Hecarim, at his base he can be many things. He can be a jungler, he can be a tank, he can be a carry. But when you think about it anyone can be all of those things. I play him as a support type hit-and-runner. I start the game with Ghost and Exhaust and my 21/0/9 masteries and with the intent to go bottom. Now with my play of Hecarim, which I find successful, he is tanky, but he is also able to get in and out of a fight with doing good damage on the way. One of the coolest parts of Hecarim is that he gets damage from his extra move speed, 25% when he is level 18, so why not use that to your advantage? Also the passive allows you to go through minions, which is like when ghost is active, so this helps the escapability that he has because you cant be boxed in by minions while you get ganked. With my build you do use that to your advantage, you get the bonus of that move speed, for chasing and running away, and the damage from it, which I believe really ties in to the role that Hecarim should play in the game.

Looking at your runes you should get flat armor pen marks, this gives bonus damage early on, and helps late game, but early on its easy to stack armor, and could be smart as getting damage is easier than getting AP so sometimes people have a lot of armor, so this helps to increase your early damage. Then you get flat armor seals and magic resist per level glyphs, these help with the survival of your play, the flat armor for the most armor early game, and the magic resist per level because as I said, getting AP early is harder, but late game these help to stack up and give you more magic resist. Lastly you get move speed quints, these just help with the damage bonus and the speed that you are trying to build with Hecarim.

With the masteries you get the basic kind of AD masteries, the damage, armor pen, life steal, attack speed and crit. This helps to again, increase the early game damage while helping some late game. You spend the last 9 points in Utility, the first three in the reduction of death time, this gets you back on the battlefield faster, and one in the recall one because you need a point, and you don't really need mana regin, and the summoner spell one doesn't apply to you, so you get that one. Then getting the four movement speed ones, again going for your speed runner type build, and the last one is for buffs because when you do have time to go in the jungle, its nice to have them last a little while longer as they do help kill people.

Item wise you start with boots and pots, these give you the speed you are searching for, and the pots help you stay alive. You then go into a zeal to give more speed, and some basic AD stuff, the crit and attack speed. Next you get your Boots of Swiftness, in case you can't see it coming, for the speed. You then proceed to get phage for survival and some damage, and then turn the phage and zeal into a trinity force, this gives you health, mana, regins, move speed, crit, attack speed, AP, AD, and the sheen activation thing. After trinity force you build a sunfire. The sunfire helps with HP and armor, as well as giving the AOE effect, which ties in well with your W spell. After your sunfire you go Phantom Dancer, this is for the move speed mainly, but the crit and attack speed are nice too. Now is when the attention gets turned to more tanky and less speedy as you get a Force of Nature, the HP regin is a big factor, but the magic resist is another one. Lastly Warmog's in order to take full advantage of the unique passive of the Force of Nature.

For skills you want to start with Rampage, then your W, which is Spirit of Dread, Rampage again, then Devastating Charge at level four. You max Rampage first for the spammable damage, getting your ult, Onslaught of Shadows, when its available. You want to max Spirit of Dread second as it gives you some AOE damage, and it also heals you some of the damage that it does, so it makes it good for team fights and it makes it nice for clearing minions. The only main difference on Devastation Charge is the damage, the speed changes very little. So basically when it comes to using your skills what you want to try and do is open with Onslaught of Shadows, this allows you to jump to your target and it also fears them. Then you start your spam of Rampage and hit Spirit of Dread starting your damage. Then is the good time to use your Exhaust on the target and follow up with a Devastating Charge, run in front of them, and auto attack them. With Devastating Charge on you will jump to them and push them back, then you proceed to spam Rampage and chase until you feel uncomfortable, but if you do it properly, or if you are attacking a squishy person, they shouldn't be getting away. But a fully stacked Chogath or a Mundo might be a little harder to bring down solo.

Summoner spells are mainly preference, I highly recommend Ghost and Exhaust as ghost gives you a lot of speed, helps with catching and running away, and Exhaust has the slow and damage reduction, which helps for catching, getting the ability to use your Devastating Charge very easily, and it helps for one on one fights where you think you may lose, so you use Exhaust in order to be certain that you have the best chance possible.

Hecarim can be many different roles, just like any other champion can be. I prefer him to be a very speedy and decently tanky person as the speed helps him to get damage. But basically the best way I can play him is this way, very fast as it gives you more options on how to help your team, and it also is a nice addition that you have quick map access. So anyways just remember play safe early and then as you grow in items then you should be set for the owning of the lane.

So thanks for reading, and remember, play safe and stay fast!

With farming the main components for it are going to be Rampage and Spirit of Dread, the sunfire cape that you should have purchased, or that you will eventually purchase will help with this too. Because of his no-clip type passive he can run straight into the middle of the group, that is when you use your Spirit of Dread and you spam Rampage, which drops in cool down when you hit things, and then basically you just clear minion waves and you push on your merry way.