I think it's because back in the times when mummy was top ban there were 2 things that combined made him awesome:
- AOE ults raped, which allowed him to chain them with others, not to mention his W and E are both AOE so they synergise with other AOE CC,
- tank metagame, his W ate tanks alive (over time, but fights back then were veeery long

). Also because everyone was doing damage so slowly and often autoattacking his E was off way more often in teamfight. Amumu likes to be hit often with little damage

TheYango

United States47024 Posts

January 23 2011 19:39 GMT

#142

IMO Amumu is overvalued at lower Elos because from my experience, no one counterjungles properly--he's probably one of the easiest junglers to disrupt early/midgame, and if he loses a blue buff, it just really hurts his jungling speed.

On January 24 2011 03:31 BajaBlood wrote:
I maintain that Amumu was quite underplayed before the monster MR change. After that change.... well... He now needs a lot of help at blue to be able to run through the jungle. If he doesn't get help, you can recall after wolves, then wraiths/red/golems/gank. Either way though, it's hard to justify this liability when there are other junglers who can do it np and are also strong in teamfights.

From the time when Mumu was a top ban, they nerfed the duration on his ult by 0.5s (it also deals less damage but is frontloaded) while buffing bandage toss's cd. How this translated into a shift from top ban to garbage pick is beyond me - his ult is still ridiculous, he has comparable damage output to other tanks w/o any itemization for damage, and cry is nearly as good as ww+br against baron and dragon. Before the three big jungle changes (lvl up health, dragon buff, and MR), while he jungled at low health, he did jungle quickly and was able to do/assist with dragon early on.

If you're playing against a team that wants to kite you, just initiate on a couple of them and have your team roll in. If your team doesn't need your ult to initiate, just run around waiting for the right time to ult. Given that hitting 4-5 people with your ult is basically a guaranteed ace, the other team has to fight while keeping spread out, which often results in people getting picked off or being out of position.

Well in that time, Eve and Shaco started getting picked more too. When you have such strong counterjunglers as regular picks, an unsafe jungler like Amumu becomes a lot less attractive.

On January 24 2011 03:46 Tooplark wrote:
My friend plays a lot of jungle mumu (at not particularly high ELO, mind you) and he says he can still comfortably solo blue at level 1.

That depends on your definition of comfortably. Can he survive? Probably. Can he do anything meaningful if he gets disrupted? Not really. It seems like he finishes so low that if someone so much as pokes their head in, you have to back off--and for the same reason, you have to back to fountain to get full health again before you can try again. You can't even just go to wolves/wraiths instead because Despair is terrible for the wolf/wraith camps.

Even if he doesn't die, you can just put him really behind for minimal risk/effort.

ZERG_RUSSIAN

10417 Posts

January 23 2011 21:49 GMT

#143

The reason Amumu was a top ban back then was because EVERYONE was stuck at the same Elo and it was so easy to abuse scrubs with him. Now that the scrubs are all stuck super low he's kinda just shitty.

rredtooth

5464 Posts

January 23 2011 21:52 GMT

#144

On January 24 2011 06:49 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote:
The reason Amumu was a top ban back then was because EVERYONE was stuck at the same Elo and it was so easy to abuse scrubs with him. Now that the scrubs are all stuck super low he's kinda just shitty.

... no...

Navi

5286 Posts

January 23 2011 21:59 GMT

#145

so because you were at low ELO, everyone was? XD

they have done several nerfs to amumu since and the latest MR buff was a giant ass nail in the coffin, i don't think its all attributable to... scrubs and ELO and whatnot lol

ZERG_RUSSIAN

10417 Posts

January 23 2011 23:44 GMT

#146

Do you remember early season when the highest rank was 1400?

Yeah when everyone is within 200 Elo points of each other it's fair to say.

Also I stand by my analysis of Amumu, he was what got me to 1500 the first time because of how shitty everyone else was.

NeoIllusions

United States37500 Posts

January 23 2011 23:48 GMT

#147

You're overexaggerating. Hyperbole is no thanks.

ZERG_RUSSIAN

10417 Posts

January 24 2011 00:25 GMT

#148

I'm not, though, because the first time I realized "hey maybe Amumu's not as good as I think he is" was when I played against Phreak on Ezzy and I couldn't hit an ult on him to save my life. Like, seriously, he was good but he was only broken because people would get caught in his ults, didn't counterjungle and gave free dragons at level 4.

The first couple of months of ranked hardly anyone had any REAL idea what they were doing.

Navi

5286 Posts

January 24 2011 01:30 GMT

#149

amumu wasn't just a top ban for the first month or two of ranked, he was still frequently banned up until a couple months ago (he was still frequently banned with galio?)

NeoIllusions

United States37500 Posts

January 24 2011 01:37 GMT

#150

Galio got nerfed hard on his AP ratios, specifically his E. He's still a good farm bot but a lot less bursty in team fights.

