Official Patch 7.2 Notes Released!

Introduction

Check out the latest patch notes featuring some muich needed Gragas, Lulu, and Nidalee buffs accompanied by welcome nerfs on Darius and more importantly, the plague known as Katarina. Check out the full details below!

Summary

Buffs: Akali, Gragas, Graves, Lulu, Master Yi, Nidalee

Nerfs: Darius, Katarina

Tweaks: Yasuo

Reworks: Warwick

Patch 7.2 Notes

BY SCARIZARD, AETHER, GENTLEMAN GUSTAF & LUQIZILLA

Greetings, Summoners,

Welcome to 7.2, which is a continuation of our pre-season follow-up but also with a new dog. Arh-wooo.

With the dust from the assassin update having settled, we’re beefing up Lethality to put some mid-game power and snowball potential back into everybody’s favorite murder machines. We’re also continuing our work to carefully reduce early game jungler dominance, this time cutting down the amount of health junglers have during their first ganks. And while Redemption and Courage of the Colossus were both exciting pre-season debuts, we’re taking steps to let people opt into alternatives without feeling bad about it.

Beyond the big-ticket items, we’re also zooming in on a few more localized trends. Darius and Katarina have secured death grips over their early lanes, and we’re looking to loosen that up a bit. Meanwhile, Ghost is on the rise as a second “uh-oh!” button when paired with Flash, which is pretty damn frustrating to deal with. We’re sharpening the difference between the two spells - head below for the details.

That'll do it for us this patch! We look forward to seeing you on the Rift, assuming Warwick doesn’t tear us to shreds first.

GL, HF

 Patrick "Scarizard" Scarborough Paul "Aether" Perscheid Mattias "Gentleman Gustaf" Lehman Lucas "Luqizilla" Moutinho

Champions

Warwick

Warwick, the Uncaged Wrath of Zaun, will be updated with the launch of patch 7.2! To learn more, check the following links:

• Warwick, The Uncaged Wrath of Zaun - Reveal
• "The Wrath of Zaun" Teaser
• "Engineering the Nightmare" Teaser
• Warwick Champion Spotlight

Head to the “Extras” section of Warwick’s Champion Reveal article above for high-res images of his updated base and skin splash art!

Akali

R ratio up.

Akali’s finally reached a stable (though slightly below-average) state following her changes in the assassin update. Given that her core item is being nerfed this patch (see more in the Items section!), we’re taking the opportunity to not only offset the hit to Gunblade, but get Akali to a slightly stronger spot than she was at before.

Shadow Dance represents a lot of what we like about Akali’s kill pattern - it’s telegraphed, has appropriate downtime between casts, and gives the opposing team time to react with their abilities to help peel her prey. Considering all of that, we feel like it’s a good spot to help Akali successfully chain from one kill to the next once she gets going.

R - Shadow Dance

RATIO0.25 ability power ⇒ 0.35 ability power

Darius

Passive damage reduced on early levels, Q damage reduced when hit by the handle.

Darius is supposed to be the big bad guy who smashes you with an axe if you get too close, but right now he feels downright oppressive to lane against. Noxian Might’s early numbers are where the greatest problem lies. With a massive attack damage buff to count on, Darius’s level 1 all-in is brutally stacked in his favor. From there, his passive remains so potent through the early levels that opponents have no opportunity to recover. It’s okay for Darius to start building a lead with an early kill, but one death shouldn’t make or break the entire laning phase.

We also want to reward opponents who can duel Darius by outplaying Decimate, providing they do so with caution. You should still try to avoid his giant axe altogether, but if you really wanna fight the Hand of Noxus, you might have a better chance to do so now.

Passive - Hemorrhage

Bonus attack damage reduced by 10 from levels 1 - 14.

NOXIAN MIGHT BONUS (LV 1-6)40/40/45/45/45/45 attack damage ⇒30/30/35/35/35/35 attack damage

NOXIAN MIGHT BONUS (LV 7-13)50/60/70/80/90/100/110 attack damage⇒ 40/50/60/70/80/90/100 attack damage

NOXIAN MIGHT BONUS (LV 14-18)120/140/160/180/200 bonus attack damage (unchanged)

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Q - Decimate

HANDLE DAMAGE50% of blade damage ⇒ 35% of blade damage

Gragas

Armor increased. Heal on passive increased.

