LoL Patch 26.16 Notes: Riot Kills the Second-Jungler Support Meta and Adds Three Ninjas to Classic

Riot has spent months watching supports leave bot lane at level two and never come back. LoL patch 26.16 finally does something about it, and the fix lands on three fronts at once: the support role quest, Hail of Blades, and Camille.

Bot lane mages caught a similar treatment. Meanwhile, League Classic received its first real patch since launch, complete with Akali, Kennen and Shen. Below is what actually changes for your games, rather than a line-by-line copy of Riot’s numbers.

When did LoL patch 26.16 go live?

Riot published the notes on August 11, 2026, with the Faerie Court skin line arriving on August 12. The patch runs on client version 16.16.

What changed for roaming supports?

Riot named the problem directly in the patch intro: supports had started operating as a second jungler, and Riot considers that damaging to game integrity when it becomes the default rather than a strategic option.

Three changes attack the playstyle from different angles.

The support role quest now punishes leaving bot lane. Riot raised the experience and gold penalty for minion CS outside bot lane from 25 percent to 33 percent, and the window it applies to stretches from level 3 to level 5. On top of that, Riot removed the bonus quest progress that came from damaging champions and turrets, so last-hitting and fighting now consume stacks at the same flat rate.

Support role quest	Before	After
CS penalty outside bot lane	-25% until level 3	-33% until level 5
Stacks from champion / turret damage	22-24 (varied by range)	18 and 21
Creep score stacks	15 and 20	18 and 21

Hail of Blades lost its front-loaded burst. Melee attack speed drops from 120 percent to 90, while the bonus true damage shifts from 4-20 (+8% bonus AD) to 2-20 (+12% bonus AD) (+10% AP). Ranged users keep their 60 percent attack speed untouched. In short, the rune still works, but it rewards you later rather than at level two.

The champion who led the meta pays for it

Camille got the hardest single nerf in the patch. Her passive shield no longer sits at a flat 20 percent maximum health from level one. Instead, it scales at 10 / 15 / 20 / 25 percent across levels 1, 7, 13 and 19. Riot paid for that with much shorter cooldowns and a real W buff, since the stated goal is a weaker roaming support Camille and a stronger top lane one.

Why did ADCs get free magic resistance?

Because mages had taken over bot lane, and Riot wants that power back in mid.

Every marksman on the following list moves from 30 magic resistance (+1.3 per level) to 33 (+1.1 per level): Akshan, Aphelios, Ashe, Caitlyn, Corki, Draven, Ezreal, Graves, Jhin, Jinx, Kai’Sa, Kalista, Kindred, Kog’Maw, Lucian, Miss Fortune, Quinn, Samira, Senna, Sivir, Smolder, Twitch, Varus, Vayne, Xayah, Yunara and Zeri. Tristana climbs further, from 28 base to 33, which puts her in line with the rest.

Early magic resistance matters far more than the late-game figure here. At level one you gain three flat MR against a mage who has no penetration yet, and by level 18 the two curves nearly meet again. Consequently, the buff lands exactly where mage bot laners were winning: the first ten minutes.

Boots reinforce the same idea. Chainlaced Crushers fall from 30 magic resistance to 25, making mid lane a worse place to itemise defensively against mages, while Spellslinger’s Shoes climb from 18 flat magic penetration to 20.

Which items changed in patch 26.16?

Sundered Sky finally took its nerf after a year as the default AD fighter buy.

Item	Key change
Sundered Sky	Healing cut to [90% melee / 45% ranged] base AD + 4% missing health, health up to 450, recipe simplified
Black Cleaver	AD 40 ⇒ 45, move speed split back to [20 melee / 10 ranged]
Eclipse	Damage up to [8% melee / 5% ranged] max health, shield down slightly
Sterak’s Gage	Bonus AD 45% ⇒ 50% of base AD
Berserker’s Greaves	Attack speed 25% ⇒ 30%, T3 40% ⇒ 45%
Runaan’s Hurricane	Bolt damage 55% ⇒ 65% AD, move speed 4% ⇒ 5%
Sunfire Cape	PvP damage up to 20 (+1.5% bonus health), cost up 100g
Tiamat	AD 20 ⇒ 25

Riot’s reasoning on Sundered Sky is worth reading twice. The item healed for more than dedicated lifesteal options when players chained its triggers well, so the fix trims healing rather than removing the mechanic. Black Cleaver, Eclipse and Sterak’s all rise to fill the gap for melee AD fighters specifically, with ranged users held back by melee/ranged splits.

