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Advice for jungling?

AmenPerson··1 votes·482 views

So, this is more me asking for help, because I'm a shit jungler. And how I got Kha'Zix to mastery 4 is beyond me.

http://i.imgur.com/zGY4jc3.png

But yeah, I'm just wondering if there's any advice and tips on how to get more efficient with jungle clears, as well as clearing up some terms used.

So, I don't know how exactly you kite a jungle camp. To me it's just walking around with the camp following you and autoing it. Do you kite allow yourself time for your cooldowns to wear off? Like if I was Kha and kiting blue, would I be doing that to wait for my W to go off cooldown?

Invading. I get the idea of it, of going and stealing the enemy jungle camps, but when would it be a good time to invade and who do you not want to invade against? Would I do it after taking blue and going for there red or something like that? Or would I invade straight after taking my red?

Ganking. Now, I know this is super important for the jungler, but I don't do it good. Most of the time I'm sitting in one of the side bushes at mid, waiting for the enemy mid laner to move closer. Is that good or bad? Would it be better to be more aggressive with ganks, or to be patient? Are there lanes that need ganks more then others?

I'm hoping that some people will be able to answer these questions for me, and hopefully assist me in trying to be a better jungler, as well as new people who don't fully understand the role yet.

7 Comments

EndlessSorcerer3 votes

I would suggest watching videos by high-ELO and/or professional junglers (i.e. Nightblue3, Stonewall008, Valkyrin, and foxdropLOL). They will typically provide a lot of useful tips while playing and you can often see or hear their decision process and some optimizations throughout the game.

Off the top of my head, some basic optimizations may be:

  • Use hard-CC when the monster camps are about to attack you to cancel that attack and delay their next.
  • Each of the smite buffs are quite useful in different situations. Be sure to take proper advantage of them.
    • Raptor's buff is great for ganking
    • Gromp buff provides extra damage during clears and fights, especially for champions with a lot of health
    • Krug's buff reduces the damage you take while clearing and lets champions without CC kill Scuttle Crab faster
    • Wolf buff is useful when you are being counter-jungled or invaded (or after your initial towers have fallen).
  • If you have a weak early clear, Krugs -> Raptor's -> Red Buff is probably the route that conserves the most health.
  • Kill the little Raptors and the little Krug first on single-target clearers. They deal a significant amount of damage for their health value, so you will be healthier if they die early.
  • If you think the enemy jungler will invade you early game, it can be safer to start on a buff camp rather than a little camp since you are less likely to be where they are looking.
  • Attack Speed is extremely efficient at clearing on most junglers. I'd recommend using about 15% on champions when you need to speed up their clear even if they don't use the stat much later (with a few exceptions, such as Nidalee and Evelynn).
  • Keep a pink ward out (or in your inventory) whenever possible. This is important for every champion, but I thought I should emphasis it. There isn't really a good reason not to.

As far as ganking is concerned:

  • When possible, conserve your gap-closer while ganking. If you can get to the enemy champion without using your mobility spell(s), then you can save it to catch them after they try to escape (Flash, dash, blink, etc).
  • You should should try to stay between the enemy and their escape route. You should be trying to move backwards (towards their escape) in-between attacks so that you can body-block them and slow their escape. This also leaves you closer to them if they try to dash on blink past you.
  • Use Raptor's smite buff to determine if you have been spotted by wards when ganking to reduce the risk of them escaping or receiving a counter-gank.
  • It can be risky to gank top-lane while Dragon is up since the enemy team can just group and take it 4v3. I'd recommend ganking top-lane early if possible (after your initial clear) and when Dragon is down; that lane can be quite snowbally due to isolation, so you want to get your ally ahead.
  • Learn to recognize the general times when buff camps spawn during games. If you see the enemy gank bottom lane while their top-side buff is up, you can go steal it from them.
  • Watch when top and bottom lane initially go into lane. If that lane has leashed for their jungler (missing health, mana, or showed up to lane a bit late), then you know where the enemy jungler has likely started and where they will end their clear (where is closest for them to gank).
  • If you have killed the enemy laner, you can either allow your laner to freeze or shove the lane into the enemy tower. If you shove the wave under tower and the next minion wave is coming up, it can be helpful to proxy it to ensure that the wave fully resets and the enemy laner misses as much as possible. This is very situational though and you will have to learn when through experience.

