With the Preseason, Riot Games decided to fundamentally change the Delay Reduction, to replace it with Skill Boost. At the same time, the studio also decided to make changes to the Flight of Life as well as the critical hits. The problem with the overhaul of the item system, the Mythics and the Legendary, is that League of Legends is suddenly going to be deeply imbalanced. Some champions will be too strong, some items completely broken, and it is precisely the role of the Preseason to help identify these imbalances.
Cooldown Reduction is Out, Ability Haste is in: What is Ability Haste
That said, Riot Games has already anticipated some changes, in terms of mechanics that could get out of control – or on the contrary, never have been. Among them, Cooldown Reduction (CDR) has long been the subject of debate, as the stat had to be capped at 40% in order not to be overpowered – something that obviously displeased Riot Games. So, they decided to replace it with Ability Haste, a new stat that they say does more or less the same thing.
For each Ability Haste point, you will cast your skills 1% faster – except that you won’t be limited, so you can reach up to 200% skill speed.
Life Steal and Vampiric Effects
That being said, CDR isn’t the only stat that’s going to change with the preseason, as Life Steal and vampiric effects evolve, for clarity.
- The Lifesteal now means the care obtained from the auto-attacks, and on-hit effects are now included in the calculation.
- The physical Vamp means the care obtained from auto-attacks and skills (effect reduced to 33% for spells in the area and familiar)
- The Omnivamp means a received care from all sources of damage (effect always reduces to 33% for spells in the area and familiar)
Critical Strike Stat Change
We expected a little by looking at the list of new Mythic items, but Riot Games decided to nerf Critical Hits. Or rather, they tried to make them less prevalent and ubiquitous in late-game ADC builds. The changes are minor, but their impacts will definitely be significant.
For one thing, items that give a critical hit percentage will give less, from 25% currently to 20%. On the other hand, without modifiers, Critical Hits will now deal 175% damage instead of 200%. It remains to be seen how this nerve will relate to the rest of the changes brought about by the Preseason…
