LoR Ladder News: The Spice Must Flow!
Not too many changes at the top of the LoR Meta… but Samira Varus, Gnar Norra, Annie Jhin, and Celesbians may have something to say about that.
There haven't been many movements since last Tuesday among the Top Dogs of the Runeterra Ladder;
… so, today, let's instead focus on the ascending, hot spice!
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The Spice Must Flow!
Two of these four decks (namely Gnar Norra and Samira Varus) have been performing well for long enough to assume they are not flukes – and they are punching so hard right now, that they may actually be Top Dog contenders.
The other two (Annie Jhin, and Leona Diana) seem to have found their footing and, like Deep or Lurkers, may be old decks willing to make a strong return.
Samira Varus, ft. Riven
If you're looking for punchy, spicy new stuff, then this is it!
It took some time and meta shifts (the first Riven Sammy Varus experiments, with poor results on the first Sunday this patch, weren't too far from the current best versions), but by current numbers brewers are fairly close to cracking the code here…
Samira Varus, ft. Riven – Link to full deck list
Samira Varus – Link to full deck list
… with nearly identical Follower count, and most differences between the two best-performing decks found in their Spell spread.
Both versions show great performance: a crazy 59% win rate in nearly 1,000 games for the Riven variant, and nearly 59% across 700+ games in the non-Riven version.
The archetype is still polluted with bad builds, so matchup data is hard to parse – it looks like Ashe LeBlanc is not too good news (above all for the Riven version), while Karma Sett and Fizz Samira appear as slightly favored matchups.
And, in Tournament settings, top pilots such as Leer are considering bringing Samira Varus as their Samira option for the Runeterra Open.
(As a side note: there's a Bandle City version of Samira Riven, going low-ground and super aggressive, but it's doing awful; it has nothing to do with the Varus version).
Annie Jhin
Yes, it very much looks like bullet buff and blazing brat are back! =)
With some early showings last Saturday, and credible numbers last Tuesday, Annie Jhin has finally done the thing (it changed a couple of cards, at long last!), and will probably bring tears of joy to fans of old-school, classic Discard Aggro: Augmented Experimenter is back in the game!
Annie Jhin – Link to full deck list
Annie Jhin's current best deck sits at nearly 800 games played in a three-day window (with play rate growing 60% in the last couple of days) and with a great 55% win rate – and its matchup spread is quite interesting: seemingly very favored against LoR ladder overladies Ashe and LeBlanc, demolishes Malphite Taliyah, has a tiny edge against Samira Fizz, and it would seem it has a very good odds against other popular ladder options like Galio Udyr and Aatrox decks.
Leona Samira is a problem, though, and it seems Illaoi Jarvan is a pretty rough matchup.
Gnar Norra
Frequent readers of these articles are probably in the know, but here is the best Norra deck (outperforming by huge margins her partnerships with Veigar, Senna, or Heimer):
Gnar Norra – Link to full deck list
Amazing 57% win rate in about 700 games in the last three days and, with minor tweaks, Gnar Norra has been steadily gaining traction since more than a week.
One thing to note, though, is that our cute Yordles are a bit of a roller-coaster brew (or a "polarizing" deck, if you will): Ashe LeBlanc, Leona Samira, Gwen Quinn, and Lurkers, you'll probably steamroll – Karma Sett or Maokai Nautilus, get ready to get thoroughly squashed.
But as long as you don't mind a deck with very high highs, and very low lows, Gnar Norra is a very spicy brew to look into.
You can also swap Gnar for Swain, if you prefer – it's actually a slightly more popular deck, and quite good (packs a nice 53% punch), but thus far the stats convincingly point at Gnar here.
Celesbians, aka Diana Leona
Now, trade carefully here!
We have only about 500 games in the last three days, and this deck reemerged very recently – it was performing badly last Tuesday, and it only started getting traction two days ago on Thursday.
On other hand, though, Diana Leona is a tried-and-true pairing, that had its chance to shine bright several patches ago – like Deep or Lurkers since the patch landed, and now Annie Jhin, this may be a pre-rotation survivor about to return with a vengeance.
Diana Leona – Link to full deck list
As noted, data is very scarce – thus far, Diana Leona seems to thoroughly beat Karma Sett, shows good odds against Leona Samira, has a small edge versus Samira Fizz, and struggles uphill against Ashe LeBlanc and Deep.
Top-End LoR Decks
If you're looking for top-shelf options, here are the most popular decks in Runeterra with win rates above 51% (note that we are looking at specific decks, not whole archetypes):
As noted above, there haven't been many changes at the top of the LoR meta since last Tuesday, with the exception of Annie Caitlyn (and Caitlyn decks in general) losing a lot of steam – you can find the best version and details about most of these decks in the article below:
Wrapping Up
As noted, the top of the Runeterra ladder hasn't seen too many changes…
… but we'll see what the up-and-comers have to say about the matter, above all since they all have at least one good matchup against the current rulers of the LoR meta.
Hope you've enjoyed today's spice, and good luck out there! =)
RIWAN is free, and ad-free (except I guess this block right here =).
We’re passion-fueled — but an extra cup of coffee always helps!
If you like what we’re doing and would like to support us, here’s our Tip Jar:
… THANKS!! 😄
... and if you need data about any deck you're curious about, just let me know! =)