On this week’s episode of “what did we patch in,” it’s some April fools' shenanigans! This time around we’ve got a few changes when it comes to the damage coming out of the support role for a few champs, and some pesky bugs that were impacting Senna and support items. We also got some changes to bring the Solo Queue Terrorizer known as Volibear back in line, as well as some tweaks to give Olaf a little more junglin’ power. We also pulled back some changes we gave to Rell in the jungle department and then gave Sylas a teeny bit more jungling power for those strange people out there that want to jungle Sylas. We also have a few more tweaks to Galio following last week's changes to incentivize him a little more on getting some melee uptime.
We also threw down a slew of ARAM balance changes for supports and tanks, have an update on DirectX support and a handful of April Fools' skins!
Cheddar Chief Twitch, Durian Defender Rammus, Choo-Choo Train Ornn, Toy Terror Cho’Gath, and Zesty Dip Zac will be available April 3rd, 2024 at 18:00 UTC.
Skarner VGU[]
”Your impact on this world is but a grain of sand in a vast desert! Let me show you.”
Do you feel the earth tremble beneath you? That’s because Skarner’s VGU is now live with this patch!
Starting on April 9, 2024 we’ll be spinning down support for our online shopping site, shop.riotgames.com. This means RP purchases, LoL PC event skins, and weekly skin sales will no longer be available on this site. While you’ll still be able to redeem codes via the website, we recommend using the client in place of the website going forward.
DX9 Depreciation[]
To maintain the stability and performance of our games we need to deprecate support for older hardware or software that isn't widely used by players anymore. To that end, some time in the next few patches we will remove support and the ability to manually opt for DirectX 9 for League of Legends and Teamfight Tactics. If you're currently opted into using DirectX 9, the game will automatically disable this option when we remove the support. If you were running in DirectX 9 due to hardware incompatibility issues, we recommend upgrading your devices as soon as possible, so you may continue to play.
We’re currently targeting 14.9 for the end of DirectX 9 support, however if we change these plans we’ll continue to update you in future patch notes.
For more information on making sure your DirectX version is up to date and troubleshooting any issues related to it check out our support article. (The link should take you directly to the DirectX section, if not you can find it there).
Champions[]
Camille Q bonus move speed increased, cooldown decreased. W outer cone damage increased. E damage decreased.
Camille has been pretty sad in top lane ever since the walls got pushed back. We think she could use some larger scope work in the future, but that doesn’t mean we can’t buff her right now. So we’re playing up some top-specific strengths targeted primarily at her laning phase, which is power she’ll carry into the rest of the game. We’re mostly giving her better sustained target access, which she’ll actually appreciate when she’s got solo lane levels of gold and experience. Because we’re concerned about support Camille’s power level, we’re bringing down her Hookshot burst a little as compensation. Our hope is that she remains viable in both roles and that top laners specifically feel more impact.
Fiora’s a bit too strong, especially in early game where they’re supposed to be more of skill matchups than feel like she’s winning by default. So we’re going to adjust her ability to win sustained fights against other fighters by making a small change to her base AD.
Base Stats
Attack Damage: 68 ⇒ 66
Galio Passive damage increased. W damage reduction increased. E damage increased.
Last patch, we preemptively nerfed Galio to ensure the changes didn't land too strong. Since he landed weaker than we expected, we'll be walking back on these nerfs as they're no longer necessary. We're specifically reverting nerfs that affect him more while he's in melee range, as he needs the durability from W and the damage from passive and E to secure kills during that window. While the passive ratio buff will also strengthen his full AP builds, we're okay with that result because it skews him mid and is still helpful for his AP and HP builds.
Karma W root duration increased at lower ranks. R+E AoE shield increased.
Karma’s changes last patch landed very close to our goal, but we still want to do a little more to preserve her support power level. In order to do this, we’re decoupling her E ranks from the Mantra-E numbers to make it more in-line with the rest of her abilities, and make it less punishing if you don’t dump skill points into E. These changes should net around a 20-25% increase in shielding to her secondary targets through Mantra-E.
R+E AoE Shield: 39-129 (based on E and R ranks) (+31.5% AP) ⇒ 45/81/117/153 (based on R ranks) (+40.5% AP). (Note: Move speed and single-target shield unchanged)
Shadow Assassin Kayn took a huge hit last patch, largely due to his synergy with Profane Hydra being heavily nerfed. He’s still got some half-decent builds with other items, so we’ll be buffing him with those in mind, since we expect him to climb as players adapt to the new normal. These changes will also slightly buff Rhaast, since he uses the basic version of Q before he transforms.
