Welcome to patch 12.20!
Another patch and it’s time to show the lights that stop me turn to stone—you shine it when I'm alone.
In our last patch before the Dragonlands Championship patch we’ve got Chibi Dragonmancer Ashe, an Augment rebalance, friends lists on Mobile, and a whole lot more—let’s get into it!
With the Dragonlands Championship less than a month away, we’re doubling down on competitive balance. This means making bigger changes this week that focus on our highest levels of play to allow for a better live practice environment ahead of the tournament. It also means a more balanced environment to hit ranked goals for the rest of us—best of luck y’all!
Part of our competitive focus is disabling our two most high-roll Augments. In a set where the most capped board is a bunch of expensive Dragons, High End Shopping and Level Up provide a significant advantage in accessing this powerful (and justifiably expensive) board. Access to these Augments can allow skilled players to run fully capped Dragon boards by Stage 5, creating advantages over other players that cannot be rivaled by other Augments in the highest echelons of play. We’re temporarily removing these Augments for our most competitive patches, but we’ll be bringing them back with patch 12.22.
Our Dragon (6) change is a bugfix for a change we implemented during patch 12.19.
By nerfing Jax we weaken the frontline for the Shimmerscale/Lagoon opener while also hitting one of the core units for Sy’fen and Shi Oh Yu comps. Our Terra bugfix nerf is another change that we implemented during patch 12.19.
Available as a rare (2%, guaranteed by the 61st pull) drop from the Dragonmancer Archer Eggs, Chibi Dragonmancer Ashe continues the #DiesOfCutScene saga with their finisher, firing an explosive Dragonmancer Arrow that’ll hit more than just a knee. Each Egg is available for 390RP, with non-Ashe hosting Eggs containing a random Little Legend from our back catalog (Mythics/Pass exclusive Little Legends excluded).
Alongside her Dragonmancer counterpart, Chibi Ashe joins our growing collection of Chibi Champs. She’s available with her custom boom, Enchanted Crystal Arrow—defeat can be so cold. Pick this Chibi Queen up from the store for 1900 RP and watch her go BRRRRRRR as you win streak!
High rolling is cool, but some of these rolls have gone too high.
This change also impacts Mobile.
Large, like my respect for Zippy and Zippy enthusiasts despite insulting his IQ last patch.
The Attack Speed and Omnivamp from Guild have been strong enough to support hypercarry Xayah comps as well as different variations of Guild vertical. With these nerfs, we don’t expect the Guilded age to be over—we just expect the Guild members to put a bit more effort into their success.
Let’s talk Soy’fen (Shi Oh Yu and Sy’fen comps). With rising popularity and win rates over the weekend, we’ve had to ship a number of large nerfs targeted at this comp. The most obvious is the Jade Statue Attack Speed nerf below, which impacts both Shi Oh Yu and Sy’fen, in addition to Pantheon, who being AD, greatly benefit from it. You will also find Pantheon nerfs and the removal of one of the strongest Silver Augments (Jade Crest) that will make this soy protein rich comp part of a more balanced diet.
Zac’s currently struggling across all levels, but the increase in his damage as he stars up isn’t a stable or noticeable improvement.
Nomsy has excelled in the field of magic with her top-tier Mage build, but here at TFT we encourage a liberal arts approach, and are thus dedicated to helping Nomsy improve her marksmanship and Evoker skills.
Despite the name of his spell, Rengar, has been seen tearing up the Convergence. We had a smaller nerf planned for Rengar, but with our nerfs to Rengar’s biggest counter, Soy’fen, we’ve had to preemptively increase these nerfs.
With no utility, Volibear is the type of champion where if he isn’t dealing damage or soaking it up, he just isn’t very useful. So we’re giving him some more Health via an earlier cast of his spell.
Dragons are poikilothermic (their body temperature changes with the outside temperature) and last I checked, Summer is over—but also I’ve been trying to bust out that word all set.
Ao Shin is hurling their projectile lightning vomit a bit too soon, given how impactful their upchucked bolts are.
Zoe’s cycling through her stolen spells faster than summer heist flicks, so it's time to slow her roll before she gets caught and is forced to live life underground.
Built Different and Double Trouble require players to make tradeoffs to get more power from playing a certain way, but when these are stacked, they create too much power without adding additional tradeoffs. While the highroll of collecting all the BDs/DTs is appealing, it creates a situation where the Augments can’t be balanced appropriately as individual picks. We also see Augment selections as critical decision-making moments that are harmed when taking a repeat BD or DT will always be the best option.
Cutthroat has neither been a fun Augment to take, nor a fun one to play against.
Together, Think Fast and Astral warp the early game too much—but if you are already running Astral and you hit Think Fast as your second Augment, it’ll still be a very strong pickup.
Small, like the effort it took to lie about my respect for Zippy and Zippy enthusiasts.
Please fasten your seatbelt, three-star your Ezreal, and ensure your Bonkeykong has a Deathblade.
Buffing these two cost 3-stars is just one way a specific dev shows their love to the champion he holds deerest.
No, this is not enough to bring back Dragonmancer Nunu, but it is enough to bring Dragonmancer Rakan into play as a top eight contender!
Other than the Swain buffs, all the changes below only impact these units at 3-stars.
I don’t know why I put these in the ‘small changes’ section when I hit 3-star tier 5 units almost every game...
Our Zz’Rot Portal changes will make the item more intuitive and fix the feels-bad movement pathing for units that cannot easily get into the holder’s attack range (yet are still within 4 hexes).
Mobile is getting a powerful buff this patch—friendship! Friend list chat is here—so get to meeting and greeting because your Double Up partner is just a few taps away.