DISCLAIMER:This is a work in progress and I need your help .
Jungling Basics As a nearly essential part of every strong team, a jungler provides a second solo lane, mobility in the form of coverage and ganks, and dragon/buff/map control. Most champions are capable of jungling with smite. Although almost every champion can jungle, there are a few standout junglers which I consider to be superior to the rest for ease of use and general power levels. If you are new to jungling, your first champion is Warwick. If you have a basic grasp of creep spawn timing and mechanics, move up to a harder champion like Rammus/Amumu/Fiddle/Udyr. Once you get them down, move on to more risky junglers like Olaf, Evelyn, Master Yi or even someone as crazy as Morgana/Twitch/Trist.
Whatever you do, *TAKE SMITE*.
In general, there are two types of junglers: Tank junglers and Gank junglers. Tank junglers build essentially pure tank items and rely on their skills to support, get kills and/or set kills up for their team. Examples of this are Amumu, Rammus, Malphite, Udyr, Nunu, Shen, Gragas, Cho and Mundo. Gank junglers rely heavily on items to help them jungle, primarily Madred's Razors and the two items that build from it, Madred's Bloodrazors and Wriggle's Lantern. Warwick, Yi, Evelyn, Pantheon, Akali, Olaf, Shaco, Tryndamere, and others fall under this category. Some champs, like Warwick, are great at doing both at the same time.
Getting Started Runes/Masteries/Summoner Spells/Builds There are a couple of ways to jungle on different champions, but for my purposes, I always run 1/8/21 with max points in Improved Smite, Strength of Spirit, Good Hands, Improved Ghost, Awareness, Greed, Meditation, Utility Mastery, Quickness, Intelligence and Presence of the Master. There are many other ways to run a jungle champion's masteries, but this is my personal favorite for the improved cooldowns on summoner spells and abilities, movespeed, and enough points to max everything in the tree that you want. The other most common mastery setup for jungling is 1/14/15 for champions that really want the extra survivability.
As far as runes go, there are different pages for different champs, but the extremely useful pages generally run attackspeed. Each champion is nuanced and requires tweaking of a runepage, but as far as DPS go, you generally want attackspeed reds and quints, at the least. Other useful runes to have are movespeed quints, flat armor yellows, MR/lv yellows and blues, attackspeed yellows and blues and flat cdr blues. Examples: on Udyr, I run MS Quints, aspd reds/blues and flat armor or MR/lv yellows. On Yi, I run full attackspeed.
Your summoner spells are basically non-negotiable. Take ghost and take smite.
In general, on tanks you want to open either HoG or Sunfire with merc treads and on auto-attackers you want to build razors into lantern or bloodrazors. Each champ's specific build is different, but for tanks if they have a lot of physical get HoG->Sunfire->Omen and diverge while against magic-heavy comps you want to go HoG into double Negatron. Make those into Veils/FoNs/QSSs later.
I pretty much always try to open with cloth armor and the least amount of potions I need to finish my first run. On some champs, that means I can start with a ward, but if I'm confident about my map awareness and good at counting creeps, I can skip this and get a faster HoG/longsword depending on the champ I play. Opening Cloth + 5 pots on champions like Yi will force you to spend for boots instead of a longsword on your first buy unless you sell a potion. If you were just going to sell it, why'd you even buy it?
Paths There are tons of ways to jungle, but most champions do one of 3 things: start at blue, start at stone golems, or start at wraiths. Know your matchup and where their optimal starting point is, and count their creeps to assure yourself of where they are. If they get 2 creep kills off the bat, they started at stone golems. If they don't get one for quite a while then suddenly get 3 then 6, they started at Blue buff. If they begin with 4 off the bat, they were at wraiths, and you can judge which way they went from there.
The two most effective base paths are starting at stone golems or starting at blue buff.
More on this later...
Wards For the first 15-20 minutes, it is the jungler's job to keep the dragon warded. I like to say it's the jungler's job to keep everything warded, but it's nice to have some ward support from your team. Placed in the right spots, they will allow you vision of incoming ganks, potential buff jack opportunities, potential gank opportunities, dragon and jungle raid opportunities, champion position and allow you to safely push towers.
Wards are super important, so don't neglect them, even if you have a lantern.
The Gank The Jungle Gank is an essential part of any successful jungler's playbook. You should know exactly when you can gank, how strong your gank is, how dangerous your gank is, how deep you can dive, what weaknesses your gank has, where the other team has warded, what summoner spells they have, what happens after you gank, and when the situation is right, you gank.
If your gank is successful, farm and push the lane super hard. Level off of the creep experience and try to take down the tower. If it was unsuccessful, push the wave so it can't be counterpushed too fast and retreat. I usually know just by looking whether or not my gank will result in a kill. If I'm unsure, sometimes I try anyway. If I know it won't work, I cover the lane instead.
Covering Lanes Another important part of a jungler's job is covering lanes. Usually you're nowhere near the place that needs to be covered, so try to anticipate it when you're nearby and tell them, hey, want me to cover while you heal? If you get into the habit of helping your teammates before they're within dive range it will greatly decrease the number of stupid deaths your team has overall.
When you're covering a lane, try not to push too hard unless there are no champions to gain exp from it. You want to zone your opponent, and you want to save the experience for your lane champ, but you also want to let nothing go to waste, so last hit the shit out of those creeps. Play it as if you were in the lane, and leave when your champ comes back unless he's going for a gank. If you're good with your lane control you can hold a lane and jungle at the same time, especially in mid and near stone golems.
(Here ends the basics.) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Advanced Strategy One day, you will be jungling with a champion, starting at blue, finishing it and making your way to your stone golems when you come across a chilling realization: your wraiths are missing. You continue on to stone golems, and you don't hit 4 off of them. What do you do? You panic, not wanting to waste time, and decide to attempt red at level 3. You end up feeding to the lizard and losing your blue buff. Upon checking the champion scoreboard, you notice while you have 8 creeps, the enemy jungler has... 24.
What the hell.
The Wraith Jack My name is 5HITCOMBO, and I am the king of all wraith jacks. This is the first of many things that will set you apart from every other jungler. Your team comes to blue to defend you, and you're sitting in the grass together, waiting for something to come. Minions spawn, but instead of waiting the extra 25 seconds for your blue buff, you go straight to their wraiths, smite the big one and kill the small ones. Depending on who you are, you will have different paths. Here's my two favorites that work with basically any standard jungling champ: Their wraiths -> your wolves -> your wraiths (smite should be off cd as soon as you get there--use it here or save it for...) -> stone golems -> bluepill -> blue buff -> wolves -> wraiths -> stone golems -> bluepill -> red buff -> gank
Alternatively, you can try to really deny them: Their wraiths-> your wolves -> your wraiths -> their wraiths -> bluepill -> their wraiths -> blue buff -> wolves -> wraiths -> stone golems -> bluepill -> red buff -> gank
The beauty about wraith jack is that it forces them into the position where they can commit horrendous mistakes while increasing your creep score. Blue buff is worth more in terms of experience and utility but with the wraith jack, you deny your opponent part of his farm and experience while taking it for yourself. I've had many Amumu players suicide themselves to lizard because they don't know what to do without the wraiths there. Other players will bluepill, find that they don't have enough for razors, buy boots, run back out and be way behind on farm, as I'm still jungling at full speed while they have delayed their razor for minutes.
The wraith jack is such an amazingly effective tool for disrupting an opponent's jungling. There have been games where I have had 48 creep kills when my opponent had 12 because when I went for the second jack I found him there and killed him and just snowballed out of control from it.
