Hey all! I am bestial walker, currently Challenger in EUNE and ranked #1 Udyr in EUNE by op.gg. Ever since I can remember, I have climbed by one-tricking Udyr - he is the only champion that I have had a consistent positive winrate with throughout the seasons. This season, out of more than 400 games with Udyr in master and challenger tiers, I have maintained nearly 60% win rate (59 to be precise), which I consider a real feat given the sheer number of games.

I was the first one to discover the potential of tiger Udyr with tiamat after the nerfs in 6.7 hit and Phoenix Udyr's glory days ended, but unfortunately his kit was simply not strong enough to be competitive. After his buffs in patches 7.21 and 7.8 though, that completely changed. Many high-elo players still consider Udyr a weak pick and complain when I pick him, because he can be easily kited. That is true, and making mistakes on Udyr can get you punished easier than most champions. However, if you really know his capabilities and are able to calculate when you can go in and when you have to back away, Udyr can be an insanely strong pick - his sustained damage is through the roof meaning that you can farm and get objectives very quickly, he can 1v1 almost any champion in the game (if he can get in range), and he has strong wave clear and pushing capabilities. All in all, Udyr is a really strong pick if you want to have impact and carry games in solo queue.

Udyr is possibly the best champion to carry games with in low ELO. I find it extremely fun to stomp games below Diamond on smurf accounts. In plat and below, people are so disorganized and unaware of the map, making ganks disgustingly easy. If Udyr can stick to enemies, his damage and CC is ridiculous, and you can win pretty much any duel or even many 1v2s. In these divisions, people are so unaware of the map that you can very easily pick off early kills and start snowballing. A snowballing Udyr can only be shut down by a team that sticks together and chains their CC so that he can't really get in range of anyone to actually damage them. However, below Diamond, people don't understand the concept of properly grouping, playing around fed teammates, peeling for their carries, etc. You will find yourself easily catching one or two enemies at a time throughout the whole game, which is a paradise for Udyr.

Furthermore, closing the game with Udyr doesn't require you to depend on your team at all as you can solo every objective in the game (even Baron if you're snowballing).

It's like a free ticket to high elo.

The first difference that you will see between my playstyle and all other playstyles is that I do not build Trinity Force. The reason for that is simple - at 3733 gold, Trinity Force is simply not worth the gold compared to other items, such as Black Cleaver. In high elo, people will try to kite you. A lot. Usually, the only moment you actually stick to a champion and have time to damage them is the duration of your E stun. This means that you can't really get much value out of triforce, as you will only be able to proc its passive once when fighting somebody. However, one Q-empowered attack is enough to get full value out of your Cleaver, as your Q's passive will fully stack Cleaver's passive, even if you land a single auto. Furthermore, Cleaver also provides tankiness and movement speed - both very strong on Udyr, and costs almost 1000 gold less than trinity.

For your first recall you should aim to get 1050 gold asap so you can get your Tiamat. Tiamat is your absolute core item - it is needed to properly clear your jungle and push lanes. Afterwards, rush Warrior. In the early game, your role is assassin. You should abuse your movement speed to have strong map presence and catch enemies alone. You can delete almost anybody in a split second after a single E stun. By the time you get your Tiamat and Warrior, the laning phase will be over and you will often be forced to fight multitudes of enemies at a time. This is where kiting becomes a problem, and where you need to start scaling some sustain, otherwise you will just die immediately in teamfights. Most of the time, you will have gained enough lead early to afford to build Black Cleaver to keep up with damage. However, sometimes you will be behind. In such times, you should skip Cleaver and go for raw sustain - most likely Thornmail, and continue your build path as a tank. Both ways, you transition into the mid-late game as a fighter/bruiser with good follow-up engage, decent peel, but also still strong nuking potential when you manage to catch squishy enemies.

The weakness of this build is that you do not have mana sustain and it is hard to stack your passive in the early game. 20% cooldown reduction is enough to maintain your passive fully stacked by only spamming a single stance (usually E). This is after you complete your Warrior and get Kindlegem for Black Cleaver, and it's when your roam becomes super strong.

A great part of Udyr's strength is his ability to single handedly capture objectives.

You can solo drake at level 3, even if your Q is still rank 1.

Most of the time, this is what you are going to try to do. Nobody expects you to kill the drake so early in the game, so most of the time it is not warded. Usually, I will hit level 3, get the second rank of my Q (even though that is not necessary), and sneak drake for level 4.

Thus, you must always start with topside, so you can be on drake at level 3. This is a perfect opportunity to invade their topside. In fact, always invade the enemy topside buff. It is always worth it and gives you a nice boost to your odds at the start of the game. Outside of high elo, most of the time people don't even protect it and you just take their buff. If someone is protecting it, it's usually just their top laner. Your early game is extremely strong and you can first blood them or burn their flash. Getting your team to follow and invade with you is also smart.

The camps that you are going to clear before your first gank, apart from buffs, are wolves, gromp and scuttler. That is because without Tiamat you have no AoE, so raptors and golems take too much of your time to clear. Usually, you get your buffs, wolves, gromp, the scuttler in front of drake, and hopefully the drake as well. At this point you will have around 700 gold. You will need 350 more gold, as you need 1050 gold to get tiamat on your first recall. This is where you need to decide whether you can gank some lane, or you will go and clear your raptors and golems.

Udyr becomes a really strong split-pusher once you get your tiamat. Seize every opportunity to get enemy turrets - if you know that the enemy team is far from a lane, you can clear its wave in a second and deal huge damage to its turret with your passive + Q attack speed.

Counter the enemy jungler at every opportunity you get. You can easily 1v1 almost every jungler in the game, so do not be afraid to storm in his jungle, clear his camps (which you do insanely quickly with Tiamat) and hunt him down if you have vision of the rest of the enemy team. If you cast your Q and prepare your 3 stacks then wait in the bush for somebody to walk by, doing auto > Tiamat > q > auto is enough to delete them in the early game.

Udyr is a very tactical champion. He has no escape or gap closer, and being a good Udyr player boils down to having a profound understanding in exactly how much damage you can do and take at every point in the game, thus knowing when running in is worth it. Early in the game, you can even 1v2 most champions (this is a fun fact to abuse in the botlane) if you know the true extent of your damage. The only way to achieve this is by experience. So, if you like this champion and are inspired to become the Godyr - play him. A lot. Grind, grind, grind. That is the way.