This week, Taleworlds started letting players into Mount & Blade 2: Bannerlord for the long-awaited sandbox's first closed beta. It's a multiplayer beta, so players won't be mucking around in the campaign; instead they'll be skirmishing with each other and testing the game's matchmaking and combat systems. 

While the studio remains tight-lipped when it comes to a release date, it does seem like Bannerlord's approaching the last leg on its journey through development, and once this closed beta concludes, Taleworlds will start letting everyone test the multiplayer. But for now, it's being kept small. 

"With this being the early stages of testing, we have decided to keep the player count rather small and manageable," wrote Taleworlds, "allowing us to more directly engage testers and make better use of the feedback provided to refine Bannerlord’s multiplayer and make it the best that it can be. The game is far from feature and content complete, and these early tests are very much focused on testing the game’s systems and mechanics, as well as, stability before it’s ready for a more general audience."

It's been seven years since Bannerlord was first announced, so this sort of progress is pretty exciting. Taleworlds is calling this the first steps to releasing the game. I predicted a 2019 launch earlier in the year, and I still reckon there's a chance. At Gamescom, people outside of the closed beta will get their first opportunity to play, so that could coincide with the open beta. 

It looks like Borderlands 2 VR is coming to PC, after almost a year of PlayStation exclusivity. Evidence comes via an ESRB rating for the Windows PC edition of the game. There's no indication of release date, but these classifications are usually filed within a month or so of release.

Borderlands 2 VR contains the full original game, but on PS4 at least, its entirely single-player. That does detract somewhat from the game's central appeal, but the opportunity to virtually inhabit Pandora is pretty cool. As is watching piles of guns explode from toilet cisterns. 

The virtual galaxy of New Eden is under siege, and no one knows why.

On Wednesday afternoon, thousands of players across the lawless regions of null-sec space, where EVE Online's fabled player-created empires battle for supremacy, were ambushed by fleets belonging to a mysterious non-player faction known as Drifters. While hostile NPC factions have always been in EVE Online, they've never posed a collective threat to its entire playerbase. Until now.

I've reached out to several sources, but the full extent of the Drifter invasion is still unclear—as is the extent of the damage so far. What we do know is that almost all of EVE Online's biggest factions, like The Imperium and TEST Alliance, have had their home stations sieged by Drifter fleets, each numbering in the hundreds, while smaller Drifter squads are ambushing anyone travelling through nearby systems. It's chaos, and EVE Online pilots are scrambling to respond.

"It very much caught everyone by surprise," an EVE player named Rhivre tells me. "There was no warning or hint that it was going to happen, then suddenly reports came in from all across null-sec about structures being shot at."

Not alone

At 2:44 pm EST, members of TEST Alliance, one of EVE Online's largest and most storied player empires, received an automated warning message:

"BOTmadmin: via notifybot Structure attacked: unknown 1029248651499 [Pharolux Cyno Beacon 94.60/100.00/100.00][B0RT] in BY-MSY Esoteria by [ ](Vigilant Tyrannos) Artemis Tyrannos @ 2019-06-26T18:43:00Z [a minute ago]"

This message was the first sign that something was very wrong, TEST's head diplomat tells me. His name is Dran, and he was logged in when the invasion first begun. As he explains, some of the automated warnings that began pouring in were "undocumented garbage" that couldn't be deciphered because TEST's player-programmed tools weren't designed to respond to attacks from computer-controlled forces. But one thing was clear: One of TEST's massive starbases was under attack.

But from who?

Players in the vicinity of the BY-MSY star system in TEST's home region of Esoteria were quickly able to confirm what was happening. As they warped to the besieged citadel starbase, a fleet of nearly 100 Drifter battleships unleashed volley after volley against its shields. Dran's first suspicion was sabotage.

As TEST scrambled to muster its pilots into action, reports quickly spread that attacks were happening elsewhere in the null-sec regions of New Eden. Chinese alliance Fraternity had at least one of their own starbases sieged, while The Imperium had to prematurely end a war campaign against a rival empire so it could quickly retreat home and mount a defense of its own stations. Meanwhile, Pandemic Horde had a special structure known as a jump bridge outright destroyed. More and more reports are coming in by the hour, leading to an unprecedented ceasefire between all of EVE Online's warring alliances as they focus on defense.

Until yesterday, Drifters behaved like most of EVE Online's non-player factions—but with a few improvements that make them significantly more deadly. For one, Drifters will follow you through a star system if you provoke them and try to run away. As Dran explains, players quickly learned to exploit this behavior by attacking a group of Drifters and running for the safety of a nearby starbase. The Drifters would give chase and effectively walk into an ambush as the player could then use the starbase's defenses to easily tear them to shreds.

It was possible to "farm" the Drifters this way, but that also came at a risk. If you drew the Drifters to a starbase and left them there, they'd slowly chew through its shields—though it would theoretically take hours given how small Drifter fleets typically are.

So when Dran saw a fleet of a hundred Drifters obliterating their citadel starbase in BY-MSY, he immediately suspected someone was trying to sabotage TEST from the inside using some kind of unknown strategy to gather such an enormous Drifter fleet. "I wasted at least an hour going through all our gunner [access lists] to find a spy that didn't exist," he says.

As more and more red alerts came in from TEST starbases throughout the region, it quickly became clear that this was beyond the scope of a saboteur exploiting a game mechanic. Dran tells me that within a period of 12 hours, over 38 TEST starbases were hit by Drifter fleets, though none were outright destroyed because EVE Online's complex siege systems are broken into separate phases. 

Large player-created structures effectively have three health bars, and each time one is depleted there is an invulnerability window to give each side a chance to regroup and plan for the next battle. That ended up being the saving grace for TEST—and every other major alliance in EVE.

Even though TEST's fleet commanders were eventually able to marshall defensive fleets capable of destroying the Drifters, Dran says there were simply too many battles happening at once to defend everything. "How do you recognize the threat, ping an alliance, get a fleet of 30 to 50 dudes, ship up, undock, fly even two to three systems over, and engage a fleet in 14 minutes?" he says. "And that's assuming you get the notification instantly. We got ours a minute after it started, and then did that for 12 hours straight."

And what's worse, no one knows when this will end, or even why this is happening—except the developers at CCP Games, and they aren't talking.

But the Drifters are striking so hard and fast, starbases are frequently being put into their invulnerability windows far more quickly than thought possible. Normally, sieges in EVE Online can take up to 12 hours or more, but these Drifters are so powerful they're tearing through defenses in a matter of minutes.

Meanwhile, players travelling through null-sec space are frequently being waylaid by smaller gangs of Drifters who quickly obliterate their ships and everything in its cargo bay. One particularly painful loss was a Hel supercarrier, costing its pilot more than 16 billion ISK, EVE's in-game currency (this roughly translated to $150 since you can buy ISK in-game). 

The Drifters are even attacking pilots' escape pods, which are automatically jettisoned from a destroyed ship so that players can retreat to safety. Losing your pod means respawning at a medical bay that could be on the other side of the galaxy. Until yesterday, Drifters would only target and destroy your pod if provoked, but now they're destroying them regardless—breaking all of EVE Online's rules.

Apocalypse now

While writing this, all of null-sec space in New Eden is still under constant assault. For TEST and Dran, it's been all hands on deck. He's only managed to get a bit of sleep in between helping coordinate defenses and his regular diplomatic duties—not to mention juggling a full-time job. "It's stressful, man."

While the EVE Online subreddit seems to be soaking in the chaos and carnage, those in leadership positions like Dran are understandably at the end of their rope. "Don't get me wrong, the balls it would have taken to set this mechanic on the game intentionally, I applaud it," he says. "The game needs more snowglobe shaking."

But at the same time, years of effort by tens of thousands of players is collectively at risk.

"If another player comes by and knocks down our sandcastle that's one thing," Dran adds. "Those risks are understood and part of the sandbox. We set up full well knowing the risks, and are prepared to fight anyone for our right to be here. We didn't set anything up knowing that at any point with no warning NPCs would materialize and blow everything up. NPCs don't sleep, they don't get tired, they don't have to wake people up or take off work to show up for a timer. They just exist one second, shoot, and then despawn. EVE is supposed to be a sandbox driven by human interaction and intrigue. This just feels contrived."

The leader of The Imperium, a man known as The Mittani, is especially annoyed with the invasion. "The Imperium was in the midst of prosecuting a war involving tens of thousands of real players," he says. "We are annoyed that we have had to stop our player vs player warfare and grind through what amounts to World of Warcraft-style raid content, but we have already broken down how the Drifter AI works and have successfully defended all of our structures thus far. I look forward to going back to real player vs player content, which is why I quit WoW for EVE in the first place."

But right now there is no end in sight, and CCP Games is refusing to acknowledge or explain anything. "We reached out to CCP employees, anyone we thought might know what was going on," Dran explains. "We couldn't even get confirmation that this wasn't a bug, or that it was a player or that there was some intended counterplay. Nothing. Silence."

At the time of publishing this story, CCP Games hasn't even acknowledged that half of EVE Online is actively on fire. That initially led many to believe this was all some kind of horrific accident or bug, but now the consensus is that this invasion was planned. After all, EVE Online's current expansion is called, well, Invasion. But because major shifts in EVE Online's delicate ecosystem have always been communicated months or years in advance, no one expected this.

I reached out to CCP Games personally, and a spokesperson said they "reached out to the Drifters for comment, but they rejected our hailing frequencies."

CCP did say, however, that it "intercepted" the above image, which is a map of EVE Online's different player-alliances. It hints that the Drifters (and, by extension, CCP Games) might not stop until all of EVE Online's null-sec territory has been wrested from the hands of its players.

If that's the case, EVE Online could be headed for its most dramatic upheaval in the 16 years since it was first launched. It's nearly been a full day since the invasion started, and Dran and the other players I've spoken to are confused, frustrated, and shaken. They've spent years building and protecting their empires, and now CCP seems poised to burn everything down.

What will happen next is anyone's guess.

Masters of Doom is a 2003 book about the creation of the groundbreaking FPS Doom, with a particular focus on the two dominant personalities behind it, John Carmack and Johm Romero. It's an outstanding behind-the-scenes look at a genre-defining studio—we called it a "must read" in our 2018 reminiscence on pulling the trigger of the BFG-9000 for the first time—and the tale may soon be headed to the small screen, courtesy of... the Franco brothers?

According to Variety, USA Network has ordered a pilot based on the book, with James and Dave Franco signed as executive producers. Gears of War 4 lead writer Tom Bissell, who also has writing credits on Tales From the Borderlands, Uncharted 4, What Remains of Edith Finch, and others, will write the series and is also credited as an executive producer.

If the pilot is picked up as a series, Masters of Doom would become the first part in an anthology, with subsequent seasons detailing other "seminal moments in videogame history." There's no word on casting yet, but there's one obvious question hanging over the whole thing right out of the gate: Which Franco will play Romero?

Although shortly after the announcement, Brenda Romero asked an even more pointed question:

Romero, who's currently heading up development of a new strategy game for Paradox called Empire of Sin, also confirmed that her husband is not directly involved in the project. 

He does think it's cool, though.

Romero's Doom-Mastering partner, John Carmack, said on Twitter that he's not involved in the project either.

When Paradox Interactive acquired sandbox jail sim Prison Architect from Introversion, the publisher said it was "eager to explore the development of potential new games", but Prison Architect is still getting attention, too. New developer Double Eleven released its first update, The Clink, today. 

The Clink chucks a bunch of new floors and walls into your list, makes it easier to search for hidden tunnels, in turn stopping escapes. You'll also find more quick rooms in the quick build menu, when you can't be bothered to build another identical room by hand. 

Check out the patch notes below:

• Four new floor tiles and four new wall types added.
• Increased the number of foremen that can be hired for larger prisons where foremen also teach programs.
• Added new sprites for missing orientations to many items. Aiming to provide full set of rotations to all objects in the future.
• Added “Guard Response” button that allows players to immediately send existing nearby guards to a location, instead of needing to hire additional guards to deal with incidents.
• New “Tunnel Search” button that allows the player to have guards search all toilets only, for hidden escape tunnels.
• Additional Quick Rooms added to the Quick Build menu, for quicker and easier room construction.
• Following prisoners and staff has been made easier, you can now double-click on them to enable.

A hotfix was also put out, in case you were getting some crashes due to the update.

It's just a wee one, but it will probably be reassuring to modders and prison architects that it's still being supported by the new owners. According to Double Eleven, this is just the first of "lots of free updates and content". Paid DLC is also on the cards. 

The Clink update is available now.  

Field of Glory: Empires, Ageod's classical grand strategy game, will unleash players on the map of antiquity next month, and to get prospective armchair consuls up to speed, there's a video that breaks breaks down all the empire building and empire smashing. It's also in Latin. 

There are subtitles on the off chance that you aren't fluent. There's also an English version, too, but living languages have dominated trailers for too long. Bring back the classics. Maybe throw in some fictional ones, as well. They don't even need to be related. Planet Zoo gameplay, but in Klingon. 

Field of Glory: Empires' setting means Imperator: Rome comparisons are probably inevitable, and there are some broad similarities, but Empires' scope is larger, it's turn-based and fights take place on a tactical map. You'll be able to play as one of 70 historical factions, each with their own national traits, modifiers and special units, as you try to make your empire big and fat. 

You can recruit from a pool of more than 600 units, drawing from different cultures and spread across 20 unit types. Once you've built up your army, you can hurl them at your enemy in largely automated battles. Alternatively, you can load the battles into Field of Glory 2, giving you direct control over the battle, and then load the results into Empire. It does mean you'll need two games to get proper tactical fights, though. 

As well as tangible threats like big armies and other empires, there are also more existential threats, like decadence. Apparently, the older your empire, the more tricky it will be to keep it from becoming bloated and vulnerable. You'll need to nurture your government and culture as your empire expands or it invite a crisis that can topple the whole thing. 

Here's the original video:

Field of Glory: Empire is due out on Steam on July 11.

Localisation is a word for a number of processes all to do with ensuring a game is ready for a specific local market. this includes everything from creating a translation that stays faithful to the originally intended meaning, to cutting and amending content in line with different countries’ laws. the Yakuza series’ great localisation is an important factor in its success, and so i asked localisation producer Scott Strichart about the pitfalls of his job.

In order to localise a game correctly you need to have two things: text and context. As with any big creative project on a schedule, you unfortunately don’t necessarily get both at the same time. 

“Until recently, we’d never started localisation prior to the game being done in Japan, which was amazing, because we could just boot up every scene, every substory, every movie right in game,” Strichart says. I imagine him wistfully staring off into the distance. 

To finish everything on time, localisation now often begins before the original text is even finalised. In some cases Strichart and his team make educated guesses at who is talking to whom, how far away speakers are from each other and sometimes even their gender, the latter of which the form of address in Japanese can help with.

“Once a particular scene comes online, we’re able to check it out and adjust accordingly ... It’ll be an ongoing process to smooth this out with [developer Ryu ga Gotoku Studios], but I’m committed to doing that.” Strichart, who took up his current position prior to the release of Yakuza 0, is an enthusiastic spokesperson for localisation with an apparent love for language. 

Having started in QA himself, he acknowledges that building a translator’s skills takes time and teamwork. There’s no small amount of project management behind building an experienced team. 

“Usually our more experienced translators and editors handle the main story, while the supporting translators and editors get assigned swaths of text where it makes sense to group up. For instance, all the substories, all the minigames, all the tutorials, with some natural crossovers when it makes sense to do so. 

“To date, I’ve also stacked a ton of this work on my own plate, because I enjoy the creativity of it. I love having translators and editors on my team who grow with the games, because they’re already familiar with things like the game’s worldview and the styling we use.”

Magic words

Arguably the most important skills to develop are listening and research. ‘Intent’ and ‘atmosphere’ are two words that you hear regularly in localisation, and Strichart explains why. “This game is set in Japan, and I would never want to lose its sense of place and culture at the cost of a little confusion over street food with no one-on-one translation. Maybe you’ll even learn something from the game! Generally speaking, English is a more idiomatic language, so finding idioms that still match the intent of the Japanese dialogue without necessarily matching the line word-for-word is the touch of magic we bring to the game in hopes of making it sound like good dialogue to the English ear.” 

I bring up a scene from Yakuza Kiwami 2, out for PC this month, that serves as a good example for the magic Strichart is talking about. In it, Kiryu gets invited into a club where a gang of adult men roleplay as toddlers. When he refuses to play along, the gang leader shouts, “Let’s pacify this bitch!” 

“The line was originally ‘Let’s crack this bitch’ in Yakuza 2, but Jon Riesenbach, my editor for Kiwami 2, really took it to the next level. See? Magic.”

Changing accents

Localising also means finding a way to approximate local ways of speaking. Dialects use specific words and accents limited to one country. Western Japan’s Kansai dialect used in the series by characters such as Majima is famous throughout the country, but there’s no singular way to localise it, mostly because any accent (such as the Southern American accent Ace Attorney uses in its place) is also specific to one location. Scott weighs in on the tricky question of how to provide a consistent tone in a text several people work on. 

“I made a point to overhaul Majima’s accent starting with Yakuza 0. I aimed to remove any direct correlation one could make to an American South accent and embody what is generally perceived as being the root of the Kansai dialect—faster speech, colourful language, and high energy. This accent actually proved problematic, because I was the only one who could really write in it. “Sam Mullen, our director of production, recently came down on me for it, joking that if I got hit by a car, Majima would have to be written out of the series. I have since written an internal series accent guide and someday, I’ll be forced to let someone else write him.”

