Patch 3.13.0 Notes – Card Balance Updates, New Seasonal Tournament Rewards and More

Patch 3.13.0 brings a wide variety of balance updates, as well as new Seasonal Tournament rewards. As previously announced, there are a host of cards being rebalanced – be sure to check out Raphterra’s analysis on the nerfs and the buffs!

Bard’s Departure and Kai’sa’s First Nerfs | Assessing All The Nerfs In Patch 3.13!

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Card Updates

Here’s a look at each of the card updates coming in this patch:

Champions & Related Cards

ILLAOI (LEVEL 1)

BASE STATS: 1|6 → 1|5

ILLAOI (LEVEL 2)

BASE STATS: 2|7 → 2|6

Our goal here is to enable greater interaction by putting Illaoi more in range of removal.

TENTACLE SMASH

CHANGE: Spawn 3 → 2

Tentacle Smash proved to be too strong a universal removal tool for Bilgewater, especially against opponent’s smaller champions.

KARMA (LEVEL 1)

BASE STATS:4|3 → 4|4

KARMA (LEVEL 2)

BASE STATS: 5|4 → 5|5

We hope that the jump from 3 Health to 4 (especially on a 5 drop) shifts how easy Karma is to remove and increases her currently low playrate.

GNAR

CHANGE: Create pokey stick or if you have one reduce cost by 1 → 2

Small QoL buff to Gnar, who soundly believes that Poking should be free.

ZILEAN’S CAREFUL PREPARATION

NEW CARD: To play, place a card from your hand into your deck. Predict, then create an exact copy of the chosen card in hand. Create a Zilean in your deck.

Long time coming, but finally Zilean’s spell makes sense in Zilean’s decks!

THE WANDERING CARETAKER

CHANGE: Chimes don’t start planting until you have 3+ mana gems

We want to reduce the frustration of early turn Chime high sides and point Bard a bit more firmly towards a midrange archetype.

COSMIC BINDING

CHANGE: Plant 3 → Chimes Plant 6 Chimes

Some compensation to Bard for the nerf, enabling more dedicated Chime decks to do their thing, eventually.

SECOND SKIN

CHANGE: Focus → Slow

SUPERCHARGE

COST: 3 → 4

The goal here is to increase the opponent’s ability to interact with Kai’Sa decks, as well as taking Kai’Sa’s power down a peg.

HATE SPIKE

COST: 2 → 1

Small buff to Evelyn with likely some broader utility in Shadow Island decks in general.

HARSH WINDS

COST: 6 → 5

Although this is technically a champion buff, the main goal here is to give player’s some better tools for interacting with huge units.

BLIGHTED RAVINE

CHANGE: When I’m summoned, heal your nexus 4→2.
Countdown 1: Deal 2 Damage to everything→all units

Small nerf to Ravine, retaining its board sweep but losing the superfluous Nexus damage.

FROZEN THRALL

CHANGE: Countdown 8 → 9

Preemptive nerf to Thralls since we are nerfing some of its main predators and not looking to catapult it back to dominance. Should mitigate some of the early turn high sides that players found frustrating.

BOOM BABOON

BASE STATS: 3|1 → 2|1

STATION ARCHIVIST

EFFECT: Pick a spell into the top 5 cards of your deck and create an exact fleeting copy in hand.

CHANGE: Then shuffle those top 5 into your deck.

Both Baboon and Archivist add cards to hand without a suitable tax on their stats, and are over-represented in the meta as a result. The Archivist’s ability to stack the top of the deck was also contributing to some frustrating non-interactive combos.

RAVENBLOOM CONSERVATORY

CHANGE: Countdown 10 → 12

Increasing Conservatory’s Countdown should mitigate early high sides. It was just too easy to consistently level it in hand.

KADREGRIN THE RUINED

CHANGE:  Grant an allied Champion or Dragon challenger →  Grant an ally Challenger and +1|+1

Kadregrin was too narrow to see much play, and the effect was slightly weak for a 6 drop. Hoping this bump should make him an interesting candidate for inclusion in Dragon and other decks.

MARK OF THE STORM

CHANGE: Grant an enemy Mark of the Storm. If they already have it, Remove the mark to Stun and Deal 2 → 3

This and a number of subsequent changes are aimed at revitalizing Bandle City’s attractiveness as a recall region.

STARBONE

CHANGE: If you behold a celestial, create The Messenger in your deck and grant celestial allies everywhere +1|+1 → If you behold The Messenger, grant celestial allies everywhere +1|+1

Removing the narrowness from this card in order to make a build around for Celestial decks.

BLOODY BUSINESS

CHANGE: An ally with 5+ Power strikes an enemy →

Reputation: I cost 2
An ally with 5+ Power strikes an enemy

You should get more for jumping through Reputation’s hoop, and hopefully this coupled with some of our more recent changes will make this deck genuinely exciting to play.

