Patch 14.18

E damage increased.

Ahri is underperforming a bit so we’re here to give her a bit of help. We’re playing up her ability to assassinate, as her backline access is relatively unique among mages and we think that’s a good strength to lean into. So we’re amping Charm’s rank-up and AP ratio to make her more threatening to isolated targets. We know she typically maxes it last, but this better rank-up may make it worthwhile to prioritize in specific scenarios, meanwhile the AP ratio will still be nice to have, even if it’s left at rank 1.

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  E - Charm

  Damage: 80/110/140/170/200 (+60% AP) → 80/120/160/200/240 (+75% AP)

R jump distance and wall forgiveness decreased, duration decreased.

Aurora’s landed as a popular champion and is performing quite well in higher skill level play. Since we’re at the World’s patch and don’t want to risk her hopping all over the competition, we’re significantly reducing her ability to pick off and corral enemy champions.

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  R - Between Worlds

  Maximum Jump Distance: 400 → 250

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  R - Between Worlds

  Wall Jump Forgiveness: 700 → 450

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  R - Between Worlds

  Duration: 3/3.5/4 → 2/2.5/3 seconds

W damage decreased.

It’s Worlds, so you know what that means, it’s time for Azir balance changes! This time it’s nerfs. We’re pro-skewing these nerfs so that he can keep a reasonable win rate for normal players without taking over the mid lane game champion pool in Pro. We’re taking down some of his early laning power as pros currently manage to squeak out of laning phases with a very small farm deficit, which we’re hoping to grow. And for the late game damage, the average solo queue game doesn’t go nearly as long as pro games do, so we hope that both of these changes disproportionately hit Pro play.

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  W - Arise!

  Damage: 50/65/80/95/110 + 0-77 (based on level) (+55% AP) → 50/65/80/95/110 + 0-45 (based on level) (+35/40/45/50/55% AP)

Q damage decreased. R damage decreased.

After a few rounds of direct and indirect changes, Corki is no longer the go-to mid laner in Pro. That said, we’re still concerned he may come back to overtake the mid meta at Worlds, so we’re delivering a light tap to his early Q power to give more champions room to push back against him in the early game and decreasing his R damage, primarily through level scaling, which mid laners in pro get a lot of.

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  Q - Phosphorus Bomb

  Damage: 70/120/170/220/270 (+120% bonus AD) (+100% AP) → 70/115/160/205/250 (+120% bonus AD) (+100% AP)

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  R - Missile Barrage

  Damage: 80/180/280 (+80% bonus AD) → 80/160/240 (+70% bonus AD)

Base AD increased.

So we have two goals for Gnar this patch. We think a stronger Gnar would be an interesting option for the Worlds meta and want to ensure that the Fleet adjustments don’t hit him too hard in solo queue. We’re increasing his base attack damage as compensation for the recent Fleet Footwork nerfs and to also make his last hits feel better.

WW ally shield strength increased.

There’s a decent appetite for Hwei support from players, but it’s currently a bit weak, so to help those players out we’re buffing his WW shield to allies to push his support up a decent amount, and hopefully not mid by much.

• WW - Pool of Reflection

  Ally Shield Strength: Reduced by 50% → reduced by 25%

E shield strength and slow decreased.

Ivern’s actually much stronger than his solo queue win rates indicate, as players are typically not rushing Redemption, which is his best item. If you’d like to make up for these nerfs, simply switch from Moonstone and enjoy continued success! Beyond that, Ivern currently risks becoming the #1 pro jungler for Worlds, so we need to trim his power to keep him from overgrowing the competition. We’re nerfing his early ganking and dueling power which should specifically reduce his early game dominance in Elite and Pro play.

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  E - Triggerseed

  Shield Strength: 85/125/165/205/245 (+50% AP) → 75/115/155/195/235 (+50% AP)

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  E - Triggerseed

  Slow: 45/50/55/60/65% → 40/45/50/55/60%

Passive damage increased.

Jarvan IV is a valuable Pro pick who isn't currently being played much, not to mention he could also use a bit more power in solo queue to help him out. We’re buffing his passive to bring up his early clear and skirmishing, as more power here should feel good across the board, but it's also a lever particularly important in Pro.

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  Passive - Martial Cadence

  Current Health Damage: 7% → 8%

R armor, MR, on-hit damage, and armor per champion hit increased.

We’re happy with how our Jax changes back in 14.14 gave his opponents more ability to counterplay him, but they also left him a bit weaker than we’d like. For these changes we’re opting to give him some more late game skewed power that should particularly benefit him in higher levels of play where his teamfight durability becomes increasingly important.

