When Riot tweaked Soraka’s Q and E abilities in Patch 9.9, things started off pretty innocuously. Then people figured out that the changes made her a viable mid laner. Yes, AP Soraka was being played by pro solo laners, including Clutch mid laner Tanner Damonte, who locked her in for seven-straight games.
Now in Patch 9.10, Riot has decided that enough is enough—they’re giving Soraka even more power. She’s getting even more movement speed when landing her Q, from 14/18/22/26/30 to 15/20/25/30/35 percent. The boost will also decay much slower than before.
The key mark here is after level three points in Q, where she’ll be able to throw out a Q and then scurry back to the minion wave with impunity. That will make her even more annoying to play against in both solo lanes and in the bot lane. The reasoning Riot gave was that it “missed on the power level” in the Patch 9.9 changes. But with solid a win rate in her traditional support role, we don’t agree.
The other champions being buffed actually sort of need it. Another support that’s receiving buffs is Zyra, whose plants don’t take additional damage from on-hit effects. Think of the support Miss Fortune that Kang “GorillA” Beom-hyeon played at Worlds a few years ago. The MF was good because her passive dealt extra damage to Zyra plants, but that won’t work anymore.
In the jungle, the biggest change is happening to Master Yi, who’s getting a mini rework. His Q can now bounce back to the first target when additional enemies aren’t in range, and he’ll go a lot faster on his ult. That’s a massive boost to Yi that we think will be beneficial at all ranks.
Xin Zhao’s Q cooldown is being decreased from 9/8/7/6/5 to 7/6.5/6/5.5/5 seconds. He actually needs this since his power level dropped once scuttle spawn moved back, delaying his early power around river skirmishes. And Graves is getting another buff in a long line of changes that have failed to make him a priority pick. His Q detonation damage is going from 85/115/145/175/205 to 85/120/155/190/225, but we don’t think the extra damage at max rank will fool anyone.
Finally, in the top lane, Fiora will be able to block basic attack-based stuns, like Braum and Kennen. It’s a small quality-of-life change that her mains will like. Then there’s Tryndamere. He’s getting a decently-sized buff to his spin cooldown, from 13/12/11/10/9 to 12/11/10/9/8 seconds. It’s losing some of its AP ratio, so AP Tryndamere is probably still dead, but he’ll be able to spin more than before. But again, he has a solid win rate. Was this necessary?
Patch 9.10 is expected to drop on May 15. Given the small sizes of most of the nerfs and buffs, expect to see more stuff tweaked in the next couple patches as we reach the middle of the League season.
