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Shaco Build Guide by nSanityy

Shaco - Carry Ranked Games

Shaco - Carry Ranked Games

Updated on December 2, 2011
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League of Legends Build Guide Author nSanityy Build Guide By nSanityy 9,965 Views 5 Comments
9,965 Views 5 Comments League of Legends Build Guide Author nSanityy Shaco Build Guide By nSanityy Updated on December 2, 2011
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Introduction


Welcome to my first build, featuring Shaco The Demon Jester.
I have played him for a long time now and I must say, he is probably THE most fun champion to play.
I will try to update this build as frequently as I can, with pictures, videos etc. just try not to be too harsh with me. Leave a vote and a comment on 1. Is this a good build? and 2. How can I improve it?, as this will help me out a lot in the future.

Important:


I know this is a lot of text and it might get hard to read after some time. But you must understand that mastering a champion that has a high learning-curve like Shaco takes it's time, sweat, tears and hopefully blood in the end. If you are a skilled player skip the masteries, rune and build order sections. If not I would suggest you to read this in parts. Look for a problem when playing Shaco and search it here.
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Pros & Cons




Pros :

  • Fast Jungle
  • Great ganking (one of the best!)
  • Impressive damage early on
  • Can take Dragon as soon as it spawns & Solo Baron
  • Good counter-jungle with great steal potential
  • Great pusher & tower destroyer
  • Great warding due to Jack In The Box
  • Fun to play

Cons :

  • Squishy early
  • Quite hard to learn to be a good Shaco
  • Expensive build
  • Needs lots of mana to be the most effective
  • Relies on kills/farm
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Runes



Runes

Sorcery
Phase Rush

Explanation:


Greater Quintessence of Desolation & Greater Mark Of Desolation
For that faster jungle & greater damage when ganking.

Greater Seal of Armor
For the extra survivability in the jungle and in lane.

Greater Glyph of Attack Speed
Faster jungle due to more attack speed.



Note:

Greater Seal of Armor and Greater Glyph of Attack Speed have a good synergy with Wriggle's Lantern (extra survivability due to increased armor) and Phantom Dancer (even more increased AS which makes Shaco good in 1v1 situations).
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Masteries

Explanation:


Actually pretty much self-explaining, this is what buffed Shaco with the Fizz Patch.

Brute Force - Extra AD for clearing your jungle faster & more efficient ganking.
Butcher - Bonus damage to minions is a must have for a Shaco-Jungler.
Alacrity - Good synergy with your Greater Glyph of Attack Speed
Sorcery - A left-over point that gives you 1% cooldown reduction (you can change this one if you wish).
Weapon Expertise - A great help when ganking and fighting in general.
Havoc - Same as Brute Force only better :)
Vampirism - A little bit extra life-steal that fits well with Wriggle's Lantern.
Sunder - Adds to your Greater Quintessence of Desolation & Greater Mark Of Desolation as well as to Weapon Expertise . These combined equal massive damage!
Executioner - Same as Havoc only better :D

Summoner's Resolve - For that 10G when using Smite.
Resistance - I found the extra MR quite useful when ganking APs that dominate my team (they feel invincible and will try to 1v2 while retreating).
Hardiness - Works great with Wriggle's Lantern as well as with Greater Seal of Armor.
Tough Skin & Bladed Armor - Extra defense and damage to minions is always fine for junglers.



As you can see my Mastery & Rune selection is for a more effective jungling and getting the most amount of damage in a short amount of time when ganking. The extra Armor, Magic Resist and minion damage help jungling and surviving.
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Skill Sequence



Ability Sequence
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18


Explanation:

You take your first point in Jack In The Box for better jungling as they do a fair amount of damage, fear the target (important seconds in which they can't attack you) and also draw the minion's damage to themselves.



Your second point goes to Two-Shiv Poison. It not only does damage but also has more options like : slowing the target when ganking & pulling minions into your Jack In The Box.



Then you finally take your third point in Deceive which can work like a little Smite and makes you one of the most dangerous gankers in the game.



The rest is quite simple you max out Two-Shiv Poison first, Deceive second and Jack In The Box last, taking a point in Hallucinate whenever you can.
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Skills Explained

Shaco deals 20% bonus damage when striking a unit from behind.

