Click to open network menu
Join or Log In
Mobafire logo

Join the leading League of Legends community. Create and share Champion Guides and Builds.

Create an MFN Account






Or

's Forum Avatar

Ability Update: Xin Zhao

Creator: PsiGuard September 25, 2017 6:28pm
PsiGuard
<Retired Admin>
PsiGuard's Forum Avatar
Show more awards
Posts:
10290
Joined:
Jun 26th, 2011
Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep September 25, 2017 6:28pm | Report
Source by Gentleman Gustaf

Xin Zhao is a champion from many seasons ago who has received only a few notable changes throughout the years. His abilities have become quite dated compared to the rest of the champion roster and Riot has been looking to update him for a while now. With preseason 8 coming up soon, this is a good opportunity for some bold changes.

Who is Xin Zhao

"When we started to think about Xin Zhao’s gameplay identity, we struggled to really pull much from his kit. We knew Xin Zhao needed to be swift, forceful, strong, and mysterious, but beyond that we didn’t have much to go off of. The one thing that really stood out was his spear, but his kit didn’t really say "spear fighter".

He was a diver - sort of. But while most divers shine in teamfights as either damage oriented initiators compared to Vanguards or all-in murderballs compared to assassins, Xin Zhao falls off pretty hard when teamfights begin. So the first step would be giving Xin Zhao something to do in teamfights.

The second step was giving Xin Zhao decisions to make. Right now Xin Zhao pretty much clicks all of his keys on you and wins - or loses - on the back of how many stats he has now."

Dive into the Fray

P
Passive: Every third attack deals bonus damage and heals Xin Zhao. No longer reduces armor.
Base damage decreased. Now scales with bonus attack damage rather than total attack damage.
W
Wind Becomes Lightning: Xin attacks with his spear for 2 attacks in quick succession.
  • Attack 1 - Slashes all enemies in front of him.
  • Attack 2 - thrusts his spear forward at range, slowing enemies struck for 1.5 seconds.
Base damage decreased. Slow duration decreased. Now grants Xin Zhao bonus attack speed for 5 seconds.
Xin sweeps his spear in an arc around him, knocking back all enemies - except the last one attacked - stunning them briefly and dealing damage. After the sweep, Xin’s awareness is highly elevated, making him immune to all damage inflicted by enemies outside of his circle of awareness. Enemies inside the circle may successfully damage him.

The new Xin Zhao should still have many of the same weaknesses as the old one. He’s still pretty susceptible to being kited by mobile champions or locked down by crowd control. However, his ability to isolate an opponent to create a duel zone gives him a unique way to shine as the game goes on and skirmishes turn into teamfights.

Expect to see your new Demacian seneschal Soon™. Leave us your thoughts on the Xin Zhao update in the comments below!
Thanks to Lugignaf for the sig!
VexRoth
<Veteran>
VexRoth's Forum Avatar
Show more awards
Posts:
2890
Joined:
Jan 9th, 2015
Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep September 25, 2017 6:59pm | Report
Foxdrop has a PBE game up with the updated Xin Zhao. His opinion was the W felt really awkward since it causes Xin to stop moving so he can't really use it to chase, unless you just happen to catch your fleeing target with the spear thrust.
Re4XN
<Member>
Re4XN's Forum Avatar
Show more awards
Posts:
1069
Joined:
May 31st, 2015
Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep September 26, 2017 3:41am | Report
VexRoth wrote:
Foxdrop has a PBE game up with the updated Xin Zhao. His opinion was the W felt really awkward since it causes Xin to stop moving so he can't really use it to chase, unless you just happen to catch your fleeing target with the spear thrust.


Rito's new 3-hit passive replacement. Slash-and-thrust. From what I could gather, Evelynn also has a slash mechanic. Rito's like a teenager, they go through phases...

Regarding the Senechal, I was almost hoping for a Legion Commander rip-off with his ultimate, it'd be really funny to see how that'd turn out. I guess in the end, I am glad they didn't go that way, we already have enough cancerous champions in the game.
SpikeThePike
<Lucky Charm>
SpikeThePike's Forum Avatar
Show more awards
Posts:
176
Joined:
Jul 15th, 2015
Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep September 28, 2017 10:45am | Report
The changes are nerfs.

The key point is that Xin can now only get his bonus attack speed steroid following Audacious Charge (E). But a good Xin player wants to engage without using E, so that the E is available to follow up if the target dashes or flashes away.

Xin players now have a choice to make: engage without E, and have bad DPS, or engage with E, and have no dash for the next 8 seconds (that's a horrible 11 second cooldown on E, reduced by 3 seconds from 3 Q hits - I am assuming you have 10% CDR here).

The other big problem is that the new ability, the W, interrupts your movement and other actions and has a very long casting animation, so it actually reduces your DPS and mobility. Personally I don't put any points into this until level 8, seems to work best...

