Surrender at 20: Red Post Collection: 2/29 Patch Update, Cassiopeia MYMU Direction, RP Art, Context on Recent PBE Changes, and more!

[UPDATE: Added in information on the February 29th patch update!]

Today's red post collection includes the 2/29 Patch update, Repertoir on the direction of Cassiopeia's mid year mage update, Meddler on the Talon and Devourer PBE nerfs, a look at RP art, and more!

Continue reading for more information!

"He has returned"

February 29th Patch Update

The official 6.4 patch notes have been updated to reflect a hotfix that went out on February 29th with bug fixes for Aatrox, Karma, and Rengar!

"2/29/2016

Aatrox

HIGH-FIVE, PANTHEON - Fixed a bug with Q - Dark Flight where Aatrox's character model could visually jump off the screen, allowing Aatrox to move and attack while "invisible" until his model landed

Karma

OVERLY DEFIANT - Karma's Mantra'd E - Defiance shield no longer refuses to break under certain circumstances

Rengar

CATNIP - Fixed an interaction that bugged out some of Rengar's abilities, allowing him to cast them without triggering their cooldowns"

Mid Year Mage Updates - Cassiopeia Direction

Following up on the Brand, Malzhar, and Vel'Koz discussions, Repertoir has posted on Cassiopeia's direction for the future Mid Year Mage Update.

"Hi all,

It's time for the post where we talk about the direction we want to take Cassiopeia. Now that we've done a few of these, you probably know what to expect from this, but in case you've missed those ones, I'll reiterate. This will not be an exhaustive list of the exact mechanics changes or numerical changes you can expect to see in the update, as that is all still pending. Instead, I hope this informs interested parties in the kinds of things they can expect to see.

When it came to deciding which mages we wanted to update with this group, we knew we wanted to get to Cassiopeia, but we actually had a pretty hard time trying to determine what exactly we wanted to accomplish on her. As I've mentioned previously, there isn't a prescriptive formula we can apply to all these various mages to ultimately achieve the best results for each of them, but here's what we're thinking for Cass.

A lot of players have asked for "Poison Mage" when talking about Cassiopeia. This updatedoes not intend to make Cassiopeia a "Poison Mage," at least not in a way that some players seem to desire (or fear, depending on your stance). To truly make her a "Poison Mage" would require large alterations to the champion that may achieve that feeling, but that we ultimately thought would no longer be Cassiopeia. That said, Cassiopeia is a mage that utilizes poisons, and it currently feels like there is not enough power allocated to these parts of her kit, so we'd like to redistribute some power in the kit off of Twin Fang and Aspect of the Serpent, and into other areas. If you don't like Cassiopeia because you expected a "Poison Mage" out of her and didn't get one, then you may not still like her following these changes. If you don't like Cassiopeia because the way Twin Fang works makes her feel one-dimensional, then hopefully this will appeal to you. At the end of the day, we do think Twin Fang is important to the identity of Cassiopeia, but the power budget that has been allocated to it is a bit out of whack.

Let's get into some expectations. Feel free to drop some questions/comments below if anything is unclear. This isn't a heavily wordsmithed post, so there's likely some stuff I don't say correctly the first time.

Here's some stuff we're happy with about Cassiopeia and are unlikely to change:

Despite facing gameplay not being perfect, Petrifying Gaze provides some really cool high moments.

Twin Fang as a high cadence spell.

Twin Fang's power being unlocked by Poisons.

Cassiopeia feels swift and deadly.

Here's some stuff we're less happy with and are actively trying to resolve:

Aspect of the Serpent forces a carry curve in an unnatural, somewhat feel-bad way.

Poisoning should be more about harming/disabling enemies than empowering Cassiopeia.

The amount of power allocated to Twin Fang makes Cassiopeia feel one dimensional.

Noxious Blast and Miasma's targeting types can result in lame "place your circles here" gameplay.

Miasma's output (damage/slow) isn't very interesting and doesn't feel particularly "poison-y."

