Pros + Strong pre-6 Ganks. + One of the best counterjunglers out there + So good splitpusher + One of the most fun champ to play with. + So Slippery and annoying. + He is the most mental champ out there. + You can easily win people with Coulrophobia. Shaco has evolved over the seasons. While he it hasn't the best assassin, his kit is designed for tilting enemies and attacking them while they less expect it. Be sure to never fight alone early game unless it's an easy 1v1. With his built in dash with invisibility, Shaco is one of the most terrifying Champions of the Rift.

Cons - Weak early ganks if not used to them. - Hard to play. Extremely hard to master. - You MUST stay focused and calmed to play him. - You'll get flamed sometimes for picking him. - Squishy champ. - He have troubles against Guardian Angel and revealing champs like Twisted Fate. Shacos weaknesses relies of how different he is. While his one-shots and plays are rewarding, a single mistake can make you throw a huge lead. It's important that you stay focused on him and you master all of his kit in order to feel as much confortable as possible with the mad jester.

Many people ask me which is the actual role of Shaco. Is Shaco a strong choice? the answer is YES, he is an amazing choice in solo queue, but he is a hard champion to play and to master, and you will need LOADS of practice while you feel da pawah. If you are looking for a Darius-like champion, you took the wrong one.

Shaco is a FUN, worth, powerful Champion.

Is he a carry?No.
Is he an initiator/engager? No.
Is he a tank? No.
Is he a support jungler? No.
Is he an assassin like Kha'Zix? Kinda.
Is he a bruiser that can fight for a long time? No.


So.. What can this little funny guy do for my team? Is it there anything he can do better than anyone?

Shaco is as an anti-meta, and you will be busy when playing him. As a quick reference, Shaco has two "main objectives:" to Deny and Demotivate your enemies and make your team rich. While he is not the best fighter or assassin, he has epicly good utility.

A good comparison would be Twisted Fate. He doesnt have the best burst like LeBlanc or the best fighting power like Ryze or Swain, yet he is still one of the top picks on high ELO due to his utility and is not rare to see him banned. Shaco is somehow the same, but as a jungler role instead of a midlaner.

Shaco Skills are a little bit hard to understand. You may know the range, the Cooldown and the damage of each one, but the important point is knowing HOW and WHEN you must use them. Season 7 added few tweaks to them that made them even better.

---

Shaco's new passive is pretty sweet. it grants BONUS DAMAGE when striking from behind with both your Autoattacks and your Two-Shiv poison. Many people say that the use of this skill is what makes a Shaco good or bad.

---

Aaaah... Deceive. This is probably Shaco's best known signature. It is basically a Flash that turns you invisible for few secs and enhance your next attack. IMPORTANT: WITH THE RECENT REWORK, DECEIVE CAN CRIT WHEN STRIKING WHEN BACKSTABBING.

We will grab this Amazing heaven gift at lvl 2 and is gone stay as youre one-point-wonder ability.

---

SURPRISE! This is Jack In The Box, an invisible machine-gun that will appear to the first target that approaches it, will make it flee and will shoot him AND ALL THE ENEMY TARGETS AROUND. Early-game it works nice to tank early buffs and make them being cleared in 2-3 seconds at lvl 1. Late-game you will want it mostly for the fear and to set escaping routes when killing turrets. Season 7 brought 2 things to jitb.

We're taking a point of Jack In The Box at lvl 1 and level it to level 3 as soon as possible. Jitb is going to be your main jungle clearing tool, and having it at lvl 3 is going to enhance our pathing speed a lot.

• Placing a Jack In The Box in the feet of an enemy during a 1vs1 can make you win the fight. Never forget it.
• In teamfights use it to protect your carry. Place a Jack In The Box near your Varus, so when that Kha'Zix jumps into his face to burst him he will get feared and you'll be able to burst him down.
• Place one or two boxes before a Teamfight, they'll grant you and your team an escape route if things go wrong.
• It not only grants vision to you, but your teammates. Gift the lane you ganked with a Box in that bush without a ward. If you are low and the ganked one died, their jungler may be coming. Put a box, save a life.
• You can place a box in front on you when Blitzcrank is grabbing you. If the box is still visible when the grab reach it, it will take the box instead of you.
• Always take care of your mana. If you are in middle of a fight and you have less than 150MP, dont be a suicidal machine and use that mana to place a box that will probably die in secs. You'll may need that MP to Deceive to safety.
• Red trinket reveals Shaco boxes, but it doesn't deactivate them anymore.

