Red Post Collection: Preseason 2023 Preview, MM & Champ Select Update & More

• Red Post Collection: Patch 12.18 & TFT Notes, /dev: Ahri's ASU, & More
• 9/28 PBE Update: Tentative Balance Changes

Teamfight Tactics Patch 12.19 Notes

"Back in my day, the Dragonlands were about a boy and his yeti, some Dragon loathing reroll comps, and a 5 Dragon chase trait. 

Now Scalescorn get along with Dragons, Dragonmancer Nunu is counterable, and there’s a 6 Dragon chase trait?! What have the Dragonlands come to? All that and the long-awaited Secrets of the Shallows event are coming this patch. The Secrets of the Shallows event will be playable starting October 5th at 11 AM Pacific Time, until November 1st. 

RODGER “RIOT PRISM" CAUDILL"

Preseason 2023: Preview

Preseason 2023 changes will begin hitting PBE tomorrow! Before they’re out, we wanted to walk you through all of the changes you can expect to see roll out to PBE over the next few weeks. We’re shipping them a bit early this year to give us time to test changes and gather your feedback, so make sure you get those games in because there’s plenty to try out! 

Housekeeping note: Things will be in a pretty early state when you first see them, so expect changes to things like icons, item and effect names, visual and sound effects, stat values, and more as we continue to test features during PBE. Barring massive table-flips, this preview page won't be updated after publishing. When the patch notes come out, they'll have all the final details as usual. 

The Return of Chemtech

Chemtech Drake will be returning this preseason with a brand new buff and soul! 

• Chemtech Drake will now grant a small amount of Tenacity and Heal/Shield strength when slain
• Chemtech Soul will grant bonus damage when below a certain amount of health

Alongside the Chemtech Drake, the Rift will take on a new Chemtech-inspired appearance featuring Zaunite chemicals and mutated jungle plants with upgraded effects. 

• Blast Cones will now blast those in range twice as far as before
• Honey Fruits will upgrade into Stim Fruits, no longer slowing champions that consume them and granting a small bonus shield in addition to the usual heal
• Scryer’s Bloom will upgrade into Stalker’s Bloom. When hit these plants will now reveal a small circular area around the plant and a cone opposite of the direction it was hit, granting movement speed towards revealed enemy champions and reducing wards revealed to 1 health. 

Jungle Improvements

Avatar Smites and Jungle Pets

The jungle is a dangerous place and it's dangerous to go alone, so take one of these jungle pets by purchasing them in the in-game shop as an egg! These pets will acquire “treats” through monster kills and slowly over time as the game progresses which will help them evolve. Once evolved, pets will give their owners Avatar buffs which empower them with different abilities. 

• Noxian Embercat*: This will be the pet of choice for junglers looking to play more aggressively. It will provide slows and bonus damage.
• Ixtali Ixamander*: This jungle pet is perfect for junglers looking to frontline and tank for their teams. It will provide a shield based on your health that provides bonus slow resist and Tenacity when broken.
• Ionian Cloudleaper*: This jungle pet will be great for junglers looking to rotate and move around the map more quickly. It will provide bonus movement speed. 

Leashing Range Indicators 

In an effort to make the jungle more welcoming to players unfamiliar with the role, we’ll be adding visual leashing indicators that will show how far camps can be pulled before their patience starts diminishing. We’re also decreasing the distance camps can be pulled, so no more having to stand on the perfect pixel in order to hyper-optimize your jungle clears.

Recommended Jungle Paths 

Another addition we have to help make the jungle more accessible are recommended jungle paths for every champion. These first clear paths were determined by gathering data from high skilled junglers on their high mastery champs across the globe. Pathing recommendations are based on which routes most often led these players to a victory and will be updated each patch. 

Communication Tools

Updated Ping Wheel 

League is a team game at its core. In order to better facilitate communication between teammates we’re doubling the number of pings available to players. The 8 pings on the wheel will now be as follows:

• Returning Pings (clockwise): Retreat, On My Way, Assist Me, Enemy Missing
• New Pings (clockwise): Push, All-In, Hold, Bait 

New Vision Pings 

We’re also adding an entirely new ping wheel that focuses primarily on vision. Using this wheel, you can now indicate the following: 

• (from left to right) Vision Cleared, Enemy Vision, Need Vision

Objective Voting 

Getting your team on board with taking an objective can be difficult and having everyone ping On My Way if they can contest or Retreat if they can’t can get very confusing. We’re introducing a new voting function that will appear when objectives are pinged that will function similarly to a surrender vote. Now all players can vote and indicate whether or not they’d like to take or contest that objective. 

