Udyr is one of the best junglers in the game. As a phoenix he can clear camps incredibly fast, counter jungle really well and preform strong ganks at any time as his jungle is really safe.
Udyr is a very versatile champion that can preform many roles, such as tank, bruiser, AOE dps or even a combination of it all.

Pros:

• Very fast jungle clear time
• Very safe jungler
• Very mobile champion
• Very tanky, while still being able to do decent damage
• Great farmer

Cons:

• Quite vulnerable to slows/getting kited
• Damage falls off late game
• No real ultimate
  

I thought I'd start this off explaining why I choose Wingborne Storm over Wilding Claw.

Pros of Wingborne Storm:

• Faster jungle times
• Lots of AOE damage
• No need to buy Wriggle's Lantern

Pros of Wilding Claw:

• Higher single target damage
• Relies less on having red buff or any other slow

Overall, going Wingborne Storm allows you to farm much faster, without having to spend gold on Wriggle's Lantern and still having very high damage output with some attack speed. However, Phoenix Udyr really relies quite heavily on having a slow to be able to properly stick to a target and do damage. Phoenix stance also allows you to be a very agressive jungler, allowing you to invade the enemy jungle very effectively and clear their camps quickly.

I use a rather unique mastery setup for Udyr, mixing up tankyness with utility for maximum efficiency in the jungle.




Offense:

Plentiful Bounty : Pretty standard for any jungler, adds up in the long run.


Defense:

I get Hardiness for some early game armor to help me with the early game jungle, Evasion + Nimbleness to match with my dodge runes.
Defensive Mastery also helps alot for your early game jungle durability, Resistance and Harden Skin are both useful fillers.


Utility:

3 points in Good Hands for minimal downtime, a point in Perseverence as a filler.
Awareness is very important, you really need the extra experience from this.
Utility Mastery to make all those buffs last as long as possible, fill it out with Greed and Meditation .
Quickness and Blink of an Eye are very important to make you more mobile.

This is the rune setup I use for Udyr. Below the explanation and some alternatives:

Marks

• Greater Mark of Attack Speed: Wingborne Storm scales incredibly well with attack speed and as Udyr doesn't really need Armor Penetration, your marks are the best source for attack speed.

Seals:

• Greater Seal of Evasion: I use these to synergize with Nimbleness . Makes you very mobile against AD champions or anywhere there's a bunch of creeps attacking you.
• Greater Seal of Armor: Good to help you survive longer in the jungle early game. Makes your jungle alot safer.
• Greater Seal of Attack Speed: Wingborne Storm has one simple rule: You want attack speed? Get more attack speed! Seriously though, if you don't think you need the extra tankyness or dodge, these are pretty good.

Glyphs:

• Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist: Gives you a nice magic resist boost late game.
• Greater Glyph of Magic Resist: If you think you'll need to get the magic resist earlier in the game (perhaps to gank that pesky Brand), get these.
• Greater Glyph of Attack Speed: Another possible choise to get those attack speed runes in, though make sure to not overkill it and balance it out.

Quintessences:

• Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed: Makes you more mobile -> Allows you to better stay on a target to get those phoenix procs.
• Greater Quintessence of Attack Speed: Same deal as before, you CAN get the much needed attack speed here but make sure to balance it out with other needed stats, such as tankyness.
• Greater Quintessence of Health: If you think you need a more tanky early game, these are a good choise.

Smite: This is a jungle Udyr guide, junglers need smite.

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Flash: Great spell that can be used as both gap closer or escape ability.

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Ghost: Alternative to Flash, makes you incredibly fast combined with Blazing Stampede

Passive: Monkey's Agility

Entering a stance grants Udyr 10% attack speed and 3% dodge for 5 seconds. This effect can stack.

Makes Udyr's jungle times considerably faster. Synergyzes very well with Wingborne Storm and Nimbleness .

Tiger Stance

Activation: On his next attack, Udyr swipes at his target, dealing normal attack and dealing 150% of his attack damage + 30 / 80 / 130 / 180 / 230 extra damage over 2 seconds as magic damage. In addition, It increases attack speed 5% less than passive for 5 seconds.

