Surrender at 20: Red Post Collection: Patch 11.14 & TFT Notes, Quick Gameplay Thoughts 7/9, /Dev: Tackling Queue Dodging & More

Today's red post collection includes the Patch 11.14 & TFT notes, a new QGT from Captain Gameplay on upcoming Sona changes, a /dev on queue dodging from BarackProbama, a look at the Reckoning Pass II, and lots more!

Continue reading for more information!

7/9 PBE Update: TFT Reckoning: Dawn of Heroes Testing & Loot Assets

Patch 11.14 Notes

The Patch 11.14 notes are now available! Head over to check out all the details:

"Oh. Hello.

This patch, we’re flipping over to focusing on champions. Past the usual balancing, we’ve given adjustments to four friends: a follow-up buff to a catfish, a sweeping pass to solve some persistent issues with a dancer, a helping hand for a purple doctor in the jungle, and a boost to a fawn's solo combat. Then, we're also bringing down the power in Stridebreaker's slow, and giving some love to its favorite buyers (Darius and Garen) to compensate.

And with Sentinels of Light comes a new event game mode, Ultimate Spellbook! Channel your inner Sylas and be prepared for an ult-erly good time.

We’ll see ya in the next one.

Take this portal to the TFT patch notes to check out the last patch before our Mid-Set, Reckoning: Dawn of Heroes!

TRICIA "MOM CAT" TAN
HANNA "SHIO SHOUJO" WOO"

[Full Patch Notes here!]

Teamfight Tactics Patch 11.14 Notes

The TFT Patch 11.14 notes are now available! Check out the full patch notes here:

"Welcome Shadow Item Connoisseurs,

It’s the last patch of the first half of Reckoning and we’re tidying things up before our Mid-Set, Dawn of Heroes. Be sure to get your rank up to Gold (or higher) this patch to earn the Set’s exclusive ranked emote before Dawn of Heroes brings a soft rank reset in Patch 11.15. And once you’re done doing that, you can stop sitting in the dark while listening to Radiohead and read about all the bright, new, and heroic changes in the Mid-Set Mechanic reveal! As for here, I’m not leaving you high and dry—check out the balance changes below so there are no surprises on your final grind!

RODGER "MINIONSRPEOPLE2" CAUDILL"

Quick Gameplay Thoughts 9/7

Here's Captain Gameplay with this weeks quick gameplay thoughts - "We're targeting patch 11.16 for a mid-scope Sona update."

"Hi, Captain Gameplay here with an update on upcoming Sona work. If you might recall, Sona was briefly meta as a top laner who took the support item and just harassed and roamed, without really trying to even last hit. While we generally like alternative play styles (ex. camp clearing buffs to allow more champs to jungle, adding more ratios for champs to scale with alternate builds), this playstyle violated a core laning skill test—in lane, someone should be attempting to farm minions and contesting that should be valuable for the opponent. In addition, this strategy was particularly feels-bad, since top laners got endlessly harassed by long ranged attacks and auto-targeted spells.

Last year we made some changes to Sona in order to give us a way to address solo lane Sona without hitting from Bot/Support Sona. We added a mana refund that tied her to sharing auras with allies, and increased her mana costs. Functional, but not very fun: Sona loves to cast lots of spells, and her auras are actually a small amount of the mindshare of each one. Preventing her from casting spells (by running her out of mana) unless she played around an effect she often didn't think about made for a less fun version of Sona.

Well we are now re-visiting Sona to replace this mana refund mechanic with something that Sona players will be more excited about. In place of high mana costs and a mana refund, we are replacing Sona's Ultimate cooldown passive with a stacking mechanic that rewards her for using Q and W in a way that matches the mindshare of those spells. A positive incentive rather than a negative one that doesn't punish her by preventing her from casting future spells will make for a generally more enjoyable experience.

Now, when Sona damages enemy champions with Q - Hymn of Valor or uses W - Aria of Perseverance to heal an injured ally or protect them from damage with the shield (the full base value; a tiny bit of ambient damage won't count), she will permanently gain a stack of Accelerando, granting ability haste for her basic abilities (up to a cap). Striking two different champions with Q will grant two stacks, and W can grant up to 5 stacks if it heals an ally and blocks damage on all four allies. This new passive rewards Sona for using Q and W well in a duo lane, rather than penalizing her like the mana refund did.

