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Hi there! I'm Jammy Kammy, currently a silver garbage support main, but I just love Vayne so much. She was the first ADC that I really liked and was able to carry with, so I’ve always loved playing her. Vayne is easily my favorite ADC because she reminds me of the assassins with the opportunity for lots of dashes and combo-esque technique. Vayne has lots of carry potential that I had discovered throughout my time of playing League of Legends, even at top lane with this build. I wanted to create this guide to show people a potential opportunity to play this champion in its more “troll” spots, but make good use of it in a more assassin/bruiser-like way.

Obviously, Vayne is meant to be played as a hyper-carry ADC, wherein she has a support whose job is to keep her safe through her incredibly weak laning phase until she can get items and become a threat. However, this build wants to exploit other champions’ weak laning phases (in the top lane), and ensure her own safety by playing everything by her needs and options (in the jungle). This build is always a work-in-progress, and is constantly updating because this is such an unconventional build, but I’ve been seeing good success in the right matchups, which seems to be the most important part of this build.

Vayne is a rather risky pick to throw top lane, but sometimes it proves to be a good, fun option.

Pros:

Super fun lane bully if put into a good matchup.

Assassin-like ADC with major hyper-carry potential.

Pretty safe to draft if your adc doesn’t reveal for some time.

Cons:

Easily counterpicked if blind, resulting in a hard lane.

Difficult mechanics

Flash - Best summoner spell in-game. No doubt about it.

Teleport - Meta top-lane summoner. Lets you get back to lane quicker.

Ignite - Could be used in lieu of teleport. I think this would be best against a really easy lane that could potentially get you a first blood.

Barrier/Exhaust - Could be used in lieu of teleport. This would be optimal against someone who has really good dueling/killing potential at top lane. Use only if you have a really hard or easy lane.

There are two ways to play Vayne top. You can either max your Tumble if you are having a very easy time in lane and want to get kills in order to snowball a lead for yourself, or max your Silver Bolts if you find that laning phase will not be the moment where your strength will be reached.

You should max condemn last because tumble and silver bolts do so much damage, and your team can provide any CC if you can’t chase down an enemy (as Vayne tho lol), and obviously put a point in your ultimate whenever it is available.

-Important ways to use skills

Passive - Your passive is for chasing enemies down to poke or kill them. Use this to your advantage.

Q

-Tumble is a dash that also grants an auto attack reset. This provides huge synergy with your silver bolts, as well as any Sheen items you pick up during the game.

-Tumble can be used to effectively escape enemies, dodge skillshots, and chase. Being on a short cool down and low mana cost, there isn’t much punishment for using it freely.

W

-Silver bolts do true damage to an enemy when an enemy has 3 stacks of silver bolts on them. Some people will take advantage of the fact that a greedy Vayne will do almost anything to get that third stack. Sometimes it isn’t worth it, but if you are safe, take the advantage you have with this ability.

-As previously mentioned, Tumble provides and auto attack reset that, when in range of an enemy, will always proc the auto if you have already clicked the enemy champion either before or mid-Tumble. This means that if you land one shot on an enemy and Tumble, you can get the next two shots off very easily.

E

-Condemn is the make/break spell on most Vayne players. Condemn is a wall away from securing the kill or saving your opponent’s life and getting BM’ed in chat. Condemn should be used very sparingly as it has a very high cooldown and mana cost.

-Tumble can be used to get a better angle on an enemy, allowing a more secure Condemn to pin an enemy to the wall.

-Condemn also procs silver bolts.

-Condemn applies the damage AFTER the end of the targeted unit’s displacement.

-You can condemn minions…. Generally, try not to do that.

R

-Final Hour is the assassin-esque opportunity that Vayne gets. She is able to go invisible for a relatively long time after Tumble (isn’t that spell so important?? No wonder I like to max it first.) It would be nice to save Tumble for Final Hour so that it is easier to get away. Also, auto as soon as possible to trigger the cooldown timer on Tumble.

