:P Lee Sin :P Champ-Course

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1.1. Most players in the game are privy to how strong Lee Sin's Q is both in terms of damage and mobility. Everyone will try everything in their power to dodge and avoid it, which can make landing it a bit tough during a gank. However, you can use people's sense of security against them when going for ganks. When you walk into a lane, players will instinctively hide behind minions to protect themselves from your Q. Thinking they're safe, they'll stop actively dodging your spell. This is when you should line up your Q, and then immediately use smite to kill the enemy minion that's in the way of your projectile. Do this and you'll catch a ton of people off guard helping you score way more kills.

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2.1. As powerful of a spell as Lee Sin's Q is, it has 1 major drawback. Once you commit to flying to your opponent, there is no turning back and it is very easy to respond to and counter it. For example, plenty of champions can knock you out of your Q's animation, completely negating the damage and leaving you super vulnerable. However, there is a very simple solution to this problem, and it's to mind game your opponents with a ward jump. You see, your opponents are going to react immediately to the animation of you flying towards them. So if you just ward jump towards them instead, they'll panic and use their counter ability, thinking that you're committing to the play. This way your Q2 is still active, and now they have no answer to it, allowing you to execute them for a free kill. Trust us when we say this will catch your opponents off guard every single time.

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3.1. When people think of the most annoying characters to kill in the game, a champion that comes to mind here is Leblanc. Her W makes her impossible to lock down, since she can both create distance and travel back to it at any time she wants. Well, what if we told you that you can do something very similar with Lee Sin's Q. If you're ever in danger from an enemy player, then you should look around for another target that you can put your Q1 on. Then, you want to build distance between you and the marked target. This puts your opponent into a lose/lose situation. If they pursue you, then you'll jump to your target and evade them entirely. And if they try to cover your Q'd target, then you can just keep running away to safety.

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4.1. If League of Legends players were polled, it would be almost unanimous what type of champions are most hated. Stealth characters. Being unable to hit them as they dance around and try to kill you is one of the most frustrating experiences is the game. Of course many of you know that Lee Sin's Q will give true sight of your opponent when it lands. (true sight meaning: the opponent can no longer stealth). However something you may not think of in the moment is that the true sight goes away once you use your Q2. A small tip to keep in mind is that you should try to delay using your Q2 until the last possible moment against stealth champions, so you can continually auto attack them and give them no way to outplay you.

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5.1. Now the next advanced mechanic you need to know is the Q2 cancel. Basically, a lot of your abilities are locked out as you're in the middle of your Q2. For example, you can't E or R mid air while you're traveling to your target. However, you can cancel this with with a ward hop before taking your Q2. Here's how. Land your Q. W to another target, and then take your Q2. However, you need to do this quickly, almost as if you didn't cast your W. Now as you're flying you can do anything you like. For example, before landing with your Q2, you can use your active item and E to deal a bit of damage to your opponent to get more value out of your Q's execute damage. Another interesting mechanic is the drive by kick. You Q a target behind the person you intend to kick. Then you ward hop cancel your Q2 to drive by kick your opponent into your team.

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6.1. Lee Sin is at his best when he's in the jungle. His ability to traverse terrain is unparalled thanks to not just his W, but his Q as well. But while you can often be constrained in your mobility whenever you don't have wards available, that isn't an issue with your Q. It has such a low cooldown, so whenever you find yourself in danger in the jungle, you should look for available jungle camps to jump to with your Q to make a quick getaway. To make this even better, what we'd suggest you do is have an extra keybind to normal cast your Q with. Lee Sin's Q actually has an absurdly long range, which can come in clutch. Being able to accurately see just how far away you can Q mobs from could help you make some great escapes. For example, you can even do a crazy hop all the way from the river to this raptor camp with this trick.

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7.1. One of your biggest powerspikes to be aware of happens in the mid game as you reach level 9 and have about 1 and a half items. This is because at this point Lee Sin's Q is at max rank, giving it a fairly low cooldown. And on top of that, you should have an item like Goredrinker and maybe a Warhammer for some extra cooldown reduction. With those 2 things, your Q's CD becomes extremely low, allowing you to abuse one of the most important things you need to remember about Lee Sin - which is the fact that his spells begin their cooldown on the initial cast, not the second one. It isn't something you really think about with his W or E, however you can abuse this following trick with his Q for extremely unfair damage later into the game. If you land your Q on a target, then you'll want to wait until it's about to time out to reactivate it. Remember, the actual cooldown is already ticking down as Q's mark is active on your opponent. Afterwards, take the Q, do as much burst with auto attacks and spells as possible, then ult your target. By now your Q will be back up to use again, allowing you to burst your target with a ton of execute damage. This is an incredibly potent combo because Lee Sin's Q is one of the strongest damage abilities in the game because it already deals 2 instances of damage. When you get to double that damage in an encounter, it makes it insane just how much damage you can do in a fight.

