I. Preface
II. Introduction
III. Skill Explanations
IV. Summoner Spell Explanations
-- Considerable Summoner Spells
V. Rune Explanations
-- Alternative Runes
VI. Mastery Explanations
-- Defensive Tree
-- Utility Tree
VII. Core Item Build Sequence
-- Situational Items - Physical
-- Situational Items - Magical
-- Situational Items - Balanced
-- Situational Items - On the Offensive
VIII. Jungling
-- Basic Jungling
-- Leashing
-- Step-By-Step Jungling
IX. Type II Jungling
-- Pros/Cons
-- Jungle Route
-- Playstyle
X. Counter-Jungling
-- Responding to Counter-Jungling
XI. Mid to Late Game Playstyle
-- Mid Game Phase
-- Late Game Phase
XII. Tricks & Strategies
XIII. Closing
XIV. Special Thanks
XV. FAQs
XVI. Change Log




This guide will lead you on a walkthrough of Jungling Amumu and his nuances. Amumu excels late game but has difficulty in the early phases - however, Jungling Amumu has no problem powering through neutral creeps early game. This build will provide the optimal build order for an Amumu to dominate the early game jungle, still be an efficient ganker, and tank like a boss late game.

Abbreviated Terms
AA = Auto-attack (Basic Attacks)
AD = Attack Damage
AP = Ability Power
AS = Attack Speed
AoE = Area of Effect
CC = Crowd Control (Stun, fear, slow, snare, etc)
CDR = Cooldown Reduction
DoT = Damage over Time
ELO = Elo rating (Rating system designed by Arpad Elo that is now used in gaming communities worldwide)
FB = First Blood
GP10 = Gold Per 10
HP = Health
LS = Life Steal
MD = Magic Damage
MP = Mana
MR = Magic Resistance
MS = Movement Speed
OOM = Out of Mana
SV = Spell Vamp
DPS = Damage Per Second; also: Strong Auto-attacker
MDPS = Magical Damage Per Second; also:Strong spells; casters
MP5 = Mana Regeneration per 5 seconds
HP5 = Health Regeneration per 5 seconds
ArPen = Armor Penetration
MPen = Magic Penetration

6.29.11:

I added Philosopher's Stone and Heart of Gold into the main item build. I've been using them for a while, since GP10 became popular, but I hesitated to put them into the guide because we all knew that GP10 would be nerfed soon. With the recent patch nerfing gold per 10 but still keeping them as powerful early game items, I now feel comfortable enough to put them into the guide knowing that they hopefully won't be nerfed again in a patch or two.


I have made some alterations as to how I play Amumu. Recently I have been experimenting with flat Armor seals instead of mana regen and I found the results satisfactory. In addition, Sunfire Aegis is no longer core - Aegis of the Legion is such a ridiculously good item that I have started rushing it after my Catalyst, as it also provides something for my Cloth Armor to build into.

Everything else is, for the most part, unchanged.


I created this guide because the other jungling Amumu guides were not satisfactory enough to me. This Amumu guide shows what I believe to be one of the optimal item, rune, and mastery builds for this particular champion.

This guide will go over two different ways to start jungle Amumu - type I and type II jungling. Type I starts at the blue buff and is faster and allows for an earlier gank. It generally ganks right after finishing the route, around level 4.

Type II jungling starts at the wraith camp, making it much safer from enemy 5-man ganks in your jungle. It ideally jungles until level 6, but can stop at any time to gank.

Pros:
-Very fast jungler with a passive in his E ability that reduces the damage he takes while jungling
-Extremely good ganker coming out of the jungle with a stun in his Bandage Toss
-Very effective tank late game; potentially reaching well over 300 armor/magic resist
-Extremely high AoE magic damage through Despair, Curse of the Sad Mummy, and the occasional Sunfire Aegis
-Superior to other junglers like Warwick not in his early game speed, but because of his utility late-game and his game-breaking ultimate
-Jungling lets your team have three extremely fast levelers - jungling is typically a must in any higher-ELO game
- Despair absolutely rips apart neutral buff camps, especially Dragon and Baron Nashor, since it is percentile based damage.
-Deceptively strong 1v1 champion with his Despair, burst from Tantrum, and burst from his ultimate and Bandage Toss.

Cons:
-Not as fast as some other junglers like Warwick or Olaf
-Weak autoattacking, which can lead to some ganks getting away
-Sometimes difficult to skill-shot his Bandage Toss
-Mana starved and almost useless without the Golem buff early game
-Terrible in 1v1s early game - very poor burst damage and is much more useful as a tank/initiator
-Incapable of ganking enemies early game without the help of allies, unless the enemy is at extremely low health
-Jungles with very low health - very vulnerable to ganks and counter-jungling
-Usually a predictable jungler, as 90% of all jungle Amumu start at blue buff

Cursed Touch is Amumu's passive, and it's what makes him so deadly to many champions. At level 18, you lower magic resistance by a full 35 points - in many cases, this is enough to lower a champion's MR to zero if they haven't gotten any Magic Resist items. This makes your magic DoT and your ultimate that much more devastating.

Bandage Toss is a skill shot that has a pretty long range (farther than Ezreal's Mystic Shot). When cast, you shoot out a bandage in a straight line at a decent speed, which stuns the first non-allied non-building unit that it hits. You also deal magic damage on impact and you pull yourself to them. This is an extremely useful skill for several reasons:
-Extremely good at initiating ganks and for chasing runners.
-Very useful for jumping walls in the jungle to either escape ganks or to save a few seconds while jungling.
-Pulls you into melee range to start dealing heavy AoE damage with your W and your ultimate.

While it can be hard to aim at times, practice will have you consistently hitting enemies. Primarily you will be using this in early game to gank mid or bottom. You pull yourself to an enemy, and as you call for the gank, your teammates will react accordingly and move in just as you throw the bandage toss. It is very difficult to escape this kind of gank - albeit still possible, as this video clip from the WCG 2010 finals shows:


(Skip to 2:10 for the action).

As you can see from this example, Amumu probably communicated with his team beforehand. As the commentator (Phreak) says afterwards, he probably told Ashe to shoot her arrow at that point, and he timed his Q accordingly. This is important to note: While your Bandage Toss is great for the stun and for the initiation, it is sometimes better to save it for when you know you can use it to stop a fleeing enemy. The perfect time for this is ganking enemies who are pushed up to your tower - it takes them longer to notice and to flee. While your team may not have this championship level of coordination, it is an important theme to note.

