Shaco General Guide by JigityJack

Introduction

Hi everyone! Welcome to my guide to jungle Shaco. I am pretty much the best Shaco in North America. Jungling is about my favorite role, because I feel its the most important aspect of the team, and a good one can carry most games.

General Shaco Information

Shaco is a great early game champion. He has high early damage, and can easily gank warded lanes. He is widely said to fall off hard late game, but a well played Shaco can be extremely useful. His kit is not the best for team fights, but you can still do very well if you know what you're doing. He is an excellent split pusher, which can win games. He is an incredibly powerful assassin. He is very elusive and escape nearly any situation, granted there isn't a lee sin on your back.

Pros

* He clears slow early, but it changes to one of the best in the game upon obtaining Ranger's Trailblazer and Ravenous Hydra.
* His ganks are strong
* He can split push very well
* Very stong early game
* He has a clone Hallucinate
* One of the best escapists
* Capable of letting mid have blue
* He can chase very well
* He can take dragon very early

Cons

* Very squishy, but his deception can make up for that
* If you fall behind, it can be very difficult to catch up
* He is a selfish jungler, which can make your team pretty upset

Items

Starting Items-
Hunter's Machete: Best jungle start. Self explanatory.
Health Potion x2: Self explanatory.
Warding Totem: Wards win games.
Sweeping Lens: Good on most junglers, but not necessary on Shaco. He can gank lanes without being spotted by wards, so it's not very useful.

First Purchase-
Ranger's Trailblazer: Gives Shaco much more jungle sustain, which he lacks early.
Poacher's Knife: Gives slightly more burst and has the movement speed steal. Great for ganks, but Shaco will benefit much more from the jungle sustain. He has plenty of damage as is.
Skirmisher's Sabre: Gives a lot more damage, but Shaco will have a very slow clear time without Ranger's Trailblazer. You will usually fall behind with this.
Pickaxe: Shaco's power spikes hard when he gets this.

Core-
Ranger's Trailblazer - Devourer: The attack speed combined with Ravenous Hydra makes his clear time insane. every camp you clear, you get stronger. Allows him to clear more camps between ganks, resulting in more damage and a higher level.
Ravenous Hydra: When you get this and devourer, your damage becomes astronomical. Clear time sky rockets, and you now have great split pushing potential.
Berserker's Greaves - Homeguard: Movement speed = more global pressure, more ganks, more wins. Attack speed is a great advantage too. With homeguard, you get right back into action after going back to base.

Next-
Phantom Dancer: makes you attack much faster, run faster, gives you crit chance, and ignores unti collision. Big power spike from this item.
Infinity Edge: Once you get this and Phantom Dancer, you become a menace for the enemy team. You will melt anybody.
^I consider these core items as well.

Finishers-
Trinity Force: If you get this, you will 1 shot the ADC, APC, or assassin. Makes your burst even stronger, to the point where if you're not focused, they get aced. Also gives you a little health and movement speed, but it's really just too expensive.
The Black Cleaver: Great against armor heavy comps, makes you a bit tougher and the CDR is very helpful.
Randuin's Omen: Build Against AD heavy comps. Makes you a little bit tanky and slows people down when they focus you.
Spirit Visage: Gives you health and magic resist, and buffs your lifesteal. Cool Down Reduction is also great.
Banshee's Veil: very similar to Spirit Visage, but trades lifesteal and CDR for the spell shield.
Guardian Angel: Gives good Armor and Magic Resist and gives you the revive. I think the cooldown is too long and it doesn't make you tanky enough. It's a good item, but noy my favorite.

Dilemmas-
Blade of the Ruined King vs Ravenous Hydra: Hydra gives you more attack damage and AoE. faster clear times, better split pushing, and more jungle sustain. Blade is great for chasing people, but Shaco already has great chasing potential. He benefits more from Hydraa.
Ranger's Trailblazer vs Poacher's Knife vs Skirmisher's Sabre: poacher's knife and Skirmisher's saber are great for single target burst and chasing ability. Shaco already has plenty of burst but a very slow clear time and poor sustain, so he sees more benefit from Trailblazer.
Devourer vs Warrior: Warrior is very effective vs armor heavy teams and is all around a great item, but devourer adds damage as the game goes on and synergizes much better with Hydra.
Statikk Shiv vs Phantom Dancer: The lightning damage from Statik Shiv really doesn't do much, and you already have plenty of AoE from hydra. PhD has better stats and allows you to run through minions, which can be crucial in certain situations.
Spirit Visage vs Banshee's Veil: Spirit Visage and Banshee's veil are very similar and usually yields a tough choice. when it comes down to it, SV gives you more lifesteal and CDR, but banshee's veil gives you the shield and 50 more health. I prefer to go with SV because the CDR makes you that much more mobile, and the lifesteal buff makes you much tougher to beat in a duel. Banshee's Veil is undoubtedly better if you keep getting destroyed by 1 ability, like a stun, grab, etc.

