[Champion] Vi - Page 7

GTPGlitch

5061 Posts

January 30 2014 23:34 GMT

#121

I'm just in silver 3, but i've been going lizard->botrk->tank. Is that an overly-squishy build?

What about, say, golem->mallet->botrk->tank?

Also, generally my first back before second round of buffs is spirit stone+vamp and boots if I have the money. I get the vamp so I can solo drag after first ult-gank, would it be better to just finish the lizard/golem? I haven't tried soloing drag without the vamp scepter because between the two I hardly lose any hp, but I'm not sure if it's worth not finishing the jungle item for a few more minutes :S

Alaric

France45622 Posts

January 31 2014 14:38 GMT

#122

If your goal is to initiate (especially if you have to teamfight, less the case in ganks and individual picks) then it's to squishy. Basically, if you're likely to die faster or at the same time than the target you're ulting you're probably doing it wrong.

I don't think BotRK's that good an item on jungle Vi because her goal is to catch people and set targets up for burst, BotRK's passive is nice in the mid-late game if you have to duke it out with other bruisers, but it lacks burst (unless you use the active) to kill people during your cc and after cutlass you're sitting on a 1800 gold gap where you don't have much for show.
Triforce or Gauntlet (or an early brutaliser to become a BC after tank items) are better for burst, Gauntlet is also prob better than Mallet if you want sticking power.
Hexdrinker, Cowl, a casual Belt are good for early tankiness if you don't want the golem spirit.

If you want to solo drake after the first ult-gank then you're probably mid or bot, in that case if your ult nets you a kill you shouldn't have to solo the drake. With the new spirit stone passive you also don't need the vamp for jungling and it gives you less damage than 2x short sword or Lizard Spirit.
Basically, you're making a gambit that you can solo drake shortly after you buy vamp to make it worth. If your team can help you (and thus you don't need the vamp) or you don't have the opportunity to solo it, it's delaying your spirit item for a marginal gain so I'd avoid it.

I don't know how well Vi can solo the drake with the new spirit stone (and maybe kindlegem or short swords) but it should be easy to test out in a custom game and see if the lifestal makes any meaningful difference.

GrandInquisitor

New York City13113 Posts

February 03 2014 22:57 GMT

#123

As to what skill to start first: W clears faster than E, but E triggers your passive and keeps you at higher health. Assuming you are getting a leash and smiting, E's extra health is better than the minimally faster clear.

739

Bearded Elder29903 Posts

February 04 2014 12:34 GMT

#124

When I'm playing Vi I mostly go for Lizard > Brutalizer > Sunfire > w/e is needed but brutalizer/sunfire are core items on my Vi. If it comes to skills I always max R > Q > E > W

DrunkenOne

United States302 Posts

February 04 2014 16:30 GMT

#125

Randuins much better tank item than sunfire imo. I go lizard->brut->randuins. Lets you ult in and then randuins active. You pay a lot for the sunfire damage which you dont really need since you do huge damage anyways and dont need the sunfire to clear camps or waves thanks to all your aoe.

Alaric

France45622 Posts

February 05 2014 15:00 GMT

#126

Did some math a bit back (after the initial nerfs) and it turns out that for a Q-auto-E combo, maxing W beats maxing E starting from 1k HP. Seeing how you put your 2nd point in one of these spells at level 8 and that even Ashe is likely over the threshold by that point (1027 HP at level 8, give her a dblade and she's over it at level 7), you get a stronger burst (and better dps overall on champions, buff/big monsters and dragon/baron) by going R>Q>W>E.
I can see ammo management being a bit more annoying now that the CDR from both blue buff and SV has been hit tho.

YouGotNothin

United States907 Posts

February 05 2014 17:32 GMT

#127

I used to run R>Q>W>E, but now I like to go R>Q>W=E, maxing them simultaneously. I usually put the more points into W (i.e. both are lvl 1 you upgrade W to lvl 2 then E to lvl 2 then W to lvl 3 so on and so forth). Don't know if this is ideal but I like it, I have been doing this a lot for other champs too that have two nice 3rd & 4th priority skills like Lucian I go R>Q>W=E also.

drkcid

Spain196 Posts

February 28 2014 08:47 GMT

#128

I´m wondering if anyone has tryed AP build on Vi just for fun. Is it possible to have enought AP to use you E and to do a ton of damage? It could be hilarious to use Q and R to CC and then E.

