Riot details experimental champion changes coming to League’s 2021 preseason

League of Legends senior champion designer August Browning outlined all the champion changes coming to the 2021 preseason today, ahead of the new item system overhaul. 

The goal of “most” of these experimental changes, according to August, is to ensure the champions work correctly with the new items while “maintaining compelling build choices.” 

All champions with spells that critical strike or have other unique crit interactions have been adjusted to work correctly with the new crit values and Infinity Edge.

Crit damage has been lowered from 200 to 175 percent and crit chance per item has been dropped from 25 to 20 percent. Infinity Edge also gains an additional +8 percent critical damage per 20 percent crit chance. 

Caitlyn, Jhin, Senna, Trynamere, Yasuo, and Yone have each received tentative changes on League’s PBE to reflect this.

Caityln

Passive – Headshot

• Headshots gain 25 percent less bonus damage from crit chance

Jhin

Passive – Whisper

• Crit damage reduction: from 25 percent (150 percent damage crits on live) to 14 percent (150 percent damage crits on PBE)

Senna

AS ratio: Increased from 0.2 to 0.32
AS per level: Decreased from 4 percent to 2.5 percent

Passive – Absolution

• Crit damage reduction: from 35 percent (130 percent damage crits on live) to 14 percent 9150 percent damage crits on PBE)
• Crit chance per 20 souls from 15 percent to 10 percent
• Excess crit to lifesteal conversation: from 25 percent to 50 percent

E – Curse of the Black Mist

• Movespeed speed: from 20 percent to 20 percent (+3 percent/100 AP)

R – Dawning Shadow

• Damage AP ratio: from 0.5 to 0.8

Tryndamere

Passive – Battle Fury

• Crit chance per point of fury: from 0.35 to 0.5 to 0.3 to 0.6

Yasuo

Passive – Way of the Wanderer

• Bonus crit strike chance: from 100 percent to 150 percent
• Crit strike damage reduction: from 10 percent to 15 percent

Yasuo

Passive – Way of the Hunter

• Bonus crit strike chance: from 100 percent to 150 percent
• Crit strike damage reduction: from 10 percent to 15 percent

To go along with these changes, champions with item passives and champions that make use of on-hit effects have also received changes on the PBE. This is in accordance with the new Mythic items joining the game.

Ornn

All Mythic items have Ornn upgrades. Only Mythic items can be upgraded. Each upgrade is worth roughly 1,000 gold in stats.

Viktor

Passive – Glorious Evolution

• No longer starts with Hexcore in his inventory and cannot purchase upgrades
• Viktor gains an Evolution point when he completes a mythic or legendary tier item
• Each evolution point upgrades a spell and grants +10 percent total AP permanently

E – Death Ray

• Mana cost: from 60/70/90/100/110 to 50/60/70/80/90
• Laser ratio: from 0.6 to 0.7
• Aftershock ratio: from 0.7 to 0.6

Zoe

W – Spell Thief

• Currently does not work with new item actives. Will be updated to work shortly before pre-season ships

Elise

Q – Venomous Bite

• Now applies on-hit effects

Katarina

Passive – Verocity

• Now applies on-hit effects to all units struck

E – Shunpo

• Now applies on-hit effects

R – Death Lotus

• Split damage into (base and AP ratio) magic, and (AD and ASPD ratio) physical. Now applies on-hit effects at 33 percent efficiency to all units struct (each unit is hit for a total of 3x Kat’s on-hits over the full 2.5 channel duration)

Kayle

Passive – Divine Ascent

• As per Zeal stack: from 6 percent (30 percent at 5 stacks) to 6 percent + 2 percent/100 AP (30 percent +10 percent/100 AP at 5 stacks)

All of these changes are experimental and liable to change before League’s 2021 preseason goes live later this year. They’re now available to test on the PBE.