League of Legends patches have introduced massive, sweeping, meta-hammering changes over the last two months or so. This week’s Patch 8.12 will be no different, according to the official patch notes, so prepare yourselves.
The best news of the patch is certainly the total removal of the Banner of Command. Riot has tried to balance it a few times this season, but it’s mostly remained a meta-defining item with unparalleled power and cost effectiveness. So Riot is removing the item indefinitely, or at least until the design team can give it a proper rework.
That’s not the only change that will alter the meta in a big way. Major shielding abilities on Lulu, Janna, Orianna, and Karma are being nerfed, opening the door for more kinds of supports too.
This should be the last major mid-season patch altering a wide area of League’s champions, according to Rio. But most of the patches this season prior to any mid-season patches were pretty massive, too, so we’re not sure players will be able to notice much of a difference in impact.
Nerfs
Champions
Ezreal
- Base armor lowered by three points.
Taliyah
- Threaded Volley (Q): Champions will take 50 percent less damage from rocks after the first, up from 40 percent.
Shielding champions
Janna
- Eye of the Storm (E): Shield now quickly decays after 0.75 seconds for its old duration.
Karma
- Inspire (E): Shield duration lowered from four seconds to 2.5 seconds (also applies to Mantra-boosted version).
Lulu
- Help, Pix! (E): Shield duration significantly lowered from six seconds to 2.5.
Orianna
- Command: Protect (E): Shield duration lowered from four to 2.5 seconds.
Items
Banner of Command
- Removed from game.
Shielding/healing items
Forbidden Idol
- Cooldown reduction halved from 10 percent to five.
- Heal and shield power boost lowered from eight percent to five.
Ardent Censer
- Heal and shield power boost lowered from 10 percent to eight.
Mikael’s Crucible
- Heal and shield power boost lowered from 20 to 15 percent.
Redemption
- Heal and shield power boost lowered from 10 percent to eight.
Athene’s Unholy Grail
- More damage mitigation now converted to healing passive ability (to compensate for shield/heal nerfs to other items).
Runes
Celerity (sort of)
- Bonus movement speed halved from three percent to 1.5.
- Damage conversion from bonus movement speed to AP and AD doubled.
Buffs
Champions
Elise
- Base movement speed raised by five in both forms.
- Volatile Spiderling (W): Base damage raised by 5-25 damage depending on rank.
Kindred
- Attack speed growth raised from 2.5 to 3.5 percent.
- Dance of Arrows (Q): Bonus attack speed raised from 10 to 25 percent.
- Mounting Dread (E): Base damage raised by 15 at all ranks.
Lee Sin
- Safeguard/Iron Will (W): Cooldown lowered by two seconds.
- Tempest (E): Base damage raised by 10-30 depending on rank.
Poppy
- Iron Ambassador (P): Cooldown lowered at levels seven and 13 by one second and two seconds respectively.
- Hammer Shock (Q): Cooldown lowered by one second. Bonus AD scaling raised from 80 percent to 90.
Rumble
- Scrap Shield (W): Base shield increased by 20 at all ranks. AP scaling increased from 40 percent to 50.
- The Equalizer (R): Max base damage increased by 50-200 depending on rank and AP scaling raised from 150 percent to 175.
Sejuani
- Fury of the North (P): Icebreaker to monsters damage lowered from 400 flat to 10-20 percent max health (capped at 300) to match its damage toward other targets. Now applies to champions, medium monsters, large monsters, epic monsters, super minions, and siege minions.
- Winter’s Wrath (W): Mana cost lowered by 15. New AP scaling added to swing (20 percent) and snap (60 percent).
- Permafrost (E): Non-champion cooldown removed (this means her stun and Icebreaker can now be spammed on monsters). Base damage raised by 10-30 depending on rank and AP scaling raised from 30 to 60 percent.
Yorick
- Yorick’s summons now update their stats when Yorick’s stats change.
- Last Rites (Q): Cooldown lowered slightly at later ranks.
Items
Sterak’s Gage (sort of)
- Now grants bonus AD equal to 50 percent of your base AD, rather than a 50 percent boost to your base AD.
- This means that Sterak’s will be weaker when paired up with Sheen items, but will be much stronger on any champion whose abilities scale with bonus AD. This is a buff for more champions than a nerf.
Maw of Malmortius
- Shield now lasts five seconds (listed as a bugfix).
Runes
Hail of Blades
- Bonus attack speed raised from 50-100 percent depending on level to 75-125.
New stuff
Emotes
- Emotes are now 100 RP cheaper.
- All players who bought emotes prior to 8.12 will receive a free M’Pengu.
- Mystery emote tokens added.
- A small bubble will appear next to in-game portraits when an ally uses an emote.
- Added auto-fire slots for First Blood and Ace.
- All emotes now have custom sounds.
- Emote animations added.
- New emotes: Yikes, Okay, Joy Pengu, Go Team!, and Hype Kitty.
Skins
Playmaker Lee Sin and Sweeper Rammus
