Welcome, my name is Reptile and this is my vladimir guide. I have thousands of vlad games spanned over the five years i have played league of legends. Last season i had 2 accounts in diamond. This season my main El Reptili is diamond v and my smurf Tigereye is platinum 1. I'm not some high elo solo que god, but i do think i know what im talking about when it comes to playing vladimir. Anyways thanks for reading my guide i hope it helps you out.

These are my vlad stats for my accounts.

Don't ask how i got a 90% win rate on my smurf

Pros

+ Crushes most top laners + Great farmer + Amazing team fighting + High damage + Gets tanky building damage + Low cool downs late + Most of his damage is AOE + Good Split pushing + Very high skill cap with his pool

Vladimir is currently the strongest AP top laner. He has very few bad matchups. He scales insanely well into the lategame. He becomes a high damage, high health, ap tank. Vladimir has enough damage to 1v5 late game. Don't believe me? Watch this, warning we get loud. Vladimir has a high skill cap believe it or not!

Cons

- Squishy early on - High cool downs early - Susceptible to frequent ganks - Vulnerable to % health damage - Very high skill cap with his pool

Vladimir has, in my opinion, very little weaknesses. His biggest weaknesses come from his laning phase. Where he is squishy and has high cooldowns. He has some matchups that i would go as far as to call unwinnable. Looking at you Swain and Fiddlesticks. A weak early game and difficult matchups make Vladimir a difficult champion to master.

Flash and Ignite are what i run every game no exception. The positioning and dive potential are too good to pass up on. Flash can help you escape ganks or dive onto the enemy backline. Ignite synergizes with Hemoplague and can ensure kills. I don't run Teleport on any of my top laners it's not my style but if you really love it you can take it.

Crimson Pact
Passive gives AP for Health and Health for AP
Vladimir gains 1 Ability power for every 40 points of bonus health and 1.4 Health for every 1 Ability power. This passive enables vladimir to get very tanky while building almost all offense.
Transfusion
Vlad's main spell it deals damage and restores HP
The Core to Vladimir's Kit. The damage dealt from this ability is instant but the heal has a travel time. Keep this in mind when you are in clutch situations where you need the heal to survive. This ability is great for last hitting under tower and for poking your enemy under their tower. You can run in and hit them with this and run out before the turret shoots you.
Sanguine Pool
Vlad's escape it makes him untargetable and has an AOE damage slow
This ability is what makes Vladimir who he is. It makes Vladimir untargetable for 2 seconds and give him a slight movement speed buff. You can use this ability to dodge anything that isn't a DOT like Ignite, a tether like Soul Shackles or the occasional weird interactions like Death Mark and Chum the Waters. Knowing when to use this ability is what seperates the good Vladimir players from the great ones.™
Tides of blood
Aoe damage spell that increases healing and regeneration
Stacks up to 4 times with each stack it increases the damage and regeneration. The regeneration on this ability affects everything from base health regen to Health Potion , Transfusion and any regen gained by items such as Rejuvenation Bead. This ability will hit as many targets as are in range. It has a bit of a weird cast range i have realized from watching my girlfriend play Vladimir. Its a bit shorter than the range on Transfusion.
Hemoplague
Aoe spell that increases all damage dealt to any target affected by it
Vladimir's ultimate he drops a pool of blood at a target area and infects any target hit by it. For 5 seconds the target, any minion, creep or champion take 12% incrased damage from all sources. This means ALL SOURCES, Minion, Baron nashor, Ignite, Transfusion, Dragon's Rage, any and all damage gets amplified.

Standard Runes, this is what i would recommend and what i take most often since most of the lane matchups we face now a days are difficult, and games rarely last until lvl 18. Gives you 10% cdr early on as well as some ability power for extra healing and damage. These runes will help us survive the early game matchups however they wont get us to 40% cdr any longer after the ionian boots nerf. If you are planning to get a kindlegem take 12-18-0 masteries making sure you get intelligence, otherwise use 18-0-12.


All in late game build. With this build we don't have to build kindlegem for 45% CDR but it takes a while for us to ramp up. You can afford to take this against super easy matchups. In the utility tree you can take either Thunderlord's Decree or Windspeaker's Blessing Thunderlord's Decree if you want more damage Windspeaker's Blessing if you want more regen, pretty self explanatory.

Hooray! two of our core items cost got reduced.
Ionian Boots of Lucidity got reduced from 1000g to 800g
Will of the Ancients got reduced from 2500g to 2300g

Its no secret that Vladimir's early game is his greatest weakness. Rushing these boots gets us some much needed CDR. Having his transfusion on the lowest cooldown possible is a good way to mitigate his early weakness.