Amumu on the other hand, besides the last patch change on jungle monster MR, he was completely untouched. He was less picked because he fell out of flavor. Nothing more.

Trying to cite Amumu's inability to root a champion that has a freaking blink skill is rather nonsensical. Amumu puts his team in a great position to force team fights in the jungle. So you can't root Ez, but I'm sure you can get those squishy casters that don't have Flash up.

Dgiese

United States2687 Posts

January 24 2011 02:35 GMT

#151

Ok, so bringing this back round to advanced jungling...

What would you guys say are the best options for counterjungling an amumu (assuming you're not Shaco / Eve).
I.e. Lvl1 teamfight at blue
Gank at blue
Wraithjack
etcetc

Hell even just in general if I've got WW against (Amumu / Fiddle / insert disruptable jungler here) what exactly should I be aiming to do to shit on his face the most. With Fiddle I'm under the impression that stealing his camps is a better idea than ganking him.

Oh and what are some of the other champions that have vulnerabilities early on in the jungle: Does Udyr still get low on blue (did he ever?) etc.

Thanks

gtrsrs

United States9109 Posts

January 24 2011 02:41 GMT

#152

against amumu take his wraiths and golems then back and do your own jungle, you've already won. he has to start blue->wraiths so he won't be on that side of the jungle at all. amumu so hard to jungle without every camp available. steal his wraiths whenever you're on that side and they're up and he'll just have fits.

rammus will either (a) back before he does red -> gank, or (b) be pretty low by the time he finishes red. if it's the second you can catch him at red for an easy kill.

when i'm jungling shen against warwick i always wraithjack and then try to catch him on his second wraiths. usually we're both pretty high HP but my burst is higher so i can scare him off them and hopefully jack one/force him to use a pot/back.

TheYango

United States47024 Posts

January 24 2011 03:06 GMT

#153

Did some brief testing with Amumu to answer your question:

Runes: Mpen reds, Armor yellows, Mp5pl glyphs, HP quints
Masteries: 1/14/15, SoS, not dodge
Items: Cloth + 5pot

Starting at blue, Amumu finishes around 260-ish HP. He himself hasn't been directly buffed/nerfed, so a level 1 fight at blue is no better or worse than it was pre-patch. On the other hand, the fact that he finishes so low means that you could probably just force him off while he's doing it and then back off--you probably don't even need to commit to killing him to set him really far behind (since he won't have enough HP to come back to finish golem, and Despair is bad for doing Wraiths/Wolves). First blood/buff steal if you can, but you probably don't even need to get that much done to screw him up.

Wraith jack--going blue->wolves->minigolems is fine for Amumu, but leaves him with 1-2 pots and low-middling mana. He can risk red or b from minigolems. If he risks red, he'll be VERY gankable.

Navi

5286 Posts

January 24 2011 03:10 GMT

#154

i agree that attacking amumu himself while he's attempting the blue is probably the most practical and damaging thing you can do to him, as soon as the blue starts to heal he's screwed.

Dgiese

United States2687 Posts

January 24 2011 03:18 GMT

#155

Ok cool, thanks for the advice.

ZERG_RUSSIAN

10417 Posts

January 25 2011 02:35 GMT

#156

Don't start at blue with Amumu, go small golems -> wraiths -> wolves -> bluepill -> blue

Navi

5286 Posts

January 25 2011 02:57 GMT

#157

for safety from counterjungling, or is it a faster route?

TheYango

United States47024 Posts

January 25 2011 03:01 GMT

#158

On January 25 2011 11:35 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote:
Don't start at blue with Amumu, go small golems -> wraiths -> wolves -> bluepill -> blue

Thats what I would do an Amumu if I were bothering to play him, but I rarely ever see other Amumu's use that route, so I'm not sure it's the best standpoint to look at counterjungling him from.

BajaBlood

United States205 Posts

January 25 2011 03:56 GMT

#159

I don't think you can risk your blue having been taken by getting there so late, though it's probably a better idea than doing blue first without any support. Either way, though, you're taking a big efficiency hit with the first route and the risk of starting way behind if you get chased from blue. I wouldn't ever pick Mumu over other junglers if those were the only two choices.

The answer, imo, is to have a team prepared to defend the jungle at level 1 even if they miss a creep or two in lane. Have you and three others camp blue with the last trying to discourage a wraith jack (but still close enough to get to a lvl1 fight if it goes down). At 1:55 have the other three help you take blue with minimal damage, then run to top/mid and tp to bot. If he can kill blue at high life, Mumu can clear the jungle and be ready with a pretty decent gank at lvl 4.

ZERG_RUSSIAN

10417 Posts

January 25 2011 05:02 GMT

#160

You want one person at each of these spots early game if you're not Shaco:
3-way grass
Wraith opening
River grass nearest mid lane
Blue entrance

and you wherever you're starting

This is the safest way to open a game if they don't have a blitzcrank.