Detailed Feedback on the current LeBlanc PBE state @AzuBK @Jinxylord / @RiotAugust

Hello there, I would to give some honest feedback and on the Leblanc revert, which in my eyes is a great move by @RiotAzuBK and RiotAugust. I am playing Leblanc since season 3 and since season 4 she has always been my most played champion despite meta shifts and nerfs. However, the PBE version needs some fine tuning before hitting the live servers and I don’t want Leblanc to be unplayable (in the way that I can still play her in High elo and doing well with her) nor permabanned to the point even the lower MMR players who aren’t as experienced as Leblanc mains “abuse” this champ for winning easily.

• Mirror Image: Passive revert much appreciated. One of the big fun aspects of Leblanc. Clone does not proc On hit things (Lichbane revolver) as it used to.

• Sigil of Malice: Completely reverted. That’s cool.

• Distortion: W Damage revert due to sigil bounce remove was necessary for waveclearing, having some form of AOE Damage, but nerfing all other parts of this ability is unjustified. Lowering the dash speed as pre-rework version is totally okay, but adding a delay to snapback AND lowering the time from 4->3 to return to the pad is too much. It was not even considered a problem that Leblanc has 4 seconds to return to her pad. This timer got burned in my mind so badly that I can tell “okay I got like this timeframe left to w back”. When they added the extra second back in season 4 despite the silence remove (which was legit a good decision to remove) Leblanc FELT good to play.This change allowed her to juke better and the 1 second more is so satisfying. I play tested her and its really underwhelming to play it´s so short I wondered so many times why I can’t return cause the timer already expired. Also noticed that you run out of mana so freaking fast since Q and E also got its mana increased compared to Leclunk and after one combo I can’t do anything but farm for 2 mins until my manas restored which is kind of a problem. It was once 120, but was lowered and added the extra second to compensate for the silence remove and to focus on Distortion as her main Damage spell.

This is an example why so many Leblanc mains want to keep the 4 seconds on the Distortion. It creates opportunity to outplay your opponent without making it in any way toxic, because it happens a lot that the enemy chases me and one or two guys camp my distortion pad in case i want to return and simply just kill me. (Btw even Zed has the ability to go back to his R for 6 seconds and his W for 4.5 seconds and i don´t see a problem with it, because if you play it right as a team you will still be able to catch him or burn his ) https://plays.tv/video/5aa1a796bb49c7eb2b/leblancs-ability-to-snapback-4-seconds

• Ethereal Chains: I like this change. It forces you to stay in a dangerous range to your enemies to deal a good amount of damage (kinda like the 1.5 delay but not all power is in that ability). Tether range reduce is also okay. Gives the opponent a better chance to break the chain, which is healthy. • Mimic: Now this ability has a good side but mostly bad changes in my opinion. The RQ backload is a good and healthy change to prevent the infamous QR oneshots from a safe distance, which a lot of people hated (although you had to be extreeeemly fed to do that and the enemy (affected most likely supports and adcs as mid had always abyssal scepter during that time, but due to the fact the adc was too greedy to buy a hexdrinker which nullifies that poke combo and the support being underlvled or had no mr item either) Anyways good change. But why are you touching Leblancs only way to deal a reasonable amount of damage aoe wise. The ratio is now equal to the basic ability and offers only 200 more base dmg at level 16. Theres no reason to ever RW but to close a great distance or 5 ppl are on top of each other in a teamfight which doesn´t happen too often either and if so you can´t kill anyone unlike whose QEWQ Rotation on 5 people DEMOLISHES the entire team. It should really be considered increased to its pre-rework value (0,9).

