Title. I don't understand why there's this... distaste for Hunter's Machete.

• It improves clear speed.
• 5 pots mean you end your clear much closer to full HP on some junglers than Boots + 3.
• Spirit Stone is a cheap, stat-efficient upgrade.
• Wriggles is still really good on single-target autoattacking junglers.
• Spirit of the Ancient Golem is incredibly stat efficient even before taking into account the Tenacity and clear speed (aka objective control) it provides - perfect tank item.

I mean, I don't really see why people go so far out of their way to avoid it.

"But we're ganking/dueling naked!"
> Sure, but you were doing that when all junglers were starting boots in any case - no defensive stats there. You lose a little movement speed, gain some health on clear. C'est la vie.

"But Spirit Stone/ the upgrades suck!"
> Well, Spirit Stone is actually really efficient. For 800g you get 924g worth of hp5 and mp5, so even if you don't take into account the passives you've just made 124g worth of stats.

Compare with Philo Stone. For 700g you get 792g worth of stats - only 92g "profit". It takes the Philo Stone something like a minute to make up the extra value.

Besides which, being a partly % based item, Spirit Stone scales well into the late game. So unlike Philo Stone, it can sit in your inventory and not be completely useless if you choose not to turn it into something. [EDIT: I base this on the fact that the regen from Philo is pitiful, not the gp10. The gp10 is nice.

As for the upgrades - generally also very efficient. Wraith and Lizard do suck, but Wriggles is still very good on the champs it's good on, and Ancient Golem gives jungle tanks everything they need.

tl;dr - What I've seen is a lot of people going out of their way to avoid Machete, like taking it puts you behind. I disagree. Thoughts?

I always get it. But I've never tried anything different.

it only helps with the clear, it has no PVP capability what so ever...

with boots you got some gank speed potential.
WIth Cloth you got some armor.

with the machete you can push that lane harder and get yelled at for the lane tax ?

It's because junglers don't like having a singular item shoved down their throats for them to be able to jungle. For example, Trundle Junglers used to love starting Vamp Scepter int their run. Now it's literally 'You take Machete and waste money on potions or you don't get to do anything.'.

No stats. It sucks coming out of the jungle to fight someone with an item that literally does not help you AT ALL.

It's also become an almost mandatory start to take machete now, which is meh. I mean, you can probably still go cloth+5, and it's not like its any worse than everyone going boots+3 in S2, but it's because this combines with the first thing I said, no stats.

You're forced to take a "no stat" item to clear jungle, but then if you get invaded, or want to gank before you back, or you need to help someone, you're running on your champions base stats while the laners probably have a long sword or boots or something, they have an item advantage.

It's small but it still doesn't feel good.

Also some niche starts like vamp start were removed.

It doesn't work on lane minions. It's designed for junglers to stay evenly leveled with laners even if ganks fail. I really like the item, but do wish there was more diversity on options.

Hate grabbing 5 pots.

With all the comparison between the upgrade items and philo stone, i dont see why they dont put a gp5 stat on machete or even on the upgrades. Junglers are already starved for gold as it is.

yea it builds into the spirit stones....but not every champ needs mana regen ._. ....

Largely what I see is the "ahmygerd it giefs no statsssss" argument.

Which, for all the stone upgrades, is BS (Golem OP).

Boots give you less movespeed now - they are nowhere near as vital as they were in s2.

Finally, there's the "I gots counterjungled by a guy that had boots instead". Just a tip - that's not Machete's fault.