Patch 7.1 changes

Hotfix (April 11) / Field Adjustments Teleport tracks removed from the race start area and mid lane The teleport tracks sat in the two busiest spots on the map, so fights broke out the moment the game began and enemies could arrive from angles nobody was watching. With them gone from the start area and mid lane, early positioning is decided by walking there yourself, and it is far easier to predict where a fight will happen. The racing gimmick itself is untouched — tracks elsewhere on the map still work.

Hotfix (April 11) / Field Adjustments Race start position adjusted Summoner Spell Adjustments: Snowball Chariot Damage: 60-200 + 4% Max HP → 30-90 + 1% Max HP Range: 20 → 15 (after upgrade 30 → 20) Summoner Spell Adjustments: Snowball Chariot of Vitality Damage, healing, and range reduced Summoner Spell Adjustments: Snowball Chariot of Ballistics Snowball and chariot damage and range reduced Augment Adjustments Enhanced Mega Snowball: Bonus true damage reduced Enhanced Penetration Snowball: Bonus true damage reduced Enhanced Haste Snowball: Ability Haste 100 → 50 Snowball Chariot loses most of its base damage and its Max HP scaling on top of a shorter range, so simply driving through a target and deleting them no longer works. Both variants and the enhanced snowball augments were cut at the same time, which loosens the grip snowball-centric setups had on the mode. The Ability Haste drop from 100 to 50 on the enhanced Haste Snowball is the heaviest hit — chaining casts to lock down a fight is no longer realistic.

Hotfix (April 11) / Bug Fixes Fixed an issue where swapping augments in champion select would occasionally fail Augment swaps happen inside the short window of champion select, so a failed swap means starting the game with a setup you did not choose. It did not happen often, but when it did there was no way to undo it. With the fix in place a re-pick always registers, which means you can wait and read the enemy composition right up to the last few seconds before committing.

New Champion K'Sante, the Pride of Nazumah, joins the Rift! K'Sante is the new champion added in 7.1. This entry is the release announcement — no stat or ability numbers are attached to it. Counterplay is never settled in the first days after a release and win rates swing hard, so when K'Sante shows up on the enemy team it is safer to look for a numbers advantage with your team than to try to win the matchup on your own.

Tempered Fate Landing indicator timing: after the cast → at the start of the cast Tempered Fate takes time to land and covers a lot of ground, so how early the team can read where it will drop decides whether the follow-up connects. Showing the indicator the moment the cast begins gives everyone extra time to step clear of the zone or line their own abilities up on it. Bard's own power is unchanged; what improves is how cleanly his team can play around the ultimate.

Bladesurge Healing: 16/20/24/28% AD → 11/14/17/20% AD Bladesurge can be dashed onto minions and jungle camps, so Irelia could top herself back up while pushing the wave without ever touching the enemy. With the heal cut at every rank, wiping away a lost trade with a single Bladesurge no longer works. Win an early trade against her and that health lead now sticks, which also opens a wider window for a jungle gank.

Spell Thief Missile base damage: 20-50 → 25-55 Sleepy Trouble Bubble Missile speed increased Portal Jump Cooldown reduced Zoe lives and dies by whether her skillshots land, and this patch helps at both ends of that. The faster Sleepy Trouble Bubble leaves less room to dodge on reaction, and the extra base damage on Spell Thief makes the chip damage after a hit more reliable. The shorter Portal Jump cooldown lets her run her intended pattern — step in, fire, hop back out — more often.

Base Stats Base AD: 50 → 54 Phosphorus Bomb Damage ratio: 110% bonus AD → 125% Corki gets his damage from both auto attacks and Phosphorus Bomb, so extra base AD steadies his last-hitting and his lane trades at the same time. The higher bonus AD ratio means every AD item now adds noticeably more weight to the bomb, which also speeds up his wave clear from the mid game on. Falling behind because of a soft early game happens less often, so there is less time to survive before his items come online.

Duelist's Dance True damage based on the target's Max HP: 4% + (6% per 100 bonus AD) → 3.5% + (5% per 100 bonus AD) Duelist's Dance deals true damage off the target's Max HP, so it bites hardest into champions who stack defenses — which is exactly why Fiora was such a problem for tanks. Both the flat portion and the bonus AD scaling come down, so a duel takes longer to close out and even a fully built Fiora no longer walks through a front line unopposed. For the target, that extra time is often enough to hold out until a teammate arrives.

Cull the Meek Healing on hit and the healing cap reduced Renekton's staying power came from healing himself back up mid-fight with Cull the Meek, which let him keep swinging even from a losing position. With both the heal per hit and its cap lowered, he can no longer erase a bad trade in one go. Health deficits now stick in lane, and getting back to the lane after a gank takes noticeably longer.

Searing Brilliance (Passive) AP ratio per stack applied to the execute HP threshold: 0.6% → 0.5% Solar Snare (E) Snare duration and direct-hit base damage reduced Golden Eclipse (R) Bonus damage AP ratio: 3% → 2.5% Mel closed games out by stacking her passive to raise the execute threshold and then finishing anyone left at low health. With the AP ratio per stack reduced, that threshold climbs more slowly, so building AP no longer widens the kill window the way it did. A shorter snare gives her less time to convert once she does catch someone, and with the bonus damage ratio cut as well, one missed follow-up is now often enough for the target to get away.