Obviously, do not attempt this if the enemy team comes to gank you. Do not feel the need to kill all of the wraiths if an enemy shows up. Smite the big one and gtfo. Head over to those wolves and work your way down to stone golems.
This is a dangerous game, but in higher skilled games you want to exploit every little edge that you can.
Topics I still want to cover Subterfuge Buff Steals Counterwarding Tracking General Tips ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Got some nice jungle tutorials, thanks to Brambled for the links: Eve -
Xin - ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Please discuss any criticism or comments in a civil manner .
List of junglers separated into efficient junglers and viable. How to ward enemy jungle When to use vision wards instead of sight Who and when to give up Lizard/Golem to Paths to gank (with pictures, e.g. screenshots + directional arrows)
Help me out on this if you want to guys, get your best jungler and post some screenshots. Also, does f12 still work in game? I can never seem to find any of the pictures I take.
On November 05 2010 22:30 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote: Help me out on this if you want to guys, get your best jungler and post some screenshots. Also, does f12 still work in game? I can never seem to find any of the pictures I take.
When to dragon? Handling a dragon fight Coordinating ganks with those in lane Jungling from behind (i.e. how do you recover from a mistake / gank / buff steal) Capitalizing on an advantage in the Jungle
On November 05 2010 22:57 byFd wrote: Wraith Jack seems nice, i think you should mention what to do if u get Wraith jacked yourself
Ah yes, good point--if you're wraith jacked, go to golems, use that potion, then hightail it back to wraiths to take them before they get jacked again. Act as if your route was wraiths -> wolves -> stone golems (then probably bluepill and go blue buff wolves wraiths stone golems).
On November 05 2010 22:57 byFd wrote: Wraith Jack seems nice, i think you should mention what to do if u get Wraith jacked yourself
This.
First game as jungle Rammus, other team jacks Wraiths and Red, and I'm sort of high-and-dry with regard to what to do, and end up falling really behind and feeding the whole game.
I'd like to see a section on which junglers are effective at ganking and which should just concentrate on farming. For example, I've seen people say that WW can't really gank well until 6 (unless he ganks a lane with a stun).
The heck, WW has a nasty level 2/3 gank, especially to mix it up because most people don't expect it, becaaaaaaaause most people gank at 4 ('tis when you get Liz).
On November 06 2010 00:45 Southlight wrote: The heck, WW has a nasty level 2/3 gank, especially to mix it up because most people don't expect it, becaaaaaaaause most people gank at 4 ('tis when you get Liz).
I don't have enough WW experience to know anything, I've just seen it said, but I don't remember where. If it's stupid, it was probably on the official forums.
you should mention that there are exceptions to the ghost/smite rule, like rammus who's ganking ability benefits from flash SOOOOOO much more than it does from ghost.
also, I think this is a pretty good list of champions who are viable at the higher levels, though I'm sure I'm missing some:
Dedicated Junglers Warwick Udyr Olaf Amumu Shaco
*Champions you should literally never lane with. They're much better in jungle than in lane and tend to be fast junglers.*
Good Junglers Rammus Malphite Master Yi NuNu
*Champions who are probably better off in the jungle than in lane, but can get by in either situation. They tend to be really fast junglers with average lane presence.*
Viable Junglers Akali Pantheon Gragas Shen Mundo Xin Zhao Tryndamere? (bad laner, bad jungler, lol) Cho Gath? (good laner, good jungler, lol)
*Characters who are better off in lane, but are viable jungle picks in high level games. These champs typically need to abuse strong ganks and/or map control for jungling to pay off.*
On November 06 2010 00:45 Southlight wrote: The heck, WW has a nasty level 2/3 gank, especially to mix it up because most people don't expect it, becaaaaaaaause most people gank at 4 ('tis when you get Liz).
I've been mixing up the level 3 gank a lot recently. it's really savage if their mid blew their flash in a level 1 fight to protect golem or soemthing.
I mean, it's weaker than other champs level 3 ganks, but if they overextend because they think they're safe, a ghosted, bloodscented, double buffed WW will kill someone with flash down.
I'd honestly consider Malphite a "should not lane" as well as Rammus, but maybe it's just me. For instance, a very good Rammus is 100 times scarier and more likely to dominate from jungle than stowed away in a crappy lane.
Thanks for the guide. I consider myself an ok jungle amumu and hopefully I can get better now.
I've started tracking enemy junglers by keeping track of CS on the scoresheet and it works wonderfully, I can predict where they will be without wards/clairvoyance and set up a gank.
Successfully wraithjacked with olaf vs. Udyr yesterday.
Udyr is such a perfect champion to do this with. He NEEDS wraiths, but has a hard time starting there. When my wraiths spawned for the second time after my 2nd wraithjack I found udyr there with low health and underleveled ready to die to me plus my mid lane.
He could never get dragon and never attempted a gank. Too underleveled and bad buff timings for both.
I find that you're fine running wraith wolf wraith SG b blue wraith wolf sg red with him, RWRE and usually I hold off on the gank unless it's absolutely necessary.
About tank junglers: I feel like I never have any HP on Rammus/Amumu, especially when an opportunity for a gank opens up and I'm midway through my second tour of the non-buff creeps with double buff at around lv4 or 5. This problem persists through midgame and gets better at around lv 14 or 15 when I start to have significantly more armor and a sunfire. Though around lv10 to 15 Rammus' jungling speed goes way down unless I've bought a wriggles. Amumu is just fine as long as I have blue, but he hemorrhages HP and you have to B before any sort of gank.
The brunt of my question is I feel like I can't jungle fast enough or effectively enough on Rammus without a wriggles, and though Amumu's jungling speed is fine with blue he's always missing a lot of health. Is it completely wrong to depend on wriggles for jungling or do I need to buy more health pots or finish off my less-than-perfect tank jungling runepage which has some t2 runes and no 3rd hp quint in it.
On November 06 2010 11:49 Dezzimal wrote: About tank junglers: I feel like I never have any HP on Rammus/Amumu, especially when an opportunity for a gank opens up and I'm midway through my second tour of the non-buff creeps with double buff at around lv4 or 5. This problem persists through midgame and gets better at around lv 14 or 15 when I start to have significantly more armor and a sunfire. Though around lv10 to 15 Rammus' jungling speed goes way down unless I've bought a wriggles. Amumu is just fine as long as I have blue, but he hemorrhages HP and you have to B before any sort of gank.
The brunt of my question is I feel like I can't jungle fast enough or effectively enough on Rammus without a wriggles, and though Amumu's jungling speed is fine with blue he's always missing a lot of health. Is it completely wrong to depend on wriggles for jungling or do I need to buy more health pots or finish off my less-than-perfect tank jungling runepage which has some t2 runes and no 3rd hp quint in it.
After about 15 minutes, your opportunities to really farm up start to get less and less, since you have to be at at team-fights to initiate. Before then, you really want to be getting Hearts of Gold because they help to supplement your income for a long time, and become cost-effective for the HP/armor within a minute of buying them. They don't cover you for magic damage, but picking up a negatron can hold over your early needs.
A lot of times I end up getting sunfire really late or not at all on Amumu. Randuin and GA are way more cost-effective for similar stats, and lots of times the enemy's damage isn't so physical-slanted to warrant 3+ armor items.
EDIT: OK I sort of went on a tangent that really didn't answer your question. On top of which I'm not sure my advice is that correct, or helpful. >.>
On November 06 2010 17:13 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote: Okay, so I just got FRAPS and I think I'm going to start frapsing my games to commentate on. Hopefully we can get some good jungle games in .
