Counter Guide

How to Beat Hecarim

Matchup Guide · Evergreen · 3 Counter Picks

Hecarim turns movement speed into damage, so every item, rune and buff that helps him arrive also decides how hard he hits when he does.

He's the clearest example of a champion whose threat is a distance rather than a cooldown. He doesn't need to outplay anybody (he needs to already be moving), and a lane that's fifteen seconds from safety is a lane he covers in six. That's why he punishes overextension harder than almost anything else in the jungle, and why the players who complain about him are usually the ones standing furthest from their own tower. Beating him means taking away the run before it becomes a fight.

Matchup Snapshot Hecarim, the Shadow of War

Where You Meet Him Jungle

Damage Type Physical, and it grows the faster he is going

Why He Is Frustrating He is already on top of you when the gank starts

Mobility Extreme, and it doubles as his damage

Biggest Threat Warpath [Passive]

Hardest Counter Lillia

What a Counter Needs

Slows, roots or anything that makes the run stop being a run
Vision far enough out that the approach is not a surprise
A way to punish him in the early jungle, before the speed is worth anything

Patch 26.18 Matchup Data

Who Beats Hecarim on Patch 26.18

Best Picks Into Hecarim

Lillia1,014 games57.0%
Briar1,479 games55.6%
Cho'Gath1,431 games55.6%
Udyr558 games55.0%
Shyvana1,911 games54.7%

Picks Hecarim Beats

Qiyana1,178 games45.8%
Nidalee768 games46.1%
Kindred663 games47.1%
Rengar839 games47.6%

Win rates are for the champion listed, in the jungle against Hecarim. They come from Nerfplz's own ranked solo queue games on Patch 26.18, Silver and above, 50,070 Hecarim games in all. Only matchups that show up in at least 1% of those games are listed.

Hecarim Overview

Strengths: What Makes Him Dangerous

Speed is his damage. Warpath [Passive] means every step he takes toward you makes the hit at the end of it worse (an unusual and very unpleasant scaling).
He covers ground nobody plans for. The gank you thought you were safe from was measured against a jungler who runs at a normal pace.
He heals in the middle of a fight. Standing in a group of people is where he gets his health back, so a team fight is weirdly the safest place on the map for him.
His engage scatters your team. Onslaught of Shadows [R] starts the fight and removes everyone's ability to answer it for the seconds that matter.
He is a nightmare to run from. Almost nothing in the game outruns him, so the fight you decided not to take frequently happens anyway.

Weaknesses: Where You Get In

Slow him down and he stops working. Any slow at all is doing double duty here, cutting the arrival and the damage in the same instant.
His early jungle is unremarkable. He isn't a strong first clear duelist, and a jungler who contests him before he has items is fighting a very ordinary champion.
He commits in a straight line. The charge picks a direction and sticks to it. Terrain, walls and anything that repositions him mid run make it very hard to arrive where he wanted.
He is not a threat when nobody is out of position. His entire value is punishing distance. A team that plays close to its towers gives him no work to do.
Grievous Wounds cuts the sustain. The reason he survives being focused in a team fight is the health he takes back from standing among people, and it is a cheap thing to switch off.

Countering Hecarim

Based on the strengths and weaknesses above, beating Hecarim comes down to champions who can accomplish at least one of the following:

Ward far out instead of close in. A ward that sees him at your lane entrance has told you nothing useful, because by then the run is already at full value.
Buy a slow before you buy the damage item. This is the purchase people put off, and it is the one that turns his best moment into an ordinary one.
Contest his jungle early. He's beatable there in a way he isn't later, and slowing his first few clears removes more of his game than any single fight will.
Stand near your own turrets when he is unaccounted for. This is boring advice. He needs you to be somewhere far away, and you get to decide whether you are.

If you're already locked into the matchup without any of those tools, these strategies still work:

Playing a Bad Hecarim Matchup

Play the lane short. Giving up a few minions to stand where his charge isn't worth taking is a trade you win every time.

Group early. He's at his best against one person a long way from help, and he's at his worst against five people looking at him.

Take the fight when his engage is down. It's a long cooldown, and without it he has to walk into your team the same way everyone else does.

Best Hecarim Counters

Three ways to beat a champion whose damage is a distance covered: cage the run, beat him before the speed matters, or take the speed away entirely. One counter each.

Jarvan IV Cages The Charge

He's the specific answer rather than a general one. A champion who has committed to a direction at full speed has nothing to do about a wall appearing in front of him.

He also arrives at the same speed as the gank he is answering, which matters more than the cage in most games.

Elise Beats Him Early

She wins the early jungle and can force the fight rather than wait for one, and his good version arrives late enough that the lead sticks.

There's nothing clever in this pick. It's pressure applied during the stretch of the game where he can't answer it.

Nasus Takes The Speed Away

His slow is the single most direct answer in the game to a champion whose damage is calculated from how fast he is moving, and it lasts long enough to cover the whole fight.

It also solves the second half of the problem (he's very hard to escape once he's decided to follow you).

Itemizing Against Hecarim

The first two are the matchup and the last two are ordinary insurance:

Executioner's Calling is aimed at the health he takes back in the middle of a fight, which is the reason focusing him so often achieves nothing. Randuin's Omen is doing two jobs here rather than one (a slow against him is a damage reduction as well as a movement one). Plated Steelcaps handles the basic attacks that fill the gaps between his abilities. Zhonya's Hourglass is for whoever he keeps arriving on, since the charge is a commitment and the item outlasts it.