Patch 7.12 is coming tomorrow, and it’s filled to the brim with champion changes. Some champs will leave the patch stronger than they were before it arrived, and others won’t be so lucky.
Here are the five most important champion changes arriving with tomorrow’s patch and how they’ll affect the meta.
1) Jhin
Ever since Blade of the Ruined King was buffed earlier this season, marksmen and markswomen (markspeople?) that can use the BotRK to its full potential have risen to the top of the ADC meta. Twitch, Lucian, Ezreal, Ashe, and Kog’Maw have all become viable options in what has become one of the bot lane’s most diverse metas we’ve ever seen. Unfortunately, there’s one marksman that’s been harshly excluded—Jhin.
See, Jhin gains nothing from the BotRK. He doesn’t benefit from attack speed, and with so little basic attacks compared to most other ADCs, he doesn’t benefit from the item’s bonus damage passive or even its lifesteal. That means he’s forced to build his old expensive critical strike items while other ADCs are getting cheaper, more reliable damage much earlier in the game. With that, they can effectively run circles around him. Well, not anymore.
Starting tomorrow, Jhin’s Dancing Grenade (Q) and Curtain Call (R) will deal a lot more damage. The base damage on the Q is actually being lowered very slightly, but the AD ratio is being increased by 10 percent. Jhin gets more AD due to his passive than any other marksman in the game, so 10 percent is actually quite a bit of damage. His R is just getting a flat buff to its base damage at all ranks with no catch. These buffs will certainly help Jhin claim his spot in the meta once more. He won’t be as dominant as he once was, but he’ll certainly be a contender.
2) Karma
Since Lulu’s decline began following being banned every single game and a round of nerfs, Karma became everyone’s go-to shielding champion. Unfortunately, she’s way too powerful. She has a lot of utility in the form of big, beefy shields and a stun, but her damage is also higher than most other supports, and not having to sacrifice her utility to delete people is OP.
Well, she’s getting knocked down a few pegs tomorrow. In Patch 7.12, her shields will be less powerful—both her regular shield and her ultimate empowered shield will protect her allies less. That way, at least her protection will be hindered a bit to compensate for her insane damage.
Despite those nerfs, however, Karma won’t likely come out of this patch a loser. There are big changes coming to support items, including a monumental buff to Athene’s Unholy Grail, which essentially turns it into an AP support’s dream item. With its newfound AP stacking passive and its boost to shielding and healing, Karma is going to get a lot of use out of it. Combine that with Ardent Censer, and she will still deal quite a bit of damage. Honestly, Karma may walk away stronger than she was before these nerfs.
3) Zac
Just leave poor Zac alone. Tomorrow’s update marks the third straight patch that Zac has undergone some heavy changes, and that’s not even including the two separate hotfixes that have been pushed out for him. He’s been strong, too weak, and too strong over the course of just a couple months.
In his current state, the blob is too strong. To try to curb his enthusiasm and utterly insane levels of OP, the damage on both his W and E is being reduced by a healthy portion. Unfortunately, the new Zac doesn’t really rely on his damage to be effective. His incomparable crowd control is why he’s OP, so we’re not really sure if taking 20 damage from his abilities will really do much to slow him down. If anything, it will hurt his camp clear speed, but that should be about it.
4) Malzahar
The Prophet of the Void has had it rough over the past year or so. He used to be a strong mid lane option, and following his rework in the spring of last year, he was turned into a support that couldn’t really play mid effectively. Well, Patch 7.11 introduced another Malzahar rework that was designed to give him some mid lane power back. On the bright side, it worked. On the other hand, it worked a little too well.
His winrate and playrate both spiked, and now, he wins more games than any other mid laner in League, which is a far cry from where he was a month or so ago. In tomorrow’s patch, the late game damage on his Q and R is being brought down a bit. It will certainly affect his numbers in the late game, which is where he really shines, but his laning phase should be otherwise unaffected.
5) Rek’Sai
The Void Burrower underwent a rather extensive rework in Patch 7.11 as well, but unlike Malzahar’s, her update didn’t work out terribly well. In fact, she’s pretty damn weak. The rework was designed to turn her from a tank to an assassin-diver hybrid. On paper, it should have worked, but her newfound squishiness in the jungle is so drastic that her assassin-like kit can’t outweigh it.
Now, her Unburrow is going to scale with 80 percent of her AD, up from 40, which means that it’s essentially going to be added as a part of her damage kit rather than being used only for the knock-up. With such a high AD scaling, this ability will actually contribute to her burst damage so much that she might be able to keep up with other high damage options in the meta.
Also, her new ultimate is way too easy to dodge. Once you know she’s coming, you can essentially slowly walk five feet to the left to avoid her lunge out of the ground. Because of that, it’s being buffed to be much more difficult to avoid without using a flash or some other huge movement ability, which is sorely needed.
These buffs probably won’t be enough to let Rek’Sai compete in the meta, but she may work in certain situations now.
