Master Yi Build Guide : This will be... a harsh lesson [Yi Mid Guide] (3.12)

News

Changelog:
[30.09.2013.] - Guide created.
[12.10.2013.] - AD carry Assassin build added (core) + new chapters
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Possible future plans:
[Stale]Adding match-up chapter
[Stale]Adding video guide
[Stale]Adding more pictures to guide

Introduction

has through a lot of changes and obstacles. From being underplayed melee carry to overpowered and annoying AP mage. I never liked AP because my auto attacks almost didn't deal any damage and meditate was so annoying and unfair, but I loved burst damage and great minion clearing ability. I even tried take hybrid item build on Yi, but it just was too weak, if not going pure AP or AD. I always felt that right spot is being AD carry, but there was no spot for melee AD carries in current META.

In patch 3.10 got visual upgrade and kit rework. These upgrades made me happy. After trying new out I felt that he's on right spot, but after some time, I noticed after playing against he's ridiculously noob-friedly (low risk, high reward) - you couldn't do anything to him after killing blow because of Q being untargetable and of E allowing to grant bigger AD ratio while granting more flat, AD ratio True Damage, Q damage. It was really frustrating to deal with him without hard-CC, he was the most picked and banned champion (about 90%) with 53-54% win rate. It was so easy to play with him while being a huge threat to enemy team. I hated it (if I lost game, everyone flamed me for being horrible with broken champ or if I won the game, I also got flamed by picking 0 skill champion) and waited for proper nerf.

Finally the long waited nerf was live and IMO is on ideal spot. Two main problems were fixed - E AD ratio boost per rank and fully Q reset on kill. Now playing requires skill which made noob-friendly players lose a lot of games after patch making "trash" in their eyes.

Example: Every time I take in ranked play mid lane, I so often hear: "pls no yi", "why yi", "troll", "ad or ap yi?" (seriously?), "we need ap mid" (umh... Zed, Kha'Zix?).

After lot of testing I found perfect build to lead you, fans, to victory. Now let me teach you... a harsh lesson.

Why AD Yi Mid-lane?

Ofcourse I might aswell go top lane or jungle, but why mid-lane? In top lane it is really hard to deal with tanks and bruisers with squishy even if you max E for flat true damage, while stacking health can counter you. It's not a no lane for , but the major thing why can't go top-lane is lack of tanks (as you see, I focus more on assassin build than split pusher).
In jungle excels on clearing jungle really fast and counter jungling. But then he has no CC in his kit, low jungler gold income compared to lane gold income and risk to lose Dragon/Baron while split-pushing, because of . As Season 4 promised jungle and support gold income will become bigger I'll try jungle more in jungle.

Lets finally answer, why mid-lane? Before rework AP was strong in lane, because of strong, safe harass, huge sustain and great farming abilities. Then why AD Yi was not a thing then compared to AP Yi? Weak sustain, weak and random minion kills, but great harass (kinda). After rework mid-lane saved specific great qualities - great harass and most important constant, strong farming ability, which plays huge part of mid-lane .

Pros / Cons

Pros

+ Huge Damage Output (if snowballed)
+ Great Farming Ability
+ High Mobility
+ Resets
+ Tower Destroyer
+ High Reward

Cons

- Squishy
- No CC
- Early mana issues
- Melee Auto-Attacker
- Countered by hard CC and invulnerability
- Heavy Focused
- High Risk

Summoner Spells

Best Choices:
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As has no reliable escapes except which is his ultimate, you'll need to take to survive unexpected ganks or other tricky situations.

Best ability to finish someone in order to gain resets and kills.

Spoiler: Click to view

Optional Choices:
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It works really well with as he has already build-in high mobility with and to keep lane pressure when needed, but it sacrifice instead of for kill secure.

As is squishy could help survive lethal attacks while losing and being able to get killed by it.

It's an option against high-CC, sustained damage dealers or tanky carries with no escapes like or .

Generally it's a bad spell as gives same effect thought it has good synergy with it and is much stronger choice for .

Runes

It scales with all abilities, except , bringing the highest possible early damage. Mark of Armor Penetration is not an option, because it doesn't scale with other abilities aswell already has True damage from

Standard seals for mid-laner.

Against magic dealers flat magic resist help farm and harass safer, as he is melee carry.

Same as .

Masteries

Standard [21/9/0] masteries for AD carry with exception and depending on situation (what kind of damage dealer you face in lane).