You want to get one rank in this at either level 4 or 5, based on how badly a gank is needed. In lower ELO matches or in solo queue, where a jungler is not necessarily on every team, you'll want to go get their golem buff after you get Lizard. There, it is acceptable to get Despair at level 4 and Bandage Toss at level 5. However, in higher ELO games or in arranged 5v5s, or ranked games, you should try getting it at level 4 since you will not be able to jungle in their side - they almost certainly have a jungler as well.

Despair is the ability that makes Jungling Amumu possible. It is a toggle ability that creates an Aura similar to a mini-Sunfire Cape. Despair deals constant AoE magic damage that scales with level, and deals an additional amount of magic damage per second based on the maximum health of the enemies around you. Because of this, it is incredibly useful at taking down Golem at level 1, since Golem has a very high amount of health and negative magic resist. The same philosophy applies to the Lizard buff and getting Dragon as well.

In addition, Despair can be useful when taking out other tanks like Cho'Gath or a tank Garen. With your passive lowering their magic resistance, you have the potential to turn tanks to mush. In conjunction with a Sunfire Cape of your own, your area of effect damage becomes significant - it can easily farm waves of minions in a matter of seconds and greatly speeds up jungling, as well.

While Despair may not be as practical late-game as it is early-mid game, it does have its uses - one of the most prominent being catching up with a fleeing enemy. Despair can easily give the damage you need to kill a fleeing enemy at low health, while autoattacking can slow you down enough so that you cannot catch up to them. My analogy for those Starcraft 2 players out there: Think of the Great Train Robbery mission, where your Diamondbacks were able to strafe and keep up with the train while attacking, while your Marines were unable to catch up to the train as they shot without stimming (analogous to, say, Ghost).

Put one point in Despair first because of its effectiveness against Golem. After that, focus on maxing Tantrum (your E) and then Despair to increase your overall AoE DPS.

Tantrum is your E spell and your primary farming skill. Upon casting, it hits all enemies around you for a decent amount of magic damage. Passively, it reduces all physical damage you take by amounts increasing up to 5. This is incredibly effective in mid game and makes you very survivable in the jungle. Finally, Tantrum's cooldown is reduced by half a second for every hit you take as it's recharging. This allows you to spam the relatively cheap spell (50 mana) much more often when facing more enemies - this is especially useful on the Wolf, Wraith, and Golem/Lizard camps.

Get one rank in Tantrum at level 2 and focus on maxing it, since it will increase survivability in the jungle and your burst damage significantly. Tantrum is also the reason you do not take dodge masteries or runes - you want to be hit so that you can deal more damage with Tantrum.

Curse of the Sad Mummy is your gamebreaking ultimate. Upon activation, you turn a pretty large area around you into the zone of death - all enemies caught in this area will be rooted and unable to attack for the next two seconds while taking substantial magic damage. This is fantastic for three things:
-Initiation: What better way to start a planned team fight than to pop in with your Bandage Toss and pop your ultimate? As they're snared, your team gains superior positioning and can initiate their AoE ultimates. One of the best things your ultimate does is cause panic and chaos - when a player realizes that he cannot do what he wants to do, like fight or run, the team plan is often abandoned. This creates a psychological and physical advantage over the other team.

-Chasing: Use this sparingly, only when your Q is too far on recharge to use in the near future. Say that there's a very fed Pantheon on the opposite team - 18 Sword of the Occult stacks, 4/6 items on his build completed, and it's only 30 minutes into the game. Your team chases him but he Flashes away and your Q is on cooldown. At this point, it is acceptable to Flash after him and pop your ultimate to stop him from escaping. Generally, you'll want to save your ultimate for team fights, but if it means killing one or two well-fed enemies who would have gotten away otherwise, don't hesitate to use it.

-Fleeing: Similarly, your ultimate can be used to flee chasing enemies. If you can get away without using it, please try to, but in the event that you are hounded by a Mundo with Maximum Dosage active or a Sivir with her ultimate up, you can throw your ultimate down to stun them for 2 seconds and hopefully get away. Again, do this sparingly; if you can get away by "jungle juking" (discussed later) or by popping Flash, please do.

-Setup: Finally, you can use your ultimate to give the time that other champions like Nunu, Miss Fortune, or Fiddlesticks need to set up. Here is an example of the proper positioning of Amumu's ultimate in a team fight:

Basically, if you know when and where to place Galio's ultimate, you can apply the same logic to Amumu.

Smite: A must for almost all junglers, in my opinion. Smite drastically speeds up your jungling process, as without it, it would be impossible for Amumu to kill Golem at level 1 unless you somehow got extremely lucky with dodges. Smite lets you prevent people from taking your buffs, whether it is enemies who ambush you or allies who are just a bit too annoying to listen to your pleas of "Let me have blue buff!"

One of the best lines concerning Smite, from Faro in his video guide to Udyr -


Amumu cannot jungle without Smite. He becomes so much slower and cannot go to the jungle straight from level 1, defeating the purpose of having a jungler in the first place.

Flash: It was a toss-up between this and Ghost for me. I chose Flash because of the insane potential combos using this and Curse of the Sad Mummy. Ghost is a bit more useful for chasing, but the reason I didn't pick it is because Amumu's single-target damage is so mediocre that he can't get reliable kills chasing with Ghost, compared to a champ like Twisted Fate or Xin Zhao.



Ghost: However, this isn't completely out of the question. If your team is the kind that lacks mobility or needs chasers, you can easily fill that role. Ghost is great for taking enemies down and also for escaping them, so if (when) they remove Flash, you'll have a handy option available. Ghost is probably more useful in higher ELO ranked games than Flash is.




I would not advise taking any other summoner spells on Amumu, unless you need to take Teleport to counter a global ultimate or backdoor-heavy enemy team.

Greater Marks of Insight give Amumu an extra 8.5 Magic Penetration early game, which is nice considering that every single one of your skills deals magic damage. You should NEVER consider any other Mark on him. Health Marks are terrible anyway.

