Riot has been putting way too much emphasis on the jungler over the last few seasons

Rock MD·Jan 18, 2017·62 votes·2,798 views

With early game additions like Rift Herald and first tower blood, as well as how friggin' good Baron is, and Riot's emphasis on teamwork, it's no wonder junglers came out dominant.

I can win a game with a bad toplaner/mid/adc/support, or against a good toplaner/mid/adc/support.

But I don't think I've won a game yet where my jungler was outclassed unless my entire team held his hand all game. And even then their jungler is a huge threat.

It feels downright futile to try to do anything as another lane and say, "Yeah I carried."

60 Comments

aspects1Jan 19, 201718 votes

as a jungle main who likes to farm, i really dont like the emphasis riot is putting on ganks. i prefer when you have the option to go either farm oriented OR gank oriented. now if you go 2m without ganking every lane at least twice, they flame you nonstop the rest of the game, say gg no jg, and afk waiting for 20

LauchmelderJan 19, 20175 votes

Considering my junglers pretty much ignored my lane regardless of me being ahead or even in lane lately I think I have the right to sometimes be pissed at farm junglers.

Especially if we could get first tower blood on mid but the jungler let's the enemy team have it on bot.

aspects1Jan 19, 20175 votes

think of it this way, a lane wants help when they are behind or they want to push a tower now there are 3 lanes now they are across the map from each other now add in objectives counterjungling farming its simply too much for one player to do. you have to choose what to give up, and in this meta, riot is forcing us to give up farming

Supreme Senpai69Jan 19, 20172 votes

They decreased spawn timers to promote ganking. You can also tax the lanes after a gank, as long as it's successful. Like don't just randomly stroll through the lane, miss a skillshot, then horde 2 waves of minions lol. Farming junglers really shouldn't be a thing. The jungle is the area you get the least gold from, not including support. It's where we stick a player because there's only 3 lanes yet 4 players need to get gold by killing things. Jungle is sorta the concession. But in return, you get the ultimate roaming power because nobody knows where you are. Nobody can ping mia to anticipate a gank.

If you aren't using that power you're squandering the role. Like, you don't have to camp lanes or force ganks. I'm sure you're an a excellent jungler, though I'm also sure there's many things you can improve on as well like anybody else. But in.. random number based on feeling, but maybe 80%(?) of my games, the jungler doesn't make an attempt to gank my lane. And it's like. You're wasting so much power given to you inherently in your role. What about the role appeals to the people who don't gank?

If you wanna play farming simulator go top lane lol. It is a hard role, don't get me wrong, but some people have absolutely no business trying to play such a hard role.

MimrJan 19, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Revan Senpai,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=ipMJZ0ew,comment-id=0005000000000001,timestamp=2017-01-19T06:11:38.460+0000)

They decreased spawn timers to promote ganking. You can also tax the lanes after a gank, as long as it's successful. Like don't just randomly stroll through the lane, miss a skillshot, then horde 2 waves of minions lol. Farming junglers really shouldn't be a thing. The jungle is the area you get the least gold from, not including support. It's where we stick a player because there's only 3 lanes yet 4 players need to get gold by killing things. Jungle is sorta the concession. But in return, you get the ultimate roaming power because nobody knows where you are. Nobody can ping mia to anticipate a gank.

If you aren't using that power you're squandering the role. Like, you don't have to camp lanes or force ganks. I'm sure you're an a excellent jungler, though I'm also sure there's many things you can improve on as well like anybody else. But in.. random number based on feeling, but maybe 80%(?) of my games, the jungler doesn't make an attempt to gank my lane. And it's like. You're wasting so much power given to you inherently in your role. What about the role appeals to the people who don't gank?

If you wanna play farming simulator go top lane lol. It is a hard role, don't get me wrong, but some people have absolutely no business trying to play such a hard role.

Lane taxing? The only things that will accomplish is having an angry laner and fucking up his wave management. I only start hitting minions if we have a chance of getting some good damage in on the tower after a gank.

I'm getting sick of all the pinging, crying and people getting their asses into trouble for no reason resulting in a desperate attempt from my side trying to bail them out. Resulting in me having 30 CS and being 2 levels behind the opponent jungler as bloodrazor-tiger Udyr of all things.

