Qi — Patch 1.62 Verdict
[Liquipedia RPL: S] Pro play (RPL 2026): 80 picks, 37.5% WR, 47.4% pick/ban rate. Note: pro meta may differ from ranked.
Qi — Warrior Guide
Qi answers the question of what happens when a tank hits you like a fighter. She plays like a freight train wrapped in armor: charge through minion waves with Starchaser, shred resistances with Mountain Shaker's stacking armor-reduction, then blow up isolated targets with a point-blank ult that punishes any hero standing near a wall. You bully your lane opponent into submission, stack Aura charges off your skills to keep your HP topped up through the two-auto healing procs, then become a teamfight menace who can peel a whole backline against the nearest piece of terrain.
This patch she sits firmly in A tier on a 37.5% win rate against a 28.1% pick rate, so she is picked a lot and still winning her share, which tells you she is reliable rather than flashy. The 19.3% ban rate confirms enemy teams respect her enough to remove her before the game starts. She is not the broken stomper of previous patches, but the Mountain Shaker armor shred stays obnoxiously good into physical-heavy comps, which are everywhere on the Thai server right now. Pick her up if you already understand slayer-lane fundamentals, enjoy close-range brawling, and want a warrior who can still function as a semi-tank when your team needs it.
Strengths
- +Starchaser's airborne into Mountain Shaker's armor shred creates a self-contained all-in that Qi can execute without any teammate assistance, making her one of the slayer lane's most reliable solo-kill threats.
- +Protection Aura's stacking armor and two-auto heal make short trades heavily favorable for Qi, allowing her to repeatedly duel melee warriors who lack burst or CC of their own.
- +The Brawler's wall-pin is a 1.5-second hard stun that Qi triggers entirely on her own, giving her disproportionate carry potential in a role that usually depends on setup from supports or junglers.
- +Mountain Shaker's up-to-five-stack armor reduction synergizes violently with a full physical build, meaning her late-game damage output far exceeds what her warrior/tank label suggests.
Weaknesses
- −Qi's entire threat model collapses against enemies with reliable dashes or blinks, if the target simply moves away after the Q airborne, the R wall-pin never connects and her combo deals mediocre damage.
- −Protection Aura stacks expire after only 5 seconds, so extended kiting or ranged poke burns her sustain window down without ever triggering the healing autos, leaving her surprisingly vulnerable against patient opponents.
- −Starchaser is Qi's only gap-closer, and using it defensively means surrendering all offensive threat for a full cooldown cycle, skilled opponents exploit this timing aggressively.
- −Her damage is almost entirely physical with no true magical component, making her straightforward to itemize against: one Gaia's Standard or Mantle of Ra on a tank can dramatically reduce her effectiveness in teamfights.
Abilities
PProtection Aura
When Qi uses an ability, she accumulates Aura stacks (max 3). Each stack grants her armor for 5s. If an ability hits enemies, her next 2 auto attacks gain 100% attack speed and deal physical damage while restoring HP.
1Starchaser
Qi dashes forward, dealing physical damage to all enemies hit and knocking them airborne for 0.5s.
2Mountain Shaker
Qi releases a shockwave, dealing physical damage and reducing enemy armor in the area for 5s (max 5 stacks).
RThe Brawler
Qi pushes all enemies back, dealing physical damage. If enemies hit an obstacle, they take additional physical damage and are stunned for 1.5s. Qi can recast to dash forward and deal physical damage (15% of HP lost).
How to Use Qi's Kit
Every skill cast stacks one Aura charge (max 3), and each charge adds a chunk of armor for 5 seconds, so in a 1v1, the longer the trade goes, the tankier Qi gets. The real payoff is the two-stack proc: land a skill on an enemy and your next two auto-attacks gain 100% attack speed plus physical damage and HP restoration, turning a short trade window into a burst of free sustain. The most common mistake is using all three skills in one burst and walking away before getting both empowered autos off, stay in melee range after your combo to cash in every heal tick.
A short, fast dash that airbornes every enemy it passes through for half a second, this is your primary engage tool, your escape, and your Passive trigger all in one button. The hitbox is wider than it looks, so angled casts can clip enemies standing just off the direct path. In lane, resist the urge to Q purely for poke; save it to initiate a full combo where the 0.5-second lift gives you time to land W and position for the R wall-pin. Cooldown management matters: blowing Q defensively to dodge a skillshot can leave you unable to engage for a full rotation.