STARSHAPING

CHANGE: Invoke a celestial card that costs 7 or more, then heal an ally or your Nexus 4 → 5

Another revert, hopefully enabling some slower decks than the current meta has allowed.

THUNDERFIST

BASE STATS: 2|3 → 3|3

MASA, CRASHING THUNDER

BASE STATS: 5|4 → 5|5

RISSU, THE SILENT STORM

BASE STATS: 1|1 → 1|3

STORMCLOUD

CHANGE: Impact → When I’m summoned, grant me Impact 3 times

All of these changes are aimed at amping the Bandle City recall package. This and some of the buffs that follow are aimed at giving players more options for brewing with Bandle and encourage some new decks.

DUSKPETAL DUST

CHANGE: The next unit with nightfall you play this round costs 1 less → The next CARD you play this round costs 1 less

QoL buff for Nightfall, removing a long-standing frustration for players

THE STAGEHAND

BASE STATS: 4|4 → 4|2

In this patch we are moving a lot of cards in and out of different tiers of interactability. Ephemeral makes The Stagehand enough of a poor target for interaction that it has no need for 4 Health.

Editor’s Note: Jhin is the only one allowed to be perfect.

DEFIANT DANCE

COST: 4 → 5

Small hit to Azirelia aimed at keeping it from dominating the meta after the dust clears on this patch.

THE TRAVELER

BASE STATS: 3|4 → 4|4

Upping the Power here should make this a more attractive Invoke choice.

SQUEAKER

BASE STATS: 1|2 → 2|2

Rumors that Squeaker has a blackmail portfolio for every designer are completely and totally unfounded.

Editor’s Note: Ok, we did it. Again. Don’t be a Squealer, Squeaker. No one likes a Squealer…

BANDLE CITY MAYOR

BASE STATS: 2|2 → 2|3

Testing this initially brought a lot of apprehension to the team, but afterwards we felt that the meta is in a position to handle an enhanced Mayor.

ANCIENT HOURGLASS

COST: 2 → 3

Shurima was not intended to be the premier unit protection region. It was, uh, time for a change.

NEVERGLADE COLLECTOR

Cost: 2|4 → 2|5

Potentially some indirect help for Husks, and a much needed bump for Collector in general.

WINDING LIGHT

CHANGE: Overwhelm → Overwhelm removed

We want to put more emphasis on Winding Light as a go-wide finisher and less on its own stats and evasion.

PAPERCRAFT DRAGON

COST: 5 → 6

We want to tap the brakes on Papercraft one-turn kills with this one.

BATTLE BONDS

COST: 4 → 5
CHANGE: Slow → Burst

Reworked in order to provide a more potent tool for wider Targon strategies.

BENEMONE

BASE STATS: 4|3 → 4|4

Trying to open up some more playable options for Bandle City.

SCARMAIDEN REAVER

BASE STATS: 4|5 → 4|6

Bump to bring her more in line with current unit stat lines

TWISTED CATALYZER

BASE STATS: 2|2 → 3|2

Reverting Catalyser to give Darkness-stans a better chance in what has proven to be a very difficult meta for them.
Editor’s Note: Darkness loves pain!

Personalization

Take a look at this shiny Board, Cardback, and Icon that will be awarded to winners of the upcoming Seasonal Tournaments.

Seasonal Tournament Rewards

PINNACLE OF GLORY

For legends who compete at the highest level. This board has special visual effects and music.

SEASONAL COMPETITOR

Take pride in each and every victory

SEASONAL COMPETITOR

Miscellaneous

• The next Expansion is being revealed via live stream! Tune in to Twitch
  • August 17 at 9AM PDT
• Check out some of the amazing artwork that was submitted to our Star Guardian Community Art Gallery!

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue causing players to be unable to reconnect..
• Fixed an issue causing United Front matchmaking to fail.
• Fixed an issue preventing PC players from opening the Options Menu with the ‘Esc’ key.
• Players will no longer get stuck after the first turn of Tutorial 4 – Light and Shadow.
• Mark of the Storm’s impact text will now display the correct amount of damage.
• Using Choice cards with Targeting no longer causes both options to freeze on screen.
• Evelynn and Kai’Sa AI decks now contain copies of Evelynn.
• Fixed an issue causing Relic of Power to draw an incorrect number of cards.
• Fixed an issue causing an incorrect number of Gifts From Beyond to appear while Taric is supporting a unit.
• Uncommitted blockers will now properly return to the backrow.
• Fixed an issue causing targets to be removed.
• Fixed an issue causing Mind Meld’s ‘spells played’ tracker to be incorrect.
• Shen, Kinkou Student, and Void Abomination will now interact with allies as intended.
• Fixed several VO issues that were playing incorrectly.
• Fixed several VFX issues that were playing incorrectly.
• Updated localization for some cards that were missing translations.
• Updated several cards that were missing card text.
• In general, updated several text descriptions to better align with game mechanics.

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