Karma General Guide by GreyVictory1510

Introduction

So... Here is my Jungle-Karma guide. Before anyone says something: I played her in the jungle before it was brought to the LCS and I play her a bit different. So please, don`t come with LCS! BLA! I realy didn`t like the Karma there. o_Ò And this is a guide in progress, so keep that in mind. ^^
Karma is a Utility-Champion. She has a little bit of everything. She can realy hurt and slow with her Q, her W snares and she can give any champ on her team a shield combined with a very strong speedbuff. She can even speedup your Minions. Her Ultimate buffes the next ability she uses up. Her Q bursts and slows more, W heals and E buffs your entire team in a certain range! If you want an allrounder and you don`t need a tankjungler, she is your man! Ahhhh, woman. ^_^"

Pros / Cons

Pros +Her Mantra-Q bursts even without any AP! +Slow, Snare and Speedup. +Safe clear with decent time. +Good Build-options(nearly everything).

Cons -Weak to burst and ambushes with hard cc. -No gapcloser. -Your Snare takes some time. -Q blockable by minions and champs.

Champion-Abilitys

Gathering Fire is Karmas passive. Damaging enemy champions reduces your cooldown on your ultimate by two seconds and damaging enemy champions with Autoattacks by 1 second.


Inner Flame is Karmas Q. It damages every enemyunit and jungle creeps in a small area after hitting a target and slowing them for 25% for 1.25 seconds


Focused Resolve is Karmas W. It damages an enemy over time and snares them after 2 seconds for 1/1.25/1.5/1.75/2 seconds, depanding on level.


Inspire is Karmas E. Inspire gives an ally a shield and grands 40/45/50/55/60% movementspeed.


Mantra is Karmas Ultimate. After activading it, Karma can use an empowered version of her next casted ability for 8 seconds. Mantra is available from level 1.



Soulflare is Karmas Mantra-Q. Inner flame deals additional magic damage, leaves after hitting a target a field, which slows for 50% and explodes after 1.5 seconds, dealing great magic damage to every enemy standing in it.

Renewal is Karmas Mantra-W. Focused resolve deals bonus magic damage and Karma is healed for 20% of her missing health immediatly and after snaring the enemy again for 20% of her missing health.

Defiance is Karmas Mantra-E. Inspire deals magic damage, gives half the shield amount to all allied champions around the target and gives them the full bonus movementspeed.





Basically... Always cast your Q in fights and in the jungle, when you can. You could wait to improve your positioning, but as your Q slows and reduces the cooldown on your Ult by two secs for every champion you hit, most of the time it is better to spam it. If your enemys are slowed, you can move in comparison more freely to get a free line for your Q to hit keytargets.
Snare with your W champions like Jax, Shyvana, Nasus or Riven, who will try to get on your Carrys. But keep in mind: Your Mantra-W heals yourself, so maybe it will be a good option to hold on to it. You must learn to predict when you will need the heal in your backhand and when not.
Use Inspire on your most valuable allys, but only if it will do them any good. No need in giving a shield to a target which recives no focus or which doesn`t need the movementspeed for repositioning.
Now we come to the hardest point... What ability is worth using Mantra on? Basically... Everyone. It depends heavely on the flow of the match which is your best option. If you had a good game, your Inner Flame deals good damage and you have a clean shot on the enemy carries, gives them your Soulflare! Maybe the will use flash to get out, run away or get hit by your full burst. Everything works fine and gives your team the upperhand. If the enemy carry flashes away, for a few seconds even, he can`t kill your team. This gives your team the chance to attack. If they get hit, they could be halfdead or at least are scared for ther lifes. ; ) If flash was baited... The enemy can`t use it midfoght for repositioning or escaping. If your Team is behind, use Defiance It gives your entire team a shield and the ability to move better to outplay your enemy. If one of your carrys is fed... Just shot everything on anyone, who wants to get close to them, Soulflare for slow, Focused Resolve snare and Inspire on your carry. If you are the carry... Renewal. keep yourself alive for more Inner Flames.

