How to win the jungle race as Vi against Locke · Matchup data reviewed on patch 26.15
Read from Vi's seat: the race windows this plan plays for against Locke.
| Stage | Read | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Level 1 Clear | Vi Favoured | Vault Breaker charge poke plus the Blast Shield wins the first short trade, but Q nail volleys clear camps at range while banking marks for the first scuttle fight. You still win the straight exchange at the first buff; keep it short, keep it decisive, and keep the scuttle line yours. |
| Level 2 Skirmish | Vi Favoured | Denting Blows shred starts beating slower kits in extended exchanges. Locke can make it awkward — a stacked nail string into the blink-through consume deletes half a health bar — but not with one camp still up on both sides. Trade, then walk away with the second buff and the tempo that comes with it. |
| Level 3 Route | Vi Favoured | The full charge-engage with W shred is a clean, honest duel you slightly favor. The margin is thin: W's grey-health refund makes his short trades cheaper than they look — full clears cost him real HP, and one slow camp on your side hands the window straight back, so keep the trade short. Fight him at full marks-zero and punish the ten seconds after his blink — E is his only exit. |
| Levels 4-5 Macro | Vi Favoured — Take Duels | You hold the edge at 4-5, not a blowout. He uses 4-5 to bank marks at range, then blinks in the moment the nail count says the kill is there, so meet them where the camps are, not where their laners are. |
| Level 6 Breakpoint | Cease and Desist Favoured | Cease and Desist is point-click lockdown — your engage can no longer be juked. The Purgatory totem turns any low-HP skirmish into a chain of executes and blink resets, so the margin is real but narrow: fight when your ultimate is up and Purgatory is the one on cooldown. |
| First Item Spike | Lich Bane / Shadowflame Spike | His Lich Bane spike is real: the blink-consume chunk one-shots chipped squishies. Respect the first-item window, then note his E is still a one-way door — punish every spent blink. Locke's first item makes the mark consume hit for a real chunk, which is when the blink stops being a poke tool. |
| 2+ Items Scaling | Even Scaling — Prep Decides | Late-game Locke scales with his seal count, not his items — deny executes and his floor never rises. Focus him when E is down and never let "almost dead" linger inside Purgatory. |
Standard start — his level-1 clear is ranged but mana-hungry and his duel is honest at best; you dictate the early tempo, not him. Locke clears at range with Ritual Nails and banks marks while doing it, so his first scuttle arrives with stacks up.
Ranked by the race windows in Vi's plans — the jungle race carries no win-rate sample.
The full Vi vs Locke 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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Vi's race plan controls 6 of the 7 windows — Vi holds the tempo advantage in this jungle matchup.
Not exactly — Vi's race plan controls 6 of the 7 windows, so Locke is playing catch-up and has to lean on the map.
Playing the other side? Locke vs Vi guide →
All Vi jungle matchups →
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