Ionian Champions #4: Udyr The Animal Spirit

League of Legends

Lore and Backstory:

Udyr was born in a verdant clearing lit with a crimson glow from the blood red moon.  Even at a early age he was compelled by an innate primal drive coursing through him.  On his father’s farm he would work while watching the wild mustangs graze in the fields around him, immersed in his connection with these beasts.  His parents would often find him sleeping under the stars and would scold him as they dragged him back into the house, to conduct his respite like other ‘civilized’ folk.

On his sixteenth birthday, Udyr wished his family farewell and ventured east, impelled to rid himself of civilization and to fulfill his primal connection.  He took up residence in a forest where his senses overcame him and he, eventually, lost the last vestiges of his human nature.  He protected his territory with great ferocity as people passed through, much like the beasts that surrounded him.

During the time that Udyr resided in the woods he decided to scare a monk that was passing through.  He leaped out of the brush with a mighty roar, but the monk just pushed him aside.  Udyr was the master of his territory and he tried time and time again to triumph the monk.  After many tries Udyr became fatigued and the monk turned toward him and motioned him to follow him on his journey to the Hirana Monastery.   The monks that resided in the monastery took Udyr in and instructed him how to control his fury.

“We will not pity the defenseless”

“We will make use of their pelts”

“If PETA asks, this fur is Fake”

During the match between Ionia and Noxus where Ionia was granted a rematch to fight for their freedom from the invasion of the southern tip of their homeland by the Noxians,  Udyr was one of the chosen champions. He  teamed up with Ashe to draw first blood against Miss Fortune, one of the Noxian champions,  and Ashe dealt the killing blow with a well-placed arrow .  Ionian champions went on to claim victory and win their freedom from the Noxian invasion.  Udyr had 9 kills, 1 death, and 10 assists during this match.

Position:

Udyr was released December 2, 2009 and is classified as a melee fighter.  He can perform duties as top lane or as a jungler.  He is a martial arts champion and he has four fighting stances: Tiger, Turtle, Bear and Phoenix (explained later).

Abilities:

Udyr can be one of the best junglers in the game.  He can clear his jungle quickly and with bear stance can deliver some serious pain onto unsuspecting and over extending opposing lane champions.  His Turtle stance shields him and restores mana and health with every hit while active.  Tiger stance increases attack speed and first hit while in this stance puts a Damage over time on a selected target.  His area of effect damage ability is called Phoenix Stance which flames shoot out around him and damage all nearby enemies.

Monkey’s Agility (Innate): Udyr’s attack speed is increased by 10% for 5 seconds each time he switches stances. This effect can stack up to 3 times. Switching stances sets off a 1.0 second global cooldown.

Tiger Stance (Q) (Stance)– Activation: Udyr’s next attack will deal his current attack damage in addition to magic damage over 2 seconds. In addition, Udyr gains an attack speed buff for 5 seconds. This stacks additively with his persistent attack speed bonus.

Persistent effect: Udyr’s attack speed is increased.        Cost: 55 / 50 / 45 / 40 / 35 mana   Magic Damage: 30 / 80 / 130 /180 / 230 (+1.5 per attack damage)

• Cooldown: 6 seconds.  Persistent Attack Speed Bonus: 20 / 25 / 30 / 35 / 40%   Activation Attack Speed Bonus: 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 / 35%

With this skill Udyr gains attack speed and a Damage over Time for a time period.  His attack speed will receive a bonus when he continues to attack in this stance.  This stance is the only skill in his set that utilizes Attack Damage, as all of the rest of his stances use Ability Power.  The attack speed bonus at level 5 is substantial but in most cases you will level this at the end of your 18 levels.

Turtle Stance (W) (Stance)– Activation:Udyr gains a shield that absorbs damage for 5 seconds or until it has absorbed the full amount of damage.

Persistent effect: Udyr’s attacks cannot crit, but they restore a percentage of his damage as health and mana.
Cooldown:6 seconds

Cost: 55 / 50 / 45 / 40 / 35 mana    Shield Strength: 60 / 95 / 130 / 165 / 200 (+0.5 per ability power)  Damage to Health Restored Ratio: 10 / 12 / 14 / 16 / 18%
Damage to Mana Restored Ratio: 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9%
This is your bread and butter for jungling.  Turtle will help you with regenerating your health and mana, and mitigate damage while fighting creatures in the jungle.  The shield strength scales off of Ability Power and at level 5 will be able to keep your champion alive longer.  The damage to health percentage at level 5 is ok but with a life still item it will keep your health topped off.  The mana regeneration is low but if you are in the jungle and you travel from camp to camp it will keep your mana at a good level, even more so if you remember to grab blue buff.

