Udyr is a very versatile champion. Being able to clear the jungle at break-neck speeds at relatively high health, his ganking is very strong and his initiation is decent. Being able to change his style of build to fit what the team needs is a great bonus. Forgoing damage to gain more bulk and vise versa. This is the tankier side of Udyr so you don't get crumpled like paper by even the weakest of carries.

Pros!

• Very strong ganks.
• High damage output while being tanky.
• Fast to level 4.
• Being counter-jungled only slows you slightly.
• Multiple paths he can take to avoid being counter-jungled too hard.
• Repeatable ganks.
• Strong duelist.
• Awesome skin.

Cons...

• Any ranged person who is even remotely faster than you will kite you all day.
• His ganks must succeed or he won't snowball like he should.
• Money is a problem as he needs to buy way more wards than most junglers.
• Being caught outnumbered or right after you used a skill means trouble.

Udyr has four abilities that can be picked no matter what level you are. Each of them have their different strengths and weaknesses. All of his skills upon activation force a 2 second cooldown.


Entering a stance grants Udyr 10% attack speed and 3% dodge for 5 seconds. This effect stacks 3 times.
Monkey's Agility is your passive and one of the reasons you can jungle with such efficiency early on and later as well. Proper management of the buff it gives is essential to taking on dragon at level 5-6 and one of the things that, combined with tiger, makes you a major tower pusher.


Active: Udyr's next attack does 150% of his AD plus 30/80/130/180/230 extra damage over 2 seconds as magic damage. It also increases his attack speed by 15%/20%/25%/30%/35%
Persistent effect: Increases attack speed by 20%/25%/30%/35%/40%
This is your tower pushing skill. The extra damage does not go on towers although it will be saved until you hit something else. The "next attack" bonus is lost if it isn't used before switching stances.


Active: Udyr gains a temporary shield that absorbs 60/100/140/180/220 (+50% of ability power) damage.
Persistent effect: Udyr cannot crit but 12/14/16/18/20% of his damage is returned as health and 9/10.5/12/13.5/15% of his damage as mana.
This is your sustain skill. Giving you a shield and some life steal and "mana steal". Any bonus damage you do off items directly effects the amount of life/mana you gain. This will take into account, Sword of the Divine, Madred's Bloodrazor, Wit's End, ect. It will not factor in Madred's Razors after the most recent patch. Not sure about Wriggle's Lantern though.


Active: Udyr gains 15/18/21/24/27% increased movement speed for 2/2.5/3/3.5/4 seconds.
Persistent effect: Udyr's attacks stun the target for 1 second. This effect can not happen on the same target again for 6 seconds.
This is your universal skill. It's main uses are; getting to fights; getting away from fights; stuns; popping a Banshee Veil bubble so your nukers can get through. If you stun a target, they will get a "buff" showing that they have been stunned. They will also gain this "buff" if your shot is blocked by a Banshee's Veil. If you use Bear in the middle of a fight and stun someone almost immediately, the CD on Blazing Stampede will tell you when they can be stunned again if you have almost no CDR.


Active: Udyr sends out pulsing waves of fire dealing 15/25/35/45/55 (+25% of ability power) magic damage each second to nearby enemies for 5 seconds. In addition, Udyr's ability power is increased by 16/24/32/40/48 and his attack damage is increased by half of that amount.
Persistent Effect: Every third attack, Udyr engulfs enemies in front of him in flame, dealing 40/80/120/160/200 (+25% of ability power) magic damage.
This is your farming skill. It not used for much more than that in this build. It can be used for a bit of damage in teamfights and to speed through camps but, that's just about it. It can be used to push towers decently if it is combined with Wilding Claw but getting more AD almost always trumps the damage you would to by alternating between this and Tiger.

You should always be trying to get Wilding Claw over anything else.
Alternate between Iron Mantle and Blazing Stampede as the game permits.
If you are having a hard time chasing or running from people, use Take bear over turtle for the speed. If you are getting into fights more often, take turtle over bear for the sustain and shield.
Grab one point in Wingborne Storm whenever the tower pushes start. I usually get it around level 6.

