Vi Build Guide by pSyDeD

NOTE

Guide updated!

Introduction

Hello Summoners! My name is pSyDeD, and i am currently ranked Gold V on the SEA server. After months of being in love with Vi <3, i decided to write a guide for her to help more players pick her up and win games. Vi was my most played jungler in S4 ahead of Jarvan IV and most memorably helped me win a 4v5 in my Gold promos to get me my Gold border just a day before the end of S4.
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What makes Vi stand out?

Vi is one of the best and most unique creations of Riot's champion design team. She radiates the badass attitude of a "bad cop" while her kit gives us a clear indication of her favourite hobby, Punching. Moreover she has the best life advice a league champion can give, "If you hit a wall, hit it hard."

Vi's mechanics make her extremely fun to play, and her aggressive play style and uncleansable, unavoidable, undodgeable ult Assault and Battery make her engages one of the most simple and most potent in the game.

Pros / Cons

Pros:

+ Fantastic Single Target CC
+ Great AD ratios
+ Vault Breaker is a low cooldown gap closer, can jump over walls
+ Great ganks, almost unescapable after 6
+ Synergizes well with mid-lane assassins
+ Efficient jungle clear
+ Naturally tanky, passive scales with HP
+ Nightmare for carries

Cons:

- Vault Breaker can be interrupted
- Vault Breaker has a high cooldown early
- Early ganks heavily reliant on landing Vault Breaker
- Self CC, slowed 15% while charging Vault Breaker
- Weak level 2, susceptible early in the jungle
- Has trouble sticking to targets
- No natural sustain
- Ultimate cannot be cancelled, may result in being led into a sticky situation
- Not the best teamfighter
- Not the best tank

Masteries

Vi is best played with 21/9/0 masteries. Being mainly a burst AD caster, Vi needs her cooldowns to be up to do damage, hence points into Sorcery are absolutely necessary for Vault Breaker and Assault and Battery to be up as often as possible. Expose Weakness makes her ganks and engages more effective. We do not go into Warlord as Spell Weaving and Blade Weaving will make the Trinity Force build more effective.

In the defensive tree, we try to take as much health as possible since her passive Blast Shield scales with her HP, so we go 3 points into Veteran's Scars and Juggernaut .

Runes

Vi scales hard with AD, a fully charged Vault Breaker at max rank does300(+ 160% bonus AD) with this build. Assault and Battery has 450 base damage and an additional 140% bonus AD over it. We take as much bonus AD using Greater Mark of Attack Damage in our runes as possible to make these two abilities hit hard.

Greater Seal of Armor is necessary for tanking jungle monsters while clearing, and also help her in taking on AD carries later.

For glyphs, Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist are the most advisable to give her some defensive stats mid to late game, however, if the enemy team has negligible or no magic damage on their team, Greater Glyph of Cooldown Reduction can be a viable alternative to make Assault and Battery available more often for ganks.

Greater Quintessence of Attack Damage is what i always use on Vi and these are the most viable quints. Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed is also used by a few Vi players, maily to make Vault Breaker smoother, however, it is not worth sacrifice the bonus AD from our quints for this purpose, since Vault Breaker is not a very hard skillshot to land, and Boots of Mobility may be very well be bought on Vi to allow more map presence instead of Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed

Items

Which Smite to get?

As of Patch 5.8, chilling smite is the most popular smite on Vi. Challenging smite is a viable alternative, however, i prefer chilling smite simply because it gives you extra cc and makes early ganks much more potent. blasting smite is least recommended because vi already has good aoe jungle clear with Excessive Force.

As always, start Hunter's Machete and 2 health pots with a Warding Totem

Keep jungling until low, back and upgrade to Stalker's Blade and buy a few health pots, Vision Wards and Stealth Wards. Switch over to Sweeping Lens. Look for dragons and ganks.

Try to upgrade to Enchantment:warrior as your first item and everntually, buy Boots of Speed and look to get your Phage to work towards Trinity Force. Phage is preferable over Sheen as the first item of Trinity Force as it gives Vi a bit of survivability as well as ability to stick to targets with Unique Passive: Rage. Also, as we have discussed earlier, Vi benefits from the bonus AD and it synergizes well with the armor pen from

Mid Game is when skirmishes should erupt, and Vi could benefit from some defensive stats at this point. A Giant's Belt will give Vi some survivability, and again, will synergize well with her passive, Blast Shield so Vi can survive skirmishes long enough to dish out damage.

Now, there are several choices of boots for Vi:-

- Mercury's Treads are the boots i buy most of the time on Vi. The Unique Passive: Tenacity is very useful to stay CC'd for shorter periods during fights.

- Ninja Tabi is also viable if the enemy team has a lot of basic attack based champions, or just a fed AD carry, and it will greatly reduce the damage taken by you from basic attacks.

- Boots of Mobility should be chosen when you feel you do not need the Tenacity from Mercury's Treads or the defensive stats from Ninja Tabi, rather you need to roam and apply more pressure around the map on objectives and force ganks. It also makes Vault Breaker smoother.

We get Trinity Force on Vi for a number of reason:-

- Vi benefits from all the base stats
- Phage passive helps her stick to targets
- Excessive Force procs Sheen in a cone, dealing Tons of AOE damage.

Patch 5.8 item notes

Why Triforce over Black Cleaver

Patch 5.8 came with a buff to The Black Cleaver which presented a few junglers with an alternative item on vi. However, i prefer Trinity Force instead of The Black Cleaver on vi. The reason being simple, triforce+warrior does a lot more damage to squishies.

