Hi Guys, here's Nefarium, welcome to the right spot if you want to learn how to build a successful Brand, to the right spot that will teach you how to play it correctly and to the place that will gives you lot of advices and all you need to know to play this fantastic and funny champ.
As the writer of this build i just ask ppl to test it out before rate, because you must really have to try this build and see how much it can works, and how much fun it can brings to you, owning all you can find in your games.
I spent a lot of time studying this champ and I'm writing here to share what i learnt about this awesome champ to you all, and i hope you can get at least the same fun that i got with this Brand too.
But don't want to bore you, so lets begin the true part of the build...

Quintessences: the best quints almost for every caster ap are te flat ap one and Brand its kinda a standard heavy ap champ so if you pick those you will be fine 100%.
Others good quints for this champ are the flat hp ones,i found they works fine too,boths are quints that helpa you a lot in early game,so they are both cool for the flat amount of a stat that they guarantee.
Someone is wondering also about the mov. speed quints or the magic pen ones if they can works fine too but im bere to explain you how to create a succesfull Brand with standard things,imo they are just epic tries that they doesn't works like expected.
So i suggest to run the flat ap ones.

Marks: obbiously magic pen ones, no changes Are permitted here,it's just useless to have one of the strongest burst in the game if you dont get some strong magic pen. So go for it!

Seals: the mana-regen are a good choice,also if Brand isn't that hard mana-drainer you will need to have a good mana pool to do everything fine, like farm creeps, harrass your enemies, and those seals works great combined to the mp crystal you are starting with; it will guarantee a long time in your lane with the use of the 2 pots and often brings you to the first blood....
Another good choice could be the ap seals too,but it depends also on playstyle and personal likes or dislikes.

Glyphs: dont really have much to say about those, ap per lvl are just the best choice!

Simply the standard AP carries spec.
If you are wondering why only 1 points in perseverance it's because, you can read it on the forums too, the bonus % is applied to your BASE hp and mp, so it's worthless.
The other points are just standard.
Let'z move on ;)

Here's come the most important part....
I obviously think that this item build is the strongest one that I could forge for this champ.
Feel free to apply changes to my item choice but I really suggest you at least to test it out and to see how much it works.

My build let you begin with a mp crystal and two pots, and it let you stay in your lane (you WANT the mid) for really long time, and combined with the mp/regen seals, it will provide hp and mp to do everything, farm, harras your opponents, avoid enemy's ganks easily and after those you will still have a good sustainability, and of course they can still let you get the first blood, because Brand is seriously a strong champ through all the game, earl mid and end game, you will see it with your eyes.

At the first recall get your Catalyst it will really help you farm, that one of the most important parts of the game.

Next recall is obviously for boots, the magic pen one are just the best choice, go for it.

After boots my choice is to rush Dcap; the Rabadon is just the best item for an heavy AP caster, so as soon as you can get it, as soon you will pew pew enemies. Imo best choice.

Then buy a Void Staff is kinda standard, as i said before it's useless to have the imba LOLburst if you can't apply it because you don't have enough magic pen.

At this point the item choice depends on the game off, but i found out that the most versatile and usually best choice is to complete your catalyst into a Banshee's, and then get a Morello's + a Zhonya's.
Here's come the explanation:
Banshe's its for the hp, mp component, for the magic res one, and obviously for the unique effect. This item , combined with the Zhonya's armor + unique effect will grant you a very good defense end game, and they will both provides you situational spells like the immunity or the shield, that they will always comes in handy, because it's just nonsense to have one the best nuker if you can't nuke your opponents just because you are spending all your time to avoid damage, or kite....so any good player knows that you can't just go for a 100% nuke, and you really need some toughness. And last but not least brand is the main focus really often, so your good positioning combined with those two effect will let you stay alive pretty good and will usually turn your team fights into an easy win.
The Morello is an amazing item; Brand is completely CDs dependent, so every time you shatter all your abilities you will instantly become an easy pray and pretty useless, so the CD reduction provided by that item + the blue buff (yes, you REALLY need that buff, ask your jungler if he doesn't already knows, to let you get it) will decrease drastically your ability CDs (also if Brand's players can't whine on the CD duration because they are really low). When you are team fighting and you are waiting for your (reduced) cool downs here's the zhonya's effect will really helps you out!
Give it a try and check with your own eyes ;)

Occasional items:

Some people ask me why i left the Rylai's out of this build, and I tell to them that's because you will not really need it, but i'm not saying that it's a bad item for Brand.
The slow effect can be easily applied from one of your team mates, by some strange abilities, or something like randuin's from your tank, so imo it isn't necessary at all. The hp bonus is awesome but the banshee's is more complete than the Rylai's.
Obviously if you are running vs an Heavy ap comp you can try to forget your Zhonya's and replace it with a Rylai's, same for the heavy ad comp that they could let you forget your banshee's, so feel free to replace some items, and feel free to do some changes, also because of likes or dislikes.