There will always be instances in which a reference is so specific to its culture that fitting idioms just don’t exist. Strichart says that even when a few Japanese puns are lost, there are enough ways in which the localisation team can make up for it elsewhere. I appreciate Strichart for shedding more light to a part of the game-making process that we tend to take for granted, especially as English speakers. 

Good localisations don’t just give us something new to play, they also hone our intercultural skills, allowing us to take a peek at the world behind a game.

Amid Evil's worst weapon is a staff that shoots blue homing blobs—pathetic water balloons that splash against low-poly demons, many of whom look like what you'd get if you coated a bunch of triangles with super glue and threw them in a dryer. It's worth using during the most annoying encounters, when a projectile-lobbing enemy is perched high above and is hard to hit with anything else. I don't like it or the moments when I resort to it, but I can also use the entire earth as a grenade, which more than evens things out. Amid Evil is good.

It's a throwback FPS like Dusk, but rather than hitscan pistol headshots, Amid Evil recalls Heretic and Hexen's magical weapons. The staff sucks, but there's also a magic sword, a grenade launcher that shrinks and fires random planets (like the earth), a spike-firing morningstar, a lightning trident, plus your default axe and a geometrically-unreasonable purple thing that clears rooms like Doom's BFG. 

Most of the weapons are fun, but the Star of Torment, which pins enemies to walls like FEAR's stake gun, or can be used to homer them out of the level entirely like they've been slapped by a god, is Amid Evil's pièce de résistance—I can never tire of it. 

Pushing buttons

Part of Amid Evil's appeal is that it ignores certain annoying, speed-hindering FPS conventions scaffolded onto shooters since the '90s. There's no fall damage. You can breathe underwater. Elevators won't crush you if they catch your shoulder on the way down. They'll just clip through you as they should. Accidental deaths have their place in games, especially when they're comedic, but here they'd only get in the way of the fun and the speed. They aren't missed.

Amid Evil falls prey to other genre foibles, though. Getting out of water is a pain in the ass, because you have to convince the game that you're a dolphin and deserve to majestically leap over the lip of the pool when what it really wants is for you to ineffectually bob side-to-side. 

And then there's the platforming, and you probably already know the type: Here's a game about running very fast all the time because there's a mob of demons chasing you, so how about you climb spiraling, ultra-narrow balance beams and leap between platforms that disappear on a timer?

If you thrive on precarious ledges, you should definitely play Amid Evil—it'll make for impressive speed runs—but I took to quicksaving constantly so that if I tripped up and stumbled down three-quarters of a level I could reload and try again without having to climb all the way back up. I love that there's no fall damage, but sometimes it's a curse.

Also slowing things down are the gods' button-centric architectural designs. You're the latest mortal champion taking a stab at cleaning up their evil-infested lands, and except for the boss stages, every level is a button hunt. Body-check one of the big blue switches, and something about the level changes: an elevator activates, a door opens, the water level rises. And then you go find the next button to walk face-first into until you eventually find a key to open up the next big area, just like in the classics.

That's not really why I liked the classics. I love Amid Evil's big open levels—the way some of them fit together, especially the one made of moving gears, boggles me—and they're full of secret areas to discover. But kicking around demon guts as I retrace my steps to try to figure out which damn pathway the last button opened up isn't as fun as pinning demons to walls with the Star of Torment, which is very fun.

Soul sacrifice

Most of my 'buts' about Amid Evil go in the other direction. Some of the levels are tedious, sure, but I always wanted to see what strange machines and inadvisable architecture lay around the next corner. Anti-aliasing is off by default (I turned it on for these screenshots), and I might prefer it that way—the glittering jaggies give Amid Evil the look of a rare foil baseball card, and it's more endearing than garish. It's beautiful all smoothed out, too. The opening scene, overlooking a church at the bottom of a cavern, drew me in like a siren. 

And some of the enemies are boring, but one time I fought two giant space serpents while suspended in a glob of water floating in the astral plane. Some of the demon spawn are just green triangles that rush at you, but in one part there are giant laser monsters that come across like Angels from Neon Genesis Evangelion.

When I'm just tearing through evil knights and stone giants and weird heads with flamethrower mouths, and I'm more kite than man, Amid Evil shines like the best of Quake and Serious Sam. My second-favorite weapon, the sword Whisper's Edge, slings waves of green energy that can clip multiple enemies. I could spend all day circle strafing around courtyards, slicing the heads off of the chain of grunts following me and flinging the occasional wave at the flying artillery above.

My favorite thing about Amid Evil is that while its Hard Mode is challenging, just about every bad situation is salvageable—it feels nearly ideal to me, as difficulty modes go. I've mentioned quicksaving, which is one useful tool, and secret areas with big heath boosts are also helpful. There's also the part where you can go super saiyan.

Slain enemies drop souls, and if you fill a meter with them, you can activate Soul Mode, which turns all of your weapons into fire hoses of death. The Star of Torment fires clumps of homing crystals that one-hit just about anything and explode outward on contact to clean up nearby grunts. Whisper's Edge fires bigger waves that always pierce enemies and bounce off walls. The BFG-like Aeturnum, which often saved my ass in normal mode when I needed to vaporize a room without a real fight, fires black holes.

Soul Mode is not nerfed at all against bosses. I took the first of them down with a soul'd up Star of Torment like he was nothing. Though the final boss was tougher, it only took me a couple tries, and the first was just to figure out the concept. Would I have felt more satisfaction had it been harder? I don't know, but I didn't feel unsatisfied. I kind of wanted to go kill the gods I was doing all this dirty work for afterward. How were they gonna stop me?

My only complaint is that I didn't need Soul Mode enough. I'd hold onto a full meter for ages, thinking I'd surely encounter an untenable situation where I'd release it and mop up Hell's minions like a spill on aisle 666. But in some levels I never even thought about using it, and when I did I'd obliterate what was in front of me so quickly that I'd desperately sprint around looking for more stone giants or creepers or flame spirits to devour and find none. That's helped a little by playing the hardest difficulty, Evil Mode. It's semi-hidden, but I'm sure the brave will find it.

There are quiet moments in Amid Evil, too, and not just when I get lost looking for a button. As I took a breather from the carnage in one of the final levels, a faint, bumbling trumpet unexpectedly cut through the ominous vocal 'ahhs' and synthy moans, as if one of the orchestra members was bleeding out in the astral plane somewhere outside the level. I was moved by a game about slaughtering low-poly demons, it's true. 

The pithy signs around the levels aren't especially original as far as godly decrees go (and are hard to read because the font for everything in Amid Evil is awful), but they do evoke a curious universe that could live in the pages of old fantasy quarterlies. Despite barely telling a story, Amid Evil made me wonder if the gods might be the real assholes—they were the ones who put buttons everywhere, after all—and when it was over I lingered for a long time before letting it end. I want more.

Elemental Rifts

"This preseason, we're adding more game-to-game variety and opportunities for mastery to Summoner's Rift. After the second Elemental Drake of the game dies, the map will permanently transform to one of four Elemental Rifts, each with unique terrain changes that'll alter the way you take on teamfights, rotations, vision, and objective control.

Elemental Rifts don't favor a specific team, so games are still in players' hands regardless of which one takes shape. We also wanted to ensure the Rifts feel intuitive even in your first game, so they don't introduce any new mechanics and terrain changes always occur in the same areas no matter which element spawns."

Transformation Mechanics

TRANSFORMATION TRIGGER: After the second Elemental Drake dies and the third is announced

RIFT ELEMENT: Same as the element of the third drake

TERRITORIAL: Once the map transforms, all future Elemental Drake spawns will be of that element only

TERRAIN CHANGES: Always occur in the four jungle quadrants, centered around the buff camps, as well as in dragon pit

Infernal Rift

JUNGLE: The brush nearest to Blue and Red buffs burn away, and new pathways open up through the Blue and Red buff pits

DRAGON PIT: The entrance to Dragon pit widens

"New paths make opportunities for a quick flank or sidestep that your opponent isn't expecting."

Mountain Rift

JUNGLE: Two new bluffs of rock emerge in each jungle quadrant

DRAGON PIT: A rock formation rises in front of the Dragon pit

"Extra tight spaces give opportunities for big AOE wombos and create some interesting new hiding spots with fog of war."

Ocean Rift

JUNGLE: Most of the brush in the jungle grows larger and new Honeyfruit spawns near the buff camps. Water pools into puddles throughout the jungle, which is mostly aesthetic unless you're the Empress of the Elements or running the Waterwalking rune.

DRAGON PIT: New brush patches sprout up around the Dragon pit

"Sneak around the jungle or look for a new ambush opportunity."

Cloud Rift

JUNGLE: Air currents flow throughout the area around Blue and Red buffs, granting speed boosts to everyone inside

DRAGON PIT: Dragon Pit also becomes a speed boosting wind tunnel

"Dodge skillshots or make a swift collapse on your enemies trying to sneak a far away objective."

Side Lane Alcoves

BREATHTAKING VISTA OF DEATH: New alcoves have been carved into the outer corners of top and bot lanes

BOT LANE BRUSH: Two long patches ⇒ Three patches, mirroring top lane

"We're adding two new lane alcoves to the Rift, one in each side lane. We don't expect laning to fundamentally change as a result, but the extra terrain and its impact on line of sight should occasionally offer new playmaking opportunities through positioning, jukes, flanks, and ganks."

River Entrance Brush

WHERE'S GAREN?: New brush has been added by the river entrances in both Blue buff quadrants.

"New brush patches near the blue buff ramps into river add new strategic and tactical options as teams approach and contest objectives."

Elemental Drakes

Dragon Souls

I GOT SOUL: The first team to slay four Elemental Drakes gains a Dragon Soul matching the Elemental Rift

EXCLUSIVITY: Elder Dragon begins spawning after one team gains a Dragon Soul, meaning only one team can have it.

DURATION: Like Elemental Drake buffs, Dragon Souls are permanent and persist through death

"Dragon Souls are a new end-game payoff for the team who wins the Elemental Drake game, a powerful reward that's similar to an Epic objective. Dragon Souls don't offer the same moment-to-moment strength as Baron or Elder buff, but they're permanent and an additional bonus on top of the drake stacks their bearers already earned."

Infernal Soul

• Every 3 seconds, your next damaging attack or ability on an enemy unit triggers a small explosion, dealing 90 (+0.25 bonus attack damage) (+0.15 ability power) (+0.03 bonus health) damage to the target and nearby enemies.

Mountain Soul

• After not taking damage for 5 seconds, gain a shield for 225 (+0.2 bonus attack damage) (+0.15 ability power) (+0.15 bonus health)

Ocean Soul

• Dealing damage to enemies heals you for 180 (+0.4 bonus attack damage) (+0.25 ability power) (+0.1 bonus health) and restores 90 (+0.04 maximum mana) mana over 3 seconds.
• Damage to minions or monsters regenerates with 30% effectiveness.

Cloud Soul

• Passively gain 10% increased movement speed.
• After casting your ultimate, gain an additional 30% movement speed for 3 seconds (30 second cooldown).

Elemental Drake Buffs

"We're updating the buffs to be more equal in power and excitement. Stack for stack, elemental buffs are weaker than before to avoid excessively power creeping SR's buff ecosystem. With Dragon Souls adding new late game payout to Elemental Drakes, we're switching from the current frontloaded buff stacks back to a linear model. Last note: You can now get four stacks of an element if the enemy team gets the first two or three drakes (always different elements), then you get the next four (always the same element)."

Infernal

"Just a balance pass."

INFERNAL MIGHT: +10/17/24% attack damage and ability power ⇒ +5/10/15/20% attack damage and ability power

Mountain

"Extra damage to objectives was a subtle-yet-powerful snowballing effect that was often hard to appreciate outside of coordinated play. We're switching Mountain to a more straightforward effect all players can play around."

MOUNTAINOUS VIGOR: +16/23/30% bonus true damage to epic monsters and turrets ⇒ +8/16/24/32% armor and magic resist

Ocean

"We're removing Ocean's mana regen to even its power out among users regardless of resource type. That gives us room to allow Ocean's healing to continue in combat, which is a buff for any user."

OCEANIC WILL: 6/9/12% missing health and mana regen per 5 seconds when you haven't taken champion/turret damage within 8 seconds ⇒ 5/10/15/20% missing health regen per 5 seconds (mana regen removed)

Cloud

"Cloud's movement speed was powerful, but not all that exciting. We're moving the speed boost to Cloud's Elemental Rift (where we can support it with visuals) and adding a different kind of haste to Cloud's buff."

CLOUDBRINGER'S GRACE: +3/4.5/6% bonus movement speed (tripled while out of combat) ⇒ 10/20/30/40% ultimate CDR, ignoring the CDR cap

Elemental Drake Mechanics

"With drake types going down to just one element after the Rift transforms, we're ensuring the first few you see don't double up on elements so you still experience a variety of drakes in each game."

DRAKE SPAWN ORDER: Random ⇒ The first three drakes are now always three unique elements. All subsequent drakes will be the same element as the third drake.

DRAKE SPAWN WINDOW: 5:00 initial, 5:00 respawn until 35:00 ⇒ 5:00 initial, 5:00 respawn until one team has slain four drakes (see Dragon Soul section above)

"Since the Elemental Drake buffs are a bit weaker, we're dropping the health of the first two drakes. The battle over the Dragon Soul begins heating up after that, so drakes after the first two have more health to widen the opportunity for teams to contest."

HEALTH: 3500 (+240 per level, minimum level 6) ⇒ 2650 (+240 per level, minimum level 6) before the Rift transforms; 4350 (+240 per level, minimum level 6) for the third drake onward

Elder Dragon

REMOVED - ELEMENTAL MULTIPLIER: Elder Dragon's buff no longer increases the effects of Elemental Drake buffs by 50%

BURN DAMAGE: 45 (+45 per Elemental Drake stack) true damage over 3 seconds ⇒ 90-270 true damage over 3 seconds (at 25:00-45:00 game time)

REMOVED - BURNING BRIGHT: Elder Dragon's burn no longer reveals enemies

REMOVED - ELDER MULTIPLIER: Taking Elder Dragon a second time no longer increases the Elemental buff multiplier to 100% or the burn damage to 135 (+90 per Elemental Drake stack)

"Up until now, Elder Dragon massively favored the team that was already ahead due to scaling with drake stacks (and in super long games, itself). We're removing that scaling to make room for power that's equally rewarding whether you're pressing a lead or making a comeback"

NEW - EXECUTE: Damaging an enemy at less than 20% health causes them to die in an Elder Immolation after 0.5 seconds (no cooldown).

DENIED: Elder Immolation can't execute enemies through invulnerability effects like Zhonya's Hourglass or undying effects like Kindred's R - Lamb's Respite

"Elder's new mechanic is an execute, sharpening its identity as the end-game teamfighting buff and making its impact much more obvious than the DoT and drake scaling it used to grant. Note that the 20% threshold looks higher than it is in practice: You'll rarely bring an enemy to exactly 19.9% before they go boom."

BUFF DURATION: 150 seconds; lost on death ⇒ 180 seconds; still lost on death

"We're standardizing the duration of Elder and Baron to three minutes. These buffs should last long enough for attacking teams to gain real advantages off coordinated power plays, but not so long that attackers come out ahead if they passively leave opponents stuck on defense for extended periods. If these duration changes make Elder too strong or Baron too weak, we'll adjust their effects accordingly."

SPAWN RULES: First dragon spawn after 35:00; 6:00 respawn ⇒ 6:00 after one team kills their fourth Elemental Drake; 6:00 respawn

"Final note about how often Elder will actually show up in games. In a complete stomp, the earliest Elder can spawn is 26:00 plus time spent in combat with the drakes. But in a game that's going even or isn't seeing many objectives taken, it's also possible for Elder to never spawn."

Baron Buff

DURATION: 210 seconds ⇒ 180 seconds

"We're standardizing the duration of Elder and Baron to three minutes. Though they have different strategic strengths, both buffs should last long enough for attacking teams to gain real advantages off coordinated power plays but not so long that defenders are paralyzed for excessive lengths of time. If these duration changes make Elder too strong or Baron too weak, we'll adjust their effects accordingly."

Buff Visuals

Row 1: Blue buff, Red buff, Red buff burn

Row 2: Elder Dragon, Hand of Baron, All buffs + Dragon Soul

"Visuals for Blue Buff, Red Buff, Red Buff's burn effect, Hand of Baron, and Aspect of the Dragon (Elder Dragon buff) have all been updated. All monster buffs are now visually cohesive, including the new Dragon Souls."

Top Lane Influence

Rift Herald

"With the increased importance on drakes on bot side, we're spawning Rift Herald a bit earlier and letting her respawn once so teams don't completely abandon their top laners in favor of bot lane presence. (Y'know...more than they already do.)"

Rift Herald Fight

INITIAL SPAWN: 10:00 ⇒ 8:00

NEW - RESPAWN: 6:00

DESPAWN: 19:30, delayed to 19:50 if in combat (unchanged)

HEALTH: 10,000-16,000 (levels 6-12) ⇒ 8,250-16,500 (levels 6-12)

ATTACK SPEED: 0.5 ⇒ 0.4 (it's easier to poke Rift Herald's eye before she spins around)

Summoned Rift Herald

EYE OF THE HERALD PICK-UP WINDOW: 40 seconds ⇒ 20 seconds

EYE OF THE HERALD CHANNEL: 4 seconds ⇒ 1 second

HERALD LEVEL: Average level of all ten champions, determined on using Eye of the Herald ⇒ picking up Eye of the Herald

HEALTH: 4000-6400 (levels 6-12) ⇒ 3180-6360 (levels 6-12)

HEADBUTT TURRET DAMAGE: 40% current heath (1600-2560), minimum 1500 ⇒ 1500-2550 (levels 6-12)

HEADBUTT SELF-DAMAGE: 25% current health ⇒ 66% current health

Minion XP

"We're very lightly adjusting minion XP to slightly equalize the influence top and bot laners have on the game. Solo laners will level about 2% faster from minions, while duo laners (or solo laners getting non-stop jungler attention) will level about 2% slower. Put another way, every five waves adds up to an extra caster minion for solo laners and one fewer for bot."