Off Screen Pings 

The last communication change we have for you is a small quality-of-life update that will notify which direction an off-screen ping came from by displaying it on the edge of your screen. Enemy Missing pings will show on your screen regardless of where they are pinged on the map while Retreat, On My Way, Assist Me, Hold, All-In, and Push pings will only be displayed if they’re pinged within 3000 units (approximately corner to corner of your screen when fully zoomed out or 20 Teemo’s) of your screen’s edge. 

Vision System Updates 

Allied Ward Tracking 

While there are currently ways to see how many wards you have out, there isn’t a quick way to check which wards are closest to expiring other than manually looking at every ward placed. We’re introducing new ward visuals on the minimap that will indicate when wards are close to expiring. They will change appearance when wards reach 60 and 30 seconds remaining before they expire.

Enemy Ward Timers 

It can be hard to keep track of every single ward that gets placed on the map and even harder to successfully communicate that information to your teammates. Now, if you ping an enemy ward that you saw them place within the last 10 seconds, a perfectly accurate ward timer will appear until the ward is removed or expires. 

Loadout and Ability Recommendations 

Recommended Rune Pages and Summoner Spells 

Another change we’re excited to introduce are optional recommended rune pages and summoner spells in champ select. Once you lock in your champion, you’ll see a recommended runes button to the left of the edit rune pages button. Opening this interface will display up to 3 rune and summoner spell setups you’ll be able to select to use in game. This system is still being fine tuned, so you can expect to see more on this later on in preseason. 

These recommendations will be updated once per patch and are informed by what setups are optimal and popular. Of course, you’re always welcome to theorycraft and bring whatever loadouts you want! 

Recommended Abilities 

We’re also helping players in-game by providing them with recommended ability level ups. These will indicate which abilities are typically ranked up at each level and, similar to the above, will be updated once a patch based on what is currently optimal. 

Top Lane Changes 

We’ll also be making some adjustments to help top laners scale faster and hit those key item and level breakpoints faster relative to mid and bot. The changes will be as follows: 

• Solo Lane Experience: Solo lanes will now receive a 95% experience multiplier (previously 93%) from minions
• Duo Lane Experience: Duo lanes will now receive a 22% bonus experience multiplier (previously 24.73%) from minions
• Mid Lane Gold Changes: All minions spawned in the mid lane will now be worth 1 less gold before 14 minutes when last hit (previously, only cannon minions were worth less gold, but were worth 10 less gold)

New and Updated Items 

We’re introducing 12 new/updated items in this preseason! As a disclaimer, please note that item stats, effects, and even names are subject to change while on PBE. 

• Icathia’s Endurance (Mythic Item)
• 400 Health
• 30 Armor
• 30 Magic Resist
• 20 Ability Haste 

