Banners by Vancha

-As of right now I have removed the quotes section, I found that many people just thought it was a waste of space, if enough poeple want it back in the comments, I shall put it back in.
-Working on the matchups section now and am working on the ADC section to do something similar to the matups section but on how to assassinate every ADC in the game.

CC - "Crowd Control" meaning stuns, slows etc. CS - "Creep Score" meaning the amount of minion kills you have. AP - "Ability Power" AD - "Attack Damage" Wota - "Will of the Ancients".

Pros: +No Mana +Very high burst in fights +Excellent duelist +Can juke easily +Can kill enemy AD carry with ease if they are out of position +No skillshots +Feels Natural to play for a lot of us

Cons: -Is easy to get caught if not having Twilight Shroud off cooldown -Can be countered by Vision Ward and Oracle's Elixir -Has a lot of champions that can beat her in lane or outplay her easily -Can be hard to know who to kill in team fights

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+Gives you amazing sustain in lane as well as some good dueling +Lets you free farm against hard matchups to spell vamp back their poke and such. -Doesn't give flat damage or magic pen

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+Trades with this can be used quite effectively more than Hextech Revolver +The magic pen with this can be quite effective vs early magic resist items such as Hexdrinker -Requires you to be snowballing your lane and have an easy matchup

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-This should be your main choice for boots and should be used almost 100% of the time in mid lane.

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-This is a nice choice for Top lane if you are vsing a Jax or another AD hard counter for Akali.

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-This is a nice choice again if you are vsing a hard champion that is AP or that the opposing team has a lot of CC and/or lock down.(id say about 3-4 stuns would make me buy this)

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-I quite like these if you are snowballing in lane and feel like your cooldowns are too long.

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+Gives Akali some of the CC she is missing +Has the sustain from the Hextech Revolver

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+Gives you amazing sustain in lane +Can be used with a fellow Katarina, Rumble and many others to do double Wota.

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Note that I usally build both of these this is just the way you can decide to get what one first

+Gives you two chances in a team fight +Gives magic resist and armour -Can just make you die twice in a row and have a 5 minute cooldown item doing nothing

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+Gives health and AP stats +Gives Akali the CC she is missing from the slow.

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For Top:For Mid:

This summoner spell is essentially an instantaneous, very short distance teleport. Your champion will blink 400 units in the direction of your cursor. This is very useful for blinking over thin walls, and just generally escaping or chasing. I almost always take Flash.

Ignite will place a damage over time debuff your target, dealing: 70-410 true damage over five seconds, depending on your level. This spell also inflicts grievous wounds on your target, reducing all incoming heals by half. I often use this in combination with Flash to finish a fleeing target, and it is my preferred second summoner spell.

This will increase your champion’s movement speed by 27%, and also gives you the ability to walk through units. This is a very good summoner to use in combination with Flash can be very useful for chasing and/or escaping. I would suggest using this if you are new to Akali, or are less confident in your ability to juke.

This spell will make you champion teleport to a ward, tower or a minion after chanelling for four seconds. If the channel is manually interrupted, half of the cooldown will be refunded. Displacement crowd control can also disrupt the channel, and will not refund any of the cooldown. This is very nice summoner spell if you are looking to make cross-map plays. It can also be useful if your aim is to split push or backdoor. Another common use for teleport is to split push until a team fight breaks out, then teleport in and clean up. With the addition of the homeguard upgrade for boots, teleport has recently become a much more attractive option for Akali.

This will heal your champion and all surrounding allies for 90-345 HP, depending on your level. I personally prefer to take offensive summoner spells on Akali, but the recent buff to Heal has increased its usefulness. Since it now heals surrounding friendly units for the same amount as you, it can be used as a nice counter to area of effect damage in teamfights.

This will slow movement speed and reduce damage from all sources by 30%, and reduce attack speed by 50% for 2.5 seconds. I would use this if you like going for a Will of the Ancients on Akali and don't like ignite.

This will bring your champion back to life instantly, with increased movement speed for a limited time. The only time I would ever use this would be in Dominion, and even then I usually prefer more offensive summoner spells.

This summoner spell removes all crowd controls and summoner spells from your champion. In addition, it will decrease the duration of all incoming disables by 65% for three seconds. Since Akali is an assassin if, Quicksilver Sash and its upgrade, Mercurial Scimitar, are perfectly legitimate items to build. If you find yourself getting disabled often, I would prefer to get one of these items instead.

Clarity restores 40% of your maximum mana, and 40% of the maximum mana of surrounding allied champions. Since Akali uses energy, Clarity should never be taken while playing as her.

Barrier instantly shields your champion from up to 115-455 damage from any source. The shield lasts for two seconds. The only time I would take Barrier would be if I was using a Barrier/Ignite combination, for towerdiving.

Clairvoyance reveals a section of the map for five seconds. If anyone on your team is taking this summoner spell, it is traditionally the support.