Abilities

[Passive] Double Strike

Great passive to farm better, harass opponents and to destroy towers faster. Every 4th attack will proc do deal instant second attack with 50% reduced physical damage reduction ignoring on hit effects, meaning everytime you get 3 or 4 stack you can harass opponent with with full True damage potential.
Second attack from will proc additional stack making strike twice every 3rd attack, which allows destroy towers really fast.

[Q] Alpha Strike

Leap that damages up to four units, but now it has constant increased damage dealt to minions, meaning you'll have much easier time farming in lane, similar to old AP Yi, which is why mid-lane AD Yi is a thing compared to old AD Yi. Additionally now deals damage to four closest units to each other, meaning at (Rank 3) you'll be able kill caster minions instantly with possibility harassing enemy champion without being in contact (not so random anymore), this is why I max Q first = higher nuke, faster farming.

The best part of rework is ability to crit which gives huge damage spike to damage output similar as AP Yi did. Also auto-attacks reduce cooldown by 1 second, reducing it by 2 seconds with proc.

[W] Meditate

is changed so couldn't use it typical healing tool. Instead now it is more a surviving tool with better heal, as lower you are on hp, and changed from flat resistances to damage reduction. So use whenever you are low on hp if you're not recalling back or when to survive burst potential. Take point early at level 3 as it has saved my life countless times right before I killed enemy with on.

Major thing what is changed about is damage reduction is changed to half against towers, meaning don't tank towers or you'll die instead. Use to survive last towers hit instead.

[E] Wuju Style

Cooldown massively reduced, duration reduced, active changed to True damage, it has AD ratio on both passive and active, no mana cost. A lot of changes. There are two things which allows harass opponents often is CD reduction and true damage. With having about 94 AD at level 2, meaning you'll do about 141+38TD=179DMG with proc ignoring damage, which is a lot. And with reduced CD sacrificing duration you can harass opponent much often than you used to with old AD Yi. Later in game True damage will allow you to duel tanky enemies.

[R] Highlander

now has a passive and active. Part of active (Resets) is changed as passive, which I find is really great change, because it solves mana problems which you had with old Yi reactivation, now instead on killing or assists duration is increased while has it's own cooldown. Major thing what is changed is the way how basic abilities are reseted. Now instead reseting basic ablities fully, it resets 70% of CD in order to use auto-attacks or to reactivate , which is reasonable, because old AD Yi didn't do much with back then, old AP Yi did a lot of damage with with full resets, but was useless if he couldn't finish him, but when combine similar effects in one piece, it made "broken", which hyped noob-friendly players to exploit Yi's capabilities.

Items - AD-Carry Assassin Build (Constant)

Sight Ward
Starting Items

I always take these items, when going to lane. is such a great items for . Most of time while farming/harassing and while recovering will soak your mana. This item will help you recover your mana aswell will recover your health as is a weaker heal you're not low enough. The best part of this item is that you call sell it later to get little more needed gold to buy big items.
is great when you are being harassed hard and need health to recover quickly.
Aswell Sight Ward helps you notice upcoming ganks as Yi doesn't have any escape in his kit while laning.

Doran's Blade

is next needed damage item as it gives you AD/HP/and 5 HP per hit which synergies well with .

Boots of Speed

Self-explained. You need additional MS to avoid ganks easier.

Youmuu's Ghostblade

This item is specially made for melee ad-carries, which makes shine. gives everything needs - Attack Damage, Cooldown Reduction, Critical chance, Movement Speed, Attack Speed and Armor Penetration, it almost like it's made for only. Lets take a deeper look, why!
, getting it early after finishing and will give you enough AD, CDR and most important ArP. At this state of game enemy laners will probably build armor items to avoid you damage output, like or . It's even better if they skip armor, because if lower their armor get the more damage you'll deal, while AD will increase your overall boost and CDR will lower your cooldown meaning you'll be able to farm and harass opponent more frequently.
And now for . The sad part is that it only gives 30 AD, which is not a lot compared to other AD items, but most important it gives 20 ArP, 15% Crit and amazing active is huge for . 20 ArP is a lot while you're still laning, this will negate users and make squishy champions squishier. Then getting 15% Crit is huge thing as it will increase your damage dealt as you're auto-attacker - combined with it will ensure you'll crit this early in game, not to mention crit scaling. And the most important part of active: Grants you 20% MS and 40% AS compared to (25% MS, 35% AS (rank 1)) is almost equal. So basically you get a second with only 45s CD, and combined these both together, well... you won't outrun . And combined all stats together, you get great item, which is made for only for 2700g. That's indeed cost-effective purchase during early-mid game.

