Hello people, and welcome to my AP Twisted Fate build/guide.

AP Twisted Fate focuses on hit-and-run tactics. This means you should be getting yur combo off, then generally backing off most of the time.

If you don't feel like reading too much, you can skip to the "Skills (Pick a Card Strategy)" chapter of this small guide.
I'm open to any nice suggestions as well :D

These are for you to figure out mostly, but here are my opinions of TF's pro's and cons~

PRO

- Your ultimate can help gank people, very useful in general.
- Has some CC (Gold card Stuns, Red card slows)
- Has built in auto mana regen. Pick A Card Blue card gives mana (and makes easier to CS)
- Good TF players change games, and will be praised :D
- Gangnam Style Dance~ (Type in "/d" in the chat bar to start dancing)

CON

- Hard to play.
- Especially hard for beginners, usually, to always pick the right card.
- Not easy to master :(

The 9 Greater Mark of Magic Penetration give you 8.5 magic penetration. 9 magic pen. is decent, just a bit to counter whatever magic resistance runes your enemy has.

The 9 Greater Seal of Health is for an extra 48.15 HP. 48 HP COMBINED with 36 at level 1 from my masteries and 26 from a quintessence is equal to 100 bonus HP at level 1. This will give you enough HP to survive more earlier in the laning phase, if the enemy gets a few hits on you.

9 Greater Glyphs of Warding is fore more survival during laning. They give 12.06 magic resist (MR). Plus 6 MR from masteries, 18 bonus magic resist will help you take less damage from enemy spells.

1 Greater Quintessence of Health will help you survive more. 26 may not seem like a lot, but combined with other HP buffs +100 HP at level 1 is pretty good.

2 Greater Quintessence of Ability Power Just a simple boost of AP for early gaming. This will give 9.9 ability power. 10 AP + 4 AP from masteries will give you about 15 AP at level 1. A decent amount to have.

My masteries, there isn't much. Take the AP boosing stats, and get some in defence for early survival. Thats it.



These runes and masteries are my own, and you can improvise to see whats best for you, but these work best for me.

Boots will allow you to kite better (basically meaning hit-and-run), and it gives you movespeed which works best on TF early. This also allows for 3 health pots to be bought, which gives a lot of sustainability early.
Since base movespeed was buffed for season 3, boots might not be as good start item. Crystalline Flask is a good replacement, since it gives you sustainability, and with the flask you don't need as much sustain so you can buy a sight ward.


Doran's Ring This can help you, with 80 HP, 15 AP, and 5 mana regen. 80 HP and some more early AP are great for boosting you early on. The mana per kill will allow you an easy way to stay in lane even more with 5 mana per kill.


Upgrade to Sorcerer's Boots for some early magic penetration, added with your runes, should give 29 magic penetration. This should bring the enemies magic resistance down enough to have you do a good deal of damage.


Next I buy some HP for, again, early survival. Catalyst the Protector gives 290 HP which is BIG boost in your survivability. I usually don't finish this into a Banshee's Veil or Rod of Ages yet because getting more damage from now on is priority, and also, you should wait and see if you need more damage or survivability in the late game.


Next is Sheen. This is the first part of Lich Bane. This is your first noticeable damage-boosting item. this is a great item because: 25 AP, 250 Mana, and the passive. Late game, this passive would fall off since it scales with your attack damage, but then when we build it into a Lich Bane then the proc will scale off of AP and will be VERY useful in dealing damage.


It should be around Mid-Game now. (maybe the 20-25 minute mark)


Finish your Lich Bane for good damage, the proc, and the movespeed also helps.


I get Lich Bane BEFORE Rabadon's Deathcap because of a few reasons.
- Building rabadons first takes much longer, and only until you finish building it will give you noticeable damage.


- Lich bane is built of many cheap, useful items, so you can still gain usefulness slowly.


- lich bane gives much more stats needed mid game. Rabadons is for pure damage, suited for late game.


After your lich bane, you really should aim for the Rabadon's Deathcap. This is the time when you usually need damage. Also, your Lich Bane scales with AP.


Really late game, you USUALLY need a bit more survivability, so I finish Catalyst the Protector into Banshee's Veil, mainly the passive bubble blocking 1 spell will help you a LOT. Skirting around the enemy, there can be times when you get caught with 1 spell, and that will be the end of you. Grabbing this item will prevent that, giving you a second chance. IF you want more damage, you aren't being focused as much, or the enmy has no long-range skills to catch you, then a Zhonya's Hourglass can be very useful. (props to phil collins for the idea)


You really should be ending the game about now, but sometimes there are very looong games. For those long games, you can now get a Void Staff which will take away their magic reistance by 43% total combined with your masteries.