I'd like to note that the last time I jungled, blue spawned at 1:45 instead of 1:55, and stone golems spawned at (I think) 1:37 instead of 1:40. I'm going to go clarify this, hopefully practice games don't take 2 people.
edit: 1:38 for double golems, 1:53 for blue, but I swear it's spawned earlier for me than that.
On November 07 2010 11:58 SnK-Arcbound wrote: I'd like to note that the last time I jungled, blue spawned at 1:45 instead of 1:55, and stone golems spawned at (I think) 1:37 instead of 1:40. I'm going to go clarify this, hopefully practice games don't take 2 people.
edit: 1:38 for double golems, 1:53 for blue, but I swear it's spawned earlier for me than that.
The clock often bugs when someone has issues connecting, like when someone drops while loading or sits at 999 ping but instantly loads or just takes years for everyone to join the game. It might just be that.
What do you guys think of Armor quints over HP quints on junglers with positive armor scaling? I just bought rammus and played a few games with him featuring AD luxes and Malady Sivirs, and Armor feels like it's more natural to him, but his earlygame HP is so low.
For what it's worth, I feel like Flat HP quints lose value steadily as the game goes on. You should be pushing small edges you have as the levels go up and flat HP quints only allow you to do this for the first 1-6 levels.
As a jungler, if you don't absolutely need the hp to make a safe jungle run, I'd opt for Movespeed quints if possible. Especially on junglers like Udyr who also serve as great chasers.
HP is nice but after level 5 you never loose or win a fight based on 100 HP - think about it, at that level 100 HP is already in the reach of a single lucky carry crit.
Junglers especially perform mostly regardless of HP. If the enemy manages to suprise you alone in the jungle they aren´t looking for a fair fight. If they don´t have some kind of advantage that is worth more than 100 HP they wouldn´t have gone after you anyway.
on a seperate note, what do you do when the yi you're jungling against procs Madreds' 5x in a row + double and kills dragon in the time it takes from you to get there from wolves?
On November 07 2010 23:51 ShoreT wrote: As a jungler, if you don't absolutely need the hp to make a safe jungle run, I'd opt for Movespeed quints if possible. Especially on junglers like Udyr who also serve as great chasers.
Attack speed quints on Udyr for Phoenix DPS and Turtle leech~
On November 08 2010 09:20 UniversalSnip wrote: When I jungle amumu I always end up underleveled compared to the rest of the team. Is this normal?
This is the problem with "viable" junglers. They can jungle but they do it much slower than say a WW or Udyr. So yes, they end up a little underleveled. It's up to you to find open lanes (let's say after outer towers have fallen, yours or theirs) and farm a couple waves of creep.
Olaf and WW are both very similar champions: amazing junglers, tanky dpsers, have a nuke with WW's Q and Olaf's E, their ulti helps them get to the squishies fast (Olaf's is safer though). Olaf can use his Q to slow oponents and WW's E helps him catch up to hurt enemies, and both have aspeed and lifesteal.
Who is better overall? Right now I think Olaf is better overall, plus he doesn't have to build Bloodrazors to have a high damage output, so he can go straight for a tank build.
On November 08 2010 09:20 UniversalSnip wrote: When I jungle amumu I always end up underleveled compared to the rest of the team. Is this normal?
no its not normal, you might be wasting too much time looking for ganks. just keep clearing the jungle unless you are 100% sure you can get a kill
Yeah, I have this problem a lot because I waste too much time roaming instead of just making sure I'm keeping up in levels. It's hard to shake the habit because so many people on your team will make comments like "wtf where is gank" even if there's no good opportunity.
On November 08 2010 09:20 UniversalSnip wrote: When I jungle amumu I always end up underleveled compared to the rest of the team. Is this normal?
This is the problem with "viable" junglers. They can jungle but they do it much slower than say a WW or Udyr. So yes, they end up a little underleveled. It's up to you to find open lanes (let's say after outer towers have fallen, yours or theirs) and farm a couple waves of creep.
Amumu is a significantly faster jungler than WW. Tantrum + Despair >> Hunters Call + Hungering Strike in terms of jungling speed- what WW has in his favor is that he spends a lot less gold on pots.
I've never been much for jungling, as I've always preferred to be in a lane. But after I read this, I took what I learned and actually developed a way to Jungle KogMaw. I keep up in levels with the side lane, and red buff gank comes right before the lanes hit 6. Obviously, Kog lands in the "viable" category for junglers, simply because of the low hp moments between lvl 2 and 3. But after that, things get ultra smooth.
lol, Kog isn't "viable" jungle. He's "troll" jungle status. He's a DPS and a carry, so ideally put him in a solo lane.
And before someone jumps on me and says "What about Yi?!". Yes, Yi is also DPS but Alpha Strike has a mini Madred's proc so Yi breeze through the jungle. Kog doesn't have anything of the sort.
Yi can also Highlander out of most Jungle ganks. Kog is a sitting duck.
On November 08 2010 09:20 UniversalSnip wrote: When I jungle amumu I always end up underleveled compared to the rest of the team. Is this normal?
no its not normal, you might be wasting too much time looking for ganks. just keep clearing the jungle unless you are 100% sure you can get a kill
Might not exactly be true. Unlike laneminions the junglecreeps don´t grant more XP over time and the "big" ones have prohibitive respawn times. You WILL fall behind eventually if you keep jungling. Ganking is important, so is covering a lane when someone is pushed/shopping. Not only for overal Towerhealth but also your XP-gain. My suggestion is to try and spend the least amount of time possible in the jungle. When that enemy Mordekaiser is hopelessly overextended the Wolves can wait.
You can continue to jungle till around 8-10 but its recommended that you gank inbetween. After your jungle time make sure you get your buffs, focus on dragon, and ROAM
On November 09 2010 01:39 NeoIllusions wrote: lol, Kog isn't "viable" jungle. He's "troll" jungle status. He's a DPS and a carry, so ideally put him in a solo lane.
And before someone jumps on me and says "What about Yi?!". Yes, Yi is also DPS but Alpha Strike has a mini Madred's proc so Yi breeze through the jungle. Kog doesn't have anything of the sort.
Yi can also Highlander out of most Jungle ganks. Kog is a sitting duck.
:/
Works for me. Kog has an AoE that helps him breeze through the jungle, on top of ridiculous early game attack speed from his Q. Ghost doesn't leave me a sitting duck. I'll stick with making unconventional jungles work. It throws people off.
On November 09 2010 01:39 NeoIllusions wrote: lol, Kog isn't "viable" jungle. He's "troll" jungle status. He's a DPS and a carry, so ideally put him in a solo lane.
And before someone jumps on me and says "What about Yi?!". Yes, Yi is also DPS but Alpha Strike has a mini Madred's proc so Yi breeze through the jungle. Kog doesn't have anything of the sort.
Yi can also Highlander out of most Jungle ganks. Kog is a sitting duck.
:/
Works for me. Kog has an AoE that helps him breeze through the jungle, on top of ridiculous early game attack speed from his Q. Ghost doesn't leave me a sitting duck. I'll stick with making unconventional jungles work. It throws people off.
To be honest, I wouldn't discount it until I tried it, I know that jungle tristana isn't absolutely terrible because she speeds up really fast midgame and ranged red buff ganks with aoe slows aren't anything to sneeze at.
[edit] Also Kog actually has a bloodrazor proc doesn't he? [/edit]
On November 09 2010 01:39 NeoIllusions wrote: lol, Kog isn't "viable" jungle. He's "troll" jungle status. He's a DPS and a carry, so ideally put him in a solo lane.
