Teamfight Tactics patch 9.21 notes

Riot·Oct 22, 2019·1 votes·89,777 views

Greetings Tacticians!

This is it, the final countdown, the last round, the third period, the fourth quarter, the ninth inning, the end of the road, the last stop, closing time, or more specifically, the last patch in Teamfight Tactics' first set. While we await the start of Rise of the Elements, we have one last balance pass and patch for you to reach the rank of your dreams. So cue the montage music and let's get into it.

Take this portal if you're looking for League's patch notes!

Blake "Riot Beernana" Edwards

Ranked

This is the last patch to continue climbing the ranked ladder in Teamfight Tactics' first Season. Ranked will be off in patch 9.22 for the start of Rise of the Elements to make sure that we have any major bugs or balance issues out of the way, but it will return in patch 9.23.

Player Damage

Right now, player damage is both too low in the early game and too high in the late game. This leads players to take advantage of using the early game to stockpile gold, as well as really unfortunate late-game losses when trying to change up your strategy or unit placements. We're pulling level-up damage from the champions and putting it into their base damage to counteract these trends.

1-Star by Tier: 1/1/2/2/3 ⇒ 1/1/1/2/3
2-Star by Tier: 2/2/3/4/5 ⇒ 2/2/2/3/4
3-Star by Tier: 3/4/5/6/8 ⇒ 3/3/3/5/8
Base Damage: 1/2/2/3/4/5 ⇒ 3/3/3/4/5/6

Traits

Guardian bonus Armor: 45 ⇒ 40
Hextech Item Disable duration: 7 seconds ⇒ 5 seconds
Knight Damage blocked: 15/35/60 ⇒ 15/30/60
Rangers bonus Attack Speed: 25%/70% ⇒ 40%/70%
Sorcerer Ability Power: 40%/100%/175% ⇒ 40%/120%/200%

Champions

Lissandra Starting/Total Mana: 0/85 ⇒ 0/95
Varus Attack Damage: 50 ⇒ 60
Brand Pyroclasm bounce range: 2 Hexes ⇒ 3 Hexes
Brand Pyroclasm missile speed: Slower ⇒ Faster
Cho’Gath Spell Damage: 175/350/525 ⇒ 200/400/600
Draven Attack Damage: 70 ⇒ 65
Pantheon Armor: 80 ⇒ 70

Items

Locket of the Iron Solari duration: 7 seconds ⇒ 8 seconds
Redemption Health threshold: 25% ⇒ 30%
Repeating Crossbow Attack Speed and Crit Chance per stack: 20% ⇒ 30%
Spear of Shojin Mana restoration: 15% ⇒ 18%
Trap Claw stun duration: 5 seconds ⇒ 4 seconds

Bugfixin'

Kai’Sa’s spell tooltip now properly scales with Ability Power
Coins don’t launch as far
Adjusted a few of the drops in Thieves Gloves
Draven now has the intended attack speed ratio
Players will no longer occasionally receive inexplicable massive amounts of damage during overtime.

70 Comments

Win ZhaoOct 22, 201947 votes

please ensure all players load into the game before actually starting the game. its not like league where people have 1:05min to afk before the minions actually start. I keep loading in after carousel

MalfuryOct 22, 201911 votes

Yes! This happens all the time and not only to me. I see usually 1-3 ppl per game move after the carousel is almost finished... bc they dont connect as fast

Daggerman28Oct 23, 20194 votes

That can be chalked up to pc performance issues which is something Riot is very picky on. While i'd like to see this change i'm not entirely hopeful for it.

MoistKinkajouOct 23, 20194 votes

I have noticed this issue while playing my laptop, xeon E-2176M (2.7 GHz) and NVIDIA Quadro P1000 (built in).

However, I haven't noticed this issue on my desktop, threadripper 1920x (3.5GHz) and Radeon R9 200.

Both 32Gb RAM and avg. ~45-60 ping.

Leads me to agree it is some sort of resource problem, sorta stab in the dark since I didn't dig too deep :(

hopefully that helps riot :* <3 TFT keep up good work :D

MagicFlyingLlamaOct 24, 20193 votes

It would depend on storage speed, not any other spec.

DatCrazyOokamiiOct 31, 20191 votes

It's fixed now

TortoiseOct 23, 20191 votes

since 9.18 (I believe) I haven't been able to pick once from the first carousel. I know they shortened the time of the first round, but they probably shortened the first carousel time also.

