As it turns out, I was dead wrong about the deceive bug. The skill is currently working as intended, dealing 140 percent of your base damage at rank one and scaling up. It does seem a little silly that you don’t get to a regular crit level of damage until rank four, but then again I seem to fare pretty well with Shaco so maybe I shouldn’t complain.

I do miss the days of two-shotting any caster that looked at me funny.

I’ve said plenty of times that I love Shaco. That frenetic, crazy playstyle just suits me. I’m also in love with all the control Shaco brings to the map. He is one of few characters that has a very easy time dealing with Warwick by himself in the early game.

Unfortunately Shaco is also fraught with bugs. The most current is one that shows up time and time again. Deceive isn’t granting the proper amount of bonus damage. Instead of dealing critical damage (200% of your base) + a bonus 40 percent at rank one, it’s only dealing base damage +40 percent. That sucks. A lot. It takes him from being one of the strongest early game characters to a fairly mediocre pile of excrement for the first ten minutes. His jungling potential is still there, and once you get a Madred’s you’ll hardly notice the difference, but as an avid Shaco fan I’m hoping they fix this one relatively soon. He’s so well-dressed now, how could you not want him to be a real contender again.

There it is, all shiny looking. It’s not the milestone 1000th, but it’s fun to see each hundred go by. They’ve all been different, and my focus has been on completely different toons. For this one, I’ve made my rounds back to Shaco, and I’m finally getting back into his playstyle. And damn if that clown isn’t fun.

The only unfortunate thing is that the big 900 is that it’s sandwiched between a load of losses. In fact, I’ve only won two games out of my last ten, which is a rough way to go. The good in all of it, though, is that I’ve pulled some nice records despite the losses. It’s been a fun way to change my focus in the games – trying to perform well, even exceptionally well, in the face of defeat. At the very least it’s a great way to start to prepare for Season One.

For the data freaks, I have losses at 14-7 (Kat), 16-4 (Shaco), and 12-4 (Shaco). Oddly enough I have just two losses in which I had a negative K/D ratio, and in both games it was by just one death. I think I can live with that.

I’ve been a part of a popular thread on the test realm forums regarding Shaco bugs. If you haven’t played Shaco recently you might not want to start. As fun a character as he is, he’s horribly buggy right now, sometimes to the point of breaking the game.

As a for instance, I was running down a Kat the other day on TT. I had just given her a nice burst to put her at 10 percent health or less. A simple deceive and maybe a two-shiv and she was done. Nothing stood between us but a wide open lane. I press Q, click up next to her and…I go nowhere and stay visible. My deceive cooldown starts and I stare at my computer with a sad dejected look. We still haven’t nailed down why this happens but it’s happened a few times for me and others.

The big one, though, is deceive damage. When deceive allows you to port and stealth it’s not dealing proper damage. I first noticed it when I was attack creeps on Twisted Treeline. I had approximately 155 damage and was deceive critting minions for around 330 damage, almost exactly the 200 percent crit plus the 10 percent damage from the offensive mastery without the bonus 120 percent damage that should be applied by level 5 deceive.

Shurelia has confirmed an upcoming hotfix for this, likely on Monday. It was supposed to have been in today but it got pushed back because of some technical issues.

Patch notes are up on the Test Realm forum for the Ezreal rollout and I’ll say it, I’m scared. I was mostly excited for the last patch, but the XP system blew chunks and that queue dodge penalty is the worst thing to happen to the game since Nidalee. There are a few diamonds in the rough, though, and I’m hoping they will be enough to carry me through.

First, Shaco is getting a massive nerf. Deceive damage is down 10% at all levels, Jack in the Box damage scales more slowly and has its AP ratio decreased, and, the whopper, throwing Two-Shiv while stealthed breaks you out. It’s not clear whether that removes your crit damage bonus – my hope is that it doesn’t – but it’s possible. You might notice that none of this makes him any more viable for the late game, which is most players’ complaint.

Then there’s Nidalee. I’m personally of the opinion that she needs the kind of nerf Shaco received. Unfortunately, Riot didn’t contact me regarding the matter, so she’s getting a tiny nerf and a little buff. Primal Surge now has its mana cost increased by 5 per level instead of the flat 50. Can I just say that this is in no way a nerf. By the time you reach the max rank, most players have more than enough mana to cover the difference, particularly if they’re going AP build. Which reminds me, AP Nidalee just got a fat buff. Javelin Toss AP ratio is up to 55% from 40%. The other change is reducing her passive to 15% move speed from 25%. Really, though, that’s not the issue with Nidalee’s escapability. It’s the fact that you can spam Pounce, which, when coupled with the brush bonus, makes her extremely difficult to kill. They could take it down to 8% and she would still probably get out of most situations.

Twisted Fate got enough changes to make him a lot less frustrating to play against and probably more overall fun. His new passive, Loaded Dice, grants TF’s team an extra 2 gold per kill. It’s actually worse than Second Sight in my mind, but not such a problem. Gate is gone. In its place is Stacked Deck, which is basically a built in Sword of the Divine. Every fourth attack deals magic damage that scales by level, affected by ability power. It also increases his attack speed and reduces cooldowns. He’s another in the latest string of toons that will benefit in big ways from Guinsoo’s. The new skill is obviously severely overpowered, but a slight nerf should bring it in line. Gate is now built into Destiny, allowing you to teleport anywhere on the map though it no longer slows. Overall, I think it’s a good change, and will actually make him a lot more fun.

There are some other minor changes, including a slight buff to the XP system (50% of a level’s XP for same level champion kills instead of 40%) , but most of them shouldn’t change the game much. The XP system will still likely too heavily prioritize farming, but it just might be enough to discourage a lot of 5-man while encouraging some push. Honestly, though, ganking is what makes the game fun. Almost no amount of XP nerfing will make me want to stop.