Another patch day is upon us, bringing another ninja to your summoner’s pane in the form of Kennen, the Heart of the Tempest. As with every patch, there’s a host of balance changes and tweaks along with the usual skin release and random audio updates.

First, let’s talk Kennen. I’m pretty excited about him, though he probably won’t hit his stride for a couple weeks. There was more active discussion on the test realm forums about his AP ratios and skillset than I’ve seen for any of the other recent heroes so I’ll be curious to see where he ends up. For now it seems he’s somewhere in the middle of the pack with regard to viability. His ult needs some considerable work to be truly powerful (personally I say drop the CD down to Ryze levels and he’s good).

Jax is finally catching a nerf, though not to his obscene survivability. His AP ratios have been lowered across the board, which is a good thing. Unfortunately, Ninja Tabi got a small buff to both armor and dodge and Phantom Dancer caught a dodge/movespeed buff as well. I see more scary AD Jax players in my immediate future.

Other than that things mostly remained the same. Anivia got a small movespeed buff, Ryze got a little nerf, and Janna caught some much-needed love with a slightly tweaked ult to include a slow for targets who reenter the heal and some mana efficiency improvements. The Item Shop UI has been tweaked and several items have been changed, perhaps the most significant of which is Haunting Guise, which now gives lifesteal on spell damage.

Overall I think this should be a pretty sweet patch. I’ve got 7300 IP banked for the Kennen purchase and 3900 RP to spend on some new skins. Hello, Swamp Master Yod…err…Kennen.

It’s time for another “state of” post, but this one is a little scarier. The subject here is Jax, one of the most hotly contested toons in the game right now. I wanted to give a quick look at some of his potential problems and what the future may hold.

First, Jax is undeniably strong. In my opinion, he’s too strong. His passive is among the best in the game (if not the best by a long shot) and his skills deal incredible damage. He can be extremely difficult to bring down in a teamfight, particularly the new 3v3 game and he can easily solo entire teams if he gets even a moderate level of farm.

The big problem with Jax is that he gets too much benefit from every item. While most characters have to make choices like survivability vs. damage output, Jax gets everything in one tidy little package. Want to go physical damage? Great, have some free health. AP? Awesome, have some free health. In fact, the worst items you can get for Jax are health items. Why would you when you can boost your damage output and your survivability in one fell swoop.

The other problem is the way his damage scales. As though the health bonus weren’t enough, Jax has insane AP ratios. With even 100 AP his Empower -> Leap Strike combo takes huge chunks of health. You just better hope that next attack isn’t a relentless assault proc or you’re as good as dead.

Jax does have a weakness, though: mages. Jax is susceptible to snares and stuns, despite the fact that most Jax players take cleanse. Because mages don’t rely on physical attacks their damage isn’t stymied by dodge chance. It is possible to blow Jax up in one fell swoop but you better do it fast. If he gets close to you it’s probably going to be a four shot.