Sure, jungle camp spawn timers have increased to promote ganking but often I don't even get the time to farm the camps that do spawn because as soon as I try to farm wolves you can bet your ass that the enemy Lee/Rengo/Shaco is getting a double kill on botlane because they overextended again despite being 0/3 behind.

salty testiJan 19, 20171 votes

[deleted]

aspects1Jan 19, 20171 votes

as long as a jungler has recommended jungle items, they are meta enough that you can just kite a camp and clear without losing hp (except raptors)

salty testiJan 19, 20171 votes

[deleted]

aspects1Jan 20, 20171 votes

if you brun 2 pots, esp since smite returns hp now, you better be with 100 hp of full, or your literally just standing there autoing the camp not making a move to kite it i can play darius jungle and be full hp after first clear with just refillable and smite

RexSaurJan 18, 20174 votes

Lvl 3 full health red buff ganks on lvl 2 solo laners is the worst thing that has happened to the early game of this game.

GayFluffyUnicornJan 19, 20171 votes

Atleast it is happening level 2. I remember my vlad game very well when i got ganked still being level 1 by a level 3 jungler...

Troy242621Jan 19, 20174 votes

It's not every jungler applying this much pressure. It's just a few abuse cases.

Namely, LeeSin Zac Hecarim .

TSP ECLIPSEJan 18, 20173 votes

If you read the post meddler posted about 2 hours ago, he states that they want to tone the jungle down so the jungler wouldn't have such an overwhelming impact of the early game. The jungle is much more dynamic than lanes and that is why they are investing so much into it. Changing experience/jungle camps/ etc can make or break champions... do you remember season 3-4 when all you would see is Elise, J4, Sejuani, and Lee Sin? They need to make changes to introduce more champions playing in more areas as well.

LankPantsJan 19, 20176 votes

3-4 when all you would see is Elise, J4, Sejuani, and Lee Sin?

Get your timeline right. Sejuani was one of the weakest junglers in the game in seasons 3/4. She was strong for about 2 weeks in season 5 before Riot crippled her because they don't want anyone other than Lee Sin to be viable in the jungle.

NuparuJan 19, 20173 votes

She was strong for about two months.

Stop cutting it short because "muh character got nerfed fast." I don't think she deserved to be nerfed that hard but at least be real with how long she was actually strong for.

LankPantsJan 19, 20176 votes

Riot got next patch nerfs out for Sejuani when she was strong. These bought her more into line than someone like Lee Sin is right now. She was meta for 2 months, she was strong in the way Lee Sin is strong now for literally 2 weeks.

PermabannedGarenJan 19, 20174 votes

{quoted}

Riot got next patch nerfs out for Sejuani when she was strong. These bought her more into line than someone like Lee Sin is right now. She was meta for 2 months, she was strong in the way Lee Sin is strong now for literally 2 weeks.

Sejuani was much stronger than Lee Sin is now. You're insanely delusional.

I GANK LANESJan 19, 20171 votes

why is this downvoted

LankPantsJan 19, 20171 votes

Because Lee Sin has spent the last 5 seasons as the number one picked jungler and is utter bullshit to play against. He crushes diversity and is the limiting bar to the jungle, as he has been for most of Leagues lifespan. People are straight up sick of his shit at this point.

GayFluffyUnicornJan 19, 20172 votes

We are real. It's not only sejuani. Have you forgotten about maokai? He was contested a few times in spring split---->nerf, dead immediately in the next patch. Same with nautilus. We have three champs here who got immediately butchered for being once in the spotlight. Then we have riot: we dont want to hit lee sin because muh LCSBIGMONEY. Gragas, elise, rek sai being the to go junglers for over a year? Doesn't matter, they need their time in the spotlight cause flashy plays. A little lovetap here and there but that's it.

Professor WardJan 18, 20173 votes

Without knowing a single thing about league, from an outside perspective, anyone would tell you that the roamer needs to be strong, and will have the largest impact on the game.

The jungler is going to be important from game design alone.

RexSaurJan 18, 20172 votes

{quoted}

Without knowing a single thing about league, from an outside perspective, anyone would tell you that the roamer needs to be strong, and will have the largest impact on the game.

The jungler is going to be important from game design alone.

The jungler can be important without deciding the whole game by himself.

See season 2 jungle, where junglers had way less exp and gold but they still had huge map impact, but they couldnt solo carry games in 10 minutes they actually had to get their carries strong so they can carry them, sort of like a support role, which is how the jungle should be instead of this mess of outleveling solo lanes while being 0-0-0.

PermabannedGarenJan 19, 20172 votes

{quoted}

The jungler can be important without deciding the whole game by himself.

See season 2 jungle, where junglers had way less exp and gold but they still had huge map impact, but they couldnt solo carry games in 10 minutes they actually had to get their carries strong so they can carry them, sort of like a support role, which is how the jungle should be instead of this mess of outleveling solo lanes while being 0-0-0.

