KATARINA BUILD GUIDE

 

Introduction

I wanted to do the guide on my favourite and most played champion, Katarina. I watch tons of streams and videos of high ranked Katarina players such as; Scarra, Westrice, TiensiNoAkuma, Xpeke, Voyboy and I set up my runes and masteries according to them. I felt the need to do this guide because, I didn't see any good guide for Katarina that is also up to date on Solomid.net. Westrice's guide is really good, however it is not up to date. I am looking forward for your positive/negative criticism.

 Pros:

• She doesn't use mana.

• Immense damage output if you can get resets.

• Can carry a team if played right.

• One of the best mid game champions.

• Built in ignite.

• Easy to learn.

Cons:

• Vulnerable to crowd control abilities.

• Hard to master.

• You will get flamed for picking her and you will take the blame if you lose even if you have a good K/D/A.

• Very hard early game without ganks or kills.

• Melee auto-attack range.

• Reliant on ultimate.

 

Her Role In a Team

After certain changes to Katarina and the metagame, Katarina can be both played as a squishy assassin or a tanky damage dealer. Her passive  Voracity is what makes Katarina the assassinating goddess she is. My build is set around this passive. Your job as Katarina is to get lots and lots of kills. Your passive resets the cooldowns of your three non-ultimate abilities and decreases the cooldown on  Death Lotus by 15 seconds, each time you get a kill or an assist. Because your passive reduces your cooldowns, you don't need cooldown runes, cooldown shoes or cooldown masteries. That means I shouldn't see , or CDR runes when you are playing Katarina. 

 

Skills

Voracity

Explanation: Champion kills or assists reduce Death Lotus's cooldown by 15 seconds and refresh basic abilities.

• Your bread and butter.

• After each kill your cooldowns reset for your normal abilities.

• After three kills, your ult cooldown resets.

• To abuse this passive get lots of ability power, so you can kill more people in a team fight.

• This skill requires you to have fast reflexes, when playing Katarina. 

Bouncing Blade

Explanation: Katarina throws a dagger that bounces from enemy to enemy, dealing magic damage and marking them. Her next spell or basic attack against a marked target will consume the mark and deal additional magic damage.

  Range of the first Bounce: 675

• Your harassment skill.

• If you cannot auto attack minions, last hit with this.

• Can be bounced off from a minion, in order to harass without going near the enemy and taking damage.
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Sinister Steel

Explanation: Katarina whirls her daggers around her, dealing magic damage to all enemies in the area. If she hits an enemy Champion, Katarina gains a burst of speed for a short duration.
Whirls daggers in a circle dealing 40/80/120/160/200 (+0.6) (+0.3) magic damage. If she hits an enemy Champion, Katarina gains 12/20/28/36.5/44% movement speed for 1 second.

• Your wave clearing skill.

• Speed buff will help you escape ganks.

• Can have more burst than your ultimate if you can get the reset.

Shunpo

Explanation: Katarina instantly moves to her target's location and takes reduced damage from enemies for a few seconds. If the target is an enemy, she deals damage.
Moves to a target's location. Deals 40/70/100/130/160 (+0.4) magic damage if the target is an enemy.

After using Shunpo, Katarina takes 20% reduced damage for 3 seconds.

  Range: 700

• Your surviving tool.

• Always carry a ward with you so you can put it down and Shunpo to it, this will have a Flash effect.

• Always try to execute your enemies with Shunpo, so you can have a quicker time killing the others. 

Death Lotus

Explanation: Katarina becomes a flurry of blades, throwing daggers with unrivaled speed at up to three nearby Champions. Daggers deal magic damage and reduce incoming healing on targets hit.
Becomes a flurry of blades, throwing daggers at the closest 3 enemy Champions dealing 400/500/600 (+3) (+1.75) magic damage over 2 seconds.

Daggers apply Grievous Wounds, reducing incoming healing by 50% for 3 seconds.

  Range: 550

• Hits three different champions, 10 daggers each, adding up to 30 daggers in total.

• You can use this ultimate more than once in a teamfight, this will help you wreck up kills.

• This ultimate doesn't need line of sight to be activated. Even if your enemies are against a wall, you can still channel this ult, and it will hit them. This will surprise your enemies, and can lead to you getting kills.

• It has a small range so be careful to not waste it.