Welcome back to the next installment in my five-part series on climbing the ranked ladder. If you are a first time reader, you can check out the introduction and first champion spotlight here. As stated in my last article, the purpose of these guides is to explain how a person with solid core mechanics can positively affect the game using certain champions. So without further ado....

Role Spotlight #2: Top Lane
Champion: Shen

Shen is a champion I found to be easy to learn and fun to play, but difficult to master. However, once you have some games under your belt, Shen can be an excellent tool for pulling yourself out of bronze. Keep in mind, Shen is not the type of champion to carry a game single-handedly. He's more the type of champion that prevents the noobs on your team from going into full-feed mode. Many times, this is enough to allow and enable the rest of your team to carry the game. He's also a very safe laner which at the very least means you won't be a detriment to your team by feeding. Let's break down his kit and how to use it to your advantage.

Passive: Ki Strike
Shen's auto attacks periodically deal 8-76 (based on level)(+10% of bonus health) bonus magic damage and restore 10/20/30 energy. Every basic attack reduces Ki Strike's cooldown by 1 second, doubled to 2 seconds while the shield from Feint holds.

One of my favorite things about Shen's passive is that it is easy to notice. When Shen's passive is ready to use, his hands pulse with energy as seen below.

Ninja's don't sparkle... They pulse...

Ki Strike is an empowered auto-attack that deals magic damage, but scales off of the bonus health you build on him. There's not a whole lot to say about this passive. It's great for trades, especially when used in conjunction with his Q. Early on, the initial damage from Vorpal Blade (Q) plus the empowered auto-attack from Ki Strike is quite a strong trade. Add in the shield from Feint (W) and the small heal that Vorpal Blade provides you and you've got enough to make anyone think twice about trading with you in the future.

Once you've used your passive, your basic attacks reduce the cooldown by a second. Activating Feint and auto-attacking while the shield is up will reduce the cooldown of Ki Strike by two seconds instead of one. For prolonged trading in lane and more consistent damage in teamfights, build a bit of attack speed along with the standard health items and be sure to use Feint while auto-attacking to have your passive up as much as possible. It's also interesting to note that Ki Strike's increased damage applies to towers, making Shen a solid split-pusher.

Q: Vorpal Blade
Shen throws a blade at a target enemy, dealing magic damage and marking them for five seconds. Shen or allies heal over three seconds after damaging a marked enemy. The healing duration refreshes with each attack.

Vorpal Blade is Shen's multi-use pocket knife. It's extremely useful throughout every stage of the game, though particularly during the laning phase. We've all been in the same situation. For some reason or another your allied minions decide to focus down two of the enemy minions at the same time. Are they close enough together for you to get both? Will one die before the other? WHICH ONE DESERVES TO DIE AT YOUR HAND? Relax. With Shen, you can grab both by auto attacking one and throwing your Q at the other. Something important to note that I did not realize at first is that if you last hit a minion with your Q, the healing effect still applies over one second instead of the full three.

Vorpal Blade also allows you to prep caster minions for tower shots while still last hitting the melee minions with your Q. When minions walk under tower at full health, the melee minions will die if you auto them after two tower shots. The caster minions need a bit of prep beforehand. One auto plus a tower shot, followed up by a second auto will kill the caster minions. Thus, being able to prep the caster minions while last hitting the melee minions with your Q can be very useful and prevent lost farm.

This ability is also useful when trading or poking. I normally max Q as Shen meaning that at level 5, I have a damage dealing ranged ability every five seconds. If your opponent is focused on his farm and does not want to trade, throw your Q at him each time is come off of cooldown. I run AP Quintessences on my rune page for Shen because all of his damage besides his passive scales off of his AP. The Q's begin to add up after the first few pokes. Either your opponent will get frustrated and attempt to trade or he will continue to focus on his farm and be forced out of lane. For extended trades, throw your Q on your opponent and heal each time you auto-attack him. Coupled with the shield from Feint, and the damage reduction from Shadow Dash, superior trading with Shen is easy.

W: Feint
Shen shields himself for up to 3 seconds.

There isn't much to say about this one. It's a shield used to prevent damage. I often max W third, as the cool down on Shadow Dash can be extremely important, however, if you find yourself taking a lot of damage during the laning phase, put a few points into W instead of your other abilities. It's better that you deal less damage and have a slightly longer cool down on your other abilities than feeding kills to your lane opponent because you did not level your W. This ability scales off of AP and it is good to use as you Shadow Dash into a person, or a group.

Whenever I have someone shoved under tower while playing Shen, you can use your Q to poke from range. If you happen to go a bit too far and provoke a tower shot, Feint can mitigate most of the damage. Repeat this process to drive your opponent out of lane or set up a dive with your jungler.

E: Shadow Dash
Shen dashes in a target direction, dealing magic damage to all enemy champions he hits. This also taunts them for 1.5 seconds and restores 40 energy per target hit.
Taunted opponents are forced to auto attack Shen and deal half damage for the duration of the taunt.