I saw some builds putting in an Archangel's Staff by the fact they pick up the tear instead of the catalyst, but trust me, i tested it out, Brand doesn't really need this item. Yeah it comes in handy, 'cause sometimes you just get mana starved but if you are a lil' bit good at position AoEs and Skillthrowns you will just be fine also with your mana. Just get confident with that ;)

Another situational item is the Rod of Ages; it is a good item yes, but Banshee's is still the banshee's. But in some games if you don't really need your effect or something about the banshee's just feel free to complete your catalyst into a rod of ages. Not a waste of golds for sure, but there are better items for Brand.

The soul stealer is just an epic failure on Brand. Tested it out in lot of games, and i really recognized that you really don't need it at all. Your AP amount will always be fine at every point of the game, so forget it please.

Im free to discuss about this item build in the comments below, so just feel free to rate my item choice of to dislike it, i will take it as a constructive critic ;).

The skill sequence is really simple.
Raise up your W (Pillar of Flame) every time that you can, it's your main spell and main damage.
Everytime you can get a points into your Ulti (Pyroclasm) obviously get it.
When you can't raise your W or your R just put the point into your E (Conflagration), and ofc the left points will go each one on the Q ability, the stun (Sear).

This fact it's because you need your W maximized, it will provides you GREAT dmg, GREAT farming, and will let you often start your ability chains.

You are leaving the grow up of your Sear so lately it's just because the stun time is always 2 secs, it's an independent value from the rank of the spell, and you will really love it, it's just awesome.

Your E is doing more damage than your Q so after the W your E is more important then your stun damage. It will also spread your debuff to all the target's in range, so it will help you create the insane damage output that brand can do also on AoEs.

R....your ulti...it's just....EPIC! Get fun by watching your ulti kill the whole map next to your target. Get fun to pew pew and be ready to read [all]: OMG Brand is fun OP! - or - Riot nerf this guy plox!!
Just ignore them , if his damage is so crazy, it's just because you are doing it fine, and you are building a good Brand. /cheer

For the explanation of your skill i'll leave it to Rioters. I think that if you are on this page you already knows Brand skills, but we will talk about Rotation later togheter ;)!

Flash + Ignite is just the best choice you can do on this great champ.
But it's not the only one that worths.
You can also take ghost instead of Flash if your play style is with that spell.
In my opinion flash is awesome, you can jump over a wall, flash behind flashed opponents, reach someone far from you, and obviously escape from the ganks and go in and out from team fights.
If you prefer ghost just go for it, similar spells, but there are no video games with a caster without a blink spell, so make your choice wisely :P!
Ignite will let you get kills in early game extremely easily, it stacks perfectly with your passive, will let you kill regenerating champions, but i recognize that this spell late game it's less useful,
that's why you can also chose to get the ghost again istead of ignite, but it will be a lil' bit harder to get your fb alone, or just don't whine if someone is not getting finished by your passive only, eheh.

What about other spells?
Ignite is cool, but leave it to your AD mates.
Teleport always comes in handy but on brand it's a waste of slot imo.
Heal it's something terrible....helpful earl game? maybe, but when i encounter guys with this spell i just laugh my a.. off!
Rally is just.....
okay, what about CV? leave it to your support, and if you doesn't have one, feel free to get it if your party asks it, but you must know you are wasting a slot.
Clarity isn't that bad, but if you are doing right, you will not need it, if you think clarity is awesome on Brand you are missing something about his play style sorry.
Fortify, obviously it's not your task to take it.
Ofc no smite, you're not jungling.
The last one is cleanse...yeah it will always comes in handy but there are surely better spell for brand. So in my opinion forget it.

By the fact the ranked setup it's now very often

Tank solo top
Heavy aoe AP mid
AD carry + support bot
plus a jungler

the choice of the midder is really important.
I read lot of discussions about that, some people thinks that annie is best choice, others Malzhy, or any others LeBlanc, but lot of people are of my same opinion: Brand is the fu...ng best AP midder.
You can farm a lot, you are a lil' bit tougher than others APs so you can avoid some ganks, you literally bring the hell to your opponent midder, and you can help get a kill on other lanes really well.

So yes, you want the mid, in every game, farm like a boss, and what i suggest you is as soon as you reach lvl 6 to go into bot or top lane and get some kill/doublekills, it will really help your game to get the right direction, and 99% kill with you ultimating some lvl 4 guys.

In your lane last it a lot without spamming too much your W , just 1 time per wave, and you will be fine, both with last hits both with manapool.

