Fiddlesticks/Strategy

## Tips

Playing As  **Fiddlesticks**
* Use  Dark Wind to rack up many minion kills, and try to use  Drain on minions to get the maximum health drain.
* Use  Terrify on enemies before starting up  Crowstorm or  Drain to ensure maximum damage.
* Fiddlesticks is very fragile if you build AP items. Try to strike a balance between offense and defense with runes, masteries, and items.

Playing Against  **Fiddlesticks**
* Avoid attacking while close to your allies.  Dark Wind will bounce between you and your allies, increasing its damage.
* If Fiddlesticks has used  Crowstorm, try casting a stun or slow and moving out of range until the spell dissipates.
* If Fiddlesticks is nowhere to be seen, watch out for an ambush  Crowstorm from brush.

## Tricks

* **Fiddlesticks** is versatile and can go on a variety of lanes, with the most common one being jungle. Due to Fiddlestick's sustain with  Drain, he is one of the few junglers who don't have to worry at all with being at such low HP at the first clear, that they have to go back to base instead of ganking. In fact, this combined with  Terrify makes Fiddlesticks one of the best level 1-3 gankers; he can even gank at level 2 just after taking blue if he decides to level up  Terrify instead of  Dark Wind.
	+ Fiddlesticks's jungle sustain is so good, that he might not even need a leash at all. This allows his teammates to go directly to their lanes to farm.
	+ However, Fiddlesticks is extremely dependent from the blue buff to jungle, especially early game, as he is mana hungry. Be very careful of enemy counterjungling.
	+ Fiddlesticks' ganking potential spikes even more after he obtains  Crowstorm as he can make nasty surprise ganks, coming from nowhere.
* Although Fiddlesticks is good at jungle, he can go mid lane too. The advantages of doing this is that it allows your jungler to pick a tankier champion. While Fiddlesticks may seem to lose most matchups at mid lane, his  Dark Wind allows him to farm and to harass the enemy laner from a long distance, and his  Drain allows him to stay at lane for a longer time than many other mid champions, as long as you can manage your mana effectively. Keep in mind that Fiddlesticks doesn't push the lane very well unless you decide to max  Dark Wind, but if you do that, you lose the sustain and dueling potential from  Drain.
* Because  Terrify is a reliable crowd control, and the fact that he can harass very well with  Dark Wind,  **Fiddlesticks** can also be used at bot lane as a poke-based support. Fiddlesticks' harass is one of the strongest and without a healing support such as  Soraka or  Sona, Fiddlesticks has the potential to harass the enemy ADC and support out of lane with ease. However, he is very vulnerable to all-ins due to his lack of escapes and his squishiness. Keep that in mind when facing enemy supports with a lot of CC such as  Leona.
	+ Keep in mind that Fiddlesticks doesn't have a lot of utility outside  Terrify. You may need to purchase some support items such as Şablon:İi to compensate for that. Do that only if Fiddlesticks is behind or if you don't really need another source of magic damage, however, as Fiddlesticks' damage potential is wasted if he goes for a support-oriented build; his  Drain will be useless and his  Crowstorm will do laughable damage without AP items.
	+ Even if you decide to build AP, however, Şablon:İi is still essential.
* At late game, it is likely that many champions have build their own form of sustain, or defenses, allowing them to 1v1 Fiddlesticks effectively. He is also prone to being bursted due to being squishy. Despite this, Fiddlesticks is extremely good late game due to his insane AoE damage with  Crowstorm allowing him to devastate enemies at teamfights, especially when combined with other AoE ultimates such as  Amumu's  Curse of the Sad Mummy. His  Terrify is also detrimental to any champion who is vulnerable to CC, this includes squishy carries such as the ADCs.

Ability Usage
* Dread is a very useful ability. It allows you to reposition yourself after  Drain or  Crowstorm.
* 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.
* When laning,  Dark Wind is an extremely effective poke. 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 a 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. You can also initiate a fight by using  Flash or  Crowstorm over a wall and using the aforementioned combo onto the enemy team.
* 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 6 bounces, although it can only silence each target once). It can also be very effective for farming since it deals bonus damage to minions.
* 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.
* Casting other abilities, getting silenced or getting stunned while using  Drain or  Crowstorm will stop channeling.
* Flash can be used after casting  Crowstorm to quickly jump into an enemy or a 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**, as Fiddlesticks lacks any ability to escape.
* Crowstorm does not make you invulnerable. Be careful about blinking into crowds with only maximizing damage in mind. Items like Şablon:İi would be helpful.

