Speculation on Xin Zhao's mini rework

Hey everyone.

So I'm definitely excited about the mini rework that Xin will be getting soon. I feel like his current kit is too linear or simple if you will. Despite that I still chose to main him for the reason of liking the simplicity and macro focused gameplay he offers.

With the rework, Riot has confirmed that the main changes are coming to his W ability, but nothing has been confirmed. I'd like to have some fun speculating what might change.

Passive: I'm sure his passive can remain somewhat similar, at least in practice. The idea of challenging an opponent is quite unique to him, so I'm not opposed to keeping it. However the armor shred % it offers never truly feels rewarding. I'd like to see his passive be more of a "You and me are fighting, screw everyone else" so to speak. That said, perhaps lowering the % shred to 10% and providing Xin a small damage reduction from sources that are not the enemy you are fighting. Towers obviously ignore this reduction.

Next, his Q. Riot stated that his core healing, and knock up will remain the same. Since W is changing entirely, I'd assume his Q will gain offensive power while W gains defensive power. With that said, I believe the passives on old W will shift to his Q and be gated by its activation. Perhaps his next 3 auto attacks will have increased attack speed, while the first one crits, second one heals Xin and the third one has the knock up. Number balances obviously thrown in to insure nothing is broken.

His new W: Here we really have no idea what this could be at the moment. I have a feeling it will be a skill designed around a parry mechanic that when proced will grant Xin attack speed. Since we know nothing about this new ability, I don't have much to offer there.

His E. I heard his E is receiving minor changes. Some speculation on the Xin reddit page is that it will no longer be a targeted dash. The change some mains want or expect is that the dash will now be a straight line skill shot type dash with an aoe slow at the end. At least this will add more skill expression to his ability to close distance and also give enemies a chance to avoid his engage.

His ultimate: At the moment I don't believe there are many changes to his ult, so I can't put very much out there.

Either way I am very excited to see where Riot intends to take Xin. I have faith, and I'm pretty sure it's going to be a blast.