Yorick Build Guide by Quinncidence

This guide is to teach my fellow Meowricks on the most optimal build/playstyle that I have found in order to have the best success/impact in high elo games. Note that other guides will show you plenty of fun and interesting ways to play Yorick, but I will only focus on what I find to be the most optimal playstyle in master-chall games.

Also note that "ghouls" will be called "cats" in this guide.

Hello my fellow viewers and welcome to my Meowrick guide!
I am Quinncidence and I started playing league in season 1, I was a Quinn onetrick in season 6-7 where I first reached Challenger. I then decided that I wanted to play competitively so I learned more meta toplaners.
One day in Season 8 when I played Cho'Gath top I came across this weird champion called Yorick and he completely destroyed me (I played old Yorick in the past and loved the champion but I never played him after the rework in Season 6).
But after that game my love for the new Yorick started..
OP.GG on all of my accounts.


Peaked 1172 lp on EUW Season10 with mainly Yorick and Heimerdinger both with ≈ 60% after around 100-140 games on each champ (dropped down to 57% on Yorick before I took a picture).


Yorick only account that I started on in preseason to figure out the best build with the new items for him.

Yorick only account in season 11 (11 february).

Yorick was my most picked champ in my official games from 2019-2020 (11 games).
Bellow are my current achievements in my competitive career.

Here is also a video from a session I had with Krykey where I talk about how I am thinking while playing Yorick.

Why would anyone play Yorick you may ask?
Yorick is a great pick if you want to have a splitpusher that beats most tanks and immobile mages that people will play on top. He has a very unique kit that allows him to push multiple lanes at the same time, you can at the same time as you push 2 lanes go and farm the jungle and gain huge cs, gold and xp leads compared to your opponent.
He also has insane dueling potential when he has his 4 cats and Maiden ready and will win most 1v1's in the mid game.

Pros

++You get 100% of the gold/exp from minions and monsters which the cats or Maiden kill
+Melt towers
+Can solo Nashor
+Wins most 1v1 duels mid/lategame
+Can push 3 lanes at the same time
+Has cats
+Very different playstyle compared to other champs

Cons

-Immobile
-Cat/Maiden reliant
-Very different playstyle compared to other champs
-Has alot of bugs (full doc of bugs can be found here )

Lets talk Runes!

No matter which keystone you pick, the rune shards will be the same.

10%AS - This helps you lasthit easier in the earlygame which I value more than the extra AD you get from Adaptive
(if you do not feel like you have this issues, feel free to pick Adaptive).

Adaptive (can swap to Armor in a very tough matchup).

Armor/MR depending on whom you face.

Grasp of the undying

This page gives us most of the things we need as Yorick.
Grasp of the Undying - A great rune which is easy to stack when you bonk the enemy.

Demolish - Extra damage towards towers is always nice.
Conditioning - The stats you get from this rune are worth around 500g (12 min) and scales the more armor/MR you buy.
Overgrowth - Gives you around 200-300 HP at 20-30 min which is worth another 500-800 gold.

As for secondary runes the most consistent and stable choice is Inspiration.
Magical Footwear - Gives boots worth around 400g (enchanced boots with +10MS).
Approach Velocity - This rune works really well with your E Mourning Mist and Serylda's Grudge.

^If you can get away without being punished these are in most cases the best runes you can find, however vs some champions we need to change things up.

Second Wind - Vs heavy poke ( Akali, Gangplank, Jayce for example).
Bone Plating - Vs burst champs ( Camille, Jax, Renekton).

Unflinching - Vs heavy CC top/junglers ( Jax, Renekton, Elise).

You could also change the secondary runes to Domination.
Ghost Poro - Extra vision when your wards expire + more AD.
Ravenous Hunter - Once fully stacked you get 9.5% omnivamp which is great.

^These runes could work really well in lower elo but the higher you climb, the harder it will be to stack Ravenous Hunter (players do not do as many mistakes and are harder to kill) hence I stick with the more consistent option of Magical Footwear and Approach Velocity.

Conqueror

This page is great when you play vs a really tanky comp and you do not need the tankiness from Resolve. Conqueror - Great at shreading tanky targets (also synchronises well with the base AD stacking from Trinity Force).

