LoL Patch 26.18: Riot Says Poppy Has ‘No Counterplay’ in League Classic

League of Legends Patch 26.18 is here, and it’s shaking up the meta shortly before Worlds. Plus, there are a ton of League Classic updates to look forward to, a Caps Hall of Legends event, and major Mayhem changes.

First off, Classic Poppy is back, and Riot knows exactly what they have done. Her ultimate picks one enemy and makes her untouchable by everyone else. Riot’s own patch notes call it “no counter-play”, then suggest ulting the Soraka and killing the ADC while nobody can stop you. That is LoL Patch 26.18 in one champion.

Five Demacians land in League Classic, the first Council vote results arrive, and Summoner’s Rift gets a round of nerfs aimed squarely at professional play. Let’s dive in.

Patch 26.18 Champion Nerfs: Three Weeks Before Worlds

Worlds starts on 15 October, and this League of Legends patch will be shaping the meta. It’s important to keep up so viewers don’t get left in the dust.

For this reason, most of these are Champs that play a heavy role in pro. Patch 26.18 will still affect your solo queue, but it’s mostly intended to adjust high-level standings.

• Nautilus loses base attack damage and Dredge Line scaling
• Bard loses armour at base and per level, targeting durability rather than damage
• Syndra loses passive mana and gains a second of W cooldown
• Cassiopeia trades laning power for AP scaling, explicitly to reduce her pro skew
• Seraphine bot gets E flattened to 11 seconds at every rank
• Zeri loses attack damage scaling on Ultrashock Laser

Patch 26.18: Champion Buffs

• Viego gets the biggest improvement. His passive heal now scales off bonus AD, AP, bonus attack speed and bonus health, which opens up the bruiser build considerably.
• Master Yi was collateral damage from an earlier Rageblade bugfix. He gains armour growth and five percent extra move speed on Highlander at every rank.
• Zaahen now puts Q on cooldown immediately when entering resurrection, so he stops coming back with it unavailable. His Q2 also becomes a clean double of Q1.
• Ekko and Kassadin get smaller top-ups on mana costs and ratios.

Players Voted on Classic’s Design, and the Result Was Mostly “Leave It Alone”

Riot’s first Council poll asked Classic players to vote on real design decisions. Three produced changes:

• All three proposed items return. Zz’Rot Portal, Cloak and Dagger and Moonflair Spellblade, on 60.67% for the bundle option.
• Modern jungle timers arrive, always visible on the minimap.
• The river gets a turtle at top and a duck at bottom, on 52.09%.

The more interesting half is what did not change.

Game length came back at 52.80% “about right”. Snowballing came back at 48.82% “about right”. Ward trinkets scored 69.72% approval. Base gates survived at 55.03%.

On every question asking whether Classic feels wrong, players said it feels fine. The only changes voted through were additions. That is a solid verdict on how the mode is landing, and it lines up with what Riot said in the September Dev Update, where the Classic work was all friction removal rather than fixes.

New League Classic Champions in 26.18

Five Demacians are coming to League Classic in this patch:

• Poppy (2010-2015) is the headline. Diplomatic Immunity makes her immune to everyone except one chosen target, and her passive halves all damage above 10% of her current health.
• Fiora (2012-2015) brings the original Blade Waltz, an untargetable dash chain applying on-hit effects.
• Galio (2010-2017) converts magic resistance into ability power and leaves a speed-boosting draft with Righteous Gust. Riot notes Hwei later borrowed that one.
• Shyvana (2011-2013) is another addition. Riot recommends using Frozen Mallet, on the logic that a slowed target cannot run.
• Xin Zhao (2012-2017) is right click until they die. He has been nerfed since the original, which will reassure anyone who remembers it.

All five slot into a shop that rewards single purchases far more than modern League does, so plan your first back around them. Our Classic item build guide covers how that economy works.

On the balance side, Nasus can no longer critically strike with Q stacks, and Warwick takes a heavy pass across attack speed, passive scaling and Hunter’s Call.

Check Your League Classic Account for Free Skins

Previously, we saw how important owning League Classic skins was to the player base. Riot is now also unifying Classic Skin Chromas with their base skins rather than selling them separately.

If you only bought the Classic Chroma, Riot is also granting you the base skin free.

Baron Rammus also goes into the vault in Patch 26.20. He’ll be discounted until then, but afterwards, you won’t be able to grab him. That is the same patch bringing Team Voice to NA and Oceania on 7 October.

Mayhem Stops Offering AP Augments to Vayne

Riot has built an exclusion system so augments stop appearing on champions they make no sense for. The clearest example is a new filter blocking AP-scaling augments on champions without AP ratios, covering Aatrox, Darius, Garen, Draven, Riven, Zed and around sixteen others.

Clown College returns after being disabled, and Spin to Win jumps from a 30% to a 50% R damage increase.

Riot also closed a set of Hydra exploits, including one that generated free gold by selling and rebuying Hydra items with Ultra Hydra equipped.

The Hall of Legends Event Goes Live

Patch 26.18 launches the Caps Hall of Legends event, with Immortalized Legend Tristana, Risen Legend Tristana and Risen Legend Orianna arriving 10 September.

By purchasing the Event Pass, you can get even more goodies:

• Risen Legend Orianna Skin & Border
• Risen Legend Orianna Event Chroma
• Freljord Taliyah, Elderwood LeBlanc, Empyrean Akali Skins
• 125 Mythic Essence
• 11 Orbs
• 15 Caps-Themed Icons & Emotes
• Unkillable Demon Cactus Ward
• Beacon of Hope Banner
• “Martin 1” Title
• And more!

Caps becomes the first Western player inducted in the Hall of Legends. He’s notable for his extremely strong EMEA performance, and has spent time on orgs like G2 Esports. The Tristana skins were co-developed with him. Caps specifically picked Tristana as his Hall of Legends Champion because of how much fun he had playing her.