Surrender at 20

Patch 4.21 Notes


Patch 4.21 is on the way and the official patch notes have been posted!
Continue reading for the full set of patch notes, including a slew of preseason follow up changes, several new skins, Rek'Sai,  and much more!

Here's the full patch notes, this time with an introduction by Pwyff:
"Summoners, 
BIG PRESEASON FOLLOWUP PATCH. If anyone remembers last year's followup preseason patch (it's only been a year but check out the progress we've made!), we were very conservative with our changes. 
Not this time. 
While it's true we've introduced a lot more change in the 2015 preseason than 2014, it's also worth highlighting how many more 'design levers' we have to tune with. That's a fancy way of saying we have the right dials in the game to crank up or down when something appears too strong or too weak - all without having to fully reconstruct the kitchen. We're mixing metaphors, but you get the point. 
Anyway, the big narrative before we ring in the holiday break and the new year is systems cleanup and last-minute gifts for League's many orphaned champions. Talking about the system changes: while we're happy with how the preseason has progressed, we saw a number of opportunities to address the more egregious problems (snowballing, early to mid game gold flow, jungle balance, Warwick). We know everyone's still getting adjusted to the new preseason, so we'll be watching closely over the next while to see what new Warwicks come bubbling to the surface. 
Please don't let it be Warwick."
Chris "Pwyff" Tom

Patch Updates

12/11/2014

Twisted Treeline

TOOLTIP FIXThe "Reinforced Armor" turret tooltip now properly indicates turrets gain +75 armor/magic resist when no enemy minions are nearby

 Flash

BUGFIXFixed an issue where Flash caused several 'charge-up' abilities (ex. Vi's Q - Vault Breaker) to immediately go on cooldown

Kalista

BUGFIXSuccessfully last-hitting with E - Rend no longer causes Rend to auto-cast itself a second time
BUGFIXCasting R - Fate's Call on an Oathsworn Karma, Nidalee, Jayce or Elise no longer affects their ult skill rank

Orianna

BUGFIXSewn Chaos Orianna's ball is no longer invisible while idle

12/10/2014

Turrets

TURRET PARITYFixed damage ramp-up inconsistency with red-side Inner turrets

Dragon

BUGFIXDragon's AoE fireball now deals the same damage to each target hit, rather than the second target taking more damage than the first, etc.

Jarvan IV

BUGFIXR - Cataclysm no longer deals damage multiple times if Jarvan's target displaces him while Cataclysm is active

Champions

Rek'Sai

Rek'Sai, the Void Burrower, will be released a bit later during Patch 4.21!

Azir

More bugfixes and we're making Azir a little smoother to play.
Having tweaked Azir just last patch, we're looking to see how he performs from here before really changing his power level. So... bugfixes. Always bugfixes.

W - Arise!

I THOUGHT WE REMOVED DODGEFixed a bug where it was possible for targets to walk out of range of a soldier's attack, causing the attack animation to play but do no damage.

E - Shifting Sands

I SHIFT IN YOUR GENERAL DIRECTIONFixed a bug where casting Shifting Sands outside of its cast range would always cause Azir to walk into range. Shifting Sands now checks for the nearest soldier to your mouse and immediately goes there if the soldier is in range, no matter how far from Azir the mouse was.
SPEEDY SHIFTINGFixed an issue where Shifting Sands would fail to be queued up during a cast of W - Arise!. Now pressing W + E together should always create a soldier and then instantly move Azir to that soldier. Note: there's a similar problem with pressing W + Q together that we have not fixed yet but are looking into.

R - Emperor's Divide

I'M ACTUALLY HELPINGThe allied speed boost of Emperor’s Divide now grants assists

Cassiopeia

Aspect of the Serpent now gains stacks over time and every second an enemy champion is poisoned (rather than on poisoned unit kill or when using Twin Fangs on an enemy champ). Twin Fang now adds a debuff that amplifies poison damage on the target.
Cassi's recent update definitely gave her the late-game we intended, but at two great costs: her early-game strength, and her identity as a 'Poison Mage.' We're trying to smooth out a bit of Cassiopeia's power here with some early buffs alongside some guaranteed scaling on her passive so that she can hit her early-mid-lategame fantasy (that is now a word) at the appropriate times. In short, we're looking to reach a middle ground between the update and her original feel of killing you slowly with venoms. Just quicker. (And with more venoms).

Passive - Aspect of the Serpent

STACK CITYCassiopeia builds a stack of Aspect of the Serpent on every poisoned unit kill or on Twin Fang cast on enemy champion ⇒ once every 6 seconds (10 times per minute) and for every second that an enemy champion is poisoned.
IT'S A BUFF WE PROMISECassiopeia gains special bonuses at 75/200/400 stacks ⇒ 100/250/500 stacks. The new breakpoints will be hit sooner than the old ones based on the new stacking mechanics (above).

Q - Noxious Blast

EVERYTHING IS NORMALFixed a bug where Noxious Blast's delay wasn't actually normalized (it was hitting anywhere between 0.25 seconds and 0.5 seconds). Now has a flat 0.4 second delay.
MOVEMENT SPEED BONUS10/15/20/25/30% bonus movement speed ⇒20% bonus movement speed at all ranks

E - Twin Fang

NEWLOOK AT THIS SYNERGYTwin Fang now adds a debuff on the target that amplifies further poison damage by +20% for 5 seconds. This debuff stacks up to 2 times (capping at +40% poison damage).
COST30/45/60/75/90 mana ⇒ 35/45/55/65/75 mana
RATIO0.4/0.45/0.5/0.55/0.6 ability power ⇒ 0.55 ability power at all ranks

Cho'Gath

Life's hard for a Cho'gath. You want to eat your enemies, they don't want be eaten, and all it takes is one little death to set this poor little monster back. These changes should help Cho get back into the fight, but we also wanted to create bigger decisions between saving Feast for a kill or nommin' down on some creeps.

