Master Yi ARAM Build and Guide

Updated for patch 26.21. Ability details come from Riot’s official game data for this patch; ARAM balance numbers come from the League of Legends Wiki’s champion data.

A Master Yi ARAM build is On-Hit damage with Attack Speed, on a champion the Howling Abyss slightly favours: Master Yi deals 100% damage and takes 97% damage in ARAM. His kit is five abilities that make basic attacks hit more, hit twice, hit with true damage and keep hitting after a kill, and the Abyss gives him a fight every minute to do it in.

The items below are our reading of what fits that kit in patch 26.21. No win-rate tables were involved.

How is Master Yi changed in ARAM?

One number moves. His damage dealt stays at 100%, so every Double Strike and every tick of Wuju Style lands at full value, while damage taken drops to 97%. That’s 3% less of everything thrown at him, which on a melee champion with 175 range is the difference between reaching the carry and dying on the way. Why does a champion famous for snowballing get a small buff here? Because the Abyss is five enemies in a corridor, with no jungle to farm and no flank to come from, and a Master Yi walking straight at a team eats more poke than he ever does on Summoner’s Rift. To be fair, the modifier softens that walk. It doesn’t shorten it.

Why does Master Yi fit the Howling Abyss?

Because his ultimate rewards exactly what ARAM produces: a fight where several people die close together. Riot’s ability text for patch 26.21 says this:

• Double Strike (passive): every few consecutive basic attacks, he strikes twice.
• Alpha Strike (Q): he teleports across the battlefield, dealing physical damage to multiple units in his path while untargetable. It can critically strike, and basic attacks reduce its cooldown. Base cooldown 20/19.5/19/18.5/18 seconds.
• Meditate (W): a channel that restores Health and reduces damage taken, grants Double Strike stacks and pauses the remaining duration of Wuju Style and Highlander. Cooldown 10.
• Wuju Style (E): bonus true damage on basic attacks. Cooldown 14.
• Highlander (R): Move Speed, Attack Speed and immunity to slows, with the duration extended by champion kills or assists. Passively, kills and assists reduce his other cooldowns. Cooldown 85.

Count what happens in one Abyss fight. Highlander goes up, Alpha Strike puts him on the back line (and dodges whatever was aimed at him), the first kill extends the ultimate and refunds his Q, and the second Alpha Strike is already available. Five enemies in one place means five chances to extend Highlander. On the Rift he has to hunt for that; here it’s the default. The catch is the walk in. Nothing in his kit is a shield, and Meditate is a channel that stops the moment he’s stunned, so 97% damage taken is a help, not a cure.

What should a Master Yi ARAM build focus on?

Attack Speed and On-Hit damage, with a Life Steal item so that Meditate isn’t his only healing. For what it’s worth, Critical Strike is a weaker fit, because Wuju Style and his passive do their work per attack rather than per crit. Four items from the current shop line up with that.

Kraken Slayer goes first. Bring It Down is the reason: every third Attack deals bonus physical damage On-Hit, and the bonus grows with the target’s missing Health. The item’s own stat line, 40% Attack Speed with 45 Attack Damage and a 4% Move Speed bonus, exists to make that third hit arrive quickly. Double Strike counts as attacks for that rhythm, so the third hit arrives sooner than on most champions, and the missing Health scaling is why he finishes targets other champions leave at a sliver.

Second is Blade of The Ruined King. Mist’s Edge adds a percentage of the enemy’s current Health as bonus physical damage On-Hit, so this is the item for the tank standing in front of the people you actually want. The 10% Life Steal matters nearly as much here, and 25% Attack Speed plus 40 Attack Damage fill out the rest. Clawing Shadows slows the target by 30% for 1 second after three attacks on a champion. Honestly, the Life Steal is half the point here.

Guinsoo’s Rageblade is third, and it looks like the odd one out on paper (30 Ability Power on a champion with no spell to scale it) until you read the passives, with 25% Attack Speed and 30 Attack Damage coming along. Wrath adds 30 bonus magic damage On-Hit, and Seething Strike grants 8% Attack Speed per attack for 4 seconds, stacking 4 times, after which every third Attack applies On-Hit effects twice. Put that next to Kraken Slayer’s third-hit bonus and Blade of The Ruined King’s current Health damage and you can see why the three are bought together. Each one makes the other two happen more often.

