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Choose Champion Build:
-
Alpha Yi
-
Jungle AP Master Yi
Recommended Items
Spells:
Flash
Ignite
Items
Ability Order
Double Strike (PASSIVE)
Master Yi Passive Ability
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
FRIENDS, IT IS WITH GREAT DISAPPOINTMENT AND MUCH SADNESS THAT I COME HERE TO CONVEY YOU AN HORRIBLE MESSAGE. THE MIGHTY HAS FALLEN. THE EVIL FORCES OF THE MORELLO ARMY HAVE TAKEN HIM AWAY FROM US.

WE MUST NOT SHOW WEAKNESS. DO NOT CRY, MY BROTHERS. STAY STRONG.
But seriously though the new AD Yi has a very similar playstyle to old AP Yi so it's k.
By the way almost everything below this is obsolete and rather useless.
This is now the only way to play


Hey, welcome to my

MY AD YI GUIDE: http://www.mobafire.com/league-of-legends/build/master-yi-and-his-dark-sides-ad-213739
If you have literally NEVER played Yi before, I suggest you play him as AD first :p
If you want to know a little bit about me, click here!
Oh and quickly, check out TinyStar's Boutique, she is the one who made the sweet graphics for this guide :3.


Hello there! If you've never seen what AP Master Yi can do or if you simply enjoy watching pentakills, let me show you epic videos that will surely make you want to play AP Yi!
Click on the spoilers to reveal the PENTAKILL videos!



Now, if you want to do this, keep on reading :D!


- Great Laning Phase
- Amazing Pusher and Roamer/Ganker
- Can snowball extremely hard and carry a game
- If fed, can easily get Triple, Quadra and Pentakills
- Can build nothing but damage and still have crazy survivability
- There is literally nothing more fun than AP Yi in this game (Instakilling champions, Multikills and MediTanking are just so... awesome...)

- Requires really good timing and judgement (like the old
Katarina)
- Requires a lot of farm to be really effective Late game
- Sometimes relies a little bit on luck (
Alpha Strike's targeting system)

This is what works best in almost every case.
-
Expanded Mind 's +180 Flat mana really helps Master Yi's terribly low mana pool late game. Master Yi was designed to be an AD Carry that relies on autoattacks so he has trouble with his mana to compensate for his other awesome base stats (scaling Magic Resist for example).
- Running out of mana in a teamfight really isn't something you want. Really not. Imagine you killed someone with your burst combo and now you're about to bring down the entire enemy team and get a pentakill when suddenly you just run out of mana and stand in place like a re-tard as you are pointlessly spamming Q. And then you die because you can't use
Meditate. Very sad story.

Alright, my runes are pretty standard. An ordinary Caster setup that works very nicely on Alpha Yi.
For Reds, choose

My Yellow runes are



However, you should really use





For Blues you want


For the Quints I tend to go


Here are the summoner spells that I consider ''viable'' on Alpha Yi:






Every other spell should pretty much never be taken.

Useful early in the game.




*Side note: Nope, Double Strike will not make your



Alpha Strike
Master Yi leaps across the battlefield striking up to 4 enemies, dealing 100 / 150 / 200 / 250 / 300 (+100% of ability power) magic damage to each enemy with a 50% chance to deal 260 / 320 / 380 / 440 / 500 bonus magic damage to minions.
Master Yi's Ninja skill. Your bread and butter skill, you shall use it to farm, harass, dodge skills, escape, kill champions, everything!
- During
Alpha Strike, you are untargetable, you can use this to dodge spells
- If you have good tiing, you can use
Alpha Strike on enemies right before they go through a wall and you will land next to them (over the wall too).
Here's a video that shows that you can follow enemies through walls:



