All-Star Pros on Patch 5.23

The League of Legends Pre-Season has shaken up the professional metagame. But before pros hit the Rift in their respective regions, the All-Stars are set to battle on the Pre-season 5.23 Patch at the 2015 All-Star Event.

With champion and item re-works, system redesigns, and more, the All-Stars had a lot to say about the new patch after playing with League's new changes for the last few weeks.

Marksmen Changes

The most comprehensive changes to League were the adjustments to marksmen. After playing around with the re-worked champions for a few weeks, the All-Star ADCs had mixed feelings on the changes so far. One thing was a common thread though: this was definitely a welcome change from the stagnant and boring ADC itemization in 2015.

"I think [the item changes] are cool," EU LCS All-Star ADC Rekkles said. "After playing so long, using the same item builds, regardless of the champion you play, it feels good [to get something different]."

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Rekkles is referring to the holy trinity of marksmen items of 2015 -- Infinity Edge, Phantom Dancer / Statikk Shiv, and Last Whisper -- that ADCs bought in nearly every game (notable exceptions being Kalista and Vayne).

"It's reversed now -- the item kind of decides the champion you play. It's different," Rekkles continued.

Where professional players differ is how much the changes impacted the state of the game, especially as far as marksmen are concerned.

"I don't think it's a lot better or worse," NA LCS AD carry Doublelift says. "It's more skillful, so the bad ADCs will get exposed really fast -- the ones who don't know how to play, but they just learned how to play Sivir and Kalista and just farm."

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"I also think it's a little more snowbally," Doublelift continued. "So in terms of a better AD player vs. a weaker AD player, the better player will always make the weaker player look bad. Before, that wasn't true -- but in terms of overall game impact, it's about the same."

A few other ADCs are a bit more glass-half-empty about the practical impact of the changes, despite liking them in general.

"I think the ADCs are more unique than last season," LCK ADC PraY said. "I think the items are different and better than last season, but I think that the metagame for ADCs is not that great right now."

Former Jin Air ADC and Team Fire substitute Cpt. Jack piled on as well. "Overall, the ADCs are more unique -- it's better overall. But like PraY, I think right now it is not a great meta for ADCs."

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Though PraY and Cpt. Jack agreed on the ADC meta not being that friendly, LCK support Madlife disagreed with his fellow Koreans. "I think ADCs can carry the game easier. They have more impact on the game. I'm glad, because by extension, supports can help impact the game more."

Maybe there's some premature ADC QQ in Korea, especially because PraY admitted he hadn't played that much yet. Regardless, it's clear that there's still some work to do on the Pre-Season changes.

"I think some things are unbalanced," Rekkles said. "But that just goes with the territory. It's hard to know what's going to be good or bad before trying things."

Mid lane changes

Along with the marksmen changes that swept onto the Rift, there were some itemization changes for mages that had some unique ramifications -- mostly for mid lane. Across the board, AP items costs were changed, and in almost every case, raised several hundred gold. In particular, Zhonya's Hourglass was hit particularly hard, with many other AP items less so. In addition, many of the marksmen itemization changes had some splash damage into the mid lane.

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"AP champions aren't doing as well," LCK mid laner Faker said. "I think other champions will be picked more than mages now."

LPL mid RooKie agrees with his LCK counterpart. "I think the AD champions all became better than the mages, especially Ezreal and Jayce."

Meanwhile, LPL substitute mid laner GODV was slightly more optimistic about his prospect of playing mages in the mid lane. "It's true that the AP items are more expensive, but I feel like I can get the AP items at the same timings as before, because I get more money. Also because defensive Masteries are getting nerfed, I can still play AP champs."

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A partial reason for GODV's additional income comes from the new and improved Frost Queen's Claim. What was originally intended as a support mage staple (Hi, Lulu!) has found its way into the mid lane because of its gold efficiency, good stats, and sometimes oppressive (and spooky) active.

"I think [Frost Queen's Claim] is too strong right now," Faker said.

"I think the item is just totally unbalanced, and you have to get it," Rekkles agreed. "I think everything about it is too strong."

"It's really good," EU LCS mid laner Froggen said. "If you get the three stacks, you go for a trade and proc Thunderlord's Decree, and then wait for the cooldown and stacks to build up and do it again."

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NA LCS mid laner Bjergsen doesn't see Frost Queen's Claim use in the mid lane as necessarily bad by default, but he is worried about its over-tuned stats. "There is more variety [as a result of Frost Queen's Claim]. Rod of Ages also got buffed, so people buy RoA on more champions, but Frost Queen's Claim is really overpowered. We're going to see a lot of variety instead of seeing Morello's every game, which is nice, but Frost Queen's is so OP."

"Plus, spooooky ghosts…" he added. The Spooooky, annoying, four-second-slowing ghosts have been great at creating catches and initiating teamfights. And short of a Bill Murray & Dan Akroyd appearance on the Rift, it doesn't look like the ghosts are going anywhere.

General changes

There's still time before the 2016 Season begins, but it seems like overall, players like the potential paradigm shift of Patch 5.23.

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"Some of the tanks, Malphite, Mundo, and Rammus... are just way too insane," NA LCS jungler Meteos said. "Aside from that, AP champs are weak because their items got nerfed. But other than that, it's been super fun. All of my games have a really high kill count and action going on all the time."

Alright we get it, there's some OP stuff floating around, but what about the rest of the changes?

"Because of all the changes, I think that the game will be much shorter," said LCK jungler Score.

To get to that shorter game time, minions were changed in how they scale through the game, and towers were changed to be easier to take throughout a match. The vision system was also changed, with removal of Stealth Wards (Green Wards) and a complete overhaul of the Trinket system. Another jungler, EU LCS' Amazing, had some things to say about how the vision changes have impacted the aforementioned pace of the game.

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"I think the vision changes, that mostly influences jungle play, are really hard to manage as a jungler," he said. "You're basically stuck in a limbo where you want to buy wards and establish control, but you can't really do that. So you have opt for an early Tracker's Knife or early Sightstone to compensate for no green wards, which can influence item choice heavily. But Warrior (enchantment) being strong is great to me because I like Lee Sin and Rengar and such."

Of course we never miss a chance to see some NA Rengars over here in Los Angeles. We hope Amazing will have better luck on the Pridestalker in EU.

Some other All-Stars also spoke to us about how the meta looks to be shaping up in the early 2016 Season. "In the Worlds patch, the meta was best for top lane to carry the game," Worlds MVP MaRin said. "But for Patch 5.23, I think that the ADCs are better at carrying the game."

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Perhaps this sentiment was best summed up by CIS Substitute Flashy, who was very articulate about some of the aspects of the new patch and how it will change the game going forward.

"The metagame has changed; it's the same as it was in Season 2," he says. "It became more aggressive, better for people who want to play, not to farm and stand waiting for an enemy's mistake. Right now, the metagame agrees with players that play aggressive champions.

"It [forces] players to play in a more aggressive way, no matter the lane. More than that, mid lane is not the best anymore. You have three [potential] hyper carries at bot, top, and mid," he continued. "Before it was that top is semi-support, always takes Teleport, and makes plays bot, and that's the only reason you'd pick top.

"What I expect from the meta in this tournament," he concluded, "is that people will not farm. They will play. And those who play well, win. It won't be [as games are in] EU LCS. It won't be one kill per 20 minutes."

Will Flashy's prediction for the event prove true? Tune in for the rest of All-Star 2015 to see how players adapt to the 5.23 Patch when the action continues on Friday, December 11 at 5 PM PST.