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Hey guys, wRAth here. This is a primarily AP build for Katarina, the Sinister Blade. After her rework, AD is even less viable than it was before -- her main harass and damage ability, Bouncing Blades, doesn't even scale with AD. If you want to know all about Katarina, AP vs AD, and want to read an overall in-depth guide for AP Kat, look no further. Please leave any comments and constructive criticism below, and be sure to vote :)

Abbreviated Terms
CC = Crowd Control (Stun, fear, slow, snare, etc)
AP = Ability Power
AD = Attack Damage
MPen = Magic Penetration
CDR = Cooldown Reduction
OOM = Out of Mana
HP = Health/Health Points/Hit Points
DoT = Damage Over Time
AoE = Area of Effect
MRes = Magic Resistance
CS = Creep Score
MS = Movement Speed
DPS = Damage Per Second

Sinister Steel

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Greater Marks of Insight
All of Katarina's abilities are dealt as magic damage, and as such you want magic penetration. This extra MPen is very helpful along with your masteries (if you follow my setup), your Sorcerer's Shoes, and the MPen from the Void Staff in this build. All of the MPen will allow you to slice through enemies as if they had virtually no MRes at all, even offtanks and tanks.

Another viable rune option is the Greater Mark of Precision. I enjoy taking these runes on a lot of my APs since they only take away 3.5 magic pen, which is hardly noticeable, and add a whopping 9 armor penetration, which helps a lot for auto attack harassing and a bit with last hitting as well. However, I prefer these on ranged champions since you harass a lot with your auto attacks when you have the range to. With Kat, though, most of your harass comes from your Bouncing Blades and other spells, and more often than not you detonate your marks with Sinister Steel or Shunpo, not auto attacks. However, you still DO attack, so if you want to take these, you can.



Greater Seals of Scaling Health
With these, it is quite an easy choice. Besides these being half the price of the flat Greater Seal of Health, they give around 4 times as much health at level 18. The Seals of Scaling Health also have a larger amount of total HP per rune turnover once you hit level 5, which, since I mid, I hit quickly, and even side-laning you hit quickly. Flat HP seals are only really helpful for jungling, since they only grant more HP really early game, and we are not jungling with Kat in this guide :)

You want health seals to make her a little less squishy. In total, 9 of these seals give around 180 extra health at 18, which helps a lot considering you don't have to spend any gold in-game to get the extra HP.

The HP also acts as extra effective armor and magic resist when using your Shunpo, since you take reduced damage from ALL sources.

You could also go with the Greater Seal of Armor if you notice the enemy is physical damage heavy (if playing draft mode). Armor seals also help you take reduced damage if you draw minion aggro, and most AP mids harass often with auto attacks -- having armor seals mitigates a bit of that damage. I still prefer HP/level seals more often than not, especially in Kat's case due to the effective resistances, but these are a good alternative.


Greater Glyphs of Magic Resist
These runes help a ton. You get 12 MR in total from the start, and since you will most likely be mid, this means you are negating quite a bit of damage from the enemy AP's spells, which helps a lot early on to let you lane longer. I get flat over scaling here since the scaling Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist becomes more effective at level 9; however, by then, you will have some more health and tankiness anyway, from your items as well as naturally leveling up, so having a bit more MR won't be nearly as effective as having a large amount early game. You need to make sure you stay in lane and do not get pushed out early, since that can set you far behind and put your enemy way ahead. The larger amount of MR from these flat runes over the scaling ones early game help you achieve that.

If you happen to go mid vs a non-magic damage dealing champion, you can take the Greater Glyph of Scaling Ability Power instead, which will give you a bit of a boost to your total AP.



Greater Quintessences of Ability Power
These quints are great. Right off the bat, you start with 15 extra AP (not including masteries), which adds around 11 more damage to your Bouncing Blades (including the mark detonations), 9 to your Sinister Steel, 6 to your Shunpo, and 26 to your Death Lotus. This is nice for early game harass, and lets you farm a little bit easier as well. These quints have more of a drastic effect early game, when the extra damage from your AP will really show in ganks and harassing, but through late game, in conjunction with Deathcap's passive, it will turn in to around 20 extra AP. And, going into a game with free AP, without having to spend a single gold coin, who DOESN'T want that? These calculations do not include the total AP increase from the Archmage mastery points.