Meditate
Master Yi channels, restoring 28 / 56 / 84 / 112 / 140 (+40% of ability power) health every second for 5 seconds for a total of 200 / 350 / 500 / 650 / 800 (+200% of ability power) health. While channeling, Master Yi gains 100 / 150 / 200 / 250 / 300 armor and magic resistance.
Early game it's just a ridiculously powerful sustain ability.
When maxed second, this ability becomes so powerful that you can easily tank towers and multiple enemies damage at the same time. Each time you use this spell, you become pretty much invincible for 5 seconds unless someone throws hard CC at you. In teamfights, you should usually use this spell while waiting for your



Wuju Style
Passive: Increases physical damage by 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 / 35.
Active: Master Yi can activate this ability to double its effectiveness for 10 seconds, but this removes the passive bonus until Wuju Style becomes available again.
Take one point in it whenever (usually at level 4) you feel like you could use extra damage and you don't really need to get another point in

I would also like to say that because you are playing AP Yi, you did not lose the ability to right click enemies. You can still and must autoattack champions after using



Always activate




Increases Master Yi's movement speed by 40% and Attack Speed by 40 / 60 / 80%, and he becomes immune to all slowing effects for 6 / 9 / 12 seconds. Additionally, killing a champion refreshes all of Master Yi's cooldowns. (Assists reduce half of the base cooldown amount.)
This is a GREAT skill on AP Yi. Movement speed is awesome to chase and run away (+ can't be slowed). The attack speed is great early to kill enemies. But the best part is : ALL YOUR COOLDOWNS ARE REFRESHED IF YOU KILL AN ENEMY! This is what makes AP Yi something worth trying. More explanation in the Gameplay section. Put a point into this every time you can.

Choose one of those to start the game:


Crystalline Flask + Health Potion + Ward:
Those are the most reliable starting items. They will help if you think you're going to have a rough start because the enemy jungler will gank you a lot or the enemy laner just counters you. Use the sight ward in the river to see the enemy jungler come if he tries to gank you. Most of the time this item is unnecessary on AP


My build heavily focuses on doing alot of single target damage to make use of your ultimate's passive that refreshes your abilities' cooldowns on a kill. This will allow you to spam

*Important Note*: This build order really is not set in stone, consider adapting your build to the enemy team. For example, you can get



Item Sequence






![]() Boots of Speed Great to dodge skillshots, escape ganks, chase enemies, roam around the map, etc. ![]() Rabadon's Deathcap Must-Have item! This item is easy to understand. Ability Power. It's a must have for late game that is sure, but why get it first?! It's simply the best damage item for early-mid game, that's why. Your ![]() ![]() ![]() Sheen Because it will make your single target burst significantly higher (and you really need that). ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Lich Bane ![]() ![]() Void Staff One of the best damage items (in the top 5) for AP Yi. You wanna be able to take down tankier enemies as well in teamfights so ![]() |
_____ |
![]() Needlessly Large Rod It's the most efficient AP/Gold item right after ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Sorcerer's Shoes I get ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Deathfire Grasp ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Zhonya's Hourglass This item gives a LOT of damage while still being one of the best (if not THE best) survivability items for AP Yi. If you got stunned while your were channeling ![]() ![]() |


Malady
This item does technically work well on AP Yi because he has high attack speed and his passive, but there are just so many other better choices... This item gives sustained damage, AP Yi wants burst damage to be unpredictable and impossible to stop,



Athene's Unholy Grail
AP yi doesn't need that much mana regen, and other items give him more damage for less cost. While this item is still good, it's not in the best choices.


Mejai's Soulstealer
Rarely ever viable. If you are going to dominate the enemy, then by all means get this. Otherwise, you should not get this. I only get it when I play on smurf accounts.


Liandry's Torment
Do not get this item on AP



Rod of Ages
This one is what a call an ''Overkill'' on lane sustain.

However, it does not really fit this Yi build.



It will delay your other items and your damage will suck balls.


Rylai's Crystal Scepter
This one is pretty good. It gives AP and HP which is really helpful because sometimes if you are silenced and you can't use

The slow is kinda wasted though. 15% slow is not needed since you already run so fast and your target will die so fast that the slow will be wasted.








Abyssal Scepter
Speaking of


OR
If you are getting destroyed by some other burst mage that can CC (like




Kage's lucky pick
Kage's Lucky Pick
Only get this early if you really know that you're gonna build




Morello's Evil Tome
I don't know how I feel about this item. I guess you could get it against a





Nashor's Tooth
Attack Speed is unnecessary on AP Yi... if you want more pushing power,




Banshee's Veil
Overrated item on Yi but still good. Since you can't choose which ability you will block, this will not help you keep your meditate up in teamfights. A well-timed Zhonya's Hourglass active will save your life from CC more often than Banshee's Veil. However, if the enemy team really has THAT much magic damage, you can get it instead of damage items.


Guardian Angel
With such a low HP pool, Yi can die fast even before he can deal any damage. This will negate the problem at the cost of damage. Only get it if enemies are super squishy but super deadly.
Can't think of any other items. Comment if you think of one!

Alpha Yi's gameplay is very unique and fun. It is somewhat similar to an Assassin.
AP

Mid is an epic lane for AP Yi because it's usually easy to win your lane against a typical mid champions. Also, since you are in the middle of the map, you are in a better position to join teamfights or to gank a lane (AKA roaming). Mid is also the shortest lane, that means you will less distance to run if you got ganked because you pushed too far.
Top can also work extremely well against some champions with no CC. You can push very hard and kill melt towers like they're butter without anything to stop you.
In lane, you want to farm and harrass your enemy at the same time as much as possible with

Don't spam your abilities too much in early levels and don't forget to use



Keep on farming your lane like a boss. If there are teamfights nearby, go help, your AoE damage is great with

The key to success with AP

Your goals should be:
- Get your enemy out of lane by harassing him
- Push hard to deny your enemy gold and experience
- Gank other lanes to make your whole team fed
With AP Yi's high movement speed, burst and towerdiving potential, it is easy to successfully gank lanes.

Now, if everything went well you should have alot of farm at this point. Notice how this build is heavily focused on single target damage? You are now an assassin. Think of yourself as a


In Teamfights:
Before a teamfight: If you can harass the enemy team with your

In teamfights: There is basically four ''main'' ways to behave in a teamfight with AP Yi:
1: The TiensiNoAkuma Yi: When the enemy team has many many ways to stop your

2: The Attention Wh0re Yi: Only do it if you have





3: The Anticarry Yi: If you know that the enemy team really is tanky but not doing any damage at all except ONE specific hypercarry, you can just forget about trying to kill the other tanky enemies. Focus on killing that one carry that is doing all the job and get rid of him. Wait to be able to see him and go straight for him (use

4: The Hard Carry Yi: That's when you are so fed that you can kill someone that is full HP instantly with your combo. Basically you do the same as in the first way (TiensiNoAkuma), except instead of waiting for your team to make someone on the enemy low on HP, you just go in and kill someone by yourself. Basically just do work and carry hard :P.
But no matter what you do, there is one thing that you will always do: try to kill enemies. You should do that by using this combo:
The AP Yi burst combo
1.

2. Activate

3. Use

4. Use

5. Hit him with

6. If he's not dead yet,




Most of the time, this combo will be enough to kill a squishy enemy and you can start spamming

HOWEVER, if the target does not die, you can save your *** with




It's not that bad if you don't kill your target instantly,



Here's a video that shows

*Side note: If you do not get the killing blow on an enemy, it doesn't really matter because it will cut your base cooldowns in half and you already have around 24% Cooldown reduction with runes and masteries and items.(Or maybe 40% cooldown reduction with blue buff). This means if you get an assist, your skill's cooldowns will be cut by around 74-90%. Which isn't so bad if you ask me :P.

