Shieldbow nerfs, Rengar & Janna reworks live on PBE servers

It’s that time of the year where the holiday spirit takes over, but if you are working for the League Development team, this is one of the busiest times of the year. All of the competitive play for the year has been finished and when the preseason starts, it’s time for changes. The patch cycle of the year ended with patch 11.24 B, but work on the PBE server never stops. If you haven’t seen our article covering the latest patch you can check it out here.

Rengar’s issues

Meanwhile, on the PBE server, some major changes are happening. For the last few years, after his peak days in season seven, Rengar has been in and out of the meta for various reasons. Last year’s item rework really did more harm than good considering the assassin’s mythic items were lackluster compared to the new marksman items.

This year the new mage items, the changes to existing ones that gave them more health, all made Rengar’s job harder. The final straw that broke Rengar’s back was the Chemtech Rift, introduced to the map when the Chemtech Drake had been slain. The drake converted the jungle quadrants into camouflage zones, removing all the bushes in them, and thus making Rengar useless.

Playing Rengar on the Chemtech Rift meant you could only use your passive, and your champion properly, only in the middle of the map. From the top lane bushes, in the river, mid lane bushes, and bot lane. Rengar’s win rate has plummeted since this preseason started and Riot have already announced changes to combat this, alongside his mini rework that’s been postponed for almost half a year.

With these changes, Rengar can jump from camouflaged zones, not just bushes after he gets his Ultimate ability because it’s a passive on his R. Also, his Ultimate will now make him camouflaged rather than stealthed like Evelynn. The drawback is that he will be seen from a lot further away before he jumps on you with Ultimate because the camouflage range indicator is a lot bigger than the one for stealth.

Also, he does have a cooldown on his passive so he can’t spam jumps out of camouflaged zones, as often as he could from bushes. The cooldown is rumored to be four seconds, to prevent ‌abuse from interactions like with Senna E which is also a camouflage.

Shieldbow, Eclipse and Wit’s End nerfs

One of Rengar’s greatest enemies is also getting nerfed on the PBE server. Shieldbow is losing some damage and a big chunk of its passive shield, going from 55 AD -> 50 AD and the shield going from 300-800 health points-> 275-650 health points. The shield passive cooldown on Eclipse for melee users also got longer, going from six seconds to eight.

A lot of discussion has been going on regarding the state of Magic Resist in the game, so Riot are taking a step in that direction. The duration of the Force of Nature passive is increased to seven seconds from the previous five, and the damage reduction is now 25% instead of the previous 20%.

The thorn in all mage players’ eyes, called Wit’s End, is also getting nerfed by adjusting its build path. Now you can no longer get 45 magic resist for 950 gold and build it into a damage item as well as you now have to buy a Pickaxe as a component.

Janna mini rework and shift of power budget

Meanwhile, Janna is also getting changed through a mini rework that’s scheduled to hit live servers in February 2022. Being one of the oldest champions in the game, over time she has lost a lot of power compared to other meta enchanters. The stated goals for her state are to drain power from her W poke playstyle in the lane and make Q a better and stronger ability. With this update, she will now have more base movement speed by 15 points and more base attack damage but a lower attack range by 50 units.

Her Q ability will now travel a longer distance over a faster period, do more damage and cost less mana. But will do only 80% of the damage to minions to avoid solo lane Janna meta coming back in pro play.

On the flip side, her W will now have a longer cooldown but do more damage, slow more and give more passive movement speed. Her passive however no longer gives her a flat movement speed increase, but while she is moving towards allies. Also, her basic attacks and her W no longer do bonus magic damage based on her movement speed. The E shield ability now also has a lower cooldown and lasts longer, but the refund mechanic has been removed. Currently, if Janna slows or knocks up an enemy, it reduces the remaining E cooldown by 20 %.

A lot of mixed opinions have been voiced over these proposed changes, with the Janna community disliking the change in playstyles. They claim that Janna’s movement speed on her passive is one of the things that makes her a great peeler, and is vital to playing around the map. Also, the E refund mechanic rewarded skilled and aggressive Janna players but now that’s also gone. There’s still time for testing and input so we will have to wait and see what results we will get on the live servers in the new year.