[S15] LordGrox High Elo Rek'sai Guide
Build Guide By LordGrox
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Rek'Sai Build Guide By LordGrox
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Rek'Sai Build Guide By LordGrox
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Recommended Items
Runes: Bruiser: Conqueror
1
2
Precision
Inspiration
+10% Attack Speed
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+10-180 Bonus Health
Spells:
Flash
Smite
Items
Default Options
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Starting Items
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Bruiser Build
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Core Items
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Alternative Items
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Assassin
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Core Items
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Good Items
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Alternative Items
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Ability Order Q > E > W Max Order
Fury of the Xer'Sai (PASSIVE)
Rek'Sai Passive Ability
Threats & Synergies
Threats
Synergies
Extreme
Major
Even
Minor
Tiny
Show All
None
Low
Ok
Strong
Ideal
Extreme Threats
Ideal Synergies
Gragas
Almost unplayable matchup thanks to his E which has no effective counterplay. Avoid direct confrontation unless ahead, be careful not to over-chase, as he can easily turn situations around.
Rek'Sai
It's important to note that the best way to achieve synergy in a game is to play with people you know, rather than relying on specific champions. However, if you're looking for some tips, champions that provide crowd control are good for ganking. Additionally, champions that give you shields, health, or movement speed can be useful in other situations.
Synergies
Ideal
Strong
Ok
Low
None
Rek'Sai
It's important to note that the best way to achieve synergy in a game is to play with people you know, rather than relying on specific champions. However, if you're looking for some tips, champions that provide crowd control are good for ganking. Additionally, champions that give you shields, health, or movement speed can be useful in other situations.
Hello! My name is LordGrox, and I am a huge fan of Rek'Sai. I have been playing her exclusively in high elo EUW SoloQ ever since her release and have developed a deep understanding of the champion. In this guide, I will share some of my insights and strategies with you.
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I stream on twitch from time to time! Give me a follow to get notified when I go live! |
If you want to talk about this guide, feel free to join the Rek'Sai mains community Discord!
Special ThanksWHO AM I?ChangelogIf you want to see detailed rune pages and explanations, please refer to the in-depth section!
Right now there are 2 meta builds that you can choose from. The next section in this guide will try to explain that some more, but the 2 runes that emerge from this selection are
Conqueror and Hail of Blades:|
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CONQUEROR Conqueror provides bonus AD, which is incredibly strong thanks to Rek'Sais bonus AD scaling on all abilities. As it does not provide any Attack Speed, your combo will have to be well trained in order to utilize this rune to the fullest.
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HAIL OF BLADES Hail of Blades is the attack speed rune from the Domination tree. It speeds up your combo and allows you to quickly hit a fully rage stacked E, making it excellent in burst scenarios. In contrast to Conqueror, this rune provides no additional damage to your combo, instead it only increases your DPS.
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PERSONAL OPINION |
BEST RUNE: CONQUEROR Conqueror outperforms other runes especially in any extended skirmishes. Bonus AD and Healing are actually fairly benefitial and stacks can be gained even from your Smite or active items like Stridebreaker.
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Why are other runes not mentioned?
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Go visit the "What not to pick" Section in the In-Depth Runes section for more information on other keystones! |
If you want to see itemization, please refer to the builds section at the top!
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BRUISER
+ Strong survivabilty + Skirmishing potential + Helps with playing as a semi-frontliner + High Sticking power - Lower damage output - Expensive items Meta choice for people who prefer the "normal" bruiser playstyle of Rek'Sai, focused on making plays while being tanky enough to survive skirmishes even when you get locked down. |
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ASSASSIN
+ High burst damage + Opens assassin opportunities + Gives more agency to your plays | Decent sticking power - Lower survivability - High vulnerability to CC Alternative choice to the bruiser playstyle. While Rek'Sai always prefers to play somewhat like an assassin regardless of build, this greatly enhances her assassin playstyle. It will provide you more opportunities to single out targets and oneshot them with great burst, at the cost of making you much more vulnerable. |
Now that you've chosen a build, let's delve into your item choices.
STARTERS
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BLUE SMITE Blue smite is the only smite you really need. While others are okay, blue smite excells at allowing you to make more plays due to the movement speed. |
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HEALTH POTION Not recommended, as you should be able to clear just fine without. Rek'Sai has enough sustain, so if you do struggle I recommend training your clears in practice tool. |
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STEALTH WARD The default trinket for every jungler. While you can buy Oracle Lens in anticipation of the enemy warding one of your jungle entrances, it is usually better to take the Stealth Ward.
