This guide will focus on playing Wukong as a tanky melee DPS carry, with some excellent burst DPS and survivability. He's got an amazing harass game, and some excellent combos I'll detail later in the build. Please try this build before you knock it. I'm aware nimbus strike is more popular than crushing blow, but it shouldn't be. Crushing blow flat does more damage until very late game, and the armor debuff never goes out of style. Just take my word for it and try it out.

Pros
- Excellent burst DPS
- Interesting and versatile toolkit
- Great escape mechanisms
- One of the best initiators in the game

Cons
- DPS doesn't scale as well as some other champs
- W ability scales with AP, which really makes no sense
- Poor farming (unless you count the ultimate)

His passive might make him sound like a tank, but Wukong has some amazing burst damage if built right. I take 21 points in offense and the 9 extra points into defense for some added survivability. Wukong makes a decent tank, but he really shines as a melee burst dps champion.

I've tried a full tank build in the past, but quit honestly, I felt he was a little lackluster overall when built this way. His damage output is really dependent upon +attack damage items. His ultimate is especially dependent upon +Attack damage items, as the base damage is relatively low, but it receives 100% bonus from items. While the knock-up is a great way to start off a team fight, without some decent damage to back it up, you're really not going to turn the tide of the fight. Especially if your opponent is stacking health/armor.

For my standard DPS build, I get 9 Greater Marks of Desolation (the best for AD DPS) 9 greater seals of vitality, 9 greater glyps of alacrity, and 3 quintessences of desolation.

The vitality runes really help with survivablity, as he innately has only moderate health. Remember that vitality runes are better than fortitude past level 6. They also have great synergy with Atma's impaler, which you'll be getting late game.

You can stack armor runes if you wish, but you already get a fair amount of armor from your passive, so I don't feel it's too necessary to do so. +HP is going to be slightly more effective.

You might also consider stacking glyphs of strength over alacrity, but I don't feel the extra 2.5 damage is better than the increase to attack speed, even though you're using him for burst damage.

Nothing really new here, the same spells that are good for most other melee champions remain are just as effective for Wukong. I recommend taking Flash over Ghost since you're really more of a burst DPS champion than you are a chaser. Get in, smash, get out. You might consider going Ignite instead of exhaust, either one will land you some nice kills, but generally if you could have killed someone with ignite, you probably could have killed them with exhaust, and in my opinion exhaust has more versatility since it can be used defensively.

Wukong does depend highly on cooldowns to pull off any decent DPS. Getting clarity will certainly improve your harass game early on, but late game, I never found myself really hurting for mana with Wukong.

I've seen a lot of other build really focus on Nimbus strike and overlook Crushing Blow. In this build, Crushing blow is the first skill I max, and I have really good luck with it. I think people overlook just how much damage it does, and the armor debuff really helps. Crushing blow benefits from 100% of your attack damage because it uses your attack damage as it's base damage. Nimbus strike is great to close distance, and the attack speed bonus has great synergy with crushing blow, but crushing blow will do more damage than nimbus strike for the majority of the game until you get a whole lot of +AD. And the armor debuff ensures it will never go out of style.

I recommend getting nimbus strike at level 4, but you can get it at level 2 over decoy as an alternative. I've found that getting decoy second however keeps you from getting ganked early on, and it greatly improves your harass with crushing blow. Getting nimbus strike at level 2 generally will get you killed for being too aggressive.

At level 4, your combo will be: nimbus strike -> crushing blow -> decoy to get away. This is possibly one of the best harass combos in the game. It's guaranteed damage, and decoy allows you to get away scott free.

The Three Combos

W -> Q

W in a group of mobs, sneak around and land a Q on your enemy. Never go to deep with this one, but it's great for some chaotic harass early on.

E -> Q -> W

This combo is your bread and butter. Nimbus strike in, crushing blow, and then immediately W to get away before your enemy can react. It's not as effective against AoE champions like Morde, but for the most part, this harass is rock solid. Be mindful of your pathing after you W.

E -> Q -> R -> (E/W?)

This combo is great for both ganks, and initiating team battles. Nimbus strike in and immediately land a crushing blow on your target, before they have a chance to run away, hit your ultimate for the knockup and massive damage. You can throw a summoner spell down on any particular target while you're spinning without interrupting your ulti. If your target is still alive at the end, rush in for another nimbus strike, this should finish the job. If you're getting targeted in a team fight and you're low on health W immediately afterwards to sneak away. If you're still good on health, stay in and clean up with the rest of your team.

As an alternative to the longsword and health pot, you might consider starting off with a Doran's Shield. This is an optional item, as it will slow down your build a tad, but it will add significant early survivability, possibly landing you an early kill. I don't recommend the doran's blade, as if you're going to start off with offense, you might as well grab an item you're going to be using later ie. the longsword.

Since Wukong focuses more on burst dps and harass than attack speed, I usually get Mercury Treads over the Berserker's Grieves, however berserker's are not a bad choice, especially if you're low on money early game.

Focus on items that give +attack damage and health/armor to get the most out of your abilities and passive. I've had very good luck with the above item build. In a pinch, you can build Wukong as a tank, but his damage will suffer terribly late game if you do so. I don't recommend building him tank unless you have some really solid DPS on your team, otherwise you'll always find yourself short DPS in a team fight.

If you find the enemy team is heavy in AP, you might consider adding a Hexdrinker into the build before getting a black cleaver. Banshee's veil is too expensive and it doesn't add anything to your damage.

I've had a few comments about not taking Trinity Force in this build, and after some playing around with sheen I decided to add it. I still think, Trinity force is simply too expensive and not effective enough to rush, as each individual component doesn't really benefit you enough to make the overall cost worthwhile. The passive on Sheen/Tforce is nice with Wukong, but since sheen adds ability power instead of attack damage, the overall result in my opinion is underwhelming without additional AD to carry the slack.

The other effects trinity force provides really aren't that helpful for Wukong. The movement speed and attack speed bonus are already covered by your nimbus strike, and you really don't benefit at all from ability power. I went ahead and added it to the build but as the last item, because really the attack damage is more important in my opinion. Sheen proc is just the icing on the cake.

This build is still a work in progress, but I've been very happy with the results thus far. Please don't leave comments telling me how much better nimbus strike is until you've tried this build.

- You're not as tanky as you think you are, even with your passive.
- Crushing blow absolutely destroys towers.
- Decoy is generally not fooled by towers, flash is far more effective for escaping a tower dive
- Crushing blow, crushing blow, crushing blow... no seriously, crushing blow.