3rdStormOct 23, 20196 votes

Honestly the first carousel is so inconsequential. Unless you are forcing strats or going for quests. Even then its a very minor set back.

Sir KissOct 23, 20195 votes

Except that you don't know that you're not in so you miss the first 3 minion waves and lose to the 2nd and 3rd ones, potentially... and when you DO get back in, your items are invisible and you have to roam your board to pick them up, which makes NO sense!

ZynthOct 24, 20192 votes

This is how I felt because it literally happened to me every game since I started playing tft and I played today and it didn’t happen anymore so either my toaster got a surprise boost for the day or they somewhat fixed this?

ScarletmeowOct 22, 201912 votes

"Draven now has the intended no longer has a higher attack speed ratio than intended"

Wat

RiotRiot BeernanaOct 22, 201911 votes

We're fixing that one, not sure how it got messed up.

NecrosìsOct 22, 201911 votes

Imagine still not fixing overtime bugging out

Unkle ThomOct 22, 20194 votes

I swear to god this better get fixed.. last patch to play ranked until 9.23. I'd rather not sit out 3 patches in a row from ranked.

zsocwOct 22, 20193 votes

Someone confirmed somewhere the fix is actually coming with the patch :) May have been morello's twitter. I trust twitch chat on this. summoner 31

HEEEEEEEEEEEEEOct 22, 20192 votes

"Players will no longer occasionally receive inexplicable massive amounts of damage during overtime."

swallamaOct 22, 20196 votes

"Players will no longer occasionally receive inexplicable massive amounts of damage during overtime." Is that not it?

LuvzOct 22, 201915 votes

I'm not OP, but that does not seem to address OT simply not triggering and OT resulting in a draw for minor draw damage, but breaks a win streak, etc.

guardianJLAOct 24, 20191 votes

The OT not triggering is the only thing that happens to me which ends up in a draw. Has only happened twice and I've played a bunch of tft. For those talking about not being able to pick in the first carousel, I think their problem is their client. Ryz7-2700, 1060,16gb @72ms here

TortoiseOct 23, 20191 votes

I've seen the issue in this patch. It just skips overtime. I'm trying to debug it myself. I think it has something to do with shapeshifters.

Koumyou69Oct 22, 201910 votes

i find that characters often stop moving/attacking during the match and face away from the battle while not being stunned or snared. is this something anyone else is noticing?

TubaManBoyOct 23, 20191 votes

Trap Claw

ArtilonArkadiOct 23, 20192 votes

No it's broken pathing for the ai. Stunned heroes have a stunned animation. Like the other two posters, I have noticed heroes that have never taken any damage or attacked, sometimes just standing still until other units shift.

Petey PastramiOct 23, 20193 votes

Are they melee units that can't reach a target?

ArtilonArkadiOct 23, 20194 votes

I'll try to explain it as best I can:

I had a line of 4 melee on top line, far right. 2 melee behind them, slightly offset to the left. Opponent had their entire team directly across from my front line. The 2 melee in the mid line could have walked around to attack the exposed heroes, but never moved until two of my heroes were already killed.

It only happens in extremely specific circumstances, but I have seen it happen to others and it has happened a few times other than this one I just explained. It's like the AI wants to walk through the front to attack, but can't find different pathing

Zed Zul ZorOct 24, 20191 votes

I've noticed it too, but one reason is if there is no path to attack someone but I do feel like I've seen it even when there was a path but not totally sure. Its like they just pause occasionally if the path is too far and wait for an opening. Kinda sucks.

danttenOct 26, 20192 votes

Units will always target the closest unit to auto, so if you have alot of melee units they can get stuck. I believe this is because the specific unit they are targeting has all the hexes around it blocked. They will not switch targets until that target either dies, becomes untargetable, or if a unit like blitz or Camille forces a target to be focused

Void2258Oct 23, 20199 votes

Is there an way we could have changes to carousel? It's too easy to get "too close" to a champ while trying to go around to get who you want and select them by mistake. Also, everywhere else in the game we can check stats for champs and items, but in the carousel it's all about memorization. The opening carousel is also too fast; half the time it ends before I can reach my pick and I get random.

HanzoNovaOct 23, 20197 votes

Does anyone else think its a tad unfair that when losing to a clone you take massive damage but they take none at all when you win? Even just a tine bit.

StiylMagnus931Oct 23, 20191 votes

You're winning against a composition that lacks any & all class bonuses.

But I agree it's a bit silly to come away with nothing, apart from some confidence that your champs aren't total ass.

Another AsheOct 23, 20192 votes

i thought they get class bonuses from a few patches ago? i could be wrong

zliplusOct 23, 20192 votes

No, you're right, the clone was fixed a long time ago. You do take slightly less damage than from a real person though.

PossumFlavoredOct 23, 20195 votes

So, played a couple games with this patch. I abhor and hate the early game damage changes. It makes the game feel so much more RNG based. If I get unlucky on items, or champs, its no longer 'ok, wait a few rounds and I can stabilize. I can play maybe play the long game and still win.' its 'oh crap now im dead'. It really amplified the part of the game thats most frustrating for me, the RNG.

DokiFTWOct 22, 20194 votes

rangers op time

Fella AirOct 23, 20193 votes

I'd like confirmation of something I've suspected for a long time... Is there something hidden in the code that makes your people never choose to focus draven first, and always wait for literally his entire team to be dead before anyone goes on him? I swear it doesn't matter where my assassins are in relation to him, or how fast I cut down their frontline, the enemy draven is ALWAYS the last one to die and it's really annoying.

JaspersOct 23, 20192 votes

My only issues with current TFT is how long it can take Wild to ramp up and Katarina obliterating my entire team. A level 2 with any AP item will just delete my team as she's an assassin and isn't targeted at first. I hate Kat in it. :P

Daggerman28Oct 23, 20191 votes

have fun playing against an eve then

WolfDesiignOct 23, 20191 votes

I have this bug that whenever I disconnect after I reconnect all of my current items in my bench lose their icon and go into a white with another item but not 1 all of them but whenever I get another item it is normal but also after i disconnect the classes that are on the left hand side of the screen are gone as well and i have to put all the champions in my bench and back so that i can see their classes again. Anyone else?

lFroglOct 24, 20191 votes

Can someone explain the player damage and star by tier thing? Confused about what it means.

Navarre85Oct 24, 20191 votes

They made it so tier-3 and tier-4 units do overall less damage on each level, while simultaneously increasing the base damage your Legend does early in the game. What this means is the early game defeats will damage you quite a bit more than previously, while later rounds will be less damaging than they were before as everyone gets higher tier, upgraded units out.

In my opinion, it's not a great change because the early game is the most RNG based and you can get really screwed over by poor rolls. A common strategy before was to play conservative with money in the early game and take a few losses to get better carousel picks and build up money for level ups. Honestly that strategy was probably a bit too strong, but the new changes will make matters worse as people with bad luck will just end up losing before they get a chance to build a strong team and make a comeback, whereas people who get good luck will be able to more easily convert their early game dominance into a snowball since any loss they may take in the late game is less likely to outright kill them.

Zed Zul ZorOct 24, 20191 votes

What I do is roll with whatever comp I can get early game but have a mid / late game comp in mind from the start. Take whatever wins you can early game and save your money. Comps that have more higher tier champs will work out better.

TeebsOct 25, 20191 votes

Can you please add a clear visual indicator to the TFT portion of your client when there are new patch notes?

Underlords even lets you read them in game.

I managed to de-rank a bunch on 9.21 before I noticed damage went up and figured out there was a patch. Not fun 😬

TeemoCityOct 25, 20191 votes

stinky

lumanachiOct 26, 20191 votes

Good changes but when are going to discuss the dragon changes, they getting annoying man XD

Ronin720Oct 27, 20191 votes

Fix ranged champs walking to melee range for no reason. Also fix champ cards not rerolling after each fight. This happens multiple times each game and no I don't have it locked,

OG RunespiritOct 28, 20191 votes

Draven item 3070

GigakatOct 30, 20191 votes

The damage changes to this patch seem to have eliminated a level of skill, because you can't push for an economy strategy now and do well. It's essential to build a composition as fast as possible because HP has become a currency in a way. If you lose the early game it's so much harder to win, where an economy strategy let's you re-roll for high levels or invest into the better units.

Mad HackOct 31, 20191 votes

brand range allows distance poke compared to other spell casters. Example. Morgana, who I think is well balanced will once again be behind because of it. She is already range distance behind spell casters

Zevv3Oct 31, 20191 votes

You should put the date the patch goes live at the top.

Devious StaresNov 1, 20191 votes

As Scarra has mentioned, this is the most unbalanced and poorly thought out game in its genre.

Here's hoping set 2 will be playable.

Make sure to include the mechanics where you can't use your items, can't move, can't attack, or can't gain mana - because that's what makes it so much fun to play.