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CORE
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BRUISER
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ASSASSIN
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GOOD ITEMS
Note: From this point on, any bruiser item is viable. Feel free to select any you haven't bought yet.
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3300
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DEATH'S DANCE Very basic bruiser item, good against AD heavy teams. Stats are of course desireable and it's passive damage cleanse can greatly increase the odds of your survival in teamfights. |
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3100
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SUNDERED SKY A decent choice for bruiser players. HP synergizes with Titanic Hydra, AD is always welcome and Haste is useful for using more high CD abilities like your E or R. The sustain from it's passive is another major reason to buy this item, granted that you utilize it well in teamfights.
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3200
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BLADE OF THE RUINED KING As this item deals %Current HP damage, this item shines against bruiser/tank heavy teams. If you need to carry your team, this is a decent choice to greatly enhance your damage, at the cost of making you a lot more squishy. |
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3100
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MAW OF MALMORTIUS A decent item against Full AP comps, but for the most part this gets outperformed by Sterak's Gage. I would only seriously consider this against a full AP team with some tanks.Note: This cannot be bought together with Sterak's Gage, so make absolutely sure that you really need this item!
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ALTERNATIVE ITEMS
Note: You are of course free to buy these items if you feel that they suit your playstyle, I would however advise against them for the most part.
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2900
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ECLIPSE Bit of an outlier item, as it is fully damage oriented but provides no lethality. This can be considered as an alternative to other full damage items but generally feels worse, as the shield utility it provides often times gets dwarfed. |
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3100
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LORD DOMINIK'S REGARDS Rarely you will encounter someone still building crit on Rek'Sai. This can however be a choice if you are truly desperate to carry against very tanky opponents, although its complete lack of utility at such a high price point is a large drawback. 25% crit chance alone will also not change much. |
TANK ITEMS
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Now before you look at these items, here's a DISCLAIMER: While Rek'Sai top excells by building HP and abusing the passive HP% based healing, this isn't great for jungle. Your role is a lot more active and as such you do not have the option to farm Fury against minions to heal mid-fight. While these items can definitely be built later into the game, I would still not recommend them personally. |
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2900
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KAENIC ROOKERN One of the better choices for tank items, as this can syngergize fairly well with Titanic Hydra. The impressive base stats make this a fairly good choice against strong AP carries.
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2900
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DEAD MAN'S PLATE Decent value against AD heavy comps and provides you with some additional movement speed. The hit now also scales with base AD (since 11.13), so that's kinda cool. |
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2700
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SPIRIT VISAGE A decent item if your team has a healer, as it increases the heals you gain, as well as the bit of healing Conqueror provides. Furthermore this of course also enhances your passive healing. A decent choice against AP heavy teams. |
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Resistance Boots are currently meta. Pick them depending on the situation. |
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↗ Plated Steelcaps Strong resistance oriented boots against heavy AD teams. Also provide damage reduction against auto attacks which is useful against ADCs and AA heavy champions. |
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↗ Mercury's Treads Strong resistance oriented boots against AP and CC heavy teams. Also prodive tenacity, which is useful against CC heavy teams (even if they are not full AP). |
Other boots and why we dont pick themTIER 3 BOOTS
Generally we only want resistance boots. Because of this, there are only 2 realistic tier 3 boots you will buy:
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Armored Advance or Chainlaced Crushers Both of these boots are generally great upgrades that will increase your survivability whenever possible. They come at a price point of 750 and 800respectively, which they do not make up for in raw stat value (if we ignore their new passives). These can only be bought if you win the Feats of Strength and have finished 2 items. Because of their price however, it is generally not a good choice to buy these directly after finishing 2 items. Instead it is often times better to finish a 3rd item first, as you are more dependant on the damage stats a full item provides.
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Please note that personal preference can impact your choice and that all smites are valid options.
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↗ Gustwalker Hatchling This smite offers pretty decent movement speed bonuses on bushes and monster kills. This makes it faster to clear your jungle as it reduces the time you spend moving from camp to camp, but it will also be a great tool to get from A to B fast. Weave bushes into your walk paths and you will out-move everyone. |
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→ Scorchclaw Pup Damage based smite that can help against tankier targets, but your job is usually do deal with squishy damage dealers or bruisers. Simply gets outclassed by the utility of blue smite. |
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→ Mosstomper Seedling The defense route. You usually don't really want to pass on the utility capabilities of blue smite, so I don't recommend this. Suited for defensive players who seek more survivability. |
In the upper section, I show 2 different maxing orders. Let's look at the advantages of either one of them.