Greater Seals of Resilience give you the extra early-game armor to survive the jungle at reasonably high health. They also allow you to rush Merc Treads and the components for Aegis after without worrying too much about armor.

Greater Glyphs of Shielding are extremely helpful for this build. Since it focuses more on armor than magic resist, the additional MR will pay off late game.

Greater Quints of Fortitude are universally good on any champ. For Amumu, it gives him that bit of extra health needed to jungle early game while not being at any risk of dying.




Greater Marks of Resilience greatly improve your early game durability and are used especially when you don't start with a Cloth Armor and potions. This lets other openings such as Sapphire Crystal into a fast Catalyst the ProtectorCatalyst or a Regrowth Pendant into a fast Philosopher's Stone be viable openings without getting too low.


Greater Seals of Clarity used to be the main rune choice on this guide, but you don't need the mana as much as you need the extra health coming out of the jungle. Late-game, however, they do substantially deal with Amumu's mana problems, and could be preferable for some people.


Greater Glyphs of Focus are ok as well if playing a more offensively-based Amumu, more based on spell spam. Greater Glyph of Scaling Cooldown Reduction is alright as well on this type of Amumu - however, I would strongly advise sticking to scaling MR glyphs because they become so strong.


Greater Quintessences of Resilience are extremely good as well - in all fairness, they are STRONGER than health quints. However, health quints are much more common and all-purpose and most people won't want to invest in armor quints - but it is worth noting that armor quints leave you with higher health after your initial jungle. Usually it doesn't matter since you typically recall after getting to 4, but if you want to gank immediately after, feel free. Armor quints are highly recommended when NOT starting with a Cloth Armor.


Greater Quintessences of Swiftness are your last option. As a tank, that extra speed is really nice, so investing into it could mean the difference between getting to Dragon/Baron in time to steal it or getting to a team fight early enough to tank, or chasing down that last enemy who you normally would have just missed with Bandage Toss. Still, I stick with health quints because they make your early jungle a lot safer - feel free to use these, though, if you want to.

I run a slightly strange 1/14/15 mastery set, but you can see that I grab everything that is essential. Improved Flash and Smite along with defensive masteries for better jungling.


Tier 1 - Improved armor and magic resist. Max both of these, as it gives you a significant advantage early game.

Tier 2 - Increased health regeneration. This is taken over Evasion because you don't really want to dodge attacks, as that slows down your Tantrum recharge, leading to less damage per second. While dodge masteries are good on most other tanks, I'd try to shy away from them on Amumu.

Tier 3 - Reduced damage from minions and physical attacks. Because Tantrum is so strong at mitigating damage, it becomes very powerful in conjunction with these masteries which drastically decrease the damage you take in jungle. You want to max both Harden Skin and Defensive Mastery .


Tier 1 - Good Hands over Perseverance. As many of you should know, a 4% increase is so miniscule that it doesn't really make much of a difference. Consider that even with 100 HP5, you're only getting another 4 health per 5 seconds. A 10% decrease on your death timer, however, potentially means 6 more seconds of running back to the fight or running to stop their Baron. As a tank, you will inevitably die.

Some arguments have been made that since you get blue buff, Perseverance increases the regeneration there even more. However, to be frank, if you're running out of mana with blue buff that you actually need the extra 4% gain, you're doing something terribly wrong.

Tier 2 - Improved experience gain. This is a must. Without Awareness , you do not level from killing the Golem spawn at level 1 and your jungling slows down considerably.

Tier 3 - The absolute most important mastery here is Utility Mastery , which increases your neutral monster buffs by 30%. That's a gain of 45 seconds on your Golem and Lizard buffs. Grab one point in Greed - while some may disagree with this mastery, I say that it adds up to 300 gold in a 50-minute game, meaning you can afford more wards in mid-game or buy that one extra Elixir late-game that may have eluded you without Greed. Finally, get improved mana regeneration.

Tier 4 - This is where you stop. Grab a point in improved Flash. As a tank, you want movement speed as well, so we put two in that mastery.

Finally, get improved Smite. If you think that the 5 gold and the 5 extra seconds aren't worth it, you can put another point in Meditation for more mana regen or Quickness for the speed. However, I recommend improved Smite because you'll be last-hitting a lot with your Smite, meaning a potential 10-15 extra gold coming out of the jungle for the first time, which translates to 10-15 potential extra seconds not having to wait at spawn to grab those items you need.

This is the item build that I use on Amumu when jungling, and it is one that I would recommend on all Amumu players, regardless of where you play. Start off with a Cloth Armor and five Health Potions. After making your Golem to Golem jungle run for the first time, port back to base. You should have roughly 550 gold just from jungling at this point - if you ganked once or twice and pulled it off, you should have more. Buy your Boots and a few more Health Potion. However, if you ganked and got a kill/assist, you should buy one of the other components to your Aegis. Get Sight Wards all the time. If you can afford them, buy them. Your improved mobility and tankiness will make it much easier for you to plant wards than for your teammates to. Although you should by no means be spending an extra 270 gold every time you port back to base, you should try to get at least 1 or 2 wards when you can afford it - without gimping your item build. Items take priority over wards, unless your team has been seriously ganked consistently thoughout the game.



This is where the new additions come in - you should aim to get both Philosopher's Stone and Heart of Gold as soon as possible, to generate as much gold as possible. Philosopher's Stone gives you some sustain and makes you not as dependent on blue buff, while Heart of Gold is a decent chunk of health. But the most important part is the gold. As a tank, you shouldn't be taking all the creeps and should let your carries farm up as much as possible.

The gold you get from these gold per 10 items allow you to not only pass up farm and give them to your carries, but also allow you to buy many more Sight Wards for your team. Around this phase in the game, Oracle's Elixir should be high priority if you know the enemy team is warding a lot, especially around your jungle.


Mercury's Treads are the boots you should get almost every game. They give you decent magic resistance, which is great since you don't get any MR items early game, as well as reducing most CCs by a significant amount. These are basically the best boots for a functioning Amumu to have. If the enemy team is full of ranged DPS carries (Ashe, Sivir, AD/AS Teemo, AD/AS Kog'Maw) then it is acceptable to obtain Ninja Tabi. Normally you'll want to stray from that last option though, since the dodge will screw up the cooldown on your Tantrum.

