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Katarina Build Guide by Kusoku

Katarina Du Couteau: The Sinister Blade

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Spells:

Exhaust

Flash

Ability Order

Katarina Passive Ability

Introduction

Hello, I'm Kusoku, I was introduced to MobaFire by a friend, he showed me his guide here and I liked the way he put some things on it. I have decided to check some guides that were put on this site. As I read them I found points that I agree/disagree with. Nevertheless there was always this lack of information I find very useful for players (or simply some guides were denying those information). Then I've decided to make an account and put my first (ever) guide to (I was really shocked about all the formatting that could be done).

In this guide I'm putting all my experience from playing (she was my 2nd champion on League of Legends - and my main since then). The cheat sheet shows basic build for , for some time I had only Core Items, but I think it's better to show full build and write about other possibilities in guide.

Thank you for reading my guide and I hope it will help you (at least some of you).

You can find Abbreviations that could've been used here

Katarina Du Couteau: The Sinister Blade

In my opinion it's one of the best passives in-game.

Decreases skill cool downs by 15 sec after every kill/assist (only is not reseted, since all other skills have lower cool down). Also grants us extra 25 gold for every assist/kill.

Tips & Tricks:

Allows you to make many surprising maneuvers, like sudden tower dive with Shunpo which would be deadly to you after your kill, but thanks to it you can make your escape again with the same skill.

Powerful harassing tool as well provides good farming mid-late game.

Bounces from 2-6 targets, on higher lvl you can use it to harass enemy from almost safe place, because it will bounce trough minions/enemies to your target (sometimes it will not jump like you want it to and might end not hitting the target you wanted).

Tips & Tricks:

It deals magic damage (not physical like some think).
Try to hit the furthest minion you can afford to hit your target, as it grants you the best chance to actually hit your enemy, as well as almost safe place, from which is easy to avoid enemy attacks.
Every bounce without Preparation results in damage lowered by 10% so try to reduce the count of bounces to get maximum damage output, although sometimes it may be not safe and not recommended.

Buffs , and increases normal attack damage.

Activating it before will sustain the damage on each bounce as well as give to enemies debuff which decreases heal effects by 50%. Activation before results in lowered damage (15-35%) we receive for 3 seconds.

Tips & Tricks:

Activate it as often as possible or use it right before skills for some tactics.
On lvl 2 of this skill duration is almost as long as cool down of this skill, so you can activate it earlier and wait for cool down almost to be up and then use it 2 times almost in the same time.
Use Preparation while the blade is going to the target (but before it hits). Thanks to it your power will not decrease after each bounce and you'll surprise enemy by sudden power up activation and half heal debuff. You may also activate it after it hits but it will sustain the damage that was lowered (not the full damage it had on beginning).
Using it right before Shunpo is probably one good habit, as it will help to lower damage you always receive and sometimes it is this the thin line that keeps you alive.

Great way to get to the enemy or escape.

It's an instant movement to the target, which puts you behind the target and attempts physical attack right after using it. It can be used offensively as well as defensively. Closing the gap, dealing damage on target or using on nearby minion to dodge skill shot, widen the gap.

Tips & Tricks:

Can be used to move to a nearby sight ward or Noxious Trap etc. (it will reveal ward not sure about traps and so on)
You can easily escape ultimates like Bullet Time, Absolute Zero or even Death Lotus etc. (skillful ones may even evade ultimates like Enchanted Crystal Arrow and so on)

Enemies nearby be aware, because death awaits you. Even though it's simple to break, in my opinion it's still one of the top ultimates in-game.

Deals massive damage up to 3 enemies in range by throwing 10 daggers over 3 seconds each dagger deals 50/65/80 basic damage (+0,25 AP and +0,5 AD). But even though it's a powerful ultimate DO NOT BE CARELESS every stun/knockback/silence is able to break it and you'll be in a very uncomfortable position, so you need SOME common sense: be patient and watch carefully when enemies are throwing their CC skills, then use it.

Many times I have seen s go alone into a group of full HP enemies and ultimate, and wind up dying without getting any kills from the situation. Although is able to pull off some crazy stunts, try not to get too cocky.

Try to keep from using your ultimate unless in team fights, ganks or situations where you can guarantee dealing enough damage to kill your target(s).

Tips & Tricks:

Try to use Preparation+ Shunpo before Death Lotus which will minimize damage you receive and may give you enough health to fully cast Death Lotus, which also enables safer tower dives for your combo.
Remember that most champions with CC will try to save a skill for your Death Lotus like Talon's cutthroat. Try waiting till everybody gets engaged in fight then use powered Shunpo followed by Death Lotus.
Death Lotus also hits units on stealth, you may also take advantage of it to notice incoming gank (because your ultimate becomes available whenever some champion is in its range).
Be wary when using items, they break your ultimate on usage.

