League of Legends 11.15 Patch Notes

It’s that time again, the time where we talk all about the character buffs, nerfs, and changes that come with the most recent League of Legends patch. Lots of character changes with the 11.15 patch so we aren’t going to spend a ton of time recapping and get right to the juicy stuff. You know what League of Legends is and we want to give you our take on the most recent changes.

            We’re always inclined to start with the nerfs and get the bad news out of the way.

            Annie has been dominating close-up, short-range fights. The devs think it’s a good idea to lower the ratio on her Q attack. That should reduce her ability to stop others from challenging her lane.

            Aurelion Sol has pushed the line for elite play which means the devs wanted to slow them down. They did this by increasing the cooldown of their Q ability. A small change, but should have the impact they are looking for.

            Gwen’s strength is supposed to be in her raw stat power. So her abilities should be a little weaker than they were currently. So they took her E ability and reduced the speed early on, but keeping the threshold that it has later. So if you think about it generously, its kind of only a partial nerf.

            Irelia is seeing her second nerf in a row, the devs reducing the damage ratio and the damage reduction that it affords. This is a smaller correction from last patch in order to find a good place of balance but we are unsure if she will be seeing a third nerf in the next patch.

            Kayle is seeing a rather firm nerf in the form of a magic resistance reduction. This is supposed to make her surmountable early game but we are curious to see if such a heavy-handed change has some unintended consequences down the line.

            Sylas is technically a nerf since overall he is going to be a tad less powerful than he was before, but the devs are being kind enough to balance it out. The duelist's W ability will heal less but this is being balanced by increasing the detonation damage of his Q ability.

            Thresh has a diverse toolkit at his disposal, so the devs thought it could be trimmed back a bit for the sake of fair and balanced play. The cooldown on his E ability has been increased to see if that doesn’t slow him down just enough.

            Viego is still seeing some balance issues from his launch that the devs seem to be struggling to get just right. This is the second update that they have continued to give him bonus damage against monsters. This is compensation, this time, for reducing his Q ability in the hopes of making him less solo lane viable.

            Lastly on the nerf side of things, we have Wukong. Wukong is seeing some serious nerfing with the reduction of his base health regen. We get why the devs would do this for balance reasons but you hate to see it happen.

            Next, we have the more optimistic news, if you choose to interpret it that way, the buffs.

            Lots of base stat tweaking in this patch. First up we have Blitzcrank with a base armor buff, giving him some serious weight. On top of that we are seeing a damage increase in his Q ability, so be prepared to see a lot more Blitzcrank.

            The devs want to see more of Caitlyn in the viable marksmen builds, so they are upping her Q damage ratio in the hopes that it will encourage people to favor the already viable builds.

            Cassiopeia is seen as having not aged all too well by the devs making her a bit slow in the modern gameplay. They want to see her be more viable earlier on, so they upped the damage of her E ability to see if that evens the playing field a little.

            The same goes for Kennen as well, the devs missing them from the general gameplay. You know they hate to see one of their characters struggle so they are hoping the Q damage increase will get Kennen back on the board.

            Mordekaiser has not been holding his own in his lane, which is a bit sad for a big bruiser like him. The devs are hoping a little bit more bang for his buck when it comes to overhauling the W ability that he has will do the trick.

            Nidalee’s buff is certainly one of the kinder ones we are seeing this patch, with an overall health and health gain improvement. The devs want to see her be fierce and they are hoping to give her a little more padding will help people play more bravely.

            Rell’s buff is actually a reverted nerf, which isn’t surprising but also isn’t too common either. Either way, ferromancy is getting back to its old tricks with the cooldown it used to have and you’ll be seeing players combo with Rell just like they used to.

            Shyvana is seeing some overall rounded buffs. A decrease in cooldown speed for her Q and increased damaged ratios are changes the devs feel will help her balance more while favoring multiple builds for her.

            Syndra’s buff is actually another revert of an earlier patch. The devs thought her Q ability cost increasing would help but actually caused her too many early game problems so they changed it back.

            Last on the buff list we have Xayah. Her R ability cooldown is being decreased to prevent her from holding the rest of the team back if she lags behind. Considerate of the devs to do that really.

            And those are the buffs and the nerfs in this patch. There is also a new champion released recently, Akshan, but the release was recent enough that we aren’t ready to say anything just yet. Be sure to check in to hear our assessment of the newest LoL champions, changes, and news.  As always, we will be fully stocked with LO Laccounts for sale both before the season and as the new season begins.