A Mighty Sword! (Conquest - Jungle - S2)

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Passive - King's Sword

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King's Sword is a helpful passive for Ao Kuang's burst. It creates charges over time that give your abilities +5% damage when used (1 charge per ability). This essentially enables the first three abilities used when ganking to have extra damage if you've waited for all your charges to recharge by staying out of combat. As an added bonus, you can also cast an ability with no mana by using a charge instead.

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1 - Water Illusion

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Water Illusion is part of what makes Ao Kuang so deadly. Activating this ability gives you a short range teleport, invisibility, and a water copy of yourself on your previous location which you can detonate for high area damage. This ability allows you to gank without being seen, pursue enemies with its teleport or escape once you've picked off a member of the enemy team. Because it gets a great damage increase upon upgrading, I typically will sometimes prioritize this ability over Dragon Call until it is level 2.

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2 - Dragon Call

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Dragon Call is primarily used as Ao Kuang's slow and mid-late game damage. Upon activation, all your basic attacks will do an additional damage for each of its six dragons. However, because it is also your slow, it can be hard to hit these basic attacks without Greater Sprint. Thus, most of the time I find myself activating this, doing some basic attack damage and then activating it again to slow my enemy during the early game so I can combo with Wild Storm and/or Water Illusion's detonation (a good way to maximize damage is to teleport in front of the enemy before detonating Water Illusion so that way you can focus them longer or use Wild Storm). Because of its low early game damage (since it can be difficult to land every hit without Hastened Fatalis or Greater Sprint and because of its nerfs in the 2/11/15 patch), and constant 30% slow, I typically focus on upgrading this ability after getting a point or two on Water Illusion during the early game. However, if you've gotten enough attack speed & Greater Sprint, this ability should become a first priority.

One final note is that I find it incredibly helpful to keep this ability on instant/quick casting. It is relatively easy to aim, and regular casting only really helps you judge how long its range is. However instant casting allows you to send forth Dragon Call's slow the second an enemy is getting away, greatly helping you pursue them as quickly as possible.

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3 - Wild Storm

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Wild Storm is Ao Kuang's go-to damage ability. Always make upgrading this a priority as it is the primary component of your burst potential. This ability is especially powerful because it takes into account your basic attack items' effects (it will even call in a dragon from Dragon Call to strike if it has been activated). When engaging, always try to use this ability quickly, because its small 5 second cooldown, allows you to easily use it twice during your gank. Wild Storm is also useful for clearing jungle camps very quickly.

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4 - King of the Eastern Seas

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King of the Eastern Seas is what makes Ao Kuang truly unique. Executing an enemy in a Thanatos like style, it enables you to either pursue fleeing enemies once you've ascended into your dragon form, or retreat if you just assassinated someone in the middle of the enemy team. Water Illusion works great with this ability, allowing you to assassinate an unsuspecting enemy player in the midst of their allies and get away without a sweat. Since upgrading this ability no longer increases the execute threshold, it's best to level it after Wild Storm and Dragon Call.

Note: While this ability is great at assassinating someone under tower and easily getting away by transforming into your dragon form, towers may still target you once you land, even if it's halfway across the map from the tower. This may or may not be a bug that will be fixed in future updates of Smite, but for now it's something to be cautious of.

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Boots are an excellent starter item for Ao Kuang, giving him some early mobility. Once upgraded to Shoes of the Magi they also provide good magical power, which I prefer over Shoes of Focus' CDR.

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Bumba's Mask is my go to starter item for most assassins. It's incredibly helpful to Ao Kuang's early game for taking out jungle camps, but if you're confident in your early game jungling you can start building your other items immediately.

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Telkhines Ring is an early game oriented item that capitalizes on Ao Kuang's inherently high attack speed as well as the attack speed later gained from Demonic Grip. Giving your basic attacks an additional 40 damage, Telkhines Ring really packs a punch during this stage in the game when paired with the previously gained attack speed. Another bonus is that this item's effect will also proc on your Wild Storm, giving you additional damage for that ability as well. Additionally, Telkhines Ring provides nice magical defense for surviving enemy attacks throughout the rest of the game.

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Demonic Grip gives you an immediate magical power and attack speed boost, as well as a magical protections debuff, boosting all of Ao Kuang's strong points. For its cheap price point, this item is a must have.

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Winged Blade gives you extra movement speed which is great for both getting around and pursuing enemies, immunity to slows which is great for both pursuing and escaping, cooldown reduction, health, and attack speed all for a very affordable price. Because all of its stats are effectively used, I find this to often be a must have for Ao Kuang.