R - Feast

NEWHUNGRY HUNGRY CHO'GATHFeast now has 50% of its cooldown and mana cost refunded if it kills a minion or monster.
COOLDOWN60 seconds at all ranks ⇒ 80 seconds at all ranks

Corki

Phosphorus Bomb travels slower.
Oh Corki. We've known about your strengths for some time, but we're always careful about balancing you because you're rarely a 'standout' in any particular category (unlike, say, Tristana or Kog'Maw who you know are strong when they're strong). But with power reductions coming for Lucian, we know you're up next on the "very strong, safe marksmen" list in competitive play, so we're taking some cautious steps to keep you in line as well.

Q - Phosphorus Bomb

MISSILE SPEED1125 ⇒ 1000

Diana

Lunar Rush still gets the reset if Diana casts it on a Moonlight'd target but is interrupted mid-dash.
When getting the reset, two things can go wrong for Diana: missing her Q, or having R interrupted. Cancelling R not only removes all of Diana's damage options, but often just leaves her dead in the water, so we're throwing her a lifejacket (check that metaphor). As long as you target a unit affected by Moonlight, Lunar Rush's cooldown will be refunded even if the dash was cancelled. This change makes it a little easier for those hoping to become the living embodiment of the vengeful moon.

That line's in the tooltip. We wrote that.

R - Lunar Rush

C'MON MAN I EARNED THISCasting Lunar Rush on targets that have the Moonlight debuff will reset Lunar Rush's cooldown, even if Diana is interrupted out of her dash

Fiddlesticks

Dread now applies on things Fiddle interacts with, as opposed to a broad area of effect. Dark Wind no longer silences the same target multiple times but will try to prioritize new targets as it bounces along.
Terror's always kind of been Fiddle's thing, and he's certainly a pretty big one (terror, that is) given the current jungle environment. With that in mind, we're looking to drain some of his less-clear power and add more consistency (for him and opponents).

Passive - Dread

NEWFOCUS FEARDealing magic damage or casting Terrify applies Dread to enemies for 2.5 seconds, reducing their magic resistance by 10
REMOVEDNOT SO GREAT AT PARTIESFiddlesticks no longer applies Dread to all enemy units within 800 range

E - Dark Wind

NEWBOUNCE ALL DAYNow prioritizes targets not yet hit by Dark Wind
REMOVEDCRAZY LONG SILENCESDark Wind can still hit targets multiple times, but it will now only silence them once
SILENCE DURATION1.2 seconds ⇒ 1.25 seconds

Galio

Don't let me get in my zone.
Galio's ultimate has two major risks involved - either he's crowd-controlled during its channel or his opponents buy Mercury Treads. We like the teamplay that comes from coordinated interrupts but find it a little sad that tenacity messes with his flow so much. Is now fixed.

R - Idol of Durand

NEWYOU'RE STUCK IN HERE WITH MEIdol of Durand's taunt is no longer reducible by tenacity.

Jarvan IV

IF HE'S MAKING A CRATER SOMEONE'S GONNA GET HURT.

R - Cataclysm

NEWARE YOU CALLING ME FATFixed a bug where Jarvan would sometimes fail to do damage if he was killed quickly after landing from Cataclysm. Note: Jarvan still won't deal damage if he's killed mid-air, but if he's able to land and create the wall, he should always deal damage.

Jax

Jax's E and R scale better into the late game.
Surprise - he's back. While it hasn't been too long since Jax's reign over top lane, now that his laning power is a little more manageable we think we can give him some more late game love as a reward for getting through the early to mid phases.

E - Counter Strike

COOLDOWN18/16/14/12/10 seconds ⇒ 16/14/12/10/8 seconds

R - Grandmaster's Might

BONUS ARMOR25/35/45 (+0.3 attack damage) ⇒ 20/35/50 (+0.5 attack damage)
BONUS MAGIC RESISTANCE25/35/45 (+0.2 ability power) ⇒ 20/35/50 (+0.2 ability power)

Jayce

Before this change, you could activate Hyper Charge, wait a bit, then Double Hyper Charge someone, doing 'The Most Damage In League of Legends' (maybe?). It was unintended and kind of goofy.

W - Hyper Charge

LESS HYPER, MORE CHARGEHyper Charge now goes on cooldown after the third shot rather than right on cast
COOLDOWN14/12/10/8/6 seconds ⇒ 13/11/9/7/5 seconds

Jinx

Rules are made to be broken. Like buildings. BUT NOT CLARITY. NEVER CLARITY.
Recent updates to the way buff icons are shown have made telling what weapon Jinx is using a little chaotic (and not the kind she prefers). We've changed it so Switcheroo's icon is always the gun you'recurrently using, and added a flashy-toggle swirl to show you're spending mana while using Fishbones.

Q - Switcheroo!

SPELL ICONSwitcheroo!'s spell icon displays the gun Jinx will switch to ⇒the gun Jinx is currently using
TOGGLE SWIRLS!!!When using Rockets, the ability icon will flash (like Ashe's Q) to show that Jinx is now in "mana spending mode"

Kalista

More early damage on Rend, Usability buffs to Sentinel's passive, and a tightening on Fate's Call to make Kalista's early levels more smooth.
Whether you think she's the second coming of Beta Twisted Fate or just another marksman in the crowd, it's clear to us that Kalista needs a bit of love to reach her full potential. Refunds to Rend will let savvy Kalista players stay afloat in lane, while some extra damage makes it more worthwhile for her to land extra attacks in extended trades.