---

An amazing ability that will work both as a finishing nuke and as a perma-redbuff. With the recent chagnes, TWO-SHIV POISON DEALS BONUS DAMAGE WHEN STRIKING FROM BEHIND.

Since the slow power, the damage and the miss % increases with the skill level, you're going to want to max out Two-Shiv Poison FIRST. This little friend now deals damage according to enemy miss health. Overall, a nice finishing blow that slows and works wonders in addition to your Red buff.

Rework Changes
Good news: It deals enhanced damage according to enemy missing HP, but being the max already when under 30% (yay!),it scales with bonus AD (yay x2!) and now DEALS MAGIC DAMAGE (yay x3!)

• Don't use your Two-Shiv Poison to engage. NEVER, unless you're facing someone like Sivir or Nocturne that could block it.
• Two-Shiv Poison does magic damage now. That means that even if we're building AD and enemy builds armor, they will take a lot of damage from it!
• You can use your Deceive+Tiamat Active + AA + Two-Shiv Poison combo, but just to finish a carry who is low. NEVER to initiate a full gank/fight unless your target is epicly overextended.
• Remember this skill PROCS Backstab AGAIN. Always try to use it from behind, a knife thrown right between the eyebrows won't hurt as much as if it is thrown on the back.

---

HALLUCINATE What is worse than one annoying Shaco...? Yes, TWO ANNOYING Shacos! This little guy will duplicate yourself, and will help you to kill people, bait people, melt turrets, check bushes and solo Dragon at lvl 6-7. I personally move clone with Alt+right click. Some people do move it with R, but you'll find it rather unconfortable.

Just take Hallucinate wheanever possible (6,11,16) like most ulties in any champ. Pretty straightforward.

• Shaco's have 75% of your AD, but procs all on-hit sources of damage such as Blade of the Ruined King and Duskblade of Draktharr. Your Hail of Blades will proc on Shacos Clone, too!
• Controlling your Clone (alt+click) is an art to be mastered. Think as if you were using two champs at once, don't use your main shaco and clone shaco by turns.
• It's really easy to bait with Hallucinate. If someone is chasing you and your Deceive is on cooldown, enter a bush, use Hallucinate and make the Clone go out to the path you would normally take if you were fleeing. If they chase him it will explode and damage your follower, while letting you deceiving out to safety (if you are low and he high on hp) or deceiving in (if you think you can kill it) for the WOMBOCOMOBO of Hallucinate explode + Deceive + Tiamat active + AA + Two-Shiv Poison + Thunderlords.
• If you are 1vs1ing and someone fights you back (and is facing you), position your clone at his back and make him attack from there, so he procs Backstab.

---

THIS CHAPTER IS BEING UPDATED FOR SEASON 12. READ CAREFULLY. PERIOD.


If you are OK with this, let's go on this guide. Enjoy![/color]

---

You must understand that Shaco doesn't have a fixed item setup. You need to adapt to the team you have and the team you're facing in order to take the maximum profit from the gold you spend. Don't stick into a fixed build, or you will find yourself failing in a game while you actually played nice and you won't understand why.

So lets start with the items:

CORE

emberknife: Standard start. Better exp, better farm, better sustain, basically a must for every jungler out there. We're taking this little guy at lvl 1. Ember is usually better than Hailblade, since we already have an slow and the Damage is plain better with emberknife.

CORE

Refillable Potion: I damn love it! I can't count how many times this little guy saved me. This potion will give you sustain and will let you recover after a successful gank if you want to farm a little more.

DEAD

Tiamat:Used to be a core, not that strong anymore since Riot Removed the Active and it only works for a slightly faster clear now. Our boxes deal AOE damage now, so we should be clearing fine without it. Don't use tiamat.

CORE

Eclipse: I love it. Nice mobility, nice stats, nice shield. Eclipse is a wonderful tool for moving around a fight without being a super-duper-easy target to melt, and for counterjungle-obsessed players like me.