Alternatively, if your team is doing very well and you feel that you can get away with not running defensive boots, try Ionian Boots of Lucidity for the CDR. When running either Ninja Tabi or Ionian Boots of Lucidity, it is highly recommended to turn your Philosopher's Stone into an Eleisa's Miracle since Tenacity is an important stat.

Aegis of the Legion: Aegis of the Legion is a truly fantastic item, providing a substantial amount of armor, magic resist, and damage to your entire team. Even taking out the aura effect completely, it is still cost-efficient just based on the bonuses it gives you. Aegis also builds out of the three fundamental early game survivability items - namely Ruby Crystal, Cloth Armor, and Null-Magic Mantle. This allows you to build different items first to accommodate for the type of damage most prevalent on the enemy team. Overall, the benefits on Aegis are too good to pass up. Note that while it doesn't afford as much armor as Sunfire Aegis, your armor seals should make up for that until well into mid-game.
-Very strongly recommended - should almost never be skipped.

Banshee's Veil - While not an absolutely essential item if the enemy team lacks a lot of magic damage, it is a great item all around for blocking spells from any source. The extra mana will improve your staying power without the Golem buff, and you'll also love those 2-3 levels you spend jungling after having bought Catalyst the ProtectorCatalyst. If you find yourself taking a pounding from magic hits, you can get Negatron Cloak before Catalyst.
-Strongly recommended - can be skipped if facing little crowd control and magic damage.



Late-game, if you aren't going to build your gold per 10 items into anything, remember to sell them! If you're 45 minutes in and the next team fight is going to decide the game, don't keep around those two items that provide minimal benefit at this stage. Sell them and finish a core item, or turn your Heart of Gold into a Randuin's Omen. Just don't keep them all game - they've paid for themselves, and then some.



At this point, you absolutely must branch off your item build based on the composition of the enemy team. The mark of a good Amumu, or any good tank, is that he adjusts his item build to tailor the builds of the enemy team. This also means that you should pay especially close attention to hybrid characters, like Kog'Maw or Ezreal, to see if they're building AD/AS or AP!




When facing a team that deals mostly physical damage (define mostly here as 3 and above), there is a certain course of items that you should buy to maximize your own efficiency in fighting them.

Sunfire Aegis: This will speed jungling up greatly, as well as giving you needed bulk. If you're up against a team consisting of mainly magic damage users, you may want to get the Giant's Belt before the Chain Vest. This item synergizes extremely well with your Despair, and it USED to be considered core on Amumu - however, as explained before, I have found results with Aegis to be better. While patch 1.0.0.107 made Sunfire Cape's effect unique, you can still get one and speed up your jungling and creep killing. You increase your own magic DPS while decreasing their damage from your armor and health.

Thornmail: Cheaper than Sunfire Cape, but gives much more armor and a great passive. Only use this when fighting a lot of autoattack DPS damage, especially on enemies that stack attack speed. Champions like Twitch, Master Yi, and Ashe should be instant alerts that you may need to purchase Thornmail at some point during the game.

Frozen Heart: While the passive may seem to conflict with your Tantrum, the payoffs are worth it. The cooldown reduction combined with the Golem buff brings you well over the 40% CDR cap. The extra mana lets you spam spells longer without relying on the Golem. Finally, you get 99 extra armor, which is always fantastic against physical DPS. This is a good spell to consider if you're not controlling Golem all the time, or just want some extra CDR.

Randuin's Omen: A very strong item. You can convert your Heart of Gold into this item to obtain a strong tanking item with a powerful active. Your Bandage Toss into a Curse of the Sad Mummy puts most of the enemy team out of commission for about 2 seconds. With your Randuin's active, you can continue to render a few of them almost useless for even longer.




Banshee's Veil: While you should be getting this close to every game, it's not necessary if they don't have huge amounts of crowd control. The health and mana is very nice, as is the magic resist, but the obvious appeal is the spell shield every 30 seconds.

Quicksilver Sash: This is a much more situational item that rides along the same lines as Banshee's Veil, but less expensive and more specific. Take QSS only when you face a team packing a ton of strong debuffs. Characters that fall into this category are Ashe, Vladimir, Mordekaiser, or a team with 2 or more copies of Exhaust or Ignite. At only 1440 gold, it's much cheaper than Banshee's Veil.

Force of Nature: This item gives the highest Magic Resistance out of any one item in the game. It also gives increased health regeneration based on your maximum health, so in conjunction with your other items, FoN can easily keep you alive for long periods of time. Get Force of Nature when facing a lot of MDPS champs, such as Mordekaiser, Singed, Heimerdinger, or other Amumu.



Eleisa's Miracle: A powerful alternative to Mercury's Treads. Most often you'll be buying this in conjunction with Ionian Boots of Lucidity - it does take up an extra slot compared to just Merc Treads but the extra CDR can be very powerful. With Randuin's Omen and an Elixir of Brilliance, you'll have a hefty amount of CDR.

Guardian Angel: Get this if you feel that you're getting focused quickly in team fights - although you shouldn't be, you're the tank. Guardian Angel is most useful late-game when you've pushed into their base or when they've pushed into yours, so until then I don't highly recommend buying this item. However, it does have its uses.

Warmog's Armor: Honestly, I frown upon this item when playing as Amumu. However, if Warmog's suits your playstyle then go ahead and get it. It gives pure health, which is very nice when you've already gotten approximately 200 armor and magic resist against a balanced team.

Soul Shroud: Useful for the aura, health, and CDR - if you're focusing on a more CDR-oriented Amumu, you MAY want to consider this item.

Will of the Ancients: You actually deal quite a bit of magic damage, so this item may be useful for improving your damage as well as healing you quite substantially when you use your ultimate or any of your skills. The aura helps as well.




DISCLAIMER: These items are situational; try to stick to tanking items unless your team starts to win, in which case it is acceptable to begin building Ability Power or more offensive items.


Abyssal Mask: This item is great in that it gives you both Magic Resist (always good for a tank) and flat magic resist reduction to your enemies. While some may argue that Void Staff is better because of your lack of Sorcerer's Shoes, I say that the magic resist from the Scepter is too good to pass up. In addition, Abyssal Scepter greatly helps out a magic-damage heavy team.