Gragas has been struggling to survive his first clear in the post-pre-season jungle; camps with multiple monsters (which he should excel at clearing) proved particularly difficult to handle. Beefing up the Rabble Rouser’s early game enables him to more safely finish his first clears and ramp up through the rest of the game.

General

ARMOR26 ⇒ 29

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Passive - Happy Hour

HEAL ON CAST4% of maximum health ⇒ 6% of maximum health

Graves

True Grit refreshes off any instance of damage.

Back in 6.23, we shipped an under-the-hood fix to a general piece of code that True Grit uses. This corrected a bug causing True Grit to refresh off any instance of damage Graves dealt, rather than only basic attacks (as stated in the tooltip). Being correct, however, isn’t always the same as being right. The bug was in place for so long that we had balanced around it, and Graves mains had grown accustomed to the extra refreshes. So, we’re putting the behavior back in and changing the tooltip instead.

E - Quickdraw

BUGFIX-FIXTrue Grit’s duration is refreshed by Graves’s basic attacks against non-minions ⇒ basic attacks and spells against non-minions

Katarina

E ratio down.

Terrorizing high level play (and the Jin Air Green Wings), to say that Katarina’s flashy update packs a punch would be an understatement. A large part of Kat’s oppressive power comes from her early all-in strength: she’s able to land multiple abilities on opponents before they have access to most of their tools. When looking at where we could even the playing field, Shunpo felt like the obvious choice for having the least actual gameplay when used solely for its damage. Katarina’s lethal takedowns should reward anticipation, execution, and dagger tossing; repeatedly clicking on your opponent in the early-game no longer carries as much weight toward that end.

E - Shunpo

RATIO0.65 total attack damage ⇒ 0.5 total attack damage

Lulu

Passive damage up, Q mana cost reduced.

Lulu’s prevalence as a solo laner was characterized by a combination of strengths she made little trade-offs for, making laning against her a particularly frustrating affair. We solved this by transferring some of her lane clearing power into team utility, hitting her ability to poke champions in the process. Now that the Fae Sorceress sports a healthier clearing pattern, we’re comfortable giving her some offensive power back in a way that augments both her support and solo playstyles.

Passive - Pix, Faerie Companion

DAMAGE9-105 (at levels 1-18) ⇒ 15-117 (at levels 1-18)

CONSISTENT PIXPix’s damage now increases every level, rather than every two levels

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Q - Glitterlance

COST60/65/70/75/80 mana ⇒ 50/55/60/65/70 mana

Master Yi

Double Strike no longer fizzles if the first hit kills a unit. Meditate pauses E and R durations and stacks Double Strike.

Master Yi’s Meditate sells itself as a “sit still, be tanky, heal up” button. The obvious in-combat use is to channel it while waiting for cooldowns to refresh or allies to arrive, but Yi mains can also make use of the button press on its own. The first case is similar to abilities like Fiora’s Riposte: activating Meditate for a split second to mitigate incoming damage, then immediately canceling it to resume the offensive. The second uses Meditate as an attack reset - equally reflex-intensive, though not nearly as much of a high moment for Yi (relative to any other basic attacker).

To be clear, we’re not getting rid of Meditate’s insta-cancel uses with these changes! Instead, we’re making the channel more appealing andless punishing so the decision isn’t quite as lop-sided.

Passive - Double Strike

NEWLIKE LUCIANIf Double Strike’s first hit kills a unit, the second strike now searches for a new target within 300 range (prioritizes killing blows)

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W - Meditate

NEWQUIET!Channeling Meditate pauses the durations of E - Wuju Style and R - Highlander

NEWI’M MEDITATINGNow grants Master Yi 1 stack of Double Strike per second while channeling

Nidalee

Base health and Human E’s heal up. Human W now functions like wards.

