Champion Guide

Illaoi Guide

By LoLSuggest

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Illaoi has low mobility, no hard CC and many counters, but she surprises opponents with her damage: place tentacles well, land Test of Spirit, and fight where your tentacles protect you.

Recommended Setup

Our recommended Illaoi build

Our recommended runes, summoner spells and items. Compare build win rates on the stats page.

Items

Starting Items

Core Items

Situational Items

The lane page is Grasp of the Undying with Demolish, Bone Plating and Overgrowth, plus Manaflow Band and Scorch; Conqueror with Presence of Mind, Legend: Haste and Last Stand is the alternative, and this rune page works across matchups. Exhaust and Flash is the default — Teleport is less needed thanks to the top-lane quest. Start Doran's Blade. Sundered Sky is the usual first item, then Black Cleaver against tanks or Sterak's Gage, with Iceborn Gauntlet's slow helping tentacles connect. Plated Steelcaps against AD threats, Mercury's Treads most often; Spirit Visage, Jak'Sho, Randuin's Omen or Death's Dance complete the build. Max Q first.

Runes

Primary Tree

Secondary Tree

Summoner Spells

Strengths

Huge damage inside her tentacles, especially after landing Test of Spirit.
Leap of Faith turns teamfights and lets her push lanes and bait ganks.
Strong split-pusher who forces the enemy to answer her side lane.

Weaknesses

Low mobility and no crowd control; many champions counter her.
A missed Test of Spirit can lose the trade or get you killed.
Poor tentacle placement leaves her unable to fight where she needs to.

Laning Phase

At level 1 use Tentacle Smash to take the first minions and hit your opponent. Level 2 is weak, so just farm. From level 3 you can trade in most matchups — open with Harsh Lesson, kill the spirit, then use auto-attacks, W and Q. Avoid fighting near minions, which block Test of Spirit. At level 6 you can shove as long as Leap of Faith is up and act as a lightning rod for the enemy jungler; baiting a 2v1 can win the lane outright.

Mid & Late Game

After laning choose between split-pushing and grouping: split if the enemy top laner is better in teamfights, and contest their split if they are the better side-laner. Pressure a side lane before Baron or Dragon so the enemy must choose between a tower and the objective. In teamfights stand inside your tentacles, land Test of Spirit and draw attention so your carries can deal damage.

Key Tips

Keep at least two tentacles close to you and stay between them when fighting.
Damage the spirit before using your ultimate, then ult so the weakened spirit dies and slows the target.
Use your ultimate right before you're about to be crowd-controlled.
Ultimate halves W's cooldown, which also speeds up taking towers.