In League of Legends, the first new champion was released in 2025, and fans of Arcane will already know her. However, right at the start, she seems to have been somewhat too strong. After just 2 days, a nerf followed.
Who is the new champion? With Mel Medarda, a new champion was released in the Rift on January 23, 2025. Fans of Arcane know her as the daughter of Ambessa Medarda, who is already in the game. In the game, Mel is a mage who brings interesting abilities:
- Passive Ability: With each ability, Mel gains 3 bonus projectiles for her next attack, stacking up to a value of 9. Whenever she deals damage, Overwhelm is triggered. The damage scales cumulatively. If an opponent has taken enough damage from
Overwhelm
, Mel can consume the stacks and execute the opponent. - Q Ability: Mel fires multiple projectiles that deal damage repeatedly in an area.
- W Ability: Mel gains movement speed and a shield that can reflect each projectile from opponents.
- E Ability: Mel fires a larger projectile that can root and slow enemies in the surrounding area. This counts as a root and not a stun.
- Ultimate: All enemies, regardless of distance, marked by
Overwhelm
, take damage based onOverwhelm
stacks. When you level up the Ultimate, herOverwhelm
damage also increases.
This sounds like a pretty solid kit that also works quite successfully. The launch was probably a bit too successful, as Mel received a nerf in the form of a hotfix after just 2 days.
Mel is probably too strong and gets nerfed immediately
How successful is Mel? Many new champions are not particularly good upon release – based on the statistics. This is because players need to familiarize themselves with the abilities and playstyle first. That was the case with Hwei or Smolder.
With Mel, it looks quite different. If you look at her statistics on U.GG, you’ll see that she is quite successful.
- Based on all ranks, she has a solid win rate of 50.84% on the mid lane with over 111,000 matches (as of January 26, 2025, 11:30 AM).
- She has a pick rate of 13.8%.
- However, players don’t seem very eager to play her, as her ban rate is at 43%, the highest currently, which is quite normal for new champions.
That she has such a win rate despite the lack of player experience is probably not entirely planned. At least according to the nerfs that were patched as a hotfix on January 25, 2025. They nerfed the damage of her passive, her ultimate, and her Q.
On the LoL developer account on X, they said: Mel currently exceeds expectations by a large margin, as we apparently overestimated her mastery curve and underestimated the learning curve for playing against her.
Whether Mel will continue to perform this well will be seen in the coming days. The next regular patch is expected on February 5, 2025.
The community wants to ban her
What does the community say about Mel? In a recent Reddit thread, the user Temporary-Platypus80 explains that he bans Mel every match as long as she is not the first pick in his team. He thinks she is way too strong, and by doing so, he would increase the chances of winning.
With over 5,300 upvotes and over 800 comments, he gets a lot of support:
- For many users, the problem lies mainly in her W ability and the ability to reflect projectiles. This is also true for tTensai (via Reddit):
As long as there is the revolution of abilities, I will ban her.
- Crimsonavenger2000 (via Reddit) raises concerns about the win rate:
I have only fought against her once, so I can’t say what I think of her state, but has any champion ever achieved 52% [win rate] in the release patch?
- MRChesey (via Reddit) questions why she is being banned outside of ranked matches:
A new champ is released, people want to play normals to try her out, everyone bans her. They jump into ranked, see that she’s not banned, and pick her only to feed.
But these are of course just impressions from the first days. It can take a few weeks for a new champion to fully integrate into the game. However, such a high win rate is already a sign. Another current champion, Aurora, was so good with professionals that she had to be changed: LoL: A new champion has to be changed in less than 6 months because professionals are just too good