Overheal - An extra shield is always nice.
Legend: Bloodline - 9% Lifesteal once fully stacked.
Last Stand - Best rune in the row damage wise.

Same secondary runes as before Inspiration.
Magical Footwear - Gives boots worth ≈400 of gold (enchanced boots with +10MS).
Approach Velocity - This rune works really well with your E Mourning Mist and Serylda's Grudge.

You could also change the secondary runes to Domination with the same reasoning as before (better in lower elo).
Ghost Poro - Extra vision when your wards expire + more AD.
Ravenous Hunter - Once fully stacked you get 9.5% Omnivamp which is really insane.

Unsealed Spellbook/Glacial Augment

The last runepage which you should only use if you play vs someone who you will never be able to stack Grasp of the Undying upon such as Vayne or Lucian.
Unsealed Spellbook - This keystone will give us the option to swap summoner spells which will help us more than Grasp of the Undying ever will (in the scenario you lane vs something simulair to Vayne or Lucian.
You will have plenty of good options to swap to ( Ghost and Exhaust comes to mind).

Glacial Augment- This keystone should only be picked if you plan on building Stridebreaker (the Speedrick build). This keystone combined with Stridebreaker will make it easy to get close to the ranged champs. You use the item near a enemy and if you hit them a slowing beam will appear, making it so much easier to land your E Mourning Mist when they try and run or dash away.

Magical Footwear - Gives boots worth ≈400 of gold (enchanced boots with +10MS).
Biscuit Delivery - Helps you survive the tough matchup
Approach Velocity - This rune works really well with your E Mourning Mist and Serylda's Grudge

The secondary runes we are looking for here are the ones that gives the most sustain early which are:
Second Wind - They poke, you heal
Revitalize - Best rune to withstand the poke early (also increases the heal from Q Last Rites)

Start items

Best start item stat-wise (80 HP 8 AD 2.5% omnivamp) if you do not need the sustain from Doran's Shield or Corrupting Potion . (Note that you cannot stack the omnivamp from Doran's Blade (it shows that you get more omnivamp but it actually does not work), feel free to jump into practice tool and test for yourself.

Give you alot of value vs champs that will try and bully you early levels ( Jayce or Gangplank for example). Doran's Shield basicly only gives you 80 HP as soon as lane phase is over so the item is only for early survival .

I am not a big fan of this item, but it is a viable option if you play vs a bruiser that wins early fights and you do not feel you can get away with Doran's Blade start. One could argue that swapping Approach Velocity to Time Warp Tonic could be worth it, but since I rarely feel the need to buy Corrupting Potion I do not have enough knowledge on when it might be worth, so I am gonna leave the choice to you.

Cull is a great item to give you a bit of extra gold, usually I build it in matchups where I can get the push first waves. I start with Doran's Blade and slowpush and crash the 3rd wave and do the "cheater recall" and then pick up the Cull.

Boots

Pick vs heavy CC comp.

Pick vs heavy AD comp (if enemy top and jungle are both AD Plated Steelcaps is really valuable (especially if they would buy lethality.

If you do not think you need Mercury's Treads or Plated Steelcaps then Boots of Swiftness is my favorite pair of boots, the extra movementspeed Boots of Swiftness gives will help you alot to avoid ganks while splitting or to dodge skillshots from the enemy (especially when paired with Magical Footwear, Dead Man's Plate, Winged Moonplate and Force of Nature).

Mythics

Give a really underrestimated passive "Swift Strikes" which gives u MS when you attack someone and the most important part, "If the target is a champion, increase your base AD by 6% for 3 sec (stacking up to 30%). Why would this be so good on Yorick you may ask? Well first of all Yorick has fifth highest base AD at level 18 (147 base AD) so the 30% extra base AD is lovely. Second of all the spellblade ( Sheen passive) proc SCALES on base AD, so the more stacks we have, the scarier will your Q Last Rites bonk the enemy.

