5 Tips to Help You Impact the Map as the Jungler
Learning how to have more of an impact in League of Legends will heavily increase your chances of winning the game as you’ll be more involved and can potentially dictate the game’s outcome.
Junglers have one of, if not the most important job in the early parts of the game. You need to learn how to have more of an impact as a Jungler to increase your chances of winning the game and snowball your lead into a victory.
This article is brought to you in partnership with our friends from ONE Esports, check them out for more awesome LoL content!
Tips to Help You Impact the Map as the Jungler
- Play Around Your Champion Power Spikes
- Abuse Predator Cooldown
- Objective Control
- Warding Tips and Tricks
- Understand Jungle Paths
1. Play Around Your Champion Power Spikes
You need to play around your power spikes in League of Legends. If you do not play your best with the tools available to you, you’re going to struggle to help your allies. There are many different power spikes in League of Legends but for many Junglers, it’s about knowing when you’re strong and when you’re weak.
Some champions are strong early game skirmishers such as Lee Sin or Viego and should try to gank as often as possible in the early game to get a lead. However, some champions are not very strong until level 6 like Amumu as he needs his Ultimate to really come online. Without his Ultimate, he cannot really gank too well.
Playing around your power spikes is very important, and you need to do as much as you can whenever you can. For instance, a weak early game champion, like Amumu should power farm and then start ganking as soon as he has his Ultimate. Whenever his Ultimate it is on cooldown, farm, farm and farm, and then gank again when your Ultimate is back up.
2. Abuse Predator Cooldown
Some champions in League of Legends like to take Predator as their main keystone. This rune is very good at helping them close the gap between the enemy, and it can also help them to force ganks in warded lanes thanks to the extra movement speed which gives the enemy less time to react.
We’ve briefly mentioned abusing cooldowns already, but make sure you abuse your Predator cooldown and try to gank whenever you have it available to you in the early game. It will make ganking a lot easier, especially in the matchups that are somewhat harder to gank.
3. Objective Control
The next thing you can work on to improve your impact on the map is by looking to secure objectives such as the Dragon and Rift Herald. Most Junglers nowadays can solo these objectives without much of an issue, but usually, you’ll have to instigate taking the objective as your team may not help you to take it.
Whenever you have the opportunity to, you should try to take the Dragon as it provides global stats for your team which can help you win the game. The more Drakes you get, the earlier the big Dragon buff will appear, and the higher the chances you have of winning the game. Champions such as Karthus can solo this objective on their own.
Similarly, try to take the Rift Herald on your own as early as you can. The Rift Herald is a very good objective and it can allow you to gain a large gold lead. Gank a lane, kill the enemy and then place the Rift Herald down and take the tower plates. The extra gold will help you complete your first item quicker compared to the enemy.
4. Warding Tips and Tricks
The next way you can have more impact on the map is by having good vision control. Let’s start with buying Control Wards. As a Jungler, you need to buy lots of Control Wards throughout the game. They will help you in the long run in a variety of ways. Firstly, you may wish to place Control Wards on objectives to help you spot the enemy Jungler, deny vision and also make taking these objectives safer.
The next thing you can do is place wards in the early game via your trinket. Place wards in high traffic areas which you know the enemy Jungler will take. This will help you spot them before they gank a lane, or before they take the objective. By knowing where they are, you could potentially counter them.
Here are some good warding spots we recommend for the Jungler. You can find a lot of additional warding images in our in-depth warding guide which has tons of examples for every role.
When you change your trinket to a sweeper, make sure you sweep high-traffic areas and bushes before ganking a lane. This will increase your chances of successfully ganking your allies.
Finally, you can increase your map pressure by taking the Scuttle Crabs whenever you can. The extra vision they provide will help you and your team know where the enemy Jungler is. It can also prevent the enemy Jungler from taking the Dragon or Rift Herald as they know it’s warded.
5. Understand Jungle Paths
This one might be a bit weird, but hear me out! By understanding the best and most optimal jungle paths for each champion, you’ll have more impact on the map as you can have a healthy and fast clear. This advantage may help you in the fight for the first scuttle crab.
This is the best first clear for Sejuani. You can find all the jungle routes for every Jungler in the game by checking out the Mobalytics Champion page for your favourite champions.
However, by also knowing how each Jungler paths, you can know where the enemy Jungler will be at any given time. This could provide you with a lot of opportunities. For instance, if you’re a strong counter Jungler like Wukong, you could counter their ganks and turn the exchange around. Alternatively, if you’re weak at counter ganking in the very early game like Kindred, you could try to invade their other side jungle, take a nearby objective, or gank another lane.
All in all, learning jungle routes or having an understanding of where champions maybe will help you in the long run improve your map pressure.
Final Thoughts
Impacting the map can be somewhat challenging for a new player, but once you start to play the role more often, you’ll find yourself being able to pull off and make certain plays. We hope these tips and tricks will help you improve when playing in the Jungle role. Remember to check out our friends at ONE Esports for more awesome League content.