Here's what I hope (these designs are still in progress) will be true of Cassiopeia following her changes:

Cassiopeia will still feel like Cassiopeia and not "brand new LoL Poison Mage." Tweaks here and there, but still Cassiopeia.

Cassiopeia's poison spells will feel like they stand alone rather than feeling like slaves to Twin Fang.

Cassiopeia will still be pretty heavy on the inputs side of things, namely frequency.

Avoiding getting poisoned will still feel like one of the main things you're thinking about when playing against Cassiopeia.

Poisons will feel less like generic DoTs.

Cassiopeia still feels like a medium-short range mage.

That's about all I've got for now. Again, if anything is unclear, or if you have further questions, ask it below.

Cheers,
Repertoir"

Following the post, Repertoir hung around the comment section to answer questions and reply to feedback:

He continued:

"Quote:

I love twin fangs! I understand moving power around in the kit but I really hope it doesn't feel too weak in the update. I love spammy champs like that, and I personally really enjoy the way her burst power is gated behind having to land q or w.
Imagine that Twin Fang does 65% of Cassiopeia's damage at the moment, with 35% elsewhere (making these up). We're probably looking at pulling things closer to 50/50. I think a good sweet spot would be if felt like it was still going in for to really amp up the damage, but that you weren't completely zoned from effectiveness if you couldn't."

As for how punishing it currently feels to miss a spell on Cassiopeia, he noted:

"Quote:

One issue I have with cassio is how punishing it feels to miss a single spell. I like her overall difficulty, but being stuck doing nothing because you missed Q once is frustrating. Will that be addressed at all?
Yep! I forgot to mention this above, but this is something I'm looking at giving some attention to."

On her poison strength, he commented

"Quote:

I was thinking she should have a STRONg poison.
Like the kind that might kill you at half health late-game.
I'm not sure exactly what it should look like, but I do agree her poison damage should feel powerful."

As for these changes in the context of her last rework, he noted:

"Quote:

The irony here is that after all the changes you've given her in the past she doesn't really feel like Cassiopeia to her fans now anyway.
Hoping to address some of that by giving her a little more of her past feeling."

he continued:

"Quote:

When I think of Cassiopeia, I think of the Medusa that is wittling you down, denying you areas to go to, and has the expected high-moment of stopping you in your tracks for trying to face her.

I don't think of someone fishing for a poison tag, to then throw some random, snake-themed projectiles at me whose only counterplay is literally "don't get hit by anything else first".
That's totally understandable. However, this is all contingent upon your expectation that Cassiopeia be more like a Medusa. I agree that Medusa and Twin Fang spam don't necessarily go hand-in-hand, and that if we were to create Cassiopeia from scratch today, Twin Fang might not be part of the equation. That said, we're trying to refine a character that utilizes her existing sources of power, one of which is Twin Fang, into something that is more balanced (thematically speaking, not power). Twin Fang has undeniably always been one of Cassiopeia's threats, so we don't want to get rid of that. We want to balance things out so that it's not playing such a disproportionately high role in that power distribution.

Kinda funny how you want to talk about "alienating players" when reworks and updates in the past had no qualms about completely changing a character.
Not sure there's a point to a comment like this, as I'm sure the desired outcome isn't that we should just change characters without regard to identity."

For more on the Mid Year Mage Update, check out these links:

Context on Talon PBE R Nerfs

When asked about the 2/27 PBE Talon R nerfs, Meddler explained:

"There are a couple of things behind that Talon nerf:

We believe assassins are healthiest when a proportion of their burst's gated behind a long CD, particularly if they've got a really reliable kill pattern. By nature of their high target selection and burst assassins tend to have lower tactical counterplay than most other classes, so giving their opponents a window to play with where they're noticeably weaker's important. Talon's certainly not the only assassin with that issue either.