Pros / Cons

Pros:

No Mana
Ridiculously low cool downs
(especially thanks to Voracity)
Great harassing skills
Very good farm mid-late game
Amazing damage output
Great Chaser / Escaper (even without Flash, but I use it anyway)
Multi-Target Ultimate

Cons:

Early game farm is weak
Death Lotus is easily interrupted by CC
Usually you are the first target
You need to depend strongly on team in fights (especially for Death Lotus)
No Crowd Control
Death Lotus broken by item usage (even pots)

Things needed to master Katarina:

Common sense
Good reflex
Map awareness (I still kind of lack in here xD)
Good way of positioning yourself
Good sense of timing
Keeping calm in fights (sometimes you can just lose fight you could win,
because under pressure you panic)

Full Range and Zone of Katarina Skills

Before we start on range/zone of your skills let’s look closer at the mechanics of and how it will bounce (it's not full bounce count).

Bouncing Blades - Route of the blade:

1. Dark Blue Line - way to the first target
2. Dark Blue Dot - first target
3. Light Blue Line - possible route to the 2nd target
4. Light Blue Dot - most probable 2nd target
5. Orange Line - way to the 3rd target (both ways possible)
6. Red Dot - 2nd/3rd target of
7. Red Line - way to the 3rd/4th target

So now that we know how the works, we want to know the full Range of skills. Basic range is very simple as we can light it up moving mouse cursor above the skill we would like to use. But what about the range that is not visible? (bounce of the , + )

Bouncing Blades - Full (possible) Range

Range of Shunpo + Bouncing Blades

And to put all that knowledge to work lets finish up with Zoning Tutorial by Shurelia

Skill Sequence

I have for you 3 skill sequences each has its good sides and require different style of play. I like to play using the Common skill sequence. However there was time I used Close Combat Style all the time

Common:

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

I use this build almost always on mid/side with ranged/mage enemy champions.

We maximize while taking 1 point each into and then we (always) take as soon as we can, after it on lvl 8 I take another skill point into and after maxing I maximize finishing with .

Why I take 2 points into ? Because of its cool down and the way I play with I'll tell more about it inTactics below.

Q: Could you tell us why you put a point in at level 1 if you max first? Isn't a better farming/harass ability then ?

A: On first lvl's has to last hit minions almost like melee AD champion, whenever she gets or first. Second thing is the damage of those skills on lvl 1. While has 67 (with bonus AP) damage on first target and 61 damage on second target, you may hit enemy champion ONLY once with this skill. On the other hand deals 95 damage to single enemy, we have single burst on enemy champion + single AD attack almost instantly after and we can use it to dodge enemy skill shots (like 's ).

Although you should start from on lvl 1 if you are against champion with low cool down range skills like and his because he will burst you down if you'll try to fight against him in close range, farming minions also can be hard with him, so you probably will have to use to last hit minions.

Other case would be to be able to pull blue/red for your jungler

Conclusion: on lvl 1 is more concerned about early 1 vs 1 fight.

Close Combat style:

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

Like the one before but we switch maximization of with

Like the title of this sequence says it's more compact way of playing with , it's play style is fit to play using and CDR Core as you will depend mostly on 's cool down, but Basic Core also work with it. Best enemies for this strategy are melee champions.

Risky one:

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

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

Truthfully now I'm practically not using this strategy anymore.

In those two we simply ignore for raw power output (on single player at that because is losing 10% of damage each bounce), but with power we have risks, we are more squishy mostly because we can't use + combo for lowering received damage.

Tactics

Killer Instincts:

I give 2 ability points in it because after you activate it lasts more/less as long as CD to the next so if you use it right before it ends you might use it again after a second or 2.

You also should activate as soon as it's on CD usually I throw or or even both of them then use . Other way it's to activate it right before using a skill or right after you throw (you may also activate it after few bounces but it sustains lowered damage so -10% for each bounce).

Farming:

Although isn't the best of farmers early game, just make sure you stay back and last hit when possible. If a wave of minions are low on health use on them to get a few last hits.

Mid-late game is where shines with farming. You simply annihilate minions with your .

It's a bit harder to farm while going with maxed first (close combat style), since you'll be restricted by 's cool down. It's more concerned with damage output on 1 enemy than minion waves or multiple enemies.

Common abilities:

You should place yourself behind minions, sometimes far from minions (on the side or so) if enemy champion can get you easily even behind them (ranged like or mage ) and when you attempt to harass enemy try to throw at the most far away minion that with will reach enemy champion. Use Combo + to make harassing more effective and + make great finish with (but have common sense use your ultimate when you know you will kill with it - or at least that you have chance of killing)

Close Range:

I called it Close Combat because this strategy works best against melee range champions. Simply focus on enemy Champ you want to harass and use + and run away from him you can also throw to add some more damage and when you know your ultimate will kill him just ++.

Runes

provides us with very high damage output through the Game, those runes also have very important meaning in this build mechanics.

are one of the greatest runes that give us survivability in Game, thanks to them we are more resistant to AD champions as well as we take less damage from minions.

