A General Guide to Top Lane

Welcome to the Island

Hello fellow summoners!  I'm Wing and today I would like to introduce you to my guide on top lane.  The top lane seems like an isolated role without much of an impact on the rest of the game.  The two people who play up on this island just seem to farm and trade all day, right?  Well if that is the case, then I don't think they're playing top lane the way it's supposed to be played.  Hopefully this guide will show you why I think this way.  Top laners can put a ton of pressure on the map when played correctly and they can totally carry a game through good decision making.  

Picking Your Champion

There are a few things to consider when picking your champion.  You should look at what champions your team has locked in and depending on the types of champions they have chosen, you can pick something to compliment them.  For instance, if your jungler picks Tryndamere and your mid laner picks Azir, you might do your team some good by picking a tanky champion like Sion or Maokai. 

You should also take into account the enemy team’s picks.  You want to pay close attention to the opposing top laner’s pick if it’s been chosen and it’s obvious.  A lot of solo lane champions can be played both mid and top so you won’t always be able to guess who you’ll be facing in lane.  If you have a good idea who you are up against, you could choose to try and counter pick if you know enough about the champion and its matchups.  If you do not have a good understanding of matchups, there are some basic rules based on the nature of each champion’s kit.  Sustain beats poke, poke beats all in, and all in beats sustain.  Just remember that this doesn’t always hold true since some champions have more than one of these characteristics.  Vladimir for instance has really good poke against melee champs and sustains well.   

The last and most important consideration when picking your champion should be comfort.  I cannot emphasize how important it is to pick a champion you are familiar with.  Even if you could pick a champion that counters the enemy, if you go into that game with zero knowledge about how to play your champion, then you won’t be able to abuse the counter pick. 

Summoner Spells

As a top laner I recommend carrying Flash and Teleport.  Flash is crucial because it allows you to reposition instantly and I think Teleport is a wonderful pickup for most top laners right now.  Ignite is a strong summoner spell and it gives you pressure in lane, but teleport gives you pressure everywhere.  Without this summoner spell you are tied to the island that is top lane and it becomes hard to carry, even if you get an advantage in lane.  Being able to join a fight instantly can win you a game if the other laner is running ignite and does not rotate in time.

Other summoner spell combinations are viable based off of a champions kit.  An example of this would be Tryndamere, who has the most success running Ignite and Ghost.  Ignite can be used more effectively than Teleport on champions that can really snowball off of kills in the top lane like Wukong.  The information on the win rates of these champions with regard to their summoner spells can be found here: 
http://champion.gg/champion/MonkeyKing, http://champion.gg/champion/Tryndamere  

Smite Teleport Champions

With the changes to smite this season, and the addition of Cinderhulk, we are seeing many champions in the top lane carry the smite summoner spell.  Hecarim and Shyvana are usually the first two champions that come to mind when people think of running smite and teleport.  Both of these champions have a movement speed steroid that can get them out of sticky situations, which allows them to forego flash.  They also have ultimate abilities that allow them to escape if absolutely necessary.  You will also see some Sion’s and Maokai’s run smite/teleport, but I do not recommend this because you will more than likely be a sitting duck for the enemy jungler. 

The reason these champions bring smite is to have access to one of the active abilities granted by upgrading the Hunter’s Machete.  Most often it will be the Challenging Smite which  acts like exhaust with a lower duration and effect, but it allows your champion to do true damage to the target champion over 3 seconds with your auto attacks.  It also allows these champions to purchase the Cinderhulk item.  It acts like a Sunfire Cape and grants your champion 25% additional health. 

How to Use Smite Effectively

 First off you want to always start a camp level 1.  You can do your wolves or raptors, perhaps even the enemy’s red buff if you’re willing to gamble.  Smite immediately and if you are running flask, do not be afraid to use its charges while taking that camp.  With the rise in popularity of this pair of summoner spells, counterplay has begun to spring up along with it.  Since having smite telegraphs to the enemy team that you want to take a camp, it is possible that the enemy top laner might try to invade on you while you are taking damage from the jungle monsters.  This is why it is important to stay topped off if you have potions, in case you do get invaded on.  It is recommended that you ward an entrance to your jungle before taking a camp.   

You should be level 2 right after taking the camp.  When you back you should purchase additional potions and a ward.  You can even buy a pink ward to pressure the other laner if you use your level advantage effectively.  Remember to teleport to lane by teleporting to the turret.  This reduces your teleport to a 240 second cooldown from a 300 second one.  When you get to lane you should have missed about 3 minions, but you will still be ahead of the opponent by half a level.  It takes 7 minions to hit level 2, so you can abuse the other laner until then.  You should trade well with your enemy because of the level and potion advantage.  Just be careful about taking bad trades since you will not have your teleport while theirs is available. 

