League of Legends (LOL) Update 11.17 Patch Notes – August 24, 2021

AKSHAN

E base damage decreased late; AD ratio increased. Akshan can no longer revive teammates when he’s dead. R cooldown upon cancellation decreased.

Players are still figuring out Akshan, so we’re being cautious with any changes to this charismatic rogue. We’re also cleaning up some pesky bugs and making his E-max a little less overpowered. This’ll make his AD builds more appealing while also making up for the damage loss in Q-max builds. Finally, the change to his W should give opponents a way to stop Akshan from reviving all his allies—in other words, kill him first!

W – GOING ROGUE

E – HEROIC SWING

R – COMEUPPANCE

BUGFIXES

• Passive – Dirty Fighting‘s second attack will more consistently complete on targets when the first attack was executed at max range
• Passive – Dirty Fighting Now correctly predicts whether the first attack will kill the target, including through shields and with Akshan’s on-hit effects
• A placeholder icon no longer appears under Akshan after gaining a shield from Passive – Dirty Fighting
• E – Heroic Swing will no longer end early on turrets
• E – Heroic Swing‘s cooldown no longer gets reset when it kills a Scarecrow Effigy from Fiddlesticks’ Passive – A Harmless Scarecrow or a clone from Shaco’s R – Hallucinate
• E – Heroic Swing no longer gets extra range if he casts spells on enemies or places wards outside of its maximum distance
• R – Comeuppance now consistently executes minions regardless of armor bonuses (like Hullbreaker or Baron Nashor)
• Addressed an issue where a single bullet from Akshan’s R – Comeuppance dealt unusually lethal damage to Yorick’s R – Eulogy of the Isles‘s Maiden

AMUMU

Q now has 2 charges. W damage increased early; decreased late. R stun duration no longer scales. Health and armor growth decreased.

Our sad little mummy’s been left out of high level play for ages. While there’s an easy joke here about Amumu having no friends, we wanted to address this long-standing problem and ensure he can find his way in the world of modern League. In particular, we wanted to up his engage threat in the early game where high MMR players prioritize securing small leads that can snowball into victory. One subtle benefit of 2-charge Q, beyond the obvious stuff: It reduces the pressure to spam Q on cooldown, since you aren’t “wasting” uptime by holding onto your first charge as long as the second is recharging. This creates a new avenue for skill expression: When should Amumu use both charges, and when should he hold one?

All this said, Amumu’s late game has never really been his problem. We tossed in a few nerfs to his later scaling to even out his newly-increased potential to get ahead early. From a raw stats perspective, he’ll be innately weaker at higher levels, but now he’ll get there faster and have more items when he does.

BASE STATS

Q – BANDAGE TOSS

W – DESPAIR

 As a reminder, W ticks twice per second, so each tick deals half the listed damage below!

R – CURSE OF THE SAD MUMMY

EKKO

Passive damage against monsters increased.

Ekko is played more in the jungle than in mid lane, yet jungle Ekko is languishing in terms of power. We’re juicing up his jungle clear speed to help him shatter more camps in less… time.

PASSIVE – Z-DRIVE RESONANCE

EVELYNN

R cooldown decreased.

Eve’s been left in the dark by recent nerfs to her early core items like Lich Bane and Dark Seal. We’re lowering the cooldown on her ultimate early so our lovely demon lady can still find victims opportunities to create leads.

R – LAST CARESS

GANGPLANK

Q now counts as a ranged basic attack. E scales better with crit. Barrel recharge time increased but max charges now increase with rank.

Gangplank’s interaction with Grasp of the Undying made his poke pattern of clicking Q every 4 seconds a nightmare for counterplay, which made his lane power pretty explosive. As a result, we’ve had to limit his scaling in a way that’s been unsatisfying for Gangplank players, given that late game power has traditionally been core to his identity. We’re walking back on that plank by lowering his early advantages and bringing them back ashore in late game with extra crit-skewed spice. More barrels!

PASSIVE – TRIAL BY FIRE

Q – PARRRLEY

E – POWDER KEG

GRAVES

Q mana cost increased.

Graves has been cropping up as a dominant mid pick, so we’re nerfing his ability to control lane priority with his wave-clearing Q in a way that still retains his jungle power.

Q – END OF THE LINE

SKIN SPLASH UPDATE

IRELIA

Q healing decreased.

Irelia’s blades are still a bit too deadly. We’re tapping down her innate sustain so that she’s a bit more punishable when she makes mistakes. This’ll also nerf the Ionian blade dancer’s ability to spin around seemingly-doomed teamfights at super low health.

Q – BLADESURGE

KAYN

Assassin Kayn passive damage decreased.

Blue Kayn’s been overshadowing games too regularly, especially with his Goredrinker build. We’re reducing assassin Kayn’s damage to encourage him to build more offensively in order to reap his enemies.

PASSIVE – THE DARKIN SCYTHE

LEONA

W bonus resistances decreased.

