Hello and welcome to my first real guide on none other then my favorite nuker, Brand.
In this guide Im going to go over the pros and cons of brand, as well as this build, why I take the items I do, why I purchase them In the order I do, and some helpful tips on early to late game harassment and combos as well as farming techniques.

I'd like to mention that obviously I'm not perfect, but I am oopen to constructive critisim and advice as I am still somewhat new to this game (lvl 28 at the time of writing this) and that half the reason Im doing this is so I have a reference should I ever forget my own build XD The other half of the reason was I wanted to hear other peoples thoughts so go ahead speak up, PLEASE!

so the pros and and cons of brand are as follows:
PROS
-great early game capability as well as huge late game AoE damage in team fights
-passive nets kills that otherwise would have gotten away
-wonderful ROT's (rotations-essentially a combo using all skills in quick succession for massive damage/CC)
-great zoning ability with pillar of flame (for info on zoning go here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kxGQ3gWdrM)
- good at 1 on 1 and team fights
- YOU GET TO LIGHT **** ON FIRE!!!!!

CONS
-mana starved for most of the early game
-squishy as hell both early and late game
-missing with anything in your ROT's results in losing a kill/assist and in team fight can end up in you (or a teammate) dying a horrible death
-long range AD champs like kogmaw, ashe, and teemo can and will rape you in mid if your not careful (and sometimes even if you are)
-you will be focused on to no end in a team fight (I've had poppys and trynds fire there ult at full health and blow past my tank and the rest of my team just to kill my sorry *** before the fight even starts)
-your pretty much useless while your ROT is on cooldown
- playing him will inherntly cause you to think of Ashe and Anivia as arch rivals and Annie's as posers XD (and hate the letter A too aparrently lol)

so there you go next up are the pros and (sadly) cons of my build:

PROS
-your starting mana crystal will keep you in the lane at the beginning long enough (most of the time) to earn 1100 gold for sorcerer shoes on your first port back
-Morellos evil tome combined with frozen heart give you max CDR eliminating your worries of being useless and making you MUCH MUCH more dangerous with 737 AP then you would be without them at 1000+ AP (I mean really would you rather deal 600 damage once or 480 damage twice!)
-frozen heart also shuts down Xin Zhao's and the like that are designed to solo kill champs like you and stops them from doing just that (on top of that the irony of brand having a frozen heart.....priceless)
-with magic pen runes, masteries and sorc shoes/void staff you maximize your MP which not only eliminates the need for higher AP but also scales up the damage on your passive Blaze as well.
-the total cost of this build is 15525 Gold which in most 5v5 games is very atainable by the 40 minute mark even if your doing bad and (in rare cases) can be collected by the 20-25 minute mark (well that is if you can last hit minions with any skill at all)
-rylais gives you 500 health to stay alive as well as a slow that procs with your passive as well as your abilities and the 80(+30%) AP is nice too :)
-radabons deathcap is the hole reason this build can operate at end game and still hit ******edly hard over and over and over again
-this build nearly completely removes brands dependence for blue buff

CONS
-your CDR comes first meaning your OMG LOL I 1 SHOTTED THAT SQUISHY VAYNE LOLOL power hits come later
-your CDR will inherently conter-act the extra mana you get from your items so expect to base a bit more frequently then other builds using archangels and some such
-people are going to "wtf is brand getting Frozen heart for?!?!? ***in nooooob! uninstall NOW!" comments until they see you nuke 3 champs in a row with your rot cuz your cooldowns are so low. (then they tend to shut up, thats right no sorry or nothin!)

well thats it for now I suppose onto the skill overview and your ROT's! yay!

Blaze
Brand's spells light his targets ablaze, dealing 2% of their maximum Health in magic damage per second for 4 seconds.

-Ok first of is brands passive which is BADASS, basically its that every one of your spells has insta ignite that stacks with the real ignite and also proc special effects of all your spells while on the target, as mentioned above ive had alot of kills because of this thing widling away a running champs health to 0 so I dont have to dive to kill them, which as we al l know results in us squishies in getting raped by OP turret fire early game.


Sear
Brand launches a ball of fire forward that deals magic damage. If the target is ablaze, Sear will stun the target for 2 seconds.

sear is your spell that is used for 2 things and neither of them is damage, 1 is setting someone ablaze for procing other spells or b and much moreimportantly stunning someone who is already ablaze, best thing about this build is the CDR is short enough you can fire this thing twice and do both!

Pillar Of Flame
After a short delay, Brand creates a pillar of flame at a target area, dealing magic damage to enemy units with the area. Units that are ablaze take an additional 25% damage.

In other words, Brand blows up everything in a big circle, and anything not already on fire is on fire now while anything already on fire is about to wish to hell they haddent been! this spell is your bread and butter, hence why you open with it, it has large AoE, short cast time delay (for a large AoE spell that is) and high damage output coupled with ******ed range, this bad boy is where most of your kills come from.


Conflagration
Brand conjures a powerful blast at his target, dealing magic damage to them. If the target is ablaze, Conflagration spreads to nearby enemies.

this attack is how you will initiate a champion whe going for a kill 99% of the time also this spell is insta cast and cant miss, therefor its a great harass tool, to top it all off if the guy your using it on is already ablaze it becomes an AoE damage that has the same range Pillar Of Flame! now thats potent minon wave destruction


Pyroclasm
Brand unleashes a devastating torrent of fire, dealiing magic damage each time it bounces. If a target is ablaze, Pyroclasm's missile speed increases.

In short, Brand sends a HUGE fireball at the enemy when it hits the target its going to bounce at the closest enemy unit. It can also bounce off minions which is good and bad, sadly though unless it hits a champ at least twice its not that good in a 1 v 1 except to finish off a runner due to its good cast range, however in a team fight this thing messes people up or even more deadly if you catch 2 champs walking alone together with no minions which in short looks like there playing pong with a giant ball of death before dying now I find that it is unessicary to have the target ablaze when using this, it obviusly never hurts.