MasterYi Yeah let me just be a support for my team. I'm sure being low in gold and being under-leveled won't make me useless.

RexSaurJan 19, 20173 votes

{quoted}

Yeah let me just be a support for my team. I'm sure being low in gold and being under-leveled won't make me useless.

The point is that ganking should cost you exp and gold aka resources.

Farm heavy junglers can still farm the jungle and build items, but as a tradeoff they dont get to impact every lane early game.

But as it is right now they just insta clear everything and then have a full minute and half to gank whatever they want without losing anything.

PermabannedGarenJan 19, 20171 votes

{quoted}

The point is that ganking should cost you exp and gold aka resources.

Farm heavy junglers can still farm the jungle and build items, but as a tradeoff they dont get to impact every lane early game.

But as it is right now they just insta clear everything and then have a full minute and half to gank whatever they want without losing anything.

Well, Yi doesn't, and he's actually one of the worst champions in the game at the moment, but sure, I'm okay with not being able to pressure lanes the same way a Lee Sin or Hecarim can. And I agree that those champions shouldn't get to clear really quickly and easily while also getting to pressure every lane.

MimrJan 19, 20171 votes

{quoted}

The jungler can be important without deciding the whole game by himself.

See season 2 jungle, where junglers had way less exp and gold but they still had huge map impact, but they couldnt solo carry games in 10 minutes they actually had to get their carries strong so they can carry them, sort of like a support role, which is how the jungle should be instead of this mess of outleveling solo lanes while being 0-0-0.

I hated S2 and S3 jungle. All types of junglers should be viable, not just earlygame and tank/ support junglers.

The DeckownerJan 19, 20173 votes

rito wants actions in lcs games, and in pro play solo kills in lane rarely happens, which is why,rito is forcing the current meta.

GayFluffyUnicornJan 19, 20172 votes

So much this. One of the reasons i think riot is still nerfing CotC over and over instead of touching vi and heca and zac because they are entertaining to watch. Now imagine amumu being strong or shyvana... Nerf nuke would be on its way

The DeckownerJan 19, 20171 votes

cotc is getting nerfed because poppy vs maokai top is boring to watch.

RexSaurJan 19, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Deckowner,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=ipMJZ0ew,comment-id=0007,timestamp=2017-01-19T01:39:46.514+0000)

rito wants actions in lcs games, and in pro play solo kills in lane rarely happens, which is why,rito is forcing the current meta.

Thats not how it works.

The stronger the jungler is the less 1v1/2v2 action there is, because any time you go for a trade and you dont have vision of their jungler then its better to just play safe otherwise its too risky.

LankPantsJan 19, 20172 votes

It's also terrible for the jungle pool. With so much emphasis on early ganks and objectives the only junglers who ever see any play are early game centric shitlords like Lee Sin.

TheSingularityJan 19, 20171 votes

The only tank I can play currently is Zac (I have a tank pool of approx 20 champs, incl non tanks built full tank). No other tank even comes close to being viable right now. Vi, hec, lee and Ivern simply out do them by a massive margin

TheHypeGokuJan 19, 20171 votes

I ganked mid. Burned flash. I ganked top. Got first blood with their flash. Ganked bottom. Stacked up like 4+ kills in a number of ganks.

Enemy top laner 5 kills in lane. The bottom lane that I fed goes top and tries to fight a fed Irelia with Vi and Sona behind her. Irelia snowballs.

Irelia wins game.

Jungle not as strong as you think.

Supreme Senpai69Jan 19, 20173 votes

Jungle is the strongest role. But not every game is winnable. You can play a game perfectly and still lose. Anecdotal evidence means literally nothing

Outta SippiesJan 19, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Revan Senpai,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=ipMJZ0ew,comment-id=00060000,timestamp=2017-01-19T06:15:21.843+0000)

Jungle is the strongest role. But not every game is winnable. You can play a game perfectly and still lose. Anecdotal evidence means literally nothing

that's not true, if you play a game PERFECTLY then that means no flaws, a loss is as a result of a flaw or many flaws.

Supreme Senpai69Jan 19, 20172 votes

Almost like there's four other people on your team. You can play perfectly. Your team can make flaws. Nobody in the world has a 100% winrate. Even if you have 52% you'll climb, and that's because it's a team game. You aren't expected to win every game. Not every game is winnable.