Playing her Oathsworn Ally's gotten easier too - we've added an execute function to Sentinel's passive to help you feed your baby vengeful spirit some much-needed gold, while tag-teaming teamfights with Fate's Call should feel more responsive.

Finally, eternally giving your soul up to a quest for revenge (and really cool initiations) is too big a deal to be decided by a simple mis-click, so we're letting Kalista rebind before a certain point in the early game. You'll now have 3 minutes to get over your cold feet before you're stuck with her for the rest of your existence. No pressure.

The Black Spear

NEWMAYBE WE SHOULD SEE OTHER PEOPLEKalista can now re-bind to a different ally any time before minute 3:00

W - Sentinel

MINION DAMAGE FLOOR100 ⇒ 75
NEWIT'S LIKE TARGON'SIf Sentinel procs on a minion with 125 health or less, it will automatically kill that minion.
REMOVEDX-RAY GHOSTSSoul Sentinels no longer see through brush or over walls

E - Rend

MANA COST35 ⇒ 40
NEWMANA REFUNDNow restores 20 mana if Rend kills a unit, up to twice per cast
DAMAGE PER EXTRA SPEAR5/9/14/20/27 + .15/.18/.21/.24/.27 attack damage ⇒ 10/14/19/25/32 + .2/.225/.25/.275/.3 attack damage

R - Fate's Call

ALLY RECAST DELAY1.2 seconds ⇒ 1.1 seconds
SPOOKY CLARITYVisuals slightly tweaked to emphasize the re-cast delay

Kennen

General quality-of-life buffs for this weird lookin' Yordle.
Like many champions before him (Veigar, Karthus, and Cho'gath come to mind) Kennen has been held back by inconsistencies in the timing of his abilities. After a much-needed round of re-coding, we've fixed an issue with Electrical Surge while also tuning Slicing Maelstrom. It's worth noting for Kennen's R that this is a slight late game nerf to his single target ult burst, but a buff to his area-effect speed.

W - Electrical Surge

THAT RESPONSIVENESSElectric Surge now checks for viable targets on the beginning of the cast rather than at the end (it still hits enemies after a cast time, but is generally more reliable)

R - Slicing Maelstrom

TIME BETWEEN STRIKES0.5/~0.4/~0.33 seconds ⇒ 0.25 seconds at all ranks
TIME BETWEEN STRIKES ON THE SAME PERSON0.5/~0.4/~0.33 seconds ⇒0.5 seconds at all ranks
TOOLTIP CLARITY!Slicing Maelstrom's tooltip now reflects the duration of the storm rather than maximum number of strikes. Its duration has always been 3/4/5 seconds.

Lucian

Lucian's got a shorter window to double tap people with Lightslinger, and deals less damage with it at lower levels.
Lucian is a character that's carefully defined by his low combat range (500) and being opportunistic to succeed within it. These changes are more along the lines of pushing that while creating more windows of opportunity against Lucian. We do say windows of opportunity a lot.

Passive - Lightslinger

PASSIVE BUFF DURATION6 seconds ⇒ 3 seconds
RATIO0.5 attack damage at all levels ⇒ 0.3/0.4/0.5 attack damage at levels 1/7/13

Nocturne

We're going to copy paste the patch note into the summary: Nocturne now gains massively increased movement speed when moving toward feared targets. This works with other fears!
Waaaaaay back in 4.3 (That's February! Hi Vel'Koz!), we changed fear mechanics across the board to make the affected unit move away from you instead of in random directions. Unlike other champions, however, Nocturne has lacked a way to really capitalize on the consistency of his newer fear. So we're fixing that. Also, this means any of Nocturne's spooky friends (Shaco, Fiddlesticks, Hecarim, Lollipoppy) can set him up for some sweet ganks. 

Because he's a nightmare.

A living nightmare.

E - Unspeakable Horror

NEWPASSIVE - ALSO WORKS WITH OTHER FEARS!Nocturne now gains massively increased movement speed when moving toward feared targets

Pantheon

As some who benefited a lot from the Preseason changes, Pantheon fits well within our expectations for a jungler: his ganks are amazing and he really benefits from the itemization paths available (see: Warrior enchant, Stalker's Blade, etc). From a durability standpoint however, Aegis Protection's been giving Panth a free pass in terms of health-pool, making him head-and-shoulders above other Assassins/Fighters when it comes to ganking-uptime. We're lowering his attack speed to make his passive proc less often unless he focuses more of his mana into casting spells, which translates to a riskier jungle for him overall. 

To slightly compensate (and make his combo abilities better), we're speeding up Pantheon's attack frame animations, which gets a little complicated but basically means he completes attacks faster butdoesn't attack faster overall.

General

BASE ATTACK SPEED0.679 ⇒ 0.625
READ THE CONTEXT THIS GETS COMPLICATEDPantheon's attack frame animation speed has been increased by +26%

Rengar

Haha oh dear.

Bonetooth Necklace

WHOOPSBonetooth Necklace actives no longer benefit from cooldown reduction

Sejuani

Sej has more base mana, Q no longer scales with max health but just does straight magic damage. W and E are more focused on consistent damage over time.
Winter is coming, and she's riding a boar. Sejuani hasn't been in the spotlight for some time, but in light of the updated jungle we figured we'd look back at some outliers. While Sej's far from the bottom of the ice-bucket, she's always suffered from not having incentives to stay in the fight compared to other tanks. Instead she just throws out her spells and then sits around waiting for them to recharge. 