Absolutely the best item for Vladimir this item is practically made for him. It gives him +10% CDR +20% spell vamp +80 AP and +112 HP

This is usually what people most question me on in my build. Why Rylai's Crystal Scepter third item? why not Zhonya's Hourglass? Rylai's Crystal Scepter third item is insanely strong for Vladimir it gives him +110 AP and +540 Health and the slow is great on him. It can help him chase or disengage and it makes him insanely scary in a team fight. Rylai's Crystal Scepter makes him almost unkitable you can spam your Tides of Blood and Transfusion and laugh as a Jinx tries to run from you.

This item is amazing on Vladimir, +120 AP +50 Armor and +168 HP. The active Synergizes extremely well with Vladimir's Sanguine Pool. In a team fight Vladimir can Sanguine Pool into Zhonya's Hourglass into Sanguine Pool for 6.5 seconds of invulnerability.

I generally go Void Staff 5th item because usually by then the enemy team is afraid of me and is starting to build magic resist. Void Staff is just a great mage item. It gives +70 AP +98 HP and 35% magic penetration. Once you get this item your damage will sky rocket even against those super tanks.

The Holy grail of tons of damage, if the enemy team has a lot of squishies or no one is really building magic resist you can get this before void staff. This item gives you +120 Ap +168 HP not counting the bonus +30%.

+500 HP, +10% CDR +70 MR +150% HR +20% Bonus on Regen +12.5 AP. I would always condemn this item. I would always say it wasn't worth it to build this because i wanted more damage. However in season 6 an early kindlegem is the most reliable way for vladimir to hit 45% cdr without sacrificing too much. I would still hold off on spirit visage until last item. Its good, but i value the other items over it.

MALPHITE DIFFICULTY 1

NASUS DIFFICULTY 1

SHEN DIFFICULTY 1

SINGED DIFFICULTY 1

TRUNDLE DIFFICULTY 1

AKALI DIFFICULTY 2

GANGPLANK DIFFICULTY 2

GAREN DIFFICULTY 2

JAX DIFFICULTY 2

JAYCE DIFFICULTY 2

LISSANDRA DIFFICULTY 2

AP NIDALEE DIFFICULTY 2

WARWICK DIFFICULTY 2

GNAR DIFFICULTY 3

KATARINA DIFFICULTY 3

KENNEN DIFFICULTY 3

RYZE DIFFICULTY 3

TRYNDAMERE DIFFICULTY 3

AATROX DIFFICULTY 4 Aatrox can be a hassle if you don't harass him a lot in early levels. He has sustain almost good enough to match yours with Blood Thirst and his all in burst with Dark Flight, Blood Price, Blades of Torment and Ignite can be a bit scary. Your goal in this matchup is to be as annoying as possible lvl 1. Spam your auto attacks and Q on him you want to discourage his lvl 2 all in. If he cant all in you this matchup becomes easy with you out sustaining him and having more kill potential on him than he does on you.

SHYVANA DIFFICULTY 4

VOLIBEAR DIFFICULTY 4

CHO'GATH DIFFICULTY 5 Cho'Gath can match your sustain with his Carnivore early on. Cho'Gath will focus on shoving minions into your tower. You can match his pushing if you keep your Tides of Blood stacked just watch out for his Feral Scream into Rupture combo. Try not to rely on Sanguine Pool to dodge Rupture. Like most matchups once you get your Ionian Boots of Lucidity, Fiendish Codex and Hextech Revolver it becomes heavily in your favor.

HEIMERDINGER DIFFICULTY 5

JARVAN IV DIFFICULTY 5

MAOKAI DIFFICULTY 5

RENGAR DIFFICULTY 5

RUMBLE DIFFICULTY 5

SION DIFFICULTY 5

ZAC DIFFICULTY 5

KASSADIN DIFFICULTY 6

OLAF DIFFICULTY 6

TEEMO DIFFICULTY 6

YORICK DIFFICULTY 6

ANNIE DIFFICULTY 7 Annie can be very hard to play against her Disintegrate deals a lot more damage than your Transfusion can heal for. She will win every trade early. Focus avoiding trades and farming minions until you get your Ionian Boots of Lucidity, Fiendish Codex and Hextech Revolver then you can trade with her. Be careful not to drop below 50% hp. She can Flash Summon: Tibbers Ignite and you'll end up a stain. If you can time your Sanguine Pool to dodge her Summon: Tibbers you can crush her.

