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Tier 1: Offense

Summoner's Wrath :
I take Summoner's Wrath for two reasons. First, it increases the speed of your Ghost from 27% to 35% movement speed bonus, which Warpath takes advantage of. Second, it makes chasing and running that much easier. You are the master of chasing and running after all.

Tier 1: Defense

Summoner's Resolve :
Now whenever you are jungling, if you don't take Summoner's Resolve , I think you are a bloody fool. With it, every time you use Smite, Summoner's Resolve grants you 10 gold. By level 4, you should have used Smite twice, resulting in 20 gold. Now add in all the other times you are going to use it, by then end of the game. That adds up really quickly. Without it, you will fall behind in gold extremely quickly, no matter how much you gank.



Perseverance:
This mastery might be one of the most underrated ones I see in the current mastery tree. I don't see very many people use Perseverance. Why, I am not sure. With 3 points in this mastery, it grants you up to 6 HP Regen per 5 seconds based on your missing HP. This means that the more HP you are missing, the more HP Regen per 5 seconds you will have.



Durability :
Alright, now I know some of you think that 6 HP per level isn't all that much, but at level 18, that's a grand total of 108 extra HP. Now remember, you are a tank, so you should take as much HP as you can take all the time no matter what. Every tank should put 4 ranks in this mastery.



Tough Skin :
Now 2 damage is not a lot, I admit, but it can save your life. Now imagine you are jungling wraiths, and each of the wraiths hit you 10 times, before you kill them all. So 2 x 10 (hits) = 20 damage. Now take 20 damage x 4 (the number of wraiths) = 80 damage. Early on in the game, this 2 damage reduction per hit can save your life, and can mean the difference between losing blue buff, red buff, or possibly both, in the jungle.

Tier 2: Defense

Hardiness :
This mastery only adds 5 armor, but it's well worth it. More armor means less damage from all auto attacks, and the physical damage from the enemy champions. You are a tank. You need armor.



Resistance :
Slightly different from the mastery above, this mastery adds 5 magic resist. It's not much, but again, it's well worth it. 5 magic resist decreases the damage taken from magic damage. You are a tank. You need magic resist



Bladed Armor :
This mastery is the second most widely used among junglers. It reflects 6 points of damage back at all minions and monsters every time they hit you. This allows you to clear the jungle camps quicker. You are a jungler, and you will need this ability if you want fast jungle times. Faster jungle times mean more ganks.

Tier 3: Defense

Veteran's Scars :
30 extra HP isn't much, but Like I said in the Defense 1 tier, you are a tank and need all the HP you can get. So why wouldn't you get this mastery?



Safeguard:
This mastery is one of the most underrated masteries in the game. Safeguard reduces all tower damage by 5 percent. Now who wouldn't want this mastery, tank or not?

Tier 4: Defense

Tenacious :
I absolutely love this mastery. It gives 15 percent Tenacity which reduces the duration of all crowd control effects by 15 percent. If you get stunned for one second, you would actually only be stunned for 0.85 seconds. Now combine this with something like the Mercury's Treads or Spirit of the Ancient Golem which both give an extra 35 percenttenacity, reduces the duration even further. Instead of getting stunned for 0.85 seconds, you will only be stunned for 0.5 seconds. Not too shabby, eh?



Juggernaut :
This is again one of my favorite masteries. Juggernaut increases all of your bonus and base HP by a whole 4 percent! I know it's not a ton of HP, but imagine this. You have 2000 HP, and because of Juggernaut , it is increased to 2080. It's honestly not that much, but again, you are a tank. You need all the HP you can get.

Tier 5: Defense

Legendary Armor :
This mastery grants an extra 5 percent to your bonus armor and magic resist. So if you have a Thornmail, instead of it giving you 100 armor, it will give you 105 armor instead. If you have a Spirit Visage, instead of giving you 50 magic resist, it will give you 52.5 magic resist. Awesome mastery, right?

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Standard Runes:

Greater Mark of Attack Damage:
With the marks, I go with the Greater Mark of Attack Damage. These runes will allow your auto attacks and your Rampage (Q) to do more damage.



Greater Seal of Armor:
You need Armor in the jungle! These give the most benefit to your jungling.



Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist:
Now you are the tank, and will be rushing into the fight on the front lines. You will benefit from these runes by an incredible amount.



Greater Quintessence of Armor:
I personally find that Hecarim is still a little bit squishy in the jungle, so I use Greater Quintessence of Armor.

Alternate Runes:

Greater Mark of Armor Penetration:
Now if you don't like the Greater Mark of Attack Damage, you can always switch to these for a different damage output.



Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed:
I used to run these runes, but I find that they don't add enough damage. Sure, you can get around the map quicker, but the damage from your Warpath (Passive) just isn't enough to keep these runes on.



Greater Quintessence of Attack Damage:
These runes are for if you think you don't need the extra durability, but the damage instead. I don't suggest these, as Hecarim's jungle sustain is horrible early game, and the more armor you have, the more durable you are in a team fight.



Greater Quintessence of Armor Penetration:
For these runes, it is the same situation as the one described above. If you feel you don't need the durability, but need the damage, this is a different rune you could use.