Seizing the opportunity to improve this, a lot of Sejuani's damage has been shifted out of her up-front burst (Q) and instead shoved into the damage-over-time of her Flail and Permafrost, making her a more active threat in prolonged fights. Sometimes icy hearts just need warm smiles. Or buffs for the holidays. 

We're giving you both.

General

BASE MANA287 ⇒ 400

Q - Arctic Assault

REMOVEDENEMY HEALTH SCALINGArctic Assault no longer scales with 4/6/8/10/12% of target's max health
DAMAGE40/70/100/130/160 magic damage ⇒ 80/125/170/215/260 magic damage

W - Flail of the Northern Winds

COST40 mana at all ranks ⇒ 40/35/30/25/20 mana
INITIAL HIT DAMAGE40/60/80/100/120 (0.3 ability power) magic damage⇒ 4/6/8/10/12% of target's max health (+3% per 100 ability power) in magic damage
AREA OF EFFECT DAMAGE80/120/160/200/240 (+10% bonus health) ⇒40/70/100/130/160 (+4/6/8/10/12% total health)

E - Permafrost

COOLDOWN11 seconds at all ranks ⇒ 10/9/8/7/6 seconds
DAMAGE60/110/160/210/260 magic damage ⇒ 60/90/120/150/180 magic damage
SLOW DURATION1.5/1.75/2/2.25/2.5 seconds ⇒ 1.5 seconds at all ranks

Shen

Check out this awesome summary: Shadow Dash costs less energy. 20 less.
Though Shen is no stranger to the shadows, we all remember how crazy this ninja gets when he's gets out of control. That said, we think loosening some of Shen's larger energy constraints is a nice place to push his power without instantly putting him on top. We're still assessing where he's at, but hopefully this allows us all to see a little more Shen in our lives. Or not? (He's not a very good ninja).

E - Shadow Dash

ENERGY COST120 ⇒ 100

Shyvana

Twin Bite has a slightly lower cooldown and Burnout now deals bonus damage to monsters.
In light of her recent exit from popularity, Shyvana's a character that's been left without a clear identity. Is she a human? Is she a dragon? Is she viable? Leaning on her original jungling roots, we've decided to boost Shyv's clearing speeds so that she can be one of the faster farmers out there, opening her up to make cooler decisions than just shoving in top-laners and living forever.

Q - Twin Bite

COOLDOWN10/9/8/7/6 seconds ⇒ 9/8/7/6/5 seconds

W - Burnout

NEWMONSTER MASHINGBurnout now now deals +20% bonus damage to monsters
IT'S COMPLICATEDFixed a bug where Burnout was scaling incorrectly with attack damage when Shyvana was in her dragon form

Soraka

Soraka's base health regen and health regen growth stat have been reduced, but Astral Blessing's passive now scales better with ability power.
One of the problems the Soraka update tried to fix were the times when she would just sit in the back and heal things without ever being vulnerable. In practice, however, Soraka's synergies with health and mana regeneration allowed League's Premier Healer to overcome these obstacles and amp her annoying meter all the way to 11. Thanks to the way regen works in the 2015 preseason, we're able to mitigate the effectiveness of this strategy by lowering her base stats, but we're adding more power into Astral Blessing's passive to reward the most accurate of star-snipers.

Premiere healer.

General

BASE HEALTH REGENERATION4.675 ⇒ 2.5
HEALTH REGENERATION GROWTH STAT0.7 ⇒ 0.5

W - Astral Blessing

PASSIVE RATIOAbility power ratio range is now 0.2 ability power to 0.4 ability power ⇒ 0.4 ability power to 0.8 ability power (there's a range because this scales in effectiveness with Soraka's missing health)

Varus

Despite being an effective lane-bully, Varus's effectiveness is so heavily tied to his Q harrass that he often finds himself running out of gas when it comes time to leverage that early-mid advantage into a more substantial one. We think Varus is a pretty cool dude (if perhaps a little grumpy; all he does is grumble), so we're seeing if this small change helps him stay relevant into the late game.

General

MANA REGENERATION PER 5 SECONDS GROWTH STAT0.5 ⇒ 0.8

Warwick

We bet nobody saw this coming.

Warwick's popularity (and subsequent insanity in the win rate department, even though we don't like using win rate as a statistic because it's loaded with so many other variables but let's not get into that) is a perfect storm of changes to preseason systems, the jungle, and the latent powers within his kit. We all know Warwick should be lowered a peg (or two. or five.), so we've decided to focus on Hunter's Call and Infinite Duress. 

We're going to be monitoring Warwick heavily to see if we need to go harder, but we're confident this reduces his power enough that you might actually be able to compete with him in games. 60%. Never forget. Now let's not talk about win rates again (seriously though, win rates are a correlation of game health, not a cause).

W - Hunter's Call

DURATION10 seconds ⇒ 6 seconds

R - Infinite Duress

TOTAL BASE DAMAGE250/335/420 magic damage ⇒ 150/250/350 magic damage

Yasuo

Yasuo moves slightly faster and Steel Tempest has a lower cooldown at early ranks.
We might have overdone it a tad with 4.18, so we're stepping back just a bit. These changes should maintain Yasuo's vulnerability to ganks in lane but give him a little more leeway to make plays with Steel Tempest. A wanderer isn't always lost, but that doesn't mean he's over-nerfed. What does that mean. We don't know.

