Patch 7.20 Notes

Evelynn

Evelynn, Agony’s Embrace, will be updated with the launch of patch 7.20! For more details, check the following links:

• Agony’s Embrace (Champion Teaser)
• Evelynn Reveal
• Evelynn Color Story
• Evelynn Bio
• Evelynn Champion Spotlight

Head to the “Extras” section of Evelynn’s Champion Reveal article above for high-res images of her updated base and skin splash art!

Brand

It’s been a hot second since we’ve seen Brand melting face in mid. Mana efficiency’s one of his more noteworthy problems: High costs keep his bot lane harass in check, but solo Brand can’t avoid paying those costs since he has to clear minion waves. Giving the Burning Vengeance his own form of the Doran’s Ring passive puts a bit more gas in Brand's tank without causing bot lane to combust as a result. This won’t solve all Brand’s problems, but it’s an important step toward adding fuel back to his mid lane fire.

Passive - Blaze

Graves

Graves isn’t getting ahead in the scenarios he should. The Outlaw is constantly being outpaced in the early game and is not able to get his ball rolling enough to dictate the game. With a little bit more health and damage in his rotation, Graves should to be able to clear the jungle without having to have perfect mechanics—and do so a little bit faster, enabling him to scale properly.

Base stats

Q - End of the Line

Karma

One of the keys to mastering Karma is optimising Mantra usage for every situation, and with these changes she’ll be able to do that more often. As long as she’s beating on enemy champions, Karma will have more access to Mantra in the late game.

Passive - Gathering Fire

Ornn

Ornn’s come a long way since his release a few patches back, and while we’re not looking to make massive power shifts today, we do want to address a few things that feel off about the guy. Shifting Bellows Breath from current to max health damage will make finishing off low-health opponents less of a Sisyphean challenge. Additionally, we’re addressing weird cases where Searing Charge narrowly missed terrain despite looking like a solid hit, as well as making Call of the Forge God significantly smoother when Ornn redirects his ram buddy with a good old-fashioned Freljordian kiss.

W - Bellows Breath

E - Searing Charge

R - Call of the Forge God

Tahm Kench

Tahm’s been held back by a few lengthy lockouts on Devour and Abyssal Voyage, preventing him from making quick decisions. Lightening these restrictions will give the River King a much-needed power-up. For good measure, we’re also giving Tahm a more direct buff via the damage on An Acquired Taste, particularly when it comes to how early he can access its maximum damage.

Passive - An Acquired Taste

W - Devour

R - Abyssal Voyage

Azir

Azir’s update seems to have landed well. We’re continuing to keep an eye on how things settle in for the long term, but in the meantime we’ve got improved visuals for Arise!’s new attack speed buff.

General

Taliyah

W - Seismic Shove

Mid-Patch 7.19 Janna Updates

Resurfacing our Janna followup for those who might’ve missed it between patches. Though 7.20 itself isn’t bringing any additional balance changes, we’re still keeping a close eye on her.

If you’re curious as to what prompted the below changes, we put together a boards thread around the time Janna’s first hotfix went out.

Base Stats

Passive - Tailwind

W - Zephyr

E - Eye Of The Storm

Sterak's Gage

Sterak’s Gage is supposed to function as one of the keystone items for juggernauts, alongside Dead Man’s Plate. While DMP helps juggernauts overcome their natural immobility and make it into a teamfight, Sterak’s Gage is the item that lets them stay in that fight. Right now, it’s not really hitting that goal.

One of the biggest weaknesses juggernauts face is their susceptibility to crowd control. Without gap-closers they often spend a whole fight getting kited before they die. We’re tasking the new Sterak’s Gage with solving that problem and shifting some of its power into Tenacity on Lifeline. On top of that, we think Sterak’s Gage could use some raw power, so we’re shoring up its base stats, especially its base attack damage amp.

However, with these changes, we’re going to have to make Sterak’s Gage melee only. With increased damage, it will once again be enticing to marksmen, but they already have enough anti-assassination tools. Adding Sterak’s into the mix would simply be one too many. The other non-juggernaut group worth mentioning is the cadre of Trinity Force fighters—your Camilles, your Jaxes. Trinity Force’s spellblade passive and the freshly-buffed base AD multiplier on Sterak’s make for an attractive combo, but between the lower base AD these champs have and the smaller Lifeline shields they’ll get (less bonus health in their builds), we’re alright letting them experiment for the moment.

Jaurim's Fist

Jaurim’s Fist takes a bit too long to stack up in power. Nothin’ more to see here.

Ancient Coin Line

Ancient Coin’s mana restore is meant to allow supports to use their abilities frequently, provided they’re willing to risk walking into the minion wave to pick up their coins. Odd as it sounds, Coin’s mana restore is so generous it’s disincentivizing supports from taking the intended risks. When blue coins are too potent, supports can afford to miss drops while still having enough mana to stay in lane. Why risk taking damage (let alone death) if you’re not even close to OOM?

In this regard, reducing Coin’s mana restore makes the cost of missing a drop higher, since Coin users will need to more consistently pick up their blue coins to stay in lane. That in turn makes it easier for opponents to force Coin users back to base, whether due to low health (they took damage while grabbing coins) or low mana (they didn’t grab their coins).

Spellthief's Edge

Giving Spellthief’s supports a bit more oomph for their early game aggression. Remember how we just said Coin users will have to walk up to the minion wave more frequently? Go punish them for it.

Note that this isn’t +5 AP to every Spellthief’s item—just Spellthief’s itself.