Patch 25.19 sets the stage for Worlds with a mix of onboarding updates and meta-shaping balance changes. Brawl joins the New Player Journey as an experiment to help newcomers learn through fast teamfights. On the competitive side, several champions receive targeted buffs to encourage pro play variety, while other see trims to rein in dominant or frustration-prone patterns.
Brawl is added in Patch 25.19
In this patch, the developers are testing Brawl as a tool to help new players learn League. They believe Brawl gets players into teamfights quickly, showcasing some of the game’s highest highs without requiring the complex mechanics of Summoner’s Rift. As part of this effort, Brawl is being added to the New Player Journey to see if it makes learning League more enjoyable.
For the next two patches, Brawl will be available to play for anyone who has missed it.
Champions
Ahri
“Ahri is statistically fairly weak right now, so we’d like to give her an edge in aggressively diving into the enemy team, risking her life for the resets.”
R – Spirit Rush
- Damage per hit: 60 / 90 / 120 (+ 35% AP) ⇒ 75 / 125 / 175 (+ 35% AP)
Brand
“Brand is a little weak, especially in his more income-heavy roles. So we’re giving him a bit more power to let him run over games where he gets off to a good start by nuking his opposition.”
Passive – Blaze
- Monster Damage Modifier: 2.6x ⇒ 2.65x
W – Pillar of Flame
- Damage: 75 / 120 / 165 / 210 / 255 (+ 60% AP) ⇒ 75 / 120 / 165 / 210 / 255 (+ 70% AP)
R – Pyroclasm
- Damage per hit: 100 / 175 / 250 ( +25% AP) ⇒ 100 / 175 / 250 (+ 30% AP)
Caitlyn
“Caitlyn’s been missing from pro play for quite some time now despite her reputation as a lane bully. As her ability casts are potent enough, we’re pushing up her basic attack power with the hope that she has a real shot at making it into some games this Worlds.”
Base Stats
- Base AD: 60 ⇒ 62
Corki
“Corki is becoming a little stale in pro play so we’re delivering a nerf to open up the bot lane metagame for Worlds this year. We’re hoping to pro-skew this nerf by removing some of his trivial wave pushing.”
Q – Phosphorus Bomb
- Damage: 70 / 115 / 160 / 205 / 250 (+130% AD) ⇒ 60 / 105 / 150 / 195 / 240 (+ 125% AD)
Diana
“Diana is a reasonably performant mid laner but overall weak as a jungler. So we’re buffing her bespoke monster mod in order to give her clear a bit more power.”
Passive – Moonsilver Blade
- Monster Mod: 2.6x ⇒ 3x
Draven
“Draven has a bit of room for buffs in regular play and is completely missing from pro. We’re giving him a little power this patch to see if he can make it back into the spotlight.”
W – Blood Rush
- Attack Speed: 20 / 25 / 30 / 35 / 40% ⇒ 30 / 35 / 40 / 45 / 50%
R – Whirling Death
- Damage: 175 / 275 / 375 (110 / 130 / 150% Bonus AD) ⇒ 200 / 300 / 400 (110 / 130 / 150% Bonus AD)
Jax
“We’d like to see Jax as a more meta-defining top laner at Worlds this year but acknowledge he’s already strong enough for regular players, so we’re making his strengths more windowed, something that highly skilled players and coordinated teams can readily harness.”
Base Stats
- Base HP: 665 ⇒ 650
R – Grandmaster-At-Arms
- Initial armor gain: 25 / 50 / 75 (+ 40% bonus AD) ⇒ 45 / 60 / 75 (+ 40% bonus AD)
- Magic resist gain is still 60% of armor gain
- Resistance gain per additional champion hit unchanged
Jinx
“Jinx has been all but missing from pro play and we’re hoping that with a little nudge to her early game she’ll find her way back on stage.”
Q – Switcheroo!
- Bonus Range: 80 / 110 / 140 / 170 / 200 ⇒ 100 / 125 / 150 / 175 / 200
E – Flame Champers!
- Damage: 70 / 120 / 170 / 220 / 270 (+ 100% AP) ⇒ 90 / 140 / 190 / 240 / 290 (+ 100% AP)
LeBlanc
“With a hope of seeing some flighty assassin play in mid lane, we’re buffing LeBlanc ahead of Worlds by giving her better wave control and PVP burst, especially in protracted side lanes where she’s able to reliably get access to her target. We’re also wary of LeBlanc’s current status in support, so we’re backloading this power into those later-game side lane positions.”
W – Distortion
- Damage: 75 / 115 / 155 / 195 / 235 (+ 70% AP) ⇒ 75 / 115 / 155 / 195 / 235(+ 80% AP)
R – Mimic
- Distortion Damage: 150 / 300 / 450 (+ 75% AP) ⇒ 150 / 300 / 450(+ 80% AP)
Lee Sin
“Lee Sin is a very performant jungler at almost all levels of play but is suspiciously absent from pro. Our goal with this patch is a series of power-neutral adjustments that should give him a sharp early game strategic niche without significantly changing his win rate.”
Base Stats
- Armor Growth: 4.9 ⇒ 4.5
Q – Sonic Wave/Resonating Strike
- Damage: 55 / 80 / 105 / 130 / 155 (+ 155% Bonus AD) ⇒ 60 / 90 / 120 / 150 / 180 (+ 95% Bonus AD)
Lillia
“Lillia is a little weak and we’d like to see some AP junglers at Worlds, so she’s the perfect candidate for a buff this patch. By playing up her ultimate, we’re hoping she’ll succeed more in highly skilled and coordinated environments.”