Zoning:

It is very important during the laning phase to zone your opponent by using your Twilight Shroud on the enemy minions, denying your opponent minion kills and xp. Be careful not to use this too often, as if the enemy jungler ganks your lane, your main escape is gone. Abusing the bushes in lane can be very effective when playing against a ranged champion, forcing them to waste a ward, but be careful not to miss minion kills.

Another thing you can do if you really feel like zoning your opponent is to stand in front of their melee minions and throw your Mark of the Assassin on them every time it’s off cooldown, and just get last hits with your auto attacks. Remember that this will leave you very open to ganks, but it is a very effective way to zone them. I would only suggest using this tactic if you feel like you are comfortable playing Akali, and have an easy match up.

Farming:

Some other things to keep in mind are farming or ‘creep score’ (abbreviated to cs). To get farm, you should be last hitting. With Akali, you either hit the minion when it is low enough to be killed with one auto attack, hit it with Mark of the Assassin to kill it, or explode your mark after marking it and using Crescent Slash on them. Those last two are mainly used of pushing so don't use them unless you want to push. Farm is the most important thing when laning, though don't let that make you forget you are an assassin, and your goal is to kill your opponent. Even if your opponent gets a kill ahead of you, you are still able to snowball ahead with enough cs. Reaching 100 cs by 13 minutes is fairly standard, though generally speaking, being ahead of your opponent is good. Don't feel bad if you fall behind. As an assassin, Akali snowballs quite well off a single kill.

Another tactic you can use is called freezing. This is when you prevent the minions from reaching your tower and keep them just in front of it. This will allow you to last hit without interference from the tower, and will also leave you less vulnerable to ganks.

Gold Per 10 items:

Another thing to keep in mind is gold per 10 items. These will give you additional gold income. There are four items that currently fall into this category. Between them, they have three unique passives, and thus these items can be stacked.

Philosopher's Stone

The unique passive of this item is Transmute, which grants an extra five gold every ten seconds. In total, this item costs 700 gold, making it the least expensive and most profitable of each of the three items. In addition, it grants an additional 7 HP regeneration, and 9 mana regeneration, making it an excellent item for in-lane sustain. However, as Akali uses energy, the usefulness of this item is somewhat reduced.

Kage's Lucky Pick

This is the best of the gold per 10 items for Akali, as it grants 25 ability power, and furthermore is a component of Will of the Ancients, if you choose to build it. Its unique passive is Lucky Shadow, which gives an additional four gold every ten seconds. Costing 765 gold in total, it is the second most expensive of the three items.

The end tier upgrade for Kage’s Lucky Pick, it retains the gold bonus from Lucky Shadow. While the active is nice, and it grants 45 AP, the mana regeneration aura makes this an item better picked up by a support.

This item has some limited use on Akali, giving 10% critical strike chance. Its unique passive, Avarice only gives an extra three gold every ten seconds. However, it also gives an additional two gold per kill. At 800 gold, it is the most expensive of the three items.

These items can be bought early game and sold later when you need the item slot and as long as you have had the item for approximately 23 minutes, you will make a profit. I would stay away from buying more than one of these, as if you do not have one before ten minutes, there is more benefit to building damage or defense. As said above, Kage’s Lucky Pick is really the only of these three items that is useful on Akali.

When to stop laning and start roaming:

Another thing to consider during the laning phase is when to kill their tower. If you kill their tower you cannot stay in your lane any more unless they push it back, leaving you free to roam. Roaming with Akali is my favorite thing to do in this game, letting you gank other lanes. Some types of ganks you can pull off are pretty cool, such as dashing to a minion from your tower in lane then dashing to them after coming to the lane this can catch a lot of people of guard, as they will expect you to come from the river. When you kill your tower is really up to you. I would say around 12 minutes into the game, but earlier or later is ok, depending on how comfortable you feel with roaming round the map.

Juking:

If you find yourself in a rough spot on low health in your shroud, you have eight seconds to decide what you are going to do. Sometimes the enemy will just run in the direction they think you went which will let you do quite the number of things, including but not limited to: running the other way; dashing to a creep to get away; or dashing to a target and then flashing past or over a wall.

Another thing I like doing is placing a ward inside a bush you pass while running. If you are close enough, you can Shadow Dance to them if you see them coming, and continue running away.

What to do if you are losing lane:

If you find yourself unable to trade with your lane opponent, I would suggest buying a Giant's Belt and/or a Hextech Revolver. These will help significantly with just surviving. You don't want to give more than one kill to your opponent. Your main goal from this point is to play a bit more passive than you were before, and take any advantages you can. For example, if your jungler comes up to help, or they miss or waste a crucial skill. Even when behind, Akali can deliver a surprising amount of burst, possibly allowing you to get an answering kill if your opponent gets careless. Take as many advantages you can to get back into the game. In this situation, roaming and trying to get kills from other lanes can also help you regain lost ground. If you want to know more about items that can help to get you back in the game, go here.