General

MOVEMENT SPEED340 ⇒ 345

Q - Steel Tempest

COOLDOWN5/4.75/4.5/4.25/4 seconds ⇒ 4 seconds at all ranks

Zac

Elastic Slingshot makes more chunks if Zac hits multiple champions, and Let's Bounce has a higher knockback range.
The last on our 'Naughty or Nice' junglers list, we wanted to give Zac a little more oomph for those who make it through his somewhat punishing early-levels. In-line with Zac's identity as initiator, buffing the knock-back effect on Let's Bounce! means finding fights at max-range lets Zac play more with his opponent's positioning to single someone out.

E - Elastic Slingshot

NEWSO CHUNKYZac now creates extra chunks for each additional champion he hits
DAMAGE80/120/160/200/240 magic damage ⇒ 80/130/180/230/280 magic damage

R - Let's Bounce!

KNOCKBACK RANGE250 ⇒ 400 (enemies will be knocked up higher and longer to match the new range, but total crowd control durations remain the same)

Mass Texture Rebalance (Part 4)

We're continuing our comprehensive pass at the game's older character textures. As with parts 1, 2 and 3, our goal is to improve parity with newer releases and make sure everybody looks at home on the newly-updated Rift. Is anyone even reading this paragraph anymore?
TEXTURESThe following textures have been updated:

Malphite

  • Base, Coral Reef, Marble, Obsidian, Shamrock

Malzahar

  • Base, Djinn, Overlord, Shadow Prince, Vizier

Shen

  • Base, Blood Moon, Frozen, Surgeon, Warlord, Yellow Jacket

Wukong

  • Base, General, Jade Dragon, Volcanic

Xin Zhao

  • Base, Commando, Imperial, Viscero, Winged Hussar

System Changes

Turret Gold

Turrets are worth more gold!
One issue with Dragon getting stingy with his gold bounties is that the amount of accessible gold in each game has gone down. What that means is that players are having more difficulty hitting their mid-game fantasy item builds (that is now a term) at a reasonable time. Rather than just throwing gold onto everything, we're going to up the rewards on objectives that are already gold-focused so as to reiterate their strategic value. And diversity.
OUTER TURRET GLOBAL GOLD REWARD100 ⇒ 125
INNER TURRET GLOBAL GOLD REWARD125 ⇒ 150

Turret Shielding

We don't hate Mordekaiser or Malzahar, we swear.
Our philosophy with the inner turret shield has always been about offering a broad strategic defense against poke / siege teams, and not a weird way to nullify damage-over-time abilities. That said, our safeguard against the latter wasn't very fine-tuned as the turret basically checked every second if a champion within range had been damaged and, if they hadn't, it gave them a shield. This lead to some weird timing issues where a DoT-ed champion could potentially cycle between being on fire while also getting shielded if they hit the right window. Hopefully this change removes that but, if it doesn't, we'll be sure to revisit this!
INNER TURRET SHIELDING WINDOW1 second ⇒ 1.5 seconds

Death Timers

The death timer is being unilaterally raised by 2.5 seconds.
We've noticed that because objectives are so much more important (or everyone just wants to protect the Rift Scuttler crab...), team fights are also starting earlier and more frequently. While the extra action is great, lower death timers mean the victorious team doesn't have enough time to do anything after, which leads to a lot of combat without much progression in objective control. We're hoping for a better balance here, even if the change itself is small.
MINIMUM DEATH TIMER7.5 seconds ⇒ 10 seconds
MAXIMUM DEATH TIMER50 seconds ⇒ 52.5 seconds

Experience Rewards for Champion Kills

Slightly less experience rewards for killing everyone.
Echoing the above point, there are a lot more team fights in the early game so we're doing some light retuning to make sure things don't get out of control too quickly.
CHAMPION BASE KILL EXPERIENCE55% ⇒ 50%

Minion Gold

More minion gold on the map!
With every other objective on the map gaining more importance, we want to make sure that lane control strategies feel equally rewarding. You could call this a form of importance-creep (although you'd be weird to call it that) where things need to keep up in importance in relation to each other but, similar to our thoughts with Dragon not giving a global gold bounty, this was another place we could introduce some accessible gold.
MELEE MINION GOLD REWARD19 ⇒ 20
RANGED MINION GOLD REWARD14 ⇒ 15

Minion Health

Minion health scales slightly less over game time.
Apparently minions scale on their own very, very complicated math system that involves game time and some exponential factors, which is less than ideal for all involved. On a whim, we picked a random time (22:30) in the game and did comparisons, so we'll share some very odd math with you. It's worth noting this willhave an impact on games but it'll be hard to tell from this changelist.
MELEE MINION TOTAL HEALTH AT 22:30About 4% lower in comparison to 4.20 minions. This difference grows slightly larger over time (maybe at about 8% - 9% lower in comparison to 4.20 minions at 50:00).
RANGED MINION TOTAL HEALTH AT 22:30About 3% lower in comparison to 4.20 minions. This difference grows slightly larger over time (maybe at about 7% - 8% lower in comparison to 4.20 minions at 50:00).

Summoner's Rift

General Changes

We are constantly iterating on the updated Summoner's Rift!
  • Summoner's Rift has received new music that changes throughout the game!
    • Added an option in the audio menu to switch back to the classic Summoner's Rift music
  • We're continuing to optimize performance by making slight graphical adjustments throughout the map
  • Improved consistency of river, top and bot lane brush behavior when champions are near brush edges
  • Baron no longer loses his out of combat regen if attacked from outside his attack range
  • Baron is feeling festive!

