Zeri the Carry
SawyerNelson
Intro
Zeri is an aggressive ADC with lots of good solo tools, making you less reliant on Support play, while still being able to capitalize on their plays.
Runes
Zeri uses Lethal Tempo the best out of all other keystones.
Lethal Tempo allows you to get free attack speed and extend the range of your Q! It's really coded like that, lol.
With the free attack speed it also requires less attack speed from the build, letting you dip into more damage centric items.
The Minor runes aren't to crazy, simply giving you more HP & Damage.
- Lethal
Summoner Spells
Summoner Spells for Zeri are very simple, you can default Heal giving you more HP and movement speed during a fight, and maybe helping your allies.
Exhaust if the enemy has unavoidable burst damage (Talon, Evelyn, etc). Zeri is especially venerable to single target damage as she can't dodge it, so reducing it with Exhaust is one way for her to have some counterplay.
Cleanse if the enemy has significant CC ( Leona, ,Maokai, Nasus (W), etc ). Building into QSS comes way later and is generally bad for the ramp of Zeri's power.
- Summs (Role 1)
Skill Path
With an On-Hit build for Zeri you will always be maxing Q -> E
Level 3 you can choose to put 3 points into Q instead of W, it's usually not possible to land a W early so more power to the Q = more pushing.
- Skill Path
Zeri
Build
I think it's best to start Doran's Blade, most lanes you don't want action levels 1-3 anyways, and Zeri is very squishy without it, compared to most ADC's running Long Sword + 3 Health Potions.
On your first recall you can build towards Berserker Greaves, this will give you lots of pushing power and maneuverability in the lane. Without Boots it becomes almost impossible to trade in the Bot Lane for Zeri, then into Noonquiver for the same reason Push, Push, PUSH!
Kraken Slayer will give you the most possible damage out of a mythic item, so even if a game is going bad you will be able to have a chance in at least a couple of fights.
Essence Reaver 2nd gives you lots of damage early as well, giving you a sheen item which Zeri abuses so hard.
Bloodthirster gives you the sustain needed for late game teamfights
After that the builds it is all damage and utility depending on how the game is going you can pick up whatever fits the situation. Remember you can pick up some AP items since Zeri has ok AP scalings.
Similar to situations when you should run Exhaust, you can build Immortal ShieldBow as your Mythic item, you trade damage for survivability, but survivability in the since that you can actually play. Immortal Shieldbow is only necessary when the enemy has unavoidable targeted damage that simply kills Zeri ( Evelyn, Kai'sa, etc)
Trinity Force is a viable Mythic and changes the build path for Zeri, but this guide will focus on the Crit Build.
- Item Set 1
Matchups and Synergies
- Matchups
- Synergies
Laning
The Laning phase is going to be the most important part to have stable when playing any ADC. For Zeri you are either Pushing or getting pushed in. When to push or get pushed in depends on the matchup, which are different every game, so try and identify it as you load in and if you don't know try to push! If it doesn't work out, now you know you! Zeri's ability to trade early isn't as strong as other ADCs. When PUSHING spam Q from a safe distance, and if the enemy moves into you, you can use E & W to punish them, otherwise it's a Q spam onto the wave. Once the wave is on the enemies turret you can Recall, Poke them, hit turret, or skirmish in River. Know what you are going to do as the wave is crashing rather than trying to figure it out once you're there. When getting PUSHED IN, DON'T trade with the enemy. The minions block your auto attacks and W, you will be trading into the 2 Enemy champions so 2 auto attacks for 0, their poke abilities, and an entire minion wave, this is a losing move!
On 1st Recall if you can get full Berserker Greaves it can be a fairly strong power spike, allowing you to push harder and avoid enemy poke, if not you can go Boots + Refillable Potion + dagger, Dagger + Refillable Potion, Dagger + boots + Longsword, etc.
Zeri is pretty similar to a Vayne / Samira in the sense that you can REALLY start fighting once you have ULT at Level 6. You want your lane to be stable, having good CS and not dying up to this point so that you can have a chance to beat the enemy. If you attack in correctly or don't endure the enemy early, they may have an item advantage around this time, making your fight into them much less likely to work out.
