I wanted to get the basics of this guide out to the public...I usually don't release an incomplete guide but I want to get some feedback early.
What you can expect throughout the next few days:
-Section on laning bot, top, mid
-section on farming
-videos on gameplay
-pictures for visual descriptions
-summoner spell definitions
-match ups (for top lane only, it's a lot of work and I think he is a better top than a mid)
-a skill sequence section (for right now if you have any major questions comment or inbox, but this will be coming up soon
-and proly a lot more :D

AND lastly I will be working on this a little every day, so check back :D

Thresh is a Wonderful champion with many possibilities of excelling in most roles. This guide will explore the nooks and crannies of thresh and explore possibilities. (All viable possibilities that perform well in game-play although one may excel more than another).

Below is the Champion Spotlight, Lore, And some fun facts.

Item summary:

This is what I have found to be the most optimal build for the top lane for being an AP bruiser. Abyssal Mask and Void Staff provide magic penetration for your Death Sentence passive and Wit's End & Sunfire Aegis to hit harder. A common enemy team is becoming a team with no AP carry, In this situation exchange Wit's End with Malady and Abyssal Mask with either Rabadon's Deathcap or Randuin's Omen. If the other team is mostly physical damage with little CC, I'd grab ninja tabi over Mercury's Treads

Gameplay summary:

Play extremely passive till you either receive a gank, or build Wit's End or Sunfire Aegis. Buy Vision Wards so that your jungler can gank for you with a high success rate due to Thresh's incredible CC. Use Dark Passage to collect souls that would otherwise put you in harms way. And if the enemy is melee you can use flay and combo it with an auto attack or 2 to get off some damage and repeat. Do not be afraid of squating on tower, you can farm souls easily, and not be worried of ganks, receive ganks, and thresh even has good farming under tower with Death Sentence's passive.

Pros of Thresh Naturally tanky Many build possibilities He has a lot of amazing CC Amazing late game Has the only skill that can change allies' positioning

Cons of Thresh Mana Hungry Long Cooldowns Vulnerable without armor buffs No health/mana sustain Every single one of his skills is a skill-shot

Damnation is his passive and quite a unique one at that. Thresh does not gain armor per level which could sound like a weakness but the rest of the passive makes up for it because every soul he collects from minions, champions gives him 1 armor/AP. virtually if you collect a lot of souls you will have more armor earlier in the game than if you were to gain it per level.

Tricks:

• Your first soul gives you 1 AP/Armor and decreses by .01 for every other soul...Ex. soul #2 gives you .99 and soul #3 gives you .98 all the way down to .5 and remains constant at .5.
• Every large minion such as: siege tanks, super minions, dragons, baron, and buffs as well as large golem/wraith/wolf grant one soul no matter what while all others have a 20% chance to grant a soul.
• Champions that die near Thresh provide a soul.

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Death Sentence is almost over powered with the potential it holds. The passive makes his auto attacks deal minimally his souls...So if he had 120 souls each auto attack will do 120 added damage. But it also works like ashe's passive Focus The longer Thresh waits to attack the more damage his next auto attack will deal...This is not affected by souls and scales at 200% maxed out. Ex. If you have 120 souls and 200 AD and wait for the longest period his next attack will deal 520 damage (souls+ 2x AD) the minimum amount is 120 so depending on the time you wait his passive will deal 120-520 damage.

Tricks:

• If you look where your buffs are for auras (above the abilities) you will see the icon for Death Sentence if it is blue it will deal minimum damage...while green, then yellow, then red scale in damage up to the maximum which is red. Watch out for this when you are supporting because it provides excellent poke.
• You can use Death Sentence on a minion or neutral monster and click it again to pull yourself out of danger, or get over a wall quickly. Example uses can be if you are playing mid that you can clear minions and hop over to wraiths to clear them quickly.
• It currently takes 10 seconds to build up to maximum damage.

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Dark Passage is brilliant for use in lane, and in fights. This provides a shield for allies as well as thresh, thresh receives 2 shields though (once when he casts near himself and again when it returns to him). If you allies pay attention to the lantern they can receive a beneficial save as they will be pulled to Thresh

Tricks:

• If you are supporting with thresh you can throw the lantern to collect souls so that you do not have to take damage to get souls.
• In teamfights you will want to communicate with your adc on the lantern. generally an ADC will kite bruisers off them and run away from the fight to live and get out the most damage (otherwords they wont run in when 5 enemies are able to attack them) while they are kiting away from the fight, you can throw the lantern back to them and they will be pulled completely away from the bruisers chasing them and back by allies.
• When playing mid lane, you can throw Dark Passage over to friendly wraiths and wolves to collect a little extra souls, or if the enemies wraiths are warded you can take souls from there as well.
• (Pending till I personally test it) but Lee Sin, Katarina, and jax can use gap closers on the lantern.