Game should seriously be over now. If not, sell your Doran's Ring for WHATEVER you like. You can even buy an Infinity Edge. Just kidding... you should now get a Guardian Angel. Late game this will let you spawn again and skip a 60+ second death timer. You can also get this earlier if you need it, but damage should be your first priority.

OTHER ITEMS

I have recieved some suggestions to build certain items. Here is a section to talk about them. I'll add more, with some suggestions from people :D


This item is a good alternative to Banshee's Veil or Guardian Angel. If the enemy has no long-range poke to catch you out of position, or you have simply NO trouble dodging them, Zhonya's Hourglass is a good replacement for Banshee's Veil.
If you have no trouble with late game deaths, you can scrap a Guardian Angel for Zhonya's Hourglass.
The 2 second stasis is somewhat situational, but still very useful. Just pop it when you're in trouble that only lasts a few seconds, and *pop*, you're fine!


This is a good choice, because it just gives SO much more burst, and one of its components, kage's lucky pick, will give you more gold over time. I sometimes build this, but to me, it doesn't really shine as much on TF. Good item though, reccommended if you want to ditch the Banshee's Veil or Guardian Angel.


An interesting choice to pick...
300 HP is a nice bonus for a bit more survivability.
60 AP good for damage, not too bad.
15 magic penetration combines with boots for 30 magic penetration which is a good amount.
Unique Passive: Dealing spell damage burns enemies for 5% of their current health as magic damage over 3 seconds. If their movement is impaired, they take double damage from this effect. Multi-target or periodic effects deals 2.5% over 1.5 seconds. 300 max damage vs monsters. A decent passive, and when you realize that it deals DOUBLE damage when someone is CC'ed you can see that it goes great with Pick A Card since your gold and red cards stun/slow them.

This will be your MAIN damage tool. Its hard to aim and hit from a long range, on a moving target. This is why you use Pick A Card gold card to keep them in place.

This is your hard-to-learn skill. IMPORTANT: Here is the order of cards: Blue, Red, Gold,Blue again. BIG TIP: To get gold card, wait about 1 second after blue card appears, then click. You should get a gold card. Of course, if you have super-awesome reflexes, just wait until you see gold and *click*.
For this skill, you can also put leave it on a few rotations. Move toward your enemy as you leave the skill cycling between the cards. If they stay in range, lock down a gold card and stun them, then use Wild Cards to do great big damage. If they run away, lock down a blue card and use it to kill a minion for gold.

There is not much to explain about this skill. You can try to hit minions 3 times, then for your next AA attack your enemy for bonus damage, but I just leave it up to luck.
:)

YOUR ULTIMATE. THIS SKILL IS AWESOME. After you activate it, you can see every enemy. Then you can teleport within a large range. Walk a bit from your lane, and then you can ultimate-teleport to bot lane or top lane, use gold card, and kill an enemy. Position yourself a little behind the enemy, or towards where the enemy is running. You can proc a gold card before you use your ultimate to make it easier.





Max Destiny -> Max Wild Cards -> Max Pick A Card -> Max Stacked Deck last

>>> >>> >>>

You CAN max stacked deck after you have about 3 points in Pick A Card but that's up to personal preference.

Here is a picture to explain better.

You should try and aim a bit behind them, so that if they run back, you are there with a
gold card waiting for them. If they keep fighting after you teleport, make sure you teleported close enough to give your allies support.

In the picture above ^^^ I would have been too far away to help, if the enemy continued to kill my teammates.

Ahri can be tough for some people to face, and not so tough for others. Against Ahri:

- Stay behind minions and dodge her Charm skill. This skill is what allows Ahri to land all her damage~

- Even behind minions, watch out for her Orb of Deception which can go through minions! It will also push the lane, if she lands it on minions.

- Farm up, gank lanes with your Destiny, as a good ahri will probably not be defeated by Twisted Fate.

- Try to harass, but don't trade. She will outdamage you, if she lands her skills.

- Remember to call "MIA" whenever Ahri is out of your sight for more than 3 seconds!


I have been against Annie a few times as Twisted Fate. This lane actually is harder for TF in my opinion.
She outranges you with her Disintegrate with 600 range, while your AA range is 525. Against Annie:

- When she walks toward you with a stun ready, Wild Cards in her direction, while staying away/out of her range. If she keeps walking, she'll get hit by Wild Cards, so this forces her to dodge.

- Farm with Wild Cards while hitting blue cards for mana as much as you can.

- WATCH OUT at level 6, she has Summon: Tibbers and she can burst you down very easily, by using Flash.

- Call your jungler to gank. If SHE is constantly walking toward you to try and get her Disintegrate and stun off, then she will usually be an east target to gank. Use this to your advantage.