And before someone jumps on me and says "What about Yi?!". Yes, Yi is also DPS but Alpha Strike has a mini Madred's proc so Yi breeze through the jungle. Kog doesn't have anything of the sort.
Yi can also Highlander out of most Jungle ganks. Kog is a sitting duck.
:/
Works for me. Kog has an AoE that helps him breeze through the jungle, on top of ridiculous early game attack speed from his Q. Ghost doesn't leave me a sitting duck. I'll stick with making unconventional jungles work. It throws people off.
If you're having fun with it, go right ahead. I'm just highlighting the shortcomings of a jungling Kog. If you play ranked with it, you'll eventually reach a point where you can get harassed out of your own jungle rather easily. But if you're not playing ranked, no need to heed me.
Kog has a mini-BR sure, but on small camps that's not quite as good as a chance to do bonus flat damage. Jungling Kog is definitely troll status, just look at how much less farm you'd get compared to soloing.
On November 09 2010 12:16 DiracMonopole wrote: Yeah, I dont think Kog makes a good jungler. He makes a great buff-stealer though, particularly once he gets his ult.
Only true in low-level games where people either don't take smite or don't last hit with it.
What do you think about wraith jacking but leaving a small wraith on? I still don't have proper timing/path for most champs but my experience as Jungling Yi going jack-wolves-my wraiths-stone golems-bp leaves me not enough time to jack their wraiths a second time (onces I caught an olaf and got fb though, but against mummy I was late).
But then, I'm running flat HP quints without whatever masteries that give you ms. Perhaps those can make it in time? But would it be worth it to leave 1 small wraith?
Honestly, wraith jack seems optimal just to steal xp and throw off unexperienced junglers. Their wraith is too close to their mid carry / towers for you to do anything gank worthy. So you clearing the camp and keeping the timer is better imo.
With Irelia's champion spotlight, Phreak mentions a new route that was also seen with Kobe24 in CLG vs HMUF Game 1. Smite big wolf camp, take blue, and steal their red and gank. Thoughts and input?
I've been jacking enemy twingols lately to great success. Actually I've just been a general dick - Yi sees me coming to his wraiths? Start at his golem. Teammates see Shaco mucking around my golem? Start their twingols. (twingols only if you know where the enemy jungler is - no one ever (yet) thinks "dang I bet olaf's at OUR twingols imma go check.)
Does somebody have/know of a decent jungle Udyr video? I feel like I'm doing something wrong with my ability usage because I can't come anywhere close to the mid 3 min clear times people say I should be hitting.
if u jungle like this with twitch (liz and red pot) you might as well just have 2 junglers, while you roam around with lizard. probably get the other jungler to ward enemy blue (taking the long path) while u ward enemy red or something
On November 05 2010 22:43 nyxnyxnyx wrote: Who can solo dragon, and at what level / at what cost to HP?
In other words, who's best/fastest at doing Dragon?
While you're at it, do Baron too.
Fiddlesticks, who I was apalled to see didn't make some of the earlier jungler lists... I played a game with him yesterday with a level 2 dragon kill using a blue elixir and a level 12 baron kill using mpen boots, blue elixir, and a tear. He's extremely fast in the jungle and has reasonable ganking, and he's extremely difficult to invade/gank because he's always at full health and has a spammable cc.
EDIT: Oh, I forgot... Reason #1 why all junglers should always take smite.
The ending they're talking about was me, as a fed jungle Rammus, strolling down to re-ward Baron, finding them doing it, smite-stealing it, then scoring a quadra kill when they tried to kill me. Would have been a penta except Ashe threw a volley in and finished one of 'em.
Fiddlesticks doesn't have good anti-invasion CC until level 4 unless he wants to ruin his jungle speed. And opening elixirs in the jungle is really cheesy, you can't count on it as a reliable start because in cases like the one you said (blue to take early dragon), if the opposing team counts you CS and figures it out and stops you, you're way behind. Fiddle lacks the flexibility to be a really good jungler IMO.
Fiddle is an amazing jungler at low ELO, though. You can start wherever, though you have to be careful if it isn't blue, and you just freefarm jungle until 6 and gank everything.
He's not my favorite - that award goes to Rammus - but he is capable... better in jungle than in lane, really. *he's fast *he's an early dragon or gank threat (because he can take his fear and red buff early if a gank is necessary) *he can pass off red to mid for early lane advantage *he doesn't spend money on pots, so he can easily get early wards or go straight to better gear *he's difficult to invade successfully because he can take early wards and is always at full health *he can gank fairly well My only major complaint is that his lategame is underwhelming.
Open elixirs is a dead giveaway if they have a Cv to see it, but this game for some reason they didn't, and they couldn't tell what was happening from my CS because we played aggressively and opened with a team ancient golem steal, from which I routed their wolves>our wraiths>dragon. It's not something I would usually do, but the combination of no opposing Cv, our massive lvl 1 strength meaning we could play aggressively, and our Cv showing no early wards was too tasty to pass up. Worked out really well, since our top and mid lanes also picked up a kill when their WW attempted to counter-steal our blue, which I had warded.
Regardless, the question I was answering is who can do it fastest? And the answer is Fiddle. Shaco used to be able to do it at level 1 with massive luck, but got nerfed, so it's Fiddle, then Shaco and WW at level 3. For Baron... I know I did it with a level 12 Fiddle, and I suspect that better planning could have gotten a kill as soon as he spawned. I know Olaf can do it at level 11 with a health item and Madred's. Those are both probably 15 minute baron kills, so that's about as fast as it gets.
On November 20 2010 07:06 Iri wrote: He's not my favorite - that award goes to Rammus - but he is capable... better in jungle than in lane, really. *he's fast *he's an early dragon or gank threat (because he can take his fear and red buff early if a gank is necessary) *he can pass off red to mid for early lane advantage *he doesn't spend money on pots, so he can easily get early wards or go straight to better gear *he's difficult to invade successfully because he can take early wards and is always at full health *he can gank fairly well My only major complaint is that his lategame is underwhelming.
Regardless, the question I was answering is who can do it fastest? And the answer is Fiddle. Shaco used to be able to do it at level 1 with massive luck, but got nerfed, so it's Fiddle, then Shaco and WW at level 3. For Baron... I know I did it with a level 12 Fiddle, and I suspect that better planning could have gotten a kill as soon as he spawned. I know Olaf can do it at level 11 with a health item and Madred's. Those are both probably 15 minute baron kills, so that's about as fast as it gets.
Fiddle is actually kinda slow compared to, say, Olaf or Mundo. Without golem, he's painfully slow. If you take early fear, he's REALLY slow and even then his gank is weak. He's also quite easy to successfully invade because there's so much jungle for him to ward and it's really easy to gank him. Also his late game isn't underwhelming by any means - crowstorm has a great AP ratio and his CC stays always relevant.
What should you do when you're jungling a character who's inferior to their jungler (like Jax vs Warwick)? What's the best way to hedge yourself against getting raped in the jungle or getting your creeps/buffs jacked? Should you start with a wraith jack to throw the enemy jungler off?
Pantheon is a far inferior jungler to Warwick, but I tend to win Panth vs. WW in the jungle by being aggressive with early ganks to put the ball in WW's court to make him reestablish lane control for his teammates before he hits 6. Basically you need to just figure out something that your jungler is better at and play to that advantage. I dunno for Jax though, lol... he seems almost strictly worse than WW in jungle.
On November 23 2010 02:41 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote: Won't jax 1v1 warwick though? I swear counterstrike raped warwick. That's jax's main strength vs warwick I think.