Greater seal of vitality

Other possible runes are Greater seal of vitality. For some people those might seem more useful than , because when we use + we reduce health we receive a bit better than with simple armor (but you don't always remember about activation or use up to power ).

Greater seal of vitality

we take those because on lvl 6 they have slightly more AP than and as said earlier we want to maximize damage of .

Little math about scaling vs flat AP:
0,9 / 0,17 per lvl= 5.823529411764706
meaning at lvl 6 we have more AP from scaling ones

Other worth mentioning runes are which are providing us with better cool down reduction but those runes are making most of use Early Game, Late Game we use them to get as close as we can to the 40% CDR limit (considering you don't have blue golem's buff and/or ).

Like previous runes are providing us with better cool down reduction, the difference is that those runes get better only on lvl 13, so it's up to your choice if it is more benefiting to get the flat ones or stick with worse cool down reduction till lvl 13.

starting 15 AP for higher damage from skills early on as well as damage for on lvl 6 is higher than from .

had to give them very much thought, but finally decided to add them. They are giving us 1,5% movement speed each. But to have them we really need to sacrifice 5AP for each which is our starting power source, so decide for yourself what benefits you the most.

Masteries

Basic Masteries:

I take "9/21/0" mastery build. is a bit squishy at the core, so defensive masteries beefs us up a bit. I really liked old defensive masteries and especially , but and gives us like effect but instead of 1 point we need to spend at least 5 points.

The offensive tree is just like the old one and the new defensive mastery tree is very flexible for you may spend your points however you see fit for her.

Let’s play with math:

Let’s say that we have 4% damage reduction (1% - 2 mastery points; 3% - 3 mastery points;) and a skill shot that deals 500 damage (past MR reduction):

500 x 4% (area effect skill shot) = 20 HP SAVED
500 x 1% (not area effect) = 5 HP SAVED

But if we take 5 points in other masteries we would have (3 points), (2 points) or (2 points) to choose from (took as example only lowering damage masteries):

++ single minion attack:
4 + 1 per 5 seconds = 5 HP SAVED // 1 point
2 + 3 per 5 seconds = 5 HP SAVED // no

++ minion group(6 minions’ not counting siege minion):
6x4 + 1 per 5 seconds = 25 HP SAVED // 1 point
6x2 + 3 per 5 seconds = 15 HP SAVED // no

++ champion attack (skill included):
2 + 1 per 5 seconds = 3 HP SAVED // 1 point
2 + 3 per 5 seconds = 5 HP SAVED // no

Conclusion: The number of saved HP is small however we would spend our mastery points in those skills. For me is the most benefiting mastery for 2 mastery points that leaves on what the other 3 masteries we would like to spend. I take which is very good in team fights and on instant AoE damage skills.

Offensive Masteries

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In those masteries I took "21/9/0" (first masteries) and "21/0/9" (second masteries). We are ignoring squishiness of and utilize even more destructive power. Also Offensive tree is very inflexible for .

But there are very big Cons comparing to defensive masteries:

Rylai's Crystal Scepter is a must have, we cannot exchange it with any other situational item.
Damage output is practically similar to "9/21/0" until we get Rabadon's Deathcap.
Boots of Speed is the only viable starting item, taking Doran's Shield is almost suicidal, you need to depend on dodging skill shots, you are too squishy to take them head on.

Descriptions and Comments of Used Masteries:

Offensive:

You are using exhaust, ignite or ghost? Ofc we need it. Thanks to it our additionally lowers MR and armor by 10 each.

+3 AP just simple as that.

Very useful, mastery gives 4% CDR. One of the most important masteries on out early game.

provides us with 10% magic penetration.

1,5% more damage output to our already devastating attacks.

+18 AP at lvl 18, not that much but if we want to proceed in Offensive tree we take it.

+5% more AP. Our can get around 600 AP (without rabadon's bonus) AP so +30 AP.

+6% damage output if enemy has less that 40% HP. In our case getting enemy to 40% health is just a matter of seconds as our has potential to take the whole HP in just 3 seconds.

Defensive:

Additional 6 Magic Resist, who wouldn't want this from Defensive tree.

look above (6 Armor instead of MR).

+108 Health at lvl 18.

lowers damage received by 2 (might be exchanged).

+30 extra health for 1 point, pretty good exchange ;)

reduced damage by 3% from area effect abilities. (might be exchanged)

Fills the 2% CDR hole while having Golem's buff and for complete 40% CDR limit.

Additional 24 gold for every kill//assist, we are now almost like with old . (might be exchanged)

3% more health and 10% lower CC effects. We take it mostly for extra health since CC is not so useful for - doesn't prevent breaking - but ofc still very good effect.

Utility:

We are using so these -15 seconds is very useful.

-10% of time spent dead, with 21 in offense is very squishy so this is brilliant here.

recall lasts 1 second less - useful.

2% more movement speed is great as we will need to dodge many skill shots.

