Shyvana Build Guide by sk1llzn00bz

Who am i? Welcome, I am sk1llzn00bz, the jungler of Bad Company Gaming. I am fifteen years old, from Norway, and i have been in the League for a while. I am primarily a Jungler, but i also enjoy playing support. My favorite, and i believe most common picks are Amumu, Nautilus and Nocturne. This guide is on, in my opinion, another one of the strongest and most entertaining junglers there is: Shyvana, the dragonborn. She is an excellent duelist, and remains one of the fastest junglers in S3, despite the indirect nerfs to her. I played Nautilus before he was cool.

space Not so photogenic ): Will be changed

Shyvana is a jungling bruiser. She is very mobile, clears camps quickly and is one of the strongest counterjunglers there is. She is a strong duelist, and can win a duel with most popular junglers at the moment.

It's important to understand the difference between a control jungler and a ganking jungler. Shyvana is a control jungler. This means that you are not going to win the game by ganking, but rather by controlling the map: Keep track of objectives, keep the opponent jungler in check, that kind of stuff. While some junglers are a combination of the two, like Nocturne, Shyvana is restrictively a control jungler.

Do not mistake this as "I should never gank", because you should. Shyvana's ganks is sub-par, but she can shut down and bully weaker junglers with ease, thus maintaining map and dragon control.

Shyvana is a strong addition to any team with strong CC and follow-up initiation.

In a teamfight, Shyvana serves as an initiator and assassin. After a fight is initiated, you want to zone out the opponent ADC. Shyvana is excellent if paired with strong follow up CC. Some synergies you should take note of:

Orianna

Command: Shockwave is a lot of damage and disruption. Dragon's Descent into Command: Shockwave can easily half-shot entire teams. Command: Protect will keep you alive, and Command: Dissonance will speed you up, and deal additional damage.

Lulu

Wild Growth is an amazing follow-up to Dragon's Descent. Not only does it knock enemies into the air, it makes you extremely beefy, and slows enemies around you. Amazing synergy, not only with Dragon's Descent, but also with Burnout. The MS from Whimsy helps you stick to the target. Lulu makes it really hard to kite you.

Karma

This synergy felt a lot stronger before, but from what i heard they are buffing Karma, so it is worth to take note of. A Mantra boosted Inspire is a pretty huge shield and mobility buff, and e great AoE nuke. Only con is that Karma might only get one Mantra per fight, because of how the new Karma works, and you might not want to blow it as initiation.

Pro's + Fast clear + Great counterjungler + Very mobile + Not blue dependant

Con's - Lacks CC - Poor ganker - Red buff reliant - Kiting problems

Attack speed marks to help Fury of the Dragonborn. Lowering cooldown on Twin Bite, longer Burnout's, and more damage on Flame Breath debuffed targets. They increase the frequency of Madred's Razors procs, and makes you a really speedy jungler.

I pick Armor Seals for a sustained first clear. Pretty self-explanationary, and not too much to say about them. Pretty good for any champion, and works perfectly on Shyvana too.

MR/18 Glyphs helps you scale into mid-lategame. During the midgame MR/18 becomes stronger than the flat MR ones, which helps you sustain burst in the midgame fights for objectives.

MS Quints used to be my go-to quints for every jungler. In Season 3, they gave everyone a hefty mobility boost, so they are no longer necessary. I choose to pick armor seals because they make you even stronger 1v1, and really sustained in the jungle. If you are offensive by nature, do not be afraid to pick AD or ArmPen quints.

I pick a fairly standard 9/21/0 mastery page. It is designed to give Shyvana nice tankiness early game. The offensive tree helps Shyvana's damage.

In the offensive tree i take Fury . Attack speed is a great stat on Shyvana. I also pick up Summoner's Wrath to boost exhaust. It is superior to one percent attack speed.

Deadliness and Weapon Expertise helps you scale into midgame with Armor penetration and scaling AD.

I delve deep into the defensive tree, picking fairly standard tank masteries. Summoner's Resolve allows me to keep up in gold, because you pretty much spam Smite.

Hardiness , Durability , Tough Skin , Bladed Armor and Veteran's Scars are all aimed towards keeping me sustained in the jungle. They help early but fall of lategame.

Tenacious reduces the duration of CC, which makes you harder to kite. This is important since kitability is one of Shyvanas main weaknesses.

Defender is primarily for early skirmishes. Up to 5 Armor and MR helps during e.g. an invade.

Juggernaut and Reinforced Armor is amazing for surviving AD Carries lategame. 4% of you HP is a couple hundred, which is pretty good. 10% less damage from critical strikes is at least 100 health each autoattack lategame.

Honor Guard makes you very hard to kill lategame.

Necessary for any jungler. Period. While Shyvana can clear the jungle without Smite, you will need it to secure buffs and objectives.

Shyvana utilizes exhaust very well. It can snowball a skirmish with the opponent jungler, and it justifies Shyvanas lack of CC.

