Arena of Valor (AoV) - Jungling Basics (How to Jungle)

The basics of jungling in Arena of Valor (AoV), with an explanation on why jungling is important, and what kind of monsters you'll encounter in the jungle.

What is Jungling?

The jungle is the area in between the lanes on the map. The jungle is populated by neutral monsters that grant experience and gold when defeated. Some monsters additionally grant the player or team a powerful buff that can turn the tide of the match.

Defeating all the monsters in the friendly jungle will give the player enough XP to level up from 1 to 4, allowing for early ganks and a quick lead. Players who focus on leveling is this way are known in Arena of Valor as junglers.

Monsters in the Jungle

Seagle

The least dangerous of neutral monsters, Seagles are the dragons that patrol the river next to the top and bottom lanes. Completely passive, the monsters won’t even retaliate when attacked. Slaying this creature will spawn a special light which will patrol around the enemy’s jungle and reveal any heroes it passes by.

Might Golem


Defeating the Red Golem will grant the player with a buff that reduces enemy movement speed when a normal attack hits and deals extra burn damage for a period of time. This buff is a good tool in ambushing enemies early game, as they don’t usually have any options to counter the effect of this buff.

Sage Golem


Defeating the Blue Golem will grant the player with 20% cooldown speed and 2% mana regeneration per second for its duration. This buff compliments mages well and is best suited for them. That said, other heroes can benefit from the buff as well.

Spirit Sentinel


The Spirit Sentinel resides across the river from the Dark Slayer. Defeating it will grant the player 50 HP regeneration per second as well as 20 bonus movement speed for  60 seconds. After exiting combat, movement speed is increased by an additional 40. The Spirit Sentinel is weaker than either than the Dark Slayer or Abyssal Dragon and can therefore be easily killed alone.

Abyssal Dragon


Defeating the Abyssal Dragon will grant the slaying team gold and experience. It is important to kill the Abyssal Dragon and prevent the opposing team from doing so. This is because the team who slays the dragon most frequently will have a level and gold advantage over their opponents.

Enraged Abyssal Dragon

Ten minutes after the Abyssal Dragon spawns, it will evolve into a much more powerful version of itself – the Enraged Abyssal Dragon. Killing the Enraged Abyssal Dragon grants the slaying team gold and experience, in addition to powerful buffs unique to each of the hero classes in the team. Below is a list of the buffs granted to each of the six hero classes.

  • Tank: recover 1% of Max HP every second
  • Warrior: increases attack damage by 50 (+10%)
  • Assassin: increases armor pierce by 100, magic pierce by 75, and movement speed by 20
  • Mage: increases ability power by 75 (+15%)
  • Marksman: increases critical chance by 10% and armor pierce by 15%
  • Support: Unique Passive – nearby heroes recover 100 HP and 50 Mana every 5 seconds

The Enraged Abyssal Dragon also drops the Abyssal Stone, a powerful item that grants the player who picks it up temporary invincibility for 0.5 seconds when taking lethal damage, and recovering 1000 (+10% max HP) HP.

Introduced in the 2018 Winter Wonderland update, the attacks the Abbysal Dragon (and its and enraged form) as well as the Dark Slayer will reduce the HP recovery of heroes by 50% for 5 seconds.

Dark Slayer


Dark Slayer is the strongest monster in the jungle. Even with a full build of tier 3 items at level 15, the Dark Slayer can be very difficult to kill. As such, it’s much better to rally with your team when planning to fight it. Defeating the Dark Slayer grants the team a 1% a second HP/Mana regeneration for a period, 20% additional movement speed for 9 seconds when leaving the Altar in base, and recovery granted by the Altar goes into effect when remaining in battle for 90 seconds. What’s more, defeating the Dark Slayer allows the player who killed it to summon the Drake for 90 seconds.

It is also worth mentioning that defeating either the Enraged Abyssal Dragon or the Dark Slayer will cast the Abyssal Curse on the entire slaying team. This debuff significantly lowers the team’s damage against the Dark Slayer and Enraged Abyssal Dragon for a long time.

Drake

The Drake is technically not a jungle monster but a unique summonable monster that will attack the enemy’s towers or minion waves, and is available for the player who killed the Dark Slayer. Below are some of its characteristics in battle.

  • Drake out-ranges towers. Each time the Drake attacks a tower, counter damage is inflicted upon itself. The Drake will fly away once its HP is depleted.
  • After being summoned, the Drake grows continuously for 10 seconds, gaining 7% damage reduction every 2 seconds, up to a maximum of 35%.
  • The Drake has a movement speed of 300 and aligns with that of the minion waves.

The Drake survives for a maximum of 3 minutes after summoning it. Bear in mind that the player who obtains the Drake summon after killing the Dark Slayer should summon it within a minute and 30 seconds after obtaining it (otherwise, the summon will be lost). The Drake’s summonable period is also indicated by its icon at the bottom of the screen that constantly ticks away after obtaining it.

Role of a Jungler

The role of a jungler is to level up by defeating the monsters in the jungle. Heroes in the jungle level up faster than those in the lane, so having a jungler on your team can give your team an early advantage in the game. A number of items in the game assist junglers slay monsters and level up quickly.

Another role of the jungler is to ambush enemies. Since they spend most of the time in the jungle, they won’t be shown on the map unless they are spotted by an enemy. Hiding in the bushes and launching surprise attacks is rather easy for junglers as a result. Furthermore, a jungler’s ability to level quickly gives them access to their ultimate ability faster than any of the heroes in the lane. Ultimates greatly increase a hero’s killing power, and so a jungler can be a huge threat to laning enemies in the early game.

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