Solo XP

MELEE: 58.8 ⇒ 60.45

CASTER: 29.44 ⇒ 29.76

CANNON: 92 ⇒ 93

Shared XP

"Divide evenly among the champions sharing XP."

MELEE: 76.8 ⇒ 75.4

CASTER: 38.4 ⇒ 37.12

CANNON: 120 ⇒ 116

Turret Plating

"Slightly buffing Turret Plating durability to prevent group-and-push blowouts in the early game, especially with the Rift Herald changes in mind."

BULWARK RESISTANCES: 25 ⇒ 35 armor and magic resist per third, fourth, and fifth attacker when a plate is destroyed

Doran's Shield

PASSIVE: Up to 30 health over 10 seconds when damaged by an enemy champion ⇒ Up to 40 health over 8 seconds when damaged by an enemy champion, based on missing health. 66% effective for ranged users or when triggered by AoE, DoT, or proc effects

"Buffing DShield's regen to make it a stronger option in melee vs ranged matchups."

Jungle Pacing

"We're incentivizing junglers to prioritize farming rather than just fitting camps in between ganks. Higher camp uptime ensures junglers have consistent access to gold and XP on their side of the map, and the removal of catchup XP steepens the cost of failed ganks. Since junglers will be able to clear their camps more frequently, we're reducing the gold and experience a full clear grants so they don't take over games. We're also ensuring both sides of the jungle get junglers to level 3 in their first clear."

Jungle Item XP

REMOVED - CATCH-UP XP: Jungle items no longer grant additional XP on monster kill if you're behind in levels (epic monsters still innately have catch-up XP though)

FIRST CAMP BONUS XP: 120 ⇒ 165

Camp Timers

SMALL CAMP RESPAWN: 150 seconds ⇒ 120 seconds

NEW - SMALL CAMP RESPAWN ICONS: If your team had vision of a small camp when it was killed, you'll see a respawn icon on the minimap 15 seconds before respawn

BUFF CAMP RESPAWN ICONS: Buff camp respawn icons change from gray to yellow 20 seconds ⇒ 15 seconds before respawn

Krugs

BASE XP: 247 (217 on first clear) ⇒ 160 (Ancient Krug's first clear penalty removed)

BASE GOLD: 125 ⇒ 120

Murkwolves

BASE XP: 115 ⇒ 95

BASE GOLD: 84 ⇒ 70

Gromp

BASE HEALTH: 1800 ⇒ 2100

BASE XP: 115 ⇒ 135

BASE GOLD: 86 ⇒ 105

Raptors

BASE XP: 115 ⇒ 95

BASE GOLD: 112 ⇒ 85

Lethality Items

"Though the item system currently has three Lethality options, AD assassins overwhelmingly favor Duskblade and Youmuu's and typically skip Edge of Night. This leads to a lot of same-ness in terms of how one game feels relative to the next for them. We're adding two new options and reworking Edge to give assassin players more ways to adapt their build to each game."

Duskblade of Draktharr

TOTAL COST: 2900 gold (unchanged)

ATTACK DAMAGE: 55 ⇒ 60

LETHALITY: 21 (unchanged)

COOLDOWN REDUCTION: 10% (unchanged)

UNIQUE PASSIVE - NIGHTSTALKER: After being unseen for 1 second, your next basic attack against an enemy champion within 5 seconds of being seen by an enemy champion deals 30-150 (lvl 1-18) bonus on-hit physical damage. Melee attacks slow the target by 99% for 0.5 seconds after a 0.25 second delay. (unchanged)

REMOVED - UNIQUE PASSIVE BLACKOUT: No longer disables nearby wards or reveals nearby traps upon being spotted.

"We're taking away Duskblade's utility passive (Blackout) and giving it a bit more damage, making it the highest lethality and highest AD upgrade to Dirk."

Youmuu's Ghostblade

TOTAL COST: 2900 gold (unchanged)

ATTACK DAMAGE: 55

LETHALITY: 18 (unique)

COOLDOWN REDUCTION: 10%

MOVEMENT SPEED: +40 out of combat (unique)

ACTIVE: Gain +20% movement speed for 6 seconds (45 second cooldown) (unique)

NEW - GHOST-BLADE: Youmuu's' active now allows its user to ignore unit collision for the duration

Edge of Night

TOTAL COST: 3000 gold ⇒ 2900 gold

ATTACK DAMAGE: 55 ⇒ 50

LETHALITY: 18 ⇒ 10

HEALTH: 250 ⇒ 325

REMOVED - UNIQUE ACTIVE NIGHT'S VEIL: Channel for 1 second to gain a spell shield that blocks the next enemy ability within the next 7 seconds (40 second cooldown).

NEW - UNIQUE PASSIVE SPELL SHIELD: Grants a spell shield that blocks the next enemy ability. This shield refreshes after no damage is taken from enemy champions for 40 seconds.

"Edge of Night is the defensive Lethality option, but attaching that function to an active with a steep learning curve has made it ineffective for many aspiring assassins. We're switching Edge of Night's spell shield to a passive, making it more usable for a much wider skill range. This reliability incurs a damage cost: Edge of Night no longer grants extra AD or Lethality over its components, though we bumped its health to even things out overall."

Sanguine Blade

TOTAL COST: 3000 gold

BUILD PATH: Serrated Dirk + Vampiric Scepter + 1000 gold

ATTACK DAMAGE: 50

LETHALITY: 10

LIFESTEAL: 15%

UNIQUE PASSIVE - BLOOD PURSUIT: While near one or fewer visible enemy champions gain 8 lethality and 40-100% attack speed (lvl 1-18), decaying over 3 seconds if other enemy champions get too close.

"The first of our two new items. Sanguine Blade offers Duskblade-tier damage when you're hunting a lone enemy, but drops closer to Edge of Night levels if you're teamfighting. Go 1v1 somebody. Or 2v1 or 5v1, but where's the honor in that?"

Umbral Glaive

TOTAL COST: 2400 gold

BUILD PATH: Serrated Dirk + Long Sword + Long Sword + 600 gold

ATTACK DAMAGE: 50

LETHALITY: 12

COOLDOWN REDUCTION: 10%

UNIQUE PASSIVE - BLACKOUT: When spotted by an enemy ward, reveal traps and disable wards around you for 8 seconds (45 second cooldown). During this time, basic attacks instantly kill disabled traps and deal triple damage to wards.

"The second Lethality addition, and the new home of the Blackout passive. Umbral Glaive's stats aren't too high, but it's also the cheapest Lethality item. Pick it up if you want to black out the enemy's map. That's why the passive is called Blackout."

Serrated Dirk

REMOVED - HEADHUNTER: Your next damaging spell no longer deals 40 bonus physical damage after you kill an enemy

"The item shop has a few component pieces whose passives disappear from their upgrades, and Serrated Dirk is one of them. These days we're not huge fans of that, since disappearing passives ask you to play around an effect that you lose access to as the game progresses. Since the lethality line's getting an overall power-up from the adaptability provided by new options, we're nerfing it by removing the disappearing passive from Dirk."

Support Items

Mechanics Updates

"We're refreshing support items to be less poachable by solo laners and have an expanded quest system that provides free, automatic upgrades, letting supports start the rest of their build earlier. (This should also lead to more build diversity between champs that use the same starter.) As a trade-off, Tribute no longer damages and Spoils of War no longer heals, so supports will have less impact in the early lane phase.

At max tier, we've removed the Tribute/Spoils of War passives. Most of the gold these effects granted is still earned in the lower tiers and passive gold per 10 is up, so mid/late game economy is still buffed overall considering the gold made available by the free upgrades.

We're also introducing AD equivalents of the items to broaden the cast of champs who can be played as support. At launch they'll basically be the same as the AP versions, but that symmetry may break down the road as we balance each item line individually."

Tiers

HOW SATISFYING: Support items still have three tiers, but now upgrade automatically for free as you complete their quests

TIER 1: 400 gold starting item. Earn gold with Tribute or Spoils of War to upgrade.

TIER 2: Increased stats and 3 ward charges. Earn gold with Tribute or Spoils of War to upgrade.

TIER 3: Significantly increased stats and 4 total ward charges. Tribute or Spoils of War go away.

CUMULATIVE COST: 1800 gold ⇒ 400 gold

Anti-Poaching

EAT THE RICH: Farming more than 20 CS per 5 minutes (3 out of 10 waves) reduces gold from minions by 50%. The penalty increases with further CS to a max of 80% reduction at 50 minions.

MATH: Once the penalty kicks in, your CS gold is reduced to (70 - CS within 5 minutes)%

Spellthief's Edge Line

"The magical-flavored aggressive line (with fancy new icons)! Tribute no longer deals damage, so Spellthief's users won't be contributing as much to early skirmishes. The new anti-poaching rule lets us rip out Tribute's nearby ally requirement and charge rate CS penalty.

Tribute gold is buffed for Spellthief's but nerfed for Frostfang to maintain the time at which supports gain access to wards (given they can't pay to upgrade to Frostfang) but push the final upgrade later than when supports previously completed Remnant of the Watchers. Shard of True Ice's stats on top of the items purchased with freed-up transformation gold would've been too much of a buff."

Tribute Changes

REMOVED - OLD TRIBUTE: Damaging spells and attacks against champions or buildings deal 13 (upgraded: 18) bonus magic damage and, if an ally is nearby, grant 11 (upgraded: 22) gold. Gain a charge every 10 seconds, up to 3 charges. Before quest completion, Tribute generation pauses for 12 seconds per minion or non-epic monster slain.

NEW - NEW TRIBUTE: Damaging spells and attacks against champions or buildings grant 15 gold. Gain a charge every 10 seconds, up to 3 charges.

Spellthief's Edge

COST: 400 gold

ABILITY POWER: 10 ⇒ 8

NEW HEALTH: 10

REMOVED - MANA REGEN: No longer grants +25% mana regen

GOLD PER 10: 2 (unchanged)

UNIQUE PASSIVE - TRIBUTE: Damaging spells and attacks against champions or buildings grant 15 gold. This can occur up to 3 times every 30 seconds.

QUEST: Earning 500 total gold through Tribute upgrades this item to Frostfang.

Frostfang

ABILITY POWER: 20 ⇒ 15

NEW HEALTH: 70

REMOVED - MANA REGEN: No longer grants +50% mana regen

REMOVED - COOLDOWN REDUCTION: No longer grants 10% cooldown reduction

GOLD PER 10: 2 ⇒ 3

UNIQUE PASSIVE - TRIBUTE: Damaging spells and attacks against champions or buildings grant 15 gold. This can occur up to 3 times every 30 seconds.

UNIQUE ACTIVE - WARDING: Place a Stealth Ward. Holds up to 3 charges which refill upon visiting the shop.

QUEST: Earning 1000 total gold through Tribute upgrades this item to Shard of True Ice.

Shard of True Ice

NAME: Remnant of the Watchers ⇒ Shard of True Ice

ABILITY POWER: 35 ⇒ 60

HEALTH: 200 ⇒ 150

REMOVED - MANA REGEN: No longer grants +50% mana regen

REMOVED - COOLDOWN REDUCTION: No longer grants 10% cooldown reduction

GOLD PER 10: 2 ⇒ 3

REMOVED - UNIQUE PASSIVE - TRIBUTE: Damaging spells and attacks against champions or buildings no longer deal 18 bonus magic damage and, if an ally is nearby, grant 22 gold up to 3 times every 30 seconds.

UNIQUE ACTIVE - WARDING: Place a Stealth Ward. Holds up to 4 charges which refill upon visiting the shop.

Spectral Sickle

COST: 400 gold

ATTACK DAMAGE: 5

HEALTH: 10

GOLD PER 10: 2

UNIQUE PASSIVE - TRIBUTE: Damaging spells and attacks against champions or buildings grant 15 gold. This can occur up to 3 times every 30 seconds.

QUEST: Earning 500 total gold through Tribute upgrades this item to Harrowing Crescent.

Harrowing Crescent

ATTACK DAMAGE: 10

HEALTH: 70

GOLD PER 10: 3

UNIQUE PASSIVE - TRIBUTE: Damaging spells and attacks against champions or buildings grant 15 gold. This can occur up to 3 times every 30 seconds.

UNIQUE ACTIVE - WARDING: Place a Stealth Ward. Holds up to 3 charges which refill upon visiting the shop.

QUEST - Earning 1000 total gold through Tribute upgrades this item to Black Mist Scythe.

Black Mist Scythe

ATTACK DAMAGE: 35

HEALTH: 150

GOLD PER 10: 3

UNIQUE ACTIVE - WARDING: Place a Stealth Ward. Holds up to 4 charges which refill upon visiting the shop.

Spoils of War

REMOVED - OLD SPOILS OF WAR: While nearby an ally, melee basic attacks execute minions below 200-285 / 215-470 / 350-860 (lvl 1-18) (+ 100% AD) health, healing you and the nearest allied champion for 5-30 / 10-60 / 15-90 (based on missing health) health and granting them kill gold. Ranged basic attacks don't get the execute and heal for half the amount. Gain a charge every 40 / 30 / 20 seconds, up to 2 / 3 / 4 charges.

NEW - NEW SPOILS OF WAR: While nearby an ally, basic attacks execute minions below 50% of their max Health (30% for ranged) and grant your ally kill gold. (These effects recharge every 45 seconds. Max 3 charges.)

Relic Shield

COST: 400 gold

HEALTH: 50 ⇒ 30

NEW - ABILITY POWER: 5

GOLD PER 10: 1 ⇒ 2

UNIQUE PASSIVE - SPOILS OF WAR: While nearby an ally, basic attacks execute minions below 50% of their max Health (30% for ranged) and grant your ally kill gold. (These effects recharge every 45 seconds. Max 3 charges.)

QUEST: Earning 500 total gold through Spoils of War upgrades this item to Targon's Buckler.

Targon's Buckler

NAME: Targon's Brace ⇒ Targon's Buckler

HEALTH: 125 ⇒ 100

NEW - ABILITY POWER: 10

REMOVED - HEALTH REGEN: No longer grants 50% health regen

GOLD PER 10: 1 ⇒ 3

UNIQUE PASSIVE - SPOILS OF WAR: While nearby an ally, basic attacks execute minions below 50% of their max Health (no penalty for ranged!) and grant your ally kill gold. (These effects recharge every 45 seconds. Max 3 charges.)

UNIQUE ACTIVE - WARDING: Place a Stealth Ward. Holds up to 3 charges which refill upon visiting the shop.

QUEST: Earning 1000 total gold through Spoils of War upgrades this item to Bulwark of the Mountain

Bulwark of the Mountain

NAME: Remnant of the Aspect ⇒ Bulwark of the Mountain

HEALTH: 350 ⇒ 300

NEW - ABILITY POWER: 40

REMOVED - COOLDOWN REDUCTION: No longer grants 10% cooldown reduction

REMOVED - HEALTH REGEN: No longer grants +200% health regen

GOLD PER 10: 1 ⇒ 3

UNIQUE ACTIVE - WARDING: Place a Stealth Ward. Holds up to 4 charges which refill upon visiting the shop.

Steel Shoulderguards

COST: 400 gold

HEALTH: 30

ATTACK DAMAGE: 3

GOLD PER 10: 2

UNIQUE PASSIVE - SPOILS OF WAR: While nearby an ally, basic attacks execute minions below 50% of their max Health (30% for ranged) and grant your ally kill gold. (These effects recharge every 45 seconds. Max 3 charges.)

QUEST: Earning 500 total gold through Spoils of War upgrades this item to Runesteel Spaulders

Runesteel Spaulders

HEALTH: 100

ATTACK DAMAGE: 6

GOLD PER 10: 3

UNIQUE PASSIVE - SPOILS OF WAR: While nearby an ally, basic attacks execute minions below 50% of their max Health (no penalty for ranged!) and grant your ally kill gold. (These effects recharge every 45 seconds. Max 3 charges.)

UNIQUE ACTIVE - WARDING: Place a Stealth Ward. Holds up to 3 charges which refill upon visiting the shop.

QUEST: Earning 1000 total gold through Tribute upgrades this item to Pauldrons of Whiterock

Pauldrons of Whiterock

HEALTH: 300

ATTACK DAMAGE: 24

GOLD PER 10: 3

UNIQUE ACTIVE - WARDING: Place a Stealth Ward. Holds up to 4 charges which refill upon visiting the shop.

REMOVED - Ancient Coin Line

"Where Spellthief's established itself as the aggressive support item line, Ancient Coin and Relic Shield overlapped in rewarding more defensive, attrition-based playstyles. With the switch toward allowing ranged champions to use Relic Shield, we're retiring the Ancient Coin line."

