We've got the details on this week's 3.2.0 patch and oh boy, it's a big one! Read on for the balance changes, plenty of new Arcade-themed cosmetics, and more.
Quote From Riot New Expansions - A Curious Journey
Ava’s journey has reached its thrilling conclusion, and she’s brought with her a few mementos from her adventure, including the final expansion of the Beyond the Bandlewood set - A Curious Journey!
A Curious Journey contains 48 collectible cards, including four new champions - Gnar, Yuumi, Galio, and Udyr, and two new keywords - Attach & Formidable.
Learn more about everything coming in the expansion in the details below, and get ready to complete your adventure in A Curious Journey, playable at approximately 11AM PT on February 16!
New Keywords: Attach & Formidable
Support your units in an entirely new way with Attach! Units with Attach can be played on the board as a normal unit, or can Attach to an allied unit, providing that unit with the attached unit’s stats and keywords, amongst other bonuses depending on the card. Using Attach counts as targeting an allied unit and triggers effects like Fated, providing even more power!
Formidable units turn bulk into brawn, and Strike using their current Health instead of their Power. Because they’ll get worn down through clashing with enemy units, be sure to keep Formidable units healthy to make the most out of them!
Sunsetting Expeditions
Starting in patch 3.2.0, we’re beginning to sunset Expeditions by removing the weekly cap on fully-rewarded runs, which also means Free Play is no longer available due to the lack of a weekly cap. Expedition Tokens are also being removed from the Weekly Vault and the new player 7-day login bonus. In May, with the release of patch 3.8.0, Expeditions will no longer be accessible, so be sure to spend your remaining Expedition Tokens before then.
For more information, please refer to the original announcement article.
New Challenges, Quests, and AI Decks
New Challenges and Quests have been added to introduce the keywords, archetypes, and champions being added in Magic Misadventures. Additional AI decks featuring cards added in the expansion have also been added to the Vs. AI opponent pool.
The Path of Champions Updates
- Gnar & Yuumi have been added as selectable champions in The Path of Champions.
Card Updates
Our next major set of card updates is scheduled for patch 3.4.0 on March 30, but before then, as part of the launch of A Curious Journey, we wanted to take this as an opportunity to release a small number of balance changes, along with some additional comments & context from designer Alexzandros Lee!
The start of a new set is an exciting and wild time. A full on fiesta of whatever craziness people want to jam into a deck and take into queue. Previous meta decks, however, tend to punish that. The goal of these changes is to help address those decks enough that players don’t feel punished for trying the new things, while also making sure that as the meta gets refined it doesn’t return to the old hotness.
Champions
Ahri (Level 1 & Level 2)
Base Stats (Level 1): 2|3 → 2|2
Base Stats (Level 2): 3|4 → 3|3Ahri’s been an elusive target to pin down for most decks. This change makes her more susceptible to targeted removal, and makes it easier to set up blocks against her that can take her out. It also means that if the Ahri player wants to keep her alive they’ll need to invest more resources in protecting her, which should strain their mana and open up windows to disrupt the rest of their board.
Followers, Spells, and Landmarks
Iceborn Legacy
Change: 5 cost Burst Speed → 6 cost Focus SpeedWe loved seeing the deck building that came about from this card but we want to make it a bit less abusable. The mana cost increase should push out how early it can be combo’d with other buffs, providing a bigger window for other decks to prepare for the onslaught of Poros / Spiders / Sand Soldiers, and of course Slotbots.
We’re also moving the spell speed to Focus. While this won’t impact winrate /that/ much because it’s commonly used pre-combat to force lethal, this does help reduce some of the play against anxiety of potential “Surprise you’re dead” situations when they could use it as a combat trick.
Wounded Whiteflame
Base Stats: 2|4 → 2|3Pantheon decks are already performing quite well, and with the release of A Curious Journey he is getting further support with Yuumi. This change is aimed at pulling out some power from the Fated package to give the deck room to flourish without becoming the de facto best deck by way of it’s natural predators getting weaker.
