Dash-heavy AD carry Zeri has been buffed or nerfed a whopping 12 times across just nine League of Legends updates since her Summoner’s Rift arrival in January this year as Riot Games struggles to fit her into the Season 12 meta.
The Spark of Zaun will get her twelfth change in League Patch 12.14.
Since her January release, Zeri has only really dodged changes—buffs and nerfs alike, mind you—in just four patches. The AD carry has kept her ability kit and numbers entirely in tact across back-to-back updates just once in her short League history: 12.8 and 12.9 carried no changes for the champion.
Throughout her tumultuous time on the Rift, the Spark of Zaun’s win rate has swung as high as 59 percent (in high ELO lobbies) and slumped as low as 39 percent.
The AD carry’s Q ability “Burst Fire” has been changed six times already. Her “Spark Surge” dash clocks in as the second most tweaked with seven buffs and nerfs, while her ultimate “Lightning Crash” tops out with nine. Zeri’s basic attack (six) and “Ultrashock Laser” (five) have seen multiple tweaks too.
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Zeri copped a major change list in League patch 12.7. Her Q, W, E, and ultimate were all nerfed and she suffered a base stats blow to the tune of less armor, attack damage, AD growth, and health.
Months later, in League patch 12.11 in early June, the ADC zapster had all four of her abilities hit again, this time alongside her basic attack, in a pile of nerfs.
In the next Season 12 update, coming July 27, the Zaunite’s ‘right click’ will be changed again; it now executives enemies below 60–150 (+18 percent) health. Zeri’s ultimate also took a hit via its on-hit damage.
Every Zeri change & fix since release
- 12.2 — Released.
- R hotfix.
- 12.3 — Base stats, Basic Attack, Q, E, R changes, bug fixes.
- 12.4 — Basic Attack, Q, W, R changes.
- 12.5 — Stats, Basic Attack, Q, E, R hotfix.
- 12.7 — Stats, Q, W, E, R changes.
- Stats, W, E, R hotfix.
- 12.10 — Stats changes.
- 12.11 — Basic attack, Q, W, E, R changes.
- Basic Attack, Q, E hotfix.
- 12.12 — Stats, W changes.
- R hotfix.
- 12.14 — Basic attack, R changes.
She has been hotfixed an incredible five times since release.
While the Riot devs have been relatively quiet on their ongoing Zeri struggles and her seemingly impossible-to-balance kit, several designers have called her “scary” and admitted it’s easy to “overshoot” on changes.
The League team is also determined to keep her close to the ongoing ranked and pro play meta so they don’t have yet another “all or nothing” character in the game’s modern roster. These include Ryze, Azir, Kalista, and more, all of whom either totally dominate proceedings on the Rift or rot with win rates in the 40s.
For this reason, Dot Esports expects even more Zeri tweaks this year.
While Zeri is still a long, long way away from Ryze’s incredulous League change list (the Rune Mage has been reworked five times) she may eventually close the gap.