Other tips:

  • Whenever possible, walk up to the enemy champion during a gank and save your gap-closer for after they use their escape abilities.
  • Watch the enemy laners when they go into lane. Whichever lane shows up later and/or missing mana will likely indicate which side of the jungle the enemy jungler started on (which is useful for predicting gank paths and for counter-jungling).
  • When against aggressive early counter-junglers (i.e. Shaco) it can be a good idea to start on your buff camp and/or to start on a different side than you usually do. If he invades your buff, you've already taken it and/or you aren't there to be killed.
  • Watch the minimap to see when and where the enemy goes to ward, which laners are pushing, which laners are vulnerable
  • Know, roughly, how most laning matchups go so that you can prioritize which lanes are the easiest to gank or require an early gank to decide the matchup.
  • If you have blown an enemy's Flash during a gank but haven't killed them, swing back around immediately after an gank them again. Many people don't expect it
  • If you've killed an enemy during a previous gank in top lane, kill them again immediately after they return to lane. They likely won't have wards up yet and a second back-to-back death can be enough to completely crush any chance that opponent has to recover the lane.
  • Top laners rarely bother warding the lane bushes. As such, lane ganks can be quite surprising and effective.
  • When you kill an enemy laner, shove the minion wave into the tower so they miss gold and experience and so that the minion wave will reset to the middle of the lane. If you can get away with it, clear the upcoming minion wave as well to ensure the reset and maximum missed minions.

You will learn a lot through experience, but these tips should help you at the start.

Tormentula2 votes

It depends on the jungler you're playing as.

Some junglers need to be very active and aggressive early on, others need to farm up and then become carries.

There are basic rules of jungling but they change with who you're playing since they may be forced to do something other junglers shouldn't take the risk of doing (dives, early ganks, power farming, invading, camping, etc)

Kha'zix for example should look for level 3 ganks, picks, catch outs, and then as the game goes on he should look for single targets by themselves.

Don't watch videos giving jungle advice, just watch videos of your champion in action and you'll piece together the rules of junglers as you learn that champion playstyle. You'll understand why as that champion you do what you do and then you'll learn what makes that champion a good jungler.

Brutalitops012 votes

First off, for counterjungling, if the enemy jungler shows him/herself on a different side of the map as you, go take a camp if you can. One thing I'll do if I plan on doing a level 2 invade is go drop a ward over the wall at the enemy's Krugs, then if they're there, start red side and take their blue, and if they aren't, start blue side and take their red. This is a fairly risk free way of doing things, as it'll allow you to sneak a camp from them without them knowing.

Second, clears. For Kha'Zix specifically, I start Gromp, then at every other camp, take out the smaller minions first so that my Q has the isolation bonus on the bigger one.

Third, ganks. Bot lane is the best place to gank, as the bot turret melts super quickly and there's a dragon right there, which is always good to have. However, where you should gank depends a lot more on summoner spells and crowd control. Are you a cc bot? You can probably gank pretty much anywhere. Are you a damage threat? Gank lanes that are pushing into your side or lanes that have a ton of cc. It really just depends on the game. Oftentimes, though, ganking lanes that're losing hard will just get you double killed, especially if it's a snowbally lane.

Quil Evrything1 votes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoVzf7IOAfY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlZBVVbTeTU

find the good youtube teachers. watch them.

Oh Look Kaede1 votes

Keep their jungle warded as well as awareness in rivers to catch enemy jugglers trying to gank lanes. Try to gank lanes that are struggling, not the ones winning.

Mira Arya Enthe1 votes

Play Shyvana

Mr Killalot1 votes

{quoted}

So, this is more me asking for help, because I'm a shit jungler. And how I got Kha'Zix to mastery 4 is beyond me.

http://i.imgur.com/zGY4jc3.png

But yeah, I'm just wondering if there's any advice and tips on how to get more efficient with jungle clears, as well as clearing up some terms used.

So, I don't know how exactly you kite a jungle camp. To me it's just walking around with the camp following you and autoing it. Do you kite allow yourself time for your cooldowns to wear off? Like if I was Kha and kiting blue, would I be doing that to wait for my W to go off cooldown?

