Riot bends Lux, Xerath into mid lane again as LoL Patch 13.17 brings huge pile of changes

The mid and jungle roles are to see huge changes in League of Legends Patch 13.17, with the most interesting among them revolving around Lux and Xerath and a concentrated push to bring the spellcasters back to the map’s central role.

Matt “RiotPhroxzon” Leung-Harrison, the lead League balance boss, today revealed several champion buffs and nerfs rolling out on the Rift next week, including the aforementioned two buffs.

Lux, Zoe chief among planned buffs

There are nine champion buffs planned, with five in mid lane, two in top lane, and one each in the jungle and bot lane. They include:

• Elise
  • More auto attack damage and healing, longer E stun duration
• Gnar
  • More Mega Q and W damage
• Lux
  • Less mana regeneration, Q cooldown, and E damage, but more passive damage
• Orianna
  • More health growth and W damage
• Samira
  •  More health
• Twisted Fate
  • More Q ability power damage
• Tryndamere
  • Extra attack range
• Vex
  • Increased Q damage, lower W cooldown. Her R ping will now also mention any enemies that are in range
• Zoe
  • More health regeneration, E Sleep duration, and her E’s magic resistance reduction is now fixed too

As RiotPhroxzon mentioned, the buffs to Lux should push her back into the mid lane, where she has been struggling recently. We’ll have to wait until the patch launches to see if these changes are actually effective though.

One of the biggest struggles with Lux in the mid lane is she is relatively mana hungry. You’ll find yourself out of mana pretty quickly and unable to use your abilities. With these buffs, League players should be able to bind enemies more often and see a slight damage improvement when pulling off E-into-Q combos.

What’s interesting about these buffs are the ones coming to Vex, especially her W. Having the cooldown on her shield reduced, especially in the early stages, means players can be more aggressive in the early game and be more durable.

Junglers hit hard again, Xerath loses power

While there are only five champion nerfs in Patch 13.17, they are, for the most part, jungle-focused. The nerfs rolling out include the following:

• Kayn
  • Lowered W attack damage ratio
• Kha’Zix
  • Lowered Q attack damage ratio
• Kindred
  • Less E slow strength
• Naafiri
  • Less health, a reduction to her passive cooldown, as well as nerfs to her Q2 heal and damage and her E ratios. Her packmates will also now take bonus damage from champion melee attacks.
• Xerath support
  • Changes to move him back to mid lane

From Phreak’s comments in a Twitch stream, jungle nerfs should be a focus for the devs as long as they believe the role to be “20 percent stronger.” So, the nerfs to Kayn, Kha’Zix, and Kindred aren’t too surprising.

The nerfs to Xerath Support or Naafiri aren’t too surprising, either. Xerath has a 52.6 percent win rate in support, so nerfing his mana and passive cooldown may lower his win rate there and push him back to being a mid laner again.

The nerf that will make many other mid laners happy is to League’s newest arrival, Naafiri and her packmates, who will now receive more damage from champion melee attacks. This will be a relief for some players because her dogs have felt almost unstoppable; having them nerfed should make her feel a little less oppressive.

These tentative changes should go live in Patch 13.17 on Aug. 30.