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Ahri Akali Annie Anivia Cho'Gath Cassiopeia Darius Diana Evelynn Elise Fiora Fizz Galio Gangplank

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Garen Gragas Irelia Jarvan IV Jax Jayce Karthus Kassadin Katarina Kayle Kennen LeBlanc Lee Sin Lux

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Malphite Malzahar Mordekaiser Morgana Nasus Nidalee Olaf Orianna Pantheon Poppy Renekton Rengar Rumble Riven

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Ryze Shen Swain Syndra Talon Teemo Tryndamere Twisted fate Veigar Viktor Vladimir Yorick Ziggs Zyra

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Nine-Tailed Fox, quite the Charmer. This can be quite the odd lane sometimes mainly consisting of poke wars and a 5 second all in ending in one of the 2 dead. my advice with this matchup is to make sure you take advantage of cooldowns, if she uses her Charm and misses Shadow Dance to her. This is one of those lanes that i would suggest not useing your Mark of the Assassin to farm cs but to use it every time its off cooldown to hit the Ahri and if she counter pokes, use one of your 9 pots. Be very careful when trying to force a trade with her, if you jump to her (unless done skillfully through a creep wave) this gives a perfect position for the Ahri to Charm you and then follow up with the rest of the combo and if shes brave enough use Spirit Rush to get positioning on you. Don't forget you have 3 Dashes but so does your opponent and these don't need something to dash to. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Another Fist of Shadow? Ah, vsing yourself. This is quite the odd lane sometimes, useing your Twilight Shroud at the right time can be everything in this lane. The later you can use it the better really cause once you have used it, it should force your oppent to do the same, then its just the common wait till it runs out. Roaming can mean a huge advantage if you are in the mid lane, if you find that you just keep going even try going bot or top to pick a free kill/assist from the other lanes basically being your teams jungler but still as a laner. If done correctly this will give you a gold advantage over your oppent and should give you an advantage in fighting the other Akali. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Cryophoenix eh? This lane as far as all in trade go id say would all depend if Anivia can land her Flash Frost this can lead to many of her combos. Her Flash Frost into Frostbite can be deadly since if she lands her Flash Frost or uses Glacial Storm it doubles Anivia's damage on her Frostbite. Her Glacial Storm can also be a very hard counter to your Twilight Shroud you have to react quickly to the situation and try and go all in or back out as quickly as u can. Though you magic resist is raised when you are in your shroud it is not suggested to take free damage while in it. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Dark Child seems like a simple matchup at first sight but can be quite deadly if played incorrectly. The first thing you must learn about this matchup is what Annie's Stun looks like, you should see a white ring around her if her stun is up this means that any of her abilities used next can stun. If she wastes her stun on getting cs and you are level 6 try to take advantage of this, though if you go in with her stun up this can be quite difficult. Some Annies will be smart and keep their stun one ability away from being shown so they can go into a quick Incinerate into Summon: Tibbers combo a lot of the time catching you off guard bring you down to low or dead health. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Burning Vengeance, considered one of the hardest conters to Akali in the mid lane. He has a stun, something that can easily hit you in your shroud and can survive alot of your attacks on him with the correct runes/matsires or correct positioning. This matchup is all about dodgeing his skill shots cause if you dodge his Sear that is his 2 second stun out of the way for 8 seconds at the most! take this advantage if u can and try to force a trade if you can. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Serpent's Embrace considered another one of Akali's greatest counters and I don't blame them this can be a very hard matchup for Akali and is a very good matchup for learning how to dodge things with your Shadow Dance remember the more mobile you are in the lane the harder it is for your opponent to hit you with skill shots. Her Petrifying Gaze, Miasma and Noxious Blast can all hit you inside your shroud. Cassiopeia's cooldowns are very low apart from her ultimate so dont think you can take advantage of them being used to get cs, unless its her ultimate. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Terror of the Void may seem like quite the challenge at first but if you can dodge well enough can become a lot easier. This is one of the matchups where I would highly suggest useing what I like to call Shadow Dodgeing, This is when you use your Shadow Dance to dodge skill shots, this can be very useful if you see a Rupture coming you can either dash to him or a nearby creep. His Rupture and Feral Scream fill up the majority of your shroud don't be afraid to use a Shadow Dance stack to avoid it its well worth it. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Ah The Hand of Noxus you may not have a hand after this encounter. Darius is considerd one of the hardest counters to Akali in the game and there are many reasons to why. To start he can use his Decimate to hit you in your shroud, he can suprise you with his burst quite easily with Noxian Guillotine and can survive a lot of damage. But don't worry you have a few tricks up your sleve too. To start I would suggest if possible to run Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed if possible cause not only does your Mark of the Assassin outrange his Decimate it out ranges his Apprehend aswell! letting you get free Mark of the Assassin poke off and he cant do anything about it. Not just this but if you use your Twilight Shroud as soon as u see his Noxian Guillotine being channeled you can cancel it! ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Scorn of the Moon more known as Akali 2.0 when originally show cased. This is a very difficult matchup for Akali players sometimes since not only can she out poke your Mark of the Assassin with her Crescent Strike that she can use a almost identical gap closer as you. On top of all of that sometimes she can use her Moonfall to pull you out of your shroud. Some advice with this one is its all about dodging her Moonfall some tips i can give you for this is move towards her or in the other direction it spawns for you, sometimes if you watch your opponent enough to learn where they like to place their skill shots read their movements of sorts you can sometimes use this to dodge the next one you see if you can see it coming in time. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Elise can be very annoying early on the main thing that i like to do in this lane is to start with 9 post so her harras doesn't mean much, at my elo the majority of Elise players that have used there skills to early to often and ran themselves oom trying to out harras me. If you can run an Elise oom by harrasing her you can try and go for an all in trade, just don't forget that her spider form takes no mana to cast spells. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Widowmaker can be quite annoying in lane not only can she go invisible she can poke quite often with her Hate Spike. One thing that you have to look out for in this lane is all in trades when you are both at low health, remember the more targets she hits with her Agony's Embrace the bigger a shield she will get from it. Though most all in trades with Evelynn is possible to outplay and I would suggest to try and trade with her just be careful of her burst damage. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots the Grand Duelist eh? well she can be quite easily out dueled by you guys if done correctly, one thing I do have to note about this matchup is do not get batied by her Blade Waltz this can mean very easy death at low hp. My advice on how to trade is simple use your Mark of the Assassin constantly on her and use your auto attacks to get cs, if she jumps on you simply proc the mark and apply another if possible and apply your own judgement on how to win the trade from there. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards The Tidal Trickster is a very interesting lane, to start off if he has a good enough reaction time that he can dodge incoming mark of the assassins with his Playful / Trickster and he can make you very confused with his positioning with Playful / Trickster and Urchin Strike. He can also hit you inside his shroud with his Playful/Trickster and his urchin strike does apply a damage over time effect so don't forget that. Now for the things that you can do to win lane first of all don't be afraid to use health pots and if he uses his Playful / Trickster to dodge a mark of the assassin go in on that, it has a 16 second cooldown if he only has one rank in it compared to yours that has a 6 second cooldown (technically it should be a 5 second cooldown if you are level 6 cause it will have 3 ranks in it) and another thing is that when it gets later into the game his chum the waters will become a big majority of his damage, so if he misses it make sure you punish him for it! ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Galio is quite an annoying matchup at times. His Righteous Gust and Resolute Smite make it very hard to get away from him without some juking and that if he sees that he is winning the trade you can be sure he won't let you get away without trapping you with Idol of Durand. So what can we do to prevent this? Well to start off one of the main things I would suggest doing vs a Galio is try to take advantage of roaming as much as possible. If you see their bot lane starting to overextend push your lane to tower, leave and go get a double kill with the help of your bot lane. This will give you an advantage over Galio and then feel free to trade with him at any time. Though you can trade with him without roaming and picking up a kill or two its just a lot easier if you do it this way. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Gangplank is one of the many people that is considered a "counter" to Akali by the community. The main reason behind this being not only can he survive a lot of your burst he can deal a lot too. his Parrrley is very anoying, and is the main reason why you start Cloth and 5. If you notice him coming up to hit you with Parrrley head for him and hit a quick Mark of the Assassin and then go back to whatever you were doing. This will trade some damage majority of the time his Parrrley will do more, but the heal from Mark of the assassin will make up for it. Now some of the other key points in this lane is do not get baited by his heal off of Remove Scurvy and don't forget that he can hit you inside your shroud with Cannon Barrage. Apart from these play safe and take advantages when you can. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Garen can be a very very hard lane for many Akali and is quite the challenge for me sometimes. For this matchup I would highly suggest making a custom mastrie page that is 9/21 I will put one at the bottom of this matchup in the spoiler for an example. Ok for acaully fighting him make sure that you try not to trade with him just go up and poke him with Mark of the Assassin, though if he uses his Decisive Strike on a minion you can try and be a bit aggressive just be careful. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Gragas' damage is very dependent on his barrels, if you can dodge one of his barrels and you are level 6 you can punish him for it. One thing to look out for though his Explosive Cask can knock you out of your Twilight Shroud. Gragas is very weak when you are in close range if you are practically on top of him moving constantly in between attacks it will make it very hard for him to hit the majority of his skills on you. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Jarvan IV is quite a strong trader, and can lock down quite strongly, but with enough skill he can't lock down us ninjas for long! One of the main tools Jarvan has is his Demacian Standard into Dragon Strike combo. This will pull him a short distance technically being like a Flash, but knocking up who ever he hits with it as well. One of the main bits of advice about this matchup is do not freak out if you are trapped in Cataclysm even if you are low health as an Akali this does not mean you are always dead. The first thing you do is if possible use Twilight Shroud and from there if you do not want to go all in look for an escape root. This can be anything, dashing to a champion or minion, flashing out or a combo of the two. You have a lot of tools as he does so use them effectively and make sure not to get baited by Golden Aegis. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Irelia can be a very snowball type of lane, similar to riven in the way that if she gets one advantage in lane she will outrade you majority of the time. Some advice I can give you with this lane is as soon as you see her use Hiten Style to use your Twilight Shroud you can tell if she is using her Hiten Style by her blades splitting apart. Now one trick that Irelia players can do that you want to look out for is when they jump to a minion and then jump to you using Bladesurge since the cooldown will refresh if you kill the target when it lands. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots This used to be considered the hardest champ for Akali to beat in the game, this changed over time and sometimes can be quite easy to quite the challenge. Jax is one of those champs that will be a beast late game if you don't stop him. Though its hard to zone him from farm you can out trade him from time to time. Now the main thing I think that kills Akali in this lane is his Counter Strike how you deal with this is as soon as you see it activate Twilight Shroud. In response most Jax will activate Grandmaster-At-Arms. Now it is up to you, to back out or to go all in. Personally I would go with the wasted ult and go back in when he doesn't have it. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Jayce, at first is quite annoying but personally can be quite easy once you get the hang of things. What most Jayce will do is they will use their ranged form to poke you with auto attacks for free, this can be quite annoying but don't forget if they go up for an auto that's a free chance to hit a Mark of the Assassin then go back to farming. Now what some very high level Jayce's have been doing vs a Akali and I have been doing as well when i am unable to play Akali and play him. basically this is where they will pick up a Elixir of Fortitude, All in you at level one, out trade you cause of the extra damage from an elixir and sometimes get first blood. This can be very annoying. As for trading if you see him swap from Melee to Cannon go in if you are in range, this will make it so he doesn't have any of his melee abilities for 5 seconds this can be very helpful. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Karthus is another person that you have to shut down early or he becomes a beast game with farm. but unlike Jax or Irelia you can trade with him quite easily. Karthus doesn't have much in the way of fighting early his main harras tool is his Lay Waste don't take this as you don't need to dodge it though, if you can avoid free damage always do. The main thing is to not get baited by his Death Defied. Once killed he has infinite mana and can cast spells for 7 seconds but cannot move this can be very annoying if you kill him at low health just to get hit by Requiem and die. Another thing to not forget is that his Wall of Pain reduces your magic res for 5 seconds. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Vsing a Kassadin can be a very painful and punishing lane, Like you Kassadin can snowball off of a kill or two so be careful, sometimes this lane is made up of one all in and whoever comes out on top will continue to win the lane, sometimes this is not the case though. Even if you do lose a kill to Kassadin, you can roam to get you back into the game, what I like to do sometimes, is recall and run bot lane, and if your bot lane is there as well as theirs, tell them to force a fight when you are close, join that fight and force a 3v2 fight. One thing that is very important is do not forget that his Null Sphere can silence you. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Sinister Steel Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Katarina to me can be quite easy to quite hard for Akali. Early game she will poke you with Bouncing Blades, if you see her trying to do it, take the Bouncing Blades and throw a Mark of the Assassin onto her. Some Katarinas will sometimes even Shunpo onto you, this sets you up for a very easy Mark of the Assassin and be able to proc it. As for her ult Death Lotus make sure as soon as you see it, use your Twilight Shroud. This is not so that you just sit there in the shroud, this is for the magic res that it gives you. As soon as the shroud is down throw every one of your spells onto her apart from summoner spells. Be careful not to be baited by her cooldowns though with her passive of Voracity if she gets a kill or assist all her cooldowns are reduced by 15 seconds. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Kayle is quite annoying to vs the reason behind this being her cooldowns can be very confusing to keep track of sometimes. Kayle's harras from when she hits 2 with both her Reckoning and Righteous Fury can be very painful, even more so if said Kayle is building AP. One main point about this lane is do not get baited by her Intervention if the Kayle you are vsing is following the current meta for Kayle players and is building some cooldown reduction it can be very hard to keep track of when it is up or not. Your shroud is very important in this lane, if you want to go for an all in trade once you used all your cooldowns use your Twilight Shroud because this is a matchup where you cannot take free hits with. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Kennnen is quite the hard matchup for many is quite understandable why, 3 of his 4 skills can hit you inside your Twilight Shroud this does not mean hope is over though. One of the main things in this lane is learn when he is going to have his stun shuriken up as it is called by many to set up his stun combo. You can see that every 5 attacks Kennen will get a glowing shuriken in his hand, this means that his next auto attack will apply a Mark of the Storm stack. He can put more mark of the storm stacks by using abilities on you, and when 3 stacks are applied within 8 seconds, it will stun the target. Make sure you poke him with Mark of the Assassin early if you want to be able to go in at level 6. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Sigil of Silence Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Leblanc more know as LePain to many can be quite a tough matchup if she gets an advantage. Early game she will poke you with Sigil of Silence and sometimes Distortion with it, this can be very painful and since Sigil of Silence silences unless you see her coming in for the attack its impossible to hit her with Mark of the Assassin to trade damage. The big thing about Leblanc is the amount of damage she can do in one combo she can almost 100 to 0 if she gets enough of an advantage, this can be very dangerous. My advice for this lane is trading can be quite hard but sometimes can not be avoided, roaming is one of your best options here, if you get a kill or two up on her it can really help. This is probably one of the only matchups in the game that I would suggest running Barrier instead of Ignite if you have trouble in the matchup. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Lee Sin is considered to be one of the hardest matchups in the game of Akali and it is quite the hard lane. The ways that Lee Sin is considered to be a counter to Akali is that his Sonic Wave and Tempest. Not only this but he can use his Safeguard if he sees it in time to block any Mark of the Assassin poke. Though this all is against you don't worry though he can block your Mark of the Assassin poke his Safeguard is on a longer cooldown meaning if he blocks the first one he can't block a second one. Now try not to go to all in on a Lee Sin, try to play this lane carefully, but not to carefully. If you feel like you can all in and win the match go ahead but I wouldn't suggest. Another thing to look out for is his Dragon's Rage a lot of Lee sins when they see you on low health will start a combo of marking you with Sonic Wave, into a Dragon's Rage and follow you with a Resonating Strike. This can deal up to 300 damage with 0 bonus AD so be careful! ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Vsing Lux is all about dodging skills, if she hits her Light Binding she can follow up with everything else. If you get hit by a Light Binding, you can still Twilight Shroud so if she is level 6 shroud as soon as possible or you maybe facing a Final Spark to the face. Once you are level 6 you should start to be aggressive as possible as soon as you have 2 Shadow Dance stacks go in when possible or if she misses a Light Binding. You should be applying Mark of the Assassin onto her as much as possible before level 6 in this lane, you don't have to explode the mark, position yourself behind minions and apply the mark. Do not forget that her Light Binding stuns 2 targets so it hitting 1 minion in front of you will not save you from getting stuned. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Malphite in lane is made to just soak up damage in lane while still doing some damage this means that you will not be able to kill him as easily but you can still kill him over time. Majority of the time a Malphite player will hit you with Seismic Shard while getting cs this poke can be very annoying but you can always trade damage and hit a Mark of the Assassin onto him when he does this. Do not forget that his Ground Slam and Unstoppable Force can hit you inside your Twilight Shroud. Be sure to constantly be hitting him with Mark of the Assassin from a distance because if you keep hitting him every time its off cooldown not only will this get him quite low over time and set up for a level 6 all in. Also this will make it so he cannot get his passive back. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Personally I have not run into many Malzahar but I will try to give the best advice I can for this lane. To start Malzahar's poke can be quite annoying with his Call of the Void and his annoying little Summon Voidling running around. The point of a Malzahar is to shut down a carry in a team fight with his Nether Grasp this may or may not be you if you jump onto him in a team fight. Leave you stuck there for 2.5 seconds and not be able to do anything for their team to focus you down. If Malzahar is getting annoying late game but you are doing well sometimes its a good idea to pick up a Quicksilver Sash making it so if he does use Nether Grasp on you, you can activate the item and you will be free instantly. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Mordekaiser is quite a tanky person early with his Iron Man passive and can poke you quite well with Mace of Spades and Siphon of Destruction. This is one of those lanes where if possible roam and pick up some kills and or assist to get an advantage over Mordekaiser. Be careful not to get baited into a low health fight with him when you are both level 6 though, if you do kill him it is very possible that the damage over time from Children of the Grave and sometimes an Ignite can kill you afterwards. Be sure as soon as you see his Children of the Grave activated on you use a Health Potion or two if possible this will help survive the damage. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: 9 Pots & 2 Wards Morgana quite similar to Lux is mainly about dodging her Dark Binding though unlike Light Binding it will not go through two targets. Also unlike Lux you do not have to worry about Morgana's burst she doesn't do much damage all at one time, majority of the time she is there to set up a 5 person stun in a team fight with her Soul Shackles. Personally a Morgana can be quite easily shut down as long as you constantly are poking with your Mark of the Assassin and go in at level 6 when you can or when she uses Dark Binding. Take advantage of cooldowns if you can. If you get hit by a Dark Binding and feel like you are in danger of not making it out alive make sure you use Twilight Shroud if possible. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Nasus' main goal in the lane is to farm his Siphoning Strike by getting last hits with it, this will be all he wants to do all laning phase, if you do not stop him from doing this, he will become a beast late game. Now by the time you are level 6 if he is maxing it first his Siphoning Strike will be on a 6 second cooldown. This is the majority of this damage from spells so if he uses it to get a creep, you can go in on that and take it as an advantage. Though it does not to do much damage early be careful of his Spirit Fire being able to hit you inside your shroud. And make sure not to get baited by his Fury of the Sands when tower diving or going all in. ^ Matchup contents ^