ALTERNATIVE
Hastened Fatalis guarantees that you'll stick to enemies as well as providing similar movement speed to Winged Blade, but less health and lacks Winged Blade's passive. This item pairs particularly well with Telkhines Ring proc'ing its passive more often and guarantees the hits from Demonic Grip for penetration. Generally this is best against teams lacking slows.

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Since this build otherwise lacks sufficient power and sustain to keep Ao Kuang aggressive into the late game, Bancroft's Talon provides the perfect balance of a strong power item as well as a good amount of lifesteal to keep Ao Kuang in the fight.


ALTERNATIVE
Polynomicon grants you a huge amount of power on your Wild Storm since it procs its passive, as well as good power, mana and lifesteal. Overally this item's passive makes it a good addition to Ao Kuang's kit due to its burst potential, but due to the lower power of the rest of this build lacks in burst potential compared to Bancroft's Talon.


ALTERNATIVE
Chronos' Pendant is a useful item late game, allowing you to use your abilities far more often which not only makes it easier to escape with Water Illusion but also gives you more chances to execute your opponents. Overall, this provides greater utility than most other alternatives that Ao Kuang has available.

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Was there ever any doubt? Rod of Tahuti provides a massive increase to your magical power, enabling you to eliminate enemies with ease. The only drawback is that this item is very expensive, thus I will always advise getting it last.

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Boots are an excellent starter item for Ao Kuang, giving him some early mobility. Once upgraded to Shoes of the Magi they also provide good magical power, which I prefer over Shoes of Focus' CDR.

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Bumba's Mask is my go to starter item for most assassins. It's incredibly helpful to Ao Kuang's early game for taking out jungle camps, but if you're confident in your early game jungling you can start building your other items immediately.

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Bancroft's Talon provides a huge amount of power and early lifesteal, giving all of Ao Kuang's abilities more umph and giving him ample sustain as well.

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Spear of the Magus provides the best penetration for Ao Kuang since it procs off of every dragon from Dragon Call and allows him to gradually increase his damage as he uses his abilities on all enemies. While Obsidian Shard has more power, it's easy to see when calculated that you'll be dealing more true damage with Spear of the Magus in almost any situation.

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Polynomicon provides Ao Kuang with even more life saving lifesteal, some extra mana for additional sustain and an amazing passive that procs on his Wild Storm expanding his burst potential to its maximum efficacy. Overall this item's passive makes it an essential part of Ao Kuang's kit due to its burst potential.

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Soul Reaver will max out your burst potential allowing you to quickly snatch up enemies from the back lines with your ultimate during the late game due to its immense 100 power and it's amazing passive. Just make sure that you don't waste your passive poking your enemies health, save it for an all in attack.


ALTERNATIVE
Chronos' Pendant is a useful item late game, allowing you to use your abilities far more often which not only makes it easier to escape with Water Illusion but also gives you more chances to execute your opponents. Overall, this provides greater utility than most other alternatives that Ao Kuang has available.


magi's blessingALTERNATIVE
magi's blessing is essential if playing against a team with very large amounts of CC. Sometimes it's not about dealing as much damage as quickly as possible, but rather about simply surviving an onslaught of guardians.

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Was there ever any doubt? Rod of Tahuti provides a massive increase to your magical power, enabling you to eliminate enemies with ease. The only drawback is that this item is very expensive, thus I will always advise getting it last.

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Greater Blink is a incredibly useful alternative for Ao Kuang since it allows you to instead of engage with your Water Illusion, to either pursue or escape using it. This makes Ao Kuang much more safe for ganks and behind-the-lines attacks late game and generally makes him a more potent assassin.


ALTERNATIVE
Rage of the Gods is sometimes my starter active with Ao Kuang because it provides an easy way to quickly take out jungle camps. This item is useful since it allows you to jungle more quickly, allowing you to counter jungle as well, and it allows you to steal objectives out from enemies noses while cloaked.


ALTERNATIVE
Achilles' Spear is great both for clearing jungle camps and for sticking to targets and dealing extra damage. Generally I find Achilles' Spear to be a more offensive start for those looking to play more aggressively. Use depending on what gods you're up against.

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Purification Beads are a must for junglers that don't invest in magi's blessing. While offensive power is key, you're only useful if you're alive. Ao Kuang can get away with solely using Purification Beads as his means of escape because of his teleport/invisibility that comes with Water Illusion.