Spoiler: Click to view

Boots

Complete you boots to or . Grab if you have problems with CC or magic damage dealers or grab if physical damage dealers cause you problems. Mostly I prefer , that's why I sell for later in game.

Mid Items

As auto-attacker you'll need to sustain yourself during skirmishes and team-fights. As for , you should get it right after to increase your dueling capabilities, by adding more crit chance for stronger auto-attacks and more frequent crit proc, by adding more AS to lower faster, increase your DPS and by adding MS to ensure you're stuck to your target.

or
AD item

As you got enough AS and Crit, you need to get another AD item. Choice between and depends on how much gold do you have. I would always prefer to get instead, but usually I don't have enough gold to purchase it after next as it is 675 gold more expensive. The goal here is getting AD items which builds later on.

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QUESTION?
Why do you switch items between AD and Crit/AS so often? Why not finishing them?
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First of all, look at kit. He almost benefits from AD/AS/Crit equally - AD gives boosts AA, and , AS also AA, and and Crit AA, and passive. While crit doesn't synergies with active, it doesn't matter as active is just a bonus to deal with tanky champions. So basically kit benefits equally to AD/AS/Crit, meaning, you will need to buy items, also slow and steady, to maximize damage potential as AD-Carry Assassin. This is why is such a good item on . Also its cheaper to get them in middle-game than higher tier items. Forcing on one stat early will lower your overall damage output while increasing specific ability's damage (it's also a choice, but then you'll need to check Burst Assassin Build instead).
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Late Items

After getting AD item finish to as it will give you much more guaranteed crit proc, faster auto-attacks (more true damage from active) with increased crit chance for maximal dueling capabilities. Actually now when you'll finish to you'll start assassinating people instead of just dueling, as carries won't stand a chance to compete versus you without proper CC, additionally will provide you with nice passive to ensure no one stands in your way.
But why not taking before . Ofcourse same thing about AD and Crit/AS balance, but that's not a main reason. Main reason is Cost-Efficiency: For 1625g you get 20% Crit/32% AS instead of 25% Crit/45 AD for 2925g, excluding passives, while both increase damage output similarly. Thought buying first is not a good idea, but after getting this item you'll become a unstoppable killing machine. I mean it! will give you such a big damage spike that you'll wreck carries in pieces without proper CC, because it's just too good for - AD/Crit, but most of all passive 260% crit bonus damage where is included, making it deal 165(+ 196% AD) when critted, it's almost 2.0 TAD for ability which hit up to 4 targets. This is when fun gets real.

Defensive Item

Now you'll have to get a defensive item as you'll be doing huge threat to enemy team. will give you defensive stat boost to survive enemies attacks against you. The passive will revive if he dies, which is really important to not let carries die in late when everyone have big death timers. will help you a lot against hard CC like which can shot you down instantly in teamfights. If you can't remove effects like grab instead.

Lifesteal Item

And as you last unfinished item is upgrade it to any of these items. Mostly I prefer , because in my opinion it outscales other item such as or . It gives you 75 AD, but most important you'll additionally deal AoE damage per auto-attack with attractive active to burst someone down even faster. But generally I like this item because it also gives you great split pushing ability, which is really important in end-game. If you want for better crits and damage overall, take , for shredding tanks apart. Your choice!

Optional Items

It's really weird, why I don't change instead of . Question is - Do I want to lose 15 crit for 35% ArP? I'll say - no. already gives little ArP which still helps, gives utility active to avoid tricky situations and I don't like to see Crit chance dropped from 70% to 55% as I like seeing critical damage dealt as often as possible combined with and effects, which add that assassin feel. Also this is where active should get handy as it deal true damage. If armor is really a problem, take instead .
Why not taking instead as an option? Well losing 10% Crit chance for little AoE burst is not worth so much as higher chance to crit with AA and , but you can try building instead, if you like that burst effect.

Items - Burst Assassin Build (Risky)

Sight Ward
Starting Items

I always take these items, when going to lane. is such a great items for . Most of time while farming/harassing and while recovering will soak your mana. This item will help you recover your mana aswell will recover your health as is a weaker heal you're not low enough. The best part of this item is that you call sell it later to get little more needed gold to buy big items.
is great when you are being harassed hard and need health to recover quickly.
Aswell Sight Ward helps you notice upcoming ganks as Yi doesn't have any escape in his kit while laning.

Doran's Blade

is next needed damage item as it gives you AD/HP/and 5 HP per hit which synergies well with .

Boots of Speed

Self-explained. You need additional MS to avoid ganks easier.