It’s no secret that Nidalee’s strength in 2017 isn't what it used to be. There's a catch, though - while most Bestial Huntresses are now struggling to make ends meet, experienced Nidalee players aren’t feeling that pain. We're not in a rush to make her Queen of the Jungle again, but that doesn't mean we can't beef up her consistency. For this round of changes, we're focusing on putting power into Nidalee’s utility outside of the jungle. Making Bushwhack a more consistent Hunt activator - especially in lane - should reward creative Nidalees without putting them right back on top.

General

BASE HEALTH511 ⇒ 540

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W - Bushwhack

NEWBUSHWHARDSTraps are now invisible, have 3 health, and are disabled by control wards

MAXIMUM TRAPSUnlimited ⇒ 4/6/8/10 at levels 1/6/11/16

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E - Primal Surge

MINIMUM BASE HEAL25/45/65/85/105 ⇒ 35/55/75/95/115

MAXIMUM BASE HEAL50/90/130/170/210 ⇒ 70/110/150/190/230

Yasuo

E damage down, now has an AD ratio.

We’re okay with Yasuo maxing Sweeping Blade first if he needs to dodge stuff and be super fast, but we’re not okay with how much damage he gets on top of that mobility. That said, Yasuo’s still supposed to ramp into a late-game carry, so we added a ratio to E so he gets some of that damage back as the game progresses. You gotta earn, yo.

E - Sweeping Blade

DAMAGE70/90/110/130/150 ⇒ 60/70/80/90/100

NEWRATIONow has an 0.2 bonus attack damage ratio (does not increase with stacks of Sweeping Blade)

Items

Lethality

Lethality’s base effectiveness up.

While Lethality’s introduction addressed the over-the-top midgame spike physical damage dealers enjoyed toward the end of the 2016 season, it’s clear we’ve gone too far in the other direction. When Lethality items do appear in builds, they’re often as third or fourth items. This presents a conundrum: most Lethality items are accompanied by out-of-combat movement speed to facilitate early-to-midgame roams and ganks, but the math just doesn’t support the investment over more concrete purchases (Caulfield’s Warhammer, for instance). So, while we’re tuning up Lethality’s damage no matter when you buy it, this change most favors early purchases. Finishing a Dirk (or perhaps even a Duskblade) once you’ve started to procure a lead will more consistently push assassins over the damage thresholds they need to get the snowball rolling.

BASE EFFECTIVENESSLethality immediately grants 40% ⇒ 60% of its value as flat armor penetration. The remainder scales with enemy champion level.

EXAMPLE10 lethality now grants 6 flat armor penetration up front plus 0.22 per enemy level, capping at the full 10 once enemies are level 18

Duskblade of Draktharr

Damage after having not been seen increased.

Following up our nudge to Lethality is some love for its marquee item. Much like Infinity Edge or Rabadon’s Deathcap, Duskblade is intended to be the big purchase if you’re all-in on Lethality’s gameplan of murdering everyone that’s not a tank. That said, many champions we’d expect to see with the item (like Kha’Zix or Talon) instead opt for other big ticket AD items like Ravenous Hydra or Infinity Edge itself to push their damage output to the next level. We’re adding some more bite to Duskblade’s effect to make it shine in the situations you’d expect to see it succeed.

NIGHTSTALKER DAMAGE50 ⇒ 75

Edge of Night

Active cooldown reduced.

Edge of Night fills out our trifecta of Lethality care packages. Similar to Duskblade, Edge is a unique item for a specific playstyle that’s getting crowded out by other options (namely, Maw of Malmortius). We actually like the tradeoff between Edge and Maw, but the trickiness of properly using Edge’s active is pushing people away from it. Targeting the cooldown opens up more flexibility and room for error when using the spell shield, making the item less punishing when you predict a teamfight incorrectly. Toss in the potential to gain multiple spell shields per fight, and you’re looking at a change that just might push this item over the Edge. Of Night.

COOLDOWN45 seconds ⇒ 30 seconds

NINJA SHIELDUsing Edge of Night’s active ability while Invisible/Camouflaged will no longer break the stealth.

Hextech Gunblade

Active damage reduced at early levels.

