League of Legends patch 4.4 changes detailed: Kassadin rework, Lich Bane changes, and more

Riot Games has outlined the changes coming in this week's League of Legends patch 4.4 (possibly arriving tomorrow). While there are plenty of tweaks, the two major changes this patch are the Kassadin rework and the overhaul to Lich Bane.

"This patch, you'll see the first results of that labor as we bring out a healthier (and hopefully less banned) rework Kassadin who still embodies the theme of a mobile anti-magic assassin," Riot said.

"Our other big change is to Lich Bane, as it was skewing a lot of champion power in unhealthy ways. Specifically, there are champions who have a lot of their power tied to Lich Bane – we balanced them to compensate for the changes – and then there are champions who like Lich Bane for its high burst, low cooldown properties. High burst isn't unhealthy if it's timed and executed properly, but Lich Bane was just a pile of damage for something you're already doing, and it came up much, much faster than other burst damage focused items like Deathfire Grasp."

League of Legends patch 4.4 contains tons of new champion/item reworks and tweaks, but below are the few major changes that are worthy of mention. You can view the full change-log here.

Kassadin Rework

We've increased Kassadin's attack range and changed his passive so it no longer grants attack speed but avoids unit collision. We reduced Null Sphere's damage and pulled off the silence, although it will still interrupt channeled abilities. Instead, Null Sphere now grants Kassadin a shield on use. Nether Blade now passively deals bonus magic damage per autoattack and, when activated, deals higher bonus magic damage as well as restoring some of Kassadin's missing mana. No big changes to Force Pulse though we did reduce its damage a bit. Riftwalk, on the other hand, has a lot of changes. We've reduced its cooldown and it now scales with max mana instead of AP. Each stack now doubles the mana cost of the next Riftwalk but we reduced the mana cost and the number of max stacks to compensate. It also no longer refunds mana on hitting enemy champs.

General

Passive – Void Stone

• NEW UTILITY Kassadin now additionally ignores unit collision
• ATTACK SPEED BONUS Bonus attack speed per magic damage reduced ⇒ No longer grants attack speed

• NEW UTILITY Now additionally grants Kassadin a shield for 1.5 seconds that 40/70/100/130/160(+0.3 Ability Power) magic damage
• NEW UTILITY Silences the target ⇒ No longer silences, instead it interrupts channel spells
• DAMAGE 80/110/140/170/200 (+0.7 ability power) ⇒ 80/105/130/155/180 (+0.7 ability power)

W – Nether Blade

• PASSIVE Kassadin's basic attacks draw energy from the void, dealing 20 (+0.1 ability power) bonus magic damage.
• ACTIVE Kassadin charges his Nether Blade, causing his next basic attack to deal 40/65/90/115/140 (+0.6 ability power) bonus magic damage and restore 4/5/6/7/8% of his missing mana (increases to 20/25/30/35/40% against champions).
• COOLDOWN6 seconds
• MANA COSTNo cost
• UTILITYResets Kassadin's basic attack timer on activation

E – Force Pulse

• DAMAGE 80/120/160/200/240 (+0.7 ability power) ⇒ 80/105/130/155/180 (+0.7 ability power)

R – Riftwalk

• NEW DAMAGE 80/100/120 (+0.8 ability power) ⇒ 80/100/120 (+2% maximum mana)
• NEW STACKING DAMAGE 50/55/60 (+0.1 ability power) per stack ⇒ 40/50/60 (+1% maximum mana) per stack
• NEW RIFTWALK STACKS Costs +100 mana per stack ⇒ Now doubles its mana cost per stack
• NEW UTILITY Refunds mana on hitting enemy champions ⇒ No longer refunds mana on hitting enemy champions
• COOLDOWN 7/6/5 seconds ⇒ 7/5/3 seconds
• MANA COST 100 ⇒ 75
• MAXIMUM STACKS 10 ⇒ 4
• STACK DURATION 8 seconds ⇒ 12 seconds

Annie

Q – Disintegrate

• NEW UTILITY Reduces cooldown by half on all kills (champion or minion)
• BASE DAMAGE 85/125/165/205/245 ⇒ 80/115/150/185/220
• ABILITY POWER RATIO 0.7 ⇒ 0.8

W – Incinerate

• BASE DAMAGE 80/130/180/230/280 ⇒ 70/115/160/205/250
• ABILITY POWER RATIO 0.75 ⇒ 0.85

R – Summon: Tibbers

• BASE DAMAGE 200/325/450 ⇒ 175/300/425
• ABILITY POWER RATIO 0.7 ⇒ 0.8

Elise

E – Cocoon

E – Rappel

R – Spider Form

• SPIDERLING HEALTH (ROUGH VALUES) 90~260 ⇒ 85~390
• SPIDERLING HEALTH (REAL VALUES)
  • 90/100/110/120/130/140/150/160/170/180/190/200/210/ 220/230/240/250/260 ⇒85/95/105/115/125/135/145/160/175/190/210/230/250/ 275/300/325/355/390

Heimerdinger

Q – H-28G Evolution Turret

• NEWUTILITY Heimerdinger now spawns with maximum ammo count
• NEWUTILITY Turret Health now scales with Ability Power at a ratio based on level (flat 0.05 Ability Power ratio from levels 1-8, increases by 0.035 per level from levels 9-18 ending at 0.40 at level 18)
• NEWUTILITY Turret basic attacks now restore 1/2/3/4/5% Beam charge
• NEWUTILITY Cooldown reduction modifies beam cooldown ⇒ Cooldown reduction no longer modifies Beam cooldown
• SMARTS Turret AI is less reliable at last-hitting minions unless Heimer himself has ordered the Turret by attacking that minion

Vi

Q – Vault Breaker

• MINIMUM DAMAGE 50/80/110/140/170 (+.7 Bonus Attack Damage) ⇒50/75/100/125/150 (+.8 Bonus Attack Damage)
• MAXIMUM DAMAGE 100/160/220/280/340 (+1.4 Bonus Attack Damage) ⇒100/150/200/250/300 (+1.6 Bonus Attack Damage)

R – Assault and Battery

• COOLDOWN 130/105/80 seconds ⇒ 150/115/80 seconds
• KNOCKBACK DURATION ON SECONDARY TARGETS 0.5 seconds ⇒ 0.25 seconds
• KNOCKBACK DISTANCE ON SECONDARY TARGETS 350 ⇒ 250

Lich Bane

• EMPOWERED DAMAGE Deals 50 (+0.75 ability power) magic damage ⇒ Deals 75% Base AD (+0.5 Ability Power) magic damage

Remember, these are just a few of the changes in patch 4.4. To view all of the bug fixes and item changes, check out the full patch notes.

Judging by the recent announcement and today's posting of the patch notes, it can be assumed that patch 4.4 will arrive sometime tomorrow. We'll be sure to let you know when it goes live.