Ok so lets start
At begin i would like to say its not my build i got it from this side:
http://leaguecraft.com/strategies/guide/11826-a-very-detailed-ezreal-guide.xhtml

But i copied here something.
In my opinion its the best build from this everyone( Hare hare ezreal etc.)

Enjoy ;)

Table of Contents
Abilities 1
Introduction 2
Watch me play 3
My personal view of Ezreal 4
In the head of Win10cent 5
Changes/Additions 6
About Armor Penetration vs Damage runes. 7
Annoying Ezreal Tricks. 8
An Alternate Strategy (Side laning) 9
The importance of last hitting 10
Masteries + Runes 11
Skilling Order 12
Summoner Abilities 13
Items 14
Items to counter specific champions 15
How to play Ezreal early game 16
Tips and Tricks to counter a specific enemy champion in the mid lane 17
Twisted Treeline 18
Ezreal, The Prodigal Explorer

Ezreal was born with the gift of magic flowing through his veins. Ezreal, however, was also born with a much stronger sense of wanderlust. Put into school to become a skilled techmaturgist, Ezreal quickly became bored with magical studies. By the time the boy genius was eight years old, he had fully mapped out the underground tunnels of Piltover. The quality of his work was so great that the government of Piltover purchased his maps and salaried his services as Piltover's Grandmaster Explorer. This sealed the deal on Ezreal's path in life - he would eschew the arcane arts in favor of archaeology. Since then, countless of Ezreal's adventures have been written about as romanticized stories. One of Ezreal's latest adventures, however, has brought him face-to-face with his other legacy - his latent magical power. While exploring the pyramids of Shurima Desert, Ezreal uncovered an Amulet of incredible power. Aside from the sheer size of the amulet (it was made for a being easily twice Ezreal's size), it allows the wielder to control and shape magical energy - provided a source of magic is in the vicinity. This allowed Ezreal to tap into his natural talent for magic without having to put any serious effort into it - a big win for the Prodigal Explorer. The drawback is that for some unknown reason, the amulet is attuned with summoning magic. Without warning, Ezreal may find himself acting as a champion for, as he puts it, ''a summoner hell-bent on resolving some irrelevant world-shattering League conflict.'' Still, Ezreal feels being summoned into a Field of Justice on occasion is a small price to pay. ''There's little time to study musty tomes when you're busy crawling around where the musty tomes originally came from.'' Such is Ezreal's credo.

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1. Abilities
Rising Spell Force
Good passive if you're going AD, kinda pointless passive if you're going AP. Using your ulti will most likely trigger 5 stacks of it immediately, i would not advice wasting your ultimate just for this purpose though, but it's an option.


Mystic Shot
Great spell, does tons of damage, it procs on hit effects such as the lizards slow and the sheen proc.

As an AD it will be your main source of damage through the whole game and it will be quite heavy. This spell is based on your physical attack and has a 1.0 AD ratio.

You can use it to check brush for enemy champions.

You can shoot people in the fog, if let's say they are running on another side of a wall with low hp, with a little skill you can still shoot and hopefully kill them.
I would advice you NOT to use it to farm like most guides suggests. However there are exceptions. If you have really low hp and need just a little more gold you can step back and farm a little with Mystic shot. If you have insane mana regen you can farm with it, or if you are dominated by the other champion(s) (this should not happen ever but in case it does) then you might as well use your mana to farm instead of harrassing. However your mystic shot should be used mainly to harrass the enemy champion(s).

I'm sure there are more things you can do with it, i just can't come up with everything as i'm writing but i will add more things to the list as i go.


Essence Flux
As an AD you will basically only use this for buffing your teammates or maybe debuffing the enemy team but i wouln't worry about using it that much.


Arcane Shift
Built in flash. I love this spell, saves your skin as often as it helps you get a kill. But it has some tricks to it that maybe some of you don't know about.

If you notice for example sions stun is coming at you then you can arcane shift away to atleast increase the gap between you and sion so maybe he won't get any hit's in or you can make it to tower range, it's hard to master this but i thought you should know it.

If you use Arcane shift and a target is closeby an homing missile will automatically target the closest target, even invisible things, so if you arcane shift to a place which seems to be empty but a missile still launches, then you know something is there, either a ward, teemo shroom or an invisible character.

You can towerdive quite easy with this spell, if an enemy has low hp at their tower just run in there pop ignite, or auto attack or mystic shot or whatever, once the target is dead just use arcane shift over the wall. Okay maybe it's not that easy but it's possible.

And do NOT use this spell to line up your other shots (like many many other guides and the description of Ezreal says), okay you could do it, but early game it WILL drain your mana very quickly if you over use it and even if you would use it for this purpose it's still not a guaranteed hit with mystic shot afterwards. Instead of using this horrible method find ways to harrass your enemy without it. Don't worry i will explain just how annoying Ezreal can be in a later section.

Try not to use arcane shift as an attack but more of a way to escape. For example, if you were to arcane shift to an enemy and behind him in a bush are 2 other enemy champions and they all start attacking you then you have a really hard time getting out of there. You have to find a sweet balance to when using this spell, it should be used offensively some times, like for example if ashe has 150 hp and is a bit behind the tower you can arcane shift in and just shoot a mystic shot and then run out of turret range, you could still get ganked but atleast you got a kill. It's so situational i couldn't tell you exactly when to use it, so just get a feeling for it yourself.


Trueshot Barrage
Because of the buff to this spell you are now able to kill minion waves with it mid-late game, which is great. The buff is good but not too good, i think the buff was good enough.

When you first get your ultimate at level 6 check every enemy champion on the map, if they have 300hp or less just kill them.

You can use it to snipe enemy champions running away or recalling.

You can steal buffs, if you got their lizard, golem, dragon or baron warded, you can if you know how to time it right steal it right in front of them. Beware if they have smite, you will not succeed, it's almost never on cooldown and they probably won't use it until they know they will kill it with it.

You can, if you really want, to clear creepwaves with it (if you're playing AD you can't kill the whole creepwave, just the creeps who has already taken some damage) this is great if you just recalled and noticed you need just 50 or 100 gold.

I will give you some pointers where to aim if an enemy just ran away into fog of war with low hp.

If your lane mates has pushed your enemies towards their tower and let's say the enemy tries to kill your mates but fails, if your lanemates are still pushing then he can't recall by their tower so then he will most likely be recalling at the brush between their towers, because it's closer and they think they are safe there.

If your mates are pushed back and suddenly one of them has low hp and starts to run back to their tower, he will most likely be recalling right behind the enemy teams first tower.

If your enemies are pushing your 3 tower in mid and one of them has low hp, then they will most likely be recalling at the brush on either the right or left side between your first and second tower, so pay attention which way they are going, left or right, either way, that's where they'll be.

After a while of playing Ezreal you will most likely know where they are and everytime you snipe someone everyone will go, OOH NICE, GJ, OMG OMG OMG etc etc. Ezreal is pure skill so it's not without reason they applaud you.


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2. Introduction
External Image

Hello and welcome to my guide to Ezreal.

My in game name is Wictor Dolk, on the EU west server

I've played nearly 600 games as Ezreal and i just can't get enough of him, he is a really fun character to play.

You can watch my live streams here: http://www.own3d.tv/live/20311

You probably wonder what you will find in this guide, let me tell you.

A very detailed strategy of how to play Ezreal like a pro.
How to disable your opponent in the mid lane.
Tips and tricks how to counter every enemy champion you may encounter in the mid lane.
How to give your team a much better chance of winning.
Tips and tricks that i've picked up throughout my games.
And lot's more great stuff :)

I highly suggest that if you are new to Ezreal or find him to be too weak then please read everything that is in this guide!

Sorry for any spelling or grammar errors, as i am from Sweden my english is not the best of this world.

You can join my facebook page for discussion, pictures, videos, ownage and lols

Join it here:

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>http://www.facebook.com/pages/Win10cent/212349475471048?sk=wall

THIS GUIDE IS NOT FINSISHED and will keep on updating this guide as soon as i figure more stuff out, and when i have more time to write it down. Don't judge it too hard yet. I will add more builds and give everything more detail soon.

Please take note, that just because you read this guide you probably won't be owning in game, but it will give you a better understanding of how to own. Also please note that you WILL have to practise a lot to become good with Ezreal, and you may wonder, is it worth it? I'd say yes. I don't know of any other champion that can own as much as he can through the whole game and i've never had so much fun with any other champion. This is what differs from other champions, they might be easier to learn but on the other hand they are not as good. Ezreal is giving you a reward for your efforts.

I made an Ezona guide, you can read it here: http://leaguecraft.com/strategies/guide/15076-ezona-guide-as-requested.xhtml

Amumu jungle guide ----> My friend Plagueis for my team has made an excellent jungle guide for Amumu check him out, give him feedback and upvote his guide if you find it helpful: http://leaguecraft.com/strategies/guide/17497-all-you-need-to-know-about-jungling-by-plagueis.xhtml
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3. Watch me play
You can watch me play live or watch some of my recorded games on youtube, just follow the links below. I will add more video links here as i upload them.

Live stream: http://www.own3d.tv/live/20311

Youtube Videos:

Since i upload a few games every day i play i'm just gonna give you the link to my youtube channel, in there you can find all of my uploaded full games. You can also subscribe to my channel if you want to get a message every time i've uploaded a new video.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Corian86?feature=mhum

UPDATE:

I AM FINALLY BACK! I've fixed my computer problems, fixed Windows 7 which means all my future videos will be recorded with audio from the game and team speak. I will now start to update this guide with new builds, strategies and videos.

Thank you for your support.
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4. My personal view of Ezreal
Okay, this might not be a very important section for this guide, but i felt like i should give you my thoughts of Ezreal. (I apologize in advance if it sounds like i'm bragging or if it seems like i'm calling you idiots, i'm really not but i want to get this message out there)

To most people Ezreal is a piece of glass, a fragile annoying brat who sucks early game, who is mediocre mid game and quite good, but far from the best, late game. Now i would love it if you who are reading this would just wipe your memory and start seeing Ezreal for what he actually is. Ezreal may not have the most hp early game, but it's enough, if you have hp quints he will even have more than enough. One thing he has though is damage. You may not believe me but i've met so many people who get stunned when i get first blood, and when i do and the enemy i just killed comes back again he still can't get it out of his head, and he goes "Ezreal's a squishy i've never had a problem with Ezreals before why is this guy beating me?" So he tries to attack me again and dies once more. Now why is this? Why can i kill almost every champion in mid and mostly between 2-5 minute mark? I will probably get flamed by a lot of Ezreals out there for this but here we go, because i do NOT treat Ezreal like a squishy little piece of glass! It's really that simple.