After Sona reaches the cap for Accelerando, subsequent stacks will instead refund a bit of R - Crescendo's cooldown. We chose ultimate cooldown refund as a reward here to encourage very exciting, aggressive Crescendo plays.

Sona is currently planned for patch 11.16, which ships next month!"

/dev: Tackling Queue Dodging

Here's a new /dev blog from BarackProbama on queue dodging - "Why dodging is a problem for League, and what we're doing about it."

"Hey all, BarackProbama here to talk some more about a very chill and cool topic that no one ever has opinions on: Champion Select dodging and penalties. When we previously discussed our plans for dodge penalty escalation, we saw some pretty strong reactions. The changes start going live starting in patch 11.15, so we wanted to talk more about the philosophy and data behind the problems we're trying to solve.

We mentioned before why dodging is bad for League: When a player dodges, the matchmaker has to throw everyone back into queue and form new teams out of the remaining players. This can be a headache at all levels of play, but is especially bad in places with a low player population, like the top of the ladder. Already-long queue times get even worse and match quality goes down because the matchmaker has to pull from a wider skill range to fill open positions. Dodging gets everyone into matches more slowly, and the matches are worse.

Beyond lower quality matches, we also believe that intentionally dodging ranked games to guarantee favorable circumstances reduces the competitive integrity of League. We expect players to try their hardest in all situations, even those that are uphill battles from the start.

For example, strategically banning champions is a core mechanic in ranked. It’s a part of what makes League dynamic and interesting, and creates a tradeoff risk to one-tricking. Playing around bans is a key component to being skilled in the game, and dodging whenever your main gets banned removes the need to get better by learning how to win on multiple champs. That's another reason we're working to curtail this behavior.

Of course, there are real cases like emergencies or disconnects that warrant not playing a game you’ve started. That's why the first punishment tier is light, so that occasional dodging for legitimate reasons isn't overly penalized. But the spike in dodges at high MMR tells us that this isn't what's occurring in most of those cases.

Dodging Data

Let's look at that high MMR data.

The first and most salient thing we look at are the number of games that don't start. At high levels of ranked play (Diamond I+) for the past few months, ~33% of champ selects end in a dodge. Not cool.

Champ Select Failure Rates in high MMR

The good news is that only a minority of highly ranked players are truly abusing the system. Only ~%1.6 of highly ranked players are dodging 3+ times per day. This is the primary behavior we're targeting.

Dodge Rates in High MMR

Which leads to an average increase of 40% in the time it takes to get into a game at this level.

Obviously this isn’t a great state of affairs, which leads us to…

What We're Doing About It

As a refresher from last time, we're adding a new dodge penalty tier to curb those 1% of players who dodge 3+ times a day. One dodge will move a player up a tier (or three failed ready checks—this has been true for years but we haven't talked this deeply about dodging before so it's not common knowledge). We also want to acknowledge that this doesn't address some of the other root causes of dodging; more on efforts to tackle those in a bit.

Since last time, we also heard feedback that this new tier should be added to ARAM. Here's what ARAM's penalty tiers will look like:

We're also changing the reset strategy we use. Previously, we completely reset dodge tiers 24 hours after the last recorded dodge. This'll change to reduce dodge tiers by one every 12 hours, making daily consecutive dodgers face these restrictions sooner and helping legitimate dodgers recover faster.

Another change we’re making is only apply these restrictions to League of Legends MOBA modes (Summoner’s Rift, ARAM, event game modes) which means that TFT will be unaffected. Since players can't disrupt TFT games by dodging (there's no champ select), there's no harm for queue lockouts to protect the community from.

We’re going to be rolling this out carefully over the next few patches to ensure that it has the effects we want: Higher match quality and lower queue times, especially at high ranks. These changes will go into effect without warning in order to best measure their effects. Consider this post as notification that they may activate at any time.

Future Work

One critique some players had when we announced the new penalty tiers above is that they only impact LP, which can be recovered fairly easily. In the future, we plan to evaluate additional punishments that will stick with a dodger for longer than a one-time LP penalty.

