Ashe rework discussion, thoughts and questions and concerns

Arcade Andrew··18 votes·15,037 views

Hello, PRAISE THE LORD ASHE BUFFS HAVE ARRIVED

however I'd like to discuss them with everyone :D!

here are some basic discussion related questions you can answer if you dont know what to else to say: 1- Are you glad for the buffs?(my answer: yes 2- What do you think of her new kit?(my answer: I think the passive might be a little bit broken with no cost for the slow) 3- any ideas for possible new meta builds? ( my answer: machine gun ashe baby item 3085 )


now my own personal thoughts on the new kit

Passive: I think the passive might be a tad broken, You are giving ashe an unlimited slow with no risk or cost to it?! Back when it costed mana at least it was balanced so nobody would be perma slowed. However I am glad ashe is no longer "punished" in her passive for auto attacking

Q: Seems great, although It could be a problem depending on how the extra arrows scale

W: more arrows yes! cone width reduced no D:!

E: No more gold D:? also THIS IS probably going to need to be nerfed, Its not basically a global ward that youll have to check something every so often, unless the CD is super high perhaps making it global isnt the best idea?

R: No discussion needed here on my side


QUESTIONS FOR RIOT

  1. Aren't you worried that Ashe will become to powerful with the perma-slow and it having no negative effect on ashe now?
  2. On Ashe's Q will the extra arrows scale with DMG and also apply a slow? once you hit 5 stacks, if this is the case Doesn't that make it possible she can also have those extra arrows with no negative effects to her as long as she keeps attacking?
  3. Why did you reduce the width of the cone for her arrows but add more arrows?
  4. Why does her hawkshot no longer grant gold?
  5. What will the CD/negative effects be like to prevent the global hawkshot from being to overpowered in vision control

concerns:

passive: perma slow, with no negative effects on ashe for doing so, basically I am worried this perma CC for free will become to over powered

Q: the extra arrows at five stacks: Im worried they will apply a slow and you can keep the extra arrows infinitely as long as you keep attacking, also no mana cost on them?

W: cone width reduction but more arrows seems wonky to me...and might hurt ashe more than help her.

E: no more extra gold on last hits? this was a pretty neat feature to get ahead, Ill miss it. E: global vision control?! if the CD is very short and the mana cost not very high, say goodbye to ever safely securing a dragon or baron with an enemy ashe around who can hawkshot every few moments to check it

75 Comments

RiotRiotRepertoir14 votes

QUESTIONS FOR RIOT

  1. Aren't you worried that Ashe will become to powerful with the perma-slow and it having no negative effect on ashe now?
  2. On Ashe's Q will the extra arrows scale with DMG and also apply a slow? once you hit 5 stacks, if this is the case Doesn't that make it possible she can also have those extra arrows with no negative effects to her as long as she keeps attacking?
  3. Why did you reduce the width of the cone for her arrows but add more arrows?
  4. Why does her hawkshot no longer grant gold?
  5. What will the CD/negative effects be like to prevent the global hawkshot from being to overpowered in vision control
  1. Somewhat concerned, but she effectively had permaslow before (albeit with a mana cost), and this version starts with a lower base than the Live rank 1 15% slow, so there's probably a numbers-balanced version available.
  2. The 5 arrows per attack on her Q have their own AD ratio, something like .23/.24/.25/.26/.27 for a Total AD ratio of 1.15/1.20/1.25/1.30/1.35 per basic attack while it is active. They all apply the slow. Q is a spell with a somewhat long cooldown, so she can't just have it active forever.
  3. First of all, it's only very very marginally narrower. We increased the number of arrows and put better blocking gameplay in (by allowing enemies to get hit by several arrows, but only damaged by the first) so that opponents can better play against Volley.
  4. We've put power in several places with these Ashe changes, but that meant we had to take some out in others, and small bonus gold on kill isn't all that sexy, even if it does have some small wins attached to it.
  5. Hawkshot's base recharge time is very long (90 seconds at rank 1 and going down substantially with rank from there, I believe), because we also agree that this change is scary. But we also think it has the potential to be pretty darn cool. As she's tested on PBE and in her first few weeks on Live, we'll determine what these cooldown values should be in order to make sense, but ultimately, we thought this change really helped to emphasize Ashe's utility elements.

Hope this helps to answer your questions.

