Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Volibear patch - My take on the new jungle.

I'm making this post a little sooner than I probably would have liked. I'm not ready to throw my hat into the 'change it back' ring yet, but servers are down, so I'll give you what I've got.

-Champions with high movespeed in the jungle are amazing now. Most of my experimenting was done as Shyvana. She's a very fast champion to begin with, taking her W, MS quints, and both MS masteries, she's able to clear incredibly quick. In fact, most of the time, I was able to keep on par with the mid/top lanes in EXP. I was actually beating them in raw CS, but I'm unsure how that converts to gold at this point. The enemy jungle was Xin Zhao, and he got destroyed. I had doubled his CS at ten minutes, ganked more than he did, and maintained a two level advantage.

-Exp mastery is once again incredible. Without running exp/movespeed, the current jungle is a little lacking. It was required before (to get your level 2 at golems) but when the mastery changes came about, the exp to golems was buffed to give you 2 without the mastery. Once again, running exp/movespeed kept me on par with mid lane.

-It was a common strategy to hit 2 from golems, then gank. In the new jungle, even more interesting, is that red will give you 2. And not only will it give you 2, but it's easier to kill. Red -> 2 -> gank is really strong, and surprising.

-The main complaint that I'm seeing is that the risk/reward is too risky. I look at it differently. Previously, you had to gank when your jungle is cleared, because there was nothing else to do. Now, whenever you're close to a lane, you have to ask yourself "can I gank once I clear this?" if yes, you do. If not, you have to decide which camp to do next. The decision should be based on which lane would be the easier kill. "If I go to golems from wraiths, I may be able to gank bot, they're pretty pushed, but top lane is in trouble, maybe I'll head to wolves and gank or cover for him." Those types of interactions are much better than the Jungle's dead -> time to gank ways of the old jungle.

Of course, I'm not sure about the numbers. I feel they're pretty close, but maybe over buffing the jungle is the best way to help others see it this way. Once they're used to the playstyle, they can always adjust it down as to not be overpowered.

-Breaku, NA sever, 1600 elo.

More jungle changes in the works!

Posted by Morello:
Hey folks,

After letting the jungle settle for a day and not only reading the feedback on the forums, but watching streamers, discussing with high-level players, and running some additional internal testing and mathcraft, we will be making changes to the jungle, likely tomorrow.

What will be the scope of these changes, and what are we trying to fix?

* XP Rate: This isn't as smoothed out as we'd liked (or was intended) and has been the most noticeable problem in the new jungle. While we do think this is not as drastically far off as some believe, it is lower than intended. We'll likely make updates here, especially relating to small camps.

* Penalty of missed ganks: While we do like this tradeoff, we don't like the tradeoff ratio here, something you guys have also felt pretty substantially. Changes made will effect this for the better, whether in increased reward or reduced resource loss.

* Gold Rate: Jungler gold is slightly lower than needed, and this is also related to small camp gold. We will be more careful here as to not make counter-jungling worse (since it revolves largely on stealing the big monsters out of camps), but will be evaluating this.

Classick, Guinsoo and I will be doing some final proposals and mathcraft in the morning, in hopes to release it in a hotfix. I'll try to provide status updates as we get more information. Details to come.


I really wish I had more time to play with it. I'm not the greatest jungler, but I was having a lot of success in the new jungle. Oh well, the success can only be amplified in the new new jungle.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

11/29/2011, NA servers are up!

Enjoy your Volibear!

Skin Models - Volibear Patch

To see the art, check this post: http://fotmop.blogspot.com/2011/11/new-skins-in-volibear-patch_29.html

Here are the models of the new skins!


I really like that Warwick and that Akali. The Lux model looks better than the art.

New skins in the Volibear patch!

Sup Dudes. It's patch day shortly, and you know what that means! New skins! I really dig this Akali skin. Which is your favorite?

I love this Akali
Not sure if this is a New skin, or just updated art.
JANNA :D
Not sure how I feel about this Lux.
Megaman trist?
Looks like Warwick?!
Again, this might just be updated art.
VOLIBEAR!
VOLIBEAR!
VOLIBEAR!
To see the models, view this post: http://fotmop.blogspot.com/2011/11/skin-models-volibear-patch.html

Volibear patch, and more, today!