Invading. I get the idea of it, of going and stealing the enemy jungle camps, but when would it be a good time to invade and who do you not want to invade against? Would I do it after taking blue and going for there red or something like that? Or would I invade straight after taking my red?

Ganking. Now, I know this is super important for the jungler, but I don't do it good. Most of the time I'm sitting in one of the side bushes at mid, waiting for the enemy mid laner to move closer. Is that good or bad? Would it be better to be more aggressive with ganks, or to be patient? Are there lanes that need ganks more then others?

I'm hoping that some people will be able to answer these questions for me, and hopefully assist me in trying to be a better jungler, as well as new people who don't fully understand the role yet.

Kiting a jungle camp has 2 main uses:

  1. Taking less damage - By kiting a camp, you allow the camp to deal less hits and therefor less damage. This is most notable on the blue buff and the krugs so I suggest practicing on them first. The Blue sentinel has a short melee auto attack range. By kiting it, it gets off less autos. And if you're unfamiliar with kiting, you basically auto/cancel reset animation and auto again when it is back up. With the krugs, if you drag them out you can kite the small krug around the large one and take no damage from it.
  2. Dragging to next camp - by kiting a jungle creep towards your next camp by kiting, you will effectively save time.

Invading can be complex but some quick tips I've noticed.

  1. A good time to invade is when you spot the jungler on the other side of the map. See them gank top lane while you are bot? Now is a good time to take a camp bot side because they will most likely be up and the jungler won't be able to contest you for them.
  2. Vision helps with invades, along with knowledge of other jungler. At the beginning of the game, try to get your team to get a ward in on either your opponent's krugs or gromp. That way, you know what their pathing will be and can invade early. Also, if you are going against a champ who is really relient on a particular buff (ie Hecarim with the blue buff) you can usually get away with starting gromp, then going directly to steal his red buff.
  3. Champions that are good duelists are better at invades (like Jax). You'll be more likely to come out on top if you run into the jungler. These champs are also more dangerous to invade.
  4. Don't invade without smite up. Sometimes you can literally walk up to the camp your opponent is working on and smite it and walk away.

Ganks are all about gaining advantages for you laner.

  1. A successful gank isn't always about getting kills. Chunking the enemy, forcing them off csing, and making them blow summoners (especially) are all succesful ganks. For example, you gank a lane, but they flash away. That's huge because you can revisit the lane shortly after because they have less of a chance of ecaping now.
  2. You want to gank a lane when the opponent is pushed up usually unless you have some cc to lock them down.
  3. Coordinate the ganks with your team mates. I usually ping an "on my way" when I go to gank or tell my team mate to let them push. Then, right before I execute the gank, I ping the enemy champion.
  4. Gank winning lanes to snowball them and give them lead, not to help losing lanes. I know many people want to help losing lanes get back even, but it's generally a waste of time, especially if the opponent is fed (you may just feed them more). Instead, focus your effort towards a winning lane so they can snowball hard.
  5. Get a red trinket to help eith ganks. You will nullify a laners wards with this.

Other tips: -With wolves and raptors, take out the smaller creeps first; you will take less damage. -when you have the Krug buff, let your sixth auto hit the large creep in these camps so you take less damage. -when you have a successful gank, use it to get ahead (for example if you gank bot and your team gets two kills, go to the dragon and try to secure it with them). -as a jungler, you have the most influence over the map, so pay lots of attention to it. Look at the map constantly when clearing camps and provide plenty of vision for yourself and your mates. -if you don't already, take refillable at beginning, then get hunter's potion ASAP. When I jungled at first I thought health pots were better because you get more health initially. In contrast though, if you kite properly you won't need the extra health and the hunter's potion will give you massive sustain. Allowing you to farm and gank more. -know which jungle item to take. They have high mobility champs? Take stalkers for the slow. High damage champs? Take skirmishers for reduced damage. Champs that like to roam? Get a trackers so you can ward more.

Adaptability is the name of the game for a jungler. Always be thinking about what you can do proactively to help your team out. That's all I can think of right now. I'm a noob but these are things I have learned that have greatly helped me be a better jungler. Good luck on the rift!

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