This is a very great passive that, when used with Deceive, can do a crazy amount of damage. This works like Havoc but is a lot better.



Shaco teleports nearby and becomes stealthed for 3.5 seconds. His next basic attack within the next 6 seconds will critically strike, dealing 140/160/180/220/240% damage (normal critical strikes deal 200% damage).

A good ability to have for escaping, ganking and moving around the map faster. This works like Flash, which is the reason you don't need Flash. Ghost + Deceive grants huge mobility and speed making escaping and ganking really easy.



Shaco creates a Jack In The Box at the target location. It will Stealth after 2 seconds, and pop out when an enemy comes near, fearing nearby enemies for 0.5/0.75/1/1.25/1.5 seconds and attacking them.

Even though you max this last, it is an important ability to have not only while jungling. Used right, you can ward an important part of the map for a short duration (for example ward enemy jungle or its entrances before doing dragon). You also can build a ''wall'' of Jack In The Boxes around you while doing dragon (explained further in the Jungle part).
Last but not least it is useful while ganking as well, when used at the right time. I haven't figured it completely out yet, but if you gank and Deceive behind an enemy, quickly place a Jack In The Box in the enemy's escape route. He eventually gets feared which almost guarantees you the kill.




Passive: Shaco's basic attacks poison his target, reducing their Movement Speed. If the target is a minion, it reduces their chance to hit by 20/22.5/25/27.5/30% for 2 seconds.

Active: Deals 40/80/120/160/200 (+) (+1) magic damage to target enemy, and poisons them for 3 seconds. Upon activating this ability the passive is removed until Two-Shiv Poison becomes available again.

Two-Shiv Poison is another spell that can be used offensively and defensively. Also it not only makes jungling easier but also ganking. This kinda works like a mini Red Buff. If you come up close enough try to Auto-Hit your target first before throwing this. This completes your Backstab- Deceive- Two-Shiv Poison. If you Deceive behind your enemy, auto hit him which will proc Backstab for 20% more damage + Two-Shiv Poison's passive. Then activate Two-Shiv Poison right after your auto hit. This burst deals insanely high damage early game, snowballing with your items into late game.



This is what makes Shaco a true assassin. Not only you can deal high amounts of damage with your item build but you can also 3-hit an enemy carry using all his abilities at the right time.




Shaco vanishes briefly and reappears with a clone that lasts up to 18 seconds. The clone deals 75% of Shaco's damage and receives 50% increased damage.
On death, the clone detonates, dealing 300/450/600 (+1) magic damage to nearby enemies.

A great Ultimate that fits well with Shaco. First of all this is what makes you a good 1v1 Champion and a great pusher. Second of all you can dodge spells like Ashe's Enchanted Crystal Arrow or Karthus' Requiem. This also makes it possible to early dragon and solo Baron in late game.



As you can see you can use Shaco's abilities Offensive and Defensive, for jungling, ganking and for 1v1s.
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Summoner Spells

My choice :


- In my eyes a must have for any jungler no matter how strong he is. You jungle way faster, you can steal Dragon, Baron or enemy jungle easily. 10 Gold for every Smite equals free Sight Ward


- Fits well with your abilities in my eyes as you can use this offensive & defensive. This really makes your ganks deadly as hell because of Ghost + Deceive.


Viable alternatives :


- Great mobility because you can jump over walls. Not needed for Shaco because of Deceive and Flash has a very high cool down.


- Probably worth a try if you replace it with Smite. Great ganks if you Deceive + Exhaust the enemy and THEN attack. Not the best choice because you would need to skill this in your masteries, which would change everything.


- Solid choice for everyone. Great for "last hitting" enemies.


- Shaco needs a lot of mana. Your mid wants Blue often. Viable in my eyes but I prefer explaining mid that I need it and gank 4 times than letting mid take it and gank 2 times.


- Nice one for pushing. Other than that good for solo lanes. If you find yourself pushing much more than being an important role in team fights take it.


- A nice and underestimated spell in my eyes. Getting caught by stuns etc.? Try it out. With my build your survivability will forgive you a mistake so Cleanse is not really needed.



Not for you:



- Holy moly, this spell saves lifes so often...in low elo!