Cheers, Repertoir

Remlap12232 votes

Sooooo... Now that Hawkshot loses the passive gold bonus... Is something like that going to be implemented in GP's new kit? I like this idea of gold stacking on him, but unless you're Nasus with a negligible mana cost on your stacking Q or Veigar with a mana regen passive, it tends to be counterproductive.

Edit: Love Ashe's new kit btw. I hated playing as Ashe beforehand, but I'm actually pretty excited about the new changes now.

Edit 2: Since Hawkshot is global, is {{summoner:2}} getting removed?

RiotRiotRepertoir6 votes

Ashe losing her Hawkshot gold wasn't really done with consideration to Gangplank.

No plans to change Clairvoyance.

CubedJustice4 votes

Perhaps buffing clairvoyance would help. Like, if you spot somebody with clairvoyance, you have vision on them for the next four seconds?

Photos of Ghosts1 votes

Or it gives the spot of enemy wards without making them targetable - so you still have to use a sweeper on them.

Vesarixx2 votes

{quoted}

No plans to change Clairvoyance.

Now SivHD will be able to take 3 clairvoyances

WarWork2 votes

Wouldn't it be healthier if along with the scaling slow you add an effect like after every X basic attack Ashe's next attack applies a slow? And have X decrease everytime she levels her ult?

Narasimha1 votes

The biggest issue I have is, how does her Q interact with on-hit effects? Its all fun and games until she starts applying BotRK 5 times an attack. Or BC. Or Hurricane.

RiotRiotRepertoir5 votes

She will only apply BotRK once an attack. BC she currently applies on all 5 attacks. Hurricane she currently shoots an additional 2 arrows for each attack, so 10 total Hurricane arrows per attack.

Crett4 votes

{quoted}

She will only apply BotRK once an attack. BC she currently applies on all 5 attacks. Hurricane she currently shoots an additional 2 arrows for each attack, so 10 total Hurricane arrows per attack.

Do you guys have a stance on the Runaan's interaction? I don't want to get too attached to the concept if it's temporary

The Soulforged4 votes

Would each of those Hurricane arrows apply on-hit effects, meaning attacking someone next to your target would be more effective than actually focusing ur target?

Shinjusuke2 votes

I was thinking that too. I'm excited for the changes but it seems like this'll be another one of those "there's a bunch of 'special cases to think about" like back when Lucian's ult stopped paying attention to Sword of the Divine.

LongHair Fox2 votes

So if I understand this correctly: When using max rank q and hurricane ashe's main target will take 1.35 Total ad + onhit effects once while her side targets will take 50+2.50 total ad + onhit effects 5 times?

It seems a bit counter intuitive that shooting at targets next to the one you want dead is best. This ofcourse does not factor in crit damage so when you get enough crit chance it will be normal again however runaans builds often have very little crit chance.

Champion Skin1 votes

Though Ashe doesn't actually crit she only get bonus damage for each and every hit after the first unless you hit them with W first or they are slowed for some other reason (is this bonus damage counted as on-hit?)

LongHair Fox1 votes

From what I have seen it is counted as a crit so that every aa ashe makes after the first is a crit but has reduced damage. A bit like yasuo also has reduced crit damage. This means ruunans bolts will not benefit from the extra damage. However I think in this case we will see some crit being build do to the scaling with statikk shiv (aa + 10 bolts means it procs on every aa). If this ships out as is I will have to try item 3031 item 3087 item 3153 item 3085 item 3071 item 3158 Due to all the benefits you get from onhit effects. I doubt it is the best build but it will give you the highest theoretical damage when your q is active which it will only be around 35% of the time.

Champion Skin1 votes

I think Ashe works almost the same as crit would normally do Each % crit would increase your DPS by 1% and it is the same with Ashe

However I think it starts at 10% increased damage (because the first hit will never crit so she has to get in 10 hits to make up for the difference if she has 100% crit... however if she has 0% crit it is a buff as well 10% increased damage is better then 0% from crit)

AMYS GRAVE1 votes

She will only apply BotRK once an attack.

good.

BC she currently applies on all 5 attacks.

so she wil be able to get 5 stacks with one aa? that sounds really broken.

Hurricane she currently shoots an additional 2 arrows for each attack, so 10 total Hurricane arrows per attack.

sounds strong.

