4/7 PBE Update: New Fiddlesticks, Jayce, Zilean, Ziggs skins, ARAM Improvements, Lucian and DF LS Chromas, and more

Today's patch starts off the 5.8 PBE cycle and it is MASSIVE! New stuff includes Risen Fiddlesticks, Forsaken Jayce, Blood Moon Zilean, and Master Arcanist Ziggs skins, several improvements and changes to ARAM, the previously announced Chroma packs for Lucian and Dragonfist Lee Sin, big changes for The Black Cleaver, Texture rebalances for Poppy, Shaco, Shyvana, & Teemo, and MORE!
Continue reading for more information!

Table of Contents

• New Skins
• Risen Fiddlesticks
• Forsaken Jayce
• Blood Moon Zilean
• Master Arcanist Ziggs
• ARAM Improvements
• New Feature: Chroma Packs
• Context on The Black Cleaver Changes
• Texture Rebalances
• Poppy
• Noxus Poppy
• Lollipoppy
• Shaco
• Mad Hatter Shaco
• Royal Shaco
• Nutcracko
• Workshop Shaco
• Asylum Shaco
• Shyvana
• Ironscale Shyvana
• Boneclaw Shyvana
• Darkflame Shyvana
• Teemo
• Happy Elf Teemo
• Recon Teemo
• Badger Teemo
• Astronaut Teemo
• Cottontail Teemo
• Super Teemo
• Panda Teemo
• Mushroom Update
• Balance Changes

New Skins

Here's Riot KateyKhaos with a bugs & feedback thread for Risen Fiddlesticks:

"From the sands comes Risen Fiddlesticks! 

Risen Fiddlesticks will be 1350 RP* and includes:

• New model and texture! (Oooh, shiny!)
• New particles! (He gives a whole new meaning to throwing sand in your enemies' eyes!)
• New sounds! (They're uh... pretty 'buggy', one might say. :D)
• New recall animation! (Poor Fiddle!) 

Risen Fiddlesticks is now available to play on PBE! We always find bug reports and feedback super helpful, so feel free to comment in the thread below! Likewise, if you've got any questions, post 'em here, and we'll do our best to answer them! 

*Prices on PBE are subject to change."

"Bring down the hammer! 

• The dark and brooding Forsaken Jayce has descended onto the PBE! This skin includes:
• All new model and texture!
• All new particles!
• All new recall animation!
• All new SFX! 

This skins price is 1350RP - (pricing subject to change) 

Your feedback and bug reports are extremely helpful to us, so please check out Forsaken Jayce 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! 

Note: His Acceleration Gate (E) is supposed to be blue. Due to game play concerns we made an entirely new particle but kept the coloring blue to make it obvious that this Gate is from a friendly Jayce. It's a similar situation to Ahris (Q) color which can't be changed since it shows if her passive is active or not."

Here's Nurse Flan with a bugs & feedback thread for Blood Moon Zilean:

"Dark clouds part and reveal a sinister red moon. Its red beams of moonlight pierce through the night as Blood Moon Zilean emerges from the shadows. He has seen your future, and it was painful... 

Zilean merged the blood moon arts with his powers over time, and he's ready to showcase his new abilities on the Rift! He will be priced at 975RP *

• Completely new model (new mask and robe!)
• Carries around a new time machine! (blood moon style!)
• New particles for abilities!
• New recall! (he uses his clock as a gong!)
• New audio for his Recall, Q and R! 

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 Blood Moon 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! 

*Prices are not final and may be subject to change :)"

"Magic first, questions later! 

Master Arcanist Ziggs, the skilled arcane wizard, is ready to try out some new spells on the PBE! This skin includes:

• All new model and texture!
• All new particles!
• All new recall animation!
• All new SFX!

This skins price is 1350RP - (pricing subject to change) 

Your feedback and bug reports are extremely helpful to us, so please check out Master Arcanist Ziggs 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!"

ARAM Improvements

Here's Riot JxE with details on all the numerous ARAM improvements that are hitting the PBE in today's update, including a new summoner spell, several item changes, reskinned minions and updated structures, a new loading screen, and more!

"Hey all! 

As we continue to polish and update Summoner’s Rift, we found a cool opportunity to make some improvements to Howling Abyss and ARAM. Without any further ado, let’s break the ice and get things rolling – here is the list of changes coming to the PBE today: 

Gameplay Changes; My Mind is Telling Me No: 

New Summoner Spell on ARAM: Mark/Dash 

After analyzing the results of Legend of the Poro King, we realized that Poro Toss gave an across-the-board bump in viability to some historically unpopular picks and helped balance the playing field. After careful consideration and some tweaks we’re bringing this back to ARAM as an optional new summoner spell called Mark/Dash.

 

Mark allows you toss a projectile at an enemy unit, you can then follow up on a Marked unit with Dash to quickly travel to the Marked target. 