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Flay is an average skill with a slow, casting it while facing an area will push enemies away, while facing away will drag them toward you giving you your 2nd pull.

Tricks:

• Use Death Sentence and if you land it, when they get close enough pull them again with a backward flay to get them even more in the fight.
• In the late game if you Land a Death Sentence use The Box and Flay them into the box they will most likely die as a flash will not help them get away.

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This ability is treated as a J4 ult as people will rather flash out of it then walk through it, land it and you will most likely grab a kill with a 99% slow.

Tricks:

• Although this ability can be used as a flash and use in the middle of the team you want to hit a easy kill champion with the first wall so you get the full 2 second slow and full damage.
• Look at tip #2 on Flay
• The slow does not slow the enemy below 110 base movement speed, and Rylai's Crystal Scepter and Iceborn Gauntlet will not slow past 100%, they do not apply as an added sum (like critical strike) but multiplicative like tenacity.

Pulled through a Wall like a Ghost:

Death Sentence > *Instantly The Box > Walk and attack to the other side of them > Flay them away from their destination.

Explanation:

If you grab the target you want activating The Box right before you start pulling will pull them through The Box and guaranteeing a slow. But Why not Flay them right after? Because by waiting the 2 seconds after The Box's slow wears off you can activate Flay slow for 1.5 seconds. Slowing the enemy for a steady 3.5 seconds and giving allies time to catch up. And of course you can throw Dark Passage while doing this combo to get allies in position for the kill.

Pull, Push, And dead:

Death Sentence > The Box > Flay them into the box.

Explanation, This is the bursty disruptive way to do things, it does more damage in succession and will either bait a flash or get a kill on a squishy.

Support:

This is probably the most common at this point in his release but not his only shining position. I will mention he has: 2 slows, 2 pulls, a knock back, great armor and AP, and a shield the repositions allies...but then again he can do this everywhere...

Top:

This is my favorite lane for him and where he excels the most at. He has amazing combos that Will be explained in the "How to play top thresh: for dummies" section. But he is naturally tanky, can escape from ganks with a push, and his ultimate...but more will be put on this position

Mid AP:

There has been much discussion about Mid Thresh And although it's doable it isn't done the normal way of carrying. I will say this and you can quote me on this...Thresh cannot carry going ap, he is played as an ap bruiser and will never be ap due to cooldowns, low scalings, only 3 damage skills, and the fact that all his moves are skillshots.

ADC:

I have played this a handful of times now and would like to apologize to those who I insulted. But saying this I will also say that ADC Thresh or AD bruiser Thresh, is only good in lane phase and falls off the deep end late game.
Here is Why:
-1 AD ratio which works like Ashe's passive and to get it to scale to max he has to wait in between attacks.
-His base AD is 48...and ~ 87 at max level. *Fun Fact: Out of 110 champions he only has better than 5 other champions( Vladimir, Teemo, Lulu, Orianna, Karthus) at level 1, and has the worst base damage at level 18.
-His Attack range is 475 *Fun Fact: Same as Janna, Only better than 5 other champions ( Karthus, Vladimir, Karma, Morgana, Urgot)

Jungle Thresh:

I have been incorrect on some of things previously stated, and I apologize...Enemies cannot see souls if they cannot see Thresh. But I still don't see him playing jungle Effectively.
Here is why:
-Cooldowns and base damage is too low to possibly have a decent clear rate
-Cannot maximize his build because you are jungler
-His ganks are only sub-par because every single one of his abilities are skillshots, and if you miss your Death Sentence the gank is most likely failed.
-I'm not sure how souls would work, but I imagine with the bad clear rate he would be very low on souls when he could have more in a lane.
-And although enemies cannot see your souls if they cannot see you, if they have bad map awareness and have a ward down, although they might not know you are there because they are bad at map vision, they will see your souls and start to wonder.

1. When I play Thresh I have mana problems, what should I do? The answer is simply that you should not have mana problems. In Top and Mid lane you should not be using abilities to clear waves (also considered pushing) the only ability you should ever use commonly is Dark Passage to collect souls that would put you in harm to get. Otherwise never use Death Sentence without an incoming gank, never use Flay unless a MELEE opponent is trying to poke you down, then you can flay them away and auto attack them twice to trade damage equally if not more. In most situations you will never kill anyone in lane by youself until your first or 2nd damage items, saying that you should buy plenty of Vision Ward's so that your jungler can provide a hefty gank that your CC will usually grant a 90% success rate. I will reiterate this in the gameplay sections in the upcoming sections.

Legendary items:

Notes: These items are the ones I see best fit for any position on Thresh as they have much to offer.

-Top (must have)
-Mid(Great option)
-Support (Great Option) Wit's End is underused but I see amazing potential using it on Thresh. It provides 42 magic damage each hit, basically adding 42 souls to your auto attack which is a hefty sum. Provides AS so that you get your on-hit effects off more ( Death Sentence and Wit's End)...and above all it's pretty cheap and provides MR. great item for Thresh even on support as you can deal high damage with Thresh's Death Sentence and wit' end by constantly auto attacking.