Shurelya's Reverie

TOTAL COST: 2250 gold ⇒ 2050 gold

BUILD PATH: Kindlegem + Aether Wisp + Faerie Charm + 475 gold ⇒ Forbidden Idol + Crystalline Bracer + 600 gold

HEALTH: 200 ⇒ 300

COOLDOWN REDUCTION: 10% (unchanged)

MANA REGEN: +100% (unchanged)

NEW - HEAL AND SHIELD POWER: 10%

NEW - HEALTH REGEN: +100%

REMOVED - ABILITY POWER: No longer grants 40 ability power

REMOVED - MOVEMENT SPEED: No longer grants +5% movement speed

UNIQUE ACTIVE: Grants you and allies within 700 ⇒ 1000 range 40% bonus movement speed for 3 seconds (90 second cooldown)

ACTIVE RANGE: 700 ⇒ 1000

Engergized and Crit Items

"We've struggled in the past to differentiate Energized builds from traditional crit, given that Statikk Shiv and Rapid Firecannon occupy both spaces and the only other Energized item is Stormrazor. This time, we're embracing the overlap and the goal of our changes is to make Energized a slightly more mid-game-oriented flavor of crit, rather than its own thing entirely. Energized is about the occasional massive hit rather than a non-stop barrage of consistently strong attacks. To that end, we're lowering the gap between how many procs users get from moving versus attacking—attack speed was giving drastically more procs, making hit-and-run playstyles too ineffective by comparison.

One trend you'll notice in the items below is a simplification of individual item passives, particularly the ones that change how Energize behaves. Each item now adds just one additional effect—Stormrazor's slow, RFC's range, and Shiv's lightning—and proc damage has been standardized to a flat 120 on each item. All other mechanics changes have been removed or rolled into Energized's baseline functionality so each item can stand on its own, rather than require other Energized items to become fully effective."

Energized

ZAP: Damage from Energized effects now stacks, rather than choosing the highest-damage source

KEEP MOVING: Energized charges from moving increased by 20%; charges from attacking reduced by 50%

DEMOLITIONIST: Energized effects now always work on turrets

UPDATED - Stormrazor

TOTAL COST: 3100 gold ⇒ 3200 gold

BUILD PATH: B.F. Sword + Long Sword + Kircheis Shard + 850 gold ⇒ B.F. Sword + Cloak of Agility + Kircheis Shard + 400 gold

ATTACK DAMAGE: 60 ⇒ 55

NEW - CRITICAL STRIKE CHANCE: 25%

ATTACK SPEED: 30% ⇒ 15%

ENERGIZED DAMAGE: 50 ⇒ 120

ENERGIZED SLOW: 40% decaying over 1.5 seconds ⇒ 75% for 0.5 seconds, non-decaying

REMOVED - ENERGETIC: No longer amplifies other Energized effects by 35%

"The absence of crit chance on Stormrazor was the biggest impediment toward Energized working as a crit variant. Adding it in means players can go for Energized builds without having to trade away their crit progression. Per the simplification note above, we've removed Stormrazor's amp on other Energized sources and sharpened its slow to a stronger, shorter effect that offers more play-around opportunities."

Rapid Firecannon

ENERGIZED DAMAGE: 60-140 (lvl 1-18) ⇒ 120

REMOVED - DEMOLITIONIST: No longer causes Energized effects to work on turrets. Because that's baseline Energized functionality now.

REMOVED - EXTRA ENERGIZED: No longer increases Energized charge rates

"We're leaving RFC's range increase as its defining feature and making its turret functionality baseline for Energized. Its charge rate increase is going away per our earlier comments on not wanting an Energized item's strength to be tied to how many other items in the system you own."

Statikk Shiv

ENERGIZED DAMAGE: 60-140 (lvl 1-18) ⇒ 120

SHIV LIGHTNING BOUNCES: 5 ⇒ 7

REMOVED - EXTRA SHOCKING: Shiv Lightning can no longer critically strike

"Shiv still makes lightning, but we're removing the ability for lightning to crit. This is partially for that crit-vs-Energized split we've talked about already, but also because fully stacking Energized items (360 damage) gets you more power IE Shiv crits did previously (325 damage). Since this is still an early-to-midgame nerf, we're also folding Stormrazor's old bounce increase into Shiv's baseline. This is also a good time to remind you that Shiv no longer needs RFC to proc on turrets."

Kircheis Shard

TOTAL COST: 600 gold ⇒ 700 gold

ENERGIZED DAMAGE: 50 ⇒ 80

"We're making Kircheis Shard's Energized proc more powerful so it feels more like you're starting down the Energized path when you pick it up. It was already efficiently costed, though, so we had to bump its price up a bit."

REMOVED - Brawler's Gloves

"We're streamlining crit items down to one component. This is a slight nerf to build flexibility, particularly early-game, since Cloak requires more time spent farming before it can be picked up."

Cloak of Agility

CRITICAL STRIKE CHANCE: 20% ⇒ 25%

"The good news is we're buffing Cloak. It now gives the same amount of crit as a completed item, so if you need to hit the crit cap in a hurry, just layer a few of these on! (Probably don't do this, but the option's here if you want to experiment)"

Zeal

TOTAL COST: 1200 gold ⇒ 1400 gold

BUILD PATH: Brawlers' Gloves + Dagger + 500 gold ⇒ Cloak of Agility + Dagger + 300 gold

CRITICAL STRIKE CHANCE: 15% ⇒ 25%

ATTACK SPEED: 15% ⇒ 12%

MOVEMENT SPEED: 5% (unchanged)

"Zeal's crit stats got a lot bigger from switching to Cloak of Agility. We dropped its attack speed a bit so we could avoid having to raise its cost too much to keep it balanced."

Phantom Dagger

BUILD PATH: Dagger + Zeal + Brawler's Glove + 700 gold ⇒ Dagger + Zeal + 900 gold

"With Zeal's crit going up, Phantom Dancer didn't have room for another crit component."

Removed Items

REMOVED - Spear of Shojin

"When wielded by its most synergistic users, Shojin's unique passive reduced the downtime of their CC, mobility, and immunity spells beyond what we think leaves healthy room for counterplay."

FOUND IT IN THE BACK OF THE FREEZER: Spear of Shojin is still available in ARAM

REMOVED - Zz'rot Portal

"Zz'Rot enables split push strategies that don't involve enough champion interaction. We may revisit this type of strategic item in the future, but if we do it'll require more risk for wielders to use."

WHAT'S IN A NAME: Malzahar's W stacks have been renamed from Gathering Swarm to Zz'Rot Swarm. Next patch, his W will also be renamed to Zz'Rot Swarm.

REMOVED - Ohmwrecker

"Ohmwrecker's been underused and underpowered for a long time. Turret disabling is an interesting mechanic we think could have a place in League, but not one that potentially shows up in every team's toolkit, which is the risk a good version of Ohmwrecker presents."

WHAT'S IN A NAME: The Penetrating Bullets passive on turrets has been renamed to Ohmwrecker

REMOVED - Raptor Cloak

"With the removal of Zz'Rot and Ohmwrecker, Raptor Cloak doesn't build into anything. Sorry, Darius."

Item Set Editor Cleanup

"While these items were technically "removed" when we turned their respective modes off, we're removing them from the item set creator to make the tool easier to use."

DOESN'T SPARK JOY: Items from Nexus Siege, Odyssey: Extraction, Nexus Blitz, Poro King, and Dominion have been removed from the item set editor

Runes

REMOVED - Kleptomancy

"Kleptomancy was designed as a rune that (a) allowed users to build a gold advantage over opponents at the cost of the immediate power other keystones provide, and (b) created moment-to-moment changes in laning dynamics depending on what you got from procs. The experience Klepto created for opponents, however—be farmed for gold by constant harass damage—has been rough, especially for ranged vs melee matchups. Removing gold as an incentive only left the moment-to-moment dynamic changes as Klepto's design core, and League's consumable item system isn't deep enough to carry an entire keystone on its back. Sorry, Klepto—even for an Inspiration rune, you were too weird."

NEW - Prototype: Omnistone

Periodically gain a single use of another random keystone.

"Enter Omnistone, a keystone meant to be Kleptomancy's spiritual successor. Like the elixir portion of Klepto's design, Omnistone is about making use of what you've got in the moment. Relative to the individual keystones it offers, Omnistone's advantage is that users can rapidly cycle through keystones that otherwise have much longer cooldowns."

ROULETTE: Periodically gain a single use of another random keystone. Once a keystone is rolled, it can't be rolled again until only three options are left, at which point the table resets (you won't get the keystone you just used, though).

COOLDOWN: Gain a new keystone 8-4 seconds (melee, lv 1-18) or 12-8 seconds (ranged, lv 1-18) after using the last. Scaling is weighted toward later levels.

AUTO-REROLL: Gain a new keystone while out of combat after 40 seconds of not using a keystone

VISIBILITY: Your current keystone shows up to the right of your health bar. All ten players can see it.

ADDITIONALS: Dark Harvest souls persist after you get a different keystone and affect all your other keystones. Grasp of the Undying's health persists after you get a different keystone, too.

Available Keystones

• Press the Attack
• Lethal Tempo
• Fleet Footwork
• Conqueror
• Summon Aery
• Arcane Comet
• Phase Rush
• Electrocute
• Predator (only if you have boots)
• Dark Harvest (souls amplify the effects of all keystones)
• Hail of Blades
• Grasp of the Undying
• Aftershock (only if you can trigger it on a basic ability)
• Glacial Augment

Conqueror

REMOVED - TRUE DAMAGE: Conqueror no longer converts 8% of damage against champions to true damage at full stacks

HEALING: At full stacks, Conqueror heals for 8% of pre-mitigation damage against champions ⇒ 15% of post-mitigation damage against champions

MAXIMUM STACKS: 5 ⇒ 10

STACKS: 1 per ability hit or basic attack ⇒ 2 per ability hit or melee basic attack, 1 per ranged basic attack

STACK DURATION: 8 seconds for melee, 3 seconds for ranged ⇒ 8 seconds

ADAPTIVE FORCE PER STACK: 2-6 (lvl 1-18) ⇒ 2-5 (lvl 1-18)

MAX ADAPTIVE FORCE: 10-30 (lvl 1-18) ⇒ 20-50 (lvl 1-18)

"Conqueror has been too effective at allowing sustained-damage fighters to deal with tanks, who have lost their place in solo lanes as a result. We're removing the true damage conversion and changing the heal to post-mitigation damage so Conqueror doesn't hard-counter tanks, but buffing its adaptive force to keep it strong. We're also changing up Conqueror's ranged/melee split so ranged users are a bit less disadvantaged (though Conqueror remains a melee-focused rune)."

Aftershock

RESISTANCES: 70 (+50% bonus resists) ⇒ 35 (+80% bonus resists)

DAMAGE: 10-120 (+4% maximum health) ⇒ 25-120 (+8% bonus health)

COOLDOWN: 35 seconds ⇒ 20 seconds

BUGFIX - Aftershock's resistances no longer last for slightly longer than intended

"Aftershock's flat resistances were eliminating a primary weakness of several ranged champions, forcing us to either balance the rune around edge case users (making it weak for its main audiences), or balance those edge case users around Aftershock (whose mains might not even like Aftershock's playstyle). We're reshaping this keystone back toward tanks and fighters, and will keep an eye on how former(?) ranged users fare in preseason."

Presence of Mind

TAKEDOWN BONUS: Restore 20% of your maximum mana and refund 10% of your ultimate's cooldown ⇒ Restore 20% of maximum mana or energy and increase your maximum mana by 100 (up to 500) or your maximum energy by 10 (up to 50)

"This rune's ult cooldown refund overlaps too much with Cloud Drake's new buff. Admittedly, so does Ultimate Hunter, but Hunter is usable by more champions and has a clearer goal, so it's the one that gets to stay. We're changing Presence of Mind to finally open it up to energy users and grant a resource pool increase (big brain getting bigger) rather than a partial ult reset."

Nimbus Cloak

PROC: On ult cast ⇒ On Summoner Spell cast

SPEED BOOST: 100 bonus movement speed for 2.5 seconds, decaying over the last second ⇒ 15-35% movement speed for 2.5 seconds depending on Summoner Spell cooldown

LONG COOLDOWN: 35% movement speed (Flash, Teleport)

MEDIUM COOLDOWN: 25% movement speed (Heal, Ignite, Cleanse, Exhaust, Ghost, Barrier)

SHORT COOLDOWN: 15% movement speed (Hexflash, Smite, Zoe's W - Spell Thief, ARAM's Mark)

"We turned Nimbus Cloak into Cloud Drake's Dragon Soul, so we're changing Nimbus Cloak to work off Summoner Spells instead."

Champions

Senna

Passive - Absolution

REMOVED - SPELLTHIEF'S CONVERSION: Senna no longer converts ability power from Spellthief's Edge into adaptive force since she can just buy Spectral Sickle

REMOVED - ALT MODE BONUS: Senna no longer gains double Mist stacks on ARAM, URF, or their variants

Bug fixes

• The camera no longer becomes locked if, while dead, you use the minimap to move the camera around, then after respawning press the spacebar to center it on yourself
• The mute icon has been fixed
• If Poppy stuns an enemy with E - Heroic Charge and that enemy is then stunned by another effect during Heroic Charge's stun, the second stun is no longer removed when Heroic Charge's stun expires
• Darius' W - Crippling Strike attack no longer hits through Teemo's Q - Blinding Dart when it critically strikes
• If Garen's Q - Decisive Strike attack is canceled due to losing vision of his target, he's no longer locked out of casting E - Judgment until Q's empowered attack window ends
• Spoils of War can now properly be proc'd even if the only nearby ally is untargetable or in stasis
• Malphite's W - Thunderclap empowered attack window no longer lasts indefinitely if the first basic attack that would proc it is canceled
• Diana now properly gains a stack of Conqueror from the basic attack issued automatically after dashing to a target with R - Lunar Rush
• Shyvana's Dragon Form Q - Twin Bite now properly grants multiple stacks of Conqueror
• Evelynn's Passive - Demon Shade tooltip no longer displays zeros for every number

Senna

Senna escapes from the lantern on November 10!

• Champion Trailer
• Universe Hub
• Champion Insights

Ashe

W - Volley

• Cost: 50 mana ⇒ 70 mana

Blitzcrank

Q - Rocket Grab

• Base Damage: 80/135/190/245/300 ⇒ 70/120/170/220/270

Ivern

Q - Rootcaller

• Leave Room For Daisy: Ivern will now always dash into melee range of the target
• Three's A Crowd: Fixed a bug where Ivern would land inside some jungle camps when dashing with his Q
• Abra-Kadabra-Alakazam: Fixed a bug where allies would teleport to unexpected locations when Ivern would dash to a rooted target

Kai'Sa

Q - Icathian Rain

• Non-Minion Multi-Hit Missile Damage: E30% ⇒ 25%

Kalista

W - Sentinel

• Bonus Damage On Marked Targets: 5/7.5/10/12.5/15% of target's maximum health ⇒ 10/12/14/16/18% of target's maximum health
• Mark Duration: 3 seconds ⇒ 4 seconds

Kayle

Q - Radiant Blast

• Base Damage: 70/115/160/205/250 ⇒ 60/100/140/180/220

W - Celestial Blessing

• Cost: 60/70/80/90/100 mana ⇒ 70/80/90/100/110 mana

Malphite

R - Unstoppable Force

• Ratio: 1.0 ability power ⇒ 0.8 ability power

Nautilus

R - Depth Charge

• Primary Target Base Damage: 200/325/450 ⇒ 150/275/400

Pantheon

Q - Comet Spear

• Minion Damage Reduction: 20% ⇒ 30%
• Execute Threshold: 25% of target's maximum health ⇒ 20% of target's maximum health

W - Shield Vault

• Removed No Longer Walking All Over You: Pantheon's dash speed is no longer increased from boots

Sejuani

Base Stats

• Attack Damage: 64 ⇒ 66
• Health Regen Growth: 0.85 ⇒ 1
• Attack Speed Growth: 3% ⇒ 3.5%

Q - Arctic Assault

• Damage: 80/120/160/200/240 (+0.4 ability power) ⇒ 80/130/180/230/280 (+0.6 ability power)

E - Permafrost

• Bugfix: Passive now properly resets its debuff duration when reapplying at max stacks

Sylas

Base Stats

• Health Regen: 7 ⇒ 9
• Health Regen Growth: 1 ⇒ 0.9
• Magic Resist: 36.1 ⇒ 39

W - Kingslayer

• Cost: 50/55/60/65/70 mana ⇒ 40/45/50/55/60 mana

Xayah

W - Deadly Plumage

• Bonus Attack Speed: 40/47.5/55/62.5/70% ⇒ 35/40/45/50/55%

• If her target dies before Caitlyn's Energized (via items like Rapid Firecannon and Statikk Shiv) Passive - Headshot hits them, Caitlyn will no longer be damaged in their stead
• Ornn's second R - Call of the Forge God activation now properly knocks up enemies close to it
• Gangplank's E - Powder Keg's barrels no longer trigger Teemo's R - Noxious Trap's shrooms
• Game invites will no longer disappear if the game owner changes modes
• Fizz's Q - Urchin Strike now properly breaks spell shields
• Twisted Fate's R - Destiny will no longer block projectiles (like turret or dragon attacks) if it is interrupted
• If Taric casts R - Cosmic Radiance and dies during the cast window, the cooldown will now reflect the proper time and not reflect his W - Bastion cooldown
• Rek'Sai's R - Void Rush refund now properly and consistently works when enemy champions die during the cast and dash of the ability
• Syndra's R - Unleashed Power HUD icon now properly shows how many Dark Spheres are available to use on cast
• Nidalee's Q - Takedown's empowered basic attacks now properly deals damage to traps
• When Sion casts R - Unstoppable Onslaught out of its range, the ability will now properly cast immediately instead of after he walks into cast range
• When Q - Twin Bite is on cooldown, Shyvana's basic attacks on structures now properly reduce the ability's cooldown
• Rift Herald's summon trinket now properly has the 1 second lockout period that all trinkets have to prevent accidental usage

Skins

• True Damage Yasuo
• True Damage Akali
• True Damage Ekko
• True Damage Qiyana
• True Damage Senna
• True Damage Qiyana Prestige Edition

Chromas

• True Damage Yasuo
• True Damage Akali
• True Damage Ekko
• True Damage Senna

Garen

Nerfing Garen after his changes in 9.20. While this change might look large, we've kept the ratios the same, so it shouldn’t feel like a huge nerf.