Think about it, if you are hiding behind your creeps all day focusing mainly on farming, all you have is mana regen runes, cooldown runes and utility masteries, and in your head you think Ezreal is a squishy and everyone else is so powerful, then ofcourse your not gonna kill anyone in a side lane or in the mid lane. Not only do you know this yourself, your enemy knows it too and he exploits it, when he notices you are afraid of his harassment he will only harass you harder. I used to treat Ezreal like a squishy and of course i still had my good games, but one day i thought to myself, why can't i be that aggressive dominant and powerful champion in the mid lane? And that's when i decided to change my playstyle, i swapped my mana regen runes and utility masteries for armor, magic resistance and offense. A lot of you will not agree with me and i know i will get a lot of comments telling me stuff like "Yeah right, you can't take Karthus mid he's impossible for Ezreal". And before you give me comments like that, just think about what i've said. If you make the enemy afraid of you instead of the other way around you can kill just about anyone. One thing i've noticed is that about 70% of the time i charge in to attack someone they start to run, so really what do you have to be afraid of? At level 2 (when i mostly make my move) you will have hit atleast 2 mystic shots at the enemy, and most enemies won't use a potion after losing 200hp, so at level 2 if you arcane shift in, start auto attacking, use mystic shot, pop exhaust and ignite a lot of people will run in fear, they could fight back but they will die if they do, i promise you.


When i play other champions and someone else goes mid it happens so often that both of the mid champs are just standing there killing creeps and they don't kill eachother or barely attack eachother until team fights break out and that's just wrong. To me a much better start of the game would look like this, i'm level 4 and the enemy champ in mid is level 2, i'm level 7 and the enemy champ in mid is level 4-5, i can help the sidelaners because my mid enemy is dead, he cannot, my side laners are safe from ganks from mid so they won't have to worry about that. A start where i have about 5-10 kills after 15 minutes, my team has 0-3 deaths while the enemy has 5-16 deaths. They have no jungle buffs and my team has wards all over the map. This can all be accomplished by simply letting Ezreal go mid and be super aggresive.

I know by experience that when you're playing an afraid Ezreal who barely shows himself until mid/late game, an Ezreal who focuses mainly on farming and who also has a bad habit of relying on mana regen, then it's really hard to adjust to a more aggressive playstyle, but if i could do it, so can you!

If you want to know how to play more aggressively read the section "How to play Ezreal early game" and you could also check out the section "Tips and tricks to counter specific enemies in the mid lane".

I know a lot of you might be struggling with Ezreal, he is NOT easy. A lot of times when i play as Ezreal the other team starts to flame me because i'm only good because i'm fed, but guess what? I get fed in every game i play, that is the truth. NOTE: The only way for me to get fed in every game is to use the runes that i've written in this guide, the same masteries and the same or almost the same playstyle, i'm sure you can modify it a bit but it's VERY VERY important. So if you don't have these runes, i advice you to wait because you won't be able to carry your team to victory if you don't get a good early game. Right now on my profile i have Ƀ kills and I kills in my last games. Trust me, players who says Ezreal can't carry a team has not seen a real Ezreal.

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5. In the head of Win10cent
This section is about psychology and manipulation.

Manipulating peoples emotions has always been like a hobby to me, getting what you want without asking for it or trigger a feeling inside another human being is a very fascinating thing. I've read and practised the mystery method for about 6 years now and it's a very good example of how you can trigger other peoples emotions. For those of you not familiar with the mystery method, it's a working method of how to manipulate a girl who usually would be out of your league (of legends) into liking you, and if it's possible to push a girl's buttons into liking you, trigger feelings inside another player's head should be a lot more simple..

This game can trigger feelings which we cannot control and i've already talked about fear in another section but for those who missed it i'd just do a quick recap.

Fear


Have you ever bullied someone in real life? Well, most of the time a bully only shows his dominance to weaker people, this is pure logic because if there would be a stronger guy around he'd get punched back if he'd try to push him around. Just like in real life, even if it's not really the same thing as dying in League of legends, the emotions are still there. If you show a more dominant side than your opponent, he will have to back off. This is important for a lot of reasons, for example if you are not the dominant one in the mid lane then your enemy will be. You are a squishy champion of 530hp at level one (including Doran's blade), if you are up against a beefy guy in the mid lane, like mordekaiser, he will think and act as if he is the dominant one against you UNTIL you show him that in fact you are the dominant one. So start thinking right now, i am the dominant one and i am not afraid of any champion. That is step one, if you are not convinced yourself that you are the dominant one then you will have a hard time to convey such dominance. Step two is to show your mid enemy and the other team that you are the dominant one, getting a first blood within the 2-5 minute mark is a great way to achieve this. Another way to convey dominance is to be overly aggressive, suddenly walking past the enemy creeps is a great way to check who is the dominant one, if he back off you are in command, if he fights back he's still not afraid of you and does not respect you enough to retreat. If this happens, you have to prove to him that you are in fact the dominant one of this lane, to do this you simply try to kill him or reduce his HP by a lot. This is why i practise a good early game rather than mid and late game. Let me explain, people who see you kill your enemy in mid 2-3 times will now be afraid of you, because they know by now you have far greater power than they do, this will make your enemy very nervous when you're out in the fog of war, or when they see you rushing towards them. This is basic psychology, everything we do even in a game is based on our feelings, we may not want to run away, but deep inside we know if i stay here we will die. Having a lot of kills gives you respect and power, so instead of farming gold and then get fed, it's more effective to get the power and respect early. Some people are not convinced that you are more powerful even if you get fed, this is most likely because so far all the Ezreal players they've seen has not been aggressive or had power (or atleast not shown their dominance enough), these guys has to be put in place, if people are not afraid of you, make them, show them that you are not running away, show them that you are fearless and charge in alone. It might seem like a stupid plan to just charge in, but as long as you have more power than they do, the outcome will still be better for you. This concept could of course be applied on any champion, not just Ezreal.

Anger


This game can also trigger a feeling of anger. When a game doesn't go as smoothly as usual, someone might be feeding on a lane or some enemy jungler stole your junglebuffs, there are a lot of things that can happen in a game which will trigger a feeling of anger. Now, we can exploit this and there are a lot of ways to cause the enemy team to feel angry. But first, why do we want to make them angry? I've always felt like there's a very thin line between anger and stupidity, for example how many times have you heard someone say, i know what i did was stupid but i was just so angry! You make mistakes when you're angry and this is what we're after. I once played against a Cho'gath and in every teamfight he always ate someone at the end of the fight following that by immediately saying Mhmaumhmaum (some sort of eating sound) and the first time he did it it wasn't that bad but after 3-4 times it started to become annoying and eventually it turned to anger. We ended up losing the game. That is why after i kill someone i use a punchline, some clever words, that are not insulting but just annoying, for example if you constantly say to your enemy "Aww, you just had bad luck" and the following times you kill them you say "Aww, you had bad luck again, oh man" this will do the trick. You will get the same effect by saying something completely random like "Oh banana, oh oh, banana nana, oh banana, i love banana nana". Try your best not to anger your team mates, this might be hard sometimes but concider the following scenario. I dominate the mid champion in almost every game and usually he dies 2-3 times, the enemy team will not concider me to be a good player but rather concider their ally as a noob, and i'd think there has been a lot of trashtalking going on against that player. If people start to trashtalk their allies they are only making it worse and it just triggers a feeling of anger which leads to mistakes. Instead of trashtalking that feeder just tell them what to do, switch lanes, send back up, buy a certain item, be more defensive, say whatever but don't insult them.

I might add some more emotions later, if you have something clever to contribute or want me to discuss an emotion some more just give me a comment.

Confidence


Confidence is key to owning the mid lane, i often get questions like "What to do if my enemy is more aggressive?" or i get comments like "You faced a noob". What these people fail to see in these videos is what is actually going on inside my and my enemy's brain. Players who goes mid are usually quite passive, they focus mostly on last hitting with the occasional move of harassment, some champions are better at harassing and they will be more aggressive because of this, but what almost no other player expects is an overly aggressive player, almost no other player expects you to charge them at level and the result of doing this causes the enemy to panic. Players who panics does stupid things that they normally don't do and they will most likely make mistakes that will cause them to get killed.

Players play their best when they have confidence, this happens mostly when they sense that they have a feeling of power, for example when they are fed. At level A though, they only have confidence when they get the feeling they are stronger than their enemy. My pantheon video is a perfect example of this, that guy is most likely used to playing against "normal" Ezreals who generally has about ů߽ attack damage and next to no defense. With that in mind he charged me and was overly aggressive to me without realizing my power and because i have the same confidence he has instead of running i returned fire and killed him instead. Now while people may argue that his aggressive move was foolish and stupid, in reality it's not really that bad of a move, concidering most players would start to run. So to answer all those questions i get about players i face being noobs or not aggressive enough, the answer is i have more confidence than they do. If you fail against your enemy in mid your opponent had more confidence than you.
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6. Changes/Additions
Here you will find all the things i've added or changed in this guide, check back here often to get the latest news!

15-08-11 - Added the section "The importance of last hitting" and changed the build "My favourite build i use right now" to match the one i actually am using right now.

01-07-11 - Added the section "An Alternate Strategy" to the guide. Removed a couple of outdated sections.

20-06-11 - Added a link to my facebook page found here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Win10cent/212349475471048?sk=wall

11-06-11 - Added the section "Annoying Ezreal Tricks".

01-06-11 - I AM FINALLY BACK! I've fixed my computer problems, fixed Windows G which means all my future videos will be recorded with audio from the game and team speak. I will now start to update this guide with new builds, strategies and videos.

Thank you for your support.

23-03-11 - Added a link to my Ezona guide. Ezona guide: http://leaguecraft.com/strategies/guide/15076-ezona-guide-as-requested.xhtml


17-03-11 - There was a new patch a few days ago, nothing really changed for our Ezreal except 1 more attack damage on Doran's blade (yay). I fixed a few spelling errors.

09-03-11 - Edited a lot in the guide, removed everything about AP and Hybrid, simply because i don't play them anymore. Also edited my favourite build a little.

01-03-11 - Added the section "It's offical, Ezreal is now the greatest carry in the game" update talk.

20-02-11 - Added videos for killing Akali, Kennen, Malzahar, Karthus, Ezreal and LeBlanc.

19-02-11 - Added another feeling to the section "In the head of Win10cent"

11-02-11 - Added a new section called About Armor Penetration vs Damage runes. Credit to Ryther for doing the math!

06-02-11 - Added the section "Watch me play" where i will add all further video links.

