6/16 PBE Update: Skin Tweaks, Balance Changes, & more!

The PBE has been updated! As we continue the 7.13 PBE cycle, tonight's update includes SKT T1 Olaf and Ekko tweaks and more tentative balance changes.
Continue reading for more information!

Table of Contents

• SKT Skin Tweaks
• Miscellaneous
• Balance Changes
• Context & Notes

SKT Skin Tweaks

Few skin tweaks for the SKT skins currently testing for release in 7.13!
An axe pickup particle added for SKT  T1 Olaf:

SKT T1 Ekko's death vfx are now gold to match the rest of his visual effects

Miscellaneous 

• Looks like a few more start of game tips added. See the text dump on pastebin. This set relates to player behavior and follows another set of new start of game tips added earlier this pbe cycle. 
• UPDATE: Reinboom has shared the full set of new loading screen tips for 7.13

• Legend of the Poro King is on the PBE for RGMQ testing.

Gnar
[Context]

• Boomerang Throw (mini Q) - damage increased from 5/35/65/95/125 to 5/45/85/125/165

• Crunch (mega E) range increased from 475 to 600.

Kindred
[Context]

• Mark of Kindred (P) Number of successful hunts to increase attack range after the initial four lowered from 4 to 3. 

• [The first 4 successful hunts increase Kindred's attack range by 75. Every 3 successful hunts after the first 4 increase their attack range by 25.] 

• Wolf's Frenzy (W) current % health damager per mark increased from 0.5% to 1%

• Mounting Dread (E) base damage increased from 40/60/80/100/120 to 60/80/100/120/140

Kennen

• Attack speed growth reverted from 3 to 3.4%

• Electrical Surge (W):

• Active's AP ratio changed reverted - back from 60% to 55%.

• Passive's values changed a lot - from [Total AD] to [base + bonus AD + AP]

• AD Ratio changed from [40/50/60/70/80% total AD] to [60% bonus AD]
• [new] 30% AP ratio added.
• [new] 30/35/40/45/50 base damage added

Context & Notes

d-von! get the contexts!

1) Here's Meddler with his quick gameplay thoughts for 6/16 including discussion on a few upcoming changes:

"Morning folks, 

Usual Disclaimers 

These posts will often contain talk about future work we're doing, or planning to do, that isn't yet guaranteed to ship. The nature of the work could change or, depending on what we discover, projects mentioned may get put delayed or even stopped.
If you'd like to see a Tweet whenever a new one of these posts goes up: https://twitter.com/RiotMeddler 

Gnar 

We've been trying out some Gnar changes recently, looking at both adding a bit of power and whether his play pattern needs a bit of work too. That's included looking at things like moving his % health damage from his W to his Q. After some testing we'll probably be going with some simpler changes though, conclusion being he mainly just needs a bit of power. Likely targets are mini Q base damage and mega E range, might see those on PBE shortly. 

Diana 

We don't have work currently underway for Diana, wanted to mention her though since it's been quite a while since we mentioned her however. Our belief is whenever we next look at Diana we should be doing some changes beyond just balance, so probably a mini-update like Rek'Sai or Heimer's. Unsure when exactly that would be, but did want to mention we're not just forgetting she exists or unaware of player feeling she needs help. 

Kindred 

Early assessment of the 7.12 patch suggests the buffs there may not have been enough to put Kindred in a good spot. We're still evaluating whether that's the case or not, on the belief it probably is though we're going to be looking at some follow up buffs, likely in 7.13. Possible targets include E base damage and looking at number of marks needed for the AA range increase after the initial 4 marks. 

Spectator and Allied View team indicator circles 

Last year we did some clean up on which team indicators (green/red rings etc) show up to allies, or to spectators, on a number of champions. Result of that was things like the green ring around Trundle's W not being shown to some players or to viewers (didn't offer meaningful information, so was clutter without benefit). We'll be doing another pass like that shortly, in part because we're getting close to the time of the year where there's a lot of Esports viewership of particular patches. Sing out if there's something you've spotted in Spectator in particular that's ugly or distracting and just doesn't need to be there and we'll give it a glance. 

World's Patch 

Speaking of Esports, for anyone interested it looks highly likely that 7.18 will be the patch for Worlds this year. We'd originally been thinking 7.19, but that ended up being a bit too tight timing wise. That will mean 7.18's a smaller patch though most, with the goal of avoiding both late significant disruption and minimizing bug risk. Some changes will also be avoided where possible in the few patches beforehand (e.g. major systemic gameplay changes to things like objectives, whole categories of item etc)."

2) Ricklessabandon on Kennen iteration and Ancient Coin line changes:

[1] "likely going to be away from twitter until monday, but as a heads up: kennen iteration and changes to the coin items should hit pbe tomorrow"

3) phroxz0n noting Gnar's E range in Mega Gnar was also buffed in today's update:

"Big Gnar jump range (not double jump) : 475 >>> 600"

4) On the liklihood of these Kindred changes shipping, wav3break noted:

"These will likely all ship as they are. Only one that might be suspect to further tuning is Wolf's Frenzy."