Vayne is one of the clearest choices if you want to climb in Solo Queue in League of Legends, because she is one of the strongest solo carry choices in the game. To start, Vayne is an incredibly powerful scaling Marksman. Generally, Solo Queue games are more chaotic and tend to run longer. As a result, Vayne’s late-game strength is easy to reach in this climate. Additionally, Vayne’s kit allows her to deal significant damage to even the tankiest of enemies because of her Silver Bolts’ percent health true damage. Furthermore, she has the built-in ‘steroids’ of increasing her Attack Damage stat with her Final Hour, and a Basic Attack reset with her Tumble. Overall, combining these incredibly lethal features of Vayne’s kit, her Tumble can be used to dodge abilities and kite away from enemies effectively and her Condemn allows her to self-peel and even sometimes initiate picks or fights! All of these pieces that make up her kit are incredibly useful in Solo Queue games!

What Are Vayne’s Strengths?

What makes Vayne strong in Solo Queue is what makes Vayne strong in general. She provides irreplaceable late-game insurance for her team even if she’s behind. No matter the situation she is in, when piloted effectively, Vayne can squeak her way out of sticky situations, and even turn them around on her enemies.

What Are Vayne’s Weaknesses?

The primary concern with Vayne is her early game power. While Vayne can have good trades and even get early kills in lane, it’s quite difficult to do unless her enemies underestimate her. Combine her early game weakness with her short range, and it’s easy to see how enemies can abuse her in lane. That’s why her laning is crucial to her success in any game. She can either be the method of snowballing for her enemies, or she can minimize her mistakes and put her enemies on a timer, forcing them to attempt to make plays that are not guaranteed. Otherwise, without that intervention, Vayne will quickly and quietly scale to her power spikes in the mid-to-late stages of the game and become a threat. Thus, any Vayne player must understand how to play out lanes in the various matchups she can encounter.

What Are Good Supports to Play with Vayne?

What Support would pair well with Vayne to get her snowballing the way she’s designed to? While there certainly are better Supports to pair with Vayne than others, it’s best to describe her best paired Support as the Support that will help her the most in her given matchup. Thus, ideally, Vayne’s Support will be able to choose their Champion after the enemy bot lane chooses theirs. While that’s clearly not happening every game, whenever it’s possible to delay your Support’s pick, it would be a good idea.

Drafting the best Support for Vayne given the enemy bot lane will maximize the chances of Vayne getting through the laning phase without being brutally beaten. A perfect example would be against Caitlyn and Karma. At first glance, the range and poke that Caitlyn and Karma have seems impossible for Vayne to deal with, regardless of her paired Support. However, drafting a Champion like Blitzcrank in this lane would be a fantastic option for Vayne. Most players would think a more defensive option like an Enchantress Support would be better to heal Vayne after the poke, but that will only keep Vayne alive in the lane and not help her thrive. For Vayne to get some breathing room in this matchup, Vayne needs to be able to get close enough to the enemy that their range advantage is negligible. The perfect opportunity for that is a Blitzcrank’s Rocket Grab, which, onto either Caitlyn or Karma, will likely result in them burning Flash. If they decide to stay and all-in, Vayne and Blitzcrank will win. So, with Blitzcrank drafted in this matchup, the last thing to worry about in the lane is how Vayne needs to play to minimize the Caitlyn/Karma threat of poke.

Luckily, aside from Caitlyn’s Basic Attacks, all of their poke comes from skillshots which shouldn’t be a problem for a Vayne with Tumble. Therefore, as long as Vayne is respectful of Caitlyn’s range advantage and Headshot damage, Vayne should be able to be healthy enough to follow-up when Blitzcrank eventually lands a Rocket Grab. Vayne will still need to sacrifice some minions to stay healthy, but it’s a risk worth taking to develop some control over the lane. If she doesn’t, she will inevitably get shoved under her tower where Caitlyn and Karma will be free to poke, take turret plates, set up dives, roam for Dragons, and ultimately snowball their lane. Imagine Vayne playing with an Enchantress Support in this situation instead, and it’s easier to see that these Supports will not help Vayne gain any traction. Instead, these Supports will just make enduring the poke under the tower easier, but the rest of the problems will still occur. On the flip-side, one early pull can get a kill, resulting in priority over the lane, and enough of a gold difference that Vayne has unofficially already won the lane!