An area pulse that reduces armor on every nearby enemy for 5 seconds and stacks up to five times, at full stacks a target's armor is essentially gone, which is disgusting when you're building Fenrir's Tooth and Omni Arms. Use it immediately after Q lands so the armor shred is already eating into the target while your empowered autos proc. The biggest mistake in teamfights is casting W while standing away from the cluster; you need to be in the thick of the enemy team to hit multiple stacks on multiple targets simultaneously, not on the edge.
The first cast blasts all nearby enemies backward, enemies that get knocked into a wall take bonus physical damage and are stunned for 1.5 seconds, which is the entire reason Qi is threatening. The second cast is a forward dash that deals damage scaled on Qi's missing HP, so it hits significantly harder when she's been in a prolonged brawl. Always use R first cast to pin enemies against terrain before following up with the re-cast dash, using the dash first wastes the wall-stun window entirely. In the slayer lane, learn every wall angle in the side corridors so the initial push always connects with geometry.
Skill Order
Priority: R > Q > W| Skill | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1Starchaser | 1 | · | 3 | · | 5 | · | 7 | · | 9 | · | · | · | · | · | · |
2Mountain Shaker | · | 2 | · | 4 | · | · | · | 8 | · | 10 | · | 12 | · | · | · |
RThe Brawler | · | · | · | · | · | 6 | · | · | · | · | 11 | · | · | · | 15 |
Loadout
Golden Body
Spirit
Dragon's ClawStandard Build
1
2
3
4
5
6Core Combos
Standard Lane Kill
1P2Use Q to airborne the target, immediately cast W to stack armor shred, then cash in both Passive-empowered autos during the lift window for maximum sustained damage in lane.
Wall-Pin Execute
12RREngage with Q, proc W shred mid-air, cast R first cast to pin the enemy into a wall for the 1.5-second stun, collect the two empowered autos, then re-cast R's dash while they're stunned and your HP is depleted enough for the missing-HP bonus to matter.
Flicker Wall-Pin (no dash required)
2RRAgainst targets who are hugging a wall but outside Q range, W first to pre-apply armor shred, then R and immediately Flicker behind them so they're pushed into the wall before they can react, this is the setup your opponents least expect.
Full Rotation Brawl
1P2RRThe complete all-in for squishies with no escape: Q airborne into W shred, R wall-stun, empowered autos during stun, then re-dash for the missing-HP burst to finish the kill if they popped a shield or healed mid-fight.
Gameplan
Qi's first real spike is level 4, when all three abilities are online and the full Q into W into R combo is available. She snowballs hard once Broken Spear is done; the armor penetration plus Mountain Shaker's shred makes her trade damage genuinely scary. The Omni Arms rush after that turns her empowered autos into proper burst, and Fenrir's Tooth marks her damage ceiling. She is weakest in the first two levels before Q is leveled, and she fades slightly in a 5v5 if she can't find isolated wall-pin opportunities. Force extended 1v1s before 15 minutes, and play for picks in the mid-game rather than frontline brawling.
Early Game
Levels 1–6- →Play for short aggressive trades at level 1 using an auto-attack into minions to stack one Passive charge before level 2 — this puts you ahead in the first real exchange when Q comes online.
- →After hitting level 4, look for the first solo-kill attempt by forcing the enemy under tower range with Starchaser's airborne, denying them the safe retreat distance needed to survive the wall-pin combo.
- →Rotate to Dragon only if your jungler is already contesting — never sacrifice a push wave or lane bounty for a Dragon fight you are not needed for.
Mid Game
Post Broken Spear- →After completing Broken Spear, roam toward the mid lane specifically to pin squishy mages or marksmen against the narrow corridor walls where R's wall-stun is almost unavoidable.
- →Use Mountain Shaker in every teamfight at full stack depth — dive into the centre of the enemy cluster so the armor shred applies to as many targets as possible, amplifying your entire team's physical damage.
- →Track the enemy jungler's position before every side-lane all-in; Qi is extremely vulnerable to counter-ganks if she has burned Q on the lane opponent and has no escape tool for 8+ seconds.
Late Game
Teamfight phase- →In late-game 5v5s, open each fight with R's first cast to shove the carry or mid-laner into a wall before your team's damage dealers arrive — a 1.5-second stun on a squishy is a death sentence.
- →Build Death Sickle before Blade of Eternity if the enemy team has heavy burst; the active shield combined with Passive armor stacks makes Qi nearly unkillable in a 2-second window, long enough to land the full combo.
- →If you have secured enough kill gold to be ahead, transition to being the primary engage rather than waiting for a jungler initiation — your wall geometry knowledge is your biggest late-game edge.