This is arguably Shen's most valuable ability. As stated earlier I normally max Shadow Dash second after Vorpal Blade for the shorter cool down. When an ability is potentially game changing, you want it to be up as much as possible. Shadow Dash can be used for engaging, escaping, trading, and moving across the map more efficiently, among other things.

My favorite place to be as Shen is farming under tower and it is entirely thanks to Shadow Dash. Farming under tower does take a fair bit of practice, but if you can master this skill as Shen you will find out why. Farming under your tower means that for your opponent to get farm and experience, they must overextend themselves. The call of low health minions is strong and if that minion happens to be in range of your tower, use Shadow Dash on your opponent to force them to take tower aggro as they move to last hit. Even one successful trade like this can set your jungler up for an opportunistic gank. And junglers love ganking for Shen. Shadow Dash is fairly easy to land and keeps that person in place for a full second and a half. This is plenty of time for you to get off your full combo as well as your jungler. If at this point your opponent is not dead and is able to get under his tower, ult your jungler, allowing him to go ham while the shield from Stand United soaks up all of the tower damage. Ez.

When shoved to your opponent's tower, Shadow Dash makes escaping ganks a breeze as well. If you have warded properly, you should have plenty of warning. You can use Shadow Dash two different ways here. If the jungler was able to surprise you, Shadow Dash through him and shield yourself to prevent his initial damage and CC. Shen is fairly tanky, even at early stages of the game, so this combo often goes a long way in aiding your escape. You may be forced to back afterwards, but you probably won't die unless you're up against two champs with hard CC.

If the enemy jungler has some form of hard CC, and you think you can escape by walking out, try ducking into the top brush for a moment. Most laners opt to ward the tri brush and the river so these bushes are normally not warded. As a general rule for being ganked, no matter the champ you are playing, is that breaking vision even for a moment can buy you enough time to escape. To prevent being targeted by CC, you should be able to Shadow Dash from one bush to another and hopefully walk it out. Flash if necessary.

Engaging and finding picks is the most significant use of Shadow Dash. This ability can lock down multiple targets for 1.5 seconds, which is plenty of time for your carries to do work. Shen isn't a classic engage champion like Malphite or Shyvana, who dive straight into the center of a team. I use Shen more for jumping on someone who steps out of position. Look for the carry who steps just a bit too far forward to land some poke or the support who walks out just a bit too far to ward. Shadow Dash only has a range of 600, but by flashing mid-taunt, you can increase that range to 1000 units, and there is nothing more satisfying than landing a flash-taunt on an out-of-position ADC. You can practically taste the fear. Do keep in mind the Shen is the hitbox for this ability. Anything he dashes through is taunted. If you flash during the taunt, you will only taunt targets that you hit before and after the flash, not the targets in between.

The last note I will make about this ability is that it can be used to dash over nearly every single wall on Summoner's Rift. This can be used for clever escapes, flanks, or moving to objectives quicker.

R: Stand United
Shen channels for 3 seconds, granting the target allied champion a shield that lasts up to 5 seconds. If the channel completes successfully, Shen appears between the target and the nearest visible enemy champion.

How many times have you seen your fellow teammates about to do something incredibly stupid and you think... 'if only I could have been there... we could have turned that around'... If this is a feel you feel all too often, Shen is the champion for you. Stand United broken down to its simplest terminology is an anti-feed button.

Map pressure is a word often used when discussing pro strategies. It's used when talking about how certain decisions are made. Teams may not be able to go for a tower dive in bot lane because of the pressure of the enemy top-laner's teleport. When a teleport cooldown is blown, they talk about how pressure has been relieved and more plays can be made. There are only a handful of champions that are able to pressure the entire map just by being in the game. Shen is one of those champions. When playing against a Shen while Stand United is off of cooldown, it means that at any moment, any fight can be turned around on you. A Shen with solid map awareness will instantly turn any 1v1 into a 2v1, or 2v2 into a 3v2, etc. The shield alone can be powerful enough to turn the tides of a 1v1, let alone teleporting himself there to follow up.

Stand United is also beautiful for setting up tower dives. Stay in communication with your jungler. Let him know when Stand United is ready to use and have him let you know if he wants to dive. The shield is strong enough to block at least two full tower shots, if not more, which gives your team plenty of time to finish off their target.

I often say, in Bronze and Silver, sometimes all it takes to win a game is for your team to not feed. If this is a frequent problem for you, play Shen and prevent the feeding. That's all for today folks. If you've enjoyed my rundown of Shen and his abilities, check out my guide on Sivir here. If you have any questions or feedback, leave it in the comments below. If you enjoyed this guide on climbing the ladder, don't forget to check back in a few days for my next champion guide.

Statistics and ability specs courtesy of the League of Legends wiki page.