As most of you know by now, ryze got a few major changes to his abilities. I'll list them out here, then go into more details with the edited guide.

1) Ryze's passive no longer makes it so his skills cooldown each other when you use them. His new passive builds up stacks that grant him additional power, a shield based on a percentage of his mana. This is good and bad. It means he won't be able to build all three skills up and just spam cooldowns for them. But it also means if you build your timing right, you can have better survivability in the jungle.

2)Ryze's Q is now a skill shot, not a targeted one. Good for shooting blind if an enemy is running, but if they're in a group, you can't single them out.

3)Ryze's Q no longer lowers his passive cooldown. Instead, Ryze's ult does that every time it levels up.

4) Ryze's multiple area attack, his E, has been vastly improved for group encounters. If an enemy is in a group of minions, simply target him, and the spells will bounce between him and minions. However, unlike his old E, the spell will go back to the original target and deal extra damage. In one on one encounters, it functions as it did before by bouncing between Ryze and his target if Ryze is close enough. It also stacks the magic resistance debuff.

5) ryze's E skill has had it's cooldown cut down almost in half. Since his Q isn't as necessary since it is just a skillshot and doesn't have the cooldown passive tied to it, I'd suggest leveling up Ryze's E and his W (root) first.

Hello everyone, hope you're doing well. If you're reading this, well, let me thank you. It is my first guide, and I'm hoping for feedback.
My personal belief is that with a good leash, and a little creativity, any champion, and I mean any, can jungle in the game. It simply comes down to what you like to play, and what kind of jungle do you want to be. Do you plan to be a tank, taking advantage of the sweet, sweet HP Cinderhulk boost? Want to be the one to swoop in? Allister may say swooping is bad...but not if you're the one doing the swoop in.

Everyone says Ryze can't jungle. Or at least he shouldn't. He has a lot of tough roadblocks compared to sturdier champions. But with a little quick thinking, he can be a deadly force to reckon with during laning phase, all the way through end game (depending on the player and how they build him).

So if your curiosity has been peaked in the least, sit back, and enjoy.

This section is about why I picked Ryze as a jungle. Feel free to skip on to the next one if you just want to get to the details of the build itself and how to play him.

For starters, Ryze is cheap. Only 450 IP points. Anyone can get that in a day, so he is easy to access for all players. No having to spend money or weeks of IP building to get him like some other Ability Power champions.

I read on a forum somewhere, at some point, that Ryze couldn't jungle.
You see, I love jungle. I usually play Shen, Pantheon, or Naut, depending on my team and my mood. But I got tired of never feeling like I did much. Sure, I had games where I got kills, and I got plenty of assists. But really, I just had to take damage with a few pokes thrown in here or there. A few key pulls or slow downs. And all three of my normal champions don't have great Area attack damage (AoE). Sure, Naut and Pantheon have some, and are useful in situations...but it's comparatively lower to many champions. So! Ryze would be my foray into the world of ability power based, high damage champions. It's been a rough ride. But after some tweaking, he's shown to be a solid jungle all around, and I couldn't be happier with it. I'll be experimenting with more oddball champions in jungle later. So check out those guides as they come too! (shameless plug)


Another benefit is that no one really jungles with him. I've never seen it. People I've played with (that have played the game far longer than I have) have never see it. And people assume he isn't dangerous. That assumption has left a lot of dead enemies on the ground. And if it's something new that people don't know, if done right, could be played to your advantage.

So, I'm going to be completely honest with you, my reader(s?). Ryze is tough to play as jungle in the first go around. He relies heavily on mana, and he burns through that mana quickly. So, follow my directions, and you should make it through.

Start with Gromp, aka poison toad. The monsters are going to hit you, so you should take the automatic poison damage against them. The more damage the better.
Have your leash start the battle and take the brunt of the damage. At about half health, signal them to leave. This will help you conserve precious mana, and you probably won't need a potion yet. Smite the toad, get the poison, kill it, then move on to the wolves. Clear them out, and you'll likely need to use one health potion here.