- Blurgh, I don't see any good point to use it.


- Tanks only. Period.


- To be honest I haven't tried out this yet. Seems interesting but I don't see this happening on junglers.


- Hm, interesting but not for a jungler.
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Items


Explanation of Item choice:

- An excellent item for jungling. The extra AD, Armor and Life Steal really help to stay in the jungle forever and survive those encounters with enemys. Additional to that you have a free ward. However with this ward you should only ward places like Dragon or Baron and buy additional wards for your Solo Top and Mid lane. A support should ward Bot and if posible Dragon.





- Not necessarily the best choice but this really helps getting around the map fast and is a solid pick for a roamer like Shaco that will gank as much as he can.





- A solid amount of AD, 25% critical chance and 250% damage when hitting a critical strike. This is the ideal item when getting Trinity Force and Phantom Dancer. In total, you will have 70% critical strike chance with these three items. And the additional 50% damage really helps out dealing monstrous amounts of damage.





- As final item I chose Banshee's Veil because my Shaco was lacking Magic Resistance, Health and Mana. This item solved my problems and gave me a nice passive that lets me ignore any spell which again has a great positive effect on the Go In- Kill - Go out idea.





OR - Great Items that you need (one of them depending on how much gold you have in your bank). Black Cleaver is great if your enemies build Armor because your Hallucinate clone gets a buff from it too. More importantly you get your needed Attack Speed and AD and Black Cleaver gives a nice amount of both.
If you don't have enough money or you feel lacking Magic Resistance buy Wit's End. Great On-Hit buff (yes Hallucinate!) and great Attack Speed + that nice MR.





- A great item for Shaco because of the huge Health bonus. If you follow this order and you got all items, you will be a running Hell-Machine. The bonus AD is quite nice and you get an awesome slow! Your enemies should not be able to escape now.





There's no real order I think. It's all depends on the situation. If you are getting nuked down fast this order should work. If your still getting nuked down fast after Banshee's Veil get Frozen Mallet. If you see yourself tanky enough go for more damage.



If you have all items above and the game is still going on, trade your Wriggle's Lantern for Madred's Bloodrazor and your Mobility Boots for Mercury's Treads.

Also never forget to buy Sight Ward! You created a solo lane so be responsible for it and ward it. It is also your task to have Baron and Dragon warded despite having a supporter or not.



When you really have all items, or don't feel like changing your Wriggle's Lantern and Mobility Boots, feel free to buy Elixir of Agility, Elixir of Brilliance, Elixir of Fortitude and Oracle's Elixir.
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Building Your Items!

It is quite important when and how you build your items so this is how:


Start off buying Cloth Armor and 5 Health Potions.
After you finished blue you should have enough money to buy Boots, a Sight Ward and some Health Potions. Decide for yourself if you need Health Potions.



Then finish your Wriggle's Lantern first and get your Mobility Boots right after.
Never forget to buy Sight Wards!



Buying your Infinity Edge I'd suggest building it like this: B. F. Sword > Pickaxe > Cloak of Agility.



For the Frozen Mallet you want to get the thing you need more. Damage = Phage Health = Giant's Belt



The order you build your Black Cleaver depends on how much money you got. Preferably buy B. F. Sword first.

Same goes for Wit's End, where you preferably buy Recurve Bow first.



For Banshee's Veil try getting Negatron Cloak first.
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Jungling


The Jungle 101 for Shaco & his companions
Important: look at Building Your Items! section.


Jungle Route (best one in my opinion):

/league-of-legends/ability/jack-in-the-box-205

*Early Dragon Video comming soon*

The good things about early dragon are :
It most likely isn't warded,
Great gold advantage early on for your team,
Fair amount of experience,
More dragons for your team to get.

What you need to have for doing it:

Wriggle's Lantern is the most important thing you need;
Beeing level 6 and have you Hallucinate ready;
Probably Blue buff to do it faster;
Map awareness.



Warding! Important thing to do!
:
Priority sorted with numbers 1 beeing highest priority.
Red~ Your most important ward spots as a jungler.
Yellow~ Spots to ward if counter-jungled a lot.
Green~ Ward spots for counter-jungling.
Blue~ Other mention able ward spots (good for late game).