As mentioned earlier, we understand that we also need to attack the root causes of dodging. Here's a snapshot of some of what we're looking into:

Adding New Punishments to Champ Select Reporting - This will be a way for players to report someone who is intentionally planning to ruin the game from champ select and have that player bear the consequences of their behavior.

Autofill/Secondary Role Parity - We’re investigating targeted enhancements to matchmaking that will prioritize both teams having the same roles autofilled, not just the same number of players. This is an improvement that didn't make it into last year's general matchmaking updates, but with the added urgency around the dodging issue, we're reprioritizing it now.

Whew! That was a lot. Thanks for sticking with me and see you on The Rift!"

Teamfight Tactics: Reckoning II Gameplay Overview

TFT Reckoning: Dawn of Heroes is heading to live in patch 11.15! Here's a gameplay overview - "The Dawn of Heroes brings light to the battlefield with new champions, and traits!"

"Introduction

Pengu and friends have been fighting the Black Mist for half a Set now. Or almost half a Set. Regardless, I’m sure their fight has been a real pane in the Skyglass. But it’s paid off, because the Dawn of Heroes is right around the corner, as long as Patch 11.15 is behind that same corner. For now, it’s time to go over the new Champions (yes, that includes Akshan) and Traits hitting the Convergence. If you're looking for info on the new mechanic, I hear the writer of that one is rather funny and good looking. For now, let's see who's hanging up their adventuring hats and who is gearing up to join your party in Reckoning: Dawn of Heroes. Onwards!

Retreating into the Shadows

With the forces of Order shining a new light across the Convergence spelling big changes for our Mid-Set mechanic, our Champion rotation is smaller in scope than Fates: Festival of the Beasts. That being said, a beacon of light and call to adventure brings new Champions, and including the big Vertical Trait, Sentinel, joining our roster. To make room for all these heroics, we’re swapping out a few shady characters and minor traits.

Forget about some Forgotten - With the powers of the Black Mist ebbing, Forgotten Champions now gain their stacking bonuses after each victorious combat they participate in. Forgotten is also dropping down to a 2/4/6/8 Vertical. Go ahead and forget about the following:

Warwick

Viktor

Katarina

Dragonslayers slayed - While the Dragonslayer trait will be leaving, Diana will stick around. Diana will retire from her Dragonslayer career, yet continue to slay anything but Dragons (Draconic champs and pets are still fair game). Say goodbye to:

Trundle

Pantheon

Mordekaiser

The Coven has crumbled - No witchcraft can reconjure these sorcerers:

Lissandra

LeBlanc

Morgana

Rearranging Rangers - There’s a new Ranger ready for action, which means we need to make some room, so give a good spirited farewell to:

Kindred

Fiddeling with Abomination - Let’s see who drew the short end of the Stick:

Ryze

The Verdant Wilt - Ashe and Kayle will be sticking around without their third trait, but you can say good Knight to your sweet prince:

Taric

The Fall of a God-king - There is only one true God-King. And that one is not the loser:

Darius

New to the Adventure

With many dear frenemies departing we’re reloading the roster with new and mostly heroic Champions for Pengu and friends to drag in and out of Portals. In total, we’re adding 12 new champions and two new traits (excluding unique 5-cost traits).

Cannoneer (2/4/6) - Locked and loaded, every fifth shot, Cannonnear Champions deal a percent of that attack's damage in an explosion around the target as physical damage. Here’s who’s packing the heat:

Senna: Tier 1 Sentinel

Tristana: Tier 2 Hellion

Miss Fortune: Tier 3 Forgotten

Lucian: Tier 4 Sentinel

We heard you missed Fortune, but we already have Miss Fortune at home, and just like Fortune in Fates, she’s going to Make It Rain. Run Cannoneer as a splash in your Sentinel comp (more below), or dive deeper down the barrel running 4 Cannoneer with frontline that can amplify your Miss Fortune through Forgotten (Hecarim, Thresh) and hit 3 Sentinel (Irelia, Pyke, Rakan). Most of these units are 2 and 3 costs, allowing you to focus on rerolling as opposed to the standard curve in the big vertical, Sentinel.