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8.1. There is a very consistent issue that plagues a lot of Lee Sin players whenever they try to pick up the champion, and that is that they try to get too fancy. Lee Sin is this flashy playmaking champion, so you need to be constantly making big plays in order to play him correctly, right? ... Wrong. There is a very simple mindset you should have when playing Lee. Go for simple and consistent plays when you're ahead, and do the flashy stuff when you're behind. The reason why is because the flashy plays often require you to give up a lot of damage in order to get into position to land meaningful kicks onto enemy carries. Not only that, but they can often leave you stranded deep into enemy territory, which will often result in your death. When you're ahead, you don't want to sacrifice your own life or damage to kill another member of the enemy team. Just play standard and don't try to do too many fancy things. However, Lee Sin is a champion that doesn't do too well when he's behind. In those cases, going for crazy flanks or deep kicks onto enemy carries is significantly more worth it. If your own life isn't very valuable in the game, then trading it for an enemy carry will often be the correct play. Keep this mindset in mind, and you'll throw way less games picking up Lee Sin, compared to other newer players on the champion.

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9.1. A major issue that newer players run into with any champion that uses energy is resource management. Your abilities have low cooldowns and are super impactful, but they're worthless if you don't have the energy to cast them. As a quick reminder, you really need to be making use out of your really strong passive in fights. You should be weaving autos as often as possible in between spells, since Lee Sin restores a lot of energy with his passive. It's actually almost impossible for Lee to run out of energy in fights, if you're consistently landing auto attacks. However, you won't always be able to auto attack too often in every fight, and you can run out of energy quickly. Which leads us to a neat little trick you can pull off in a situation such as this. Sometimes you might have enough energy to land a Q1, but not enough to land Q2 afterwards. However, if there's another target beside you, you should auto attack it once or twice after your Q1 to restore enough energy in order to Q2 towards your opponent. It is important to note that you don't actually have to do this. Even if you cast Q1 with exactly 50 energy, the timer on your Q2 always gives you just enough time to get enough energy for the second activation But auto attacking something else before dashing to your actual target can also be very useful for pooling much more energy so that you can actually fight them and use other abilities once you commit.

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10.1. One of the biggest misconceptions players have when playing Lee Sin is using his Q as a gap closer by default in order to deal damage to their target. The problem with doing this every time is it doesn't play around the second part of your Q dealing more damage the lower health the target is. What this means is that you will often not want to begin fights by using your Q as a gap closer, since this won't maximize the amount of damage you can do. It may seem counter-intuitive, but in a situation like this, Lee could land his Q, but instead of gap closing with it, he could jump with his W to close the gap instead. Then he uses the rest of his cooldowns, before committing his Q2. As you can see, even with the same amount of auto attacks and spells used, there is a 150 damage difference when Lee does this, compared to when he uses his Q just as a gap closer.

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11.1. Okay, now you're getting into the super advanced section of Lee Sin's combos. Having watched the insec and having an escape route videos, you should have a good idea of how to kick your opponents into your teammates now. But Lee Sin mains have taken this a step further to really optimize playing Lee Sin. The following is commonly referred to as the Chinese Insec due to the most insane Lee Sin mains pushing the limits of what this champion can do. First, you will need to practice buffering your ward after a flash. Basically, if you click your ward in a spot that is out of range, then flash toward the spot you placed the ward to get into range, then your ward will automatically be placed there since is has been input buffered. Then, you want to combine this concept with your W. So you buffer ward, flash into range and then W to it. Try practicing this in one fluid motion as you get the hang of it. Now, combine that with your Q at the start. Q your main target, buffer ward, flash, W, kick, and then Q back to your main target. And there you have it. That's the Chinese Insec, and you definitely don't have to feel bad if you can't pull it off because of your slow fingers. The main advantage of this variation is that it's both very fast AND you travel back to your target towards where you kicked them, instead of leaving yourself stranded in the middle of the enemy team. Although it's useful to know, it is not how you'll actually climb on Lee Sin. This is just for those players who want to take Lee to the next level for their montages.