These are also spots you have to be aware of when ganking!



Will be Redone after the Jungle Patch:
Time, a junglers enemy, or can it be a friend?


All creeps have a set timer when they spawn for the first time and spawn after got killed. Knowing when a dragon or an enemy red buff spawns (especially as Shaco) can work wonders to counter-jungle or get kills.

List of spawn times and buff descriptions:

Wolfes, Wraiths and Golems

Initial Spawn: 1:40
Respawn Time : 1:40


Blue Buff & Red Buff

Initial Spawn: 1:55
Respawn Time : 5:00


Blue Buff explanation:
unit regens 1.5% mana (or energy) per second and has (16 + Level*0.5)% cooldown reduction on their abilities. If slain, this buff transfers to the killer.

Red Buff explanation:
This unit's physical attacks apply a debuff that slows the target's movement speed by 10 / 20 / 30% for 3 seconds and a dot that deals 10-50 (10 at levels 1/2, 15 at 3/4, 20 at 5/6, etc) true damage twice. If the buff holder is slain, this buff is transferred to the killer.

Dragon

Initial Spawn: 2:30
Respawn Time : 6:00

Bonus when killing Dragon:
Killing the dragon grants 190 gold to each player on the killing team and gives experience to killer and nearby allies. The killer receives 25 bonus gold.

Baron Nasher

Initial Spawn: 15:00
Respawn Time : 7:00

The buff grants:

40 ability power
40 attack damage
3% of your maximum health in health regeneration per 5 sec.
1% of your maximum mana in mana regeneration per 5 sec.
Killing Baron also grants gold and experience for the whole team.



Knowing when something in your as well as your enemy's jungle respawns is quite important. For example you know that your enemy's jungler starts at blue. He will most likely be done around 2:30. Adding the 5:00 from the Blue respawn time you can say that their Blue Buff respawns at around 7:30. Especially as a Shaco this is an important thing not only to know but also to do as you can get an easy kill with your boxes. (Note: Non-activated Jack In The Box stays hidden for 1:30). In this example starting to set up a trap at their blue at 7:00 gives you 30 seconds in which you can place at least 2 Jack In The Boxes (3 if you have blue buff yourself). If the enemy still hasn't shown up at 8:50 you should have enough Jack In The Boxes placed to easily do their buff in a matter of seconds.
What can help with this, is Clairvoyance that (if given) your support should have.



So in general you could say knowing the times of spawns is important. It not only helps you getting more farm and denying your enemy's jungler but in some situations also getting free kills. When finishing dragon just write the exact time you finished it and calculate from that time when the next dragon is gonna spawn.
As said, especially for Shaco and his Jack In The Box this is extremely useful.



Jungle Route explained (in case the video is unclear etc.):

As soon as the game begins, quickly buy a Cloth Armor and 5 Health Potions.
Run to your golems and place a Jack In The Box, which will not auto-attack the golems when they spawn! So leave some space there. Quickly place your second Jack In The Box in the brush at Red Buff. Your third again at golems and your fourth again at Red Buff.
Note: Placing all your Jack In The Boxes in one point is the most effectiveness against enemies, however for dragon you want to spread them out because he does AoE damage.

So after placing 4 Jack In The Box you run to Wraiths and smite the big one. I like to use Ghost now to run back to the Golems and finish them off. After Golems finish red and the rest of your Wraiths. You should be LvL 2 after golems and Lvl 3 after Red Buff. Do your Wolves with Auto-Hits only and place at least 2 Jack In The Box at Blue Buff.
Either you gank after Red Buff, or after Blue buff like I do (it is completely up to you and the situation!)

From now on you should be ganking mostly, if you decide to jungle further on just try to keep your path in a straight line like Wolves > Wraiths > Golems so you dont have to run complicated paths.

Counter-Jungling is right up to you if you got first blood and have some wards left, ward their blue and red. Either go for killing them when they do either buff or steal it with smite.

Note:

junglers like Nocturne, Warwick Lee Sin and Udyr won't like it if you enter their territory!
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Ganking

Ganking is Shaco's main discipline and the main way you get your kills. Before getting into detail with how to successfully gank, let me tell you some basic rules and guidelines when ganking:


1. If your enemy has no jungler and your Top Lane is in a 1v2 situation, ganking there becomes priority #1.

2. Don't only gank when you are sure you get a kill from it. The main reason of ganks are helping the lanes dominate the enemy.