Item Shop Buying Range

You can now only buy items if you're on the physical platform.
The space you could buy items on Summoner's Rift was always a bit odd (slightly oblong in favor of top lane), so we decided to have a CLARITY! intervention and re-did the boundaries. We do realize this is a small nerf to specific top lane starts that wait in base for extra gold before walking out with the minion wave, but it's something we've always wanted to do. So we did it.
THERE IS NO FREE SHIPPINGThe shop purchasing area is now restricted to the physical platform.

Geography Changes

SMALL RELOCATIONSSlightly adjusted positioning of Blue/Red buff camps so that area-effect abilities should now consistently hit the same number of monsters in all four camps
KRUG EQUALITYRed side Krugs now mirror Blue side (the Ancient Krug is always further away from the base)

Dragon

Fixed some exploits where players could not take damage from Dragon in a variety of ways.
Real talk: those videos of low level Fioras soloing dragon are pretty cool, but there are obviously more abuse than "neat" cases, so action had to be taken. This does lower some of the nuance of the Dragon fight (ie: aggro dancing or running... a lot of attack speed on jungle Pantheon. Woo mastery.) and doesn't solve all low level solo Dragon cases, but it'll at least give us a better idea of what champs should have that threat versus those who shouldn't. Final note: Dragon's fireball will now pop Banshee's Veil, but we're aware of that interaction and are planning to keep it (for now).
I'M CASTING MY FIREBALLFireball is now treated as a spell and not an auto attack (also, you can spell shield it)
SKILLSHOTS ARE HARDFireballs track the target like a normal attack or targeted spell
NO DANCING HEREDragon will always finish his attack before switching targets
BUGFIXDragon no longer gets stuck outside his pit when hit with terrain abilities (ex. Anivia's W - Crystallize)
ALL DRAGONS GO TODragon once again drops a soul for Thresh

Hand of Baron

SHORTER BARON BUFF.
Now that Hand of Baron has CLARITY OF DESIGN, players have been pretty good about using it to its maximum potential. Unfortunately, this makes outlasting or enduring a Baron buffed team pretty tough, so we're lowering its duration to maintain its clear identity without teams getting steamrolled as soon as it lands.
DURATION240 seconds ⇒ 180 seconds

Dragon Slayer buffs

The power of the first Dragon Slayer buff has been reduced and the 4th stack / 2nd stack bonuses have been swapped.
Right now we're seeing games snowball a little too quickly, and one of the culprits seems to be the Dragon Slayer buff. Of specific note is that second stack buff that lets a team double down on their map pressure, as they can objectively push lanes and take jungle monsters a whole 15% faster. We're not sure if that's a mathematically correct statement, but let's assume it is.
FIRST STACK8% Attack Damage and Ability Power ⇒ 6% Attack Damage and Ability Power
SECOND STACKNow gives +15% damage to Turrets.
FOURTH STACKNow gives +15% damage to minions and monsters.

Gift of Heavy Hands

+1 to the number of attacks needed to stun a monster with the Heavy Hands buff.
It turns out that a stun based on basic attacks + high attack speed champions = very strong junglers who can safely farm to infinity. In general, we're okay with Heavy Hands adding more safety to a jungle clear but, for some champions, it got a little obnoxious.
REQUIRED HITS TO STUN5 ⇒ 6

Gift of the Toadstool

More poisonous toadstool armor.
The Gromp buff was designed to establish a baseline clear speed for tank junglers, as we expect most would rely on the toadstool armor over their basic abilities to clear camps. This is just an example of the ways we can tweak jungle parameters to benefit groups of junglers in healthy ways!
DAMAGE SCALINGGift of the Toadstool'd champions deal 6 + (6 x level) magic damage over 3 seconds ⇒ 4 + (8 x level) magic damage over 3 seconds

Jungle Gold

You should probably ask politely to take a jungler's camp if you don't have a Machete. All that lost gold adds up man.
We're seeing a lot of junglers having difficulty keeping up in gold generation, but if we just throw more gold onto the camps we'd probably see laners stealing monsters instead. This is a light first pass at correcting gold flow for junglers versus laners, but we now have the ability to go harder (or softer) if this is still a problem in the future. Design levers!
GO BACK TO YOUR LANEAll jungle camps now give 10 less gold
THIS IS MY JUNGLEHunter's Machete now grants +10 gold per large jungle monster
UPGRADE EARLY FRIENDSAll tier 2 and 3 jungle items now grant +20 gold per large jungle monster

Items

NEW

Negatron Cloak

IT'S BAAAAACK.
We're currently happy with the magic resistance changes, except for Guardian Angel on squishy damage dealers. Right now, GA's got a preeeeettty big combine cost without providing much protection against Mages through its build path, so we're re-introducing Negatron Cloak as a stepping stone.
RECIPENull Magic Mantle + 350 Gold = 850 Total Gold
MAGIC RESISTANCE45

Guardian Angel

See above.
See above, which will direct you to above that. So see above the above.
RECIPENull Magic Mangle + Chain Vest + 1500 gold ⇒ Negatron Cloak + Chain Vest + 1250 gold
TOTAL COST2750 gold ⇒ 2850 gold
MAGIC RESISTANCE45 ⇒ 50

Abyssal Scepter

While Negatron Cloak is here, we might as well use it in recipes that make sense.
We don't see this as being a permanent fix for Abyssal Scepter, but felt we could make this change just to clean up the recipe. While there's less Magic Resistance in the build path, it also consumes less inventory space!
RECIPEBlasting Wand + Null-Magic Mantle + Null-Magic Mantle + 580 gold ⇒ Negatron Cloak + Blasting Wand + 730 gold
TOTAL COSTUnchanged (2440 gold)

