8.6 Duskblade and related changes

Hi everyone, This is a thread to discuss the upcoming Duskblade changes we have aimed for 8.6 and some associated champion tweaks we have coming alongside them. Keep in mind this is all tentative and subject to change, but I&#039;m trying out using threads like this to make some upcoming change and our iterative process more visible. For those unaware, here are the current Duskblade changes: * Melee Damage :: 60 / x / 320 &gt;&gt;&gt; 30 / x / 200 * Ranged Damage :: 45 / x / 300 &gt;&gt;&gt; 30 / x / 200 * NEW :: Melee basic attacks instantly kill traps and wards disabled by Black Out * NEW :: Black Out won&#039;t be triggered if the owner is using a Red Sweeper (so you can&#039;t waste it) The above changes are a large damage nerf to the item. We think the other additions are powerful and good additions to the item, but several champions have been crutching on the high powered damage tuning of Duskblade, and we&#039;re looking to inject that power lost back in. I _think_ these changes are pretty generous, but that&#039;s pretty subjective, so let me hear it if that&#039;s way off. The champions we&#039;ve chosen are who we identify as the most core users; if we thought they could easily swap to a different build and be just as effective on 8.6 as they currently are on 8.5, they probably aren&#039;t on the list. If you don&#039;t see a certain champion, that&#039;s probably why. Feel free to ask either way. It&#039;s possible I&#039;ve forgotten an important user. Below is the list of champions and changes we&#039;re looking at helping out: **Kayn** Kayn&#039;s adjustments are pretty straightforward damage buffs. They may not fill the damage void left by Duskblade entirely, but W&#039;s damage especially is more broadly applicable than Duskblade&#039;s was. Also, Zenon (Kayn&#039;s creator) has some passive tweaks going on that may also make it into the patch. Those are aimed at flattening his passive&#039;s charging experience and helping out lane Kayn, but he&#039;d have better context on that than I do. * W Bonus AD Ratio :: 120% &gt;&gt;&gt; 130% * R Bonus AD Ratio :: 150% &gt;&gt;&gt; 175% **Kha&#039;Zix** Kha&#039;Zix is looking at a significant Bonus AD ratio bump to his Q. We&#039;ve chosen this to help fill the damage void left by Duskblade in a way that is also in line with effective isolation play (rather than passive damage, for example). The damage bump to Q is so significant because we&#039;ve also removed his W&#039;s bonus damage to monsters. Mechanics like these enforce that he could basically only jungle, and we may as well bridge the gap between jungle and solo lane play a bit where possible; for what it&#039;s worth, I don&#039;t expect this to make him a primary laner by any means. * Q Bonus AD Ratio :: 120% &gt;&gt;&gt; 150% * REMOVED :: W 20% bonus damage to monsters **Miss Fortune** Miss Fortune&#039;s buff is a very straightforward AD growth buff, which is also probably the smallest on the list. The reason for that is that of the list here, she seems closest to being able to effectively transition to other builds without significant cost to performance. * Attack Damage Growth :: 1 &gt;&gt;&gt; 2 **Shaco** Of the stuff here, I&#039;d say Shaco&#039;s is most experimental. These changes reflect my understanding (which, admittedly, could be off) that Shaco players feel pretty crappy about their early game because they feel forced into putting points in a Q that yields them literally no damage on rankup. These changes hope to be power neutral alongside the Duskblade changes, but an increase in satisfaction. By flattening Q&#039;s invis duration to 3 seconds and removing the CD return mechanic, he should be able to put early points in his E while feeling like Q is still fulfilling its purpose. If he gets to max E, he gets more early game damage and has more control over the outcome of the early game. You&#039;ll notice that Shaco has the most significant changes, and that although his damage numbers are not being outright increased like others, his kit&#039;s damage should come online sooner and give him needed agency over the outcome over the game rather than relying on Duskblade 1-shots in the later parts. The E slow nerf is to offset some of the increased power of his very early ganks provided by a meaningfully longer invis duration. 3 seems like a reasonable maximum duration for his invis given that it used to be 3.5 pre-rework, and that was at a time when dropping a pink ward when he was around was much more effective than options against his current invis. * REMOVED :: Reduced cooldown on basic attacking after casting Q * Q CD :: 16/15.5/15/14.5/14 &gt;&gt;&gt; 16/14.5/13/11.5/10 * Q Duration :: 1.5/2.25/3/3.75/4.5 &gt;&gt;&gt; 3 * E Slow :: 20/22.5/25/27.5/30% &gt;&gt;&gt; 10/15/20/25/30% **Talon** Talon&#039;s a pretty simple case of filling in some of his lost damage in a way that we believe will be functional and satisfying to players that enjoy him. His passive damage will continue to scale past level 11 up through level 18, and his R Bonus AD ratio is increased. * Passive Damage :: 75 / x / 175 (levels 1-11) &gt;&gt;&gt; 75 / x / 245 (levels 1-18) * R Bonus AD Ratio :: 80% &gt;&gt;&gt; 100% **Wukong** Wukong is similarly getting some damage buffs, most notably to his Q, which tentatively now increases its AD ratio with rank. * Attack Damage Growth :: 3.2 &gt;&gt;&gt; 4 * Q Bonus AD Ratio :: 10% &gt;&gt;&gt; 10/20/30/40/50% **Zed** More damage bumps. Giving Zed some Base AS to make his attacks come out a bit more quickly and increase his dueling threat, as well as some ratio bumps on his base kit. * Base Attack Speed :: 0.651 &gt;&gt;&gt; 0.658 * Q Bonus AD Ratio :: 0.9 &gt;&gt;&gt; 1.1 * E Bonus AD Ratio :: 0.8 &gt;&gt;&gt; 0.9 Editing this in since I forgot: Quinn also has some stuff coming from Xenogenic, and August has some stuff for Rengar, so that's why they're not mentioned here. That&#039;s it for now! This stuff should appear on PBE tomorrow. If you have questions, let me know!
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