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On Strategic Diversity in the Jungle - What's in the Works?

coppinslinger·2/26/2015, 1:31:07 PM·3 votes·876 views

Let's get straight to the point - EVERYBODY KNOWS that Season 5 has basically failed HARD in creating diversity in the Jungle. Basically only one strategy is viable right now - pick a strong early game AD Bruiser who can deal with the jungle well enough in between their high-impact early-game ganks. Vi JarvanIV LeeSin - This is basically the viable jungle pool with a few other champions being tier 2, and handful being "situationally" viable (at best), and the rest being horrendous in almost every other circumstance.

I don't by any means think these champions are "strong" right now. In fact, Jungle is an incredibly weak role right now. These champions are only viable in the sense that they are less USELESS then everybody else in the Jungle at the moment.

Here's how I the changes in this season were casted:

  • The Jungle was made harder such that champions have to "choose" between farming and ganking. Respawn timers are longer, gold is down, experience is down.
  • The Jungle was filled with multiple buffs to juggle, and tons of items to choose from (16 in total! WOW!) giving Junglers "strategic diversity" in how they choose to play the game.

Here's what these changes really meant in the end:

  • The Jungle is so hard, that there is little reward to picking a champion that struggles with it in the early-game. Champions that can't gank their first or second back are completely reliant on their team for the first 10 minutes until they farm up enough experience and gold to be useful. There is little payoff or reward for waiting this out. Your powerspike is not impactful due to the fact that you are likely 2-3 levels behind solo laners and that you are down in gold and items. Only champions who have the early burst and lock-down can manage to be useful when down gold and experience.
  • The Jungle buffs/items are great, but are PUNISHING when chosen incorrectly. The Jungle is so hard right now that juggling these buffs is more of "are you choosing the right buff right now so you aren't useless?" instead of "how are you going to optimize your strategy to win the game?" The Jungle is an optimization game, not a multi-pathed way to victory.

That basically sums up the Season 5 changes. The way I see it, there is literally only ONE viable way of playing the Jungle right now - survive early-game and gank for your team as much as possible. If your Jungler can't do that, they are basically useless. The Jungle is so weak right now that this is the ONLY way to be useful - by trying to get your team ahead early-on enough that you can be easily carried through the mid and late-game.

Junglers need more payoffs for clearing the Jungle other than "great, I'm still healthy after clearing - now I can go gank for my team." Right now the Jungle is basically farm as safely as possible in between ganks, THERE ARE NO OTHER PAYOFFS.

In Season 4, junglers had way more options in how they played the game (gank-heavy, farm-heavy, counterjungling, farm till powerspike, spit-push/pressure) because they could SURVIVE well enough till they could actually be useful in utilizing their specific niche. The Season 5 jungle just punishes you for not optimizing around its realities so hard, that there is no point in trying to survive long-enough to get to fulfill your niche.

So I don't know what we're going to do. We're stuck in a rut right now. The problem ISN'T that Lee Sin, Vi, Jarvan, Rek'sai, etc. are too strong right now, the problem is that you basically built the jungle from the ground up such that they THRIVE in the setting you built. I really don't see any option for making the jungle more diverse other than just straight making it easier to deal with and moving back towards the easier Season 4 jungle. But right now, you're pretty adamant that the jungle needs to be "hard" and that we have to "choose" between farming and ganking (but what about everything else?). I know some people are worried that just making the jungle easier across the board might over-buff the dominant Junglers right now, and you might be right. But honestly, if we just keep on going the same route by dumping so much mud on the Jungle insisting that this is going to solve the diversity problem, and, even worse, if we start nerfing the dominant Junglers (who are the only ones that can actually do ANYTHING right now) it will just become the garbage role of the Season. Dumping mud on a pile of mud won't make it shine any better, especially if it covers up the shiny rocks on top.

So honestly, WHAT ARE YOU PLANNING? Because right now, basically everyone agrees that all the changes made so far are just making the jungle more oppressive and LESS fun.

4 Comments

Tyverus2/26/2015, 2:25:57 PM2 votes

Yes those junglers are dominant. But when havent they been? Any buff given to "jungle diversity" directly and irrefutably buffs those core junglers twice as much since they can merely follow the same strategy and do it better. Season 5 does have similar problems to season 4 but I believe that is more due to the lack of innovation by current junglers than poor jungle set up. The innovation needed is back to the same issue everyone has with assassins in mid. Why should I pick naut/mao/zac when I have more control of my fate by playing vi or lee? Dont get me wrong, I wish lee would get the same treatment as most others and be nerfed to oblivion until a suitable kit balance/rework can be found but.... #flashy-plays.

Getting back on track, Ganking simply allows for better options in deciding the outcomes of the game. Laners lack of wards or deaths to the enemy have much more impact on team morale and so those dominant junglers, the ones that can influence this early game, will continue to be dominate in this #not-really-a-team-game-game. Time and again I go into ranked with the concept of picking a jungler to compliment my team by asking "do we need a tank?" or "wow we have a lot of ap, i should play an ad jungler" or similar but almost without fail I get punished by laners losing, or lacking wards and dying to ganks. It's much easier to pick a carry jungler and trust my fate is in my hands than to trust my adc who died 3 times in 5mins to make a comeback/go ham when I initiate.

I think Riot did good by removing dfg to help alleviate the assassin mid problem. However, the jungle is a whole other situation and removing a single item wont solve this one. Until there's a reward for playing tank/farm junglers without rewarding lane-pressure junglers we'll likely have to hold our tongues and save farm junglers for bot matches.

LoLKiru2/26/2015, 2:39:30 PM1 votes

I can't say exactly whats being planned (im not riot) but there was talk of buffing alot of the weaker junglers who had trouble with their clears via data gathering with that PBE exclusive buff

See this thread for more details on exactly how said buff works: http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/8bjulQZi-jungle-data-gathering-help-us-know-your-early-game-better

I feel that tuning champions to suit the jungle, is better than tuning items (especially when all of the abuse cases, only come from the top 3 or 4 junglers usually; even after the nerf to chilling smite, I don't feel any real difference on my ganks with Rek'Sai) and if you tune the champions themselves, you don't run the risk of indirectly buffing the top tier junglers any further.

Cenobite Azaziel2/26/2015, 2:40:29 PM1 votes

It is kind of funny that if you try to solo a camp without machete, some champs will die and other will stay alive with 50~100hp. So during early game the jungler is always soloing an "enemy champ", that escales with everyone lvls, soaking up the whole damage. Talk about fairness...

All four heroes have somethngn in common. They can gank well, they have some kind of AOE damage that helps them clear faster and they have some kind of built in sustain. Shields, spell vamp and hardly fall of during late game. That is the jungle staple. Good at everything but better at ganking. Just enough sustain in the jungle so it won't get wasted (since you have to B for your items and etc...), tons of damage and insane mobility.

N3mO062/26/2015, 3:43:28 PM1 votes

All these words are right, but I have to say something about the 3 holy tier ( lee, Vi, Jarvan): they are too strong...If they were not so strong they had problems with this new jungle. If a Vi with just a trinity and warrior can do 2000 damage with just q+ aa+ e+aa, although I have canceled his ulti with zhonya, isn't normal, that is, it would be normal if she did only damage, but she has AoE damage, with closegap, knock up and a ult-stun locked, reduction of the armor, damage base on maximum health, reset of aa with e for insane burst and she is also extremely tanky. Lee has insane mobility and many tools and his base stats??? 350 base m speed ( like vi, 2 free close gap and you have 350 m speed!??!).....rengar 345, jarvan 340, Zac 335, Nida 335. They aren't the main problem, but they are a part of it