Against the Grain

With the current meta in Season Three starting to settle in, it’s time to assess one of the most discussed roles, the Jungler. The Jungler role has become somewhat stagnant this season according to many players, but there are many exciting changes coming to us in patch 3.8. Let us take a departure from the normal course of action and take a look at what the current meta provides Junglers that could bring a nontraditional pick into the scene.

The pace of the early-game has changed and with it, we have seen a great deal of hand holding between Mid Lane and the Jungle. This means that camps and wave are being split for the majority of the early to mid-game. What does this mean for the cast of junglers? It means gods with slightly weaker clear are surviving the early game and making to late game with a bit more ease. With all the hard carries and squishy burst mages coming into the mid lane this season how can a poor Jungler keep them alive so they can carry them into the late-game? Many junglers like Thor, Hun Batz, and Serqet are prioritized for the strength of their control, but they suffer from the same things their mid lane counterparts do which is a lack of sustain and low defenses. Gods with high survivability like Tyr and Herc suffer from high mana cost and the predictability of their kits present difficult kills in the early game and their potency isn’t seen until later into the game when they can really catch an opponent unaware.


With these factors considered I bring you Jungle Khepri, a god who has typically been passed over for roles other than support after the nerf to his lane clear and minion healing. Khepri has one of the better early game passives for supporting those squishy Mages, a shield that continues to proc onto yourself and allies as you maintain a presence near them. This means you aren’t losing precious health to camps and you are putting a little meat on those Mid Laner’s bones to get them through the early poke phase. There is truly no weak point to this passive, it is effective throughout every point in the game. The more allies you have around you the more effective it becomes making it one of the strongest passives for teamfighting in the game.

Khepri’s lane clear is extremely strong when paired with just about any other god. He also excels at shutting down the wave clear of enemies by providing protections to his own minions via his second ability Rising Dawn. Rising Dawn is on one of the most stacked abilities in the game. It provides strong damage to camps and waves, while lowering their physical protections as well as offering resistance to his own wave and his allies. Yet another versatile strength as he can use this offensively or defensively.


His first and third abilities provide safe attempts for kill setup, and early into the game offers a substantial amount of damage. His shield gives him a bit of a safety net to poke or attempt early kills. Should the kill fail his durability and passive shield generally give him an easy out. Through my experimentation with Jungle Khepri, I have generally found that early aggression awards me a first blood or forces out an enemy Purification very early on in the match. At level three Khepri can lock an enemy into place for 2.8 seconds by combining the root and the grab. This is also one of the safest initiations as missing the root doesn’t place you out of position and means you don’t have to waste the pluck and can save it for the next try or even as an escape. Landing it all but guarantees the grab as the enemy is stuck in place for 1.3 seconds giving you plenty of time to aim the follow-up ability. The three seconds of hard crowd control means that even Mid Laners with the slowest of reactions have a chance to confirm some damage onto your prey.

As soon as Khepri hits level 5 he gains yet another potent tool for protecting that death averse Mid Laner, Scarab’s Blessing. Level 5 is that fateful moment where mid lane gods start dancing on their toes waiting for every global Ultimate to hit them as they contest those risky mid camps. Khepri’s Ultimate denies those early kills and puts his team at an advantage by wasting enemy Ultimates at the same time.


Now that we’ve discussed all of Khepri’s strengths in the season 3 Jungle let us go over builds. Due to the low magical scaling and high base damage his build has quite a bit of freedom. Bumba’s Mask is a must to start with, providing more farm for you and your team as well as giving you the MP5 and health regen to keep you on the playing field. Combine this regen with his passive shield and you should be able to keep his health topped off for a long time. Normally playing Khepri in the Support role puts you at a gold and experience disadvantage, but the jungle allows him not only to scale those abilities more effectively for teamfights but the gold to get his build online earlier too. Cooldown scales great with every one of his abilities allowing for constant gank attempts, peel and denying your friends their chance to die a good death.

I prefer to build Shoes of Focus, Breastplate of Valor, Spirit Robe, Bulwark of Hope (Or Pestilence), Midgardian Mail, and I always leave one slot open for a contextual item. Hide of the Urchin, Winged Blade, Which Blade and Hide of the Nemean Lion come to mind when defense is needed. Gem of Isolation has a fairly good synergy with Khepri’s kit as three of his abilities will proc it, and Rising Dawn will continue to proc the slow for its entire duration. Go on, try missing that root with an enemy slowed by Gem’s passive.

I max Khepri’s first ability Abduct first for stronger Jungle clear and more damage and control during ganks. Each level bolsters Abduct’s damage and lengthens the duration on the grab.I then max out his Ultimate for the larger health return on revives. Next, prioritize his second ability Rising Dawn for higher damage reduction and lastly Solar Flare.


Khepri isn’t right for every situation, do keep in mind his strengths and when to pick him. He provides a great deal of protection as well as opening other opportunities on your team’s roster. It frees up your Support to play gods with more aggression and higher clear like Guan Yu and Fenrir to win the duo lane while ensuring your team still has the hard peel it needs in late game team fights. He provides safety for gods with less self-peel in the Mid Lane such as Zeus and Raijin and can help speed up wave clear against gods like Isis and Janus. His hard CC is excellent at securing kills on to less mobile picks like Anubis and Kukulkan.

His solo camp clear and kill potential aren’t as strong as carries like Kali and Ao Kuang, so make sure you are buddying up with an ally to see his true potency. Now go forth and hug thine enemies!



Written by

Zakery Warren

Jungler... Khepri?

Isn't his scaling complete garbage?

Guess this is a different approach to jungling. Rather than jumping in to gank people, the idea here is to jump in to lock enemies down and allow your other teammates to complete the gank. More utility, less damage. Maybe a good choice when you've got an overly aggressive Solo and/or Support, like a team with Ares, etc.

I LOVE Gem of Isolation, but I'm not so sold on it for Khepri. Sure, it procs on all 3 main abilities, but 2 of them already lock the enemy down for a good amount of time, so the effect seems like it would be diminished somewhat. Guess the DoT from Rising Dawn makes for a nice, prolonged slow, though. Would probably say more CDR and maybe Winged Blade for extra speed would be good...initiate with lockdown abilities, then if the enemy is able to start getting away, enough CDR would help get a second round of abilities off.

Weak3n did a Khepri jungle before as a request from one of his subscribers on Twitch.

talking about the jungler while using arena as background seriously