Sword of the Divine

And here she is. This item is so great on , because it has perfect synergy with in every aspect. Lets see why. First, you are building from AS items, which are cheap and effective. Early AS allows you to use full potential of and , aswell as for CD reduction to maximize your dueling capabilities. Second, with AS items combined with you'll shred towers in no time.
And at last when you'll get itself. You'll instantly notice huge damage spike for upon usage. Best part of is that it grats 100% crit chance, meaning you'll have guaranteed critical bonus from for free without consuming stacks, so after dealing critical you'll still have next 3 attack with 100% crit chance, which is absurd damage output so early in game, not to mention it will grow and grow more as you'll build more AD to it. But be careful using it, because any kind of hard CC or invulnerability will during active can negate its effect as it is only 3 seconds. High risk, high reward item for high risk, high reward champion.

Spoiler: Click to view

B. F. Sword

Now building AD is important as it will increase damage output of , and .

Boots

Complete you boots to or . Grab if you have problems with CC or magic damage dealers or grab if physical damage dealers cause you problems. Mostly I prefer , that's why I sell for later in game.

The Bloodthirster

Same as you need AD as much as possible. Why not take or instead? is good item for , but I tend to build him as assassin, meaning will scale with , and less than pure AD. Second, has no problems stacking full with farming potential. is bad item rushing for assassin - 25% Crit will make a waste, gives a lot more AD, its cheaper and gives lifesteal. passive is not enough.

Late Items #1

will give you defensive stat boost to survive enemies attacks against you. The passive will revive if he dies, which is really important to not let carries die in late when everyone have big death timers. As for . is really useful at this state of the game. Yeah I mentioned why it's a bad buy, but now I'll tell you why it's a good buy at this state of game. First, AD itself. Second, passive from . This will significantly boost your damage output upon crits, because the more AD you have the stronger crits become, not to mention it makes crits also stronger. And third, 25% crit chance won't be waste anymore in this state of the game, because after using you can't stop and go back, it's not 100% crit change, but 25 crit chance is still good to deal massive damage output after assassination attempt.

Late Items #2

These late items are more tended on survivability than damage output. will help you a lot against hard CC like which can shot you down instantly in teamfights. If you can't remove effects like grab instead. will make you more tanky against AD carries or assassins. At upgrade to for AD damage boost.

Which better - ADC or Burst?

I created this guide to popularize mid-lane as I find him really strong there. At beginning I used Burst Assassin Build or build, it was really good build and still it is, but it felt always to me "Make or Die." I already knew was great item on , but damage later on wasn't enough. Now after a lot of testing different builds on , I found perfect build path, that will always snowball you if you're getting in lead of others. Lets compare these two builds!
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___________

ADC

+ Constant Damage
+ High Mobility
+ Monster late-game
- Need to snowball
- Weak burst damage early/mid-game
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_____

Burst

+ High damage burst
+ High Attack damage
+ Strong turret pusher
- Slow without
- Risky ( depended)
- Countered by Crowd Control, Untargetability, HP

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After comparing both builds, I concluded that both builds offer different playstyle - while ADC build is typical AD approach, burst build is focused more on using full potential of and active. Still I prefer now more going ADC build as it is more constant, offering to deal huge amount of damage in extended skirmishes or team-fights, while burst build excels great at killing high priority target with strong peel in second, like or .

Results

Fell free to send your success with this guide:
My results:

Summary

Thanks for reading my guide. Hope it will help you as mid-laner.
Leave comments or ask questions.

If this guide will get popular I'll also update it with counter-pick and counter strategy chapter, and ofcourse with latest patch changes, also with Season 4 changes.

This will be... a harsh lesson [Yi Mid Guide] (3.12)

This will be... a harsh lesson [Yi Mid Guide] (3.12)

Choose Champion Build:

Recommended Items

Spells:

Ignite

Flash

Items

Ability Order

Double Strike (PASSIVE)

Alpha Strike (Q)

Meditate (W)

Wuju Style (E)

Highlander (R)

Recommended Items

Spells:

Ignite

Flash

Items

Ability Order

Double Strike (PASSIVE)

Alpha Strike (Q)

Meditate (W)

Wuju Style (E)

Highlander (R)

News

Introduction

Why AD Yi Mid-lane?

Pros / Cons

Summoner Spells

Runes

Masteries

Abilities

Items - AD-Carry Assassin Build (Constant)

Items - Burst Assassin Build (Risky)

Which better - ADC or Burst?

Results

Summary

League of Legends Champions: