update · August 12, 2026

Deadlock August 12 Update Shakes Up McGinnis and Drifter

The latest Deadlock update targets balance across the roster with specific nerfs to McGinnis and Drifter alongside adjustments for Apollo, Billy, and Doorman. Key tweaks modify scaling, base stats, and ability cooldowns to shift team fight dynamics.

Deadlock's August 12 patch brings widespread balance tweaks to multiple heroes, targeting problem spots in weapon scaling, cooldowns, and base attributes. Heroes like McGinnis and Drifter receive notable downward adjustments, while others see structural changes to their kit utility.

Hero Nerfs and Scaling Reductions

McGinnis takes heavy hits across multiple categories, including a 5% reduction to base bullet damage and growth values, plus a drop in spirit resistance per boon from +0.625% to +0.35%. Her Mini Turrets no longer target zipline heroes or retain their initial 80% decaying resist, though their base health is bumped up to 100 plus 9 per boon. Drifter's Rend spirit scaling drops from 1.7 to 1.4, and Stalker's Mark cooldown increases to 26 seconds with a reduced T2 cooldown bonus. Other targeted nerfs include reduced bullet damage scaling for Wraith's Card Trick heart heal and Full Auto T3 spirit scaling.

Kit Reworks and Utility Shifts

Apollo's Riposte gets a mix of tweaks, increasing melee resist reduction to -25% while tying a +0.4s stun duration to its T2 upgrade and extending T3 lifesteal duration to 13 seconds. Billy's Rising Ram T3 now grants +10% max HP for 16 seconds on hero hit instead of flat spirit damage. Holliday's Powder Keg splits its damage output evenly between immediate impact and a 3-second damage-over-time burn. Doorman's doorway range drops to 65m, and his Walker targets no longer trigger stomps on Luggage Cart-dragged enemies until after they are dropped off.

Why this patch matters

This update pulls back the raw power of several dominant picks, forcing players to adapt to stricter cooldowns and less forgiving damage scalings.