R - Judgment

• Base damage per spin: 8/12/16/20/24 ⇒ 4/8/12/16/20
• Damage ratio per spin: 0-8.2 (levels 1-18) (+32/34/36/38/40% attack damage) (unchanged)

Kayne

Both of Kayn's forms are underperforming right now, so we're adjusting his damage to give him a bit more oomph against champions, regardless of which form you choose.

Q - Reaping Slash

• Damage: 60/80/100/120/140 ⇒ 75/95/115/135/155
• Rhaast modified damage: 0.5 total attack damage ⇒ 0.55 total attack damage
• Bonus damage to monsters: 55 ⇒ 40

Kog'Maw

Right now, Kog'Maw's E does not feel rewarding to cast, even when it lands successfully. Rather than decreasing the costs on his E's or other abilities' early ranks, we're upping their value so that Kog'Maw’s kit still has a risk vs reward element.

Base Stats

• Mana: 322.22 ⇒ 325
• Mana regen: 8.676 ⇒ 8.75

Q - Caustic Spittle

• Base damage: 80/130/180/230/280 ⇒ 90/140/190/240/290

E - Void Ooze

• Base damage: 60/105/150/195/240 ⇒ 75/120/165/210/255

Lulu

Lulu's transition into the mid-game could be better. We want Pix to offer more to fights and for players to make choices that are more worthwhile as Lulu scales.

E - Help, Pix!

• Shield: 80/115/150/185/220 ⇒ 80/120/160/200/240
• Damage: 80/110/140/170/200 ⇒ 80/120/160/200/240

Maokai

Maokai is underperforming across all levels of play and needs some help to keep up with his would-be lumberjacks.

Q - Bramble Smash

• Bugfix: Maokai will no longer damage nearby targets if he's begun casting Q - Bramble Smash right before dying

W - Twisted Advance

• Cost: 60/65/70/75/80 ⇒ 60 at all levels
• Damage: 50/75/100/125/150 ⇒ 70/95/120/145/170

R - Nature's Grasp

• Root duration: 0.6-2.4 seconds (based on distance traveled) ⇒ 0.8-2.6 seconds (based on distance traveled)

Master Yi

Phantom Hits now proc Double Strike and apply Double Strike stacks.

Passive - Double Strike

• Phantom hit bugfix: Master Yi's Phantom Hits (from Guinsoo's Rageblade) will now properly proc Double Strike and apply Double Strike stacks

Pyke

When Pyke gets ahead, he takes advantage of the situation without any real risk, killing off folks left and right and becoming near-impossible to take down. He should still have trouble escaping after an assassination, even if he's doing very well. And if he makes a second pass at a kill, he shouldn't be at near full life.

Base Stats

• Health growth: 100 ⇒ 90

Passive - Gift of the Drowned Ones

• Grey Health: 30-81% (levels 1-18) of the damage he takes from enemy champions ⇒ 25-50% (levels 1-18) of the damage he takes from enemy champions

Shaco

Shaco landed in a strong spot after 9.20, so we're doing some light touch-ups to address specific concerns about his lane presence and early jungle power.

W - Jack In The Box

• Box duration: 60 seconds ⇒ 40 seconds

Sona

Follow-up QoL change and passive bugfix for the adult woman.

General

• Resource bar: When her Passive - Power Chord is ready, Sona's resource bar will now change color based on her current active aura
• Passive bugfix: Sona's abilities no longer fail to generate Passive - Power Chord stacks immediately after an empowered attack

Viktor

Viktor is a little weaker than we expected after the changes last patch. We're going light on the follow-up, since we know people are still getting accustomed to him. We're also including a bugfix that already happened in a mid-patch update in 9.20, since we weren't able to widely message it out at the time!

Base Stats

• Health: 528.04 ⇒ 530
• Attack damage: 52.04 ⇒ 53
• Armor: 22.72 ⇒ 23

Q - Siphon Power

• Damage: 50/65/80/95/110 ⇒ 60/75/90/105/120
• Bugfix: Now properly buffs Viktor's shield when augmented

W - Gravity Field

• SFX bugfix: Gravity Field's SFX is no longer noticeably louder when using it against more than one enemy

Warwick

Warwick is falling behind the pack, especially when he maxes his Q before his W. We want him to still have the option of maxing out one over the other based on the situation, but they should both be on a more equal footing.

Q - Jaws of the Beast

• Damage ratio: 6/6.5/7/7.5/8% of the target's maximum health ⇒ 6/7/8/9/10% of the target's maximum health

W - Blood Hunt

• Bonus attack speed: 50/65/80/95/110% upon attacking a Blood Hunted target or an enemy unit below 50% of their maximum health ⇒ 70/80/90/100/110% upon attacking a Blood Hunted target or an enemy unit below 50% of their maximum health

• When Kindred casts W - Wolf's Frenzy, Wolf now properly attacks enemies in range when she is not attacking anything
• When walking over a Rift Scuttler Speed Shrine, champions will now have a Revealed Eyes marker over them
• Enemies spotted by Ashe's E - Hawkshot will no longer have the vision Eyes above their heads until the end of the game
• Qiyana's R - Supreme Display of Talent VFX no longer desynchronize with its effects and they properly follow the outline around terrain all the way through from the enemies' perspective if it is cast in Fog of War
• Heimerdinger's R - UPGRADE!!!'s tooltip no longer mentions that his E - CH-3X Lightning Grenade's slow is improved to 80%
• Only champions can pick up Eye of the Herald. Dashing as Yasuo through it with R - Last Breath or having the living shadow from Shadow Assassin Kayn's W - Blade's Reach stand on it will no longer have those non-champion entities pick it up
• When Sylas Hijacks Nidalee's ultimate and uses her Q - Takedown, he'll now properly do damage with it
• Aurelion Sol's R - Voice of Light's VFX are no longer globally visible in Fog of War
• Neeko can once again select herself to deactivate her disguise, putting it on a 2-second cooldown
• Kled will no longer lose his untargetable status when dismounting near turrets/walls

Skins

Chromas

Witch's Brew Blitzcrank

Count Kassadin

Riot is making big changes to three heroes in this patch: Garen, Shaco, and Viktor. The developer doesn't consider these changes large enough to be called "reworks," though the differences are fairly drastic. Rounding out the patch are some bug fixes and changes to the Locket of the Iron Solari item.

Blitzcrank

Base Stats

• ARMOR: 44 ⇒ 40
• ARMOR GROWTH: 4 ⇒ 3.5

"We like the extra range from 9.19 but think he's a little too strong right now."

Garen

Base Stats

• ATTACK SPEED GROWTH: 2.9% ⇒ 3.65%
• HEALTH: 616.28 ⇒ 620
• HEALTH GROWTH: 84.25 ⇒ 84

Passive - Perseverance

• REGENERATION: 2/8% (based on level) of his maximum health per 5 seconds ⇒ 1.5-10.1% (levels 1-18) of his maximum health per 5 seconds
• REMOVED - EMPOWERED REGENERATION: Garen no longer passively doubly regenerates health while below 25/50% (based on level) of his maximum health
• UPDATED - REGENERATION INTERRUPTION: 9 seconds when hit by non-minions before level 11; 4 seconds when hit by epic monsters, towers, or champions after level 11 ⇒ 7 seconds when hit by epic monsters, towers, or champions

Q - Decisive Strike

• NEW - CAST TIME: Now scales with Garen's attack speed, behaving more similarly to a basic attack
• BUGFIX: Fixed a bug where when Garen is slowed, his Q's lockout time dramatically increased

W - Courage

• RESISTANCES PER KILL: 0.33 bonus armor and magic resistance (max of 50 at 150 unit kills) ⇒ 0.25 bonus armor and magic resistance (max of 30 at 150 unit kills)
• UPDATED - SHIELD ME: Grants 30% extra damage reduction and Tenacity for the first 0.75 seconds ⇒ Grants a shield for 10% of his maximum health and 60% Tenacity for the first 0.75 seconds

E - Judgment

• SPINS: 5-10 (levels 1-16) ⇒ 7 (+1 per 20% attack speed from items and levels)
• DAMAGE PER SPIN: 14/18/22/26/30 (+0.36-0.4 attack damage) ⇒ 8/12/16/20/24 (+0-8 based on level) (+0.32-0.4 attack damage)
• BONUS DAMAGE: 33% to a single enemy ⇒ 25% to the nearest enemy
• SPINS BEFORE SHRED: 4 ⇒ 6
• NEW - ALEXANDER THE GREAT: Now grants stacks of Conqueror on each spin

R - Demacian Justice

• REMOVED - PASSIVE: Garen no longer marks enemies with the most kills in the last 5 minutes as the Villain
• NEW - LASIK: Grants vision of the target for 1 second, preventing it from cancelling if the target breaks line of sight
• DAMAGE: 175/350/525 (+0.286 /0.333 /0.4 of the target’s missing health) as magic damage ⇒ 150/300/450 (+0.2/0.25/0.3 of the target’s missing health) as true damage

"Making big changes to our resident good guy, namely removing the Villain mechanic on his ultimate. Disliked by both Garen players and their opponents, the mechanic wasn't making his gameplay healthier and took control from Garen when choosing his targets, frequently setting him up for failure.

We're also cleaning up his passive and allowing him to gain Conqueror stacks, a Rune other juggernauts get. Garen should now feel more intuitive to play too and not so linear due to more options when considering items."

Ivern

Base Stats

• BASIC ATTACK RANGE: 125 ⇒ 475 (Ivern is now classified as a ranged champion for all runes, items, etc.)

W - Brushmaker

• REMOVED - LONG ARMS: No longer increases Ivern's range

"Making Ivern more approachable (and stronger!) by not forcing him to get accustomed to multiple basic attack ranges."

Lissandra

Base Stats

• ARMOR: 20.216 ⇒ 22

Passive - Iceborn Subjugation

• DAMAGE RATIO: 0.3 ability power ⇒ 0.5 ability power

W - Ring of Frost

• DAMAGE RATIO: 0.5 ability power ⇒ 0.7 ability power

"We're sharpening her niche as a bursty, engage mage while trying not to impact her pro-leaning power."

Pantheon

General

• BUGFIX: Pantheon's Q - Comet Spear and W - Shield Vault now properly work when taking Thresh's W - Dark Passage within 0.2 seconds or less

Q - Comet Spear

• BASE DAMAGE: 75/115/155/195/235 ⇒ 75/110/145/180/215

"Pantheon remains a top-tier pick in more skilled games. We've decreased some of his early-game damage as it's more impactful in higher-skill ranked games. Also, a bugfix!"

Qiyana

Q - Edge of Ixtal

• BASE DAMAGE: 80/100/120/140/160 ⇒ 60/85/110/135/160

"We're hitting Qiyana's trade damage, especially after she hits level 3, since it is deceptively high and is making her oppressive in the early game."

Shaco

Base Stats

• ATTACK DAMAGE: 66 ⇒ 63
• ATTACK DAMAGE GROWTH: 3.5 ⇒ 3

Passive - Backstab

• NEW - BASIC ATTACK DAMAGE: Basic attacking an enemy now deals an additional 10-25 (levels 1-18) (+0.15 bonus attack damage) damage from behind (this damage can critically strike)
• NEW - TWO-SHIV POISON DAMAGE: Two-Shiv Poison now deals an additional 15-50 (levels 1-18) (+0.1 ability power) damage from behind

Q - Deceive

• STEALTH DURATION: 1.5/2.25/3/3.75/4.5 seconds ⇒ 2.5/2.75/3/3.25/3.5 seconds
• COOLDOWN: 16/15.5/15/14.5/14 seconds ⇒ 12/11.5/11/10.5/10 seconds
• REMOVED - T-TIME IS TICKING AWAY: Deceive's cooldown no longer reduces when exiting invisibility and dealing his next basic attack
• DAMAGE: 10/20/30/40/50 (+0.4 bonus attack damage)(+0.3 ability power) ⇒ 25/35/45/55/65 (+0.25 bonus attack damage) When striking from behind, Deceive is guaranteed to critically strike for 130% damage.

W - Jack In The Box

• UPDATED - YOU ALL GET A BOX: When triggered, the boxes can now attack multiple enemies in an AoE range
• NEW - AOE DAMAGE: 15/20/25/30/35 (+0.1 ability power) (single target damage unchanged)
• NEW - NON-CHAMPION FEAR DURATION: 2 seconds on all non-champions
• FEARED MOVEMENT SPEED: 100 movement speed for all enemies ⇒ 60 movement speed for minions and monsters, 100 movement speed on champions

E - Two-Shiv Poison

• DAMAGE TYPE: Physical damage ⇒ Magic damage
• DAMAGE: 55/80/105/130/155 (+0.6/0.75/0.9/1.05/1.2 bonus attack damage)(+0.75 ability power) ⇒ 70/95/120/145/170 (+0.8 bonus attack damage) (+0.6 ability power)
• EXECUTE DAMAGE: 0-50% increased damage based on missing health ⇒ 50% increased damage on targets below 30% health

R - Hallucinate

• BOX TRIGGER TIME: Boxes trigger after 2 seconds ⇒ Boxes trigger immediately
• DAMAGE: 200/300/400 (+1.0 ability power) ⇒ 150/225/300 (+0.7 ability power)
• NEW - BOX AOE DAMAGE: 10/20/30 (+0.1 ability power) (single target damage unchanged)
• FEAR DURATION: 0.75/1/1.25 seconds ⇒ 1 seconds

"Shaco's playstyle and identity have both changed considerably post-rework, and the gameplay gains have been dubious at best. He should feel empowered to interact with enemies, especially in the early game, but struggles to do so. With these changes, we’re aiming to round out the amount of damage he deals throughout the game instead of having his damage centered around his late-game one-shot potential.

Additionally, we want to support both the more common AD and the more niche AP Shaco builds as meaningfully different playstyles. So, we've changed E's damage type and moved some ratios around to encourage each build to play differently around their abilities."

Sona

General

• PASSIVE QOL: Added a resource bar so that it's easier for Sona to track her own passive (only visible to Sona)

Varus

Base Stats

• ATTACK DAMAGE: 59 ⇒ 61
• MANA REGEN: 7.34 ⇒ 8
• MANA: 360.5 ⇒ 360
• HEALTH: 499 ⇒ 500

"Giving Varus some general, reliable power."

Viktor

General

• BUGFIX: Hex Core stats now update upon purchase instead of when Viktor next levels up
• BUGFIX: Augmented: Aftershock Death Ray missiles are now the same width as the initial missile

Q - Siphon Power

• SHIELD: 8% of his maximum mana (+0.15 ability power) ⇒ 30-115 (levels 1-18) (+0.15 ability power)

W - Gravity Field

• UPDATED - AUGMENT: MAGNETIZE: Enemies stunned by Gravity Field are dragged into the center ⇒ Direct hits slow enemies by 20% for 1 second (does not proc on R ticks)

R - Chaos Storm

• NEW - DO YOU KNOW THE MUFFIN MAN?: Chaos Storm will continue chasing champions even after Viktor dies
• NEW - KRACKO: Chaos Storm can now move over terrain
• TICK CADENCE: 2 seconds ⇒ 1 second
• TICKS: 3 ⇒ 6
• DAMAGE PER TICK: 130/210/290 (+0.85 ability power) ⇒ 65/105/145 (+0.45 ability power)
• AUGMENT: PERFECT STORM MOVEMENT SPEED: Chaos Storm moves 20% faster ⇒ 25% faster (minimum movement speed is now 200 ⇒ 250; maximum movement speed is now 300 ⇒ 375)

"Giving Viktor some love by offering him more exciting Augments for his W and R, two abilities that are generally underpowered, and decreasing some of his mana dependency."

Locket of the Iron Solari

• SHIELD STRENGTH: 30 (+15 per level) ⇒ 120 (+10 per level)

"Looking to broaden the uses of the Locket, especially in a meta where there are less AoE burst champions. The change will also apply to Circlet of the Iron Solari!"

• Fixed a bug where after the ally Yuumi is attached to dies while she's in Stasis (via Zhonya's Hourglass or Stopwatch), she will lose the ability to gain turret aggro for the remainder of the game
• Fixed a bug where casting R - Featherstorm with the cursor exactly below Xayah would cause the ability's rotation lock to be removed
• Nunu's E - Snowball Barrage is no longer able to slow enemies more than once within the same cast of snowballs
• When casting Wukong's R - Cyclone as Vi's Q - Vault Breaker hits and kills Wukong, Wukong's R - Cyclone no longer loses its functionality
• Diana's R - Lunar Rush's cooldown now successfully refresh even if the ability hits an enemy at the edge of an explosion from her Q - Crescent Strike
• Diana's Q - Crescent Strike explosion VFX no longer can be seen in Fog of War
• Winter Wonder Neeko will no longer lose a significant amount of base stats and the ability to basic attack when Lulu uses W - Whimsy on her as Neeko is using R - Pop Blossom while disguised
• When Lulu polymorphs Gnar with W - Whimsy just before he transforms back from Mega to base form, Gnar will no longer acquire extra buffs and have Mega Gnar's attack and crit animations and particles
• Cho'Gath's R - Feast execute indicator now properly appears on clones' health bars
• Lux's Passive - Illumination is now properly tagged as a single target ability

Similar to our philosophy for last year's Worlds patch, we've been making steady changes throughout the last few patches as to not completely throw everything in flux and have the pros invalidate whatever playbooks they've been developing for the most exciting event of the year. More than completely neutralizing top priority picks, we've been working on elevating more champions to competitive viability and are continuing that work in 9.19.This change process has resulted in smaller buffs or a couple of impactful nerfs across a slew of champions and more pro-focused changes that should even out the scales and create fun, diverse, and impactful picks for the next few weeks of Worlds games.

