5 things to know from Patch 8.7

Patch 8.7 is finally here, and it’s bringing with it a lot of tuning changes to make sure the stage is set for Riot’s midseason update. While a lot of the changes are fairly small scale, there are still a few things worth mentioning about the patch before we get into the details.

First and foremost, Swain’s brief, two week long, domination of the mid lane has likely come to an end thanks to a few nerfs to his Q. Locket of the Iron Solari also got a few well targeted nerfs that may turn it back into a situational item rather than a must have for every fight. The good news is those are really the only big nerfs coming through on this patch. And I’m sure the newly reworked Irelia will make everyone forget about Swain soon enough.

Here are the five most important things in this patch. For a complete list of the Patch 8.6 changes, check out our post here.

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1. Irelia’s rework is here

The new and improved Irelia is finally here! In terms of reworks, Irelia’s isn’t quite the biggest we’ve ever seen, but it’s pretty close. In fact, she only really kept one ability from her original kit, everything else is brand new. All those changes help make this one of the slickest and most exciting kits that Riot has designed in a long time, even if she’ll probably be banned for at least the first week.

2. A lot of champions got buffed

In most patches, the numbers of buffs versus nerfs is pretty comparable. But that’s certainly not the case for Patch 8.7! There are almost 20 champion related balance changes in this patch and all but three are direct buffs. This is one of Riot’s smaller, odd numbered, patches where they avoid introducing huge system wide changes, and it looks like they used that stability to make sure some of the game’s least loved champions — like Karthus, Malphite, and Hecarim — got some much needed attention.

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3. Manaflow Band and Ninja Tabi both got changes

There aren’t a lot of things in League of Legends right now that worked on just about every champion, but the Manaflow Band rune and Ninja Tabi boots were certainly two of the outliers. Manaflow has been one of the strongest runes since the Runes Reforged was released during the preseason and it was good on just about any mana using character, thankfully, Riot is making the rune a little more interesting and giving it a stacking mechanic instead of the free mana it once had.

As for Ninja Tabi, it’s almost hard to remember a time when they weren’t the best boots. Over the last year or so, if the enemy team had more than one AD champion, you probably had a good chance of seeing all five opponents building Ninja Tabi. This may not be the first, or most substantial of the Ninja Tabi nerfs, but maybe this will be the one to finally bring them in line with the game’s other boots.

4. Minion gold has been redistributed

This is a bit of a weird change, in large part because it’s likely only half of the minion changes Riot are planning in the next several weeks in an effort to make laning phase more meaningful. In short, caster minions are worth a little less gold now, and that gold has been moved onto the value of melee minions, somewhat, but mostly canon minions, which should be given a renewed focus in lane.

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5. Rumble finally got a new skin

It sure has been a while hasn’t it Rumble? In case you haven’t been keeping track of exactly how long it’s been, today marks the four year anniversary of Super Galaxy Rumble’s release. That was the last time Rumble had a new skin. Thankfully, Badland Baron Rumble is here to end the drought in his new and terrifying looking mech suit. Joining Rumble with a new Patch 8.7 skin is Wukong who’s getting a new, robot inspired, Lancer Stratus skin.