Summoner Spells

Your usual and always jungle Shaco spells.

Allows for a much better time in the jungle, and the items are very necessary.

Stronger ganks, picks up kills you normally wouldn't get.

Provides a good gank due to the slow, but Ignite still makes for a stronger gank.

A good summoner spell, but not necessary on Shaco because he has a built in flash with a stealth on it ( Deceive) that gives him all the mobility and escape he will ever need.

Can be useful for teleporting to a warded bush for a gank, but not necessary since Shaco can gank a warded lane easily. Also requires a well coordinated team, which doesn't happen very often.

I've tried this before. it worked fairly well, but doesn't compare to Ignite.

Runes

Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed for the mobility. Allows you to take the full offensive mastery tree, but still gain bonus movement speed. Movement speed is important to Shaco and junglers in general because it helps them "be everywhere at once."
Greater Seal of Attack Speed faster clear times.
Greater Glyph of Attack Speed for faster clear times.
Greater Mark of Attack Damage for the faster clear times and early damage.

Masteries

Coming soon..

Skill Sequence

1 Jack In The Box For clearing blue
2 Deceive or Two-Shiv Poison Depending on if you're counter jungling or clearing your own.
3 Deceive or Two-Shiv Poison Whichever one you didnt get at level 2
4 Two-Shiv Poison Max it first. best damage and slow.
5 Two-Shiv Poison
6 Hallucinate Ult is always to be upgraded
7 Two-Shiv Poison
8 Jack In The Box Need to max second for the fear.
9 Two-Shiv Poison
10 Jack In The Box
11 Hallucinate
12 Jack In The Box
13 Jack In The Box
14 Deceive
15 Deceive
16 Hallucinate
17 Deceive
18 Deceive

Clearing the Jungle

RUSH TO BLUE!!!!! First Jack In The Box at about :57 to have the max number of active Jack In The Box's when blue spawns (should be 4). Blue will die instantly. Now is where you do some thinking. You can grab Deceive or Two-Shiv Poison second. I like to grab Two-Shiv Poison and go to wolves. After that, go to red. The other, more risky option is to counter jungle. For this, grab Deceive second and go to their red (assuming their jungler started blue). Place a warding totem trinket in the bush by wraiths . They probably wont be there yet because they go gromp blue and wolves before heading over. Then you just go kill red and watch your Warding Totem to see of their jungle is making his way towards you. If he hasn't been there yet, take one of the smaller lizards. If he's there, leave them both. Regardless, you leave at least one little minion to delay the respawn of the camp. After their red , you either go take their golems, or gank. You must get your red soon after you take theirs or else they will and your counter jungle will not be quite as effective. Take some camps in between ganks to stay farmed and up to level. After your first b or 2, you can clear the camps using only a Jack In The Boxbox, so you should give blue to your mid.

Ganking

THIS IS WHERE Shaco SHINES. His ganks are simple. Deceive in, auto attack them one time and place a Jack In The Box in their escape path. The auto attack is for the Deceive crit, red slow, and Two-Shiv Poison passive slow. The Jack In The Box will fear them in most cases. Use Tiamat or Ravenous Hydra if you have it. Save the active on Two-Shiv Poison for the finisher, and Ignite for when they run under their tower.
**If the lane is warded, do not panic. http://imgur.com/gallery/86ieKDk/new The purple circles are spots that are never warded where you can deceive and run into lane from.

** Shaco is a selfish jungler, meaning you try to take the kills. This may upset your team, but will help you snowball your way to victory.

Team Fights

This is perhaps the most difficult thing to do as Shaco. Since you're so squishy, they can kill you instantly. The best way to do it is to stay back and wait. when someone initiates, you creep up and stay hidden. Just wait until you see the person on their team you want to assassinate. when you see them, Deceive to them and auto attack, followed up by using Ravenous Hydra and a Jack In The Box. If you start to get focused or need more damage, use Hallucinate, but be careful not to waste it. It can make the difference between life and death. Save Two-Shiv Poison for the last hit, trying your best to get the kill. The rest of the time you just auto attack and spam Ravenous Hydra.

Split pushing

This is another one of Shaco's stronger attributes to the team. He can take down towers lightning fast because of Hallucinate one, and two his Jack In The Boxs hit towers. He can clear minion waves swiftly if he has Ravenous Hydra and/or Statikk Shiv. He can escape the whole team using Deceive if he is smart as well. This is much of your mid/late game, because your not the best team fighter out there. Split push often as it is an effective tactic, but you don't want your team to be at a constant 4v5. Try to balance it out as best as possible.

Thanks!

Thanks for looking over my guide! please rate and give me feedback in the comments section. Have fun dominating your enemies as Shaco, the Demon Jester