Kayle Build & Rune Guide

Kayle is a late-game powerhouse, with the ability to burst down any Champions within seconds if she’s allowed to get there. From being extremely weak in the early game to an absolute beat in the late game, she can be considered the best scaling Champion on Summoner’s Rift. Using just empowered auto attacks, she can deal AOE damage while healing herself and has an ultimate to turn her impervious to damage for contingency.

How To Play Kayle?

Kayle’s playstyle can be summarized in two words, late game. If your team has a Kayle on it, chances are you will win fights the later the game goes on. But in the early game, it might feel like you are at a member disadvantage.

The best thing to do is play safe in the early game. Don’t miss minions, and try to prevent your opponent from shoving the wave. Till you reach level 6, Kayle is a melee Champion. You can use your E to poke the laner sometimes, but it can result in death if you’re not careful.

How Do Kayle’s Abilities Work?

Kayle’s abilities are mostly focused on buffing her own stats or keeping her alive. This is because all her damage comes through her auto attacks. She is also one of the few Champions that can go with a hybrid build path as her auto attacks do a percentage of AP damage as well. Play around your E cooldown in the early game to get some poke in and deter your opponent and never engage without your R.

Divine Ascent (Passive)

Divine Ascent is Kayle’s main scaling ability that allows her to upgrade her forms as she levels up. In the first 3 forms, up to level 16, this ability is based on stacks Kayle gains from auto-attacking. After level 16, Kayle reaches her final form, and all her auto attacks deal the same damage and apply on-hit effects. She also gains progressively more basic attack range as she goes through her forms, going from a melee to a ranged Champion.

Her first form, Zealous, is the starting form. Per stack, Kayle receives 6% (+25% Bonus AP) attack speed for 5 seconds. This can stack up to 5 times, and at max stacks, Kayle becomes Exalted, gaining a 10% movement speed buff toward enemies.

Kayle’s second form is Arisen, which fully turns Kayle into a ranged Champion. She gains additional auto attack range permanently. She gains this form at level 6.

Her third form is Aflame. Aflame is similar to Zealous, but when she reaches max stacks and becomes Exalted, all of Kayle’s basic attacks launch flaming waves behind their target. These waves deal 10-30 (+10% Bonus AD) (+25% Bonus AP) bonus magic damage and have an AOE radius. This form is reached at level 11.

Kayle’s final form is Transcendent, and in a lot of games, this is where she will actually come online. She reaches Transcendent at level 16 and becomes permanently Exalted, meaning she does not need to gain stacks anymore. Kayle gains a 100 bonus attack range, boosting her total attack range to 625. Each basic attack deals the same damage as mentioned in previous forms.

Radiant Blast (Q)

Radiant Blast is a short-range AOE ability that is primarily used to shred enemy defenses before bursting them down. Kayle summons a celestial sword in the targeted direction, dealing magic damage to the first enemy hit and nearby enemies.

This attack slows them for 4 seconds and also reduces their magic resistance and physical armor by 15% for 4 seconds. This ability can also be used to farm minions pre-level 6, as you don’t have many ranged attacks.

Celestial Blessing (W)

Since Kayle is bullied throughout most of the lane phase, her W is what keeps her healthy and viable. You can’t scale up properly if you need to keep recalling to regenerate health, so knowing when to use Celestial Blessing is crucial to playing Kayle.

Kayle heals herself and the targeted ally for a small amount of health. Both also receive a small movement speed buff that scales with Kayle’s AP. This can also help in setting up ganks and keeping your jungler alive.

Starfire Spellblade (E)

Starfire Spellblade is an auto attack empowering ability that causes Kayle’s next ability to deal more damage. The more important part of this ability is its passive effect that allows Kayle’s auto attacks to deal more damage without needing to activate this ability.

Kayle’s next attack becomes ranged, and deals bonus magic damage according to the target’s missing health. This ability is upgraded at level 6 when Kayle becomes Arisen and causes her empowered auto attack to explode on-hit, causing AOE damage to nearby enemies.

Divine Judgement (R)

Divine Judgment is Kayle’s characteristic ability which makes her essential in team fights. By using this ability, Kayle can make an allied Champion (or herself) invulnerable for 2/2.5/3 seconds. After the ability ends, it does AOE magic damage around the targeted ally, dealing damage to nearby enemies in a circular radius.

This is a great ability for full 5-on-5 team fights where you can turn your engage invincible, allowing them to tank for longer.

Kayle’s Build Path (Items + Runes)

Kayle runs a variety of different builds, considering she benefits highly from AP but is an auto attack dependant Champion. While this depends on your playstyle, matchup, and role in team composition, the AP build is much more used as compared to the AD Kraken Slayer build. So let’s see what makes this AP build so successful.

Items

• Starting Item: You can take either Doran’s Blade or Doran’s Shield. Doran’s Blade is for low-mobility matchups where they can’t jump on you as much as Malphite or Sion. The lifesteal and her W can help keep you healthy enough from the occasional engagement. Doran’s Shield is for bruiser matchups like Darius, where they will engage often, and you need some defensive stats.
• Core Items: Nashor’s Tooth rush is the way to go for AP Kayle players. The additional attack speed plus AP boost is amazing with her kit. Follow this with a Riftmaker. Riftmaker helps you deal way more true damage and shreds high-health Champions. It also gives you more lifesteal so you can burst your opponent before they zero your health bar.
• Situational Items: After the first 2 items, you can build depending on the matchup and game state. For more AP-heavy team comps, Wit’s End is a must as it gives some magic resistance plus attack speed buffs. It will also help you apply on-hit effects more often. After this, you can go Rabadon’s Deathcap for more AP stats.
• Boots: Berserk’s Greaves are Kayle’s most common pickup, as the more attack speed you have, the faster you burst down your opponent.

Runes

• Primary: For primary runes, take Lethal Tempo into Triumph, Legend: Alacrity, and Last Stand. Lethal Tempo is the best rune for attack speed abusers as it lets you surpass the attack speed limit. Triumph can help keep you in lane if your jungler often ganks to get you some Champion takedowns. Legend: Alacrity gives more attack speed, while Last Stand significantly increases your damage output as your health drops.
• Secondary: Conditioning and Overgrowth will be your secondary runes as they give additional defensive stats plus health throughout the match. Great runes for scaling Champions.

Final Thoughts

Kayle is a fun champ, albeit a difficult one to play in many circumstances. Unless you have some basic game knowledge, most Champions will set you so far back in the early game you won’t be able to recover. Play safe, and don’t listen to your team’s pings; you are pretty useless until you get some damage output. After that, go crazy and 1v5 the entire enemy team.