With the Season 4 preseason comes the introduction of a new item called “trinkets”. In this article, I am going to talk about the three trinkets, their upgrades, and how I think they are going to impact season 4. So, lets get started.
What Are Trinkets?
Trinkets are a new free item that currently claims the ‘4’ button on the keyboard. This little gadget can either place a ward, scan a location, or reveal stealthed objects/champions. All of these trinkets are extremely useful considering they are free items.
On top of that, they automatically upgrade when your champion hits level 9 and you can further upgrade them for 475 gold. Sounds helpful right?
Tip: Personally, I am used to placing particular items in the 4, 5, and 6 slots of my inventory so getting them all pushed over got me pretty confused. Bind the trinkets to 7 (or ~) and move the other inventory slots back to normal if it is confusing you too!
The Warding Totem
As the name suggests, the warding totem creates wards. The basic totem creates a 60 second stealth ward with a 120 second cooldown while the level 9 upgrade (the Greater Totem) produces a 120 second stealth ward with the same cooldown. It can then be upgraded into either a Greater Stealth Totem which produces a 180 second stealth ward (120 second cooldown), or a Greater Vision Totem which produces an infinite duration vision ward (180 second cooldown).
This is an ideal item for laners who do not want to spend money on warding. Why spend 75 gold on something you can get for free! The free ward allows you to buy bigger starting items and avoid early jungler ganks at the same time.
However, this comes with a price. Unknown to many players, enemy players can look at your trinket and see how many wards you have placed down! As a jungler use this to know if the enemy warded or where they wound up warding!
Don’t gank, he warded
The Sweeping Lens
The sweeping lens is the new method of clearing out invisible traps or stealth wards. The sweeping lens allows you to scan a nearby location for invisible objects. It disables and reveals these invisible traps/wards, allowing for easy clearing. The first level of this trinket allows you to scan within 400 range (180 second cooldown). The level 9 upgrade doubles the sweep area of effect while increasing the range to 600 and decreasing cooldown by 30. The final upgrade, Oracle’s Lens, further reduces the cooldown by 30 seconds while adding a True Sight effect on your champion. True Sight lets you walk around the map for 10 seconds with the ability to detect stealth. Perfect for clearing multiple bushes that are close to each other or for hunting invisible Teemos.
Whoa, good thing I didn’t facecheck that
An important thing to remember is that the Sweeping Lens and the Greater Lens do not allow you to see invisible units! Unknown to you readers, in the bush scanned above, the illusive Teemo is lying in wait to assassinate me. Do not forget this!
The Scrying Orb
The scrying orb is a trinket that allows you to scan a location within a fixed distance from yourself. The scan lasts for a single second and reveals the location even granting vision in brushes. However, it does not reveal invisible champions or stealth wards so do not rely on it for those purposes.
The initial orb allows you to scan an area within 1100 range (150 second cooldown). The level 9 Greater Orb extends the range to 2000 with the same cooldown. Finally, the Farsight Orb allows you to scan a good 2500 range with a 120 second cooldown.
While this trinket may not seem as useful as the other two, it most certainly does have its uses. You can use it to scan very distant brushes far from the usual ward range. This reduces the chances of you accidentally facechecking into the entire enemy team.
This trinket can also be used in conjunction with really long range ultimates such as Caitlyn’s Ace in the Hole, Lux’s Final Spark, or Ezreal’s Trueshot Barrage when an opponent barely escapes from death with a flash or other escape spell. 
You think you can get away?
Final Thoughts
All of the trinkets are interesting items that have immense utility. Considering that they are free items, you can get quite a lot out of them, whether it be orthodox uses or thinking outside the box. The preseason so far has not gone on for too long, but I am excited to think about how the meta will change and how professional players will put these items to use in tournaments.
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Shoutouts to
Hotoyt and Zantiphiny for helping with the pictures