I recommend getting your machete upgrade after your first big item is completed.  The Skirmisher's Saber is probably the best option because it allows your smite to work a lot like exhaust, but on a lower cooldown.  This summoner can be used to pressure the opposing laner, but it is most effective in skirmishes and teamfights.  Using it on high damage dealers like mid laners and ad carries can change the flow of a teamfight.  Imagine that you are Hecarim and the enemy team has a Jinx.  If you use your ultimate to cut to the backline and smite the Jinx, she will do a lot less damage and you will be dealing true damage with your auto attacks for the next 4 seconds.  This can shut down a carry and it gives you stronger kill potential against these targets.

Starting Items

Your starting items should depend on two things:  Your champion, and your lane matchup.

Doran’s Shield

Doran’s shield is a good item into champions that like to poke with auto attacks and single target spells.  It blocks 8 damage from single target attacks and spells from champions.  This is really useful against champions like Kennen and Gnar.  This is the go to item for resourceless champions where flask is not an option in a poke heavy matchup.  For champions who use mana, flask is a possible alternative.

Crystalline Flask

If your champion uses mana and you are looking for some sustain, then this is the item for you.  This item is a potion which starts with 3 charges that restore both your health and mana by a small amount (120 health and 60 mana over 12 seconds).  It restores only 30 less health than a health potion and the charges refill every time you recall.  This is a wonderful item in the top lane because you have the ability to base and instantly teleport back to lane.  Flask can get you through poke heavy or difficult matchups.  It comes in handy for top laners who like to start jungle camps for the fast level 2 since you can chug flask charges, base to refill them, then teleport to lane.  You will often see this item on champions like Hecarim, Irelia, and Fizz.

Cloth Armor

This opening allows you to start the game with an additional 15 armor and 5 health potions.  This is only recommended when going up against ad casters.  This is particularly useful into matchups against Talon and Wukong. 

Boots

This opening gives you 25 additional movement speed and 4 health potions.  This opening is mostly for champions who benefit from movement speed.  If you need to dodge certain skills or if your champion has no built in escape mechanism, this might be the right opening for you.  This opening is most commonly seen on champions like Vladimir and Rumble.

Doran’s Blade

This is a strong item for attack damage champions who want to take control of the lane.  You can only buy one potion with this start so be sure to be careful about how you trade.  This item is strong on champions that want to go all in on their opponent.  What makes it a better option for this type of playstyle as opposed to a long sword start is the health which comes up strong in duels.  You’ll see this opening from champions like Gnar and Renekton.  *I’ve seen a lot of Akali’s start this as well, so this is something to look out for.

Long Sword

This item offers 3 more attack damage than the Doran’s Blade but does not have the health or lifesteal.  You instead have the ability to buy 3 health potions.  You generally opt for this start if you want to have some early ad and sustain.  Although you have more potions, keep in mind that you do not have any lifesteal outside of runes so trading efficiently is crucial.  You will see a lot of Riven players opt for this start.  With such low base health regen, the potions come in handy.  It also allows them to build straight into their brutalizer.

Doran’s Ring

The Doran’s Ring is the standard opening for most mages along with 2 health potions.  This item provides your champion with 60 health, 15 ability power, and 3 mana regeneration every 5 seconds.  It also has a passive ability that restores 4 of your mana every time you last hit an enemy unit.  This item gives you an early game advantage much like the Doran’s Blade.  If you were to go head to head against another mage with a flask, you would do much more damage and you would be harder to kill because of the additional health.  This is a common opening on champions like Maokai, Lulu, and Lissandra.

Yellow Trinket

Remember to always purchase yellow trinket.  This gives you a 60 second ward.  At level 9 you can upgrade this to hold multiple ward charges which come in handy for any top laner.  You will most likely carry teleport and pressure the side lanes.  This is the best trinket to carry while split pushing, since you need the vision to prevent the enemy team from collapsing on you.

