Massive Olaf updates hit the League of Legends PBE patch 12.8 cycle: Berserker Rage changes, Ragnarok tweaks, and more

Olaf is getting a massive mid-scope update which is scheduled to go live with League of Legends patch 12.9.

However, Riot will be testing out the new changes from the patch 12.8 cycle itself, and players will be able to try out the latest tweak to his kit for a week before it disappears from the PBE and reappears after 12.8 officially drops and the 12.9 cycle begins.

Olaf will be receiving a plethora of changes this time around as the League of Legends developers look to address some of the urgent issues that players have been facing with the Berserker.

In a recent tweet and a subsequent Reddit post, League of Legends’ lead champion designer Riot August shared some of the changes that players can look forward to when the updates arrive on the test server.

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All Olaf updates expected to make their way to League of Legends patch 12.9

Riot August suggested that one of the main objectives behind Olaf’s mid-scope update is to improve his consistency in the Season 12 meta. The developer suggested that in solo-queue, Olaf has consistently had one of the lowest win rates for quite a while, and the proposed changes will look to give him a bit of quality of life, making him a more viable option in the Jungle and the Top lane.

August also stated that Olaf is a:

“Deeply pro-bound champion: his win rate is kept lower than would otherwise be ideal because he tends to take over pro play when his kit is tuned to win games in Solo Queue. And he’s been deeply impacted by systems changes this season, even more so than other fighters, putting him in particularly bad shape with the current item system.”

He further added:

“With these problems in mind, the goals for this update are to add significant excitement to his kit, remove a bit of pro-oriented power (reduce how easily he escapes dangerous situations with his R as well as curb how fast his jungle clear can get when perfectly optimized.) Lastly, this update should help him use Juggernaut items effectively to scale better than before, which should also make him more resilient to future systems changes.”

The League of Legends Olaf updates will not be a straight-up buff, but rather changes will be made to almost the entirety of his kit to make him balanced and give him more agency in both the Jungle and the Top lane.

It’s important to note that the updates listed below are tentative and might not entirely reflect in the official update.

The Olaf tweaks will first hit the League of Legends PBE later today as the developers will be testing the changes out before shipping it off with the official patch.

Base Stats

• Attack Damage :: 68 (+3.5/level), 127.5 at level 18 >>> 68 (+4.7/level), 148 at level 18
• Health :: 575 (+100/level), 2275 at level 18 >>> 575 (+105/level), 2360 at level 18
• Mana :: 316 (+42/level), 1030 at level 18 >>> 316 (+60/level), 1336 at level 18

Passive - Berserker Rage

• Calculation reworked to grant max effectiveness at or below 30% health
• Maximum Attack Speed granted :: 99% >>> 40-100% (levels 1-18)
• [NEW] Now gives up to 12-35% life steal (levels 1-18), based on Olaf's missing health

Q - Undertow

• [NEW] - Shreds 25/27.5/30/32.5/35% armor for 4 seconds on champion hit
• Damage :: 80/125/170/215/260 >>> 60/110/160/210/260
• Minimum Range :: Approximately 300 >>> 425
• Mana Cost :: 60 at all ranks >>> 40/45/50/55/60
• Cooldown :: 7 seconds >>> 8 seconds
• Cooldown refund on axe pickup :: 4.5 seconds >>> 5 seconds

W - Vicious Strikes [REWORKED]

• (ability may be renamed)
• [NEW] Resets Olaf’s basic attack
• [NEW] Olaf gains 70/115/160/205/250 (+25% of Olaf’s missing health) as a shield for 2.5 seconds
• [REMOVED] No longer grants Life Steal
• [REMOVED] No longer amplifies Olaf’s healing based on missing health
• Attack Speed :: 50/60/70/80/90% for 6 seconds >>> 40/50/60/70/80% for 4 seconds
• Cooldown :: 16 seconds at all ranks>>> 16/14.5/13/11.5/10 seconds

R - Ragnarok

• [NEW] Hitting a champion with a basic attack or E - Reckless Swing extends the duration of Ragnarok to 2.5 seconds. Olaf can refresh Ragnarok indefinitely.
• Duration :: 6 seconds >>> 3 seconds
• [REMOVED] R - Ragnarok's passive's bonus resistances are no longer lost for the duration of the cast