Patch 14.8 Notes

Akali

Base health increased.

We're raising Akali's early game health to help her get to her mid-to-late-game state more consistently. Her base health was uncharacteristically low compared to other champions, so this should bring her more in line with her peers.

Base Stats

• Base Health: 570 ⇒ 600

Azir

Base health regen decreased. W damage decreased.

Azir has been a Pro play staple for an incredibly long time thanks to his passable laning phase paired with an incredible late game and playmaking potential. We'll be adjusting his early game safety by lowering his base health regeneration, and lowering the early damage of his W with a goal to give his counter picks a better opportunity to beat him in lane.

Base Stats

• Health Regeneration per 5 Seconds: 5 ⇒ 3.5

W - Arise!

• Magic Damage: 0-77 (based on level) (+50/67/84/101/118) (+55% AP) ⇒ 0-77 (based on level) (+50/65/80/95/110) (+55% AP)

Briar

Health growth decreased. Q range increased. W bonus attack speed decreased.

Briar continues to be very strong in lower skill levels so we're taking another pass at her to address this. The bug fixes to Sundered Sky (one of her core items) were a contributor to some of her power, so we're nerfing her sustained output while giving another minor buff to Q for skilled players who like switching targets and cosplaying Lee Sin hopping to wards.

Base Stats

• Health Growth: 100 ⇒ 95

Q - Head Rush

• Range: 450 ⇒ 475

W - Blood Frenzy

• Bonus Attack Speed: 54/68/82/96/110% ⇒ 55/65/75/85/95%

Draven

Q damage increased.

Despite what he might admit, Draven's early game lacked the power that gave him the ability to control the laning phase. We want to reestablish Draven's ability to be a lane bully, so we're putting a bit more power into his Q's to let him be just that.

Q - Spinning Axe

• Bonus Physical Damage: 40/45/50/55/60 (+75/85/95/105/115% bonus AD) ⇒ 45/50/55/60/65 (+75/85/95/105/115% bonus AD)

Galio

Base movement speed increased. Q cooldown decreased early.

Galio is close to a reasonable power level, but he's not fully there yet. In order to get him there we're giving him two smaller buffs to increase his power and to ensure he becomes an interesting pick for Pro play. We're increasing his base movement speed, as it's a stat he highly values, especially since he needs the target access for multiple passive procs. We're also including a small reduction to his early Q cooldown to help him get more passive refunds.

Base Stats

• Base Movement Speed: 335 ⇒ 340

Q - Winds of War

• Cooldown: 12/10.75/9.5/8.25/7 ⇒ 11/10/9/8/7 seconds

Graves

Passive reload time scaling adjusted, critical damage ratio per pellet increased.

We're giving Graves some much-needed buffs while skewing him toward crit itemization and repeat attacks, which we think is a healthier spot for his gameplay as opposed to lethality burst. While this reload speed change is a bit of a riskier buff, we think it'll be good for Graves and we'll follow up if his power level ends up wildly out of line.

Passive - New Destiny

• Attack Speed Scaling: Increased Attack Speed scaling from non-level sources towards reload time by 35%
• Critical Damage Ratio per Pellet: 40% ⇒ 45%

Hwei

Passive bonus magic damage increased.

We expected we’d have to balance Hwei around Pro play with pretty low win rates for regular players. However, as the Pro season has developed, it looks like we have more room than we initially thought, so we’re giving him a small buff to his passive, which brings him up a touch in lower-skilled brackets where players don’t dodge away from the damage as well. Our goal is that he’ll be a moderate-presence champion in Pro play while also being as successful as most other mages in solo queue.

Passive - Signature of the Visionary

• Bonus Magic Damage: 35-180 (based on level) (+30% AP) ⇒ 35-180 (based on level) (+35% AP)

Jarvan IV

Passive damage increased.

Jarvan IV is one of the simpler junglers to play, so any time his win rate in lower-skilled brackets barely crests 50%, it means he's actually weak and needs some help. To buff him, we're partially reverting the 13.18 passive nerf as it was a satisfying aspect of his kit that gave better clear speed and kill-securing that benefits players of all calibers.

Passive - Martial Cadence

• Bonus Physical Damage: 6% of target's current health ⇒ 7% of target's current health

Jhin

Bonus movement speed on crits increased. Q damage increased.

As a uniquely utility-focused ADC, we think Jhin can be a high performer without causing too much trouble. Plus he's a little on the weak side right now, especially in higher skill brackets. Not only are we adding several more 4s to his tooltips, we're also powering up the more skill-expressive parts of his kit with his ability to kite early and the power of his ramping grenade bounces.

