Skill usage Edit

• Keep in mind that your passive  Dread will be seen when your enemy is close enough, even when they lack vision of you. This can occasionally ruin potential ganks in which the enemy gets the debuff and retreats, so make sure that your passive is out of range until you engage.
•  Dread is very useful early game. If you are laning with a mage or caster, this will allow you to push your lane much better.
•  Terrify with  Drain is an amazing combo that can turn the tables in a fight. To make sure that the enemy stays within range,  Terrify them against a wall, where they will be under heavy fire and under control.
• If you use  Drain on enemies that go into stealth or flash, Fiddlesticks won't stop channeling until they go out of range.  Drain also continues through  Sanguine Pool,  Rebirth and  Playful.
• In early game lane,  Dark Wind is an extremely effective poke. With no ability power runes it does 65 damage a bounce with no reduction in damage from successive bounces, and it only costs 50 mana.
  • Furthermore,  Dark Wind can be used from an extremely long range since you can bounce it from melee minions to range minions to the target character. Even at closer range it silences so you can escape often without taking damage. Since  Dark Wind is the last ability you should level, use it early (levels 1-5) and often to give you a lane advantage. At middle levels (6-11) this ability will be far less effective at poking from range and clearing minions, while champions with long range pokes will stop you from farming.
• When taking down opponents, consider using him as an assassin, as Fiddlesticks shouldn't take on many champions head-to-head. Sneaking up on an enemy champion then using  Crowstorm,  Terrify, and  Drain maximizes damage.  Dark Wind is most useful for silencing enemy champions but can do very high damage to bunched up enemy champions (especially pairs of champions with no minions around as the spell will bounce between them until it reaches 5 bounces, keeping them both silenced for the duration). It can also be very effective at farming minions as it deals 50% bonus damage to minions. You can also initiate a fight by using Flash or  Crowstorm over a wall and using the aforementioned combo onto the enemy team.
• Coordinate with your teammates when you use  Crowstorm in order to maximize the damage. It synergizes well with abilities which provide area of effect crowd control.
• Use  Dark Wind to rack up minion kills and try to use  Drain primarily on siege minions to get the maximum health gain.
•  Drain allows Fiddlesticks to jungle by almost continuously regaining health. With his  Terrify and with  Dark Wind he is a great ganker as well as a great jungler.
• Casting other abilities, getting silenced or getting stunned while using  Drain will stop channeling.
• Flash can be used after casting  Crowstorm to quickly jump into an enemy or group of enemies. Two blinks are twice as effective.
• A summoner spell that can be used to escape, such as Ghost or Flash, is essentially mandatory on Fiddlesticks.

Build usage Edit

• Starting items for Fiddlesticks should almost always include some form of mana regen. A few Mana Potions or a Doran's Ring will allow you to throw out pokes constantly and keep your life up with  Drain.
• Zhonya's Hourglass is a must have on Fiddlesticks. It gives you the ability to very effectively tower dive or initiate team fights with  Crowstorm or block the massive amounts of CC and incoming damage that will be thrown at you whenever you choose to  Crowstorm in.
  • Often times it is best to rush Zhonya's Hourglass since  Terrify ->  Drain combo will give you plenty of sustain while  Crowstorming in for 1v1 assassinations, and what you really need is early team fight sustain because you often have to get into the mix to do damage.
• Buying Rylai's Crystal Scepter will maximize your damage with  Drain, as your enemy is slowed when trying to escape. It will also help your ultimate to maximize damage and also be an AoE slow in large team fights leading to advantage.
• Buying a Deathfire Grasp or Liandry's Torment/ Blackfire Torch can help Fiddlesticks deal with champions with high health.
• If you are being targeted by the enemy team during  Crowstorm, you can use Zhonya's Hourglass to avoid taking damage without ending the Area of Effect effect of  Crowstorm.
• Fiddlesticks is a relatively slow jungler and it can be hard to gank until you reach level 6 and get  Crowstorm. Consider buying Boots of Mobility Boots of Swiftness to help switch between farming while your  Crowstorm is on cooldown and ganking.
• Abyssal Scepter can synergize with his passive  Dread, decreasing enemies' magic resistance by up to 30 MR.
• Using a Banshee's Veil is good idea for more survivability and so the channeling of your ultimate  Crowstorm will not be interrupted by an enemy with a disruption CC ability.
• A Spirit Visage allows Fiddlesticks to heal a lot more with  Drain meaning that he can put more points into other abilities earlier on.
• Additionally spell vamp extremely increases the healing effectiveness of  Drain, making Will of the Ancients a decent item, but not an absolute must-have.
• Buying Athene's Unholy Grail will provide a huge amount of sustain when used with drain, not to mention cooldown reduction and ability power.

Jungling Edit

• If the enemy team has a strong invade, such as Blitzcrank or Alistar, consider starting with Boots of Speed, Sight Ward and a Health Potion. Placing the ward at either your blue, or the enemy team's blue before the jungle camps spawn; this can give your team valuable information on where the enemy jungler is starting and make it easier for you to steal their blue if they're invading your side of the jungle.
• Starting items: Amplifying Tome or Doran's Ring or ( Boots of Speed and 2 × Health Potion and a Mana Potion)
• Skill progression:  Drain →  Dark Wind →  Drain →  Terrify →  Drain →  Crowstorm
• Jungling order:    Wolves → Blue Golem (Smite or Smiteless)  → Wraiths →  Red Lizard (Smite)  Small Golems → Wraiths → Wolves → Gank / Fountain
• An alternate strategy is to get  Terrify at level 2, and gank lane.  Terrify/ Drain can deal significant damage especially if your opponents have not hit level 2.
• Doesn't necessarily need Smite for a full clear due to his health regeneration, but jungling without it is not recommendable as it jeopardizes buff camps, Dragon and Baron Nashor.

Recommended builds Edit

Summoner's Rift recommended items
Starting		5
Essential
Offensive
Defensive
Consumables

The Proving Grounds recommended items
Starting		2	2
Essential
Offensive
Defensive
Consumables

The Crystal Scar recommended items
Starting			2
Essential
Offensive
Defensive
Consumables

The Twisted Treeline recommended items
Starting
Essential
Offensive
Defensive
Consumables

Countering Edit

• Fiddlesticks deals most of his damage from his  Drain and  Crowstorm and both have channels which can be interrupted. This means that hard CC, like a stun, can stop most of Fiddlesticks' damage.
• A common Fiddlesticks strategy is to hide in the brush and wait for an unaware champion and use his  Crowstorm. Good warding and map awareness can stop Fiddlesticks from ganking you from typical locations.
  • If you notice you have the  Dread debuff, but you can not see Fiddlesticks, he is probably hiding nearby in a bush or behind a nearby thin wall. Use this to your advantage.
• When starting a team fight try to save your ability with CC that can interrupt channeling abilities.
  • If you see an enemy Fiddlesticks channeling his  Crowstorm, use a CC ability that can stop him (stun, silence, knockback, knockup).
• Having a healing reduction like Ignite, Executioner's Calling, Morellonomicon or abilities such as  Impure Shots can make  Drain less effective.
• An easy way to counter Fiddlesticks is to purchase a Mercury's Treads to reduce the duration of his fear or a Banshee's Veil to negate one of his spell and reduce his damage output.

Champion Spotlight Edit