Overall, the best Support for Vayne is one that counters the enemy bot lane. When counter-picking is not possible, generally Supports that are either great for engaging, or Supports that are great for peeling/healing Vayne are optimal. Consider suggesting engaging Supports against trade-heavy matchups, and peeling/healing Supports against all-in matchups.

What Are Difficult Marksmen Matchups?

The most difficult Marksmen matchups for Vayne are Marksmen that greatly outrange her or have better early-game damage than her with some area-of-effect ability. In general, Kog’Maw, Caitlyn, and Ashe are difficult for Vayne to deal with because of their longer range. Additionally, Miss Fortune, Twitch, and Draven are difficult because they have better early game damage and area-of-effect abilities that can control the window of time where retaliation or longer trading patterns are possible.

Consider Miss Fortune against Vayne. Both will likely take Press The Attack as their Primary Rune choice. However, Miss Fortune’s Strut and Double Up ability will make proccing Press The Attack quicker than Vayne. While Vayne can use her Passive to attempt to prolong the trade window, Miss Fortune can use Make It Rain to slow Vayne and prevent her from getting the last Basic Attack to proc her own Press the Attack. In such a matchup, quick trades are not an option unless Vayne can initiate it when Miss Fortune is last hitting a minion. Of course, that is an option, but the counter argument is that Miss Fortune can just as easily (if not more easily) do the same to Vayne. Vayne’s best option is to proc her Silver Bolts without proccing her Press The Attack in that window by using Basic Attack -> Tumble (Basic Attack) -> Condemn. If done in quick succession without mistakes, Vayne can win the trade, however, it comes at the expense of Mana and using her only crowd-controlling/self-peeling ability in the process. With the Condemn cooldown being 20 seconds at Level 1, that trade is not really worth the risk.

What Are Difficult Support Matchups?

To adequately assess the most difficult Supports for Vayne to play against, it’s important to highlight their threat level against an average player on Vayne compared with an excellent player on Vayne. Generally, the most challenging Supports to play against have high damage poking abilities like Zyra, Xerath, Vel’Koz, Lux, and Brand, or have incredible engage/catch potential like Lux, Morgana, Nautilus, Pyke, Thresh, and Zyra. When piloted by an excellent player, most of the enemies with poke won’t be extremely difficult as they require them to land skillshots. Not only are better players good at dodging skillshots, but they also know when to use Tumble to dodge them, and how to position in the lane to reduce the risks. For average players, that task is not nearly as achievable.

When it comes to heavy engage/catch Champions, Vayne will always have difficulties, regardless of the player’s skill. Sure, most of these Champions also require a skillshot to engage/catch the Vayne, however the difference between their skillshots is the threat of the skillshot. To explain what that means, consider this question: What is more threatening to a full health Vayne, a Vel’Koz with Plasma Fission ready, or a Pyke with Bone Skewer? See, abilities that deal damage are threatening only because they deal damage, whereas abilities that engage/catch an enemy imply a lot more. When a Vel’Koz positions aggressively in lane to threaten using Plasma Fission, all that means is they are ready to deal damage to you. But, when Pyke positions aggressively in lane to threaten using Bone Skewer, they are ready to kill you.

Essentially, the Supports with engaging/catching abilities don’t even need to use them to be threatening. Just the fact that they are available is the threat. With poking Supports, their abilities aren’t nearly as threatening until you are low enough on health that they can kill you, in which case, any ability is threatening! Overall, a great player will play to minimize the threat that certain abilities carry, but against engage/catching abilities, the only real way to minimize the threat is to stay completely out of range, or dodge it, putting it on cooldown.

What Team Composition is Most Challenging to Deal with?

While Vayne is exceptional against most team compositions and Champions, there are certainly compositions that make her life miserable. The most troublesome for most players is the heavy-dive compositions that will forcefully push through enemies to get to Vayne and kill her with heavy crowd-controlling abilities. Compositions like that are incredibly frustrating to deal with, however they are certainly beatable. Any composition that relies on heavy dive can be countered by appropriate forethought and positioning, as well as mechanics (sometimes). The Champions that are generally heavy-divers are also Champions that Vayne melts through like butter! So, sometimes diving straight into Vayne is a welcoming experience for more advanced players.

However, even for advanced Vayne players the most challenging team compositions involve heavy area-of-effect and zoning abilities. Vayne thrives in an environment where she can quickly maneuver and reposition to survive and dish out massive damage numbers. Against a team with area-of-effect and zoning abilities, that’s nearly impossible, unfortunately.