My experience is that since WW jungles through faster, I would have the level advantage to just Q kite Jax and buy time. It makes running into Jax while counterjungling him a bit of a pain, but not really enough to hurt WW.
On November 23 2010 02:41 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote: Won't jax 1v1 warwick though? I swear counterstrike raped warwick. That's jax's main strength vs warwick I think.
Jax can't rape WW until he gets to level 6. At lower levels, especially if he's low on mana, he simply can't put out enough damage to beat WW and overcome the heal. Moreover, WW jungles faster than Jax, and should have a level (and item) advantage.
On November 23 2010 02:41 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote: Won't jax 1v1 warwick though? I swear counterstrike raped warwick. That's jax's main strength vs warwick I think.
I don't see how that would work, jax really has no damage except leap + empower combo early, and the cooldowns are quite long on that.
WHY THE HELL would you voluntarily jungle as Jax? His jungling is either very slow or requires some lucky dodges, and he's strictly better in lane than in jungle. If they have a WW and the game is even enough that counter-jungling is important, you need to be running someone who's a decent jungler... Rammus, Olaf, Shen, Shaco, Udyr, Amumu...
On November 23 2010 20:21 Iri wrote: See, here's what confuses me about this question:
WHY THE HELL would you voluntarily jungle as Jax? His jungling is either very slow or requires some lucky dodges, and he's strictly better in lane than in jungle. If they have a WW and the game is even enough that counter-jungling is important, you need to be running someone who's a decent jungler... Rammus, Olaf, Shen, Shaco, Udyr, Amumu...
I definitely prefer to lane as Jax, but there are two problems:
1) I'm level 26 and playing normal games. I don't have a dedicated jungler right now.
2) More often than not, no one picks a jungler, leaving me to do it.
Eh, I feel you. I've been getting so much practice on my jungle Rammus lately, since I've been farming IP for rune pages and nobody wants to tank or jungle... Maybe grab Yi sometime or something? There are several fairly cheap champs who can jungle much better than Jax.
Jax actually isn't terrible because he has a built in closing skill and a stun. It's pretty hard to get away from him if he lands a leapstrike/counterstrike with red buff.
When I last jungled Jax, I found him pretty solid actually. Blue buff dependent, rune and mastery dependent, but you can clear jungle by about 3:45 iirc with average counterstrike procs, get tabi -> lizard and drop a pretty powerful gank as long as you make sure there are creeps near whoever you jump on. With Tabi you're really likely to get a creep attack counter proc. Also I haven't really been impressed by lane Jax.
On November 24 2010 15:35 Tooplark wrote: When I last jungled Jax, I found him pretty solid actually. Blue buff dependent, rune and mastery dependent, but you can clear jungle by about 3:45 iirc with average counterstrike procs, get tabi -> lizard and drop a pretty powerful gank as long as you make sure there are creeps near whoever you jump on. With Tabi you're really likely to get a creep attack counter proc. Also I haven't really been impressed by lane Jax.
Yeah, this is pretty much how it goes for jungling. Get the blue buff and whore counterstrike like no tomorrow. I only sink 1 point into it, then put 2 points into empower before dedicating the rest to leapstrike for ganking. Once Jax hits level 6, jungling is easy as cake.
Lane Jax is good if you have a solid lane partner who can help keep the enemy off of you. Leapstrike/empower + CS is powerful on paper, but it's very mana intensive in the early game. You can really only do it twice before your OOM. If I have a bad lane partner, I'd rather jungle to avoid (hopefully) harassment. Jax is more about surviving his lackluster early game than anything else.
Hmm, can you cover more topics in OP? I am so bad at jungle, I know only the blue path.. and only rammus. All this adv stuff I haven't even played with cuz jungling I dunno...
I heard that in this game, people who start blue gets owned by warwick. All warwick has to do is their wraiths and red and then back out. By the time their jungler comes to wraiths it's like .......
Warwick can't finish red if he starts wolves unless he ignites the big one instead of smiting it I think.
Lately I've been seeing a lot of good teams go 5 man wraith jack 5 man red jack give to their solo mid and get to lane after. Works best with at least 1 teleport.
The Wraith Jack The beauty about wraith jack is that it forces them into the position where they can commit horrendous mistakes while increasing your creep score. with the wraith jack, you deny your opponent part of his farm and experience while taking it for yourself. I've had many Amumu players suicide themselves to lizard because they don't know what to do without the wraiths there. Other players will bluepill, find that they don't have enough for razors, buy boots, run back out and be way behind on farm, as I'm still jungling at full speed while they have delayed their razor for minutes.
The wraith jack is such an amazingly effective tool for disrupting an opponent's jungling. There have been games where I have had 48 creep kills when my opponent had 12 because when I went for the second jack I found him there and killed him and just snowballed out of control from it.
i got a question for you, as i am a new jungler. this post actually has me more scared then it helped i think lol... i have a new strat i wanna try now with Wraith Jack... but what exactly is the proper response to having your wraiths stolen if it isnt blue pilling or proceeding to red buff? how can i respond without you just gaining a complete advantage over me or, or to lessen that?
The Wraith Jack The beauty about wraith jack is that it forces them into the position where they can commit horrendous mistakes while increasing your creep score. with the wraith jack, you deny your opponent part of his farm and experience while taking it for yourself. I've had many Amumu players suicide themselves to lizard because they don't know what to do without the wraiths there. Other players will bluepill, find that they don't have enough for razors, buy boots, run back out and be way behind on farm, as I'm still jungling at full speed while they have delayed their razor for minutes.
The wraith jack is such an amazingly effective tool for disrupting an opponent's jungling. There have been games where I have had 48 creep kills when my opponent had 12 because when I went for the second jack I found him there and killed him and just snowballed out of control from it.
i got a question for you, as i am a new jungler. this post actually has me more scared then it helped i think lol... i have a new strat i wanna try now with Wraith Jack... but what exactly is the proper response to having your wraiths stolen if it isnt blue pilling or proceeding to red buff? how can i respond without you just gaining a complete advantage over me or, or to lessen that?
actually, there is a really easy way to deal with wraith jack. First off, have some1 spot the wraiths for you, preferably some1 who is in the furthest lane (i.e. if ur bottom left team, have some1 from bot lane watch, mid and top should be protecting you). Even if you dont want to teamfight lvl 1, you can just let him have the wraiths (he is backed up by his team) so go take his minigolems. you actually come out ahead, just dont get spotted by the creeps coming lol
Take your stone golems, you should still be able to do it. Jungling is all about being able to adapt. Timing and map awareness are very important too, so if he took your wraiths, count his creeps, see where he is, and figure out what he's doing.
On December 14 2010 19:29 HeavOnEarth wrote: yup its useless now
Incidentally, this also hurts the weaker junglers just as much as the healing change, because weaker junglers also tend to be more predictable. With someone with 1-2 really viable clear paths, you can track him just by memorizing the appropriate clear time, and confirming with a CV somewhere along the way. With a champ like WW that can start anywhere, go anywhere, and not give a fuck, tracking him is going to be impossible.
Would love some details on a guide. I normally just see we have no jungler and pick warwick/smite. Since I'm <level30 without runes I half-ass it and it works the majority of the time, but in games where there's an enemy jungler/counterjungler I get roughed up really badly.
so how does udyr jungle now? i tried phoenix and all you ever get is dead and oom seems like tiger/turtle the way to go? and with locket gone.. lantern?
On December 15 2010 10:42 aliasds wrote: so how does udyr jungle now? i tried phoenix and all you ever get is dead and oom seems like tiger/turtle the way to go? and with locket gone.. lantern?
