Graves/Strategy

Skill usage

 * Try to keep your stacks up by attacking minions, for free damage mitigation.
 * During the laning phase, is a strong harassment ability, but will quickly drain mana if used constantly.
 * Using on caster minions will kill them in a single cast at higher ranks, even without damage items.
 * Graves can push and farm a lane easily by using . However, should be reserved due to its relatively low damage, and high utility.
 * For a high damage combo, throw a on your target, close the gap with, and fire a close-range.
 * The sight reduction of has great utility, along with the AoE slow.
 * can be used to juke your enemies and allow to make decisive choices when either chasing or escaping.
 * It can be used to set up a gank, because the target will not be able to see any incoming champions.
 * A can be a strong deterrent for an oncoming enemy team.
 * greatly diminishes the utility of an enemy champion that relies on ranged unit-targeted spells, such as or  because vision of their target is required to cast these spells.
 * can be used to dash through thin terrain. This allows to be very mobile and can benefit him in chases and escapes.
 * Try to use at the beginning of a teamfight when your enemies are grouped together, allowing you to hit multiple targets.
 * When the champion against you has a blink (eg. ), and he attempts to engage you, throw a to where he blinked, and quickly dash away leaving your opponent visionless.
 * By using smart cast, you can cast and  together in such a way that you dash back while shooting the three bullets of  in front of you. Use this combo to finish off enemies with low hp and make a quick escape.

Build usage

 * Due to the high AD ratios on and, stacking items that provide AD is a great way to increase Graves' damage output.  and/or  are both excellent items on.
 * Similarly, building armor penetration items like and  can greatly increase his damage output from the said skills as they deal physical damage. The former is more useful for Graves as it not only grants him a bit of durability due to his short range, but also gives armor shred debuff in his AoE skills that is beneficial to your entire team.
 * Due to the fact that has only his  to slow enemies,  (or ) gives him a high utility, but it sacrifices his damage potential.
 * Cooldown reduction and attack speed can significantly reduce downtime.
 * With enough attack speed to reach the 2.5 cap with active,  can be active continuously.
 * passive lets reduce the cooldown of  three times faster, as the 2 minor bolts are considered to be auto attacks.
 * Despite being listed as a default recommended offensive item, is an ill advised item to rush on  since Graves have relatively high AD scaling skills and the item does not give enough AD.
 * However, it synergizes well with as it will help reduce the CD of the said ability thanks to the built in attack speed. Players should take this item into consideration as a situational item when dealing with tanks buildings lots of health after building enough AD and armor penetration with it's passive and active.

Countering

 * One of strengths is his burst. Try to avoid his high burst and take advantage of his high cooldowns during the early game.
 * Also note that auto attack is fairly short (525 range), use this as your advantage by playing poke based ADCs ( and ).
 * Consider investing in early armor to mitigate his damage at early game.
 * Try to spread your team out, to minimize the damage from.
 * Quickly move out of . The debuff only last when you are inside the AoE.
 * Also, save your spells until outside of as the vision loss can lead to the loss of your target.
 * If you are a champion that plans to cast a supportive ability on an ally, considering staying close to the ally so that cannot stop you from seeing them and thus casting onto them.
 * Avoid extended skirmishes with as he gains armor and magic resistance as the battle rages on from . The bonus armor and magic resist can change an expected kill to a close call.