Zhonya's Hourglass: The passive is useful, although you won't be using it all too often, unless using it to get out of a combo or to break turret aggro. The Hourglass is useful in that it gives you a ton of AP as well as a great amount of armor. You can use this for your offensive pushes, especially if you know you'll be turret diving.

Rylai's Crystal Scepter: The absolute best part of this item is that it gives you slowing tears. Did you hear that? IT GIVES YOU TEARS THAT SLOW PEOPLE. No, but really, this item is ideal for an offensive tank such as Amumu. As mentioned before, Despair will now slow people, making it child's play to chase. In addition, you get flat health, making you a bulkier tank, and additional Ability Power, buffing the damage on your skills. This is a great item to consider over Abyssal Scepter if your team lacks crowd control.

Rod of Ages: Only get this item when you're about to build your Banshee's Veil. You have your Catalyst the ProtectorCatalyst but during the time that elapsed after you bought it, your team has turned around the game and is now dominating the enemy. At this point, it is acceptable to build a Rod of Ages - the health and mana help, but so does the Ability Power. These three all increase over the next 10 minutes, as well, making Rod of Ages a good mid-game item for when you're winning.

Jungling refers to the act of having a character not stay in the lanes, but instead travel around the jungle, taking out neutral minion camps. When done correctly, jungling can level a champion as quickly as a solo-laner. This lets your team have, essentially, three carries - the solo champion in middle, the solo champion in top, and the jungler - all of whom level extremely quickly.

As a jungler, your job is to take out these camps while not dying (unless playing Smite+ Revive Evelynn, but that's a conversation for another time). Most importantly, after securing your buffs and being reasonably high leveled, your job is to gank the mid and side lanes.

Higher-level games will always have a jungler, as the advantages are too good to pass up. As such, when your ELO rises and you notice more and more enemy junglers in normal games, you need to be able to deal with them. For now, however, this guide will take you through how to jungle with just Amumu, not how to counter others.




Red lines represent optimal ganking paths. Yellow stars represent essential ward placement.

When starting off, you will need to assign roles - who is the mid carry, who is the top soloer, and who will be dual laning at bottom. Try to assign your support characters, like Taric, Janna, Soraka, or Sona to the bottom lane with melee characters. Try to assign characters with lots of staying power, like Mordekaiser, Akali, or Nasus to the top lane.

Start off at the patch of grass between your blue buff and mid lane. This allows you to scout for an early gank at your own golem and prevents first blood. If wanted, you can have your team stand guard with you as well.

Go to the blue buff golem and take him out with your Despair. Level up Tantrum and move on to the wolves. Take them out with your W and E. In a similar manner, kill the wraiths, making sure to autoattack the big blue wraith first.

Then go to the Lizard buff and kill it with your W and E, Smiting at around 470 health. Finally, destroy the small golems. This lets you level again, bringing you to level 4. Put a point in your W if you want to continue jungling. If not, upgrade your Bandage Toss and gank.



Leashing is simply the act of having a teammate stand on the other side of the wall by blue buff and doing a bit of damage to it, whether it's from a spell or an autoattack. This will cause the blue golem to start trying to attack your ally. When it loses aggro, it will switch targets to you - but during all that time, you've been attacking it and crying by it.

LeagueTopTen has a pretty good video illustrating a good jungle leash (although do note that you really only needed Sona and Amumu didn't have to tank that one Golem hit).


Like LTT says, there's no disadvantage to getting a leash. Your teammate that does the leashing usually takes around 30 damage which is healed by the time he gets back to lane, while you save around 200 health in total. Always get a leash in your games.



Stand here at 1:55. Immediately pop Despair and start attacking the big Golem. Pop your Health Potion as soon as his first attack lands. Activate Smite when he falls below 445 health. After that, toggle Despair off to conserve mana and autoattack the two small lizards to death. You'll level up from this camp - put a point in your E and move on to the Wolf Camp.


Attack the big brown wolf and use Tantrum whenever it recharges, keeping Despair up the whole time. As soon as the big wolf dies, toggle Despair off. Use another Health Potion when the first wears off. As you attack the small blue wolves, you should be able to use Tantrum one more time, just to speed things up. Remember that you should toggle Despair off the moment the brown wolf dies.

Walk into the center of the four wraiths. Initiate with Tantrum and pop Despair. Focus the blue wraith down, while spamming Tantrum on recharge. Use a Health Potion at this camp. If done correctly, the three red wraiths die at the same time, then the blue wraith dies very quickly afterwards. This brings you to level three - level up Tantrum.


Move on to the Lizard camp - note that it is difficult to kill the Lizard without masteries and runes. I recommend you be at least level 21 before attempting this. Anyway, your Smite should have 10-15 seconds left on its cooldown. Pop a Health Potion and attack the big Lizard. Spam Tantrum and keep Despair up, and Smite when he falls below 470 health. Sometimes, you'll have enough mana for three uses of Tantrum, sometimes not. You don't take much extra damage, regardless. The big lizard should die at around the same time as the small ones.


Finally, move on to the small golems and take them out with your standard combo. Use Tantrum to initiate (try to catch both of them with it) and keep Despair up. However, you probably won't have enough mana for any more Tantrums at this point - it's fine. Just use Despair while autoattacking and you can handily clear both camps without dying.



Blue pill back to base. At this point, I generally have close to 550 gold, so buy your Boots and three health pots, along with a Sight Ward or two.

If their team lacks a jungler, go ahead and take out their blue buff. If they do have a jungler, however, go back to the wolf camp, then clear wraiths and the small golems again before ganking. Make sure to ward either Dragon or their Golem/Lizard buff to create some very easy ganks.

This is a new form of jungling introduced to me by YouTube user and LoL player Stonewall008. His channel is filled with jungle videos for just about every champion that can do it, and I highly recommend it for any aspiring junglers out there. The video in question that showed this way of jungling with Amumu is:


This jungling does work with the patch that increased neutral monster magic resistance to 0. You actually don't need to start with a Sapphire Crystal at all - the standard Cloth Armor and 5 health pots will do.




Pros:
-Begins at the wraith camp, and therefore is much safer from ganks, since everyone assumes that Amumu starts at blue
-Generally jungles until level 6 rather reliably and quickly
-Able to gank anytime after red buff - flexible path


Cons:
-Slower than classic jungling
-Vulnerable to the enemy jungler stealing your blue before you can get it
-More vulnerable to being scouted with Clairvoyance





Skilling order:

^Picture obtained with Leaguecraft's champion builder.

