Riot plans to buff both Kayn and Kha’Zix in Patch 8.6, according to the latest round of PBE updates—but the jungle duo doesn’t really need to be stronger, at least not by much.
Kha’Zix is definitely the most confusing head-scratcher of the two. Sure, he isn’t performing as well as top dogs like Skarner, Volibear, and Warwick (well there’s a statement we never thought we’d say), but he doesn’t need to be a top-five jungler of any given patch. Right now, he’s sitting on a 50 percent winrate and a seven percent playrate, according to League of Legends stats site Champion.gg.
That means he wins half the games he’s played in, and he’s still the second most popular champion in the jungle. That’s the picture of good health for any champion, and yet, a buff is still headed his way.
In Patch 8.6, assuming this change actually makes it through testing, the AD scaling on his passive is being increased by 10 percent, from 20 up to 30. For context, that’s about a 25 damage boost if he’s at 250 total AD, scaling higher the more AD he builds.
Kayn is a little bit less perplexing, but he’s still not performing that bad. His winrate is only one percent lower than Kha’s at 49 percent, and he’s still the eighth most popular jungler. Out of 46 jungle champions, that’s pretty good. Of course, unlike Kha, Kayn is nonexistent on the pro stage, but not every champion needs to be pro-viable, either.
Kayn’s buff is more severe, as his ultimate’s base damage and AD scaling are both going up by considerable margins and his passive will now stack more quickly to aid his transformation. Kayn is one of those champions that becomes much stronger upon hitting a certain point in the game, and for him, that’s his transformation. If he can hit it sooner, his importance in the meta will likely go up, too.
Both of these buffs are planned for Patch 8.6 in two weeks, but as with any PBE change, there’s a chance they’ll never see the light of day.