-top (must have)
-mid (Great option, but Sunfire Aegis will do)
-Support (Great option) Warmog's Armor is honestly op right now, you see it on majority of champions these days...voyboy builds it on Katarina... 1k health and health regen is pretty op in S3 where armor is less effective because of the mixture between Black Cleaver and Last Whisper.

-Top(must have if the other team has 1 ap champ)
-Mid (must have unless laning against an AD bruiser.)
-Support (good option) Abyssal Mask is on the list because it provides amazing stats of AP and MR while providing an aura that allows him to deal more damage, and allies with magic damage to deal more damage. Good on support, top, or mid....great item in general.

Other Items:

-Top (Must have)
-Mid (recomended)
-Support (optional) Sunfire Aegis almost made the legendary item list, but It is very optional on the support build and should be taken under certain conditions such when going against heavy AD. It provides damage that doesn't scale with AP so the damage is good on any champion much like Wit's End. The Health and armor are desirable too. Also why it didn't make legendary item list is that Thresh has 475 range and the range of Sunfire Aegis is 400, I still like it though just because it will still be useful, and fighting at maximum range isn't needed on thresh.

-Top (optional)
-Mid (optional) Rabadon's Deathcap is an amazing and logical choice because much like Veigar thresh's Damnation gives him AP throughout the whole game. I do not build it that often because of the long cooldowns on Thresh's abilities but it can provide to be worthy with Malady.

-Top (optional for peeling) Only Build Frozen Mallet on Tops. I think there are better choices out there but this one works for peeling off of your ADC while providing health as a bonus.

-Support (must)
-Top (optional when support doesn't grab) Runic Bulwark is needed somewhere on your team, and if your support isn't carrying it then you might as well...It really has amazing stats of mixed armor, health, and health regen.
-support(must)
Shurelya's Battlesong is a core and must have item on the support to engage fights or to escape tough conditions, Every support should aim for this at some point in the game. I personally get it ASAP just because it can change a teamfight by giving your team a better position, and you can escape conditions that might throw a game.

-support (good for roaming or chasing. I rarely get this on thresh, butttt I can see where Twin Shadows would be good. You could activate it to slow enemies, then pull them and they are done for at that point.

-top (beautiful item to replace warmogs)
-Support (almost a must) Locket of the Iron Solari is becoming a highly used item after they buff it received. The shield can save lives and the stats are excellent too.

-support (situational) The most situational item to build in the game is Mikael's Blessing because it removes CC that can save your ADC when you are support, but the stats are poor and it is just so situational...I put it in here simply because it will be core against champions like Malzahar, Warwick, Skarner, Urgot because it can cleanse their suppress.

-Top (not bad, but there are better options)
-support (Great option for Full CDR) This Item could almost go in the legendary items just because the CDR is just awesome, but I personally don't like it on my mid at all or on top just my top because my main sustained damage are from my auto attacks off Death Sentence and only a little come from my bursty abilities. But the Aura and CDR work wonderfully on the support at any time you need more armor.

-top (situational)
-support (situational) Randuin's Omen is an amazing item for the stats of armor and health, you also can pull others back to you and slow them with randuins and wait to use The Box at a better time. I personally always get it when the ADC is like uber fed and can just eat people..

-top (optional)
-Support (must have) If you do not get Ruby Sightstone than your team has the right to yell at you all game because wards are important and sometimes even the top or mid can grab one of these for extras, its only 700 for the Sightstone and gives you 2 wards, or 1300 for the Ruby Sightstone which is a lot better

-mid (good option)I put this item here because the stats are amazing on any AP champion, Health, mana, AP, and the catalyst the protector helps with the early game by sustaining in lane.

BOOTS:

This item is good when the other team has no AP champions, have little crowd control, or the ADC is fed. When building this i would recommend Zephyr for the tenacity only on top and maybe mid lane, but that is totally your choice.
The Best option in any position so that stuns do not affect you for 100% duration.
I get these anytime the other team has little to no CC and when they shouldn't be wasting single target stuns on me... gives you the little extra magic pen to deal more damage.
-top(eh, I don't roam on top lane much)
-Support (good option with the CC you have excellent roams)
-mid (the best place to get these is mid, you can roam bot or top.) I would take these with strong roaming intentions, if you plan to leave lane to help get kills elsewhere go for it.

-top (good choice)
-Mid (good choice)
This item fits well on Thresh because Damnation & Death Sentence give him on-hit damage and this increases the amount of times he can attack in a second.

The best enchantment on Thresh anywhere because his Q is single target and so are his auto attacks that you should be using because his auto attack his harder than any other support.

Feel free to submit your end game scores with Thresh!

2 Ranked games victories in a row using this build :D
More Top lanes.