For build, to keep everything a bit cleaner, I tried to fit information into notes, so you may or may not check it before reading through! (Hover your mouse over "notes" sign.)

Hey there! Let's start with saying that I am not a great League player and I still have much to learn myself. I finished in Gold last season, not really wishing to deal with Ranked toxicity and grind, and I am still relearning the game. I started playing back in season 1, but I had a long break. Also, I play on EUNE server.

I really love the champion design and how fun it is to jump around. I initially started playing her before rework, quit the game BECAUSE of the rework, came back and started finding some joy in playing champion again. But cold, hard truth is - I don't know why you would pick Irelia in the first place. Most matchups are skill based, but enemy favored. It takes a ton of time to learn the mechanics, resetting the Q and using the wave in lane, landing a good ultimate... I'm still far away from good at all that. She has a great outplay potential, but there are just easier champions that are stronger even with generally weaker players against you. But there is one thing that still makes me keep playing her, it's her kit being just SO fun. And if it's not fun for you, definitely go for a different champion.

I am pretty sure that you should look at some better players than me for explanations regarding that, but the baseline is - Irelia at 5 stacks is a bit stronger than most champions, while Irelia fighting at less than 5 stacks is usually dead Irelia, unless you are far ahead/lucky or in a good place to fight. I like to let my enemy push into my tower the first 2-3 waves building before crashing at the tower. Your jungler can use it to gank at level 3. Being passive for first 3 levels helps keep you safe before your combo and lets you stack under your tower. That's also usually a good opportunity to try and all in your opponent. If you hit your E, your chances are high, if you block most of the enemy physical damage with your W, you have a big chance of getting back to the fountain with additional 400g. At level 6 you have a great All-In potential with 2 Q resets. Be wary of champions with stronger early game though, like Renekton.

Now, we are entering territory of things you should learn from players way above me. Basically, you will have to decide what to do with the wave, if there are no objectives, you might want to freeze, if there are objectives, you might want to shove it and get lane priority. Irelia has a pretty good wave clear with her W + Q, if you want more, early Tiamat would help even further with that.

If her passive stacks were kept by hitting towers, she could do well as a splitpusher, but it doesn't, so your prefered way of playing her in team is a teamfight. She is extremely good at jumping into the backline and getting rid of carries, but remember, you need help from your team to do things in this game. And from my knowledge, while Irelia isn't really great at peeling for carries, sometimes it's the way you should go around in teamfights, usually when enemies don't have any good engage tools and when they have a great peel for their carries. She can tank a fair amount of damage with her incredible healing, in last season I had teamfights in which I tanked 6k damage while having <3k HP, though much remains to be seen with the new items.

Thanks for reading through. Some time later I might want to fill the threats/synergies tabs, depending on what you guys think of the guide, maybe it's just garbage, no worries. It ain't much but it's honest work. Have a fun Penta at the end, just for you, breathtaking people reading this guide. Play Video