Start with a Cloth Armor and at least 1 Health Potion. If you want to, you can buy a Sight Ward - this will be discussed later. Start at the patch of land next to the Wraith camp that overlooks the river, as shown by the green arrow in this diagram:


At 1:40, go to the Wraiths. Put a point in Tantrum and Smite the big blue one. Use Tantrum and get one autoattack off on each of the three small wraiths, using Tantrum again on recharge. After clearing wraiths, go to the wolf camp and focus the big one, using Tantrum when its up. After killing the large wolf, you'll reach level 2 - upgrade Despair. Since Stonewall started with a Sapphire Crystal, he can use Despair after leveling up - however, if starting with a Cloth Armor, I recommend just autoattacking down the remaining wolf camps, leaving Despair on for about 3 ticks or so, just enough to shave one autoattack of time off your jungle run.

After that, go to the small golems and spam Tantrum while keeping Despair up. Smite one of them as soon as your Smite comes up. Use a Health Potion if you don't have full runes or masteries - with a full rune/mastery set, you can kill the golems quite comfortably without dying. Killing these golems should bring you to level 3. Put the point in Despair and recall back.

At this point, if you started with Cloth Armor+5 health pots, you should have barely enough money for your Boots. Buy those, and make sure you have 4 health pots before setting out. Go to the Ancient Golem, as shown by the diagram.



At blue buff, keep Despair on while focusing the big golem, spamming Tantrum on recharge. Use a Health Potion as soon as you take damage. Smite him at 470 health, to prevent a counter-jungle from stealing it.

Continue through the camps, clearing Wolves and Wraiths in the way you usually would. Now you need to go to the small golems, skipping Lizard for now. Kill them with only Despair and Tantrum - don't blow your Smite here. After golems, go to red buff. Focus the big lizard, keep Despair on, and spam Tantrum - smite at 495 health. Recall back, or gank if you feel like it. Continue to follow the skill order shown at top during the course of your jungle - HOWEVER, if you feel comfortable ganking directly after red buff, make sure you put an early point in Bandage Toss at level 4.



Green dots represent essential ward locations. Yellow dots represent optional ward locations. The red arrows going into top, middle, and bottom lane represent your ganking paths.

Upon recalling back, buy your Null-Magic Mantle and if you ganked and can afford it, Mercury's Treads. In addition, try to get at least one Sight Ward. Go clear wolves, wraiths, and small golems again, Smiting at the small golem camp. You should be level 6 now, and you can gank freely.




The first thing you need to know is "When am I going to use this route over the regular route?" There are a few cases where you may very well want to consider this.

Let's say that the entire enemy team has infiltrated your jungle in hopes of an early gank. Your team is weak at level 1 team fights, whether it's because they have multiple Ignites, Exhausts, or have Rally. Maybe your team has a lot of characters who are weak at level 1. In any case, you can't hold your own blue buff and you retreat. You're not gimped by this at all - simply start at Wraiths and do this style, and you won't be thrown off at all by their attempt to gank you.

This also works when you've got one or two people who you know are going to try and dedicated counter-jungle you, or are just hanging around, not in their lane, waiting to kill you at blue buff. Characters like this all include Shaco, Teemo, Evelynn, and the occasional Twitch. These characters can all punish you for not realizing that they're MIA at level 1.

Finally, this is a viable jungle route for when you know that the enemy team will play passively, or when your team has a lot of characters that push the lane out, such as Mordekaiser, Heimerdinger, Malzahar, or Renekton. Because the enemy lanes will be so far back, you won't have much of an opportunity to gank before you get your ultimate - thus, it is much better to do a more passive jungle route to respond to your opponents' passive playstyle.

As for the style of game you'll be playing, it'll be extremely similar to standard jungle play. It just relies less on those early ganks and focuses more on leveling.


Regarding that Sight Ward that I said I'd talk about - Feel free to get it at level 1 if you're against a jungler that you're confident you can gank in jungle easily. Place it at their red or their blue, depending on where they're most likely to start, and grab 2 health pots and be prepared to steal a buff. If you didn't get this ward, it's not terrible at all. Amumu isn't the most reliable ganker in the jungle, compared to Shaco or pre-nerf Evelynn, so it's no big deal.

Counter-jungling is a term that refers to when a champion enters the enemy jungle and attempts to cripple the enemy jungler by stealing his creep camps (denying him experience and gold) or just killing him outright.

The most common way is the first - simply steal creeps. Smite can kill the blue Wraith at level 1, so a lot of junglers will go and Smite the blue wraith, then run to their blue buff and jungle normally. Other junglers might kill a Wraith and a Golem, while some can steal red buff out-right. Counter-jungling requires a good knowledge of different junglers, their routes, and their timings.

A recent game where HotshotGG played jungle Amumu:



He demonstrates knowledge of the game - he skips red buff when he realizes that the enemy team has a jungle Shaco, who is a strong counter-jungler. He also knows that Shaco doesn't pick up blue buff for a while, and manages to steal it before the opposing Shaco realizes. This is a great example of a game where knowledge of other junglers and their paths can turn the tide.

Know that the majority of jungle Shaco players typically start at red buff. Therefore going straight to red buff with your whole team to "pop" his Jack In The Boxes is a way to cripple his jungle. Another way is to steal his blue buff, since you know he'll be preoccupied with red.

Know that the majority of Warwick jungles can take completely variable jungle routes, meaning that it is difficult to counter-jungle from the start.

Know that the majority of Olaf players will get very low while doing red buff, meaning that it is a good idea to ward it and come to kill him when he does it.

Knowledge like this is essential to your counter jungle - it lets you know if it's a better idea to steal his wraiths, his golems, or his blue buff.

While a lot of people may think differently, Amumu can counter-jungle quite effectively. Any jungler can, really. A lot of games, I'll do this if I'm feeling aggressive or if I know that I'm up against a jungler that's dependent on XP and buffs to complete his/her route.

In higher ELO games, people will move out as a team from level 1 and do one of three things: Guard one of their buffs, move out to attack an enemy buff, or wait in the river or a similar neutral zone in case the enemy moves out. Therefore, at these levels, it is extremely risky to try to counter jungle. Example:



Skip to 0:53 for the derp.