Go forth and tower dive, but remember, it’s only worth it if you say so in chat. 

Item Changes; Out With the New, In With the Old: 

Bloodthirster added 

With the recent rework of Bloodthirster, it made sense to re-introduce the SR favorite to ARAM to help out champions that rely on high AD to be more successful on the map. The passive doesn’t hurt either - shields up! 

Sanguine Blade removed 

10 out of 10 ADCs agree that Bloodthirster is bigger, better and bloodier than Sanguine Blade. We can't argue with that, so we’ll be retiring it from ARAM. 

Warmogs added 

Ever shed a tear after purchasing Giant’s Belt on ARAM only to remember you can’t build Warmogs? We’re bringing the HP behemoth to ARAM to give tanks a little love and to help them survive poke long enough to initiate at the right time. Note that we’ll be keeping a close eye on this one to make sure tanks don’t become too overpowering. 

Skin Boosts; Turning the Random Dial to 11:
After flicking some switches and fiddling with a couple of dials, we've successfully added Skin Boosts to our ARAM update! Throw down 95RP and you'll give everyone on your team a one-time random skin for the champ they're using that game. You'll also earn yourself 200IP while giving your teammates 100IP. 

Map & Art Changes; No More Nexus Gnomes:
We’ve skinned some of the art from Summoner’s Rift to match the Howling Abyss theme and bring some consistency between the maps. We also took this opportunity to do some general art polish, make some performance improvements and fix an issue that caused champion spells to sometimes be clipped when drawing on the ground. Check out these screenshots for more details. 

 Reskinned Nexuses (Nexi?)

Reskinned Minions

 

New Loading Screen

 

If you discover any bugs, please post them here!"

Here's the new HA background with no VS:

New Feature - Chroma Packs

Chroma packs are making their PBE debut in today's update. These are 590 RP bundles that include three different color variations for a champion's base or existing skin that you already own.

More information can be found here in the PBE announcement and feedback thread and in the FAQ.

Here's an example process of buying the Chroma bundle via the store's "Bundles" tab, choosing your color variant, and loading in. The "slice" images listed below are currently used in champion select and in the shop but are not used in loading screen.
To start off with we have Chromas for Lucian and Dragonfist Lee Sin.

Lucian: Prime Chroma

Dragonfist Lee Sin

Context on PBE The Black Cleaver changes

Here's Riot Axes with context on The Black Cleaver changes currently up on the PBE for testing:

"Hi folks, Riot Axes here to talk about The Black Cleaver update coming to the PBE (soon!). The Black Cleaver is an item that’s been in a pretty rough spot for a while: when it’s cost effective, it makes you good at killing, well, anyone, since it gives strong burst tools through flat armor penetration, along with tank-busting power with armor shred (anyone remember League of Cleavers?). Because of these issues, we've had to tune the item accordingly, which has left is pretty mediocre at both jobs (bursting folks vs. shredding tanks). 

That brings us to today. Right now we're setting out to give the item a more cohesive identity. Specifically: tank busting. We're giving TBC more max shred and a new set of stats that are best used by champions longer combat patterns – with more CDR and health, plus a movement passive – at the cost of reduced attack damage and removed flat armor pen. This should allow The Black Cleaver to be a genuinely powerful option in certain scenarios without just dominating every situation. 

The item: 

The Black Cleaver

• Phage + Kindlegem + 825 gold (3000 gold total)
• +400 Health
• +40 Attack Damage
• +20% Cooldown Reduction 

UNIQUE Passive: Dealing physical damage to an enemy champion Cleaves them, reducing their Armor by 5% for 6 seconds (stacks up to 6 times, up to 30%). 

UNIQUE Passive - Rage: Dealing physical damage grants 20 movement speed for 2 seconds. Assists on Cleaved enemy champions or kills on any unit grant 80 movement speed for 4 seconds instead. This movement speed is halved for ranged champions. 

I'd love feedback on any part of this, but especially on item clarity - do you understand what's going on? Do you understand how to use it well?
Thanks!"

Texture Rebalances

Today's update includes another set of texture rebalances, this time for Poppy, Shaco, Shyvana, and Teemo! These are low scope texture updates aimed at aligning older champions & skins with the current art style. They are not replacing proper and larger scope visual updates.

Poppy

[ Only these two for now. Other Poppy skins likely in a future pbe update. ]

Shaco

[Nothing for Masked Shaco.]

 Shyvana

[No changes for Icedrake Shyvana and Championship Shyvana]

Teemo

While not as significant, Astronaut Teemo, Super Teemo, and Panda Teemo also have slightly updated mushrooms.
According to Ququroon, the 5.8 PBE cycle contains the last set of champion texture rebalances. He also noted that a Lux texture rebalance will also be included in this cycle.