These ultimately determine your damage output and the amount of damage you can take as well.

Tank mastery explanation: Most people say that Ardor is a useless mastery. While this is mostly true, on Udyr it is decent. It increases the steroids you get from both Tiger stance and Phoenix stance. All others are pretty much standard tank masteries. Also, Nimbleness and Evasion work so well with your passive.

Damage dealing mastery explanation: Offensive Mastery increases the damage dealt on all your attacks and skill procs in the jungle. That includes Tiger stance and Phoenix if you are inclined to get it. The attack speed is more important once you have Turtle and Phoenix stance.

Your starting jungle items are important but there are two different setup you can do.
Cloth Armor+ Health Potion X5: This is the "safest" route as you will always have enough health potions to just wait for a little bit before engaging either Red buff or a counter jungler. This is also the easier ganking setup as you will be able to heal up after the mini golems to gank or, head back if you wish.


Cloth Armor+ Health Potion X2+ Sight Ward: This is the "optimal" item setup as you can ward for someone on your team and be slightly closer to Madrid's Razors on your first trip back. Do this only if you are experienced with your jungle route and you are sure you won't be needed for a bit.

On your first trip back you want to be working towards Madred's Razors. If you think that a gank will be available by the time you get to base, get boots instead. A long sword if you can afford it as well. Most of your money is going to come from either ganks or jungle creeps. Don't be afraid to go into their jungle to steal them. There are very few junglers you can't handle.

Heart of Gold should be your next priority. Right after getting Heart of Gold, you should be working towards Wriggles Lantern and then boots.

Boots are situational. Against most teams, I.E. smart teams with CC, you should get Mercury's Treads. Other times, you should get either Ninja Tabi for the dodge chance or Boots of Swiftness for when you don't have bear up. Boots of Swiftness are not really recommended unless you and your team are stomping.

Build a Catalyst the protector later if you need the sustain. If nukers are getting in your way early, buy it and upgrade it to Banshee's Veil ASAP.

Trinity Force comes right after your boots. The part you get first depends on your needs at the time. f you are being outran for some odd reason or are going for backdoor Udyr, get Zeal. Sheen is your "all purpose" item. Get it if nothing else.

After this point, you should be building tanky.
Your main items are Randuin's Omen, Frozen Heart and , Force of Nature
Other completely viable items to fill your last spot or swapped in over a different item are:

• Chalice of Harmony: for mana regen. You're going to be blowing through a lot if you don't have blue buff.
• Guardian Angel: You will be dying quite a bit if not played right.
• Aegis of the Legion: It combines well with almost all your skills and gives your team a bit more durability.
• Spirit Visage: For the bonus healing from Iron Mantle.
• Thornmail: For when DPS got you down.
• Warmog's Armor: Substantial health boost that increases your lifetime by a semi-good margin. Goes well with Atma's Impaler if you pick that up as well.

If you want more damage, you can take it.
Viable damage items, in order of preference, are:

• Atma's Impaler:If you built enough health items, this will be a nice boost to your damage.
• Frozen Mallet:Tanky with a bit of damage. Synergies well with Atma's Impaler if you choose to buy it.
• Guinsoo's Rageblade:You're Udyr. You won't have problems keeping the stacks. It synergises quite nicely with Wingborne Storm as well.
• Youmuu's Ghostblade:It works as a great gap closer as well as giving you some CDR (not really needed) and also building from a GP5 item. Good for a tanky champion.
• Hexdrinker:I'm a bit sketchy on this. It gives you a bit more MR and, it gives some damage. Not bad. Not great either.

I will be using the term "Tiger harass" in this section. It means, using Wilding Claw and almost immediately switching to Iron Mantle to regain as much mana and health as possible. This does slow you down a bit so you may opt to not use it.

I follow a very standard route with Udyr.

This is the route you should be taking.