Sentinel (3/6/9) - At start of combat, the Sentinel with the highest Health gains a shield that grants Attack Speed each time it is applied. When the shield is destroyed or expires it will pass to the ally with the lowest percent Health. The shield Health and the Attack Speed get bigger with more Sentinels.

Olaf: Tier 1 Skirmisher

Senna: Tier 1 Cannoneer

Irelia: Tier 2 Legionnaire, Skirmisher

Pyke: Tier 2 Assassin

Rakan: Tier 3 Renewer

Galio: Tier 4 Draconic, Knight

Lucian: Tier 4 Cannoneer

Akshan: Tier 5 Ranger

The Sentinels have mostly been pulled from the vanilla Runeterra canon, where with the help of Akshan, they’re poised to strike back against Viego and their own Black Mist dilemma. But on the Convergence, it's the Little Legends with all the power, and my Molediver doesn't care about the Sentinels beyond using them to take first! In fact, you can be sure to see me run Viego in my Sentinel comp to activate those sweet Skirmisher and Assassin bonuses. And just to add insult to injury for those Runeterran nerds (that’s me btw), I’ll slam a Sentinel Emblem on my Viego.

As a big vertical trait, the Sentinel comp gives carry options with Akshan and Lucian a bit late in the game, so keep an extra Cannoneer, or Skirmisher around to hold items for the two. And if you can make it to level 9, do try the anti-lore Viego addition.

The Stuff of Legends: New Tier 5 Champions

Gwen: Tier 5 Inanimate, Mystic

Ability - Weaving her way through battle, Gwen dashes behind her target and performs 2 rapid snips in a cone in front of her, dealing magic damage, while healing for a portion of the damage dealt. If only one enemy is hit, Gwen will increase the number of snips by 1 for the remainder of combat.

Inanimate - At the start of combat, Inanimate champions summon Hallowed Mist in the 1 hex surrounding them for a few seconds, granting all allies within damage reduction from enemies outside of the mist.

Tailoring your Comp - Use Gwen if you come up against heavy magic damage to add Mystics to your composition. Gwen’s passive trait, Inanimate, allows you to protect most of your team at the start of each round. This makes Gwen fit seamlessly into Skirmisher comps due to their high number of melee carries that can stack with Gwen on the frontline.

The Final Thread - Because Gwen’s ability heals from a percentage of the damage it does, she’s better equipped with resistances and Ability Power than flat Health. There’s lots of decision making involved in positioning Gwen. While melee comps benefit from placing Gwen in the center to maximize Inanimate, other comps might want to position Gwen on the flanks. Placing Gwen on the edges of the battlefield allows her to reap more damage from sewing in extra snips each time she hits only one enemy.

Garen: Tier 5 Dawnbringer, Knight, Victorious

Get Wrekt Darius - The war of the God-Kings has ended. Night makes way for Dawn, and Garen brings an end to the Wolf’s Carnage with the momentum of change that has spread across the Convergence. There is now only one God-King, and he is Victorious.

Victorious - When a Victorious champion scores a kill, their next attack is empowered to deal 40% of the target's missing Health as bonus magic damage.

Akshan: Tier 5 Ranger, Sentinel

Akshan swings in to save the day in Runeterra with the ability to shoot ropes to swing around, camouflage indefinitely near walls, resurrect his pals, print gold, shoot bullets, and shred armor. Sheesh, the crazy things people will do just to make a few friends. With all these heroic attributes, Akshan is the perfect fit for Dawn of Heroes, where for the first time ever, TFT is announcing the new Champion just a few hours before those Summoner Rifters get their QWER fingers on him. So what am I doing with this honor… squandering it by taking a moment to ruin every Akshan pun. Alright, let’s swing into it… heroically.

Ability - Akshan rolls to the nearest edge of the battlefield, anchors his grappling hook to the center of the battlefield, then becomes untargetable, heroically swinging in a circle. While swinging he continuously shoots the enemy nearest to him, each shot dealing physical damage scaling with his AD, and reducing their Armor for 5 seconds.

The Main AttrAkshan - The new Ranger may only be a frAkshan of the Sentinel crew, but I assure you, his charisma and ability will have you hooked. The Sentinel vertical trait provides frontline and peel, but being the rule breaker he is, Akshan’s mobility provides even more.