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  R - Grandmaster-At-Arms

  Base Armor Granted: 15/40/65 → 25/50/75

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  R - Grandmaster-At-Arms

  Base Magic Resist Granted: 9/24/39 → 15/30/45

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  R - Grandmaster-At-Arms

  On-Hit Magic Damage: 60/110/160 (+60% AP) → 70/120/170 (+60% AP)

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  R - Grandmaster-At-Arms

  Armor Per Additional Champion Hit: 15/20/25 (+10% bonus AD) → 20/25/30 (+10% bonus AD) (note: 60% of this bonus is still gained as MR)

Q slow increased. E bonus movement speed increased.

In a world full of ranged AD mids, somehow Jayce hasn’t made an entrance on the professional stage. The fact that we’re not seeing him almost at all plus some pretty poor solo queue win rates means we’re pretty confident a certain anime protagonist hasn’t shone(n) as brightly as he’s meant to. His damage is already in a pretty good spot after his recent buffs, so we’re taking a look at his utility to give him more to do than just kill everything.

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  Q - To the Skies!

  Slow: 30/35/40/45/50/55% → 35/40/45/50/55/60%

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  E - Acceleration Gate

  Bonus Movement Speed: 30/35/40/45/50/55% → 35/40/45/50/55/60%

Attack speed growth increased.

Another comfort pick for Pro, Jinx has a little bit of room for power so we’re giving her some tiny bit of additional attack speed growth which should help her crit builds hit slightly harder.

Base armor decreased.

Leona’s been shining bright for a while now, and while we’re glad she’s popular we’d like a bit more diversity in the Pro play tank champion pool. We like how much crowd control she has and we took down a bit of her damage last time so now it’s time for a little less durability to make her not quite the #1 tank pick.

Passive monster damage cap decreased. R sleep duration decreased.

Lillia has quickly become the top jungler in Pro and is generally performing too well in most skill brackets of solo queue as well. As the jungle has become more hospitable to AP champions and items have become better for Lillia over time, we’re continuing to chip away at her inherent kit strengths. We’re once again reducing her clear speed since newer items provide a lot of benefits here while adding a pro-skewed nerf to her ultimate’s CC duration.

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  Passive - Dream-Laden Bough

  Monster Damage Cap: 70-100 (based on level) → 65 at all levels

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  R - Lilting Lullaby

  Sleep Duration: 2/2.25/2.5 seconds → 2 seconds at all ranks

Q damage decreased.

Lissandra’s buffs from last patch overshot a bit, so we’re clawing back some of the power we gave her. Instead of reverting some base damage or her R slow, we’re toning down her Q’s AP ratio which has led her to opt into burstier builds. We want to lean into her ability to repeatedly crowd control opponents, so this should move her away from high AP builds and over to more ability haste focused ones.

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  Q - Ice Shard

  Damage: 80/115/150/185/220 (+85% AP) → 80/115/150/185/220 (+75% AP)

Passive Pix damage increased.

We want to give enchanters a bit of a fighting chance at bringing some more ADCs into the World’s meta and also give players some more options in the support role. Lulu has some room to gain a bit of extra power, so we’re reverting a nerf to her passive and giving her a little bit more oomph.

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  Passive - Pix, Faerie Companion

  Pix Damage per Bolt: 3-37 (based on level) (+5% AP) → 5-39 (based on level) (+5% AP)

Passive shield strength increased.

Malphite has fallen off a bit throughout the year and as a straightforward and very easy to pilot tank, he’s meant to be quite appealing for a variety of situations. Due to this, we’re giving him some more power in hopes that he enters the pantheon of viable tank picks. To get there we’ll be returning his passive shield value to its former glory in order to make League’s oldest tank just that extra bit rock solid.

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  Passive - Granite Shield

  Shield Strength: 9% maximum HP → 10% maximum HP

Q damage decreased. E cooldown increased, sapling duration in brushes decreased.

Maokai is the other tree at risk of becoming the #1 jungler at Worlds this year and while we’re happy that tanks are viable, we’d like there to be more of them available. As such, we’re bringing down some pro-skewed power via his sapling vision control with a little damage off the top as well, as he shouldn’t generally need so much damage as a tank.

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  Q - Bramble Smash

  Damage: 65/115/165/215/265 (+40% AP) + 2/2.5/3/3.5/4% target max HP → 65/110/155/200/245 (+40% AP) + 2/2.5/3/3.5/4% target max HP

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  E - Sapling Toss

  Cooldown: 16/15/14/13/12 seconds → 18/17/16/15/14 seconds

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  E - Sapling Toss

  Sapling Duration in Brushes: 30 (+2.5% bonus HP) seconds → 30 (+1.5% bonus HP) seconds

Base AD decreased.