Vision Control

The following images should provide you with some valuable information on ward placement with regards to the type of jungler you may play against.  In this first image we will be looking at the wards placed most commonly top lane.  The T represents the top laners, J for junglers, M for mid laners, A for ad carry's, and S for supports.  The green/pink dots represent wards along with their area of vision (pink for vision wards).  This ward setup works for both red and blue side, but it is recommended against junglers who can dash over walls.  This allows you to see inside the brushes near top lane in case someone like Sejuani dashes over into the bush.  If you had your wards further down you would not be able to catch this.  These are also the easiest wards to place because of how close they are to your lane.  The downside to these wards is that when ganked by certain junglers, these wards are so close to the lane that it may be too late to dodge the gank.  Junglers like Rammus and Hecarim are very fast and if you see them from the tribush ward, you may already be dead or have to burn flash.  These wards do not protect you from lane ganks either as we can see by the arrow going through the lane bushes.  This applies to both red and blue side.  Always be wary of these bushes, especially against stealth junglers like Rengar and Evelynn.  

This next image shows a pair of wards further away from your lane,;this image is geared towards top laners playing on red side.  These wards are good into junglers that lack the ability to dash over walls.  If you are able to place both of these wards, you should be able to see these junglers with more than enough time to react to their ganks.  Like the previous image, you are still vulnerable to lane ganks so take that into consideration.  Remember that these wards are not the best against junglers who can dash over walls because they can take the routes marked by the 2 bottoms arrows.  The first comes from the banana brush near mid lane; the jungler can dash over the baron wall into your tribush without you ever seeing them.  If you look at the second arrow, Sejuani can just dash over into that bush without you ever knowing.

The next image shows a ward setup for top laners on blue side.  You need a ward higher up in the red side tribush because there are several ways they can enter the bush.  This covers all of these options without needing a bunch of deep wards.  As always, remember to care for lane ganks.  

These are not the only possible ward setups you can run, but these wards cover most basic routes into your lane.  There are also a lot of other wards that can give you valuable information about the enemy jungler and their route.  One jungler that tends to give people more trouble than others is Evelynn.  Her permanent invisibility makes her hard to track, but if you can get wards on her jungle camps, you have a much better chance of predicting where she will be.  As a top laner you have access to one side of the jungle, and if you can get wards on camps you are not only helping yourself, but the rest of your team.  

This image has two good warding spots against Evelynn and both deep wards are useful against the other junglers as well.  The northern most ward does not see the bush near blue buff, but you should be able to see when she is doing either blue or gromp, along with her path after taking a camp.  The second ward will spot her at wolves and should tell you which side of the map she's headed towards.  

There are some perks to warding the red side jungle as a blue side top laner.  There is a great spot for a pink ward that most people don't check.  The wards in the following map will give you a lot of valuable information about any enemy jungler.  A really nice spot to put your pink ward is in the bush near the golems.  You will see where the jungler goes after clearing the camp, and you can sometimes spot stealth junglers coming at you from the lane.  The other wards will help you spot the jungler at their red buff and raptor camp.  

Wards are your primary source of vision, but this little guy can be your best friend in the top lane.

The Scuttle Crab when killed creates a speed shrine outside of baron's pit (the top lane scuttle) that gives vision around it and speeds up champions who travel through it.  This vision and buff is specific to the team that kills it.  The shrine lasts 75 seconds and the crab respawns every 300 seconds.  This means that if you take it, you won't need a ward in river for the duration.  The speed buff is really valuable as it can speed your jungler in, or if anyone gets caught in the river the movement speed can help them get out.

Level 1

After you have bought your starting items, you should fan out with the rest of your team.  This means that you should quickly move towards an entrance to your jungle so that you can scout for the enemy team.  If everyone on your team sits at a different entrance to the river, you should be able to avoid losing buffs to the enemy jungler.  You should also avoid leveling a skill just in case something happens level 1, or until the start of the laning phase.

An example of how you can position yourself level 1.  

Most people will watch entrances or leash for their jungler, then go to lane.  If you are playing a smite teleport champion, you want to take a camp like wolves or raptors at 1:55, recall to buy a ward and more potions, then teleport to lane.  You can also clear a camp without smite on most champions.  You want to take the raptor camp when it spawns, recall, then teleport back to lane with the level advantage.  This is really easy on champions like Jax and Maokai.  You can use counterstrike to reduce the amount of damage you take on Jax and Maokai can stack saplings to clear the camp quickly.  If you think that the other top laner is taking a camp, you should try and deny them as many minions as possible.  You can do this by last hitting as slowly as possible. 

Proper Teleport Use

Knowing how and when to teleport separates the good top laners from the great top laners.  Laning is only one part of the game.  In order for a top laner to truly impact the game, it is important that they teleport effectively in order to pressure the map.  

Many top laners use the teleport spell to get back to lane quickly and avoid missing creeps under turret.  Only use teleport to get back to lane when the wave is pushing towards you. This is a fine use of teleport, but if you only use teleport to get back to lane, then you are wasting a valuable resource.  Teleport advantage becomes crucial the later the game goes.  When one team has teleport advantage, it forces that team to have their top laner grouped with them at all times, while the laner with the teleport can split push freely.  If they do not group as 5, then you have the ability to join your team instantly should a fight break out.    