Swinging into Akshan - Armor Shred on his Absolver (his gun), the Ranger trait, and a ‘get it done’ attitude make Akshan a great support for our sad boi Aphelios, who needs all the help he can get. But to make Akshan an Absolve-lutely powerful perfAkshan, stack AD items like he’s cosplaying as Samira from Fates. I’ll let you grapple with that mental image for a second.

And that just about covers it. We're excited to see what you make of all the new champions and mechanics. You'll start seeing everything on PBE July 7 and it will head to live servers with patch 11.15, early morning on July 21, with the Pass and Store Content activating later that day at 11 AM (PDT)!"

Reckoning Pass II & More

Along with the new set changes, a new pass will be available! Here's more from MinionsRPeople2 - "Everything you need to know about the Reckoning II Pass, Little Legends, Arenas, and more!"

"Hope breaks through the Black Mist, shining a light on the Sacred Keep, where a new host of Heroes take their first steps into a brand new world by spamming emotes and stuffing their face-holes in preparation for their next adventure. With this new day comes the Dawn of Heroes Mid-Set complete with RPG-inspired Little Legends, arenas, and just over the horizon — is the wild west?

Saddle up buckaroo, cause we’ll be riding into all this and more, right here, and right before Reckoning: Dawn of Heroes begins July 21st with the release of patch 11.15!

Choose Your lil’ Legend: Fearless Fellowship

Inspired by ye olde classic RPG themes, we’ve got new variants for Fuwa, Molediver, and Umbra. Each Little Legend in the Fellowship has a classic Class (or Origin) version and a variant that shows a rise with Order or fall into Chaos. Let’s look closer at the Order variants since they’re so keen to rise to the top!

You’d think being able to heal anything would make you truly fearless, but Order Fuwa still can’t heal the worst of their ailments; low self-esteem.

Order Molediver confuses being good at something with being good. This works out fine for Fuwa who rarely has to get their hooves dirty.

Some see Order Umbra as greedy for sitting on all that gold, but Umbra insists they will donate it all to poros in need… one day.

Of course, you don’t have to follow the path of Order. The road to Chaos is still appealing to the likes of these Little Legends.

Neither Order nor Chaos, the Fearless Fellowship assembles to take on the adventures promised in a new world! And what better adventure than whatever section happens to come up next?

Reckoning II Pass

The Reckoning II Pass marks the start of a grand adventure for you to score new loot by playing games and completing missions. Just like a good ol’ RPG, the Pass will track your progress with an XP bar, earning you rewards, like emotes and Little Legend eggs, each time you level up!

To get more out of each level in the Pass, you can grab the Pass+ for 1295 RP allowing access to level rewards such as booms, arenas, star shards, and the truly powerful Order Pengu in addition to all the stuff the base Pass already has.

You can always upgrade to the Pass+ later, and you’ll retroactively get everything you would have unlocked with the Pass+ active. Once you start your journey with the Pass+, you’ll also unlock our most rule abiding Sprite to date, Order Sprite. That’s the type of Sprite I’d take home to meet my houseplants.

Across your new adventure you’ll unlock four new booms (finisher spells?) with the Pass+. Use these to vanquish your foes: Jagged Path, Abyssal Chasm, Soul Siphon, and Shattered Heart.

For this adventure, the Pass+ exclusive Little Legend is Order Pengu. No one believes in you more than you, except for Order Pengu, who’s expectations for yourself transcend this reality. With Order Pengu, every 8th you take, is still an 8th, but it will be taken with grace, dignity, and dedication to do better next time! With the Pass+ you’ll get Order Pengu at one and two stars, but to truly transcend Order Pengu to three-stars you’ll have to use Star Shards. But don’t worry, you’ll get those with the Pass+ as well.

As you level up with the Pass+, you’ll uncover new maps (arenas) to further your RPG experience. Some adventurers start in places like Pallet Keep or Helgen Island, but for us, it's our very own Journey's Beginning.

Journeys often present immediate challenges for the adventurer with baddies, puzzles, or even the elements along the way. The first challenge of our new journey awaits us at the Desert Path.