I get these over the AP per level Greater Quintessence of Scaling Ability Power because those only give, together, around 9 more AP. And the extra AP gained from them does not pay off until level 12. Now, if you are mid, you might think "oh, well he said the other per level runes were okay if you are mid," well these are different. Their early game effect is SO drastic, and this also lets you get boots instead of an Amplifying Tome first thing (see "Items" section for more on this), that you want to get flats.

Other viable alternatives could be the Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed, since the extra movement speed helps a lot early game for mobility and juking enemy spells, and the Greater Quintessence of Spell Vamp, which would give you a free 6% spell vamp off the bat, which would stay with you throughout the game, increasing your vamp from 20% to 26%.

Voracity
This passive is really nice, and synergizes well with Katarina's kit. Every time you get a kill or assist, your basic spells are instantly refreshed, and your ultimate's cooldown is reduced by 10 seconds. This opens up many opportunities for Katarina during fights and laning phase. If she successfully dives for a kill early on, and uses Shunpo to go in, instead of dying to the turret aggro, she can instantly Shunpo back out to a creep since the cooldown on it will be refreshed. Likewise, in fights, since all of her abilities deal AoE damage except her Shunpo, any time she gets a kill or assists in a kill, which is easy to do with her spells, they come back instantly, allowing you to even more damage. Unfortunately, with the Katarina rework, no longer can you get your ultimate back up instantly after getting 3 kills or assists (the ult hits up to 3 champs, so netting a kill or assist on each one would bring your ult back up instantly) unless you have full CDR, which would require you having blue buff in addition to your masteries/ Deathfire Grasp (which you should still pick up if your jungler lets you, as must junglers don't need a blue past 1st or 2nd, and the CDR is really nice on Kat). However, with blue buff, it will feel just like the old Kat, getting a kill or assist on 3 champs and then having your ult back up instantly. However, without blue, you will need to get 4 kills or assists in a quick fight to get it back up almost instantly, or have an extended fight where you get a few kills/assists after you initially use your ult to have it back up again near the end of the fight.

Overall, a really nice passive for Katarina.



Bouncing Blades
This skill is amazing in so many ways: for farming, harassing at range, and to dish out a lot of AoE damage in mid-late game. If the enemy team is grouped up in a fight, one toss of your Bouncing Blades can deal damage to every enemy champion. I max this spell first since it is your long ranged safe harass, your farming tool, and your most damaging ability. You can constantly poke enemies down at a safe range with it, and not put yourself in danger in the process.

This skill definitely makes up for the nerfs on Kat's other skill during the rework. It is truly amazing -- a lot of damage with a .3 AP ratio AND a .6 AD ratio (which will add some damage once you purchase a Hextech Gunblade), large AoE, terrific for farming and detonating Bouncing Blades marks, great harass, as well as a large MS boost, on a 4 second cooldown ignoring CDR at all levels. With blue buff, along with the masteries in this guide and Deathfire Grasp, this spell will be on a little over a 2 second cooldown. The extra damage ability on Katarina helps solidify her role as an assassin, and it being AoE fits perfectly with the other AoE abilities ( Bouncing Blades and Death Lotus) in her kit. In teamfights, this ability lets Kat dish out a lot more DPS than she previously could.