Summoner Spells

Defensive:
If you have problems with escaping (no nearby targets to or your is on cool down) and you know death awaits you will probably save you, you can use it to jump behind walls or simply create more distance (where you might have some target in range you could to).

Offensive:
You see enemy under tower and some minions close by, you know that if you run towards him, he will run back not to be in your range of . You to close the distance and then he probably will be in your range of after you kill him you right away (thanks ) toward those nearby minions.

one of my favorite spells, slows Movement Speed by 40%, lowers Armor and Magic Resist by 10 (with Mastery point invested into it).

Defensive:
You know that enemy champion will kill you if he gets to you, will lower the damage dealt to you as well as slow enemy champion so you can make your escape safer.

Offensive:
Your has only 550 range so you want to slow him from the moment you start casting your ultimate to deal him most damage possible. but unlike items which are breaking your ultimate if used while channeling, can be safely turned on while channel, without you to worry about breaking your deadly .

Other good spells for Katarina:

just burn those pests that lived through your skills.

if you are scared of CC use this but remember using it after is kind of a waste of ultimate (I'm considering someone just disrupted your ultimate), so you want to use it before to launch it after all CC went gone and you have free will then. But I prefer making or instead of taking this skill.

good for chasing/escaping but I still prefer .

Not Recommended:

hmmm yes you can heal yourself to sustain a little more damage, but let's get real if needs to heal herself and can't escape you will probably die anyway, there are always moments it will save you but I still don't recommend it.

Core Items

Basic Core:

CDR Core:

Those are my preferred Core Items for , past those I mix in Late Game Items or/and Situational Items (sometimes I get before ). I do not include as Core Item since I almost never end making it. It's an expensive Item and after little nerf last patch it's even less worth getting it. Usually I tend to hurry Situational Items while still relaying on .

is a very uncomfortable item for me. To have enough magic penetration and deal significant damage you need it, but there are many important items at this stage, it should be made as 5th item, can be made as 4th while sacrificing some sustainment.

After Core Items I mix in Late Game Items with Situational Items, depending on what I actually need. You might find that making all the Items from cheat sheet above is not always beneficial to the games you are playing. (it's just that those are the most basic builds)

grants us higher movement speed and 20 points of magic penetration.

grants us higher movement speed and 15% of cool down reduction.

is a great item it provides you with decent AP as well as spell vamp thanks to which survivability increases and is cheap only 1200 gold.

NOTE: Multiple target abilities (Bouncing Blade and Death Lotus) grant 1/3 spell vamp, 5% with the , 8% with the mentioned later.

This item is just amazing. It adds 140 AP plus 30% of your total AP. So we usually end with 600-700 AP thanks to the boost.

is a great item for , provides 70 AP and 40% of magic penetration

is an excellent for , it provides us with nearly everything we need: 70 AP, 57 magic resist and aura which is lowering nearby enemies’ magic resist by 20. And why I think:

SPA

>

SPA

with grants us more penetration than at least up to some point(with it's the other way around because you don't have so high basic magic penetration)

NOTE: and stack multiplicatively and sum up to 46% magic penetration.
(1.0 - 0.4) * (1.0 - 0.1) = 0.6 * 0.9 = 0.54 = 54% of original resist that means:
1 - 0,54 = 0,46 = 46% penetration

50 Magic Resistance vs :

50-20=30
30-28,5=1,5
1,5-10%=1,4

50 Magic Resistance vs :

50-28,5=21,5
21,5-46%=11,5
filler

+
+
filler

80 Magic Resistance vs :

80-20=60
60-28,5=31,5
31,5-10%=28,4

80 Magic Resistance vs :

80-28,5=51,5
51,5-46%=27,8
filler

+
+
filler

100 Magic Resistance vs :

100-20=80
80-28,5=51,5
51,5-10%=46,4

100 Magic Resistance vs :

100-28,5=71,5
71,5-46%=38,6
filler

+
+
filler

200 Magic Resistance vs :

200-20=180
180-28,5=151,5
151,5-10%=136,4

200 Magic Resistance vs :

200-28,5=171,5
171,5-46%=92,6
filler

+
+
filler

Conclusion: Because most champions have less than 80 magic resistance (even with 1 MR item), we will deal more damage using while using .

Core through the Game

At the beginning you need to choose how you want to start.

will give you +50 movement speed so easier and faster positioning yourself + you also get 3 s which means 600 HP recovered.
filler

which gives us extra 100 health, 8 HP reg / 5 sec (which means 200 health recovered in 2 minutes 5 sec) and +10 armor (somewhere in-game you will sell it to get other HP giving item or because you will be out of space).

You should try to last hit minions as often as possible while using all your skills, if you can you should try to throw in a way that will harass enemy champion. On some champions using hit and run strategy (with ) is very benefiting, since you will deal more damage than most of the champions, but champions with fast CD's (like ) will be able to simply obliterate you so do not even attempt it.

Usually I go back first time when I have gold for both and (means 1550) and Sight Ward/ if I have enough gold for it.