Aatrox

Q - The Darkin Blade

• Minion damage reduction: 60% ⇒ 45%

Akali

R - Perfect Execution

• R2 maxiumum damage: 195/420/645 ⇒ 225/450/645

Annie

E - Molten Shield

• Movement speed: 25-50.5% (levels 1-18) ⇒ 30-60% (levels 1-18)
• Cooldown: 15 seconds ⇒ 14/13/12/11/10 seconds

Ashe

Passive - Frost Shot

• Slow: 15-30% (levels 1-18) ⇒ 20-30% (levels 1-18)

Q - Ranger's Focus

• J>PQ GOT AC: Now is an auto attack reset

Blitzcrank

Q - Rocket Grab

• Range: 1050 ⇒ 1150

R - Static Field

• Passive max stacks: 2 marks ⇒ 3 marks

Fiora

Q - Lunge

• Tower defense: Can now hit turrets and wards (will prioritize champion vitals, ultimate targets, champs, dying minions, turrets, and wards, respectively)

E - Bladework

• Stonehenge: The second basic attack can now deal bonus damage to turrets

Gragas

W - Drunken Rage

• Cooldown: 5 seconds ⇒ 6 seconds
• Damage ratio: 8% of target's maximum health ⇒ 7% of target's maximum health

Graves

Base Stats

• Attack damage: 66 ⇒ 68
• Health: 551.1 ⇒ 555
• Mana: 322.2 ⇒ 325
• Mana regen: 7.9 ⇒ 8

Heimerdinger

Q - H-28G Evolution Turret

• Basic attack ratio: 30% ability power ⇒ 35% ability power

E - CH-2 Electron Storm Grenade

• Stun duration: 1.25 seconds ⇒ 1.5 seconds

R - H28Q Apex Turret

• Basic attack ratio: 30% ability power ⇒ 35% ability power

Karma

Q - Inner Flame

• Q1 damage ratio: 60% ability power ⇒ 40% ability power

Mordekaiser

W - Indestructible

• Damage dealt potential shield: 30% of the damage he deals ⇒ 35% of the damage he deals

R - Realm of Death

• Are you ready to rumble?: Spectators now see the combatants in the Spooky Realm as appropriately spooky

Orianna

R - Command: Shockwave

• Damage: 150/225/300 (+0.7 ability power) ⇒ 200/275/350 (+0.8 ability power)

Ornn

Passive - Living Forge

• Masterwork upgrade: Masterworks upgrade for free when Ornn reaches level 13 ⇒ 12

Pantheon

Base Stats

• Magic resist: 32.1 ⇒ 28

W - Shield Vault

• Empowered damage: Deals 150% total attack damage over three hits ⇒ Deals 135-165% (levels 1-18) total attack damage over three hits

Rek'Sai

Base Stats

• Armor: 33 ⇒ 36

Q - Queen's Wrath

• Face my wrath: Rek'Sai's Unburrowed Q now works on turrets

Riven

Q - Broken Wings

• Cooldown: 12 seconds ⇒ 13 seconds

E - Valor

• Cooldown: 14/13/12/11/10 seconds ⇒ 12/11/10/9/8 seconds

Sejuani

Passive - Fury of the North

• Icebreaker damage ratio: 10/15/20% of target's maximum health (levels 1, 7, 14) ⇒ 10% of target's maximum health

Sion

W - Soul Furnace

• Base shield: 30/55/80/105/130 ⇒ 50/75/100/125/150

Sylas

Base Stats

• Armor: 32 ⇒ 28
• Armor growth: 3 ⇒ 2.5

Passive - Petricite Burst

• Damage ratio: 9-60 (levels 1-18) (+1.0 total attack damage)(+0.2 ability power), reduced by 50% for minions that aren't the primary target ⇒ (+1.1 total attack damage)(+0.2 ability power) to the primary target, (+0.4 total attack damage)(+0.2 ability power) to everyone else

Tahm Kench

E - Thick Skin

• Grey health heal: 75% of Grey Health at all ranks ⇒ 30-100% of Grey Health (levels 1-18)

Twisted Fate

E - Stacked Deck

• Attack speed: 10/15/20/25/30% ⇒ 20/25/30/35/40%
• Base damage: 55/80/105/130/155 ⇒ 65/90/115/140/165

Vayne

R - Final Hour

• Bonus attack damage: 20/30/40 ⇒ 25/40/55

Veigar

E - Event Horizon

• Cooldown: 18/17/16/15/14 seconds ⇒ 18/16.5/15/13.5/12 seconds

Xin Zhao

Passive - Determination

• Base heal: 8-59 (levels 1-18) ⇒ 10-78 (levels 1-18)

Q - Three Talon Strike

• Base damage: 20/25/30/35/40 ⇒ 20/28/36/44/52

Yuumi

Q - Prowling Projectile

• Slow: 20/32/44/56/68/80% ⇒ 20% at all ranks
• Slow duration: 1.5 seconds ⇒ 1 seconds
• Cat nap: Slow no longer decays over time

Zac

R - Let's Bounce!

• NEW Green potion: Bloblets restore an additional 1/2/3% maximum health

We've removed "The" from some item names and descriptions!

• Black Cleaver
• Black Spear
• Bloodthirster
• Dark Seal
• Hex Core mk1 and mk2
• Lightbringer
• Obsidian Cleaver

• Fixed a bug where Ultimate Hunter would not reduce Kayle's R - Divine Judgement's cooldown
• Fixed a bug where Rakan's self-only R marker would display in Spectator Mode
• Adjusted the default keybindings for some pings ("This is warded" moved to H, "Hold position" moved to J)
• Tibbers will properly draw turret aggro onto Annie if he deals damage to an enemy champion under turret
• Illaoi is properly able to cast W - Harsh Lesson even when Grounded
• Shyvana no longer loses her gained movement speed from W - Burnout when transforming via R - Dragon's Descent
• Yasuo is no longer able to cast R - Last Breath onto a non-knocked up target who's just been hit with Ornn's R - Call of the Forge God
• When Taunted or Silenced, Shyvana's Q - Twin Bite's empowered attack properly launches onto the target before being consumed
• Increased the recast lockout time for Pantheon's E - Aegis Assault so spamming the key doesn't accidentally, almost instantly, cancel the ability

Championship Ryze, Valiant Sword Riven, Majestic Empress Morgana, and Splendid Staff Nami will be available on September 26, 2019.

The following chromas will be released this patch:

League of Legends 9.17 patch notes: Hero rebalancing and Collection updates

Aurelion Sol

Passive - Center of the Universe

DAMAGE: 20/23/26/29/32/35/40/45/50/55/60/70/80/90/100/110/120/130 ⇒ 16/18/20/22/24/27/30/35/40/45/50/60/70/80/90/100/110/120

RATIO: 0.18-0.35 (levels 1-18) ability power ⇒ 0.25 ability power

REMOVED - NULLIFYING CC: Ability-inhibiting crowd control no longer nullifies Center of the Universe

Q - Starsurge

COOLDOWN: 10 seconds ⇒ 11/10/9/8/7 seconds

MOVEMENT SPEED: 10% ⇒ 20%

NEW - CATCH ME CATCH YOU: If Aurelion Sol is faster than his star, the star will speed up to keep up with him

W - Celestial Expansion

NEW - LET IT RIP: When Aurelion Sol pushes his stars out to the Outer Limit, they gain increased damage and rotate at a high, but decaying speed. After 3 seconds or if Aurelion Sol reactivates it early, the stars will retract and grant Aurelion Sol 40% movement speed, decaying over 1.5 seconds

COOLDOWN: 6/5.5/5/4.5/4 seconds ⇒ 8/6.5/5/3.5/2 seconds

MANA: 40 mana + 22/24/26/28/30 mana per second it's activated ⇒ 70/80/90/100/110 mana on cast

E - Comet of Legend

REMOVED - PASSIVE: Aurelion Sol no longer gains bonus movement speed when moving in the same direction for a period of time

RANGE: 3000/4000/5000/6000/7000 ⇒ 5500/6000/6500/7000/7500

COOLDOWN: 60/55/50/45/40 seconds ⇒ 80/75/70/65/60 seconds

SPEED: 600 ⇒ 600/650/700/750/800

"We're making Aurelion Sol more vulnerable to counterplay in the early game so that we have room to buff his scaling and presence in the late game. His adjusted W should also help make him a more approachable champion to those new to him, with clearer indicators of success and more satisfying in-game payoff."

Galio

Base StatsRounding out an unnecessarily gross number

MANA REGEN: 9.335 ⇒ 9.5

Q - Winds of War

COOLDOWN: 14/13/12/11/10 seconds ⇒ 12/11.5/11/10.5/10 seconds

W - Shield of Durand

MINIMUM DAMAGE: 10/20/30/40/50 ⇒ 20/35/50/65/80

MAXIMUM DAMAGE: 30/60/90/120/150 ⇒ 60/105/150/195/240

"Galio's been underperforming for the last few patches so we're helping him out to keep him competitive against other choices."

Kalista

Base Stats

ATTACK DAMAGE: 67 ⇒ 69

MANA: 231.8 ⇒ 250

MANA GROWTH: 35 ⇒ 45

"Buffing Kalista in this specific way so she can succeed more in the hands of an average player and generally in a wider range of games."

Kayle

Passive - Divine Ascent

FORM LEVEL ORDER: Kayle ascends to her Aflame form at level 6 and Arisen form at level 11 ⇒ Arisen form at level 6 and Aflame form at level 11

ZEALOUS BONUS MOVEMENT SPEED: 15% when Exalted and moving toward enemies ⇒ 8% when Exalted in all directions

ZEALOUS STACK SOURCES: Basic attacks against non-structures ⇒ All basic attacks

ARISEN ATTACK RANGE: 550 ⇒ 525

REMOVED - ARISEN ATTACK SPEED PER STACK: Kayle's bonus attack speed from her Zealous form no longer increases to 10% bonus attack speed per stack when Kayle is in her Arisen form

REMOVED - TRANSCENDENT FIRE WAVE TRUE DAMAGE: Fire waves no longer deal true damage

NEW - TRANSCENDENT ATTACK RANGE: When Kayle is in her Transcendent form, she gains an additional 50 range for a total of 575 attack range on basic attacks

Q - Radiant Blast

NEW - MANA REFUND: Now refunds 50% of the ability's mana for each champion hit with it

CAST DELAY: 0.5 seconds ⇒ 0.25 seconds

CAST TIME: Attack speed timer ⇒ 0.25 seconds

MISSILE SPEED: 2000 ⇒ 1600

RANGE: 950 ⇒ 900

RESISTANCES REDUCTION: 20% of the target's armor and magic resistance for 3 seconds ⇒ 15% of the target's armor and magic resistance for 4 seconds

BUGFIX: Fixed a bug where Radiant Blast wouldn't pierce as far if it hit its target at point-blank range

E - Starfire Spellblade

BONUS MAGIC DAMAGE: 8/10/12/14/16% (+1% per 100 ability power) of the target's missing health ⇒ 8/9/10/11/12% (+1% per 50 ability power) of the target's missing health

ON-HIT RATIO: 0.1 total attack damage and 0.2 ability power ⇒ 0.1 bonus attack damage and 0.25 ability power

R - Divine Judgment

COST: 100 mana ⇒ 100/50/0 mana

AOE RADIUS: 475 ⇒ 500

"We're shifting power into Kayle's early game at the cost of some of her late-game carry potential. Kayle should still be a weaker champion early who ascends into a god, but she (and her opponents) should now have more influence on whether or not she gets there."

Leona

Q - Shield of Daybreak

COOLDOWN: 6 seconds ⇒ 5 seconds

"We're letting Leona really lock into the engaging supports that she fares well against to keep her a good counter against those specific match-ups."

Lucian

Base Stats

ATTACK DAMAGE: 61 ⇒ 64

"Giving Lucian a bit more power in the early laning phase to punish champs who have been able to run around freely without fear."

Neeko

Passive - Inherent Glamour

NEW - I'M BEAUTIFUL: When disguised, Neeko can select herself to deactivate her disguise, putting it on a 2 second cooldown

"Giving Neeko a QoL change so she can return to her own form without having to expend a resource or take damage."

Pantheon

Q - Comet Spear

NEW - THRUST DAMAGE: Thrusting Pantheon's spear (releasing the ability within 0.35 seconds) now also increases the physical damage on targets below 25% of their maximum health (matching a fully hurled spear's bonus damage)

E - Aegis Assault

REMOVED - MONSTER DAMAGE REDUCTION: No longer reduces damage against non-epic monsters

"Even after the removal and decrease of the monster damage reduction on his Q and E, respectively, jungle Pantheon is just not as strong as his other roles. We're following up by entirely removing the monster damage penalty on his E, since it appears we were being too cautious regarding his jungle prowess. This and the change to his Q Thrust shouldn't swing his balance too much, and only help those who are struggling with relearning him."

Quiyana

E - Audacity

BASE DAMAGE: 70/105/140/175/210 ⇒ 60/95/130/165/200

R - Supreme Display of Talent

COOLDOWN: 120/100/80 seconds ⇒ 120 seconds at all ranks

"Qiyana's early trade damage makes her stronger than she should be in lane. That coupled with her near constant ults later is a bit too overbearing throughout the whole game."

Ryze

Base Stats

MAGIC RESIST: 30 ⇒ 34

"Now that Ryze has proven he can be useful without Overloading his enemies in competitive play, we think it's safe to give him a smidge more survivability."

Zyra

R - Stranglethorns

COST: 100/120/140 mana ⇒ 100 mana at all ranks

COOLDOWN: 130/120/110 seconds ⇒ 110/100/90 seconds

"We're giving Zyra more opportunities to burst down her enemies."

"In 2017, players asked us to expand the weekly free champion rotation beyond just 10 champions. As a result, we updated our model to include 10% of the total number of available champions to the rotation and increased the number to 14. With Qiyana, we're officially at 145 champions! As promised, we're officially increasing the number of champions to 15 in the next free-to-play rotation on the first week of September 2019."

• Soraka now properly heals herself with R - Wish for more when she is under 40% of her maximum health.
• Certain champions' movement abilities are now properly disabled when they're Grounded (Zac's E - Elastic Slingshot, Malphite's R - Unstoppable Force, Camille's E - Hookshot, Graves' R - Collateral Damage, Thresh's W - Dark Passage, and Fiddlestick's R - Crowstorm)
• Rek'Sai no longer gains a short "Can't Be Displaced" buff if her target dies as she starts R - Void Rush
• Cleanse now properly clears the stun from Viktor's AUGMENT:IMPLOSION W - Gravity Field
• Lee Sin's Q - Resonating Strike's dash speed is now at its proper speed (not as slow as it was in 9.16)
• If Sylas dies immediately after casting Pantheon's R - Grand Starfall via R - Hijack, he will no longer be locked out of using items and basic abilities
• Sivir's W - Ricochet now properly bounces when recast when she reaches 45% CDR by holding Spear of Shojin or Cosmic Insight
• Statikk Shiv will no longer hit nearby targets outside of Mordekaiser's R - Realm of Death when the holder attacks him within it
• When Tahm Kench dies while using W - Devour on another unit, that unit's HP can now properly go below 1 HP

Elderwood Ahri

Elderwood Veigar

Elderwood Nocturne

Infernus Varus, Shen, & Galio

Elderwood Ahri

Elderwood Veigar

Elderwood Nocturne

Infernus Varus

Infernus Shen

Infernus Galio

League of Legends 9.16 patch notes: Pantheon rework and more balance changes

League of Legends 9.16 brings a bunch of balance changes to more than 20 champions while introducing a full rework of Pantheon. The patch also brings big changes to Biscuit Delivery and Ranked adjustments. Let's dive in.

Pantheon rework

"Pantheon crashes through the enemy frontline and causes havoc in their ranks starting in 9.16."

• Pantheon Gameplay Preview
• Pantheon Champion Theme
• Pantheon Biography
• Pantheon Behind the Scenes

"High-res versions of Pantheon's updated splash arts are available on League Displays!"

Azir

Q - Conquering Sands

COOLDOWN: 15/12.5/10/7.5/5 seconds ⇒ 15/13/11/9/7 seconds

"We're opening up late game windows of opportunity for Azir's enemies so he and his soldiers can't just chase them relentlessly."

Corki

Base Stats

ATTACK DAMAGE: 60 ⇒ 55

ATTACK DAMAGE GROWTH: 3 ⇒ 2.5

"Corki's been too present in pro play due to his all-too-reliable damage, so we're nerfing him."

Dr. Mundo

W - Burning Agony

TENACITY: 10/15/20/25/30% ⇒ 30% at all ranks

E - Masochism

COOLDOWN: 6 seconds ⇒ 6/5.5/5/4.5/4 seconds

"With four patches worth of smaller changes already under his belt, the mad lad's been asking for something more substantial."

Ekko

E - Phase Dive

BONUS DAMAGE: 40/65/90/115/140 ⇒ 50/75/100/125/150

R - Chronobreak

COOLDOWN: 110/90/70 seconds ⇒ 110/80/50 seconds

"Ekko has room for more power in all areas of play."