As a powerful fringe item, Gunblade finds itself in a similar position to last season’s Frozen Mallet. While few champions are able to capitalize on its specific set of stats, those that can (Akali, Katarina, Corki) have uncovered Gunblade’s overbearing potential. When built as a first item, Gunblade’s active provides damage akin to a 5th spell for most users, easily overpowering the opposition with its instant nuke. We want Gunblade users to feel good about buying into an aggressive option, but the effectiveness of the item was just too much.

ACTIVE DAMAGE250 at all levels ⇒ 175-250 (at levels 1-18)

Redemption

Health down. Heal down at lower levels. Mana regeneration up.

Redemption gives supports (especially enchanters) a way to contribute more directly to teamfights. However, its mid-game ability to dramatically turn skirmishes is making it the optimal first purchase on just about every support. In this landscape, whoever gets Redemption has a substantial advantage in all-ins, which leaves no room for other item choices. We’re significantly toning back its early strength, but keeping the teamfight impact that makes the item so redeeming.

HEALTH400 ⇒ 300

MANA REGENERATION+75% base mana regen ⇒ +125% base mana regen

HEAL130 + 20 per target level (150 - 490) ⇒ 40 + 25 per target level (65 - 490)

Knight's Vow

Cost down.

Even among protector-types like Braum, Knight’s Vow isn’t seeing much play at the moment. This might just be because everyone’s buying Redemption (see above), so we want to see how this patch shifts the support item landscape before making substantive changes to Knight’s Vow. That said, a lower price point should help encourage supports to make the switch.

COMBINE COST800 ⇒ 700

TOTAL COST2400 ⇒ 2300

Eye of the Equinox

Cost increased. Cooldown reduction added.

Eye of the Equinox has been suffering two-fold. Tank supports have fallen off in popularity, and Ruby Sightstone has gotten significantly more prevalent. We’re making Eye of the Equinox a bit more attractive for tanks to hit both problems with one stone.

COMBINE COST550 ⇒ 650

TOTAL COST2200 ⇒ 2300

COOLDOWN REDUCTION0% ⇒ 10%

Ardent Censer

Attack speed and health drain buffs now scale with target’s level.

Ardent Censer isn’t living up to its promise of empowering attack speed carries in late-game teamfights. We’re adding some scaling so Enchanters get more bang for their buck as the game progresses.

ATTACK SPEED BUFF20% ⇒ 20% - 35% based on target's level

HEALTH DRAIN BUFF20 ⇒ 20 - 35 based on target's level

Chalice of Harmony

Magic resist up.

The Chalice of Harmony paths are supposed to give mage-like supports (and support-like mages) the health and mana they need to keep using their abilities. However, sustain doesn’t do much if you’re dead in two seconds. For all the magic damage showing up in bot lane right now (looking at you, Ziggs and Malzahar), Chalice is missing the mark as an option to keep supports alive while they spellcast. Slightly more magic resistance should put it on track.

MAGIC RESIST25 ⇒ 30

Athene's Unholy Grail

Spillover.

MAGIC RESIST25 ⇒ 30

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Mikael's Crucible

Also spillover.

MAGIC RESIST35 ⇒ 40

Summoner’s Rift

Jungle Tuning

Jungle monsters spawn three seconds later.

As we’ve discussed several times recently, junglers have too much control over the early game. Last patch saw adjustments to the payoffs of camp clearing; this patch, we’re addressing how sharply the risk of early ganking has fallen since pre-season.

First up: the initial jungle spawn time. With how early monsters spawn, laners are able to give Smite-less leashes at no cost. This allows junglers to take very little damage on the first camp, saving Smite’s damage nuke and sustain for later. Laners still have the option to give their junglers strong leashes, but will now pay the cost of missing a minion or two to do so.

General

INITIAL JUNGLE SPAWN1:37 ⇒ 1:40

GROMP AND KRUG SPAWN1:49 ⇒ 1:52

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Next: camp damage. The raptors pose threat through sheer numbers; the small chickens will mess junglers up even if they burst the large one. But less-populated camps don’t have the same tradeoff: junglers who are capable of bursting the large monster take almost no damage from the camp overall. In the case of Gromp, we’re doubling down on his paradigm of dealing a ton of damage upfront, while the Ancient Krug is merely getting more damage.

