Riot plotting to shift Nautilus back into jungle with LoL patch 11.11 buffs

Anchor-wielding titan Nautilus is set to become the next League of Legends champion shifted into the jungle in Season 11, with Riot Games unveiling plans to buff the support’s clear speed in LoL patch 11.11 to move him into the role.

Nautilus, who only just celebrated his ninth LoL birthday, is on the verge of making his triumphant return to the jungle, more than five years after Riot forced him into a playmaking tank role in the bot lane all the way back in Season 7.

The Titan of the Depths originally enjoyed a healthy jungle clear speed, and made a perfect roamer thanks to his Dredge Line and Depth Charge.

In a bid to make support into a more engage-heavy role, however, and move away from its “healer” status, Nautilus copped a series of ability changes that saw him disappear from the jungle meta. Riot was seemingly happy to keep the Bilgewater titan bot lane indefinitely, until recently.

Now, it seems a role reversal is actually on the cards.

Riot are planning to ship buffs for Nautilus’ clear speed, which should see him join fresh-faced jungle acolytes like Darius, Morgana, and more this season.

To manage this swap, the LoL dev team are targeting the Titan of the Depth’s damage-dealing Riptide ability. While most of his kit ⁠— including his Q, R, and his passive ⁠— is chock full of crowd-control, his E dishes out AOE damage.

In patch 11.11, the Bilgewater tank will now deal double that damage to camps; that is, Riot are adding extras to his E ability: “This ability deals 200% damage to jungle monsters,” it now reads.

This buff fires his clear speed to around 3:20 at worst.

With the new changes, Nautilus can now rival other top-tier junglers like Elise, Lee Sin, and Kha’Zix, all of whom have enjoyed a quick rise to the top in Season 11 now Hecarim and Udyr have been shunted out of “S-tier”. Like Elise and Lee Sin, the titan also boasts an exceptional gank too.

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Be warned: there’s no guarantee these buffs stay as-is. In fact, Riot dev RayYonggi has already confirmed they will “likely be tuned down” before release.

As of publication, Nautilus still enjoys a 51.22% win rate when played support, Lolalytics reports. The Titan of the Depths is played in 10.24% of games, and is banned in 8.97% more.

Riot has already unveiled several changes coming in League of Legends patch 11.11; Senna will have her “tank” build sliced in half, and the “sad” Rammus rework should also get a hefty boost to lift his flailing numbers too.

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In a hilarious twist for Ryze mains too, the Rune Mage is also in the firing line for yet another rework. Riot should reveal those changes in the next few patches.