On PBE for patch 11.1:
Runaan's Hurricane
Jinx, Twitch and Aphelios might finally be playable. Also this leaves Kai'Sa untouched, since she can still Q+E evolve with the same amount of gold by buying a Pickaxe before Runaan's Hurricane. Everyone wins.
External link →does it still have the 40-70% scaling on bolts? would be massively buffed compared to season 10 if so.
Nope. Since the 10.25b patch has technical limitations, it will probably have to read as 40-40% until 11.1, when we can change it properly.
to be fair to riot (lol), I can see how they were trying to keep runaans as a late game item choice but they didn't account for how dogshit some champs are without their runaans interaction (aphelios, jinx, etc.)
Basically this. Preseason is a time to try some things out—turns out that other champions weren't really interested in Runaan's later in the game, even if it's technically powerful. At that point, the choice is to try and figure out a different way to execute on it being a late-game item or to go back.
The delay on changing it back was because the rest of the marksman ecosystem also clearly needed some changes, in more obvious ways. Zeal items were underpowered and peoples' purchasing behaviors' take time to catch up. By 10.25, the other Zeal items are almost certain to be often better than Runaan's second on the usual Runaan's suspects, which was closer to the originally intended purchasing structure. However, it was pretty clear by this point that many people really like having Runaan's properties on certain champs every game and, especially given the long-shot odds of landing the broader late-game appeal, I decided there was more value in trying to tune it competitively as a second item and offer it up alongside the occasional PD/RFC/Stormrazor for the champs that feel like they're bound to it.
Honest question on Zeal items, outside of champs that need runaans I haven't seen any Zeal items built all season (or built them myself). With the attack speed that mythics give + boots and AD / crit damage down, it feels like stacking the more ad focused crit items is just what feels best since it seems like a zeal item will just gut your damage. With IE becoming an auto 3rd item forever, what will make me want a zeal item second over the collector (or NQB on Xayah) even with the change?
Zeal items should be powerful for DPS on champions that are mostly basic-attack reliant, and generally stronger (comparatively) as you progress towards third item, picking up more AD. Phantom Dancer is a very high DPS item if you can actually basic attack. RFC offers a unique property in attack range.
I can't overstate the amount of feel difference a couple hundred gold on components and finished item can make. One of the main reasons that AD items felt more powerful before was they actually were just much more powerful.
Just wanna say first, thanks for taking the time to reply to these threads. I’m sure ADC mains appreciate being able to see the thought process behind the decisions.
I wanted to ask what your thoughts on the state of Mortal Reminder are right now. I often have the feeling of too many balls to juggle as an ADC in terms of buying items—needing to buy Damage, Armor Pen, AS, and a defensive item and then on top of that a situational Grievous Wounds item. If I need to buy Mortal Reminder, then I’m likely stuck without a defensive item or without a core-identity zeal item(e.g. Runaans Jinx/Aphelios, Rapidfire Cait/Jhin). If I choose to sacrifice my damage, well, then I don’t do any damage.
On another thought, do you believe armor is too strong in the game currently? By mid to late game we’re talking base armor that negates 40-60 percent of physical damage which, in turn, necessitates the buy of last whisper items. If armor was tuned and last whisper was removed I think build paths would be a lot more healthy. When you think about it, what does an armor pen item even do except give damage more damage which isn’t exciting as crits, a unique zeal property, more attackspeed, a lifesaving defensive item etc. I think if you had gone this route, the runaans damage idea would’ve worked a lot better. Anyway, thanks if you read this.
I would say that it's currently optimal for non-marksmen to buy Grievous Wounds. If you do have to buy it, it's intentional that you have to give up a property (lacking defense and utility is the expected tradeoff in most cases, though not always). Would love to find a way for GW to actually feel actively good to buy, but alas today is not that day.
I think armor is tuned pretty appropriately atm. Don't think LW items are optimal until pretty late in the game unless against multiple tanks or unless inability to kill a single tank is impeding your ability to fight.
what technical limitations inhibit yall from changin the tooltip lmao
10.25b is actually a micropatch. Riot leaves the office for two weeks immediately after, but we still want to put out a smaller, low-risk balance patch. We're missing localization resources and don't deploy a new game version at all.
What was the thought behind making the item worse than in s10, exactly?
You can check my other comments for context if you're interested.
Quick question: I love this change, but compared to before preseason the item has lost almost 300g in stats (and that’s before considering that crit is a weaker stat inherently) while only getting 100g cheaper.
That being the case, is there any world where you guys could/would buff the bolt scaling to a flat 50% at all levels instead of 40%? It’d make the item much nicer in the mental space with the bolt damage being exactly half of your primary autos, while also making up for that lost value to make it more of a power neutral change.
Regardless, as an ADC main and Jinx/Aphelios lover I really appreciate your insight and you guys taking the time to think this through. Also appreciate you giving it a shot as a late game item even though it didn’t really work out.
A lot of items have different efficiencies compared to last season overall, because we care more about the ecosystem than individual items' power level. Items exist to create interesting and compelling choices and power progression/fantasy, and each individual item can range pretty broadly as long as it's balanced enough against its competition in-slot. In other words, if the subclass (basic attack-heavy marksmen) remains weak after the 10.25 and 10.25b changes, we'll try to find the best way to buff it, which might be through Zeal items or might be through something else. If it seems that Runaan's specifically is failing on either of those axes, through being unsatisfying to build or complete or through simply not being powerful enough to be a competitive purchase on champions who should consider it, then we should figure out a way to accomplish that (which very well could mean buffs).
One reason many items lost some amount of efficiency is that they also grant mythic passive stats, as well.
All super fair and makes sense; FWIW I'm not "pre-selling" myself on the idea that Runaan's will be weak without the buff I mentioned. I'm very excited for this revert and really appreciate you guys giving all this stuff a go and being truly aggressive with these changes to get stuff right.
Thanks again for being responsive, as a player it means a ton to get to directly speak with you guys about your thought processes. ADCs definitely were a bit weak on launch but that's obviously totally understandable with so many moving parts in preseason, and at this point I'm super amped to play with the 10.25 buffs tonight after work and even more amped now for next patch.
Cheers!
Awesome to hear. Thanks for asking thoughtful questions.
Short question when it comes to the itemizing structure. Especially with IE now being put in 3rd place for a lot of crit ADC's, when you were talking about Runaans as a late game item, do you have a statistic on how often ADCs actually get to 4-5 items?
Usually the 4th item slot has to be some form of defensive item that you need in order not to get completely blown out of the water be it e.g. a GA or QSS. Thus Runaans would only make it into the 5 th slot, basically fullbuild, considering that in higher elo's the game time is only somewhere between 26-28 minutes, that would make it only a niche item that most ADCs would still forgo for a different choice probably most of the time.
Right, but there's still value in having late-game not entirely solved all the time. Games being 27 minutes on average doesn't mean long games don't happen, and long games should also be of the highest quality we can deliver—they make up a lot of the most memorable and momentous games. "I need more damage" is a really valid desire at 4th item, even if in a lot of gamestates it's incorrect. If you have a lulu protecting you, or if they're short on divers but heavy on tanks, it's good to have an item that fills that need. The issue we ran into here was a dearth of valid second items that felt good for some marksmen, which, as you're identifying, is a much bigger problem because games always make it to that point. That's why Runaan's is moving back to that slot. Choice is more valuable early in the game because you always get there (hence one of the reasons Mythic items can offer a lot of value to the structure).
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