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↗ Q MAX INTO E MAX Best in slot after the 13.11 buffs. The Q cooldown at level 5 together with ability haste items is insanely low and the sooner you hit it the better. While you sacrifice some E cooldown, the combat strength you gain is massive. |
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↘ 3Q INTO E MAX While tunnel cooldown reduction is greatly appreciated, on current Rek'Sai you really want to have your Q maxed as fast as possible, due to the fact that not only the cooldown decreases but also the %-based scaling increases. With it's low cooldown, your Q will be your main clearing + consistent damage dealing tool. |
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TIME TO TAKE A LOOK AT REK'SAIS KIT!
As you may already know, Rek'Sai is a shapeshifter, similar to champions like
Elise or Jayce, meaning she can swap between 2 forms. For Rek'Sai this change of forms is triggered by her W, which unlike the 2 champions above has to be skilled.I encourage you to read the ability descriptions yourself first to get a general understanding of what each ability does. This will help you make informed decisions about how to use them in-game.
Now let's delve into her abilities!
PASSIVE: FURY OF THE XER'SAI
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Rek'Sais passive heals her by consuming fury while burrowed. This happens in 3 second increments and heals maximum health on a percentage base, scaled by level. Because of this, her passive is a great tool to regenerate even during combat, especially once the mid game starts and she has bought some HP items. |
UNBURROWED FORM
Q: QUEEN'S WRATH
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Her Q will add extra AD damage to your auto attacks. Now here's the juicy part: It will act as an auto attack reset. This means you can quickly strike twice in a row by auto-attacking once, pressing Q, and then quickly auto-attacking again. This is integral to every interaction you will have, so remember it! |
W: BURROW
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Her W is a shapeshifting ability. The burrow does nothing aside from changing your form! Wait, I lied. You may have realised that while burrowed, your vision gets obscured, with a large circle AOE around you. That is your TREMOR SENSE! Inside of this AOE, every moving object gets revealed by a small ping every 1.5s. This is a huge advantage because it gives you vision outside of where you should be able to see! |
E: FURIOUS BITE
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Her E is a great tool against any target, but deals most damage against those with more HP. You always want to use it with max fury, as without you will lose the %-based damage! This ability no longer deals true damage. |
BURROWED FORM
Q: PREY SEEKER
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Want range in your melee kit? Here you go! Her Q will send a missile flying towards the enemy, revealing them for 1.5s (while burrowed!). The range of this ability is similar to the AOE you see around yourself from being burrowed. Use it as a range indicator! Amusingly enough this ability scales with AP. |
W: UNBURROW
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Her burrowed W is still a shapeshifting ability, but this one is important: it's your knock-up! This knocks up all targets in your range, but the key part is that this will knock up your primary target within your auto attack range (this can be done simply by casting an attack move on the target). Funnily enough, this knockup range can therefor be increased with an item like Rapid Firecannon.
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E: TUNNEL
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The bread and butter of Rek'Sai, her E will allow you to place a reusable tunnel on the map. This will take you through terrain and creates unique paths only you can take. Be aware that enemies can destroy these by standing on them! |
R: VOID RUSH
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Rek'sais finishing move: Void Rush. Apply any damage on an enemy and you will see them marked with your fin. Now, whenever you feel like it, using R on a marked target will burrow you in the ground for 1.5s, during which you become untargetable. After the initial timer, you will pounce on the enemy in a range of up to 1750 units (that's a lot), dealing missing HP% damage. This makes her R a great execution tool! |
Now that you've had a good look at her abilities let's look at Rek'Sais combos, as well as some special interactions her kit provides!
Let's start with the basics.
Auto Attack Reset
The classic Auto Attack Reset
Every single time you attack something, you should do an Auto-Attack Reset (assuming your Q is up):
Order:
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Auto Attack
- Queen's Wrath
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Auto Attack
This should be used against every single target in the game. Learn to utilize this everywhere, as it provides extra damage and speed.
Basic Combo
The most basic combo, usually used against jungle camps and champions
A simple combo you also want to use against most single targets in the game. This should be your bread and butter against champions and jungle camps. This combo can always be executed and does not rely on large cooldowns.
Order:
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Alternative Order:
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Advanced Combo
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BRUISER
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Since Stridebreaker doesn't really interact with your auto attacks, it can be triggered at any point early in the combo to gain 2 more Conqueror stacks.
