League of Legends Jungle Guide

Jungling is a League of Legends strategy that involves killing neutral monsters in no man’s land to gain XP, increased abilities, and Gold.  The reason the strategy is called Jungling is because players venture away from the lanes to the jungles of the map to kill monsters for XP and gold.  Jungling is an advanced strategy that should only be used after you’re gained a decent amount of experience playing the game.

The Advantages of Jungling

Jungling is a very valid strategy if you know how to jungle properly.   Jungling allows your team’s other champions to gain the full XP from battling the minions on the lanes while you gain XP by fighting monsters.  If you have competent teammates who take advantage of the extra XP and gold from battling enemy minions, jungling can result in a team that is much more powerful than a usual team.  However, if you have incompetent teammates they will be overwhelmed by the enemy’s champions while you are busy jungling.  Additionally jungling can allow you to take the enemy by surprise as you can swoop in and aid your team from unusual angles (which known as ganking).  A good jungler will confuse the enemy team and demoralize their champions as you move through the shadows, attacking and disappearing with no actual decipherable pattern.  A veteran jungler is a huge asset who can help you win the game.

The Disadvantages of Jungling

There are some disadvantages to jungling, which is expected as the game must be kept balanced.  First of all, if you aren’t efficient at time management jungling is a bad way to gain XP and gold.  I remember the first I tried jungling as a fresh newbie.  I chose a champion that was entirely unsuited for jungling.  I ended up spending a massive amount of time trying to kill monsters because my champion (Brand) was unsuited to fighting them.  Because of this my champion lagged far behind my enemies more powerful champions who were gaining XP quickly.  Jungling can also backfire if your team is inexperienced and can’t hold the battle without you constantly being there.  As you can see, jungling requires an experienced player and a solid team.

The Best Champions to Start With Jungling

There are some champions that are far more suited to jungling than others.  Choosing the proper champion for jungling can win or lose the game for you.   The three champions I’d recommend to newbie junglers are Udyr, Warwick, and Nunu.  These are excellent Junglers because they are able to destroy monsters easily.  Other champions like Brand are bad fits for Jungling as they struggle to defeat monsters.  Monsters use melee attacks thus it’s important to have a champion that is excellent at close quarters combat.   The one monster that uses magic is Baron Nashor.

What Items Should a Jungler Start With?

The usual build for a jungler is usually to start with cloth armor and 5 potions.  The armor helps protect your champion from monsters’ melee attacks.  The 5 potions are useful for obvious reasons.   Another good option is to go with Hunter’s machete instead of armor.  Hunter’s machete increases your attack damage and can help you clear up monster camps quickly.  I suggest that you only use Hunter’s machete if you have solid runes with you.

Buffs and How They Affect Jungling

If you aren’t aware of it, Buffs are essentially extra “upgrades” that you gain after defeating certain monster camps.  One of the two buffs you should go for as soon as possible is the “Crest of the Ancient Golem” (also known as blue buff) which grants increased mana regeneration and faster cooldown reduction.  The second buff you should go for is the “Blessing of the Lizard Elder” (known as red buff), which increases your attack strength and slows the enemy down.   The third buff is the “Exalted with Baron Nashor” buff.  This buff grants increased health, increased mana regeneration, increased attack damage, and higher ability power.  It is suggested that you start with the red or blue buff.

Ganking

Ganking is an important part of the jungling strategy.  Ganking is attacking the enemy lane from neutral lands like the forest.  It can be an essential force in demoralizing and confusing the enemy as you attack from unknown angles and keep making the enemy guess.  There are some important rules to remember while ganking, the first is that you should never take on more than you can handle.  Don’t gank an enemy turret at full health, or don’t gank an enemy champion who is healthy and has minions right behind him.  You should also gank when the enemy attacks your ally, thus making the enemy think twice before attacking your ally again.

Counter-Jungling

Counter-Jungling is the antidote to the enemy’s jungling efforts.  The main focus in this strategy is to attack the monsters in the enemy’s jungle.  Another aspect of this strategy is to gank the same lane as the enemy’s jungler and thus putting their jungler on the defensive.  The main advantage to this strategy is that you thwarting the enemy’s jungler from gaining experience and Gold.  It’s important that you inform your team when you are counter-jungling, as it’s easy to get trapped if the enemy finds out that are you counter-jungling.  You should also use certain champions with a combination of speed, high damage and ability to escape.  I’d recommend champions such as Shyvana, Dr. Mundo, Nunu, Udyr, and Zed.

It’s very important that you know the enemy position before counter-jungling.  Counter-jungling is all about knowing the enemy’s position as well as the respawn times of the monsters in his jungle.  You should not spend too much time in the enemy jungle or they will absolutely catch on to what you are doing.

If the enemy is counter-jungling you, you should use vision wards to know exactly where the enemy’s counter-jungler is.  Wards are items that you can place near your jungle’s entrance to know when the enemy is entering your jungle.  This can allow your team to decimate the enemy’s counter –jungler before he has any chance of success.