• Voidborn Resilience: For each second in champion combat gain a stack granting 3 Armor and Magic Resist, up to 10 max. At max stack become empowered, instantly draining enemies around you for 4% of your maximum health each (reduced to 1% against minions and monsters) and doubling your resists from stacks until end of combat (60 second cooldown).
• Mythic Passive: Grants all other Legendary items 5 Armor and Magic Resist
• Radiant Virtue (Mythic Item)
• 400 Health
• 30 Armor
• 30 Magic Resist
• 20 Ability Haste
• Guiding Light: Upon casting your ultimate you Transcend, increasing your maximum health by 10% for 9 seconds. While Transcended you and allies within 1200 range of you gain 25 non-ultimate Ability Haste. You and allies will also heal for 1.5% of your maximum health every 3 seconds, increased by up to 100% based on that champion’s missing health. Healing is doubled on yourself (90 second cooldown).
• Mythic Passive: Grants all other Legendary items 100 Health
• Iceborn Gauntlet (Mythic Item)
• 400 Health
• 40 Armor
• 20 Ability Haste
• Spellblade: After using an ability, your next attack is enhanced with an additional 100% base AoE physical damage and creates a frost field for 2.5 seconds. Enemies that move across the field are slowed by 15% + 0.003% of your maximum health. Your primary target is slowed for double the amount and has their damage against you reduced by 10% for 2.5 seconds (1.5 second cooldown).
• Mythic Passive: Grants all other Legendary items 50 health, 5% Tenacity, and 5% Slow Resist
• Goliath’s Ascendiary (Mythic Item)
• 800 Health
• 200% Base Health Regeneration
• 20 Ability Haste
• Colossal Consumption: Charge up a powerful attack against a champion over 3 seconds while within 600 range of them. The charged attack drains the target, dealing 50 + 10% of your maximum health as bonus physical damage and healing you for that same amount. You permanently gain maximum health equal to 15% of the drain (30 second cooldown per target) (note: Maximum health will be lost if the item is sold).
• Mythic Passive: Grants all other Legendary items 1% increased health and 6% champion size
• Rod of Ages (Mythic Item)
• 60 Ability Power
• 300 Health
• 300 Mana
• This item gains 20 health, 20 mana, and 4 ability power every minute, up to 10 times, for a maximum of 200 health, 200 mana, and 40 ability power. Upon reaching max stacks, gain a level (Note: the level cap will remain at 18).
• Mythic Passive: Grants all other Legendary items 5 Ability Haste
• Catalyst of Aeons
• 225 Health
• 300 Mana
• Eternity: Restore mana equal to 15% of damage taken from champions, and health equal to 20% of mana spent, up to 15 health per cast. Toggled abilities can only heal for up to 15 health per second.
• Abyssal Mask
• 500 Health
• 300 Mana
• 40 Magic Resist
• 10 Ability Haste
• Eternity: Restore mana equal to 15% of damage taken from champions, and health equal to 20% of mana spent, up to 15 health per cast. Toggled abilities can only heal for up to 15 health per second.
• Unmake: Curse nearby enemy champions, reducing the Magic Resist by 5 + 1.5% bonus health (maximum of 25). For each Cursed enemy, gain 9 Magic Resist.
• A champion can only be Cursed by one enemy at a time (prioritizing the most potent Curse)
• Sunfire Aegis (No longer a Mythic Item)
• 400 Health
• 50 Armor
• Immolate: Taking or dealing damage causes you to begin dealing 15 (+ 1.75% of bonus health) magic damage to nearby enemies (increased by 25% against minions and 150% against jungle monsters) for 3 seconds. Damaging champions or epic jungle monsters with this effect adds a stack, increasing subsequent Immolate damage by 10% for 5 seconds (6 stacks maximum).
• Turbo Chemtank (No longer a Mythic Item)
• 450 Health
• 50 Magic Resist
• 10 Ability Haste
• Active - Supercharged: Grants 40% movement speed towards enemies or enemy turrets for 4 seconds. Once near an enemy (or after 4 seconds) a shockwave is emitted that slows nearby champions by 40% for 1.5 seconds (90 second cooldown).
• Randuin’s Omen
• 400 Health
• 70 Armor
• Active - Humility: Briefly slow nearby enemies by 55% for 2 seconds (60 second cooldown)
• Rock Solid: Reduce incoming damage from attacks by up to 5 (+ 0.35% of maximum health)%, capped at 40% of the attack’s damage
• Critical Resilience: Critical Strikes deal 20% less damage to you
• Spear of Shojin
• 65 Attack Damage
• 300 Health
• 20 Ability Haste
• Dragonforce: Your non-ultimate spells gain (6 + 10% of bonus AD for Melee champions / 4 + 6% of bonus AD for Ranged Champions) Ability Haste, reduced to (3 + 5% of bonus AD for Melee champions / 42+ 3% of bonus AD for Ranged Champions) Ability Haste for immobilizing spells
• Exigency: Gain up to (15% for Melee champions / 10% for Ranged champions) increased movement speed, based on your missing health (maxed out when below 33% health)
• Ravenous Hydra
• 65 Attack Damage
• 20 Ability Haste
• 9% Omnivamp
• Cleave: Attacks and abilities deal (60% for Melee champions / 30% for Ranged Champions) physical damage to other enemies within 350 units of the target hit
• Carnivorous: Gain 0.5 AD and 0.1% Omnivamp whenever you kill an enemy, stacking up to 25 AD and 5% omnivamp. Lose 50% of these stacks on death.
• Can only hit each target once per attack or ability every 10 seconds
• Cleave does not trigger on structures

And that concludes the Preseason 2023 PBE preview. We can’t wait to see how all of you will use these tools to level up your game and what fun discoveries you’ll make as you test out all of these changes. Thanks for reading and we hope to see you on the Rift!"

Want to leave constructive feedback on these upcoming changes? Check out the feedback threads below:

• Item Changes and Updates
• Chemtech Dragon and Terrain
• Jungle Changes
• Communication Systems
• General Discussion and Bugs

Here's a few extra tweets on the changes:

I've mostly been working on jungle stuff this preseason, but had a little extra time and slipped in a Navori change.