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12.1. In skirmishes in group battles it is the most basic of basics that beefy teammates will position in front of their squishier allies. Everyone knows this. However, you can actually use this to your advantage as Lee Sin to increase your damage output substantially and turn your enemies against each other. An incredibly deadly part of Lee Sin's kit that most people don't think about is the bonus damage on his R when he kicks a target onto another player. Surely you can see where we're going with this. Take a look at Lee Sin's kick damage on a dummy on its own. It does 411 damage. However, let's say there's a 3000 health target standing in front of a carry. This is about the amount of health dedicated tanks have in the mid and later stages of the game. Then, Lee kicks that tank into the carry, and he deals an extra 300 damage to them. And the cherry on top is that you've not only increased your damage, but at the same time opened a path for you to land your Q onto your main target, allowing you to burst them for a massive amount of damage.

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13.1. As we've seen previously, kicking someone in front of you into your primary target gives you a ton of extra damage in fights. However, people aren't always going to line up for you to do that. To really bring your Lee Sin to the next level, you'll need to get comfortable quickly dashing around your target to get to an angle where you can kick them onto your teammates. Walking around is way too slow and obvious. While it can work on unsuspecting foes, the higher you climb the less useful that will be. The second best method is to use a ward hop to angle yourself properly for your kick. This is definitely good, but it has a very, very slight delay that technically your opponents could react to. The actual best way of angling yourself is with R flash. Remember from before that this is an instant kick combo. The target that you're kicking will have no time to react, making it an almost guarantee that this lands, helping you knock up all your foes for a massive play. To practice this is really simple. Set up 4 dummies close to each other in the practice tool. Set cooldowns off and practice hopping and flashing around to angle your ult into the other dummies over and over. The key bit to this practice is that you shouldn't have to think about how you're going to angle your ult. It should become instinct for where you need to hop to, in order to be able to kick your target into another target.

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14.1. Coined after Insec, a Korean player who debuted this play in Season 3, the insec is one of the most notable and important combos any Lee Sin player should immediately learn. It's really simple once you understand the mechanics behind it. You Q towards your target. Once you land, you place a ward behind them, dash to it and then kick them towards your teammates. This is definitely one of the main combos you want to practice if you really want to pick up Lee Sin. A few minutes in the practice tool and you'll get it in no time. While it is relatively simple to do, Lee Sin mains have continued to devise new ways to improve on the insec and make it even better and more efficient. For example, you can speed it up by not allowing your Q2 to land its damage by ward-hopping behind your target mid-flight. Although this sacrifices a bit of damage, it is faster to cancel your Q's animation to immediately hop behind them with your W, giving your opponent less time to react. Now if you don't have a ward available, you can do the flash variation which is basically the same thing. You Q to the target, deal damage, and then R flash them into your team. Or just like the regular insec, you can forego your Q2's damage, so that you can flash earlier and kick them into your team slightly faster. Deciding which version of the insec you'll use will come with experience and practice. The simple answer is that if you want speed and to give your opponents less time to react, then you should cancel your Q2's damage part, since it isn't as important as the kick. However, if you think that extra bit of damage will matter, then allow your Q2 to go off and then kick your opponent into your team. We're making this sound way more complicated than it actually is, and these decisions will mostly only matter at higher elos. Just practice the simple and regular insec if you want to and you'll do just fine.

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15.1. The immediate thing most players want to do when picking up Lee Sin is to start dashing around all over the place by ward hopping. But then you start trying to do it and it feels super clunky, slow, and it doesn't look as smooth and seamless as it should. Don't worry, in this guide we've got you covered with the most common issues newer players run into when learning how to ward hop and how to fix them! The very first thing you want to do is to go into settings and see if you have Quick Casting with indicator on. If you're used to playing with this setting on, then you may want to turn it off when playing Lee Sin. Otherwise, your ward hops will end up super slow. The next step is to get comfortable binds for your trinket wards and the control wards that you end up purchasing. The best way to set up binds for these is simply to put your wards on keybinds that don't share a finger with what you use to press W. For example, using 2 as a ward keybind might be bad for you, because that's also the same finger a lot of people press W with. This player has his trinket wards on C, which doesn't conflict with their W bind. And their control wards are on their mouse button, which obviously would also not interfere with their W bind. These are just some examples of what you could possibly use. For yourself, just find whatever is most comfortable to do. After that all there's left to do is practice. For some players it'll definitely take multiple tries to get it down, but a clean ward hop is pivotal to playing Lee Sin smoothly and effectively.

