6.5 Patch Notes

Azir

General

W - Arise!

Gnar

Simply put - Gnar's underperforming in the top lane, specifically in the early stages of the lane. That in itself isn't a problem - Gnar's a champion of highs and lows (on account of his rapidly oscillating 'Mega' and 'Mini' forms), so a little bit of variance isn't out of the question. What's actually worrying is that Gnar's underperforming when the majority of his opposing top laners are the very tanks he's intended to bully. Gnar's always been an important 'release-valve' pick teams can fall on when tanks get out of line, so we're tossing him the same attack damage adjustment we gave marksmen back in Preseason to help him curve smoothly into the adorable little predator he was born to be.

General

Passive - Rage Gene

R - GNAR!

Hecarim

Though it hasn’t been that long since Hecarim’s era of dominance in the toplane, our little pony is struggling to be relevant after his last few rounds in the patch notes. Specifically, many of the recent changes Hecarim received were to limit the abuse cases of an early Homeguard purchase - something that’s no longer possible after preseason. A happy Hecarim is one that’s blissfully trampling the enemy’s ranks, so we’re peeling back some of our previous changes and supporting Hec’s effectiveness when pulling off his signature flanking maneuvers.

E - Devastating Charge

Jarvan IV

At the height of his power, Jarvan excelled at everything. He could snowball games early, and yet scale hard into the late game. He brought burst damage, initiation, peel, tankiness… you get the point. We’re in no hurry to return players to the terror of his glory days, but right now Jarvan players don’t really feel good about doing, well, anything. We’re sharpening Jarvan’s identity as a top-notch teamfighter by giving him the tools to perform better when more enemies are around. Jarvan won’t feel much different in 1-on-1 situations, but he’ll feel more impactful when he wades into the thick of things, fighting harder for Demacia the more enemies - or allies - are around.

W - Golden Aegis

R - Cataclysm

Kog'Maw

Before we talk 6.5, let’s talk about how we got here.

Kog’Maw’s identity is one of the clearest we have in league - a baby voidling that if sheltered and protected, grows into a hyper-carrying win condition all his own. Historically this has been done through balancing his laning phase to a state where it’s nearly impossible to withstand aggression, given that the rewards for succeeding were that you’d have an extremely powerful Kog’Maw on your team. Cut to the Marksman Update for Preseason, and now Kog has an additionaltradeoff for his power - specifically ‘can you engineer a fight such that he can stand still and obliterate everything in sight’. Granted, the tradeoffs between high damage and mobility isn’t actually ordinary for a Marksman - they usually kite and fight simultaneously. Understandably, the early days of Kog’Maw’s update were a rough learning time for us all. We had a glass cannon that was all glass and no cannon.

So we thought, ‘If he’s not performing, let’s give him some love in a way that boosts his laning phase!’ That was 6.3. Terror ensued.

Back in the present, we’re looking to make a sustainable Kog’Maw for the long-term, free from the binary teeter-totter of ‘really strong or really weak’ that hypercarries tend to fall into. The changelist below represents a shift in thinking about Kog’s power curve - he’ll still scale incredibly with items, but that curve is now more even across the game (rather than spiking at any one particular point). Smoothing this curve means that Kog’s lane can be in a state that’s relatively normal compared to his peers, but the ‘race against the clock’ should feel less harsh for those that fall behind. Kog’Maw may always be the posterchild for what the term ‘hyper-carry’ means in League of Legends, but the hope is for that term to extend beyond just ‘bad lane, great late game’ and into meaningful interactions between the champions and their environments.

General

Q - Caustic Spittle

W - Bio-Arcane Barrage

Nautilus

If you remember our Malphite changes from 6.4 this one’s going to sound familiar. Top lane’s a tank-friendly place these days, and Nautilus has resurfaced as the anchor-wielding lane-bully of choice. Given Naut’s level of reliability as an initiator and overall teamfight nuisance, we’re cutting down on his damage output and (literal) wave-clear in lane to give opponents a shot at getting ahead.

E - Riptide

Pantheon

While Pantheon’s always had ‘these numbers don’t even look real’ levels of damage, it wasn’t until the changes to Aegis Protection’s block mechanic in 5.22 that he started really taking off. We’re digging how those changes have made Pantheon more flexible in top and jungle, but his damage output is simply too high for that level of consistency. Heartseeker Strike’s important to give Pantheon something to do in fights that isn’t just stun + spear, but its current power level makes him nearly impossible to fight solo. Pulling back Heartseeker’s damage and cleaning up how generous Grand Skyfall is when fishing for engages should combine to make Pantheon’s risk in line with his incredible rewards.

E - Heartseeker Strike

R - Grand Skyfall

Quinn

While Blinding Assault doesn't truly blind anymore, there was a nasty bug that would make key abilities like Udyr's E- Bear Stance or Twisted Fate's W - Pick-A-Card miss while nearsighted. That's pretty frustrating, and also just not how the ability is meant to work. Fixed!