If I need to back off earlier and don't have cash for I upgrade and few s// sight wards (if possible also ).

From this point on you should start ganking, but do not neglect farming on minions, do it when you can and DO NOT force it while you know you'll be sacrificing tower.

You should back when you have enough cash for your Shoes ( if you upgraded shoes earlier) or even with enough cash for next item (/).

You are past the point you needed to choose which boots you need to buy. If you went with Close Combat Style you'll probably want cool down reduction so go with take instead of but you still can go with used on Common Style.

allows you easily gaining 40% CDR using and blue golem's buff which means you can every few seconds. But then again if you choose using , masteries and blue golem's buff we have already 40% CDR, meaning with we lose the whole CDR bonus, then again we don't have blue golem's buff all the time and then we make use of those boots. Some like to have near 40% CDR all the time ( + + + gives 37% CDR).

Thanks to I still think it's better to have + there's a little bonus while we take those boots to our last Core Item about which I told earlier.

For this Item you may need to go back to base twice or more times (depends on games, sometimes once will be enough). To maximize damage you want to get it as fast as possible, so on first back off you buy on second and finish it (or finish it on 3rd run). Sometimes you will need to sacrifice your damage and buy or even finish whole or to actually survive damage output from their AP casters before finishing .

NOTE:AD champions usually do not deal enough damage to kill you (without items on lvl 18 you will have above 100 armor) but if you'll still need some armor will be enough.

Usually I go catch the first and collect rest of the gold needed for it. If I'm forced back earlier I buy and finish it on the next run. But remember that finishing or before might sometimes be a better solution.

If you went with CDR Core then you probably would want to go with some defensive item before grabbing , but if you want faster damage output then without you won’t have enough magic penetration to do so. You need to decide what is more important to you here.

Past this point I mix in Late Game Items with Situational Items, depending on what I actually need. You might find that making all the Items from cheat sheet above is not always beneficial to the games you are playing.

Late Game Items

is a great synergy to your skills by giving slow to enemies as well as good source of health and AP.

one of the great items for the only down is its price it provides us with AD and AP as well as spell vamp and vamp, as well we have slow effect on use but you cannot use it while channeling because it will break it, you need to do it before or after finishing.

NOTE: If we want damage then Gunblade is better than WotA, if we look at price then its other way around.

provides armor and great amount of ability power, active: God mode for 2 seconds :P, the active is terrific when against enemies such as , especially if you might die from it, as well as AoE and CC ultimates such as 's ( along his passive ) and the second burst of 's (to prevent the stun). It also works great when you are using your in a big team fight, you can pop the active once you're done if you are taking heavy damage, to let your teammates come and push them away from you. You can also use the active if you need to get away from someone, you are about to die, etc; activating the hourglass can give you the vital 2 seconds you need for a teammate to come to you to to, whether in a team fight or not. Great for getting out of sticky situations, and it lets you be more risky.

Not Recommended but Plausible:

it's a great item thanks to its properties. It gives extra AP, magic resist, movement speed and its boosting your 1 attack by the amount of your AP (an attack usually occurs right after ).

Even though, I still do not recommend it. For starters if we play we do not intend to hit enemies but burst them out with skills, if skills aren't enough usually you would back off to wait for CD and save some HP from very possible harass or counter action of enemy. Also making it before is a bit useless because it would give about the same damage as from doubling our attack damage. Second it’s a very expensive item: 3470 gold. As I wrote above, making it before is kind of missing its point, so if we have our core items (all items from early-mid game) I would prefer making for 2400 gold (upgrading ) which will give us more/less the same amount of damage in skills or making any other of Late Game / Situational Items. And last we do not need 350 MP that is providing us with, the only item I consider good even though we lose mana boost is .

Situational Items

Survival Situational Items

Some health as well as magic resist and shield from 1 skill every 45 seconds, it's a great item where enemies have not too many CC, it'll support you to throw quickly without too many worries.

If enemies have many annoying AD and don't have too many CC directed at you that could disrupt , provides armor, health and mass movement slow and attack speed slow on nearby enemies as well as health regen and 5% CD.

source of additional armor and magic resist that may save your life, as well as passive that is giving you second chance (750 HP after death - 5 minutes CD after use) of coming back with your high damage output or just stalling for some time in which your team mates might come. Usually you would prefer making other items as most of them are often coming handier than guardian, but overall it's still a very good item.

Team Play Situational Items

a great team play item which will also give you good bonuses. This item gives you 50 AP and an aura which gives +30 AP and +20% spell vamp. You should make this item if you have many skill using champions and only you make spell vamp, it'll increase survivability of the team in range of your aura.

NOTE: Preferably used as a substitute of (at least by me).

Situational Items against CC

magic resist as well as Cleanse every 90 seconds if enemies have many CC
or champs like , etc. it's a must have, usually I make it before .