The reason for this change over others is that Whiteflame tends to be a core part of the Fated deck and can easily take over games with how quickly it can grow out of range of most removal. Reducing its health should provide a bigger window where the opponent can deal with it.
Kinkou Wayfinder
Change: 4 cost 2|3 Allegiance: Summon 2 different
1 cost allies from your deck. → 4-cost 3|3
Allegiance: Summon a 1 cost ally from your deck.Kinkou has proven to be an absolute value engine monster when paired with repeat recall. While we don’t usually like hitting the same card multiple times if we can get away with it, it’s clear that Wayfinder is a key part of the more abusive plays we’ve seen from the Ahri/Kennen/Mono Ionia decks. This change should reduce how easily they can refill the board with value while also opening up the ability for players to consider other regions beyond splashing purely for combat tricks.
Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy the changes and everything else coming in A Curious Journey!
Region Road Updates
- Region Roads for Bandle City, Freljord, and Demacia have been extended.
Personalization
The following personalization items are available with this patch in the Store or Arcade Battle Event Pass.
Please see our dedicated cosmetics post - tons of images!
Arcade Battle Event Pass
Only you can protect Arcadia from a final Game Over. Ready to fight?
Purchase before March 2 to get an exclusive quest that awards 10 Arcade Tokens and a Rare Prismatic Chest! The event pass grants access to an upgraded event path with premium rewards and immediately unlocks the Hector Guardian. All unlockable rewards can be viewed on the Event rewards road.
Play games to earn Arcade Tokens and unlock more rewards!
Event ends and pass expires March 17 at 10:00 a.m. PT.
Expeditions
- New archetypes, champions, and cards from A Curious Journey have been added to Expeditions.
Miscellaneous
- The ranked season for Magic Misadventures has concluded, and A Curious Journey is underway! Collect your ranked rewards depending on your performance, including an exclusive Magic Misadventures icon from the previous season in the Loot popup on the home screen.
- Startup splash screen background has been changed from red to black based on player feedback.
Bugfixes
- Fixed an issue where Pantheon was gaining more keywords than intended on leveling up.
- Fixed an issue where Sion’s card was not highlighted gold when level up conditions are met.
- Fixed an issue where Buhru Sentinel and Burgeoning Sentinel were receiving buffs from Single Combat.
- Fixed an issue where Station Archivist was only placing cards from the top five cards to the top of deck.
- Fixed an issue where Zed’s Level 2 Living Shadow was not correctly copying itself..
- Fixed an issue where Earthshaker was not doubling Impact after reaching four stacks.
- Fixed some consistency and grammar issues with card text templating.
Comments
The nerf to Ahri don't matter much, because your still not gonna able to kill her with all the cheap recall and protective spells that Ionia has, Wayfinder on the other hand got the axe I don't think that card is worth using now.
I will admit that I never a fan of poro elusive but I do think that Iceborn legacy was over-nerfed, none of the decks using that card were top tier.
Glad to see that they nerfed whitflame the thing just wouldn't die if you didn't run vengeance or minimorph.
Ahri nerf is well-deserved, you want champions to be strong, but not THAT strong. Wayfinder joins the club of unplayable allegiance cards. Ahri Kennen definitely needs to change now, away from an allegiance deck, but it's impossible to tell what it'll look like in the end.
Iceborn Poros may not have been top tier, but Iceborn Spiders kind of was, it's the strongest Freljord + Shadow Isles deck before the patch. Iceborn Legacy might still have a place in more traditional Poro decks, the ones with Aurora Porealis, but those are definitely not going to be competitive meta decks.
I'm concerned the Whiteflame nerf may not have been enough, Pantheon decks were already top tier before the patch and that was despite being hard countered by Ahri Kennen. With the substantial power-up that is represented by Yuumi's release, there's a good chance Pantheon will become the next meta king.