Divine Sunderer is sadly not that great of an item to rush as we might think. The 10% of targets max HP damage does not do much before your enemy actually buys HP and the Mythic passive Divine Sunderer gives (5% armor/magic pen per legendary item) is nonexistent in the midgame. Imagine a 2 item spike on Yorick at the 15-20 min mark. How much does 5% armor/magic pen really do towards a target that only has around 100 armor/60 magic resist?

Divine Sunderer is supposed to be the "antitank" mythic, but for Yorick Trinity Force just gives a far better 1st item spike vs both tanks and bruisers (and more damage with the stacking base AD passive), so please never rush Divine Sunderer on Yorick.
If you face a tank with 300 armor and you need a armor pen item, just buy Serylda's Grudge as a 3th-5th item)

A viable Mythic for Yorick, if you plan on building it you need to run with Glacial Augment for maximum effect. This item should be considered when you play vs ranged top such as Lucian, Vayne or Jayce. 3% extra MS per finished Legendary item (combined with Dead Man's Plate and Force of Nature will make you really hard to catch.

Lifesteal items

Now that we have the mythics done, lets jump into the lifesteal items!
Yorick wants some kinda of lifesteal (preferably omnivamp) in his build. So if we do not pick Ravenous Hunter or Legend: Bloodline in the runes, there is not many great options for us left.

The best lifesteal (omnivamp) item there is for Yorick. The item gives him a big chunk of AD, 20 ability haste and AoE damage which will let him farm minions and monsters even faster. NEW in the last patch they removed 5% omnivamp from this item (currently 10%). There is now even more incentive to look into Titanic Hydra instead.

Gives crit now so it is kinda useless for Yorick.

Not a great item for Yorick.

Now this item looks pretty good on paper, it is a splitpush item and Yorick likes to split, correct? In most of my games (on Yorick), I mainly let my cats or Maiden split the sides while I am farming monsters or grouping with my team for an objective (drakes/Nashor). Even if I would push a lane I usually delete the towers easily with the help of Demolish and cats anyways. So with my playstyle Sanguine Blade does not benefit me that much, that is why out of all lifesteal/omnivamp items I prefer Ravenous Hydra. If you need a lifesteal item when you also have Titanic Hydra, Sanguine Blade is the best choice.

Viable Items

This item synchronises well with other HP stacking items you might build ( Sterak's Gage, Dead Man's Plate, Spirit Visage etc). The only reason why I would not build Titanic is if you do not have lifesteal in runes and you want to buy a lifesteal item. The best option would then be Ravenous Hydra.

Perfect item for Yorick. It gives alot of armor, HP and MS and I usually prefer to buy this as 2nd or 3rd. If you need the tankiness and/or the MS to survive a certain matchup build it 2nd.

Great item that synchronises well with Sterak's Gage, Gargoyle Stoneplate and Ravenous Hydra. I usually buys it as a 3rd-4th item. If I play vs alot of AP champs I could concider buying it 2nd. But usually I try to build it after Trinity Force and Ravenous Hydra.

Another perfect item for Yorick, I usually gets it as 4th or 5th item. I prefer to buy Trinity Force, Ravenous Hydra, Dead Man's Plate and Spirit Visage before.

If you play a MS based build (hello Stridebreaker) and need some MR, this is a fine choice.

A viable option as 4th-5th item vs heavy crit enemies. Synchronizes well with Glacial Augment.

Cats and Maiden applies the slow from this item, which makes it really good (especially combined with Approach Velocity). It usually has to be bought as 4th or 5th item if you want to get it.

A really valuable 4th-5th item (works well with Spirit Visage and Sterak's Gage in teamfights).

Always a viable option as 4th-5th item.

You usually just want to sit on Executioner's Calling until you have no more item slots left. Feel free to upgrade to Chempunk Chainsword once your other slots are full.

You usually just want to sit on Quicksilver Sash vs stuff like ( Ashe, Malzahar and Mordekaiser ) until you have no more item slots left. Feel free to upgrade to Silvermere Dawn once your other slots are full.

Gives you a big chunk of AD once completed, it could be a viable item for Yorick, but I have not played enough with it to give a fair statement. The cats cannot apply the bonus damage from the item!