I max this ability second for many reasons. Of course, you want to max Bouncing Blades first, since it is Kat's only ranged ability that lets you harass and farm from a safe distance, and it also deals the most damage from any of her abilities when the marks are consumed (of course, the cooldown is twice that of Sinister Steel, so the DPS from Sinister Steel, assuming you use it every time it's up, is more -- however, you cannot always be in range for Sinister Steel without dying every two minutes, as you can with Bouncing Blades, which more than makes up for the longer cooldown). I max Sinister Steel second over Shunpo though for many reasons:

1. Sinister Steel deals more base damage at all levels (except at level 1, both deal 40 damage), and deals more damage than Shunpo until acquiring 400 AP exactly, ignoring the bonus AD ratio. At 400 AP, however, you will probably be level 18, so both Shunpo and Sinister Steel will be maxed anyway, and, if you follow this build and build order exactly, you will have a Hextech Gunblade at around 400 AP, which provides 40 AD, increasing the damage of Sinister Steel by another 24 -- this means, even at 400 AP, you are STILL going to be dealing a bit more damage with Sinister Steel.

2. Lower cooldown at ALL levels, especially at level 1 (4 seconds on Sinister Steel, 14 on Shunpo.

3. Helps a lot with farming, since it is AoE -- simply use Bouncing Blades and then detonate the marks and deal extra damage with Sinister Steel.

4. Also deals more damage when ganking/in fights due to it being AoE.

5. Leveling it also increases the movement speed buff on it, which lets you harass the enemy with Bouncing Blades, Shunpo in, and then Sinister Steel for more damage and a large MS buff to get out of range of the opponent's retaliation harass/turret damage if diving/creep damage extremely quickly. Also helps with chasing, which works well too when roaming and ganking lanes after pushing up mid.

6. Shunpo's damage reduction stays at 20% at all levels. If it increased with level, that would change everything. But, since it has low damage without a lot of AP, early game you should really only be using it for the utility aspect of it -- jumping in to finish a kill off or to set up a combo, escaping harass or ganks, etc. And since the damage reduction on it remains the same, and lasts the same duration, if you had it maxed at level 9 or 18 it wouldn't change the usefulness of Shunpoing right before you take damage to reduce some of it.

For all of these reasons, I max this skill out second, at level 13.



Shunpo
Shunpo is your awesome utility blink ability that helps with setting up combos, chasing and ganking, escaping ganks, etc. The damage reduction built into it helps her play her role as an assassin by jumping in, surviving long enough to kill all of the things, and jump out. The damage reduction is also a life saver in certain situations, such as when a Vladimir ultimate is about to detonate or a Karthus ult is about to strike. If you save your Shunpo for when you would receive the damage (you have to have a general knowledge of the game to know how long the time is on these kinds of abilities before they deal their damage), it can be the difference between life or death.

For reasons mentioned previously, I take a point in Shunpo at level 3 so I have it for the utility aspect, but then save it to max last.

Now, there are some pretty sick moves you can pull off with Shunpo. Let's go over a few of them:

1. Shunpo-to-ward trick. Make sure to try to always carry a few sight wards with you, as long as you can and have to money to buy some. What you have to do is quite simple. Just place the ward in front of you, at maximum distance, and Shunpo to it!

This opens up a lot of options. You can use it as a supplemental flash, placing it over a wall and then using Shunpo on it to blink over the wall. This can be helpful for either escaping from enemies or chasing enemies, especially if they have a built-in blink as well or if they flashed and yours is down or you don't want to waste it to follow them. You can use it to dodge skillshots that you would otherwise fall to if there are no creeps, champions, or monsters nearby to Shunpo to.

Berzerk has kindly allowed me to use some of his videos in my guide. Thanks Berzerk! In this video, he demostrates the ward hop:
Play Video /league-of-legends/ability/shunpo-180 Berzerk to demonstrate this:
Play Video /league-of-legends/ability/shunpo-180
Death Lotus
This is the ultimate where you see Kat spin in circles while shooting out blades. How she does not get dizzy, I don't know. But, what I do know is that it deals crazy damage and has an extremely low cooldown. And now, with the rework, although the damage is reduced a bit, the DPS of it is increased, since the channel time was reduced to only two seconds. And, if you get kills or assists with it, it lowers by 10 seconds each kill/assist thanks to her passive (see above).

