Official Patch 26.13 Notes Released!

 

Summary

Patch 26.13 (Pandemonium) is here and it's a big one: Locke, The Ashen Exorcist, joins the Rift as the newest champion, launching alongside the new Broken Covenant and High Noon skin lines. On the balance side, eight champions get toned down, led by Bard, Brand, and K'Sante, while nine pick up buffs, with Aphelios, Draven, and Kai'Sa headlining the glow-up. Last Hit Indicators are also rolling out to Normal Draft, a nice quality-of-life boost for anyone still learning to farm.

Buffs: Aphelios, Draven, Kai'Sa, LeBlanc, Olaf, Poppy, Qiyana, Vex, Zaahen
Nerfs: Bard, Brand, Cassiopeia, K'Sante, Rek'Sai, Rumble, Senna, Sion

Patch Highlights

Our newest demon-huntin' baddie Locke is hitting the Rift this patch! You can check him out in between MSI matches, but you won't see him on that big stage yet.

The patch also introduces balance adjustments across numerous champions, Ranked 5s returning June 26 at 8pm, and last hit indicators for Normal and Ranked Draft queues.

Locke

Locke, The Ashen Exorcist

"Guilt's a sickness, and I've got the cure."

Locke, the Ashen Exorcist, is slayin' demons (and disappointing his mother) starting June 24th. He's an on-hit marksman built around marking enemies and cashing in those marks for bonus damage.

• Passive - Silver Stake: Magic damage on-hit, scaling off the target's missing health.
• Q - Ritual Nails: Throws soul nails that mark enemies; consuming marks deals bonus damage.
• W - Soul Ignition: Gains attack speed and move speed, dealing self-damage that's paired with healing.
• E - Ashen Pursuit: Teleports in and dashes through targets.
• R - Purgatory: A binding artifact with a potential execute.

Champions

Aphelios

Since his nerfs earlier this year, Aphelios has fallen in priority and win rate. With some power budget freed up, we're pulling back on some of those earlier nerfs to highlight each gun's unique strengths.

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Calibrum

• Passive Mark Damage: 15 (10% bonus AD) ⇒ 15 (15% bonus AD)

Severum

• Q - Onslaught Damage: 19/24.25/29.5/34.75/40% Total AD per attack ⇒ 20/25.25/30.5/35.75/41% Total AD per attack

Infernum

• Q - Duskwave Damage: 20-110 (Lvl 1-18) (10-16% bonus AD) ⇒ 20-110 (Lvl 1-18) (15-21% bonus AD)

Crescendum

• Q - Sentry Damage: 35-125 (Lvl 1-18) (30-48% bonus AD) ⇒ 35-125 (Lvl 1-18) (34-52% bonus AD)

Bard

Bard has been a tanky roaming meta staple for much of the season, so we're trimming his damage so tank Bard doesn't get to hit nearly as hard without investing in AP.

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Passive - Traveler's Call

• Damage Per Meep: 35 (+10 per 5 Chimes) (+40% AP) ⇒ 30 (+6 per 5 Chimes) (+40% AP)

Brand

Brand continues to dominate bot lane for most players, so we're nerfing his early passive detonation damage while offsetting some of that hit for more skilled players and supports through mana tuning.

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Base Stats

• Base Mana Regeneration: 9 ⇒ 11

Passive - Blaze

• Detonation Damage: 8-12% (Lvl 1-17) (+2% per 100 AP) ⇒ 6-12% (Lvl 1-18, scaling above 18) (+2% per 100 AP)

E - Conflagration

• Mana Cost: 70/75/80/85/90 ⇒ 90 (flat)

Cassiopeia

Cassiopeia has risen to the top of pro play presence, even before our 26.12 nerfs to her major competition. We would like to preserve some of her unique strengths, like her rewarding laning and slippery speed, but she should have a less gigantic health bar for when opponents actually lock her down!

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Base Stats

• Health per level: 104 ⇒ 98

Draven

As the marksman meta has evolved around crit, on-hit, and caster builds, Draven has fallen behind. We're buffing his heavy-AD pattern instead of trying to redirect his itemization.

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E - Stand Aside

• Cooldown: 18/17/16/15/14s ⇒ 16/15/14/13/12s

R - Whirling Death

• Damage Reduction per Enemy Hit: -8% multiplicatively, floor of 40% (at 11 hits) ⇒ -5%, floor of 50% (at 14 hits)

Kai'Sa

Kai'Sa has struggled to get through lane and find her big Killer Instinct moments, so we're buffing her fallback W pattern early and her later-game backline dive threat.

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W - Void Seeker

• Cooldown: 22/20/18/16/14 ⇒ 20/18.5/17/15.5/14

R - Killer Instinct

• Shield: 70/90/110 (+90/135/180% AD) (+120% AP) ⇒ 100/150/200 (+90/135/180% AD) (+120% AP)

K'Sante

K'Sante has been a major beneficiary with Doran's Helm entering the mix in Season 2, so we're lightly tapping down his early reliability while still rewarding successful all-ins.

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E - Footwork

• Shield: 80/120/160/200/240 (+15% bonus health) ⇒ 70/112.5/155/197.5/240 (+13.5% bonus health)

LeBlanc

We want to better reward LeBlanc players for landing some of her less guaranteed damage, rather than giving her more gank or lane support, both of which she does really well already.

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R - Mimic

• RQ1/RE1 Damage: 70/140/210 ⇒ 70/150/230
• Mark/Root Damage: 140/280/420 ⇒ 140/300/460
• RW Damage: 150/300/450 ⇒ 150/315/480

Olaf

Olaf used to be a staple in the jungle but has been out of favor for a while now, despite our earlier attempts this season to help him out. We are looking to give him a bit more power to entice him back into the wilderness.

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Q - Undertow

• Monster Bonus Physical Damage: 20/35/50/65/80 ⇒ 20/45/70/95/120

Poppy

Jungle class diversity has been dominated almost exclusively by fighters for a while now, and we think Poppy is a good pick for a tankier counter option into many of the fighter junglers at the top of the meta. This buff is aimed at her jungle clear and gank windows while minimizing top and support impact.

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Q - Hammer Shock

• Monster Damage Cap: 50/80/110/140/170 ⇒ 75/105/135/165/195

Qiyana

Another class that's underrepresented in the jungle is assassins. We feel Qiyana is a great choice for a buff as she's recently been on the lower end of balanced in the jungle, so we're giving her a jungle-focused buff to help bring her back without meaningfully juicing mid lane.

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Q - Edge of Ixtal

• Monster Damage: 155% ⇒ 175%

Rek'Sai

Rek'Sai's combination of dueling power and mobility has made her too successful at high ranks, so we're shaving down her early-to-mid burst windows while preserving her unique map movement and longer fight pattern.

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E - Furious Bite / Tunnel

• Physical Damage: 80/108/136/164/192 (+64% bonus AD) ⇒ 70/95/120/145/170 (+60% bonus AD)
• Bonus True Damage: 125% ⇒ 120%

Rumble

Rumble has been an extremely reliable blind-pick top laner for a long time, so we're lowering some of his early staying power and base damage while keeping his scaling pattern intact.

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Q - Flamespitter

• Damage: 60/85/110/135/160 (100% AP) ⇒ 50/75/100/125/150 (105% AP)

Senna

Senna players have moved over to a much stronger Bot lane farming pattern, so we're softening her farming and Shiv synergy while also tuning her DPS around having access to more souls. The Doran's Helm nerf should do the rest of the work necessary to get her to the right power level between roles.

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Passive - Absolution

• Soul Drop Chance (Senna Kill): 10% ⇒ 5%
• Soul Drop Chance (Ally Kill): 28% ⇒ 32%
• Crit Damage: -10% (180% / 27% with IE) ⇒ -15% (170% / 25.5% with IE)

Q - Piercing Darkness

• Cooldown Refund Trigger: On Hit ⇒ On Attack

Sion

Sion has been resilient in both solo queue and pro play for a long time, so we're weakening some of his reliable early lane power and resource access without decimating his core tank fantasy.

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Q - Decimating Smash

• Min Damage: 40/60/80/100/120 ⇒ 30/45/60/75/90

W - Soul Furnace

• Mana: 65/70/75/80/85 ⇒ 75/80/85/90/95

Vex

We feel Vex has had less of an impact in her games than we think she should, so we're giving her a quality of life buff that should make her reset pattern feel smoother so she can have more pop off giga plays.

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E - Looming Darkness

• Cooldown: 13s ⇒ 12s

R - Shadow Surge

• Reset Time Window: 6s ⇒ 8s

Zaahen

Zaahen is already seeing more play across audiences, so we're giving him more room to fish for his early trade patterns and engage in mid game skirmishes without raising his scaling ceiling.