• Pick tiger in fountain. Use it and wait for mana to re-charge.
• Pick your items. Items to pick were explained earlier in the item section above.
• Make your way to the bush near your golem.
• Hit the golem and after a second or two, use Wilding Claw again. Use a health potion after it hits you. Smite it for the kill.
• Level Iron Mantle.
• Move to Wolves. Use Tiger harass if you feel like it.
• Repeat on Wraiths.
• Level Wilding Claw
• If you have a little bit of time, pre-charge tiger before you initiate on Red. Again, Smite it for the kill.
• Go to double golems and repeat Tiger harass.
  
  By the end your items should look like this if you took the defensive item path: Cloth Armor+ Health PotionX3
  And like this if you took the "offensive" item path: Cloth Armor
  
  
  While going through your path, you should not be spamming your skills all the time. After taking down the double golems, you have 4 options depending on the items you took and your health level. if you took item path 1 up there, you may; counter jungle; recall; double back and stay in the jungle; or gank.
  

  If you are counter jungled!

  If your blue buff or your red buff is stolen, it doesn't matter too much. You are a good enough 1v1 that, you could run into their jungle and most likely hold your own against their jungler. Xin Zhao, you will have no problems with. I've done a 1v1 against most of the "standard" junglers. You have the damage to out-last most of them. Nunu might be an issue. If you have to counter-counter jungle him, try to camp a buff with a ward and attack him right after you steal his buff.
  If you run straight in, you have to be watching the mini-map unless you have a ton of map awareness. If one of their laners goes MIA, you leave the jungle, fast. The first few times into the opposing jungle, it should be for laying down wards. Second time onwards, you should be stealing buffs. When stealing buffs, leave one minion behind. It delays the respawn timer and it's just annoying as all hell. If you suspect you've been counter-jungled, ask one of your laners to check your buffs to see if they can to clear out the straggling minions.

For Udyr, a successful gank is one where they die or use summoners while you use almost nothing. Your general "gank plan" is this. Activate bear and run out. Attack. Switch to tiger and bear as needed.
Depending on who you initially attacked, you may want to switch targets. Your stun isn't limited to one person. You can swing around and hit both laners most times. Only use ghost if you absolutely have to for you to have any surprise. For example, they are at your turret. These are both good opportunities to gank but, you have a long distance to do so.
If they are at your turret and you can see that your laner is about to push them off, use Bear to run to the bushes on the other side of the lane if there is no minion line coming through. This will give you a perfect ganking position. Don't forget, if no turrets are down, you can look at your mini-map to gauge where the enemy minion wave is. It syncs up with yours on the map.

Smite is a given because, you will be jungling, right?
Ghost... Here's where I break it down a bit. As long as you have a chase spell, it's good in this slot.
Flash if you're not taking ghost because, it's really your only other option. If they flash over a wall, do not flash after them if you do not know if you can kill them.

Ignite and Exhaust are two completely viable spells. I just feel like they're lacking in some area and that ghost and flash do the job better because Udyr has no gap closer other than Blazing Stampede.

This is my personal style to play.
If you want to add anything or if you think I missed anything, comment and tell me, please.
Yes I've played Udyr for a while. Couple months non-stop. There's still a lot that you can do that I didn't put there because I don't know about it. So, comment, vote (up if you please), look at the rest of my guides as well.

2011-06-24: Guide started in drafts
2011-07-21: Guide published
2011-07-21 10 minutes later: Added a "Skill order" section.
2011-07-23: Clarification on when to take Turtle over Bear and vise versa.
2011-07-27: Changed the skill section to reflect the patch. Same with items. Added a notice at the top. Will remove when re-construction is finished.
2011-07-28: A huge *****torm of updates. Added the mastery embedded on the guide instead of the pictures. Changed some other stuff I don't want to go into because, there were a lot of updates. Removed the "under reconstruction" section as this is now finished for the time being.
2011-07-29: Changed the banner. Thanks to The_Nameless_Bard for it!
2011-08-31: Fixed a bug with the item planner that made the rest of the guide unable to be seen.
2011-09-04: Added in Warmog's Armor as an item alternative.