Back from the dead: Riot showcases new Chemtech Drake, returning for League’s 2023 preseason

League of Legends’ most infamous dragon is finally making a grand return to Summoner’s Rift.

In a new developer’s vlog, Riot Games’ lead gameplay designer Matthew “Phroxzon” Leung-Harrison confirmed that the Chemtech Drake will be reintroduced in the 2023 preseason—and the toxic high-flyer is coming with a whole new set of effects.

One of the most significant changes to Chemtech Drake is its Dragon Soul effect since it will no longer provide players with a temporary Zombie state in which they can continue to attack enemies for a short duration after dying. This effect was highly controversial and caused complaints about the ease that teams had when snowballing leads once this soul was captured.

Instead, Chemtech Soul will grant more damage and damage reduction when an affected player is at low health. Phroxzon didn’t specify what kind of effect each Chemtech Drake stack will give to players who kill the toxic beast, though.

Phroxzon did, however, say that if the Chemtech Drake dominates the Rift, it will no longer spawn invisibility zones around the map’s jungle areas. As a replacement effect, the dragon influence will cause all plants on the map to mutate and become enhanced. Scryer’s Bloom, for example, will provide bonus movement speed when players move toward revealed enemies. Blast Cone will have an increased range as well, giving new ways to traverse the map with the improved fling radius.

Chemtech Drake was introduced during the 2022 preseason alongside the Hextech Drake as a way to increase unique situations and meaningful strategies to the later stages of a game. But only 24 days into this year, Riot decided to shelf the new dragon because it was “too frustrating to play with—especially if you’re on the losing team.”

With Chemtech making a return, there will now be six dragons to keep track of in both solo queue and professional play. Casual players and competitive teams will need to adjust their strategies for the new dragon, while Riot will need to keep tabs on how it is received after a whole year of tweaking.