Masteries

As for masteries I recomment11/13/6. Get Sorcery for the cooldownreduction and Butcher for the plus 2 damage on minions Arcane Knowledge gives you the 8% magicpen for your Soulflare you will realy like to have.
Invest one point in Summoner's Resolve for the 10 Gold. It seems to be not much, but it realy stacks up. Also get Tough Skin for the reduced damage from Minion, Veteran's Scars for the health and Hardiness for the Armor. Also get Relentless , because Karma has no gapcloser and neads to run up to her enemies.
Also take Wanderer and Meditation for your basic needs and roamingabilitys.

Runes

As an AP-Jungler with good base damage and a shield, which scales with AP, take 9Greater Marks of Magic Penetration, 9 Greater Seals of Armor, 9 Greater Glyphs of Scaling Magic Resist and 3 Greater Quintessences of Ability Power. You could switch to Movementspeed, Gold per 5, more Ap or Magic Pen or Attack Speed. ^^

Spells

Obviously you should use Smite. It will help you in the jungle, even if you can clear it without it. You can steal blue, red, Dragon and even Baron with it or secure them, so that they won`t get stealed in return.

Well, Flash is always an option. A free blink is never a bad thing to have. When your opponents have many gapclosers, you should be mobile, too. Examples are Ezreal, Kassadin and Ahri.

Items

You can change your boots depending on your neads. When facing a lot of heavy cc, take Mercury's Treads for the tenacity, while facing some heavy AA-Champs, like Tryndamere or Master Yi, take Ninja Tabi. You could also take Sorcerer's Shoes for the magicpen and Ionian Boots of Lucidity for the early cooldownreduction.

The Jungler-Items are very cost efficient. You should buy it as fast as you can. It gives great stats for the gold it costs and the spellvamp will work wonders with your W and Q on minion waves. Also 20% less cooldown on smite is always ice to have. ^^

You will need the mana. Spamming your Q will burn through your reserves and always shielding your teammates doesn`t help, too. The AP wil be put to good use and the later version, Seraph's Embrace, gives you even more Mana and a shield on top of that!

Now... You can realy abuse the active... When you use your Mantra-W you will get healed two times, first at the beginning and second after snaring. When you activate your Hourglass, you will damage the enemy over the time while being immun to every damage AND you will even get healed at the end, as long as your W hits for the full damage. If you are low, this will safe your life so many times. Combined with flash and your Manashield from your Seraph's Embrace you will be able to heal up after being nearly dead enough to get away from even the dangeroused situations. Keep in mind, that stuns still kill you. ^_^"

Warding

You are the jungler and come around more around the map then anyone else from your team. Always keep that in mind. It pretty much gives you the best opportunity to ward. Most wards can be easely set up by your Teammates, because they don`t have to go far from there lane to set them up, and as a result, the ward-pressure is pretty situational, but in case they don`t ward, you should know were to set Sight Ward`s up.

*The bigger the wards are the higher, the priority to set them is.

Top priority:

You should always have a ward, that covers dragon and the jungle entrance, baron and the jungle entrance, one in each tribush and two around the mid-lane, one in each small bush above and below the lane. This way you alway know, where enemies leave the jungle and when. It let`s you plan your next actions and where to gank.

Low priority:

It can be fatale, if you gank while the enemy-jungler is near your position or, what is even worth, if he surprises you. Therefor you can set wards up in the enemy-half of the jungle. But these wards have a lower priority, so only set wards there, if you have enough gold on you to buy these without ruining your game. And who know? Maybe you will be able to steal some buffs to even out the money you used for setting up these wards.

Situational priority/Gank-wards:

Finally there are the bonus-wards in the Top- and Bot-lane, which are pretty situational to be honest. Against champs like Nidalee and Blitzcrank you realy want them, so that you have enough time to dodge there skillshots, but against other champions they will only help you to a very small degree. But there is a reason, why there are listed in this jungle-guide, but not the other situational wards! You can use them for teleport, if you decided to take it, and gank from behind! If your team sets them up without beeing noticed, your enemies won`t even know, what will hit come to them!

Counters and Good matchups

*In progress. Will be added, when I have enough time again.*