Hello all, and welcome to my Xin Zhao guide! Many people see Xin Zhao as a broken champion due to his insane ability to snowball out of control and destroy the early, mid, AND late game, but he does have his strengths and weaknesses. I have been playing Xin Zhao for a little while now, and while he does seem to be unbeatable in most scenarios, there are a few that truly stick out as true weak points for him.

Seeing as we won't have a lot of attack speed built in, and Xin Zhao does most his damage with basic attacks, I fill my runepage up with attack speed runes, and throw some lifesteal quints in there to give him the added sustain. Say what you will about my runepage, it does what it needs to do in order to get the job done, and it does it well, seeing as unless im fighting LeBlanc or Teemo, I win.

This isn't the only way to go as far as the mastery tree goes. If you want more sustain as opposed to more burst in a fight, then take Battering Blows and Warlord's Bloodlust instead.

Obviously, a Hunter's Machete and whatever warding item you use is the best choice for a starting build when jungling.
CORE ITEMS:
Enchantment: Devourer
This little bastard is what makes Xin Zhao so monstrously powerful. When it becomes sated, several things happen.
Three Talon Strike only takes two hits to apply all 3 attacks, and enemies will be knocked airborne on the second strike.
Battle Cry heals you every other attack instead of every third attack.
Your devourer enchantment will do 120 magic damage every other attack, which equates to 90 magic damage every attack.
Guinsoo's Rageblade will apply its passive damage twice as well, and since this scales with any damage you build, the amount of damage dealt could be extremely lethal.
Nashor's Tooth, you guessed it, will apply its' damage twice, piling even more magic damage on to the already absurd amount of pain you are already laying down.

Guinsoo's Rageblade
This item adds extra AD and AP, and while that's really nice, the real power behind it is its' passive. With each attack, you gain extra attack speed and damage. After landing 4 attacks, you gain an AoE that pops on-hit, dealing magic damage that scales with your AD and AP with each attack.

Hextech Gunblade
This item is your main source of sustain. We want it for the AP and AD it provides, as well as that passive heal for 15% of total damage dealt. We also like the active ability, which damages enemies and applies a slow, as well as giving us an extra damage outlet for our AP rather than just looking at our Audacious Charge and Nashor's Tooth if we choose to get one.

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ARMOR
Randuin's Omen
I tend to buy this pretty much every game, because it gives a good balance of health and armor, and the enemy team doesn't tend to have a champion that shreds through armor. The active is nice too, as you can dive them, hit them with your Three Talon Strike, then as they go to run, hit them with the slow and just keep going. If they're still alive, you can then hit them with Hextech Gunblade's active and that should be enough to finish them off.

Thornmail
I really don't like using thornmail if I'm not playing Rammus. Xin really just can't use it as effectively as most other champions can, seeing as everything that survives long enough to hit him more than twice tends to be a tank, and I don't know a lot of tanks that are heavy on the auto attacks, other than Nasus, who won't notice the damage anyway.

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MAGIC RESIST
Spirit Visage
This item will increase all healing coming toward you by 20%. This is why I tend to get this item for my magic resist needs.

Banshee's Veil
The only reason I would even suggest this item is to block some of LeBlanc's insane burst or avoid Veigar's Event Horizon. It won't do much to save you, but if you can block one spell, then you just might survive.

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AD ITEMS
Trinity Force
This beauty works wonders for you. It's your source of attack speed, chasing ability, burst, and early game sustain. It has 2 passives. The first one, rage, increases move speed by 20 on basic attacks and 60 when you kill anything. The second one, Spellblade, adds 200% of your base attack damage as extra damage on the next basic attack when you use a skill. Since your opening move is to dive the enemy with E while activating Q, the next basic attack when combined with this will pretty much take most their health unless they're a tank. Combine with Sterak's Gage for best results.

Sterak's Gage
This item is more a tanky item than it is an AD item, but when the 25% increase to base AD is combined with the 200% base AD sheen proc passive in Trinity Force, you turn an item that was meant for tankiness into an insane burst item with the bonus of a nice little passive which shields you when you take too much damage at once.

