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Since y'day, we added Azir, pulled Ziggs. The change we want to test is not appropriate for the World's patch.

There are too many meta effects that are buffing Azir since the last bout of Pro Play. (Shiv nerf, Trist nerf, AP nerfs to Kaisa that make it harder to run AD mid, etc.)

Galio: CD buff to play up his global niche, rather than making him more generally powerful

GP: Similarly, ult focused upgrades that focus more on his global niche

Jhin: 14-44 more scaling on rank 3 ult (looks small on paper, but can deal up to 4x based on missing HP)

Lee Sin: An early dueling and sustain buff. We're being careful not to get lane Lee back and are throwing in a compensatory lane nerf early tmrw.

Lissandra: Root duration increase to target matchups where she has higher W uptime (melees + LB) and keeping her other matchups relatively similar

Nunu: Because sometimes you gotta roll it down. E has a longer window to land all snowballs, but if you land them all they're gonna hurt

Pyke: Finding some buffs for Pyke that aren't damage, but still help him out. Trying to match W and E rankups to give him more versatility in games where one of them is better

Syndra: A small buff to her early Q which will affect all aspects of her game

Twitch: We've held off on doing this change for a long time. Part of it is because we want Twitch's ult to still be flashable/somewhat dodgeable and secondly for opponents to process what's going on. Increasing the speed a little hopefully maintains those properties but resolves some feelsbads around Twitch's ult being worse than not using it

Azir: Azir is still able to get push in many matchups, hitting some of his poke uptime as a result.

Rek'Sai: P changes have allowed Rek'Sai to perform more like a bruiser rather than an assassin. Our changes aim to keep this shape, but nerf it a bit, while also hitting early game strength with Movespeed and early Q damage.

Zeri: A simple change to her baseline mobility, given her kit's mobility" - https://twitter.com/RiotPhroxzon/status/1704348828344979786

>>> Champion Buffs <<<

Galio

  • [R] Hero's Entrance cooldown reduced 200/180/160 >>> 180/160/140 seconds

Gangplank

  • [R] Cannon Barrage buffs:
    • Cooldown reduced 180/160/140 >>> 170/150/130 seconds
    • Death's Daughter slow increased 60% >>> 75%
    • Raise Morale Move Speed increased 30% >>> 40%

Jhin

  • [R] Curtain Call base damage increased 50/125/200 >>> 64/154/244

Lee Sin

  • Base Armor increased 34 >>> 36

  • [W2] Iron Will Life Steal and Spell Vamp adjusted 5/10.5/16/21.5/27% >>> 10/14/18/22/26%

  • [E1] Tempest base damage reduced 35/65/95/125/155 >>> 35/60/85/110/135 (as per Phreak's comment)


Lissandra

  • [W] Ring of Frost root duration increased 1.1/1.2/1.3/1.4/1.5 >>> 1.25/1.35/1.45/1.55/1.65 seconds

Nunu and Willump (AP Focused)

  • [E] Snowball Barrage AP ratio per hit increased 10% >>> 15% (90% >>> 135% total)

Pyke

  • HP per level increased 104 >>> 110

  • [W] Ghostwater Dive cooldown reduced 12/11.5/11/10.5/10 >>> 12/11/10/9/8 seconds


Syndra

  • [Q] Dark Sphere base damage increased 70/105/140/175/210 >>> 75/110/145/180/215

Twitch

  • [R] Spray and Pray auto attack missile speed increased 4000 >>> 5000

>>> Champion Nerfs <<<

Azir

  • [Q] Conquering Sands cooldown increased 12/10.5/9/7.5/6 >>> 14/12/10/8/6 seconds

Rek'Sai

  • [P] Fury of the Xer'Sai heal reduced 15-125 (+2-12% max HP) >>> 10 (+2-10% max HP) (based on level)

  • [Unburrowed-Q] Queen's Wrath tAD ratio reduced 34/38/42/46/50% >>> 30/35/40/45/50%

  • [W] Burrow/Unburrow adjustments:

    • [Unburrowed-W] Burrow bonus Move Speed reduced 350/355/360/365 (based on levels 1/6/11/16) >>> 340/345/350 (based on levels 1/6/11)
    • [Burrowed-W] Unborrow base damage increased 50/65/80/95/110 >>> 50/85/120/155/190

Renekton

  • Base Magic Resistance reduced 32 >>> 28

Zeri

  • Base Move Speed reduced 335 >>> 330

>>> System Buffs <<<

Seeker's Armguard

  • Armor increased 15 >>> 20

Randuin's Omen

  • Cost reduced 3000 >>> 2700

External link →
about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by Th3_Huf0n

Jesus f**king christ, that Jhin R damage buff is way bigger than anything I expected for Jhin.

THAT'S SO MUCH f**kING DAMAGE

EDIT: I am going to add, if Worlds is indeed topside focused (whether its sololane or jungle, doesn't matter), Jhin skyrockets in terms of botlane powerpicks.

It has a Total AD ratio, the real difference in damage is ~14%

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

The third Lee Sin line isn't mentioned here, but is currently minus 0-20 damage off of E.

Top/Mid Lee max E 2nd. Jungle Lee maxes E last.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by Darkened_Auras

They really said "f**k Rek'Sai mains, we don't want her in Worlds." This is gonna feel f**king rough

Rek'Sai has been completely ceilinged by elite MMR solo queue, sadly. And then we buffed her best first item.