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ASSASSIN
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Your Q and Titanic are each auto attack resets, allowing you to hit 5 enhanced auto attacks (Note the last auto attack just before casting R!)
The most advanced combo. Used against champions for maximum burst. Be aware that this requires all cooldowns to be up in order to be fully executed. Generally, every combo you do aims to be this one, but more often than not something will be on cooldown, in which case you just leave out the missing parts.
Order for Bruiser:
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Order for Assassin:
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I want to spoil some Rek'Sai main secrets I've learned over the years, so let's list them here:
Manual W and toggles
One of your most valuable tools in a gank/skirmish/anywhere is your W
Unburrow. Hitting the knockup on a key target is of utmost importance. Here are things you should know:
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Problem: the enemy is covered by minions. If you manually press W Unburrow, you are likely to miss the target and knock up a minion Solution: manually right-click the enemy champion to guarantee a knockup |
Right click toggle
Expanding on the problem shown above, you will notice that it can get hard to right-click an enemy champion properly. Luckily, riot provides tools to fix that. Enable these 2 settings:
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Set a keybind for your champion toggle. (Whatever key you are comfortable with)
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Turn it into a toggle instead of a button that needs to be held
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With these 2 settings you can now toggle "champion only". Right clicks will no longer work on anything else, meaning you can no longer miss your knock-ups!
WARNING: This does not work with Auto Attack Move, only right click!
Auto Attack Move
Once again adding onto what I already said, you should learn to utilize "Auto Attack Move". For me this is bound to the key 'A'. It allows you to quickly perform AA's without having to hit a target with right-click. While I do trust you in that you are the absolute gaming golem, right-click master and a general high-end gamer, I recommend you get used to this. Having to hit right clicks is unnecessary when Auto Attack Move exists.
Do note that this does NOT work together with the champion only toggle!
The ult dodge
Let's look at 2 clips first to see what I'm talking about:
Dodging a dangerous Orianna R
Dodging a Qiyana R
Your R
Void Rush makes you untargetable for 1.5s. Additionally, you will disappear from the map for a short period of time. This allows you to dodge all kinds of nasty damage and CC! Aside from being untargetable, this can also be used to dodge an ability predictively.Here are some examples of abilities which are beneficial to dodge:
- Jax E Counter Strike - Stun
- Darius Q Decimate - Damage & Healing
- Ahri E Charm - Charm effect
- Aatrox 3rd Q of The Darkin Blade - Damage & Knock-up
- ...
EVEN MORE ABILITIES!This list could go on for quite a while, and I may get around to adding more Abilities. Fact is: Incorporate dodging key abilities into your playstyle.
Ult Dodge 2: Sleepy boogaloo
Despite being affected by Drowsy, Rek'Sai does not enter sleep after or during her ult cast. Instead, the effect is defacto cleansed.
Now ignore the joke title, because this one is important:
Lillia with Lilting Lullaby and Zoe with Sleepy Trouble Bubble can apply the drowsy status effect, which will put you to sleep after a short timer. This can be dodged by ulting a target while still drowsy!Ult reveal
Notice how Akali stays revealed during Rek'Sais R duration, even though she is insider her shroud and not attacking?
Very situational, but an unexpected trick. Some champions can go invisible in combat. Stuff like Akali
Twilight Shroud, Kha'Zix Void Assault or Shaco Deceive. These will usually stay hidden until they reveal themselves. Here's the important part: your R Void Rush reveals enemies! This means that if you use your R predictive on the enemy invisibility, they will stay revealed no matter the circumstances. This means you can reveal the enemy for your team to kill, making tools like Akalis Shroud useless.The W landing ult
See how you land burrowed? You can instantly knock up again after landing!
The trick with this is to spam your W
Burrow while you are in the air during your R Void Rush. It can be hard to pull off and isn't always doable since your W needs to be off cooldown. It does give you the advantage of landing ready to knock your target up, making it a decent engage tool.The 1-way tunnel
A simple spell, but quite unbreakable. A 1-way tunnel outside of the drake pit. It can be used from the inside, but cannot be destroyed from the inside.
These tunnels are called 1-way tunnels because they are only really useful from 1 side. Please note that these have fairly limited uses. You should not be placing these intentionally, but instead abuse this mechanic whenever a tunnel entrance is really close to a thin wall!
