League of Legends patch 11.1 notes: Gnar buffs, Season 11 start, more

League of Legends patch 11.1 ⁠— the first update of 2021 ⁠—  has arrived. With Season 11 kicking off on January 8, Riot are putting the final touches on preseason with changes to new items, as well as buffs to Gnar & Qiyana, and more nerfs to Pantheon.

It’s been a long wait over Christmas, but the light at the end of the tunnel has appeared; Riot Games are back in the studio, and the first updates of 2021 have rolled out.

The LoL meta has been in a state of flux since Riot dropped patch 10.25 ⁠to end Season 10. The new items have been causing havoc across the Rift, and a number of champs have soared ahead thanks to their changes. This includes mid laner Katarina, tanks like Malphite and Ivern, and more.

While the Sinister Blade isn’t being touched, the latter two tanks are. They’re two of 16 champions receiving balance changes on League patch 11.1 — although not immediately — as the meta shifts again ahead of the Season 11 launch.

Gnar buffs, more Pantheon changes in first LoL patch of 2021

The first patch of 2021 is set to include some updates for Gnar and Pantheon.

The former hasn’t been changed in a while, and is in dire need of a buff after the Season 11 item rework. Riot are heeding the call, massively buffing his mega form, while also adding some nice changes to his mini form too.

• Read More: Everything we know about Riot’s League of Legends MMO

Pantheon, on the other hand, is getting more nerfs after his patch 10.25 decimation. While support Pantheon is dead, like Riot wanted, top lane has landed a bit too strong, so they’re nerfing his sustain.

Outside of the two top laners, Fiddlesticks and Master Yi are being nerfed in the update. Karma, Qiyana, Ryze, Xayah, Yasuo, and Yone are receiving some buffs as well.

Lead developer Mark Yetter also confirmed six champions are being hotfixed on Day 1 with balance changes not in the patch notes. This includes buffs to Sivir and Varus, and nerfs to Graves, Malphite, Ivern, and Taliyah.

Riot aims to shift item power with burst nerfs

There’s been one major complaint with the League Season 11 items so far ⁠— they’re a bit too bursty. Every item has some sort of assassin-esque power-up, turning any champion into a burst mage, bruiser, assassin, or marksman. Even supports can buy Eclipse.

Riot has noted this backloaded power on the actives of most items, and are looking at shifting them to more sustained stats to help champions scale based on their abilities, not on their builds.

• Read More: Biggest winners & losers after LoL free agency

Duskblade of Draktharr, Prowler’s Claw, Hextech Rocketbelt, Night Harvester, Trinity Force, Goredrinker, and Stridebreaker are all being targeted with this update.

The Runaan’s changes touted for patch 10.25 have also finally been shipped, while Shurelya’s Battlesong is getting a buff for supports.

League of Legends Season 11 starts January 8

While the patch is going live on January 6, Season 11 won’t start until two days later on January 8. The start time will be at 4am local time for each server.

You can find the full League of Legends patch 11.1 notes below, including the Day 1 hotfix

League of Legends patch 11.1 notes

Champions

Fiddlesticks

W: Bountiful Harvest

• Cooldown: 9/8.5/8/7.5/7 seconds ⇒ 10/9.5/9/8.5/8 seconds

Gnar

Q: Boulder Toss

• Base damage: 5/45/85/125/165 ⇒ 25/70/115/160/205
• Slow: 15/20/25/30/35% for 2 seconds ⇒ 30/35/40/45/50% for 2 seconds

E: Crunch

• Range: 600 ⇒ 675

E: Hop

• Attack speed duration: 4 seconds ⇒ 6 seconds

Graves

Base stats

• Attack damage: 66 ⇒ 64

Ivern

Q: Rootcaller

• Cooldown: 12/11/10/9/8 seconds ⇒ 14/13/12/11/10 seconds

Karma

E: Inspire

• Shield: 80/110/140/170/200 (+50% AP) ⇒ 80/120/160/200/240 (+50% AP)

Malphite

W: Thunderclap

• First hit bonus damage: 30/45/60/75/90 (+20% AP) (+15% armor) ⇒ 30/45/60/75/90 (+20% AP) (+10% armor)

E: Ground Slam

• Damage: 60/95/130/165/200 (+60% AP) (+40% armor) ⇒ 60/95/130/165/200 (+60% AP) (+30% armor)