Scip

Czech Republic11293 Posts

February 28 2014 09:30 GMT

#129

Ok, lets deal with this in order:
No, you shouldnt get vamp scepter before lizard/double longsword for lizard. As mentioned above, I dont think you should need it to solo dragon at lvl7 and you really probably shouldnt be soloing it anyways. I think Botrk is overly squishy, I almost always go Lizard Elder - tank, you really want that Randuins active and Banshees asap, in teamfights youll do more dmg anyway if you can afford to not worry about your own hp. I am suspect of the Golem - FM idea, it has no resistances until about 5k gold lol, that seems pretty late, not sure if the math checks out tho.

For the first skill, I guess it can depends on how good a leash youre getting. If you get a good leash but without dmg on small lizards, E will be better, otherwise W will be better.

Dont see any logic behind the Elder Lizard, Bruta, Sunfire build. Sunfire is the best when you are alone in a lane or maybe if you have Rammus level problems of clearing the jungle. But Vi's 1v1 is honestly rather pathetic so you probably won't get much me-time in lane and you obviously have no problems clearing. Again, Randuins active might even allow you to deal more dmg in a teamfight, at the very least be a lot more useful.

Maxing W 2nd is standard on Vi, I don't think anybody maxes E second

I don't see how maxing 2 skills simultaneously ever makes sense apart from being mildly aesthetically pleasing. Mind to explain your reasons? :3

Aaaaaaand no

SidianTheBard

United States2474 Posts

February 28 2014 14:34 GMT

#130

I still always do the whole Golem > Brut > Randuins/Veil depending on enemy team. Squeeze in Tabis as well when I feel I need them. Usually after Golem, but sometimes I wait til after Brut before getting t2 boots. I also use to always max E second but for the past few months, especially with all the health stacking/tanks, I've been going W second.

Still have yet to try out the Lizard build on her, I guess I just always like the extra health / tenacity on golem. Plus since I like going Bruta 2nd item I guess I would just feel too squishy going lizard / bruta.

GrandInquisitor

New York City13113 Posts

February 28 2014 16:40 GMT

#131

You don't need to be tanky at first. You're an AD assassin; you don't have an escape, but you shouldn't need an escape because for the first half of the game at least, your goal is to kill them before they kill you. And Lizard/BC or Lizard/TF Vi is really really good at doing that.

Alaric

France45622 Posts

March 01 2014 00:38 GMT

#132

Guide finally updated for s4. In brief, jungle part revamped with masteries, items, and some other minor stuff. I've added some little remarks ont he playstyle and added people in the credits.
Regarding the dead picture links, I won't update them: you can see which item it is through the link URL if you hover the pictures with your mouse anyway.

For reference, s3 guide:
+ Show Spoiler [Jungling Vi v1.03 guide] +

Jungling Vi

There are two main approaches to jungling Vi: the tanky one, and the damage one. The tanky one plays for the dps on Denting Blows and being able to initiate more reliably, with a smoother powercurve, while the damage one focuses on burst, crushing people in early skirmishes and snowballing the game, with a steeper transition into the lategame.

Runes:
+ Show Spoiler +

Fast clear:
AS/armour/MR/AD
Vi tears through the jungle by herself, but AS marks allow you to murder buffs/drake alot faster, especially at early levels, and gives you some more dps overall. I personally favour this one.

Strong burst/ganking:
ArPen/armour/MR/AD
Higher burst damage in ganks, at the expense of standing dps and a bit of jungle speed. It comes down to preference.

Mobility:
AD/armour/MR/MS
I don't recommend it, as your clear and damage will suffer from it. Better rely on your positioning/swifties/slows (red buff, mallet, etc.) to reach and stick to targets. It is usable though.

You can swap out flat MR, scaling MR and CDR for your Glyphs depending on playstyle and preference. Vi benefits a lot from CDR on her Q, especially once small skirmishes/jungle fights start.

Masteries:
+ Show Spoiler +

Because Vi's kit excels at clearing the jungle and keeping a high HP pool, you can get away with a bunch of masteries set-ups, most notably:
- 9-21-0 (you can swap out points in Relentless to max out Hardiness and take Defender too)
- 21-9-0 (you can swap Sorcery out but CDR never hurts Vi)
- 21-0-9
- or even 9-0-21 (Expanded Mind, Biscuiteer and Explorer can be swapped for Greed/Wealth, you can trade Alacrity for Sorcery if you want the early 10% CDR too).

