So you want to be a jungler? Well you better suit up because being a jungler is one of the most mentally taxing and yet rewarding roles in the game. Junglers can very easily carry games but at the same time require a few things from you. Oh, and You're blamed for everything.

NOTE: Rememeber this is only the basics. I'll be writing a more in depth guide on the jungle later. Addtionally more advanced concepts that I will touch upon will often become outdated with thing's like meta changes and jungle buffs/nerfs, as well as Season 4 coming soon so there will likely be a large jungle overhaul. These are things that a person learning the jungle shouldn't have to take in to account or else it becomes overbearing and outdated as they are still learning if changes should oocur.

So without further ado WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE

What is Jungling?

Jungling is the act of going in to the forested area's on the Purple/Blue sides of the map and killing the monster's in this area rather than farming the minions that go down the lanes. Always take the summoner spell Smite if jungling.

Why is it a Good Idea to Jungle?

By taking the role of a jungler, you effectively give another lane full experience and gold in a lane, while also having an income yourself. This also allows the jungler to become a ganker, which we will cover shortly.

What is Ganking?

Ganking is ambushing an enemy champion in the hopes of either forcing him to return to base and miss experience and gold or in the best case scenario, kill him for money. This is one of the reasons why common junglers are champion's with Crowd Control like stun's and slow's.

When Should I Pick a Jungler?

A jungler is an amazing addition to a team in any situation, and almost never are there times where you won't want one as you won't be maximizing gold. Additionally you won't have the summoner spell Smite which is extremely important for last hitting Dragon/Baron so the enemy can't steal it.

When Should I NOT Pick a Jungler?

As stated, rarely is it a good idea not to. HOWEVER, Many junglers are unable to jungle reliably in the jungle at low levels when you don't have many runes/masteries, and will often die or be forced to go back to base unless they get a heavy leash.

What's a Leash?

Finally, ASK FOR A LEASH! A leash is when your teammates assist you in killing the Ancient Golem/Elder Lizard when they spawn, and run off shortly before it dies giving you full XP and Gold. This can help junglers both waste less potions tanking camps as well as stay at full hp so as to avoid being an easy target if someone tries to gank you.

This is a basic map of the jungle. We'll categorize the camps based on the difficulty it takes to kill them as your average jungler.

Baron Nashor

Big Bad Baron Nashor is the toughest of all the jungle camps and in most cases takes multiple champions to kill him, but offers the greatest reward. For killing Baron Nashor Your entire team, regardless of who killed it gains the buff Exalted with Baron Nashor, 300 gold and 900 experience. That's a whopping 1500 gold to your team, and thats not even counting the stats that it gives you.

A Few Things to Know: You can dodge Baron Nashor's knockup as it has a tell for when it's happening. A green puddle will appear below you and you can move away from it to avoid the knockup.

Baron Nashor attacks the closest target to him, so switch aggro between teammates to leave one teammate less vulnerable.

Baron's basic attacks apply the damage reduction.

NOTE: This picture is slightly outdated and as of the making of this guide, Voracious Corrosion now reduces ALL damage dealt to Baron Nashor by 50%, not simply reducing the targets attack damage by 50% anymore

This is a Dragon. Yep, a Dragon. Despite being a Dragon he's not too difficult to take down around 6-9 minutes with your team,as well as a few junglers being able to kill him that early solo Fiddlesticks Nunu & Willump and Nasus with his ult can all kill Dragon solo Make sure to use Vision Wards to clear out enemy vision or they WILL gank you and you will die and possibly give them Dragon. Killing Dragon will instantly give everyone on your team 190 gold, That's 950 gold in total so getting this is a top priority early on.

The Ancient Golem AND The Red Lizard These two guys over here are the starting camps that every jungler will kill first and are the third hardest camps to kill. Upon death the Ancient Golem will transer the buff Crest of the Ancient Golem, giving mana regen and 20% CDR. The Elder Lizard upon dying transfer the buff The Blessing of the Lizard Elder, better known as Red Buff. This buff enhances your auto attacks to deal deals 10-50 bonus true damage 3 times, as well as slow them. The Other Guys The initial spawn times for each of the small camps is 2:05 The respawn time of small camps is 50 seconds The Wolves are pretty simple and easy to kill. They can crit but you'll often barely notice and are usually quickly farmed before you're off to gank/put pressure somewhere. Additionally each small camp will heal a small amount when you kill the main monster. Wraiths are even easier than Wolves. Kill em, move on and gank/pressure. Now the Golem's are a little harder. Most jungler's have difficulty with them early on and are best avoided unless there's truly nothing else to do.

