Akshan

“Akshan was one of the clear winners from the recent changes to early game sustain, so this patch we’re back to balance things out by tapping down his early game threat and vulnerability.”

Aurelion Sol

“While Aurelion Sol can still be a menace in the late game (deliberately so), we don’t think his early game needs to be quite as painful as it currently is so we’re giving him better early trades and generally improving his ability to dodge skill shots and navigate fights. His W is based on his underlying move speed, so this move speed buff helps his flying, too.”

Blitzcrank

“Blitzcrank has been underperforming so we want to add some more pep to this steam golem’s step with some better sustained disruption and damage to get him rolling again.”

LeBlanc

“LeBlanc’s last set of changes made her more viable in the highest levels of play, but have also led to her being a bit overwhelming for the rest of us at home. We’re delivering some base stat nerfs that should make her weaker for most players without impacting her viability in high level play too much.”

Skarner

“Skarner is one of a few champions who’s a little weak but has a deceptively low win rate due to being quite hard to play. Still, he’s a champion who has room for buffs, so we’d like to do just that. We’re aware of his recent history with pro play, so we’re pairing these buffs with some nerfs that we hope will disproportionately affect low-ping, pro players. Our overall goal is a stronger Skarner who can sustain this new level of power for months to come. We’re nerfing Impale’s cast time to increase his counter-play for skilled opponents. As Skarner is meant to occasionally be a juggernaut, we’re increasing the viability of AD juggernaut items, specifically Sterak’s Gage, by increasing his total base AD and his overall AD scaling. And finally, to make him more approachable, we’re removing an awkward optimization around Q’s uptime with compensation that should feel similar for most players.”

Build pickrate increases Increase >5%

Build	PR increase	Pickrate
	7.87%	15.51% 7.64%
	6.37%	8.65% 2.28%
	5.14%	6.73% 1.58%

View all Skarner builds

Talon

“Talon is running (front-flipping) the jungle right now, especially with the newly-buffed Axiom Arc. By comparison, he’s pretty fair in mid, so we’re just looking to give him some jungle-specific nerfs without hurting his viability mid.”

Volibear

“As the dust has settled from Volibear’s recent changes, his AD and AP builds are much closer in power and we believe jungle Volibear to be appropriately strong. That said, top lane Volibear is currently quite weak. To help him out we’re delivering some changes that’re intended to keep jungle Voli at about the same power level but substantially buff up top lane.”

Yone

“We buffed Yone last patch but due to his tendency to build Doran’s Shield and Second Wind, he didn’t end up as powerful as we would have liked. Since we are happy with the results of reducing his sustain in the last patch, we’re re-adding more early agency through his ability to hit back at his opposition.”

Biscuit Delivery

“As we’re sweeping through several runes in order to promote more choice in the system this patch, we want to nerf a few of the top performers, and biscuits are among them. We’re keeping to our goals from the last patch to reduce some early lane sustain, so we’re lightly tapping the regen per biscuit.”

Build pickrate changes Change >5%

Build	PR increase	Pickrate
	8.53%	12.38% 20.9%
	6.24%	42.31% 48.55%
	5.33%	9.77% 15.09%
	5.16%	17.48% 22.64%
	5.14%	72.55% 77.69%

View all Biscuit Delivery builds

Cash Back

“Cash Back stonks are low despite the fact that virtually every champion buys items and wants more of them. We’re looking to empower this rune to make it a more competitive choice in its row.”

Build pickrate changes Change >5%

Build	PR increase	Pickrate
	7.39%	8.27% 0.88%
	6.48%	16.39% 9.91%
	6.33%	34.86% 28.53%
	5.30%	12.27% 6.97%
	5.21%	9.53% 4.32%

View all Cash Back builds

Guardian

“We recently adjusted Guardian to make it more attractive to enchanters and now we’d like to revisit the rune to push up its desirability across all classes, both tanks and otherwise. We don’t want an early surge of health to make it impossible to all-in squishy champions in lane, so we’re mostly backloading this buff by increasing its level and AP scaling.”

Hail of Blades

“Hail of Blades has its share of hard-bound users who we tune against the rune, but it would also be nice if it had a set of champions who wanted to occasionally run it. The combat pattern of melee Hail of Blades is pretty compelling, so we’d like to buff it for melee champions in order to give it more of a fighting chance.”

Build pickrate changes Change >5%

Build	PR increase	Pickrate
	8.93%	41% 32.06%
	8.12%	28.88% 20.76%
	7.61%	7.61% 0%
	7.14%	21.56% 14.41%
	6.37%	8.65% 2.28%

View all Hail of Blades builds

Legend: Bloodline

“Bloodline's current tuning has left it in a pretty underwhelming state. Given that life steal is so highly sought-after, its pick rate has remained quite steady regardless. Still, we're looking to return some power and satisfaction to the rune when it's picked up.”

Nimbus Cloak

“As part of our goal to open up more choices in minor rune slots we're tuning up Nimbus Cloak this patch to be more appealing, especially when using longer cooldowns.”

Phase Rush

“It’s important that Phase Rush has some slow resist on it in order to feel like it actually does something when faced with slows. However, it's sometimes so strong that it can feel like there’s nothing you can do to pin them down. We’re softening the slow resist on Phase Rush a little bit in order to make it not quite so good at letting its users get away.”

Triple Tonic

“Triple Tonic has been dwarfed by the ever-popular Biscuit Delivery for some time now, and while we’re shipping a small nerf to Biscuits this patch, we’re also looking to give this rune a stronger identity through its short windows of power, giving potentially a better early-game Recall and then an all-in opportunity at level 6.”

Build pickrate changes Change >5%

Build	PR increase	Pickrate
	9.47%	22.95% 13.48%
	6.12%	12.07% 5.95%

View all Triple Tonic builds