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Riot Jag tweeted:

Hey all, hope you can take a break from Dr. Mundo for a minute so can I tell you about upcoming SR-T work:

-We're pushing back the Force of Nature changes by a patch. We wanted to ship them with 11.13's Mobility changes, but pivoted on the direction due to player feedback.

-The team is working on Lucian changes. Lucian's power as a flex pick and dominant mid laner has served to make him highly pro bound, where he maintains a very high presence there. On the other hand, he has a very low solo queue win rate in all positions, and despite this, most solo queue players still choose to play him in the bot lane. Our tactics are to increase bot lane bindings. Currently we're testing reduced base stats and some nerfs to his early abilities, but in exchange he gets new empowerments when he is Healed or Shielded by an ally. We're also testing increased damage against immobilized targets. As always, we can't guarantee that any of this makes it to live, but we wanted to keep you all in the loop here.

-Mages are getting buffs in 11.13. We've seen the class take a lot of hits this year in terms of satisfaction and power level, so we reduced AP Mana Mythics' costs by 200 gold. We know this doesn't solve all player pains, and we'll keep a close eye on them going forward.

-Finally, my hopes are high that 11.13 will be a very big patch. Between the Tahm Kench update, new top lane items, mage buffs, and major mobility tweaks, this will probably be the biggest meta shake-up we'll see for quite a while. Very excited to see how it turns out!

Edit: Update on Sona:

Lots of questions regarding Sona updates.

We're still working on the art assets. Still aiming for a late summer release.

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over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by ThisIsSnake

/u/RiotJag, thank you for the excellent comms here. Your post style is the BEST way IMO to convey real near term 'in the works'. You touched on several current pain points, and when we can expect to see them. Great stuff.

Two particular comments if you can address them:

  • Could you find some time to detail a longer term forecast for bringing the total Mage itemization quality up. Includes things like burst variation, AP bruisers, and nontraditional AP items. Will the non AP mythics get tweaked/reworked in this? They are too burst centric atm (2 of the no-mana AP mythic items are burst damage + mobility).

  • Love seeing that the team is no longer leaving Pro-play bound champs in the gutter. To me its absurd that the wider team has continued to leave pro play champs in the gutter over the years instead of iterating further. Phreak has some great comments on 'solo queue buffs' in his recent patch run down video. Edit: Phreak's 11.12 run down, great content. https://youtu.be/qpV823EEFhk

-The most I can say here is that we can see holes in Mage itemization that could be worth addressing soon (like preseason).

-Haven't seen his video yet (I try to catch them when I can). But we've been doing a lot of work this year to reduce extreme pro bindings, and will continue to.

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by Foucz

i bet lucian players are thrilled when they hear they can have their champion at full power when someone else does something, for sure it will not be infuriating when your ally fails to give you bonus damage

We're being pretty careful here to make sure we create mechanics that retain Lucian's high-agency identity. We don't expect to limit him from aggression based on how his support is playing.

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by korro90

No mention of the Lillia changes :(

(Though cheaper Liandrys will be slight buff)

Lillia has changes in testing that I believe we're fairly high confidence on. They have similar goals to Lucian - reduce pro binding, increase solo queue power. I think those are aimed for 11.14 now. Can ask ExasperatedDan on Twitter about more details.

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by flamesofkarma

u/RiotJag is karma on yalls radar for any changes like lucian?

Nothing in the short term.

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by korro90

Great to hear! Just in time for her skin, right? wink wink

Nope!

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by korro90

D: I guess I gotta keep on dreaming...

Wait wait wait just to be clear, I was saying we're not making changes "in time for her skin". We don't have a goal to buff champions because of upcoming skin releases.

I don't know what her skin release schedule is, that's a different team.

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by GamdzykMakayra

If you don't mind me asking, are Irelia changes still in the works?

Yep, aiming for 11.14 I think.

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by riceislifeuwu

I was also thinking, I’ve heard some universal agreement that the spike for mana less eternal sustain dshield ad meelee champs in mid to have push and prio over a mage that has to get lost chapter and struggles to push out and base until then - is a bit unbalanced, so I was wondering has anyone ever thought of adjusting the mana regen or some meelee-ranged passive on dring? And this isn’t so much like rito pls but like if this is a discussion in the past that’s happened, I’m just genuinely curious on the reasons why :)

We're definitely discussing the Doran's Shield/Second Wind heavy sustain strategies.

I'm not confident they don't have a place in the game. But we can see the problems these effects create as well.

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by ThisIsSnake

/u/RiotJag, If I could follow on, is there a reason that Mage itemization would wait until the next pre-season? The dev balance team has been killing it with the larger item iteration sets, lately. IMO Its been much better for the game to get these larger patches to address gameplay after the S11 preseason, instead of the usual wait till the next preseason.

There is also the meme that this entire season is still in pre-season, so I don't think it would be any harm to see changes sooner than later, once they are ready. I think everyone would love to just have an idea of what is going on behind the scenes to polish the AP item system off.

The scope of such changes is very large, and so there's just a lot of work required behind it, and that takes time.

We're not waiting for any reason other than we have a lot of stuff in the pipeline right now. :)

over 3 years ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by daswef2

Sylas magic resist base and growth is also absurd

Almost all of Sylas's scalings are absurd lol.

over 3 years ago - /u/RiotJag - Direct link

Originally posted by jhelton808

Hey u/RiotJag, a little late to the thread but thanks for communicating openly with us. Are there any plans to address the popularity and success that melle champs are seeing in the midlane this season? It feels like pretty much every champion you go against is an assassin or bruiser in midlane and it’s pushed a lot of traditional mages out, and while 200 gold is nice I don’t think this will change the problem(with champs like sylas actually being buffed here).

Also, with the mobility changes, champs that are already struggling like Zoe are getting a strong option of theirs nerfed(nimbus cloak) which tunnels them more into certain choices. Are there plans for individual champion changes for mid mages planned possibly before preseason to address this?

The problem is on our radar. If the item changes don't move mages in the right direction enough then we'll keep looking for opportunities here.