The Problem with Magus

I noticed a few posts about Mage junglers and Magus and I thought i'd breakdown how I see it.

Basically, Magus and the S5 jungle changes punish champions who can clear camps quickly using spells. This would be fine if champions could reasonably rely on their auto attacks to clear and sustain well, but this is unfortunately not the case for mage/AP junglers. I have the most experience with , but I see this as an issue on other champions as well. Diana wants to use her W to sustain the jungle and her Q to clear it quickly. She can get an incredibly quick clear time with her passive, especially around mid game. But she is often left completely manaless (and thus useless) after 3 camps. If she clears slower (lets say by not using Q), the mana-back-over-time of magus or hunters machete will allow her to reclaim some of that mana, but then she has a longer clear time, which means she takes more damage, which means she needs to sustain more, which means she has to expend more mana and use her W multiple times. It's a viscous cycle that just plain sucks when champions are not balanced around it, and right now the AP junglers are NOT balanced around it. Having to purchase a second mana item muddles up Diana's already awkward itemization path. She WANTS to get a zhonyas or an abyssal or CDR item, but having to invest in mana after your first item just sucks. Mana items should be first buy items; at least the components should be.

Magus should have a mana regeneration passive worked into it that goes beyond the scope of the other jungler items. I understand that mana is a gate, and thus any regeneration would have to come with some sort of hoop to jump through. My suggestion would be to tie it something indicates an AP mage or assassin is doing well. Hit a skill shot? Get some mana back. Maybe it could work in a similar manner to Quinn's passive, where a nearby target is 'marked' and any spell used against it will refund the spell and restore a decent amount of mana over time. This would create a mini-objective so that the mana isn't 'free'.

Another option would be to tie the amount of mana magus regen's for you to your AP. Simple, but it would be something that only Magus junglers could make use of and it would reward them for building how they are supposed to build (which in turn enables them to clear faster and not be punished for clearing the jungle well!) This scaling would also enable it to have some late game oomph, and could also serve as a balance lever.