Targon's Brace

Targon's Brace Spoils of War passive now executes at higher thresholds.
We've heard this request quite a bit from supports who don't know how to last hit (just kidding), so... here you go.
SPOILS OF WAR EXECUTE BASE200 ⇒ 240

Face of the Mountain

See above, but replace Targon's Embrace with Face of the Mountain.
See above, then see above that. At this point we're going to repeat the joke about supports not being able to last hit.
SPOILS OF WAR EXECUTE BASE200 ⇒ 400

Ranger's Trailblazer

Ranger's Trailblazer no longer reduces Smite's cooldown.
The goal of Ranger's Trailblazer was to either help a jungler double-down on their farming or help them get out of the dumpster when their teammate accidentally steals the first camp (or buff!). Unfortunately, reducing Smite's cooldown creates the wrong incentive as it gives all of the above advantages to junglers who are ahead whilealso letting them counterjungle and gank more by stealing enemy jungle buffs.
REMOVEDSMITEY REDUCTIONSNo longer reduces Smite cooldown by 15 seconds

Poacher's Knife

Not a placebo.
Poacher's Knife is actually very impactful in counterjungling, but because we made it only track 'bonus' gold, the tooltip undervalued the actual use of the item. Changing the tooltip isn't a placebo, we're trying to reflect the contribution it brings!
IT'S NOT A PLACEBO WE SWEARPoacher's Knife's tooltip now reflects the total gold from stolen large monsters, rather than just the +20 gold from the item itself

Skirmisher's Sabre

Attacking a Smited opponent now burns them for true damage over 3 seconds, rather than just dealing true damage on hit. Also truest damage.
While we're running into a few abuse cases with Skirmisher's Sabre, the big reason we're changing it is because it's weighted so heavily in favor of dudes who can hit you in the face as fast as possible. Given our goal with the new jungle items was to open up different playstyles, we're balancing it out in favor of more champions.

As for the bugfix, there are whispers of an ancient form of damage in League of Legends - truer than True damage itself. What that actually means is we have a tier of damage above "True" damage called "Pure" damage or, as it's more commonly known: the Fountain Laser ("Did that just kill me in Zhonyas?"). You can probably see where this is going: an error in coding means we changed Challenging Smite's debuff from True damage to Pure damage, which let it kill things it really shouldn't have.
STOP IT WARWICKBasic attacks against a Challenged target deal 17-51 (based on level) true damage on hit ⇒ 60-162 (based on level) true damage over 3 seconds
AS OPPOSED TO "REAL" DAMAGEFixed a bug where Challenging Smite's True damage would kill units through near-death / revive effects like (but not limited to!) Guardian Angel, Tryndamere's Undying Rage, and Zilean's Chronoshift

Enchantment - Devourer

Sliiiiiightly overtuned.
Kind of reminds us of launch Feral Flare. And nobody wants that.
MAGIC DAMAGE ON HIT40 ⇒ 25

Chalice of Harmony

More mana regeneration!
More mana regeneration!
PASSIVE MANA RESTORE1.5% of missing mana every 5 seconds ⇒ 2% of missing mana every 5 seconds

Athene's Unholy Grail

This is going to get repetitive. More mana regeneration!
More mana regeneration!
PASSIVE MANA RESTORE1.5% of missing mana every 5 seconds ⇒ 2% of missing mana every 5 seconds

Mikael's Crucible

Last one we swear. More mana regeneration!
More mana regeneration!
PASSIVE MANA RESTORE1.5% of missing mana every 5 seconds ⇒ 2% of missing mana every 5 seconds

Forbidden Idol

Less mana regeneration.
When we realized Forbidden Idol was the only item in the game that didn't have mana regeneration that was a multiple of 25%, we figured it would be wiser to bring it in line than to let it sit at an odd 60%.
BASE MANA REGENERATION60% ⇒ 50%

Twisted Treeline

Jungle

Twisted Treeline's jungle has been updated to account for the 2015 season!
With the new 2015 preseason hitting Summoner's Rift, we felt we could port over most of the jungle changes to Twisted Treeline before taking a deeper dive on any map-specific modifications we need to make.

Base Stats

JUNGLE PARITYAll jungle monsters have been updated to match the same stats / respawn times of the Summoner's Rift jungle monsters.

Golems

GIFT OF HEAVY HANDSBasic attacks stun on the first and sixth attack against a target (same as the Krug buff on Summoner's Rift)

Wolves

CURSE OF THE WOLFDeals 6 + (8 x level) magic damage over 3 seconds to enemy attackers (same as the Gromp buff on Summoner's Rift)

Wraith

HEALTH RESTORESmiting the Wraith restores +20% maximum health instantly (same as Red Brambleback on Summoner's Rift)

Vilemaw

BASE HEALTH5011 ⇒ 5311

Items

Madred's Razors

COMBINE COST0 gold ⇒ 300 gold

Overlord's Bloodmail

HEAL ON KILL OR ASSIST200 health over 5 seconds ⇒ 300 health over 5 seconds

REMOVEDItems

  • The following items have been removed:
    • Atma's Impaler
    • Sword of the Divine
    • Executioner's Calling

Dominion

Items

NEW Overlord's Bloodmail

HEALTH850
PASSIVEOn kill or assist, heal for 300 health over 5 seconds

Summoner Spells

Teleport

NEWDOCUMENTATION!You can now Teleport to wards by clicking on the minimap.

