Glacial Augment Zoe and didn't really enjoy it, I don't really play this path. With Cosmic Insight, Magical Footwear and Biscuit Delivery, these are all the runes you generally take if you are in Inspiration, though Time Warp Tonic is good with Kleptomancy. Finishing off main runes with Sorcery. Here we take Arcane Comet because Summon Aery is better for champions like Malzahar who don't have any effect on movement. Next you want to take Manaflow Band. This is generally best on this tier and, as Neeko struggles with mana, it is very good at keeping you in lane. On the next tier, you want Absolute Focus. I don't really like this talent but Cosmic Insight isn't too good as you won't really get enough CDR for it to take effect and Neeko doesn't need Celerity. On the last tier, you want Gathering Storm. This is best because Scorch is quite bad and Waterwalking isn't amazing as Neeko isn't a mid laner or ADC who ganks a lot. Moving to secondary, if you started Arcane Comet or Glacial Augment, you will want to take Domination. I like to take Cheap Shot for its bonus to blow-up and Ravenous Hunter, the lifesteal is essential for me to play any mage but on Neeko the alternative Ultimate Hunter isn't too good because Pop Blossom is can be kind of hit and miss. If you started Dark Harvest or Electrocute, you will want Sorcery and you want to take Manaflow Band. This is generally best on this tier and, as Neeko struggles with mana, it is very good at keeping you in lane. you want Gathering Storm. This is best because Scorch is quite bad and Waterwalking isn't amazing as Neeko isn't a mid laner or ADC who ganks a lot. Finally for those Neeko ADCs, I like to take Inspiration as the others don't offer very much in my opinion. Though, Cheap Shot is still a possibiliy, but Biscuit Delivery is far too good at keeping you in lane and Magical Footwear is still good, even after the nerfs.

Optimal (On Hit) Precision is great when you are taking ADC or any on hit build. This is substantially weaker in other roles

Optimal (AP) I love domination on almost every mid laner. It gives you nice sustain along with bonus damage and vision.

Optimal (Glacial Augment) This is good if you particularly like Glacial Augment, along with giving you a good early resource advantage in gold, mana and health.

Situational (AP) I prefer this when you are in a very pokey match-up, with champions like Xerath or Aurelion Sol, where you are less likely to combo.

Weak (All) Resolve doesn't really offer enough for it to be useful, but you could try something off-meta with it.

So it has been 4 days since I finished this guide but never did the items part, so let's talk.

MID

First, your start. I take Doran's Ring as I think it is all round better than Corrupting Potion, especially after its nerfs in 9.12. Then we, as all champions I know, take Stealth Ward

Your first back you want to look to build Lost Chapter. This item is great to get as early as possible. If you can't, get Boots of Swiftness and prioritise Amplifying Tome. If you have left over, get Boots of Swiftness. If you have picked up an early kill and haven't died, think about Dark Seal. If you still have gold, grab Refillable Potion.

If at any point Dark Seal, gets lots of stacks, think about Mejai's Soulstealer.

Looking at your first item, you want Luden's Tempest or Everfrost respectively, if at any point you have enough gold buy Needlessly Large Rods until you have Rabadon's Deathcap, as it is a hard to buy item but is worth it when you do.

Looking at second item for Glacial Augment you want to get Fiendish Codex that will build into a Twin Shadows. This gives a second trigger to Glacial Augment, which is generally enough. Meanwhile, you will build Blasting Wand into a Void Staff for some nice Magic Penetration

ADC

I start with the classic ADC start of a Doran's Blade. It gives lifesteal (which the runes lack), which inevitably keep you in lane longer. Then we, as all champions I know, take Stealth Ward.

Then we build Recurve Bow, this gives bonus attack speed that'll trigger Shapesplitter more often, as well as the bonus damage being nice. We then start going towards Berserker's Greaves and Bilgewater Cutlass.

We follow this into Blade of the Ruined King, a second Recurve Bow that becomes Guinsoo's Rageblade and Stinger to Nashor's Tooth.