GREAT

Duskblade of Draktharr:Amazing for Assassin Shaco. Duskblade will make your enemies explode in a little fart. It sinergyzes TOO GOOD with Shaco's passive, Deceive and Essence Reaver. The invisibility it provides will give you some room to reposition yourself in Teamfights. Your snowball potential won't be a joke if you get duskblade somehow early. (wait! It will be a joke! We're Shaco! Huehuehuehuehue!).

CORE

Essence Reaver:Essence Reaver is a blessing for Shaco in season 11. Not even a mythic item, this little guy provide us with everything we need: plnety of AD, haste, Crit, MP and a wonderful passive that will melt carries when coupled with other items/runes. Definetely a must nowadays after our Mythic

GREAT

The Collector: Collector is a wonderful item when you're facing squishier teams. it's letalithy and passive will enhance your snowball, and the Crit will rush your Infinite Edge build. While is not that good against tanks, this can be your 3th item in 40% of your games

.

GREAT

Lord Dominik's Regards: I'm in love with this item. Armor melting to kill bruisers and tanks, critical chance to kill squishies. I've become a dominik's lover for a while, and you should definetely get this if there is at least 2 armor users in enemies Team.

GREAT

Infinity Edge (needs testing): The old Infinity Edge is back. The old Shaco kit is slightly back. With them, it's viability for Shaco. Shaco's passive, Deceive and two shiv poison proc it. There are better items for an early game, so focus on getting a lead and let Infinite Edge become the icing on the cake of your build.

VIABLE

Guardian Angel: Guardian angel brings great aid when facing bursty AD champions. Being able to survive the first combo can be the difference between winning or losing, but you shouldn't be the one engaging in the first place. GA is a wonderful choice when an enemy saves his combo specifically for you.

MEH

Maw of Malmortius: You are not going to use Malmortius a lot. It's a situational items that can work wonders in certain situations, and be useless and a waste of money in others. Take it when you're fighting a Fed AP burster (annie/Karthus+nunu, Katarina) and you need to burst her faster than it bursts you.

MEH

Mortal Reminder: Like Maw of Malmortius, Last whisper and Mortal reminder are situational items. Extremely strong in some situations and pointless in other ones, you'll have to use your brain in order to decide if to purchase it or not. Mortal is an AMAZING choice when you have tanky, sustainish champions as enemies (Fiora,Vladimir,Mordekaiser,swain) as you will melt them. Useless against squishy targets.

VIABLE

Bloodthirster: Interesting lategame item. While earlygame the shield is kinda "meh", in lategame it's huge and it has great stats. Overall an offensive-defensive item that fits Shaco quite a lot when he gets a duelling role.

GREAT

Boots:Even after the nerf, they still are a must for early ganks. Don't do your second back if you can't afford them.

CORE

Berserker's Greaves:I used to hate this boots. A lot. Not only I used to hate them, but I thought they were the worst option for Shaco. However, with the new jungle and new runes, I still have the mobility I used to have with Mobility Boots, and the attack speed of this boots help A LOT at early jungle clearing and duelling. Clearing fast is a must if you're going to counterjungle, and it will help you at top ganks ,where the champion is usually tanky and you'll need few more hits per second. If the team have 3 or more stunners (Leona + Amumu + Malphite + Ashe + Veigar) you may consider take Mercury's Treads or Ninja Tabiinstead, specially lategame.

VIABLE

Boots of Mobility: Some Shaco players still use these. Too bad this boots got nerfed and you now lose speed while in combat. IMO They are meant now for AD casters who can just go in fast, explode someone in 0.5 secs (yo kha'zix) and run away.

IMPORTANT: Remember that we creators rely on you readers to grow. If this guide somehow helps you out, PLEASE VOTE IT and comment so I can keep improving!

90% of AD Shaco players use Hail of Blades. 90% of AP Shaco players use Dark harvest. Some random people use Electrocute and thats OK.

HAIL OF BLADES ✦ Hail of Blades Hail of blades has recently become the main choice for Shaco Players. HoB now brings a wonderful tool for Shaco players that want to abuse his earlygame and duel as much as they can.