You can look to fight when your Support lands CC, the enemy missteps, or you can even flank with Zeri's E. If you are playing with an Enchanter Support it gets tricker, but you don't have to smorc into the enemy, take a small trade with E and see what comes of it, if you can keep pushing it do, but if not back off, and trade again when your E is up and your Enchanter Support's abilities are up as well.
When your ULT is down, just look to farm, be very careful of being pulled into bad fights. If your team starts a fight when your ULT is down and it looks bad, it's ok to push out your lane and recall. If you incorrectly read the situation to it's easy enough to E into a fight from long distance and clean up afterwards.
The Laning phase ends when you take the enemy turret, or if they take your turret, around that time you will enter the Mid Game.
Mid Game
Into the Mid Game your goals are:
- Farm
- Follow up on Fights ( Don't start them )
- Take enemy Turrets
The main and most achievable goal is to get farm, into the Mid game you should be Mid Lane more often than not as ADC, and in the Mid Lane the waves come a bit faster, so that faster you clear them, the faster you can get to a jungle camp, or a fight that is happening, but don't randomly leave the lane to walk to another one without reason. I say follow up on fights not start them, not because you can't look for your own plays, but its in your best interest to let fights start then get in there. Zeri is very squishy, and if you dash into 2 people at the wrong place and wrong time it can flip the game on it's head and become unplayable, to avoid all this, simply don't engage yourself. If fights are happening in the Jungle or side lanes, LOOK at the fight before going there see it on your minimap and click on it to see what's happening, what abilities are being spend, how much HP the enemy and your allies have, is that fight going to be over before you get there? Can you get a turret instead of going to the fight? If you get there information by watching and ask yourself these sort of questions than it becomes much easier to play. Otherwise you are magnetized to your allies decisions. Imagine being chained to a wild boar chasing anything it sees, no thanks.
When fights break out, you can play on the edge of them and join when the situation looks good, it's better to be less comital as you will be able to stay alive more often, so even if a fight goes poorly, than you are alive to catch minion waves and farm jungle camps to continue to power up, this becomes especially true when your team is losing. When AHEAD you can sometimes RAM into the enemy but I think most players understand that more than they do playing slower.
TeamFighting
The goals of Farming properly and powering up in the Early Game and having that all play out smoothly is so that you can consistently reach a good power level for TeamFights. How you play Teamfights is going to determine if you Win or Lose a good amount of your matches on ADC. So being strong enough to participate is the 1st step, when that is achieved then you can start to practicing fighting well.
The most common mistake ADCs make is trying to do it themselves. This usually looks like them moving into the enemy trying to attack what ever shows up on their screen, so you click towards the enemy and now are in a 1v3 , 1v4, 1v5? All this for 1 auto attack ? Pull the enemy into you, or wait behind your team, it's not your job to start the fight as ADC, if you can't stand this fact play Nautilus or Alistar instead. With that being said, you also don't want to be too far back, which at the very least gives you something to aim towards during the non-action setup of a teamfight. You want to be just on the edge of getting hit by the enemy, and being able to hit them yourself.
Most Teamfights will happen around Dragon, be sure of what your team is doing, are you all Diving? Finishing Dragon ? Turning off Dragon? Watch and REACT, things are always changing.
Your going to have to move your Camera past yourself as well, the fights will start far away, even before fights start you want to see the enemy, and where they are positioned. The enemy Kennen just moved into the bush, and is now flanking through our Blue side Jungle! This is an important thing to know.
Zeri's ULT is CRUCIAL! You have to keep hitting enemies to keep it going, so if you cast it to early and the enemy backs off, your ULT is now on cooldown and they can re-engage. So be sure of the direction of the fight when casting! If cast to late you simply miss out on damage & movement speed build up.
So be behind your allies, let the fight start, then build up ULT stacks of enemy front line, or flank enemy back line with and E over the wall.
How to Win
- Win Lane
- High CS
- Take Turrets
- Win Teamfights around Objectives
- Push with Lead and END