Slighly situational, but you can do a lot of cool tricks with it. Flash > Dragon's Descent allows you to clear much ground, and allows for extreme escapes and gap-closing. Having two gap-closers is nifty for smitesteals, and should never be underestimated.

Ghost makes you an increadibly strong chaser, combined with Burnout, however it does not complement Shyvana as well as Exhaust. Shyvana is already super mobile and does not need Ghost. Despite this, it is the go-to summoner for many Shyvana players out there.

My favorite combination is easily Smite/ Exhaust. Smite is essential, and Exhaust complements Shyvana very well. It is also a very versatile spell, that can be used for it's CC or for it's debuff. Examples of good uses would be to, for instance, slow down an opponent to make him unable to escape a gank, or reducing the opponent jungler's damage output 1v1. Take Ignite whenever you are against e.g. Fiddlesticks and Dr. Mundo

Fury of the dragonborn Fury of the Dragonborn is Shyvana's passive. Her basic attacks enhance her abilities. Twin Bite: Every autoattack reduces the cooldown of twin bite by 0.5 second. Burnout: Every autoattack extends the duration of Burnout by one second, up to a cap of six seconds. Flame Breath: Every autoattack deals 15% of Flame Breath's initial damage to debuffed targets. Dragon's Descent: Every autoattack generate two fury. Fury of the Dragonborn is an amazing passive. It is very important for you DPS to know how to use it. The most important is the full-leangth Burnout's. For those who choose to pick up Trinity Force the Twin Bite cooldown is extra important.

Twin bite Twin Bite makes your next basic attack strike twice, both applying on-hit effects. This is the reason why the Trinity Force build works so well. Basically hitting Twin Bite will let you land two Sheen-hits in a splitsecond. That is effectively "one autoattack" that deals 300% of your attack damage. I max Twin Bite last, because it's damage is least significant on tank/on-hit Shyvana, which i tend to play a lot. If you are playing AD Shyvana maxing Twin Bite after Burnout might be viable.

Burnout Burnout is Shyvanas bread and butter ability. It is really good for fighting the opponent jungler, clearing or ganking. If we look on the maths it looks something like this at rank five: The duration can be extended to a maximum of nine seconds: 85 * 9 = 765 That is 765 base damage. But it will get better: Burnout's scaling is 0,2 every second: 0,2 * 9 = 1,8 So Burnout is pretty much a 765 base damage spell with 1.8 scaling. That is pretty crazy, considering Darius' Noxian Guillotine have a maximum base damage of 680, and a scaling of 1.5. I always max Burnout first because of the significant damage. No questions asked.

Flame breath Shyvana's third ability is Flame Breath. The 15% Armor debuff, in addition to Exhaust (with Summoner's Wrath ) is a lot of armor reduction. In addition the spell will apply an on hit effect that causes our basic attacks to deal 15% of Flame Breath's initial damage on hit. The debuff lasts for four seconds. 260 / 100 * 15 = 39 In addition to Wit's End, this is 81 additional magic damage every autoattack. I choose to max Flame Breath second, after Burnout, because the armor reduction and on hit effect deals more damage than Twin Bite unless you build AD Shyvana.

Dragon's descent Dragon's Descent is Shyvana's ultimate. It have a passive that, at rank three, gives you 20 free Armor and Magic resist. Those are doubled when entering dragon form. Dragon's Descent's active is a gap closer and small knock back. It deals significant damage, so you want to hit as many people as possible with it, but make sure you hit the priority target, usually the AD Carry. While in dragons form, Shyvana's abilities gain additional effects, and the resists are doubled to 40. Twin Bite: Twin bite hit's everyone in a cone in front of Shyvana. Burnout: Burnout scorches the ground beneath Shyvana, leaving a trail that damages opponents. Flame Breath: Flame breath damages in a cone in front of Shyvana. You obviously want to out a point in Dragon's Descent whenever you can.

When i itemize for Shyvana, i want to opt for a mix of damage, tankiness and utility. Tankiness is prioritized, while damage is secondary. The only utility items i would ever build for Shyvana is the Locket of the Iron Solari, and everything that debuffs the opponent AD, such as Randuin's Omen.

As far as boots go, you really only have two viable options - Mercury's Treads or Ninja Tabi. These are the boots that give defensive stats, and none else should ever be considered, maybe except a very situational Berserker's Greaves. In a standard game you should opt for the Mercury's Treads for the tenacity, but versus a AD heavy team or a fed AD, get Ninja Tabi.

Locket of the Iron Solari gives you amazing tank stats, and more presence in teamfights. If you don't get it, your support should always get it. It is an almost 1k shield distributed on your team, so along with Runic Bulwark it is a great counter to AoE damage.