ELECTROCUTE ✦ Electrocute Electrocute is a safe, wonderful choice for newbie Shacos. Similar to the old Thunderlords, it gives a little burst to your combo that people doesn't usualy expect. Those of you that come from playing other assassins like Kha'zix will enjoy using this for a while.

DARK HARVEST ✦ Dark Harvest Dark Harvest is the greedy choice for those Shaco players that expect a lead. Shaco's kit doesn't include a lot of direct damage, so getting Harvest stacks is going to be hard. This is, however, an amazing choice for AP Shaco.

Smite hands down. This is one of the best spells of the game! Not only cause it let you finish the jungle buffs faster and safer, but allows you to counterjungle and steal every single monster in game including baron and dragon. With the new buffs, Smite is also a part of your burst combo.

Amazing for finishing people and extra damage. The other choice instead of Exhaust. I usually prefer Ignite over this one cause I think Shaco actually needs that little damage peak to snowball early. Overall taking it is a must if there there is just an Ignite on my team, and enemy team have a Dr. Mundo, a Volibear or a super duper squishy team. Main choice for most of my games as my second spell.

I like Exhaust 'cause it gives you both defensive and offensive potential. Red + your E passive + exhaust is almost a stun, plus damage mitigation works wonders against people like Tryndamere. In addition, if enemy team comes to gank you at lvl 1 and your team covers you, you'll have at least 2 Exhausts for that teamfight, so you increase the chance of winning it and getting a First Blood. Taking Exhaust is a must if that Annie support thought that taking Ignite would be better for the team.

The spell everyones loves. I'm not an exception, I think Flash adds so much speed and versatility to League of Legends. However I think Shaco if one of the few champs that doesn't need Flash to succeed. There are better options and with Deceive you should be fine if you use it correctly.

Good for Hecarim and Singed, bad for Shaco. It is not bad at all, but there are just better options for him.

: Not a bad option for a second spell if the enemy team have more than 4 Stuns/jails/snares. A combo made of Amumu, Leona, Ashe, Alistar and Ryze may need you to take Cleanse do reliable things Ingame.

Early Game Shaco Earlygame is the sexiest thing on League of legends. With our one-point-Wonder Deceive being brought back, your main job in your games will be GANK AS MUCH AS YOU CAN while you keep you farm at a good state. Remember: you're A GANKER

Mid Game When Mid-game comes you should choose one of two roles. As Shaco your objective is to make your team incredibly rich in kills AND gold, and depending on on who are you facing and how is the game going on you must take the role of SPLITPUSHER or the role of ASSASSIN.

Late Game Shaco's lategame is decent, but clearly inferior to other juglers. Try to end the games as fast as you can, since an Ashe with lifesteal, Guardian Angel and Phantom Dancer will be almost impossible to burst down

As Shaco your jungling objectives are kinda different of the other junglers, so lets start talking about your job as Shaco in there, and then we will talk about routes.

In my opinion if you want to play Shaco seriously you'll have to be jungling AND counterjungling. If you don't want to jungle and/or counterjungle, I must inform you that Shaco isn't your champ.

"But White Crooooooooow! I want to faaaaarm my own jungle creeeeeps or my mid steeeeaaaals them and I can't build my Serrated Dirk at level Fiiiiiive!".
Now listen kids, Remember your roles as Shaco we said before? Your job is to make your team AHEAD the enemy team, plus enhance this by making the enemy team being BEHIND what should be normal.

Your job is to make your team incredibly fed and strong, and enemy team incredibly useless and weak so your team can stand a 4vs5 lategame while you splitpush like a beast and destroy all the turrets.

And to do this you have to do things that solves both missions:

1. Abuse your strong ganks early.
2. Steal enemy jungle creeps so they get tilted and underleveled.
3. Let your mid have your raptor whenever possible so he get ahead in gold.
4. Steal enemy buffs whenever possible (care with wards)
5. If your midlaner is mana-dependant, make him have always your Blue buff.
6. Shaco traps are strong early. Try to kill enemy jungler to make him stay behind.

If you do these jobs correctly, you'll get as much Gold as you would if you kept farm your camps over and over. Now lets see how do we do all those things.

