5 things to know about League of Legends patch 9.2

The League of Legends year may have started a couple of weeks ago with patch 9.1, but this patch feels like the real beginning of the season. With patch 9.2, League adds its first new champion of the year and also kicks off ranked play for season 9.

This time around the beginning of the year starts off with a bang as Riot opted to make quite a few changes. While the new champion is sure to keep most people’s attention, it isn’t the only thing that’s changing in the patch. In fact, the entire jungle is getting a bit of an overhaul. Most of the camps are going to be worth slightly less experience overall and Baron is going to scale now, making a 20 minute Baron strong instead of game-ending.

For a closer look at all of the changes coming to League in patch 9.2, you can check out the full patch notes.

Riot Games

Sylas is here to steal your ult

League’s newest champion is here! In case you haven’t been paying attention, his name is Sylas and while he has several pretty neat abilities, the only one that most people are talking about is his ultimate, which lets him steal the ultimates of other champions. Yep, just by clicking on another character Sylas can take their ult for himself. Since everyone has been paying so much attention to his ultimate, and how he’ll be able to use the ults of other characters, there’s still plenty to be discovered with Sylas and how exactly he will work so don’t be surprised if he spends the first two weeks just being banned.

Ranked play comes with positional ranks and starts as soon as the patch is live

In case you have someone missed the last several months of announcements on this topic, this is your final reminder that season 9 of ranked play starts back up when this patch goes live on Jan. 24. Once ranked is back it will also bring with it a whole new system of rankings which will now be handled by position. So, you can be a Gold 1 mid laner and a Silver 2 top laner and the relative skill of opponents in each game should match up with that fairly well. At least, that’s the idea.

Riot Games

There are a few items changes to help reduce damage

There are three big changes happening to items which should all help reduce the amount of damage champions are taking in each game. The first two are nerfs to Oblivion Orb, which is now going to cost slightly more and have five less ability power, and nerfs to Morellonomicon which is now going to cost slightly less, but also have less AP. The other major damage related change coming is a buff to Sunfire Cape which is now significantly less expensive allowing the champions that work well with the item (that’s basically every tank in case you forgot) should be able to built it a little easier.

A lot of runes are getting minor changes

If you’ve been playing during preseason, it shouldn’t be too surprising to hear that there are plenty of rune changes coming in this patch. Runes like Overheal and Absolute Focus have been nerfed with flat decreases while Legend: Bloodline is getting a much weaker early game in exchange for a stronger late game. Meanwhile, Cut Down is getting a small change that should make it more useful through entire games. Also changing in this patch are the rune stats, with adaptive damage going from 10 to nine and armor and magic resist both increasing slightly.

Riot Games

The new Valentine’s Day skins are coming along with new Firecracker skins

Along with all the other changes, this patch also includes plenty of new skins so everyone can look their best at the beginning of the ranked season. Sejuani and Vayne are both getting Firecracker skins, Tahm is getting his new Coin Emperor skins, and the Heartbreaker Vi and Heartpiercer Fiora skins should be here in time for Valentine’s Day. Also, Vayne’s getting a prestige version of her Firecracker skin, but the rest of the skin news is significantly better.