Xin Zhao is a tanky dps anti-carry. Your main goal should be able to take out the enemy team's carry. He can initiate a teamfight with his charge and ult. Xin is a really strong character all around and fits into a lot of team comps well.

Still testing Xin with the new masteries, will update when I figure out what's the best for him.

• Flat Attack Damage Reds: Helps with the early game burst damage.
• Armor Penetration Quints: Helps a lot with your damage. Stacks nicely with
• FLAT Armor Yellows: Helps you be tankier early game so you don't get denied as hard with auto attacks. As well as when you go in for harass, you don't take too much creep damage.
• Magic Resist Per Level Blues: I prefer Magic Resist Per Level Blues over Flat Magic Resist because early game skills don't do much damage, it's late game where you need the extra Magic Resist.

These are the Summoner Spells I use. I now get because it is broken and almost is necessary to get on all champions now. I also grab because it allows me to win almost any 1v1, escape ganks, chase, the utility it offers is too much to pass up.

Other good choices would be:

• : This is necessary if you're going to be jungling.

I wouldn't bother with any other Summoner Spells for Xin.

Xin Zhao is healed for 30 points for every 3 attacks that he lands. This amount increases by 5 every 2 levels.



This helps you lane better early and one you have more attack speed it can act as a nice lifesteal. This also works when you hit towers/inhibs because it is a heal not a lifesteal. When you have a lot of armor you can tank towers really well because of your passive.




Xin Zhao prepares to unleash a fearsome combo, causing his next 3 standard attacks to deal his attack damage + 15 / 30 / 45 / 60 / 75 to enemy targets, with the final attack knocking his opponent into the air.

Cost 30mana
Range 375



This is really strong for Xin because there's no protection against knock up/knock back so it's a really good form of CC. With this and your you can keep the enemy in the air a lot of the fight.




Battle Cry
Passive: Increases Xin Zhao's attack speed by 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 / 35%.

Active: Xin Zhao unleashes a battle cry, increasing his attack speed by double the passive amount for 5 seconds, and causing his standard attacks to reduce all other ability cooldowns by 1 second.

Activating this ability removes the passive bonus until this ability refreshes.

Cost 35
mana

Range 20




Use this skill when you're going to get a lot of auto attacks off and it'll make all your other skills cool down a lot faster so you can spam them in a fight. This will allow you to use and multiple times in a fight to pump out a lot of damage and CC to your enemies.




Audacious Charge
Xin Zhao charges an enemy unit, dealing 70 / 110 / 150 / 190 / 230 (+40% of ability power) damage to all nearby enemies and slowing them by 20 / 25 / 30 / 35 / 40% for 1.7 seconds.

Cost 70
mana

Range 650
Cooldown 16/15/14/13/12



This is a good charge skill. Has a slow component which helps a lot in chasing, ganking, and initiating a teamfight. Use this skill to charge on their carry and take them out fast.




Crescent Sweep
Xin Zhao unleashes a fierce spear sweep on targets around him, dealing 125 / 225 / 325 + 20% of their current health in physical damage. His magic resistance and armor are increased by 30 / 40 / 50 for the next 6 seconds.

Cost 100
mana

Range 20




When you cast this in the middle of the teamfight, you'll become really tanky and do some nice damage as well. You want to use this right after you charge in. Try to use this on as many enemies as you can because each enemy you hit will increase your Armor and Magic Resist.

Take solo Top or Mid depending on who you'll be going against. Xin is a strong duelist and can burst a lot of damage at lvl 3. Try not to get denied and just CS for a few lvls until you have and . You can harass easily with these for a lot of damage.

He can also do well in Bot if he has someone to babysit him or someone with CC. If the enemy gets CC'd Xin can burst a lot of their health but I prefer him in a Solo Lane.

(note: a good little trick is to hit 2 minions with to charge up a knock up, then use to close the distance and the enemy will be knocked up instantly)

By now you should have a lot of damage output with . Just keep farming and ganking when possible. If a teamfight happens you need to be there. You can change the fight with , , and your auto attacks.

Use your ward in the River to give vision to your team as well as yourself.

By this point you should not only have a lot of damage items, you'll be really tanky as well. This allows you to withstand a lot of damage and if you make them focus you, they will be blowing a lot of skills on the tank which your team can take advantage of very well.

With the new changes to Xin's , it makes him a very strong, fast, and safe jungler.

I've tested a few things in the jungle with him and will share them here. For runes I use the same as if I were laning Xin because I do not have Attack Speed (reds/blues) or Health (quints) but those would probably be better, but my rune set up works just as fine.





I think Xin can start anywhere in the jungle, but I prefer 2 routes for him.





This route will get you to level 4 at about 4:15. You'll be too low to gank though.

For this Route you start:

Skill Order: Q -> W -> Q -> E -> E -> R, then follow the standard skill order posted in this guide.





This route will get you to level 6 at about 7:15. You'll be full health and have boots and double buff, so you can gank from here.

For this Route you start: , and at your first back you buy

Skill Order: Q -> W -> Q -> E -> E -> R, then follow the standard skill order posted in this guide.


It all depends on what you want to do, gank earlier, or get to 6 earlier. Both work fine, just a matter of preference.

Your main goal should be to kill the enemy team's carry, then the rest of the squishies, then the tanks last.

If you get focused just try and do as much damage as possible before you die because Xin doesn't really have an escape, you're really tanky and have lifesteal so you'll be living for a lot longer than you think.

Pick your fights well, if you go in too early you will be killed fast. You can initiate sometimes but not every fight, once you start playing Xin you'll find out what you can and can't do.

I play Xin a lot and he's probably my favorite character. I hope this guide helped you to improve your Xin play. This is just my take on Xin, I know a lot of people play him much differently than I do but I get asked a lot about my Xin so instead of explaining over and over, I figured I would write a guide. This is just a guideline showing what works for me, try things out and do what works for you! Thanks for reading.