Ezreal

Q - Mystic Shot

RATIO: 0.3 ability power ⇒ 0.15 ability power

E - Arcane Shift

COOLDOWN: 19/17.5/16/14.5/13 seconds ⇒ 25/22/19/16/13 seconds

"AP Ezreal's burst has made him a bit of a terror, so we're taking some power out of the build and hitting his early game safety."

Fiora

E - Bladework

COOLDOWN: 13/11/9/7/5 seconds ⇒ 11/9.5/8/6.5/5 seconds

BONUS ATTACK SPEED: 50% at all ranks ⇒ 50/60/70/80/90%

"Giving Fiora more strength to capitalize on momentum she gets from a lead in lane."

Jax

Q - Leap Strike

COOLDOWN: 10/9/8/7/6 seconds ⇒ 8/7.5/7/6.5/6 seconds

"As a melee champion, Jax will benefit from having more opportunities to jump on the ranged enemies who otherwise steadily chip him down in lane."

Kassadin

W - Nether Blade

EMPOWERED BASIC ATTACK DAMAGE: 40/65/90/115/140 (+0.8 ability power) ⇒ 70/95/120/145/170 (+0.8 ability power)

"Strengthening the aspects of Kassadin that can keep some of the shorter ranged mid laners in check, especially if they're champions he should naturally be good against anyways (AP assassins)."

LeBlanc

Q - Sigil of Malice

RATIO: 0.3 ability power ⇒ 0.4 ability power

"We're reverting the nerf LeBlanc received earlier this year since she can use more power in a way that average players can utilize."

Lux

W - Prismatic Barrier

SHIELD: 50/65/80/95/110 ⇒ 50/75/100/125/150

MAX SHIELD: 100/130/160/190/220 ⇒ 100/150/200/250/300

"When we hit Lux's shield with nerfs in 9.14, we were mainly quelling the builds that took advantage of its safety. However, as a result we ended up hitting support Lux a lot harder than anticipated. We’re giving back some of that damage mitigation so she can still keep her partner meaningfully safe in the bot lane."

Nocturne

Base Stats:

ARMOR: 36 ⇒ 38

HEALTH: 582.8 ⇒ 585

MANA: 273.8 ⇒ 275

MANA REGEN: 6.756 ⇒ 7

W - Shroud of Darkness

BONUS ATTACK SPEED: 20/25/30/35/40% ⇒ 30/35/40/45/50%

"Nocturne has been overshadowed by other junglers as a competitively viable option, so we're buffing him."

Riven

Q - Broken Wings

COOLDOWN: 12/11.5/11/10.5/10 seconds ⇒ 12 seconds at all ranks

"We're reverting the scaling cooldown change to Riven's Q from 9.10. The cooldown increase on her E from that patch didn't offset the strength of the Q buff in higher levels of solo queue games, and our intent wasn't to buff her in that patch."

Senjuani

Passive - Fury of the North

FROST ARMOR: 20 (+0.25 bonus armor) bonus armor and 20 (+0.25 bonus magic resistance) bonus magic resistance ⇒ 10 (+0.35 bonus armor) bonus armor and 10 (+0.35 bonus magic resistance) bonus magic resistance

Q - Arctic Assault

COOLDOWN: 17/15.5/14/12.5/11 seconds ⇒ 20/18/16/14/12 seconds

"Sejuani has been a dominant force in pro play for awhile, despite receiving some recent nerfs. Taking a more substantial swing at her power."

Shen

Q - Twilight Assault

EMPOWERED CHAMPION DAMAGE RATIO: 4/4.5/5/5.5/6% of target's maximum health ⇒ 5/5.5/6/6.5/7% of target's maximum health

E - Shadow Dash

BASE PHYSICAL DAMAGE 50/75/100/125/150 ⇒ 60/85/110/135/160

"Shen could use a little more power when split-pushing in the mid-to-late game."

Singed

Base Stats

MANA: 290.6 ⇒ 330

ATTACK DAMAGE: 62.32 ⇒ 63

MANA REGEN: 7.524 ⇒ 7.5

ATTACK SPEED GROWTH: 1.81% ⇒ 1.9%

R - Insanity Potion

BONUS STATS 30/55/80 ⇒ 30/60/90

"Giving Singed a little extra oomph so his Insanity can lead him to some more wins if he makes it to the late game."

Sion

Base Stats

MANA 325.6 ⇒ 330

HEALTH 542.64 ⇒ 545

MANA REGEN 8.0008 ⇒ 8

Q - Decimating Smash

BASE MINIMUM DAMAGE: 20/40/60/80/100 ⇒ 30/50/70/90/110

BASE MAXIMUM DAMAGE: 60/120/180/240/300 ⇒ 70/135/200/265/330

Removed

REDUCED DAMAGE ON MONSTERS: Decimating Smash no longer deals 80% damage against monsters

"Smoothing out some of Sion's rougher edges, like rounding out his base stats and removing a mechanic that no longer seems needed. Overall, he'll have more chances to brawl with his opponents in the top lane, especially with other fighters."

Sivir

W - Ricochet

RATIO: 50/55/60/65/70% attack damage ⇒ 30/40/50/60/70% attack damage

"Sivir is strong. When coupled with Yuumi, she's ESPECIALLY strong. The cat is getting nerfed (spoiler alert if you haven't gotten to her section yet), but we think Sivir could use nerfs too to quell her early game wave clear and give opponents a chance to put her on the back foot."

Sylas

Q - Chain Lash

DETONATION DAMAGE: 45% reduced damage against minions ⇒ against minions and monsters

R - Hijack

BUGFIX: Sylas now properly heals himself when casting a Hijacked R - Mantra empowered W - Renewal from Karma

"Sylas has been thriving in the jungle after his latest set of changes. Following up on those by toning down his clear speed a bit."

Syndra

Q - Dark Sphere

TRANSCENDENT 15% bonus damage against champions ⇒ 25% bonus damage against champions

E - Scatter the Weak

BASE DAMAGE 70/115/160/205/250 ⇒ 85/130/175/220/265

"Syndra's weak in all levels of play at the moment so we're giving her some general power."

Tahm Kench

Base Stats

MOVEMENT SPEED 345 ⇒ 335

E - Thick Skin

SHIELD DURATION 3 seconds ⇒ 2 seconds

"We're making Tahm Kench more vulnerable to ganks as a countermeasure to the safety he brings his already-safe bot lane buddies (like Ezreal)."

Yuumi

Q - Prowling Projectile

EMPOWERED DAMAGE: 50/95/140/185/230/275 ⇒ 50/85/120/155/190/225

SLOW: 40/48/56/64/72/80% ⇒ 20/32/44/56/68/80%

SLOW DURATION: 1.25/1.35/1.45/1.55/1.65/1.75 seconds ⇒ 1.5 seconds

COOLDOWN: 11/10/9/8/7/6 seconds ⇒ 13.5/12/10.5/9/7.5/6 seconds

"Yuumi's damage is too high for how reliable it is, especially when coupled with other high-damage bot lane partners."

Ziggs

W - Satchel Charge

RATIO: 0.35 ability power ⇒ 0.5 ability power

COOLDOWN: 24/21/18/15/12 seconds ⇒ 20/18/16/14/12 seconds

R - Mega Inferno Bomb

COOLDOWN: 120/105/90 seconds ⇒ 120/95/70 seconds

"Ziggs isn't doing so hot right now, so we're buffing up one of his less potent abilities and letting him access his ultimate more frequently."

Biscuit Delivery

BISCUITS DELIVERED: 4 ⇒ 3

DELIVERY INTERVAL: 3:00, 6:00, 9:00, 12:00 ⇒ 2:00, 4:00, 6:00

HEALTH PER BISCUIT: 15% of missing health ⇒ 10% of missing health

HEALTH PER BISCUIT (MANALESS CHAMPIONS): 20% of missing health ⇒ 12% of missing health

MANA PER BISCUIT: 15% of missing mana ⇒ 10% of missing mana

HEALING DURATION: 15 seconds ⇒ 5 seconds

PERMANENT MAXIMUM MANA INCREASE: 40 mana per biscuit consumption ⇒ 50 mana per biscuit consumption

"These biscuits are too fresh, giving too much sustain to its holders during laning phase. Many of these changes are to the rune itself, but the ones that affect the Biscuits directly will also apply to the Biscuits occasionally acquired through Kleptomancy."

9.16 Nerfs

SWAIN -5% damage dealt ⇒ -6% damage dealt & +6% damage taken

9.16 Buffs

MORGANA: -6% damage dealt & +6% damage taken ⇒ -6% damage dealt

VOLIBEAR: +5% damage taken ⇒ Unchanged

YORICK: -5% damage dealt & +5% damage taken ⇒ -5% damage dealt

YOU DID IT: Your Honor 5 capsule will contain a random emote or ward skin, as well as an Honor 5 token you can redeem for Medieval Twitch, Grey Warwick, or one of the two new chromas shown above if you already own the base skin. You don't need to own both skins before being able to pick a chroma for a skin you own.

BUT ACTUALLY: This season only, your Honor 5 capsule will contain two Honor 5 tokens because we promised you two chromas this season, not one.

BELATED ELATED: If you hit Honor 5 before 9.16 and already owned both Medieval Twitch and Grey Warwick prior to getting your capsule, we'll add your two Honor 5 tokens directly to your account during patch 9.16. (It'll take a little bit to get to everyone. Stop being so honorable. Actually, don't.)

LADDER DOWN: Losing a game at 0 LP in Grandmaster or Challenger demotes you to Master, 0 LP ⇒ Diamond 1 with 75, 50, or 0 LP based on whether your MMR is higher than the Master cutoff, between the Master and Diamond 1 cutoffs, or lower than the Diamond 1 cutoff

"We're unifying Challenger and Grandmaster's 0 LP demotion rules with Master's existing rules. This is mainly an edge-case change since losing LP over a few days or weeks naturally demotes players into Master before they reach 0 LP, though in smaller servers it'll also address situations where it was near-impossible to demote out of Challenger."

• Gnar can no longer change the direction of E - Hop after transforming through R - GNAR! before bouncing on a minion
• Allies with Orianna's E - Command: Protect on them will now see an indicator centered on her
• Malzahar's R - Nether Grasp now adds a Revealed marker to the target (including stealthed targets)
• Xayah's Passive - Clean Cuts basic attacks now properly spawn feathers behind her target and not around her
• Master Yi's basic attack immediately following his Q - Alpha Strike now properly grants an additional stack of Conqueror or Electrocute
• Darius' Passive - Hemorrhage no longer incorrectly displays a ranged indicator
• If Katarina drops a dagger near a wall and then casts E - Shunpo so that she can blink to the other side of the wall, she now properly gets a reset on the ability
• Nautilus' W - Titan's Wrath will now properly proc Electrocute instead of granting only one stack while active
• Lee Sin's hitbox will no longer warp across the map when casting Q - Resonating Strike
• Twitch is no longer able to cast Q - Ambush without consuming any mana 3 seconds after its cooldown resets when an enemy champion dies from his Passive - Deadly Venom
• Selling any stacking consumable item will no longer sell two of them at a time if there are more than one
• Karma's W - Focused Resolve now properly lowers R - Mantra's cooldown while damaging enemy champions
• Phase Rush and Electrocute activates properly when Poppy casts E - Heroic Charge in specific combos

League of Legends 9.14 patch notes

Blitzcrank (Anti-shield):

"R now destroys shields on enemies before dealing damage and silencing."

R - Static Field

NEW: Static Field now removes shields on enemies before its other effects (damage and silence).

Renekton (Anti-shield):

"Empowered W now breaks shields on targets before dealing damage and stunning."

W - Ruthless Predator

NEW: Destroys existing shields on targets when empowered with 50 Fury before its existing effects (damage and stun).

Katarina (Anti-heal):

"R healing reduction increased."

R - Death Lotus

40% healing reduction ⇒ 60% healing reduction.

Kled (Anti-heal):

"Q pull now applies healing reduction."

Q - Bear Trap on a Rope

NEW: Pulling in an enemy reduces all healing on them by 60% for 5 seconds.

Fizz (Flat damage reduction):

"Passive reduces all sources of damage."

Passive - Nimble Fighter

DAMAGE REDUCTION: 4/6/8/10/12/14 (levels 1/4/7/10/13/16) against basic attacks ⇒ 4 (+0.01 ability power) against all sources of damage(maximum of 50% reduction).

Leona (Flat damage reduction):

"W reduces damage by a flat amount; armor decreased; magic resist decreased. R no longer empowers basic attacks."

W - Eclipse

NEW: Eclipse now grants 8/12/16/20/24 pre-mitigation damage reduction (maximum of 50% reduction).

ARMOR: 25/35/45/55/65 ⇒ 20/25/30/35/40

MAGIC RESIST: 20/30/40/50/60 ⇒ 20/25/30/35/40

R - Solar Flare

REMOVED: Leona no longer gains empowered basic attacks after casting Solar Flare.

Karma (True sight):

"W now provides true sight on rooted targets."

W - Focused Resolve/Renewal

NEW: Focused Resolve/Renewal now reveals successfully rooted targets for the duration of the root as well.

LeBlanc (True sight):

"E now provides true sight on rooted targets."

E - Ethereal Chains

NEW: Ethereal Chains now reveals successfully rooted targets for the duration of the root as well.

Morgana (True Sight):

"R now provides true sight on stunned targets."

R - Soul Shackles

NEW: Soul Shackles now reveals successfully stunned targets for the duration of the root as well.

Ahri (Anti-mobility):

"E now cancels in-progress dashes; bonus damage duration decreased."

E - Charm

NEW: Charm now cancels in-progress dashes.

BONUS DAMAGE DURATION: 5 seconds ⇒ 3 seconds.

Cassiopeia (Anti-mobility):

"W minimum cast range removed; maximum cast range decreased; cooldown increased early and decreased late. E healing increased; now reduced when poisoning minions and small monsters; cost flattened. Ability casts now buffer."

General

NEW: Cassiopeia can now buffer her ability casts.

Base Stats

HEALTH: 537 ⇒ 575

HEALTH GROWTH: 87 ⇒ 90

MANA: 418 ⇒ 350

MANA GROWTH: 31.5 ⇒ 40

ARMOR: 25 ⇒ 20

W - Miasma

REMOVED: Cassiopeia no longer has a minimum cast range on Miasma.

MAXIMUM CAST RANGE: 800 ⇒ 700.

COOLDOWN: 18/17.5/17/16.5/16 seconds ⇒ 24/21/18/15/12 seconds.

E - Twin Fang

NEW: Cassiopeia heals for 75% less when she poisons minions and small monsters.

HEAL: 5-22 (based on level) (+0.1 ability power) ⇒ 13/16/19/22/25% of her ability power.

COST: 40/45/50/55/60 mana ⇒ 50 mana at all ranks.

Poppy (Anti-mobility):

"W bonus movement speed increased; bonus movement speed duration decreased; grounds and slows dashing enemies."

W - Steadfast Presence

NEW: If Poppy stops an enemy from dashing or casting a movement ability, she grounds and slows them by 25% for 2 seconds.

MOVEMENT SPEED DURATION: 2.5 seconds ⇒ 2 seconds.

BONUS MOVEMENT SPEED: 30% ⇒ 35%.

Aatrox (changed):

"Base health regen growth increased. R no longer revives Aatrox; amplified self-healing increased; cooldown decreased."

Base Stats

HEALTH REGEN GROWTH: 0.75 ⇒ 1

R - World Ender

REMOVED: Aatrox no longer earns a Revive through kills

AMPLIFIED SELF-HEALING: 40/55/70% ⇒ 50/60/70%

COOLDOWN: 140/120/100 seconds ⇒ 120/100/80 seconds

Akali (changed):

"W cooldown flattened; energy restore flattened; duration extension removed; stealth type changed. Q AP ratio increased. E damage increased. R cooldown increased."

Base Stats

MAGIC RESIST: 32.1 ⇒ 37

HEALTH GROWTH: 85 ⇒ 95

Q - Five Point Strike

RATIO: 0.5 ability power ⇒ 0.6 ability power

W - Twilight Shroud

STEALTH TYPE: Obscurity ⇒ Invisibility (Akali is now fully revealed by True Sight effects, rather than only her outline)

COOLDOWN: 25/22/19/16/13 seconds ⇒ 20 seconds at all ranks

ENERGY RESTORE: 40/50/60/70/80 ⇒ 80 at all ranks

REMOVED: Twilight Shroud's duration no longer extends if Akali breaks invisibility by basic attacking or using abilities

E - Shuriken Flip

SHURIKEN DAMAGE: 70/105/140/175/210 (+0.7 bonus attack damage) ⇒40/70/100/130/160 (+0.35 total attack damage)

NEW: SHURIKEN AP RATIO: 0.5 ability power

DASH DAMAGE: 50/80/110/140/170 (+0.7 bonus attack damage) ⇒40/70/100/130/160 (+0.35 total attack damage)

NEW: DASH AP RATIO: 0.5 ability power

R - Perfect Execution

COOLDOWN: 100/85/70 seconds ⇒ 120/110/100 seconds

Alistar (buffed):

"Base mana and mana growth increased."

Base Stats

MANA: 278.84 ⇒ 350

MANA GROWTH: 38 ⇒ 40

Aurelion Sol (changed):

"Q max stun duration and radius growth per second increased. E max movement speed now scales with level."

Q - Starsurge

MAXIMUM STUN DURATION: 1.65/1.8/1.95/2.1/2.25 seconds after traveling for 5 seconds ⇒ 2.2/2.4/2.6/2.8/3 seconds after traveling for 5 seconds (minimum stun duration still 0.55/0.6/0.65/0.7/0.75/0.8 seconds)

STAR RADIUS GROWTH: Increased by 33%

E - Comet of Legend

MAXIMUM BONUS MOVEMENT SPEED: 25/30/35/40/45% ⇒ 25-45% (levels 1-18)

Bard (changed):

"Base health increased; health regen decreased. E travel speed increased; ally bonus speed flattened."

