Pre-Season PBE Update- Thoughts

PLEASE READ :D[]

It's that time of the year, guys. It's the nearing end of Season 5 of League and the Pre-season is here with lots of changes coming. I'll be stating just what I think of everything after having read the changes. I may tackle some item price changes, but I probably won't stress out too much on them. I'll be perioidically editing and updating this blog if new content is released.

Skins []

One of the reasons (but not the main reason) I tried to climb to Gold (and was successful in doing so) The Victorious skins are rewards to players who achieved a rank of Gold and up. I managed to get Gold last season from starting all the way from Bronze II. Victorious Morgana was kinda cool.

But now, I'm not as impressed as last year. Honestly speaking, Victorious Sivir feels a bit lackluster. Her armor looks nice and I like the change to the color of her hair. But I believe that I am speaking for a lot of people when I say that her Boomerang Blade looks severely out of place.

I get the motif of the weapon. The wheat-looking thing on the sides are the things Roman emperors wear on the sides of their heads or are found in logos. I don't recall what it's called, but it's a symbol of glory or something. I get it. But the overall design does not fit well with the rest of her armor.

There are also very little particles to give her since all she ever uses is her Boomerang Blade. So the lack of new particles is understandable.

Juggernaut Reworks- ADC version[]

The main attraction of this year's Pre-season. It was teased by Riot a while back and now they're really doing it. Let's take a look at them individually.

Caitlyn[]

The point of these reworks was to give the ADC's their own thing. With this first one, I think they gave Caitlyn a bit more stuff to do.

Headshot (Passive) Caitlyn Headshots targets she has trapped or netted. Additionally, she gains a free headshot every 7 basic attacks; attacks while in brush count as 2.Headshots:*Deal +50% Attack Damage as a bonus damage to champions, increased by Critical Strike Chance and Critical Strike Damage

Deals 250% Total Damage to minions
Have double range against trapped or netted targets

This was the made the real change to her kit overall. The traps' and the net's offensive uses have been amped up. Usually, the traps would serve more as secondary wards and the net as an escape. But now, this encourages use of them more in lane as an offensive move. I could easily see Caitlyn building Trinity Force, honestly XD

Corki

Corki is a weird one for me. Half of his damage has been turned into Magic damage. His passive no longer deals true damage, but split Magic and Physical damage instead. Good news since now this will interact with Trinity Force. Gatling Gun does the same split damage gimmick as well. But the big rework in his kit is "The Package"

Hextech Munitions (Passive)

Hextech Shrapnel Shells Corki's basic attacks deal 10% bonus damage, and half of his basic attack damage is converted into magic. The Package After an initial 8 minutes, The Package arrives near the fountain. Picking it up temporarily grants 50% out of combat Movement Speed and upgrades Valkyrie into Special Delivery. The Package reloads 4 minutes after being delivered.

Corki_Valkyrie_-_Marksman_Update — Corki Valkyrie - Marksman Update

I firmly believe that Corki, as much as that this encourages him to take more risks compared to his current playstyle, has more potential during teamfights due to the disruptive nature of The Package. Corki will now need to know when, where and how to properly use this Package because it will only ever spawn after every 4 minutes.Note that his regular Valkyrie won't be on cooldown. Good to know.

Graves[]

Quite honestly my favorite out of all the reworks. Graves' rework puts him much closer to his theme while also having a potentially high-risk-high-reward style of gameply due to the nature of his new auto-attacks.

Destiny (Passive) Graves' shotgun has some unique properties -- *Double Barrel: Graaves must reload when he runs out of ammo. Attack Speed reduces reload time only slightly, but reduces time between attacks dramatically

12-Gauge: Attacks fire 4 bullets (8 on critical strikes). Units hit take 75-110% Attack Damage + (25-33)% for additional bullets.
Buckshot: Bullets cannot pass through units. Non Champions struck by multiple bullets are knocked back.

Graves' shotgun finally works like a normal shotgun and totally fits his playstyle as the mid-ranged tanky burst ADC. His auto-attacks might possibly the strongest in the game now if all bullets hit the target. Additionally, getting Infinity Edge increases the number of bullets fired for his critical strikes from 8 to 10.

I could also see, however, that his laning phase might be a lot tougher. His AA range has been dramatically reduced for compensation of his powerful auto-attacks, which may leave him vulnerable to poke and CC. The support must do his best in keeping him alive and getting him kills as much as possible. I'd highly suggest someone like Tahm Kench or Braum.

Kog'Maw[]

The squishiest out of all these marksmen, but also one of the most powerful hypercarries. His rework is interesting, to say the least.

Bio-Arcane Barrage (W):

40 Mana 13 sec Cooldown For x seconds, Kog'Maw's basic attacks:

Gain x attack range.
Gain x% Total Attack Speed and his spell cast times are halved.
Deal x% damage to non minions.
Deal x% (+x)% of the target's maximum health as additional magic damage.

During this time, Kog'Maw's Attack Speed cap is doubled.

This gives new meaning to shredding HP since Kog'Maw's thing was using his acid spit and whatnot. This ability allows Kog'Maw to reach a whopping 5.00 sttack speed, or 5 attacks per second (correct me if I'm wrong) Now the downside is that his AA damage to Champions is reduced by a percentage. However, on-hit effects apply normally. A build of BotRK, Wit's End, Nashor's Tooth, Black Cleaver etc. might not be far off from being effective due to his new W.

Miss Fortune[]

Now, we have Miss Fortune who already had a little rework during the Gangplank Rework. First of all, she now has a new passive (not Mobility boots, yay!)

Love Tap (Passive)Miss Fortune deals [50%- 100% total AD] bonus physical damage whenever she attacks a new target. Deals half damage to minions.

Miss_Fortune_(Classic_&_Arcade)_-_Marksman_Update — Miss Fortune (Classic & Arcade) - Marksman Update

Her old passive, which was basically just mobility Boots, has now been moved to her W. Her Impure shots, however, have been removed. Her W is now called Strut and still gives her attack speed like before. Interestingly, the duration of the attack speed buff is prolonged if her passive is procced. This could be useful during teamfights if managed correctly.

If you watched the video, you can clearly see that her Ult gained an additional 4 waves on its first level, for a total of 12 but also rooting her for 3 seconds instead of 2. But at the final rank, it'll be twice as many waves as it is now on live. Her teamfight potential has been increased due to just how much damage her ult can now do; especially since Bullet Time can now crit.

Quinn[]

Last but not least, we have Quinn and Valor. Her kit has been in an awkward spot for a while now. While the rest of her kit is still basically the same, apart from some minor tweaks, her Q and her Ultimate have been repurposed.

Firstly, her Q no longer blinds and is renamed "Aerial Assault." Though the blind has been removed and her dueling style now is much less appealing, it now marks the target with her passive. This could potentially make a new and even more bursty combo.

Q -> AA -> E -> AA -> P -> AA

With the numbers on her passive tweaked, she can potantially deal 375-450% of her total AD in that combo.

Now a lot of people think that her new ultimate is bad. And not just bad, I mean REALLY bad. I don't really see why not, though. Having no cooldown and a massive MS boost, she is now the Bard of the ADC's. Heck, she can even have Bard as a support and they can go roaming together. "SS bot always missing." But seriosly, Riot did state that they are trying to make her even more viable as a mid-lane ADC because of her roaming potential. A big kick in the groins for the assassin-style Quinn players there, but that wasn't her real role in the first place.

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