Patch 11.8 brought plenty of unorthodox picks the jungle.
You may have noticed a rise of popular laning champions finding their way into the jungle in your solo queue games, this is courtesy of the recent 11.8 patch. Solo lane champions Diana, Zed, Darius, Mordekaiser, and Morgana received buffs that greatly enhanced their jungle clear abilities and damage dealt to non-epic monsters.
During one of Riot’s Quick Gameplay Thoughts, Riot addressed their rationale behind their decision to turn such proficient laners into equally dominant jungle champions. This change seems targeted toward newer or lower ranked players, as Riot stated “Right now, the jungle is very intimidating to a lot of our players, especially in lower MMRs.”
This added potential to flex champions into the jungle is said to not replace their main roles as Riot devs elaborated “We always look to increase diversity to the experience of the game, and having a new set of junglers helps a lot in that regard.”
Feels like the wrong approach to balancing jungle is just buffing random champion’s clear speeds. People just want chemtank nerfs not to play Morgana Darius and Diana jungle. Just nerf chemtank to the floor that’s literally it
— Christian Rivera (@IWDominateLoL) April 15, 2021
Though champions like Diana may be a sudden solo queue menace, given her 150% damage increase off Moonsilver Blade against non-epic monsters, it is unlikely that we will see any of these champions transition to pro play. The competitive jungle meta is currently dominated by champions who synergize well with specific mythic items. Until the Turbo Chemtank or related items see nerfs, the Hecarim and Udyr meta will likely continue.
Check out our article on Chemtank tweaks!
This is however, an ongoing effort to make the jungle more accessible to players as Riot has expressed their interest in adding more viable jungle champions in the future.
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Image credit: Riot Games