These can be placed at any thin wall in the game. Usually, you would want them from a side where it is harder for the enemy to break them, meaning your side (eg. Blue side places them from Blue side territory)
I covered some Interactions, now let's look at some dangerous interactions you need to watch out for!
STATUS EFFECTS
Grounded status effectGrounded effects make it impossible to use your E
Tunnel, R Void Rush and Summoner Spell Flash. Getting grounded means you will be helpless, so avoid the effect as much as you can!Champions that ground you are
Cassiopeia, Poppy and Singed.Silence status effectA usual silence is always a danger, as it keeps you from using your abilities/Summoner Spells/Items. A special case that you should know about is
Sorakas E Equinox. Standing inside of it means you can still auto-attack while burrowed, but you will not knock up! Remember this, as you can still abuse the situation to get some quick AAs in.Nearsight status effectAs with Silence, this is also a common danger, but it is enhanced by Rek'Sai being burrowed. This already reduces your sight radius by a ton. If you get the Nearsight effect while burrowed, your sight radius will get so small that it gets almost impossible to find targets.
Be aware of this against
Graves, Nocturne and Quinn!Blind status effectOnly the devil
Teemo himself can apply this status effect to you. While blinded, auto-attacks will not grant any fury! Try not to waste your Q while blinded, as deal no damage and lose your procs.CHAMPIONS
Let's take a look at some nasty interactions you should watch out for:
Dangerous Champion InteractionsI've explained the basics of the kit so far, now let's talk about tunnels. Rek'Sais burrowed E
Tunnel allows you to place a tunnel at a fixed range. This tunnel is your main form of engage and also your greatest ganking tool.Generally, there are Utility and Gank tunnels. Here's what the gank tunnels look like most of the time:
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Red Side Gank Tunnels
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Blue Side Gank Tunnels
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You generally want to be oppertunistic with these and place them whenever the need arises during a gank.
Next up are Utility tunnels:
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These can be placed whenever you are just farming camps and have the cooldown of your tunnel available. Make sure NOT to place these when you expect a gank or a skirmish soon, as you may want that cooldown to be available! |
Before I go into the details, let's clarify what pathing even means. Pathing defines the path you take while going through the jungle. It gets changed by the camps you take, the order you take them in and the ganks/invades you do in between.
I've greatly compressed this entire section into a single image as to give you a better idea of what to do:
The idea
- This path will be followed on either side of the map.
- This pathing is largely an alternative to match against full clear junglers.
- Instead of full clearing, the idea is to force a level 3 gank (at any lane really)
- After getting in a (hopefully) successful gank, you will want to resume your clear
- This path will leave you 2 camps down after 2 full clears, but should help you apply more pressure to the map, getting early leads.
Details
- Clear your birds (You can even start W at lvl 1, as it makes no difference in clear speed)
- Clear Krugs
- Clear your Red Buff ( Smite it!) Then, gank any lane. Should you gank your
red-side sidelane (in the image above that would be your botlane), you usually want to backport and buy some Long Swords. - Resume the clear and get your blue-side crab OR your blue, depending on the timer
- Get blue or the crab, whatever remains
- Resume your full clear, starting at Gromp. From here on out, clear towards your red-side
Please note that as of now I will not be going into great detail on later pathing. Pathing is a very difficult construct and is best learned through experience or through other sources. I do not think a written guide will do a good job in explaining these high-level concepts, and as such I will merely advise you to seek help on other platforms, such as Youtube or on dedicated Jungle Main Discord Servers.
Rek'sai is a champion that excels at ganking, diving and skirmishing in the early game. In this section, I want to go into details of how a gank should look like and what to watch out for when picking a lane to gank.
PICKING A LANE
Picking a lane to gank has multiple facets. Let's start with the basics:
1. Win Condition
Picking by win condition is usually a good idea in a more meta-gamey way.
Consider the following:
- Which lane can carry your game to victory?
Think of Hyperscalers like Kassadin or Kayle, think of people with really good win rates on their champions and OTPs. In the current meta is also usually a good default to play for your adc / bot-lane, as they can usually carry the game once ahead.
- Which lane enables you to get objectives?
For the early game, this will usually be bot lane. They can help you get Dragon and even help you contest Rift Scuttler. You can also consider other lanes for help with Rift Herald.
Additionally, you can think use these lanes to cover invades.
- Which lane can you kill to get a lead yourself?
While Rek'Sai isn't the best scaling champion, getting an early lead in kills and lane tax can give you a significant advantage over the enemy jungler. Think about lanes that can be killed for free: CC on your side, no escape on the enemy side.
