After two days of reveals , Riot just showed what the next League of Legends champion, Taliyah , can do. She’s an earth mage that can throw rocks and affect the ground beneath her feet. Think of her like Toph from Avatar: The Last Airbender , except she can see.
Her passive gives her increased movement speed near walls. She jumps on a rock and traverses the edges of Summoner's Rift. Her kit is full of weird and unique interactions with the map around her, making her a deadly enemy when she’s played right. Plan to see a bunch of terrible Taliyah’s when she first gets released.
Taliyah’s first ability turns an area under her feet into “worked ground” that she moves faster on. She also throws five rocks in a targeted direction. The “worked ground” will stay for a few minutes, and if she casts the ability again on it, she throws another projectile. I can’t wait to try using her with Jarvan IV, the battlefield is going to look like Malphite with acne.
Her second ability is a bit like Vel’koz’s knock up with a longer delay. Taliyah picks a spot on the ground and after a delay knocks whoever is standing on it into the air. If she recasts it before it erupts, it will throw the enemy in any direction. Combine this with her Q and she has some serious burst potential.
For Taliyah’s third ability, she flips over a bunch of boulders on the field. After a delay, she does a large amount of burst damage to whoever is left standing on it. Enemies inside the field aren’t slowed, so it’s going to be hard to use this ability to damage champions. I can see it being used as wave clear and burst in teamfights. Taliyah has very little crowd control, which will be her biggest weakness. It’s hard to keep enemies inside your zones of damage when you have no way to keep them there.
Her ultimate may be the most ambitious and insane Riot has ever given a champion. She creates a wall on the Rift that she can glide on top of. This wall is massive, it can travel from the base all the way to the middle of mid lane. It’s the ultimate ganking tool; use your ultimate in the river and then gank bot lane, cutting off the enemies’ escape.
Without a doubt, Taliyah will be one the hardest mages in League of Legends to master. Her high burst and movement speed gives her ganking proficiency, but a lack of crowd control really punishes bad players. I’m curious to see if she gets played more in the jungle or in the mid lane, because she seems to be able to do both with ease.
