Volibear Picked in Pro League of Legends Game

Volibear’s recent buffs helped the champion enough to the point that he’s now been picked at [...]

By Tanner Dedmon

Volibear's recent buffs helped the champion enough to the point that he's now been picked at least one time in a professional League of Legends match.

The thunderous bear was chosen by the Golden Guardians' jungler Juan "Contractz" Garcia during the North American team's match against Echo Fox. Contractz took Volibear to 4/4/14 score against Echo Fox's Joshua "Dardoch" Hartnett who played Zac with a score of 3/4/8. Both junglers were able to help secure several neutral objectives for the teams including two Barons, several dragons, and a Rift Herald, but Golden Guardians ultimately took the game away from the team that's No. 1 in the current NA LCS standings with 10 wins under Echo Fox's belt.

The Volibear pick was a surprising one for the pro game, though if you've been playing much solo queue lately, it might not be quite as surprising. Both Volibear's pick and win rates have risen after the release of Patch 8.4, the patch that pros are now playing on during the LCS matches as of this weekend. Still, the casters and audience met the quick Volibear lock-in with exclamations while referencing his rise in popularity and the buffs that made it possible.

If you've noticed the more frequent Volibear picks in normal games but didn't pay close attention to the patch notes for Patch 8.4, you may have missed the changes that made him viable once again. Those changes are outlined below for reference, the most notable ones being the decaying movement speed on his Rolling Thunder and the knockback on Majestic Roar.

Q - Rolling Thunder

  • BONUS MOVEMENT SPEED 15% ⇒ 15/17.5/20/22.5/25%
  • BONUS MOVEMENT SPEED TOWARDS CHAMPIONS 30/35/40/45/50% ⇒ 30/37.5/45/52.5/60%
  • [NEW] MASTER DRIFTER When Volibear changes direction (from "towards champions" to any other direction), his bonus movement speed now decays over 1 second rather than falling off immediately. In other words, dodging and weaving won't slow you down as much.

W - Frenzy

  • [NEW] HUNGRY BEAR Frenzy's cooldown is halved if it is used on a minion (in addition to monsters, as previously)

E - Majestic Roar

  • [NEW] ROAR Slightly knocks back enemies
  • [NEW] SWAT Enemies who are dashing or airborne (before Roar is cast) are dealt 40/60/80/100/120 (+0.3 ability power) additional magic damage
  • [BUGFIX] SCARY BEARY Summoned Rift Herald will now be terrified properly

This wasn't the first time that a newly worked-on champ was picked this week either. Earlier in the week in the LCK, the reworked Swain was picked in the matchup against KSV eSports and MVP. MVP's Kang "ADD" Geon-mo only got one kill and died once on Swain, but he utilized Swain's utility to amass 12 assists and ultimately help MVP win the game.

Trending Now: