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Ekko Build Guide by

[Season 11] Yamikaze's Challenger Ekko Guide

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Runes:

Domination

Electrocute

Sudden Impact

Eyeball Collection

Ravenous Hunter

Sorcery

Absolute Focus

Gathering Storm

Bonus:

+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+9 Adaptive (5.4 AD or 9 AP)
+65 Base Health

Spells:

Flash

Ignite

Items

Starting Items

First Back

Core Items

Standard

Situational Items

Boot Options

Ability Order

Ekko Passive Ability

Champion Build Guide

-Table of Contents-

Pre Game

Runes
Summoner Spells

Ekko

Abilities
Ability Sequence
Items

Gameplay and Extra

About Me
Early Game
Waveclear
Mid Game
Teamfights
Target Selection

Hi, welcome to my Ekko guide. I'm Yamikaze, a Challenger Talon player. My peak rank is around 30 on the NA server and I ended rank 100 Challenger in Season 8.

Domination & Inspiration

Electrocute

More damage to help you get that first one-shot in a teamfight.

Sudden Impact

Extra magic pen for your abilities and armor pen for your early autos after you use E.

Eyeball Collection

More AP for more damage (and helps make sure you have enough AP to 1-shot the caster minions with Q)

Ravenous Hunter

Since Ekko has a lot of single target ability damage, ravenous hunter is really good to keep you alive in teamfights. The other choices in this row are also all good (ingenious for rocketbelt / hourglass cooldown reduction, relentless for out of combat ms, and ultimate hunter for ult cdr) so take whichever one you prefer.

Sorcery

Absolute Focus

Gathering Storm

: Extra AP to help you hit 2Q and 1Q timings (being able to 1-shot the caster minions with 2 Q's and then 1 Q at lvl 9).

: Even more AP for 2Q and 1Q. Remember both this and absolute focus are necessary to hit a consistent 1Q timing at lvl 9.

Offense: 10 Adaptive Force

Flex: 10 Adaptive Force

Defence: 15-90 health (HP into mixed damage teams, armor into ad heavy teams, mr into ap heavy teams.)

	+

Flash

This is a MUST HAVE for Ekko. If you don't run this spell, you will die to ganks, miss out on kills, and you'll get flamed by your teammates. Also lets you pull off cool long range burst combos with E and/or R.

Ignite

is good into matchups where you think you have kill pressure in lane (usually melee matchups or squishy, immobile mages that you think you can kill).

Teleport

is good into poke-heavy matchups (such as ) where you'll get bullied hard early game and need to back for sustain. You can also run ignite to kill them so they can't poke you anymore, it's really personal preference. Take your pick. In high elo, most Ekko players run TP almost every game due to his weak laning.

Z-Drive Resonance

Passive: Z-Drive Resonance

Standard 3 hit passive. Hit an enemy champion or large monster 3 times for lots of damage and ms if it's a champion. Since most of your damage is up front, this is how you take a trade and get out of the enemy laner's range. Usually you can proc this with e-q-aa.

Timewinder

Q: Timewinder

A bit of an awkward skillshot but it's easy to get the hang of. The hitbox expands when it hits an enemy champion and it begins to rewind back towards you. Usually you want to throw this in your roll animation (the first part of your e), but you can also mash it so it goes off melee range right after your blink (the second part of your e).

Parallel Convergence

W: Parallel Convergence

Basically an aoe stun on delay and grants a shield when you walk into it. The only hard cc in your kit (aside from killing enemies, of course…), except you don't really need to land it. Use this as a zoning tool in fights or lane to force the enemy player to either walk towards you or be hit by the stun. Also, use your mobility to quickly proc the shield even if the enemy target isn't in the stun range. To hit this, I'd recommend stepping to a side bush in mid, control ward the bush, and use W in fog of war. This makes it much easier to hit as the enemy laner can't see the cast animation. Further, most people tend to forget that this ability has a passive - your autos deal percent missing health when the enemy target is below 30%. Pretty big for finishing off tanks in fights.

Phase Dive

E: Phase Dive

E- A roll then a blink with an empowered auto. Your primary mobility tool in fights. Remember you can cast Q mid-roll (press it right after you E) or right after you blink (for a guaranteed Q hit melee range).

Chronobreak

R: Chronobreak

Basically you gain a buncha health and nuke everyone where you were 4 seconds ago. In my opinion, this is what makes Ekko so much fun to play. There are so many tricks to this ability - you can step forward, back, then ult in lane for a 1-shot combo (make sure to E before you R so you can blink immediately). You can throw your W in your R path and stun the whole enemy team. You can even use your R to re-route your Q to hit a target walking the other way. The opportunities are really limitless. Don't be afraid to use this ability just for a heal - it's one of the best ways to stay healthy in fights after you get bursted down.