29-01-11 - Added a new live stream since my old my didn't work, follow this link http://www.own3d.tv/live/20311


29-01-11 - Upcoming patch changes section added, discussion about the upcoming changes to runes added. Added some more color to the guide as well.

27-01-11 - Added a link to my live streams at the introduction section.

25-01-11 - Added some more color to the text + some more rune options on seals.

24-01-11 - Added a little more information in "My personal view of Ezreal" + a screen shot.

23-01-11 - Added a picture of a penta kill.

18-01-11 - PATCH! Well no changes to Ezreal or any of his items. In conclusion, Ezreal will continue to own! I do fear that if everyone were to play Ezreal this way he would soon get an early game nerf :(

15-01-11 - Added a video turorial for killing Karthus in the mid lane.

13-01-11 - Added a video tutorial for killing Swain in the mid lane.

10-01-11 - Added the section "In the head of Win10cent" which is about manipulation and psychology.

08-01-11 - Added a video tutorial for killing Twitch in the mid lane.

07-01-11 - Added a few new rune setups. Deleted the old ones.

07-01-11 - PATCH! No changes to Ezreal, but we have a few new items to look at, it doesn't change anything for our beloved AD Ezreal, however the AP Ezreal and Hybrid is changed a little bit. Also added a bit of information on the new champion "Caitlyn" in the "Tips and Tricks to counter a specific enemy champion in the mid lane" section.

01-01-11 - Added a tutorial video for killing Pantheon in the mid lane. (sorry the video is kinda dumb, he's dead 16 seconds after i first see him on the screen...)

30-12-10 - Added a tutorial video for killing Cassiopeia, Fiddlesticks and Ashe in the mid lane.

28-12-10 - Added a Twisted Treeline section.

25-12-10 - Changed everything regarding Elixir of fortitude, made a few tweeks to the look of the guide.

24-12-10 - Corrected some spelling errors.

23-12-10 - Added a new rune setup and a follow up section called "How to play Ezreal early game with the new rune setup" and a tutorial video for killing Lux and Vladimir. Removed the Standard AD build and added My favourite AD build.

22-12-10 - Added a tutorial video for killing Anivia and Malzahar in the mid lane.

21-12-10 - Added a tutorial video for killing Kassadin in the mid lane.

20-12-10 - Added a video of encountering Veigar. Also corrected some spelling errors.

18-12-10 - Added Cassiopeia to the "Tips and Tricks to counter a specific enemy champion in the mid lane" section. Also made a new section called "Items to counter specific champions".

15-12-10 - Added difficulty levels (in my opinion) to enemy champs you might encounter in mid they can be found in the section "Tips and Tricks to counter a specific enemy champion in the mid lane"

14-12-10 - Added "Let's talk builds" section and also added "The Tank Destroying AD Build"

14-12-10 - PATCH DAY! * Base damage increased to 47.6 from 45
* Damage per level increased to 3 from 2.6
* Base attack speed increased to 0.665 from 0.658

I'm just laughing and crying at the same time. I'm laughing because Ezreal already has enough power to kill anyone in the mid lane and yet they give him even more! On the other hand i'm crying because they totally nerfed Elixir of fortitude which is my favorite item in the game. I would think it's still quite helpful early game even after the nerf but i'd guess it will lose it's usefulness lategame. I'm still in the process of trying all the changes made to items in game and i will give you my thoughts and possible changes to builds as soon as i gather more information. I'm mostly curious about trying the new Last whipser into my build as see what happens.

13-12-10 - Added difficulty levels of the builds and added some color to the text.

13-12-10 - Added changes/Additions.

09-12-10 - Guide published.
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7. About Armor Penetration vs Damage runes.
It has been said for a long time that armor penetration runes are a must for Ezrael, it has been said that without them Ezreal will suck. Some people claimed (myself included) that some armor penetration + atk damage runes were better but what is actually true?

Thanks to some great research from Ryther, i do now have the answer, Ryther you are the man, i'd like it a lot of everyone who reads this and find this section useful to credit him in a comment!

Most players who argue that armor penetration is better is because it's better late game, and yes that is completely true, it is better in every aspect, but by how much? I have a very detailed calculation of all the different rune setups imaginable + a detalied calculation of every base armor stat for each champion.

To make this easier for me to explain, let's say we are using the same masteries i'm using, 21/9/0. If i were to go with armor penetration marks and quints and buy a doran's blade as my starting item, my damage on level 1 would then be 62 against an average champion if i were to go with 3 damage quints and 6 arm pen + 3 dmg marks i would end up with 72 damage against the same enemy champion.

Okay, i don't think anyone doubted that damage runes early game was better than armor penetration, but now that we got that settled, let's see when armor penetration get's better than damage and by how much.

I will display the difference in damage from level 1-18 with each setup of runes.

Armor penetration Quints and Marks:
Lv1=62, Lv2=65, Lv3=68, Lv4=71, Lv5=75, Lv6=76, Lv7=76, Lv8=77, Lv9=77, Lv10=77, Lv11=78, Lv12=78, Lv13=78, Lv14=79, Lv15=79, Lv16=79, Lv17=79, Lv18=80


Armor Penetration Marks and Damage Quints:


Lv1=72, Lv2=72, Lv3=73, Lv4=74, Lv5=75, Lv6=75, Lv7=75, Lv8=76, Lv9=76, Lv10=77, Lv11=77, Lv12=77, Lv13=78, Lv14=78, Lv15=78, Lv16=78, Lv17=79, Lv18=79.


As you can see, going with armor penetration quints and marks gives you better damage at level 6 but it's not even by 1 damage, and even at level 18 the difference is also less than 1 damage. And if you look at the damage early game you get much more damage early game with the damage quints.

UPDATE!
I've received A LOT of questions regarding this matter, and A LOT of players are not convinced at all that damage runes could be even slightly viable on any champion, i think what most players are forgetting is that first of all armor penetration runes were nerfed and that they really have no idea how much the extra armor penetration will help you mid/late game. So therefor let me give you an example of how "good" the armor penetration runes are mid/late game.

Because of the fact that the more damage you get the more damage you will deal with your armor penetration runes, and this is what confuses a lot of players. So for this example let's say it is mid game and i'm level 13 i'm using full armor penetration from runes and masteries that would give me 31 armor penetration. For this example i have 250 atk damage.

Now let's say i am attacking an enemy with 100 armor.

Target armor: 100 - 31 arm pen = 69

Damage reduction = 69 / 169 = 40.8%

My actual damage to the target = 59.2% of my total atk damage.

250 x 0.592 = 148 damage



Now using my setup i would have 16 armor penetration from runes and masteries and because i have 10 atk damage from runes i would then have 260 total attack damage with the same items at that point and time in the game.

Target armor: 100 - 16 arm pen = 84

Damage reduction = 84 / 184 = 45.6

My actual damage to the target = 54.4% of my total atk damage.

260 x 0.544 = 142 damage



Now it is up to you to decide, would you rather pick 10 more attack damage by the time your enemy has about 500hp or would you rather pick 6 more damage by the time your enemy has about 2k hp? I think the answer is very simple.

There you have it folks, now please don't ever ask me again why i pick damage runes instead of armor penetration
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8. Annoying Ezreal Tricks.
Some tips and tricks i've picked up or forgot to mention before.

I've watched some Ezreal players play and one thing i've noticed is that they don't time their mystic shots. By timing i mean it should have the same rhythm as your auto attacks. To make it simple let's say you shoot 1 auto attack each second. When you use an ability you stop auto attacking for the duration of the animation of your abiity. So if you were to cast an ability right when you were supposed to shoot an auto attack the auto attack would be canceled and you would then need to wait 1 second in order for your next auto attack to shoot.

So whenever you're fighting a champion, the lizard or anything that requires you to use a lot of your abilities ALWAYS use them right after you have shot an auto attack for INCREASED DPS!


Another little trick that i REALLY love is how to screw with a Malzahar.

This is a little hard to pull off but when it does work it's awesome and you can laugh that malzahar in his face. One thing i've noticed is that once you start the animation for your ultimate it cannot be canceled by a silencing spell like Malzahar's Call of the void. So if you're deciding to go head to head with a malzahar and you notice he's starting the animation for call of the void immediately start your animation for trueshot barrage and it will still launch and by the time your trueshot barrage is finished the silence will be gone. Yeah, take that Malzahar!


The slippery hand of Blitzcrank.

This is a similar technique but using Arcane shift instead. We all know how annoying it is to be grabbed by Blitzcrank and it usually results in you being dead. Working up your reflexes will save you and also grant you a laugh in Blitzcranks face! Whenever you see Blitzcranks animation for Rocket Grab starting be ready if it's about to hit you start your animation for arcane shift. Even if he hits you and starts pulling you pack your arcane shift still trumphs his rocket grab and you will jump out of his hand and it will look as if you made a longer jump than usual, and you are making a longer jump.
This can be done with any snare, stun, pull or any form of CC, if you learn to time it right you can escape in time for their CC to wear off.
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9. An Alternate Strategy (Side laning)
I've recently, believe it or not, started to go on a side lane, and i've been ever more deadly than i am on the mid lane.

There are a few requirements needed in order for you to be successful on a sidelane though:

¤ You will need a babysitter (a supporter)

¤ Your babysitter must NOT take any last hits (or kills) and only focus on assisting you with heals/buffs and debuffing the enemy.

¤ Your babysitter must be able to know what you're doing and when you're doing it, if you're charging in to kill the babysitter must be ready for it and immediately charge in after you.

¤ You or the supporter (whoever recalls first) must buy atleast 1 ward and place it at dragon to avoid being ganked.

That is all you need for a successful bot lane with Ezreal.

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Why this sudden change in tactics?

Even though Ezreal melts faces on mid, i've discovered that i can do it just as easy on a sidelane, and having an AP carry on mid is better for your team if you are facing an high elo team that is. Mid Ezreal is fine for solo queue and for low elo premades, but in higher elo you will need to go bot.

So far i am really really liking it, most of the time i can now get a double first blood instead of just a first blood.

Why does this work?

The reason this works so well is because most of the time you will face an AD carry with a babysitter just like yourself, and the most common rune setup for an AD carry is 25 armor pen, mana regen and cooldown reduction. This is really giving you a great edge on your opponent, you still have 36 armor on level 1, so they are not dealing true damage to you, but they don't have that extra armor so you will be dealing true damage to them. Also you have much more attack damage on level 1 than they do. Focusing down an enemy is really easy and since mystic shot has such a long range you can zone them out very easily.

How do you kill them?

