How to win the jungle race as Locke against Graves · Matchup data reviewed on patch 26.15
Read from Locke's seat: the race windows this plan plays for against Graves.
| Stage | Read | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Level 1 Clear | Respect Graves | At level 1 this window belongs to Graves: End of the Line plus knockback autos shred melees holding a buff pit, and True Grit armor plus point-blank double-shot autos win any close-range brawl. Fight him in the open where his pellets spread, never inside a tight buff pit. Skip the level-1 crossing and bank tempo on the opposite side of the map. |
| Level 2 Skirmish | Respect Graves | True Grit armor plus point-blank double-shot autos win any close-range brawl — Locke has no answer to that at level 2. Quickdraw (E) True Grit armor stacking lets them out-trade in tight jungle lanes on their half of the map too, so refuse the level-2 skirmish and answer the pressure cross-map. |
| Level 3 Route | Danger — Avoid Graves | Graves out-classes you at the opening scuttle — Smoke Screen's blind caps a kit that wins almost every close-quarters exchange, and True Grit armor plus point-blank double-shot autos win any close-range brawl. Give up the level-3 river fight, full-clear away from them, and trade map pressure instead of health. |
| Levels 4-5 Macro | Danger — Avoid Graves | Graves owns 4-5 outright. He uses 4-5 to take your camps, because True Grit stacking makes him the better invader, so treat every crossing as theirs and take the camps they are furthest from. |
| Level 6 Breakpoint | Respect Graves's R | The R execute plus True Grit armor closes out any trade he starts ahead — Locke loses the straight post-6 duel. Respect the burst threshold and fight him in the open, never the pit, and shift your pressure to the side of the map Collateral Damage is not on. |
| First Item Spike | Lich Bane / Shadowflame Spike | Lich Bane turns every blink-consume into a Spellblade chunk and Shadowflame sharpens the low-HP crunch. This is your strongest duel window of the game — cash it on a pick, not a coin-flip. Graves' first item is a large step in raw damage — the double-shot at point blank starts removing squishies outright. |
| 2+ Items Scaling | Danger — Graves Outscales | Late game you are a cleanup engine, not a frontliner: enter second, blink the marked kill, and chain E resets. Every sealed soul permanently raises the totem floor — your scaling is the seal count. |
Start Red with a leash and Q the camp from max nail range — W’s grey-health refund keeps the clear honest, but full clears cost real HP, so path toward a healthy scuttle, not a fight. Graves has one of the fastest clears in the game — End of the Line through two camps at once means he is level three early.
Ranked by the race windows in Locke's plans — the jungle race carries no win-rate sample.
The full Locke vs Graves report continues with scuttle & dragon rules, invade windows and safety boundaries, the top-side objective fight, macro rotations and the win condition — plus the live enemy-jungle tracker that shows their start, clear and gank timers in game.
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Graves pressures 6 of the 7 windows in this race — survive the early game and scale into your windows.
Not exactly — Graves pressures 6 of the 7 windows, so Locke is playing catch-up and has to lean on the map.
Playing the other side? Graves vs Locke guide →
All Locke jungle matchups →
More Locke jungle matchups: vs Evelynn · vs Fiddlesticks · vs Gragas · vs Hecarim · vs Ivern · vs Jarvan IV