Hun Batz: Jungle guide

Hun batz is one of the best junglers and completely underplayed right now. His ultimate allows him to be great at ganking and teamfighting. His passive is great for boxing during whole game and with his 1 and 3, he becomes very mobile and safe to play.

I've player hun batz a lot (close to 3k whorshippers) and thanks to him I'm a diamond player in league right now. So if you're thinking of playing him, here are my tips and experiences ;)

Hun batz has a good early clearing. His 2 is a cone which allows him either to hit the 3 jungle camps or even the 6 minions on a wave.

Your starting build will the standard build for junglers:

Bumba's mask + HOG 1 + Boots 1 + Health pot + Mana pot

Hun batz is very mana hungry, so you're gonna need that mana pot. I hardly ever get a ward on him but you could if they have a good potential of invade (thanatos jungle, ymir jungle, bakasura solo, loki solo are usually willing to invade). In that case you could give your health or mana pot for a ward.

Of course you start on your speed buff. You should always wait till last seconds to make sure you're not getting invaded to level up your ability, but in case you're safe you will get your 2 ready. In case you get invaded or you wanna invade, you can get your 1 as it is your escape and also your slow. Hun batz can be good for invade if you have a solo laner who is good at that too.

If your solo laner has HOG, you HOG your speed and he will HOG his mana buff. If he doesn't have HOG, start the speed with your 2, and let him tank a little the buff. You will HOG his blue or if you're getting invaded, HOG the speed, pick it and go to lane arround the tower (the safe way). If there is no invasion, you and your solo laner will get buffs and go to solo lane. With your 2 to, hit all 6 creeps and to go a safe position. I recommend always leveling up your 1. It allows you to be safe in case you're caught in a bad position (for example, hercules pulls you, or anyone with heavy hammer is slowing you), but also to chase enemies (if you see kill potential and wave is cleared or mostly cleared, you can use ur 1 to slow enemy and be agressive).

Remember your passive. After using an ability you should always give a basic attack as it can crit. This is great at any moment of the game and you should always take it into account. It can help you get an early kill. So if you're going agressive, use your 1, hit a basic (or a pair of them since the enemy will be slowed), then use ur 2 and again, basic attack. You can easily get an early kill by doing this or you will help your solo getting it or at least you will either force a back or force him into tower, allowing you to rotate mid. It's important you are always agressive on solo, of course, if you can. But early agression will help you a lot.

After hitting level 3 on solo lane (2 waves), you're willing to attempt a gank on mid. If you were able to outpush the enemy on solo, you will be on time to share the mid wave with your mid laner. This is great and it is what you want to do. Right when on mid, try putting some pressure on the enemy mid laner, but care with the enemy minions. You should be able to see if there is kill potential or not. If there is, tell your mid laner you're gonna gank and look for the best moment to spam your 3 skills (also remember to use ur mana pot when starting the rotation, and maybe the healing pot too, as you will run out of mana quick). If you get a kill, great. If you don't, you poked the mid laner quite a lot for sure. Get the wave with your mid laner and watch the map. Is there kill potential on the duo lane? Is the enemy duo outpushing your duo? If this happens, rotate quick to duo lane and look for a kill. Of course, call that you're doing that. If there is no potential at all, ping back harpies and share them with your mid laner. After this, check again the duo lane. If there is kill potential, go there. If there is not kill potential you can either go mid again to share another wave with your mid laner or if you don't have much mana and health, it's time to back, get at least tier 2 boots and get ready to fight midcamps.

If you followed me, we didn't use HOG at all after clearing first buffs. This means your HOG will be up for midcamps. This should always be like that unless you needed it on a gank to save yourself from enemy minions or to secure a kill. Also you could use that if you see you're about to get level 5 and you need an early ult. But out of that, save it for midcamps. Be there on time (before 3 mins) and if things are going good, you can have free midcamps. Use ur HOG quick to get to level 5 if you were not 5 already. If you succeded, you have kill potential as your midlaner should be 5 too. If the enemy is contesting the midcamps, ult into them and use all your kit. Your mid laner should follow you (always call for it, VAA). You could even get a pair of kills on 2v3 if the enemy is not level 5 (the enemy jungler should not be, and neither the enemy support unless there was a kill on the duo, the mid can be so be careful because a kraken could ruin it, always think of which enemies you're facing). So first midcamps are really important and make a big difference.

