Massive Zoe nerfs are on the way in League Patch 8.16

When in doubt, nerf Zoe.
Image via Riot Games

As sure as the sun will set, Zoe will be annoying. This is an indisputable fact of life, and apparently, Riot agrees. The balance team is dishing out a big, fat damage nerf to her in League of Legends Patch 8.16, according to the latest PBE update.

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Zoe has been very popular both in solo queue and in pro play lately. Her burst damage can’t be matched by any other mage in the mid lane, and on top of that, she makes that stupid “:P” face every time she ults near you. Is there anything on Runeterra quite as irritating as her? Probably not, but unfortunately, the nerfs Riot has planned won’t do anything about that face she makes.

Instead, it’s all about the damage, and we guess that’s good enough. Her passive ability, More Sparkles!, is taking a hit to its AP scaling, dropping all the way from 32.5 percent to 20 percent. Its base damage is falling, too, but not to the same extreme.

Spell Thief, her W, is also being knocked down a peg or seven in the AP department. Its AP scaling will now be 40 percent, rather than the 55 percent that’s in her current kit. These are obviously very significant numbers, and she’s definitely going to feel it as soon as she buys an item or two.

One of the biggest complaints about her kit is that it revolves almost completely around landing Paddle Stars, but she has so many other powerful tools to burst people down even if she misses it. With these nerfs, she’ll be punished much more for missing her Q, but it won’t be any weaker. We think that’s about as good as you can get with a Zoe nerf.

These changes should both go live next week when Patch 8.16 hits live servers.


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Aaron Mickunas
Esports and gaming journalist for Dot Esports, featured at Lolesports.com, Polygon, IGN, and Ginx.tv.