Patch 3.03 Patch Notes and patch preview

Patch 3.03 approaches! Maintenance will begin on March 1st at 2 AM PST for NA, 4:00 GMT for EUW, and 3:00 GMT+1 for EUNE,

Here is the patch preview, giving you a look at some of the bigger changes and the new Smart Ping feature.

In addition, this patch will also contain Quinn and Valor, Phoenix Quinn, and Celestine Soraka, but they will all likely, as is usual, not be available when the patch initially goes live.

Continue reading for a complete set of patch notes!

Here are the full patch notes for 3.03:

"Amumu

These changes slightly reduced Amumu’s burst damage and allow his opponents to spread out during team fights, avoiding all being locked down by Curse of the Sad Mummy.

• Bandage Toss
  • Damage reduced to 80/130/180/230/280 from 80/140/200/260/320
• Curse of the Sad Mummy
  • Radius reduced to 550 from 600

Ashe

As a classic ranged AD carry, we wanted to make her standout as a bigger late game threat.

• Attack Speed per level increased to 4% from 3.34%

Darius

These changes reduce Darius’ ability to snowball during the laning phase while preserving his multi-kill chains of Noxian Guillotine in team fights.

• Noxian Guillotine
  • When Noxian Guillotine kills the target, it can be recast within the next 12 seconds. This can occur multiple times in succession
  • Cooldown adjusted to 120/100/80 seconds from 100 at all ranks

Fiddlesticks

• Several of Fiddlesticks' visual effects have been updated

Garen

We’ve slightly reduced Garen’s resilience as he no longer gains bonus Armor and Magic Resist from his base stats. Garen will lose between 4-14 Armor and Magic Resist depending on his level.

• Perseverance
  • Heal amount reduced to 0.4% of maximum Health per second from 0.5%
• Decisive Strike
  • Fixed a bug where the cast time was faster than intended
• Courage
  • Passive adjusted to now increase bonus Armor and Magic Resist (from items, runes or masteries) by 20% instead of total Armor and Magic Resist by 20%
• Demacian Justice
  • Fixed a bug where the cast time was faster than intended

Hecarim

These changes make Hecarim’s durability more consistent by smoothing out his early game jungle clear while reducing his late game survivability in team fights.

• Rampage
  • Damage increased to 60/95/130/165/200 from 50/85/120/155/190
• Spirit of Dread
  • Healing adjusted to 20% at all ranks from 10/15/20/25/30%
  • Cooldown increased to 20/18.5/17/15.5/14 seconds from 14 at all ranks
  • Fixed a bug where Spirit of Dread was stating it dealt more damage than it actually was

Janna

• Monsoon
  • Mana cost reduced to 100/150/200 from 150/225/300

Kassadin

We’ve made Nether Blade consistent against all structures. As an already effective mobile assassin, Kassadin does not need unnecessary pushing power.

• Nether Blade
  • Fixed a bug where Kassadin's basic attacks with Nether Blade active triggered Muramana's active damage more than once
  • Nether Blade's active no longer deals damage to inhibitors or the nexus

Kayle

These changes remove the least noticeable points of excess power on Kayle’s kit. To increase Reckoning’s immediate impact, its slow is becoming stronger but now has a shorter duration.

• No longer gains Magic Resist per level
• Reckoning
  • No longer amplifies damage while the target is slowed
  • Now applies a stack of Holy Fervor to the target
  • Slow duration reduced to 3 seconds from 4
  • Slow amount adjusted to 35/40/45/50/55% from 35% at all ranks
  • Missile Speed increased to 1500 from 1300

Nidalee

These changes clarify Cougar form’s intended strengths of high damage and high mobility rather than durability.

• No longer gains Magic Resist per level
• Swipe
  • Ability Power ratio increased 0.6 from 0.4
• Aspect of the Cougar
  • No longer grants bonus Armor or Magic Resist

Renekton

• Ruthless Predator
  • Fixed a bug where Ruthless Predator was unable to critically strike on any of the attacks; Ruthless Predator can now critically strike on the first attack

Taric

These changes provide opponents with early lane counterplay to Taric by reducing the amount of passive Armor granted by Shatter. In return, Taric is gaining meaningful ways to potentially scale into the later game, new itemization options and better ability to engage his opponents at close range.

• Base Attack Damage reduced to 57 from 62
• Gemcraft - Remade
  • Taric's basic attacks deal bonus magic damage equal to 2% of his maximum Mana; this bonus damage is doubled against champions
• Shatter
  • Passive Armor aura adjusted to 12% of Taric's Armor from 10/15/20/25/30 (Taric's self-Armor bonus remains 10/15/20/25/30)
  • Active damage now additionally scales with 30% of Taric's Armor
  • Mana cost reduced to 50 at all ranks from 50/60/70/80/90
• Dazzle
  • Mana cost reduced to 75 from 95

Tristana

As with Ashe, we wanted to make her standout as a bigger late game threat.

• Attack Speed per level increased to 4% from 3.01%

Tryndamere

These changes preserve the intended gameplay and counterplay of Bloodlust by forcing AP Tryndamere build up Fury before being able to fully take advantage of his heal. Using Bloodlust at 100 Fury will result in the same 1.5 AP ratio as before the patch.

