Patch 9.24 Highlights
League of Legends Patch 9.24 is here. It’s the final update of the year so Riot Games is looking to end 2019 with a bang. This huge patch has a new champion, a mini rework and substantial balance changes as the game continues to prepare for the full launch of Season 10.
There’s certainly a lot to go through but these are the five changes that will have the largest impact on the game.
Aphelios release
Starting with the main attraction of the update as Riot is releasing its most complicated champion ever in the brand new marksman, Aphelios. The Weapon of the Faithful is unique champion who doesn’t talk and is instead guided by his sister, Alune, who provides him different moonstone weapons from a distant temple sanctuary.
Aphelios has his own one of a kid HUD in-game as he doesn’t have an E ability. Instead, he cycles through five separate weapons, having access to two of them at a time. His W swaps his main-hand weapon and off-hand weapon which is important as the main-hand weapon will change the effect of his Q and his Ultimate though some abilities will also bring his second weapon into play too. Every weapon has a limited amount of ammo and when the resource is dried out, that weapon goes to the back of the line.
Aphelios is going to have a steep learning curve and it will probably take players a long time to fully adapt to his playstyle. Still, the preseason is the perfect time to practise and if you want a better understanding of his kit you can look at this primer which tries to help. Good luck.
Braum buffs
Braum has typically been one of the strongest supports in the game, especially in pro play, for the majority of his time on Summoner’s Rift. However, he has suffered a bit recently with engage tank supports Leona and Nautilus dominating the current meta.
Riot wants to keep him as an effective tool against ranged champions so they’re making him slightly less effective against melee champions in hopes he will be easier to balance going forward.
His base health per level and health regeneration have been increased while the cooldown on his W Stand Behind be now has a shorter cooldown. The ability has also had its mana cost flattened while the bonus resistances has been decreased for his ally (16% to 12%) but massively increased for himself (16% to 36%). And finally, his ultimate now knocks up the first target hit, for longer with the time scaling depending on the distance, with all other targets being CC’d for just 0.25 seconds.
Diana rework
Next up is Diana who has received a mini-rework with an aim to make her smoother to play and play against. Her Ultimate, Lunar Rush, and her E, Moonfall, have been swapped with needed changes for the numbers. Being able to dash pre-6 should make Diana nicer to lane with while her new R, which still pulls enemies in but now deals AoE damage after a short delay, should give her opponents more room to outplay her.
She also now has increased scaling attack speed thanks to a change with her passive. The new changes could see Diana become popular again and keep an eye out for her in the jungle role, the changes could significantly help her in that role.
Senna nerfs
Riot has been releasing new champions at an extraordinary rate during this preseason and upon release, support/ADC Senna has proven to be far too strong, especially in the latter role.
Senna proved to be very safe in lane so her poke and waveclear has been hit with a nerf to the damage of her Q Piercing Darkness and the root duration of her W Last Embrace has been decreased at early levels. But perhaps the biggest change of all is the rate of which wraiths drop from her passive has been decreased on minions Senna kills in order to slow down her scaling.
Conqueror nerfs
Finally, we have the Keystone Rune Conqueror which has been far too strong since it was changed for preseason with many champions able to abuse it. The duration of its buff effect has been decreased from eight to six seconds and ranged champions, who were best at abusing that duration, now receive less healing.
