I've been looking at quite a few xin guides, and for the most part, each guide's skill level-up sequence tends to differ. I'm pretty sure it's usually best to get at least one point in all abilities early on due to the synergy of the entire kit, but I'm always wondering which ability to further level up on.

Here are the stats that you get beyond the first level of each ability.

Leveling up Three Talon Strike gives:
+45 (total) extra physical damage, -1 second to cooldowns

Leveling up Battle Cry gives:
+10% attack speed on activation, +6 heal passive, and -1 second to cooldowns

Leveling up Audacious Charge gives:
+40 extra magic damage, +5% slow, and -1 second to cooldowns

So how do you recommend skilling up Xin?

Audacious charge. 3 Talon will let you chain Audacious in a single skirmish if you level e.

I recommend the Charge as the first thing to max. Charge adds the most damage in a reliable-bursty manner, and the -1 cooldowns is pretty important.

When you charge someone, as stated your slow only lasts for 2 sec, enough to get in your 3 Qs and thus a knockup. After that, they are free to escape.
It takes about 2 seconds to beat on them and knock them up (and u have a 2 sec slow). If you have a 12 sec charge (with say 10% CDR to 10.8), then after 3 Qs and 2 sec you still have a CD of 5.8 seconds. They gonna escape.
But with an 8 sec CD (7.2 with 10% CDR), you have a 2.2 sec CD after the charge. This gives you a much much better chance of re-charging them to re-engage and re-slow.

The improved quality of the slow is also a minor but noteworthy factor.



From there, either Q or W can be leveled.

W gives you the lifegain and you may wind up taking it over Charge or Q if you needed more sustain. During jungling, 1 rank of W is plenty for quite a while.
But 10% AS is pretty weaksauce and the -1 CD is mostly irrelevant since you will likely only use it once per engagement even on a re-charge.
10% AS at .672 base speed is 0.0672, or about 1 extra attack every 15 seconds of continuous attacking. Meh.

Maxing Q is a bit deceptive because its cooldown DOES NOT START until all 3 hits have happened!!! That means you Charge, autoattack,Ult maybe, Q...Q....Qknockup. NOW the Q CD starts...
2 sec later you re-charge the bad guy but even a maxed Q still has another 3 sec CD.

I max Q, as it is your main damage. Then E and W

Top Lane should max Q for the reduced cooldown and bonus damage.
Jungle should max E for the slow.

Top lane: Q > W > E.
Jungle: E at level 4 but max it first.

Wow, these scrubs don't even bother to read or try to make intelligent arguments.

Charge = 40 magical damage, always works instantly.
Q = 15 damage PER HIT and even if you can get all 3 hits in (unlikely), its only 45 vs 40 dmg per rank.
Most of the time Charge will do more damage per rank than ranking Q will.

Lessened cooldown on Q doesn't matter AT ALL during laning.. you will never ever ever get in two sets of Qs until your Charge is maxed since the CD doesnt even START until the knockup.