Reign of Gaming

I might be reading the original post incorrectly, but I think he was describing dying trying to solo the blue buff and then his top laner came down to take it after he died. In this context I would say you need to ask for a leash to help you do your first camp clears. Also make sure you start with the appropriate items (machete + 5 health pots on 95% of all junglers) and appropriate runes (at least full armor yellows) and masteries. Evelynn has a somewhat rough first clear so you will almost certainly need a decent leash. 

I typically play on about 80 ping. I generally consider this a slight advantage over anyone with 200 ping or higher. I'm not sure how much the range from 10-100 ms ping matters. Probably a very very marginal difference. This might deserve a different thread, but I would personally say that Hardware holds more people back than ping. I play on the very lowest game quality settings and manage 50ish fps while laning and like 20 fps in teamfights. On a side note, my mouse sometimes goes on the fritz and doesn't register clicks, but $20 can fix that problem a lot easier than the fps. (I use task manager to end all unnecessary programs before I play games). With a top of the line gaming computer, I think a good portion of the community would be able to compete at a substantially higher level of play. (Bronze II / III for reference, but I play like 1 ranked game every week so... probably a bad example)

Admittedly this is a difficult problem to accurately quantify, because if you are good at games you probably invest in better hardware anyway. If anyone has experience playing on both a 6GB ram quad-core with dedicated graphics and also like 2GB dual-core with integrated graphics, maybe they could report their observations.

I don't know if they are nerfing Kha' Zix in the strictest sense of the word. They are thinking about moving around a lot of numbers so it's hard to know exactly where he will end up. I think pre-11 he might end up being stronger, but his late game might take a slight hit. As far as I've heard. Evolve W uses less mana, slightly less damage, built in 20% slow, no longer procs passive. Evolve Q, pretty big buff damage wise. Evolve R loses the damage reduction, but gains 4 stealths instead of 3. I don't really remember what they might do to the leap, but iirc it was minimal.

In my opinion, the best part about these item sets in general is the ability to put all the dang consumables together. Seriously... would it have been much harder for Riot to put pink wards and blue elixers in the consumables page of zyra for example? It's not like there was a lack of room.

Also very handy never to have to dig for items like Bulwark again, which is (Riot) recommended on a surprisingly low number of melee champions.

Not the easiest interface, but I have a lot of friends that I usually have to wait for them to finish games, so it's nice to have something "productive" to do during that time.

Perhaps you have seen it, but if you want at least one example of a high level Zyra jungle, you can watch it done by SaintVicious. Unfortunately it is S2 because it was near her release day, but if you are looking for some "strategic" ideas, it's better than nothing.

Even though this was when Zyra was "more OP", she has a significant buff in the S3 jungle because the monsters will target the plants. If you can micro the damage they take, you can jungle without taking too much damage beyond the first clear.

I would suggest starting machete/5 > spirit stone > sorc boots > spectral wraith/kage's pick > haunting guise > Rylai's > situational

Starting with some CDR should get you to 35ish% with spectral wraith and passive so you can spam plants all day.

Anyway the video (even if you get nothing out of it, it's still pretty funny)

Quote from BadPlayer6 »

Quote from A2ZOMG »

ALWAYS kill the tower.  No exceptions.

I agree with this.

However, I think there's a distinction that hasn't been brought up in this thread: there's a differences between actively working towards bringing down the tower, and taking down the tower when the opportunity just happened to present itself.

Should you take the turret if the opportunity presents itself? Yes. Should you be mindlessly pushing your lane in order to take the turret all game every game? Absolutely not.

I think this sums it up pretty well. There are specific circumstances (almost exclusively in premade teams) that leaving a tower up might be part of the strategy. If played well, a three champion zone on the enemy top laner at their T2 tower could put them behind even 3 levels which is brutal in a comparison to lvl 7 to 4 or so. However, in solo queue I personally have the opinion that the advantages of taking the tower are always better than the advantages of leaving it up. Teams can very rarely actually make use of the "tower still up" advantage so why bother. Pressure and slowly damage and take the tower. Don't be overzealous, there isn't really a rush to do it during the laning phase, but I know I'd enjoy the exp and gold so take it when it's easy. In the professional scene, there are instances of both tower rushing and aggressive zoning, but a vast majority are just strategic movement of champions to undefended (minimally defended) turrets.

Quote from Insanitism »

@Above.

Never, in your life will you have to 1v1 a Xin/Vi/Lee, ANYONE at level 1.

You will not trade blows until you die

You will not duel

YOUR TEAM/ THEIR TEAM WILL COME AND TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THAT BEFORE ANYONE OF YOU GUYS GET HALF HP

If before your jungle starts and somehow 1 person pops up, you must have such a bad team... Not a single leash?

Their team must be bad, solo invade?

These situations just do not occur in LoL... 1v1 them anyday lvl 1? What a joke...

HOWEVER, 1v1 lvl 2/3/4 is completely relevant, which by then they will have half their kit...With your e and q, you'll duel lee? xin? No, i dont think so.... Mundo simply does not have that power.

Ouch. You sure told me. Did I say these 1v1s happen all the time? It was simply a statement in response to a comment that suggested that Dr. Mundo is particularly more susceptible to invasion than any other jungler. He's not. In an invade situation, the jungler with the "ambush or surprise" will have a large advantage simply due to the ability to prepare for a skirmish so even lvl 2-4 fights are largely more tactics than even actual 1v1 power. You can all but ignore Dr. Mundo's sub-par sustain and typically low clearing health with a smiteless red/ blue leash and do a double buff lvl 3 clear to gank. You should be able to escape any low level invades in these circumstances.

