Patch 10.15 steps back with Yuumi and nerfs Aphelios (again)

Once again, Lead Gameplay Designer for League of Legends Mark Yetter brings us a Patch Preview to introduce us to what changes and adjustments we can expect for the next version 10.15.

10.15 Patch Preview.

Starting to shape the worlds meta and focusing on counterplay for Aphelios/Yuumi. Full changes should be ready tomorrow. pic.twitter.com/SQrmAN5KJk

— Mark Yetter (@MarkYetter) July 13, 2020

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Nerfed Champions

When Patch 10.14 official Notes were released, we all were very surprised by the changes that were coming to the Summoners’ Rift since, in the current meta, we have some AD Carries dominating the games, and the last Patch only nerfed one of them: Ezreal.

In the meantime, Kalista and Aphelios were not touched. It is true that Aphelios is a common user of the nerfs section, but his power is still overwhelming. That is why, one more time, we see his name on the nerf list.

According to Mark Yetter, they intent to nerf Aphelios’ turret “spin-up” time, which means that it will take longer to activate and start shooting once Aphelios put it in any location. This is a very logical nerf since this ability is one of the strongest right now, it allows him to press the lanes and eases every difficult situation for the champ.

The second name we see on the list is Ornn. “The fire below the mountain” has also been nerfed several times lately, but no matter what Riot Games do, Ornn keeps being a tank with lots of damage. Plus, its upgraded items make its team become undefeatable in the late game.

There are many ways to nerf Ornn, let’s see what Patch 10.15 proposes.

Lee Sin is probably the most famous jungler of the moment. We can see him every day in both competitive games and SoloQ. He is actually strong, and it has been like this for a while (remember last World Championship when Tian destroyed the enemies with Lee?).

Another nerfed jungler will be Fiddlesticks, but only for tank builds. The best feature of Fiddle is its ability to clear camps faster than anyone. That makes him very strong in the early game and helps him to win enough gold to purchase items that make him useful in the late game.

That is maybe why Riot Games only want to nerf the tank aspect. Fiddlesticks can easily win a team fight just with the combo ‘R’-‘W’, dealing tons of damage while healing (and sometimes fearing), so a tank Fiddle can be too strong.

Twisted Fate, also in the nerfs list, has been very common to see lately in competitive games, like Thresh, the last name we have. Maybe these champions are not that strong right now, at least compared with Aphelios or Lee Sin, but nerfing them would help to Riot Games intentions, written in the image of the Patch Preview: “We are tightening our thresholds in pro to get a more diverse meta for Summer Playoffs and Worlds“.

Is not a surprise that Riot Games make adjustments in the game every year in order to have funnier and more entertaining World Championships, so it makes sense that they want to nerf some of the most-picked mid laners and supports, so others can appear and make the games more diverse.

Buffed Champions

There was a time when Skarner was a terrifying opponent in the jungler. He was a clear pick or ban in competitive games and his ability kit was a nightmare for those who weren’t fast enough to avoid his ultimate.

After being missing for a long time, the scorpion will be buffed with Patch 10.15, and we already know the details of this buff:

Exactly the same thing happens with Swain, whose role in the game is still not very clear. We have seen this champion as top laner, mid laner, and even support, to end being forgotten as well.

Maybe that is why Riot Games also knows clearly what they want to do with him, and give us the details of his buff in the Patch Preview:

Shen, Gragas, Irelia, and Caitlyn are still a question mark for us, we still don’t know what changes will we have, but if Riot’s Balance Team does a good job, the matches will look totally different from now.

These are champions that have always been strong and/or very useful. Gragas, Irelia, and Caitlyn have recently been super famous in competitive games, and we can still see them sometimes with pretty decent numbers.

Shen, in the meantime, is a nice flex-pick for the top lane and the bot lane as support. These buffs could be a challenge to the most dominant champions of the current meta, so the intentions of having a funnier game for Worlds would be accomplished.

But here we have the most important buff of next Patch: Yuumi.

All the fans were celebrating the huge nerf that got Yuumi dead after Patch 10.13. Riot Games even discussed with the fans about deleting the Magical Cat from League of Legends (they won’t do that, don’t worry), but now it seems like they are stepping back and give Yuumi a little chance to be back in the game by buffing its Passive mana restore.

This tries to amend the excessive nerf to Yuumi’s ‘E’ done with that Patch. The mana cost of this ability increased by 15% of the maximum mana of the champion, a deadly change for the cat.

Yuumi is not supposed to be as strong as she used to be after next Patch, but Riot Games want to slowly increase her power, so we can use this champ again with success.

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