It's an item good to have against heavy CC teams, as you will be focused with CC, gives you 35 tenacity as well as movement and 25 magic resist. With this item you should make instead of to maximize damage. Other way around if you want survivability against spells.

It's the same group as but also gives you ability power (50 AP and 35 tenacity) for the price of 1200.

Very Risky Situational Items (Stackable items)

Nothing else at this price (let alone most other items) can provide this much AP. Plus, with the , not even including the bonus % AP masteries, the total 180 AP from this item with full stacks turns into 234 total AP. And getting stacks, especially with Kat, isn't as hard as it may seem. Your abilities are so devastating early through late game that you are guaranteed to get a lot of kills and assists. And if you lose some, just get them back! Once you get full stacks, you get 15% CDR, which will allow you to do whatever you want, whenever you want. This includes spamming your skill combo with your .

is another stackable item that has use in damage output. For me it's even less reliable than because of the effect on 20 stacks, however has higher additional damage from physical damage ratio (+0,5).

I decided to mention and because if you are successful of gaining stacks on them it's the cheapest and fastest way to high damage output. 1 of those items is powerful and hard to manage but if you go with both its doubling the damage output but at death its double the price of normal 1 snowball item damage loss.

However, those are NOT the most reliable items, use at your own risk. If you are having a good game, try to pick it up early. If not, don't bother risking losing an item slot and a lot of damage AP/damage and some gold.

I'm not a fan of snowballs (stackable items) I used them early on but as games went by I decided not to use them, at least not on I find other items I mentioned more useful, rather than risking the game and making a gamble of: "I will manage to keep stacks = win, otherwise probably loss"

Champions you should be really carefull with

One of the champions that is not hard because of CC (which she has thanks to ) but because of the fact that she can kill you in a combo. Working with should solve the stun from problem as well as part of the damage she would put on you.

Against him a is a must have (especially if u are mid against him), why? Because his is broken after use of but you must use it after he uses it on you. Suppress and damage will be null filed. You also need to watch out for which will silence you.

He has 2 skills’ you need to watch out, which will launch you into air and silencing . Best way to fight him out is to evade (it's easy to evade this one because it shows a space - center of skill - and it'll strike around it). is kind of annoying since he may target it easily and silence you, is the fastest way against it (but it’s possible to evade too, or simply withstanding it).

It's very annoying opponent, his is silencing you and has higher range than any of your skills and 3 second scare from . silence is not very long but the bad thing is that it can strike you up to 3 times which can be devastating to us. In the 3 seconds (up to 6 seconds if fiddle skillfully struck us with both skills), we may simply be eaten alive since we can't deal damage nor run (even with ). Best way to fighting him is but you may try with on your own risk.

Has also 2 CC skills and , but both of those skill have pretty high cool downs, so it's easy to strike just after he used both of them. If you find that he always saves 1 of those skills to counter you make . Killing him may be hard since his ultimate lowers your damage and he may heal up with .

Guess what? Yes 2 CC skills xD , Puncturing Taunt. is easily null filed because is breaks even on minions (still watch out especially if has ), but real pain is Puncturing Taunt since it allows to drag you around to many uncomfortable positions and traps (like 's ) + you may not do anything for 3 seconds. should be enough.

Simply too many CC (, and ) that can break your ). You should especially look out for the + combo, since it can deal a bit of damage and put you in a very uncomfortable position (like middle of enemy team).

Solution: and wait for his skills to be on CD before or if you are confident in dodging and .

Heard many times that this is problematic champion against well it's not as hard as it seems. The item I would grab is . Try to harass him using before he gets in range to cast his spell (you can always use to evade ) or after you evade his spell shot.

Now the key of successful way of killing him is evading his 1st skill shot which probably will be 2nd would be absorbed by and now to stun you with he needs to use up his ultimate to run away if he doesn't he's risking his life waiting for CDs. But if he uses and misses then all you have to worry is that if you are able to withstand the damage from the rest of the skills.

He has very bad passive working against : . Meaning won’t help too much since it's working only for 1 skill per 45 seconds. So most important thing is to evade his skill shots as much as possible, if you can't dodge them then making and using it after 3rd charge of . Especially watch out since it can give you 3 marks in about a second.

She's another champion that can almost 1 shoot you. Most critical is her silence in Sigil of Silence (after she strikes you with any other ability it gives silence). You won't be able to use skills for 2 seconds. But at lvl 6 she may silence you up to 4 seconds using Sigil of Silence and + any other skill to activate 's silence. Best way is to wait for to be on cool down since it’s her main skill enabling harassing and escaping. After it's used up harass her with through minions. Getting is also a very good idea since it will stop at least one skill (which probably will be Sigil of Silence) and save you high amount of damage.

You should be careful around her since she can stun you with 2 skills. First one she may easily put it on you thanks to her other skill so trying to use on her is like waste of ultimate since she will break it with but if she used it up remember she still may have . Making or is more than enough to fight her.

can be hard to fight against too many AP champions thanks to her , and (and her spell vamp from ). You lose ability to use until effect of wore off, so better dodge this skill well. is very good damage reduction against your skills since they are all dealing magic damage. But is almost not a worry to you. To stun you it needs 4 seconds, that means you have 1 second for reaction and using (to have full channel of your ultimate - 3 seconds). You may get but I think you may not need even that.

