Patch 15.4

Q, W, and R damage increased.

After her recent adjustments Ashe is sitting a bit on the weaker side, so this patch we're looking to add the bite back to her frost. For this change list, we're looking to give her some more power in the mid game by increasing the AD scaling on her Q and W while also giving her a bit more up front damage on her R so that Ashe and her allies can more successfully burst down enemies she's engaged on.

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  Q - Ranger's Focus

  Total Damage per Flurry: 110/115/120/125/130% AD → 111/117/123/129/135% AD

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  W - Volley

  AD Ratio: 100% bonus AD → 110% bonus AD

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  R - Enchanted Crystal Arrow

  Damage: 200/400/600 (+120% AP) → 250/450/650 (+120% AP)

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  R - Enchanted Crystal Arrow

  Secondary Target Damage: 50% → 100%

Passive damage to monsters decreased. Q and W damage increased.

Diana has quickly risen in the ranks as a jungler but is currently struggling as a mid laner. We're giving her some generally helpful buffs to make her a stronger mid lane while pulling down some jungle mods with the intent to slightly nerf her there. We're specifically choosing to increase her early game flat damage as a way to open up non-assassin build paths and to reduce some of her current low-MMR skew.

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  Passive - Moonsilver Blade

  Monster Damage: 300% → 225%

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  Q - Crescent Strike

  Damage: 60/95/130/165/200 (+70% AP) → 70/105/140/175/210 (+70% AP)

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  W - Pale Cascade

  Maximum Damage: 54/90/126/162/198 (+54% AP) → 60/96/132/168/204 (+54% AP)

Q damage increased.

Ekko's currently sitting a bit weak in both the jungle and mid lane, so we've got some timely buffs to help him out. We've got some extra base damage for his Q which should help him shave seconds clearing jungle camps and minion waves without needing additional power from items.

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  Q - Timewinder

  Damage: 70/85/100/115/130 (+30% AP) → 80/95/110/125/140 (+30% AP)

W (human form) damage decreased, W (spider form) cooldown decreased, bonus attack speed increased. R spiderling damage increased.

Elise jungle was quite weak at the start of the season, but recent buffs to Dark Harvest and Electrocute have brought her back to viability. However, Elise support has taken over as she's a bit too strong overall, so we're removing some of her support one-shot potential and buffing her sustained spider powers so that she still has a leg (8 legs) to stand on as a jungler.

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  W - Volatile Spiderling

  Damage: 60/105/150/195/240 (+95% AP) → 60/100/140/180/220 (+75% AP)

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  W - Skittering Frenzy

  Cooldown: 10 → 6 seconds

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  W - Skittering Frenzy

  Bonus Attack Speed: 60/70/80/90/100% → 60/75/90/105/120%

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  R - Spider Form

  Spiderling Damage: 8/14/20/26 (+15% AP) → 10/20/30/40 (+15% AP)

AD growth increased.

Gangplank's been avoiding his oranges and needs a dose of vitamin B (for buffs). We've cooked him up some base stat buffs due to how cleanly it benefits both his Q and his synergies with Trinity Force.

Passive damage decreased. QW damage decreased early. WE damage decreased.

Hwei's currently painting L's for his opponents, especially when it's a higher skilled player holding the brush. As a champion that benefits from his flexibility to adapt to all situations we're looking to reduce how well he can optimize his laning phase and other tools that better players typically use.

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  Passive - Signature of the Visionary

  Damage: 35–180 (based on level) (+35% AP) → 35–180 (based on level) (+30% AP)

• QW - Severing Bolt

  Damage: 80/100/120/140/160 (+25% AP) → 60/85/110/135/160 (+25% AP)

• WE - Stirring Lights

  Damage: 25/35/45/55/65 (+20% AP) → 20/30/40/50/60 (+15% AP)

W attack speed increased.

We've got a pretty straight forward change for Jayce this patch. Last patch when we raised the attack speed cap, we missed increasing his W to match, so we're back to right that wrong.

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  W - Hyper Charge

  Set Attack Speed: 2.67 → 3.0

W damage decreased early.