The jungle path is the route you will take during your first time clearing the jungle. The path you take is typically very simple and there aren't too many options but which one you take can make all the difference.

Path #1 (The Standard)

The standard jungle path people take is getting a leash at blue and not using smite (This is called a smiteless leash) and quickly rushing to red, use smite and gank as you will be level 3 with double buff making you a huge threat.

Path #2 (The Surpise Counterganker)

The second path is starting red buff smiteless, rush to blue and proceed to hide in either the top lane bush, or river bush top (And Vice Versa if You're purple) and wait to countergank the enemy jungler. Take this path if the enemy jungler is someone you think will take blue rush to red and gank top, as path #1 is a common tactic nowadays.

Path #3 (I got Invaded D:)

What's that? You got invaded? Well then you've multiple options. If they only went for a kill and backed off simply do your untaken buff and resume your normal path. If they took the buff as well you're gonna have to get a bit risky or end up behind. We'll assume here the enemy took blue. What you'll want to do is get a smiteless red and rush to their red, as rushing to their blue is the obvious thing to do and can get you killed and even more behind.

"Counter Jungling" is the act of invading the enemy jungle in the hopes of either stealing the enemies creep's, or in the best case kill the enemy jungler. When you should counter jungle is situational based on your jungler, the enemy jungler, and your teammates. If you see the enemy pick a vulnerable jungler early like Amumu or Fiddlesticks then you should try and get a strong early duelist I.E Lee Sin, Udyr, Xin Zhao or the best of them all, Shyvana to invade the enemy jungle and shut them down, as getting behind in the jungle is easy and very punishing. There are many other heroes who are great duelists early, I'm just listing a few.

Jungler's come in many different shapes and sizes, and have many different qualities but almost all of them have three thing's. Good base damage, CC (Crowd Control), and free stats (Although enough utility can be a tradeoff for this, like Amumu). The reason for this is a jungler is someone who want's to be a threat at all times, and because they are always around the map CC to deny kill's and screw tower dives is a strong thing to have as well. And finally this ties in with all 3, a jungler has a less steady income than laner's, meaning free stats help alleviate less gold, CC never fall's off, and good base damage help's them to burst down foes during early gank's. Here's a list of jungler's by category. The Counter Jungler section will have multiple hero's that already have categories because they also happen to be very strong duelists early

I'll be updating the description of these hero's as I update the guide.

The Everyman

These guy's are champion's that can both build as supportive tank's, or as carry's if the situation requires. Most are very flexible and can fit in to most comp's.

The Support's

These Champion's are almost exclusively played as tanky support's, and while some can play otherwise it's rarely optimal.

Alistar

Amumu

Zac

Rammus

Nunu & Willump

Nautilus

Nasus

Maokai

Malphite

Sejuani

Shen

The Carry's

These Champion's are one's who want to carry, but require quite a bit of gold to do so. Usually they're better laner's than they are jungler's but it's still possible. Despite being fairly weak in most aspects and only being able to build damage, their snowball potential is typically very high, turning one kill in to another in to another.

Shaco

Riven

Master Yi

Tryndamere

Jax

Diana

Darius

Fizz

Kha'Zix

Rengar

Zed

The Counter Jungler's

This is more of a sub-section than a real role, but it's one you should know nonetheless. Good counter jungler's are champion's with early burst, gap closer's and sticking power. They're also typically snowbally as well.

Lee Sin

Shyvana

Jarvan IV

Xin Zhao

Volibear

Shaco

Dr. Mundo

Darius

Olaf

Udyr

Trundle

Kha'Zix

The answer for the first question is simple. Champs like Xin and Nasus have very straightforward ganks paths, high sustain meaning they'll rarely be susceptiple to dying from counterjungling which means you're safer overall.

The other answer is a bit harder. With the exception of maybe Lee Sin most of these hero's require an immense amount of both jungle and personal knowledge with each individual one. Not to mention each has to get ahead or get behind mostly so its quite risky to pick them

Everyone loves makin' money, unfortunately being a jungler also means you'll be poorer compared to the lanes. Even if you farmed every single jungle camp at optimal times it would not give the same revenue as you would in lane. This means that if you want to get damage item's and destroy stuff you need to snowball, but NEVER get damage if you're your teams only possible tank/initator. Maybe get some minor damage item like Brutalizer or Phage but never go full damage if this is the case.