It's a bit tricky lineup her ball is able to deal pretty high damage and to dodge it you can't be looking at but on the ball. Try to imagine a circle around her ball, it can go in straight line from its position to the edge of the circle (+ there's s range). And the skill you should be careful with is as it's able to disrupt your . Best choice is but if you get hit by sole movement of the ball, you will lose passive and get hit by .

It's one of the champions that making or is simply not worth. has 2 skills that can disrupt your ultimate, first one is because of this skill it's not worth to make since every hit will take out the passive of but only the 3rd one will disrupt . Second skill is it inflicts 0,5 sec stun which means making to get out of its effect is meaningless since it will wear out before you will even react but it's still able to break your channeling. My strategy is to wait till both skills are on cool down an withstand the damage (so is the best choice against opponents like this, preferably against few AD not only ).

Very hard against:

He's very mobile thanks to his and has silencing against you (it's breaking your ) + his passive works against you (it lowers magic damage received by ). If you try to force harass him he will probably harass you even more, so focus on farming. is a must have on 1 vs 1 in team fights just be sure he used up his silence.

A skilled will always away from your harassing, force harass probably will work against you because of her passive (as well ultimate ) and she has also which is able of breaking your , focus on farming

Rest of the champions is not posing too much of a threat (if I didn't forget any more annoying champions like those above) and can simply be solved with either:

Champions with helpful skills/ultimates to Death Lotus

+
+

is a perfect partner for (my personal favorite), she may easily catch a single enemy in creating an opportunity to kill single enemy, but her other spells are even more useful for us. is preventing part of magical damage to go trough as well as giving us immune status to all stuns, silences, snares (till it breaks) which means we do not have to worry about broken , also getting in to bunch of enemies with near its full channel state will give a perfect moment for striking .

+

and are two very good skills helpful to . While uses to stun the enemy and move himself to the target, which makes easier to use , it's the perfect chance to use since enemies are unable to attack neither move.

+

Another great partner, his is taunting all nearby enemies, so we may go with and deal massive damage before they could even break it.

(+)+

is a very good partner, thanks to her with or , which will stun multiple enemies giving the perfect opportunity for .

+

Little preventing damage of enemies we jump into.

+

gives us very comfortable position for because it stuns enemies in center and slows nearby opponents.

+

Very big massive slow from will almost make sure our to be in range the channel time.

+

may greatly help our by trapping them in , although it is not disabling their ability to attack nor using CC, prevents only escapes.

+

is a pretty nasty stun for enemies before , but we are not whining about it, since its time.

+

has a stun thanks to and his ultimate makes possible stacking 3 of the marks on multiple enemies, which is the perfect moment for .

+

if we place ourselves inside our 's it will prevent enemies from funning out of our range.

+

Being in the center of the greatly assists , since she may use it to pull running enemies and help us to get our full casting time and damage from .

+

gives us a bunch of enemies flying for a moment in the air unable to do anything, another good situation for

++

+ is one nasty combo assisting , while is boosting our damage, is slowing enemies running from us.

+

as we deduct from its name, its throwing bunch of enemies into air unable to do anything and looking at draining their life

I do not recommend champions such as:

+ = You're doing it wrong

Why? Well his may throw enemies way out of range.

All other champions that are considered good are those that have stun or a crowd control, I didn't speak of them here because it's simply disabling 1 opponent and are not as useful as those above.

FAQ (for now item related only)

Q: You got and . Do we really need double slow?
A: Yes, since I use most of the times early-mid Game, and I rarely end with at all usually I take it to buff some HP or change it with other situational Item (The build showed in the beginning is in case of 100% unnecessary changes which almost never happens in games above 25 lvl), also it is Late Game Item for me, so sometimes I get it in 40 minute of the game.

Q: Should be before ?
A: It may be a bit related to my play style, but even tough provides us with slow and health, gives MR penetration and Magic resist. I have played for a while with both items as first in this place. My conclusion was that even though I were more benefited with defensive part (thanks to + and that extra health), I lacked damage output that provides with its magic penetration (we still have some survivability not as much as with extra health - 'cause of AD champions).

Q: Why ? Doesn't make any sense to me.
A: It has many usages, usually is targeted first, because of her high damage output on multiple enemies. Sometimes if you initiate too early u would've ended up dead but 2 seconds are blissful for , as I wrote before with normal build and Golem's buff and you have 40% CDR. 's have about 3,6 CD time, then its more than half of time of her CD on an escape ability. You may always use it before/after ultimate to save some HP on team fight. is also granting us 50 Armor great damage reduction against AD based champions. Usually if I do not get then I get .