We do think Talon is too strong however. He's been on the strong side in solo queue for a really long period of time. We've held off on nerfing him in the past though since his play rate hasn't been that high so he hasn't been an urgent issue. At this point though he's been too strong for long enough we feel it's the appropriate time to act, hence the above nerf aimed at making him a bit healthier as well as cutting a bit of power.

Long term we do want to do some more substantial work on Talon. In particular if we do an assassin class update at some point he'd be one of the most likely candidates for moderate sized changes, given he's got a theme with a lot of potential but a kit that does really standard stuff."

Context on PBE Devourer Nerf

Meddler also shared context on the tentative Enchantment: Devourer nerfs introduced in the 2/27 PBE update, including lowering the base damage and increasing the stacks to transform:

"We're nerfing Devourer because we believe Devourer itself is a problem. It's intended to be a mid game power spike that at present is coming online too quickly and contributing a bit much before it's sated. As a result we're both making it a bit harder to stack and reducing its power when not sated. While Devourer itself hasn't been changed recently players have got significantly better at optimizing collection of stacks, those from Scuttle/Dragon/Rift Herald in particular. We did look at whether we should reduce the number of stacks those monsters granted. We felt strongly though that pulling Devourer junglers into more contested objectives was really valuable though, as a way to offset the low interaction PVE play that farming junglers engage in.

Longer term I suspect we may end up making heavier modifications to Devourer too sometime this season. It does some cool things, but the play patterns it promotes and some of the power spikes it creates have been costly to the game at times. It's also an approach that can be extremely dominant in low level play without being functional at all in top tier play.

As to the principle of least disruption, certainly, that's a great one to consider. Do need to be careful not to fall into the trap of addressing symptoms rather than causes though, sometimes bigger systemic changes are needed."

More Sejuani Changes to PBE soon

In a reddit thread lamenting the revert of a tentative PBE change that let Sejuani use her E on enemies slowed by allies, Riot Asyrite noted he'll have a few more Sejuani changes on the PBE soon!

"Have some changes in tomorrow to address some of her power concerns. Not going overboard since she's a bit of a fickle lady, but generally focused around her early game since her mid-late game is actually pretty in line :)."

Jaredan on Mount Targon

With the new Mount Targon site up and the "He has returned" teaser circulating, Jaredan popped on the boards to comment on the idea of an "event" for the region in the same vein as the massive Bilgewater event last year.

"I wouldn't classify anything coming up soon as 'The Mount Targon Event,' if you have i mind things like Burning Tides last year as what qualifies for an event. There's some cool Targon-related stuff, as I hope you've enjoyed so far, but it's not what we would express as being an 'event.'

I've asked for some alignment and communication around what 'events' are to help clarify things for players. Keep an eye out for that."

When asked for more details, he noted:

"Quote:

Thanks for clearing that up, I said "event" just to generally categorize everything because I wasn't sure if it was supposed to be strictly lore, or if it would be similar to Burning tides, or other such things.

I assume you're not willing, or allowed, to share the estimated time of the release for the "event" (for lack of a better word), but when is Aurelion sol being released? haha just kidding, just kidding. But seriously, any input on if it is purely a lore and art update or "more"?

Sorry, yeah, you're right, I can't give any info on timing, just that some cool stuff is on its way.

Click here for more on the recent Mount Targon developments.

Meddler Grab Bag

Next up we have a grab bag of posts from Meddler!

When asked about his thoughts on Fiddlesticks, Amumu, Olaf, and Fizz passives, Meddler shared:

"Fiddle we'll likely get to at some point, it doesn't add much at all to his gameplay or enable any interesting or healthy plays.

Amumu's is also ripe ground for improvement, though it does have a bit of gameplay to it in its favour (work AA's into your play against targets, particularly those your team will focus).

Olaf's passive's great design I'd argue, creates a really interesting tension for both him and his opponents and has some cool item choice implications.

Fizz's passive isn't inspiring, it does quite a lot to help him function in lane though. Can imagine some possible improvements, wouldn't see it as as clear a win as replacing Fiddle's passive for example though."