Vi is a great initiator but not a great tank, so I recommend 21-9-0 to emphasise your strong ganks and early dueling power, taking an early lead is your best bet at surviving later initiations.

Summoner spells:

+ Show Spoiler +

Smite is obvious since you're jungling, and I favour Flash. While you have a wall-jumping ability in Vault Breaker (and Assault and Battery in some way), Flash gives you added safety, and also allows you to cover an terrifying amount of ground when combined with Vault Breaker (either during the charge or the dash), and even possibly with Assault and Battery (be mindful not to initiate that way however as your team won't be able to follow you!).

Skill order:
+ Show Spoiler +

WEQ into R > Q > W/E

At level 1 W is the best clearing skill no matter how much help you get, but it doesn't trigger your passive nor gives you burst so you may favour E if a level 1 fight erupts, nay Q if you need the cc/escape. Q is significantly slower (and thus makes you take much more damage on your first camp) however.
Q clears faster and is more mana-efficient is you charge it fully on each camp, and the reduced CDR is a boon for your mobility, be it chasing or running (or ganking warded sidelanes, see the wall-jumping section). Maxing W or E second is a matter of preference, I favour W since my builds get CDR and it helps me kill tankier champs, buffs and the drake faster. Maxing E ensures that you'll have both charges available most fights.

Routes:
+ Show Spoiler +

Any, really. You will need more help to keep decent HP if you start Wraiths or Golems followed by Red Buff, but her kit and base stats are strong enough to make Vi very flexible.
Note that you can gank as soon as level 2, but that waiting for level 3 gives you stronger (and easier) burst due to having E's auto resets, and without the risk of losing your remaining buff.

Items:
+ Show Spoiler +

Starting items:

x5 or

x2
+ Show Spoiler [Details and Machete plan] +

Standard. You can get a 3rd pot with a ward start if you wait a bit for 5 gold without losing on a camp since they all spawn at 1:55, it's risky however if you fear an invade (and undoable if you plan one yourself). You'll also need a bigger leash (especially if you start red buff) to remain high HP for the whole clear as you have less potions.

You shouldn't ever want to upgrade Machete to Madred's: despite technically autoattacking a lot, most of Vi's damage comes from her charged Q, W, and E AoE, which don't apply Madred's passive. Moreover, Spirit Stone provides welcome mana regeneration for your spamming pleasure (and ability to gank afterwards).
Your long term objective should thus be either Spirit of the Ancient Golem or Spirit of the Elder Lizard.

First recall/early game core:

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+ Show Spoiler [Reasoning] +

Your first recall should be Spirit Stone (mainly for the mana regen) + boots (easier positioning/ganking) + long sword(s) if you have the money, with whatever wards/potions you feel you may need.

The idea is to make use of Vi's good base damage and mobility to exert map pressure and get kills early, especially once you're level 6. The follow-up depends on needs:

Upgrade to SotEL: 1300 gold, 35 AD, 10% CDR, 10% monster damage, Incinerate passive.
Incinerate increases your dps, and combined with the 10% monster damage greatly speeds up drake attempts. You have a cost-efficient item completed, damage taken care of and can move on to getting tankier. You can also combine it with The Brutalizer for even more damage and CDR but it will significantly delay your tankiness unless you're ahead.
Buy The Brutalizer: 1337 gold, 25 AD, 10% CDR, 10 ArPen.
Better burst, especially on low-armour targets. Most importantly, opens up SotAG for additional HP and Tenacity (for example against mostly physical teams where you'd take Tabi over Mercs). This will however delay the rest of your build.

Kindlegem can be built into SotAG or Locket later.

Mid/late game core:
(

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(

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+ Show Spoiler [Reasoning] +

Jungle item has been addressed earlier; after this, you should focus on finishing Boots2 and Locket. Locket is another excellent low-budget item, the shield helping you survive dives and initiations on top of your passive, while giving precious CDR to improve your mobility (see the "Playstyle" section); the "ideal" combination in most games would be to build SotEL and Mercs: there aren't many MR items that Vi is comfortable with so the 25 given by mercs can't be wasted, and the Tenacity allows you to build SotEL to take care of your damage needs. Stay flexible still.