Tiamat gets the most honest changelog note Riot has written in a while. Buying it last in a Hydra build was optimal, which the team described as “pretty lame, yo.”

Does anything help AP and tank junglers?

Yes, and it comes from the pet rather than from items.

Jungle pet damage now scales at 16 percent ability power (up from 12), 25 percent bonus armor and magic resistance (up from 20), and 4 percent bonus health (up from 3). Bonus AD scaling stays at 10 percent. As a result, an AP or tank jungler clears meaningfully faster without touching a single AD fighter item.

Combined with the Sundered Sky nerf, this is Riot’s attempt to break a jungle meta that had narrowed to one item class.

Champion changes at a glance

Champion	Verdict	What moved
Azir	Buff	Q damage up 15 at every rank
Bel’Veth	Nerf	Health growth 110 ⇒ 105, True Form attack speed flattened
Camille	Adjustment	Passive shield now scales, cooldowns much shorter, W buffed
Gwen	Buff	Healing on passive 50% ⇒ 67% post-mitigation, cap raised
Kennen	Buff	R damage and resistances up across ranks 2 and 3
Nasus	Adjustment	Q stacks 3 ⇒ 4 base, 12 ⇒ 10 on champions and large units
Poppy	Rework-lite	AD down, mana and durability scaling up

Poppy deserves a note. Riot wants a tank rather than an early-game AD fighter, so her Q now scales at 75 percent bonus AD instead of 100, her slow scales with bonus health, and her W resistances rise from 12 to 16 percent. Anyone running Hail of Blades and Sundered Sky on her should expect that build to fall off.

Bel’Veth also picked up a quality-of-life addition: her resource bar turns purple when True Form can spawn Remora.

What is new in League Classic?

Riot brought three ninjas to Classic, and each one arrives in a genuinely old-school form.

• Akali returns with Twilight Shroud invisibility, energy-refunding marks, and a three-charge Shadow Dance.
• Kennen stacks Mark of the Storm for stuns and can build AD auto-attacker or dive-bomb with Slicing Maelstrom.
• Shen keeps Vorpal Blade healing for allies who attack his marked target, plus global Stand United.

Balance-wise, Riot went digging through history. Blitzcrank sits at number one in win rate, pick rate and ban rate, so his Rocket Grab early damage and cooldowns both take reverts from 2011 and 2012. Tryndamere, the single most performant champion in Classic, loses fury AD scaling from 5 to 3 per stack. Twitch, Warwick, Jarvan IV, Heimerdinger, Katarina, Janna and Nasus all take cuts, while Lux, Veigar, Soraka, Dr. Mundo, Amumu, Garen, Skarner, Alistar and Miss Fortune get buffs.

Systems changed too. Placeholder rune slots now give 80 percent of a real rune rather than 66, turret health rises roughly 15 percent across the board, and early-game Homeguards are gone in favour of shorter death timers at levels 1 through 8.

Faerie Court skins

Three skins arrived on August 12: Faerie Court Bel’Veth, Faerie Court Gwen and Faerie Court Lulu. Each has chromas launching alongside it. Classic also picked up updated base skins for Akali, Shen and Miss Fortune, with Stinger Akali, Yellowjacket Shen and Waterloo Miss Fortune selectable as chromas.

What this means for solo queue

If you play support, stop leaving lane before level 5 unless the roam is genuinely free. The quest penalty now costs you real gold and experience for longer than most players are used to.

If you play ADC, the early lane against a mage got noticeably safer, and Berserker’s Greaves are worth another look at 30 percent attack speed. Jungle mains sitting on AD fighters should test AP and tank clears before committing to another Sundered Sky rush, since the pet does more of that work now.

Full numbers live in Riot’s official patch 26.16 notes. For more coverage, see our League of Legends hub and our breakdown of patch 26.15.