Passive - Whisper

• Bonus Movement Speed on Critical Strike: 10% (+0.4% bonus Attack Speed) ⇒ 14% (+0.4% bonus Attack Speed)

Q - Dancing Grenade

• Minimum Physical Damage: 45/70/95/120/145 (+35/42.5/50/57.5/65% AD) (+60% AP) ⇒ 44/69/94/119/144 (+44/51.5/59/66.5/74% AD) (+60% AP)

Kai'Sa

Q damage increased.

We wanted to buff Kai'Sa to encourage more ADC diversity in solo queue and Pro play without touching her AP builds, which can be problematic. We wanted to increase the AD ratio on Kai'Sa's Q to emphasize damage that required higher commitment and played up her unique assassin-like characteristics.

Q - Icathian Rain

• Damage per Missile: 40/55/70/85/100 (+50% bonus AD) (+20% AP) ⇒ 40/55/70/85/100 (+55% bonus AD) (+20% AP)

LeBlanc

Q damage increased. W cooldown decreased.

Leblanc is struggling in solo queue and also isn't seeing much presence in Pro, so we're giving her a bit more power to play with. We're lowering her early W cooldown to increase her agency in lane, as its level 1 value is currently a bit too high. We're also increasing her Q base damage, as it's quite impactful for her early laning phase in high skill brackets, but should be felt by all due to its last hitting benefit.

Q - Sigil of Malice

• Magic Damage: 65/90/115/140/165 (+ 45% AP) ⇒ 70/95/120/145/170 (+ 45% AP)

W - Distortion

• Cooldown: 18/16/14/12/10 ⇒ 15/13.75/12.5/11.25/10 seconds

Mordekaiser

Q cooldown decreased. E damage decreased. R is no longer escapable with certain abilities/items.

Mordekaiser has long suffered from being very powerful in lower-skilled games while being too inconsistent in highly-skilled ones. Some of this disparity is due to his weak early lane and his ultimate being easily countered by an inexpensive item and certain champion interactions. This patch we're hoping to shore up both of those pain points while making a small compensation nerf to his damage.

We acknowledge that this change to his ultimate is quite risky. It's possible that Mordekaiser is not balanceable without such strong counters and that ultimately Mordekaiser players would be happier with a highly unreliable ult but a stronger base kit. But we're going to support this version of Mordekaiser and do our best to balance him with these new strengths in mind.

Q - Obliterate

• Cooldown: 9/7.75/6.5/5.25/4 ⇒ 8/7/6/5/4 seconds

E - Death's Grasp

• Magic Damage: 80/95/110/125/140 (+60% AP) ⇒ 70/85/100/115/130 (+60% AP)

R - Realm of Death

• newDeath Realm Escape Interactions: Champions can no longer escape Mordekaiser's Death Realm by using Quicksilver Sash, Mercurial Scimitar, Alistar's Unbreakable Will, Gangplank's Remove Scurvy, Milio's Breath of Life, Olaf's Ragnarok, or Rengar's Ferocity Battle Roar. However, crowd control immunity will still prevent the application of Realm of Death.

Olaf

Q bonus damage to monsters increased.

Olaf gained a lot of jungle power last patch but he still needs a bit more help before he's in a solid spot. Similar to Sylas, he feels a bit constrained within his main role, so we're focusing on increasing his jungle power. His first clear is already good, but his consecutive clears have room to be better since he should be one of the fastest in the game.

Q - Undertow

• Bonus Damage to Monsters: 5/10/15/20/25 ⇒ 5/15/25/35/45

Ryze

W slow increased, cooldown decreased early.

We're giving Ryze some power tailored to the average player by giving him access to a more reliable slow with a lower cooldown, which should bring up his baseline utility to his teams.

W - Rune Prison

• Slow: 35% ⇒ 50%
• Cooldown: 13/12/11/10/9 ⇒ 11/10.5/10/9.5/9 seconds

Skarner

Rune and item recommendations updated. Mana growth decreased, mana regen growth increased. Q damage increased, mana cost decreased, buff duration increased, Upheaval recast lockout time decreased, Shattered Earth cast time decreased. W mana cost increased, damage decreased.

Skarner's rework launched last patch with low jungle power and very strong performances in top lane. We expect he'll perform better as players continue to learn his nuances but there's a lot of room to make the experience of playing Skarner much nicer.