Generally if You're not snowballing You will want to buy support/tank item's such as Locket of the Iron Solari and Randuin's Omen. This also ties in to the next section. Item's with cheap component's are also item's that are generally good as a jungler rarely goes back with enough for say a B.F. sword.

THIS, MY FRIENDS IS THE HOLY LOCKET. As a jungler your income is still quite low leaving you to be a somewhat secondary support so if not snowballing cost efficient item's are key. This is that perfect item for a poor jungler. If ever in a tight spot and can't afford damage, or simply need a tank get this item as it's cost efficiency and aura make it well worth the cost.

The Math

The Locket of the Iron Solari costs 2500 gold and provides

300 health = 792g
20 armor = 400g
10% cooldown reduction = 322g

Additionally it provides an aura to everyone around the wearer giving

20 magic resist = 400g
10 health regen = 360g

Total Gold Value = 2274g

This make's the total gold value by yourself seem innefficent, however if the aura affects Your entire team the gold value boosts by 760 for every allied champion affected.

760g X 4 = 3040

This is the gold value the base value is boosted by if it affects your other 4 teammates. It isn't over yet however, as this item has an active

Unique: Shield yourself and nearby allied champions for 5 seconds, absorbing up to 50 (+10 per level) damage. 60 second cooldown. (600 range)

The active at level 18 gives 230 hp

230 HP = 606 gold

606 Gold X 5 = 3030

Knowing this using only the active makes the item efficient, even if it's only on yourself

2274 + 3040 + 3030 = 8344

So, in finishing while it is a bit unrealistic to have your entire team in the Locket aura at all time's you only require one person to be in it, or to use the active for the item to become efficeint

As I said earlier, being a jungler is the most mentally taxing of all the roles. Well maybe that was wrong. It was more like if you want to be a good jungler you need to be alert and focused and here is why. Remember these golden rules as a jungler if you wanna be good.

1# you require constant map awareness

Now to be fair having constant map awareness isn't that bad, and honestly it's something you should have as every role.

2# Knowledge of the hero you're playing and his optimal gank paths at any given time.

This one's just takes some time to get used to but it takes some research and practice before you can gank optimally at all times.

3# You require knowledge of the ENEMY Champion's standard paths and gank routes to counter him effectively

Knowing the enemy's typical route and taking measures to stop him is key to being an effective jungler. You need to put yourself in the mind of your enemy and think about what he's going to be doing and stop him from doing it

4# Do not make half hearted team decisions

Never try to do something your team isn't on board with. If you're going to gank bottom, and your ADC/Support don't want to go in, just back off. Don't keep trying for it. This goes for everything, if only half your teams onboard for something, then it's likely not going to work out.

5# Try to be a team captain

Actively try to help your team and avoid arguments. Doing well can make people listen to you, but try not to come off as condescending or ragey. I can't count the games that I've won by keeping team morale up because if your team thinks they're gonna lose, they aren't gonna try. Don't let that happen.

6# Camping pisses people off

Ever seen that guy who just rages when you camp his lane? I know I have, so what do I do? Camp s'more. Pissing off your enemies is a great way to throw them off, and make careless mistakes. Just by taking fun little jabs at the enemy they start raging insanely hard, amd feeding too. just don't be a ****.

7# DO. NOT. RAGE

I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH. Raging believe it or not LOSES you games. If you rage it's just going to throw you off because you'll be too focused on your teammates being bad, it'll throw them off and possibly make them troll in the worst case. Some people are noobs, but everybody's gotta start somewhere, saying "Why Ashe?" after she screws up isn't going to help anyone and it's not like you don't know the answer already. She screwed up, it happens to everyone but if you call her out on it that's only going to make things worse. You can't win em all but the least you can do is make the best out of a ****ty game

Man that was a lot of work since it was my first guide. Thank's of you actually read through the whole thing. If you've got any questions, criticisms, or noticed something I left out please tell me.


I'd like to thank JhoiJhoi for her amazingly comprehensive how to make a guide guide and her amazing line dividers as well as Riot for making such an amazing game.Also
Aliasear for the nice Locket icon,
NibblesmeKibbls for the icon below. I wish you all happy jungling on the fields of justice

And now that You're finished this guide you can safely say