Randuin's is an excellent "diver" item and the highest slot-efficiency for physical EHP in the game. The HP pool and your passive also help protect you against magic burst seeing how your ult paints a target on you.
Bulwark, contrary to Locket, isn't suited to divers who may die from focus fire (and thus lose the aura), which Vi typically is compared to more utility-heavy or tanky initiators (like Malphite or Jarvan IV). It also doesn't give CDR or offensive stats and its price delays items granting them. For those reasons I dislike building it, however it is a significant source of MR and a vital team item, especially against double AP. If noone else is building it (or is even less suited, like Zyra or Fiddle support), be the team player.
(Note: nothing stops you from buying both, but for a mid/late game timing you likely won't have the gold required.)

Luxury/Situational:

+ Show Spoiler [Reasoning] +

Mallet is a semi-offensive option letting you stick to targets better than Randuin's, and stronger against magic damage, but without the active or armour.
BC is a natural follow-up to The Brutalizer, granting you additional AD and some HP, and letting you debuff the whole enemy team's armour with E and R. You can also use it more defensively, combined with Denting Blows' armour reduction to negate any armour stackers from zoning your AD carry. It usually shouldn't be a priority buy though.

Wit's end can give you a MR buffer against heavy magic damage teams, however most of the price comes from the AS and passives and sitting on a NMM gives you as much MR until you start autoattacking for stacks, making it more about slot-efficiency—being melee, you most likely won't have time to stack it before the enemy unleashes his burst. Hexdrinker/Maw is a stronger option against magic burst and gives you some of your own through additional AD, while Wit's is more geared toward dps.

Zephyr is a good if expensive option for Tenacity later in the game, granting MS, CDR, AS and AD, all stats that Vi likes. However, despite the cost-efficiency, the lack of defensive stats and spread (a bit of each, not much of any) make it awkward to build until you're tankier. A true luxury item.

Warmog's may be a good defensive choice if your only goal is to survive diving and taking most of the enemy team's burst, while GA similarly discourages the enemy team to focus you as the initiatior. However, given their price Randuin's and Bulwark are likely more efficient options. If you really need more tankiness later on, you can pile these items up and challenge the enemy to punish your ult initiations.

Playstyle:
+ Show Spoiler +

Vi has extremely safe and fast jungle clears, thanks to her passive and AoE letting her flatten camps without losing HP: you can move fast across the jungle charging Q to jump walls and cluster monsters, then autoE the big one AoE them down. Only her mana limits her, which is less of a problem with blue buff then spirit stone.

When ganking, red buff is pretty important to you as it lets you walk up behind people, auto them then use a charged Q (or ult, post-6) to catch up if they flash or dash away. Good positioning, avoiding wards or having your laner bait the fight is thus pretty important.
Avoid opening a gank with Q or R as much as you can (though R is more reliable).
Ganking ranged champions, especially mid lane is harder because you can't really get behind them and if you charge Q while chasing they'll often just reach their tower. In those cases, and particularly if your laner has burst and/or cc, you can charge Q in the brush/while coming for behind and try to initiate with it. The knock-back allows for easy cc follow-up, and both burst combined should be enough to drop most squishies from full.
You can come and gank people from behind a bit like Alistar, especially mid, your passive will absorb the tower shot and the knock-back will hopefully carry you out of range.
It's also very easy to burn a flash just by walking into mid, charging Q, and releasing it at the enemy laner. Make sure to abuse the timing window you created. Obviously, champions like Talon, Katarina, Kassadin, Syndra, etc. are especially difficult to gank (even post-6 you can ult but your laner may not be able to follow from that distance if they blink).

You can easily counterjungle by fighting most junglers, however be wary of your Q being on cooldown or bodyblocked (see general tips) as you're still squishy with your passive down early on, and it has a long cooldown. A "weakness" of her strong clears is that she can easily kill all little monsters with incidental AoE, so while she can easily steal a full camp, it ironically takes longer to let a little monster behind to waste the enemy jungler's exp and time.

The build in this guide focuses on early CDR and maxing Q. Once you have SotEL+Kindlegem/Locket or SotAG+Brutalizer, you have a sub-10s non-targeted dash/knock-back (level 7+) thanks to 20% CDR. At this point you should look for an opportunity to make plays every time your ult is up, which should be every 100s to every minute (depending on level and if you have blue buff or not). Your post-6 ganks are almost as strong as Malphite's or Warwick's, play as such.
With Vi's potential for long range initiations and tower-diving (ult -> Q to knock-back into your allies, and the passive to survive), and Denting Blows' %HP damage shredding the dragon, it's a good idea to focus your early presence on your solo lanes to put them ahead, then focus on bot everytime your ult is up and/or dragon is available.