Shyvana have a really powerful early game, and picking up a Bilgewater Cutlass into Blade of the Ruined King after madreds and locket will let you dominate duels. The snowball effect justifies Shyvana's lack of CC, and will often force flashes. Next you want to opt for a Randuin's Omen. It suits shyvanas kit like a glove, being a very strong duelist and initiator. Randuin's active will shut down any physical damage dealer in teamfights, and along with LOTIS, it snowballs an even fight in your teams favor.

Next you have to choose between the Frozen Mallet and the Trinity Force. I love triforce, because it's burst is insane, but if your team is ahead, or have enough damage, it is usually worth investing in more persistent CC, in form of the mallet.

The last item is variable. I recommend building something that gives health, since health is OP right now. You basically cant go wrong with a Runic Bulwark, but Sunfire Cape and Warmog's Armor are both great pickups.









This is my general tactic with Shyvana. If i choose not to invade at level one i want to be as aggressive as possible. Shyvana is very a very strong duelist, and you can usually kill the opponent jungler if he decides to try and fight you. When you get your level two, with Burnout and Twin Bite, you can basically kill anyone.

Remember that there is no such thing as a "perfect jungle route". You have to adapt.

Start with Hunter's Machete and head to your wraiths. They spawn at 1.40. You will be able to kill them fairly quickly, especially if you get help from your teammates. They should be dead by 1.50, which mean they will be up around 2.40.

The red buff spawns at 1.55. It is recommended you get some help from your teammates. It is advised to drink a potion while fighting the lizard, so that you remain at high health. Use Smite to finish them off, so that you are secure. Just in case someone is stupid enough to invade on Shyvana.

Kill the wolves to get the respawn ticking before you invade:



Lastly, just remember that the route is not the secret: Just don't waste any time. Farm is just as important in the jungle as in every other lane. You should never ever run around aimlessly or camp a lane. Never sit in a bush for more than maybe two or three seconds. Look at it this way: If you sit in a bush for 90 seconds, waiting for an opportunity, you are not doing anything - that is equivalent to being AFK for 90 seconds.

The best advice i can ever give any jungler is to be effective. You have to farm your jungle constantly to keep up in gold.






Shyvana is an amazing counterjungler. Her clear speed and mobility is almost unmatched, and allows her to get in and back out quickly, effectively denying slower junglers their farm.

Good reasons to counterjungle:

• + Setting the opponent back
• + Steal buffs
• + Outfarm the opponent
• + Snowball
• + Remove pressure on lanes
• + Map and objective control

Stonewalls video is a perfect example on how to counterjungle. Nocturne was level three when Shyvana was level six, and he died twice. Burnout makes Shyvana and excellent duelist, and this should be exploited.

Amumu is the perfect example on when to counterjungle. You can not afford him reaching level six early, or he will dominate the early fights. As possibly the weakest duelist in the jungle, Amumu suffers early on. If a strong duelist like Shyvana enters Amumu's jungle, he basically can't do ****, but watch as she takes away all his farm.

This is the deal: Weaker duelist's like Amumu shines in teamfights, and if you allow them to farm up, you will be decimated. This is the reason why Amumu is banned at lower ELOs, people don't know how to counterjungle him, so they only see the "be decimated in teamfights" part.

Hear what, let me tell you a secret: A level three Amumu can't do jack **** in a fight.






Shyvana is a very weak ganker. Her kit contains next to no CC. Usually your build justifies this weakness( Randuin's Omen, Phage and Bilgewater Cutlass), but before you get your first items you are a useless ganker.

Her kit does however contain a lot of damage and mobility, so you can often pick up kills on overextended enemies without Flash or other escapes available.

It is very critical that you don't try to gank a lot early game. Camping midlane for 90 seconds does no good - it only sets you back 90 seconds worth of exp you could have gotten if you just farmed your jungle. I see other junglers do this a lot, just remember it does no good.

You should obviously use good opportunities you get to kill or chunk enemy lanes.




There are two things to consider when choosing your jungler. You do to a certain degree have to counter the opponents jungler, and you need to fit on your teams composition. The second one being the most important.

So how do you fit Shyvana on a team? You can not simply put Shyvana on any team, as with many other junglers, like Lee Sin or Nocturne, who has built-in CC. An important thing to know is that Shyvana is a very strong jungler on the right team comps.

The general rule is, your team needs to complement Shyvana, and vice versa: This essentialy means that you need CC in every lane in order to fit Shyvana on a team.

For instance, an ideal situation to play Shyvana, would look like this. All the lanes can complement with sufficent CC, so Shyvana should have a easy time ganking lanes. With an Malphite and Alistar, your team would have strong initiation, so you could do what you do best: Assassinate the opponent AD. With their main damage source out, your team should, in this case, be able to steamroll the teamfight. Malphite would initiate, and Alistar's sustained CC would keep *****es in line so Vayne and Ahri could clean up the mess.

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To sum it up: Shyvana is extremely team dependant. On a good composition, she have the potential to wreck faces, while on poor compositions, she can be next to useless. Bear this in mind, especially in Solo-Queue where people have a tendency to play Teemo a lot.