Infinity Edge/Infinity Gloves
Infinity Edge has always been a powerful item when maintaining its original functionality from League of Legends: providing critical damage for basic attacks. This makes Infinity Edge a “must-have” item as soon as possible, especially in the early game, when the opponent’s units are quite fragile and easy to eliminate. Infinity Edge is also one of the three “meta-defining” items for LeBlanc “God Chain” and in fact, this item is favored in almost every season.
As for Infinity Gloves, this item has always been an excellent choice for champions with true damage or AP damage and has frequently been used in previous seasons. Although this item isn’t overly popular, it consistently proves its strength and brings many surprises, especially since it also provides a certain critical rate and can be combined with Infinity Edge for champions who deal both basic attack damage and skill damage.
Guardian Angel
One of the defensive items that must be built as soon as possible is definitely the Guardian Angel. Providing a resurrection effect for the owner with 400 health, this is also considered a top “comeback” item in TFT.
In previous seasons, Guardian Angel particularly interacted best with Master Yi in Season 3 (meta Master Yi Bluetooth) when this champion had a mechanism to restore health. However, it wasn’t until Season 5 that Guardian Angel maximized its effect when combined with the Dark Blue Buff in the powerful LeBlanc “God Chain” meta at the beginning of the season. Each time LeBlanc resurrects from Guardian Angel, this unit can continuously chain the enemies to death.
Runaan’s Hurricane – Rapid Firecannon
Compared to the two names above, this duo has had a relatively inconsistent performance throughout the 5 seasons of TFT. In Season 1, the combination of Rapid Firecannon – Runaan’s Hurricane was an extremely powerful item that gave rise to the “Master Yi Bluetooth” meta or was the meta-defining item for the Marksman lineup or Olaf team-carry in Seasons 3, 4, and 4.5, while in Season 2, Runaan’s Hurricane was not rated highly as it only attacked one additional enemy adjacent to the target with 60% damage, which was too little to be effective in battles.
Specifically regarding Rapid Firecannon, this item has been strong across all seasons and as mentioned above, Master Yi Bluetooth utilized Rapid Firecannon to spawn the Kassadin Void meta (Season 1) or the Divine Fighter Warwick in Season 4. However, in Season 5, this item is mainly built for long-range champions as it only provides an additional spell cast range, making short-range champions less appealing.
Morello’s Evil Tome
This item functions similarly to the Burning Armor but it wasn’t until Season 5, when there were too many champions with skills that could dive into the entire enemy team, that Morello’s Evil Tome truly became a hot item as per its characteristics. The simple reason is that in previous seasons, while Morello’s Evil Tome was powerful, its burn damage was too low. It wasn’t until Season 5 that Morello’s Evil Tome became the “meta-defining” item that countered many metas, especially those with healing capabilities or “tanky” formations like Warriors, Divine, and Rebirth, and it interacts best with Kennen.
Guinsoo’s Rageblade – Bloodthirster/Dark Bloodthirster
This is the strongest item duo currently in Season 5, as it works well for any champion using it, but it is maximized in the hands of Legion champions – who have been buffed to gain 25% attack speed or more if there are at least 2 champions from the same class in the lineup. However, before Season 5, Rageblade and Bloodthirster had already pioneered many incredibly powerful metas, notably the Blender Nocturne of Season 1.
The reason this combo is favored is due to the massive damage output they provide, along with insane attack speed, making it one of the most comprehensive offensive-defensive combos in TFT. Even when using Dark Bloodthirster, which causes the owner to lose 33% of their maximum health, combined with Rageblade still delivers excellent results, especially since the health recovery is much faster than with regular Bloodthirster.