Lead gameplay designer Matt "Phroxzon" Leung-Harrison has laid out the full preview for League of Legends Patch 26.14, due Wednesday, July 15. Arriving mid-MSI, it's a stabilising patch rather than a meta-shaker, with Riot broadly happy with the current state of play. The most telling move, though, is what got cut. Planned Brand jungle buffs were pulled entirely in response to community frustration over mages in the bot lane, even as Riot mounted a firm defence of the very trend that prompted the removal.
Riot Digs In on Bot-Lane Mages
Phroxzon acknowledged the topic is "contentious" but made it clear Riot has no intention of purging mages from the bot lane, seeing them as "creating healthy diversity for the bot lane experience overall (roughly 4:1 ratio of traditional marksmen to mages), even though for some traditional marksmen, they can be quite frustrating." He argued players need tonal variety across their games, a mix of "high intensity" matches against the likes of Rengar or Talon and lower-stress ones, "as it creates the variety and flow state that keeps the game fun."
On the obvious counterargument, that mages post the highest win rates and must therefore be overpowered, Phroxzon says the numbers mislead. "Mages, especially simple ones like Brand, Veigar, or Swain, for example, have quite shallow mastery curves," he explained, typically gaining only three to four percent win rate after around fifty games while starting very strong from game one. "ADCs, by contrast, are typically harder to play but also reward that mastery depth more, meaning their winrates are relatively suppressed compared to mages bot." He added two structural points the discourse tends to skip: mage bots let teams undoom a draft when the enemy locks an AD mid like Zed, Yone, or Yasuo, and ADCs now enjoy accelerated three-item spikes thanks to the bot quest, meaning mages are stronger early and weaker late. For those struggling, he recommended Ezreal, Sivir, or Zeri, who dodge skillshots and outscale. A fuller video breakdown is promised.
Locke's First Nerfs Target the Right Thing
Locke lands his first nerfs one patch after release, and the reasoning is more interesting than the numbers. Phroxzon said the champion has had "a really resonant start," with players enjoying his executes, resets, and stack-into-burst gameplay, describing him as "a little skill skewed in the same way that a Katarina, Akshan, or other resetty, roamy champions might be, but not overly so." The problem is his early snowballing, not his damage. So rather than gutting the burst players find confronting, Riot is nerfing his waveclear to make that snowball harder to access, explicitly preserving what makes him distinct.
Full Change List
Champion buffs: Azir (bugfixes for jungle monster shuffling, Press the Attack, Conqueror stacks), Corki (AD growth 2 to 2.5; R passive CD reduction on auto 2-4s to 2-6s), Mordekaiser (R stat steal 10% to 13%; E damage 60-120 +40% AP to 60-140 +45% AP), Nami (E damage 20-60 per hit to 20/35/50/65/80, total 60-180 to 60-240), Yunara (AD growth 2.5 to 3).
Champion nerfs: Garen (R true damage 150/250/350 to 125/200/275), Jayce (P movespeed on form swap 40 to 30 MS; R hammer resists 5/15/25/35 to 5/12/19/26), Locke (Q nail damage 50-90 to 50-82; Q stack bonus damage 20-60 to 18-50; Q nail recast hold 5s to 4s), Senna (W grey health cap 40-200 to 40-160; crit damage modifier -15% to -20%; Q AP slow 10% to 7% per 100 AP; Q AP healing +50% to +35% AP), Seraphine (Q damage AP ratio 50% to 40%).
System buffs: Blue Buff (flat 10 AH becomes level-scaling 10/15/20 at levels 1/6/11).
System nerfs: Hextech Rocketbelt (active CD 40s to 50s; 70 AP to 60 AP; 300 HP to 350 HP; reworked build path), Immortal Path / Gluttonous Greaves mid quest upgrade (5% damage and 15% healing/shielding/regen to 4% damage and 12% healing), Jack of All Trades (adaptive at 5 and 10 stacks 10/25 to 6/20), Protoplasm Harness (cost 2500 to 2600; bonus health 200-300 to 100-300; healing floor reduced).
Riot's rationale on the item side is instructive. Rocketbelt has been a premier pick for immobile mages, and while Riot says it "likes and embraces this type of innovation," the item was "removing a core weakness of these champs (ability to be killed)," so a stronger tradeoff is being forced. Gluttonous Greaves' mid upgrade, meanwhile, was simply the strongest boot in its matchups while lacking clear counterplay.
Patch 26.14 also brings the T1 Worlds 2025 skins, headlined by Gumayusi's Finals MVP Miss Fortune Prestige, alongside Ambessa, Xin Zhao, Galio, Yunara, and Seraphine.
More:League of Legends Reveals System Changes
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