- Which lane is playing good/bad?
While theory is great, press Tab and look at the scoreboard. Is a lane feeding? Vastly behind in CS? Think about "Never gank a losing lane" and then decide whether it's worth it to put effort into this lane.
While these points can serve as a general framework, don't decide too early on what to gank. Games don't follow set patterns and neither should you. Go with the flow and don't cast away a lane in champ select!
2. Lane states
Warning: the content in this section is outdated and needs a revisit. I have removed it temporarily, so as to not spread misinformation.
3. CC, Escape tools and self peel
Consider champions on both sides:
- Do they have engage/disengage tools?
Think about mobility. Stuff like Camille's E Hookshot, Ezrael's E Arcane Shift. Many champions have similar tools. Either wait for them to be used or find a situation where using them still puts them into kill range. Consider if your teammate can help you out by using a similar tool!
- Do they have CC tools?
Can they stop your gank? Can your teammate set up a gank? Think about abilities like Lissandra's W Ring of Frost or Malzahar's R Nether Grasp. Be careful with enemies using them on you! Watch out if your teammate has recently used their CC tools!
- Can they self-peel?
Can they help themselves avoid damage? Will it be easy to escape your W Unburrow? Think about abilities like Vladimir's W Sanguine Pool or Fizz's W Playful / Trickster! Either wait for them to be used or find a situation where using them still puts them into kill range.
I want to explain some more details about the current rune choices on Rek'sai.
THE MATH
Let's take a look at some numbers to give you a better idea of what we play and why. I've created these 3 images from my own spreadsheet which accurately calculates the damage each rune adds to your combo:
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Some explanation about the graph
- This graph tells you how much damage particular runes add to a full combo
- Bonus AD (for calculations) is used from a game-set with averages per level. Therefor bonus AD values are only approximations, but generally withing acceptable margins.
- For both Conqueror and Press the Attack, you need to keep in mind that both runes provide more damage after your initial combo, which the other runes cannot.
How this graph was created
THE TAKEAWAY
Press the Attack and Hail of Blades provide the most upfront damage at just about all levels. Electrocute can hold its own and is followed by Conquerorand First Strike.It should be fairly obvious that
First Strike provides least damage and is therefor already out of the equation. Electrocute deals less damage than the likes of Press the Attack and is therefor also irrelevant.Finally, runes to actually consider are
Press the Attack, Hail of Blades and Conqueror. Hail can be a choice for those that need the attack speed, but generally it is accepted within the community that the rune only really serves as a crutch to bad combos.Both
Press the Attack and Conqueror have the benfit of providing even more damage after a succesful combo, which I cannot consider when creating the graph. Therefor, these 2 should be the best runes for straight damage.
WHAT NOT TO PICK
Earlier I mentioned that other keystones aren't really played. If you are interested in the reasoning, expand the spoiler below:
Other Keystones and why we don't play them
PRIMARY TREES
Let's pick the primary rune page first:
PRECISION
Let's take a look at the main rune tree for Conqueror: Precision. I will explain the best rune picks in this tree, and explain which ones are good and why.
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Meaningless effect as you never require this little sustain. |
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ROW 1
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Triumph
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The best Row 1 rune, as it provides extra HP and extra gold. Useful in saving you in clutch situations thanks to the HP you obtain from kills. |
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Will be swapped to Triumph in-game. (You don't have a mana/energy resource) |
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Legend: Alacrity
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The most commonly used rune from the 2nd row. Provides Attack speed which enhances not only your clear speed in the jungle, but also your combo speed. |
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ROW 2
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Some extra haste can be benfitial but on Rek'Sai you will usually require the bonus attack speed more. |
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Not played, as lifesteal is not necessary on Rek'sai. The other 2 runes are simply better. |
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Coup de Grace
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A commonly used rune in the 3rd row. It provides a flat %damage increase on low HP targets, making it a generally decent pick. |
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ROW 3
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Cut Down
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The counterpart for Coup de Grace. The choice is pretty much up to you, although I personally prefer this one so that I can dish out more full HP damage, which in turn allows the execute part of your R to deal more damage. |
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Not really played because you usually sustain well and don't want to play fights on low HP anyways. Also provides no benefit while ganking targets when you are at full HP. |
DOMINATION
Another tree to consider is domination.