Love the ashe changes! keep up the good work!

WarWork1 votes

Bortk's on hit only applies for first hit

Arenvalde1 votes

Any plans to make more of her kit scale on AP? Maybe the new Q's slow and AS?

How about giving her E an MS and/or HoT buff to allies? Would increase her utility, engage potential, and give her at least SOME kind of escape. I'd love to see a viable AP support Ashe.

Leaf of the lake1 votes

I just saw the numbers for her passive on surrenderat20, and I have to ask, why did you decide on scaling up until lv16 for it? Ashe typically has a maxed Q lv13 at the latest on live, so I would think scaling up until lv13 would make far more sense. By lv16, you're already well into lategame, and it seems strange to gate her like that when live ashe can have her kiting ability at its prime right when teamfights start breaking out, when she needs it most.

Photos of Ghosts1 votes

Hello, speaking for AP Ashe here. Could she get some other AP ratio, like on her W? A minor one like 30/40%, just for QoL. Or on the slow, to make AP support Ashe viable.

Mountain Chaos2 votes

I've heard that Runaan's Hurricane applies the Q active to both of its bolts, resulting it possibly 15 arrows from a single attack. While that is very cool, I'm curious about how two math aspects of the Hurricane.

First of all, how does a Runaan's Hurricane bolt interact with Ashe's new form of crit chance? Is it counted as bonus damage, and thus applied to each bolt, or is it counted as a guaranteed crit, and so ignored by the bolts because bolts cannot crit? If the former, that sounds both super cool and rather OP - if the latter, I still want to try building Runaan's to slow all my enemies.

Secondly, how does the damage with the Q active interact with the Runaan's damage? Does the Q deal full damage on a Runaan's bolt (which I think comes out to something like 1.35 * AD at max level)? Or, does the Q's damage get sliced in half by the 50% damage reduction on a Runaan's bolt? Once again, the former sounds awesome but super powerful. And if something more along the lines of the latter.... well, I still want to shoot 15 arrows with a single AA.

MrBuffington1 votes

From what I could tell, it seems like Runaans bolts do about half damage of Ashes autos, including half of the Q bolt damage. I forget if they crit, I'll test it again later

UberAffe1 votes

The free cc on her autos is like an inverse of kalista's free movement on autos.

I assume the extra arrows on q would deal a similar amount to lucians double shot, maybe a little less because they can be more consistent

they specifically said they want to weaken her volley now that her she has a free slow and damaging q

I would expect her hawkshot to be on a similar cd to kalistas as far as storing charges, 1 every 75 seconds or so

Champion Skin1 votes

I think it has 90 seconds cooldown at rank 1 however it will get quite a bit lower as leveled I think? It can't have too short of a cooldown as it has a global range after all if had too short of a cooldown you could pretty much use it to track the enemy jungler After all it has no combat purpose for the most part unlike Kalista W which increase her damage when she and her support is hitting the same target

djjomon1 votes

Now that she has a perma slow with no cost/toggle, I expect her damage output to be reduced. Maybe they'll make her MS even slower than she already is. There will be some trade off for a permaslow that can't be stopped.

It's likely that Ashe will be a lower damage-dealing champion, with her power heavy in utility. This is already the case with her current kit, and should be even more so in her rework. Expect her damage to go down in some ways, without it being an overall nerf.

As for Hurricane, I doubt it will be built. Since she still scales with Crit (though, as bonus damage now), she'll likely still want to build item 3031 item 3087. The bonus damage will probably favor ArPen too, potentially making item 3142 a viable pick. Since she'll have a stacking mechanic, the new item 3071 might also used. If she wants to stack hits toward her new Q passive, might as well stack %ArShred too? Maybe. Throw that in with the 20% CDR for more ult initiations...

I'm looking forward to this.

Morbidmoronjell1 votes

Since she isn't able to crit, I think her damage her be lower overall, but more consistent with her damage buff to slowed champs.

Champion Skin1 votes

Her DPS would potentially remain close to the same I would think as long as she is able to keep her targets slowed that is Though of course she won't be getting any lucky crits or anything like that

NorthernDruid1 votes

I'm really sceptical to the narrower W and the (seemingly?) nerf to her ult (only single target gets stunned).