Hun batz is an ability based assassin. This means, you want your abilities ready as soon as possible and you want them to hurt as much as possible.

This said, we are gonna go for warrior tabi always. You don't want the attack speed from ninja tabi, you want your abilities to hurt. And after that, jotuns is a must. You want the cdr, you want the power, and you want the pen. Always start like that on hun batz (same as on most ability based junglers).

Always that you back, get 1 ward and 1 mana pot. As I said, he is really mana hungry, so you will really need that pot and it can give you many kills by giving you more sustain in the jungle. Place the ward wherever you see it is more needed. By this time, you already know where you have more chances to get a kill.

If you wanna focus the enemy jungler, use your ward on his speed. This will allow you to invade it. Don't be afraid of it, you hit hard and if you wanna do this it means you're ahead of him. You can wait for his speed to come up and for him to be going for it to steal it and maybe get the kill. Of course, before invading the speed watch for the enemy mid and solo. If you did a good job on early, your mid and solo might be winning, but don't blame them if they are not. You just need 1 winning lane to win your game. If you're under this situation (which it's not best but it's good enough to carry), focus that lane and try go give that lane the biggest advantadge you can. This will force that lane to be more free for rotations on the other lanes. Don't listen to people who spam for gank when there is no kill potential. It's very common to have a solo laner screaming for ganks with a hercules full health. Think of the damage you can deal and choose your targets according to that and the damage your team can provide too.

So as I said, keeping the enemy jungler behind will help all your lanes, since they won't be ganked, or at least not a lot. And if they do, the enemy jungler might not be a thread. I mostly focus either on the enemy jungler or on the mid laner, because that way you keep your enemy safe from ganks or you make sure you get most midcamps which allow your mid and youself to be ahead (also keep your support farmed). Normally mids lack of escapes, but be very careful of big bruisers. Remember your ult almost secures that your mid will hit his ult, so it provides a lot of damage and a kill. You can also use ur ward on mid.

The duo is another good point for ganking. Early on, they will have less experience since it's 2 people sharing from lane, which means they are easier to kill. If you go for it, ask your duo to force enemy's escapes (neith's 3, anhur's 3, rama's 3, etc), and then they used it, jump in with you 1, slow them and hit, use ur 4 so it pushes the enemy towards your duo, and hit him to death. You can focus the support if he is underfarmed or doesn't have mark of the vanguard. But out of that, you should go for the adc first. If you got the duo and the enemy mid is under control, you can go for gold fury even early on. If the duo is rotating, just get out of there since you can be weak and the enemy mid can provide a lot of damage.

The solo lane is normally where you want to gank less. It doesn't mean you won't help him, but there will be less kill potential most of the times. You usually find warriors on solo who are hard to kill for hun batz, or also healers. But healers are still gankable for hun batz, since his ultimate and their lack of escapes allow him go get the kills. Assassins are also easy to gank for him. If there is a loki, remember your ult will make him visible if he was on stealth. ALways ask before ganking ur solo or mid (or even duo) if enemy's ult is up. If it's down, kill potential is high. If it's up, you should be careful deppending on the enemy of course. But a loki will always be safe with his ult, a bakasura is very dangerous, not to mention a mid poseidon, vulcan or kukulkan.

This is not only for batz but for all junglers. Be ready to take your buffs and share them with your allies. And same for midcamps. If your buff and midcamps are ready at same time, priorize midcamps, since you can always get your buff later but midcamps can be taken for any team. Right now it happens a lot that mid and support take the red buff without you. It's fine, it happens because both speed and damage were done at same time on early game. If this happens, just share more experience with mid and solo. Always that you go for a gank, share the wave. Don't leave without anything if you didn't get a kill. No matter what, get the wave. It's really important you do this or unless you're getting lot of kills, you will fall behind.