Another thing that is really questionable is the high cooldown. Keep in mind that this ability is just an empowered version of a basic ability(!) which deals a bit more damage and has no other empowered effects other than this. It is by no means any big game changing Ultimate like R, stunning the whole team or Shockwave knocking all up and securing a safe teamfight win. Your ultimate Distortion dealing LESS damage than your normal basic ability Distortion at lvl 6 and having this high cooldown is absolutely crazy (at level 11 it´s also only 55 Base Damage more for an ultimate). Why would I use W RW on a wave to clear it when I can also wait 12 seconds to cast another W to clear the wave to not have my R on a 110sec cd. Problem is, especially the higher the elo is, waveclearing effectively is a big part of midlane. It gives you control and even with old Prerework LB if you used W RW on a wave you won´t have it up roaming botlane as it was still on a 40sec cd. Until you had it up another wave arrived midlane which you either had to clear at turret or you lose all the exp and gold, because the can waveclear effectively with basic abilities on low cooldown, but LB can´t. I know waveclearing is supposed to be a weakness, but the weakness consists of having to blow your maxed Distortion (+10sec cd) and your ultimate on cooldown and not use it to threaten your enemy. Take a look at . This Champs ultimate is really identical to Leblancs. Its on a 45 / 42 / 39 / 36 sec cooldown. Even heavily reducing when hitting Champs with basic attacks or other abilities. She does not only deal more damage/shielding more with her empowered Spells, she also gains extra effects (RQ is an aoe nuke dmg spell, which deals so much dmg when building AP, W healing you fulllife, E shielding your WHOLE team for 400+75% ap and giving movementspeed buff).She can actually have her Ultimate up every few seconds. Leblanc already got her R cd increased in her rework, because this ability gained significant power. It was able to spawn a global clone (blocking skillshots, scaring enemies when your ally got ganked, holding a wave, etc) it has the ability to cast any version of your abilities and it made you invisible and casting a clone next to you. Removing all of these aspects leaves this ultimate really underwhelming and maybe the worst ultimate in this game with that high cooldown as the Damage on her RW and RE are also being reduced. No midlaner is forced to burn their ultimate to clear a wave at mid fast but as Leblanc if you want to do so you need to burn the R cd to go base/assist lanes.

Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate this work very much. Big thanks to AzuBK and August for this step and trying to make my champ fun again. However, I want to point out that back when Leblanc was always sitting under 50% winrate. The moment she touched 49% she got her Dash speed reduced her E width and her ratios on R lowered. Leblancs kit is not complicated and champs like Leblanc excel at Decision making. Burn R for waveclear into back or have it up and apply pressure? The easy aspect definitely got removed with this revert. QR won´t oneshot or even heavily poke anything from far away. To kill someone, the target either is very close to you (facechecking you) that any Mage or Assassin kills you no matter what, or you need to hit your chain (width is really low, hard to hit especially vs a grouped team). Her strength was her early and mid game. Late game against a grouped team it took so much effort not to get outclassed by the enemy midlaner because they had more to offer (Utility, CC, AOE damage, etc) If changes like the reduce of her only AOE combo get through she will just be forced to maybe kill one target and do nothing for 30 seconds until her R comes up again.If you didn’t kill anything or did meaningless damage due to hitting a tank or all the damage being nullified due to shields/heals, Leblanc was a champion that stood 15 seconds around watching her teammates getting obliterated by the enemy mid. I really think if it comes up to balancing her, you already did remove the toxic part old Leblanc was known for. Taking away the extra second on snapback, adding (keeping) the delay after the Dash despite its speed nerf and making her ult that high cd will send leblanc into the dumbster together with season 7 azir.

Things I really hope to get changed (from PBE LB) o Keep the Snapback 4 seconds o Keep at least the current cooldown or revert it to pre rework (40/32/24) o Increase the RW ratio to at least 0.75, so its actually an empowered Ultimate spell (same for RE?!)

Things that can be changed o Buff the manacosts of W (80/85/90/95/100) o Keep the Dash speed at 1600 or remove the Delay

By the way, people talk about aspects as taking ultimate hat on Leblancs old r cd would be so good, but lets be clear here. The only keystone that Leblanc can go effectively is Electrocute. It is made for Combo Assassins/Mages. Comet and aery are way too weak on her. The 2nd tree is usually the sorcery line. Leblanc has to take transcendence and gathering storm/scorch. There is absolutely no way a midlaner cant get away without gathering storm in this current state and having the R cd decreased by a little (in this case roughly 2 secs: 40%cdr 14,4 to 12,2). Giving up 48AP (Lvl 16 post 30min mark) for cheap 2 seconds on a much less effective combo power is meh. I was talking about decision making and how important it is for a champ like Leblanc. Well it already starts in the champ select.

The Black Rose shall bloom once more