If you've practised my first blood strategy then you will have no problem doing it on a sidelane, stay in the brush as much as possible (the dominant players of the side lane will have control of the brush) since you have a skill shot pushing players out of the brush isn't a problem. Last hit whenever possible but don't attack the minions otherwize. Attack the enemy carry as often as you get the chance, once you get to level 2 you know what to do, charge, exhaust, ignite and kill. If you find the opportunity to harass the supporter as well do that to as this might give you a chance to kill the supporter too.

Win10cent, i have killed them like you said what now?

Stay and farm, if you're running too low on hp and you have a supporter without a heal (Janna) it might be a good idea to recall, if you're fine on hp and mana stay and last hit and try to take down the tower if possible. Try zoning the enemy out as much as you can. Then proceed with the usual tactic, get red buff, build more items, melt faces.

Which supporter should i bring?

I've got 3 supporters i really like and any of those three works perfectly.

¤ Janna: Her shield is amazing, it allows you to effectively harass the enemy while not recieving any damage. The fact that the shield is also giving you more damage is just insane, and you are a true power house. She can also knock enemies up in the air as well as slow the enemy. Janna will grant you a lot of kills.

¤ Taric: His stun is a beast, if you are playing with a friend on ts/skype/ventrilo and Taric just get's 1 stun in on the enemy, they will die so hard combined with your power and summoner spells. Taric also has a skill that increases your armor even more, if you don't require healing he can skill it on level 2 and you will have a massive 49 armor compared to your enemy AD carry's 15 armor. The enemy AD carry won't have much to say after that.

¤ Soraka: If she buys a mana manipulator you won't have to worry about your mana at all, she will pump your hp and mana back in no time using her spells. Soraka is a great supporter, whenever you attack an enemy she can come along to silence their carry to prevent defensive spells such as Corki's escape spell, or she can silence the enemy supporter to avoid her healing the enemy.

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Other changes you might consider

If you are a player with a fairly high elo and you know you will most likely face an AD + supporter on the bot lane, you should change your glyphs from flat magic resistance to magic resistance/level. You won't be needing that much magic resistance on the early levels as most AD carries don't carry a lot of heavy AP spells.
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10. The importance of last hitting
Introduction


I am not an expert on this myself, and if you look at my first videos i uploaded like 9 months ago you will notice that my last hitting is very very bad. Recently i've started to really practice my last hitting, going into practise games just to practise. The optimal idea would be to last hit every creep while at the same time killing your enemy but that is very hard to do so we would need some kind of guideline on how much time to spend on killing the enemy.

A great thing about Ezreal is that he has a long range attack. Between last hitting you can easily hit an enemy with mystic shot if you get the chance to. As an AD carry you can also harrass the enemy with an auto attack every now and then. At some point you should find an opening to combo your opponent down. So how many creeps can i miss to benefit from my kill? The answer is about 15 creeps. If you miss more than 15 creeps due to harrassing the enemy you will have wasted gold.

What's not calculated in this is the loss of gold for the enemy champion, while you miss 15 last hits the enemy should also miss about 15 which is good. As Ezreal you have the power to force the enemy to retreat and not get last hits which is great. You also have the power to kill the enemy quickly.


How to last hit


There isn't really that much i can say about how to last hit, if you see a creep with low HP kill it. There are however a few tricks that you might not know but you should know.

1. If 2 creeps are low at the same time and are both being focused by your creeps, auto attack one and mystic shot the other.

2. If the enemy creeps are under your tower then the melee creeps needs 2 tower shots to have low enough hp for you to last hit, so wait 2 tower hits then last hit. The ranged creeps has lower HP and will die from 2 tower shots but will not have low enough HP for you to last hit it after 1 tower shot. What you need to do to kill a ranged minion under the tower is either mystic shot it right after a tower hit or auto attack it 2 times. It's quite hard to pull off every time and you need to focus to do it properly. As soon as you see the tower charging up for the first shot at a ranged creep start auto attacking it, you will then be able to attack the minion 2 times while the tower does it only once.

3. ALWAYS look at all three lanes and spot which lane is gonna be pushed next. Whenever you see a big wave of enemy creeps closing in on your lane run there as fast as possible to grab the last hits.

4. If all the lanes are pushed and you have no creeps close to any of your towers then don't just run around doing nothing, if there are jungle creeps go kill them, if your team has warded the enemy jungle then you can even grab some gold in their jungle. Remember, every time your not out getting gold you are wasting time and you should always be greedy. If you see a huge creep wave but you know you won't make it in time shoot your ultimate should give you around 100-200 gold. Ofcourse you shouldn't use your ultimate to kill creeps while you are running into a team fight but you know what i mean.

5. After a team fight don't just teleport back right away, (assuming you won the team fight and are alive) the look if there are any enemy creeps closeby you can last hit and on your way there go through the enemy jungle (if the fight was on that side and if it's on the way to the creeps) kill everything in sight, take the enemy minions and THEN recall. Even if you have low HP with the life steal you have you'll have full hp in no time. You should not do this if the enemy team has too many players alive and the jungle is not warded at all.

In conclusion, last hitting is just as important as kills. Practise to get better. Combining kills with creep kills is the way to go, focusing only on creeps isn't good and focusing only on kills isn't good you need both to maximize your gold per minute. So just be greedy think of everything as gold and take it whenever possible.
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11. Masteries + Runes
For masteries i go 21/9/0, with improved exhaust and ignite. And in the defense tree i go for armor, magic resistance and hp regen.

External Image

I feel like this is the way to go it's just so much easier to get first blood with this setup. I've tried to switch it around going deep in both the utility tree and defense tree but everytime i do i always feel like i'm swapping out damage for things i don't need as much such as mana regen or cooldown reduction. However if you feel like you don't like damage that much or just can't stand not having utility stuff then by all means go grab it. I suggest that if you want to follow my guide and become quite good while laning in mid then atleast try these masteries.

As for runes, i'd say if you know how to play Ezreal well and know how to save your mana for when it's important then go with this setup.



3 x Greater Quintessence of Strength
3 x Greater Mark of Strength
6 x Greater Mark of Desolation
9 x Greater Seal of Resilience
9 x Greater Glyph of Warding


This rune setup is a setup of pure ownage, you've got everything you need and could ever want for an early game. Let me go into a bit more detail why i chose the runes i did.

The damage runes, they are just there to boost your damage above 70, they could be the difference between you getting a kill or the enemy surviving, for my game they are a must.

The armor penetration, the average armor of champions at level 1 is 15.5, so the ideal ammount of armor penetration is 16 which is exactly what you'll get from those runes and masteries.

The flat armor runes, if you choose the flat armor runes and the armor on masteries you'll take C% less damage from incoming physical damage at level . Could it be better? You are both stronger and more sturdy than your opponent!

The magic resistance runes, a lot of times you'll encounter AP champions in mid and their harass spells can be very painful, these runes will keep you alive and prove to your enemy that you're strong enough and won't run away.
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12. Skilling Order
AD

Start with Mystic shot (Q) and take it every level you can, next take Arcane Shift (E spell), take your Ultimate whenever you can (duh..), and don't take Essence flux until you're level 13.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18
x x x x x
x x x x x
x x x x x
x x x


As an AD i've always felt like Essence flux is a waste, it requires a lot more mana than mystic shot and mystic shot does better damage, and team fights doesn't start until you're about level 13 anyway. I also like to have a shorter cooldown on Arcane shift. If you like Essence flux a lot though you can take one level of it at level 4.
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13. Summoner Abilities
Like i've said, i want that early kill, if you get a good start it's a lot easier to own later in the game, and an Exhaust + Ignite combo usually results in a first blood. I love this combination and without them i'd have a much harder time getting that first blood. I promise you that if you practise a bit you will improve your game if you use these two summoner spells along with my runes and masteries, They can also be useful throughout the whole game. I know a lot of players like having a defensive summoner spell, but i'd say try to take advantage of the fact that Ezreal already has a spell quite similar to flash and now that i'm used to not having any defensive summoner spells i really don't miss them.

However those are just my recommendations if you don't like them i'll give you a few other options.

Flash - Well it's great and all, and on Ezreal you can double flash with it, but since they are removing it from the game why bother working on it? Anyway if you still choose this as your spell i might as well give you a few pointers. It can be used both defensively and offensively. You can tower dive with arcane shift and immediately flash outta there. It's a great spell for any champion really, but at the same time i get the feeling it's sometimes a bit useless on Ezreal, atleast in my play style. But don't get me wrong it can be good, but when it comes to getting that first blood, it can't really help you much.

Ghost - This spell is great overall, if you're playing AP you can use it to chase or to escape, as AD it's mostly escaping though since with my playstyle you're gonna have the lizard buff most of the game so if you're kiting someone they'll be slowed and killed so quickly you won't really need it for chasing, great escape spell though, if you like it a lot then take it.

Clarity - I used this spell for a long time on Ezreal i didn't think i could survive without it, i had mana regen runes i had mana regen items but i wasted so much mana that clarity was a must for me. Nowadays i've learned how to save my mana for when it's important and i'm rarely out of mana even with no mana regen runes or items. So if you're like me when i first started playing Ezreal and you feel that no matter how much mana or mana regen you have you still want more, then this is the spell for you. It's mostly useful early game and the reason i don't like it anymore is that it can't save your life or kill someone. Try to learn to live without it!

Cleanse - Well, it doesn't really work well on Ezreal, if they target you you're kinda dead even if you cleanse your way out of their crowd control, but hey maybe it might save you sometimes, i've never really used it.

Teleport - It's a great spell, i like it a lot, mostly when i just recalled and a team fight is coming up, but i rarely use it on Ezreal because i don't have to recall ever early game because i'm never harrassed enough to recall, and when i first make my recall i head to the lizard buff anyway so i won't need it to get there. However if you are playing a more safe playstyle, without the lizard buff and you get the feeling you will get owned in mid then by all means take it, it will reduce the level gap between you and your opponent in mid by a lot, so for that it's great. And since your ulti can take care of creeps around a tower you don't need Teleport to go there and kill them.

Clairvoyance - Really good spell, it gives you a lot of map control, however i do not use it because if you just pay attention to the side lane enemies you won't get ganked, and even if you get ganked when you have sheen, lizard buff and elixir of fortitude they won't succeed with the gank anyway, unless they are like people ganking you and you have low hp. And if you've followed my guide and put wards around the map you will have enough map control anyway.