Outta SippiesJan 19, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Revan Senpai,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=ipMJZ0ew,comment-id=0006000000000000,timestamp=2017-01-19T08:35:24.765+0000)

Almost like there's four other people on your team. You can play perfectly. Your team can make flaws. Nobody in the world has a 100% winrate. Even if you have 52% you'll climb, and that's because it's a team game. You aren't expected to win every game. Not every game is winnable.

but you said you can play perfectly, if they make a flaw a perfect player would make up for the flaw in merely seconds.

Supreme Senpai69Jan 20, 20171 votes

That's sort of the point I'm trying to make here. Not even the perfect player can make up for their team's flaws due to the team-based nature of the game. So it's okay to lose. Learn from any mistakes you made from that game but understand it may not have been your fault. A 50% winrate means you're playing fine for your ELO. Anything above that means you deserve to climb, and you will climb. Even just a 51%

Outta SippiesJan 19, 20171 votes

please halp, I wanna jg because I'm bad and I keep losing it for my team :(

Supreme Senpai69Jan 19, 20171 votes

If you're bad play support. Support isn't an easy role, it's actually pretty hard to do well in. But you don't have to CS so it's a good place to learn how to do things. Watch how your ADC does things and learn from that. Watch your jungler and see how he plays. Supports all about the macro so you're watching everybody anyway

Pls don't play jungle if you're so bad that you "keep losing it for your team" though. Jungle's like... super important to winning

Outta SippiesJan 19, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Revan Senpai,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=ipMJZ0ew,comment-id=000a0000,timestamp=2017-01-19T08:39:36.132+0000)

If you're bad play support. Support isn't an easy role, it's actually pretty hard to do well in. But you don't have to CS so it's a good place to learn how to do things. Watch how your ADC does things and learn from that. Watch your jungler and see how he plays. Supports all about the macro so you're watching everybody anyway

Pls don't play jungle if you're so bad that you "keep losing it for your team" though. Jungle's like... super important to winning

its a joke my dude, a lot of the time, I'm feeding and stuff, don't get me wrong I have a lot of bad games. but its not because I don't know how to play I'm just WAY too ballsy for my own good, I will straight up 1v1 someone who has a gold lead on me and that's all I really need to work on honestly

Supreme Senpai69Jan 20, 20171 votes

Oh. Lmao. I thought it was a joke, but there was no /s or kappa or anything, so I figured might as well give some advice just in case

Champion SkinJan 19, 20171 votes

Why do you want to play jungle? It is one of the most difficult roles to play in the entire game.... because the jungle has so many options so finding the best one is quite difficult compared with laners who can roam/TP yes but other then that usually stay in lane

Outta SippiesJan 19, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Champion Skin,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=ipMJZ0ew,comment-id=000a0001,timestamp=2017-01-19T15:39:52.940+0000)

Why do you want to play jungle? It is one of the most difficult roles to play in the entire game.... because the jungle has so many options so finding the best one is quite difficult compared with laners who can roam/TP yes but other then that usually stay in lane

because the role is similar to chess in a way, I love strategy like that

DaNinadJan 19, 20171 votes

I still see Lee sin everywhere, but he doesn't see me

Meep ManJan 19, 20171 votes

To be fair and correct, I don't think Rift Herald has very much to do with it

SpecterVonBarenJan 20, 20171 votes

What Riot needs to do is stop looking at the jungle as just being a "farm or gank" role. They should instead find a way to encourage the junglers to fight each other sometimes. Find a way to tie the jungler up in doing something that will help their team but isn't so direct as ganking is.

Sexy Jack RabbitJan 20, 20171 votes

The Jungle was infinitely better when it was mostly tanks. I miss Season 4 :(

5050BSJan 20, 20171 votes

Few seasons ago you never saw the junglers until about 20-25m into the game farming stacks.

Then they would shred everyone. Now they gank at lvl 2...

NoblewindJan 21, 20171 votes

It's really just the inherent properties of the jungle in LoL that make it hard not to make it dominant unless you want to turn it into a secondary support role (which I would be fine with).

Junglers farm relatively safely, have presence in every lane in terms of their farm area, and for the most part only have to worry about the enemy jungler. Every other lane has to worry about its own opponents and the jungler, whereas the jungler only has to worry about 1 opponent (talking in terms of actually dying, not things like vision). You generally don't attempt to invade the jungle as a laner, for example.

If this really is a problem that needs to be changed, it needs to be more with the foundation of the role itself than on doing things like nerfing the current setup. Junglers need to either have low XP and provide a Roaming Support role, I.e. their main advantage coming from outnumbering opponents, not solo killing and carrying, OR you do something more drastic like open up the map more to provide more options for all players to deal with them directly, to reduce their overall safety on the map.