With teams around the world fighting for a spot at MSI, Riot has been working on adjusting the pro play meta prior to the start of the tournament. The next two patches will determine and shape a new meta, forcing players to re-invent themselves and fight the new optimal picks and strategies.
That said, the Riot devs are also trying to buff some of the under-performing champions in solo queue in Patch 13.7, granting better numbers to champions like Alistar, Kalista, and Yasuo, just to name a few. Among them is also Katarina, who is receiving tweaks with the primary goal of nerfing her Divine Sunderer.
The planned change for Katarina is to increase her passive date AP ratio by five percent at all ranks and have the ultimate Death Lotus’ bonus AD ratio changed. It lowers the based bonus AD ratio by two percent, the buffed version will give 20 percent more bonus AD for every 100 percent bonus attack speed (from 30 to 50 percent).
Such a big increase in numbers is causing concerns since there is room for a new attack-speed-based build that can take full advantage of the buff.
One Reddit user showed the potential damage she can deal with a Kraken Slayer build, full of attack speed items like Blade of the Ruined King, Wit’s End, and Rageknife. At level 18, the ultimate could deal up to 5100 physical damage, over the ultimate’s 2.5-second duration.
This is because, on top of all the attack-speed items, Kraken Slayer grants passive attack speed for every Legendary item completed. This means that Katarina gets an extra 40 percent attack speed for free at full build.
“Sure, the goal to nerf Divine on Katarina will succeed, but this way they just create an even bigger abomination.” is what the Reddit author said after showing the numbers.
He also explained why Katarina is having balancing issues, which always puts her on the limit. “Ever since the removal of Gun Blade Katarina’s balance is a huge issue.”
Hextech Gunblade used to be an old League item that was removed a few years ago. It was built on specific champions that wanted both lifesteal and spellvamp (which is currently what is known as Omnivamp) and Katarina was among those champions. The most important thing, however, was the active slow that she could use at the beginning of the fight to better hit the daggers.
When Riot removed the item, there was nothing that could replace it, so they decided to give her on-hit procs on her passive, E, and ultimate. This forced players into choosing between two builds: one glass-cannon, damage-oriented build that made Katarina squishy, and one that was the exact opposite. It would deal less damage but it made sure you could tank a bit of damage.
In conclusion, the Reddit user thinks that to have Katarina in a healthy state, Riot should either remove the delay on her E reset to make her dash instantly and hit reliable combos or add a new item similar to Hextech Gunblade.
According to him, Riftmaker cannot be considered the Gunblade replacement, and while Blade of the Ruined King is the most similar item to the removed item, it lacks spell vamp and ruins your third or fourth item spikes.
