https://x.com/RiotPhroxzon/status/2095029942165852287

 

Patch 26.18 Full Preview!

 

 

Cassiopeia
- Cassiopeia is in a pretty rough state for average players (~47% winrate), while being too strong in Pro Play and above average in Elite play
- We're making some adjustments this patch to move some of her power around that retain her gameplay identity of being a strong early game champion (which is inherently pro skewed), but also giving her power back for regular players
- We're also not looking to completely remove her from the meta, but just better balance across skill brackets
- One of the ways we're attempting to accomplish this is by moving more of the power into her AP ratios over her base damages as Average players tend to purchase more AP
- Her Q interaction with Deathfire Touch is also strong (though having synergistic effects with systems is a cool part of the champion), and so that rank 1 base damage is also coming down a bit

Seraphine
- As mentioned yesterday,  Support Seraphine has been her most popular role for a long time
- We're making E rank up incentives worse for the damage oriented roles, while intending for this to have relatively minimal impact for Support Seraphine who maxes this ability last

 

Zeri
- Zeri benefitted amongst other champions from the Hurricane changes
- The Hurricane changes landed well and it feels like a real item again
- That said, Zeri is now broadly a bit too strong, especially in Elite given her mastery profile
- Our principles with items are to get the items in a good spot first and then get the champions into a good spot, which is why we wouldn't follow-up by nerfing Hurricane

 

Ekko
- Ekko is being targeted for a buff in Mid
- We're giving him a waveclear buff and a mana buff, targeting his AP ratios as AP is often purchased more in mid and getting Lich Bane in mid is more typical than in Jungle
- While buffing Ekko's waveclear capabilities are on the lower interaction side, we think it's important for the game to have a mix of high and low interaction laning patterns and as a roaming, tempo champion, having waveclear is important to get his snowball going

 

Viego
- Ever since we removed Divine Sunderer and nerfed Sundered Sky in a recent patch, Bruiser Viego has been worse than squishy Viego, which is intended, but that build is a little weaker than we'd like
- Adding some explicit support for that build

 

Zaahen
- Zaahen is a little on the weak side after the last set of nerfs we did
- We're also taking the opportunity to make his Q behavior coming out of revive more consistent
- Before, you could get into de-synced states where your Q2 only has a short time to be used after reviving, etc.

 

 

 

https://x.com/RiotPhroxzon/status/2094654806992498728

 

Rageblade
- In 26.14, we re-scripted Rageblade and it changed the trigger for Phantom hit from 6 to 7
- We're making a small adjustments to Rageblade itself to give a bit of power back and to some of the disproportionately affected champions (eg. Master Yi)

 

Cassiopeia
- Cassio has been strong, especially at the higher levels of play every since Deathfire Touch was re-released
- Since then, she's been one of the most present picks and Pro Play due to her strong laning ability
- We're looking at some power neutral adjustments to Cassio, because her regular play power level is a little on the weaker side for average players
- We're taking some power out of her early game power and moving it into more scaling power, so that she doesn't win lanes so reliably, even if she's missing Q's
- We still want to maintain her strong laning ability though

Seraphine
- For several patches now, Seraphine has been in the Top 3 on our regular patch frustration surveys
- She's also one of strongest pairings in Pro Play with Ashe
- Overall, we think a nerf here is reasonable
- We acknowledge there are some Seraphine mains who won't be happy about a nerf and that we can't serve all of her audience simultaneously
- Her Support playerbase has been the most popular, despite her power level and so that's where we will continue to support her primarily
- Where we can get Mid and Bot to be powerful and satisfying given ^, we will attempt to do so
- That said, it's very difficult to thread the needle here and we run the risk of failing to meet the needs of any of her audiences if there are too many compromises
- I also wanted to address directly the nerf to her AP ratios on Q from several patches ago, as that's been a pain point amongst some in the community
- One of the ways we need to balance Seraphine in the farming roles vs her support is through her AP ratios and the Q ratio is one that drives her power and total damage output there, especially given the Q reliability adjustments made of late
- When Seraphine is able to land her Q's at max multiplier (which in lane is quite frequent), it can hit 1.4 AP ratio which we think is reasonable
- The Q damage overall is higher than E and so for now, we feel comfortable with the change (this isn't set in stone however, and there are always improvements to her to be made)