A lot of mid lane mains in League of Legends are about to be very upset, because everyone’s favorite tiny demigod Zoe is the target of some pretty hefty buffs in the next patch, according to the latest PBE update.
What’s worse, one of the buffs is a damage increase on her most irritating ability, Paddle Star. It’s true that Zoe is in a weak spot at the moment—her winrate is significantly below average at only 47 percent on League stats site OP.gg.
But when Zoe isn’t weak, she makes players very angry, as she’s proven to be one of the most annoying and difficult-to-deal-with champions in the game, akin to Yasuo. That’s mostly because of the strength of her Paddle Star, which has the ability to chunk most of a carry’s health pool in one shot with barely any AP, just like Nidalee’s spear used to do before her rework in Season Four.
Luckily for any anti-Zoe players out there, the buff isn’t enough to suddenly make her OP, but it’s still a sizeable increase in strength. The damage bonus her Q receives from distance is going up from 150 percent at max rank to 170 percent. This means that if she can get her full range on a Q, it will deal a lot more damage, but if she can’t land it at a higher range, she won’t feel the buff. Typically, changes like this only affect top-tier players who can consistently land those harder-to-reach max-range Paddle Stars, but there are still some lower elo players who will feel the effects of this buff.
The second buff comes for her Sleepy Trouble Bubble, but it’s not quite as big of a deal. At higher ranks, it’ll have a lower cooldown, capping at two seconds lower when the ability is maxed out. At rank one, there’s no change.
If these changes go through with Patch 8.21 next week, don’t expect to see a Zoe in every game, similar to the few months following her release. But if you do see one, she’s definitely going to pack a bigger punch.
