5.13 Patch Rundown and New Gold Efficiencies on Reworked AP Items

Patch 5.13 Rundown

This is my rundown of the upcoming patch 5.13. I will discuss all the changes, what some of the implications will be from the changes, and I will discuss the gold efficiencies of the reworked AP items whose stats changed.

Side Note: If you are just interested in the new gold efficiences skip to the last page (page 4). 

Fixed Death Recap

Something we all have been waiting for. Now we can get a better understanding on how much damage the opponenet(s) did and give players a better chance to understand how strong the abilities of other champions are. This will definitely be beneficial towards the bottom spectrum of players since the upper echelon of players tend to already know why they died.

Slow Stacking Gone

This prevents low mobility champions to get locked up indefinitely by slows. It also adds more thought process on how teams should distribute their slow crowd control since if a Nasus withers a player and then a Janna uses Zephyr on them it won’t do anything. Overall, this will make some teams waste their slow spell cooldowns for no other reason than increased damage towards the target. This is a major change this patch and will take some time to getting used to.

Tahm Kench

Tahm is going to add a lot of interesting mechanics towards the support role and if used correctly he will have an impact on teams’ strategies. The first thing to note is he is good at trading early on and offers a strong tanking shield for tower dives early on. For lane swap tower dives this champion can absorb at least one extra tower shot compared to other tank supports pre-level 6. He also can consume his ally to prevent a tower hit that may kill them. Next, Tahm’s ultimate will help prevent the other team taking dragon off of your team’s duo lane’s back. Tahm can ultimate his ADC right to dragon while getting items for a stronger item spike. This same ultimate can be used for unique ganks, flanks, and dives. There are so many scenarios I can put down on how useful he can be that I could probably dedicate a whole article just to him.

A few Interesting Mechanics: Swallow enemy carry and have Kalista Fate’s Call you back into tower. Swallow the enemy carry and throw him up on a Caitlyn trap.

Fixes/Buffs/Nerfs To Champions

Ekko gained and lost nothing.

Jayce received a fix that gave him a faster power spike from his ultimate.

Kalista received a nerf this patch. She has reduced auto damage, but higher growth and base. In the end, this won’t affect her total damage outcome that much. Her strong trades come from the W passive and she will still be able to stack her rend with ease still. The pierce nerf will stop the quick spikes of damage with fast Q’s, but again it is not a big enough change to make people stop playing her.

Kayle’s buff involves increased damage passively through leveling up her E, righteous fury. This change makes her harass much stronger and improves her scaling even more so. This change along with the devourer and AP item changes will most likely result in Kayle jungle coming back.

Kennen’s bug fix helps solve the issue of his W not applying towards within his ultimate. It is a nice fix for him, but it isn’t a big change to make Kennen more viable.

Nautilus had his riptide nerfed by a small amount. The early damage isn’t really changed by much and this is where Nautilus tends to abuse his riptide. I don’t expect to see Nautilus stop being picked or teetered away because he does just a little bit less damage.

Rek’sai had her un-burrow radius nerfed. 200 to 160 seemed a bit unnecessary to me. It essentially equates towards standing right on top of the enemy to get the knock-up which will also mean we see less multiple target knock-ups and narrow escapes from her knock-up. She will still see professional play due to her kit regardless of the devourer buff.

Singed gets a good buff to his fling and finally has magic resist growth. This will result in Singed being stronger against heavy AP teams and the increased root on his fling will lock up enemy carries for an additional second.

Skarner just had a small fix that results to nothing.

Syndra FINALLY got a bug fix on her scatter the weak. Not only will this allow her to survive better, but to get the catches that should have been when her stun just pushed him back. The other nice rework is Syndra no longer loses her spheres when using her E or R onto a Yasuo wind wall or Braum shield. This gives more counter play towards those champions and if she wishes to ultimate after the shield she won’t have to build up the spheres again.

Thresh just had a few fixes and now his lantern can be used to greater effect when performing big play hooks.

Veigar’s ultimate gets bigger the stronger he gets. This will have no impact besides making you more scared of it.

AP Xin Zhao received a small nerf to his battle cry.

Zilean can’t cast rewind when Q and E aren’t on cooldown. This forces him to use Q or E before using rewind to reduce his ultimate’s cooldown.

Pulsefire Ezreal received a fix to make him feel more responsive, yippee.

Non-AP Item Changes

Enchantment- Devourer

This is a big change to devourer. For one, devourer can gain 5 stacks from dragons and barons. Just getting 2 dragons would result in 1/3 completion of a sated devourer. Add in getting 2 stacks from scuttles you can see how fast these stacks build up without doing massive farming. You will also receive a stack for helping out a teammate killing a large monster, which means no more complaining about everyone taking your jungle in solo queue. An interesting thing to note for professional play is in case your top laner is still being denied in a lane swap you can gift large monsters while still getting stacks. Even at the cost of gold you are still building up stacks. Finally, the sated devourer will give a passive where every other basic attack triggers on-hit effects twice. This essentially will result in a big spike with items like BOTRK and champion passives like Ekko’s. To say the least, we will be seeing more farm centric junglers like Shyvanna, Nocturne, and Master Yi in Solo Queue. In terms of professional play I can see carry junglers going this item, but don’t expect this to be used all the time in professional play.

Enchantment- Runeglaive

The big bug where runeglaive applies spell effects is gone now so no more luden echo effects. This is a nerf towards Ezreal, Gangplank, and Keane’s Nasus who utilize this. However, it did receive a small buff towards its AP stat and AP Ezreal will still do strong damage.

