Hi everyone, im just a new player.Starting to play this game for a few days, i was quickly fond of the position of jungling. But im pretty confuse of when to counter jungle and when to farm. Even some of my friends that is experienced in jungling, they can't answer me this question. Whether I should counter jungle just after getting the red buff/blue buff or counter jungle after getting the second buff. Can you guys give me some suggestions please? Thanks!
Kouga1 votesI'm definitely not the best Jungler but here is how I see it. And I may repeat some things that you already know:
So Counter-Jungling, specifically, refers to entering the other team's jungle in an attempt to either 1) steal their camps or 2) kill the jungler himself. Counter Jungling relies on quite a few factors - your champ, the other Junglers champ, what side of the jungle you are on, and how well you can communicate with your team.
Your champ: Some champs are better at counter-jungling than others. If you're going to steal camps, you want to be able to get in and out of their jungle easily and clear camps fast, so you can steal them before you are found or their jungler arrives. Tank junglers tends to have slower clears and aren't usually good candidates, and its also easier to steal from them (since, without smite, they usually have lower damage abilities). There are some exceptions; Rek'Sai is a tanky jungler, but her tunnels allows her extreme mobility throughout the jungle and makes it very easy to get to camps without being seen and avoid getting ganked, and her clear isn't too bad if you pick up a little AD.
Their Champ: Some enemy junglers are better to counter than others. Nunu is generally someone you do not want to counter gank - he can stay at full health throughout his clears by Consuming the jungle camps, and he has a very strong targeted slow, and a self-buff that buffs his movement speed, so you really can't catch him in the jungle 1v1. If Nunu is in the game, chances are he will be stealing your camps.
If you're going to try to kill their jungler, you usually want to hit them early before they have enough sustain to get through their camps without being low health. If you can ambush them early on, you want to hit them hard and fast, kill them, and get out. The reason is that as soon as you are spotted in the jungle, they will likely ping for support and their allies will likely come running and you'll quickly be outnumbered and die.
If you're going for camps, the Tracker's item gives you a bunch of extra wards that you can use to scout out their camps and see when they come up so that you can get there quick and steal. However if you're going for a kill, the Skirmisher's is usually better since its Smite makes you take less damage from 1 champ and deals true damage on-hit.
So there are some things to think about. Another big part about jungling - whether you're countering camps, going for a gank, or looking to hunt their jungler, you want to watch your map closely. If you see the enemy jungler going Top for a gank, head to their bottom side jungle and clear out their camps. Or you can take the opportunity to gank bot, since you know their jungler won't show up. As you pass through your own jungle, drop wards in the river, somewhere where you can see the Jungler if they go to 1) gank a lane or 2) kill the Rift Scuttler. Killing the Scuttler yourself is also a good choice, since it gives a large vision area.
Anyway, the basic idea is that when you see the jungler, go steal whatever camps they are furthest from. They are more likely to have spawned again in the time it took them to clear the rest of the route.
ONEHITKOBARON1 votesthank you for your reply ! hopefully I will improve more and more through practicing. But I want to ask what if I mainly focus on killing the enemy jungler but not taking their camps when I' m counter jungling , what should I usually do to start with? Take Rengar as an example , What should I do with him early in the game and later on?
Kouga1 votesHonestly, I don't want to give you too much advice on killing the enemy jungler because I am not a great counter-jungler. Honestly I don't know the best route to start, but you can check out videos and tutorials online.
Off the cuff, I would suggest: get your bot lane to help you take Red buff first instead of krugs. You'll be taking Red when they are taking Gromp (this is assuming you are on the Blue Side, where your base is on the bottom-left corner). Then after red, start running towards their blue. Go up from the left side so they don't see you coming. If you can, get a ward out in the first part of the game before camps spawn, try to place it where you get vision of their Blue and place it after 1:00, maybe later I don't know the exact timing.
Anyway, so you now should have level 2 and red buff. Meanwhile, they should be taking a decent amount of damage from Blue buff. If you were able to get a leash without using your smite, you can easily steal their Blue with smite, then immediately attack them. They'll be denied the experience, they'll be hurt, and you have Red/Blue.
Sounds like First Blood to me, but I admit I have not done it much. So take everything with a large grain of salt. I don't know if you should use smite on your Red (which replenishes a chunk of your missing HP) or if you should try to save it to smite.. Give it a shot though, see what works. And good luck!
Darkwind1 votesI wouldn't recommend trying to kill the enemy jungler as Rengar. you take too much damage from your first camp(s). I'd recommend a champion like Shaco, Lee Sin, or Nidalee for that.
There are two primary ways that I see junglers in general kill the enemy jungler early. Both rely on predicting the enemy jungler's clear route. Let's start with saying you're playing on blue side- this method works much better on that side, because you can get a strong leash from you bot lane, and because the enemy jungler is more likely to start where you want them to.
If the enemy jungler starts gromp, they have two major clear options. They'll either go straight to blue and take it, and then work their way to red, or they'll take wolves and then head to red, before working their way back to blue. Either way, here is a pretty solid counter jungling opportunity. Get your bot lane to hard leash krugs for you- don't smite them. Then, go to the enemy blue buff. The enemy jungler will either be there at half health and without smite- in which case you can kill them, smite their blue away, or both- or they'll be on their way to red. In which case blue is yours for free, because they won't be back for a long time. However, it is critical to have been sure that they were starting gromp. For that reason, it's ideal to get a ward into the blue buff/gromp area at level 1 prior to minion spawn. If you get that ward down and you're confident your champion will be stronger than their champion when you get to blue buff, you know you can attempt this counterjungle method.
The other place that is good for ambushing the enemy jungler is red buff. This is done slightly later- you're anticipating that they will take two camps and then head to red buff. You will have to be able to clear faster than your opponent to do this invade. All you do is take gromp and blue, then head over towards the enemy red. You'll throw a ward down in the bush by red buff. If they haven't started the camp yet, back off to the bush on the back of red camp's wall. Once you seem them taking red, and lowish on health, you just go in and attempt to kill them. If they're super low, make sure to go ahead and smite red to deny them the heal. Otherwise, you can wait until it's low enough to smite steal it. If you got to the red bush first and warded it, and you know that they didn't ward that bush, you can just wait there until red is low enough to smite steal, smite it, and then kill them.
Once you've done this once (and gotten away with it), you can typically continue to bully/invade and kill them a few times, especially if they don't know what they're doing.
AyRe CoNteMpT1 votesfarming is your main priority as a jungler, same as lasthitting is the main priority of a laner
you are hidden from the eyes of the enemy and your enemy jungler is hidden. that in itself has a great value and if you show yourself, it must only be for a play that will succeed with certainty. never fuck around and never waste your time.
if your enemy jungler shows himself or gives up his position in any way, you can then decide what to do with this information (steal his camps, predict where he is gonna go next and ambush him or directly counteract his move)
after making a move (giving up your position, using big cooldowns like ult and sums, losing health or mana and in general losing your combat readyness) always recall. its called waveplay and you can imagine it like the ocean. a wave crushes onto the shore and goes back into the ocean, it doesnt stay until it gets ganked.
ONEHITKOBARON1 votesI see! thanks!