Hey summoners! I'm back, and having played a few games of League recently, I think I'm a bit more fit to give my thoughts on the latest patch. I haven't gotten to mess around with the big change of them all named Ashe, but I got to play her once, and frankly, she's a lot stronger than I originally thought the changes would be. So without further ado, let's go ahead and sink into patch 5.9.

Skins

• SSW Series - You know, I never really got into LCS and all related League of Legends pro stuff. It's more a dream that can never be attained thing, but I probably should watch some or more of it. Either way, as per my assumptions of these skin series, the champions, namely Singed, Talon, Rengar, Twitch, and Thresh, are the team's face essentially. When you think of SSW, you probably think of those five champions first and foremost. Just like when I think of myself I think of Ahri, or think of PhantomL0rd before he went general gamer streamer as Karthus. Nonetheless, the skin splash as a whole has this very Assassin's Creed style that rubs me the right way for every champion in it. As for in game, I haven't seen hide nor hair of it, but assuming Riot has gotten making in game look like splash down pat, it must look pretty good at worst.
• Suit of Cards Series - I think they missed a very good play on an ability name with Mordekaiser here, he should be the Ace of Spades, or even the King of Spades...though I suppose the King of Clubs is also very fitting. Other than Morde, this set has Syndra as the Queen of Hearts (an odd choice to me), Ezreal as the Ace of Spades, and Shaco as the Wild Card (go figure he's the wild card). Additionally, ol' Jack of Hearts Twisted Fate now uses this splash art as his own. I think the concept is cool, Ezreal looks like a pompous prince and he's kind of arrogant to start, and Syndra looks somewhat out of place, seeing her legs and all but no matter, I'm sure it'll all work out in the end. Shaco looks nuts, Morde looks like Morde, and TF well...didn't change, he's now just kind of chilling as the cowboy do. Least now TF isn't the only man of cards, just the only Gambit in the game.
• Star Guardian Lux - Hey look! It's a new champion that looks like Sailor Moon! Oh no wait, it's just Lux clad in some ribbony, pink and white apparel. This comes back to something of a theme with bright neon colored hair female character skins, but this is, to me anyway, the first time a skin with a more direct link to anime has reared itself. Nonetheless, the splash makes it seem like a really cool skin, and it's probably the first Lux skin I actually really wanted. What? Is a guy not allowed pink skins? I've got Pop Star Ahri and Challenger Ahri, and they're both really pink. Though next thing you know, we'll see Fiora with a new skin where's she clad in white with orange hair, and some male sword wielding champion will be clad in black. I'm calling it now, it's gonna happen!

Items

• Enchantment: Cinderhulk - This enchantment got a relatively big nerf in the way of damage output. Still basically acts like a Sunfire Aegis, but now it's doing 15 + Champ Level X 0.6 damage instead of 16 + Champ Level X 1 and it scaled up by 24 + Champ Level X 1.5 magic damage. I didn't see how this now works out, but basically now you're getting this as tanky Sunfire Cape, or you're going with Enchantment: Warrior or enchantment: magus depending on your scaling, since as we all know, Enchantment: Devourer is much like Mejai's Soulstealer and Sword of the Occult in that it's a high risk item, but pays of immensely if you get ahead far enough.
• Skirmisher's Sabre - The time this smite variant lasts is now only four seconds, and that's kind of the bigger thing. It's more of a counter patch against the recent upbringing of the new Smite top lane meta, trying to make it so that this either isn't as popular as a choice, or if it remains as popular, you need to make your seconds count. Personally, I don't know if I'll ever do the top lane smite lane myself, and I doubt I'll see it either. Seeing as I so adore Riven, I'm not sure it'd work out too terribly well in my favor anyway.

Ashe - So, now let's talk about Ashe and her big changes. The biggest and most forefront of her changes is that her passive got changed completely into Frost Shot, not simply tweaked, but changed. She now has what used to be her Q as her passive now, and though early on it has next to no slow, in the late game suddenly it's really hard to escape an Ashe. Initially, I thought this was a poor change as it makes it a free auto-attack modifier, and no other champion in League has that, save for maybe Warwick with his passive lifestealing effect. The way it scales seems to make it balance out a bit more, but if Ashe ever gets enough attack speed, you're never getting away from her without a set of flashes ever again. On another note, frosted targets get crit for every extra attack done to them. The catch? Ashe can no longer crit normally, she can only crit frosted targets, and at a damage multiplier of 110%, even lower than that of Yasuo's absurd double chance, only 190% damage nonsense. This damage is increased by crit strike items, but I'm not entirely sure what is meant by that. In short; Ashe crits 100% of the time on frosted targets, but at much less damage.

• Ranger's Focus - This is new, and I feel it was implemented as a way to combat more harder hitting fools like Graves and Jinx. It's basically her new passive, where every auto hit grants a stack of a passive aptly named Ranger's Focus. This stacks up to five times. At less than five stacks, Ashe's attack speed and slow are increased, but at five stacks Ashe modifies her auto attack, not only in animation but number of shots, into a flurry of arrows. Basically, she launches five arrows at her target all at once, each flurry dealing the minimum of level one-dom of 1.15 times her attack damage. This is big, as no champion really has an ability quite like what Ashe has, and it hurts a lot, as all you really need to do is hit your target five times, then pop this Q and they'll be knocked down faster than a Graves or Jinx could do you in. Very interesting ability, and the synergy is great with Ashe's new passive.
• Noticeable Changes - Ashe's Volley now acts more in line with her new passive, also giving her stacks of Ranger's Focus for each arrow that hits. It now launches nine arrows, and multiple arrows can be blocked by the same target while only one arrow's worth of damage would be dealt. Hawkshot now has two charges, is a global cast (meaning you click the minimap and the hawk will just go), but now no longer gives Ashe any passive gold for killing minions or targets. Makes sense why but man. Enchanted Crystal Arrow's only change is that instead of a 50% slow from it's blast radius, it's now based on the passive, nothing special.
• Overall - Ashe is a much better champion than she was before. Before, I scoffed at the Jinx's and the Twitch's that walked into lane thinking they'd have an easy time against an Ashe. Now I don't have to; my Q does the talking for me as they flee for their very lives. I need to experiment a bit more with Ashe's passive, but basically now, you need to think twice before you mess with Ashe.

Final Thoughts - The only other change I want to briefly touch on is Akali and her Shadow Dance, it now dashes her through her targets which is an interested change, but I feel it leads to easier escapes and a lesser way of her just literally owning everything in sight. How you might ask? She goes through her target, which means she'll be behind them, and will need to walk a small distance to get in attack range...at least that's what I think. Other than that, the rest of the patch is small number changes for the other champions and Dragon, nothing too big or pervasive to be spoken about.

This is a patch I don't have many opinions about, a lot of minor number changes that will only affect champions in the long term and not the right here and now, meaning it's harder to formulate an opinion without playing a lot more games of League. Though with that in mind, just remember that small number changes can make a big deal in the long run of the game, so don't scoff them off too easily. Either way, I'll see you guys in the next blog post, and may you all become champions in your own right!