Vainglory Forums

Hiiiiiii,

So as I progress in the skilltiers I've noticed that I'm not leveling as fast as the other players. I mostly play Catharine, Joule or Taka and 4 out of 5 games I'll stay two levels under the rest of the players. As Adagio or Saw I never have this problem. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

For Catherine, make sure you start out with Ironguard Contract and either rush Stormguard Banner for faster jungle clear or get crystal power. I assume you know to farm using her B ability and not too use her other abilities outside of PvP.
Obviously, lane heroes like Saw are going to level and gain gold much faster.

Farming in early game is really important and is much more important than kills. If you can drive the enemy out of their side of jungle early on then you have an advantage in gold and exp. So when you start the game, rush to the twin jungle creeps on the enemy's side of the "gold mine pit" and clear those before they can.

Much of the early to mid game should be devoted to farming and denying the enemy gold. Like I said above about kills, you shouldn't spend too much time hiding in bushes to gank (unless the enemy laner has pushed up to turret). Time spent waiting should be used to steal enemy side jungle camps and keep your jungle well-farmed. Don't bother waiting around for your creeps to respawn after they are cleared; either harass the enemy jungler with help or farm the lane and push. The key as a jungler is to roam and farm like mad.

Hope that clears it up. Obviously, their laner or carry is going to be a level above you once in a while, but if you are 2 levels behind it means you're not farming aggressively enough. Also, what is your current skill tier?

Thanks for such a quick reply!
If I'm the only jungler I go straight for Stormguard then level one boots then Warhorn, if theirs another jungler I get clockwork and variation of cp depending on the opposing team. Reason being, most times the other jungler wants to control the four camps on our said alone. So it's hard for me to go in the enemy territory alone and survive. When jungling alone I always start with her B ability and keep it maxed and mostly use her A ability for quicker movement throughout the jungle and evasive counters.

I'm going to start pushing further into the enemy camps like you said, I think this is where I'm falling short.

And I'm skill tier decent-ish

It sounds like you're already doing a good-job farming. I play Catherine a lot and I start with her B ability like you said. The difference is that I will stick to getting Warhorn regardless of what my teamp or enemy composition is. See, Catherine's abilities are already good without CP items. If you go Clockwork or CP, you'll be farming at literally a third of the speed you could farm with Warhorn (+100 dps PVE). Warhorn around the 9-10 min mark, or even Stormguard Banner will let you clear jungle camps like a breeze.

There's no need to use A to get around quicker since you'll run low on energy. Use it to chase or run a way. I prefer maxing her A instead of B because it increases the stun duration on an already reliable stun. Maxing B won't do any good for team fights since smart enemies typically ignore Catherine with her B up.

Unfortunately, most people in "Decent-ish" won't want to invade enemy jungle (I don't get it), so there's not much you can do about it.
Try your best to steal the two camps on the very edge of their side(top: a single healing creep, bottom: twin creeps). Use leashing; essentially kite the creep to walk over to your edge of the bush and kill it there.
Don't forget that you can always come back to your jungle after the you've cleared the enemy side. Jungle creeps increase in gold and experience overtime so there's only benefit in stealing enemy camps. Sorry for another lengthy reply, I felt that my earlier answer omitted some important things.

Good advices from jttm so +rep for you but... I'll add something. Watch out when you steal enenmy camps :
If you steal them, the enemy junglers will have less creeps to farm, so less damage taken so more health than you when they'll invade. Why would they invade ? Well since their time to farm was shorter and yours longer, they'll come visit you (At least that's what they do at my skill tier). Since you farmed more camps, as I said you'll have less health and they'll kill you easily (especially if they bought offensive items when you only bought a Ironguard Contract) if they are well coordonated. So watch out for it, it might explode back on you (happened to me more times than I could count)

Thanks Doudjr.
Adding on to what DoudJr said, more money equals more risk of dying. A great early game is the best outcome of this relation- your enemy has no kills on you and you get all their farm. At higher tiers, the risk becomes higher because enemies know what they're doing and will group up in the jungle to get you.
So I like to place some mines around camps, but so that the enemy is not likely to trip them. A lot of players think of mines as a source of damage, but they eat gold if replaced constantly and are best used for vision. When the enemy comes for you, you'll be able to see them on the minimap and run to a corner to recall to base. Map awareness is part of evading the enemy and taking their creeps.

+Rep to Jttm. I see people misusing mines all the time, even in "The Hotness". Mines for vision and properly timed flares give you an advantage that shouldn't be ignored. If you're at 12:00 or later in the game and you have an empty space in your build, you better be filling it with flares so your team doesn't walk into an ambush.