Do I scare you summoner? Nocturne in the current meta: a numerical comparison with Rengar

VS

Leading up to worlds and partially thanks to the nerfs to the top three junglers, both Rengar and Nocturne have started to gain a niche popularity within the competitive meta. Rengar is for the moment a very weird pick as it seems that only Korean junglers (and more notably Dandy from Samsung White) have been able to use him effectively. Nocturne on the other hand has seen a rise in popularity as of late in most regions (Europe is the only major one where Nocturne has not been played recently) with generally good results. In this article, I will be comparing these two junglers, with an emphasis on numerical analysis.

Two junglers, one role

Nocturne and Rengar have two different skill sets and play very differently, but they both have the same overarching role within the jungle: assassination. However, unlike Kha'Zix who relies on high damage and mobility to rapidly take out key targets, their assassination potential comes from a very specific and unique strength that stems from their ultimates: uncounterable initiation.

When Rengar and Nocturne reach level 6, they obtain incredible pressure because if an enemy champion overextends, it is virtually impossible to prevent them from initiating unto them. Even extended vision control doesn't guarantee safety. This allows Nocturne and Rengar to gain similar map pressure to Evelynn, with the added benefit of instant punishment in case of overextension and being able to more effectively dive into the backline in case of a teamfight.

Other similarities of these two junglers are:

• High emphasis on farming before level 6
• Building Feral Flare as a jungle item
• Building Cutlass/Botrk (Botrk on Nocturne is generally core, not so much on Rengar)

However, Rengar was the first to enter the meta and it's only after his failure in other regions than Korea that Nocturne has come to light (although some junglers such as KaKao have played Nocturne for longer). 

Why was Rengar the first pick of choice when it came to hard, surprise initiation junglers?

Rengar: the better assassin

It all comes down to one simple fact: out of the two junglers Rengar is simply the better assassin. 

In order to explain this, I ran the numbers and found two very simple reasons on why this is the case.

Before you proceed:

For all calculation purposes in the whole article I based myself on a few things

• Skill order: Rengar R>Q>W>E; Nocturne R>Q>E>W
• All skillshots hit
• Nocturne is on his dusk-trail 
• Rengar uses his empowered E whenever possible
• Items: Botrk and Feral Flare are the only damage items (I know Rengar doesn't always build it, more on that later)
• Calculation were made as if they were attacking an AD carry with no defensive items except for Banshee's Veil at level 18

Better burst

Looking at the numbers throughout the game, it's clear that Rengar has better burst. For the sake of this analysis, I have defined the burst these two champions put out as one rotation of spells plus one auto attack (so the damage they can put out in less than approximately 1,5 seconds)

The following graph shows the percentage of burst Nocturne does compared to Rengar (so if the number is 80%, this means that Nocturne does 80% of the damage Rengar does in the same amount of time). Levels and items show how much they are fed.

Note: I previously made an error in the graph, this has now been corrected

 Two things can be taken from this graph:

• First of all, Rengar has better burst throughout the game, especially in the early to mid game. This makes him a much more powerful force during early skirmishes, notably when it comes to set up/contest dragon
• Nocturne's burst is very reliant on his ultimate. Because of it's long cooldown and because Rengar's ultimate doesn't actually enhance his damage, Rengar gains a serious advantage when both their ultimates are down.

Better base damage

One objection to my previous calculations you may have is that more often than not, Rengar will not buy Botrk or stick to the Cutlass and not upgrade it, leaving room for more tanky items. For this graph the concept is the same: this shows the percentage of burst damage Nocturne does compared to Rengar, with one difference: this only takes into account base damage and steroids without any items. 

The graph shows the same situation as above except the gap between the two has even (except for that weird bump at level 13 this was due to an error on my part that was corrected). This may not seem that big but it shows that Nocturne is more reliant on items to do damage than Rengar is. Therefore when playing from behind, Rengar can get away with building tanky more than Nocturne can. High base damage is why you will see Rengar in the competitive scene build more tanky compared to Nocturne who will almost always build a Botrk. This means that Rengar can still fulfill his role as an assassin while building tank items and therefore fill the tank role better, whereas Nocturne has to invest more into offensive items. 

Other reasons

Other reasons why Rengar is also more effective as an assassin are:

• Better CC: he has 2 (a snare and a slow) and they are instant
• Natural tankiness thanks to his W
• Better escapability with his ultimate
• His ultimate is on a shorter cooldown even with the nerf
• Better pre-6 ganking/counter-ganking thanks to burst and better CC

So looking at this, are there any reasons to pick Nocturne at all? Well yes actually and here they are.

Nocturne: the better duelist

Better long term damage

Nocturne has two absolutely excellent steroids: his AD steroid on his Q and his AS steroid on his W. Add to that his great passive that scales with both these stats and you have a jungler who has a lot of damage with just Feral Flare and Botrk. This graphs is the same as the previous ones except this time it's Rengar's damage compared to Nocturne's over a 5 second period and no longer simply burst.

This time the roles are reversed: apart from level 6 (where Rengar manages to gain one extra Q and empowered attack), Nocturne with the same two items will out damage Rengar considerably over a 5 second period. If the period were to be increased or the tankiness of the enemy higher, this gap would increase as Nocturne would get more FF, Botrk and passive procs. 

Nocturne: a jungle carry

This high damage means that if Nocturne is even or ahead he can duel enemy carries, something that Rengar can't do unless insanely fed. Because of this, a Rengar can't truly assassinate targets and needs the support of his teammates in order to properly fulfill his role. Nocturne with even the slightest lead can dive your backline and kill them with minimal support. Nocturne is also better at longer teamfighting for this precise reason.

Other reasons

Other reasons why Nocturne may be a better pick:

• Almost instant initiation: unlike Rengar who has a ramp up time on his ultimate and still has to walk towards his target, Nocturne instantly presses R and gets to his.
• No reaction time: with the recent nerfs to Rengar, enemies have now a bigger delay between the ! icon and Rengar jumping on them in order to react. Nocturne doesn't have that problem
•  Vision deny: an aspect of Nocturne's that can be overlooked is the vision deny that his ultimate brings. This is mostly useful when taking baron.
• Spell shield: a great tool that allows Nocturne to block critical spells when diving (think Syndra's stun, Ziggs' knockup, Vayne's condemn...) and gives him a nice chunk of extra damage to top it off. 

Conclusion

So which one of these will we see at Worlds? Probably both, albeit not as much as Lee Sin or Kha'Zix. My bet is Nocturne more than Rengar as Chinese teams appear to like him, but with Dandy on the stage, Rengar is sure to be picked or banned. It all comes down to what teams value the most out of their junglers: do they actually want this type of initiation? If so, do they want someone that can constantly create picks with high burst, but who needs backup or do they want a high damage one with excellent dueling potential when he gets his two key items. Only the future will tell.