A good top laner will always be looking at the other lanes as long as their lane is in good shape.  The lane priority for teleporting goes from bottom to mid lane.  Bottom lane, like top lane, is a long lane.  This means that there is a higher chance of catching the enemy bottom lane overextending.  It is crucial that you communicate with your team about cooldowns and where you want them to place wards.  You do not want to teleport into a lane where your allies cannot follow up because their ultimates and/or summoners are on cooldown, unless you can clean up the fight by yourself.  You also want to tell your fellow laners where they should place wards, so that you can take the best possible route when ganking with tp.  The following images should give you an idea on how you want to be teleporting in the bottom lane.  

Blue Side TP Wards/Routes

The image above shows 3 wards that allow you to flank the enemy bottom lane when playing on blue side.  The ward in lane brush is great for when the opponents are pushed up and you have your jungler coming down from the river.  This gives the enemy lane virtually no good options.  If everyone on your side is relatively healthy, coming from this angle will burn summoners and potentially net kills.  The ward in the river bush is almost as good, but the enemy bot lane can just run back towards their turret.  This can be useful if the enemy bot lane does run towards river.  The third ward up in the tribush behind turret is a great ward for flanking the enemy team when diving.  If your bot lane comes up from the bottom, the enemy laners have to get through you if they want to run to their inner turret.  This almost always forces them to hug their turret and wait for the inevitable dive.  Just make sure you know where the rest of the enemy team is, or this teleport could end in your death.

Red Side TP Wards/Routes

   The image above shows 3 wards that allow you to flank the enemy bot lane from red side.  The lane ward in this image serves the same purpose as the ward in the previous blue side example.  The tribush ward prevents the enemy team from escaping into their own jungle, and allows you to better chase laners fleeing towards the river.  The reason I drew an X on the river ward brush is because the lane ward and tribush ward are superior in nearly every situation.  You just get a better angle with these first two wards.  The left most ward behind turret is this side's flank ward for turret dives.  The same risks apply, so make sure you have vision of the enemy team.

Blue Side Mid TP

Red Side Mid TP

Mid lane is not an easy lane to teleport into.  It is a rather short lane, and you won't often find a ward like in the images above.  You will most often have to teleport to a minion behind or close to the opposing laner when teleporting to the mid lane.  The enemy has a lot of options in terms of escape routes if you do not teleport on top of them or directly behind them.  This is why I marked X's on the side brushes in both images.  The mid laner will see your teleport and just run in the opposite direction if you come in from the sides.  The only times I find that a teleport works in the mid lane are when both laners are invested in a fight, especially when it is a 2v2 between mid laners and junglers.  I say that teleporting from the sides is not worth it, but if you see your jungler coming from top side for instance and there is a ward bottom, you can always try to sandwhich that mid laner.  

One final considerations should be taken when running teleport.  You DO NOT need to complete your teleport.  If a teamfight goes south before you even get there, sometimes it is better to take the reduced cooldown on teleport (200 seconds from 300) rather than enter a fight that has already been lost.  You will only be giving up an additional kill.  

Wave Control

Before we go on, it might be useful to talk about wave control.  It is important to understand how to manipulate creep waves as well as read them.  Generally the side with more minions wins, but you can generally tell which wave is going to push by the number of caster minions.  They do the most dps.  It is important to look at creep waves before you go for objectives so that you don't lose a turret due to poor wave management.  As a top laner you should carry teleport, so you're usually the one tending to the side lanes.  When playing out of a side lane you have the option of freezing the lane.  What this does is keep the wave in one place for a long period of time.  This is generally done to keep the minion wave on your side of the map and out of the hands of the enemy laners, effectively denying them gold.  This is done by last hitting minions at the last possible moment.  If the lane is already pushing, you won't be able to freeze it.  What you have to do then is reset the wave.  This sets up both minion waves as if the first waves had just spawned.  You do this by clearing all the minions in the lane, then you push as quickly as you can into the enemy turret, where the wave will reset and start pushing towards you.  Once you do this you can begin your freeze.  As important as it is to know how to freeze a lane, it is equally important to know how to slow push a lane.  Slow pushing makes your creep wave push towards the enemy's base, and it guarantees that a sizable amount of minions will hit the enemy turret.  Slow pushing forces the enemy team to either send someone to deal with the wave or risk losing a turret if they don't.  The way you slow push is by killing the entirety of the first creep wave you encounter, then killing only the caster minions in the next wave.  Your minions build up on the tankier melee creeps, but they don't take that much damage because of the lack of caster minions.  This allows other waves to meet with this one and form a deathball of creeps as they approach the enemy's turrets.  You should always make sure to setup your sidelanes before sieging turrets or contesting neutral objectives.  