Q: Why you don't add as situational item?
A: Actually I never ended up making on (not even once). If you didn't notice already with only have above 100 Armor (at lvl 18, also depends on which runes you use), so she's pretty resistant to AD attacks. I like to get most of the times (maybe it is also true that I never ended up against full AD based team).

Q: Have you considered instead of ?
A: Actually yes I did consider it. Here you have calculations I made:

cost: 1200

+56,5 damage to and +375 to cost + 2425
+28 to and +200 to cost + 900

So it's 1525 difference in gold.

NOTE: full cast damage. not counted 'cause it has almost the same damage stats.

So it's still good to get , when you want to support your team with spell vamp and 30 AP aura and save some cash.

Credits

I would like to especially thank:

wRAthoFVuLK and his Katarina Guide, because of the few things I based on in my guide (Farming, 2-3 item descriptions, a bit of description).

Jhoijhoi and her Guide to Making a Guide which enabled me to make most of the formatting made on this Guide. Also thank you for older banner and dividers(Jhoi's sig store).

LaCorpse for awesome guide bundle that came straight from LaCorpse's Signature Café.

I would like to thank all the reviewers that answered my requests and provided me with a great feedback that helped me making my guide even better: Jhoijhoi, SirSpankAlot, Icuonuez.

Everybody who have read and commented my guide :D

Change LOG

One of my best games:

Older Changes (main ones):

Changed Core items in build order into full AP build.
Added conclusion about Hextech Gunblade changes
Corrected Cheat Sheet Item Order
Added Ability descriptions
Added FAQ (it will be updated every once in a while).
Full Grammar check (used some online free grammar checking, so I'm not sure if everything is ok now, if you manage to notice some errors then let me know about it in the comments)

2011/11/15:

Corrected beginning of the guide (intro, appearance, organization etc.)
Corrected Masteries
Corrected visual appearance (I think I did it xD)
Date changes in Change LOG instead of versions, also shortened change LOG since some of the changes weren't that important.

2011/11/16:

Removal of the old masteries
Corrected calculations in Abyssal Mask vs Void Staff in Core Item Section

2011/11/24:

Added more runes.
Added other possible masteries.
Added CDR Core.
Corrected guide visually.

2011/12/17-2012/03/03:

Made Range/Zone Section.
Hextech Gunblade back to cheat sheet after spell vamp nerf on Will of the Ancients.
WotA related info.
MS Office Word spell and grammar check :D
Death Lotus info: all item usages (even pots) are breaking it (got to know it painfully last game)

To do List(for now at least):

Any changes that I’ll find necessary

Low priority:

Dominion part on Katarina - I'm not sure if I even make part about it, since Dominion didn't get to me as much as I tough it would and I don't like playing it too much, but who knows maybe it'll change. (+ it's almost like writing a new guide within a guide since there are other priorities)

League of Legends Build Guide Author Kusoku

Kusoku Katarina Guide

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Katarina Du Couteau: The Sinister Blade

Introduction

Katarina Du Couteau: The Sinister Blade

Pros / Cons

Full Range and Zone of Katarina Skills

Skill Sequence

Tactics

Runes

Masteries

Summoner Spells

Core Items

Core through the Game

Late Game Items

Situational Items

Champions you should be really carefull with

Champions with helpful skills/ultimates to Death Lotus

FAQ (for now item related only)

Credits

Change LOG

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Katarina Build Guide by Kusoku

Katarina Du Couteau: The Sinister Blade

Thank You!

Spells:

Exhaust

Flash

Ability Order

Voracity

Bouncing Blades

Preparation

Shunpo

Death Lotus

Introduction

Katarina Du Couteau: The Sinister Blade

Pros / Cons

Pros:

Cons:

Things needed to master Katarina:

Full Range and Zone of Katarina Skills

Bouncing Blades - Route of the blade:

Bouncing Blades - Full (possible) Range

Range of Shunpo + Bouncing Blades

Skill Sequence

Common:

Close Combat style:

Risky one:

Tactics

Killer Instincts:

Farming:

Common abilities:

Close Range:

Runes

Masteries

Basic Masteries:

Let’s play with math:

Offensive Masteries

Descriptions and Comments of Used Masteries:

Offensive:

Defensive:

Utility:

Summoner Spells

Recommended:

Other good spells for Katarina:

Not Recommended:

Core Items

>

Core through the Game

Late Game Items

Not Recommended but Plausible:

Situational Items

Survival Situational Items

Team Play Situational Items

Situational Items against CC

Very Risky Situational Items (Stackable items)

However, those are NOT the most reliable items, use at your own risk. If you are having a good game, try to pick it up early. If not, don't bother risking losing an item slot and a lot of damage AP/damage and some gold.

Champions you should be really carefull with

Very hard against:

Champions with helpful skills/ultimates to Death Lotus

I do not recommend champions such as:

FAQ (for now item related only)

Credits

Change LOG

Katarina's Top Builds

Katarina

Top Katarina Guides

League of Legends Champions:

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