This ability now also applies Grievous Wounds, which reduces incoming healing by 50% for 3 seconds, allowing Death Lotus to deal more net damage to healing targets such as Dr. Mundo, Swain, and Soraka, since their heals will only be half as effective during your ult and for a second after; this makes it much easier to net a kill with your ultimate or abilities directly after your ultimate without the need of Ignite on such targets.

It throws up to 30 daggers, maximum that can hit a single champion who stays in range is 10. As such, it can deal damage to up to 3 champs at once. Wow. And if you kill all of them with it or get assists on each of the three champions who your ulti targets, and you have full CDR (see Voracity sub-section) you get it back.

Instantly.

I am not going to spend too much time on this, as it is mostly self-explanatory. However, keep in mind that you need SOME common sense to know when to ultimate. Remember, you are not GODZILLA, even if you ARE playing Kat. Many times have I seen Katarinas go alone into a group of full HP enemies and ulti, and wind up dying without getting any kills or assists from the situation. Although you are Kat, and Kat is able to pull off some crazy stunts, try not to get too cocky.

You are still a squishy assassin, and you need a team to back you up in fights. If you just jump into their whole team without having anyone to peel for you, you will die instantly, guaranteed. However, in mid lane 1v1 situations, or ganks, don't be afraid to ult even if it won't net a kill or assist, as long as it will force the enemy to go back -- this still denies them gold and XP and puts yourself/your teammates at a nice advantage. Remember, even without Voracity going off, it is still on a relatively short cooldown of under a minute at level 16.

In fights, it is a similar concept, except you want to be more focused on bursting down the enemy carries. However, if you can ult before, say, a baron, and force the enemies to go back and let your team grab an uncontested baron, it is totally worth it, even if you don't grab any kills or assists, although that would be optimal.

Remember that in a fight, your job is generally to burst the enemy carries, so try to save your ultimate in teamfights for them. Also try to keep away from any enemies that have CC that can interrupt your ultimate, such as Alistar. If they keep trying to save their CC for when you ult, as they should, try to get your teammates to peel them away from you, ie. distract them and force them to swap targets.

Learn this ability whenever possible. (6, 11, 16)

Bouncing Blades

RECOMMENDED



Ignite
This is a key spell to use in your combo. Great for grabbing kills you wouldn't have otherwise, allowing you to get more fed than you would without ignite. Don't underestimate the damage of it, either. At level 18 it adds a whopping 410 true damage to your combo, which is a good percentage of a squishy's health. Not only that, but it also reduces healing on the target by 50% for the duration (5 seconds). Great for finishing off people who would have otherwise healed, as well as using on a target that can heal themselves BEFORE your combo and Death Lotus, so they won't be healing as much during it, and as such you will deal more overall damage to them; such targets are Dr. Mundo, Swain, and Soraka. Great spell overall for Katarina as well as any other carries.



Flash
A must-have spell for any caster, and basically any champ in the game, even Katarina, who already has a built-in "flash", per se. Using this along with your Shunpo gives you a "double flash" effect, letting you EASILY escape enemies, close any gaps, initiate any fights (if you can pick a carry, MVP, or a sole champion off -- please do not go in solo 1v5), get out of turret range, and more. It also comes in handy when Shunpo is down, and to go over walls that you can't with Shunpo (no ward or sight to enemy/teammate/neutral creep). Another terrific spell for Kat, and for basically anyone at that.



Exhaust
Another good option for Katarina, but not in the cheatsheet. Good to take if you are against a team with a lot of heavy physical damage. The slow and ability damage reduction also helps you net some kills or get away safely in mid, as well. However, generally not as good of an option as Ignite considering Ignite adds a lot to your early burst, and you have a single target slow in the form of your Bilgewater Cutlass/ Hextech Gunblade active already. Generally, you should at least have one exhaust on your team, usually from your support, if not another from your jungler (sometimes AD carries and solotops take it as well, but not recommended).


MEH



Ghost
Meh. You just don't need it. You have plenty of mobility with Shunpo and Flash already, you are better off using your 2nd summoner spell slot for more burst to your combo, in the means of Ignite.