• Minor Monster Spawn: 1:30
  Respawn time: 60s
  
• Major Minion Spawn (Blu & Red buffs): 1:30
  Respawn time: 300s/5m
  
• Dragon Spawn: 2:30
  Respawn time: 360s/6m
  
• Baron Spawn: 20:00
  Respawn time: 420s/7m

The most efficient route to start as Shaco is, for me,the one that lets Shaco be level 4 at 3:20. Which is a huge lead in comparison to other junglers.

STEPS:

1. Buy a Hunter's Talisman and refillable potion/bead.
2. Head your RAPTORS. Ask your teammates to cover.
3. Place 3 boxes on the camp in a triangle.
4. You don't need help, but ask for your teammates to pull a bit if you want, at this point they will be wondering WTF is this Shaco doing.
5. After cleaning the chickens, go after your red buff and clear it with your box tanking it.
6. Get those Krugs.
7. If you do it right, you will be level 3 at 2:35 aprox. Your job now is to make a decision: Gank your closest lane or go to farm/counterjungle.
   

   ---

   
   REMEMBER that Krugs give more experience than any other camp in the jungle, so be sure to clear them (both yours AND enemy krugs).
   
   Try to steal enemy little neutrals as much as possible. As always, kill all but an small one (p.e. 2 little wraiths and the big blue one, leaving 1 little alive) to max the gold losing for enemies and preventing the respawn.
   
   When you reach lvl 11 and get your Tiamat, start helping your team pushing lanes and destroy turrets. If 1 or 2 turrets have been destroyed already, start splitpushing.
   

   ---

This is the other main part where I see many Shaco players fail too. As we all know, Shaco early ganks are incredibly strong. However, if they are not well performed they can be easily evaded by an skilled player. If the enemy you gank have an escape mechanism ( LeBlanc, Ezreal, Riven...) this is even more important.

So lets say you are on a game, you took your Wolves and Blue Buff and stole enemy Red like a baws. Now Seems that it's the perfect time to gank a lane and score a first blood. But... sh1t, you enemy in top is a Riven and she warded river bush. How could you gank her without her noticing it, and good enough to score the kill?

Where to Deceive in from.

Shaco is one of the few junglers who can avoid being discovered by wards if well played, specially river ward, the most common one. When you're ganking as Shaco you should never gank from river. At least, taking the mid path. The 3.5 stealth and the jump Deceive provides can make you gank from amazing positions. Here's a pic from where you should gank only:



As you see, you should never gank directly from river but from alternative routes. Your Deceive lets you do it, and you should use it. This way enemies will be aware of your gank when you already hit them, not when they see your POOF red smoke.

The white spots are where you should Deceive from, then you'll see the paths you should take when invisible. The blue ones are the paths that you'll do more often as blue team and viceversa. However, all routes can be done while playing in any team.

• Try to keep on the communication with your team. Ask them for the placement of enemy Vision Ward so you can avoid them better.
• Shaco is one of the best lane-gankers of the game. If there is a Vision Ward on river 'cause the enemy laner knows you may come after him, try to gank directly from lane. Use Deceive in your turret and run towards the mid of the lane to start a 2vs1.
• Remember that enemies can see your *poof* red smoke when you Deceive, even trough fog of war. Be sure they aren't close enough to see it.
• The range of Deceive has been nerfed recently (WTF RIOT), so if you used to play Shaco and you want to play him back again, get adviced that jumping walls is harder now.
• Most junglers needs the lane somehow pushed to gank efficiently so the enemy cant escape even when they have seen you thanks to Vision Ward. Shaco can't gank in any point of the lane, specially when both laners are trading at mid, since the enemy won't expect a gank yet.

So we just Deceived in a gankable lane. How should we act now? It also depends on WHO ARE WE GANKING. Depending on it, our performing will be different on ganks:

Option 1: Baitable Trade

We will use this when we are ganking an enemy who is pretty strong in Early Trades. Most common cases are Riven, Darius or Garen. They are so strong early, and they tend to bully his opponent to zone him and deny his farm. This also applies to epicly strong Botlane combos, like Leona+ Ezreal.

How to do it:
Our objective is to bait a trade that will turn into a 2vs1.

