The Empress of the Elements: A Qiyana Guide for League of Legends

20 Jul 19

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The Empress of the Elements: A Qiyana Guide for League of Legends

Incredibly mobility compiled with high damage makes Qiyana one of the best playmakers in LoL.

It is no surprise that Riot has been making kits more complex since the birth of League of Legends. But their newest champion, Qiyana, may be in a league of her own. Her Q, E, and R all have 3 or more completely different uses depending on where on the map you utilize them. In addition, she has one of the most difficult-to-hit ultimates in the game. What this means for you, however, is if you put in the time with this champion you’ll be greatly rewarded. This versatile, mobile, high-damage assassin has about as much outplay potential as any other champion.

First, Qiyana’s passive is Royal Privilege. This is about as straightforward as her kit gets. Hit someone and deal extra damage on the first blow. The cooldown is quite long but gets reset each time you swap to a different element.

Her Q is Elemental Wrath/Edge of Ixtal. This is Qiyana’s main source of damage. Without an element, the ability is a straight forward slash (think Yasuo’s Q). With each element it has additional range and a different spell effect. Keep in mind this ability should be used almost exclusively with an element after level 1. With the river element, it roots all opponents hit. With the brush element, it leaves a trail that grants Qiyana stealth and movement speed until she attacks or walks out of its range. Finally, with the wall element, her projectile deals bonus damage to units under 50% hp. This is often why when trading with an opponent we start with either the brush or river element and finish with the wall.

Her W is Terrashape, which will hopefully clear up all the talk of elements above. When using Qiyana’s W, you dash a short distance towards whichever element you are targeting (i.e. river, brush or wall). In addition, her blade soaks up the elements power, granting her Q increased range and bonus effects. In addition, this ability resets her Q cooldown.

Qiyana’s E is Audacity. This ability allows you to dash a fixed distance towards your target. If you’re paying close attention, you can see Qiyana now has two abilities that when combined allows for a ridiculous amount of mobility mid-fight. She can save either one for dodging key skill shots or simply use them all to become incredible slippery during her burst.

Finally, her R is Supreme Display of Talent. This ability allows Qiyana to throw out a shockwave, knocking back opponents hit. It deals absolutely no damage until it comes into contact with (you guessed it) the river, a brush or walls. At that point it explodes, stunning all enemies hit and dealing large damage. The fascinating part of this ability is that it can hit river, brush and wall exploding off of all three objects. So while it can be difficult to use when in the middle of a lane, the opportunities around the map feel pretty massive.

Do not be discouraged if you miss this ultimate. In all my time playing League of Legends, I have never missed an ultimate as much as I have while learning this specific champion. It takes an incredible amount of experience to know the exact range and hitbox, as well as the time it takes to hit. When used effectively though, this is probably the most devasting ultimate Riot has implemented into an assassin’s kit.

Building

Qiyana, like most assassins, runs Electrocute as her keystone. Follow this with Sudden Impact, Eyeball Collection, and Ultimate Hunter. For your secondary tree you can either opt for Precision (taking Triumph and Coup De Grace) or Sorcery (taking Manaflow Band and Transcendence). Finally, Adaptive Force x2 and Health round out the masteries.

When building on Qiyana, I largely stick to building damage. The first core item you will want to build is Duskblade of Draktharr. After that either build more lethality with Youmuu’s Ghostblade or take the Black Cleaver route for a bit more survivability. Buy Lord Dominik’s Regards if you went for Youmuu’s Ghostblade or purchase Sterak’s Gage if you bought a Black Cleaver. Top either build off with a Guardian Angel for the times you get caught in CC or simply bursted down and an Edge of Night for smoother engagements.

Boot options vary. However, a good rule of thumb is to buy defensive boots when you build health and CDR boots when you are full damage.

Early Game

As Qiyana, you have a weak level 1 and 2. For this reason, it’s important to start Doran’s Shield or Corrupting Potion as they will help you survive the opening minutes of the laning phase. After that, look for times to engage with your opponent. You should have an advantage on almost anyone in a burst trade (except maybe Talon) and because of Qiyana’s low cooldowns, you probably win extended trades too.

When trading, it is important to set up your W with either a brush or river element AND wait for your cooldown to come back up. E/Q onto your opponent, W again to gain the wall element and Q them once more. Hopefully they are below 50% at this point and will be too low to trade back damage. Rinse and repeat these steps until you either force them into a poor back timing or they step up just far enough that you’re able to kill them.

Leads in lane should be relatively easy to secure so long as your opponent doesn’t have jungle backup. Make sure to ward properly before looking for trades, as you use all of your mobility to start the trade.

Mid Game

The early game, unfortunately, is the easy part. Gaining kill advantages is one thing, but snowballing them into kills on the enemy Nexus is another. Look to take your lead to other lanes. Qiyana is a great roamer as she gains movement speed when walking near or within the element she is currently holding. In other words, use the river as highway to either top or bottom lane.

Another way to impact the map is via vision. With Duskblade of Draktharr, you essentially can hold a second sweeper trinket. Utilize this in order to secure or deny vision over important objectives (i.e. key spots in the river, Inferno Drake, Baron, etc…) with the help of your jungler. This last part in bold is very important. Without a jungler's support, you are asking to be caught out in 1v2 situations.

Another way to snowball leads is by being a split push threat. Often times you will not have Teleport as Ignite is key for gaining kills in the early game. That said, you can often still attract the attention of 2 or more enemies so long as you have gained a sizeable lead. If they send multiple people to you, stay alive as long as you can by abusing the brush element and always try to trade back kills.

Finally, there’s teamfighting. This is never ideal, as Qiyana thrives mostly in small skirmishes. However, there are a few keys to remember for the times when your back is against the wall.

1. Prioritize killing the enemy's carries. Oftentimes, you will die after jumping into the middle of a fight. However, trading your life for one or both of the enemy’s strongest champions is always worthwhile.

2. After you’ve blown most or all of your cooldowns, ensure you are using your stealth as often as possible to be a nuisance to the enemy team. You can more often than not bait out key cooldowns or zone out very important opponents just by being in the area.

Don’t forget this champion has a lot to her kit and requires plenty of training before you will be playing anywhere near optimally.

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