CASSIOPEIA DIFFICULTY 7 Cass can completely dominate you if she hits her spells on you. If she lands a Q she will shred your health with E's the only way you out trade her early if you dodge her spells. Otherwise the trades won't even be close until you have Ionian Boots of Lucidity Fiendish Codex Hextech Revolver. You can dodge her ult with your pool it gives you plenty of time and is actually pretty easy to pull off. After you get your 3 items this matchup becomes a lot easier.

HECARIM DIFFICULTY 7

Finally we're getting to the actual meat of this guide. Items, runes, masteries and matchups are all great. However, knowing those isn't whats going to win you a game. Knowing what to do, when to do it, and WHY will. Its important to know why we do something or else you will just be following a guide blindly. There is going to be a lot of information in this section. So grab your reading glasses. I'm going to detail how to play vladimir in every stage of the game. I will go into detail on how to lane. How and when to teamfight. How and when to split push. When to cast what ability. Champions that synergize well with Vladimir. Champions and abilities to look out for. Various tips and tricks, and anything else i can think of. I will attempt to explain in detail everything i have learned from playing vladimir over the years.

Without a doubt the weakest part about Vladimir is his laning phase. He has extremely high cool downs, extremely low base damage and is very squishy, and it doesen't help that some of his abilities cost health. He has some very bad matchups for innexperienced vladimir players. However if you master vladimir there is actually no matchup that you should be too worried about. I used to always say that swain and fiddlesticks were unbeatable, but they are actually not that hard. You just have to adjust your playstyle a bit.

That being said im not just going to say " Vladimir laning sucks" (pun intended) and leave you to your own devices.

Most matchups consist of the same tactics and strategies to play against. First and most important, good Irelia players say your Bladesurge is never on cooldown. Well for a good Vladimir player your Transfusion is never OFF cooldown. I see too many Vladimir players try to just Transfusion the enemy laner and thats obviously ideal but if they are out of range i see a lot of Vladimirs just sit on transfusion for 1-3 seconds. Don't do this, as soon as Transfusion is up you need to cast it on the closest target. Having Transfusion up for even 2 second costs you so much health. Now that being said you have to be aware of your cooldowns and your positioning if you can get in range to Transfusion the enemy laner as soon as your cooldown comes up then thats great, thats ideal.

Auto attacks are you best friend in lane. Vladimir has a 10 second cool down 90 damage Transfusion at lvl 1. What this makes most players think is "oh all i have is 90 damage" but they completely forget about auto attacks sure we only have 48 attack damage but that combined with the hybrid pen runes we take can really start to add up if you land 3-6 auto attacks at level 1. You can NEVER stop auto attacking your opponent if they are in range. This doesnt mean you should chase them through minion aggro to auto them, but while they try to farm just whack them a few times inbetween Transfusion CD. Everyone underestimates vladimir's damage at lvl 2 with a few stacks of Tides of Blood, Transfusion, auto attacks and Ignite. Our little vampire becomes a very real threat. You'd be surprised how many kills i have managed to snag at lvl 1 or 2 because people just dont expect Vladimir to do anything at those levels. They expect to walk all over you. The rivens are the ones that i usually kill at lvl 1-3.

If you get an early kill and their jungler doesnt gank you a lot your lane is basically won. Most champions can't come back against you without help. The hardest part about playing vladimir is before we get Ionian Boots of Lucidity after that it gets so much easier. Not to mention once we get Fiendish Codex aswell you can really make the enemy laner's life a living hell.

The question i get most often is "do you keep your Tides of Blood stacked in early levels?" and the answer to this is "sometimes" its so situational this question is really hard to answer. Sometimes i dont keep a single stack of Tides of Blood somtimes i keep 4 sometimes i spam it as soon as its up. It all depends on your hp, enemy hp, minion position, which champion you are laning against, jungler position, how far you are in your build, how many health pots you have, if you have Flash, if you have Ignite, there is just too many variables. This is one of the things you will just have to learn from experience i think. Just like "how much damage will my Tides of Blood do" it will all come with learning Vladimir.



I will be the first to admit that i am biased when it comes to how good split pushing is. I love split pushing. It just fits my play style perfectly. If you have ever seen me play a game or have played with me then you know that i very rarely leave my lane. My friends always tease me about it. Like if i come down for a dragon they will say "are you lost? This isn't top lane."

