Jungling: Bilgewater Cutlass

Bilgewater Cutlass is a much-maligned item. What little play it saw vanished with the nerfs to Hextech Gunblade some months ago. As a jungler, however, I find Cutlass to be an item with potential.

My opinion of Cutlass changed when, on a whim, I built it instead of Wriggle's Lantern while jungling Jax. Though I sacrificed Armor, free wards, and the unique proc I gained AD, Life Steal, and an incredible active for ganking and dueling. Subsequently I dominated the game, enough to motivate an analysis of the role my early item choice played.

It's important to consider Cutlass on its own, without assuming it will be upgraded into Gunblade. While Jax and a few oddball junglers obviously enjoy Gunblade, the vast majority of junglers do not make good use of both AD and AP. On many champions Gunblade might not be the worst idea in the latest stages of a game, but realistically Cutlass must be treated as an alternative to Wriggle's.

Cutlass worked well in my Jax game because he has extremely high single-target damage, even without items. Through his passive and his ultimate's passive he already demolishes buff camps and dragon. Because Jax' simply doesn't need Wriggle's procs or defensive stats to quickly clear even the toughest of camps, the superior ganking and dueling power of Cutlass is more valuable.

The requirement for building Cutlass over Wriggle's is therefore the ability to clear and control the jungle without Wriggle's. Without this ability, no matter how much Cutlass' active may aid your ganks, Cutlass is not a viable alternative. Moreover, Champions who commonly build double gp10 will largely be uninterested in Cutlass. Unfortunately for Cutlass the list of champions who can both control the jungle without Wriggle's and don't build double gp10s is very small.

While Cutlass has potential on a handful of champions, it won't be replacing Wriggle's any time soon. I highly recommend trying it on Jax or any champion you think can get away with it, but most champions will still be better off with Wriggle's or double gp10s.

Jungling: Wriggle's Lantern

Since its introduction in patch v96 Wriggle's Lantern has been a jungling standard. It gives a jungler everything they could want: sustain, durability, damage, and free wards. Wriggle's is also highly overrated.

For all its benefits Wriggle's is no longer the de facto jungling item it once was. It was designed with a very different jungle in mind, one which was unforgiving and brutal. Between the mastery and jungle remakes that difficulty, and the necessity of Wriggle's, vanished. Clearing the jungle safely and quickly no longer requires a specialized item.

This is not to say that Wriggle's should never be built, but that it should be built only when it has strong synergy with the jungle champion. These champions are typically, but not always, bruisers with attack speed steroids or spammable resets, making them threats to dragon as soon as they've completed the item. Without that threat the value of Wriggle's drops dramatically. Champions whose clear times and dragon control don't significantly improve with Wriggle's are usually better off with a different item.

Too often the community defaults to Wriggle's for new jungle champions. Despite the fact that Nautilus has the worst attack speed scaling in the game and is clearly from the Amumu school of jungling (i.e. Philo + Hog) I've seen Wriggle's on him many times. Hecarim is a less obvious example, but his lack of attack speed steroids and huge synergy with movement speed and CDR (e.g. Shurelya's) puts him in a similar category. It's important make item decisions based on an examination of a jungler's qualities rather than auto-piloting a build.

Again, Wriggle's is not a bad item, but it is not the preeminent jungling tool it once was. The alternatives have never looked better, and should be considered even on champions who historically have been lantern bearers.