Matchups
Never first-pick Qi into a comp with two or more mobile duelists. Butterfly and Murad are the hardest bans to watch for; if either is available and the enemy has priority, leave her in the pool and pivot to a different slayer. She is a genuine bully into immobile warriors like Arduin or Skud who have to eat the full Q into W into R combo with no dash to escape. Against bad matchups like Florentino, use short-trade patterns with only W and passive autos rather than committing the full combo, and play around Flicker defensively to survive ganks until your item lead closes the gap. Draft Annette or Baldum in the same comp when you can; the CC amplification turns her from a slayer into something close to a hard-engage tank that her tier placement doesn't fully advertise.
Qi gets countered by
ButterflyButterfly's blink-on-kill and rapid dashes let her exit the R push zone entirely, and her physical lifesteal sustain outlasts Qi's Passive heal window in extended duels.
MuradMurad's Phase Shift can dodge Starchaser completely, removing Qi's airborne setup and leaving her without a combo entry point for the entire cooldown cycle.
FlorentinoFlorentino's passive flower pickups grant him so much healing and attack speed that he wins any prolonged brawl Qi tries to force, and his agility makes landing the R wall-pin unreliable.
VeresVeres out-ranges Qi's engage tools with her whip abilities and can chase down Qi after the dash cooldown is burned, reversing the aggressor role entirely.
Qi synergizes with
BaldumBaldum's toss sets up enemies next to walls perfectly, and the follow-up R wall-stun from Qi creates a back-to-back CC chain that gives the target essentially no reaction window.
AnnetteAnnette's tornado pulls enemies together and into fixed positions, turning Mountain Shaker's multi-hit armor shred into a guaranteed five-stack on clustered targets.
VioletViolet's burst damage is obscene against armor-shredded targets, Qi's Mountain Shaker stacks turn Violet's shots into execution-level damage against anyone Qi has been hitting.
OrmarrOrmarr's repeated knockups chain beautifully with Qi's own airborne, creating a lockdown duration that lets Qi stack full Passive armor and dish out both empowered autos before the enemy can retaliate.
Pro Tips
- →When using the Flicker Wall-Pin combo, cast R first and Flicker in the same instant, the game registers the push from your new position, meaning enemies standing anywhere near a wall can be stunned even without landing Starchaser first.
- →Mountain Shaker's five-stack armor reduction is a buff on the enemy, not a debuff that refreshes; each cast adds a new stack independently, so rapid successive casts in the opening seconds of a fight deal far more total physical damage than spacing them out.
- →Qi's R re-cast scales on missing HP, so intentionally taking a few hits before firing the second cast in a duel, rather than using it immediately, can mean the difference between a kill and a flash escape.
- →In the slayer corridor, the bushes near each turret create a natural wall angle that many opponents don't anticipate, bait the enemy into the bush, then R-push them into the side wall rather than straight back, where the stun geometry is more predictable.
Qi is the slayer pick for players who want agency without giving up tankiness. She can carry on individual mechanics while still working as a frontliner when the team needs it. Her ceiling is unlocked entirely by map-geometry knowledge and the discipline to save Starchaser for engage rather than burning it reactively. Master the wall-pin consistently and learn to stack Mountain Shaker before your carries arrive in a fight, and she rewards you with games that feel almost unfair. Diamond-and-above players who like punishing positional mistakes and dominating physical-heavy metas should keep her in the active pool right now.
Qi — Frequently Asked Questions
Is Qi good in the current ROV patch?+
Yes. Qi is a solid A-tier pick on the Thai server on a 37.5% win rate across a 28.1% pick rate, so she is played heavily and still performing. Her 19.3% ban rate confirms coordinated enemy teams would rather remove her than deal with her wall-pin in a live game. Not broken, but consistently reliable.
What is the best build for Qi?+
Recommended core is Gilded Greaves into Broken Spear into Omni Arms into Fenrir's Tooth into Death Sickle into Blade of Eternity. Broken Spear is the most important spike because the armor penetration stacks devastatingly with Mountain Shaker's armor shred. Death Sickle before Blade of Eternity is preferred in games where the enemy has burst assassins.
How do you counter Qi?+
The fastest way to neutralize her is a hero with a reliable dash or blink; Murad, Butterfly, and Florentino all deny her the wall-pin that makes her dangerous. Itemizing one physical defense piece like Gaia's Standard on a tank also cuts the Mountain Shaker shred's impact in the mid-to-late game. Stay away from walls when she has her ultimate up.
Is Qi hard to play, and is she good for beginners?+
Medium, and accurate. Her base combo is learnable quickly, but her real value needs knowing every wall angle on the map to land the R wall-stun consistently. Beginners can win with the basic Q into W into R rotation, but players who practice geometry and the Flicker wall-pin combo perform dramatically better. Not recommended as a first slayer pick for brand-new players.