Persistent Effect: Udyr's attack speed is increased by 20 / 25 / 30 / 35 / 40%. Half of this is persistent, the other half is activated for 5 seconds.

Cooldown 6seconds
Cost 55 / 50 / 45 / 40 / 35mana
Range 600

This ability makes Udyr's single target damage very scary. When going for Wingborne Storm, this is still a very powerful ability to push down towers or other map objectives.

Turtle Stance

Activation: Udyr gains a temporary shield that absorbs 60 / 100 / 140 / 180 / 220 (+50% of ability power) damage.

Persistent Effect: Udyr's attacks cannot crit, but he restores 10 / 12 / 14 / 16 / 18% of his damage as health and 9 / 10.5 / 12 / 13.5 / 15% of his damage as mana.

Cooldown 6seconds
Cost 75 / 65 / 55 / 45 / 35mana
Range 600

This is what makes Udyr so very tanky. With a low cooldown, you can pretty much spam this in teamfights giving you alot of damage mitigation. Also allows Udyr to stay very safe in the jungle and stay high health at all times.

Bear Stance

Activation: Udyr gains 15 / 18 / 21 / 24 / 27% increased movement speed for 2 / 2.5 / 3 / 3.5 / 4 seconds.

Persistent Effect: Udyr mauls his target with such force that they are stunned for 1 second. This effect cannot occur on the same target for 6 seconds.

Cooldown 6seconds
Cost 55 / 50 / 45 / 40 / 35mana
Range 600

Udyr's chasing ability. Makes Udyr very mobile and with a stun every 6 seconds allows him to shut people down quite effectively.

Phoenix Stance

Activation: Udyr sends out pulsing waves of fire dealing 15 / 25 / 35 / 45 / 55 (+25% of ability power) magic damage each second to nearby enemies for 5 seconds. In addition, Udyr's ability power is increased by 16 / 24 / 32 / 40 / 48 and his attack damage is increased by half of that amount.

Persistent Effect: Every third attack, Udyr engulfs enemies in front of him in flame, dealing 40 / 80 / 120 / 160 / 200 (+25% of ability power) magic damage.

Cooldown 6seconds
Cost 55 / 50 / 45 / 40 / 35mana
Range 600

Jungle Udyr's bread and butter. Allows him to clear camps very fast and combined with some attack speed allows him to do alot of AOE damage to a team, or even great single target damage.

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This is the standard skill sequence I follow.
Grab and max Wingborne Storm first to clear the jungle faster and to deal more damage in general.
Max Iron Mantle after that to be alot more durable and to be able to stay in fights.
Get the first point in Blazing Stampede whenever you want to go for your first gank. This can vary in every game so it's up to you to decide when you want you first point here.
Maxing Blazing Stampede before Iron Mantle is a possibility for agressive counter jungling and ganking in case there's not alot of team action going on OR you just don't need to extra durability Iron Mantle offers you.

Cloth Armor: Starting item for Udyr. Allows you to stay in the jungle very long and allows you to be very agressive early on.
Mercury's Treads: The boots of choise if the enemy team has CC. Allows you to stay in the fight better.
Ninja Tabi: If the enemy team doesn't really have alot of CC or has alot of AD. Synergizes well with Nimbleness and Greater Seal of Evasion.
Heart of Gold: Gives you some early game tankyness and extra gold. Will eventually be turned into a Randuin's Omen.
Wit's End: The core item for Phoenix Udyr. Gives you an enormous damage boost in Wingborne Storm.

Randuin's Omen: Great tank item with a very nice on-use effect for Udyr that allows him to chase down teams even better.
Force of Nature: Alot of magic damage mitigation and a very good passive for extra mobility and sustain.
Spirit Visage: Gives Udyr a nice boost in sustainability and tankyness.
Aegis of the Legion: Good all-around tank item with a useful aura.
Warmog's Armor: Good if you want some raw health and good synergy with Atma's Impaler.
Guardian Angel: Another good item for good all-around tank stats. Also gives you an extra life!
Banshee's Veil: Useful magic resist item that can stop some key spells.

