League Of Legends: Aatrox Changes Hit the PBE

New changes have hit the Public Beta Environment for patch 9.9 focused on adjusting Aatrox around. The champion has had a record of extreme strength since his rework and Riot seems to want to take a bit of a focus off that. Going from a easy dive champion at level six to a solo killing monster, Aatrox may see much more play in the coming weeks.

Deathbringer Stance: Passive Changes

While a majority of Aatrox’s passive remains the same, Riot altered one of the biggest things about it. Rather than reducing healing and shields on the target champion, Aatrox now heals for all bonus damage dealt from the passive itself. Keeping its increased range, Aatrox’s passive now has a lower percentage of bonus damage dealt by a very tiny amount. Alongside that, the base cooldown is also lowered to 15 seconds, making it used far more frequently during fights.

Without the assistance of lowering healing on champions, Aatrox will still sport great dueling potential in solo fights. Much like before, the cooldown is lowered by hitting a champion with a damaging spell or attack as well as hitting sweet spots. With the added benefit of its base cooldown being lowered, Aatrox could get an extra passive proc off during fights more frequently. Taking away power from him competitively seems to be their focus, allowing him better chances at doing well in solo queue.

Base Kit Changes

Courtesy of Victor Maury, Riot Games Splash Artist

Though all of these changes are still in development, Aatrox is also seeing adjustments throughout his base kit. His Q, Darkin Blade, is receiving a small damage boost and a decent two second shave off its cooldown. It seems the aim in lowering its cooldown is to amplify the newest change to his E, Umbral Dash.

Umbral Dash no longer grants a small amount of attack damage upon cast. Its passive post-mitigated physical damage heal has also been replaced by a non-periodic damage heal. Mixing that with his shorter passive and Q cooldowns, Aatrox should be seeing a bit more healing pumped in to his kit.

While Q and E both saw interesting changes, his W, Infernal Chains, saw an extremely basic nerf. Rather than a scaling slow, W will now slow at a fat percentage of 25 percent. With that change also came a higher cooldown earlier on in levels. Going from an 18 second cooldown to 22 seconds will see him using it a bit more safely in lane.

World Ender: Ultimate Changes

Right off the bat, World Ender sees multiple buffs in small changes to how its casting works. Lowering the cast from .5 to .25 seconds, World Ender also no longer fears allied minions.

One large nerf, which seems to be Riot’s main change to his playstyle, is the removal of his blood well passive. Aatrox no longer gains a free revive when activating ultimate. Upon casting World Ender, Aatrox is required to get a takedown in order to get a revival from his ultimate. To compensate for this change, he sees massive buffs to healing when activating ultimate. Scaling from 50 percent to 100 percent increased healing, Aatrox receives quite a bit of sustain during ultimate.

During activation, he also receives a 60 percent to 100 percent movement speed increase that decays over time. Not only does a takedown give him his revival now, he also extends the ultimate by five seconds, refreshing his movement speed buff.

Aatrox will benefit greatly from life steal and attack damage with these changes to his ultimate. In the past, his ultimate helped him secure great dives and survive team fights that may have turned south. Now, World Ender may be a great tool in dominating his lane matchup. These changes are still in the air and we may see even more changes in future PBE changes. Keep an eye out to see how things turn out for everyone’s favorite Darkin.

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