Riot wants Sion and Urgot to become junglers in patch 10.20

William Davis Published 23/09/2020

A detailed preview for the upcoming patch 10.20 has been revealed by lead gameplay designer Mark “Scuffy” Yetter, where Sion and Urgot are getting some buffs in the jungle.

The patch doesn’t include many huge changes but is instead targeting some off-meta champions that might make their return to the meta soon. In the nerf section, strong picks such as Katarina and Karthus are getting some attention.

10.20 Patch preview with almost final changes.

Samira hotfix will carry over into 10.20, we will reevaluate her state in a few more days. pic.twitter.com/Mlwm06DTd1
— Mark Yetter (@MarkYetter) September 22, 2020

Sion and Urgot could be strong junglers in patch 10.20

Two of the most notable changes are for Sion and Urgot, who are being specifically buffed for the jungle position. The two champions are usually played in the top lane, but Riot wants to mix up their flexibility a little bit.

Sion

Q – Decimating Smash, Dame to monsters 100 >> 150%

Sion will receive a substantial damage buff to his Decimating Smash, specifically towards monsters. The buff will boost his clearing speed in the jungle, to a point where he might be most viable as a jungler.

On paper, Sion can be really good as a jungler, but he has been lacking clear speed. As this will now change, the rest of his kit is appropriately suited for the jungle position. His Unstoppable Onslaught (R) can set up some scary ganks, while he will still be a valuable tank with lots of crowd control in team fights.

Urgot

P – Echoing Flames, Monster cap 60-360 >> 100-360
W – Disdain, Deals 50 minimum damage to monsters [NEW]

Urgot will also be buffed in ways that might better enable him as a strong jungler. The buffed damage to his Echoing Flames will boost his clearing speed in the early game. The buff to his Disdain will also help him out his clearing speed, especially against single-monster camps such as the Blue Sentinel and Red Brambleback.

While the buffs will help Urgot clear the jungle faster, he might still struggle with his ganks. His kit is still a little clunky in that he is not very mobile. This will hurt him in his gank attempts, as it will be hard to get in range to lock down an opponent if they haven’t already pushed forward in lane.

Katarina and Karthus to receive nerfs

The nerfs for patch 10.20 will target some solo queue heavy hitters. Karthus and Katarina are some of the most notable ones, currently sitting at 52.14% and 52.17% win rate in solo queue respectively.

Katarina

P – Voracity, Attack damage ratio 100 >> 75% bonus AD

Katarina has always been a strong pick in the solo queue because of her ability to snowball a game out of control on her own. Recently, she has been a bit too powerful, and this can be seen in her win rates.

Riot will be targeting her passive damage to make her a bit weaker throughout all stages of the game.

Karthus

Armor 20.88 >> 18
Base HP regen 6.5 >> 6

Karthus is hard to deal with because of his damage and great scaling. Karthus has been popular as a jungler in recent patches because his clearing speed is faster than that of any other champion in the game. The strategy is to power farm in the jungle until he hits his key items.

Riot is not looking to nerf his damage, but rather his armor and HP regen. These nerfs will make him more vulnerable in the early game, both to jungle camps and to enemies invading. The nerfs won’t stop him from scaling, so enemies will have to take advantage of his weaker early game in order to shut him down.

Patch 10.20 is expected to hit the live servers on Wednesday, September 30.

William Davis

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