We will deceive in, but we don't attack yet. Tell your teammate/s your intentions by pinging the target so he initiates it. Enemie/s will expose and initiate what they will think is a 1vs1 or a 2vs2 early trade, which they also think they'll probably win. After the engage and after enemy initiated (so often they do initiate with the escaping skill too, since "nobody is coming from river", he he he), go in and turn the battle into a 2vs1. They will panic, going back trying to save his butt.. so you will face his back. Do you know what does it means? Backstab.

When going in you have 2 choices. If there are no minions, your most efficient move will probably be placing a Jack In The Box between the enemy and his turret. So you make the fleeing even harder. The other option is to proc your Q from behind inmediately if the enemy is squishy and you think you can melt him, or if you think enemy is slow enough to place your jibt later.

with red, your passive E and with box fear you'll mostly get the kill. If the enemy flash away, use the active of your E to catch him up.

Option 2: Pwn da weak

We will use this when we are ganking an enemy who is pretty weak in Early Trades or doesn't like trades at all. Most common cases are Nasus, Vayne or Veigar. These people hate engaging and just want to farm lategame, when they will be able to kill even the shop guy. We can't ask the ally that is laning with him to initiate, cause that will make our enemy flee and gank will be harder.

So what to do? Tell your teammate you're going to gank, but ask him to let you position behind enemy first ] so he can't flee that easy.


How to do it:
Our objective is to SURPRISE and instakill.
So we have a Garen in our team facing an enemy Vladimir. If our Garen pops his Q and go in to initiate the gank, Vlad will most likely go back to a safer position to poke instead of fighting back. We don't want this.

Instead of waiting, if our ally is in range we will just pop our Q from behind to proc Backstab to full damage. If enemy doesn't have much hp, we can also combo it with our Two-Shiv Poison active and place a Jack In The Box between him and his turret.

100% Result on enemy: Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash Flash

If this don't happen or he just used flash before, your teammate will be able to help you to kill him thanks to your red buff + Two-Shiv Poison OP slow. Even if enemy managed to escape, you helped your bully teammate to zone his enemy even more. Now he will be just too scared to try to approach and farm, specially if you ganked him in the middle of the lane.

---

Whatever you are facing, you should be keeping on with the pressure the whole game, even when lane phasing is over. You must give the enemy fear. Make enemies think they will never have a true XvsX since you could be anywhere, hiding somehwere preparing to rush in and turn the battle.

After few turrets are dead and you lead your team epicly ahead, change your role from epic counterjungler/ganker to splitpusher thanks to your Ravenous Hydra, your Clone and your team.

22/12/2021
PRESEASON 12 IS HERE!
Shaco is in a OK Spot right now. He's not the best meta jungler out there and you won't see it on Worlds, but it works wonders on Solo Queue.

I've updated the guide with new builds, items, paths and runes, and I'll keep updating it as the patches goes by. Enjoy backstabbing!

22/11/2020
SEASON 11 IS HERE!
I like shaco in the new season. There are better choices out there, as always, but our Mad jester is in a decent spot right now. I'll try to keep updating the guide until it's finished :)

28/10/2019
Shaco has been completely reworked and now he's back as an early game assassin. After tons of work I updated this whole guide to make things clearer for you guys.

Good luck, and backstab everywhere! Remember that you can check my Twitch if you want to ask questions LIVE.

1/09/2019
SHACO IS GETTING A REWORK. Shaco is coming back to an earlygame beast soon. I leave the changelist here.

The changes may update. Be sure to stay tuned to the youtube Channel and Twitch for talking about this.

04/02/2017
Aloha all! This Shacomania just won the prize as the Best Assassin Guide of 2017 by Mobafire, and I gained the Title of "Backstabber" on the forums. YAY!

To celebrate this, I updated the guide even more, providing details about the currently OP lethality build on Shaco and more tips/tricks to succeed on it.

10/12/2016
Today is the day that our Shacomania Guide reached the TOP 1 GUIDE ON ALL MOBAFIRE.

I can't believe it, you guys are freaking sexy. Thank you so much!

I hope you all enjoyed my Shaco guide. I know it is pretty extense, I tried to be as in-depth as possible. If you want to help, you only need to vote it so it keeps up in sight.

Best Regards,

White Crow.