Miss Fortune’s had a high solo queue win rate and very high pro presence for a while now. We’re reverting one of the buffs we gave to her in 14.13 as she's strong at pretty much all stages of the game and could stand to lose some power. Bloodthirster is getting hit this patch as well which is her first item, so this change paired with that should get MF into a good spot.

E damage decreased.

Somehow, Nasus has returned. As a… mid laner? Huh. In truth, Nasus is performing a bit too well in lower MMRs and his laning pattern in Pro play is… a thing. As such, we’re making changes to hopefully solve both of these issues. By nerfing his conventional last-max ability, he’ll have less reliable late game damage, especially in lower MMRs where games go longer. As this is also his first max as a mid laner in Pro play, we can meaningfully weaken his current zero-counterplay poke pattern.

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  E - Spirit Fire

  Initial Damage: 55/95/135/175/215 (+60% AP) → 50/80/110/140/170 (+60% AP)

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  E - Spirit Fire

  Damage per Second: 11/19/27/35/43 (+12% AP) → 10/16/22/28/34 (+12% AP)

E bonus movement speed decreased.

We’ll let you in on a little secret: Rell’s E has been her optimal first max for a while. Most players don’t know that while pros do, so her solo queue performance doesn’t accurately reflect her pro power levels. In an effort to reel her in for pros but keep her from looking much worse for everyone else, we’re bringing down the power of E-max a tad. Though these number changes are pretty small (and they’re meant to be), they’ll affect both Rell and her targeted teammate.

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  E - Full Tilt

  Maximum Bonus Movement Speed: 12/14/16/18/20% → 12/13/14/15/16%

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  E - Full Tilt

  Maximum Bonus Movement Speed Toward Enemies or Targeted Ally: 24/28/32/36/40% → 24/26/28/30/32%

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  E - Full Tilt

  Initial Bonus Movement Speed: 75% of the maximum (unchanged)

Q damage decreased. E damage decreased.

Rumble has been crowding out the top lane pool in Pro play this summer and our recent nerfs didn’t do enough to knock him off that pedestal. We’re once again looking to reduce his early lane dominance since it’s pretty much impossible to dodge a flamethrower.

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  Q - Flamespitter

  Damage: 80/105/130/155/180 (+ 110% AP) (+6/7/8/9/10% of target's maximum health) → 60/90/120/150/180 (+ 100% AP) (+6/7/8/9/10% of target's maximum health)

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  E - Electro Harpoon

  Damage: 60/85/110/135/160 (+50% AP) → 55/80/105/130/155 (+50% AP)

Q damage increased.

Lane strength has been a high priority for picks in pro, yet Samira has been mostly missing from a space that she should be a viable option in. We want to be mindful of her solo queue ban rate, but also want to add some meaningful early game strength back into her kit that won’t make her too oppressive.

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  Q - Flair

  Damage: 0/5/10/15/20 (+85/95/105/115/125% AD) → 0/5/10/15/20 (+95/102.5/110/117.5/125% AD)

Passive shield strength increased.

We’d like if Shen also joined the list of strong-feeling top lane tanks at Worlds this year. While he’s already seeing some success as a support, we want to make sure he’s also doing well in his primary role. We’re buffing his level-scaling and gold-scaling tankiness to make sure that come late game, Shen feels like he can withstand incoming damage in both duels and team fights.

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  Passive - Ki Barrier

  Shield Strength: 47-101 (based on level) (+12% bonus HP) → 47-120 (based on level) (+13% bonus HP)

Base health decreased. Q damage decreased and AP ratio removed. W damage to champions, minions, and monsters decreased.

Smolder risks becoming a dominant top/mid pick at Worlds this year, but is otherwise a pretty balanced bot laner. These nerfs are meant to be solo lane skewed so that he doesn’t lose too much power in bot, but without a riskier set of changes, some pain for bot laners is unavoidable. This patch we’re nerfing his early laning power and self-sufficiency which helps him succeed in solo lanes.

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  Q - Super Scorcher Breath

  Damage: 20/30/40/50/60 (+100% AD) (+15% AP) → 15/25/35/45/55 (+100% AD)

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  W - ACHOOO!

  Glob Damage: 50/80/110/140/170 (+25% bonus AD) (+20% AP) → 45/75/105/135/165 (+25% bonus AD) (+20% AP)

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  W - ACHOOO!