Often the most used part isn't very well understood is using it to deny your enemies important information, such as health and mana, making champions like Zed, Katarina, Diana, Camille, Leona and Rakan less able to know if they can successfully hard dive you.

Another good use is aggressive returns to lane/ ganks. Here you can facade yourself as a very scary ganker such as Hecarim or Zed but do remember about effects like Demon Shade, Biggest Snowball Ever! or Void Assault as these effects will prove you aren't who you look like. If done correctly, these ganks can burn Flash or Barrier or even an ultimate like Monsoon or Tidal Wave which can be extremely impactful for your team later on with the lack of those abilities.

The final use I use is aggressive. This is where you facade yourself as a low person. This is especially effective when you are adc. You both go into the bush, you facade as them (while they are low) you go out of bush and start trying to bait them. The general idea is that they get greedy and then you punish with Tangle-Barbs which gets a follow-up of Blooming Burst. You need to act the part though, and that is the main thing to remember with deceit, you need to act like you are what you are trying to be.

Also remember some abilities that look like they should damage don't like Cocoon / Rappel and Event Horizon

Blooming Burst is pretty straight forwards. It is a very good ability to use after an enemy has been hit by Tangle-Barbs as it is one that really wants your enemies still. It has very good scaling and considering the number of explodes, it has a very good combined AP ratio (All 3 hits 90%). It also is very good follow up for Pop Blossom

Like Inherent Glamour, Shapesplitter has many uses but requires skill to use effectively.

The first use is the most straight forward one, and this the movement speed. You can use this to get out of area of effect damage such as Tormented Shadow or Glacial Storm or just to get to lane quicker.

The next use body blocking, this requires perfect timing, especially considering its long cooldown. You have to see the projectile coming towards you because you could struggle if you activate this too early. The best things to body block with this are Ace in the Hole (do it, it's so satisfying), Dark Binding, Sleepy Trouble Bubble, Hate Spike while under Allure, any hook, Abscond / Abduct, Cocoon / Rappel or Hookshot the list goes on. The thing to remember here is that this can be gifting the enemies something. It could give them a Dark Harvest, Gleaming Quill, Starcall or Kleptomancy so you have to be careful.

The next use is escape and this is another part of Neeko that is really hard to learn and master. Do at least one of these two things when trying to escape, run right next to your clone, following its exact movement (do this if you are quite close to your tower) or run down a convoluted path through jungle. This works because people assume that people will always try to run to their base as directly as possible. While your enemy runs after your clone you can escape and once they realise it's fake, you've escaped. Remember this, chasing Neeko can be almost as pointless as chasing Evelynn if you do it correctly.

Tangle-Barbs is Neeko's best form of CC. This is a very good immobilise, especially compared to most ADCs. For example, Bladecaller requires initial CC to be reliable, Flame Chompers! is slow to set up. This then means that she is a lot better with enchanter supports such as Sona, Lulu or Soraka. This ability is still a skill shot, try to get at least one enemy in the way of your real target to get that baseline two second slow which goes up to three seconds when it gets upgraded.

Pop Blossom is a very interesting ultimate with many different uses.

It can be very useful to interrupt channels that may kill you or multiple members of your team, the two that immediately spring to mind are Requiem or Life Form Disintegration Ray, especially Requiem.

Another very good use is just to gain the shield and Ravenous Hunter health to survive in a fight, which then can be followed up by Tangle-Barbs and Blooming Burst along with the rest of your team.

The final is a bit of a combo. You use Flash along with Pop Blossom, preferably while under Inherent Glamour, and you get them stunned preventing them from running away.

Patch 9.14:
BUFFS

General
Attack Damage Growth: 2 => 2.5
Attack Speed Growth: 2.5% => 3%

Inherent Glamour
Basic attacks on champions no longer break your disguise

NERFS
Attack Damage: 52 => 48
Attack Speed: 0.645 => 0.625
Shapesplitter movement speed reduced by 10% at all ranks.