Vi should always be looking to initiate onto squishies, besides, she does have passive armor reduction on her Denting Blows and armor pen from Enchantment:warrior

Black cleaver synergizes well with Enchantment:Cinderhulk however we prefer Enchantment:Warrior simply because if u want to play a tank, there are better tanks to play than Vi!

Aim for some defensive items next, the Giant's Belt in your inventory should build into Randuin's Omen. U can also go for Warmog's Armor.
Round off the build with a Banshee's Veil which protects you against being CC'd as you initiate as well as adding some more defensive stats.

Upgrade Sweeping Lens to Oracle's Lens to clear out wards near objectives and chug Elixir of Wrath

Summoner Spells

Flash is a must on Vi as it is essential to one of the most potent plays that can be made on her, the Flash+ Vault Breaker combo which we will be talking about in detail under abilities.

Smite is mandatory on jungle Vi. It will help you in clearing buffs and jungle camps and contesting objectives like Baron and Dragon

Ability Explanation

Blast Shield

This is your passive which shields you for quite a lot upon dealing damage with activated abilities and is off CD more frequently at later levels. It cannot go off via your Denting Blows.

Vault Breaker

Landing your Vault Breaker is pivotal to your damage as Vi and and it is the most important ability in her kit pre-6. We max this ability first. There are several important things to note about this ability, hence we go into detail on this

Vault Breaker GUIDE:-

- A fully charged Vault Breaker deals double damage, so try to charge your Vault Breaker upto maximum.
- This ability slows your Movement speed by 15% while charging. Try to charge it carefully, or you will give the enemy ample time to react. It is recommended you start charging from brush or just as you enter the lane to have the damage and range charged upto maximum
- You can execute a fancy Flash+ Vault Breaker combo to increase the range and give your opponents no time to react.

HOW TO Flash+ Vault Breaker

Denting Blows

This is your W which is a passive ability that deals % max HP of the target as physical damage, reduces its armor by 20% grants Vi 30/35/40/45/50% attack speed for 4 seconds. We get one point into this ability at level 1 for the sustained attack speed bonus and %max HP damage which helps us clear camps, but max it last.

Excessive Force

This ability is an autoattack reset, which causes Vi to deal damage to the target and enemies in a cone behind it. There are some important things to note about this ability:-

- This ability on activation gives Vi +50 attack range on her next basic attack.
- Excessive Force will set off Vi's passive Blast Shield
- It procs sheen damage in a cone, deals tons of AOE damage
- It applies on-hit effects like life-steal only on the target and not in a cone behind it.
- It has an AP scaling(+70% AP) on the base damage which benefits from Trinity Force

Assault and Battery

Vi's ultimate, Assault and Battery is her signature move. Put simply, Vi knocks target champion up for 1.25 seconds. There is no stopping it, no escaping it, no cleansing it. Vi knocks you up for 1.25 seconds while dealing a ton of damage. End of Story. However :-

- Spells that make a champion untargetable will cancel Assault and Battery and put it on cooldown. E.g.- Playful / Trickster , Alpha Strike , Sanguine Pool
- Assault and Battery will chase targeted champion into turret range if they use their displacement abilities such as Flash or Relentless Pursuit!
- Aim this ability in a line through the enemy team to knock aside targets in front while dealing damage to maximize your damage output
- Make sure your team is ready to follow up on your Assault and Battery!
- You are vulnerable to being led into a poor position while using this ability, so be careful with it!

Jungling

If starting top side, do the krug camp first. Smite it for the gift of heavy hands, and then work on red. Then smite bonus from krugs should enable you to do the camp easily. Be sure to use your 2 health potions to stay healthy.

Head towards blue. Use Smite on it, then keep farming or look for a gank till you have around 400-450 gold. Back and upgrade smite. Then look for more ganks or keep farming. Do not forget about the crab! You may go crab-catching if you have nothing else to do! :P

Vi is also great at soloing dragon at early levels due to her passive and the %max hp damage on Denting Blows.

Ganking.

As we talked about earlier, the general indications you should gank a lane are:-

- The lane is overextended.
- The lane doesn't have a ward.
- The lane is low on HP/Mana.
- Lacks escapes, e.g. Darius with Heal+ Teleport.
- Summoner spells such as Flash and Heal are down.

Lower Elos are all about jungle pressure, and as a jungler who excels at ganking, you want to look for ganks as Vi. Successful ganks will not only put you and your laner ahead, it will also put the opposing laner behind and help secure advantages for your teammates.

How to Gank as Vi:

Pre-6:

- Lead in with a fully charged Vault Breaker and keep autoattacking to apply the red buff slow.
- If the enemy laner is very overextended, just walk into lane and start applying red buff slow(be wary for counterganks!) and Vault Breaker to chase after they use Flash.
- Sometimes you can lead in with a Flash+ Vault Breaker combo if the enemy is low enough or cannot escape you.
- Remember to use Excessive Force right after you autoattack to reset your autoattack animation and do extra damage

After 6:

Your ganks become very potent when you have Assault and Battery

- Again, lead in by landing Vault Breaker. Flash+ Vault Breaker if necessary.
- Then use Assault and Battery after they have used their displacement effects. E.g.- Flash or Arcane Shift
- Your laner ahould also follow up on your gank and result in a kill for the team.

Vi works well with assassins such Zed or Ahri as she can line up the opposing laner and lock him down long enough for Death Mark+ Razor Shuriken or Charm+ Orb of Deception combo which should result in a kill.

Summary

Overall, Vi is one of the most fun to play and powerful junglers in the game, so i hope you have fun playing her! All the best and have fun punching your opponents in the face!

"Vi stands for Victory!"

P.S:- I will add jungle matchups and any other topics on request!