Overall Xin's scalings have been changed a lot, so that his early game damage is reduced. His scaling into late game is the same as before only if he can buy plenty of bonus AD and attack speed, for example BotRK + fully stacked Guinsoo's together, so this forces a 3 damage item build (assuming you have to have Bloodrazor as a jungler).

In practice jungling new Xin I'm also finding:
- his sustain is worse at low levels, because his (average) attack speed is lower
- he is more mana dependent than before, because you have to use E and W for every jungle camp and every engage if you want to do any damage at all
- you are forced to buy minimum 2 defensive items every game because you now don't have the free resistances from R, so that ruins any hope of a full lifesteal or full damage build
- another small annoyance, landing E no longer deals AoE damage, so you can't use it to clear mini-Krugs or small Raptors
- the only good thing, new ultimate gets some 'wtf how is Xin invincible?' from ulting MF, Jhin and Xerath, champions like that, so maybe he's still a good pick against those.

Overall I am not happy with these changes. He was smooth to play and a reliable jungler before, now not so much - maybe Riot don't want him as a jungler?

As somebody else said on reddit:
Quoted:
He won't be swift as the coursing river due to W forcing him to stand stationary. Good luck landing it when the target is not cc'd.

He won't have the force of a great typhoon due to his E's slow is barely noticeable.

He won't have the the strength of a raging fire because his Q and E base damage is nerfed to oblivion./quote]
Re4XN
<Member>
Re4XN's Forum Avatar
Show more awards
Posts:
1069
Joined:
May 31st, 2015
Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep September 28, 2017 3:24pm | Report
I feel like Riot is trying to make each champion interesting, disregarding the fact that easy-to-play champions like Xin Zhao shouldn't be changed for the sake of newer players starting out. Boring/mechanically easy champions should exist. Imagine I start today and try to pick up the new Evelynn, it's a fkg nightmare.
VexRoth
<Veteran>
VexRoth's Forum Avatar
Show more awards
Posts:
2890
Joined:
Jan 9th, 2015
Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep October 1, 2017 12:54pm | Report
The changes are nerfs.

The key point is that Xin can now only get his bonus attack speed steroid following Audacious Charge (E). But a good Xin player wants to engage without using E, so that the E is available to follow up if the target dashes or flashes away.

Xin players now have a choice to make: engage without E, and have bad DPS, or engage with E, and have no dash for the next 8 seconds (that's a horrible 11 second cooldown on E, reduced by 3 seconds from 3 Q hits - I am assuming you have 10% CDR here).

The other big problem is that the new ability, the W, interrupts your movement and other actions and has a very long casting animation, so it actually reduces your DPS and mobility. Personally I don't put any points into this until level 8, seems to work best...

Overall Xin's scalings have been changed a lot, so that his early game damage is reduced. His scaling into late game is the same as before only if he can buy plenty of bonus AD and attack speed, for example BotRK + fully stacked Guinsoo's together, so this forces a 3 damage item build (assuming you have to have Bloodrazor as a jungler).

In practice jungling new Xin I'm also finding:
- his sustain is worse at low levels, because his (average) attack speed is lower
- he is more mana dependent than before, because you have to use E and W for every jungle camp and every engage if you want to do any damage at all
- you are forced to buy minimum 2 defensive items every game because you now don't have the free resistances from R, so that ruins any hope of a full lifesteal or full damage build
- another small annoyance, landing E no longer deals AoE damage, so you can't use it to clear mini-Krugs or small Raptors
- the only good thing, new ultimate gets some 'wtf how is Xin invincible?' from ulting MF, Jhin and Xerath, champions like that, so maybe he's still a good pick against those.

Overall I am not happy with these changes. He was smooth to play and a reliable jungler before, now not so much - maybe Riot don't want him as a jungler?

As somebody else said on reddit:


I agree with much of your summary, his early sustain is down and he is more mana dependent.

Only have one game in on him so far but in some ways he feels a little better, but has more decision making.

He gets and AA reset on Q and W (and E?), which means that you can actually end up dashing twice during a fight with the cool down effect on Q for his other abilities. Also finding R mitigates his all-inness a little. You can realize you screwed up and walk out now with much less health loss than before.

And with an item or two he flat out destroys towers.

He might end up being better in Top lane as a splitpusher.

My main issue at this point is accidentally casting Wind Becomes Lightning in the wrong direction.
Joxuu
<Fabulous>
Joxuu's Forum Avatar
Show more awards
Posts:
4103
Joined:
Apr 7th, 2012
Permalink | Quote | PM | +Rep October 2, 2017 8:44am | Report
Tip for the W: Use it during Q knock up so the enemy champion is slowed after the knock up. It's also easier to hit this way.

"A person giving you advice isn't perfect and has their own shortcomings but they may give you the piece that you're missing."

You need to log in before commenting.

League of Legends Champions:

Teamfight Tactics Guide