Later, when initiating teamfights, remember to assess threats and positioning before you choose which target to ult, and when to go in (keeping track of flashes is harder but useful). Sometimes it can be more important to use it to protect a fed ally from a diver than to initiate on an opponent. Vi's kit is more suited to early/mid game skirmishes and pick-offs, but she's versatile enough that you shouldn't let yourself be constricted.

Once you're level 9, Q is maxed with a 5-6s cooldown depending on CDR. Don't hesitate to use positioning, your passive and Locket shield to walk away after initiating, wait for Q to come back up, and cut off an escape route, intercept a threat on your backline or simply punch a face in with a QautoE combo. Vi is no Kassadin or Jayce, but as long as you manage your Qs well enough (be wary or ranged roots and stuns that can interrupt the charge and put the spell on cooldown, time your casts right) you can rely on them and your passive to cover for your teammates (Q a chaser for the knock-back, run away and Q to safety 5s later).

Wall-jumping:
One of the benefits of maxing Q is a shorter cooldown that allows you to use it to dash over a wall and have it ready to gank in the next 10 seconds. You can avoid riverside bush/tribrush wards, wards at your wraiths/in the J brush, or escape the enemy collapsing on you near their buff by dashing over the dragon's or baron's pit (depending on your side), but the length of Vault Breaker's charge allows some other nifty tricks.
+ Show Spoiler +

Vault Breaker's max range is barely 45 less range Jarvan's EQ combo, allowing you to move between the river bush and near top's (blue side) or bot's (purple side) tribrush without being seen by wards in the river. You can use this when purple side to gank their pushing bottom lane, or to flank the purple bot tower unsuspected if they warded the drake, but not the river bush.
If you don't like wasting time, you can save a seconds and look cool by charging Vault Breaker outside of the wolf camp, and dash through the wall while hitting the wolves at the same time.
When chasing somebody all the way to blue top's/purple's bot inner tower, you can cross the large wall between the alley and the tower with a fully charged Vault Breaker. It's doable with other abilities (like Flash) but it can be hard to pull off, while Vault Breaker has the range to do it 100% reliably.

Note that the picture shows where you land when touching the wall and charging fully, so you'll still probably need Flash or your ult to catch your almost dead prey, as you're likely to be the one tanking the tower when you do this.

^ W second is always better than E second in terms of damage. They'll have enough HP at level 8 that the additional 1.5% max health outperforms the +15 damage from E (and if you burn both E charges you'll usually trigger W 2+ times so it doesn't matter).
Also Vi is not an assassin, she doesn't have the scaling to be an assassin. Her Q has really high base damage so you can play her as such for some time in the early game (and if you snowball) but you won't 100-0 people and your damage will fall off in the midgale.

oZe

Sweden492 Posts

March 02 2014 22:07 GMT

#133

I go lizard, triforce, tanky in soloQ. It's been working so good I haven't even considered if something else could be better.
I usually put a frozen heart in there somewhere for CDR. Never build any life steal at all and have had 0 issues with sustain.

The most epic game I was trolled in champ select to trade with a guy. Who didn't own VI and since I was waiting for the trade icon to light up. I got in game with support runes, masteries(0 13 17) & ignite. Went 25 3 XY and carried the shit out of that game anyway. Got fb with flash ignite btw =)

Ps. You need to play her with the neon skin for maximum damage ^^ If you use the acab skin I hope you lose ;-)

GrandInquisitor

New York City13113 Posts

March 03 2014 18:49 GMT

#134

On March 01 2014 09:38 Alaric wrote:
Also Vi is not an assassin, she doesn't have the scaling to be an assassin. Her Q has really high base damage so you can play her as such for some time in the early game (and if you snowball) but you won't 100-0 people and your damage will fall off in the midgale.

...Vi doesn't have scaling? Her ratios are even better than Wukong's, except that she has extreme single-target cc on top of that. The whole point of playing Vi is her damage, and if you don't build Lizard -> BC first you're wasting her AD assassin potential. Only in teamfights do you start to need tanky items, and as Vi you want to delay teamfighting as long as possible.

As you can imagine I strongly disagree with your characterization of BC in the initial post. I think it is the absolute best damage item on Vi. You stack BC extremely quickly and it synergizes very well with W, both by doubling the armor shred and also amplifying your %max health damage.