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Slightly less damage than Sudden Impact, so we're going to ignore it |
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ROW 1
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While some extra sustain isn't bad, getting more damage in an offensive tree such as domination is usually a better idea. As such this isn't needed. |
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Sudden Impact
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Currently provides the most damage in the first row, which makes this our preffered pick. |
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This effect comes in too rarely to be of use. With Rek'Sai being a melee, this is extra annoying as you need to walk up to actually clear the wards you spot. |
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ROW 2
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Grisly Mementos
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Our default choice as this greatly enhances trinket cooldowns, which is really useful for a jungler running the lense trinket. |
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This is fairly decent if you manage to stay on your ward trinket and place lots of wards, but as a jungler you prefer running lense to scure objective vision. |
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Treasure Hunter
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Great rune for snowballing early leads into significant gold advantages. The best rune in this row currently. |
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ROW 3
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Decent because it helps you roam the map faster, but has not use outside. The movement speed isn't really that useful because you need to stat check others with early leads, so gold is preferable. |
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Not picked as your ult already has a decently low cooldown and this rune has diminishing returns. Other runes are simply better |
SECONDARY TREES
Now that you've picked your Primary tree, it's time to select the secondary. There are multiple viable options, and it's up to you to decide what to play. Note that you can't play the same tree twice.
Meta Combinations:
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Precision
+ Domination + Sorcery + Inspiration |
Domination
+ Sorcery + Precision â € |
PRECISION
For secondary runes, I will not go over every single choice but instead, list the best ones. Select the ones you like the most and try out which runes fit you!
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Triumph
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The standard rune for precision. Always a good pick thanks to the health and gold. |
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Legend: Alacrity
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The most commonly used rune from the 2nd row. Provides Attack speed which enhances not only your clear speed in the jungle, but also your combo speed. |
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Legend: Tenacity
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A less commonly used rune in the 2nd row. Useful against heavy CC teams, as too much CC can lock you down from getting any engages. With this, you will have to sacrifice clear/combo speed! |
SORCERY
For secondary runes, I will not go over every single choice but instead, list the best ones. Select the ones you like the most and try out which runes fit you!
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Nimbus Cloak
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A strong secondary keystone for anyone that likes closing gaps. Will only provide 5% movement speed increase when using any Smite, but will give 25% movement speed increase with Flash. This makes Flash a gap closer which does not need to instantly connect with the enemy. Has been nerfed in patch 11.13.
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Absolute Focus
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A flat bonus AD increase whenever you are healthy. Should have almost permanent uptime in the jungle thanks to Refillable Potion and Fury of the Xer'Sai. Will also provide AD for most ganks, as you usually engage the enemy at high percentages of HP.
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Waterwalking
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Great help with roaming through the river as it provides MS and bonus AD. Will support you in contesting the river objectives Rift Scuttler, Dragon and Baron Nashor, while also aiding any skirmishes you might have.
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DOMINATION
For secondary runes, I will not go over every single choice but instead, list the best ones. Select the ones you like the most and try out which runes fit you!
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Grisly Mementos
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A great 2nd Row rune for vision control. Get's better the more you play around vision and Oracle Lens, as you are able to shut down more and more enemy vision.
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Eyeball Collection
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As an alternative to Grisly Mementos this is a good pick for anyone that has less focus and vision and more focus on just killing. Will also provide decent bonus AD, but loses the benefits of vision control.
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Treasure Hunter
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Provides you with a ton of bonus gold that can be used to snowball your already strong early game. Will help you get your key items before your opponents. |
INSPIRATION
For secondary runes, I will not go over every single choice but instead, list the best ones. Select the ones you like the most and try out which runes fit you!
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Magical Footwear
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Great rune as it saves you from having to buy boots yourself and additionally provides some free extra movement speed. With these you can even delay your T2 boots choice by quite a bit. |
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Cosmic Insight
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The other Inspiration rune, great for reducing the cooldown of Flash and Smite. Item cooldown is an additional nice-to-have!
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At multiple points in this guide, I've mentioned the importance of bonus AD in Rek'Sais kit, and the significance of runes like
Conqueror in increasing your damage. Let's take a quick look at what I mean:|
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(+ 25% bonus AD) x1 time |
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(We assume Q is level 5 for simplicity) (+ 50% bonus AD) x3 times |
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(+ 100% bonus AD) x1 time |
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(+ 100% bonus AD) x1 time |
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(Auto Attack) (+ 100% bonus AD) x4 times |
These are the damage sources in 1 Combo. All of them scale with your bonus AD,
adding up to 775% bonus AD in total scaling.
This is a significant value, and should not be underestimated. It is the main reason as to why bonus AD is so important on Rek'sai.