I think that split pushing is a very effecient strategy to win games with. If you can put enough pressure to draw the jungler and sometimes even the mid laner up to help their top laner. You relieve so much pressure from the rest of the map. Your jungler is free to make plays bot lane and secure dragons. Alternatively if they leave the top laner for dead. You can push all the way to their inhib. I have had many games where i literally solo split push all the way to their nexus.

Split pushing forces the enemy team to react and do one of two things. Either they gank you or they try to win on the rest of the map.

People always ask me "what do you do if you get ganked?" and i say "kill them both" although im joking there is actually a lot of truth in this. Vladimir fights mostly the same regardless of how many targets there are. You use Hemoplague and Tides of Blood and Sanguine Pool to damage them. All of these spells are AOE. Most people underestimate Vladimir's damage, killing the jungler and the top laner is a very real posibility depending on how strong you are. I have had a lot of games where i get so strong i can 1v3 their jungler. top and middle. Meanwhile my team is free to do anything, take mid tower, 4 man bot, take drag or take baron.

If the enemy team responds by trying to win in the other parts of the map this is where you just become the biggest ******* league has ever seen. You dive. Repeatedly. Your flow chart becomes this. Is the enemy laner alive? -> yes? -> dive them -> Repeat. Vladimir has one of the safest dives in the game. If you get ahead as Vladimir you can just crush the enemy laner over and over again. Under any tower. Vladimir actually does a lot of damage against the turrets once you get a few items. And the fact that he's ranged makes it a lot easier to dive and take turrets. Since you are ranged you can auto the inner turret a few times to remove the shield buff. If you dont do this you risk not having enough damage, dying, and potentially giving your enemy laner a way back into the game.

The hardest part about split pushing is knowing when to group. I tend to say you dont group until you have Ionian Boots of Lucidity Will of the Ancients Rylai's Crystal Scepter and Zhonya's Hourglass. Once you have these items you are ready to carry your team to that sweet, sweet, V. Of course this can vary, if your team is getting absolutely demolished and the enemy is taking an inhib. It's probably time to group. However if you can trade a few towers for an inhib of your own, thats completely worth.

Split pushing is a delicate strategy. Your team will HATE you or LOVE you. There is no inbetween either you are extremely successful with this strategy. Or you will get put in the waste bin.

If you are fed but keep split pushing while your team gets trashed they will flame you so hard. In their eyes you are losing them the game by not grouping when usually in fact you're saving the game by not letting the enemy group and seige.

Or you will be taking turrets left and right, getting kills and your team will love you because they basically get to do anything they want.

After the Teleport and tower nerfs split pushing is stronger than ever. If the enemy team leaves you alone split pushing an inhib is not unlikely.
Teamfights is where Vladimir absolutely dominates. He is an absolute powerhouse in late game team fights. He has insane damage. So much so that he can kill the 3 people that are generally squishy. The support, the marksman and the mid laner, with just our Hemoplague Tides of Blood Sanguine Pool Tides of Blood combo.

Your job, i repeat your JOB. Not your goal, not your aim, not your wish, your JOB. is to kill at the VERY LEAST 2 people on your own. Generally you should try to get the marksman and mid laner. However even getting the marksman and support or mid laner and support is great as well.

Late game Vladimir can just Flash into a clumped up team and cast your combo on the enemy team. If they focus you, Sanguine Pool into Zhonya's Hourglass makes it nearly impossible for the them to kill you while your team follows up. If they dont focus you just spam Transfusion and Tides of Blood and profit.

With 40% CDR people never expect your pool to be up twice and sometimes even three times in one fight. It can completely turn a fight if you use it to dodge an important ability. Late game the marksman and mid laner cannot survive your combo of Hemoplague 4 stack Tides of Blood Transfusion and Ignite. They will have one defensive item and that will not protect them from our damage.

The most important thing when teamfighting with vladimir is casting Hemoplague on as many people as possible. The more people you get with your ult the easier the fight will be. Especially if you have any AOE on your team.

You might be thinking holy **** vladimir is OP, and he is, but hes not invincible. With my build i prioritize damage over anything else. That makes us a bit squishy. We have a ton of health but not many resistances. If you get caught out late game and get CC'd you are just dead. No two ways about it. So you need to make sure you use both your Sanguine Pool and Zhonya's Hourglass very wisely and only when you really need it.

I play on the North American Server. I play on my three accounts El Reptiliano, Tigereye and Greenknight. Feel free to add me in game if you have any questions.

You can follow my twitch account to watch live vladimir gameplay and ask questions.

11/19/2015
Updated guide for season 6 added new runes/masteries/items. Still have a lot to do regarding matchups and adding detail to the "Meat" that i promised.