Base Stats

HEALTH:535 ⇒ 575

HEALTH REGEN: 7.5 ⇒ 5.5

E - Magical Journey

TRAVEL SPEED:800 ⇒ 900

ALLY BONUS SPEED: 10/20/30/40/50% ⇒ 33% at all ranks

Diana (nerfed):

"Passive and R bugfixes. Q arc speed decreased. W cost bugfixed."

Passive - Moonsilver Blade

BUGFIX: Will no longer occasionally do unintended additional damage to turrets.

Q - Crescent Strike

INNER ARC SPEED: 2100 ⇒ 1900

OUTER ARC SPEED: 2300 ⇒ 2100

W - Pale Cascade

COST: 40/55/60/65/70 mana ⇒ 40/55/70/85/100 mana

R - Lunar Rush

BUGFIX: Lunar Rush can no longer be reset twice when a reset was timed with a new application of Moonlight.

Galio (changed):

"Passive cooldown reduction removed; cooldown decreased; damage increased. Q cooldown and damage increased; cost decreased late. W now interruptible by CC and restricts Flash during channel; self-slow decreased."

Base Stats

MANA GROWTH: 20 ⇒ 40

Passive - Colossal Smash

REMOVED: Colossal Smash's cooldown is no longer reduced every time Galio hits a unique enemy champion with an ability.

Q - Winds of War

COOLDOWN: 8 seconds ⇒ 5 seconds

DAMAGE: 12-80 (levels 1-18) (+1.0 total attack damage) (+0.5 ability power) (+0.4 bonus magic resist) ⇒ 15-160 (levels 1-18) (+1.0 total attack damage) (+0.5 ability power) (+0.6 bonus magic resist)

COOLDOWN: 10/9.5/9/8.5/8 seconds ⇒ 14/13/12/11/10 seconds

GUST DAMAGE: 70/105/140/175/210 ⇒ 80/115/150/185/220

COST: 80/90/100/110/120 mana ⇒ 80/85/90/95/100 mana

W - Shield of Durand

NEW: Galio cannot Flash while channeling Shield of Durand.

NEW: Shield of Durand can now be interrupted by all the usual CC effects that interrupt channels.

SELF-SLOW: 30% ⇒ 15%

Jayce (changed):

"Attack damage decreased; attack damage growth increased. Q base damage decreased early, increased late; damage ratio increased."

Base Stats

ATTACK DAMAGE: 58 ⇒ 54

ATTACK DAMAGE GROWTH: 3.5 ⇒ 4.25

Q - Shock Blast

DAMAGE: 70/115/160/205/250/295 (+1.0 bonus attack damage) ⇒55/105/155/205/255/305 (+1.2 bonus attack damage)

Jhin (buffed):

"W cooldown decreased; root duration increased."

W - Deadly Flourish

COOLDOWN: 14 seconds ⇒ 12 seconds

ROOT DURATION: 0.75/1/1.25/1.5/1.75 seconds ⇒ 1/1.25/1.5/1.75/2 seconds

Kennen (changed):

"Attack damage and attack speed decreased; attack damage growth increased. E bonus attack speed increased."

Base Stats

ATTACK DAMAGE: 50.544 ⇒ 48

ATTACK DAMAGE GROWTH: 3.3 ⇒ 3.75

ATTACK SPEED: 0.69 ⇒ 0.625

E - Lightning Rush

BONUS ATTACK SPEED: 30/40/50/60/70% ⇒ 40/50/60/70/80%

Lux (changed):

"Q cooldown increased early, decreased late; cost flattened. W double shield on return removed; shield ratio increased; shield duration decreased. R cooldown reset removed; cooldown decreased late; ratio increased."

Q - Light Binding

COOLDOWN:10 seconds ⇒ 13/12/11/10/9 seconds

COST: 40/45/50/55/60 mana ⇒ 50 mana at all ranks

W - Prismatic Barrier

RETURNING SHIELD: Double outgoing shield ⇒ Same as outgoing shield (returning shield still stacks with the outgoing shield).

SHIELD RATIO: 0.2 ability power ⇒ 0.3 ability power

MAXIMUM SHIELD: 150/195/240/285/330 (+0.6 ability power) ⇒100/130/160/190/220 (+0.6 ability power)

SHIELD DURATION: 3 seconds ⇒ 2.5 seconds

R - Final Spark

REMOVED: No longer refunds a percentage of its maximum cooldown when hitting at least one enemy champion that dies within 1.75 seconds

COOLDOWN: 80/65/50 seconds ⇒ 80/60/40 seconds

RATIO: 0.75 ability power ⇒ 1.0 ability power

Malphite (reworked):

"Q slow increased, slow duration decreased. W empowers basic attacks on cast and cleaves in a cone; cost increased and scales with rank. VFX and QoL updates."

Visual Updates

SHINE AND POLISH: New VFX for all abilities and skins.

MOUNTAIN OUT OF A MOLEHILL: Malphite is slightly smaller at the start of the game.

NEW: Malphite's size now increases with his armor, capping around 850 armor.

Passive - Granite Shield

NEW: Shield regeneration VFX added.

Q - Seismic Shard

ROLLING STONES: Improved cast animation for most skins.

THE ROCK IS COOKING: Malphite now spawns his rock ~100 units in front of him rather than at his center point.

SLOW: 14/17/20/23/26% ⇒ 15/20/25/30/35%

SLOW DURATION: 4 seconds ⇒ 3 seconds

W - Thunderclap

EMPOWERED BASIC ATTACK: Malphite's next basic attack within 6 seconds gains 50 increased range and deals 20/35/50/65/80 (+0.2 ability power) (+0.15 armor) bonus physical damage.

ROCKY ROAD CONE: For the next 5 seconds after casting, Malphite's basic attacks cleave enemies in a cone in front of him, dealing 10/20/30/40/50 (+0.2 ability power) (+0.1 armor) physical damage to enemies hit.

COST: 25 mana at all ranks ⇒ 30/35/40/45/50 mana

Mordekaiser (nerfed):

"Passive base damage decreased. E magic penetration decreased late."

Passive - Darkness Rise

BASE DAMAGE: 8-25 (levels 1-18) ⇒ 5-15 (levels 1-18)

BUGFIX: No longer activates on Mordekaiser's corpse if it procs via Death's Grasp hitting 3 enemies after Mordekaiser dies.

E - Death's Grasp

MAGIC PENETRATION: 5/10/15/20/25% ⇒ 5/7.5/10/12.5/15%

Neeko (changed):

"Attack damage and attack speed decreased; attack damage growth and attack speed growth increased. Passive no longer breaks when Neeko basic attacks enemy champions. W passive movement speed decreased."

Base Stats

ATTACK DAMAGE: 52 ⇒ 48

ATTACK DAMAGE GROWTH: 2 ⇒ 2.5

ATTACK SPEED: 0.645 ⇒ 0.625

ATTACK SPEED GROWTH: 2.5% ⇒ 3%

Passive - Inherent Glamour

New: Neeko no longer loses her disguise when basic attacking enemy champions.

W - Shapesplitter

PASSIVE BONUS MOVEMENT SPEED: 20/25/30/35/40% ⇒10/15/20/25/30%

Nidalee (buffed):

"Cougar E base magic damage increased."

E - Swipe

BASE DAMAGE: 70/130/190/250 ⇒ 80/140/200/260

Pyke (changed):

"E now stuns non-champions. R deals reduced damage to surviving enemies; now grants Pyke additional "Your Cut" gold as well."

E - Phantom Undertow

NEW: Phantom Undertow now stuns non-champions, but deals no damage to them.

R - Death From Below

NEW: Deals 50% reduced damage to enemies that survive Death from Below.

SPLIT BOUNTY: When Pyke kills an enemy with Death from Below, the last assisting ally ⇒ the last assisting ally and Pyke are granted "Your Cut".

FIRST MATE: When Pyke assists on a kill following Death from Below, he receives 1 "Your Cut" ⇒ 2 "Your Cut".

NEW: Death from Below's icon now shows next to Pyke's health bar when it can be cast for free.

Ryze (buffed):

"Base health regen and health regen growth increased. Q and E bugfixes."

Base Stats

HEALTH REGEN: 7 ⇒ 8

HEALTH REGEN GROWTH: 0.55 ⇒ 0.8

Q - Overload

BUGFIX 1: Overload no longer cancels Ryze's movement when spammed during its cast time.

BUGFIX 2: Overload no longer bounces back to its original target if Spell Flux is applied to it during other bounces.

E - Spell Flux

BUGFIX 3: Now correctly triggers Manaflow Band when it bounces to a champion.

BUGFIX 4: Spell Flux no longer bounces back to its original target off of other targets that have Flux on them.

Singed (nerfed):

"Q recast timer increased; brighter ability icon when toggled on in the spell bar."

Q - Poison Trail

RECAST TIMER: 0 seconds ⇒ 0.5 seconds

INDICATOR: When toggled on, Poison Trail's icon will be highlighted more brightly.

Swain (changed):

"Soul Fragments restore mana and permanently increase Swain's max HP. Q pierces through minions; no longer pierces through champions killed. R1 drains all nearby enemies. R2 damage tied to R1 health drained; no longer modified by Soul Fragments; now castable immediately."

Base Stats

HEALTH GROWTH: 90 ⇒ 85

ATTACK RANGE: 550 ⇒ 525

Passive - Ravenous Flock

REMOVED: Swain can no longer store up to 5 Soul Fragments in reserve, empowering Demonflare.

NEW: Swain permanently stores Soul Fragments, increasing his maximum health by 5 per Soul Fragment.

NEW: Collecting a Soul Fragment restores 4/5.5/7% of Swain's mana.

Q - Death's Hand

REMOVED: Killing a target no longer restores 3% of Swain's maximum mana.

NEW: Bolts now always continues through minions, but stop on impact with enemy champions.

COOLDOWN: 7.5/6.25/5/3.75/2.5 seconds ⇒ 10/8.5/7/5.5/4 seconds

RANGE: 725 ⇒ 625

ANGLE BETWEEN BOLTS: 8 ⇒ 10

R - Demonic Ascension

COST: 0 mana ⇒ 100 mana

BONUS HEALTH: 150/275/400 ⇒ 125/200/275 (+5 per Soul Fragment)

MINION AND MONSTER HEALING REDUCTION: 80% ⇒ 90%

NEW: Swain drains all enemy units within range, including invisible units.

R - Demonflare

REMOVED: Swain no longer needs to restore 125/300/450 health to cast Demonflare and can cast it immediately.

DEMONFLARE DAMAGE: 45/60/75 (+0.21 ability power) magic damage per Soul Fragment to all nearby enemies ⇒ 75% of the health Swain has drained during Demonic Ascension in magic damage, up to a cap.

NEW: DEMONFLARE MINIMUM DAMAGE: 100/150/200 (+0.5 ability power)

NEW: DEMONFLARE MAXIMUM DAMAGE: 200/300/400 (+1.0 ability power)

Sylas (changed):

"Passive damage vs minions less reduced. Q detonation damage increased. E shield granted on first cast; no longer blocks non-magic damage but blocks all magic damage for a duration; cooldown flattened; second cast stun duration decreased. R cast range decreased, recast window decreased, cooldown increased, AD->AP ratio conversion decreased."

Passive - Petricite Burst

DAMAGE REDUCTION ON MINIONS: 70% ⇒ 50%

Q - Chain Lash

DETONATION DAMAGE: 40/60/80/100/120 (+0.4 ability power) ⇒45/70/95/120/145 (+0.6 ability power)

E - Abscond/Abduct

NEW: Now shields himself against all magic damage for 2 seconds on first cast.

COOLDOWN: 18/17/16/15/14 seconds ⇒ 14 seconds at all ranks

ABDUCT STUN DURATION: 0.5 seconds ⇒ 0.35 seconds

R - Hijack

CAST RANGE: 1050 ⇒ 950

HIJACKED ULTIMATE HOLD DURATION: 120 seconds ⇒ 90 seconds

COOLDOWN: 85/50/15 seconds ⇒ 100/80/60 seconds

AP RATIO CONVERSION: 0.5 ability power to 1.0 bonus attack damage, 0.7 ability power to 1.0 total attack damage ⇒ 0.4 ability power to 1.0 bonus attack damage, 0.6 ability power to 1.0 total attack damage.

Tahm Kench (changed):

"Passive damage health scaling increased; stacks no longer increase ability damage; abilities no longer apply stacks. Q no longer has a melee-range arc; stun now consumes all stacks. W1 Nearsight on enemies removed. W2 stun on enemies removed. E stores less Grey Health but heals for a higher percent; cooldown reduced but starts on shield expiration."

Passive - An Acquired Taste

REMOVED: Abilities no longer deal bonus magic damage based on passive stacks.

REMOVED: Abilities no longer apply An Acquired Taste stacks.

Q - Tongue Lash

ON-HIT DAMAGE: 1.5% Tahn Kench's maximum health per stack ⇒ 2.5% Tahm Kench's maximum health at any number of stacks.

COOLDOWN: 8/7/6/5/4 seconds ⇒ 8/7.5/7/6.5/6 seconds

REMOVED: No longer hits enemies in a wide arc in front of Tahm Kench on cast

NEW: Stunning an enemy with Tongue Lash consumes all stacks of An Acquired Taste

SLOW: 50/55/60/65/70% ⇒ 30/35/40/45/50%

SLOW DURATION: 2 seconds ⇒ 3 seconds

STUN DURATION: 1.5 seconds ⇒ 2 seconds

W - Devour/Regurgitate

REMOVED: Enemies are no longer nearsighted while Devoured.

REMOVED: Enemies are no longer stunned for 0.25 seconds after they're Regurgitated.

DAMAGE RATIO: 9/10/11/12/13% of target's maximum health ⇒ 11% of target's maximum health.

MAXIMUM MONSTER DAMAGE: 400/450/500/550/600 ⇒ 500

NEW: Tahm Kench can now Devour and Regurgitate Blue Sentinel and Red Brambleback.

E - Thick Skin

GREY HEALTH: 80/85/90/95/100% of the damage Tahm Kench takes ⇒45/50/55/60/65% of the damage Tahm Kench takes.

GREY HEALTH HEAL: 20/25/30/35/40% of Grey Health ⇒ 75% of Grey Health at all ranks.

COOLDOWN: 6 seconds starting on cast ⇒ 3 seconds when Thick Skin's shield expires or is broken.

Urgot (buffed):

"W recast timer decreased."

W - Purge

RECAST TIMER: 1 seconds ⇒ 0.5 seconds

Yuumi (changed):

"Passive shield decreased; mana restore removed. Q empowered damage decreased; cost increased. E missing HP scaling increased; cost decreased."

Passive - Bop 'n' Block

SHIELD: 80-300 (levels 1-18) ⇒ 50-300 (levels 1-18)

REMOVED: Yuumi no longer restores mana when she hits an enemy with an empowered basic attack.

Q - Prowling Projectile

EMPOWERED DAMAGE: 60/105/150/195/240/285 (+0.6 ability power) ⇒50/95/140/185/230/275 (+0.65 ability power)

COST: 60/65/70/75/80/85 mana ⇒ 75/80/85/90/95/100 mana

E - Zoomies!

BASE HEAL SCALING: Up to +100% ⇒ +130% based on target's missing health(healing from AP ratio still scales up to +300% based on target's missing health).

COST: 60/70/80/90/100 mana ⇒ 30/40/50/60/70 mana

Death Recap

"The new Death Recap is now live! This new and improved version includes damage type breakdowns, fight duration, and CC duration. Clicking the Recap will allow you to expand and see additional details on damage sources. We still have some more improvements planned for the future, so stay tuned. In the meantime, get in the game and see it for yourself!"

Show [Allied] Chat

"We've added a new option under Settings>Interface>Chat that will now allow you to mute your allies' chats. There is now a separate checkbox for "Show [Allied] Chat" next to the already existing "Show [All] Chat". Both settings will be checked by default, but players can now uncheck both to mute both enemies' and teammates' chats permanently, or until they're turned back on. However, unchecking both will not mute the pre- and post-game chat, but we've heard your requests and are considering including those in the future!"

Glen Schofield, well known among shooter fans as the former head of EA's Visceral Games studio and the co-founder of Sledgehammer Games, parted ways with Activision at the end of 2018, not quite a year after stepping down from his position as Sledgehammer's game director and chief creative officer. Today he revealed his next big thing: He's joined PUBG Corporation to head up a new triple-A development studio called Striking Distance.

In a video announcing the studio, Schofield ran down the highlights of the last decade of his career, which includes the development of Dead Space and three Call of Duty games: Modern Warfare 3, Advanced Warfare, and WWII. "But now I'm looking to take those experiences to explore new designs and concepts," he said. "As a creative, the freedom to explore the PUBG universe has me excited about the possibilities, which we view as beyond battle royale."

Schofield said the studio will develop "an original narrative in the PUBG universe," clarifying that it will not be a sequel to PUBG. Which is really no surprise, because you don't hire a high-profile guy like Schofield to tweak up your next battle royale map: You do it because you want to build, as he stated, a big, loud, singleplayer game. The storytelling hooks in a goofy BR like PUBG may not be immediately apparent, but if Schofield's in I wouldn't rush to bet against it.

Striking Distance doesn't appear to have a website yet, but you can take a look at its hiring page at careers.pubg.com.