The best jungle picks to help you with your ranked climb in LoL patch 12.18.
Jungle is a special role in League of Legends. You don’t exactly lane, so counter picks aren’t that big of a deal which means it is much more open to one tricking champions and nearly any champ can be played in the role. Still, playing a strong meta jungler can be the difference between winning and losing games, as there are always some champions that are head and shoulders above the rest. So if you are looking to win some games on patch 12.18, here are some of our jungle recommendations you can use.
Master Yi
The Wuju Master has always been a constant in the low elos, but ever since the 12.13 changes which gave the players the ability to choose where they will exit the Alpha Strike (Q), Master Yi has not only been a viable champion in all ranks but a strong one. Even after he got some hot fixes and Wuju Style (E) nerfs, not to mention he is due some more nerfs in the next patch.
The main strength of the current Yi is that it is nowadays much harder to punish someone for their weak early game, as the game can be delayed quite longer and comebacks are easier with objective bounties. This gives Master Yi a lot of time to farm for his two or three core items and with the absence of crowd control of non-meta engage supports like Nautilus and Leona, he can just take over games.
The builds are also quite diverse for Master Yi at the moment. You can choose to buy most of the crit or lethality Mythics, or even a Sunfire Aegis if you’d like. That’s because Master Yi’s doesn’t necessarily need any of them and delays it to the fourth or fifth item purchase. The biggest power spike right now is with on-hit items, rushing Blade of the Ruined King and Guinsoo’s Rageblade. After this, you can go defensive options like Death’s Dance/Guardian Angel, or choose to finish your Mythic.
Kayn
Kayn has been a staple pick for these kinds of “best to climb with” lists ever since he was introduced to League. He is a very strong skirmisher with a very fast clear and his Shadow Step (E) makes it very hard for enemies to predict his ganks. And when you consider his ability to either become an assassin with blue form or a bruiser with Red, it doesn’t offer much counterplay to his opponents.
In the current patch 12.18, both of Kayn’s forms are in a very good place. While Shadow Assassin was struggling a bit after the Durability Patch, Lethality buffs helped him recover a bit. But if you are looking to play Kayn, I would recommend going Rhaast in most of your games. Not only he is harder to deal with after the Grevious Wounds nerfs, but his new build with Eclipse gives him a pretty good power spike that can still one shot enemies while keeping him in fights with the shield.
Rek’Sai
Okay, this is an unusual recommendation. Rek’Sai hasn’t gotten any buffs, the latest change to her was the Durability Patch where she got negatively affected overall. But for some reason, the Void Queen is one of the best performing junglers of the patch, to the point where she saw play in LCS during its playoffs and she will get some base AD nerfs in patch 12.19.
The main reason for this is her early ganks, to be fair the whole reason is her early ganks. No jungler in the game can gank like Rek’Sai, thanks to her access to lanes with her Tunnel (Burrowed E). By using your Flash knock-up, you can guarantee early kills and snowball very easily.
Rek’Sai has a very good two item power spike with Prowler’s Claw and Edge of Night, but she will rapidly get outscaled by nearly everyone after this point so you should be really taking advantage of this. The best way to do it is to make sure you are getting objectives for your team.
Bel’Veth
The Empress of the Void was a balancing nightmare when she just came out. Too strong in the lower elos and not even playable in the higher echelon. But ever since she got some adjustments to her kit in patch 12.13, she has been raising in the rankings. And with some of her competition getting nerfed, she has been quietly becoming one of the best junglers in all ranks, even getting picked in the LPL Finals by JDG jungler Kanavi.
Bel’Veth currently is a very strong scaling champion, with a very vulnerable early game. If you decide to pick her up, make sure you are doing a good job of warding and tracking the enemy jungler as she doesn’t fare well when invaded early. She also doesn’t have great ganks, so you will need to focus on farming for your items and getting objectives. Getting an empowered Endless Banquet coral from epic monsters gives you a big power spike, doubly so if it’s a Herald. If you can manage to get an early Herald and get a dive off in a side lane, you can end games very easily.
The builds are also varying for Bel’Veth, except for your first item which always should be Blade of the Ruined King. The item is already strong by itself, but its interactions with Bel’Veth’s Royal Maelstrom (E) make it BiS for her. After this, you can either go for an aggressive Kraken Slayer/Guinsoo’s Rageblade on-hit build or a more tanky one with Frostfire Gauntlet.
Diana
So far in season 12, Diana has been “the” AP jungler in almost any patch, even though she fell in the priority in recent patches. Not many champions can match her in clear speed, 1v1 dueling or in team fights, and no other jungler can do all three of these to her level.
Despite her dominance, it took Riot till patch 12.16 to hit her with any nerfs. Even that though was not a complete nerf as Diana saw some decreased damage to her Moonsilver Blade passive damage but her Lunar Rush (E) got his AP ratio increased. This was an attempt to curb her problematic Sunfire/Nashor build. And despite having some effect, this off-tank build still performs very well with Demonic Embrace instead of Nashor’s Tooth and is her best win-rate build.
But of course, you can always go full AP one shot Diana with any of the AP Mythichs. Diana has always loved Hextech Protobelt, for both its passive effect and its active. And with the buffs to Night Harvester, it is once again a viable option when looking for multi-man ultimates.
Honorable mentions for patch 12.18
- Graves
- Fiddlesticks
- Karthus
- Volibear
- Udyr
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