Scip

Czech Republic11293 Posts

March 03 2014 18:53 GMT

#135

You'll find that against most junglers you'll want to start teamfights sooner rather than later (vs. Elise, Lee, Fiddle, Pantheon, Elise, maybe Wukong).

YouGotNothin

United States907 Posts

March 03 2014 19:30 GMT

#136

On February 28 2014 18:30 Scip wrote:
Ok, lets deal with this in order:
No, you shouldnt get vamp scepter before lizard/double longsword for lizard. As mentioned above, I dont think you should need it to solo dragon at lvl7 and you really probably shouldnt be soloing it anyways. I think Botrk is overly squishy, I almost always go Lizard Elder - tank, you really want that Randuins active and Banshees asap, in teamfights youll do more dmg anyway if you can afford to not worry about your own hp. I am suspect of the Golem - FM idea, it has no resistances until about 5k gold lol, that seems pretty late, not sure if the math checks out tho.

For the first skill, I guess it can depends on how good a leash youre getting. If you get a good leash but without dmg on small lizards, E will be better, otherwise W will be better.

Dont see any logic behind the Elder Lizard, Bruta, Sunfire build. Sunfire is the best when you are alone in a lane or maybe if you have Rammus level problems of clearing the jungle. But Vi's 1v1 is honestly rather pathetic so you probably won't get much me-time in lane and you obviously have no problems clearing. Again, Randuins active might even allow you to deal more dmg in a teamfight, at the very least be a lot more useful.

Maxing W 2nd is standard on Vi, I don't think anybody maxes E second

I don't see how maxing 2 skills simultaneously ever makes sense apart from being mildly aesthetically pleasing. Mind to explain your reasons? :3

Aaaaaaand no

I guess my reasoning for maxing W and E at same time (after maxing Q) is to have a more balanced role in game. I did some simple math on what a 6 hit combo (Q+AA+E+AA+E+AA) does at level 13 for having E at max and W at lvl 1, both at lvl 3, and having W at max and E at lvl 1. W max did slightly more damage than both E and W at lvl 3, which did slightly more than E max.

So for single target burst damage, W max is slightly better than evenly leveling E and W, but having some more points in E also helps with faster clearing of the small monsters in jungle camps, pushing lanes, and aoe damage in team fights.

I understand Vi is best used to focus single targets down but I don't think the slight single target damage increase from maxing W second instead of evenly maxing W and E is necessarily always going to outweigh the benefits mentioned above.

I would love some other insight or opinions on this though.

Alaric

France45622 Posts

March 03 2014 22:20 GMT

#137

On March 04 2014 03:49 GrandInquisitor wrote:

Show nested quote +

For the record, I usually don't take people too seriously when they advocate an early BC on an assassin/"carry" AD caster. It's not against you, it's just that I've ranted about it so many times that I'm getting tired of arguing about it.

+ Show Spoiler [combos] +

Vi's full combo at level 6 is 430 + 4.3 AD + 5.1 bonus AD + 8% (+2% per 35 bonus AD) of max health
Wukong level 6: 260 + 6.9 AD + 7.7 bonus AD
Vi level 11: 675 + 4.3 AD + 5.1 bonus AD + 14% (+2% per 35 bonus AD) of max health
Wukong level 11: 770 + 6.9 AD + 7.7 bonus AD
(not included: Wukong having higher base AD than Vi)

And most of Wukong's (as in, between 1/2 and 2/3) is AoE.

Vi hurts like a truck because she has great base damage on Q, up to 2 aa-resets and W to add a bit more.
But once Q is maxed she doesn't gain much (W gains ~3% enemy max health per level on the full combo, which more or less matches the increase in base damage of spells (40-50), however the ratio needs your target to have 1750 HP to be equal to 1.0 bonus AD on your whole combo; keep in mind that spells like Shadow Slash, Spear Shot or Taste Their Fear have a short enough cooldown that they can be used several times in a full combo, trumping Denting Blows for good).
TL;DR: you hit a damage spike at levels 9 then 11, but after that your combo won't deal as much damage as assassin AD casters, regardless of the fact that you have inferior ratios anyway.

She also doesn't have an escape, and needs to stay in melee range to deal her damage (if you can hit a fully-charged Q, even peeled your ult should let you do it though) while lacking an escape, with her burst mostly scaling off levels. She's got power timings, but she's not an assassin.