Heal - Also a spell i used in my early games as Ezreal, my arguments to use it was "Hey if i have low hp i can lure my opponent to attack me and then i use heal and BAM i kill him instead". Now that might seem like a good way to go, but then i met a player in mid with ignite. I had low hp and i lured him to attack me and as soon as he did i poped heal, but to my suprise i was ignited so my heal spell was heavily reduced and he killed me. And from that moment on i never used it again, now i just laugh in peoples faces when i see someone in mid with heal, as soon as i attack they pop heal but they die anyway so it's kind of a waste of summoner spell. Ofcourse it can save your life a lot of times, like when karthus uses his ulti and sure it's nice to heal your team in the middle of a team fight but again it won't help you in getting your first blood, atleast you can't count on it.

Rally - Not even gonna discuss this one, just don't take it.

Revive - Same thing no discution, just don't take it.

Smite - Well if you think Ezreal is a great jungler then sure take it.

I'd highly recommend ignite + exhaust, or atleast pick one of them.
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14. Items
Ezreal can be played almost however you want, and you might think some of my builds are ****, and sure some are better than others, but Ezreal is more about the skill than the items. If you know what you're doing you can adapt to either of these builds and still have a good game. I'm just giving you different options so that when you get tired of one build you can just switch to another.

Well i guess the core build is explained in the section "How to play Ezreal early game" but if you missed it here's a recap.

First pick, Doran's Blade

Next recall at 1400 gold

Sheen
Health Potion
and 2 Mana Potion.

What this does is Sheen increases your damage on mystic shot by your BASE attack damage which should be about 69 at this point, it also boosts your AP a bit and the hp and mana pots are just for killing the lizard and still be at full hp and mana when it's dead, you do now have a lot of damage early game and you can still decide if you want to become AD, AP or a Hybrid. So this is your core build and you should get this every game, side laning or mid laning doesn't matter, this is the way to go.

Note that if you feel like you die too much early/mid game i advice you to buy either a giants belt or a Negatron cloak, this will make you a little less fragile and hopefully give you that extra second of survival to kill an enemy. What item to get depends on the enemy team, if they have a lot of CC initiation and you feel like you'd have to buy banshee's veil later then grab the negatron cloak if not get the giants belt to build frozen mallet later.

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My favorite AD build i use right now. Difficulty - ****



Finish your core, Sheen and Boots of Speed

Next i usually get a,

Vampiric Scepter

Having a tiny bit of life steal early is something that i've really started to like.

Next i go with,

Berserker's Greaves

I just love having those boots and i feel like they are most helpful to me

Next i start working on,

The Bloodthirster

Life drain and damage just awesome!

After bloodthirster it's a little more situational and i tend to switch around some, but usually i get one of the following items i've placed them in order of which i buy most often:

Phantom Dancer

Recently i've started to get this item after bloodthirster most of the time. The extra crit chance is nice, attack speed has great synergy with your life steal and the movement speed is very much needed.

Infinity Edge

I didn't like crit on Ezreal at first but since i tend to place myself to deal auto attack damage i've really started to like building this item, add an elixir of agility and you'll be insane.

After the infinity edge i usually go with something a bit more defensive. If the enemy has some nasty CC initiations (Ashe ulti, Annie ulti, Veigar stun etc) and they also tend to initiate on me i usually run with,

Banshee's Veil

It's passive is great a lot of times, magic resistance is okay and you get mana and health, great item for defense.

If they don't initiate on me but rather go for me in the middle of the fight or if i can manage to stay safe for most of the battle i get this instead,

Frozen Mallet

Some much needed HP and a nice slow along with that. If you are having trouble surviving you could get a frozen mallet earlier, it's not optimal but you could get the giants belt somewhere in the middle of the build and then finish the item later.

Trinity Force

I usually save this for last, sometimes i upgrade it earlier but mostly i find that other items are better. Not a bad choice if you would upgrade it later though.

In some games that are really long and you get a lot of gold you might have enough to actually buy another item, then sell your boots and get another phantom dancer. You won't lose that much movement speed but if you also get an elixir of agility you will have 100% crit chance and over 2.0 attack speed (without your passive active).

If you manage to get all the items you don't even need to mystic shot in a fight, actually you should't, your auto attacks deals more damage and you actually waste time by shooting mystic shot because of the animation so only use mystic shot if the enemy is out of range or if you're poking before a team fight.

Why i don't take madred's bloodrazor. The extra damage from madred's isn't really a huge help, though it's not a bad item nor is it wrong in the build but i never use it anymore, it's an expensive item that grants me too little damage for my gold. Same goes for Last whisper, i'd much rather grab something more useful like infinity edge or phantom dancer to increase, movement speed, crit, crit%, damage and attack speed. Last whisper isn't a bad item either but the increase in damage isn't noticable enough for me to think that it's worth it. Also since this is the build that i am using right now i cannot include it if i barely ever use it.

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The Snowballing Beefy AD Ezreal build. Difficulty = ****


I kinda like this build and i use it sometimes, it gives you great reward for your early kills and ganks, and if you were able to follow my guide you should be able to use this build effectively.

After sheen and boots of speed get

Sword of the Occult.

Upgrade your boots to either

Berserker's Greaves or Mercury's Treads

Next i usually buy defensive item (most offen the first defensive item i get is Banshee's veil though), starting either Negatron Cloak or Chain Vest if i can't complete it at once.

Complete the defensive item.

Next i finish up

Trinity Force.

If i need more armor/magic resistance then now's the time i build it (mostly Randuin's Omen or Guardian Angel).

The game should be coming to a close by now, and if you've got these items (and my main runes/masteris) and an elixir of fortitude you will have about 3.3k hp, about 175 armor, 120 magic resistance. And with a full stacked sword of the occult you will still do a lot of damage. I know this build is not the greatest DPS build, but you can help your tank a bit, and this build is great if your team consist only of squishies and a tank.

Should it continue, just go for more damage and i recommend

The Bloodthirster.

With your armor, magic resistance and hp you can survive well enough to drain some hp back in a fight, and you won't die and lose your stacks that easily.

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The Tank Destroying AD Build. Difficulty = ***


This build is for countering really beefy teams who have quite high armor and who tend to stack up on armor items. With this build you will show them who's boss.

First of as always build

Sheen and Boots of Speed

It's important that you start working on your tank destroying items early and i'd suggest you start with:

Madred's Bloodrazor

You will have no problem finishing this up in time for team fights and it will be very useful, after you've bought your first piece of it i'd suggest you upgrade your boots to

Berserker's Greaves

Next i'd suggest you get

Last Whisper

After the update it now grants damage instead of attack speed and since you've got more than enough attack speed from madred's bloodrazor the revamped last whisper will actually be better for you.

Next get

The Black Cleaver

The reason i pick last whisper before the black cleaver is because i always feel like there's a gap or damage whenever i'm trying to get the B. F. Sword and early/mid game i'd much rather boost my damage a bit more quickly and have that gap of damage later when i'm already powerful enough. It would still almost work as well the other way around and i'd say if you happen to have Hů߽ gold after completing madred's bloodrazor, you might as well go with the black cleaver first.

The game should be coming to a close but should it continue i'd suggest you get a defensive item which can be found in the previous section.

If the game would continue even more then just finish up

Trinity Force

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15. Items to counter specific champions
I've made this section because there are always some champions you dislike. And getting a certain item might counter that specific enemy. If you find a champion annoying write a comment and i will add an answer in this section.

I got a question about Warwick in the comments. How do i counter Warwick, he see's me and uses his ulti on me and i'm dead. His ultimate is strong but there is a way you can survive.

If you are up against enemies who has ultimates which makes you suppressed such as Warwicks, Malzahars, Amumu etc etc. If you end up being focused by any of these ultimates all the time then get a Quicksilver Sash whenever you get cought in an ultimate that suppress you activate the Quicksilver sash and get out of there.

If you play against Karthus and every time he uses his ultimate you always die. Then get a Banshee's Veil it's passive will make you safe from his ultimate as long as the passive is not on cooldown.

This is all for now, as soon as i get more questions about champions i will add more information here.
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16. How to play Ezreal early game
READ THIS SECTION!


First of all CHECK WHAT SUMMONER SPELLS YOUR OPPONENTS HAVE!!! And mostly check which ones the one going mid has (or those most likely going mid), you should take the mid lane, seriously you have way more power than most people think as Ezreal. Ezreal has a reputation of sucking, really bad. He has a reputation of being weak early game, with low hp and low damage output. THIS IS NOT TRUE!!!! I've been playing so many games (and one just today actually) where players have told me that Ezreal sucks in the mid lane and every time i've got an apology, so too in the game i played today. Today Malzahar and Sion in my team started to complain that Malzahar should go mid because he's better, well maybe he is but that is very much up to the player not the champion. Anyway, when Vladimir from the enemy team shows up in mid my team is like, look now Ezreal will feed, when the clock hit 2:24 Vladimir was dead, you might think this Vladimir just sucked, but i've encountered more Vladimirs in mid than i can count and not a single one of them has beaten me. Truth is i get first blood in 90% of my games, and so can you if you just follow my guide.

I'm gonna ask you a question and i want you to think about it before you read the answer. What are your objectives when taking the mid lane?

You shall, while going mid:

- Make sure your enemy in mid is disabled, meaning he is a lower level than you and has less gold than you do, most easily done by simply killing him. Doing so will avoid the enemies mid champ (who's supposed to be the strongest among them for most of the game) to get powerful and be even weaker than his sidelane allies.

- Make sure the enemies at the sidelanes are lower level and has less gold than your side lane allies.

- Make sure their jungle is warded. If an enemy is missing and you are farming gold at mid what do you do? Continue to farm and risk getting ganked or do you back away from the creeps? Well you should back off, but if you warded the enemies jungle a bit and you notice that an enemy is getting the golem buff then you and your allies can continue doing whatever you please.

- Make sure you have control of their jungle buffs, or atleast part of it.
Basically you should while going mid make sure not only you are more powerful than the enemy, but make sure your whole team is and i will explain just how to do this. If you succeed with your objectives then your team willl have a major advantage and the game should almost be decided right there. Ofcourse even if you do everything right your mates can still feed the enemy or the enemy may be more skilled or have a better setup of champions than your team, but one thing is for sure, it will be better for your team!

This is not easy to do in every game and a lot of things can go wrong, but the more of these objectives you are able to complete the better for your team!

This game can trigger feelings which we cannot control, one of them is fear. We need to find a way to make the enemy afraid of you, if you do this then you can dominate just about anyone. In every game there is always a dominant one in the mid lane, he has the control. This person has to be you, and as Ezreal and with a little bit of practise it will be you. So start thinking right now, i am the dominant one and i am not afraid of anyone! The easiest way to do this is to be overly aggressive, and as Ezreal you can. Once the enemy has low hp he has to return to his tower only to stand there watching you as you farm while he isn't getting any gold or exp. Once he is pushed back it's very important that you continue to harass him SUPER FREAKIN HARD. Now that you understand that you can actually fear an enemy you can continue to read how to do it properly as Ezreal.