So one option you do have in the beginning is to move out as a team and steal their red buff. But you don't have to - if you're confident that you're not going to get ganked, the best way to counter-jungle with Amumu is to go to their Wraith camp. Level up Tantrum, Smite the large blue wraith, and take out 2 red wraiths with your Tantrum and auto-attack, leaving the last one in the camp so the spawn timer doesn't reset.

Another option is to go to their small golems, Smite one of them, and take just that one out with your Tantrum. A lot of junglers rely on small golems to get to level 4 and usually their key ganking skill, so taking this one out early can really cripple a lot of junglers, including Shaco and other Amumu.


A great series of videos about counter-jungling, by Stonewall008:




So this may have happened to you before - you're jungling, you kill blue buff and wolves, and you get to your wraiths - and the blue one isn't there. You kill the small red wolves and you go to your small golems - and one is missing. You've been counter-jungled, and now you're trying to do Lizard buff at level 3 with only a quarter health, and can't do it, so you're forced to retreat.

How do you respond to that?

Against any good counter jungler, you won't know they're there, unless you've taken the liberty to ward your own jungle or if your support has been very loyal with his/her Clairvoyances. Quite frankly, you need to keep going with your jungle, but you have to be smart about it. If you don't get to level 3 from your Wraiths, you'll take more damage while doing small golems, and if that happens, you can't finish Lizard buff.

Judgment is very important here - and no, not the Garen skill. If you know you don't have enough health to do a camp, then don't do it. Recall back and attempt it again. With your percentage based damage and Tantrum spam, Amumu can do just about any camp when he's at full health and mana.

In addition, if you know that your opponent is aggressively counter-jungling you, ask your support to Clairvoyance your own jungle more often, ward their jungle, and ward your own.

One of the most important things to know about counter-jungling is that it slows down the person doing it. Therefore they'll be under-leveled as well - use this opportunity and ward their buffs, invading their jungle.

The most important thing is to not be crippled - above all, don't die and lose your buffs to their jungle.

As a jungler, your job is to gank as many champions as possible early game, preferably their mid carry. As a tank, you should be expecting to get assists, not kills. As a tank, you also have the right to initiate a tower dive, but only at full health or close to full health. Try to start ganks as soon as possible - ideally, you'll be in a position to gank right after grabbing the small golems and porting back to base, but more realistically, you'll start around level 5 or so.

Remember to protect your carries late-game and that your ultimate should be prioritized as a defensive positioning skill over an aggressive push - if it comes down to you dying or your mid carry dying, sacrifice yourself. Of course, not dying would be optimal.

You are the main character on your team responsible for warding and grabbing Oracle's Elixir. With your gold per 10 items, it's basically just you and your support champion who can afford to buy these items without slowing down your item build. Constantly buy wards, constantly ward for your teammates, and mid-late game, try to have an Oracle's active on you most of the time to eliminate your enemy team's wards.




I define mid-game for Amumu as when you've stopped jungling full-time. The ganks have started. Your record is now positive, with hopefully zero deaths. You've completed your Mercury's Treads and have resumed work on your Aegis of the Legion.

Try to clear neutral creeps whenever possible. Grab Golem and Lizard, but now your priority is to let your physical DPS take the Lizard buff and your mage carry take Golem - if neither of them need it or can afford to leave the lane for it, feel free to take it.

Buy Sight Wards. Whenever you have spare money after buying an item, it helps greatly to grab one or two of these and ward Dragon and Baron, as well as the jungle passways leading to your mid lane. Your strategy for mid-game is to continually gank while preventing ganks on your own team. You do the latter by buying wards.




One or two towers are destroyed by now. Your aggressive buying of wards has led to complete control of Dragon throughout the game. You have an Aegis of the Legion and a Banshee's Veil and have started working on your situational items, based on enemy team composition.

Team fights are breaking out everywhere. Your job is to run to these fights, if you're not the one initiating them, and tank for your carries and casters. Bandage Toss and Curse of the Sad Mummy tend to grab your enemies' attention pretty quickly.

Your role at this point? Don't die. Simply stick to the following dogma:

-Initiate with Bandage Toss. Throw Despair and spam Tantrum on recharge.
-As a tank, you are the one who initiates. Likewise, you are also the one who organizes the retreat. Never, ever retreat before your squishies do without announcing it.
-Try to use Bandage Toss on the enemy team's squishy. That not only stops their damage for a second, but it also clearly marks a priority target for the rest of your team to see.

In the World Cyber Games, the championship was between America's own Counter-Logic Gaming, or team CLG (containing big names like HotshotGG, Bigfatjiji, Elementz, Chauster, and Kobe24). They faced off against EU team SK Gaming in a best of 3. In game 3, CLG had, quite literally, the single best Amumu initiate+ultimate I have ever been privileged to witness.


Skip to 11:15 for the action. CLG is in green.

Creep Bandaging - Very simple. Aim your Bandage Toss at an enemy creep and pull yourself to it. You can use this to start a fight by getting in range for your ultimate. You can also use this to run away from fights if you've overextended.

Jungle Jumping - This refers to using your Bandage Toss on neutral creeps to either escape chasers, pursue runners, or simply to speed up jungling. Say that your Kennen laning bottom is soloing Dragon when he is ganked by a Master Yi and a Heimerdinger. You are on the ledge overlooking Dragon. Instead of running all the way around, it is faster to Bandage Toss directly to Dragon - this saves you about six or seven seconds of walking, which can easily mean life or death.

Creep Clearing - This refers to the act of pushing ahead of your minions and tanking the upcoming enemy creep waves. Since they're all attacking you, the cooldown on your Tantrum is significantly reduced and you can spam it easily, clearing the creep wave extremely quickly. This lets your creeps push as well as netting you 100+ gold.

Jungle Juking - You can use your Bandage Toss to pull off some extremely efficient 1v1 jukes in the jungle. Say that you're being chased by an enemy or enemies - simply run through the brush, then as soon as you see them exit the brush as well, Bandage Toss to them and run away in the opposite direction from where you were running before. The best example of "jungle juking" that I've seen thus far:



If that's not enough, you can actually double juke them and double back in the brush again to throw them off your trail. Just don't do it too much, or this happens:



Those should be all the tricks you need as Amumu. Have fun!