Gromp

ATTACK DAMAGE45 ⇒ 70

NEWRUNNING OUT OF BREATHAttack damage decreases over the first five attacks to 50 (matching Gromp’s decaying attack speed over the first five attacks)

NEWBOOM BOOMGromp’s first two attacks are now shown as critical strikes

Ancient Krug

BASE ATTACK DAMAGE60 ⇒ 80

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Finally: Honeyfruit’s initial spawn window. Early ganks often occur before laners get a chance to invest in vision, and when Honeyfruit’s sustain is added on top of that, junglers are at basically no risk when making their first visits to a lane. We’re pushing the Honeyfruit spawn back a bit to give laners some breathing room.

Honeyfruit

INITIAL SPAWN TIMERBetween 5:00 and 5:30 ⇒ 6:00 and 6:30

Rift Scuttler

Hungry scuttles.

FORAGINGRift Scuttlers now eat nearby Honeyfruit. If you kill them while they’re eating, you have no heart.

Masteries

Courage of the Colossus

Duration down. Base shield now scales with number of nearby opponents.

Courage of the Colossus should be the go-to pick for tanky champions who want to dive into the enemy team and not die immediately. But it’s also encroaching on Grasp of the Undying’s role, giving far too much consistent power in 1-on-1 situations. We want to focus Courage of the Colossus on teamfights, leaving room for Grasp of the Undying to excel in extended trades.

SHIELD DURATION4 seconds ⇒ 3 seconds

BASE SHIELD10-180 (at levels 1-18) ⇒ 3 - 54 (at levels 1-18) per enemy champion (maximum 15 - 270)

Summoner Spells

Ghost

Ghost takes time to ramp up to its maximum movement speed.

Right now, players are using Ghost in much the same way as Flash: a snap reaction spell in sticky situations. We think Ghost has its place in avoiding incoming ganks, but shouldn’t be so effective at escaping ganks that are already in-progress. The problem stems from Ghost giving all of its speed upfront, padding the punishment for slow response time.

NEW0-60 IN TWO SECONDSGhost’s movement speed now ramps up over the first two seconds, rather than activating instantly

"Revealed” Indicator

Scryer’s Bloom now uses "Revealed" particle. "Revealed" particle simplified.

While we were adding the "Revealed" particle to Scryer’s Bloom, we realized that the old particle is pretty noisy. We’re updating the particle to be clearer and less obtrusive.

SCRYER'S EYESUnits revealed by Scryer's Bloom now display "Revealed" particles

EYEDROPS"Revealed" indicator particles have been simplified to be less distracting

League Client Update

This patch further improves stability and adds a few quality of life improvements to the updated client. More details below!

For questions about the ongoing client update open beta, check out open beta FAQ.

If you’re having technical issues preventing you from enjoying the game experience, know that you still have access to your legacy client. Just click “Launch legacy client” before logging in. You can also find solutions to most common issues in the section of our support site.

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New features

Below are the major features added to the League client update this patch.

NEWMOVABLE CHATPlayers can now pop out the chat window, move and resize it.

NEWNEWS TO MELater this patch we’ll be introducing the “NEWS” tab to the updated client. This will act as a hub for players to catch up on the latest on League of Legends and community creations from within the client.

For those of you who haven’t yet opted into the open beta, we’re releasing another chunk of files (~500 MB) later with this patch. This download (and similar downloads with our normal patches going forward) will split the updated client into smaller chunks, reducing the final download size when it’s time to replace the legacy client. If you’ve opted into the open beta, you’ve already downloaded these files, so you’ll be pretty much unaffected.

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Notable fixes

• The stat icons on rune pages have been replaced with text for improved clarity
• Later in the patch, we’re aiming to fix a bug that highlights club messages as unread, even when you’ve read them
• Instructions have been added for how to fill (i.e., Shift+click) runes to speed up rune page building
• Improvements have been made that should allow streamers to use the windowed capture mode in popular streaming software

Highlights Video Recording Settings

We’ve added the ability to manually toggle the video quality for recording Highlights from your Replays. Before you start a video recording, you can alter video and audio quality, vertical resolution and frame rate via the Video tab in the Options menu.