Kalista's changes at the start of the year succeeded in making her quite a bit nicer to play, but she's a bit overpowered right now whether you're a pro player or have simply learned how to play this difficult markswoman. Since most players haven't mastered Kalista's high skill curve, we're opting to be more pro-focused with this nerf, so we're hitting her Soul-Marked damage as an attempt to focus on that tier of play while leaving your average Kalista player relatively untouched.

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  W - Sentinel

  Target Max Health Damage: 14/15/16/17/18% → 10/12/14/16/18%

Q damage decreased, AP ratio increased.

Kog'Maw normally sits at pretty high win rates due to being easy to play and always having room for counterplay. However, he's winning a little bit more than is fair right now, so we're delivering a small tap down. We're just taking away some damage that he shouldn't really miss, as we'd like to preserve his rapid-fire spitballs as best-in-class. That said, AP Kog is getting some compensation for this nerf as it's not very strong right now and could use the help.

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  Q - Caustic Spittle

  Damage: 90/140/190/240/290 (+70% AP) → 80/125/170/215/260 (+80% AP)

W bonus attack speed decreased, cooldown increased. E damage and shield strength decreased.

Lulu is in quite a strong state right now and has power she can afford to lose so we're looking to give her some meaningful nerfs this patch. Help, Pix! is one of Lulu's most flexible and reliable abilities, so we're looking to take it down a notch while also removing a bit of power from her Whimsy.

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  W - Whimsy

  Bonus Attack Speed: 25/27.5/30/32.5/35% → 20/22.5/25/27.5/30%

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  W - Whimsy

  Cooldown: 17/16.5/16/15.5/15 → 18/17.5/17/16.5/16 seconds

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  E - Help, Pix!

  Base Damage/Shield Strength: 80/125/170/215/260 → 80/120/160/200/240

Multiple changes, overall safety decreased, damage scaling increased.

Mel has been very popular both to pick and to ban. We believe Mel experiences just a little too much safety for opponents to effectively punish her due to her range and ability durations. So to correct that we're lowering her Q range and speed, W duration, and early E root duration to make her a more assailable target. At the same time, we're returning some of her ability to scale into the mid and late game with some added damage to both E and R while lowering the damage value of W from rank up which results in some painful end game experiences.

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  Q - Radiant Volley

  Cast Range: 1000 → 950

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  Q - Radiant Volley

  Projectile Speed: 5000 → 4500

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  W - Rebuttal

  Duration: 1 → 0.75 seconds

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  W - Rebuttal

  Mana Cost: 60/45/30/15/0 → 80/60/40/20/0

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  W - Rebuttal

  Reflected Damage: 40/47.5/55/62.5/70% → 40/45/50/55/60%

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  E - Solar Snare

  Root Duration: 1.75/1.88/2/2.13/2.25 → 1.25/1.5/1.75/2/2.25 seconds

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  E - Solar Snare

  Direct Hit Damage: 60/100/140/180/220 (+50% AP) → 60/105/150/195/240 (+60% AP)

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  R - Golden Eclipse

  Damage per Overwhelm Stack: 4/7/10 (+2.5% AP) → 4/7/10 (+3.5% AP)

Q damage increased.

Nautilus' power levels are currently sinking, especially in solo queue, so we're looking to give him back a little power in his Q to make him a bit more of a kill threat early game so he can get those early takedowns and ride that wave to a win.

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  Q - Dredge Line

  Damage: 70/115/160/205/250 (+90% AP) → 85/130/175/220/265 (+90% AP)

Base armor and health regeneration increased.

Sion's not in the best state at the moment, and since we're about to nerf a bunch of his main items we're setting him up with some proactive compensation buffs. We're doing this by giving him some base defensive power that he lost from his items. Additionally, Sion currently struggles in lane with a lot of losing matchups, so we're targeting his base armor instead of armor scaling to specifically help him in the early game.

E damage to monsters increased.

Teemo jungle has definitely gotten weaker since we all went Noxus, and the recent nerfs to his E definitely didn't do him any favors there. Since he's already in a good spot in his other positions we're giving him very specific jungle power.