Early game is the term we will use for the first 14 min of the game (tower plates dissapears at 14 min).

There are so many variables that dictate how you should play the lane, all depending on what champ you are playing vs on top and what junglers the teams have. Therefore I am gonna stick some very basic notes on what the goal for each stage of the game should be.


The weakest point in the game for Yorick is probably at level one, in order to spawn cats you need to walk up and lasthit minions with your Q Last Rites. Most of the bruisers and ranged champions that you will lane against will get to push the first wave (unless you start in lane before them, because they have to leash). If you cannot dictate the lane, simply lasthit and avoid to take unnecessary damage. If you play vs a tank, you will usually get the push level one.

Note that it is not the end of the world if you have to give up some CS early. Even if you are somewhat behind in farm, you will catch up as soon as the midgame arrives!

At level two (if you have 3-4 graves ready) you can look for a trade vs most champs. Throw your E Mourning Mist towards the enemy champ and if it hits, spawn the cats and watch them claw your foe.
You can repeat this everytime you have graves ready to spawn and you hit E.

I tend to look for a base as soon as I have a good spot to recall after I've collected a minimum of 700 gold (for Sheen).
The wave is now hopefully pushing towards you now, so do not waste your Teleport unless the wave is in a bad spot.

I generally do not focus much on getting plates early, you can maybe get one Demolish proc here or there but you should not focus too much on it. Most of the times it is better to get a good base off instead of staying and greeding for 160 gold (unless you need for gold for an important item). You will be able to get plates fairly easy once you finished ur Trinity Force!

As soon as we hit level 6, we have 2 options:

a) Spawn the Maiden right away and permashove the wave (you can get the push vs most champs after level 6) and go look for scuttlecrab/jungle camps before next wave arrives.

b) Do not spawn the Maiden, keep the lane in a spot near your tower so you can safely farm and be safe from ganks.

It is really hard to say which option is the best without seeing the game, it all depends on where the junglers are and where they are pathing.

If you have been able to kill most of the minions you should have enough gold for Trinity Force (which should be the first item in pretty much every game) around 8-12 min. Once the Trinity Force is completed we have a new goal!

The new goal is to get as many tower plates as possible before they disappear at the 14 min mark. It is also around the 10-14 min time where the toplaners usually decides to Teleport or run to secure the Dragon .
If the enemy laner decides to join the Dragon fight and you have a cannon wave (with R ready) on toplane you can simply take 5 plates in one wave.

Enemy got one drake, but you just got yourself 3-5 plates worth of gold and are now ready for the next stage of the game..

Mid game is the term we will use for the 14-20 min in the game.

Hopefully you managed to farm fairly well in the early game, but things will only get easier from now on!
At this stage some towers are hopefully destroyed or atleast very low, once top tower is gone and you are sitting on your Trinity Force, Magical Footwear and are now building towards your 2nd item it is time to really get going with the farming!
If you do not feel you need the extra tankiness from a Dead Man's Plate (my favorite tank item vs AD champs) or Spirit Visage(vs AP champs) the best item you can get will be Ravenous Hydra in order to get plenty of sustain and to clear minions/monsters faster.

What you want to do now is to farm, farm and farm!
Summon your Maiden and let her spawn cats in the lane so that the cats will push it. Once you have 3-4 cats that are attacking the wave, simply run towards nearest available jungle camp.
Each cat has to hit the wave atleast once in order to stay in the lane.

You should be able at this point (with the help of your Maiden and cats) to win most 1v1 skirmishes so if the enemy laner sits on the lane there should not be any issue to force the enemy away and let the cats attack the minions. If you for some reason do not win the 1v1 even with Maiden and cats then you should head towards the jungle and farm the closest camp and let the enemy push the wave towards your tower before you go and collect it.

Push wave, kill closest camp, push wave, kill closest camp..
At this point your 4 cats can kill the Gromp without you, you can simply have the cats following you towards the Gromp and you throw your E Mourning Mist which will make the cats leap to the Gromp and kill it while you are running back to the lane.

