Riot Games has acknowledged that the jungle role in League of Legends is “in need of a touch up” and has outlined a series of planned changes for Preseason 2023.
in to lol pls blog published today (August 12), Riot has admitted that the jungle role – in which players roam across the map killing camps of enemies and assisting their team mates’ lanes – “hasn’t kept up with the times” and is “way too much” for new players to learn.
“Many League players see the wildly complex set of strategies and game knowledge required to be even slightly competent at the jungle and are scared away,” shared Riot. “We want to lessen this barrier to entry. One of the ways we’ll do that is by easing players in, showing them how to play the role, and adjusting mechanics so they’re less punishing and more intuitive. The goal here is absolutely not to dumb down the jungle or remove the ability to show off your jungle knowledge, but to make sure that jungle is complex in the right places.”
Riot added that it is exploring in-game aids to make learning the role easier, and new ways for junglers to communicate and co-ordinate strategies with their team. The blog also identified that too many champions in League of Legends are not competitively viable as junglers because they can’t keep up with how fast other champions can clear camps.
“If jungle clear optimization is no longer a major barrier-to-entry for jungle viability, way more champions can be played there,” explained Riot. “The meta is less set in stone, the jungle itself isn’t telling you that you’re bad at the game just because you picked Warwick and wanted to take raptors.”
Finally, there will be major changes to the starting items that junglers can buy – including the addition of pets.
“These pets will help you do little things in the jungle like clearing or taking down epic monsters (think old Sated Devourer puppy),” said Riot. “As you jungle, you slowly raise and feed your pet until they’ve grown up enough to be able to empower you.”
While these changes are not final, Riot’s jungle changes will be implemented during Preseason, a time where Riot typically makes larger changes to League of Legends that are riskier for the game’s balance.
Earlier in the week, Riot Games revealed a rework for Udyr, one of League of Legends‘oldest jungle champions.