After the rabadon is complete you can one-shot waves of creeps by W spell, and will let you do a crazy farm.
Remember that the farm is what you let you get fed enough to kill your opponent and then to get fed by kill's golds. Farm is really important and you are a great farmer.

About teamfight, just try to get the right position; positioning is everything! A caster must be a good player at position yourself. Whenever the right moment comes, shatter all your skills, and kite for some time(Brand is a very nice kiter), pop your flash if needed, and wait your CD, then shatter again (if the enemy party isn't already dead, also if it will probably).
You will be the guy that let you team win all the Tfights, don't be an easy pray, don't let the enemies ignore you tank/party and come to kill you, it will become an epic fail fight, and don't be the first dead player of the fights plz.

If you are doing your things correctly, and your party is not failing, i guarantee you an easy victory.

This champ is definitively a good pic for ranked games, and you can be the one who carries your team to victory.

Have fun to climb the rankings.
Get me a +1 when you got rank#1 shah, jk obv ;)!

As i said before you can easily farm with your W + E combo early, game and just farm with W by one-shotting waves after you got your Dcap.
Obviously do not spam your auto-attack on creeps, like a tard, get your last hits, really important for every game, but you can really easily push your lane, and let the game be a nightmare for your opponent laner.
As buff you will really need the Golem, so ask your teammates for that, not totally dependent but you can really use it fine, with CDR + mp spam!

As i said in ranked chapter, your task is to farm your lane as much as possible trying to kill your enemy, at lvl 6 go get your gank bot or top and easily feed yourself, get your Blue, in team fight shatter everything you can get, every time you can, and avoid the easy death, also if you are a lil' bit better than other casters in terms of squishiness you are still not so tough, remember it! The ability chains comes right here....

Here's the funniest part of Brand: SKILLCHAINS!
What makes this champ be one of the most amazing ones it's right the fact that you have some chains of abilities, that are situational, and that they can be helpful in some situation, or in others.

Your base single target Harras chain is usually
W->Q->E, if you get it with your W.
Or you can go for
E->Q->W if you want some time to get your AoE under his feet, and to maximize the W dmg(+25% on ablazed targets).

For AoE / team fights your chains is:
Q->E->W/R->R/W
here's the explanation:
your sacrificing your Q to apply the debuff to your target (also if it does a lil bit of dmg that is always fine), after the target is ablaze, you will spread this debuff to all the near opponents by your E. At this time your main target it's kinda low, and all enemy party is debuffed.
It's time to get your W and your ULTI and start to troll someone! Shatter both, in the sequence you prefer; if your E failed to debuff lot of targets, then pop ur W before, or if your E runned fine, then pop ur ULTI first so to don't waste the time of the debuff and shatter the W when everyone is certainly debuffed and using so the +25% dmg from it.

Some people may not agree with the decision to waste the stun, but it's math-tested that it's the best way to get maximized dps; obviously if the other team is just running away, then pop your Q to guarantee your team at least 1 kill, but remember, every single Brand's abilities chain must be brained, don't be a spammer ;)!

For stuns:
E->Q is the fastest. If your are getting ganked or need a fast stun go for it.
The
W->Q is fine too but a lil bit slower, also if in some cases is better, like for bushes etc...

Brand is a good kiter so get handy with this chains and you'll be unfarmable by other teams.
Sometimes you will turn enemy harras into your personal kill, kiting you are still doing a great amount of dmg and often it will be enough to shatter everything left, like ulti-ignite, to land that kill!

I personally disagree with the people that say that on single target chain you'll need to pop multi first for the debuff, so you can obtain max dps from the other skills....imo it's just a waste of ulti and sometimes people are just running away next to minions so it will be useful anyway, also if there are no other enemy champions next to your target, so imo forget this use of R ;)!

Pros:
- Amazing dps / AoE burst output.
- Great kiting abilities. (stun has extremely low CD)
- You will almost have a skill chain for every situation
- Low CDs
- Good survivability
- Can carry the mid with best results
- Brings a CC to your team to support them and to land kills
- Last but not least you can get crazy fun with this champ
- (Very last) You can end the world in fire...

Cons:
- Useless without CDs up
- Not so good escape mechanism (like wall-passing spells etc)
- Terrible vs enemies CCs
- A lil bit squishy
- Usually first focused
- Blue buff sometimes is really needed.

The end of this guide is here, I hope that readers could get some nice advices from this one, and that you enjoyed your time studying brand without a boring guide.
This is my first Moba guide, feel free to rate and comment, every single word spent on this build's comments will be accepted.
I'm sorry for my english, i know it's really bad, but it's not my main language so please be patient ;).

For every single question just write me here, or in game ( Nefarium - EU server).

Thank you for your time, a feedback would be pleased =)

Enjoy!

-Nefarium-

"Target is ablaze , everything will die!!!"