Hun batz can still be played from behind, since your ultimate provides lot of CC and it helps your team. But your survability can be a problem in some cases.

As I said, after the early items you want to go for warrior tabi and jotunn's wrath. This is your core together with deathbringer.

For third item, you must consider in which situation you are. If you're ahead, deathbringer. The main problem with deathbringer is that it's very expensive. So you will need some time to complete it. But even on tier 2, it is useful on hun batz. So if you're ahead or even, go for it. If you're behind, you have to think what you need. If you need more survability you can go for hide of the urchin. If you're dying because they have a lot of CC (maybe ymir jungle + athena/ares support), you can either rush beads 3 or get magiss blessing. If they have lot of slows (kukulkan/poseidon mid, nemesis/ymir jungle or ymir support) you can go for a winged blade. I'd not recommend getting sprint 2 (or 3) unless they really have very low CC. Remember you build cdr, which means beads should always be your active because of the CC but also those 3 seconds of cd reduction you get when using them. This can be used offensive or deffensive.

If things are doing good, deathbringer third item. And 4th item can be either hide of the urchin, even if you're not having problems surviving, you might have them soon. So hide of the urchin gives you a lot of defense. Why do you need defense on hun batz? Because to use your ult you must get in the middle of the battle. This means you can get tones of damage on you on a teamfight and hide of the urchin helps you survive a lot. If you're not afraid of that or you just want more damage, you can get either malice or titan's bane if they have a tanky team.

Most of the times you want your hide of the urchin as 4th item, then malice, then sell your bumbas and get titan's bane. But this can change and there are other items out there that can help you.

-Witchblade is a good item on hun batz. You mostly get this if the enemy team has AA gods or 4 physical gods.

-Brawler's beat stick. This is good if there is noone in your team who can kill a hercules/vamana. Normally your adc should be able to kill them lategame but if he can't, get this and help your team. Also against healers of course. You can get it if your team can't have a weakening curse (support needs blink (ares, geb, sylvanus, ymir)) and your solo needs survability and can't get it.

-Transcendence. You can get this item even on lategame, since his passive is good even without it's stacks. You can get this if the enemy team is not very tanky or their support is really behind and it's not a problem to kill him. It can be your 6th item in those cases. Crit is very important on batz, so don't give your deathbringer for transcendence. You could build this if you play on solo lane, but it should not be a item you get normally.

-Hydra's lament. It was nerfed and it's not that good anymore, but it still provides lot of damage, it allows you to cap your cdr and its passive goes great with yours. It can be a good decision but to me there are better options.

-Runic shield. You want this it the enemy has AA mages and your support is a guardian. Maybe if you have a solo warrior he will get this, but if he doesn't you can buy it. It's a very good item that only physical characters can have. You could get this instead of hide of the urchin for example, under the situation they have AA mages. You don't want this for burst mages since it should be at least your 4th item and by then, 50 magical power doesn't really make a difference on high burst.

And there can be other situational items, but those are he most relevant ones.

I mentioned it a little bit before, but I'm gonna go into more detail.

You need HOG1 on early game, of course. Which leaves you with only 1 slot.

-Beads will be your choice 90% of the time. If they have some CC, you want beads 1 early on. Maybe arround level 7-8 the latest if they have an ares, ymir, athena... You should not gank duo with an ares there if he is over level 5, without beads. You don't have CC inmunity on your ultimate as other gods do, so if they have good early CC, get early beads and as soon as you can, turn them into beads 3 which will allow you to have less cd on them but also get those valuable 3 seconds of cd reducion.

-Aegis can be a good choice for you if your enemy mid is a poseidon, vulcan, nu wa or a scylla mainly. Could be good also against a neith. You can get it against kukulkan or other burst mages but even against those, beads are a great choice since they can allow you to jump and get your cd almost reseted. Remember if you get aegis, since it got nerfed, you will more likely need magiss blessing, which won't allow you to get either hide of the urchin (so less defense for you) or titan's bane (less pen and less damage for you).