Now for the for the tricky part. Odds are, your mana is nearly out, but keep going! Go to the raptors. If you have a potion left still, use it in this battle. Kill the little raptors first. If you think you have enough hp to finish off the big one when it is alone, stay and kill it but you should have at least 350 HP though. If you have any less, you risk death. If you need more HP, don't recall!
Now, you should have a smite left. Run away from the lone big raptor until he goes back. Run to the Red Crest monster, barely in your vision, and SMITE IT! You should get 150HP healed or more. But make sure to run away from him. As soon as he settles down when you run away, go back to the big raptor and kill it. You should have around 450-500 gold now. Enough for one or two potions and the Rangers Weapon. This weapon will help a lot to save hp and mp, and give you the stun you need in the jungle to clear it faster.

Side Note: Remember that Ryze's E skill will bounce between enemies...but get right up to a single monster or enemy in general, and Ryze can use himself as a bounce! Be right next to the monster, and you'll not only lower it's magic resistance, but it should hit the lone enemy three times instead of one! Not sure exact unit distance, but you have to be almost face to face for this to happen, so don't be shy of the monsters. They'll come try to eat you anyways. Also, pretty sure Ryze doesn't lower his own Magic Resistance in the process, so there is no reason not to do this.

Ryze is tough to use at first. Ganking probably won't be on your highest priority until after level 3. But, Ryze's restriction ability is excellent. It has a low cool down, made lower by Ryze's passive once he gets his ult. So signal your allies, get a shot in and stop the enemies in their tracks. Don't worry about kills. If you get it, great. As long as the enemy dies, that's what matters. And the extra kill/assist gold doesn't hurt either.

Also, Ryze's E skill lowers magic resistance of enemies. So if your ally has magic abilities, you will be best friends for the round.

Ok. You now have more potions. You have your lovely, awesome healing stunny jungle item. Now what? Go back to toad on your side, as by now it should have respawned. Attack it, smite it, and use a potion if needed while killing it. Now, if it is close to cooling down, save your second smite for red. If you feel like you have to use it in the next jungle battle, that's fine. Regardless, now you can go for your blue crest. Kill it, heal as necessary, and you should get your blue mana regen. This will help Ryze's mana problem considerably.

(if you're wondering why not start with this, you can try if you want to. But in my experience, you'll run low regardless of the blue since Ryze has so little mana to start. Toad will do more damage for the first go around, and is better in my personal opinion. You can also stick around longer, because you have the better jungle weapon that also provides more gold, which you should get as soon as possible.)

After your blue is well in hand, finish off the wolves and the raptors again. At this point, if you need more potions, you should have enough gold to go back and get the optional (but recommended) reusable potion that restores mana and health. (seriously, do it, you'll probably end up spending money on more potions if you find yourself healing a lot anyways)

Now, hit up red and kill the little monsters, the big ones as they come, and continue to clear out the your jungle. By level 4-5, clearing the jungle, especially with blue, will be a breeze.

Of course, keep your eyes open on enemies and help allies if you can. Just don't go doing anything too dumb and getting yourself killed.

Ryze's ult has the word "desperation." Only people that should be desperate are your enemies. Ryze's ult boosts his movement speed, grants spell vamp to all spells, functions as the new cooldown passive with his update, and all spells become area attacks. Dish out damage, and you can clear the jungle easily. His ult only has a short cooldown to begin with, and using spells makes it even shorter. Also, with spell vamp, you'll be healing yourself some, so Ryze is no longer in so much danger of running out of mana or dying in the jungle.

If your enemies are pushing, this is the perfect time to nail them. You should have the jungle item for ability power boost, and maybe road of ages, so you aren't so weak. And you can dish enough damage or prevent them moving for a few seconds. A few seconds is all it takes for you and your allies to nail an enemy showing you their rear end. Continue to farm jungle and gank as needed throughout the game.

EDIT: As of last game I played, I went 24/7/17. Sadly we lost, but it was a close game. I was playing against Heim, Blitz, Riven, Nasus and Yi. Only real threat was Yi after being fully built, sheerly due to maxed Attack Speed. So this build is plenty good end game.