To conclude our RPG experience we take on the final boss. For some of us, it’s the homework we’ve been putting off, for others it’s the Pass and More article. Regardless of what it is, it takes place in a Dungeon—metaphorically speaking (I hope). For the full Dungeon crawler experience, be sure to play on hands and knees or just try out the final Pass+ arena, Dankest Dungeon. Better go light it up.

No RPG adventure is complete without some sweet loot at the end. To celebrate your dedication we’ve got some Order Pengu Emotes as the Grind Tier rewards. Check out their adorable concepts:

And now that you’ve achieved your Grind Rewards (with nothing but top fours I assume), reward yourself with a place to take a break and bake.

Golden Bakery: A Place for the Fellowship to Break and Bake

In addition to the Pass arenas, Dawn of Heroes has two interactive arenas. First off, we have the Golden Bakery.

After a long decade of battling the Black Mist, all Pengu wants to do is bake some treats for their pals. All you knead to be a pal at Pengu’s Golden Bakery is 1380 RP (10.99 Mobile).

Cycle through delicious food and be careful not to drop the pie on that marvelous Pengu centerpiece! The Golden Bakery is full of clickable mischief and has reactions to your wins and losses baked in!

High Noon Saloon: A Place to Break and Take

*Clears throat in Western* There’s a new thematic in town and the only Order that matters here is what yer buyin’. Howdy from the High Noon Saloon, pardner. Leave your shooter at the door.

Too many Pastries got you soft? Grab a stool and unload your burdens for 1380 RP (10.99 Mobile).

Make yourself comfortable, as comfortable as you can get in this locale. Tankin’ a fancy to that Organ over there? Go ahead and give it a play while I finish boardin’ up these windows. Just take care not to fall into that fiery pit, that’s where my favorite customers reside when the light’s too strong.

Saddle Up With: High Noon Squink Variants

While the Fearless Fellowship are out on adventures and quests, High Noon Squink’s out takin’ bounties. Like the other Demon Hunters frequenting the High Noon Saloon, this Squink is always findin’ a way to sneak their shooter through the batwing doors.

You wanna know more about these particular Squinks? Well, to start off, it’s hard not gettin’ on High Noon Squink’s bad side; cause every side is bad-to-the-tentacle. Order Squink’s a kind soul, but there’s a reason they have so many boots and spurs. Cactus Squink, well, they’re the sharpest shooter in town. And if you thought that was corny, just wait till ya meet Kernel Squink, cause surely they’ll butter you up before they make ya go POP! Finally, there’s Outlaw Squink, you better stay clear o’ them when the clock tolls, but you should stay clear when it don’t too.

Dawn of Heroes Bundles

Whether you’re armoring up, saddling up, or both, we’ve got new bundles for ya!

Ranked Rewards and More!

Congratulations on assembling the Skyglass and helping Pengu! Oh, you also achieved a minimum of Gold ranking in the first half of Reckoning? Well good for you. There’ll be a fresh emote hitting your inventory during 11.16 (the patch after the Mid-set arrives).

When Dawn of Heroes begins the morning of July 21st, your rank will be “soft” reset down one tier below you. For example, if you are currently in Gold II you will now be in Silver II. If you are very good at this game and currently placed in Master or above, you will be reset to Diamond 4.

You will get 5 provisional matches after the reset, meaning you will not lose any LP for sub-top 4 placements in your first 5 ranked games of the new stage. You’ll also gain extra LP for finishing top four, so best of luck! To pull the odds in your favor, be sure to play on PBE starting July 7th!"

Miscellaneous

A new Sentinels of Light comic is now available to read on the Universe or in the Wild Rift app! Check out Steadfast Heart:

Akshan's champion page and biography are now on the Universe!

"Dashing through the shadows of eastern Shurima, a righteous avenger stalks those who have harmed others. His punishment is swift, certain, and exacted by a curious weapon that rights the wrongs of his foes.

Raised on the streets of the city of Marwi, Akshan was introduced to injustice at birth. In a place where local warlords took what they wanted, most people survived by keeping their heads down and minding their own affairs. Try as he might, young Akshan could never manage to let bad deeds go unnoticed and was often quick to intervene when he saw someone being mistreated. This approach made the boy many powerful enemies, and on one fateful occasion, left him beaten within an inch of his life.