The Laning Phase

 Before you even get to lane, you need to think about your plan of action.  You have the options of pushing or freezing the lane; figuring out your best plan of action depends on the top lane matchup and who the enemy jungler is.  

If the matchup is favorable for you, you can slow push the wave towards your opponent and force them to cs a large wave under turret.  This works really well with champions that have a lot of poke and the enemy is sure to miss some minions.  You slow push by only last hitting minions when their health is nearly gone.  If you wait long enough, you can build up a big enough wave where if they try to trade back with you, they will take a substantial amount of damage from your minions.  

If you plan on doing this, you can push the advantage even further if you are able to coordinate with your jungler.  If you manage to build up a large wave at their turret and the enemy has low health, diving your opponent could put them as much as a level or even a level and a half behind in experience.  This however is very risky and you need to take into account where the other jungler could be.  Do not attempt this if you do not have enough information about the rest of the enemy team.  

If the matchup is not in your favor you can try and get the wave to push in your direction.  If you get to lane early enough, you should take aggro from the enemy minions and then try to move into one of the lane brushes.  If set up properly the wave should start pushing towards you if you last hit each creep at the last possible moment.  The issue with this is that the enemy laner will most likely hit level 2 before you, so you have to be extra careful.  The same way I mentioned diving someone who has a huge wave built up at their turret earlier, you are going to have a big target on your head.  Your opposing laner may call their jungler so you have to ward your sides and thin out the wave if you are afraid of getting dove.  The best situation would be where you have the minion wave frozen just outside of your turret.  If you can get the minions here you are set.

*  One note about warding.  Try to ward at about the three minute mark at the start of the laning phase, because this is about the time most junglers come top.  

The Mid Game and Beyond

The results of your laning phase generally dictates what you should be doing when moving into the mid game.  If you lost lane, sometimes it is worth giving up your turret so that you can freeze your wave into safer territory and catch back up in gold and experience.  This does come with risks.  Giving up your turret opens up your side of the map/jungle to enemy wards.  The opposing laner is also going to roam freely, and if you spend too much time building up your freeze, they can potentially swing the rest of the map in their favor.  Balancing your freeze and knowing when to push out can be tricky, but you should usually push out when a neutral objective like dragon or baron comes into contention.  

If you won the laning phase, you have a few more options.  You can either keep the enemy turret alive or take it down as quickly as possible.  This decision is up to your judgement, but I will weigh the pros and cons with regards to both options.  If you do keep the turret alive and your opposing laner cannot deal with you in the 1v1, you can deny them cs by letting their minions get killed by the turret.  You will be keeping them down by denying gold and experience.  This can be useful if the enemy top laner is a champion like Akali who needs gold to start having an impact.  You usually keep the turret up like this on champions like Renekton who have a strong laning phase, but fall off later in the game.  They want an extended laning phase and it helps to keep the other laner down as long as possible.  If you decide to take the enemy turret, you can shove the minion waves further into enemy territory.  This means that it will take longer for minions waves to reach your side of the map, allowing you and your team to make plays for objectives in the meantime.  This is the option for players who would like to group as quickly as possible, and it is the best option for champions who excel at teamfighting like Rumble.

Late game, your decision making will be put to the test as your ability to teleport, teamfight, and/or split push effectively are put into question.  Remember to use your upgraded yellow trinket on cooldown so that you always have vision and a way to utilize your teleport.  Communicate with your team, so that they know to put down wards or other objects that you can teleport to, should a fight break out.  You can teleport to Jarvan's flag and Thresh's lantern.  If they are not working with you on this front, you may have to forfeit split pushing and just group with your team.  It is not worth the risk if you believe someone will get caught out if you'll have no way of entering the fight.  Make sure to tend to the sidelanes before sieging or going for objectives.  You never want your siege to be cut short because you just lost an inner turret to a massive creep wave.  Momentum is key when closing out games, and wave management can give or take that momentum away.

Final Notes

Thank you so much for taking the time to read my guide on top lane.  If you have any questions or recommendations for how I can improve this guide, or if I'm straight up wrong about something, just leave a comment below and I will get back to you.  Finally I want to give a shoutout to riftkit.net, because that site helped me make the ward maps used in this guide.  I also want to thank the reddit user Sanae_, and Bin for the feedback and information.