R – Lilting Lullaby
- Bonus Damage: 100 / 150 / 200 (+ 40% AP) ⇒ 150 / 200 / 250 (+ 45% AP)
- Cooldown: 150 / 130 / 110 ⇒ 140 / 120 / 100
Mel
“Mel is statistically very weak and even though she sports a rather high ban rate, that doesn’t mean she has to be quite so underpowered for her player base. We’re playing up high-skill applications of her offensive output in order to bring her up in higher MMRs, where she performs much worse.”
Passive – Searing Brilliance
- Bonus Damage on attack per spell: 24-75 (based on level) (+3% AP) ⇒ 24-99 (based on level) (+9% AP)
- Maximum Bonus Damage on attack: 75-225 (based on level) (+ 9% AP) ⇒ 72-297 (+ 27% AP)
Pantheon
“Pantheon continues to dominate the pro jungle meta, and frankly he just doesn’t have a high skill gank pattern: Simply click on the enemy and they receive a stun. As a result, we’re swinging very hard to bring down some of his power.”
Q – Comet Spear
- Monster Modifier: 0.9x ⇒ 0.75x
W – Shield Vault
- Minion/Monster damage cap: 200 ⇒ 120
Sylas
“As players have gotten better at him, Sylas jungle has continued to rise up the ranks and now is more performant than we’re comfortable with. Since we’re happy with his power level in mid lane, we’re simply walking back a portion of his prior jungle buffs.”
Passive – Petricite Burst
- Bonus Damage to Monsters: 150% ⇒ 130%
Poppy
“Poppy finally has a relatively equivalent win rate spread across her roles, but is overall a little too strong in all three. She’s also near the top jungle spot in pro play and we’d like to create more room for other junglers to get play.”
Q – Hammer Shock
- Max Health damage cap to minions/monsters: 75 / 105 / 135 / 165 / 195 ⇒ 50 / 80 / 110 / 140 / 170
R – Keeper’s Verdict
- Cooldown on interrupted channel: 15 ⇒ 30
Seraphine
“Seraphine is a very popular support and occasional mid laner, but is unfortunately quite weak where a lot of her players are, which is in lower MMR. As Seraphine is the deathball mage-enchanter, we don’t want to get rid of that strength, but we also want her to be more self-reliant (mid lane), less reliant on her teammates knowing how her abilities work (low MMR), and more useful to her team when performing mage-like duties, such as helping take down epic monsters.”
Base Stats
- Mana Growth: 25 ⇒ 40
- HP Growth: 90 ⇒ 95
Q – High Note
- Amplified damage at low HP now also affects monsters
W – Surround Sound
- Healing: 3 / 3.5 / 4 / 4.5/ 5% missing HP per target in the circle ⇒ 8 / 10 / 12 / 14 / 16% missing HP, regardless of targets in the circle
Sivir
“Sivir is a little OP in regular play and somewhat dominates the pro play sphere. While we’re happy to have a healthy share of hyper-carries, we’d like if Sivir had more competition in that archetype.”
Q – Boomerang Blade
- Initial Damage: 60 / 85 / 110 / 135 / 160 (+ 100% bonus AD) ⇒ 60 / 85 / 110 / 135 / 160 (+ 85% bonus AD)
Syndra
“We’re delivering some power-neutral adjustments to Syndra, making her a stronger lane bully and teamfight carry mage while siphoning some power that should disproportionately impact non-pro players.”
Base Stats
- Health Growth: 104 ⇒ 100
- Armor Growth: 4.6 ⇒ 4
Q – Dark Sphere
- Damage: 75 / 110 / 145 / 180 / 215 (+ 60% AP) ⇒ 80 / 115 / 150 / 185 / 220 (+ 65% AP)
Q – Dark Sphere
- Cooldown: 17 ⇒ 15
Items
Redemption
“Redemption has found its place as a near unanimous first item for tank supports in pro play. We’re looking to pull back on Redemption’s power to allow items like Locket and Knight’s Vow to compete.”
- Heal: 200-400 (based on target level) ⇒ 150-350 (based on target level)
Celestial Opposition
“We’re fixing a long-standing issue with Celestial Opposition that gave it very weird optimizations. Essentially, players could send a clone forward and it would result in a nearly guaranteed slow-bomb on a short cooldown. While it’s fine that clones often mimic items, getting slowed by thin air just isn’t a good experience. So now the champion (or clone) must be alive in order for Celestial Opposition’s slow to trigger. This means that, for example, attacking Neeko W won’t result in you getting crowd controlled.”
- Will no longer apply the AoE slow if the user is dead
Runes
Unsealed Spellbook
“Unsealed Spellbook’s recent buff took it from being entirely forgotten to the only keystone anyone not named Neeko even uses in pro play. As a result, we’re splitting the difference with the hope that it’s still a viable keystone rune without completely dominating all choice.”
- Base Recharge Cooldown: 4 minutes ⇒ 4.5 minutes
- Minimum Recharge Cooldown: 1.5 minutes ⇒ 2 minutes
Skins & Chromas
Skins
Chromas
Source: Riot Games
This patch seems to focus on balancing champions for pro play while adjusting power in lower MMRs. Some buffs feel needed, but Im worried about the impact on diversity and whether certain adjustments might be too aggressive. Excited to see how these changes play out!