-Sprint. Same as before, it forces you to get magiss blessing. But if it wasn't for the CC, it's a great active for batz. Good to chase, good to escape, good to AA to death. Only problem is you can't get beads if you get this. I recommend you to get it only if they have lot of slows and less CC (kukulkan, nemesis for example, or maybe against an odin support instead of an ymir/athena/ares).

-Blink. You can want this to initiate. But really, you don't need it. You can need this on assault or arena where there are few minions. But on conquest, you mostly get in with your 3, by teleporting to it and get out with your 1, so you don't really need blink. You can get it, but for sure there will be better options.

And finally, what do we do with that HOG?

-Wrath of the gods. 99% of the times, not to say 100%. Why? Batz is amazing at stealing objectives thanks to his CC. And stealing a gf/fg can win you a game. I've won so many just by jumping into a fg and using my ult... This is another reason why you want hide of the urchin. You will get in trouble on purpose just to use that ult and put that CC so your team can outdamage the enemy. Really, Wrath of the gods is a must and even early on. If you see your support is falling behind, you secure objectives in a great way.

-Fist of the gods. Well you will only do this if the enemy has many magiss blessing and your ultimate is not being useful. In that case, you can go for fist of the gods to break the magiss blessing and then pop your ult. But seriously, even then, wrath of the gods is better. Ask your team to break the magiss with their CC. If they got magiss it's very likely you have much more CC. It's weird that an enemy gets magiss just for you. For you they will get beads but not magiss unless it's the support.

For ganking/fighting you want always to be safe. Even with defense, you're quite easy to kill on lategame, that's why you have your CC, so you can kill faster. Try using ur 3 to get close to the enemy so you can save your 1 to escape if things get bad. You should only use your 1 to chase in case you can secure the kill and you're safe. Sometimes even if you know you will die but at least you make the trade 1-1. Don't get crazy with your 1, it's great for chasing but then you can't escape. Saving your 3 to escape is bad since you can always use it with minions and it's hard to control its teleport. You won't always teleport where you want, and it can get you in a worse spot, so be careful with that.

Also your ult is great to secure kills and finish ganks, but it can also save your life. Don't be afraid of using it deffensively, if you're being chased and you already used your 1, pop your ult on you and you will push the enemy back while you keep running. This should save your life most of the times.

And as a last tip, remember always your passive. You want to use an ability and then a basic, another ability and another basic (at least). Don't use 2 or more abilities without using basic attacks unless for example you used your 1 to get in and the enemy god has still his escape ability ready, then use ur ultimate right away. But out of certain situations, always maximize your passive, really, it's a great passive.

You're a great initiator and your damage is decent. If you built defense, you can still get into the enemy, pop your ult and your damage and leave so your enemy finishes the job. But after you used all your kit in a teamfight you may be weak and you don't have a way to heal. Just get out. Your function is to initiate, absorb some damage, put some damage and leave. That's all you have to do. If there is a tank on your team who can initiate, wait for it. If not, your ult is great. Try to come from jungle to gank enemy if they are into lane.

You can use your 1 for this too, but take into account you may die. So just do it if it's an advantage for your team that you die. If thanks to your death and to the enemy team being greedy to kill you your team can get 3 or more kills, then you did good. You're not that important lategame as your adc/mage, so be willing to take all the damage on you. You're just important if your support is dead, because remember, wrath of the gods. But your objective is to be really annoying. You want the enemy to focus you and that's why you have defense/beads/escapes. Everything they use on you, they won't use it on your damage dealers.

You can easily be top damage still, but lategame is not best for you although you can still box 1v1 a lot of enemies. But you mostly want to save your ult for the teamfight.

Hun batz is great at any stage of the game. You just have to change the way you play it. He is solid on early, his strongest part is at mid game, both when you finished your jotunn's and you can spam ults, and also when you finish your deathbringer, when you will hurt a lot. Remember to farm to lategame and be annoying for the enemy team. Don't be afraid of being agressive, you will see soon that he can be safe most of the times, so use that to put pressure. And remember you're not as squishy as other junglers, you can even dive towers quite early. Know your limits and you will love the monkey ;)

Thanks for reading!