Rune Usage
Item Usage
* Şablon:İi is essential for jungle  **Fiddlesticks** to keep his mana topped up when clearing. It also provides AP and Movement Speed along with a mini Şablon:İi passive.
* When laning, starting items for  **Fiddlesticks** should almost always include some form of mana regen. A Şablon:İi will allow you to poke constantly and keep your life up with  Drain.
* Şablon:İi 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.
	+ It is often best to rush Şablon:İi since a  Q >  W combo will give you plenty of sustain while  Crowstorming in for 1v1 assassinations, and what you need is early team fight sustain since you often have to get into the frontline to deal damage.
* Buying Şablon:İi will maximize your damage with  Drain, as your enemy is slowed when trying to escape. It will also help your ultimate by maximizing damage and adding a large AoE slow in teamfights, giving an advantage to your team.
* Buying a Şablon:İi can help  **Fiddlesticks** deal with champions with high health.
* **Fiddlesticks** is a relatively slow jungler and it can be hard to gank until you reach level 6 and get  Crowstorm. Consider buying Şablon:İi / Şablon:İi to help switch between farming while your  Crowstorm is on cooldown and ganking. However getting Şablon:İi can give you enough magic penetration to basically do true damage.
* Şablon:İi is another good option, since  **Fiddlesticks** is almost always inside the aura of the item to deal damage. The magic resistance also gives a good defensive stat against mages.
* Buying a Şablon:İi is good idea for more survivability. It also lowers the chance that the channeling of  Crowstorm will be interrupted by an enemy with a disruption CC ability.
* A Şablon:İi allows  **Fiddlesticks** to heal a lot more with  Drain, meaning that he can put more points into other abilities earlier on.
* Şablon:İi gives  **Fiddlesticks** health, AP and CDR which are all helpful for his playstyle. The mini dash on the active also gives  **Fiddlesticks** a larger initiate range in combination with  Flash and  Crowstorm. It also improves his sub-par waveclear, especially useful if you're playing him as a laner.
* Şablon:İi as with most mages, should be bought to counter high MR stacking.
* Şablon:İi is a great mid-late game item for  **Fiddlesticks** as his AP scalings are extremely high.

Countering
* **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. However,  **Fiddlesticks** will likely disable you with  Terrify's lengthy fear before channeling, making a teammate invaluable.
* A common  **Fiddlesticks** strategy is to hide in the brush or fog of war and use his  Crowstorm to suddenly appear next to you or worse yet, your team. Good warding and map awareness can stop  **Fiddlesticks** from ganking you from typical locations.
	+ For this reason, don't be too confident to start a teamfight just because  **Fiddlesticks** seemingly isn't around, especially if you don't have vision in the nearby jungle or brush.
* When starting a teamfight, try to save your ability with CC that can interrupt his channeling abilities.
	+ If you see an enemy  **Fiddlesticks** channeling his  Crowstorm, use a CC ability that can stop him (stun, silence, knockback, knockup).
	+ If you have vision of  **Fiddlesticks**,  Crowstorm has a distinctive 'scratching' noise while channeling. Alternatively, his pose is the same as  Drain except without a green leash.
	+ However, the time window is fairly narrow, and you may be in even more danger of taking the brunt of  Crowstorm's devastating damage if you are trying to reach  **Fiddlesticks**.
* Having a source of Şablon:Pst1Grievous Wounds (like  Ignite, Şablon:İi, or Şablon:İi) can make  Drain less effective.
* An easy way to counter  **Fiddlesticks** is to purchase Şablon:İi to reduce the duration of his  fear or a Şablon:İi to negate one of his spells and reduce his damage output.
* As for champion counterpicks, it is recommended to use champions who have more than one hard CC, such as  Cho'Gath and  Blitzcrank.