League-of-legends – Counter jungling, how to do it, is it worth it

league-of-legends

Most teams on ranked games involve a jungler. It gives the team three advantages over non jungling teams:

  1. More team experience – a solo laner
    and a jungler will be a higher
    average level than two players in a
    single lane.
  2. More team gold – same as experience,
    the solo laner can last hit more
    minions and if your jungler is
    killing dragon then the benefits can
    be quite large.
  3. Ganking potential – freedom to gank
    any lane, forces players to be more
    defensive, makes teams spend more
    money on wards.

In my opinion, if the enemy has a jungler, a great idea is to pick an anti jungler. Someone with steal, shaco, eve are ideal. This can be even more effective than having a jungler on your team too because:

  1. Killing the enemy
    jungler usually means you can pick
    your enemy off when they are
    extremely vulnerable – easy first
    blood
  2. Stealing a buff early can totally
    ruin a junglers pace, giving your
    whole team the advantage

The downsides are:

  1. You are behind enemy lines, a
    predictable anti jungle/first blood
    attempt will have the exact opposite
    effect of what you had hoped for.
  2. It the jungler is a higher level
    than you, you are going to have a
    hard time countering them.
  3. You will probably struggle in lane
    if you get killed in the enemy
    jungle, putting you at a huge
    disadvantage.

Now the questions I want to know are:

  • Is it really worth the risk?
  • What are the best characters and set ups
    to be using for counter jungling?
  • What are the best methods of
    countering an enemy jungler?

Best Answer

Yes, it's worth it to pick another jungler. It does not necessarily have to be a counter-pick though, which probably needs some explanation:

  • The advantages you gave for having a jungler hold for your team as well.
  • What you labelled as 'more effective' does not really require a jungler at all (coordinate your team to kill the enemy jungler [wards!] or steal a buff)
  • Your downsides are too situation dependent:
    1. If behind enemy lines, you better know what you're doing. You have to be sure that your champ can live up to the enemy jungler and you have to make double sure that all other enemies are on their lanes. While it is a downside, it's one for which the risk can be dealt with.
    2. If their jungler is higher level than you, then either you have to improve your jungling, or you got killed/hindered before. Shouldn't happen for the first creep round, unless someone messed up their early game (see below)
    3. same as 1. Do not get killed in the enemy jungle. The enemy jungler shouldn't be able to kill you (or you shouldn't enter his lair!) and if you get ganked it's your fault for losing track of your enemies. If you suspect only a single enemy missing that might come for you, you better be on your way back to your jungle.

Anyways, double jungle teams are quite a common thing, because neither team wants to ignore the advantages gained by having a jungler. However, it also means that your team should know how to deal with that situation. Here's a few tips for general two-junglers-play:

  • Prepare for more ganks on both sides. For both junglers it's usually safer to gank, than to visit the other side's forest.
  • Make your jungle starting save. Not getting harassed while you get your first buff is extremely important. The team should realize this and protect you. Place your mates into the forest access points near the river to watch out for early ganks. Only let them leave, once the buff is save.
  • Of course, you can turn this around too and try to gank the enemy jungler with your team. Not just a single counter-picked champ, but 2+ champs.

As you can see, two junglers are possible, do make sense, and generally lead to very fast and intensive gameplay. Beware on random groups though, as a two-jungler game demands a lot more from all players and failure is easy to achieve in that setting.