Surrender at 20: 9/26 PBE Update: Sion Voiceover & SFX, Gangplank Ult Change, Blitzcrank Texture Rebalancing, HEXAKILL: Twisted Tree Line

The PBE has been updated and it's another big one! Sion's updated voiceover and new sfx have been added, including a slew of new unique taunts & jokes and over 13 minutes of audio! We also have texture rebalancing for Blitzcrank and most of his skins, updates to Masquerade Evelynn's texture rebalancing, Hexakill: Twisted Treeline up for testing, a tentative change to Gangplank's R's consistency, and more!

Continue reading for more information!

(Warning: PBE Content is tentative and iterative - what you see may not reflect what eventually gets pushed to live servers! Manage your expectations accordingly. )

Sion Voiceover and SFX

After his debut in the 9/25 PBE update, Sion's updated voiceover and sound effects are now up on the PBE!

Here's a preview video of his over 13 minutes of voice over lines, including several unique champion interactions, references to his old voiceover, and lines that slowly become more and more brutal!

Sion has unique taunts for:

Galio

"Time to cut your strings puppet!"
"One of us will finally die today!"
"I know you... I want to remember killing you"
"We've clashed a thousand times... no more!"

Jarvan IV

"Next in line, next to die!"
"I'll plant that banner in your corpse!"
"I killed you once... I'LL KILL YOU AGAIN!"
"Today... we'll see if ghosts can bleed!"

Swain

"I am not your pawn, Swain!"
"You are not my general!"
"You are weak, Swain! YOU ARE NO LEADER!"

Karthus

"Even death trembles before me!"

Pantheon

"You will be privileged to die under my boot!"

and unique jokes for:

Jarvan IV

"How many Jarvans must I kill?"
"You look just like your ancestor - dead!"
"Four Jarvans and you're all still failures! That is funny."

Urgot

"So uh, Urgot... we can't hang out any more. I'm cool now."
"Why don't I have coverage for prosthetics?"

and he has unique lines when purchasing specific items:

Banshee's Veil

"No mere spell will stop me."

Black Cleaver

"This cleaver will be red soon."
"A sword lacks heft"

Blade of the Ruined King

"This is not the first dead king's weapon I've taken."

Bloodthirster

"Yeesssss... I like this weapon"
"It longs to kill."

Boots of Speed

"Good enough to stomp insects"
"Nothing will keep me from battle!"
"These will wade through the blood of thousands!"
"Every step will crack the earth!"

Frozen Heart

"Do you feel a shiver down your spine?"
"Ah, cold fear."

Frozen Mallet

"I'll shatter the gates of Demacia with this hammer!"

Iceborn Gauntlet

"Cold as the grip of death!"
"I'll feel their bodies grow cold."

Infinity Edge

"This will sever a thousand heads."

Maw of Malmortius

"Spells... ha!."

Randuin's Omen

"Protection from the bites of gnats."
"A dark omen for my enemies!"
"They will break first."

Sunfire Cape

"All will burn in my wake."
"They'll beg as they burn."
"Fire... good"

Thornmail

"Leave no wound unanswered."

Warmog's Armor

"This was made for war, as am I!"
"This is the only fortress I need!"
"This has seen many battles."

Sion also has unique lines he will say when purchasing any item!

If you are interested in listening to these clips individually, check out the LoL Wiki's entry for Sion's PBE voice.

In addition to the new VO, he also has a new champion Select Quote:

"Rest is for the Living"

Here's an updated video preview now that his VO and SFX are implmented:

As you may have noticed in the video, his E and R indicators have also been fixed!

[E's indicator shows the path that minions will be knocked back]

Lumberjack Sion also received a few texture changes, notably to his axe, belt, and glove.

Lumberjack Sion

[Continued] Texture Rebalance Round #2

In addition to Brand, Evelynn, Nocturne, and Olaf earlier in this cycle, today's update includes texture rebalancing for BLITZCRANK!

The TL;DR of texture rebalancing is Riot is aiming to update nearly all champions and skins that were released before 2013 to better fit with the current art style and the upcoming Summoner's Rift update.

[ NOTE: OLD is on LEFT and NEW is on RIGHT ]

Blitzcrank

Rusty Blitzcrank

Goalkeeper Blizcrank

Boom Boom Blitzcrank

Piltover Customs Blitzcrank

( has a new shader )

Definitely Not Blitzcraznk

Masquerade Evelynn also received an updates to texture rebalancing from the 9/25 PBE udpate - her skin is now much more pale!

Masquerade Evelynn

[Live vs 9/25 PBE vs Today's update]

Gangplank Ult Change

Here's Riot GMang with a feedback thread:

"Should hit PBE at the next deploy. If you get a chance to try it, I'd love to know what you think!

To clarify, this is neither a "ult was the biggest problem" nor a "now Gangplank's in a perfect place." It was just a nice clean upgrade we thought people would like, and didn't have any big reason to hold it. :)

Hope you'll like it!"

Hexakill: Twisted Treeline up for testing!

Hexakill: Twisted Treeline is now live and up for testing as of today's PBE update!

Here's L4T3NCY with more:

"The Hexakill: Twisted Treeline featured game mode is now live on the PBE! Please report any bugs & feedback you might find in here for us.

The original announcement post can be found here.

Thanks PBE peeps! ^_^b"

HEXAKILL: Twisted Treeline also has its own unique HUD skin!

Other

There is a new "Character Inking" option that toggles on and off a "dark silhouette around units".

The launcher now prompts you to remove Pando Media Booster now that it is no longer in use.

Balance Changes

* Remember *: The PBE is a testing grounds for new, tentative, and sometimes radical changes. The changes you see below may be lacking context or other accompanying changes that didn't make it in - don't freak out! These are not official notes.

Champions

Akali

Twilight Shroud (W) no longer grants 10/20/30/40/50 armor or mr .
Twilight Shroud (W) now grants 60/70/80/90/100% burst of movement speed which decays over 1 second while in shroud.

Gangplank

Cannon Barrage (R) now deals equal damage over the entire area in waves instead of random spots with cannon balls.
Cannon Barrage (R) duration now 7 seconds from 6.
Cannon Barrage (R) cooldown now 125/110/95 from 120/115/110
Cannon Barrage (R) now listed a damge per second instead of flat damage per cannon ball.

Items