Trinity Force: Amazing item that offers every stat Udyr needs for more damage.
Frozen Mallet: Great item that allows you to stay on your target for more Wingborne Storm procs and synergizes well with Atma's Impaler.
Madred's Bloodrazor: Allows you to shred through high health targets.
Youmuu's Ghostblade: Another great attack speed item for more Wingborne Storm damage.
Atma's Impaler: Great finishing item to synergize with the tons of health you'll have at that point.

1. Agressive Route 1


White: first run
Red: second run

This first route, the route I usually take, assumes the enemy jungler starts at blue. You start at your Wolves IF you can get someone to do some damage to them. Quickly move to your blue buff, have it leashed and kill it. Make sure to ask your team for some damage on blue so you can quickly move on to the enemy wraiths. Mow down the wraiths and kill the enemy double golems as well.
Using this path, you can gank at any time as you'll be pretty high on health throughout the entire path.


2. Agressive Route 2


This is a pretty standars route starting at blue with a leash, followed by wolves, wraiths, red buff and golem. Using this route, you will have your red buff much faster and will be able to preform strong ganks earlier on.


3. Efficient Route



White: first run
Red: second run

This route is the most efficient in terms of exp and gets you levels faster than any other route, if done right, this should get you to level 5 by the 5 minute mark.
You can also gank at any time using this route.


Here's a good video showing a few of these routes.

The most efficient way to jungle will be to max your Wingborne Storm out first for maximum damage and Iron Mantle second for sustain. You pull camps with Wingborne Storm active, get 3 hits in for the proc and switch to Iron Mantle to absorb some damage. Turn into a phoenix again when it comes off cooldown for another 3 hits and keep rotating like this untill the camp is clear.
As soon as you've cleared the jungle, either look for ganks if a lane is open for one, or go back and buy Boots and some wards if you can.
Make sure to try and keep track of your own and your enemies buff camps so you can offensively ward up theirs, and make sure you take yours.
After you get your boots, the next item you want to buy will be a Heart of Gold, followed by a Wit's End.

Phoenix Udyr is a very strong counterjungler. Even from the start Udyr can take half of the enemy jungle against junglers who start at blue, and continue to invade whenever he pleases as they just can't 1v1 a phoenix Udyr.

Examples of junglers that start at blue and are slower/weaker than Udyr:

• Amumu
• Fiddlesticks
• Jarvan IV
• Trundle
• Gangplank

Note: while Warwick doesn't usually start at blue, he is also a champion you can push around in his own jungle and just take his camps from under his nose.
When you do invade, always make sure to pay attention to enemy Clairvoyances and enemy lane movements. While you CAN bully most junglers in their own jungle, often they will get assisted by their lanes in which case you need to get out of there.

There are 2 junglers you need to look out for while counterjungling as far as I know and those are Lee Sin and Nocturne. Both of them both have alot of viable jungle paths and are much stronger in a 1v1 situation than most other junglers.

These are the most important spots you can ward as a jungler in the early game.
Green: Defensive jungle wards
Red: Agressive counterjungle wards
Pink: Pink ward at dragon

You can also ward for your top/mid lane early on as you're the one roaming around the map and it will definitely help them out alot. If you feel you're gonna do alot of warding, you can always get a Wriggle's Lantern to help you save some gold.

• As said before, Phoenix Udyr does not need a Wriggle's Lantern to jungle effectively. You can use this to your advantage by getting a very early Oracle's Elixir to clear enemy wards
• Make sure to alway use Iron Mantle when possible in team fights, to minimize damage taken and to allow you to stay in a fight as long as possible
• Udyr is very strong at protecting his carries with Blazing Stampede. Prioritize protecting your team over killing if needed.
• Don't be afraid to use Flash as a gap closer to land a Blazing Stampede stun. Often, this can serve as a great form of initiation.

Overall, Udyr is a very strong and versatile jungler and really fun to play. I hope this guide will help people discover this amazing champion as you don't really see him often enough, and if you do see him, he's rarely seen as a phoenix.
As always thanks for reading and any comments/feedback are appreciated.