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It hasn't been long since Riot devs quickly pushed out a hotfix for Master Yi, hitting the Wuju Bladesman with significant nerfs after initial League of Legends Patch 12.5 changes had boosted the champion into the overpowered tier. Yet the toning down may have gone too far, it seems. New analytics now reveal that Master Yi's win rate in solo queue has plummeted on the live servers, especially in higher elos.
Balance changes are always a headache for League of Legends, and this time is no exception. Master Yi had enjoyed a spell of dominance in solo queue with a lethality build, equipped with Duskblade for example. But Riot wanted to bring that down a notch.
Master Yi mini-rework and hotfix swing win rates in opposite directions
As such, for patch 12.5, which went live last March 2, the dev team introduced changes – a mini-rework of sorts — that supposedly would make the lethality build less optimal. It was meant to redirect players into favoring Yi's traditional on-hit build, featuring the likes of Blade of the Ruined King, Guinso's Rageblade, and Wit's End.
As it turned out, the changes had the opposite effect. Master Yi's win rate skyrocketed to about 55 percent in Silver ranks, and even over 53 percent in Diamond and above. The pick rate also soared to more than 15 percent. Recognizing their “error”, Riot devs urgently pushed out a hotfix to nerf the champion last March 4.
The full changes are detailed here, but the gist of it is a significantly weaker Alpha Strike (Q) with reduced crit damage and lower AD scaling. Master Yi's base health, E ability (Wuju Style), and ultimate (Highlander) cooldown also received nerfs. Of course, the idea was to fine-tune the champion to make both lethality and on-hit builds weaker but still playable.
Will Riot change Master Yi again in Patch 12.5
But now, Master Yi has taken the plunge in solo queue. The nerfs have caused the champion win rate to slide to just under 30 percent in Diamond or higher ranks, and around 41 percent in Silver.
If the 20 percentage point decline doesn't seem like such a shocker, consider how these new stats have rapidly changed after just a few days of the hotfix going live, yet the entire average Patch 12.5 win rate has already slipped—that means Master Yi is losing drastically to pull the previously high rate to such a low figure.
Riot devs could try and change Yi again to stave the bleeding. But they might also choose to wait it out until Patch 12.6, set to go live by March 30. So far the League of Legends team hasn't given any indication that they'll be buffing the Bladesman, so Yi mains might have to rely on their mastery and other solo queue players will likely now pivot to other champions before the next patch.