UPDATE! After the nerf to Elixir of fortitude i am now not using it, it is now in my opinion a waste of cash. Therefor i am now always starting with Doran's Blade along with the new rune setup.

I've been doing a lot of thinking about which enemy champion to use as an example for this section, and i've seen a lot of people complain about Mordekaiser in mid. The problem most people have when facing Mordekaiser is that it seems like no matter how hard you harrass him his hp does not decrease, so most people just don't bother. Most players who play Mordekaiser will play him like this when going mid early game, they go to your creeps boost their shield hit a few creeps and back off, this way he will push more than you do, and you must not let him do this.

Here is what you do, you follow the creep in the front of your creeps and once you see Mordekaiser you immediately start to auto attack him (if you can land a mystic shot great, do it!), he will still try to boost his shield and then immediately back off, just follow him and continue to auto attack, his shield will be broken in one hit and the next will decrease his hp. Warning: if you attack an enemy champion with creeps around you will take aggro from the enemy creeps, so be smart and make sure he lose more hp than you do. After 6 seconds he will return to gain his shield again, be on your toes and when you see him walking to your creeps start attacking him (ofcourse if you can land a mystic shot, you should also do this) if you just continue to do this his hp will decrease more and more and eventually when he has about 50% hp you make your move (preferably when there aren't too many creeps around), you arcan shift in, pop ignite and exhaust and just give him everything you've got, this will kill him for sure. And now you have successfully completed one of your objectives, you have now made sure the enemy champion in the mid lane has less gold and exp than you do. You should still be having quite some hp left because Mordekaiser can't really do much damage to you yet. So while he's gone continue to last hit creeps with auto attack and regain your mana. When he returns he will be afraid of you and you should be about 2 levels above him (unless he has teleport, but seriously who picks teleport as mordekaiser?). Continue doing the same thing, be the dominant one. If he decides to test your might and tries to attack you, do NOT be afraid of his size and start to run, just stand still auto attack and use mystic shot and if you need to arcane shift away, but you should win a 1v1 battle against Mordekaiser, especially if you are a higher level than he is.

Now when you have 1400 gold you recall (You should be between level 5-7 at this point). Avoid recalling if his creeps are too close to your tower, you do not want to risk losing your tower over this. Anyway now you buy a Sheen, 2 health potions and a mana potion. Head for the lizard buff, if you have your ultimate you can use it and if you decide to use it then make sure it also hits the creeps in the mid lane, to make sure your enemy is not pushing your tower while you're away. Also when you start attacking the lizard, drink a hp pot and a mana pot to be at maximum health and (almost) maximum mana when the lizard is dead. Now with the lizard buff and sheen you will be dealing more damage than anyone on the map. So walk around the water to the mid section (he should have pushed his creeps to your tower at this point) and just kill him, your mystic shot will slow him and deal about 250 damage to him so you will kill him really quickly, now check which lane needs your help the most. Head over there and do not be afraid, you can kill just about anyone, with your superior damage and hp you can even take on 3 enemy champions at the same time, even if they all attack you, just stand still auto attack and mystic shot. I hope you understand that once you start to run in a fight you will lose, even if it seems like you will die atleast try to kill an enemy! When you're done with that lane head to the enemy lizard buff/golem buff depending on which one is closer to where you are, kill it and recall. Now grab boots and 2-5 wards quickly head back to mid because he will most likely be back by now. At this point the mid champion you're facing will die even faster, if you've followed my guide successfully he will be very gimped and you should have no trouble taking him down. When he's dead or has escaped with low hp run to the other lane kill them and take the buff closest to you. Now start warding their jungle, ward their lizard, golem and the dragon. If you have wards left place them around the mid section to avoid getting ganked.


You can continue to harrass all enemies on the map as long as you like or until team fights break out. Since you have control of their jungle right now, take advantage of it!! Try to avoid leaving buffs for the enemy team and snipe them with your ultimate or just head there once you see it's back again.

Now if you did this correctly you have completed all your objectives! You have made your team superior to the enemy team. You have warded their jungle. You have gimped their mid champ. You have control of their jungle buffs. GOOD JOB!!

If this sounds like it's a bit too much then take it one step at a time, starting by killing the enemy in mid!

So let's say you're not a very skilled Ezreal or the mid champion you're up against is just really good, or you're just having a really bad start. then you probably wonder what should i do now? Let me tell you ;)

Just farm gold from creeps, if you died once by the enemy mid champ it would be stupid to try to kill him, he is higher level now and has more power than you do and you no longer have the upper hand. So just farm until you have 1400 gold and now proceed with the plan, meaning grab sheen and lizard buff and now you can easily take back the command of the mid lane.

But Win10cent, what if we have a jungler, he will take all the buffs?

If this happens you take the enemy lizard instead.

But Win10cent what if they also have a jungler?

Well then you ask your jungler if you can have the second spawning lizard.

But Win10cent what if he don't want to?

-.- then you ward the enemy lizard and steal it from him!

If you find this strategy to be impossible or if you think everyone i've faced must have been noobs, then i'm sorry but you are not as skilled as you think you are. Just because you can't do it doesn't mean nobody else can, so if you don't believe me, try it for yourself and i'm sure if you're skilled with Ezreal already you will have no problem doing this. If you do not know how to counter a specific enemy check out the section "Tips and Tricks to counter specific enemy champions in the mid lane".

If you have any more questions about this or about anything leave a comment and i will add an answer to this guide.
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17. Tips and Tricks to counter a specific enemy champion in the mid lane
The basic strategy is to just be really aggresive, auto attack if you can and mystic shot as much as you can on the enemy. When they are at about 50% hp arcane shift in, pop ignite and exhaust and he will die.

When going for your first blood kill and you use arcane shift to attack, make sure Arcane shift also hit's the enemy, find a good opening for it. This is important.

If the survived with low hp, stand between the enemy creeps and the enemy tower, this will force the enemy to make a choice, either they stay at the tower and not get exp or gold, or they recall and fill up on health, or they try to attack you and then they die. If they are at low health like ¯߽�-ï߽� and they just walk a tiny bit in front of their tower, use arcane shift and make sure it hits the enemy, wait for the auto attack and immediately shoot mystic shot, this should kill the enemy.

Enemies like Ryze, Sivir, Karthus etc etc who has AoE spells you should always stay a bit away from the creeps, this will force the enemy to choose between harrassing you or farming, if you stand next to your creeps, they can do both. To take advantage of this i'd suggest the following, since you're gonna stay away from your creeps stand on either the left or the right side of the creeps and slowly start walking closer to the enemy turret, since you can't hit the enemy with your mystic shot if creeps are in front of them, they are now forced to make another decision either they stay where they are and get hit by your mystic shot or they walk to the opposite side of you, and this is what i want, force my enemy to move closer to the tower. Once they are on the other side i can just charge in and give him everything i've got and now he's dead. This isn't as easy as it sounds, but it works really well.

A great way to harass with Ezreal is to kill the minion in front of your enemy, a lot of players find it hard to keep track of how long your mystic shot can reach and they sometimes forget they are not protected by creeps especially if the creep in front of them suddenly died. So start auto attacking that minion in front of your enemy and as soon as your last hit flows in the air you immediately shoot a mystic shot, if he's not paying attention he will forget to move.

If you experience trouble with a specific champion you might want to drink a health potion as you engage for first blood. This is more important against enemies which tend to not run but fight back, such as Karthus. That extra hp might save you.

Against most enemies it is really important that you have atleast killed them once before level 6, when some champions get their ulti they will be much more difficult to kill, so try to atleast kill them once before that to give you the upper hand.

Sometimes when you encounter enemies like Kassadin, Vladimir or Mordekaiser who all have 1 great harassing spell but with a quite long cooldown, you sometimes get the feeling that they can harass you so well and you can't harass them at all. The trick to beating champions like those is to not run back when they harass you. Think of it like this, when they have used their harass spell they can't do anything besides auto attack for the next 8-10 seconds. That gives you 8-10 seconds to do anything you want, in 10 seconds you can land 3 mystic shots plus auto attacks, and that is enough to even kill an enemy. A perfect example of this is displayed in my tutorial video for killing Vladimir found below. Against champions like that i get hit on purpose just so that i can charge in and deal more damage in return. The result of this will be either a kill or total zone control, because if he survived he will be forced to retreat to his tower because when you charge in he has no more spells to cast on you which gives him 2 options, stay and die or retreat to his tower and not get experience. It is important to keep constant pressure against opponents like that because remember that your mystic shot can reach them far longer than their spells can, so as i've said so many times, stay between the enemy tower and the enemy creeps and if the enemy goes within reach of your mystic shot you fire away and he will back off even more and you will out level him.

I've started to record videos of encounters with champions in the mid lane which i will upload as soon as possible. This is very time consuming and it will take a long time before i've encountered everyone but i will keep on recording. And of course some of my enemies might be horrible players, but i can't really do anything about that, i'm simply recording my videos because it might be easier for some people to watch how to do it than to read about it.

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In alphabetic order.

Anivia Difficulty - *****




She is pretty tough and quite hard to kill, actually one of the hardest to kill, because you kinda have to kill her twice. Try to let her push a bit and when she's just a little closer to your tower attack and hopefully you will have slain her away from her tower and then just kill the egg. Try your best to avoid her Flash Frost, it's speed is quite slow so if you pay attention you shouldn't get hit too much. Avoid going in attack range against Anivia, she will use Flash Frost and then combo with Frostbite and it will hurt. If you chose to pick the magic resistance runes they will help a lot against her. If she has low hp and is standing by her tower, do NOT kill her, this is what she wants you to do, because then she will be at full hp again. So just farm until the your creeps are pushed back and then she has to decide, recall or just stand by her tower and not getting exp.

Akali Difficulty - ***




Akali can be hard if you let her, she has a lot of burst damage and because of her invisibility bubble she can avoid your attacks quite well. I usually try to shoot her from far away with mystic shot while she's in her bubble, even though you can't see her you can still figure out where she is. When the bubble is almost gone you have a great opening to charge her and at this moment with exhaust and ignite ready you have greater damage than she does.

Annie Difficulty - *


She's nothing special really, just be aware if she's she has a white aura around her, then she has stun ready. She's just too weak for you and you should never lose to her ever.

