A quick overview of the 8.12 PBE updates

There are not that many items that have been changed in this week’s PBE cycle, however, these changes will definitely impact the meta a fair amount if it goes through to the live servers.

Shielding champions, mostly played as support in the bot, have taken the hardest hit this patch. The shield duration for these champions has dropped dramatically, opening up the window so ADCs can actually die in fights, and shield timing is kept important.

Emote

One new emote, the “Hat’s Off Emote” shows a cute yet fancy penguin taking his hat off. It will likely be a loot item, thankfully so, given this seems to be an extreme BM emote.

Champion changes

Ezreal: Not too big a nerf, however, it will still affect Ezreal overall. Ez’s attack damage growth throughout the game (every time he levels up) will be reduced by around 17%, down from 3.11 to 2.5. Ez has been too strong in the late game, reducing his overall AD is a reasonable change.

Janna: While all the stats will stay the same – AP ratio, base shield, CD and mana cost will not be touched, the shield will now decay over its extremely long 5 second duration. This will dramatically nerf the shield, especially so since it can be played around, backing off, waiting for it to decay, then re-engaging.

Karma: Karma’s shield duration has been lowered to 2.5 seconds, down from 4 seconds. This is quite a decent nerf, as once again, it reduces the time-window the champions have a shield on for, so that they are not almost untouchable in trades.

Lulu: Massive duration nerf to Lulu’s E / shield ability. Ally shield duration will now last 2.5 seconds, down from the previous 6 seconds. The more than 50% nerf on duration is extremely harsh, and will not likely pass through to the live servers. However, it’s great how Riot are making an effort to nerf shielding support champions.

Orianna: Yet another shield duration nerf, down to 2.5 seconds from 4 seconds. Orianna’s shield makes her extremely annoying to lane against, especially due to her favourable trades, dealing a large amount of damage without taking much if not any, in return. This will definitely weaken her laning phase.

Taliyah: Taliyah’s Q on the same champion for subsequent hits will deal 40% reduced damage instead of the previous 60% reduced damage. AD has been buffed by 2, make CS’ing a bit easier, but overall, will not impact her effectiveness. E damage has also been increased, both AP scaling (by 0.1) and base damage (+15 at all levels).

Yasuo: Base AD increased from 60 to 63. Not sure how much this will impact Yasuo, but it is evident some change is necessary, as the new Yasuo is much weaker in the early phases due to the new Infinity Edge.

Item

Maw of Malmortius

Passive, “Lifeline”, duration has been increased by 2 seconds to a total of 5 seconds. This item has been fairly weak for too long, the buff will encourage more to buy it, not only for the magical damage shield, but the extended other bonuses.

Final Remarks

While nothing is ever certain regarding changes in the PBE rolling out to the live servers. We do know Riot does intend to reduce shield timers and reduce the effectiveness of support that mainly rely on their shields. This will allow a more action-packed bot lane, and speed up the game as more windows are open to kill key carries.

Image Credits: Riot Games