Wit’s End closes the four when the enemy has magic damage, which on a random team is most of the time: 50% Attack Speed, 45 Magic Resist and 20% Tenacity, plus Fray, bonus magic damage On-Hit. The Tenacity shortens the one thing that beats him, a stun during Meditate or mid-Highlander. Against a team of physical damage, Death’s Dance instead (60 Attack Damage, 50 Armor) spreads part of the damage he takes over 3 seconds and clears it when a champion he damaged dies, which on Yi is often. Boots are Berserker’s Greaves, 30% Attack Speed for 1,100 gold.

How do you play Master Yi on the Howling Abyss?

• Wait for the first death. Highlander extends on kills and assists and its passive refunds his other cooldowns, so going in after your team has already traded is worth far more than going in first.
• Use Alpha Strike to dodge, not to engage. It makes him untargetable, and on a map full of skillshots that matters more than the damage.
• Meditate behind a minion wave, never in front of five people. The channel reduces damage taken, but a single stun ends it.
• Press Wuju Style before the first attack. The bonus true damage ignores every Armor item the enemy tanks bought.
• Auto-attack minions between fights. Basic attacks reduce Alpha Strike’s cooldown, which starts at 20 seconds.

How do shopping and Mark change the game on the Howling Abyss?

Recalling isn’t possible on this map. Shopping happens at the start and after every death, nowhere else, and between those moments the relics on the lane do the healing. For a champion who heals through Meditate, that is less of a problem than for most, but it changes what you buy first: the Life Steal from Blade of The Ruined King becomes more valuable than it looks, and sitting on 2,000 gold while alive is gold doing nothing. In practice, dying with a full item’s worth of gold unspent is the most common Yi mistake on the Abyss (that and meditating in the open).

Mark is the summoner spell specific to ARAM: throw a snowball, hit a champion, and you can dash to them. The spells are chosen before the game loads and stay fixed for the match. Does a champion with Alpha Strike need a second gap closer? More than you’d think. Alpha Strike is a 20 second cooldown at rank 1, and the snowball gets him onto a carry while keeping the Q for the dodge, which is the correct order on a champion whose Q is also his only defence. Snowball in, Highlander, attack, Alpha Strike the skillshot, and then the first kill extends everything you just pressed.

Is Master Yi good in ARAM?

Yes, once a fight has started. The 97% damage taken modifier helps the walk in, and the kit is built for a map where kills come in bunches: an ultimate that extends itself on each one, a Q that refunds itself the same way, and true damage that ignores the Armor stacking every tank on the enemy team is doing. His weakness is the first ten seconds of every fight. He has 175 range, no shield, and a heal that stops when he’s stunned, and the Abyss has no side path to approach from.

The champions who ruin his game are the ones with hard crowd control, and that is the whole subject of our Master Yi counters guide. Not sure what a jungler does when there’s no jungle? The guide to LoL roles explains where he normally plays. Every item above has its full numbers in the LoL items database, and his skins are on the Master Yi skins page.

Long story short, the Master Yi ARAM build is Kraken Slayer, Blade of The Ruined King, Guinsoo’s Rageblade and Wit’s End, bought in that order, and the game plan is to arrive second, dodge with Q, and let the first kill pay for the rest.

FAQ

Is Master Yi buffed in ARAM?

Slightly. His modifiers in the League of Legends Wiki’s champion data for patch 26.21 are 100% damage dealt and 97% damage taken: normal damage out, a little less damage in.

What items does the Master Yi ARAM build use?

Kraken Slayer, Blade of The Ruined King, Guinsoo’s Rageblade and Wit’s End, with Berserker’s Greaves for boots and Death’s Dance as a swap against physical damage teams.

Why not build Critical Strike on him?

His damage comes from attacks landing often: Double Strike, Wuju Style’s true damage and On-Hit items all scale per hit. Attack Speed and On-Hit effects use that better than Critical Strike Chance does.

Does Highlander work differently in ARAM?

No. It grants Move Speed, Attack Speed and immunity to slows, extends on champion kills or assists, and passively reduces his other cooldowns on a kill or assist. The 85 second cooldown is unchanged.

Are these items based on win rates?

No. They were chosen by matching Master Yi’s patch 26.21 abilities with what each item does. We don’t use win-rate data.