4/28 PBE Update: Star Guardian Lux, Ashe Gameplay changes, & SSW skins for Rengar, Singed, Talon, Thresh, Twitch

To kick off the 5.9 PBE cycle we have a huge update, including a new Star Guardian Lux skin, Samsung White skins for Rengar, Singed, Talon, Thresh, Twitch, a gameplay updates for Ashe, and more!
Continue reading for more information!

Table of Contents

• New Skins
• Star Guardian Lux
• SSW Rengar
• SSW Singed
• SSW Talon
• SSW Thresh 
• SSW Twitch
• Ashe Champion Update
• Balance Changes

New Skins

To kick off the 5.9 PBE cycle we have new skins for Lux, Rengar, Singed, Talon, Thresh, and Twitch!

Here's Nurse Flan with a bugs & feedback thread for Star Guardian Lux:

"Episode 1 - A Guardian is Born: Lux's Starlight Transformation
"In the name of Demacia, I will punish you!" 

By day, Lux Crownguard is just a shy, studious student studying for her studies. But with the power of love and light of the stars, she transforms into a light binding, evil fighting, lovely solider of Demacia! Enter, Star Guardian Lux!

• Completely new model (ribbons, stars and cute things!)
• New particles for abilities! (stars and sparkles!)
• New recall! (she spins around magically!)
• New ability SFX! (can you even get more magical?)
• Some new animations! (a cute new idle, and a new dance! Can you tell where the dance is from?) 
• Small quality of life adjustment for the AoE indicator for her (E) Lucent Singularity. The ring has been adjusted to better represent the actual size of the ability.
• 1350 RP* 

As players who get the first look at this in-progress skin, it would be wonderful to hear your thoughts and feelings on the new Star Guardian skin! The feedback and bugs you leave here will help us get a better idea of things we may still have to take a look at. :] 

See you on the Rift! 

*Pricing is always subject to change while on PBE!"

Next up we have a set of FIVE skins to celebrate Samsung White as our 2014 World Champions!





Here's Galetta with a bugs & feedback thread for the five Samsung White Championship skins!

"The champions have arrived! 

Each one of these skins honors a player of Team Samsung White, the winners of the 2014 League of Legends World Championship! These skins are representative of the following players and include: 

• Looper: Singed, 750 RP

• New character model.

• Dandy: Rengar, 750 RP

• New character model.

• Pawn: Talon, 750 RP

• New character model.

• New (W) and (R) particles.

• Imp: Twitch, 975 RP

• New character model.

• New recall animation. He rolls in the grass! :3

• Mata: Thresh, 975 RP

• New character model.

• All particles color shifted to blue.

• New recall animation.  

Your feedback and bug reports are extremely helpful to us, so please check out all the SSW skins and let us know what you think! Feel free to drop any bugs you find in this thread as well! 

See you on the Rift!"

Ashe Champion Update

"Ashe Update Feedback Thread

Hi guys, 

Since Ashe is going to be on PBE now, I wanted to leave brief context post explaining what's going on, as well as provide a place for you guys to give feedback on power, bugs, bad feels, clunkiness, or whatever else. Without typing up a whole wall of text, I'll cut straight to the abilities:

Base Stats

• AA missle speed 2000 >>> 2500

• AS/lvl 4.0 >>> 3.33

Passive - Frost Shots 

• Permaslow moved from Q to Passive.
• Slow strength scales with character level
• Ashe no longer has a chance to crit. She never crits targets that don't have her passive on them, but always crits targets that do have it for (math stuff below, since I know people will ask or be confused): 

• (TotalAD)x1.1+(TotalAD)x((CritChanceStat)x(1+(CritDamageStat)))
• Let's say Ashe has IE, PD, and 200AD. Under this model, she deals 385 damage (200x1.1+200x.55x1.5).
• With an IE and 100% Crit, she deals her ADx2.6 on targets with her passive on them.
• Etc.

Q - Ranger's Focus 

• Ashe builds Focus stacks by attacking, up to 5 stacks. 

• When activated, she gains AS and her Passive slow is improved for 4 seconds. 

• If she consumed 5 stacks of Focus, her AA also transforms to a flurry attack for the duration, which is effectively additional AD 

• During the flurry attack, Ashe will Crit (from her passive) and Lifesteal, but will only apply on-hit effects like BotRK and Braum passive on the first arrow of each flurry attack 

W - Volley

• Mostly unchanged, except it does a bit less damage, has a bit lower CD early game, and has better blocking gameplay now (no more free damage through minion waves)  

E - Hawkshot

• No longer passively grants additional gold on last-hit

• Is now global and on ammo, but the recharge rate is longer than the old cooldown 

R - Enchanted Crystal Arrow 

• Unchanged except for a small nerf where the area slow around the ECA target is now her passive slow rather than a 50% slow  

As I mentioned, please feel free to leave feedback here. Pending how busy I am getting her ready for release and managing a few other projects, I'll try to stop in regularly to respond to your posts. 

