Garena pushed the 18 September patch and the balance list is the smaller half of it. It touches 15 heroes. The map got rebuilt.
There are 3 epic behemoths back in the Dragon Pit, a new Teleport talent, higher tower HP, and two new items. Your first 10 ranked games are going to feel unfamiliar. Here is who came out ahead and who got hit.
The biggest winners
Preyta is the headline. He has been a punchline for years, the mage whose passive did nothing. Garena rebuilt him around a stacking resource called Plague Energy that permanently evolves his kit as the game runs. At 25 stacks every normal attack becomes area damage. At 75 his Poison Gas Bomb gains range. At 145 he can cast his ultimate while moving, and a channelled ultimate you can walk with is a different skill entirely. He now works as a backline poke mage, or as an odd attack-speed "mage archer" off skill 1. I would not call him broken. He is playable for the first time in years, and heroes with brand new mechanics always over-perform for a week while the lobby learns the matchup.
PreytaRoxie got the largest raw numbers on the list. Blazing Shield went from 100 (+30/Lv) base damage to 180 (+36/Lv), and its shield from 100 (+60/Lv) to 250 (+50/Lv). That is a shield 2.5 times bigger at level 1, on a hero who already wants to stand in the middle of a fight. She has been C tier on most lists all season. She will not be next week.
RoxieAta got the treatment unloved tanks usually wait years for. Passive bonus damage went from a flat 10 (+1% Max HP) to 28~56 (+1% Max HP), Bounced is 0.5 seconds faster, and Rake Down's level scaling doubled from +15/Lv to +30/Lv. None of it is flashy. All of it is the gap between a tank who tickles and a tank you have to respect.
AtaKrizzix is the sleeper. Sneak Attack went from 160 (+12 per hero level) (+0.45MP) to 235 (+17 per hero level) (+0.55MP). Supports who poke for free are always strong in solo queue.
KrizzixYorn, Brunhilda, Eland'orr, Lauriel, Aleister, Baldum, Amily and D'Arcy all picked up smaller improvements that are still real. Yorn's is the sneaky one. Explosive Arrow and Hundred Barrage now both grant vision of what they hit, and on a marksman whose entire problem is getting jumped out of a bush, that is worth more than the damage tuning sitting next to it.
Yorn
Brunhilda
Eland'orr
Lauriel
Aleister
Baldum
Amily
D'ArcyThe biggest losers
Ryoma took the clearest hit. Pinwheel went from a flat 8 second cooldown to 10 (-0.4/Lv), and Spectral Ire lost base damage, 130 (+50/Lv) down to 110 (+55/Lv). Garena said the quiet part out loud in the design note: his early-to-mid tempo needed cooling off. At level 1 he is 2 full seconds slower on his main trading tool now. He is still fine late. He does not get to bully a lane for free anymore.
RyomaToro lost the top end of Battlecry, 200 (+40/Lv) (+4% Max HP) down to 180 (+36/Lv) (+3.5% Max HP). A small clip off a percent-HP nuke does not move him off the top of the tank lists. It does mean a full-build Toro no longer deletes a carry who steps one pixel too far forward.
ToroNatalya is labelled an adjustment and reads like one. Arcane Nova drops from 130 base to 100 while its scaling rises from +15/Lv to +20/Lv, and Lethal Rays goes from 120 (+30/Lv) to 100 (+50/Lv). She is weaker at level 4 and stronger at level 15. Most of her games end before level 15, so treat it as a nerf.
NatalyaThe map is the real patch
The Dragon Pit now rotates 3 epic monsters at the 15 minute mark, one of Infinite Slayer, Abyssal Dragon or Primordial Ape, with respawn cut from 210 to 180 seconds. At 20 minutes the behemoth is enhanced by the rift and cruises the river as the closing objective, and killing it summons 3 waves of Slayer Vanguard. Twin Dragons bites back now. Heroes with the Light and Dark synergy who attack it eat an enhanced Primordial Blast. Taking both dragons while ahead used to be free money. It is a coin flip now.
The new Teleport talent runs on a 90 second cooldown and sends you to any friendly structure, destroyed towers included, or to a creep. Split pushers just got much harder to answer. Tower HP also went up, first tower 6000 to 6500 and second 7500 to 7750, which slows the exact snowball games where the losing side surrenders at 12 minutes.
Two new items matter. Stealth Crossbow hands marksmen an active stealth with 30% movement speed and heavy regeneration. Radiant Round Shield gives tanks a repeatable shield for themselves and their lowest-health ally.
What This Means for the Meta
Tanks are the quiet winners here. Ata, Baldum and Roxie all got real buffs, Radiant Round Shield is a strong new defensive slot, and tougher towers mean games run long enough for frontliners to matter. The fast-tempo warriors who lived on ending at 15 minutes lost on both counts, Ryoma most of all.
For ranked, the advice is narrow. Learn where the Teleport talent breaks the map before your opponents do. That wins you more games this week than anything on the buff list.