The power shift on hawkshot doesn't feel like it balances itself, it's a kind of situational ability which requires a high amount of general game knowlede and skill to use well, and losing the extra gold gain means losing a lot of power in classic.

That new Q though, now this is what we want the designated archer champion to look like.

I wonder what her new CDs are, and whether this makes spellblade worth it, her W already had a fairly low cooldown at max CDR, but she was lacking with only one activatable combat ability outside her ult.

I hope the width of her W is still good enough for those team wide slows though (perma slowed team with perma item 3151 burn is fun thought not necessarily very strong to do as support).

Wheatloaf7 votes

afaik Ashe's R has always stunned the first person hit and slowed in an AoE. I could be wrong though, it's been forever since I've played her.

MrBuffington2 votes

Yep, it's not Sejuani ult

MrBuffington1 votes

1- Are you glad for the buffs?

Not sure if they're buffs yet (still waiting for full numbers; Repertoir posted some on the PBE Boards, but withholding judgement until it hits live), the crit change seems like a big deal, especially since crit is pseudo RNG and not true RNG, she might actually be losing some DPS late game, I'm not sure about the math tbh

2- What do you think of her new kit?

It looks like a lot of fun, I'm excited to try it out, regardless of nerf/buffs. The greater consistency in damage is nice, will help not messing up CS with random crits, and also gauging fights. Her Q looks so freaking cool. Her W looks nerfed, but especially with the power she's gaining in her Q and passive, it doesn't seem like a gamebreaking nerf. The passive gold was really nice, I'll miss it (or just build an early avarice blade; crit gives her a bit of flat damage with her passive now, so it isn't as terrible of a buy), but the global Hawkshot is much appreciated, especially considering Ashe is the utility ADC and yet Kalista arguably had better vision control

3- any ideas for possible new meta builds?

According to Repertoir, BC stacks on each arrow of her empowered Q (though the multiple shots only work on the first shot for some things, like BotRK and Braum's passive, for obvious reasons, I think), so BC might be good, especially with the Phage passive, maybe in place of LW. I'm also thinking IBG might also be pretty cool (sorrynotsorry) with her passive synergy. They still look like they're pushing IE as core, and SS looks like it synergizes pretty well, but BoTRK might be more common, especially with the 5.8 changes. Again, waiting for numbers to see what's actually mathematically best; it definitely feels like she has more options now, maybe too many XD

Overall really excited for the changes, hopefully other immobile ADCs (ie. MF, Varus) will get some good updates to help them compete with the other immobile powerhouses (ie. Jinx, Koggles).

Champion Skin1 votes

Hmm well it will clearly be a nerf to targets who are immune to slows like Olaf with ult on or Master Yi with ult or any target with Morgana's black shield As well they can't be slowed and as thus Ashe can't crit them at all Though there aren't that many champions who can be immune to slows so not that big of a deal I guess

MrBuffington2 votes

Reading over the changes again, it says she crits on people affected by frost shot, not people who are slowed, so it might be different

Champion Skin1 votes

Yeah it is only Ashe's own slow which procs her passive crit thingy You are right

Hyrum Graff3 votes

I just played her on PBE.

{quoted}

Not sure if they're buffs yet (still waiting for full numbers; Repertoir posted some on the PBE Boards, but withholding judgement until it hits live), the crit change seems like a big deal, especially since crit is pseudo RNG and not true RNG, she might actually be losing some DPS late game, I'm not sure about the math tbh

It is a damage nerf, if you're talking only about crit. However:

  • If you volley/ult first, you crit everytime, so it's not a damage nerf.
  • Her new Q adds a lot of dps, so her overall lategame DPS over time is actually buffed.
    • However, a lot of that damage doesn't kick in until she can activate a 5-stack Q. She definitely doesn't have her live burst potential.
    • Overall she's a more engaging character, so as dearly as I love my live Ashe, I'm not upset that this new Ashe has come.

