Numerous League of Legends champions are on Riot Games’ radar for adjustments in 2023, with more of the obscure characters reaching the top of that list. An upcoming batch of changes is directly targeting one of the oldest champions in the game who continues to struggle at all levels.
Riot Ray Yonggi, gameplay analyst at Riot Games, provided details on extensive changes coming to Annie in Patch 13.2, which is expected to hit live League servers on Jan. 24. He noted within the post that Annie “has been struggling to convert wins, even when matched against primarily melee mid lakers she should be advantaged into,” resulting in tuning across nearly her entire kit.
In both a quality-of-life update and general buff for Annie, she will now start with her passive fully stacked, allowing her to stun the next opponent—or opponents—struck by her abilities. Her passive will also reach full stacks when she respawns so that she has it going back to lane.
Annie’s W will have its mana cost decreased early to make it less costly for the laning phase. Her ultimate, where she summons the power of Tibbers, will now provide Tibbers with more HP and resistances based on her AP, though the duration that the summon lasts before expiration remains unchanged.
A few years ago, Annie received an update to her E allowing her to place the shield on allies. In this update, the shield will receive an increase to its potency and the damage it reflects back at enemies—now also reflecting damage done by abilities. It will only activate once per damage taken per enemy, however.
Not much is currently known about League’s Patch 13.2, though discoveries made earlier today on the PBE imply that the art and sustainability update to Ahri and the comprehensive gameplay update to Aurelion Sol may be also launching alongside this patch. These changes to Annie are expected to be made available on the PBE in the coming weeks, though may be altered prior to their release to live servers.