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W - Dreaded Return

• Cooldown: 16/15/14/13/12 ⇒ 14/13.5/13/12.5/12

Items

Doran's Helm

We overshot a bit with the 26.11 Doran's Helm buff, so we're tapping it back down while keeping the base health high and targeting the users it's overperforming on.

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• Armor and Magic Resistance: 10 ⇒ 8
• Health: 140 ⇒ 150

Imperial Mandate

Imperial Mandate has landed softly, and the build path has been too awkward for many of its likely users, especially supports. We're smoothing out the path and shifting some of its power accordingly.

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• Build Path: Blasting Wand (850g) + Bandleglass Mirror (900g) + 650g ⇒ Amp Tome (400g) + Bandleglass Mirror (900g) + Amp Tome (400g) + 700g
• Ability Power: 65 ⇒ 60
• Unique - Control (Ability Haste for Immobilizing Abilities): 15 ⇒ 20
• Unique - Command (Vulnerable): 6% ⇒ 7%

Last Hit Indicators

Last Hit Indicators are coming to Normal Draft games. The feature already exists in Swiftplay and Co-op vs. AI, where it's shown improved last-hitting success among newer players. Riot's stance is that skill expression should live in positioning, harassment, jungle awareness, and power spikes, not in memorizing minion-timing math, so the indicator is on by default but can be turned off by experienced players who don't want it. For Ranked, it'll ship off by default across Swiftplay, Co-op vs AI, and Normal Draft first, so Riot can collect data before deciding whether to bring it to ranked queues.

ARAM: Mayhem

Recent hotfixes improved Ability Augment offerings and fixed spell-specific issues, including critical strike augments like Jeweled Gauntlet now appearing at their intended frequency, and a fix for a bug that was messing with proper Ability Augment distribution across augment slots.

• Archmage: moved up to Prismatic tier (buff)
• Tooth Fairy: lethality reduced from 5 to 4 (nerf)
• Glass Cannon: now deals 25% / 15% (melee / ranged) true damage (buff)
• Pin Cushion: damage scaling increased significantly (buff)

Also fixed a missing health calculation bug and an infinite shield exploit.

Arena

Locke joins Arena as a new Guest of Honor with a "Fractured" augment mechanic: higher-tier augments that downgrade into Stat Anvils after two losses. Round 15 has also been changed from a gold round to an augment round.

• Zeri: substantial ability power and movement speed buffs
• Zilean: Q damage reduced
• Calculated Risk, Chain Lightning: disabled

Several other underperforming augments received cooldown or effectiveness improvements.

Reporting Direct Messages

DMs have long been a gap in reporting coverage, letting bad actors use direct messages as a place for chat toxicity without consequence. Riot is closing that loophole with a report menu built directly into the chat interface: report or block from the chat header's report button, by right-clicking the chat dialogue, or from the block menu. Blocking stops future DMs, but message history sticks around for that session so the block feature can't be used to dodge a report. Once reported, both sides of the conversation are reviewable, and all reported DM data is handled securely and used strictly for moderation.

Ranked 5s

Ranked 5s are back for a limited run starting June 26 at 8pm: Tournament Draft, double the stakes, no restrictions on who can queue together, and unique rewards. Start time was pushed to 8pm specifically for players who need to be asleep by 10. More detail is in Riot's dev blog.

Discord Integration

In Discord-supported regions, you can now link your Riot and Discord accounts to jump into games with Discord friends faster: invite Discord friends straight into a party, copy a lobby link to share in a server, or see which friends are currently playing. Accounts can be linked through the League client, Discord, your Riot account page, or a direct link.

Bugfixes & QoL Changes

• Fixed a bug where Baron Nashor's max stacks of Void Corruption was higher than intended.
• Fixed a bug where Serpent's Fang's Shield Reaver damage applied Omnivamp.
• Fixed a bug where Diana's R VFX may not play properly around different areas of the map.

Skins

Sahn-Uzal Mordekaiser is returning to The Sanctum until Patch 26.17. Broken Covenant Jhin is this patch's MSI revenue share skin, with a share of proceeds from the skin and bundle going to esports teams. Also keep an eye out during MSI Finals: all direct-purchase skins used by the winning team get a 33% discount for one week after the series ends.

Upcoming Skins & Chromas

Broken Covenant Jhin, Broken Covenant Aurora, Broken Covenant Shen (shared promo image above; official notes do not list separate splash art or individual pricing for these three)

High Noon Akshan

High Noon Locke

Chromas are available for all five skins above.