Ashe Difficulty - *




Watch out for her first attack, she will try to attack you with it because it will have a 100% crit chance. Just be overly aggressive to her, if you use the same runes as i do, you will deal more damage to her than she does to you. So just auto attack and mystic shot when possible, then make your move.

Caitlyn Difficulty - ****


So far i've met her times, unfortunately i wasn't able to record them but she is quite a threat, mostly because of her long auto attack range. The difficulty on her depends very much on her runes, masteries and summoner spell. I've tried playing her and i use the same setup as i do with Ezreal, and that setup is really freakin imba. Her Piltover Peacemaker spell has a long range just like mystic shot and it also passes through all obstacles, this makes it very easy for Caitlyn to harass you. I was able to slay her at level ‚ both times i encountered her, she did not use the same rune and mastery setup as me nor did she use the same summoner spells. I think if she would have she would have beaten me. She is actually one of the few champions which if played properly and with the proper rune setup will deal more damage than Ezreal. So how do you counter her? Well quite frankly i don't know o߽�% yet, but i can tell you a little bit of what i know. Her Piltover Peacemaker has about o߽ second cooldown at level , and since it needs A second to charge before she shoots, you can anticipate it and dodge it. After you've successfully dodged her spell and you are at level , you charge in full force, she has to auto attack you to death or run, while you can mystic shot and auto attack for the kill. When you've caught her at the right time, pop ignite and exhaust and hopefully you've had crippled her enough to slay her. I will try to upload a video of her whenever i get the chance.


Cassiopeia Difficulty - ***




I've met her two times in the mid lane so far and even though she can spam her spells quite a lot she's not that much of a threat as long as you're aggressive. Her Noxious Blast is a lot like Karthus's Lay Waste and you can dodge it in the same way, by dancing. She might turn out to be a threat once people learn how to play her properly. She will use a combo of Noxious Blast followed by -B Twin Fang won't hurt that much early game, especially if you've got the magic resistance runes. Stay away from your creeps and force her to either harass you or farm gold with her Noxious Blast. Try to land a mystic shot or two. She has fairly low hp early game and when you hit level you can take her down easily.

Corki Difficulty - ***


Not very common to see in mid, but it happens sometimes. He is actually quite powerful and be aware that if played right he can become a tough enemy. Check if he has ignite and exhaust, if he doesn't you should win against him. He get's exremely annoying when he get's his ulti though. His Gatling Gun is also something to avoid, if you stay in it for too long you might have lost the battle because of it. Lucky for you though, you can harrass him quite easily before level †, so just harrass and when he's at about ů߽% hp just make your move and he'll die.

Ezreal Difficulty - *******************************




Well if you encounter another Ezreal, just be more aggresive than he is. Check his summoner spells and stats, if you notice he has less hp, armor and magic resistance than you do and if he doesn't have ignite and exhaust, you should win against him easily. Give him a try, run towards him and auto attack, if he takes a few steps back you know you're in command, he'll die really fast. And most likely he'll be playing AP with like magic penetration runes anyway and that won't help him against you. If he uses the same strategy you do though, then well just be more skilled than him :P

Fiddlesticks Difficulty - **




He can be really annoying, his Terrify lasts forever and then he can drain your life with his Drain spell. There is a way to kill him though. Almost every fiddlesticks out there has quite low hp and you have magic resistance. So harrass him with mystic shot and try to stay out of auto attack range to avoid getting feared and drained. Do NOT let him take command of you though and get level Ɔ before you, then your lanemates will be in danger and guess what? It's all your fault. So just kill him.

Heimerdinger Difficulty - ***


Nowadays i don't see Heimerdinger that offen in mid. And quite frankly i've never met him, but i'll try to give you my thoughts of how i would deal him with. His [spell=H-ˆG Evolution Turret] is a pain, so when they are busy killing your minions, try to kill his turrets with auto attack though. If they have low hp just mystic shot. Heimerdinger shouldn't have too much hp and probably focuses on mana and mana regen. Avoid his [spell=CH- Concussion Grenade] as it will blind and/or stun you. Try to harass him as much as possible, and by now you should know when it's time to kill him ;)

Karthus Difficulty - *****






This guy is really annoying, but like i said do not stay among creeps, it will be harder for you to see his Lay Waste spell and he can harrass you and farm at the same time. So stay away from the creeps. He ususally has fairly low hp, and a lot of people playing Karthus drain their mana pretty quickly. If you're good with dancing (which is kinda what you have to do to not get dominated) then just dance, you can get hit a few times if you got the magic resistance runes without it crippling you. Most people playing Karthus are very aggresive because of the long range of Lay Waste and most Karthus players will not run when you make your final attack, they will stand there and use Lay Waste on you, you MUST be aware of this and keep dancing when you attack him or you might die. Also when he's dead just get the heck out of there or he might kill you while he's dead.

Kassadin Difficulty - ***




This guy is annoying, he will harass you like crazy with his Null Sphere. This guy can really kill you and i've suffered defeat to a few Kassadins. Usually what happens is if you charge in and make your move he will silence you and then run or if you have low hp kill you. The good thing is early game he's not that powerful and he can't use his Riftwalk until level . So you have to kill him early and preferably closer to your tower. As soon as you see him running towards you start running back or he will harrass you. He will try to stay behind his creeps at all times except when he's trying to harrass you, use this to your advantage usually to harrass you he has to walk past his creeps when he does use mystic shot and run back. Still even if he silence you, you will still kill him if his hp is low enough. Kassadin is not really a threat to you as long as you don't let him harrass you.

Katarina Difficulty - **


The bad thing about Katarina is that she's a bit like Ezreal in a way, she can teleport to your location with her Shunpo spell. Stay away from creeps or her bouncing blades will hit you along with the creeps. She will harrass you greatly once she get's Shunpo and you must show her who's boss before this, it's very important to show her that you are aggressive and you are confident or she will take over. She will probably use a combo of Shunpo + Auto attack + Bouncing Blade and you can't take on too many of those. A really bad thing about Katarina is that a lot of players who play her use defensive masteries and most of them start with Dorans shield, this will make her hard to harrass. If you know you're up against Katarina take care. However if you didn't manage to kill her before you got enough gold for Sheen and Elixir of fortitude, then just head back to mid once you've grabbed those items and the lizard buff, then she'll be no problem at all. If you attack her when she has her ultimate then for the love of god do NOT use arcane shift until she starts using her ultimate, as soon as you notice she's using it just Arcane shift the heck out of there and mystic shot her and then kill her when her ultimate is over.

Kennen Difficulty - *****




Oh i really really hate Kennen. Kennen is in my opinion one of the hardest enemy champions to encounter in the mid lane. Let me tell you why. He can throw his Thundering Shuriken in your face, and it's quite similar to Mystic shot as it has just as long range and about the same damage. A lot of players who play Kennen also get a dorans shield which will reduce your damage a bit. The problem with Kennen is that he has something Ezreal doesn't, a stun... You must not engage Kennen if he has too much hp, he will just his Thundering Shuriken, Lightning Rush and Electrical Surge, you'll be stunned and he will just deal more damage than you. Kennen is in my opinion a really great champion in this game. Lucky for us who plays Ezreal though is that we practice only on skill shots. Kennen doesn't. This will give us the upper hand as we should harass him better with mystic shot. So when you first encounter him harass him only with Mystic shot, beware that Kennen will most likely use his Lightning rush to escape which is a pain sometimes, but if you wait until he has low hp to pop your ignite, you just might kill him. Feel proud after you've beaten Kennen!

Kog'Maw Difficulty - **


This guy shouldn't be that much of a problem for you. Beware if he bought a Doran's Blade and has ignite and exhaust as his summoner spells. He can't harass you as long as you stay out of reach. And if you notice that he has less hp than you just run towards him and auto attack, he will get scared, if he stays well, he will die. You really can't lose to Kog'Maw if you're just aggressive, you deal more damage than he does and you have about the same hp, you got more armor and magic resistance as well.

Le'Blanc Difficulty - ****




She can be insanely powerful even without any items so keep that in mind. She will try to harass you with her Sigil of Silence, do not let her do this. Just keep a distance to her and harass her with mystic shot. Your magic resistance will really help against her to ease the pain of her spells. At level Ƃ when she has her Distortion spell she can be really annoying, she'll go Distortion + Sigil of Silence and then she'll just return to her starting location. However, the good thing about her is that she can't kill you at once. After she has used her spells you'll have more than enough time to kill her early game before she can use her spells again. One thing you can do against her if you have full HP and she uses her Distortion combo is as soon as she uses Distortion you start running to her starting location and then Arcane shift in front of her, pop exhaust and ignite and just give her all you've got. A lot of Le'Blanc players do not expect players to run to their starting position because let's face it most people run away, but as i've said, as Ezreal you are greatly rewarded in the mid lane for being aggressive.

Lux Difficulty - *




She is really really weak early game, if you would happen to run into Lux in the mid lane you should be happy. It's rare to find her in mid though. Her spells just doesn't do enough damage to kill you and you should be able to take control of the mid lane quite easily. There are a few things to look out for though and one thing to think about before making your move. I don't know why but every Lux i've seen in mid seems to like to snare me, since she has her Lucent Singularity spell i don't stand among creeps and then i guess she thinks she can harass me well with her Light Binding or something? Anyway, this is good for you because that is the only way she can stop you from engaging. If you were to engage her when her Light Binding is available she would snare you and run but if you stand away from your creeps she will try to harass you when she does just walk around her binding and charge her. Also be aware that she will try to snare you in front of her tower so keep that in mind.

Malzahar Difficulty - ***






I found him to be annoying at first but as soon as i stepped away from my creeps a bit to the left or right he really isn't that tough. It's really important against Malzahar to step away from the creeps, first of all you don't want his Call of the Void to hit you and you definately don't want his Malefic Visions to hit you as it will transfer to a new target when another target dies and if you get infected by it you will aggro his voidling. You must not let Malzahar get level before you have Sheen, lizard buff and Elixir of fortitude, his ultimate will kill you. As long as you stay away from creeps, take a moment to auto attack him and mystic shot when you find an opening you should be fine.

Miss Fortune Difficulty - *


It's important to stand away from your creeps against her as well because her Make It Rain will hit you if your among creeps and her Double Up will also hit you if you are standing behind your creeps. I always found miss fortune to be an easy target as long as you don't let her hit you with double up too much. Her ultimate isn't even that good because you can just arcane shift out of it. Harass her using the tips found on the top of this section and evcentually slay her.

