[LOL] Patch 4.4 Notes

Reworks:

1. Kassadin

Old Kassadin's combination of high mobility, strong disables and high burst damage left his victims with very few to no options against him (other than banning him in every single ranked game), especially when he snowballed ahead. Our focus here is to introduce more counterplay to Kassadin's kit, something we couldn't do with number tweaks alone. For example, lowering Kass's damage doesn't make for an interesting gameplay interaction (it just means you can turn around and smash him in the face if you survive the burst), while increasing his cooldowns means he just needs to wait longer before blowing somebody up.

In the end, we opted for a full-on kit rework to reinforce his core theme as an anti-magic assassin with unrivaled mobility. These changes mean Kassadin must rely on his mobility to pick fights while finding opportunities to dive in and out of combat to take out targets. It's worth stressing: these changes are to make Kassadin less of a "blow someone up when you can" champion and more of a mobile attacker who wants to get in to fight while using Riftwalk to stay safe. Obviously, this is a significant change, so we'll be watching his performance very closely.

We've increased Kassadin's attack range and changed his passive so it no longer grants attack speed but avoids unit collision. We reduced Null Sphere's damage and pulled off the silence, although it will still interrupt channeled abilities. Instead, Null Sphere now grants Kassadin a shield on use. Nether Blade now passively deals bonus magic damage per autoattack and, when activated, deals higher bonus magic damage as well as restoring some of Kassadin's missing mana. No big changes to Force Pulse though we did reduce its damage a bit. Riftwalk, on the other hand, has a lot of changes. We've reduced its cooldown and it now scales with max mana instead of AP. Each stack now doubles the mana cost of the next Riftwalk but we reduced the mana cost and the number of max stacks to compensate. It also no longer refunds mana on hitting enemy champs.

2. Annie

We like Annie's versatility, but some of her base damage is too high for how she's currently being used. Our goal is to introduce more interesting choices in Annie's kit (particularly on that Disintegrate buff) as we looked for ways to buff her late game scaling when she builds more traditional AP items.

We've reduced Disintegrate's cooldown by half on any kill (champion or minion). We've also fiddled with Incinerate and Tibbers so they do less base damage but scale better with AP.

3. Diana

The Lich Bane changes affect Diana pretty hard, so we're tweaking her numbers a little to make sure she still packs a punch.

4. Elise

Reiterating what was mentioned in the foreword of the patch notes, we like champions that have different strengths and weaknesses at various points in the game, but jungle Elise was an extreme outlier with her super strong spider-of-all-trades early game. This is definitely a nerf, but we'll keep an eye on Elise as she adjusts.

We lowered Neurotoxin/Venomous Bite's damage versus monsters while making Cocoon's stun shorter at early levels and higher at later levels. We also shortened the cooldown of Rappel and lowered spiderling health at early levels but raised it at higher levels.

5. Ezreal

We saw the Lich Bane changes as an easy opportunity to preserve the AP Ezreal off-build without jeopardizing the health / balance of his primary build.

6. Fizz

Lich Bane's a pretty key item for Fizz, so we're giving the little fish dude a buff to compensate for the item change.

7. Heimerdinger

We've been paying close attention to Heimerdinger since his kit rework and felt he could use a little more late game help. Turret basic attacks deal a hell of a lot more damage than people realize, so we're tying their power in with the “flashier†big sister: The Beam. This way, Heimerdinger must position his turrets for maximum effectiveness on both attacks (basics and beams).

Heimer's got a visual update! We bumped up Heimer's move speed and made some changes to his turrets. Turret health now scales with AP and champion levels, and turret basic attacks now reduce the cooldown of turret beams instead of CDR. Also, turrets are now a little worse at last hitting minions unless Heimer orders them to attack specific ones.

8. Kog'Maw

Late game, Caustic Spittle's lower cast range often clashed with Kog's Bio-Arcane Barrage empowered attack range, so we're clarifying Kog'Maw's role as an artillery-lobbing, tank-shredding, spittle-spitting, purple people-eating, puppy-monster… thing.

Caustic Spittle is now a straight line skill shot with a longer range. It has a higher base damage and now shreds the target's armor and magic resistance.

9. Nautilus

We're giving Nautilus some love so he can be a little safer in the jungle while scaling better into the late game (particularly with his slow early game).

10. Sivir

Continuing our Sivir watch since her rework. These nerfs mean Sivir can't create an unhealthy lane by auto-pushing her opponents to the tower without interacting with them. The higher mana costs combined with a buffed mana restore on Spell Shield means Sivir needs to take more risks to keep using her abilities.

11. Skarner

We said we'd monitor Skarner after his changes, and we're continuing to do so. The buffs in patch 4.3 were a good direction but it looks like Skarner could use a little more reliability.

12. Thresh

8 seconds is really all the time a soul needs before it realizes it can escape from Thresh. The shorter window to pick up souls means Thresh will have to take more risks as he tries to collect distant souls.

13. Tristana

Using Rapid Fire is about timing and opportunity (not mana costs!), so we're clarifying its use.

14. Twisted Fate

Twisted Fate was another Lich Bane fan who relied on its extra damage to stay strong. Now that we've knocked Lich Bane down a few notches, we're giving the Card Master a couple buffs to keep him happy.

15. VI

Vi deals a lot of damage when building tanky and we want to incentivize her to go back to what she does best: punching things. The change to Assault and Battery gives a little more breathing room for her opponents between her oppressive early ganks while also giving foes more opportunities to capitalize on poorly planned ults.

Vault Breaker has a lower base damage now but scales better with AD. We also raised Assault and Battery's cooldown at early ranks and reduced the knockback duration and distance to secondary targets.

 

Thanks mate!