Gamechangers: Fervor of Battle's Impact on League of Legends
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13 Jan 18

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Gamechangers: Fervor of Battle's Impact on League of Legends

Let’s take a look at one of League’s most popular masteries: Fervor of Battle.

Keystones are something all players are familiar with but how important are they? To answer this question let’s take a look at one of League’s most popular masteries: Fervor of Battle.

Fervor of Battle has gone through many iterations over the course of its lifetime but recently was altered in a way that changed it on a fundamental level. It’s interaction with certain champion put them on par with others and gave a few competitive viability they wouldn’t otherwise have. Since the changes, some champions have suffered greatly, but if it’s just one mastery why is it so good?

The History

Fervor’s original form allowed champions to stack it with both basic attacks and abilities on both champions and minions. It had a maximum of 10 stacks which added 1 – 8 Damage per Hit to a champion's attacks. This meant champions that could safely stack it from range or those who had low cooldown abilities could get it to max stacks easily. Since the stacks did not fall off so long as a champion remained in combat it could create some potentially unwanted situations.

The mastery was problematic at first. Champions like Gnar could abuse their range to maintain stacks while champions such as Jax, Irelia, and Nidalee could abuse attack resets and low cooldown abilities to drastically increase their damage. Inevitably, Fervor was nerfed which brought about the rise of Grasp of the Undying and Thunderlord's Decree.

Fervor remained nerfed from Path 5.24 to 6.1 where it was buffed slightly to allow champions with high attack speed to take full advantage of it. Fervor was already doing well due to the nerfs to Thunderlord's Decree but this change pushed it back into the meta. It would later be changed heavily in 6.22 and 6.24 which altered the fundamental function of the mastery which affected many champion's choice of keystone.

The Breakdown

Fervor of Battle's most stable iteration was introduced in 6.12 with the following effects:

  • Increases damage on attacks by 0.9 - 13.99, based on Champion level.
  • Completing a basic attack or ability cast on an enemy champion grants one stack.
  • Eight maximum stacks.

This version of the mastery was used primarily on Marksmen and Duelists. Champions such as Vayne, Tristana, Master Yi, Irelia, Jax, and Kayle all made excellent use of this mastery but only five of them had Fervor as their primarily chosen Keystone: Jax, Irelia, Kayle, Tristana, and Master Yi. We will be examining these champion's overall winrates, kills per game, gold per game, and other statistics both before and after patch 6.22, the patch that changed Fervor heavily.

In 6.24 Fervor was changed to the following:

  • No longer grants a stack on ability damage (negative change)
  • Stack count was increased from 8 to 10 (negative change)
  • Grants 1-6 ATTACK DAMAGE per stack based on level (this is huge, we'll get to it later)
  • Stack duration reduced to 4 from 6 seconds (negative change)

In the end the Fervor changes were a net nerf and a harsh one at that. The stack duration decrease hurt champions who liked to zone their opponents and the stack count increase meant it took longer to reach peak effectiveness.

The Facts

Master Yi

The first champion to examine is Master Yi. Yi relied heavily on Fervor due to his high attack speed and overall synergy with on-hit damage. This combined with the fact that Yi typically went full DPS or bruiser and wanted long drawn out fights meant Fervor was an excellent choice for him. In 6.21 Yi experienced several bugfixes and QoL buffs that shot his winrate up to a stable 49.49% as reported by champion.gg. The following patch, 6.22, is where the Fervor of Battle changes hit. With the overall nerf to Fervor Yi's winrate dropped by almost two percent. Even after the Fervor buffs in 6.24, Yi still hasn't fully recovered which is likely due to a slight shift in the meta.

Irelia

Objectively speaking, Irelia is a very interesting champion. She is versatile with a lot of excellent options: You can build tank or DPS, you can peel or dive, you can farm or go for kills. Fervor has always been good on Irelia but Thunderlord's and Grasp also competed for that spot (and Courage of the Colossus is definitely not bad on her either). She is a champion that handles meta changes and nerfs or buffs with grace so it's no surprise the Fervor changes didn't affect her as much as the Wuju Master. Pre-6.22, Irelia enjoyed a comfortable 51.86% winrate played top lane. When 6.22 hit, her winrate was barely impacted at all; only a 0.68% difference! Her winrate further dropped to 50.43 in 6.23 due to the meta shifting a bit, but as soon as 6.24 hit, she was back to her old form at a 51.37% winrate. Overall, she wasn't impacted much at all compared to our next contender.

Jax

Jax really saw the worst of the changes, which is surprising for a master like him. After a slowly declining winrate from approximately 53.5% in 6.18 to just under 50% in 6.21 Jax was down on his luck. 6.22 hit and really kicked the guy while he was down, further dropping him to a 48% winrate! A lot of this was due to Jax's declining relevance in the meta but the Fervor changes were the final nail in the coffin. Our Grand Master is seeing a slow return in 6.24 but for now it looks like the Champ is taking a break.

Tristana

Tristana is one of those champions with a fairly low playrate so winrate percentages can really tell a story. The Fervor changes didn't hit her nearly as hard as everyone thought they would. In fact, her winrate rose in 6.22 from 49% to 50%! This is an interesting change and has implications regarding the nature of the Fervor changes but that's a discussion for later. Just know that our explosive happy scout is doing fine, squeezing out a 50.3% winrate in 6.24.

Kayle

Kayle, like Tristana, has a fairly low playrate at approximately 2%. She is extremely versatile, capable of building just about anything, and this is somewhat true for keystones as well. Kayle will see a bit more in depth discussion than some of the previous champions due to the author's extreme bias.

Fervor was and is the primarily chosen keystone on Kayle. A few niche Kayle mains would also take Thunderlord's Decree when going for heavy AP builds but Fervor is undoubtedly the best choice for mainstream Kayle builds, mostly due to their high attack speed. 6.22 brought Kayle's winrate down a tiny amount, only a 1% difference. This is a perfect example of why winrates don't always tell the whole truth. Kayle wasn't hugely impacted by the changes but it did force a slightly different playstyle. Kayle's early damage relied heavily on the on-hit damage from Fervor and with that gone and changed to AD we saw a decrease in early laning DPS. This forced a slight playstyle change and matchups that were previously easy were now medium difficulty.

Still, Kayle perseveres and is currently sitting at a higher winrate than pre-6.22: a whopping 55% (that's the highest toplane winrate in the game right now). This is partially due to her low playrate but also because of the shifting meta where Kayle thrives. Overall the Fervor changes were only a hiccup for The Judicator.


The Big One

After looking at the facts it would seem that Fervor of Battle's changes had almost no effect on the champions that took it. In fact, some of them even have higher winrates than before! There is one interesting anomaly that spawned from the data, however, and that is the Tristana winrate change.

Tristana saw a decent jump from 6.21 to 6.22, something none of the other champions experienced. Did our little yordle girl find some magical hidden secret? No. She's just an AD Carry.

The biggest change to Fervor and the reason why it wasn't truly a net nerf is the fact that instead of on-hit damage it now gives attack damage. This means that Fervor's overall effectiveness is now not only increased with attack speed but with critical hit chance and critical hit damage as well! Marksmen are eating Fervor up as it is a massive increase to overall DPS, though it still has to compete with Warlord's Bloodlust which is another excellent mastery for our beloved AD Carries.


The Final Verdict

Although Fervor isn't quite as good on some champions now, it's still a great keystone to use! Virtually none of the champions that took it pre-6.22 were affected much and, with the changes to it in 6.24, it is now a well-rounded and balanced mastery. Plenty of marksmen are loving the changes while it is still being used by Kayle and Irelia mains everywhere.

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