Downvote me, but Lee is a good example of what an earlygame jungler should be

Spacesuit Spiff··4 votes·718 views

It's easy to see why earlygame jungers are difficult to balance across levels of play. In low elo they can rampage around the map murdering everything because nobody wards, in the LCS not so much. If you give an early jungler enough power to rampage around at the LCS level even though pros know how to deal with ganks, they'll be broken beyond belief in low elo.

So where does Lee fit into this? He's an earlygame jungler that does well in the LCS but fails in low elo. Sure, you could just go "muh skillcap" but let's look at the reasons this happens:

  1. His power is tied into mobility and playmaking. His numbers are good too (personally I think he should be squishier earlygame) but that doesn't change the fact that if all you want to do is roll your face on the keyboard, pretty much every other champ does that better. People go "omg so many dashes he can just wardhop if he misses a Q" but his true power comes from pulling off plays that involve dashing all over the place, straining his mobility to the limit.
  2. He needs to do well early, because he falls off. You went 3/3/0 in the first 20 minutes? Probably gonna lose, even though you think you did well. LCS players can work around this, but to carry soloq you need to have some sort of impact lategame, be it landing hooks or assassinating carries.
  3. He can ult people to safety. That sounds like a joke, but I see it happen all the time. It's a good mechanic because it punishes mistakes, making him even weaker in soloq.

This is how you balance earlygame junglers across levels of play. Lee is pretty much the only one who works like this, since J4/Vi/Reksai don't get much weaker when you hand them to a low elo player (Reksai should in theory because it's fair to demand players to master her tunnel strategies... except those strategies are worthless 90% of the time. I wish Riot had made her a dedicated antijungler instead of another J4, but that's getting off topic). We need more champs like this, not in the sense of "a kit that has absolutely everything" or "immunity to nerfs", but more of how he works on a macro level.

4 Comments

Shadow Gilgamesh2 votes

A FAR better example of a healthy early game jungler is Shaco, he has a REALLY good engage with his invisi-flash, and you can't chase him down if you catch him out in the jungle for the same reason, but if he jumps into a gank that he can't win, he's punished for it, because he used his movement to engage. He ALSO can't just tower dive low targets the way lee can during the period where turrets are supposed to be the safe spot. Additionally, he's gank dependant, farming is a blatantly sub-optimal strategy for him, unlike Lee, who can farm if he fails a couple ganks, he won't be great, but it's not like Shaco. And finally, and probably the BIGGEST difference is that Shaco ACTUALLY falls off, no matter how fed he is, late game other champs WILL contribute more, he might be able to assassinate a carry, but he won't be pulling any 1v5s (or 1v3s even), he's not even the best split pusher, whereas late game Lee can still find a place to be decently useful with his generalist kit, mobility, and very good disengage ult.

Daishø1 votes

http://matchhistory.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/#match-details/NA1/1706536749/218680232?tab=overview

Shaco doesn't fall off as hard as lee sin in the late game. in my opinion, shaco has a incredible strong late game. With items like shiv and ravenous, your split pushing power is immense especially when you have your clone up. You can still 1v2 easily if you play it right.

But shacos early game is his strongest point in the game, i must agree on that, but i don't agree as much with the llate game part

vIbvdOwbko1 votes

This post makes zero sense lol.

I don't even think Lee Sin is a problem but I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to get at. No it doesn't mean you lose if you did half decent early game, no that's not exactly where his power is tied to and no sane Lee will mess up their ultimate.

Have you played Lee before? lol..

"but his true power comes from pulling off plays that involve dashing all over the place, straining his mobility to the limit."

^ wtf? lol. this first part of this statement is just flat out wrong and the second part makes no sense. "straining his mobility to the limit" the fk does that mean.

2000boxes1 votes

he's saying lee is strong if he can use his extra mobility as an advantage rather than for example use his tanky build to be a helpful meat shield late game or build tons of damage and hopefully win at the 20 minute mark

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