In this chapter, I want to talk about ways of getting good at Rek'Sai and playing her in the jungle.
Disclaimer: Opinions you will read here may not be objective. They reflect my understanding of the game. While I would never consider myself a "good" player, I think I am qualified to give a few opinions on how to get into higher Elos (namely D1 and Master).
Do you want to improve? Good. Now let's get your brain into the proper mindset. Here are some rules to follow:
- Play for improvement, not for LP
Stop thinking about your LP. Set your mind on getting better, and LP will follow. Dodge games that look unplayable in champ select, and don't get mad at losing some LP.
- NEVER blame anyone else but yourself for losing games
One of the greatest mistakes most players make. Yes, there are unwinnable games. But your focus should never be on your teammates, as they are outside of your control. If you ever catch yourself thinking about your teammates, focus up and stop it. You make mistakes every game. Find them, fix them.
- Analyse replays
Go into your replays. Look to find obvious mistakes. Explore different options of what to do, note the good and the bad.
- Disable Chat
Unless you are Master+ and you are confident that communication can help your games, disable your chat. The chat provides little benefit and only serves as a platform for toxicity.
- Know when to stop
Tilted? Mad? Tired? Stop playing. Forcing 10 games a day won't make you better if you can't focus on your games. Find a point to stop every day, or at least take some breaks to reset your mental and mind.
Now the points here are a bit short, but they convey the general message well enough:
Focus on yourself, and only yourself.
One of the most integral parts to actually getting good at Rek'Sai are her mechanics (the micro). While many Rek'Sai players think that they are "good" at her, most mechanics often leave room for improvement.
The Combo
Let's start with the combo. I already linked an example of a proper combo further up in the guide, if you haven't read it look here.
The first thing I usually recommend for anyone below Master+ is to train your combo in practice tool. For me, the setup looks like this:
WARNING: The numbers here are out-dated. The general idea is the same regardles!
- Go into practice tool
- Select your usual Runes
My runes - Ingame, level to 6, fully stack runes, disable turrets and minions
- Buy a smite of your choice.
- Skip to 01:30 using Ctrl+Shift+O, use instant cdr from Ctrl+X and obtain Blue Smite by smiting 5 times
- Set up enemy target dummies and 1 friendly dummy for vision, preferably on a lane with space
- Start training your combo. Use Ctrl+Shift+O and Ctrl+X to reset everything between attempts
After the initial setup, it's time to train your combo! A proper combo on a target dummy should deal
TLDR: Go into practice tool, set yourself up for combos, learn to get the highest possible DPS.
The small things
I've already listed some sneaky mechanics, most of them only known to OTP's. These are small things, but getting to know them and actively using them in-game will give you yet another small edge over your opponents. While this is a more time-intensive step, try forcing them as often as you can.
Kiting
If you've looked at the 03:15 full clear I linked earlier, you will see that kiting camps greatly enhances your clear. This is something that you need to train if you want to clear properly. Try this in practice tool, see how far you can take camps and when they reset. This is important if you ever want to properly clear, and as it's something you can train this is not limited by your elo. If you want more examples, look at replays of other high elo Rek'Sai players.
Now it's time for some harsh reality. Macro is something that can barely be thought in a guide, and I won't attempt it as the topic is vastly more complex than anything else. Jungle macro resolves around so many factors that it is best thought by playing or by a dedicated coach.
My advice for getting better macro:
Watch guides on the early game
The early game is the most linear macro, and oftentimes there are only a few good options, making it a lot easier to learn from outside the game. There are some great guides on youtube on how to master early game pathing, and I implore you to seek them out.
Play more
Yes, sounds pretty dumb but it's always true. Playing more means you can improve more, and with time macro decisions will become more obvious. This process means learning it yourself, but that is how just about everyone will learn macro at some point.
Jungle Tracking
Jungle Tracking means following the path of the enemy jungler without actually seeing them. You will have to understand the pathing of different champions and predict where they are at different stages of the game. This is incredibly hard but gets more consistent the better your enemies get.
Don't waste too much thought on this. This will come more naturally as you play the game, so as always, "play more".
Whew, you read/scrolled all the way down here! Good job! If you have any feedback, please let me know here or come join us in the official Rek'Sai Mains Discord:
https://discord.gg/BDRkeRV
Now that the important stuff is done, let's just get this over with:
SKIN TIER LIST
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Twitch
[S15] LordGrox High Elo Rek'sai Guide
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