Another imporant thing is to keep track on where your jungler is moving, lets look at this scenario:

"You are playing Meowrick on blueside and just pushed the out the wave on top and will now look to farm the closest camp. Enemy krugs are gone so the closest (and safest) camp would be the Gromp, we head there and we kill it. What we didnt notice is that our jungler went base and was heading towards the Gromp to do a clear towards bot. As soon as he arrives he sees his weird looking teammate in a cat costume (that would be you) killing "his" Gromp. He now types "x9 Yorick stealing my camps" and goes afk.."

After all it is soloq that we are mainly playing, so by taking your junglers camps when he is heading there will upset alot of junglers, so you have to be cautious about when you can take the camps (try and do it while your jungler is fighting on the other side of the map for example).

The most important aspect of the midgame is probably the drakes.
If you need to join your team for a crucial Dragon (if enemy already has 2 drakes or more).
This also depends on game to game on what kind of comp your team and the enemy team has, but unless the enemy has a really tanky comp which your R Eulogy of the Isles will help shread, it is often better to release the Maiden in the lane furthest away from the Dragon (top). If they have a comp where the Maiden will actually make a big difference in a fight (once again vs a really tanky comp) atleast try and have some cats pushing the wave furthest away.
In the best scenario will look something like this:

"The Drake is about to spawn in 60-90 sec and you need to be there since it is a crucial drake.

Summon the Maiden and release her in your base (near top inhib tower so she goes top) , then head straight towards the botlane and spawn some cats there to make sure it will push.

It is now 20-50 sec before drake spawns and you go group with your team and have a 5v5 staredown in midlane or drake area."

Since both top and bot will push due to your cats and R Eulogy of the Isles all you want to do now is to buy time, sure the drake is important but if you can just make sure the enemy cannot start it and you juggle with them, the enemy will lose towers while you still get all the gold/exp in the side (you get 100% of all the gold/exp from minions/monsters which the cats or Maiden kill).

Remember that the mindset on Yorick should always be "farm, farm and farm". Always try to make sure that you will have cats that can push lanes far away from the objectives that you will have to group for.
The more waves you push and camps you take (without making your jungle too angry), the bigger the exp and gold difference between you and the enemy top will grow.
Now we're heading towards the last stage of the game..

Late game is the term we will use for the +20 min in the game.

The difference from mid to lategame is not that big, but now we have TWO big objectives on the map ( Dragon and Baron Nashor ) so we have the same idea on how we set up for crucial objectives as before (Put cats/Maiden in lanes furthest away from the objective 60-90 sec in advance).

It is not very likely that the teams just try and take Nashor as soon as the 20 min mark hits. It is more important after 25-35 min (depending on how the games goes).

Remember that we also play with Teleport. Therefore, it is not needed to run and group with the team for an objective. Generally your soloq teammates will tend to get caught in 4v5 situations, thus sometimes it is better to just let the cats push the sidewaves while you stick with your team and keep them safe.


In this video I am gonna set up cats in sidelane (50sec before) for an crucial objective and I then group with my team and finally Teleport towards the wave my cats pushed.
Our comp is gonna have a really hard time winning that drake fight (we managed to steal it but it is still very unlikely).
What you can do is to set up the cats prior to the objective. Then as soon as the Dragon / Baron Nashor fight will break out, you can Teleport on your pushing cats, if they are attacking the enemy base or are close to do so..

The enemy then have to find a way to base and stop me from ending the game, which they did in this clip but in other games the Teleport play will be successful.

In this guide I have shown you some ways on how you can use the lovely champion Yorick, but there is still so many other scenarios where he can be played in different ways. I am probably add more as time goes, but I hope this guide gave some some insight on how the champion can be played.

This is also my first written guide I have ever done. Therefore, I am happy to take any kind of criticism from you, my fellow viewer!
Is something poorly explained, something important is missing or maybe you just do not like that I call the ghouls "cats"?
Feel free to let me know!

I will also stream a lot of Yorick gameplay as soon as Season 11 starts so feel free to jump in and ask any questions you might have or if you just simply want to watch how I play Meowrick on https://www.twitch.tv/quinncidencelol

I hope you learnt something and if you have any questions whatsoever you can always DM me on discord (Quinncidence#7466) or on my twitter!