Best Builds for Jayce in League of Legends
Jayce is a champion in League of Legends that requires precise mechanics to unlock his full potential. While he is typically seen at the highest level of play, Riot Games has recently made buffs to push him back into the meta.
If you’re looking to play Jayce in your solo queue games, finding the best combinations of runes and items can be a challenge. Since Jayce can be played in multiple ways, each build has its own strengths and weaknesses. To help you out, we’ll be going through the most popular builds for Jayce in League.
Runes
When it comes to runes for Jayce, there are two main setups to choose from, along with a situational third option. Let’s break them down.
First Strike Jayce
Inspiration
First Strike is an effective rune for Jayce, but it requires a strong understanding of spacing during the laning phase. To make the most of this rune, you need to deal damage before your enemies. Against melee top laners, this won’t be a problem. However, be cautious if your enemy laner can damage you early on.
If played correctly, First Strike can help you build a substantial gold lead without necessarily getting kills. The extra gold you earn will be beneficial in the mid-late game, allowing you to have better items and deal more damage.
Magical Footwear saves you gold in exchange for stronger damage output. Since getting your core item is important for Jayce, this is the recommended rune in the second Inspiration tree.
Biscuit Delivery provides mana regeneration, which can be helpful in the early laning phase when Jayce gets mana-hungry. It can also help you survive against aggressive trades from enemies. If you won’t be fighting as much, Future’s Market is an alternative choice.
Cosmic Insight allows you to have shorter cooldowns on your Flash and Teleport. While the Item Haste bonus is not significant, it’s a small advantage that Jayce can take advantage of with his build. Time Warp Tonic used to be popular, but it has become less useful in the current meta.
Sorcery
Manaflow Band provides Jayce with extra mana, which is important since his early damage isn’t high. This allows him to spam his long-range Q ability and prevent running out of mana in the first few minutes of the lane.
Transcendence reduces cooldowns on Jayce’s spells. This helps him take advantage of both of his forms more effectively and greatly increases his damage output. The cooldown reduction upon takedown is an added bonus.
Bonuses: +10% attack speed, +9 adaptive force, +6 armor
Phase Rush Jayce
Sorcery
Phase Rush is the rune to go for when you know the enemy has kill threat in the lane. It allows Jayce to quickly put distance between himself and the opponent, escaping trade attempts. This rune can also be used offensively to dodge spells or reposition for the next rotation of abilities. It’s effective in any phase of the game, but especially useful in teamfights and the laning phase.
Manaflow Band and Transcendence remain the same as in the previous setup.
Gathering Storm compensates for the lack of First Strike in this setup, providing better stats in the later stages of the game. However, if you prefer more aggressive trades, Scorch is also a viable choice.
Bonuses: +10% attack speed, +9 adaptive force, +6 armor (consider swapping attack speed for another +9 adaptive force)
Inspiration
Magical Footwear and Biscuit Delivery remain the same as in the previous setup.
Conqueror Jayce
Conqueror is a rune that synergizes well with Jayce’s kit. With his multiple damage spells, fully stacking Conqueror is relatively easy. This rune provides higher overall damage and a bit of sustain.
Presence of Mind increases mana regeneration, similar to how Manaflow Band helps Jayce during the laning phase. The mana refund on takedowns is particularly useful in teamfights and extended skirmishes.
Legend: Tenacity is the best choice among the Legend runes. It provides tenacity, which is helpful against teams with a lot of crowd control.
Coup de Grace adds more damage to Jayce’s poke and burst. Last Stand can be a good alternative if you know you won’t be able to kill an enemy with a full combo.
Sorcery
Manaflow Band and Transcendence remain the same as in the previous setup.
Bonuses: +10% attack speed, +9 adaptive force, +6 armor (always go for attack speed since it allows you to stack Conqueror faster)
Items
At the start of the game, you have two different options for Jayce: Tear of the Goddess or Doran’s Blade. Tear of the Goddess grants more mana to safely get through the laning phase and allows for quicker stacking of its passive. Manamune will be fully stacked by the time you purchase it, resulting in a greater power spike.
Doran’s Blade provides better trading power and sustain for the early laning phase when Jayce is more vulnerable to ganks and skirmishes.
A risky option is starting with Long Sword. While it grants the worst starting stats, it allows you to buy Serrated Dirk on your first recall, providing an early spike with just 750 gold.
Out of these three options, Doran’s Blade is the more balanced choice and is recommended in most scenarios.
Builds
When it comes to builds, there are two options to consider based on the enemy team composition.
In the majority of cases, Eclipse, Manamune, and Serylda’s Grudge are the three core items that give Jayce everything he needs: attack damage, armor penetration, sustain, mana, and ability haste. Fully stacking Manamune will significantly increase damage output, and the slow from Serylda’s Grudge helps land abilities more consistently.
A secondary build option is to focus on lethality for dealing with multiple squishy targets. Prowler’s Claw, Youmuu’s Ghostblade, and Umbral Glaive, paired with the Mythic’s passive lethality, allow Jayce to deal almost true damage with his physical damage spells.
If you’re ahead of your enemies, continue building lethality. However, if you need defensive items, consider Maw of Malmortius against heavy magic damage, Guardian Angel against physical damage (the revive can be a game-changer in teamfights), and Edge of Night against mixed damage (the ability block effect can be crucial).
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