Bear Stance  (E) (Stance)– Activation: Udyr gains increased movement speed for a few seconds.

Persistent effect: Udyr mauls his enemies with such force that they are stunned for 1 second when they are hit. This effect can only occur once every 6 seconds on the same target.
Cooldown: 6 seconds     Cost: 55 / 50 / 45 / 40 / 35 mana
Movement Speed Bonus: 15 / 18 / 21 / 24 / 27%     Movement Speed Duration: 2 /2.5 / 3 / 3.5 / 4 seconds
Well, this stance is great for helping you navigate your jungle and set up ganks for your laning team mates.  The percentage of movement speed granted by this stance will make you very agile in the jungle and make the opposing champions think twice in over extending in their lanes.  The duration of the skill in my opinion is kind of high, 3 seconds or even 4 seconds is a long time in League of Legends, thus you can cover vast distances with this stance.

Phoenix Stance (R) (Stance)– Activation: Udyr sends out pulsing waves of fire dealing magic damage each second to nearby enemies for 5 seconds. During this time Udyr’s ability power and attack damage are increased.

Persistent effect: Every third attack, Udyr engulfs the enemies in front of him in flames, dealing magic damage.

• Cooldown: 6 seconds        Cost: 55 / 50 / 45 / 40 / 35 mana
• Flame range: 625              Activation’s Magic Damage Per Wave: 15 / 25 / 35 / 45 / 55 (+0.25 per ability power)
• Wave radius: ~500           Activation’s Total Magic Damage: 75 / 125 / 175 / 225 / 275 (+1.25 per ability power)
  Bonus Ability Power: 16 / 24 / 32 / 40 / 48
  Bonus Attack Damage: 8 / 12 /16 / 20 / 24
  Magic Damage Per Third Attack: 40 / 80 / 120 / 160 / 200 (+0.25 per ability power)
  This stance is crucial in the jungle, not only does it let you clear your camps of monsters quicker, it can do massive damage to champions.  This is Udyr’s Area of Effect damage stance.  This skill scales efficiently with ability power but it will also utilize the attack damage that you have.  The damage is done in a 500 radius around Udyr and will do more damage at the activation of the stance.  During the time that the stance is still activated it will damage your target or targets for each wave that emulates from you.

Udyr uses the stance system, with a 1 second global cooldown applied to all abilities after switching into a stance.

• All of Udyr’s abilities have no cast time and do not interrupt his previous orders.
• Certain effects of Udyr’s abilities will persist for their full duration even if Udyr switches stances. These include:
  • Tiger Stance’s on-hit effect buff
  • Turtle Stance’s absorption shield
  • Bear Stance’s bonus movement speed
  • Phoenix Stance’s AoE damage

Leveling Skills:

Udyr is a champion with 4 basic abilities, and no ultimate which means a summoner can level his R skill at level 1.  Udyr cannot max all of his skills. Each skill maxes at 5 ranks, however Udyr will only obtain 18 skill points in total. This means that Udyr may max three abilities (with the fourth only reaching its 3rd rank) or he may max two abilities (with the other two reaching their 4th rank).

The following is a build I’ve tested that’s particularly good for jungleing.

Level 1: Phoenix Stance                          Level 10: Turtle Stance

Level 2: Turtle Stance                             Level 11: Turtle Stance

Level 3: Phoenix Stance                         Level 12: Turtle Stance

Level 4:  Bear Stance                              Level 13: Turtle Stance

Level 5:  Phoenix Stance                       Level 14: Turtle Stance

Level 6: Turtle Stance                           Level 15: Tiger Stance

Level 7: Phoenix Stance                       Level 16: Turtle Stance

Level 8: Turtle Stance                          Level 17: Tiger Stance

Level 9: Phoenix Stance                      Level 18: Tiger Stance

This is a Phoenix stance jungling build, which allows Udyr quick jungling routes for maximum gold efficiency.  Taking Turtle stance at  level 2 will allow him to mitigate some of the damage and mana usage while switching stances in the jungle.  Getting Bear Stance at level 4 will give him some speed in the jungle and make opposing champions back up from Udyr’s team’s turrets when he goes in to help  gank the opposing laners.  By mid game Udyr will have exceptional items and have Phoenix Stance and Turtle Stance maxed for optimal damage and tank.  Late game he will be able to pick up his Tiger Stance and begin to heavily harass the lanes.

Summoner Spells:

Smite: This is a must have for Jungle champions.  This will allow them to kill the Jungle creatures much faster, and if you if you have the Summoner’s Resolve mastery from the Defensive column, you may even grab yourself some extra gold if you use it to slay a monster in your jungle.

Exhaust: This will help you on your ganks.  You can put this on an opposing champion and reduce their attack/ability damage and slow the movement of that champion.

