How to Play Sentinel — TFT Set 13: Into the Arcane
Welcome to our trait guide, where we’ll be covering the Sentinel trait in the new TFT Set 13: Into the Arcane. In this guide, we’ll explain how Sentinel works, cover the different champions, provide notable Augment choices, and cover some potential team comps.
Explore all of the new Set 13 traits here!
How TFT Sentinel Works
Sentinel is the new Armor/MR frontline trait for Set 13. We’ve had Sentinel in the past, and they’re another flavor of things like Vanguard or Warden. Overall, the Sentinel trait is extremely simple, giving some bonus Armor/MR to the entire team, but Sentinels will gain more.
While the bonus does apply to the entire team, it’s a bit counterproductive. If you want to buff your team more, you can add more Sentinels. But at that point you’re turning your board into more Sentinels. I fully expect most team comps to play 2 or maybe 4 Sentinel to get a good frontline buff. This also won’t compromise your board as you can focus on higher cost units.
Sentinel Trait Bonus
Champions: Irelia 1g / Singed 1g / Leona 2g / Rell 2g / Loris 3g / Illaoi 4g / Rumble 5g
Your team gains Armor and Magic Resist. Sentinels gain triple.
- (2) 10 Armor & MR
- (4) 25 Armor & MR
- (6) 50 Armor & MR
Sentinel Synergy
Here’s a list of traits you can branch into from the Sentinel units:
- Rebel 2x (Irelia/Illaoi)
- Chem-Baron (Singed)
- Academy (Leona)
- Conqueror (Rell)
- Visionary (Rell)
- Enforcer (Loris)
- Scrap (Rumble)
The Sentinel trait does have one overlap, and that’s Rebel on Irelia (1g) and Illaoi (4g). This gives the trait a good amount of direction for early team building. Jinx is a 5-cost Rebel, who can round out a trio of 3 Rebel and 2 Sentinel with Irelia and Illaoi.
Outside of that, we have a good variety of other traits. The early game units can be used for your frontline, and it’d be ideal if they also provide benefit from both their traits.
TFT Sentinel Champions
Irelia Rebel Sentinel 1g
[Link to Champion Page]
Irelia is a simple 1-cost Sentinel with a Shield ability. She’ll do a bit of damage as well, but that goes for just about every frontline unit. As previously mentioned, Irelia can be a good unit to keep around to pair with Illaoi later.
When you hit the endgame, though, you’ll likely want to replace Irelia with a higher-cost unit if you can.
Singed Chem-Baron Sentinel 1g
[Link to Champion Page]
Singed has a very unique ability for a 1-cost unit. As usual, he’ll gain some defensive stats, this time being Durability. However, he will also give a short burst of Attack Speed to the ally who has dealt the most damage.
This gives Singed a lot of utility even in the late game as he can buff up your main carry. Assuming your main carry deals the most damage before Singed casts, they’ll get a nice buff. While the buff is short, it’s still a strong buff.
Lastly, his Chem-Baron trait will be important to put together early. Chem-Baron is the economy trait of the set, and you’ll want to assemble it early to get your lose streak going.
Leona Academy Sentinel 2g
[Link to Champion Page]
Leona is a very straightforward frontline unit. She’ll gain some Durability on cast and deal some damage around her. There’s nothing too special about her kit, so pick her up if you need another Sentinel or are planning to build toward Academy.
Rell Conqueror Sentinel Visionary 2g
[Link to Champion Page]
Rell is the other 2-cost Sentinel, and her ability is a bit more unique than Leona. She’ll gain a shield on cast, but she’ll also hit enemies in a line, stealing Armor and MR from them. Assuming this steal is permanent, Rell could potentially gain a lot of Armor/MR over the fight.
We’ve seen abilities like this turn into degenerate reroll carrys, but we’ll see if Rell has what it takes. Riot also generally doesn’t keep builds like these viable for long, so if it’s ever meta, get your games in while you can.
Lastly, Rell does have three traits, making her very flexible. She can be a great early pickup for your frontline to keep you flexible to multiple options.
Loris Enforcer Sentinel 3g
[Link to Champion Page]
Loris is a frontline that is dedicated to frontlining. His ability will grant him a shield and redirect damage taken by adjacent allies to the shield. When the shield expires, it will deal damage in an area. Redirecting damage can be good, but it’s less impactful if he’s already next to other frontline tanks.
Ideally, you have him close to a melee carry to help absorb some damage from them. But, even if you have all tanks up front, Loris’ shield will still help tank more damage.
Illaoi Rebel Sentinel 4g
[Link to Champion Page]
Illaoi is the 4-cost Sentinel, and her ability has multiple parts. She’ll gain Durability, drain Health from enemies, and slam down, dealing damage in an area. The damage portion of her ability will also scale from her Armor/MR stats, so you can build with full tank items and her damage will still increase.
Overall, Illaoi is solid frontline unit to have, providing a mix of damage and survivability.
Rumble Junker King Scrap Sentinel 5g
[Link to Champion Page]
Rumble is our last Sentinel, and he definitely has carry potential. His ability will rain down missiles dealing AP damage, Burning them, and Wounding them. Wound reduces enemy healing by 33%, which is an important utility to have for the late game.
Furthermore, Rumble’s Junker King trait will give you special Armory shops, where you can buy upgrades for his Mech. This means that if you have a lot of money going into the late game, you can really juice up Rumble into a powerful unit.
However, if your economy is bad, hitting a Rumble may not stabilize your board if you can’t upgrade him enough.
Best TFT Sentinel Augments
In general, Augments like Crest and Crown will always be good, but there are definitely more notable ones to explore and discover. As we make our way to the PBE, we’ll be sure to test a variety of combinations and update this article with what we find.
TFT Sentinel Team Comps
The set has yet to even come out on PBE yet, and unfortunately, our team was unable to playtest the Set this time around. While we can’t recommend team comps at the moment, we’ll be sure to come back and update this article once we have a good feel for things.
Thanks for Reading! If you want to try and come up with your own team comps for Set 13, check out our Team Builder. For a full overview on the new set, check out our TFT Set 13 Reveal Page.