Greater Quintessence of Scaling Magic Resist:
Now this is probably the best alternative to the Greater Quintessence of Armor. You obviously aren't as durable when it comes to the jungle or champions that do massive physical damage like Graves, but it does allow you to be more durable against champions like Brand that deal huge magic damage.

Ghost:
This Summoner Spell is a MUST HAVE on Hecarim. It allows you to move across the battlefield quicker to get to a lane, to gank, to chase, or to escape. As a bonus from his Warpath (Passive), it also gives you some attack damage



Smite:
If you are jungling, unless you are Warwick or Nunu & Willump, you MUST have this. End of story. Oh, it also gives you an extra 10 bonus gold every time you use it thanks to Summoner's Resolve .

> > >

Warpath (Passive) is an awesome passive. It transfers 10 / 12.5 / 15 / 17.5 / 20 / 22.5 / 25% of your bonus movespeed into Attack Damage. It also makes you ignore unit collision, meaning you are free to move around and not get caught/trapped by the minions that get in your way.

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Rampage (Q) is your bread and butter. You max this skill first because it is on a short cooldown. Every time that you damage a minion, monster, or champion, it gains a stack of Rampage. These stacks max out at 2. For every stack of Rampage, the cooldown is reduced by 1 second. Now take this short cooldown, and apply it to a team fight. This skill alone can do MASSIVE damage. Also apply the skill to your Iceborn Gauntlet and your damage skyrockets! This skill of the bread and butter of Hecarim.

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Now Spirit of Dread (W) is one of the best abilities in the game. Hecarim puts up a circle around him and damages all enemies in the circle every second. The circle lasts for 4 seconds. Better yet,20% of all the damage these enemies take, heals Hecarim with a cap from healing off of minions! This cap is 60 / 90 / 120 / 150 / 180 HP

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Devastating Charge (E) is your ganking tool. We mainly just grab this for utility in your ganking, and without this ability, your ganks go from strong to absolute garbage. It gives you an increasing movement speed buff for 4 seconds and while it is still active, it will knock back the first enemy that you hit. It will go on cooldown when you hit someone, or when the 4 seconds is up. In combination with Warpath (Passive), it gives you some Attack Damage, which the skill scales off of! Score!

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Onslaught of Shadows (R) (Ultimate) is the most over powered Ultimate ability in the game, in my opinion. Hecarim Summons spectral riders which always go a specified distance and deal damage to everyone they hit. Hecarim will only go a chosen distance. Wherever he lands will send out a shockwave that causes everyone hit by the shockwave to flee from him for 1 second.

Uses:
-If you manage to hit the entire enemy team, which I have done over and over again, your team will absolutely destroy the opposing team.
-You can also use Onslaught of Shadows (R) (Ultimate) to escape from a champion if they are chasing you. You can use this just like the Summoner Spell Flash to go over walls to escape.
-Just like in the use above, you can use Onslaught of Shadows (R) (Ultimate) just like Flash to get over walls and chase people down. Now if you lead your target, you can get them to flee away from wherever they were running to.

Core Items:

Situational Items:

Defensive Items

Armor

If the enemy team has at least 2 Heavy AD Champions, I would suggest grabbing at least one of these items. If they have 3 or more, I suggest grabbing at least 2 of these items.

Magic Resist

If the enemy team has 2 AP Champions, I would suggest grabbing one of these. If they have 3 or more, I would suggest grabbing at least 2 of these.

Offensive Items

If the enemy team has LOTS of armor, the Last Whisper and/or Black Cleaver need to be bought. The Last Whisper allows you to ignore 35% of your opponents' armor. For example, if your enemy has 300 armor you would actually be hitting them as if they only had 195 armor. Black Cleaver allows you to shred 6.25% of the enemy's maximum armor which stacks up to a maximum of 4 stacks (which is a total of 25% of their maximum armor). Then it also allows you to penetrate 10 of their remaining armor. With the two of these items combined, you can deal a massive amount of damage. A target with 300 armor gets the armor shredded to 225 armor. The Last Whisper kicks in for an additional 35%, which brings them down to 146.25 armor. Black Cleaver kicks in once again to penetrate an additional 10 armor. Now add in the nine Greater Mark of Armor Penetration. The runes add a total of 11.5. You are now hitting the enemy as if they had 124.75 armor, instead of 300. Awesome, right? Just remember that with Armor Penetration, the percentage penetration goes through BEFORE the flat penetration.

The path that I use in the jungle is the one below

• Wolves
• Blue Buff
• Wraiths
• Golems
• Red Buff
• Wraiths
• Gank

Note:

• If you are on the blue team, mid and/or top should help at wolves. If you are on the purple team, bot should help.
• For the first gank, you should have Red Buff, Devastating Charge (E) and Ghost ready for the first gank. Make sure you use all of these for the most effective first gank and to take the enemy by surprise with your massive speed. To have your Devastating Charge (E), you MUST be level 4. Do NOT gank before this. Make sure that when you use Devastating Charge (E), you push them back towards your tower and/or away from their lane partner (do whichever is necessary for the most effective gank). Make sure to ALWAYS deal damage with your Rampage (Q) and Spirit of Dread (W) before hitting them with your Devastating Charge (E). This assures that you have the most amount of damage out of a gank.
  
  Note:
  Don't Smite at Wolves. Save Smite for Blue Buff unless your team is going to stay at Blue Buff to give you a Smiteless Blue Buff