Alice

Pick Alice when the fight has to happen in a crowd

Alice is correct when the enemy draft wants clustered, repeated contact: double front line, objective setups around Turtle or Lord, short-range mages, and roamers who need to walk forward before their crowd control matters. She turns that shape of fight into fuel because her passive rewards every skill hit with Crimson stacks, then converts nearby bodies into damage and healing once Blood Banquet is running.

She is a trap when the enemy can refuse the circle. Wanwan, Beatrix, Granger, Lesley, and other ranged carries with clean exit buttons can make Alice spend S1 just to arrive, then force her to chase outside the aura. Baxia is the sharper draft warning because his built-in regen cut attacks the exact stat Alice is built around. Karrie, X.Borg, Karina, and other true-damage threats also punish HP stacking, so do not pretend another defensive item will solve that matchup.

The best Alice games have a setter or front line who can hold people in place while she walks into the second wave of the fight. Atlas, Tigreal, Khufra, Minotaur, and Hylos all make her job simpler because they give the enemy a reason to group. If your team has no opener and the enemy has two clean disengage tools, Alice becomes a slow chase hero with expensive items.

Blood Banquet is the whole hero

Alice is not a normal burst mage anymore. Her kit is one engine: hit with skills, build Crimson, turn on Blood Banquet, then keep touching heroes so the aura never falls off. Every good Alice decision protects that engine.

Crimson Gleam is the delivery tool. You throw S1 through the lane or fight, then choose whether the recast is worth spending. The damage is secondary. The important question is whether the blink puts you inside a target who cannot immediately leave.

Doom Waltz is the maintenance button. It gives Alice her most reliable close-range hit, refreshes the stack loop, slows the people she is standing on, and becomes much more valuable after Blood Banquet is already active. Pressing it before the passive is ready is fine for setup. Pressing it after the passive is active is where the fight starts to tilt.

Throne of Ruin is not a panic heal. It is an entry shell. Alice becomes hard to stop during the charge, then lands with crowd control where she finishes the channel. The S1 recast during that window is the trick that separates a real Alice from a player who only presses ultimate in the middle of the screen.

Laning: the first 5 minutes

1. Start with Doom Waltz and contest the first wave by standing close enough to hit hero and minions. You are not trying to solo-kill at level one. You are teaching the lane that every short trade has to happen inside your stack pattern.
2. Unlock Crimson Gleam, then save the recast until it changes the trade. Throwing S1 for poke is fine. Blinking after every cast is not. Recast when it lets S2 connect, dodge the return skill, or follow a forced Flicker.
3. Arrive at the first Turtle with lane cleared, not with a half wave dying under your tower. Alice needs item timing more than early highlight plays. Push, walk with your jungler if the river fight is real, then return before the next wave turns into lost gold.

Vengeance is the default EXP spell because Alice wants enemies to spend damage into her while the aura is already working. Flicker is the greedier choice for games where the enemy back line is slippery and your team already has enough front-line damage reduction.

The Clock and Oracle checkpoint

The first real checkpoint is Clock of Destiny into Oracle, usually around the second Turtle window in a clean EXP game. Clock gives Alice the HP, magic power, cooldown, and defensive stacking profile that rewards constant magic damage. Oracle turns her self-healing from a trade tool into a front-line plan.

Before those two items, play like a durable skirmisher. Take short trades, keep the wave honest, and join fights where your S1 angle is already good. After those two items, you can stand in the pocket for longer because every repeated skill hit is also building the item and passive loop that keeps you alive.

This spike does not mean you can dive the marksman alone. It means you can claim space around the tank, Lord pit, or mid-river entrance long enough for your team to collapse. If Clock and Oracle arrive late because you kept forcing empty rotations, Alice loses the part of the match where her sustain is hardest to answer.

Stop chasing the smallest health bar

The common wrong reflex is to blink past the tank and chase the marksman. That turns Alice into a worse assassin. Her passive and item plan are strongest when she is touching the enemy who has the most HP and the least ability to leave.

1. Enter on the front line first. Put Blood Banquet on the tank, fighter, or roam who has to hold the choke. They give you the longest contact time and the most reliable refreshes.
2. Let the carry come back to the fight. If the marksman spends dash or Flicker to leave your aura, that is a win for the first half of the fight. Hold the space instead of chasing into their support.
3. Use Throne of Ruin before the control chain lands. Alice wants to absorb the first crowd-control attempt while charging, not after Franco, Atlas, or Minotaur has already locked her down.

The support-dependent edge case is a pocket healer. With Estes, Floryn, or Rafaela behind you, Alice can play one step deeper because Oracle improves the whole sustain picture. With Diggie, Mathilda, or a peel-only roam, stay more disciplined. Their value is repositioning or cleansing, not keeping you alive through a long drain trade.

Itemization: locked sustain, honest flex slots

The locked EXP shell is Tough Boots, Clock of Destiny, and Oracle. Tough Boots protects the entry. Clock rewards repeated magic contact. Oracle is the reason Alice can turn small heals into enough time for another Doom Waltz cycle.

Glowing Wand is the first flex conversation when the enemy has healing, shields, or HP-stack frontliners. Alice applies damage repeatedly in a radius, so the burn and Lifebane pressure fit naturally. Concentrated Energy is the greedier sustain-damage item when the enemy cannot burst you before the fight becomes extended. Build it when you are already reaching the second rotation inside fights.

Brute Force Breastplate is the physical bruiser answer when you need more movement and control resistance while staying active. Dominance Ice is better when attack-speed carries or sustain fighters are hitting you often enough to trigger its debuff. Queen's Wings is the anti-burst bridge against teams that can drop Alice low before Blood Banquet fully turns on. Winter Crown is the final emergency button, not a default fourth item, because stasis can save one collapse but does not help Alice keep the aura running.

Jungle Alice has a different conversation. Retribution is mandatory, and Cursed Helmet becomes valuable because it accelerates clear while matching her close-range identity. Do not copy the jungle build into EXP just because the first two items look similar. Lane Alice needs fight durability first. Jungle Alice needs camp tempo without losing the mid-game sustain core.

Mistakes that lose Alice games

Blinking in before Blood Banquet is prepared. S1 recast feels like an engage button, but Alice needs stacks before the drain plan is real. Start the contact, confirm the fight is staying in range, then spend the blink to follow or reposition.

Picking her into Baxia and calling it a skill matchup. Baxia cuts the healing Alice is paying gold to amplify. If he is already locked and your team has no overwhelming draft reason to force Alice anyway, choose a different EXP or jungle frontliner.

Buying only defense because you died once. Alice needs damage contact to heal, stack Clock, and threaten the people standing near her. A pure armor detour before her sustain core often makes her live longer while contributing less, which is how objectives are lost slowly.

Chasing ranged carries through open space. Alice wins in chokes, pits, waves, and layered crowd control. She loses when she spends S1 forward, misses the aura refresh, and gives the enemy marksman a clean kiting lane.

Using ultimate after the enemy crowd control has already landed. Throne of Ruin is strongest as a pre-emptive entry. If you wait until the hook, knockup, or freeze has connected, you have already missed the part of the skill that lets Alice ignore the first stop sign.

Key tips