Cheers, 

Repertoir"

Few more bits from the follow up discussion:

• [1] "each shot in the Ranger's Focus will crit if her enemy has her passive applied onto them. If they don't already have her passive on them then the first shot from Ranger's Focus will apply the passive and all subsequent shots will crit."
• [2]  "Her auto attacks on targets that are affected by her passive are still considered 'crits', which means that the Frenzy mastery would work on them."
• [3] Max Stack Q active and on hits: "The first Q missile will apply on-hits like BotRK; the next 4 on the attack won't."
• [4] "Runaan's fires 2 bolts for every single attack during a Focus-empowered Q. It feels pretty cool."
• [5] No Focus (Q) building on structures "Her Q works on towers and inhibs, but Focus cannot be built on structures, only maintained. For instance, if she has 4 Focus stacks and attacks a turret, the 4 stacks will be refreshed, but she won't get the 5th."
• [6] Duration of Q's passive and active - "4 seconds on the Focus stacks, and 4 seconds on the Q buff duration."
• [7] Passive's bonus damage to slowed enemies only works on her own slow
• [8] She can not "mini crit" characters who are immune to slow / disables like Olaf, Morgana, Yi.

With the changes on the PBE, let's take a closer look:

Base Stats

• Auto Attack missile Speed increased to 2500 from 2000.
• Attack Speed growth reduced to 3.33 from 4

[Passive] Frost Shots [Completely Redesigned]

Spells and basic attacks slow targets by 5/11/17/23/29/35% (at levels 1/4/7/10/13/16) for 2 seconds. 

Basic attacks always critically strike targets with Frost Shot for 110 +( [Crit Chance] x [1.0 x Crit Damage])% damage (increased by items that would otherwise grant Critical Strike Chance), but Ashe does not otherwise critically strike.

[Q] Ranger's Focus [Completely Redesigned]

Mana Cost: 50 at all ranks
Cooldown: 18 seconds
Passive: Applying Frost Shot grants Focus for 4 seconds, stacking 5 times 

Active: Consumes all Focus to grant 20/30/40/50/60% Attack Speed and increase Frost Shot's slow by 20% for 4 seconds. If 5 stacks are consumed, Ashe's basic attacks fire a flurry of arrows resulting in [.23/.24/.25/.26/.27 Total AD per arrow for a total of 1.15/1.20/1.25/1.30/1.35 Total AD per basic attack] physical damage per attack for the duration."

With these gameplay changes, Ashe's Q has new VFX.

First up her quiver glows when she reaches five stacks of Q.
Here's a brief video preview of her Q vfx across all skins:


[W] Volley

Mana Cost: 50 at all ranks (from 60 at all ranks)
Cooldown: 12/10/8/6/4 (from 16/13/10/7/4) 

Fires arrows in a cone, each dealing 20/30/40/50/60 (from 40/50/60/70/80) (+1.0 total AD) physical damage. Enemies can block multiple arrows from Volley, but will only take damage from the first.

[E] Hawkshot

Cooldown between Casts: 5 seconds
Recharge time: 90/80/70/60/50 seconds ( from 60/55/50/45/40 flat cooldown.)
Range: Global (from 2500/3250/4000/4750/5500) 

Reveals terrain as it flies toward target location anywhere on the map. Grants vision for 5 seconds. Ashe can store up to 2 charges of Hawkshot at a time. (no longer grants 3 gold on unit kill.)

[R] Enchanted Crystal Arrow 

Mana Cost: 100 

Launches a crystal arrow of ice in a line that stuns an enemy Champion dealing 250 (+1.0) magic damage. The farther the arrow flies, the longer the stun, up to 3.5 seconds. Surrounding enemies take half damage. (slow around area is now equal to her passive's slow % from 50%)

and here's a video preview of her updated kit:


Azir

• Arise! (W) cast range indicator now also shows the attack range of his soldiers. 

Nocturne

• Unspeakable Horror (E) active damage increased to 80/125/170/215/260 from 50/100/150/200/250

Veigar

• Event Horizon (E) [Tooltip now lists the delay at .5 seconds from .75]

 Mandrake Ward

• The experimental Mandrake Ward has been re-added to the PBE but is not available in the shop for testing. Last we heard the item is on hold. More information available here.

Dragon

• Damage increased to 90 from 75