Zyra jungle has always been interesting. Her plants take damage differently from any other pet, based on number and nature of hits rather than having actual health. Because of this, jungle Zyra actually works best if you focus the little minions first, contrary to how some other junglers work.
Zyra wasn't a major jungle pick in season 4, but one of the changes for season 5 is making the jungle much tougher. Because of the unique way her plants work, I predicted that Zyra might not be hit so hard by these changes, and preliminary testing suggests that to be true. She still operates largely as well as she did in season 4. When everyone else is taking a hit and she isn't, jungle Zyra may become a thing.
One of the biggest changes of the preseason is that dragon a much bigger deal. He also has a new attack which is somewhat abusable. Certain champs, like Nidalee, Pantheon, and Fiora, can use either movement abilities or autoattack blocks to take down dragon solo at very low levels. Explaining my Zyra tactics to a friend, he asked if Zyra could take dragon at level 2. Lo,
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| (burning Flash isn't really necessary, but can be used to avoid river wards) |
I'll be giving her a shot this preseason. Let me know if you find any other interesting picks for this new, untamed world!