But luck was on his side. An old woman named Shadya found the boy unconscious in the street outside her dwelling. Though Marwian custom said she should not get involved, she took young Akshan inside and, against all odds, he pulled through.

As Akshan regained his faculties, he realized his savior was no ordinary woman. Shadya was a member of the Sentinels of Light, an ancient order committed to fighting Harrowings and eradicating agents of the Black Mist. She saw Akshan as a troubled youth, stubborn and defiant, but vulnerable. After butting heads with the boy over her numerous sentinel house rules, Shadya quickly discovered there was much to like about him. He had guts and a conscience—a combination seldom found in Marwi. Seeing the immense potential in the young man, Shadya made a deal with him: she would allow him to stay, free from the grasp of his countless enemies, and, in return, he would dedicate himself to the sentinel order.

Shadya and Akshan formed a fast bond as she taught him everything she knew about surviving as a solo sentinel. Akshan the scrappy street urchin grew into Akshan the full-grown bane of scoundrels. But even as Akshan’s skills grew by the day, he could see his mentor growing more distant, and more troubled.

At last, Shadya told her pupil the reason for her concern: A Harrowing was coming, bigger than any the world had ever seen, bearing an army of wraiths and ghouls from the Shadow Isles. Their only hope of stopping the cataclysm rested with the ancient sentinel weapons that lay buried within Shurima's crypts and tombs. If the world was to be saved from ruination, they needed to collect these weapons, and quickly.

To Shadya’s dismay, she found that the ancient weapons had already been plundered by local warlords. She pleaded with them to relinquish the artifacts for the fight against the inevitable Harrowing, but the warlords refused, determined to unlock the weapons’ mysterious power for themselves.

With time running out, Akshan and Shadya were forced to make due with what they had. As they took stock of their arsenal, Akshan discovered a particularly striking gun hidden away in the base’s vault. Alarmed, his mentor snatched it away and forbade Akshan from ever using it. The weapon, known as the Absolver, was imbued with an ancient enchantment that granted it a strange, unspeakable power—it could take the life of a killer and, by doing so, restore their most recent victims to life.

“It must not be wielded by anyone,” said Shadya. “Such matters of life and death are best left in the hands of fate.”

But Akshan still bristled at sentinel rules, and he had even stronger opinions on fate. He had spent his whole life seeing good people horribly mistreated while bad people did as they pleased without consequence. If fate was real, it definitely needed help—help that the Absolver could provide.

As his interest in the weapon deepened, Akshan continued to pry its history from Shadya and came to a shocking discovery: She had used the gun to save Akshan when she found him unconscious in the street all those years ago. With it, she’d slain the criminal who had nearly killed him, and, in doing so, restored young Akshan to life. He wondered: Why did he alone deserve to be revived by the gun? Surely there were others who were more worthy.

While Akshan questioned the antiquated rules of his order, his mentor continued to press the warlords to turn over their stolen weapons. Tensions between the two parties built until one tragic day Akshan returned home to find Shadya murdered in the street, almost exactly where he had fallen all those years ago.

Akshan knew what he had to do. He made some key alterations to the Absolver and set out into the scorching desert with the forbidden weapon, hungry for vengeance. Though he could not determine which of the warlords had killed his mentor, he knew one way to be certain: he would pick them off one by one until Shadya was returned to Runeterra."

A Sentinels of Light Merch collection is up on the Riot Games Merch store, including a new Viego Unlocked statue, a Gwen plush, and more!

Riot KateyKhaos noted limited time space themed icons were back:

"Space icons are baaaaaack (for a limited time!)"

Other Games

The Sentinels of Light event is spanning all of Riot's games!

Wild Rift

Sentinels of Light Event

"The Ruination has begun, and only you can stand against it! Your first stop? The Sentinels of Light HQ.

Start - July 9th, 2021 / 00:00 UTC

End - August 10th, 2021 / 23:59 UTC

As the Black Mist engulfs Runeterra, an ancient order must bolster its ranks to protect the fading light. Join the Sentinels in their quest to stop the Ruination and witness their stories from the front line!"

Legends of Runeterra