The May 13 balance changes landed right before Brawl Cup, which is basically the funniest possible time to ask everyone for calm, reasonable meta takes.
This patch does move things. Damian got real damage taken away, Sirius lost a noticeable chunk of health, and Griff got a "bug fix" that is secretly one of the bigger nerfs in the whole update.
But if you were hoping this was the patch where Damian stops being first-ban material, I would not get too comfortable.
The ranked meta is probably healthier now. Probably.
Damian still looks like the guy everyone is going to complain about in chat.
Damian: Nerfed, But Still Probably Broken
Damian got the longest list of changes, and some of them are not small.
If you want the raw patch notes, Supercell has the full list of balance changes.
Fire Punch (which is the explosion damage of his third attack) went from 1200 to 1000, so that is 16.7% off that part of his damage. His charged hit also dropped from 2400 to 2000, another 16.7% cut. Since the first three 1400 hits stayed the same, his full 3-attack combo went from 7800 to 7200, which is 600 less total damage, or about a 7.7% burst nerf. Arena damage went from 5 to 3, which is a 40% cut, but honestly we have no idea what that even means.
His Super charge rate also dropped from 75 to 60, and the Super charge he gets from explosions was reduced. On top of that, the explosion delay got doubled.
Then, because this patch apparently needed to be weird, his Hypercharge rate went from 20 to 35. So he actually gets Hypercharge a bit easier now.
These nerfs should not matter a lot in ranked. In PLP's current data, Damian is sitting around a 63-64% average win rate, which is just stupid. After this patch, we expect him to land closer to an average win rate of ~58%, worst case.
That is a big drop, but it still makes him the number one brawler by a pretty comfortable margin. He is definitely still S-Tier on our competitive tier list!
His use rate is the more annoying part to predict. Normally, a nerf this obvious would make people play him less, but Damian is still new enough that more players are unlocking him, maxing him, and figuring out how free some of his pressure is. So instead of his use rate falling hard, we expect it to stay roughly the same for now.
The biggest interaction change is that some brawlers who should have been decent into Damian might finally get to play the matchup like normal humans.
The biggest winners are Clancy, Edgar, and Shade. Clancy becomes a much better Damian answer now that he can survive the combo and punish Damian's engage instead of getting erased before the matchup starts. Edgar also gets a lot more comfortable into him, which is scary because Edgar was already strong in ranked and this gives him another favorable pressure matchup. Shade is notably better too; surviving the burst gives him more time to abuse walls, stall Damian's pressure, and turn the fight around.
His two biggest theoretical counters, Cordelius and Otis, are mostly unaffected by the raw damage breakpoint. Cordelius is still below 7200 HP, and Otis sits exactly at 7200, so both can still die if Damian lands the full combo. They still matter because Cordelius can isolate him and Otis can shut down his chain potential, but this nerf does not make those specific matchups much safer through raw survivability.
It means Damian players have to be slightly less brainless.
His best modes should still be Hot Zone and Brawl Ball. Those modes let him force awkward fights, trap people around the objective, and punish teams for standing anywhere near each other. In Gem Grab, Hard Rock Mine still looks like the map where he can be especially gross because the fights naturally collapse into tight spaces around mid.
The explosion delay change is also more complicated than it looks. On paper, enemies have more time before the explosions go off, so yeah, that is a nerf. In real games, marked players now have to avoid drifting into their teammates for twice as long, and perhaps the most overlooked part of this change, is that this delay further delays enemy brawler health regeneration, keeping them from participating in the next skirmish for slightly longer.
So he got worse... barely. The main change is that he's going to be trapping brawlers with his super, and chaining those supers, slightly less.
Sirius: This One Feels More Like a Ladder Nerf
Sirius lost HP, going from 7400 to 6800 at max level.
That is an 8.1% health nerf.
In base stats, it is 3700 to 3400, which sounds smaller until you start looking at all the close trades he was barely surviving before.
Our current PLP number has Sirius at a 51.61% average win rate with a 13.91% use rate. After the nerf, we expect the win rate to land around 51.0%.
So the win rate probably does not crater.
The use rate is where I expect the community to overreact. We have him dropping closer to 8% use, not because he is suddenly bad, but because players are going to see an HP nerf, assume he is cooked, and stop picking him early.
That is probably too harsh.
The nerf mostly hits his comfort level. Sirius has less room to survive close trades, hold space while getting pressured, and stabilize when the enemy comp can force him to spend resources early.
Before, he could take some pretty greedy positions and still get out. Now, if he walks into a bad lane or gets pinched before he sets up value, he is going to feel the missing HP fast.
That matters more in draft than it does on paper.
Sirius was already more of a strong A tier pick than a "first-pick this every game" brawler. This probably pushes him away from early comfort picks and more toward late-pick situations where the matchup is clean.
For Brawl Cup, I would not be surprised if teams underrate him a bit after the nerf.
Not dead.
Just less automatic.
Griff: The Quiet Bug Fix That Was Actually Huge
Griff's change was not framed like a normal balance change, but it might end up being one of the most important lines in the patch.
Apparently, Griff's Super had a bug since 2024 where it dealt maximum damage at point blank instead of minimum damage.
That got fixed.
At max level, his point-blank Super damage basically went from 7200 to 3600.
That is a 50% damage loss in the exact situation where Griff was bailing himself out the hardest.
This is why the change is bigger than it sounds. Griff used to delete assassins for breathing too close to him. If you jumped onto him, there was a pretty good chance you just exploded before you got to finish the job.
Now those matchups are way less free.
Assassins and close-range pressure actually get to ask Griff a question again. He still has tools, and Piggy Bank is still great, but he cannot just mash Super at point blank and expect the interaction to disappear.
Our current PLP data has Griff at a 49.11% average win rate with a massive 29.34% use rate. After this fix, we expect his win rate to fall about 1 percentage point, landing around ~48%.
The use rate should drop harder, probably closer to 20%.
And 20% is still really high.
That tells you what kind of brawler Griff is. The win rate is not the whole story because teams pick him for a job: open the map, bully tanks, make certain lanes easier to play, and give your comp a real answer into beefy stuff.
He still does that.
He is just less safe as a panic answer into every close-range threat. That is the part that changes.
Less "pick Griff and chill."
More "pick Griff because the matchup actually makes sense."
So What Actually Changes?
The short version: this patch trims the dumbest parts of the meta, but it does not flip the table.
Damian probably drops from absurd to still absurd. A fall from around 63-64% to ~57% would be a huge nerf for almost any brawler, but he was starting from such a ridiculous place that he can lose a lot and still be the best pick in the room.
Sirius probably gets picked less than he deserves for a bit. The HP nerf matters, but the projected use-rate fall from 13.91% to around 8% feels more like community panic than a full competitive collapse.
Griff becomes less safe, especially into assassins, but he is not disappearing. If his use rate falls from 29.34% to around 20%, that still means people are drafting him constantly.
For Brawl Cup, I would expect:
Damian still won't be playable since he's too new.
Sirius showing up less often, maybe too much less.
Griff still appearing a bit, but with less blind confidence into close-range pressure.
So yeah, the ranked meta got healthier... a little... but competitive shouldn't be changed much.