-Ability Sequence-

> >

Max your ult first for increased damage, heal, and reduced cooldown. Max Q second for waveclear and for extra damage in your combo. Max E third for a lower cooldown and more damage (means more mobility!). Max W last as the reduced cooldown isn't too useful in fights.

Take two points in Q at level 3 so you can 2-shot the caster minions with Q.

Starting Items

Corrupting Potion
Start this for extra sustain or if you plan on trading a lot (esp. vs melee matchups).

Doran's Ring
I personally start this almost every game as the extra AP lets you hit certain 2Q or 3Q timings. Generally a good start into any matchup as the extra AP and health helps with early fights as well.

Early Game

Hextech Alternator
Build this if you have enough on your first recall for extra waveclear and trading.

Blasting Wand
Build this if you don't have enough for alternator. 2x amp tome is fine as well.

Sorcerer's Shoes
Build these early if you want early mobility to dodge enemy spells, avoid ganks, or chase down solokills mid. It's usually personal preference with how early you want to buy these.

Core Items

Hextech Rocketbelt
Rush this item as it's one of Ekko best items. Ekko makes use of the extra utility through his E-Q-Rocketbelt-AA combo (E and Q are 2 stacks, then you Rocketbelt to get in range for the auto to proc passive and gain ms to stick on the target or disengage). Can also use rocketbelt early for the extra ms to gain distance.

Lich Bane
Buy this after Rocketbelt. This is your major damage spike on Ekko. Before finishing Lich Bane, you can bring squishies to ~30-50% hp with one combo. After finishing Lich Bane, you're essentially one-shotting most squishies in fights, provided you aren't too far behind. Since this item has 3 components, you can start selling your dark seals to build them if you don't have the item slots.

Situational Items

After Rocketbelt and Lich Bane on Ekko, there are lots of options that you can build depending on the situation.

Zhonya's Hourglass
Buy this after Lich Bane if the enemy team has lots of physical damage or if you want survivability in fights. With hourglass, you can W-Hourglass for an almost instant shield after you get out (W takes 3 seconds to land, hourglass is 2.5 second duration). Also, you can initiate a fight by quickly comboing a squishy target (for example, e-flash-rocketbelt-q-aa) then hourglass-R to buy time for your team to back you up.

Oblivion Orb
Build this into any champ with a significant amount of healing (so basically every game) generally after your first or second item. Finish the upgrade at around 3rd or 4th item into Morellonomicon.

Rabadon's Deathcap
I like to buy this as my last or second to last item. Gives you a ton of damage into everything. Really strong and item slot efficient when completed so make sure to have it in your lategame build.

Void Staff
If the enemy team is stacking MR (this usually happens when either you're fed or if your team is AP heavy), buy a Void staff to do more damage.

Banshee's Veil
Pretty situational item that I like to build into heavy peel (e.g. Lulu or Janna) and/or poke comps. Helps you dive the enemy backline by making sure you don't get instantly Lulu polymorphed or lose half your health to a random poke ability.

Plated Steelcaps
I usually prefer Sorcs on Ekko but you can also run Tabi if the enemy team has a lot of AD autoattackers.

Mercury's Treads
You can build these into AP heavy teams and / or teams with lots of CC that can be negated by tenacity.

Combos/Rotations

Unlike other Assassins, Ekko isn't exactly a 1-shot champion until later on in the game or if he's fed. Before that, you generally want to kite in and out of fights with rotations. Thus, I call this section "Combos / Rotations."

Your standard trading combo in lane and rotation in teamfights. You can cast your Q mid-roll (E1) and it will hit your target around the time your E2 lands. Saves the cast time after your blink and allows a much faster damage rotation.

If you're not sure you can hit your Q if you cast it mid E1, you can also cast your Q after your E2 hits. Just note this is a slightly longer combo, which leaves you more vulnerable to enemy abilities.

Another rotation you can do is to cast your Q, E1 to the side to dodge an enemy skillshot (think Lux snare), then E2 to hit the enemy target as your Q hits.

Adding rocketbelt to the combo, you want to cast it after your E1 so the rockets hit the enemy target. Don't cast Q mid E1 as it won't be in range yet.

Same combo as above except with flash for even more range. With this combo, you can basically 1-shot a squishy from across the screen in a teamfight.

If you have hourglass, you can W then instantly hourglass. W has a 3 second channel time and hourglass lasts for 2.5 seconds, so the stun goes off almost immediately.

If you're using your ult to re-engage on an enemy target, be sure to E1 before your ult so you can instantly E2-AA as you leave ult for passive proc.

Good stall rotation in a teamfight.