Items:

Note: The following build from Team Solo Mid’s jungeler ” TheOddOne” is an example of an item build that works well with the jungling skill progression shown above.  It results in a healthy damage boost with some defense.

Starting Items:

Boots of Speed,Health Potion x3
These items are a must at the beginning level.  This will help Udyr stay in his jungle for a longer period of time.

First Trip Back: After getting at least 825 gold this item can be purchased in full

Heart of Gold

Core Items:

  OR Depends on opposing teams setup.  

Ninja Tabi or Mercury’s Treads                                                           Wit’s End and Phage

These will give you Movement speed, Health, Attack Speed, and Magic Resist/Armor.  Plus the Phage will give you a slow which will help Udyr and his laneing team mates kill the opposing champion and some attack damage.

End Build: The three core items above (you will need to pick which boots you are going to need either armor boots or magic resistance boots depending on the composition of your opposing team) and these items below:  You will keep Wit’s End and use Phage for one of your items (Trinity Force).  You will also use Heart of Gold near the end of your build on Randuin’s Omen.

Aegis of the Legion  Force of Nature  Randuin’s Omen and Trinity Force

These items will give you more health and health Regen which will raise your health pool up so you can take more damage and will be able to heal yourself while navigating around the map.  It will also give you some armor and Magic Resist which will mitigate the damage done to you.  Trinity Force will give you a bit more damage, attack speed, crit chance, movement speed and some more health and mana.  If you need more wards you can sell Wit’s End for them at end game.

Always carry 2-3 sight wards with you at all times. Sight is your friend.  You can put them in your jungle and your opposing teams jungle to control the Red and Blue buff and watch for movement in the jungle.  For the cost of killing 3 minions per ward, the return on investment is staggering. 

Sight Ward

Masteries:

Although it’s possible to build Udyr in a few different ways, this is the way your Masteries should look if your building the jungler that I’m focusing on today:

                                 Offense: 0 Defense: 21 Utility: 9

You will max out these skills in the Defense tree: Summoner’s Resolve, Hardiness, Tough Skin, Durability, Indomitable, Veteran’s Scars, Bladed Armor, Initiator, Enlightenment and Juggernaut.   Then in the Utility tree you will take 1 point in Good Hands  and max out Expanded Mind, Swiftness, and Runic Affinity

Trivia:

1. Udyr is named after Steve “Udyr” Wieczkowski a Producer at Riot Games.

2. He was the first Champion released after the official October 27, 2009 launch of the game.

3. The word “Udyr” literally translates into “Beast” in Norwegian. The Danish word “Dyr” means “animal”, while “udyr” is mostly used to describe people as evil, acting like animals and not caring if they kill.

4. Udyr is one of a few champions to have multiple textures in one skin. Udyr, however, has the most different textures in one skin than any other (((should just say ‘of any’ ))) champion,  a different texture for each of his stances.

Weaknesses:
One of Udyrs weaknesses is that he has to protect his Golem that gives him the blue buff (This buff will help him with regenerating mana and it also helps with cooldowns for skills).  He will drain his mana pool quickly because he changes his stances excessively, and with most item builds he does not receive enough mana regeneration items to supplement his mana usage.  He will have to have the blue buff on him as much as possible.

Counter Champions:
In the jungle Udyr is a excellent champion.  One of the ways to counter him in the jungle is by counter jungleing him which means take his buffs and monsters in his jungle.  One of the champions that can do that is Shyvanna becasue she moves faster then Udyr and she also has a Area of Effect skill to help her clear the monster camps.

Conclusion:

Like him or hate him, Udyr is one of the most versatile and strong champions fighting in the League.  His ability to shift between defensive and offensive sets makes him a fantastic tool for any team.  As a jungler, the pros have shown Udyr to be able not only to level up and gain gold at a quick pace, but also a fantastic ganker.  If you are playing against Udyr, knowing his strengths and weaknesses will help you counter his strong abilities.

About the Author:

My name is Shawn and I am the host of eSports Weekly Report and co-host of the eSports Hour @TEN where I broadcast news about the eSports community.  You’ll also be able to hear me soon on Tactical Entertainment Network’s new podcast:  WYAR Bildgewater Pirate Radio.  I have been playing online games for as long as I can remember and my favorites are real time strategy and MOBA’s. I also still enjoy a good first person shooter and used to play Counter-Strike at a competition level.

I enjoy digging up news and writing articles for the community. If there is anything that you’d like to see featured in my posts, please feel free to ask. Watch this space for more articles focusing on different champion builds for League of Legends (I hope to get them out to you on a steady basis). Thanks for everyone’s support.

Source Materials:

League of Legends Wikia.com

Journal of Justice Volume 1 Issue 7

Solomid.net guides
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