Cleanse
This is an okay spell to take, really only if you notice off the bat (in draft mode of course) that basically every enemy has heavy CC. You can just Cleanse and then Shunpo and/or Flash out. You can't rely on that happening every game in blind pick, though, so definitely don't take this spell in a blind, assuming that their whole team is full of CC every single game that you play with Katarina. And, even if they are, I still wouldn't highly recommend this spell, since you can add more damage to your combos by keeping Ignite, and just buy Mercury's Treads BEFORE your Void Staff and/or a Quicksilver Sash.


NO...JUST...NO



Clarity
You don't have mana. However much you want to think that an empty mana pool means you are just constantly out of mana on Kat, it isn't true. Just let it go.

Any spell not mentioned is a definite no-no for obvious reasons, too obvious to even spend my time discussing.

NOTE: I HAVE REMOVED ANY REFERENCES TO ITEMS THAT ARE NO LONGER IN THE BUILD, HOWEVER THIS SECTION IS STILL OUT OF DATE AND DOESN'T INCLUDE SOME ITEMS. PLEASE FOLLOW THE BUILD PROVIDED AT THE TOP OF THE GUIDE, I WILL UPDATE THIS WHEN I HAVE THE TIME.

______Remember that you have 3 actives at full build! I find it useful to smartcast item slots 1 and 2 and put Hextech Gunblade and Deathfire Grasp on them for easy accessibility and to get them off onto my target really fast. To change your key bindings, click the esc button while in game and go to "Key Bindings". Item smartcasting is found all the way at the bottom.

______Make sure that you know where each item is located in your inventory, so that you don't accidentally burn the Hourglass active when you meant to Gunblade or Deathfire, or you spam the wrong key when you are trying to activate your Hourglass, and end up dying prematurely as a result! Messing your actives up or just forgetting to use them entirely can really put you at a disadvantage and cut down on your overall usefulness!


______Since all of your abilities except Shunpo are AoE, you will only be getting a 15% 1.5 second slow on all of them from this item. You have enough survivability with Zhonya's Hourglass, Shunpo, and HP from your masteries/runes already; all you really have to do with Kat is jump in a fight with your Shunpo, use your Bouncing Blades, Sinister Steel, and Death Lotus, and jump out; you have plenty of health to do that as is. Getting this item would replace a more valuable item. Also, once you complete Hextech Gunblade, and even before if you buy a Bilgewater Cutlass, you have a long range 50% 3 second slow, which is more than enough to keep a high priority target (most likely an enemy AD or AP carry) in range for your combo.

This item still isn't terrible on her, and adds a bit more survivability. If you feel that you are getting bursted down in basically every fight, and the extra health pool would help a lot, feel free to get it, just keep in mind that it will be replacing a item that is almost always stronger on her.


Lich bane is a no. I had this question asked tons of times; it could seem good in theory, but in practice it really isn't. You don't get the mana from Lich Bane, and you would need to spend time auto attacking a single target, when you could just wait for Shunpo or Bouncing Blades to come back off cooldown for them. As mentioned earlier, your basic job is to jump in on the carries, ult, and jump out...no time for auto attacks. Your damage is strong enough, in combination with the actives from Deathfire Grasp and Hextech Gunblade, to take down any single carry anyway -- this item would just be a waste and take up a slot for a more useful item. It isn't terrible, it is surely not unviable on Kat, but it isn't ideal nor necessary. Without full CDR, you also don't have super low cooldowns to proc Lich Bane on a constant basis, which is something to look for when you buy it -- that is why champions with really low cooldowns or abilities that synergize with Lich Bane well will often get it, such as Orianna, Lux, Gragas, and Ziggs. Sinister Steel is on a relatively low cooldown, but there is still a second or two gap where you are losing a potential Lich proc without full CDR with blue buff. In teamfights, you may be able to proc it more often due to your passive, especially if you have blue buff, which would allow you to get some more spells off in a short amount of time, however, generally, as I just mentioned and mentioned time and time again, you won't really have much time to proc Lich Bane in teamfights anyway; if you get a few kills or assists and lower your cooldowns with your passive, chances are you will be using Death Lotus and your other spells again, not auto attacking. Her cooldowns aren't super high, so Lich Bane isn't totally unviable, but there are just better ways to use your six item slots for Kat.

