Conqueror

Conqueror remains as such a powerful rune for anyone who gets into extended fights. The healing and bonus true damage are so invaluable for someone like Irelia who can very quickly hit the enemy 5 times within a brief window. Press the Attack remains an option and may be taken based on the matchup, for example, fighting against someone like Yorick you generally do not want an extended trade, but the bonus damage from all sources from Press the Attack may be the difference that you and your jungler needs when you are receiving a friendly gank. But in most situations Conqueror will be your go to Keystone for Irelia.

This is the standard rune for fighters like Irelia as the sustain you get from the 12% of missing health heal per takedown can make or break a teamfight. As Irelia does a lot of diving in and out of fights, often times if you go in, get low health, and then get out while your team picks off the weak enemies, you will be in a position to go back in shortly with the healing you receive from Triumph.

Irelia has a pretty strong early game, and has phenomenal outplay potential in the right hands, but her late game leaves something to be desired, this is where Legend: Bloodline comes in! Overall you will get a permanent 12% lifesteal from this rune by the time late game comes around, helping you to offset your weaker late game.

Coup de Grace is such a perfect rune for a fighter like Irelia because it allows you to finish fights strongly. A key factor with teamfighting as Irelia is that one of the best things you can do is finish off weak enemies, so that you can get your Q Bladesurge reset from a kill. The only thing I hear people argue about this rune is the pronunciation. Leave a comment in the discussion tab if you think you know how to correctly pronounce this word!

PROS + Safe first pick + Fits perfectly into dive comps + Built in sustain + Can safely split push + Can often 1v1 anyone if played correctly + Very easy CS with her Q reset + Incredibly fun to play when you are doing well! Irelia has what I like to call a high skill floor as well as a high skill ceiling. Most people know what a skill ceiling is, a cap to how well a certain champion can be played. Take Garen for instance, he has a low skill ceiling, there is only so much that can be done with such a straightforward champion, that being said, Irelia is the opposite. What a skill floor is though, is a certain skill level you need to be at before you can correctly pilot this champion and be impactful.

CONS - High Skill Floor - Weaker late game than some meta top laners - Easy to punish yourself by not getting a Q reset - Susceptible to Crowd Control - Easy way into fights, hard way out of them - When behind it can be difficult to catch up Irelia has a lot of opportunities to mess herself up. Sometimes you can use your Q bladsurge into a minion who is low health, only to have the minion die on the way and you do not get the reset on your Q, leaving you very vulnerable IF the enemy notices. Try your best to look tough and scary because this is your most vulnerable point. Generally if you lose as Irelia it is your own fault, and many people fall to the pressure.

EARLY GAME

Stack and Trade ✦ If midlane, Irelia can use enemy minions to easily dance around skill shots! Use minions to your advantage. At times it may be advantageous to use Bladesurge on a nearly dead minion in order to reposition in a fight. Never underestimate the healing that you get from your Q as well, as 3 or 4 minions in the middle of a fight may be the difference of you getting the kill, escaping, or dying!! ✦ Take advantage of the enemy panicking when you throw your E Flawless Duet out. Try to throw out the first part of your E and then auto the enemy as they try to dodge two or three times, then E again. You usually get free hits because they are worries about the E, all the while you are getting conqueror stacks! ✦ When you have Sheen or Trinity Force take advantage of the fact that each cast of your E procs the Sheen bonus damage, this also works on turrets! So to get the most damage out of a rotation, try and get an auto in between each ability and wait out that 1.5 second cooldown, you will see a massive spike in your auto attack dps! This can really help you get some extra damage on enemies or turrets because you can E, auto, (watch for the sheen CD) then E and auto again and get an extra proc from it. This works great late game if you end up split pushing!

MID GAME

Look to roam or Teleport! ✦ Look out for small fights breaking out in mid lane or in the upper jungle, if you are able to get in range and land your Vanguard's Edge you may quickly pick up 2 or 3 free kills! ✦ I love to watch my bot lane to see if a Teleport is in order. Oftentimes you can 1v2 the enemy bot lane if they are somewhat weak from a trade. If you are ahead, you may very well be able to 1v2 them even if they are full health! Don't get cocky though, you are susceptible to hard crowd control. ✦Unless you are wildly ahead, be sure to position carefully and you will have greatest success in teamfights if you position similar to an assassin, looking for a weak enemy in the backline that you can quickly get to. If there is a weak looking Varus and Soraka in the backline of a teamfight, if you can land your Vanguard's Edge and Flawless Duet on them and quickly take them out, you can easily collapse on the rest of the enemy team with your team.

LATE GAME

Split Push or Dive ✦While split pushing might not be the most exciting gameplay, if you don't take objectives like turrets, you can't win. Taking pressure off of other areas of the map is so important. And as a late game Irelia can likely 1v1 most people on the enemy team, you can sponge a lot of pressure for your team as the enemy may have to send 2 or 3 members to try and stop you, allowing your team to have the numbers advantage in their fight. Vision is key for this strategy!!! Have good map awareness and know when to back off if you don't know where 2 or 3 of the enemy team is. If the enemy does not react though, continue your path of terror and take some towers while you are at it! Don't be surprised when you have 300+ CS at the end of a game, with such a powerful wave clear between Titanic Hydra and Bladesurge you shouldn't miss a single CS late game. ✦ Irelia can have a tough time in the late game as enemies will be looking to target you with low cooldown CC abilities and an immobile Irelia is often a dead Irelia. But if your team has other people looking to dive such as Jarvan IV, Galio, Nocturne, Camille, etc, then the enemy team will likely not be able to handle all of you! Dive right in and do your part! Even if you die mid fight, but your death allowed your team to kill 2 or more enemies, it was likely worth it!

Macro

✦ What is Macro? Please take a look at my mini-guide for a brief explanation! Play Video

Thank you for taking the time to read my guide, I am just beginning my journey of guide writing! All of the guides have been for League of Legends. I enjoy articulating what I have learned through mistakes and experiments and research. I hope that even Irelia veterans can appreciate this guide and hopefully there were little gems of information that everyone came away with from it. Irelia has changed so much over the last year and many people are re-learning this wonderful champion. Please check out the notes for the item builds and runes as there is more information tucked away in there. I hope that if there are corrections that I need to make, that people kindly let me know in the comments, and I would be happy to make adjustments!

Over time I hope to add more to the guide to keep it relevant. Eventually I would like to add more matchup specific information, as well as a full breakdown of different runes. I know I change my secondary runes often based on matchup!

Also, I am not the most artistic person in the world, so if there is anything I can change with the formatting of the guide, please let me know! I would love to make adjustments to make the guide easier to ready. And lemme beat you trolls to the punch, "It would make it easier to read if you just deleted the guide, har har, Kappa", well too bad for you, I don't care about deleting it, just care about improving it!

Please consider stopping by my YouTube channel, more guides will be added on there over time, and you might learn something new!

So once again, thank you so much, if you gleaned anything from the guide, please like the guide and if you have any questions or feedback, feel free to drop a comment!