Master Yi

Q: Alpha Strike

• Cooldown: 18/17/16/15/14 seconds ⇒ 18/17.5/17/16.5/16 seconds

Pantheon

Base stats

• Health regen: 10 ⇒ 9

W: Shield Vault

• Empowered AD scaling: 135-165% ⇒ 120-165%

Qiyana

Base stats

• Health regen: 8.5 (+0.65 per level) ⇒ 9 (+0.9 per level)
• Attack damage: 64 ⇒ 66

Ryze

Q: Overload

• Cost: 40 mana ⇒ 40/38/36/34/32 mana

Sivir

Base Stats

• Mana: 284 ⇒ 325

Taliyah

Passive: Rock Surfing

• Movement speed: 20-45% ⇒ 12-40%

Varus

Q: Piercing Arrow

• Cost: 70/75/80/85/90 mana ⇒ 65/70/75/80/85 mana
• Cooldown: 18/16/14/12/10 seconds ⇒ 16/14.5/13/11.5/10 seconds

Xayah

E: Bladecaller

• Cooldown: 12/11/10/9/8 seconds ⇒ 10/9.5/9/8.5/8 seconds
• Cost: 40 mana ⇒ 30 mana

Yasuo

Base stats

• AD growth: 3.2 ⇒ 2.2

Passive: Way of the Wanderer

• Intent bonus critical strike chance 100% ⇒ 150%
• Intent excess AD conversion: 1% crit strike converts to 0.5 AD ⇒ 1% crit strike converts to 0.4 AD

Yone

Base stats

• AD growth: 3 ⇒ 2

Passive: Way of the Hunter

• Intent bonus critical strike chance 100% ⇒ 150%
• Intent excess AD conversion: 1% crit strike converts to 0.5 AD ⇒ 1% crit strike converts to 0.4 AD

Champion Base Stat Cleanup

We’ve cleaned up some champions’ base stats over the years and are rounding out the remaining 99 champions.

• Base AD / Armor / MR / Mana: Rounded to the nearest 1
• Base Health & Mana Regen: Rounded to the nearest 0.1 or 0.25
• AD / MR / Armor growth: Rounded to the nearest 0.01. Except for Vel’Koz’s AD growth, which is 3.142.
• Mana regen growth: Rounded to the nearest 0.1

Items

Archangel’s Staff

• Build Path: Tear of the Goddess + Sapphire Crystal + Needlessly Large Rod + 1000 gold ⇒ Tear of the Goddess + Amplifying Tome + Needlessly Large Rod + 915 gold
• Ability Power: 60 ⇒ 65 (this applies to Seraph’s Embrace as well)
• Awe AP percentage from Mana: 3% ⇒ 2%

Duskblade of Draktharr

• Nightstalker Damage: 100 (+30% bonus AD) ⇒ 65 (+25% bonus AD)
• Attack Damage: 55 ⇒ 60
• Draktharr’s Shadowcarve (Ornn Upgrade) Attack Damage: 70 ⇒ 75

Goredrinker

• Thirsting Slash Damage: 110% AD ⇒ 100% AD
• Thirsting Slash Heal: 20% AD (+12% missing health) ⇒ 25% AD (+12% missing health) (heal is now calculated sequentially for each champion hit, meaning there are diminishing returns on hitting multiple champions)

Hextech Rocketbelt

• Ability Power: 80 ⇒ 90
• Health: 250 ⇒ 350
• Supersonic Damage: 175-250 ⇒ 125
• Upgraded Aeropack (Ornn Upgrade) Ability Power: 110 ⇒ 120
• Upgraded Aeropack (Ornn Upgrade) Health: 350 ⇒ 450

Ionian Boots of Lucidity

• Ability Haste: 15 ⇒ 20

Manamune

• Total Cost: 2600 ⇒ 2900
• Build Path: Tear of the Goddess + Caulfield’s Warhammer + Sapphire Crystal ⇒ Tear of the Goddess + Caulfield’s Warhammer + Long Sword (stats unchanged)
• Awe AD percentage from Mana: 2% ⇒ 2.5% (continues to Muramana)

Muramana

• Shock AD percentage from Mana: 4% ⇒ 2.5%
• Removed: Shock is no longer limited to physical damage spells

Night Harvester

• Ability Power: 80 ⇒ 90
• Health: 250 ⇒ 300
• Soulrend Damage: 125-200 ⇒ 125
• Vespertide (Ornn Upgrade) Ability Power: 110 ⇒ 120
• Vespertide (Ornn Upgrade) Health: 350 ⇒ 400