Needless to say, regardless of build, Ryze isn't the champion with the most damage or the most range for magic abilities until you get to the end game. But, he is excelling with his ult for clearing lanes of pesky minions, and can bind enemies the higher his level gets. (Not moving for a whole 2 plus seconds is death in this game most times)

Adapt as needed with your build. With spell vamp with Ryze's ult and your item, you should be able to handle most lower hp enemies. Ability Power enemies will likely be your worst enemy, since there are no mana-magic resistance items. But teleporting to defend base, push key points by popping on a minion, or ambushing enemies from behind should net you decent or moderate kills. I can easily get solid mid-teen (those are the numbers 13-19 in case you're wondering) to high-teen kills and assists, with few to no deaths. That average is great for my games that don't snowball out of control. (But that's something that hurts you no matter who you are or what you're playing.)

See the items build list. But this is a safe bet for ryze. I had a match where a Nasus got fed. His stacks brought all the boys and girls to the yard. He then went all dog on us and buried us one by one all over the map. Siphoning strike was horrid. Then I got armor up, and suddenly...what? only doing 200 damage to me instead of a 1000+? Yes please. I would suggest a similar mana and magic resistance build, but...

Maybe I am blind. But there is no item I can see that builds both mana and magic resistance. HP and Mana, HP and Magic Resistance, Ability Power and Magic Resistance, etc. They have those. But no Mana and Magic resistance. You would think mages attuned to using magic and needing mana would be able to have access to magic resistance/mana items as well. Not one or the other. Setting aside my minor annoyance of this, Ryze doesn't have very many options for sturdy builds against Magic Resistance that also increase his mana (which he needs). You can, however, go the route of going mana regen and ability power if you'd like. But that is a totally different build, meant for a different guide. And finally...

This is it. You made it through. Thanks for reading my first attempt at a guide. Leave (hopefully constructive) feedback on the build itself, how I presented it in the guide, and improvements I could make to both my guide writing and the build.

Now, to address some final concerns. If you're thinking it, it probably bothered me too. So I'll try to predict some common problems you may face.

First, magic resistance instead of armor build with mana?
-See previous chapter.

Second, what about end game ability damage?
-Simply put, I know this build isn't the most aggressive end game. I'm still tinkering with it, and it could easily change. This is the safest bet I have come up with so far though. Another option is to go high hp, high mana, and high ability power. But what is great for me is that this build is flexible. The items you buy are totally up to you for the 6th item, maybe even the 5th. Just go by whatever seems right to you. If you find a better end game build with the same survivability early and mid game, message me or comment. I'll be sure to listen.

Third. What to do if people say you are trolling?
-The best way to counter this is to do well. Or, at least, just don't die. Your results will speak for themselves. Don't get down on yourself if you get knocked down once or twice. New characters, new styles, they take time to adjust. And everyone has a few games where nothing seems to go right. Just stick with it, apologize if you do poorly, and try again in order to get better. Toxic players (and the real trolls) will do what is second nature to them, regardless of who their victims are.

Fourth. What if you die?
-This isn't unique to Ryze. Since Ryze isn't normally seen in jungle, people may accuse you of being a troll (see previous statement) or just being bad. But, odds are, if you are dying, there are probably other teammates dying. I've not died once from a monster in the jungle with Ryze. Only if another jungle or champion catches me in a low HP spot. Or if I try to gank, but an enemy is fed or my teammates use me as a sacrifice to run away. But again, this isn't unique to Ryze, that's a problem with the game, and the team you may be with, in general.

Fifth, What do I do if I'm dying and/or lagging behind?
-Again, this happens to everyone. Maybe they gank you at the start and your leash didn't help or arrive in time. Maybe you just got unlucky, or overextended. If it becomes a serious problem, focus on the little monsters, and the krugs(stone guys). Don't be afraid to recall, and ask a teammate to kill minions. Better yet, cover for a teammate that needs to go back to base. This is common courtesy and sound strategy anyways, so that should net you some gold and maintain a secure lane as well.

Sixth, Runes and Masteries.
-If you want to up your magic early on, do so. Scaling runes are great, but they don't really kick in until end game. So if you want that early game mana boost, that could very well help you out a great deal. Masteries though, I would keep similar to what I have. Sure, the extra gold in one tree is nice. But, in the long term, my build helps you deal damage to champions and monsters both, thus increasing your overall viability. Only reason I could see to invest in the other tree is for the Mana 2.5%-5% boost. But it requires so many points that you could have in extra damage and penetrating capabilities, that it just isn't worth it in my opinion.