Riot Games released the last patch for the year; the next patch will come mid-January.
This patch changes how 3-star units work, shifting power increase from health and attack damage to abilities.
General
3-star units have been a nuisance to the balance team since the launch of the game. By removing the formula used before and shifting power to abilities, it will make the game more balanced. 3-star units will no longer have more scaling than 2-star units, for example. Ivern HP from 600/1080/2160 will be 600/1080/1944 now.
Champions and traits
(3) Shadow bonus damage – reduced by 10%, from 70% to 60%.
Electric Damage – reduced tier 1 & tier 2 bonuses from 100/300/500 to 80/250/500.
Inferno Damage – increased bonus from 70/120/180 to 70/140/210%.
Assasins – the rework of the Phantom Dancer, increased the power level of assasins indirectly. With a lack of counterplay to assasins, their trait bonus needs to be nerfed.
(3) Assasin – reduced 25% crit damage, from 75% crit damage/10% crit chance down to 50% crit damage/10% crit chance.
Nocturne Ability heal – decreased for 2nd and 3rd level from 40%/60%/80% to 40%/45%/50%.
Zed Attack damage – decreased by ten from 80 to 70. Decreased armor by five from 30 to 25.
Senna – ability bonus magic damage decreased from 25/45/75 to 15/30/55.
Amumu – total mana decreased from 150 to 125. Ability range normalized from 2/3/4 to 3/3/3.
Rangers buffed – Ashe ability damage increased by 5% per level, Twitch AD increased by five, and total mana decreased from 90 to 70.
Zyra – ability damage decreased drastically from 70/80/90 to 55/65/75.
Rek’Sai – attack damage decreased by five from 65 to 60.
Brand total mana – decreased by ten from 90 to 80.
Items
Hush – proc chance decreased by 8% from 33% to 25%.
Swordbreaker – proc chance decreased by 8% from 33% to 25%.
The nerfs to Assasins are warranted after the Phantom Dancer rework. The trait was just too strong, and Zed was overpowered across the board. It will be interesting to see how the new 3 star units play out onto the field. With their normalized stats, they should no longer grant such a powerful and significant boost compared to tier 2.
The shadow and electric bonus damage needed to be reduced after being the main meta. The buff to Inferno damage is welcome as well. They should be more in line now. The resurgence of the hush and sword breaker items made them worthy of nerfs. They deny the entire gameplay of this game mode so
Overall the changes are right; they hit the correct issues in the game currently. Unlike the League of Legends team, the Teamfight Tactics team reacts quickly to unbalanced problems to have a healthy environment. Hopefully, the trend continues and more player comes to appreciate this game.