  Minion/Monster Damage: 70/112/154/196/238 (+35% bonus AD) (+28% AP) → 63/105/147/189/231 (+35% bonus AD) (+28% AP)

Q and E damage decreased.

Varus’ buffs in 14.17 landed a little stronger than intended, so we’re tapping down the AD ratios he received. We still want his primary builds to be attack speed and AD focused without his Lethality ones overtaking them, and these changes should be in line with that.

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  Q - Piercing Arrow

  Maximum Damage: 90/160/230/300/370 (+150/160/170/180/190% bonus AD) → 90/160/230/300/370 (+130/140/150/160/170% bonus AD)

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  E - Hail of Arrows

  Damage: 60/100/140/180/220 (+110% bonus AD) → 60/100/140/180/220 (+100% bonus AD)

Q damage decreased.

We buffed Vi a few patches ago and while she can really use the power in solo queue, we’re being really pro focused in this specific patch and unfortunately she’s crowding out every other fighter jungler in Pro play. So for now we’re pulling back on her recent Q buff in order to give other fighters more room to shine at Worlds this year.

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  Q - Vault Breaker

  Minimum Damage: 50/75/100/125/150 (+ 80% bonus AD) → 45/70/95/120/145 (+ 80% bonus AD)

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  Q - Vault Breaker

  Maximum Damage: 100/150/200/250/300 (+160% bonus AD) → 90/140/190/240/290 (+160% bonus AD)

Base AD increased. Q damage to monsters decreased.

Viego is just a little under his appropriate power level, so we’re looking to give him a little love (which he sorely needs, poor Isolde). We’re playing up his base AD for two reasons: To give him more affinity toward Trinity Force as an alternate starting item, and to lightly re-add some Elite-skew as he’s currently weaker in higher MMRs and early game buffs tend to even that out. We’re also aware that his optimized jungle clear is extremely fast, so in order to not make it TOO fast while also giving him the early dueling power from this base AD, we’re slightly lowering his bonus monster damage on Q.

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  Q - Blade of the Ruined King

  Bonus Damage to Monsters: 20 → 15

Armor growth increased. Q damage increased.

Xin Zhao is an extremely straightforward champion and as such should normally have a rather high win rate for a jungler when appropriately balanced. We also know he’s currently fairly Elite-skewed and can run afoul in higher skill brackets if he gets too much power. So we’re shipping some lower-MMR skewed buffs by increasing his late game durability and rank-up damage on his last-maxed ability.

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  Q - Three Talon Strike

  Bonus Damage per Hit: 16/25/34/43/52 (+40% bonus AD) → 16/29/42/55/68 (+40% bonus AD)

Passive damage decreased.

Zeri is one of the highest agency ADCs in League of Legends. For any situation, she probably has the means to outplay her opposition, either killing them or at least getting to safety (or if you’re me... wall-riding into 5 opponents and instantly dying). Champions like this tend to require lower than average win rates in order to feel fair, which is why we’re nerfing a champion with a sub-50% win rate for most players. She’s also at risk of becoming a default mid laner at Worlds this year, which is another concern. With all this in mind, we’re giving her some mid-skewed nerfs, removing early flat passive damage and some back-loaded level scaling, as her passive usage in general is more prevalent in mid lane.

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  Passive - Living Battery

  Damage: 90-200 (based on level) (+1-15% target’s maximum health) (progression followed stat growth) → 75-160 (based on level) (+1-11% target’s maximum health) (progression is now linear)

Passive damage to structures decreased.

We’re concerned that Ziggs will remain the dominant bot laner for Worlds this year, especially with some of the top tier ADCs being nerfed. We’re delivering a small, Pro-skewed tap to Ziggs that should leave him mostly untouched for the rest of us. As pro teams are much more coordinated and better at getting Ziggs in front of turrets one after another, we hope he can still be good at demolition without choking out his competition in coordinated environments.

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  Passive - Short Fuse

  Increased Damage to Structures: 150% → 75%

Fleet Footwork received several nerfs due to ADCs taking over mid lane by repeatedly pushing the waves, healing up, and escaping ganks.

Fleet Footwork received several nerfs due to ADCs taking over mid lane by repeatedly pushing the waves, healing up, and escaping ganks. While we think the rune is now in an appropriate spot for ranged users, it’s become too weak for its main melee users. We’re adjusting tactics here and adding a melee/ranged split to more than just the minion penalty which should preserve the current power level for ranged users while significantly buffing it for melee ones.