First, we're updating his recommended jungle runes and items. Every recommended page now suggests Resolve runes in the primary or secondary tree and includes an Aftershock page, as it's been a great rune for him. To our surprise, Heartsteel appears very good as well, so it's replacing Iceborn Gauntlet in his item recommendations.

Second, we're doing a sweep of feels improvements to his Q, which should make him feel much more mobile and usable in fights at large.

Third, we're shifting around power from his W into his Q. As it turns out, W-max top lane Skarner is significantly stronger than regular jungle Skarner with low counter-play, so we're trying to put these builds into similar power and fairness levels. We're also buffing the Q AD ratio to make juggernaut alt-builds more functional.

Recommended Runes and Items

• Recommended Rune Pages: Updated to offer the following rune pages: Aftershock, Phase Rush, and Conqueror
• Recommended Items: Added Heartsteel, moved Iceborn Gauntlet later, increased priority of Dead Man's Plate

Base Stats

• Mana Growth: 45 ⇒ 40
• Mana Regeneration Growth: 0.45 ⇒ 0.6

Q - Shattered Earth / Upheaval

• Damage per Hit: 10/20/30/40/50 (+40% bonus AD) (+6% of his bonus health) ⇒ 10/25/40/55/70 (+60% bonus AD) (+6% of his bonus health)
• Mana Cost: 40/45/50/55/60 ⇒ 30/35/40/45/50
• Buff Duration: 3.5 ⇒ 5 seconds (Note: the buff will still refresh on attacks and upon casting E)
• Upheaval Recast Lockout Time: 0.75 ⇒ 0.5 seconds
• Shattered Earth Cast Time: 0.5 ⇒ 0.35 seconds (Note: this is how long Skarner stands in place pulling the boulder out of the ground before being able to move or attack)

W - Seismic Bastion

• Mana Cost: 50/55/60/65/70 ⇒ 60/65/70/75/80
• Magic Damage: 60/90/120/150/180 (+80% AP) ⇒ 50/75/100/125/150 (+80% AP)

Sylas

Q explosion damage to monsters increased.

We're further buffing Sylas jungle now that we have data on how his Q modifier affects his win rate, especially since we think he could appear at MSI as a flex pick. Since he lacks any room for mid lane oriented adjustments at the moment, we'll be completely removing the Q monster modifier, as his clear still has plenty of room to go down.

Q - Chain Lash

• Damage to Monsters: 70% ⇒ 100%

Thresh

Base armor and magic resist growth increased.

Thresh is a little bit weaker than we think he should be, and since he's an exciting champion to watch on the big stage we want to give him a small buff. We think he deals enough damage already, so we're playing up his tankiness this patch, nudging his resists closer to true short-range or melee champions.

Base Stats

• Base Armor: 31 ⇒ 33
• Magic Resist Growth: 1.3 ⇒ 1.55

Zac

Base health regeneration decreased.

Zac has been bouncing around and dominating top lane for a while now, much to his opponents' chagrin. He's a pretty well balanced jungler, but a pretty noninteractive and overbearing top laner. So we're looking to reduce his early game lane safety by bringing down his passive regeneration, requiring him to risk reprisal from his lane opponents if he wants to sustain back up.

Base Stats

• Base Health Regeneration per 5 Seconds: 8 ⇒ 5

Zeri

Base health decreased.

Zeri was a big winner from 14.6's crit item buffs. Though we brought down Statikk Shiv a little, she risks becoming the most sought-after champion at MSI, so we're taking away a little bit of early game durability to open up lane bullies as a tactical counter in lane.

Base Stats

• Base Health: 630 ⇒ 600

Baron Nashor

• Acid Pool Magic Damage: 10% AD ⇒ 200 (+10% AD)
• Acid Pool Slow: 50% ⇒ 60%
• Territorial Baron Pull Magic Damage: 75 ⇒ 300
• Hunting Baron Lightning Magic Damage: 15% of target's current health ⇒ 20% of target's current health
• Acid Shot Magic Damage: 20% AD ⇒ 200 (+50% AD)
• Tentacle Knock Up Magic Damage: 25% AD ⇒ 200 (+25% AD)

Voidgrubs

• Initial Voidgrub Spawn Time: 5 ⇒ 6 minutes
• Touch of the Void Damage per Stack: 6 (halved to 3 for ranged champions) true damage per second over 4 seconds ⇒ 8 (halved to 4 for ranged champions)
• Hunger of the Void Threshold: 5 Touch of the Void stacks, gain a 2nd summon at 6 stacks ⇒ 4 Touch of the Void Stacks, gain a 2nd summon at 6 stacks