1/14/15 with full aspd+68mana page, zero problems running standard phoenix builds and hog.
I was in a solo queue game today where I was jungle Udyr and the other team had Rammus jungling, Nunu with Smite, and a Shaco laning top.
Now, we got destroyed in this game, largely because bottom fed the Teemo even when Nunu would run off into our jungle and our top Anivia somehow lost to AP lane Shaco, but I'm just curious as to what people do against aggressive two jungler counter jungling. I think I definitely should have bought an oracle's much earlier which would have helped, but just looking for general advice.
Actually the hardest thing to deal with as a jungler is strong, aggressive counterjungling teams like Nunu/Shaco/Eve etc. It basically comes down to being able to soul-read them early and massive amounts of warding midgame. All of this comes with experience.
On December 29 2010 22:39 Senx wrote: What runes would you pick on jungle nunu? I currently run mpen reds hp/lvl yellows, ap quints and cdr blues ^^
I use my generic Jungler runepage, which has ASpeed reds, Armor yellows, and MR/lvl blues with the Quints varying based on how I feel (usually HP or Move Speed).
Anyone know if there is a jungle rune tier list much like the normal list @ runeterra?
I'm sitting on enough IP to buy a set of atkspeed reds and I wonder if they would be worth it overall. Also, what high priority yellow/blues should I be looking for to round out a generic jungle set?
Jungle Poppy? I quite like her in a duo lane, she synergizes well with a lot of champs (or maybe I am just too good and own lanes because of that). But still, wouldn't mind to hear about jungle Poppy.
I just tried a bit in a solo custom with jungle poppy.
The passive is really good for starting at blue. With 0 defensive runes and a basic jungling mastery you can solo golem. I'm not sure if the damage that goes OVER 10% is reduced or the whole thing is reduced, so I was poping the pot late. Q does tons of damage vs golem and lizard and you can hit W run to the creeps 14% faster and then keep your 15 AD and armour. This burns mana pretty hard so only do it with blue buff. With some extra armour I'm sure she can easily jungle. Not sure how powerful the heroic charge gank is but if you get the stun off with the terrain then its got to be good.
You probably are quite flexible with your runes because hp isn't that necessary with the passive. You probably want armour at least. Maybe go Nony's old route and go CDR blue, mpen reds and hp quint with armour seals, for a more lategame approach.
Q-->W-->Q-->E if you're going for a level 4 gank I imagine. I'm not sure if you want to get more than 1-2 levels in Q though, it depends on how worthwhile it is to get more points in Paragon of Demacia or Heroic charge. In a teamfight or a gank getting a second heroic charge could be amazing and the W probably helps more for jungling in general, but more Q is better DPS for when you W Ghost R E Q nuke someone down. I imagine R>Q>W>E is standard though.
She definitely feels strong in duo lane as well. Heroic charge is great against brush camping champs and you have decent killing and especially tower diving capabilities with Paragon of Demacia active and Diplomatic Immunity.
She's also like the only melee character who doesn't need any defense at all. With the passive, its strong against anyone trying to burst you down, and your ultimate means you can actually initiate a teamfight to some extent without having a big risk of dying. You can ulti a tank and target someone else or ulti a high dps weak char and try to make them run//burst them down while the team charges in. Seems like a really underrated char.
The feeling of satisfaction when you're more skilled than the opponent jungler is so great. For example, I was Jungle Trundle and was vs'ing a Shaco. Right off the bat, I adjusted my play and called out gank times for Shaco, telling my team to B or play careful at certain times and such. Then, when I see him fail a gank at bot, I simply walk into his jungle and steal his Wraiths and Stone Golems. Putting him quite far behind, Shaco with no gank kills, and no farm in the jungle is crippled.
I've been constantly buying at least 2-3 Wards every buy and I never really knew how much it affects the game play. It makes your team just that much stronger. This guide really helps, but most important is just practicing, and you'll start realizing all those small things that make you a stronger player.
When you are jungling, I find that armor quints > health quints. Given that you'll be drinking many health pots over the course of the game, the EHP granted from extra armor will surpass that of the extra health. In lane, health > armor though.
For reds, I often run a mix of arpen and attack speed. Wolves and the little lizards have <8 armor, so max arpen is inefficient. Up to that point, though, I find armor pen to be better for increasing your jungle speed than attack speed alone.
Blues depend on the champ, I often run mana regen/lvl or MR/lvl.
I think the reason you get health is because a lot of your items as a jungler are defensive items and they synergize better... but then again I don't run hp quints on hardly anyone.
If you consider that like 3/4 of damage in LoL is magic and you get armour from lots of jungling items anyway you might find that health is generally more versatile.
It is also better for a once off thing like trying to do blue at lvl 1 if you have a "bad" starting jungler.
Yeah, I agree that health will be more useful mid+late game (and move speed probably even more so). I'll revise my statement to this: Get armor quints if you are playing a jungler for whom: A.) The extra security is needed because he jungles quite unsafely B.) The extra bit of HP you have after clearing the jungle means you can more comfortably go for a gank w/o going back C.) Are Rammus/Malph, whose jungling speeds increase with additional armor
Given that I jungle Amumu (A)/Rammus (B+C)/Malph (C), I have armor quints on all my jungle pages, but I can see it not being optimal for other junglers.
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.
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
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.
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.
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.
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
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.
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?)
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
As you can see in the link, it's a Nunu counter jungle vid by TheOddOne (One of, if not the best jungler's in the game). It's a really useful resource for learning high level counter jungling.
Goal: steal their wraiths twice, get 735 gold for razor+pot, and lose none of your own jungle path: e-wraiths, wolves, blue, e-wraiths, wolves, wraiths, golems (optional), buy razor+pot(+ward optional), red, gank
Works with anyone that can take wraiths first (read: anyone)
If the enemy gets jealous and tries to take your wraiths you will almost always catch them in the act and they will almost always be lower hp/lvl than you. Ping for mid support and kill them. Sometimes the enemy will get jealous and try to take your wolves, This path can't really stop that but who cares its just wolves vs 2 wraith jacks. Very rarely they will try to take your red, you will almost always get there when they either just start or are about halfway through. Especially true with nunu. Kill him
Champions I use to do this route: Yi, Irelia, Warwick, Olaf. Champions I don't use due to mana constraints or faster routes overpowering the benefit of the wraith jack: Trundle, Nunu, Udyr
Warwick and Irelia are the only two enemy junglers (that I know of) that just don't care if you steal wraiths, they will still end up strong midgame.
Everyone else I haven't figured out yet, but this is extremely powerful. No one in the general community understands why it is so powerful yet, so even when they watch me do it they just think I'm being a dick. Its impossible to copy a strategy you don't understand and that's why I love it
Possible outcomes: You kill the enemy encroaching on your turf Enemy is under leveled and goes to lane for a bit Enemy dies to minions due to their path being screwed up and being 1 level lower than normal Enemy can't do dragon or gank for a while as they catch up in levels. They also won't be itemized Enemy catches you at wraiths and you have to ghost away. Ping for mid support!
How to fight against it: No one has ever done this to me outside of TL Inhouse. In that case, I just whine that they are being tryhard and buy all troll items. Alternatively, if your wraiths get stolen make sure you are back to wraiths the instant they pop up. The second round is where this route is most vulnerable with support from mid. Especially if your mid is anivia/karthus/ashe etc. with a heavy slow.
How to fight against it, assuming you know you've been wraithjacked:
Take your blue buff, then their wraiths, then their twin golems. Enjoy the fact that you get a leash at blue and they can't unless they pull someone from lane, which isn't very smart.