Skillset: Starting Items: Cloth & 5 Pots Ah, The Exile quite a hard foe for many. There are multipul ways one can cripple a riven, one I do suggest is try and force a fight with her at level 1 with your q, if she picked up Broken Wings she will most likely try to fight you, your q will out damage her unless she has she outplays you with a cheap start or she has better runes. Just be careful if riven gets one advantage in lane, say it be ahead of you in cs, a kill can put u majorly behind in tradeing. One thing I cannot stress enough is make sure you have used you shroud before the time she has used wind slash if you can force her to use it incorrectly it will give you a big advantage. If she uses Ki Burst in lane to farm cs, go in on it, this is one of her most important cooldowns and she cant fight without it as effectively. ^ Matchup contents ^

A sneky tatic you can do with a Shen on your team is if you are ever in trouble get him to use Stand United on you when you are in your Twilight Shroud and they cant see him teleporting in.

In team fights you should be the last person to enter and if not, don't enter at all. It is your jungler's or tank's job to start off the team fights. As soon as the team fight starts find the opponents AD Carry and find if can jump straight on to them or use your shroud to get to them. The goal here is to kill all the squishes before they kill you with the amazing amount of spell vamp Akali has. Note that if the enemy's team has Oracle's Elixir on their support then it may be a good idea to jump on them first so u cant be seen while in the shroud for your escape.

The AD Carry your main goal in team fights and how each one works:

Natural escapes: 0 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Easy to Medium Crowd Control: 3 moves, these being: Frost Shot, Volley and Enchanted Crystal Arrow

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Natural escapes: 1 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Easy to Medium Crowd Control: 2 moves, being Yordle Snap Trap and 90 Caliber Net

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Natural escapes: 1 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Easy to Medium Crowd Control: 0 moves

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|Skills: | | | | |

Natural escapes: 0 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Easy to Medium Crowd Control: 0 moves

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|Skills: | | | | |

Natural escapes: 1 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Medium to Hard Crowd Control: 0 moves

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|Skills: | | | | |

Natural escapes: 1 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Medium Crowd Control: 1 move, Smoke Screen

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Natural escapes: 0 In meta is currently class as: Hyper Carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Easy Crowd Control: 0 moves

SPACESPACESPACESPACESPACESPACEACACEA

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Natural escapes: 0 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Easy to Medium Crowd Control: 1 move, Make it Rain

SPACESPACESPACESPACESPACESPACE

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Natural escapes: 1 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Medium to Hard Crowd Control: 1 move, Buster Shot

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|Skills: | | | | |

Natural escapes: 0 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Easy to Medium Crowd Control: 0 moves

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Natural escapes: 1 (kinda) In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Medium to Hard Crowd Control: 0 moves

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Natural escapes: 0 In meta is currently class as: Standard AD carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Easy to Medium Crowd Control: 0 moves

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Natural escapes: 1 In meta is currently class as: Hyper Carry Difficulty to assassinate if caught: Medium to Hard Crowd Control: 1 move, Condemn

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Some other things to think about in team fights are not just the AD carrys but their protectors the supports here are some main ones to look out for in team fights that can really stop you from killing their AD carry.

• Sona with her Crescendo This can be a very annoying thing to you having this stun having the ability to fill your entire Twilight Shroud
• Blitzcrank with his Rocket Grab and Static Field The first of the two can completly literally "pull" you out of posstion this can be quite annoying letting you be focused down inside thier team. though this can be a bit of a double edged sword letting you get closer to their carrys. The other abilty Static Field silences all people in the area making it impsible for you to use your Twilight Shroud
• Soraka With her Infuse This can be a very annoying thing for her to use on you in a team fight I have died stupidly many a times forgetting about this silence.

The Twisted Treeline is quite the interesting map for Akali removing the ablity to build a Rabadon's Deathcap and many others to have to build other things isted lets start with the basics...

To start Twisted treeline is all about the alters there is one on each side of the map having them on your side is vital to survival and victory in the early game and ealry team fights when captured they will stay locked to your team for 90 seconds giving a bonus of 3 extra gold on any cs gotten and any kills but when both are captured give a bonus of 10% AP and AD.

The baron nashor of this map is called vilemaw, This can be very hard for Akali to take down with her team seeing as she is melee some tips i can give when vsing this beast is to make sure that u are spread out on different sides of the pit this will make it so he can not attack 2-3 people on your team at once. The buff similar to baron it gives is as follows: bonus health and mana regeneration, increased attack speed and bonus cooldown reduction.


Dominion Is quite the interesting game mode is a nice break from the usual summoners rift, same rules for removed items as twisted treeline here so no Rabadon's Deathcap. Lets start with some of the basics...

To start usally what happens is four of you will go top and one of you will go bot (this is the competitive setup) one of the four will split off and take the first alter up from the spawn, the rest will take the speed alter in the race for the mid point. From here on it just goes crazy constant team fights and retreating its just a battle of whoever can hold the most points for the longest time.