Meddler also commented briefly on Ahri and Lux:

"We'll probably take a look at Ahri once the charm nerf's had a patch's worth of time to settle. Overall power impact's probably not that high, it's a change we believe appropriate regardless of her power level though so we wanted to put that out first and then assess what else to do with it in place.

Lux I suspect we'll also act on soon, I haven't talked to the Live Gameplay team (group that handles balance for champions/items once they've been in the game for more than a few patches) about her in detail recently though, so not 100% certain as to their thinking as to how out of line she is/isn't and what the appropriate things to nerf might be."

As for his thoughts on Zz'Rot portal and AP assassin itemization, Meddlercommented:

"Gut reaction is that AP itemization's less in need of assassin specific options than AD itemization. The system team (group responsible for most new item creation/item reworks) is doing a bit of work on AP items at the moment, from memory none of it's specifically assassin focused though.

It's good to see Zz'rot being used. Suspect its stats may look a bit overtuned once it's being used appropriately consistently, that's very much just a personal feeling though. One thing that's particularly interesting about it is that it's an item that's being used pretty different in pro play in different regions, with some regional metas favoring it extremely heavily and others not using it much at all. Different regions have different tendencies all the time of course, this is one of the stronger examples of that we've seen in a while though."

When asked about Aatrox and Rengar to be re-enabled following bugs in 6.4, Meddler noted:

"We've got fixes in testing at the moment. Looking good so far, need to make sure there aren't any unintended side effects though. Weekend's slowed things down a bit timeline wise (still got people working, just not as many as on a weekday)."

JPN Server Open Beta Starting

The official Japanese server open beta has started! Check out this post for details.

Art used for the announcement from komech24!

Between Two Turrets - Come chat with WookieeCookie!

WookieeCookie, of the player support team, is also hosting a discussion thread over on the boards!

"Welcome to the latest installment of Between Two Turrets, a Q&A series through which we connect you with various Rioters to chat about League, life, and anything in between. You can expect an installment every two weeks or so, with Rioters from all over jumping in to spend some time with you on the Boards.

This week, we’ve got Player Support Lead Rory “WookieeCookie” Ball!

Heyo!

I’m Rory, but a lot of you probably know me as WookieeCookie. I’m a Player Support Lead for the NA region. I’ve been at Riot since 2011 where I started in Player Support, and it's been nothing but positive since. Over the years I’ve worn many hats including supporting our tech, player behavior, and forum initiatives.

Before coming to Riot I worked at Disney providing support and moderation for their virtual worlds. If you ever played ToonTown Online, Pirates of the Caribbean or (my personal favorite) Pixie Hollow Online then hopefully you never had the misfortune of running into me, because that means I probably banned you. RIP

But don’t let that give you the wrong impression! I’m not all smites and ban hammers, in fact that is probably the least favorite part of my job. My passion is helping people, whether that’s getting past a technical issue blocking their loading screen or helping someone adjust their own behaviors in game to move past ever having to worry about a ban. I just want to see people enjoy their time in League.

So with all that aside, what do you want to know?"

Will Draw For Riot Points: A Celebration of RP Art

Last up we have a Riot feature on the tradition of players writing into Riot Support with "RP Art" in hopes of obtaining a small chunk of RP!

"Years ago, League of Legends players started the tradition of sending Riot Games Player Support drawings of champions, hoping for the one-time gift of a little RP. We call it “RP Art,” and today we’re opening the vault.

To check out a gallery of some our favorites and create art of your own, visit http://RPArt.RiotGames.com

To read more about the history of RP Art, go to http://www.riotgames.com/will-draw-rp..."

As mentioned in the video description, [CLICK HERE] to visit a gallery of the "RP ART" drawings!

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Red Post Collection: 2/29 Patch Update, Cassiopeia MYMU Direction, RP Art, Context on Recent PBE Changes, and more!

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