ALTERNATIVE
Heavenly Agility can be useful for escaping against teams with lots of slows rather than hard CC and is great for allowing you to stick to enemies or letting your entire team engage at once. Still, unless the other team is severely lacking in hard CC, go with [[greater purification.

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I typically begin the game by purchasing Rage of the Gods, Bumba's Mask and a mana and health potion (or two health depending on the enemy team). Alternatively you can also buy a Potion of Magical Might, Bumba's Mask and 2 mana and health potions (after using your first potion) for a more aggressive start. As most assassins, your first job is to either help your solo laner take out the speed and mana camps. You should then assist your solo laner in lane until they have sufficiently ranked up there abilities to clear minion waves effectively. Once this is accomplished, your focus should change to the fury camps, and if no ganks are available, either assisting the mid/solo lane or taking out mid camps. Taking out these camps is relatively quick using Wild Storm (and sometimes Water Illusion or Dragon Call), but be aware of how much mana and charges you're using. Saving Hand of the Gods for the first spawn of mid camps is often necessary to secure them from the enemy team attempting to steal.

Once you have gotten to around level 5, you should begin looking to gank lanes where enemies are either weak or have pushed your ally close to tower. Ao Kuang does have decent early game ganking potential, especially once Shoes of the Magi is completed, but be aware that you are also incredibly squishy. Avoid pursuing enemies under tower unless you can execute them with King of the Eastern Seas and avoid fighting more than one enemy at once. In general, your early game ganks should be composed of either immediately entering with a Water Illusion followed by a Dragon Call (use the slow), Wild Storm and possibly King of the Eastern Seas, or saving Water Illusion for later so that you can detonate its watery substitute or pursue the enemy.

Trick: If you think you know where the enemy will go or want to cut off a path, you can use Water Illusion in that spot, gank them while invisible and then detonate it when they pass by.

It is because of Water Illusion's wide range of uses during this stage of the game that I advise upgrading it before Dragon Call. However, if you wish to anticipate your mid game in advance (which I often find is the case), it can be helpful to have an upgraded Dragon Call instead.

No matter what during the early game, you should always be occupied. Either gank lanes, take out jungle camps or help lanes clear minions. Never sit idle/wait or return to base without reason unless you want your gold and level to fall behind.

By mid game you should have more attack speed and sprint (or Greater Sprint) allowing you to use Dragon Call much more effectively. It is at this point in the game that I would recommend prioritizing this ability over Water Illusion as it will be more beneficial than the damage caused by that Water Illusion's detonation.

During this stage of the game, your ganking potential is increased, as well as your potential to be killed. Ganks are best initiated by telling your teammate that you are ganking their lane so that you and your teammate can descend upon them before the enemy realizes you've appeared. You should still avoid fighting more than one god if possible, but if you can finish one off with one of your abilities, you can use Water Illusion to escape, or execute them with King of the Eastern Seas for even more possibilities. In general, once you have killed an enemy and ascended into your dragon form, it is not advisable to descend upon another enemy and go for an additional kill. Despite the damage inflicted upon the enemy by this ability, if you just released all your burst damage on an enemy, most of your abilities will be on cooldown and you will likely not be at full health. Thus, I typically only descend upon enemies that are at half health or below. An exception to this is if you used a Water Illusion to sneak behind the enemy team and execute one of them that was below the threshold for your ultimate. In this scenario you will be in much better condition to either rejoin your team attacking the enemy team, or descend upon a lone enemy player and kill them.

Ao Kuang is also excellent at taking out towers during the mid game phase due to his high basic attack speed and damage. Make sure to assist your teammates in this regard.

Once late game is reached, Ao Kuang has beastly stealth, burst damage and escapes. This enables you to pick off your enemies one by one, even if they're surrounded by allies. Your role in teamfights is to remain on the periphery and occasionally stealth in with Water Illusion and quickly take out an enemy player before escaping. Using Water Illusion to get inside a crowd of enemies can also provide your team a good way to initiate an attack. Since you will be targeted if you do this, try to do some burst damage with Wild Storm and basic attacks before using Dragon Call to slow any pursuing enemies and escape.

You will also be essential to taking out the Gold Fury, Fire Giant, enemy phoenixes and titan during this phase. Make sure to join your team whenever one of these options is available (most notably, you can take out a phoenix with an ally in a very brief amount of time).

Even late in the match, you will remain one of the most squishy gods on your team. Ao Kuang is basically a stealthy glass cannon. Avoid being targeted by enemies, phoenixes, the titan, anything, or you will die very very quickly.