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16.1. If you've watched Lee Sin montages before, then you'll know that this champion can seem extremely overwhelming to pick up. Lee Sin has some of the most ridiculous combos in the game that he can pull off, but trust us when we say the following. You absolutely do not need to be mechanically insane to play this champion. Learning the basic combos and some simple fundamentals are all you need to carry as Lee Sin. So we'll cover the basic useful combos you'll actually use every game here, and then towards the end of the course we'll go over all the crazy stuff you can technically pull off on Lee Sin. Alright, let's cover all the basic flash combos you'll need to get started. There's 2 big ones you need to know. Sometimes when you're desperate to get in range of your opponent you will be tempted to flash and then E to slow them. However, the faster way of doing this is with your E being input buffered first, and then flashing towards them. This isn't a massive deal, but League is a game of milliseconds, so every bit counts. Next up is along a similar line, R flash. Taking the time to flash behind your target and then kicking them is rather slow in a game that's about milliseconds, which could give your opponent a lot of time to react to your kick. The much smoother and faster play that leaves 0 room for counterplay is R flash. Simply buffer your R, and then flash at the angle that you want to kick your opponent, and it'll go off instantly after you flash. With flash combos done, let's now talk about all the ways you can make your ultimate usage more efficient. You see, when you kick someone away, your opponent is now stuck travelling in a set direction for about a second. You can abuse this in multiple ways to guarantee some extra damage on them The first and most important is guaranteeing that your Q lands. If your opponent is crowd controlled and thrown in a straight line, then you can just follow their trajectory with your Q to make sure it lands 100% of the time. There is literally nothing your opponent can do about this. It is a guaranteed combo This is a very pivotal combo to learn, since so much of Lee Sin's damage comes from his Q, especially the execute portion of it. We'd recommend practicing with dummies from multiple different angles so that landing your Q off your ultimate becomes second nature to you, regardless of what angle you kick your opponent to. Finally the last thing you need to know isn't so much a combo, but one last detail about your kick. Remember that although your opponent is kicked away from you, it takes them a moment to travel. Which means that the second you press your R, your opponent is still technically next to you for a bit. This is a small optimization thing, but you can often sneak in a bit of extra damage after kicking someone. You can R auto. R + E or R + your active item, usually Goredrinker. And that's it for all the simple combos you need to learn.

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17.1. Every jungler has unique angles from which they approach lanes to score kills more consistently. For Lee Sin, he's got 2 notable ways of ganking completely unique to him. The first being lane ganks. Due to his ability to hop to an ally, and then Q an enemy, Lee can cover a lot of distance with his mobility. This makes him one of the best gankers in the game coming directly through the lane. Otherwise, Lee's other best gank set up is finding good flanks in enemy lanes to set up easy kicks for his teammates. Now for the best kick angles, here's generally where you should approach when attempting to gank each lane, regardless of what side you're playing. For top lane ganking blue side, you ward hop from here, and kick your opponent. To gank red side, you come from here to kick. For mid lane, setting up behind them for a kick is super easy. If your opponent is hugging their tower, then you can easily find kick angles from the raptor pit. And if they're standing in the middle of the lane, then you can loop around these jungle paths to set up behind them for a kick too. As for ganking bot lane, it's basically the exact same thing as top lane. To gank the red side bot lane, you can usually find a great kick angle coming from behind this wall. And to gank the blue side bot lane, just wrap around the tribrush area and flank them for an easy kick.

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18.1. As a jungler, one of your main responsibilities in a game is smiting objectives. And more importantly, one of the ways you can carry a bad team is stealing an objective when all your teammates are dead and the enemy team is getting a Baron or Dragon for free. Luckily for you on Lee, there is a really smooth play you can make to both steal the objective, while keeping yourself safe at the same time. Walk up to the objective and Q it. Take your Q2 in, and cancel it with a ward hop. Practice that for a bit, then you just need to add smite to the mix. Q1, then Q2, cancel it with a ward hop and in the middle of dashing out you smite the objective. With a bit of practice this'll become second nature to you. And trust us that when you pull this off in clutch moments you'll finally earn the respect of your teammates. Just kidding - as if a jungler would ever be praised by their teammates in this game.