-Having a very low cooldown for an ultimate, Final Hour is able to be used to escape a fight if necessary and especially if worthwhile (surviving/getting kills). However, if every Final Hour is used to escape, something is obviously not going right.

Ultimate Vayne Condemn Combo

R - Q - E

Harass Combo

Auto - Q - Auto

Fight Combo

Q - E - Auto/Q till it’s dead

18/0/12

Fury - 4% attack speed is better on Vayne than 2% boosted (lol) Tumble and Condemn damage.

Feast - This or Fresh Blood. This is safer, which makes lane phase as Vayne slightly more forgiving by sustain. Fresh Blood is good for an easy lane, but expose weakness is like an AP support mastery.

Vampirism - Lifesteal is better than some AD scaling and useless AP.

Battle Trance - Good for small trades. Better than double-edge sword b/c it doesn’t empower enemy poke champions. The other good choice would be Bounty Hunter, but that’s only beneficial if you can kill most or all the enemies.

Battering Blows - Armor pen is better than magic pen on Vayne.

Warlord’s Bloodlust - This is the quintessential mastery on Vayne. This keeps her sustained and safe in lane phase as well as healthy in trades. It’s better than Grasp of the Undying because it gives a smaller portion as a ranged champion. Fervor is good if you have an easy lane or are carrying hard, but I feel like Warlord’s gives Vayne the lane safety she needs. I don’t need to say why you shouldn’t run DFT….

Recovery - Health regeneration is typically the first stat hit when a champion gets nerfed. Health regeneration is so good. We also don’t know if we’ll be stacking MR & Armor, so Unyielding might not be good anyway.

Tough Skin - Kinda a bad part of the tree, tbh. Tough skin is the only thing worth getting b/c of champ dmg reduction. Explorer is good for roaming, but top lane is moreso a farm/duel until Rift.

Runic Armor - Empowers lifesteal and health regeneration. Better than just 72 health (one aa vs. sustain).

Insight - Good to have the TP and Flash up sooner. The other two parts of the tree are good if you are dealing with lots of dmg or poke lane.

Runes are highly customizable. A good core is to have AS, AD, and Health in the kit. I use Marks of AD, Glyphs of AS, and Health Seals. Personally, I do run 1% crit in my marks because it’s kinda troll (but don’t rely only on the crit in fights!). I also have Quints of AD because Vayne has very low base AD, but you are also able to run AS, Lifesteal, Crit, Armor Pen, or almost anything else that gives you some AD-based benefits on your quints.

Start

Doran’s Blade - Great for an easy lane.

Shield - Great for an oppressive lane, but I never run this. Usually I just use longsword & 3 pots and upgrade to Vampiric Scepter before I get my first item.

Longsword + 3 Pots - Oppressive lane.

Off-Meta Preferential Starts

Corrupting Potion - Good against hard trade lanes or against major sustain champs. I don't use this, typically.

Cull - Honestly, idk if people still build this item (especially to start) but it’s here if you really want it.

First Back

Vampiric Scepter - First option for build after Longsword start. You’ll need the early BORK for lifesteal and AS for farming.

Sheen - Build after Doran’s Blade start. Continue the harass and pressure on this lane w/ a maxed Tumble.

Serrated Dirk/Caulfield’s Hammer - Possible start for lethality build if you are going to be the only potential carry.

Zeal - Build if you need crit strike early or if you are going to be the only potential carry.

Hexdrinker - Build if you need MR in lane.

Boots of Speed - Pick up if you can.

First Item

Iceborn Gauntlet - If you are against an AD Laner.

Maw of Malmortius - If you are against an AP Laner.

Complete Starting Item

BORK - If you started Vamp Scepter or want it after Iceborn/Maw.

Trinity Force - Build if you started sheen but are the only potential carry after first back. (I almost never build this.)

Lethality Path - If you go Lethality Vayne for hard-carry.