It looks like a lot of fun, I'm excited to try it out, regardless of nerf/buffs. The greater consistency in damage is nice, will help not messing up CS with random crits, and also gauging fights. Her Q looks so freaking cool. Her W looks nerfed, but especially with the power she's gaining in her Q and passive, it doesn't seem like a gamebreaking nerf. The passive gold was really nice, I'll miss it (or just build an early avarice blade; crit gives her a bit of flat damage with her passive now, so it isn't as terrible of a buy), but the global Hawkshot is much appreciated, especially considering Ashe is the utility ADC and yet Kalista arguably had better vision control

No random crits when CSing is SO nice, although it is a little different, to remember that your first aa against each minion does less damage. She's still got decent waveclear if you W the minion wave first, though, because that applies the slow to everyone. W is nerfed overall, but Q more than makes up for it. E is... nerfed if you consider the gold passive, but overall I consider it a buff, because the vision is a little better, and the passive made you very dependent on cs to access your full power budget. Basically, full build ashe is now more powerful but it takes longer to get there with cs alone. This makes you less dependent on csing perfectly, which is great - it makes her power easier to access.

According to Repertoir, BC stacks on each arrow of her empowered Q (though the multiple shots only work on the first shot for some things, like BotRK and Braum's passive, for obvious reasons, I think), so BC might be good, especially with the Phage passive, maybe in place of LW. I'm also thinking IBG might also be pretty cool (sorrynotsorry) with her passive synergy. They still look like they're pushing IE as core, and SS looks like it synergizes pretty well, but BoTRK might be more common, especially with the 5.8 changes. Again, waiting for numbers to see what's actually mathematically best; it definitely feels like she has more options now, maybe too many XD

She definitely has a lot of options. I built her item 3031 item 3046 item 3142 item 3071 item 3072 item 3006 => item 3172

Contrary to popular belief, cleaver is NOT great on her because she can fully stack it in one Q-aa, though I suppose that lets you switch targets during a teamfight.

It's great on her because Ashe needs the stats it gives (cdr for more ults and vision, a little tankiness, and a mini jinx passive), and makes up for its deficiency (takes time to ramp up damage) with a permaslow and the fact that ashe's own damage is largely delayed, so you're not missing out on that much by having lower armor pen on your first few auto-attacks.

Finally, we need to talk about towers. Ashe with a 5-stacks Q on a tower is almost as good, maybe better (because of her range), at tower-pushing than Jinx. Less reliable, because she needs an enemy minion wave to stack up on or she's just "meh" at it, but also safer, with more range.

MrBuffington1 votes

(....just deleted my comment I was working on for about an hour. Sigh, guess I'll retype what I remember)

I actually just finished my first PBE test on her too (Mac bug kept me out of commission until now). Overall initial impressions are positive, my favorite parts about her are still intact for the most part (her utility/CC, her W burst, her buttery smooth AA), and, as you mentioned, she's more engaging.

RE: Damage output

Your impressions are more or less consistent with mine (barring differences due to our builds). Her sustained damage feels really nice, especially with the spikes that her Q offers. If you're near a minion wave/monster camp or firing on multiple people, it isn't difficult to stack your Q really quickly at the start of a fight. I felt more like the Q steroid was more of a nice boost, less required for her DPS, just because she has guaranteed crit with her passive. I need a bit more practice utilizing it fully, but she still feels pretty strong even without it.

RE: CS, Kit, and Gold

I had a bit of trouble gauging the crit damage on my second shots for CS, messed a few up because of that, but that's just something to get used to, and is easier to get used to because no RNG. I didn't find the W block too significant; you just need to find different angles to fire from, which is sort of what I do on live Ashe since poking with W through minions isn't terribly reliable (or I'm just missing the secret). E was a buff for me, just because I constantly overestimate the range on it and end up just awkwardly walking around instead of firing the Hawkshot. She's losing a significant amount of gold, but a silver lining is that Avarice blade isn't as bad an early buy on her just because the crit chance = reliable damage for her now, and the guaranteed crits means Frenzy mastery is up constantly, meaning you can afford to wait a bit on buying AS. Her Q I still need more practice on using optimally, but overall I like it.

RE: Build and BC

So my build path was BFSword > Avarice Blade > IE > Runaan's > Furor Zerker Greaves > BC > BT > SS. I had a chance to fiddle around with BotRK instead of BT, and PD over Runaan's, but not enough to make a definitive assessment, at least on the latter. I feel like the early Avarice Blade is situational, since it's still not a great item for laning, but you can rack up a good amount of gold just by keeping with you for the entire game, and with BFS her AD is pretty good so 10% crit on top of that is decent.