Since I got asked to....
If you have LoLReplay, you can click on the links and download the replays to see me playing AP Yi! Get some popcorn! Seriously though, watching replays will make you learn quickly and efficiently.
If you don't have LoLReplay yet, you can download it here!(click)



This is a hard matchup but when you get an early advantage you can keep it and manage to win the lane (then win the game!). Includes badass ganks and teamfights!
http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2718693/

Jungle AP

This one is the first and only (yet) jungle AP Yi replay I have for you guys :P. If you are curious about how to jungle him, watch this replay and enjoy :3. If I remember right there's a delayed pentakill in that game (from me).
http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2752017/



Jungle, Bot lane AND Top lane are all losing. I get an early gank from

http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2687165/



From 0:00 to 13:00 it's pretty much just farming fest. Nothing too interesting to watch unless you want to see how to lane with AP Yi (which is pretty easy). From 13:00 till close to the end it's very interesting. However, the ending is very disappointing because it's basically 1v5 and we lose :(
http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2620107/



This one is a flawless victory (0 deaths). There are some very nice ganks in that game. Definitely worth watching. I lane against an



http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2656750/



Here I get to lane against





http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2663984/



In this game I carry harder than you could ever carry. Our bot lane feeds 20+ kills to the enemy team but we still manage to win. You should really like this one.
http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2666259/



The enemy team sent


http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2675258/



Some people have trouble against

http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2675400/



This is a normal game with some people that aren't even level 30 yet so don't expect pro plays on the enemy team. My team is doing really bad and we are losing but I end up carrying hard. You can watch if you wanna see how to win in low elo/low levels I guess :P.
http://www.leaguereplays.com/replays/match/2684043/
Hard CC: Knockup, Knockback, Stun, Fear, Supress, Silence
Weak CC: Snare, Blind, Slow, Attack Speed slow, Immobilize
Why look at that? Because you have to know if the enemy team can easily disrupt your

Another thin[g that is good to have when you're playing AP Yi is a team with a lot of initiation power and AoE damage. This is also known as


Easy (1):These champions should not give you too much trouble and should be easy to beat with your harass and sustain
Medium (2, 3 and 4):You can beat these champs in terms of harass/sustain but a good combo from them can destroy you so be careful
Passive (-): No one really has the advantage. It's probably going to be a boring farming lane with no kills involved unless the jungler comes. You can still win hard if you outplay the enemy though.
Hard (5): These champions counter AP Yi in some way. If you get one of these lane matchup, be extremely careful and call for ganks or switch lanes with your teammates.
However, it does not mean they are impossible to beat (just...harder)
*Please note that these Difficulty ratings are not always perfect because they depend quite a lot on the enemy player's skills*
Things that are important against EVERYONE:
- You can use
Alpha Strike on something right after your enemy sent out a skillshot towards you to dodge that skillshot. (You become untargetable during
Alpha Strike)
- Try to stay behind minions as much as possible when laning against champions that have skillshots that only affect the first target they hit.
- Usually it's a good idea to back off a little when using
Meditate for sustain. Otherwise, some champions can stop your channel with CC abilities
- Always try to harass the enemy as much as you can, especially in early levels (1-6)
- Do not OVERestimate your
Meditate's power early game. It has a low rank and you don't have much AP so don't think you can tank everything like you can later. If you're low on HP, simply
Flash or run away.
- If you are destroying an enemy in lane, get some sight wards because it is very likely that you will get ganked a lot mid.
MID LANE MATCHUPS:
Ahri









Thyrstehär's first few AP Yi games :D





Destokado playing Jungle AP Master Yi!







DisturbedQT's first 8 games with AP Yi:

PaddyStar11's first time playing AP Master Yi (Largest multikill: Pentakill):


KissTheLeet:






That's me on my smurf doing a Penta in a ranked game









Will add more with time.

Thanks for reading my guide! Feel free to comment and/or ask questions in the comment section below!
I hope you enjoyed this guide and that you are ready to play

MY AD YI GUIDE: http://www.mobafire.com/league-of-legends/build/master-yi-and-his-dark-sides-ad-213739
And once again, thanks to TinyStar for the amazing guide graphics :3!
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