Prowler’s Claw

• Sandswipe Damage: 100 (+30% bonus AD) ⇒ 65 (+25% bonus AD)
• Ability Haste: 10 ⇒ 20
• Sandshrike’s Claw (Ornn Upgrade) Ability Haste: 15 ⇒ 25
• Sandshrike’s Claw (Ornn Upgrade) Attack Damage: 80 ⇒ 75 (this item incorrectly had 5 more AD than it should have, bringing it in line with other Ornn upgrades)

Runaan’s Hurricane

• Attack Damage: Removed
• Wind’s Fury Bolt Damage: 40-70% total AD (level 1-18) ⇒ 40% total AD
• Build Path: Pickaxe + Zeal + Dagger + 1025 gold ⇒ Dagger + Zeal + Dagger + 850 gold
• Total Cost: 3400 gold ⇒ 2500 gold

Shurelya’s Battlesong

• Movement Speed: 40% (decays over 4 seconds) ⇒ 60% (decays over 4 seconds)

Stridebreaker

• Attack Damage: 50 ⇒ 45
• Ability Haste: 10 ⇒ 20
• Halting Slash Damage 110% AD ⇒ 100% AD
• Dreamshatter (Ornn Upgrade) Attack Damage: 60 ⇒ 55
• Dreamshatter (Ornn Upgrade) Ability Haste: 15 ⇒ 25

Trinity Force

• Attack Damage: 35 ⇒ 25
• Ability Haste: 10 ⇒ 20
• Infinity Force (Ornn Upgrade) Attack Damage: 45 ⇒ 35
• Infinity Force (Ornn Upgrade) Ability Haste: 15 ⇒ 25

Grievous Wounds

• Duration that all items apply Grievous Wounds: 2 seconds ⇒ 3 seconds

In-game chat and shop updates

• We’ve improved and standardized text editing across the shop and chat so things like CTRL+A to select all, cut, copy, and paste work as expected
• Text editing works with mouse clicks for cursor positioning and drag selection
• Items displayed in the shop build tree are now vertically centered
• When selling a stacked item like a potion or ward, the stack will remain selected and only a single instance of the item will be sold
• Pressing O and P at the same time no longer places the shop into an OP state where the scoreboard and shop overlap each other
• Many bug fixes and performance improvements

Grandmaster & Challenger Unlocks

To make the race to be the first Grandmaster or Challenger more exciting, we’ve changed the unlock process. Challenger and Grandmaster are still limited to the top couple hundred accounts on the server, but players must also have at least 200 LP in Master to reach Grandmaster, and at least 500 LP in Grandmaster to reach Challenger. Grandmaster and Challenger are no longer locked at the start of the season, so the race to be the first in your region starts on day one!

Bugfixes & QOL changes

• LEAGUE CLIENT: Fixed ember timer leaks in Profiles and Login
• LEAGUE CLIENT: Improved reliability in Champ Select,end game screen, Honor, and Friends list
• LEAGUE CLIENT: Fixed emote panel memory leak
• LEAGUE CLIENT: Fixed visual bug with chroma purchases in Champ Select
• LEAGUE CLIENT: Fixed an issue that caused the rune page editor to lock up
• LEAGUE CLIENT: Fixed a memory leak for mission celebrations
• Aphelios no longer gains bonus mana when he swaps his weapons
• Kayle’s E – Starfire Spellblade no longer triggers Mana Charge from Tear of the Goddess twice
• Passive cooldowns for Banshee’s Veil, Eclipse, Luden’s Tempest, and Edge of Night no longer ignore item haste granted from Ingenious Hunter
• Goredrinker’s and Stridebreaker’s passive’s cooldowns no longer ignore ability haste
• Gnar’s basic attacks properly apply W – Hyper stacks when his Rage bar is full
• Zoe’s E – Sleepy Trouble Bubble now properly activates Imperial Mandate’s Coordinated Fire
• Morgana’s W – Tormented Shadow now properly deals additional damage to small jungle monsters
• Talon’s Q – Noxian Diplomacy now properly grants a mana charge to Talon when he’s equipped with Tear of the Goddess
• Shock damage from Ezreal’s Muramana empowered Q – Mystic shot now properly only hits enemies once
• When Taric equips Moonstone Renewer, it now properly heals ally champions only once per attack or ability cast in combat
• Brand’s E – Conflagration now properly cancels when the enemies dies while Brand is casting the ability onto them
• Ornn’s R – Call of the Forge God no longer goes on full cooldown if Ornn dies before the elemental ram appears