Here is another big game changer in the game their are two relics in the middle of the map called storm sheilds they each spawn at the 3 minute mark, whoever takes this will receive 12.5 x level health and a 90 damage nuke that has a 4 second cooldown.

Akali is not a viable jungler from a competitive standpoint for reason such as no cc in her ganks though her clear time is ok she cant gank or fill the role of a jungler in team fights such as protecting the AD carry with crowd control and being able to peel for them. Here is some of basics of the jungle though:

When killed this will give you the Blessing of the Lizard Elder buff this will give you a slow with your auto attacks and a damage over time effect kinda like Ignite but not as powerful. This buff can work very well on Akali if you don't build a Rylai's Crystal Scepter but remember that other players can make better use with this buff. This takes 5 minutes to respawn after it is killed.
When killed this will give you the Crest of the Ancient Golem giving you extra mana or energy regen and giving you extra ability power. This works quite well on Akali if you are in mid if not I would leave it for your AD carry and even if you are mid ask your jungler before you take it if it is ok. This takes 5 minutes to respawn after it is killed.
This When killed will not give you a buff but all your team gold. This is one of the monsters that requires a team early to kill but can be soloed late game. This is the main objective of the early game and is more important than tower kills. This takes 6 minutes to respawn after it is killed and should be noted when is going to respawn.

When killed this will not only give your team 300 gold each but the Exalted with Baron Nashor buff each (to each person that is alive when it is killed). This is another monster that needs a team to take down and can only be killed mid to late game. The buff that baron gives you will give you bonus health regen, mana regen, ability power and attack damage. This takes 7 minutes to respawn after it is killed and should be noted when is going to respawn.


You can put on an option in the more options menu labelled "Show time stamps" this will make it so you can hold down the "z" button (default hotkey) and see when you have killed it and do some quick maths to when it is going to respawn.

This section is for you guys, if you guys send me a really good score by following this guide I will post it here!

Here are some people that I wouldn't be here today without that I would like to thank:

Arkrobin: For being one of my best friends to this date and helping me reach gold elo and over all being a cool dude.

Natsumiii: For letting me put her Akali lore reading in this guide thank you so much again!

Gbay99: For letting me put that big wall of text that is his youtube video and letting me put his YouTube video on how to stop loseing streaks into the guide.

Vancha: for making all of these banners

And all of you guys: That helped me get top 10 Akali guides on mobafire and that actully survived reading this guide its I'm sorry for the length XD

Please leave a rating and comment on this guide as well as posting your best scores by following this. With also if you notice any mistakes that I have made spelling or gramar.

I would also like to say a big thankyou to my friend Arkrobin for teaching me most of the things I know and sticking with me through bad elos and giving good advice.

7/5/2012
+added in boots options in items
+added in new options for general items on akali
7/6/2012
+added new items options
+added how double wills works
+added new rune icons
+added new team fight options
+added more info on her passives
+added reasons for the why certain champs are good with Akali
7/10/2012
+added void staff and deathfire grasp to items
+added the new properties for Akali's E as of latest patch.
+added more info for juking
+added Zoning Chapter
+added Void Staff to main item build
+added Akali's Lore
9/22/2012
+added Match ups
+changed a lot of stuff
9/25/2012
+added colours to Match ups
+changed the layout of the items section.
+Just did some general fixes and making everything look nice
9/29/2012
+Changed the look of the summoner spells section
+Added new titles
+Changed the Intro
+Changed some stuff in Runes and Mastries
+Added new items
+Added stuff in Combos
10/4/2012
+This guide Broke top 10 Akali guides Thank you all!
+Revamped the mastries section
+Added new items
10/5/2012
+Changed Lore, Skills and Rune sections to pictures with backgrounds for some of them
+revamped the Intro
+Changed the pros and cons
10/6/2012
+Added new info in Match ups and zoning
10/9/2012
+Added Some new items and more info on old ones and revamped the items section
10/10/2012
+Added new items
+Added A section for builds I like to follow
+Added new info to last comments
+Revamped Summoners and added new ones
10/11/2012
+Added a lot of new info into the match ups section
+Added Quick Links in Matchups
10/13/2012
+Added more info into Runes and Masitres
+Added some more information into the laning section and some things into the team fights section
10/14/2012
+Changed the quick links to icons to be found easyier
+Added more info into the laning again
+Added AD carry Matchups
10/15/2012
+Added some more info into the skills section as well as tidying it up a bit
+Added more info into the jungle section
10/28/2012
+Added amazing new titles made by a friend
11/1/2012
+Added More info into the team fights section and the jungle section
11/2/2012
+Added Singed into matchups (Sorry I missed him)
11/4/2012
+Added More info into Summoner Spells
+Added More info into Runes And Mastries
11/12/2012
+Revamped the items section
+Added Types of language from this Guide section
11/25/2012
+Added A new section
+Put A notice in the Intro
2/18/2013
+Changed alot of stuff sorry for the long time no update!