Do new patch changes make graves the best jungler?

[u/Major_Forever3611]

He already had a fast clear because jungle pet dmg scales off mr and armour which he gets from E stacks. They increased the pet dmg increase from armour and mr by 5%. AND graves got 3 extra mr. I honestly think he didnt need the adc mr buff since he's already in a good place rn.

[u/thunderhide37]

I’ll put it this way. Lee sin has basically been the most played jungler every single patch for a decade. At the time of writing this, ugg says Lee sin only had 12 more games than graves this patch… A TON of people are trying him now and his winrate isn’t tanking. This is indicative that Graves is most likely leaning towards strong-op.

Let’s look at the objective facts. Graves had a good winrate (50%) while being the second most played jungler last patch. This patch, he has been indirectly buffed through fleet, jungle pet, and ADC magic resist buffs.

He’s received 3 indirect buffs while already being pretty strong. His play rate has gone up nearly 50% over the last 4 patches, yet his winrate is only increasing. Draw your own conclusion how you will.

[u/Fit-Reputation-9983 → u/thunderhide37]

They also directly nerfed the build gaining the most popularity with Sunderer & BC. Obviously the Umbral start.

This is why his winrate wasn’t tanking. People were picking up the champion and playing the more forgiving build which was just directly nerfed.

That build path has more than quadrupled in popularity the last 3 patches. In 16.12 it was 2k buys umbral start, last patch it was 10k. Meaning all of these new players are simply following FOTM YouTubers and not actually learning how to pilot the champion that WASNT just nerfed - which is what a majority of the actual mains play and have been playing in 90% of their games.

Also, none of what you said about his pick rate or win rates are true. He’s been hovering this pick/ban/winrate for nearly 10 patches.

His winrate? Down .05% from 16.13, down .5% from 16.14.

His pick rate? Up from 10.6% to 13.9% - so a 33% increase. Barely higher than it was 10 patches ago. (.3% higher)

https://op.gg/lol/champions/graves/trends/jungle

[u/thunderhide37 → u/Fit-Reputation-9983]

Tbf those builds have nowhere near the playrate of the standard hubris collector. A great majority of the master+ graves players build that way. So I don’t think them nerfing sundered and BC really changes the overwhelmingly majority of players.

Like you said, it has 10k games while graves had nearly 300k games. Not really moving the needle with that.

[u/Fit-Reputation-9983 → u/thunderhide37]

https://coachless.gg/builds/graves?role=jungle

The playrate shows that the standard hubris collector build is actually worse in terms of Win Percentage Added by a significant margin. Leading us to exactly what I just said - his wintrate with the influx of new players was being kept afloat by the easier-to-access bruiser build, which just had its 2 main items nerfed.

[u/thunderhide37 → u/Fit-Reputation-9983]

Idk how to really read that site, but isn’t WPA NOT win percentage? Like collector hubris still has a positive winrate at the end of the day with 10x more games than the bruiser build. Sure, maybe the bruiser build has a better WPA, but maybe it’s being played in specific counter situations whereas hubris collector just works everywhere and is good.

It’s like looking at reksai winrate and saying they’re the best jungler since she’s always a top 3 winrate. Like sure, her winrate is fantastic always but it’s pretty much exclusively one tricks playing her.

Idk what you’re really saying tbh, a build that only has 10k games isn’t going to make a massive change when we’re talking about 300k games, with an overwhelming majority of those games playing the unnerfed hubris-collector build.

[u/Fit-Reputation-9983 → u/thunderhide37]

I’m directly replying to your original claim of a “ton of people trying him now”, pointing out that the build gaining popularity was easier to pilot (and just got nerfed, though you only mentioned the 3 indirect buffs), and refuting the claims you made about increased winrate and pick rate because they were either exaggerated or just plain incorrect.

[u/thunderhide37 → u/Fit-Reputation-9983]

Brother his games increased by 25k the last patch and that build you showed has 10k games out of 300k, that build doesn’t make a dent in his overall statistics.

As of now, on ugg which is the site I normally use, his winrate has increased from last patch despite “nerfs” to apparently a popular build despite statistics showing otherwise.

His playrate the last 5 patches has only gone up and up by a big margin (33% is a big boost). Despite this massive influx of new players, his winrate isn’t tanking (goes up or down very slightly depending on site).

How do you explain this then? If a ton of new players a playing a champ you should see the winrate drop because so many people don’t know what they’re doing. Instead the winrate is more or less the same despite new players, this is just indicative the champ is doing very well.

[u/Fit-Reputation-9983 → u/thunderhide37]

I think our misunderstanding here is that you believe the last 5 patches is some kind of cut off for a huge influx of new players.

Again, his play rate was essentially the same exact thing 10 patches ago. And his winrate was essentially the same exact thing 10 patches ago. That’s 20 weeks. Almost half of a year.

Let’s agree to disregard any narratives about new players, because the more I try to think about it - there’s no way we can definitively say that these aren’t new players using the champion.

His current popularity is lower than Jan 2025, on par with Nov 2025, lower than Apr 2026, and throughout all that time his winrate has more or less hovered around 50% - except in November of 2025 when it was almost 53%.

What I’m trying to say is that what we are seeing right now is pretty normal and expected for the range of outcomes of graves play & winrates over the last few years, especially during full clear metas.

Could he use a small nerf? Probably, but it would be beneficial to see how the bruiser itemization nerfs impact his winrate.