Mordekaiser Difficulty - **


The fearsome Mordekaiser, i love seeing Mordekaiser in mid he is so easy to control. If you think about it what makes him strong? His shield. And what does he need to fill it up? Your creeps. Simplest way to beat him? Don't let him near your creeps. He will try to boost his shield every Ɔth second, when he does be ready and charge in to attack him with auto attack and a mystic shot if you can, even if he does boost his shield it will be broken immediately and you will deal some damage to him. Mordekaiser is strong mid/late game and really weak early game, he can't do much damage to you so if you attack him full force at level he will die, you also have magic resistance which will help a lot against his spells. So easiest way to beat him, kill him early, be aggressive and don't let him near your creeps. If you just give it a few tries i promise you it will work.

Morgana Difficulty - **


She is a lot like Lux and the strategy is almost the same, stay away from creeps, don't get caught by her Dark Binding, harass her and then kill her. Avoid getting caught in her dark binding close to her tower.

Pantheon Difficulty - **




He isn't that dangerous early game if you don't let him be. He is kinda like Mordekaiser he has to hit creeps to get his shield. His spells doesn't hurt much on low levels but your mystic shot does. Every time he tries to attack your minions try to auto attack him and mystic shot him. If he would charge you with his Aegis of Zeonia followed by Heartseeker Strike then as soon as the stun is over Arcane shift a bit to the side pop Ignite and Exhaust and give him everything you've got. After he has used his spells he's nothing and you should be able to take him down. If you're just aggressive enough he will understand that going near your creeps equals pain and he will be careful. He can be tricky though, if you let him take command and farm as much as he wants. If you don't manage to kill him try to farm gold to afford Sheen and Elixir of Fortitude, then get the Lizard buff and now you can kill him with ease, just make sure you break his shield with an auto attack before shooting a mystic shot.

Ryze Difficulty - *


This guy is easy mode, if you fail against Ryze then something's not right. With you magic resistance his spells are crippled early game and as long as you stay away from the creeps his Spell Flux shouldn't hit you. Ryze doesn't have that much hp either and he can't really harass you. But you can. He's just as weak as Ashe or Annie and should die pretty quickly. I've never met a Ryze so far who's even been close to killing me in mid. Don't let him farm to level Ć before you decide to kill him, then he will kill you. (Most likely)

Sivir Difficulty - ***


Stay away from creeps. Stand on the left or the right side. Most players who play Sivir wants to hit you and creeps with her Boomerang Blade but it's quite easy to know when she's about to do it because she will suddenly move to a position where she can hit you and the creeps. When she does be ready to move. Her boomerang doesn't do that much damage on level but soon it will be devestating. She will will try to soak up your mystic shots with her Spell Shield that is why you have to trick her into using her spell and the easiest way to do so is to fake a shot simply by moving to a position where you could hit her. Most players will fall for this and waste that spell shield. Other than that same strategy like every other AoE spell champion, stay away from creeps, try to find openings for mystic shot, harass a bit, then make your move.

Swain Difficulty - **


I haven't fought swain a lot of times as he's quite rare to encounter. I don't find him to be a threat at all really. Avoid getting trapped by his Nevermove spell other than that just don't let him push you around. If you are just aggressive to this guy he will have to back off. Ignite is useful against his ultimate because it will heavily reduce his healing of it. Keep the pressure high on him and you're fine.



Teemo Difficulty - ** (if he has exhaust + ignite then ***)


If he has Ignite and Exhaust he can be a pain, Exhaust + Blinding Dart is deadly. Lucky for us though, he has no way of harassing Ezreal as long as you keep your range. You can still harass him so focus harassing him. You could buy an Oracle's Elixir later to keep track of his mushrooms. Note that there is a very high change Teemo is stealthed in the middle of the mid lane waiting for you to push your creeps a bit and then BAM he attacks you. If you notice he's missing be on your toes because he's most like there. And they might even try to trick you. Yesterday i played a game where Ashe went mid and Teemo went to a sidelane, they called mia on Teemo and i thought well he's not here, but about minutes into the game BOOM Teemo attacks me and he had been stealthed in the mid lane all along, they failed to gank me though. If Teemo didn't pick ignite and exhaust he's not that much of a threat.

Twisted Fate Difficulty - **


He has a few tricks. Watch out for his Wild Cards as they will go through creeps, the speed is slow on wild cards so you should be fine. He isn't much of a threat early game and you should take him down quickly. He has a stun though but nothing to worry about you'll still deal more damage to him. Quite uncommon to see in mid.

Twitch Difficulty - *




Twitch is quite rare to see in the mid lane. He isn't much of a threat as long as he doesn't have Exhaust and Ignite. He will use stealth a lot against you, so buying a ward for him is a good idea. You will still deal more damage to him, so if he uses stealth and tries to attack you, you can easily slay him.

Veigar Difficulty - *




Not very common in mid but it happens. Most Veigars i've met in mid are very defensive and will mostly stay in the background. If he uses his Event Horizon and you're stuck in the middle of it you can Arcane shift out of it and not get stunned. He will try to use a combination of Event Horizon and Dark Matter on you but early game the stun doesn't last long enough for dark matter to actually hit you. Run past his creeps without attacking he will start to run because veigar is really scared of everything and when he's ran to his tower shoot a mystic shot, stay there and keep him from farming and exping. Keep harassing and then make your move when you find an opening.

Vladimir Difficulty - **




Probably the champion most Ezreal players hate to encounter in mid mostly because he can life drain. But he's so much like Mordekaiser, he needs you and your creeps to life steal so to counter him you just have to do the same as with Mordekaiser be really aggressive. Vladimir will most likely try to use his Transfusion on you, but it has a short range so you will notice when he starts to charge you, just run a few steps back mystic shot and then charge him with auto attack and another mystic shot if you get the chance. Note that a well played Vladimir will avoid your ultimate with his Sanguine Pool so if you want to hit him with it make sure he has already used it. Ignite is especially good against Vladimir because it will cripple his life draining spells and ignite will still take damage when he's in his Sanguine Pool. Vladimir is a really easy champion to defeat in the mid lane.

Zilean Difficulty - *


With your magic resistance runes you will just crush him, i met a Zilean once who managed to put a time bomb on me and then he says in the chat "You've got magic resistance... ****". He will do whatever it takes to put his Time Bomb on you but if you keep your range he can't use it. He has mostly low hp and you should be able to kill him. Beware that after level he will try to get himself killed when he has low hp using his Chrono Shift, do NOT kill him but let him be for Ɓ seconds and then either kill him or force him to recall, don't let him benefit from using his ultimate.

---

TL:DR

Just be pro!
*
18. Twisted Treeline
Introduction


Twisted Treeline is an interesting map and you can have a lot of fun with Ezreal on it. If you are new to TT then let me tell you what it is about.

TT is a very fast paced map, ganks starts very early. The map is smaller, there are fewer towers and pressure is a very common factor.

The result of this is shorter games which makes your decision of items more critical and you have to get great items that are not too expensive.

Playstyle


Playing as an AP Ezreal on TT is in my opinion quite stupid. An AP Ezreal is only good when he has enough AP to back him up and you will rarely get that ammount of AP on TT. Because of this i would advice you to go AD when playing on TT.

Ezreal is really great on TT because of the small map and a lot of walls you can Arcane shift over and gank very easily.

I would still advice you to use the same runes, masteries and summoner spells for TT (found up above). It gives you a great deal of damage early game and on TT it is more important that ever to boost your team in both level advancements and gold.

Strategies and tips


Usually on TT there is a team fight at level before the creeps spawns, this usually happens at the brush near the lizard, teams often try to outsmart the enemy by hiding in different brushes, so be careful if they don't show up and you head to the top lane because they might be up there or on the way to gank you.

If there is no jungler in your team then for the love of god buy an Wriggle's Lantern, you can kill every monster in the jungle very quickly with this and you can use it as a ward which is very rewarding. Having jungle control on TT is essential and if you get the chance then DO IT! The reasons why you need jungle control is 1) The buffs you get from killing monsters, 2) More experience for your lane mates and 3) Because of the constant MIA (missing in action) you give the other team.

Wards! You HAVE to use them in order to win, having map control on TT is a must. Because of all the brush and because it's a small map, knowing what the people are up to and where they are is a must. If you get Wriggle's lantern you have a free ward every minutes which is great. Because of Ezreal's global ultimate you can snipe enemies and take their jungle buffs from them, but to do that you have to know where they are (or just be lucky) and the best way to do it is to just put out wards everywhere. Warding the dragon and the lizard is most important early game. Late game it will be more important to ward their side of the jungle if your team is doing great and are pushing. If it's the other way around and they are pushing you, putting out wards in your part of the jungle is more important.

Ezreal is not an easy champion to play, and probably even harder to play on TT. But if you can actually play him, you will be a very powerful enemy.

Items



Build No.1 (my favourite build right now)

In my opinion this buld is superior to build No.2. Both builds works, but i have a better streak of good games with build No.1. So if you were to make a choice then i'd suggest you practise on build no.1. Now you may wonder why did he put build no.2 in his guide? Simple answer is i know a lot of people like it so i thought i'd share it.

This build works, it has been tested and i have had a lot of success with it.

I actually start the same way i do on summoner's rift. Doran's blade and a health potion. The extra HP and damage from Doran's blade will be very useful in your first team fight.

After that i finish my usual core Sheen and boots of speed. After that the items may differ.

First get

Doran's Blade and 1 x Health Potion

Next get

Sheen

Followed by

Boots of Speed

If your team does not have a jungler i do almost always get a

Wriggle's Lantern

This will give you command of the jungle, you can kill the dragon solo with this as soon as you get it. This is a very important item to get on TT.

Next upgrade your boots to

Berserker's Greaves

Next i usually follow that up with

Last Whisper

Since you need a boost in damage quite early last whisper is great, because it will boost your damage with every piece of it you get. This item is cheap, provides a lot of damage and has armor penetration.

Next i get,

The Bloodthirster

More life steal and more damage, great for Ezreal.

I'd say you won't get further than this in the game. However if you would then get upgrade your Sheen into

Trinity Force



Build No.2

First finish your core as mentioned in build No.1

Doran's Blade
Sheen
Boots of Speed

Next get,

Wriggle's Lantern

Only get this is your team does not have a jungler

The Brutalizer

Yes, the Sheen & brutalizer combo, it works, gives you a lot of damage early game along with some CD reduction.

Next finish up your boots to

Berserker's Greaves

Now instead of getting last whisper you upgrade your brutalizer to

Youmuu's Ghostblade

More armor penetration and a nice passive along with it. Don't forget to use the passive :P

The game might end here, but if it continues upgrade your Sheen into,

Trinity Force

This item gives you a lot of everything

Note. This build is not my favourite but i added it here because i know people who like it, it works if you play well.