Twisted Fate Needs Some Help

With slated for removal with patch 5.2, Twisted Fate really isn't looking very good anymore. Before the mana changes, his Q was hit with a pretty hard mana nerf, so now he absolutely needs to buy mana items. This problem was amplified when the changes went through as now he runs out of mana very quickly and you have to spam bluecard just to sustain yourself in a reasonable fashion. Of course, Lich Bane, a core item was nerfed very heavily awhile back because of its abuse on assassins, so he relied quite a bit on DFA for his burst and killing power. With that gone, I don't see him able to 1v1 anyone. Your only choice will be to use Gate to assist with kills. Nevermind the fact that his ultimate was nerfed early game so he has fewer opportunities to use it anyway.

His win rate has really dropped and he currently sits near the bottom as one of the worst mages in the game (and this is before losing DFG). He is going to need some serious oomph to make up for it.

Really, his ultimate isn't even that amazing anymore considering teleport has been buffed and turned into a more common pick. Combine that with new champions like having as much, if not more map presence than Twisted Fate does.

I've resorted to playing him as a Support or ADC rather than a mid-lane at this point because there are just so many better choices available.