Righteous Glory

This is a medium nerf. You will receive 100 less health and the righteous glory cooldown is increased by 30 seconds. This prevents fast engages to occur quickly and force players to think twice before using righteous glory. Will it stop players going for it? Probably not since the item ability is still very strong and tanks can live with 100 less health.

Spirit Visage

An interesting buff which does help sustain supports heal their tanks better, but in the end it’s just a buff towards Alistar and Janna for professional play. Alistar can keep his tanks healthier in sieges and Janna can heal her tanks more with monsoon, though monsoon isn’t used in this regard all the time.

AP Item Changes With Gold Efficiency Changes

Needlessly Large Rod

This item has lost 20 AP, but it is 350 gold cheaper. What makes the price reduction so nice is being able to grab a quicker power spike due to it being cheaper and also puts less emphasis on saving gold. Needlessly large rod decreased in gold efficiency by 4.35%.

Rabadon’s Deathcap

Deathcap cost increased by 200 gold, but gained an additional 5% ability power bonus. This won’t matter in the beginning, but once you start having a base ability power of 500 the difference between old and new deathcap will be 25 additional AP. At 800 base AP you will be getting 40 more AP compared to the old deathcap. Essentially, we have a better late game item that costs 200 gold more. Rabadon’s deathcap decreased in gold efficiency by 2.15%.

Zhonya’s Hourglass

The reason people go zhonya’s is for its armor and ability. Cutting the cost is more beneficial than the 300 gold for the extra 20 AP. This will affect mid laners laning against assassins and will provide additional safety for them. Zhonya’s hourglass decreased in gold efficiency by 3.56%.

Luden’s Echo

You lose 20 AP and gain 3% more MS for ludens being 300 gold cheaper. This item has similar reasons as hourglass. It’s the passive of ludens that makes it so enticing. It also increases movement speed by a little bit which will allow AP poke champions to dodge skill shots better. Luden’s echo decreased in gold efficiency by 1.80%.

Rylai’s Crystal Scepter

Rylai’s crystal scepter increased in price by 100 gold, but the trade-offs are stronger slows from single target, AOE spells, and duration spells. The single target slow increased by 5% which isn’t much. The AOE slow (instant) increased by 25% which is massive. Champions like Xerath will be able to massively slow the enemy with one Q. The damage over time slow increased by 5%, but the slow duration decreased by .5 seconds. This is still a buff and the champion who will love this is Rumble. Rumble is getting several itemization buffs which should make him even stronger. No gold efficiency change since I can’t calculate the slow percentages, but to say the least the champions with AOE (instant) and damage over time this will become more efficient.

Archangel’s Staff

Archangel has become 300 gold more expensive for 20 additional AP. This is a continued trend of increasing the late game potency, but increased cost makes the item harder to obtain. The players who want a quicker item spike will want to complete archangel sooner. Also, typically their tear is at least 1/3 stacked which makes up for most of the additional 20 AP. The gold efficiency for non-stacked archangel is increased by 5.88%. The fully stacked archangel decreased in gold efficiency by 1.49%.

Rod of Ages

Rod is 100 gold cheaper, gives 150 less health, 50 less mana, 20 more mana per a minute and 2 more ability power per a minute. This is a nerf to getting an early rod of ages. You will have less health and mana on top of it taking longer to catch up to the old rod of ages so the champions who go early rod like Ryze or Karthus won’t be as strong compared to before.. However, late game rod of ages is much better compared to the previous one. Rod of ages with no stacks gold efficiency decreased by 14.03%. Rod of ages with maxed stats increased in gold efficiency by 18.71%.

Liandry’s Torment

An increase of 30 AP with only an increase of 100 gold makes this item more optimal to get. The one champion everyone will think of right away is Rumble. Rumble is going to become even better with the improvement of liandry and rylais. This item will also become more enticing for AP poke champions who might want the on spell-hit proc and not sacrifice too much AP. Liandry’s torment increased in gold efficiency by 18.99%.

Void Staff

This is a nerf to void’s staff. The whole point of void staff is to get the AP penetration. Increasing the cost by 205 gold will make it slightly harder to obtain and I have been in several situations where I am trying to get the last bit of gold for void. Void staff increased in gold efficiency by 3.24%.

Nashor’s Tooth

The increased ability power for the reduction of attack speed all at the increase cost of 80 gold isn’t a bad deal. This is still a great item on Kayle. Azir players might start using Nashor’s tooth thanks to the increase in ability power and massive CDR. However, the only problem going Nashor’s means you cap off at 40% CDR with Morellonomicon. Time will tell who would want to build this item besides Kayle. Nashor’s tooth increased in gold efficiency by 1.36%.

Will of the Ancients

This is a rather large buff for will of the ancients. This allows champions who normally wouldn’t benefit from spell vamp to pick it up. It also will still be a great item on Vlad. For instance, single target nukes like Syndra’s ultimate or quick nukes like Cassiopeia will heal quite a bit. I didn’t even mention how the heal amount is calculated before your opponent’s resistances. This means you can obtain strong healing even if you don’t have void staff.

 If you are interested in seeing the whole spreadsheet in which I compared the old and new AP items the link is listed below. 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1gr_943ZwveHw90VhdDg1KrGfMygB79W_K36m9Fuhp1k/edit?usp=sharing

Credits towards the Riot’s patch notes, riot’s picture of Tahm, and league of legends wikia to help with the gold efficiency calculations.