Alright, so we've got the new champion (Volibear of course). He's a tanky DPS Melee AP champion. He's got a fling similar to Singed. I'm curious to see if atmogs will be good on him, though I doubt it considering he scales with HP and AP, not HP and AD.

Some slight Fizz buffs. His Q can no longer be dodged, and the targeted was corrected to hit sooner.

Some slight Jarvan IV changes. His passive was changed from physical to magic (slight nerf) but now scales with level. It will hit for a little less early, but a little more late (6/8/10% from flat 8%). Combined with the physical to magic switch, it will likely hit for near the same late game.

Karthus is seeing a small nerf to his Wall. The duration of the slow is now only 5 seconds, and it will no longer reapply.

Finally Kassadin will no longer force pulse backwards!

Katarina's changes from last patch have been reverted. You can no longer select if you want to go in front or behind the target.

Sivir has been remade. Most notably, her Q is now physical damage with no AP ratio, and her W is now an on-next-hit ability.

Taric's AP ratios have gone up!

Health pots nerfed. Mana pots buffed. Madred's razor nerfed. Wriggles nerfed.

Jungle changes! Many of them

+Small camps now respawn faster, but have reduced rewards
+Small camps now have a Healing Sigil, healing the killer based upon how much health they are missing
+Neutral monsters now have their health, damage, experience reward, and gold reward increase with game length, instead of having health increases with each respawn
+Neutral monster experience range reduced to 400 from 800 (the killer always gets experience)
+Ancient Golem camp experience increased slightly and gold reduced slightly
+Crest of the Ancient Golem now grants 25 flat MP5, but grants 1% regen from maximum mana, from 1.5%, and provides energy
+Lizard Elder camp experience increased and gold reduced slightly
+Blessing of the Lizard Elder melee slow % reduced to 8/16/24% from 10/20/30%
+Dragon and Baron Nashor are now immune to armor and magic resist-shredding effects
+Baron Nashor will now push wards away if you try to place one too close
+Monsters now heal 5% immediately when they retreat (instead of after 1 second), but are easier to re-aggro

Monday, November 28, 2011

League of Legends Matchmaking?

I never believed any of the people who claimed that match making was terrible, until I saw this post: http://na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=1532073

My team-
Me, level 22, 71 victories. (Did not duo, instant queue)
Ally1, level 30, 755 wins. (1633 current elo)
Ally2, level 30, 1163 wins. (1906 current elo)
Ally3, level 30, 1137 wins. (1459 elo season 1)
Ally4, level 30, 1223 wins. (1514 elo season 1)

Their team-
Enemy1, level 30, 966 wins. (1501 current elo)
Enemy2, level 29, 77 wins. (not 30)
Enemy3, level 30, 987 wins. (1523 elo season 1)
Enemy4, level 30, 913 wins. (1619 current elo)
Enemy5, level 24, 138 wins. (not 30)

Those two made it obvious that they duo. But how did MM allow this match to happen?

Of course, I did poorly, as did the other two sub30s. I don't like being carried that hard.

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Fan Ashe Art

It's no secret that I love me some Ashe art.

So, enjoy this little bit of digital art.

Daniel


So freakin' sexy. Omg.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

New skins in the Fizz Patch!

And, they look amazing!
Amethyst Ashe

I've gotta say it; dat ashe.

Credit to http://imgur.com/a/jfujE!

Monday, November 14, 2011

Fizz (and other changes) tomorrow!



So most importantly, Fizz will be released with the patch tomorrow morning. However, there are some other major changes.

Akali will be receiving some small nerfs, mostly to her passive (but also on her Q).

Ranged carries have been adjusted a ton. Caitlyn is slower now, Graves has shorter range. Among other changes.

All the mastery trees have been rewords (http://na.leagueoflegends.com/masteries-season-two)

Wriggles was hit.

Summoner spells were all changed. (Good bye Rally and Fortify, hello Surge)

And those were the important changes. To see the details, here's the full post: http://na.leagueoflegends.com/news/fizz-patch-notes


Enjoy your Fizz!

Bunny Girl Riven; Oh, wow, It's awesome..

Some amazing fanart and a potential desktop background?

It's bunny girl Riven!



And just some updates here, my kogmaw dps o tron is almost complete. Sorry for the long wait, I kinda bit off more than I could chew with that one and midterms all at the same time.

Edit: I had to cancel the kog'maw project. It turns out I wasn't good enough at excell to pull it off. Apologies!