Regarding BC:

Vi will deal around half of her damage with the Q/R-auto-E combo (I'm assuming a fully charged Q for the combo because if you're trying to assassinate people you're trying to maximise your damage), then she'll trigger Denting blows, providing 20% armour reduction (BC will add multiplicatively for 15%, meaning it'll reduce a further 12% of their armour at this point), and deal the other half of her damage to her target.
BC won't be fully stacked until the final spell/auto (generally a spell in the rotation considered, so good for you even), and its efficiency is reduced anyway because there's already Denting Blows reducing the target's armour.

Actually, considering a fully stacked BC, you'll deal around 9% more damage compared to a Vi who stopped at the brutaliser, with the penetration mastery and ArPen marks. Before that you're mostly paying 1600 gold for ~30 AD.

If you buy LW, you spend 750 gold more +15 AD and replacing stacking armour reduction with immediate, always up 35% armour penetration. Considering how much of your damage is frontloaded, it'll outperform BC to absurd levels. It also has a smoother build path and grants more benefits until you finish the BC (up to 35 AD vs 150 health), which is important when you're snowballing and trying to stay ahead.

Obviously it's not as good later in the game when your goal is to help your team over chasing solo kills, which is why I prefer BC overall (plus, CDR), and when going brutaliser -> tanky, you'll still have to fork out 1663 gold at some point to complete the BC and it's not coming out of nowhere in the late game (and ruby is shit slot-efficiency-wise).
This doesn't make it worth it to upgrade BC at a point where it won't do you much good just to invest for when they get armour/more levels, however, because you give up so much now which is counterproductive to trying keeping the snowball going.

TL;DR: The damage increase coming from upgrading to BC is too small to be of relevance if your goal is to burst people down by yourself/play Vi as an assassin, even this early in the game. You give up a lot of momentum as the game is transitioning to teamfights and staying alive to ensure the death of the carries you can't 100-0 anymore (and who get more help/peeling now), just to keep doing a little bit more of damage compared to a Vi who will get tanky and complete BC later.
Vi doesn't do too well when behind because her "all-in" style makes her dependant on her team, so retaining momentum when you're doing well is crucial. Screw building BC early.

On March 04 2014 04:30 YouGotNothin wrote:
So for single target burst damage, W max is slightly better than evenly leveling E and W, but having some more points in E also helps with faster clearing of the small monsters in jungle camps, pushing lanes, and aoe damage in team fights.
I would love some other insight or opinions on this though.

A level of E gives you 15 more damage, 30 more if you use it twice (generally you won't, on a camp, unless it's the golems or the wight or something). It's really not a lot, especially considering that a fully charged Q will one-shot wraiths from level 5 or so onward, and mostly kill the little wolves too, so you don't have much AoE damage to provide on top of it.

Dusty

United States3359 Posts

March 04 2014 03:13 GMT

#138

Alaric have you tried going full yolo vi (aka sotel->trinity/brut in some order)?

after having gotten it a couple of times I feel like theres no other way to play her unless you get rekt early, and since you're Vi that shouldn't happen often

Alaric

France45622 Posts

March 04 2014 09:43 GMT

#139

Haven't really, nope. Will do, but that probably won't be until next week (lack of time this week and I'm exhausted so I'd play like shit which wouldn't be fair to the idea tested). It feels like it's dumping 7k gold (+ boots) into a glass cannon build and hoping they lack burst when you ult in.

I can def. see it working in a game with a long laning phase, vision control, and picks happening to take objectives (over fighting for said objectives, like sieging inner towers) but it strikes me as a snowballing/"when ahead" build rather than a stable one you can shoot for every game. Maybe I'm too harsh/conservative with the evaluation of triforce given in the OP. I'll update that once tested (but I tend to be conservative in general with my approach to the game flow).

OmegaKnetus

Germany431 Posts

March 07 2014 15:42 GMT

#140

On March 04 2014 12:13 Dusty wrote:
Alaric have you tried going full yolo vi (aka sotel->trinity/brut in some order)?

after having gotten it a couple of times I feel like theres no other way to play her unless you get rekt early, and since you're Vi that shouldn't happen often

Whenever a vi gets that build (triforce, BC, lizard elder) she can solo carry the game in solo queue. Like literally anyone who gets caugth out just insta dies. If she wants to, she can just yolo ult your adc until banshee's veil and erase them in 1 second.
That burst is just insane and still kinda tanky with the passive shield popping up 24/7.

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