Lux support is getting hit by the Zaz’Zak's change this patch, and since she's currently at a reasonable power level we'd like to give her a compensation buff. So we're buffing her ratios in a way that both roles will appreciate, but it should have slight skew for mid due to the wave clear benefits.
Passive - Illumination
Magic Damage: 30-200 (based on level) (+25% AP) ⇒ 30-200 (based on level) (+30%AP)
Nami W magic damage decreased, healing increased, and bounce fall off reduced. E magic damage decreased.
Nami is at one of her historically weakest points and we think she could use a little love. In line with our other changes around support damage, we’re pulling out some mid-game damage through her E rank up and W AP ratio and re-adding it into her healing and overall teamfight output with W’s bounce power.
Nasus Passive life steal increased. Q bonus physical damage increased.
Nasus hasn’t been performing so well in Solo Queue. We feel that he scales really well but struggles in lane, as he's able to be punished harshly. We'd like to reduce some of that harshness by increasing his Q damage to help him stack and trade better when using it on his opponent early. We’re also pairing this with an increase to his passive as we nerfed it when Divine Sunderer was still around and it’s no longer necessary to keep it lower.
Passive - Soul Eater
Life Steal: 11/16/21% (based on level) ⇒ 12/18/24% (based on level)
Olaf Q bonus monster damage added. W bonus attack speed duration increased and mana cost increased. E cooldown refund increased when hitting monsters.
Olaf is intended to be a solid jungler but has had a hard time lately, and similar to Sylas, he’s already strong in solo lanes. We’d like to give him better tools to succeed as a jungler by increasing his clear speed, as it should be one of the highest in the game since objective control is his primary strength as a jungler.
While these changes will mostly help Olaf jungle they will still help him top some, so we're including an increase to his ultimate mana cost. We'll pay attention to how this lands and if it ends up restricting his mana pool by too much, we'll follow up to make sure he's still viable in top lane.
Cooldown Refund: 1 second per basic attack ⇒ 1s per basic attack, increased to 2 seconds when hitting monsters
R - Ragnarok
Mana Cost: 0 ⇒ 100
Rek'Sai Passive fury gained from hitting minions, wards, and plants reduced and healing reduced at lower levels.
Rek’Sai is slightly too strong as a jungler, but not unreasonably so. As a top laner, though, she’s an immovable object. We’re pulling her top-lane specific levers in order to bring down that early sustain with a smaller nerf expected for her in the jungle.
Passive - Fury of the Xer'Sai
Fury gain from minions, wards, and plants: 12.5 ⇒ 5
Heal: 12-20% Max HP (based on level) ⇒ 10-20% Max HP (based on level)
Rell Base magic resist growth increased. Q bonus monster damage removed. W bonus monster damage removed. E bonus monster damage removed.
Rell has long held a spot in Pro play as a low-economy jungler who excels at securing objectives and succeeding on very little gold income. However, this specific set of strengths for this very small set of players have often prevented us from making adjustments that would be good for the 90% of Rell players who enjoy her in support. So we’re ripping off the bandage and removing all of Rell jungle’s monster modifiers, effectively removing her secondary role from the game. As these modifiers carried a little bit of power for her support gameplay, we’re giving her a small direct buff as compensation. If it’s not enough, we’re happy to give her a little more in two weeks' time.
Base Stats
Magic Resist Growth: 1.85 ⇒ 2.05
Q - Shattering Strike
Bonus Monster Damage: Removed
W - Ferromancy: Crash Down
Bonus Monster Damage: Removed
W - Ferromancy: Mount Up
Bonus Monster Damage: Removed
E - Full Tilt
Bonus Monster Damage: Removed
Senna Fewer souls dropped from allied support items killing minions, more souls dropped from Senna killing minions.
We noticed a bug that arrived in patch 14.1 that made Senna get the full drop chance from allied support item executes, which substantially increased her power as a farming bot laner. We’re fixing that bug in this patch and returning her on-kill drop chance near where it was before.
Passive - Absolution
Soul Drop Chance on Allied Support Minion Kill: 28% ⇒ 8.4%
Soul Drop Change on Minion Kill: 2.8% ⇒ 8.4%
Smolder Base armor increased. Q bonus damage based on crit chance increased.
Smolder got hit a bit harder than we wanted to last patch, so we’re returning some power in ways we think won’t be terribly frustrating. Now that he’s less evasive through E, he can stand to be more baseline durable. And now that his late-game power isn’t nearly as guaranteed, we’re going to return some damage in a way that asks him to build squishier items and be closer to his target.
