Everyone’s favorite edgy champion, Yasuo, is being buffed in the next patch, according to the latest PBE update.
Yasuo has been a bit of a problem child since he arrived in League of Legends. He’s had moments of being too OP and others when he’s been way too weak. No matter how strong he is, though, players will always be irritated with him.
Much like a talented Vayne, Riven, or Azir, good Yasuo players are extremely frustrating to play against. He’s also a very cool concept for a champion, so tons of people want to try him out. This results in a lot of inexperienced Yasuo players floundering and upsetting their teammates. Whether it’s a scary-skilled Yasuo on the enemy team or a novice Yasuo on your own team, everyone has plenty of reasons to ban Yasuo form their solo queue games.
That’s why a lot of people may be upset to learn that he’s being buffed during. Don’t worry, though—it’s not as bad as it sounds.
He’s actually been in a fairly weak spot since his huge nerf in Patch 7.11, a nerf that no one expected would hit him as hard as it did. His Steel Tempest stacks decay after six seconds now rather than 10 which has forced him to engage much faster, resulting in a lot more risky plays. This has turned Yasuo into the epitome of a snowball champion. He either gets very, very fed, or he’s absolutely useless.
On top of that, he’s had a very difficult time dealing with the game’s control mages, especially without the ability to hang onto his Q’s tornadoes for as long as he’d like. This weakness has become more and more pronounced as control mages have continued to wreak havoc on the mid lane meta, even after several nerfs were dished out last week. Despite all of this, Yasuo’s ban rate remains in the top 10 of all champions, according to League stats website Champion.gg. Why? Because he’s annoying, dammit.
Don’t let that frustration cloud what’s really happening, though, because Yasuo is actually pretty weak, and he needs these buffs. His base magic resist is being increased from 30 to 32.1, and his MR per level is rising from 0.5 per level to 1.25. That’s actually a very significant buff to his MR. This will be huge for Yasuo’s dueling potential against mages, but it shouldn’t tip him over the line.
His shield from Way of the Wanderer is being tweaked as well. At level one, it will now only protect Yasuo for 60 points rather than 100, which is a nerf. It will, however, protect him for more at max level. It will protect him from 555 damage, up from 510, which is a sizable buff. This means that his shield will protect him for more later as the game goes on, but early on, it’s a nerf. This solidifies Yasuo’s performance as a late game carry—but overall, it’s not a monumental change.
The most significant change is certainly the MR buffs, and they should have a very noticeable effect on his survivability. On paper, at least, it seems like it’s exactly what he needs. But we won’t know for sure until we see it go live with Patch 7.17 in a couple weeks.
