League of Legends Patch 9.17 jungle tier list aggregation – Mundo jungles where he pleases

Falling Champions

Jarvan IV (S to A+ tier)
Nunu & Willump (A+ to A tier)
Hecarim (A+ to A tier)
Karthus (A+ to A tier)
Lee Sin (A to B+ tier)
Kayn (A to B+ tier)
Warwick (B to C tier)
Shyvana (C to D tier)

Observations

None of these champions got touched in this patch or back in 9.16, so none of these drops can be accounted for by champion changes. In addition, only Nunu and Karthus have drops that are around those tier boundaries, meaning that their change is more due to shifts in power by other picks than them being weaker in the meta. So is there a common theme between the rest of these champions?

Yes, actually, and it’s one we touched on briefly already. They’re all Divers.

Jarvan (the number one jungler from the previous patch), Hecarim, Lee Sin, and Warwick are all Divers. Heck, even Kayn and Shyvana are very similar to Divers even though they are classified as an Assassin and Juggernaut, respectively.

It appears the jungle meta has shifted to favor Assassins over the Divers that were previously so strong in Patch 9.17. My theory as to why this is (and it’s just a theory) has to do with one of the bigger changes to Patch 9.16.

You see, back in 9.16, Biscuit Delivery got a nerf which cut back on the amount of sustain players would have access to for free during the laning phase. This means that lanes are far more volatile early and can snowball more easily. This favors Assassins over those Divers who can take advantage of laners with lower health (since they don’t have as much crowd control, they need that health advantage to make the most of their heavy burst, especially before they get items).

So, for now, Assassins are the cream of the crop in the jungle. Fret not, though, all you Bruiser players; half of the top ten junglers in the 9.17 meta are still Divers.