Base Stats
Armor: 24 ⇒ 26
Q - Super Scorcher Breath
Bonus Physical Damage based on Crit Chance: 0-30% ⇒ 0-50%
Sona Passive Staccato damage increased. Q ally bonus magic damage reduced. W heal increased. E ally move speed increased.
Sona, like Nami, is getting her defensive and utility outputs buffed with a compensation damage nerf in the fairly invisible Q aura. We’re juicing her Q-passive just a little as it’s currently the weakest option and is a more appreciable place to give her damage. We expect these changes to be power and appreciation up for Sona and her allies.
While we deeply love the bear (Editor add, not designer note), he’s still been a bit too much of a menace in Solo Queue and we’re not seeing that slow down much despite the previous nerfs. First, we’re removing an expectation-breaking interaction between his Q and Sundered Sky, which was granting him extremely large amounts of burst damage. Second, we think he needs a little bit more siphoned off and we feel like the bear enjoyers out there value the move speed from his Q more so than the frequency of the R so we want to pull back some of that previous R cooldown buff that we gave him.
Q - Thundering Smash
Crits only increase Volibear’s attack damage instead of total ability damage
Sylas jungle has been quite a weak link for him lately, but he has a playerbase that we'd like to support. Since he lacks any room mid, we’re separating his Q modifier to hasten his jungle clear. This change isn't intended to make Sylas a top tier jungler, but rather to make him more functional for those who play it. For now, we’re staying on the safer side for this initial buff and will revisit his jungle clear as needed.
Q - Chain Lash
Minion and Monster Damage: 40% ⇒ 40% for minions and 70% for monsters
We’re taking a long look at the damage coming out of the support role and this patch we’re going after some exclusively-damage sections.
Zaz’Zak’s is bound to mage supports where champions like Xerath and Lux have support as their strongest role, which leaves us little room to buff them in places like mid lane. Bloodsong creates similar problems for fighters like Camille and Pantheon with respect to their top lane power. In general, we don’t expect these damage-focused champions to switch support items, but would like if enchanters and tanks would build these items less frequently. Imperial Mandate rounds out this list as a support item that provides almost exclusively damage.
Void Explosion Damage: 20 (+20%AP) (+4% Target Max HP) ⇒ 10 (+20% AP) (+3% Target Max HP)
Statikk Shiv is a bit too strong now that crit ADCs have a great late game awaiting them. So we’ve adjusted the cost so that it doesn’t hastily bring them to the late game as much as it did in the past.
While we've seen a decline in double support items in most regions, we're still seeing some teams do double or more support items. This change should ensure that it's no longer a thing and that support items are only appearing on the intended role that should be grabbing them.
Excessive Minion Kill Threshold: 20 minions in 5 minutes ⇒ 20 minions (divided by the number of support items on your team) in 5 minutes. This update applies to all support items.
For additional clarity this would be 10 minions over 5 minutes if two people on your team have World Atlas, then 7 minions over 5 minutes if three people have it, etc.
ARAM Balance Changes[]
We’re continuing the ongoing work to reduce the amount of durability debuffs on champions that are generally more engaging supports and tanks. This process overall is going to take us a few iterations and will have some knock on impacts to anti tank options so we’ll work on continuing to address those as well. Our goal is to be assessing more archetypes of champions more often so that we’re allowing each playstyle to have its fun in ARAM.
Next up on the list later on is for assassins and mages in the near future!
BUFFS
Galio: Damage Taken: 110% ⇒ 105%
Morgana: Damage Dealt: 90% ⇒ 95%
Rell: Damage Taken: 105% ⇒ 100%
Sett: Ability Haste: -20 ⇒ 0
Singed: Damage Taken: 110% ⇒ 105%
Sona: Damage Dealt: 95% ⇒ 100%
Teemo: Damage Dealt: 85% ⇒ 90%
Urgot: Damage Taken: 110% ⇒ 105%
Zyra: Ability Haste: -20 ⇒ 0
ADJUSTMENTS
Cho’Gath: Damage Taken: 105% ⇒ 110%
Taric: Damage Taken: 105% ⇒ 110%
Quickplay Update[]
As a post-launch follow up, we’ve bundled Quickplay bug fixes and quality of life improvements with a visual update. The key improvements are focused on predictability and usability.
