League of Legends

Introduction

First off, there's a big difference between top lane Lee Sin and Jungle Lee Sin. There are reasons to play him top, Lee Sin can create a ton of early pressure in the top lane, and can become one of the best splitpushers. In addition, Lee Sin is a lot of fun, and a great way to refine mechanics, having one of the highest skill caps in the game. I prefer playing him as a tanky splitpusher, and while going full damage can be a lot of fun, it's a huge risk, and you'll fall off pretty quickly.

Insec on KT Bullets is a great example of this, he plays Lee Sin to create pressure on one side of the map for his team, and then as the game drags on, he becomes very tanky and has a superior engage on the enemy team. However, I don't think Insec will continue to play him competitively, as Ozone's Mata using Lee Sin as a support is a similar concept, using Lee Sin for his superior engages, and while a support won't be able to splitpush, you also aren't taking up an entire lane of farm, but you still gain the early pressure on one lane.

Remember that as a top laner, you're going to be putting the most impact on the "top lane island," and other than maybe roaming mid or to dragon, you aren't going to be putting a ton of pressure on the map, so you have to be putting it onto your lane. With Jungle Lee Sin though, you can be abusing your early game pressure onto the entire map. It's a trade off to play him top.

Top Lee Sin works best with damage oriented junglers like Vi, Riven, or Kha'Zix. All these provide a moderate amount of CC, and more importantly, a gap closer that Lee can follow up on with W. This makes ganking easy as the jungler can engage and Lee has an easy follow up. As the game stretches on, in teamfights you and your jungler will excel at diving the enemy back line and there will be a ton of damage between the two of you, and the enemy team will have to focus peeling for their backline or just watch them die terrible deaths.

ITEM BUILDS:

Overview Doran's Blade/Doran's Shield Yellow Trinket -> Tiamat-> Ravenous Hydra -> Sightstone (not ruby) -> Red Trinket -> Mercury Treads/Ninja Tabi -> Randuins/Spirit Visage -> Last Whisper -> Ruby Sightstone

Early Game Start Doran's shield or Doran's Blade and one health potion. Which item to start depends obviously on the matchup, against any ranged champion Doran's shield is needed, and against AD heavy Melee champions like Riven, Doran's shield is needed. Doran's blade is good when you know you'll be able to outtrade your enemy. When in doubt over which to pick, go for the safe route with Shield. With your yellow trinket, you can use it for either escapes or for wards. Since you won't be taking W until level 4, you can use your first ward as a defensive ward, and then from then on save it for escapes.

First Back Obviously the amount of gold you have on your first back depends heavily on what you buy. However, if you don't have enough to finish your Tiamat, don't be afraid to only buy the AD parts of it, and go back with a pickaxe and longsword. If you find that you're really far ahead here you can go Brutalizer to extend your lead even more, as the early AD and Armor Pen makes it incredibly difficult for your enemy to catch up. However, if you're even or only slightly ahead, go for the Tiamat. Your Lifesteal quints make it so that you can get Tiamat before your Vampiric Scepter. Buy boots when you have the gold.

Mid Game After finishing off your Ravenous Hydra, make sure that you have at least boots 1. At this point, your next buy should be a normal sightstone, not Ruby. At this point, switch your yellow warding trinket for a red sweeper trinket. Sightstone makes splitpushing more safe, as you can pull off some really cool escapes, and warding saves lives anyway. Upgrading your boots depends on who you're splitpushing against, or what type of damage they're team favors. Note that if you opted for a Brutalizer, you should upgrade it to Black Cleaver along the line, and buying a Bloodthirster as well. So you're two damage items should either be Black Cleaver and BloodThirster, or Ravenous Hydra and Last Whisper.

Late Game At this point you should start building tanky, and your next buy needs to be either a Spirit Visage or a Randuin's Omen. Which you buy first depends on who you'll be splitpushing against, or if they have a team composition that really favors one type over the other. Generally though, buying both of these is needed. Your sixth item should be a Last Whisper, however, if you're finding that you need damage a lot, you can buy it while building your tanky stats. After you have full six items, upgrade your sightstone and trinket because you have nothing else to buy.

RUNES

9 AD Reds

9 Armor Yellows OR 5 flat health and 4 Armor

9 CDR Blues (against a very low magic damage team) OR 9 flat MR blues

3 Lifesteal Quints OR 3 Armor Quints

Marks and Seals are pretty standard for an AD toplaner. Glyphs is where you can get creative, 9 CDR Glyphs are actually a huge improvement to Lee's Laning Phase and increases your ability to make plays. However if you're against a team with any major source of Magic damage, don't risk it. Quints you should do 3 Lifesteal quints, but ever since the nerf it's actually better to run 3 armor quints or 3 flat health quints since Lifesteal ones don't have the same power they once did.