- Finish your Banshee's Veil early if she is giving you TOO hard of a time. Or some simple MR like a Negatron Cloak which is a part of your Banshee's Veil.

Brand is very good at dealing damage in teamfights. His laning is a bit less...shiny though. His skills are mostly just skillshots and somewhat easy to dodge. Against Brand:

- He can't stun you with Sear if he 1 Can't land another skill first or 2 He misses sear. To make sure you don't get hit my Sear, stay behind minions.

- Staying behind minions to dodge Sear, he still has Pillar of Flame, although this move can be dodged by just moving around a lot. Also, if he uses pillar of flames while you're near minions, he will hit minions and push the lane.

- conflagaration is not a skillshot, but it does have relatively short range. If he walks up to you and tries to use conflagaration, get a gold card ready, and still be on your guard for Pillar of Flame.

- Stay back, out of range of his conflagaration and dodge Pillar of Flame while staying behind minions to prevent a Sear.

- Overall, you should win this lane if you can dodge his skillshots. Don't focus TOO hard on harassing him, but try it when there is a good opportunity.


To be honest, Karthus just isn't much of a threat to TF. Hit-and run TF can usually harass much better, as long as you can avoid Lay Waste or Wall of Pain. Against Karthus:

- Dodge his skillshots. His main damage, Lay Waste, is quite easy to dodge. Also watch out for his Wall of Pain because if you get slowed, you can still gold card him and run away, but he will land a/some lay waste(s).

- Stay out of his general range, meaning far enough so that he has to walk up near minions if he wants to hurt you. THIS DOES NOT MEAN LOSE FARM.

- You can, very effectively, harass karthus. You can choose to just shoot Wild Cards at him because he'll be pretty focused on farming most of the time, or you can walk near him, just out of his Defile range WITHOUT using your Pick A Card yet. Keep this distance, then proc a gold card, and you should be higher or equal to his movespeed, so hit him with a gold card and Wild Cards.

- Basically the standard gold card plus Wild Cards while avoiding getting hit.


Ah... Swain...don't pick TF versus swain. I've seen new people try it out in ranked and experienced it myself, I must say this is a VERY hard lane for TF. Against Swain:

- Your first priority is to dodge Nevermove. If he catches it in you, you will be either brought down to less than 50% HP or, most likely, dead.

- If he DOES manage to catch you in nevermove, gold card him, and flash away.

- Use Wild Cards from far away to farm, and try not to lose too much exp from dieng minions.

- His Decrepify has a pretty good range now, slows you good enough so that he can use Nevermove on you, basically resulting in a high percentage of getting you killed.

- Try ganking other lanes to keep yourself not TOO far behind, while netting other lanes some kills. This is probably the best way to play aginst swain, unless all other lanes are pushed to the enemy turret.

- Avoid going against Swain if you can, as a Twisted Fate.


Veigar. This little creep. Don't underestimate him, especially at level 6. He can burst you to death if he manages to stun you, so watch out. Against Veigar:

- Before level 6, you should win EASILY. He has no real big damage, and his mana costs are just way too high to effectively harass you pre-6. Standard gold card then Wild Cards procedure for this lane pre-6.

- At lvl 6+ though, if he stuns you, uses Deathfire Grasp if he bought it, then his WHOLE combo, you WILL die.

- BUY A Mercury's Treads!!! try to get this before lvl 6, as that is when he can burst you down. Merc treads will allow you to be stunned for less time, which is better. If he leveled up his stun, he probably wouldn't have his damage as high. If he maxed his damage skills, his stun won't last long enough.

- Big emphasis against Veigar is to zone him before he hits lvl 6. This should be easy, so do just that. Also gank other lanes. Don't let veigar free farm though.








I WILL KEEP UPDATING THIS OVER SOME TIME, THERE WILL BE MORE. Please leave a comment if you really want to see a specific champion talked about.

Short message: Hit-and-run tactics work best. Use you gold card on an enemy, Wild Cards then RUN OUT. Yes you can do more damage with Stacked Deck passive but...it's not worth it. Your job is to burst the enemy and run, then wait till you can burst again. Try to aim for the AD carries, like Ashe, Vayne or their mid laner, like Annie,or Malzahar.

Farming can be really easy with TF. At first, use your autoattacks when minions are at about 50 HP. after some time, you can simply look at their health bar and tell if they can be killed with an AA or not. For when you have enough mana, use your red card on a bunch of minions, then Wild Cards. This is a really easy farming tactic. this SAME tactic can be used on the wraiths jungle camp, if you want to kill those as well.

THE END

I hope you enjoyed this guide, and learned from it, and thanks for reading!~~~