• Bloodlust
  • Ability Power ratio adjusted to 0.3 + 0.012 per Fury consumed (total 1.5 at maximum Fury) from 1.5

Vayne

These changes help alleviate some of the high pressure of playing Vayne by allowing her more liberal use of Tumble and Condemn.

• Mana per level increased to 35 from 27
• Tumble
  • Mana cost reduced to 30 from 40

Vi

These changes reduce her early jungle presence by slowing down her clearing speed. We reintroduced counterplay to Vault Breaker by rewarding opponents for interrupting her while she is charging up.

• Base Attack Damage reduced to 54 from 58
• Vault Breaker
  • Vault Breaker now goes on a 3 second cooldown and refunds 50% of the Mana cost when interrupted instead of fully refreshing the cooldown and refunding 100% of the Mana cost
• Denting Blows
  • Damage reduced to 4/5.5/7/8.5/10% of maximum Health from 6/7/8/9/10%

Xin Zhao

These changes reduce Xin Zhao’s ability to stick to his target in early engagements and reduce his burst damage especially when building purely defensive items.

• Audacious Charge
  • Damage reduced to 70/105/140/175/210 from 70/110/150/190/230
  • Cooldown increased to 14/13/12/11/10 seconds from 13/12/11/10/9
• Crescent Sweep
  • Base damage reduced to 75/175/275 from 125/225/325
  • Cooldown increased to 120/110/100 seconds from 100/90/80

Zed

These changes differentiate Razor Shuriken as a higher risk, higher reward alternative to Shadow Slash.

• Razor Shuriken
  • Damage increased to 75/115/155/195/235 from 75/110/145/180/215
• Shadow Slash
  • Damage reduced to 60/90/120/150/180 from 60/95/130/165/200

Items

• Warmog's Armor
  • Passive Health Regen reduced to 1% of maximum Health per 5 seconds from 1.5%

• Bilgewater Cutlass
  

  These changes make Bilgewater Cutlass a better early pickup for champions who want to utilize its UNIQUE Active.

  • Recipe Changed: Long Sword + Vampiric Scepter + 200 gold = 1400 gold
  • Attack Damage reduced to 25 from 40
  • Life Steal increased to 12% from 10%
  • UNIQUE Active damage decreased to 100 from 150
  • UNIQUE Active slow reduced to 25% from 30%
  • UNIQUE Active range increased to 500 from 400
  • UNIQUE Active cooldown increased to 90 seconds from 60 seconds

• Blade of the Ruined King
  

  These changes make Blade of the Ruined King a more universally useful item for Attack Damage champions and allow it to better fulfill its role in their arsenal as an item to combat high Health targets.

  • Recipe Changed: Dagger + Dagger + Bilgewater Cutlass + 650 gold = 2850 gold
  • Attack Damage reduced to 30 from 45
  • Now grants 40% Attack Speed
  • Life Steal increased to 15% from 10%
  • UNIQUE Passive adjusted to "Deals 5% of the target's current Health in bonus physical damage (max 90 damage vs. monsters and minions) on hit"
  • UNIQUE Active changed to "Deals 15% of target champion's maximum Health as physical damage (min. 100), heals for the same amount, and steals 30% of the target's Movement Speed for 4 seconds (60 second cooldown)"
  • UNIQUE Active range increased to 500 from 400

• Spirit of the Elder Lizard
  • Incinerate damage reduced to 14-50 over 3 seconds from 15-66

Game UI

• Players can now access 4 new pings in game through a radial menu
  • "Enemy Missing", "On My Way", "Danger", and "Assist Me"
• Fixed a bug in which the tooltip for the item shop button would remain over the item shop once it opened

Spectator Mode

• In Spectator Mode, the ping button on the minimap has been removed

Co-op vs AI

• Retreat behavior on bots in Dominion Co-op vs AI has been improved

General
We made a bunch of quality of life improvements to passive on-attack effects so they’re no longer consumed when attacking wards

• Nami
  • Tidecaller's Blessing is no longer consumed when attacking wards
• Thresh
  • Death Sentence is no longer consumed when attacking wards
• Statikk Shiv
  • Passive is no longer consumed when attacking wards
• Sheen
  • Spellblade is no longer consumed when attacking wards
• Trinity Force
  • Spellblade is no longer consumed when attacking wards
• Lichbane
  • Spellblade is no longer consumed when attacking wards
• Iceborn Gauntlet
  • Spellblade is no longer consumed when attacking wards

• Cursors in colorblind mode have been updated
  • All red cursors have been recolored to orange
  • The spellcasting cursor has been recolored to a lighter shade of blue
• LeaverBuster has been improved to account for client-related issues
• Fixed an issue that would cause some particles to be invisible for the duration of the match (ex: Nidalee spears, Dr. Mundo cleavers, Lux’s Lucent Singularity)
• Fixed an issue that would cause some spells to go on cooldown without casting when the target entered fog of war
• Health bars will now display thicker black lines for every 1000 health
• Enabling HUD animations now animates health and resource bars on the HUD.
• The death screen has been upgraded: Enemy and allied particles and champions will now retain light coloration while your champion is dead."