NOTE: THESE ITEMS CAN REPLACE ANY ITEM IN THE BUILD THAT YOU CHOOSE. THINK WISELY, HOWEVER, OF WHAT ITEM(S) YOU CHOOSE TO REPLACE WITH THESE SITUATIONAL ITEMS. IF YOU DO NOT NEED THESE ITEMS TO IMPROVE YOUR GAME AGAINST YOUR ENEMIES, DON'T BUY THEM.

Generally, however, if you end up actually getting to a full build, and you don't know which item you should drop for one of these, drop the Void Staff if they are mostly squishy (since it won't help too much), or the Zhonya's Hourglass if they are mostly tanky (since you need Void Staff to do more damage to them, but they won't do as much to you, so you can afford to have less defenses). Although you generally want all of the items in the main build if the game goes long enough to permit.


Quicksilver Sash
This item is good against enemies with a lot of CC (Kennen, Morgana, Lux, Vlad, etc) if you do not have Cleanse with you. It is cheap and has a cleanse-like active. It removes ALL debuffs from your character. Yes, this includes things that cleanse won't remove, such as damaging debuffs like Vlad's ulti, Malz's ulti, EVERY single debuff to you. Just use the active and Shunpo and/or Flash out of there. Keep in mind, if they CC/debuff you again right after you use the active, it won't have a reduced effect as it does with Cleanse. BE CAREFUL OF THAT. This item also gives a good amount of MRes, which is nice against these types of enemies.



Mercury's Treads
This item is also great against a team of CCers, just keep in mind it would supplement your Sorcerer's Shoes early game, so you will be dealing slightly less damage overall until you get your Void Staff. It might be worth it to have slightly less damage early game, however, if it means that you can get CC reduction against a team full of CC that could mess you up otherwise for the ENTIRE game.



Banshee's Veil
This item can be a lifesaver against certain enemies, such as enemies with CC like Morgana and Kennen, as well as enemies who have an "inevitable ultimate", such as Vlad's ultimate and Karthus's ultimate. It blocks a negative spell every 45 seconds. 'Nuff said. Getting in a sticky situation, your Banshee's might just save you enough time to get the hell outta there. This item also grants Health and mres, both helpful against these types of enemies. It also gives some mana, which doesn't help Kat, but it isn't the main use of the item so not much gold is being wasted there.



Mejai's Soulstealer
Nothing else at this price (let alone most other items) can provide this much AP. Plus, with the deathcap, not even including the bonus % AP masteries, the total 180 AP from this item with full stacks turns into 234 total AP. And getting stacks, especially with Kat, isn't as hard as it may seem. Your abilities are so devastating early through late game that you are guaranteed to get a lot of kills and assists. And if you lose some, just get them back! Once you get full stacks, you get 15% CDR, which is helpful when you don't have blue buff or blue elixir on you.

However, this is NOT the most reliable item, use it at your own risk. If you are having an exceptionally good game, try to pick it up early. If not, don't bother risking to lose an item slot and a lot of AP and some gold. It also adds a big "FOCUS ME" sign on top of your head, since the enemies will want to do all they can to prevent you from getting to 20 stacks. Be aware that this is a risky item to use, but will reap great rewards if you get a lot of stacks on it without dying.

SOME OF MY SCORES WITH KAT USING THIS GUIDE:

I hope you took the time to read through my guide. Please vote and comment, and try out my build and all of the tips that I give in my guide. I hope it will give you new insight into Katarina, and hopefully you will own with her as much as I do (or more :O). Any questions, feel free to leave them in the comments or PM me and I will get right back to you. Thanks, and have FUN!

If you want to take the time to check out my other guides, feel free to! Click the stamps to see the corresponding champion's guide!

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