League of Legends has introduced WASD movement, more Patch Changes and a host of Arena Changes to wrap up the year on a high. With changes that aren’t massively game-shifting, it seems like a quiet end to the year in preparation for a busy and probably spicy 2026 that Riot has in store for us. With only one Patch as a follow-up in mid-December, Riot has gone quiet to end the year, and it should stabilise gameplay for that end-of-year solo queue push.
Patch Note Changes
It is understandably quiet to end the year, but Riot never really learns its lessons, judging by the buff and nerf list to end the year. More Junglers getting the boot and the same suspects in the buff and nerf circus as they fall in and out of meta every two months.
Champion Buffs
The buffed Champions include:
- Braum
- Lux
- Nasus
- Sejuani
- Swain
- Tahm Kench
- Viktor
- Volibear
Why on God’s Green Earth did they buff Braum, Swain or Volibear? The rest of the Champions probably did need a facelift outside of Viktor, who is fairly stable at the moment, but these three Champions making it on Riot’s buff list is criminal. Volibear doing more damage, Swain getting more sustain, and Braum getting tankier is a recipe for disaster, and really proves Riot is favouring the low skill ceiling champions.
With over $3M contributed and a whole lot of tumbling around in the bamboo, we’re calling this one a pan-tastic success 🐼 couldn’t ask for better pals than all of you 💚 pic.twitter.com/IHHXGNVwcc
— League of Legends (@LeagueOfLegends) December 15, 2025
Champion Nerfs
The nerfed Champions include:
- Aatrox
- Ambessa
- Dr. Mundo
- Kayn
- Kha’zix
- Master Yi
- Mel
- Miss Fortune
- Qiyana
- Sylas
- Zaahen
- Zedd
So they’ve just decided to nerf the top laners turned Junglers and all the meta Junglers along with Mel, MF and the new Champion Zaahen, who is completely busted on release. Riot’s balancing act is comical in the sense that all these things were obviously overpowered before they got shipped, and the numbers and balancing decisions have proven the community right yet again.
Top Laners and Mid Assassins becoming viable Junglers fundamentally breaks the game due to how Smite can be used as a combat summoner and how well solo laners tend to scale in stats compared to their traditional Jungle counterparts. This is the reason they are locked in solo lanes, to mitigate the influence they have on the rest of the map, or traditional Junglers become obsolete. Case in point, all of the solo lane Junglers are getting nerfed.
Zaahen being busted on release was very obvious, and you would think Riot would stop releasing game-breaking OP Champions only to banish them to the Shadow Realm for six months after a month. MF and Mel continue to get boinked by the nerf stick and are either too weak to be picked ever or meta-defining. Sounds like another design problem.
Couple of League WASD updates.
1. We're seeing a couple of bugs that need fixing, so holding off on the rollout to all regions until we've hotfixed those. Possible those are addressed later today, might take a bit longer. We'll keep you posted
2. From those regions that have…
— Andrei van Roon (@RiotMeddler) December 3, 2025
Item and Rune Reworks
The item and rune reworks include:
- Bloodline
Bloodline is underperforming in its tree, so it deserves love, but anytime lifesteal gets buffed, the anti-heal items should also get a facelift to compensate, or Aatrox will inevitably start 1v9ing after 15 minutes.
The Junglers keep getting changed so often.
WASD Movement
The movement system in League has been a steady presence in a game all about shakeups and change. Introducing WASD movement to cater to a casual audience is to alienate the loyal fanbase League has had due to its own greed.
Having seen a similar downfall in FPS titles where the balance team offers a superior input as a new input to appease a casual audience, and made it superior so noobs feel better about stomping experienced players in an inferior input. That game defined FPS gaming at its peak, but quickly died after these changes really took hold.
It is fair to urge Riot to be introspective about these changes and ask if new consumers are really worth alienating your old ones to move on to new pastures and never look back. Because it does feel like the beginning of the end if this does become introduced in competitive queues.
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