I think I forgot to flag it for the preseason preview article 😔

Note:
🥐Exclusive with IE
🥐All attacks get the refund, not just crits
🥐NOT FINAL TUNING ETC. pic.twitter.com/STTmycV9sW

— Phlox (@RiotPhlox) October 3, 2022

Oh some ppl are mis-understanding the XP changes. Shared XP is a multiplier on solo XP. so the difference is .93 x 1.2473 - .95 x 1.22, which is basically nothing

— Riot Captain Gameplay (@riot_captain) October 3, 2022

Matchmaking & Champion Select - Fall 2022

Here's Riot Auberaun with the most recent updates from the Game Loop team - "Insight from the Game Loop team on some recent and upcoming changes"

"It’s been a while since we’ve talked about some of our around-game systems, so let’s get into it. To set some context, internally we’re called the Game Loop team, and we’re responsible for all of the around game things that contribute to and affect your experience in the game, like Matchmaking, Champion Select, and the various Summoner’s Rift queue types you use to select the type of play you want. Overall what we want to do is set you up with fair matches and then after you hit that “Accept!” button, give you the tools that let you prepare yourself and your team for in-game success. 

Recent updates

First, let’s get into updates on some of the things we talked about last time. 

• Revival MMR: Updates to calibrating the skill of players just getting back into the game rolled out in 12.16 to normal queues. Since then, we’ve seen a jump in returning player first-game winrates from 44.5% to 48%, reaching 50% by game 10 (up from 48% by game 10).
• Solo Only Mode: We’re not currently planning to separate solo and duo parties in Ranked. While we still believe in the logic for why this could be a good idea, we first need to make sure that duo players have another place for a compelling competitive experience. Flex queue doesn’t currently meet that bar.
• Re-evaluating our Summoner’s Rift queue portfolio: Related to the above bullet, this is something we’re interested in digging into going into next year. Specifically, we think there’s a lot of untapped potential in the spaces Blind Pick and Normal Draft are serving (which by the way a big proportion of players queue up for today, not everyone plays ranked!).

In a similar vein, we’ve been able to tackle some other new work that’s shipped recently. 

• Role Parity Matchmaking Improvements: In 12.16 we made changes to matchmaking to put additional emphasis on matching players by position preference in Ranked Solo/Duo. In other words, trying to match primaries against primaries, secondaries against secondaries, and autofills against autofills. These changes have been quite successful, increasing the total number of games with role parity by around 15-30% depending on region. In other words, you’re less likely to be playing secondary top against that 800 game Riven main.
• Rank-Based Matchmaking Adjustments: A side effect of using visible rank to define fair matchmaking is that after the initial ranked rush in January, returning players, late season starters, and smurfs end up matched together frequently. This is because they all have significantly mismatched MMR and visible rank, whereas everyone else has already stabilized. In 12.17 we made tweaks to ranked matchmaking to more quickly accept differences based on visual rank.

What’s coming next

Now the more fun stuff! We’re exploring several updates to Champion Select functionality that we think will upgrade the experience in ways that haven’t been touched in a while. Optimistically, we’ll be getting these out by the end of the year: 

• Champion Select Anonymity: Today, a lot of players use external websites and third-party apps that provide all sorts of information about their teammates. With this information, players are drawing conclusions that aren’t necessarily correct and pressuring their teammates into things that they might not want to do, like picking the exact same champion every game because it’s their highest winrate or most played. We think the best version of League is not one where you metagame based on the players in your lobby, weigh who’s on a win or loss streak or playing a different champion, and dodge or pressure others to dodge when your setup doesn’t meet perfect conditions. We’re still thinking about details of implementation here, but our starting point is likely to be hiding all Summoner names in Champion Select for Ranked Solo/Duo.

• To expand on this point, we recognize that there are legitimate reasons that someone might need to dodge a lobby, but there are also a lot that aren’t done in good faith. We want to impact the motivations behind why dodging occurs to reduce the frequency in a natural way.
• Pick Order Swapping: This is a commonly requested feature that we already see in Wild Rift. Today, you have to go through an extensive discussion in chat to effectively swap your pick order - can I pick for you? Do you have my champion? Do I have your champion? There are a lot of ways this can break down in one way or another, and this is assuming that everyone in the lobby even speaks the same language! By letting teams swap pick order with the press of a button, we hope to streamline the process of crafting your draft to be successful.
• Loadout Recommender: Like we provide item recommendations in the game, we want to provide rune and Summoner Spell recommendations during champ select. This should help narrow the gap between players who are comfortable with the rune and Summoner Spell systems and those who aren’t. We want to reduce barriers to entry and ensure players have the best possible experience with the runes system when initially ramping up on the game. Additionally, this should be helpful for more veteran players who might currently go to external websites or apps to learn what to take on a champion they’re not familiar with.

That’s it for now! Given some recent reorganization and a sharper focus, we’re optimistic about being able to move more quickly in these spaces than we have in the past, and are continuing to evaluate new opportunities and some big bets for next year."

 

Miscellaneous

• A new Worlds 2022 merch collection is STAR WALKIN onto the scene:

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