Predictability in this case means knowing that you’re going to get into game with one of your selections. Far too many players found themselves on the loading screen with the wrong runes—which is a terrible way to start a match. We found that one reason this occurs is that selections made while in queue do not stick, so we made a change to prevent it from happening in most cases. Another issue we tracked down is if a player has an invalid or incomplete rune page equipped, the system will assign them a different valid page. Our fix drives more awareness that there’s an issue with your current rune page so you can resolve it yourself.
Usability-wise, the new layout has larger hitboxes for the important choices and gives you a much clearer view of all current selections in each slot. We heard feedback that it was too easy to get into game with the wrong Summoner Spells and we saw lots of triple Smite screenshots. In addition to a clearer top down view so you can spot any issues, we made some changes to auto spell selections. In the previous version, when you selected jungle, we gave you Smite, but when you selected from jungle to another position, we left it up to you to change spells. Our fix will give you a position appropriate spell in that case, for example: ignite if you select from jungle to mid. Of course, you can change it to whatever you want, but this should put most players in a better state.
We also heard concerns that Ranked restricted players were abusing Quickplay and other Normal games to force a remake. This was addressed in the last patch across all queues so that remakes no longer count towards lifting their restriction.
Bugfixes & QoL Changes[]
Fixed an issue that caused Sundered Sky to not crit after canceling the previous auto attack.
Fixed an issue that caused the Rift Herald to stay in its original position after Evelynn jumps in it while leaving camouflage radius until she crashes or reveals herself later. (Editor’s note: bruh what?)
Fixed a bug where Porcelain Protector Aurelion Sol’s The Skies Descend (R) VFX were not consistently aligned with the trail VFX from enemy perspective.
Fixed a bug where God-King Darius’ Noxian Guillotine (R) would damage the target enemy if Darius was stunned before the ability animation played.
Fixed a bug where Battlecast / Arclight / Bee'Koz's Void Rift (W) stole VFX from Star Guardian Rell's Magnet Storm (R).
Fixed a bug where Twitch’s Ambush (Q) range indicator was not rendering over impassable terrain on Shadowfoot, Dragonslayer, and High Noon skins.
Fixed a bug where Shan Hai Scrolls Cho’Gath’s arm readjusted its position abruptly after basic attacks.
Fixed a bug Thunderlord Ornn’s Call of the Forge God (R) elemental ram VFX had partially black textures.
Fixed an issue where Guinsoo’s Rageblade decided to not show up in the Attack Damage section.
Fixed an issue where Graves was unable to cast R while grounded.
Fixed an issue where enemies could sometimes flash out of Yone’s R after it landed placing them in a new spot but still taking the damage/stun.
Fixed an issue that prevented Spear of Shojin from increasing damage from passive abilities.
Fixed an issue that prevented Jax’s passive buff icon and fishing buff icon from appearing.
Fixed an issue that allowed Viego to cast Yone E after changing into another champion.
Fixed an issue that caused Ornn’s Masterwork Items to not display damage counters.
Fixed an issue that caused enemies to sometimes die in Kindred’s R while affected by Renata Glasc’s W.
Fixed an issue that caused Caitlyn’s headshot passive to be consumed when comboing her E and W.
Fixed an issue that prevented Miss Fortune from gaining conqueror stacks when her basic attacks were empowered by her Passive.
Fixed an issue that caused Briar to sometimes not display her ability icons.
Fixed an issue that caused Ryze’s VFX to not display when casting his R near elevated terrain.
Fixed an issue that prevented Rek’Sai from gaining stacks of certain runes and Eclipse’s passive when she uses Q.
Fixed an issue that caused Profane Hydra and Titanic Hydra to have no effect when using them via Zoe’s spell thief.
Fixed an issue that caused Smolder’s R to be more whiny in spectator mode (it was playing the SFX twice for some reason).
Fixed an issue that allowed Neeko’s W clone to dance and move at the same time.
Fixed an issue that caused champions to be unable to auto attack after using attack move commands while rooted/snared.
Fixed an issue that caused champions to auto attack unintentionally after being hit by a root/snare.
Upcoming Skins & Chromas[]
The following skins will be released in this patch:
Durian Defender Rammus
Choo-Choo Ornn
Cheddar Chief Twitch & Zesty Dip Zac
Toy Terror Cho’Gath
Due to a small issue Zesty Dip Zac and Cheddar Chief Cheese will be releasing with less delicious chroma names than intended. Check out the chroma names in patch 14.8 for a sweet (or savory?) surprise!
The following chromas will be released this patch:
Caden "Riot Sakaar" House
