Since her release at the end of July, Naafiri has become one of the most-contested picks in League of Legends solo queue. The Hound of the Hundred Bites is a hugely influential champion on Summoner’s Rift with some of the highest draft presence numbers in ranked play, forcing Riot Games’ hand once more in an upcoming update.
Naafiri currently holds a 52.6 percent win rate in the mid lane among Platinum players and above, while also boasting a whopping 55.3 percent ban rate in the same ranked distribution, according to League stats aggregate U.GG. She has quickly become one of the most-feared champions in the game, which has forced the developers to knock her down another peg in Patch 13.16.
Related: Five LoL champs to be nerfed in Patch 13.16 as devs change their minds on Naafiri
Next patch, Naafiri is scheduled to get a base attack damage reduction of two, a base armor reduction of two, and a slight base attack speed reduction, if the changes on the League PBE end up dropping onto the live servers.
This is a direct counter to Riot’s original plans from Patch 13.15, where design manager Stephen Auker said Naafiri had “stabilized into a good state” since her release. As a result, Auker said there would be no adjustments since her win rate had started to flatten out around 49 to 49.5 percent for “elite ranks,” which consists of Diamond ranks and above.
Since then, however, the powerful champion has crept up into the 50 percent win rate category in elite ranks, breaking into a problematic area for the developers to balance. These small nerfs shouldn’t completely tank Naafiri’s play rate and win rate, but they should help continue to even out her strengths until she reaches an acceptable limit for both players and developers alike.
League Patch 13.16 is scheduled to release on Wednesday, Aug. 16.
Published: Aug 9, 2023 02:55 pm