I hope that this guide has increased your understanding of Jungle Amumu and how to play him. As always, comments are appreciated, as are ratings. Correctly played, Amumu is one of the most potent tanks in the game and can pump out some serious, tear-wrenching DPS. Don't expect to get a really high K/D ratio with Amumu, but instead go for a very high K+A/D ratio. Most importantly, have fun.

-Endless thanks to SixSonatas for his build format, which has been instrumental in creating this build. See his original work on Taric here.
-Thanks to DEWO for his Jungle Warwick guide and Restrictnine for his Jungle Udyr guide, both of which I used as a backbone for my own jungling section.
-HUGE thanks to Stonewall008 for his informative Amumu jungle video that introduced me to Type II Jungling and his videos about counter-jungling.
-Thanks to Grasshyren, MachinimaRealm, and Caketown for some very useful lines and videos that contributed to this guide.
-Thanks to Faro for his gameplay and commentary in MachinimaRealm's video.
-Thanks to Matt, FlashJ, and everyone else who keeps this site running! Without you guys, this guide wouldn't even be possible.
-Thanks to the community for taking the time to read this guide!

Q. Despair at rank 5 deals more DPS than Tantrum does when you fight champions. Why aren't you maxing W first?

Q. Why is Sunfire Aegis no longer a core item in your build?

Q. Why not go 21 in defense? Aren't you a tank?

Q. Why don't you max Bandage Toss first? It increases by 60 for each rank while Tantrum only increases by 25!

Q. Why don't you build Ability Power? Amumu's abilities have great AP scaling!

Q. How early can this Amumu get Dragon? When should he?

Q. Why don't you get Madred's Razors? I thought all melee junglers should get it.

Q. Why is Banshee's Veil listed in your situational items? Shouldn't you buy it every game, since it's in your core item build?

09.16.2011
-Added armor marks and armor quints as optional
-Updated icons in the mastery section
-Changed masteries to 1/14/15

06.29.2011
-Added Philosopher's Stone and Heart of Gold into the core item build
-Removed all other summoner spells except Smite, Flash, and Ghost
-Emphasized the importance of buying wards and Oracle's Elixir on Amumu
-Fixed a tooltip saying that the Utility Mastery mastery extended the time on Baron Buff when it actually does not - many thanks to Tehcolin for pointing this out!

05.31.2011
-Changed masteries to 1/13/16 to get those points in Quickness - Veteran's Scars just isn't as strong anymore
-Added the "Leashing" section
-Centered all videos

04.27.2011
-Added guide to LeagueDB

04.03.2011
-Added a video of HotshotGG playing Amumu to the Counter-Jungling section

03.30.2011
-Transferred guide to Solomid.net
-Added section in the FAQ answering why I max Tantrum over Despair

03.26.2011
-Finished changing core item build to use Aegis instead of Sunfire
-Finished Counter-Jungling section
-Changed mana regen Seals to flat armor
-Changes published

03.18.2011
-Began work on the "Counter-Jungling" section
-Fixed some minor numbering and coding issues

02.28.2011
-Edited the "Dragon" section of the FAQ to reflect that Amumu should not be soloing dragon in higher level games.

02.26.2011
-Removed the "old format" link as it was unnecessary.

02.19.2011
-Finished an in-depth Type II Jungling guide.
-Accommodated for the Patch 1.0.0.111 buffs to Amumu and change to Smite.
-Added an "Alternative Runes" section.

02.13.2011
-Added the Type II jungling section after seeing Stonewall008's video, linked in the same section.

02.07.2011
-Added Zhonya's Hourglass to the "On the Offensive" section of the "Items" chapter.

01.27.2011
-Finally updated to accomodate for patch 1.0.0.109, which slightly raised the magic resist of some neutral creeps.
-Fixed a minor coding error in the items section.

01.15.2011
-Removed the "MOBAFire database may still be inaccurate" comment now that Cursed Touch is updated to its correct description.
-Completely revamped the BBcode to be less lengthy. Drop-down icons will now display Volley instead of Volley.
-Found the correct video - it was MachinimaRealm's video of Faro's Udyr guide where he commented. Sorry, PinktyGRRR, but I hope you at least enjoyed the little attention that this got you!

01.09.2011
-Changed skill build from W-E-E-W-Q to the more common order of W-E-E-Q-E, which is better for early ganks and slightly speeds up early jungling.

01.08.2011
-Changed photos to Tinypic URLs as my Photobucket trial period has apparently expired >.>

01.06.2011
-Updated build completely to the new guide format. Created another guide in the classic format for those who liked that style.

01.01.2011
-Realized that I forgot to put "Special Thanks" in the table of contents - edited accordingly

12.28.2010
-Fixed a slight typo in the Jungling section

12.26.2010
-Wrote a more in-depth analysis of Amumu's early jungling phase, for those people who need step-by-step jungling instructions (I used to be one of these people >.>)

12.25.2010
-Added a screenshot of my completed item build

12.24.2010
-Alphabetized the "Abbreviated Terms" section, except for closely related terms.
-Added ELO rating to the "Abbreviated Terms" section - thanks, Johndevl, for pointing that out!

12.23.2010
-Slightly modified sections about wards - my thanks go to member Mastarwe for his constructive criticism

12.21.2010
-Slight errors fixed

12.20.2010
-Slightly modified the section on Randuin's Omen to reflect its nerf from patch 1.0.0.107

12.16.2010
-Finished guide
-Finished Jungling section

12.14.2010
-Revamped guide to reflect patch 1.0.0.107 - "Sunfire Cape - Passive is now Unique"
-Added DoT in the Abbreviated Terms section

12.13.2010
-Added Mid-Game Phase, Late-Game Phase, Tricks and Strategies, and FAQs
-Wrote part of the jungling guide
-Updated the Closing

12.12.2010
-Edited jungling pictures

12.11.2010
-Added Special Thanks section
-Added win streak image

12.10.2010
-Wrote up Items and all Situational Items
-Edited and fixed up Masteries
-Started Jungling section

12.09.2010
-Wrote up Skills, Summoner Skills, Runes, and Masteries

12.08.2010
-Guide created
-Wrote up the Preface and the Introduction