Still undecided about the Runaan's; damage wise it's inferior to SS and PD, on single targets at least or especially, because no crit, plus no MS that she uses, but the bolts stack her Q so fast and, with BC, she can shred an entire team so quickly with her Q active. Plus it just looks cool :P.

Also kind of mixed about BC, over LW. She has less immediate burst but great sustained damage, so BC isn't terrible on her imo, but part of me still feels like ADCs rather have the up-front pen of LW, even if Ashe can stack it super fast. At the same time, though, BC has so many benefits, as you mentioned. Her ult CD felt so much shorter. I didn't think the Phage passive was as noticeable as Furor, but I guess when you have no mobility skills, you take every bit you can get :P. The extra HP is great though, coupled with the BT shield. I'm not sure if she wants more upfront offensive ability with the LW to make up for the fact she isn't getting crits up front, or if she synergizes better with the ramp up of BC, since her damage kind of ramps up in a fight as well. Maybe they're situational.

Speaking of BT vs BotRK, I feel like BT is superior, just because she's got more AD ratios. Maybe I'm just distracted because a bigger number pops up with BT, but stacking AD seems like the way to go, since Ashe doesn't really scale with on-hits as well as other ADCs. The other consideration, though, is that the active on BotRK does help her kite, so there's that. However, with my build, the attack speed on BotRK didn't really feel noticeable, because Runaan's.

RE: Towers

I just might have not been paying attention, but I almost felt like she was losing damage on towers with her Q, because towers have a lot of armor. Probably just my imagination, or seeing smaller numbers pop up on attacking towers, lol. She's still great in sieges between her range, poke, and vision control to watch for flanks.

Call Me Khal1 votes

I just want to know how she interacts with IE now. Since she never crits now, what's the point of extra crit damage? Will it apply to her bonus damage instead?

RiotRiotRepertoir7 votes

It's not that she never crits now. It's more that she always crits, but for less.

Remlap12231 votes

Yes, but how exactly does it work with IE? What does its passive do in terms of Ashe's passive?

Reikken1 votes

it makes crit scale the damage up harder

there's a topic in the pbe forums with the exact formula end result is 100% crit + IE = 260% damage on every attack

Critmaster Garen4 votes

{quoted}

It's not that she never crits now. It's more that she always crits, but for less.

please seriously consider reworking crit in general. i understand the desire for big hits. just try to remove the rng element of it and make crits calculated instead of random.

you could just turn it into a stack mechanic like stattic shiv with some bits and bobs attached here and there. but the way shiv procs work in lane for claculated extra damage on trades seems more healthy than the rng element crit brings.

ashes passive is one way to do it, though it would probably be the more "boring" way to take the randomness out of crit.

RiotRiotRepertoir8 votes

Reworking crit is a job for the systems team. It's something I know they've considered in the past, but I don't think there is a definitive plan to do so currently.

Newbert Newman1 votes

With the E, I'm wondering if an appropriate nerf would be making it target-able like Kalista's and destroyable?

RiotRiotRepertoir5 votes

Its current testing iteration has a longer recharge time than the Live Hawkshot cooldown.

Flemman1 votes

But, as a support, how can I bait my "must build damage only" ashe to level up the ability before 13?^^

The gold was a great carrot for them to place at least 1 point in it early (even if it was still hard to make her use it effectively :p)

Duke Anax3 votes

To be honest I main support, but when i play Ashe i never level Hawkshot until I have to. It feels so uselss compared to wards. Same as {{summoner:2}} and item 3342.

The duration is so short, to hit it you need to acurately guess where the enemy is, but when you can guess where the enemy is, you don't actually need to use the abbility.

You can't even use it to check for the absence of enemies most of the time, because you can't be sure there isn't one just outside of vision.

The new Blue Ward however is great. I had hoped Hakshot might get soemthing like that too, like the hawk circling over the spot, somewhat like Kalista Sentinal.

Venowolf2 votes

Can you please put this animation on her R:

In the season 1 trailer video, Ashe freeze Warwick with her R, so have a lot of sense that Ashe R froze the enemy instead of only stun without any froze animation.

Here the animation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fmH5jp04MY#t=1m50s

Sejuani and Lissandra freeze's her targets why Ashe not?

Ahurath1 votes

Change is good however this seems like a very good remake compared to lets say tristanas. The idea of trists remake was great but it made her alot worse when you started to play her.

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