Well, like 5HIT said, unless they have Blitz on the other team, the hardest counter to wraithjacking is having a decent team protecting them. If they have blitz, well, try to avoid him, since he's the king of lvl1 fights. Which is something interesting - I like having junglers that start at blue with a blitz on my team, so we can try to force a lvl1 fight on their golem. Remember that having a scary lvl1 team is also a defense from being countered. Smart people don't blindly counter a team with Blitz/Sion/Taric. Also, smart CV usage goes a long way on counterjungling.
I'm fond of jacking both golems and wraiths on junglers capable of it as a way to punish smiteless junglers, blue-dependent junglers with team protection, or really weird junglers. However, the opportunities for this are rare as only a handful of junglers can pull it off without crippling themslves, CV support is critical, and you need a fair amount of certainty that no enemy champions are going to bump into you.
On March 10 2011 02:13 Juicyfruit wrote: How to fight against it, assuming you know you've been wraithjacked:
Take your blue buff, then their wraiths, then their twin golems. Enjoy the fact that you get a leash at blue and they can't unless they pull someone from lane, which isn't very smart.
This is somewhat risky, particularly against some wraith jackers like Yi who don't go to blue after their wolves and go straight to their wraiths.
Pulled off some 5HIT wraith jacking against a Rammus (King Rammus!) as Trundle. Poor little armordillo, tried to lizard and had to b, so I was around 3 levels in front of him and his ganks were so delayed, he didnt farm anything. Then we took bot tower (we were purple team) and I just invaded his jungle freely, up to a point someone in their team screamed "oh my god, stop that annoying Trundle". I felt so satisfied with that comment.
Will give that a go tonight. I usually play with my Tor guild so its fairly low elo (lower than what I'm used to) So should be overkill heh.
Btw do any of you guys know iFatality? I'm sure he's a smurf. Had a wicked strong nidalee build that focused solely on AP and killer spears. Was killing anyone around half health with it was just insane!
I used to be a double wraith Jack FANATIC it can really fuck up the enemy jungler BUT one thing to note you should not wraith Jack if your opponent is a FARMING jungler, only if they are a GANKING jungler. The purpose of wraith Jack is to fuck up their gank. It also slows yours down, so assess your lanes before you do it. Don't wraith Jack if you're a gank dependent jungler like shaco ie WJing is very strong as Warwick but extremely weak AGAINST Warwick because ww gank is awful and he'll just stay in the jungle until 6 anyways
anyway I've found there are other things you can do that are more disruptive than WJing but I don't wanna give away all my jungle secrets
You mentioned you run this on Yi... When I got for a double wraith jack it's normally E-wraiths-> wolves-> wraiths-> golems-> b-> e-wraiths. I hadn't really thought of going for blue and then straight back to E wraiths. What are the timings like with normal procs (I get to 2nd wraith spawn a moderate amount of time late with my route), and also what's your build (I do cloth +3 pot, I'd imagine you'd need 4/5 pot for this cause of blue?)
I'm not 100% sure if this belongs here, but it seems like the most appropriate thread.
About rune selection, especially for the blue slot.
I see most people here run scaling MRes, what is the reasoning behind that?
I totally get it on Nunu/Amu/Cho for example, but wouldn't Udyr / WW / Trundle benefit more from AS runes there?
(Or even maybe scaling CD runes on Amumu instead of it)
Basicly I feel like MRes runes help most between your first gank and your first negatron. During other parts of the game they are pretty useless compared to other options. Someone who has more clue about this than me shine some light on this please. =P
This is just theory, but could you steal the enemy red, leave one lizard alive, take their wraiths and leave one wraith alive, and do your standard jungling?
MRes is harder to place in a build than armor or health for many of these champs. MRes/lvl glyphs also are very efficient in terms of gold per rune. Mid/Lategame, that additional MRes has a MUCH bigger impact than 5% ASpd.
On March 17 2011 22:39 Shiragaku wrote: This is just theory, but could you steal the enemy red, leave one lizard alive, take their wraiths and leave one wraith alive, and do your standard jungling?
With your team, yes. Alone, most likely not, at least with most champs. You will need smite for both which doesnt work out. Otherwise Wraiths will take you really low if you even survive.
You run scaling MR because you don't need anything else in that slot and scaling MR is maybe the best lategame rune anyway (free null-magic mantle by endgame). More AS would certainly jungle a bit faster but at the cost of some lategame survivability.
On March 17 2011 22:44 spinesheath wrote: MRes is harder to place in a build than armor or health for many of these champs. MRes/lvl glyphs also are very efficient in terms of gold per rune. Mid/Lategame, that additional MRes has a MUCH bigger impact than 5% ASpd.
On March 17 2011 22:39 Shiragaku wrote: This is just theory, but could you steal the enemy red, leave one lizard alive, take their wraiths and leave one wraith alive, and do your standard jungling?
With your team, yes. Alone, most likely not, at least with most champs. You will need smite for both which doesnt work out.
But I was wondering if you could do it with someone like Warwick. Very fast and can escape if need be. That is assuming that the other jungler is slow such as a Shen or Turtle Udyr. Bleh...I am going to politely be called an idiot for these ideas.
Well I'm far from pro, but I *love* my scaling MR blues on most champs. I think 4/5 of my rune pages right now include a full set of MR/lvl blues. 24 Extra magic res late game is nothing to scoff at. Negate your opponent's sorc boots entirely! So, personally I swear by them.
That being said we should also hear from some of the better players.
On March 17 2011 22:44 spinesheath wrote: MRes is harder to place in a build than armor or health for many of these champs. MRes/lvl glyphs also are very efficient in terms of gold per rune. Mid/Lategame, that additional MRes has a MUCH bigger impact than 5% ASpd.
On March 17 2011 22:39 Shiragaku wrote: This is just theory, but could you steal the enemy red, leave one lizard alive, take their wraiths and leave one wraith alive, and do your standard jungling?
With your team, yes. Alone, most likely not, at least with most champs. You will need smite for both which doesnt work out.
But I was wondering if you could do it with someone like Warwick. Very fast and can escape if need be. That is assuming that the other jungler is slow such as a Shen or Turtle Udyr. Bleh...I am going to politely be called an idiot for these ideas.
You are quite right there... with your last sentence :p
Warwick is not fast. He is safe because he stays at high HP all the time and he can farm the jungle for a very long time without having to go back. That's about all he has going for himself these days. He is NOT fast. Shen is so much better in a lane, nobody really jungles him. He's even slower than WW, true. Turtle Jungle Udyr... I truly hope that this doesn't even exist. Pure nonsense. Udyr can clear the jungle quick and fairly safely with Tiger or Phoenix.
I guess WW could do Wraiths and then Red with some effort, but he'd most likely get 1 shotted if anyone notices.
You can fight a single wraith jack on some junglers by starting at your wraiths or smiting your blue wraith ->wolves -> your blue. I tried this on Nocturne (smite blue, wolves, blue buff, finish wraiths, red, golems) and it was actually just as fast of a full clear as a blue first full clear.
Probably wouldn't counter a double jack though and I tend to be low HP when I jungle noct.
Pardon me on my analysis on Warwick and I do see Turtle Udyr's and Stonewall did accept it due to being slow, but safe but I do not see a need for it assuming that you are doing a standard jungle build and you may want to hurry up if you are jacking enemy creep.
However, the real question at hand I have is if you can go into the enemy jungle and steal their red and leave a lizard alive to make the respawn time start when the enemy arrives, jack wraiths with a single wraith alive to give even less XP, and then proceed to your own wolves or blue if you can manage it.