Rapid Firecannon - Full carry build for crit strike Vayne.

Boots - Berserker’s if you are doing well in lane but need more AS, Tabi if you are doing poorly against AD, Treads if you are doing poorly against AP or generally need Tenacity.

Backache

Guinsoo’s Rageblade - Great if you have some AS to stack on silver bolts.

Infinity Edge - Crit-heavy build.

Essence Reaver - For heavy full-on carries that condemn, ultimate, and tumble all day.

Phantom Dancer - Great item to throw into a build, even if it isn’t hard-carry-like.

Statikk Shiv - Only really good for a full-carry build or a split-push build.


Armor Pen

Black Cleaver - Quintessential for survivability with the lethality build.

Edge of Night - Never used it on Vayne, but it’s kinda like a Nocturne shield which usually works pretty well for him, so you should be good w/ it.

Youmuu’s Ghostblade - Great duel/chase/escape item for Vayne.

Duskblade of Draktharr - Synergizes w/ Vayne Ultimate and great item rn anyway.

Armor

Thornmail - Great for dealing with sustain and oppressive AD.

Randuin’s - Good for dealing with critical strike and/or chasing.

Dead Man’s Plate - Great for chasing, damage, and some beef.

Frozen Heart - Good for countering AS ADC’s.

Beef

Banner of Command - Good for split-push.

Gargoyle Stoneplate - Never used, but probably good for tanking up.

Guardian Angel - Ofc, this is so good after the change.

Locket of the Iron Solari - Great for teamfights.

Zz’rot Portal - Great for split-push.

Frozen Mallet - Good for CC, survival, and, damage if you don’t have Iceborn.

Warmog’s Armor - Full-on health, sustain, and survival.

Bloodthirster - Used for surviving fights.

Mercurial Scimitar - Good for surviving fights w/ free Tenacity.

MR

Adaptive Helm - Used only for DOT’s or hella low CD threats.

Spirit Visage - Great survival for AP threats.

Wit’s End - Good for AS build against AP threats.

Early Game

Laning phase is very dependent on the matchup. Of course, your main priority should be farming - whether that’s champions or minions is dependent on the matchup. If you have an easy matchup, you may be getting several kills and a substantial amount of farm early. You goal should be about 80 farm, give or take, and at least higher than the enemy lane’s farm. Tumble should be used for pushing wave, harassing, and escaping ganks. Condemn should only be used during ganks or when you have a very clear wall-shot in a fight. If all else fails, you can Condemn if an enemy is quickly chasing and winning the fight. Final Hour should only be used in relatively the same situations.

Level 2 is very good for you, and typically better than most top laners. Level 3 will keep you safe or give you the kill potential that you need. Level 6 is just an empowered level 3. Level 9 is also a great spike for either your Silver Bolt damage (which should be backed up by early attack speed) or Tumble (which should have at least a Sheen supporting the damage).

Mid/Late Game

Roaming from mid lane and supports will begin taking place. If you still have to play laning phase with the enemy top lane, that is perfectly okay as Vayne. Farming will help keep Vayne in the game if not ahead. A Rift Herald would sit very nicely at top lane if this is the case. If not, bring it down to shove mid. Dragon fights may begin, which will be very nice for Vayne because there are so many walls for Condemn. Vayne will need to act as an assassin/ADC in a lot of these fights. Picks are good, but if she survives, it goes so much better. In theory, Vayne can kite and peel for herself well enough that she doesn’t need as much help from the team as Jinx would, for example. The point of this build comes out now - to stay alive long enough in a team fight while being a damage threat. You need to be able to take out either stragglers (easy enough) or whoever comes after you, so if you need to just live longer in fights to succeed, you build the tankier stuff.

Thank you for reading! Please make any suggestions that might help - I would love to look into anything that can help improve this guide! That’s all I’ve got for now! See you next patch for my update!

*Matchups coming soon!!*