Ability Bar Update

The UI has been updated per your feedback!
Thanks to your feedback, we've moved some more important buffs back to the center of the HUD.
  • The following buffs have been moved back to the center of the HUD based on your feedback!
    • Spoils of War (Relic Shield / Targon's Embrace / Face of the Mountain)
    • Tribute (Spellthief's Edge / Frostfang / Frost Queen's Claim)
    • Statikk Shiv
    • Health Potions
    • Crystalline Flask
SPIFFYMuramana now has a spiffy toggle effect when active!
INVENTORY ITEM BORDERS?Inventory item borders now match the new active item style

Team Colors

COLORBLIND FRIENDLYSpectator view, loading screens, in-game chat, and kill callouts are now colorblind friendly

Legend of the Poro King

Legend of the Poro King, our next Featured Game Mode, will be released later on during patch 4.21! More information soon - keep an eye out for all the details!

Social Features

Team Builder

These changes will kick off a bit later in 4.21, but we wanted to give you an early heads-up!
QUALITY OF LIFEYour last played spec (Champion, Position and Role) now auto-populates when you start a new Team Builder match. This information is also saved across play sessions.
DON'T RUSH METeam members can now continue to adjust their specs while the captain adds solo slots, up until the captain hits "Find Solo Players"

Suggested Players

VISUAL UPDATENew icons have been added for each suggestion type to make it easier to tell why a player has been suggested

Patcher Updates

  • It's been six patches since we launched the visual refresh of the patcher! We've removed the first-time announcement pop-up.
  • The Settings menu has been split into Help and Options:
    • Help: Repair, Save Logs, About
    • Options: Peer-to-peer preference, Volume controls
  • Adjusted pop-up and menu art to better match the rest of the patcher
  • Added patcher version number to the About section
  • Fixed a Windows bug where the patcher was sometimes 'zoomed in', preventing access to the controls in the upper righthand corner
  • Links in the Patch Notes no longer occasionally open double tabs for Mac users

Higher Frame Limiting Options

WE CAN DO BETTERAdded 120hz and 144hz display frame rate options to the options menu

Store Updates

  • Successfully redeeming an RP code now indicates the amount of RP granted. Clarity: Not just for gameplay!
  • Various End-of-Game Gifting images, tooltips and error messages have been adjusted

Bugfixes

  • Fixed a rare issue in the new LeaverBuster system where chronic leavers/AFKers with older hardware were going through two lower priority queue penalties before entering matchmaking queues
  • The new LeaverBuster's first-time leaver prompt is now easier to properly fill out
  • Fixed a number of cases where transforming champions had slightly different base stats depending on which form they were in
  • Righteous Glory, Phage and Entropy are now properly listed under the "Other Movement Items" section of the shop
  • Fixed a few cases of modified/empowered autoattacks (ex. Thresh's E- Flay) which weren't proccing the damage portion of Kalista's W - Oathsworn Sentinel
  • Sona's Q - Hymn of Valor no longer causes lag on first cast
  • Fixed a bug (heh) where Skarner's R - Impale wasn't properly working against targets with revive effects (Guardian Angel, Zac, Aatrox, etc)
  • Made changes to more comprehensively address recent exploits

Upcoming Skins

The following skins will be released at various times during Patch 4.21:

Eternum Rek'Sai

Blood Moon Elise

Blood Moon Thresh

Snow Day Malzahar

Winter Wonder Orianna

Poro Rider Sejuani


Points of interest in 4.21

Here's a brief look at a few of the new things included in patch 4.21, including things mentioned above in the patch notes and things discovered during the last  PBE cycle! Most of this coverage includes preview screen shots and video taken during the 4.21 PBE cycle and may vary from what is pushed to live.

New Champion - Rek'Sai

Our latest champion, Rek'Sai, the Void Burrower is tunneling her way on to live with 4.21 and will be released sometime after the patch goes out!
Check out these links for more info on League's latest spear throwing, ally bonding champion:

We also have her  release skin Eternum Rek'Sai, which will be priced at 1350 RP.

New Champion Skins

Patch 4.20 includes a total of five new skins, two Blood Moon themed skins and three skins that are ready for winter and the Snowdown!

Blood Moon Elise & Blood Moon Thresh


Winter Wonder Orianna, Snow Day Malzahar, Poro Rider Sejuani


Legend of the Poro King

While it won't be enabled right away, the new Legends of the Poro King featured gameplay mode is also coming in this patch! This new mode pits players on the Howling Abyss against each other with a few twists - players have two unique summoner spells that fling poros and are able to summon the mighty Poro King to assist them in battle!
Check out our PBE coverage for more on the new mode, including a look at all the different poro variations, the unique HUD / loading screen, and more!

New Ward Skins

The poro madness continues with three new wards, each featuring new sounds, animations, and more! The Poro Ward, Astro Poro Ward, and Gentleman Poro ward will be priced at 640 RP each.

Poro Ward 

Astro Poro Ward

Gentleman Poro Ward

A video preview of these three a-poro-ble wards can be found here.

New Summoner Icons

This patch features a slew of new champion icons, including several linked to the new Legends of the Poro King game mode! No specifics on pricing or availability just yet!




More Texture Rebalances

We also have over texture rebalances for five champions and several of their skins! Here's a look at the base updates, as well as list of all the updated skins.

Miscellaneous 

Baron is now ready for winter with his new hat!
The Summoner's Rift update has also received new music in this update! Click here for a listen.

We also have two new login themes, check them out here:

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