Leona’s been shining a bit too bright with her ability to soak up any damage that comes her way when she’s locking down opponents. We’re making her a little easier to kill so that opponents still have the opportunity to fight back. SPF still recommended.

W – ECLIPSE

LISSANDRA

Base attack damage increased. Q mana cost decreased.

Lissandra’s been frozen at pretty mediocre numbers across the board, even into her favorable matchups. We’re giving her some slight buffs to make the ice witch a more attractive pick.

BASE STATS

Q – ICE SHARD

LUCIAN

Base attack damage decreased. Lucian now gains on-hit damage when buffed by allies. R bullets now scale with crit chance rather than R rank.

Lucian’s been struggling quite literally everywhere except in Pro mid lane. We’re purifying his odds by empowering his duo lane synergy without compromising his solo capabilities. For example, his ult’s been super powerful in solo lanes due to its heavy level scaling, so we’re smoothing it out to scale better with gold. AP Lucian is also getting some compensation buffs since we know it’s a fun (although weak) build that gets affected by these AD-encouraging changes. Don’t worry, we haven’t forgotten about you, fans of the off-meta lulz.

BASE STATS

PASSIVE – LIGHTSLINGER

W – ARDENT BLAZE

R – THE CULLING

NAMI

Base health increased. W mana cost decreased late.

We haven’t gotten to sea Nami much lately, so we’re shifting the current by giving the tidecaller some blessings to improve her survivability in trades and allow her to use her costliest skill more.

BASE STATS

W – EBB AND FLOW

SENNA

Critical Strike Damage penalty reduced. Soul drop rate increased.

Senna’s DPS focused builds have mist the mark recently. We’re buffing up her crit to better synergize with damage items and giving her more souls on minion kills to help out players who run her as farming carry.

PASSIVE – ABSOLUTION

TEEMO

E on-hit damage increased.

Teemo could use a power-up in lane where we expect him to be able to whittle down his opponents, especially in favorable matchups when he can execute a series of Toxic Shots. Hut, two, three, four… :^)

E – TOXIC SHOT

VIEGO

Attack range reduced. Base healing on possession reduced; scaling increased. Q damage multiplier from crit chance increased. E camo radius increased. R slow duration decreased.

Viego’s been breaking too many hearts in the pro scene, so we’re bringing down the sovereign’s domination a notch. His tanky builds are offering too much pop-off potential, so we’re significantly cutting back the power of his resets if he’s not building damage. We’re also increasing his camouflage detection range and reducing his basic attack range which, combined, will make it much harder for Viego to hide in the Black Mist as a source of safety. Lastly, we’re reducing the CC on his ult since that wasn’t really its main intent.

BASE STATS

PASSIVE – SOVEREIGN’S DOMINATION

Q – BLADE OF THE RUINED KING

E – HARROWED PATH

R – HEARTBREAKER

BUGFIXES

• Addressed an issue where, when Viego possesses Zoe using Passive – Sovereign Domination, recasting Q – Paddle Star would launch a second star that disappears
• Addressed an issue where Viego’s basic ability cooldowns would get permanently reduced after gaining Accelerando stacks while possessing Sona with Passive – Sovereign’s Domination
• Addressed an issue where, when Viego has Kled’s W – Violent Tendencies buff active as his possession ends, Viego’s W – Spectral Maw will be on cooldown
• Addressed an issue where, when Viego casts Kindred’s W – Wolf’s Frenzy just as his possession ends, he would no longer be able to cast W – Spectral Maw

XAYAH

Q cast time now decreases with attack speed. R damage increased.

We’re back with a third round of Xayah buffs! We’ve been steadily bringing up her winrate while trying not to increase her pick rate in Pro too much. The rebel hasn’t taken off in Pro play yet, so we can still give her a bit more room to fly. Xayah’s Q tends to interrupt her basic attack flow at higher attack speeds, so this should let her feathers glide more smoothly throughout the game. (For Q’s scaling, remember Xayah gains 70% bonus AS from levels and 55% from W!)

Q – DOUBLE DAGGERS

R – FEATHERSTORM

ZED

Q ratio increased. E ratio decreased. R cooldown increased late.

Once Zed gets some items under his belt, his kill pattern becomes too reliable, especially for a champion with such flexible mobility tools to slip in and out of the shadows. We’re asking the master of shadows to master more shurikens to secure his kills. His ult cooldown is also getting nerfed late to match its power level more appropriately.

Q – RAZOR SHURIKEN

E – SHADOW SLASH

R – DEATH MARK

FLEET FOOTWORK

Fleet Footwork just hasn’t been a very good pick for marksmen. Rather than a straight buff to make it more viable, we’re increasing healing against champions for everyone and reducing healing against minions depending on attack type to avoid too much power in lane sustain. Healing against minions for melee is getting reduced more than ranged because melee champions have already been using it very effectively for that very reason, making this an overall buff for ranged and closer to neutral for melee.