3. There are three different sides of ganking. The first one beeing just trying to kill the enemy. The second one would be wasting their Flash, Ghost or whatever they have up their sleeves while doing a little bit of damage. This opens a wide room for a gank where you just kill the enemy because they can't escape now. The third side would be assistance of the lane. Means you jump in do some damage but immediately retreat and defend your tower.

4. When ganking don't take any CS (creep score = last hits). This will just push the lane and deny your teammate.

5. Tell your team what you are up to for example : omw top (on my way top). Ask your lanes if they urgently need ganks or if you can go on farming or assist other lanes.

6. If a lane calls you for an urgent gank, first of all start to go in their direction and analyze the situation. If another member of your team needs real help instead of just kills this member has a higher priority.

7. Make sure you don't die! This will be the thing you want to avoid most, but it happens here and there.

8. Leave a ward on the lane you just ganked because it is quite realistic that the enemy jungler will come for a counter-gank immediately.



So let's get into the course of a gank.


In my guide, I buy shoes first before ganking because it is quite early in the game (~4:40) when I'm ganking the first time in the game. At this time it is uncommon that any enemy had to go to their base so it is likely that they have no shoes at all. The trade for getting shoes before ganking is, you won't have a red buff. You may see this as a problem but don't forget your Two-Shiv Poison has an equal slow & you can get up close enemies easily with Deceive.



So after you chose what lane you want to gank (which will most likely be Top) move into one of the brushes either at your tower, in the river or at their tower (depends on the enemy placement). After giving your teammate a sign when you start the attack, you Deceive behind the enemy to proc your passive and hit them when you feel it is time to (either your teammate is up close or your Deceive wears off). Immediately after your auto-hit you throw your Two-Shiv Poison. If your enemy is no tank they will die now if they don't Flash or activate Ghost because a) you are faster due to Boots, b) because your Two-Shiv Poison slows him and c) because of him turnign his back to you and trying to reach his tower, youir Backstab gives you 20% more damage (which should add with Executioner now as the enemy got a huge nuke from you).
If your enemy is a bit tankier, just try to place a Jack In The Box in their retreating path to give you that little bit extra time and damage.



Visualization of ganking with Shaco:


So here I gank directly after blue buff because I see that the enemy lost a fair amount of HP and my Nocturne (a premade friend in this case) needs some help.
Of course at this early levels you go for the target with the least chance of survival, in this case Annie. So I tell Nocturne to attack them while I use Deceive to close the gap between me and Annie and finally hit her from behind. Right after my Auto-Attack i throw my Two-Shiv Poison to end my nuke and get First Blood.
I then go to the enemies tower and check if Renekton is around, but I don't see anyone until he actually walks out the brush with like 20% health. I Deceive as fast as possible to get near him (he actually thought I left this lane). Unfortunately Renekton uses Exhaust on me so I don't do any damage but at least Nocturne can get the kill (because Renekton used Flash earlier).
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Team Fights




Shaco is an assassin and you should play this role ONLY with him. That means you when a team fight breaks out you are not right inside it but wait until you can clearly tell where all the enemies are most important being their Ad Carry. You want to focus all your skills and attacks on the target with the biggest priority (most damage dealing one) which are their carries.
Your Hallucinate is important for surviving in team fights. You can also prepare fights with Jack In The Box at positions like Dragon. Another good use of Jack In The Box would be if their team is grouped together and you can fear everyone or most of them. This will help your team.



Another important role would be pushing towers while your team is fighting. Shaco is a great pusher because of Wriggle's Lantern and his high mobility. Also if your team can do a split push you shine in 1v1 situations. Try to stay alive because you also are a great threat for Baron & Dragon steals.



Remember:


This build is made for massive nukes but despite your 120 Armor and 100 Magic Resistance (if you have all items), you will die quick because of the high penetrations that the new masteries offer everyone.
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To Do List

-Finish all Chapters
-Add Banners for each Chapter
-Add Early Dragon Video
-Edit Titles (colorize & change size)
-Final check of the looks
-Final grammar check.
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