Every time, I've tried to compensate changes for other skill brackets or nerf things that disproportionately hit super high level play. There's also a longform change list (similar to Rumble and Azir, which were both very successful changes IMO) floating around that if I have time for, I'd like to trial. However, I can't guarantee that this will be the highest priority in the near future.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by HalfAssResponse

nice galio buffs literally not solving any of his problems in the current meta

ive come to detest those proplay micropatches because they seem like such a cope for riot to balance nothing, good luck with worlds viewership when worlds meta will be a copypaste of boring ass playoffs that nobody watched

In general, we're not trying to specifically pro skew these changes. For the vast majority of them, there are one of three driving principles:

  1. This champion is kinda just bad. We should buff them. We're aware that Worlds will be happening this patch.
  2. This champion is kinda good already. We should do something that's attention-grabbing but not actually that huge since they're already kinda good.
  3. This champions has been ultra-present in pro play and we think they'll remain a top-5 champion in that scene. Let's give pros some room to explore.

Moving forward, we'd like to do pro balance less often than we did this year.

However, I think 14/15 of the most present champions have been changed since the last time any league played on a given patch. Kai'Sa, Tristana, Azir, Renekton, Rell, etc. etc. etc. If you think nothing's changed since playoffs (which BTW was 13.13 for LPL lol), you just don't have a very good memory.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by Divine_Platypus

ofc jhin ult buff because everytime i get hit by jhin ult i think to myself "boy, this ult really does no damage" /s

I mean he's the only marksman where you can realistically dodge all of his damage and not just because he missed. It's allowed to be strong IMO.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by God_Given_Talent

Disappointed you guys didn't go with 44/144/244. Power levels be damned, I'm here to meme and RP my champ.

I wanted to raise the trap count to 4 and was told no

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by DanielDKXD

With his shield being this much of a one point wonder I would expect jgl lee to also do E second

Eh, currently jungle Lee is like +2% win rate on W 2nd. It'll get closer, sure, but I expect W to still be better.

The flat shield still scales substantially.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by Jozoz

Can you give some more context on the decision to add Azir?

The risk that he'll be #1 by a lot. Technically Taliyah and Trist had higher presence than him in LEC postseason and though Trist was nerfed (plus several systems changes should impact her), Taliyah was not. But ultimately, it's a very light touch that will absolutely retain Azir in the meta but makes him less likely to be #1. Ideally we have no 100% presence champions. We don't think Trist or Taliyah will be that and this change is to stave off the likelihood that Azir will be either.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by UNOvven

But isnt Lee being buffed specifically for pro play? I can't see how he fits into these categories.

Lee Sin is like 48% everywhere.

Win rate is not power (not exactly anyway, they're obviously correlated) but also his teammates are the ones on the receiving end of that 48% win rate and they've been receiving that for several months. He could stand to be buffed even just for his teammates' sakes.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by Lord_Dust_Bunny

I'm not sure anyone can with a straight face claim a "jungle clear speed nerf" matters when at the earliest it could take effect is level 8, for -5 damage.

By the time Lee Sin has E maxed, he is level 13 and has enough AD that -20 damage is irrelevant to clearing (as if a level 13 jungler cares about clear speed...). But more realistically Lee is maxing E last, so this nerf means at level 14 Lee Sin is now missing a whole 5 damage on his clears, while casually throwing out 700+ damage Q nukes to monsters.

Or calling the W change a 'nerf'. It's massively better until level 13, where Lee Sin now gets -1% omnivamp. The early game jungler getting a whopping +5% omnivamp levels 2-7 far outstrips the 'nerf' of level 13 Lee healing 20 less health per 2k damage dealt.

Most Lee Sin jungles max W 2nd.

For ~75% of Lee Sin players this is a 5 damage nerf at level 14.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by Pozay

Hey Phreak ; I'm noticing how most of the other buffs are not straight up damage buffs except this one (and syndra). Has there been a "directive" to avoid damage buffs ?

Nothing really obvious and direct. We're generally aware that the game is more lethal than we'd like. There are some systemic things in the works, some systemic things that are farther out, and some small direction in short-term changes.

The Samira/Quinn/Akshan changes from a couple patches ago are an example of that last one.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by Asaz12

Even if its not proplay related how does it fix him in soloq? He is one of worst midlaners

and -20sec on ult that you never use off cd is useless

Even +2 armor or -10 mana cost on q would be more impactful

I dont think there was any worse buff than what he got now from possible ones

I saw many complains on twitter so hope there will be some change to that like please it won't impact him at all pretty much and he is struggling

Q cd from 12-10 to 12-8 would be so great..

Every change has impact. It's not like Galio is trash. He's a little bit weak on average. A champion can be bad at 1v1 and good at a strategic niche. I don't have really strong opinions on Galio but in general I think playing up a strategic niche is a way to ensure League of Legends has significant variance from game to game.

about 1 year ago - /u/PhreakRiot - Direct link

Originally posted by Whodoesntlovetwob

But isn't Lee Sin balanced around that winrate,similar to Akali,Azir,Aphelios,etc?

Lee Sin doesn't have the pro presence of Azir. So the best players in the world with hundreds of games of experience on him indicate that they don't think he's very good, either.