Jungle: Where the Wild Ones Roam

The Jungler is a key influence in the pace of the game. If the Junglers are very passive and decides to farm rather than gank the lanes, the game will usually be much slower, and the game will turn into a farm fest, with very few kills in the begining. However if the Junglers  are constantly ganking you will see the game pace pickup and get much more tense and there is much more action. I see the Junglers as the play makers of the League of Legends world. It's often up to them to gank a lane, and swing it in one of the teams favors. This can be good or bad as a Jungler can swing it either way by doing certain things.

1. A Jungler can have a positive effect by putting pressure on a lane through ganking, whether this results in a kill, or just pushes the opposing champion(s) back off the minion wave and denying them farm. This puts your teammate in a good position to continue to farm and get more gold and experience than his opponent, giving him a lane advantage.
2. Another way a Jungler can have a positive effect is through counter ganking, often times a Jungler will have to "camp" a lane in order to swing it in that team's favor. This means that he spends a considerable amount of time in position to gank, or ganking a lane. If a lane is being camped by the opposing team's Jungler, the lane should be warded as much as possible, and the team's Jungler should get into position to counter gank. This often means hiding just out of site by a turret, or in side bushes along the lane. (I will get more into using the bushes in a later post.)
3. We've discussed  positive effects Junglers can have on their team's lanes, however an inexperienced Jungler can also have very negative effects as well. Ganks in balanced lanes always result in farm loss, this happens to the enemy team as well as your team. If the Jungler has several unsuccessful ganks and they don't force the lane off their minion wave, it can leave the Jungler, and his team's carry at a farm disadvantage as they are spending more time trying to kill the opposing team instead of farm.
4. Feeding of course has a very negative effect as well. I've seen entire lanes thrown because a Jungler acts to aggressive or gets counter ganked and gets himself killed, and sometimes his team. It's important to be patient as a Jungler and learn to judge whether it will be worth camping in a bush for a few seconds, or if you should just move on. A very important thing to remember is: The more time a Jungler spends in a lane, the more experience is taken away from that lane's champions and this can put them behind.

The great thing about the Jungle is that it has such a wide variety of champions that can use it. One of my favorite champions to jungle with is Evelynn. She offers great damage and burst, and her invisibility allows her to get into positions for ganks that might otherwise be impossible. Of course you always have to keep in mind what exactly your team needs. If your team is light on crowd control, it would be better going someone with less damage but more crowd control. Amumu and Maokai offer amazing crowd control with great gank potential through gaps closers like Amumu's Bandage Toss and Maokai's Twisted Advance.

If you need someone with a little bit more mobility, Shaco is a great choice for the Jungle. He has one of the fastest Jungle clears, he is a deadly counter-Jungler, and his invisibility allows him to setup ganks very well. This is not to mention his great damage output, and he can usually take out carries by himself if he sets up good boxes.

In conclusion, there is a lot of flexibility when it comes to the Jungle, and it is important to realize what your team needs and what they are good at. It's also important to understand when it is time to stay in Jungle and farm, and when to go and help out lanes and gank and this all comes with experience. A Jungler is a very important part of the game, and it make make or break games.