Example Full Combo

In this example, you would close a ton of distance with E, flash, and rocketbelt to 1-shot a squishy then immediately W-Hourglass and R after the stun hits for AOE damage on the rest of the enemy team.

Early Game

Ekko is a scaling assassin with a relatively weak early game. Versus ranged matchups, you generally want to play pretty safe. When I play in high elo, this usually means I farm with almost only Q (this requires a good understanding of waveclear on Ekko so make sure to read the following section). However, in most elos, you can generally sneak in a few autos and look for good trades when the enemy laner missteps. If you get poked out and you're running TP, just back for corrupting pot stacks and some dark seals and TP back to lane. Don't worry about falling behind in CS early. You can easily make up for a cs deficit after laning phase as you'll have better access to side waves than less-mobile ranged champions.

Versus melee matchups, you can play a bit more aggressively and look for trades level 2 (as you win most level 2 trades versus melees). If you decide to run ignite, you can also cheese level 2 kills by poking the enemy laner down with Q and then all-inning with ignite at level 2.

WaveClear

There's a lot of nuance to waveclearing with Ekko, which I will cover in this section. Since you're a weak melee champion, it's pretty difficult to farm versus some mages. Although you can kill some of them in lane (especially in lower elo), it's important to know how to quickly clear waves as fast as possible to climb on Ekko. The key here is to know when your Q will 1-shot or 2-shot the caster minions in a wave. First, you need two points in Q to 2-shot the back wave early. Thus, you'll often want to take a second point in Q at level 3. Once you're lvl 9 (5 points in Q), you should be able to 1-shot the caster wave with and

Mid Game

My general rule on Ekko is to start the game playing safe (of course, you can play more aggressively depending on your rank) and to play more and more aggressive the more items you finish. After rocketbelt, you can usually start looking for solokills on the enemy mid laner or side lane roams. Once you finish Lich bane, you can easily 1-shot most squishies and can initiate fights with picks. By the time you have 3+ items, unless the enemy team has built a pretty big lead, you should be able to 1-shot multiple targets in fights and carry the game. This means that you DO NOT have to force risky plays to attain a lead early, as as long as you're not behind by midgame, you'll be winning.

Teamfighting

Teamfighting on Ekko isn't too different from other Assassins. Simply pick a squishy target (make sure they're not stacking MR) and combo them slightly after the fight begins. Preferably, you'll want to wait for the enemy frontline to focus your teammates, then 1-shot their backline while the peel is elsewhere. However, unlike other Assassins, Ekko can also start a fight relatively easily with W. Further, if you see a good pick, you can also quickly 1-shot the target and W-hourglass or ult out.

Here's a useful target selection section from my other assassin guides:

Target Selection

Here's a hypothetical situation: You've made it past all the enemy CC. Now you can use your full combo to delete one squishy from the teamfight. Do you kill the 10-3-5 Ryze, the 2-3-8 Lucian, or the 0-1-10 Janna? Well, even I couldn't tell you which one to go for. Your mistake was not picking a target before the start of the fight.

Before a fight starts, you want to first consider which enemies you can even 1-shot. This list will usually include the enemy mid, bot, and support. From this list, you want to find the biggest threat to your team. This is usually the enemy that does the most damage but could also include the that keeps the whole team alive and makes it impossible for you to 1-shot the enemy carries.

Now, you've narrowed down your list of targets to 1 or 2 (in our hypothetical situation, this would be Ryze and Lucian). First, check for items like , , or . This is incredibly important as a well-timed stopwatch or hourglass often decides a fight. If your target has one of these items, reconsider whether it's worth burning all your cooldowns to pop either the GA passive or force the hourglass. So, let's assume Ryze has a completed hourglass. If you judge that forcing the 10-3-5 Ryze to stasis for 2.5 seconds is worth more than a kill on the 2-3-8 Lucian, then go for Ryze. However, if you judge that killing Lucian then going for Ryze as a team is the better option, go for Lucian.

Another factor high elo players consider are summoner spell cooldowns. This can be a bit overwhelming if you're newer to the game, but timing summoner spells are incredibly important once you get to around Diamond 1 or above. It's actually pretty simple. To do this, make sure to have your chat timestamps enabled. For example, if the enemy Syndra flashes, click on the flash on the scoreboard (lets say, hypothetically, she flashes at 13:30). Then, when you're walking to lane or backing, simply add 5 minutes to the flash timestamp. Afterwards, type something like "mid f 1830," with 1830 meaning 18:30. You can do the same with heal (4 minute cd), barrer (3 minute cd), teleport (5 minute cd), ignite (3.5 minute cd), and etc. Remember that and CDR boots reduce summoner spell cooldowns.