Consider a team composition like Cho’Gath, Nunu, Anivia, Miss Fortune, and Zyra. Against this team, Vayne can only dream of being able to maneuver a fight when abilities like Make It Rain, Bullet Time, Crystallize, and Glacial Storm are in the game, not to mention the other three Champions’ abilities. Since Vayne has lower attack range and relies exclusively on her Basic Attacks to deal damage, this type of team composition is the epitome of ‘FF@15’!

How Should Teammates Play Around Vayne

With Vayne arguably being the best late-game hypercarry, her teammates should play around her strengths if they want to have her as a win condition. To act as catalysts for her win condition, Vayne’s teammates should allocate an appropriate amount of the resources to her. This means that her teammates will need to ensure there is always something for Vayne to do to gather gold and scale. The only time she shouldn’t be allowed to do so is when a fight is inevitable or ideal. This means making sure a wave is prepared for her to soak up, there is adequate vision for her to get red buffs later in the game, and she is always near someone to help her if needed. Letting Vayne progress through the game with ‘high cash flow’ means a more consistent strategy to win every game, and the chances of her reaching those power spikes are much greater.

Aside from having consistent gold income throughout the game, Vayne’s teammates will need to play around her in fights. This means one of two things, peeling for her, or (for lack of better term) distracting the enemies, because distracting her enemies is more than enough for her to survive longer in fights and deal impressive sums of damage to anyone in her path. The more abilities can be used on Champions that aren’t Vayne, the better her odds of carrying the fight. As long as Vayne has both of those things from her teammates, there is a good chance she can do the rest!

How Do You Approach the Early Game?

The early game on Vayne can be extremely boring at times. Honestly, that’s okay, and actually ideal in the grand scheme of things. If Vayne is allowed to sit and last hit, she’s winning. While Vayne does have the potential to win fights and trades against certain matchups, it’s often an unnecessary risk unless her enemies are just making mistakes. Vayne should always try to play out the early game in whatever way that will make the enemies feel like they aren’t being proactive enough to shut her down. This pressure will only force them to play more aggressively and seek out less-than-ideal fights that Vayne can either win, or avoid and waste more of her enemies’ time and resources.

How to Play the Mid Game?

In the mid game, Vayne is actually more powerful than most would think. However, she will have the same prowess as her late-game self would in similar situations. In the mid game, she still relies heavily on her teammates to help her, but with the right backup, she can really pop off. Her catch potential with her Passive’s movement speed, Final Hour movement speed, Condemn stun, Final Hour + Tumble invisibility, and her burst damage from proccing Press The Attack AND Silver Bolts is unbelievable. Therefore, Vayne should always be looking to continue gathering gold to scale harder or set up picks to gain map control and get kills.

How Do You Play the Late Game?

In the late game as Vayne, there is no better plan than to survive. Survive at all costs. The longer Vayne can survive, the more damage she will deal. At this stage of the game, every Basic Attack she uses must be with purpose, every Tumble must come after the forethought of what will happen next, and every Condemn must be absolutely necessary to win the fight. The more Basic Attacks Vayne gets off, the more often she can Tumble and go invisible, and the more likely she can get a kill and keep her Final Hour active for longer, further increasing the amount of damage she will deal.

Advanced Mechanics

While Vayne isn’t an ability-intensive Champion (in fact, she is the only Champion in the game without any area-of-effect abilities), she still requires a lot of skill expression and even advanced mechanics to play at her peak. First, we will discuss the key mechanics that need to be optimized for a quality performance. Mastering the Basic Attack animation cancelling for efficient kiting is vital to staying alive but with Vayne specifically, it’s imperative to her damage output. Unlike most other Marksmen, Vayne cannot use abilities to deal damage (except Condemn… but that doesn’t really count).

Other Marksmen like Ezreal, Lucian, Miss Fortune, etc. all have damaging abilities that mean that even if they cancel a Basic Attack or two, it’s not completely the end of the world as they have abilities to also deal damage. Every time Vayne cancels a Basic Attack is effectively a duration where she is absolutely useless. Therefore, min/maxing the Basic Attack damage and animations is a MUST on Vayne.