But this is assuming the enemy starts at blue and you are going alone rather than going in with much of your team and maybe allowing mid to take the red and then you proceed with jungling.
What is this Stonewall you are talking about? O.o Though i do believe you that Turtle Udyr exists, just like AD annie. (seriously, i still don't know what you mean by Turtle Udyr, do these vamp scepter udyrs who die to mini golems start with turtle or what?)
Stonewall is some guy who posts a ton of jungling vids on youtube and people like to use the routes he has. Honestly I am not really sure why, since those vids treat jungle as if it is in a vacuum, which is anything but the case.
On March 18 2011 02:53 Shiragaku wrote: However, the real question at hand I have is if you can go into the enemy jungle and steal their red and leave a lizard alive to make the respawn time start when the enemy arrives, jack wraiths with a single wraith alive to give even less XP, and then proceed to your own wolves or blue if you can manage it.
Enemy red jack start is pretty silly IMO. The risk-reward comparison is fairly poor, as you get a lot lower and spend a lot longer time doing red when it gives you less XP than a minigol jack, and many junglers are not reliant on red at all. The chance of getting caught is really high even if you know he's starting at blue, as solo top or bot lane support will generally pass red on their way to lane after leashing blue for their jungler.
If you're going to steal the enemy red at the start, pick a team with a strong lvl 1 teamfight, and take it as a team. Starting at enemy red by yourself will fuck your timing up as well because you'll get super low from having no one there to leash it, won't hit lvl 2, and have to do wraiths/wolves with half HP at level 1 with no smite. There's basically no room for you to get caught at all.
On March 18 2011 07:12 Ecael wrote: Stonewall is some guy who posts a ton of jungling vids on youtube and people like to use the routes he has. Honestly I am not really sure why, since those vids treat jungle as if it is in a vacuum, which is anything but the case.
His routes are generally optimized almost purely around clear time which, to be fair, is probably the most relevant factor when considering weaker, off-beat junglers (i.e. characters that normally shouldn't be jungling, but who you're trying in the jungle just for fun). For most serious junglers, there are usually better routes that take into consideration other factors.
On March 18 2011 06:49 Kaniol wrote: What is this Stonewall you are talking about? O.o Though i do believe you that Turtle Udyr exists, just like AD annie. (seriously, i still don't know what you mean by Turtle Udyr, do these vamp scepter udyrs who die to mini golems start with turtle or what?)
The turtle Udyr was initially not that bad because it is deathproof by all means while in the jungle and if you get attacked, you are guaranteed to have plenty of HP to escape but later on, you may be very behind.
On March 18 2011 06:49 Kaniol wrote: What is this Stonewall you are talking about? O.o Though i do believe you that Turtle Udyr exists, just like AD annie. (seriously, i still don't know what you mean by Turtle Udyr, do these vamp scepter udyrs who die to mini golems start with turtle or what?)
The turtle Udyr was initially not that bad because it is deathproof by all means while in the jungle and if you get attacked, you are guaranteed to have plenty of HP to escape but later on, you may be very behind.
If you wanted to play like that, then you'd pick Warwick.
To also be clear, stonewall himself acknowledges that jungling in a vacuum is stupid and mainly makes the videos as a kind of benchmark for showcasing a champion's basic jungling ability.
On March 18 2011 06:49 Kaniol wrote: What is this Stonewall you are talking about? O.o Though i do believe you that Turtle Udyr exists, just like AD annie. (seriously, i still don't know what you mean by Turtle Udyr, do these vamp scepter udyrs who die to mini golems start with turtle or what?)
The turtle Udyr was initially not that bad because it is deathproof by all means while in the jungle and if you get attacked, you are guaranteed to have plenty of HP to escape but later on, you may be very behind.
If you wanted to play like that, then you'd pick Warwick.
What's the appropriate reaction to getting counterjungled very hard?
I just had a game where this happened to me. I was olaf they had amumu. At the start they came with their whole team to my blue, they had (imo) a stronger lvl 1 so I told my team to back off then let them have it and just started small gols etc. After a while amumu bandage tosses onto me at my wraiths and I'm like fuck yeah free mumu kill and didn't realise their mid and top were right behind him so he got my liz and after that i got ganked by multiple people all the time in my jungle. My jungle was warded up pretty hard so I got an early oracle and some wards of my own but still got ganked, didnt die because of my wards but they just came in, I ran, they took creeps/buff and ran away. Also lost my oracle pretty fast trading my life for dragsteal, was that worth it? I knew mumu didnt have smite up but my team was too far to help so i went in knowing i could most likely get drag but would surely die. After getting denied so hard and losing the 400g on oracle+wards in my jungle I was just useless the rest of the game until we surrendered.
edit: I realise how horrible it sounds to get counterjungled by amumu as olaf, feel free to point and laugh.
you didn't get counter jungled by amumu, you got counter jungled by his whole team and then you were horribly far behind. You should rage at your top and mid after that and then start intentionally feeding because the game is already over anyway and they're giant tools and it's all their fault, IMOIMOIMO.
Play safe, don't die, farm as well as you can, catch up later as the opportunity allows. If their solo lanes are leaving lane to counterjungle you, you should be aware of it (especially if top left lane to come fight you at wraiths) and play safe accordingly--you'll be behind in the jungle, but so long as you don't die, your lanes should be winning on farm in the meantime. If their support from bot lane roams to counterjungle you, then one of your bot laners needs to step it up as well, especially if their jungler is doing better than you.
I don't like getting fast oracles if I'm behind. You want the oracle to be on someone that's not likely to die in a fight, and that's not likely to be you if you're an underfarmed melee DPS. Ask your support to get one and clear wards for you.
if they came as 5 to your blue, just go to theirs. Otherwise, just be really vigilant about when the other lanes go missing and be proactive about getting covers so you can get some solo xp while they shop.
If your team is good enough to guard you and intelligent enough to back off when you tell them to you should all just go to their blue instead of giving up entirely. The enemy team has to completely abandon your blue to stop you or face superior numbers, and if they do it's easy to just back off again and switch back to your blue.
So when I jungle trynd I start green elixir, 4 pots and a ward. Where is the best place for me to put this ward, and when? Keep in mind that as trynd I don't use blue, but I am capable of skilling QWE for slow and spin at level 3 without hurting my jungle too bad (I usually wait until 4, though).
Right now I put the ward in the river by the ramp leading to my own wraiths, to prevent wraithjacks and super early mid ganks while I start at minigolems. Also, I'm willing to try out jack-resistant route suggestions that wouldn't necessitate an early ward (the green pot sets me behind unless I kill someone at level 4 with it).
It used to be that a simple wraith jack will really hurt Amumu unless he runs very heavy defense masteries+health quints since he can't proceed to red and doing golems will knock him down a ton. But now it works out that Amumu can do a blue->wolves->golems->red route fine with good speed and pretty high hp. There is also the fact that Amumu's jungle is pretty mana intensive, so disrupting/denying his blue will also have a pretty big impact. Also, in general, mumu is pretty useless pre-6 and doesn't invade the enemy jungle well, so counterjungling him is a pretty strong move.
With the kind of amumu masteries and runes people run now though, he is much tankier earlier on. Also, as long as he has blue, he can clear the jungle quite quickly. With the advent of roamers, I think Amumu's weak jungling is better covered than ever. So yeah, I am not too sure about how useful that advice about counterjungling mumu is anymore. It might be more effective to force him to cover lanes and jack jungle rather than trying to straightup disrupt him.
EPT
.
.
![[image loading]](http://i56.tinypic.com/34ex3yq.jpg)