To record a Highlight while viewing a replay, use the Record button on the timeline or use the shortcut Ctrl + V (Windows) or Cmd + V (OSX).

Rotating Game Modes

Attack. Defend. Repeat. Nexus Siege blasts back into rotation from 1/27/17 - 1/30/17 and 2/3/17 - 2/6/17.

• Take turns charging and protecting the Nexus with a crazy arsenal of unique and mega powerful siege weapons.
• Earn the fastest base destruction (in attack mode) and victory is yours.
• Average game length: 25 minutes.

Seem simple enough? Let the mayhem begin.

Queue Health Update

What does this update mean?

Solo/Duo Queue

Ranked Flex

Bugfixes

• Eliminated some inconsistencies with how Control Wards reveal and disable wards
• Lucian’s Passive - Lightslinger now correctly fires a second shot if it kills a champion on the first attack
• Lucian’s W - Ardent Blaze no longer fails to hit enemies in brush or Fog of War
• Fixed a bug where Zyra’s seeds from both W - Rampant Growth and Passive - Garden of Thorns weren’t respecting their spawn cap
• LeBlanc’s Q - Shatter Orb no longer fails to bounce to enemies with Passive - Sigil of Malice if LeBlanc is too far away
• Fixed a bug where Riven’s E - Valor could cancel crowd control applied by displacement abilities
• Ahri no longer occasionally extends the attack range of the first basic attack of targets hit by E - Charm after the charm effect wore off. Oops.
• Shaco’s Passive - Backstab attacks now appropriately generate overheal shield from The Bloodthirster
• Camille’s second cast of Q - Precision Protocol now correctly damages wards at level 16 and higher
• Fixed a bug where Anivia’s empowered R - Glacial Storm indicator was visible through Fog of War
• Syndra’s Dark Spheres are no longer displaced by Blast Cones. Something something minions…
• Fixed a bug where Zyra’s dead body could intercept ARAM’s snowball. Whoops.
• Enemy spell shields are no longer consumed when a nearby Kha’Zix evolves an ability
• Fixed a bug where if Quinn E - Vaulted Gangplank at the same time as he triggered a E - Powder Keg explosion on multiple targets, it made for one fast pirate
• The range indicator for Rengar’s Passive - Unseen Predator is now consistent across all skins.
• Trundle no longer speaks over himself when using R - Subjugate if he’s already talking
• Fixed a spectator bug where after skipping forward or backward, Ethereal DJ Sona would sometimes leave disembodied chunks of her gear on the map
• Guardian of the Sands Skarner no longer causes an insanely loud noise to play if certain actions were taken
• Fixed a few display bugs on Mac with the on-hover outline that appears around units
• When an Azir kills another Azir with a different skin, the dying Azir no longer steals his killer's skin's death animation particles
• Emumu's bandage particles during R - Curse of the Sad Mummy are once again appropriately emo
• Popstar Ahri's R - Spirit Rush no longer uses on-hit particles from Foxfire Ahri
• Lulu and her skins once again play their running animations when hasted, rather than walking really really fast
• Sad Robot Amumu's W - Despair puddle no longer spins around as Amumu changes which way he's facing
• The ambient glow effect on the Hextech Ward skin no longer cuts in and out on some video quality settings
• Fixed a bug causing Omega Squad Teemo's night vision goggles glow while Invisible to be active at all times
• The mirror reflection of River Spirit Nami's staff is now reattached to the staff's surface, rather than the ground
• Fixed a bug where various buff visuals (ex. Banshee's Veil) weren't following Riot Blitzcrank around during his recall animation

Upcoming Skins & Chromas

The following skins will be released during patch 7.2:

Heartseeker Lucian

Heartseeker Quinn

The following chromas will be released during patch 7.2:

Popstar Ahri

Prestigious LeBlanc