Q - Blinding Assault

Renekton

Once heralded as the preeminent lane bully, Renekton’s struggled to keep up with the top tops as the seasons progress. When we last saw Renekton’s reign of anger, teams were picking him as the one champion that could reliability ‘do it all’, giving equal parts damage, defense and crowd-control to anyone that needed it. Not wanting to reinstate Renekton as the go-to top lane generalist, we’re looking at his ability to secure advantages via skirmishes and laning prowess to really drive home his identity as the early-game croc on the block.

E - Slice and Dice

R - Dominus

Shen

Shen's still a little too subtle when letting his allies know he's coming to save them in the heat of battle, even for a ninja. Clarity!

R - Stand United

Sejuani

Sejuani hasn’t been feeling like her teamfight-dominating self ever since Cinderhulk’s rise to prominence last season. Given how she’s fallen behind her beefy initiator brethren (like Amumu or Gragas), we’re boosting Sej’s performance in the earlier stages to bring her scrapping back up to a level befitting the barbarian queen.

W - Flail of the Northern Winds

E - Permafrost

R - Glacial Prison

Soraka

Though Soraka isn't overperforming like she was at the beginning of preseason, she's still seeing too much success hanging back and passively heal-botting her marksman. Without windows of interaction with Soraka, opponents don’t have much choice other than to try and focus down her lane partner, which is the exact scenario Soraka is built to counter. Starcall is supposed to create these windows of interaction via its shorter range, but its payoff isn’t exciting enough to justify its risks given how much general strength Soraka gained from preseason.

The below changes have a lot of moving parts, but the gist is that Astral Infusion is now far less effective at undoing enemy aggression unless Soraka’s backing it up with frequent Starcalls. Starcall itself has been played up as a kiting tool to make it satisfying for Soraka on its own merits, and not just a prerequisite for impactful healing. Put together, Soraka should now be more accessible to her opponents, but in a way she can feel good about.

Q - Starcall

W - Astral Infusion

Talon

Talon’s one of the most unstoppable champions when running with a lead. While some assassins might effortlessly pick off single targets in the backline, snowballing Talons kill that single target… and just about everyone else in the fight. We’re not taking away Talon’s blades (he’s very attached to them), but increasing the windows between his ‘outbursts’ so his victims can catch their breath between respawns.

R - Shadow Assault

Urgot

Piloting Urgot successfully is a lot harder than it looks, often forcing you to make tough decisions around positioning. Do you wait to reverse yourself out of harm’s way, or do you isolate a key target and put yourself at massive risk? We don’t want to remove the weight of this decision, but adding some fear-inducing spice to his Hyper-Kinetic Position-Reversing ways should help the ability feel more ‘ultimate’ when you successfully pull off the big plays. Add in some light numbers tuning and you’ve got an Urgot that’s a little cleaner, a little fresher, but still terrifying in every way you’d expect a machine-man hybrid to be.

General

W - Terror Capacitor

R - Hyper-Kinetic Position Reverser

Vi

Picked for her ability to reliably dive priority targets, Vi’s been reliably warming the bench more often than not in 2016. Vi’s ganks have always been high-impact thanks to Vault Breaker + Assault and Battery, but it’s when she fails to convert those ganks into kills and objectives that the Piltover Enforcer finds herself in huge trouble. Compared to her peers, Vi can get out-paced pretty quickly - ‘high cooldowns and high mana costs’ don’t exactly combine for the fastest clear-speed. Pumping power into Excessive Force’s usability and output mean that Vi’s more comfortable when she’s forced to take a time-out and farm if the game isn’t going her way.

E - Excessive Force

Enchantment: Devourer

It’s that time of year again, when auto-attackers rampage through the jungle, farming until the 20-minute mark and coming out stronger than the rest of their team. When we first released Devourer, we gave devourer junglers extra stacks for two types of monsters. Contested objectives - like Red Buff, Blue Buff, and Scuttle Crab - became worth two stacks, while team objectives like Dragon and Baron yielded five stacks. When we added Rift Herald to the game, we tagged it as an epic monster. Rift Herald, while contested, has not consistently drawn team pressure, and as such we’re aligning its stack reward with other contested objectives.

In addition, Devourer junglers were merely trading Dragon for Rift Herald, or vice versa, giving opposing teams no clear plan for shutting them down. With this change, Devourer junglers will still be able to stack up, but their opponents will feel better about denying them dragons.

Guardian Angel

Guardian Angel’s effect is a game-changer in the right circumstances, but its incredibly high price tag makes it hard to feel confident you’ve made the right choice. It’s expensive for good reason, too - when GA is the go-to defensive item, the game state becomes one where almostevery champion buys it after a lead, making it next to impossible for gold-starved opponents to break through all those extra lives. That said, squishy champions (primarily marksmen) have been feeling the pressures of being annihilated by assassins and spell-combos lately, so we’re making Guardian Angel more efficient when it’s the right call.