Duskblade of Draktharr
This item supplies massive AD, 10 armor penetration, and gives you a mini Death Mark. It's a nice little item to have, but I prefer my other AD choices due to the fact that when diving in at point blank range, health is a little more important than AD.

Ravenous Hydra/ Titanic Hydra
One increases lifesteal, the other increases health. Both have an on hit effect, which by now everyone knows we love because of devourer. Go with either one if you want. They're both useful in their own situations, and both will provide sustain in their own way.

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BUT WHAT SMITE SHOULD I CHOOSE?!
Stalker's Blade for CC.
Skirmisher's Sabre for more damage.
Tracker's Knife for vision.

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AP ITEMS
Lich Bane
It's kind of like Trinity Force, except it scales off AP. While nice, you don't usually build as much AP as one would like for this item, and so Trinity Force would be the better choice in most situations.

Luden's Tempest
Good for burst. Proc's when you dive the opponent with your E, and scales off AP. Supplies move speed, which is always nice.

Nashor's Tooth
The best AP item for Xin Zhao when building devourer in my opinion. Not only does it give 80 AP and increase attack speed, it takes AP and scales it into your attacks, which means every single one of your basic abilities scales off AP. As if that wasn't enough, this item applies its' damage on hit, which means it synergizes with devourer.

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BUT I WANT BOOTS!!!! YOU NEED BOOTS!!! BOOTLESS FEET ARE FOR NOOBS!!!!
Then buy boots. When you lose out on damage, defense, and kills because you filled one of your slots with something to make you run faster (cough cough half the potential items in this build give you move speed too), don't come crying to me. Even if you buy Berserker's Greaves, you lose out on damage, armor, magic resist, or sustain. So go ahead. Buy boots.

Start with Battle Cry for that first camp, and you shouldn't need a leash. Start at the krugs, and kill the small one first. Remember to smite the big one as soon as they spawn. Place a point in Three Talon Strike and move on to the red buff. Kill the small ones, and then take down the big guy. spam Q and W. Forward to the Raptors. Again, kill the little guys, and then follow up with the big one. You will gain a third level once he dies. Put a point in E. If your mid laner is backed up, now would be a perfect time to gank (unless the enemy is LeBlanc or Heimerdinger-see above for instructions on Heimerdinger ganking).
If they are, move to the far end of the grass, and come out as far behind the enemy midlaner as you can, and then come out. Dive at them with E, and as you fly at them, activate Q and W. You probably won't outright kill them unless they're either too low on health to get away or too stupid to get out of range, but it will relieve pressure on the midlaner for them to farm or back, and if the enemy midlaner doesn't back, then you gave mid an easy kill.
You should have (depending on the mid lane gank) between 400 and 800 gold right now. Upgrade your smite and get a Dagger if you can, and move toward the wolves. If your smite is ready, smite priority goes to wolves for vision of the jungle. As always, kill the small ones first, move to the big one. Move to blue with the same strategy as before. Then take Gromp.
If the lane you are closest to could use a hand, then give it. By now you should have another 300 gold ready. Back and get another dagger, and then farm up more gold using this tactic and get Enchantment: Devourer. You should be about level 6 by now. Get some potions if you want, and go for dragon. Take dragon, take the scuttle crab, and then farm 30 stacks on your devourer as fast as you can, because once it's sated, you will be nearly unstoppable.
As you level, you should take Three Talon Strike, followed by Battle Cry, followed by Audacious Charge. As with all champions, take Crescent Sweep whenever available.

Smite
You're a jungler. Take smite. If you don't, then get out of the jungle.

Flash
Good for gap closing, good for wall jumping, good for engage, disengage, skill dodging, skill blocking, you name it, flash does it. Except instant pentakills. Flash doesn't give pentakills.

Ghost
Good for chasing, but not as good for engage or disengage as flash, and 0 wall jump power.

Ignite
Yeah, secure a kill, and listen to Pentakill's album, Smite and Ignite, while you do it. Might be worth sacrificing some mobility early game.