Short Fuse Empowered damage AP ratio reduced Bouncing Bomb Cooldown reduced Hexplosive Minefield Cooldown reduced Ziggs works by keeping bombs on the ground constantly rather than by landing one big hit. The AP ratio on his empowered Short Fuse damage comes down, but shorter cooldowns on Bouncing Bomb and Hexplosive Minefield mean he simply gets to cast more often. A fully built Ziggs hits a little softer per cast, while poking behind a shoved wave and denying ground before a fight both get easier.

Grand Entrance Damage and AP ratio reduced Grand Entrance is Rakan's engage and his crowd control in one button, and it also chunked targets on its own despite coming from a support. With both the damage and the AP ratio lowered, diving in for the damage alone is no longer worth the risk — it has to be paired with a teammate's follow-up. The crowd control itself is untouched, so Rakan keeps his value as a fight starter.

Burnout Bonus haste in Dragon Form reduced Dragon's Descent Bonus HP increased Burnout carried most of Shyvana's output while she was rampaging in Dragon Form. Its haste bonus is pulled back, so her ability turnover in that form slows down, but the extra bonus HP from Dragon's Descent makes the transformed Shyvana noticeably harder to bring down. The weight shifts from out-pacing the enemy to standing in front of them and grinding them down, which favours teamfight presence over fast clear speed.

Sweeping Blade Base damage reduced Last Breath AR Penetration: 50% → 40% Sweeping Blade is Yasuo's laning phase — dashing off minions to close the gap while chipping the enemy down. With its base damage lowered, winning the lane through repeated trades takes longer. Last Breath dropping from 50% to 40% AR Penetration also softens his payoff after a knock-up, so a target who has bought a single armor item can now sometimes survive the full combo.

New Item Cost: 3300 gold Stats: +25 AD, +36% AR Penetration, +25% Critical Rate Giant Slayer Up to 12% bonus damage based on the target's bonus HP This item folds anti-tank scaling and 36% AR Penetration into a single purchase, with the bonus damage growing the more HP the target has stacked. Because it also carries 25% Critical Rate, auto-attack champions who used to stall out against a front line can now reach the tanks without giving up their own damage profile. From the tank side, piling on HP alone is no longer the safe answer — the split between HP, AR and MR has to be rethought.

Removed Removed due to overlap with the new Guardian rune Protector's Vow is gone because the new Guardian rune added in 7.1 covers the same ground. When an identical effect is available from both an item slot and a rune slot, the choice stops being a choice, so it was consolidated into the rune. Supports who built around this item now secure that role on their rune page and spend the freed item slot on something else.

Upgraded Boots (all) Cost reduced, stats reduced Upgraded boots used to be a heavy purchase — committing to one pushed the rest of the mid-game build back by a full item. Now that they cost less they are much easier to slot in, and whatever resistances or mobility they provide arrive earlier. The trade is weaker stats, so what a single pair of boots used to cover now has to be topped up elsewhere in the build. Early power spikes come sooner, but leaning hard into boots pays back less than it did.

Base Stats Cost: 2950 → 2800 gold Lich Bane only pays off once it is finished, so its price tag was the main reason it kept getting skipped. Dropping from 2950 to 2800 brings that completion point forward, which means the ability-then-auto-attack rhythm it enables comes online earlier. Luden's Echo was cheapened in the same patch, so mages have a wider set of viable first items than before.

Base Stats Cost: 2900 → 3000 gold The Collector executes targets who drop below a health threshold, and that finishing power is what kept it near the top of build orders. Raising the cost from 2900 to 3000 means taking it first now sets the rest of the build back a beat. The effect itself is untouched, so the question is simply whether to delay the purchase or slot another damage item ahead of it.

Base Stats Cost: 3000 → 2900 gold Luden's Echo spreads the next damaging ability onto nearby enemies, which helps both with clearing waves and with the opening hit of a teamfight. Cutting the cost from 3000 to 2900 brings that first spike forward, making it easier to shove the lane and then rotate elsewhere. Lich Bane was cheapened in the same patch, so a mage's first item is now picked for what it does rather than for what it costs.

Rune System Update New runes: Guardian, Ice Overlord, Empowerment New path: Sorcery Removed: Aftershock, Glacial Augment, and others 7.1 rebuilds the rune system from the ground up, which resets rune pages that had long since settled into a default. The new Sorcery path gives ability-based champions a dedicated set of options, and the new Guardian rune absorbs a role that used to sit in an item slot. Champions built around Aftershock or Glacial Augment need a replacement, so expect build orders to stay unsettled for a while after the patch lands.

System Changes & New Content Game engine upgrade New season S21 (Glorious Eminence Jax) New Wild Pass Improved jungle monster aggro display This entry covers the foundations rather than the balance numbers. The clearer jungle monster aggro display is the change that actually shows up in play: you can now tell at a glance which camp is targeting you, which cuts down on health lost to avoidable mistakes during the first clear. The engine upgrade is about stability rather than gameplay, but together with the start of Season 21 it makes 7.1 a clean dividing line between metas.

ARAM Now a permanent mode Racing map theme, new summoner spells, and new augments added Arena Support for multiple team formations New items added (Prowler's Claw and others) ARAM stops being a rotating event and becomes a permanent mode you can queue at any time. The racing map theme, new summoner spells, and new augments all arrive together, so games in the same mode now play out very differently from one another. Arena also picks up multiple team formations and new items, which makes it a practical place to test build ideas that would never fit into ranked.