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Irelia’s update arrived on the PBE yesterday, and some of the PBE’s player-testers discovered something interesting—her AP scalings are weirdly high. They’re so high, in fact, that she might work well with a full AP build.
By the end of her first day on the PBE, though, Riot realized the predicament Irelia had found herself in. Not only was she a viable AP champion, she was overpowered, so all of her strong AP-scaling abilities were nerfed.
The strongest AP ability in her kit by far was her Flawless Duet, which allows her to throw blades to two points before the blades fly toward one another, stunning and damaging enemies caught in between. It’s sort of like Malzahar’s Call of the Void, and it’s also great for zoning and damaging enemies from range.
This ability had a whopping 90 percent AP scaling, which is absurd for it also being her best ranged harasser. Considering she can build both full-tank and attack speed carry, she probably doesn’t need to be a great AP poke champion too. That being said, it makes sense that Riot nerfed this build. Its AP scaling was dropped to 80 percent, which is still a bit extreme, but at least it’s somewhat weaker.
Her W, Defiant Dance, was also nerfed in the AP department. Without charging up the ability at all, it scales with 50 percent of her AP, but at maximum charge it scales with 100 percent. The max scaling was dropped to 90, and the minimum scaling was dropped to 45 percent. Again, it isn’t a huge nerf, but it should be enough to make her not so ridiculous.
Irelia’s update has a lot of promise for versality. Her kit allows her to build either as a bruiser, a full tank, or an attack speed carry, and now, even with these nerfs, there’s a world in which she can even be useful as an AP champion. Her passive makes her basic attacks deal magic damage, too, which only helps to reinforce the odd build.
She’s expected to hit live servers in two weeks, AP or not.