Quote from Insanitism »

Back to topic, your list is completely opinionated and FoTM

Under each champion, please write why they are under and above every champion around them and explain them without bias.

If you can successfully do this, you will not have that "tier list" you'll have something like Stonewall808's comprehensive tier list/chart with Gank ratings, sustain ratings, transition ratings

If someone exists that does the job so well, why on earth would you disregard it and create your own tier list?

Insolence.

I don't think Legend ever alluded that his list was better than Stonewall's nor suggested it was anything besides an educated opinion. This thread is for the discussion of relative strength of junglers in the current meta and if you have some specific thoughts on how you think it should be adjusted, perhaps you could share them so Legend can evaluate/try it/adjust his opinions accordingly. This thread was made for fun. While I agree that Stonewall's tier list is more informative and provides a much clearer comparison of his educated opinion on champion strength in many different aspects of the game, he does not have a "monopoly" on the jungle tier lists, so threads like this can be places where junglers compare opinions and hear about new things.

This thread and the majority of the posts here are far from "Insolent" which is more than can be said for your last 2 posts. Hypocrisy at its finest.

 In some manner of actual discussion:

Quote from Richardhand»

Thought i would post here instead of making a new thread.

I have used the 'revamped' trundle in ~5 ranked games so far and have felt almost useless.

My problem with him is he has no damage output what so ever. He must be the lowest damage in the game right now due to having no real base damage on any ability.

Try getting phage or brutalizer much earlier. Like before you even finish your boots, that might help. When you get near 6 items you can upgrade to FM or BC. I don't really play Trundle so I can't really give many specifics based on personal experience, but spectating a few winning Trundle games might give you some ideas.

Quote from camk12 »

Mundo is such a bad jungle right now, His sustain is terrible, by the time he clears blue(if he started red) he has no hp left.  If he gets invaded at his red by someone like xin, vi, lee sin, etc. he is dead.  Even if he doesnt he is too low to gnak at this point and must back while other jungles that you term FotM are ganking and farming.  Part of the tier list is keeping it up to date with the changes made in game and mundo and non sustain jungles or jungles that have trouble ganking early are weak and usually will fall behind the current top tier jungles.

Nice job listing his downsides but entirely avoiding his strengths. Not every champion can be a super ganker/easy sustainer. I can agree that he has some issues and plenty of risks in his play, but is nowhere near as bad as you make him to be. Also, as Dr. Mundo I'd take a 1v1 vs Xin, Vi. or Lee Sin at level 1 any day.

I'd say more, but it's already been said here: Is Dr. Mundo useful anymore?

I'm a little torn on Skarner right now. I picked him up a few weeks before the "bug-fix" (basically nerf) to how his ult works.

I did really well with him right off the bat and found him very strong at carrying from the jungle. Then I had a really long losing streak in games where I used him. (I don't think it was anything I was doing specifically wrong, just happened to be unlucky on teams where I picked him.) so I more or less just stopped using him. About 6 weeks ago I played a few games and won some with him again and found him really fun (as I remembered), but otherwise just seemed lackluster compared to other choices. It's slightly hard to put my finger on it, but he needs a little change. I think a slight ult -ease of use- buff would be nice. Just a minor increase in the range (like 10-15%) of use and a quicker animation. I would even trade that for a 50% reduction in suppression duration because eventually it becomes damn near impossible to even get the thing off. You get kited to death getting there and then desired targets can flash or gap close right out of it. The rest of his kit is fine; although E is pretty mediocre as far as abilities go, the Q and W synergy is really strong so it balances out. Some slight kit issues aside, he is extremely versatile in build. It's said that Skarner scales well with anything besides Crit.

There are a few hard choices to make in his builds though. Rush sherelia's so you can catch someone to ult, but die due to no tanky items, or get damage/tank items but rarely catch your targets. Tough call, especially when behind.

Regarding ghost/flash -  I would personally pick flash still because of the good innate movement speed boost on his W and good uptime in fights, but I still certainly see the use in picking ghost and think it's a perfectly viable choice.

All in all, (in my opinion) he is very fun to use in the jungle and, at a base level, pretty simple too. Is he viable in solo queue? I would say yes, but on the low end. As it's been said above, there are better tank junglers, better offensive junglers, and better initiating junglers. Just make sure you know why you pick him for your team comp and try to avoid picking into kite or slow heavy enemy teams.

I've been starting fairie charm, ward, 4 hp, 1 mana on mids pretty much since the first flask nerf. It kind of suggests more of a farming mind set (at least to me) because it's doubtful you'll be able to kill them and with the sustain and ward, it's doubtful they can kill you.

I've contemplated starting sapphire crystal + 2 hp on champions like Morgana if you know it's going to be a really safe lane, but I've only done it once or twice. Seems too risky in most cases.

As for top, I go cloth + 5 in 95% of all situations now.

I'm not sure what others think, but it seems to me that Riot doesn't know what the hell they want for early game items. Making the flask, then nerfing the flask, nerfing boots, nerfing pots, nerfing elixers, and honestly with those as precedence I wouldn't be surprised if the price of cloth armor goes up.

I'm starting to think we should just get to start the game with 0 gold and get 1 free ward and 3 free pots. Then at least Riot could be honest with themselves about how they don't understand early game item balance. (Early item choices are seriously one of my only pet peeves though, I think Riot does a pretty good job on everything else)