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  E - Toxic Shot

  Monster Damage: 125% → 145%

Q mana cost increased.

Warwick's actually doing just fine in the jungle, but his power in top lane is, well, over the top. We're looking to offset this difference by hitting his Q here since he maxes it first when playing top but second when in the jungle.

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  Q - Jaws of the Beast

  Mana Cost: 70/75/80/85/90 → 80/85/90/95/100

Passive critical damage reduction removed.

Yasuo hasn't been able to find his stride recently, so we're here to put some wind behind his metaphorical sails this patch. We'd like it if Yasuo players were more willing to buy early crit chance, so we're softening his crit damage modifier from way back when base crit damage was 200%.

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  Passive - Way of the Wanderer

  Critical Damage Reduction: 10% → REMOVED

Though Abyssal Mask is doubly situational, both needing MR and other magic-damage teammates to synergize with, it was overbuffed at season start and doesn't need to be quite so good.

Though Abyssal Mask is doubly situational, both needing MR and other magic-damage teammates to synergize with, it was overbuffed at season start and doesn't need to be quite so good. We're fine with Abyssal being a fairly rare purchase, as it's not important that tanks consistently raise damage output across the board.

We've had Fimbulwinter on our radar for a while.

We've had Fimbulwinter on our radar for a while. It's been a very strong item for a while, but it's been consistently overlooked, especially since not all tanks need mana. However, we're at a point now where champions who are between two options (Fimbulwinter vs. Muramana or vs. Seraph's Embrace) should clearly always be choosing the tank option. We're looking to fix that this patch, so we're bringing its shield down a notch.

While very popular and the current poster child of frustrating tank items, we don't believe Heartsteel is actually quite as powerful as its reputation may suggest.

While very popular and the current poster child of frustrating tank items, we don't believe Heartsteel is actually quite as powerful as its reputation may suggest. The nerf here is meant to be fairly small as a result. That said, the high-end snowball cases for this item can get out of hand, so we're specifically going after the best-case scenarios where it gains over 1000 bonus HP and feeds into all the other HP scaling.

ADC builds take a little bit too long to get off the ground at the moment, so we're shrinking their most-built item, Infinity Edge, in order to let them get into the rest of the…

ADC builds take a little bit too long to get off the ground at the moment, so we're shrinking their most-built item, Infinity Edge, in order to let them get into the rest of their build sooner.

After making several balance passes at level 2 boots late last year, we've gotten them to a point where they're appropriately competitive with legendary items.

After making several balance passes at level 2 boots late last year, we've gotten them to a point where they're appropriately competitive with legendary items. That said, we've got some minor balance outliers within the boots space itself, so we're looking to bring up some of the worst performers and bring down the top end a touch. First is Mercury's Treads, which is the weakest tank footwear. We know 50 gold doesn't sound like a lot, but boots are small items and as a percentage, this is like dropping 125 gold off of a full legendary.

As Mercury's Treads are getting a bit stronger, Plated Steelcaps are getting a bit weaker, since they're currently the strongest boots in the game.

As Mercury's Treads are getting a bit stronger, Plated Steelcaps are getting a bit weaker, since they're currently the strongest boots in the game. This has the added benefit of being a very small buff for ADCs, which we're happy to lightly buff in the short term.

Symbiotic Soles are the worst-performing boots in the game for most players, so they're deserving of a buff.

Symbiotic Soles are the worst-performing boots in the game for most players, so they're deserving of a buff. We're being a bit cautious here, only giving 5 move speed to the unupgraded version, but we'll keep an eye out to see if they're deserving of more love in the future.

Unending Despair was the strongest tank item in the game before season start, but players hadn't really caught on.

Unending Despair was the strongest tank item in the game before season start, but players hadn't really caught on. Now that it's generically purchasable with both armor and MR, players are flocking in and identifying that it is indeed very, very good. As the intent was to push the item more toward health stackers, we're continuing on that trend, making it still great for champions who stack bonus health and less of a generic tank item that anyone can grab.