In terms of some advanced, or at least, lesser known mechanics/features on Vayne, there are a few that will prove helpful in most games. First, are the most effective trading patterns. Depending on the matchup’s range, when they walk up to last hit a minion, Vayne can Tumble into range for an empowered Basic Attack, then immediately back out of the enemy’s attack range before they can retaliate. Another option for when an enemy walks into Vayne’s attack range is to trade a Basic Attack, follow up with another Basic Attack, then Tumble to reset the animation and get the third Basic Attack, proccing Silver Bolts and Press The Attack for a huge burst of damage that is difficult for most enemies to retaliate.

The other option for this situation if there’s a risk of the enemy outtrading Vayne is to start with the Basic Attack, then immediately Tumble to cancel the animation and follow up with the empowered Basic Attack and then immediately Condemn the enemy. While this pattern will not proc Press The Attack, it will proc Silver Bolts and also push the enemy out of range to retaliate in the trade.

For short trades against enemies that need to land skillshots to out damage Vayne, she should save her Tumble for dodging the skillshot and then deal more damage when appropriate. Another good reason to save Vayne’s Tumble is for some surprise burst damage. It’s a good idea to save Tumble when an enemy is getting low for a surprising burst of damage. If Vayne is clearly winning a fight and doesn’t need to Tumble for the added damage, she should continue Basic Attacking and save Tumble to follow after the enemy Flashes, or for a burst of damage that may result in the enemy Marksman not using a last-second Heal, Barrier, etc.

To follow up on the importance of saving Tumble, Vayne should also save Tumble when her target is stunned (either by Condemn or other sources). Especially when in Final Hour, Tumble is an incredibly powerful ability that cannot be used liberally to just deal more damage to a target unless absolutely necessary. Instead, it should be saved to dodge skill shots, go invisible to reposition/kite, or follow any enemy dashes/flashes!

Regarding Condemn specifically, the only advanced mechanic to it is the fact that Condemn can be buffered and redirected with an immediate Flash after use. By using Condemn then Flash, Vayne can startle unsuspecting enemies that thought they would be free from being stunned, but then get stunned into a wall. This mechanic works in the same way Lee Sin can use his ultimate then Flash to send the enemy in a different direction. While this does allow Vayne to initiate fights, or lock-down escaping enemies, it’s not always necessary. While it does look flashy, it’s best to have Flash available on a hyper carry like Vayne. So, instead try to keep this mechanic in mind when you are aggressively kiting an enemy.

Imagine a Zed dives into the backline to kill a Vayne and she Condemn-Flashes to stun him as soon as he comes out of his Death Mark. Not only will this prevent his immediately used abilities to likely miss, but it will lock down Zed long enough that your team can kill him before he can escape. Otherwise, consider Condemn as Vayne’s best tool for kiting/buffering certain gap-closing abilities. Especially for gap-closing abilities that would be followed up by crowd-control that could result in Vayne being killed. Consider Alistar’s Headbutt into Pulverize combination or Jax’s Leap Strike into Counter Strike. By Condemning Alistar as he begins his Headbutt animation, he will not be able to Pulverize Vayne, and by Condemning Jax when he begins his Leap Strike animation, if he attempted to stun as soon as he lands, then he will likely use the Counter Strike stun out of range!

The final mechanic we will discuss is cancelling Vayne’s Tumble animation. The only way this can be done is by having Vayne positioned directly next to a wall and then using Tumble into the wall. This will shorten the animation because she does not travel anywhere. This is a great mechanic for killing towers and neutral objectives as fast as possible. But, it can also be used for getting a last hit under a tower that would otherwise be lost to a turret shot. The last benefit is that it can be useful for out-damaging an enemy in a 1v1 or getting the last Basic Attack in if you’re close to death. Remember though, in these 1v1s it’s better to use Tumble to dodge skillshots or kite, but if the enemy outranges you and doesn’t have skillshots available, then that’s the benefit Tumble can provide!

The last thing to understand about mastering Vayne is how important it is to understand her damage output at each power spike, and to know how it feels kiting/attacking at each power spike as her Attack Speed changes. Again, with Vayne’s damage solely coming from her Basic Attacks, mastering kiting is crucial to playing her well mechanically, and having the knowledge of her damage output before taking fights is crucial to playing her well overall!

Conclusion

Vayne’s playstyle is cutthroat, and certainly not for the faint-of-heart. She gets right into the heat of battle and if she doesn’t come out on top, the loss is likely on her, sadly. But with that said, with great power comes great responsibility and with Vayne’s power in the late game, players need to understand how critical her life is to the success of the game. Vayne has always been, and always will be, one of the best ‘1v9’ Champions in the game because of it, so don’t take it lightly.