Masteries

Tanky

Offensive

Basically I always run one of these two pages, and it depends entirely on the matchup. Running 21/9/0 is a lot more fun and gives you lane dominance, and most games these are my masteries. However the tanky option is better for late game, and can turn bad matchups for Lee from awful to managable.

Summoner Spells

Flash: Pretty much a necessity on most champions. In addition, can be used to extend the range on your initiations.

Ignite: Lets you pressure the lane a lot harder and can give you kills. In competitive you rarely see 1v1 kills, but in solo queue there's a much greater chance of this. If you're playing against an enemy with kill pressure on you, you want ignite to even the playing field, such as Shyvanna.

Teleport: Not as good in Solo queue. However, it helps you pressure the entire map as opposed to just pressuring your lane or the limited roams you can pull off. Better with your team's coordination. Good against passive farmers like Nasus so you can pressure the map.

Skill Order

1 E, 2 Q, 3 E, 4 W, 5 E, 6 R, 7 E, 8 W, 9 E, 10 W, 11 R, 12 W, 13 W, 14 Q, 15 Q, 16 R, 17 Q, 18 Q

R > E > W > Q >

The reason that you max E is it gives reliable damage, and by slowing the enemy and reducing their attack speed, it becomes incredibly easy to win trades. maxing Q is a huge risk as if the skill missed, you lose almost all of your damage. Maxing W after gives extra life steal and spell vamp, and when top lane is a lot about sustaining through fights right now, that's incredibly important. In addition, this way of maxing provides you insane amounts of wave clear, as E with Ravenous Hydra lets you clear an entire wave in seconds. With maxing W, you can activate Iron Will and with the 20% lifesteal and spellvamp, you'll heal for an insane amount and outsustain anyone.

Tips and Tricks

Pretty simple, but make sure you're utilizing your passive to his fullest extent. Try to get out the two autoattacks between each spell cast, like if you hit a Q at melee range, you get two autoattacks, and then use the resonating strike, and then you get two more boosted autoattacks. This is even easier with your E, hitting Tempest and then saving Cripple until your passive wears off. In addition, if you're spamming Lee's abilities as fast as you can for burst, you're going to run out of energy. Using your passive helps with this.

Be careful using your ultimate as an execute. Too many times people have tried this and the only result is you punting your enemy into the safety of his tower. Note that using your ultimate on an enemy makes him an easy target for your Q, and then using resonating strike as a gap closer and execute.

Note that there are multiple ways to properly engage a fight as Lee Sin. While everyone loves doing an "Insec," there isn't always a need to be so risky, and if the enemy team can react to it fast enough (usually by flashing behind you) all you've really done is just propelled yourself into the enemy team. Unless you have the mechanics to consistently pull these off, or if you catch a high priority target out of position, it isn't always worth the risk to ward jump into the enemy team.

Practicing your kick initiations in custom games is a great way to figure out the setup you're comfortable with, and is a great way to increase your mechanics. Generally, know that Q, Q, Ward, W, R is the best way to reliably pull of these kick engages, and the most important part is to get the ward down as soon as you can. Giving the champ time to escape, or to walk in a direction that would make your kick less effective, can't be allowed, so the ward W is the hardest part. Make sure your mouse is positioned behind the enemy champion right as your Q hits so you can place the ward immediately and then W and Kick. If you're having difficulty mastering the ward jump aspect of it, using your flash is actually faster, but it's obviously a much longer cooldown.

Notable Top Lane Matchups:

Difficult Matchups
Teemo: Go Defensive mastery Tree and get Doran Shield. Not actually that difficult, but Teemo is incredibly annoying and excels at harassing melee champions and then kiting into shroom filled bushes. Just sustain through the laning phase, and don't attempt to trade with him unless he misplays. Note that his blind can nullify the extra attack speed you get from your passive. You'll be able to outsplitpush him, and you'll provide more in teamfights.
Riven: She has lots of room to outplay, and it's easy for her to dodge a Q and then punish you for it. Don't try to trade with her, unless she uses her skills to farm. If you both have all of your skills up she'll win.

Dr. Mundo: His cleavers do a lot of damage and you'll never be able to outsplitpush him. Hard to outplay him, which is something Lee excels with.

Easiest Matchups
Nasus: You can pressure him extremely hard and deny him from creeps, and more importantly, from stacking his Q. You have huge pressure on him even if you don't run ignite.
Rumble: You have pressure on him and put a lot of pressure on him, but if you mess up a combo against him it can be a huge pain. He has outplay potential, but it's easy to dodge his Ultimate with your insane mobility.

Popular right now
Shyvanna: As long as you're maxing E, you're fine, as it shuts down the extra movement speed she'll get from her W, and it shuts down the pressure she puts on you.
Renekton: Can punish you early and may zone you from creeps, but you'll be able to out-sustain him and outsplitpush him eventually. Don't fight him when he has full Fury.
Olaf: Difficult, as its hard to outtrade him due to his true damage. Manage your energy well so that you can be mobile to avoid his Qs.

Jason Mulchay