Riot’s finally given us the details for the next champion to come through into the Summoners Rift, and it’s going to be Aphelios: the gun-slinging, voices-in-his-head, wizard ADC that is Aphelios.
The champion’s going to be like no other, showing off mechanics that aren’t generally seen so far.
Here's everything we know about the newest League of Legends champion Aphelios.
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Release Date
Aphelios, according to the League of Legends client, is set for a release date of the 11th December 2019.
It was only recently that Senna was released into League of Legends and Christmas has certainly come early with the arrival of a new champion.
Abilities & Gameplay
Gun Swapping
Aphelios comes with a mechanic where he has various weapons, and ammo to go with each. The champion wields one in the “main hand” - which is currently used to deal damage, with another in your off hand. Should you desire a different weapon for each effect, or if you’ve just run out of ammo, then you can switch over to the off hand weapon.
The weapons have 50 ammo each, and although Aphelios has a total of five of them with unique capabilities, you can’t choose which of the weapons you’re going to be wielding - as they depend entirely on a weapon order. The only swapping you can do is between off-hand and main hand guns.
The five weapons each serve a different purpose. Calibrum, the rifle, gives basic attacks extra range and is meant to serve as a poke weapon, Severum gives lifesteal, Gravitum slows enemies upon dealing damage, Infernum is useful for farming as an AoE weapon, and Crescendum is going to be a close range high DPS weapon.
Each has their specific trait be treated as your passive at the time. As if this wasn’t confusing enough, each weapon comes with its own set of abilities!
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Abilities
Remember, each gun comes with its own unique set of abilities, so you’ll probably have to read through all the details many times over! Remember, each Q spell per gun has a completely different cooldown so make sure you’re keeping track in teamfights!
The ultimate sends forward a bomb that explodes on contact, damaging nearby enemies. The effect it has on people differs from gun to gun though, although the cooldown is the shared across the board.
Calibrum - The Long Range Rifle
- Q: Fire a skillshot that damages the first unit hit and marks them (Marks can be consumed to deal damage)
- R: Follow-up attacks from the bomb will mark all enemies hit, dealing higher damage when consumed
Severum - The Scythe Pistol
- Q: Gain movement speed and fire both main and off hand weapons at nearest enemies, but with reduced damage
- R: Gives Aphelios a heal
Gravitum - The Cannon
- Q: Damage and root all enemies that have been affected by your slow
- R: All attacks dealt to champions affected by the bomb are going to massively increase the slow from your passive
Infernum - The Flamethrower
- Q: Basic wave of fire. You know, run of the mill stuff. All enemies hit by the wave of fire will then be hit by auto attacks from your off hand weapon
- R: All attacks dealt to champions affected by the bomb will change the way AOE damage is dealt, to increase area
Crescendum - The Chakram
Crescendum is slightly tricky to explain the passive. Your attack will go out onto a champion, but you cannot attack again till the weapon itself has returned to you - a bit like a boomerang. Each time you hit abilities with Crescendum on, you’re also going to have the damage dealt by Crescendum’s basic attack increased.
- Q: Deploy a turret wielding your off hand weapon to shoot the nearest target
- R: Even if you don’t hit three enemies with your bomb, your damage increase on Crescendum with the passive will treat it as though you hit a minimum of three
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Aphelios is going to be one of the most ridiculous champions to balance, and one of the most ridiculously fun to watch at a high level of play.
With the champion having more complexity than potentially anything else that’s ever been introduced to the rift, Season 10 is going to be particularly interesting.
Skins
Every champion releases with at least one alternate skin, Aphelios will be no different. It is unknown what this skin will be at this point in time.
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Written byMamoon Sabri@ggTeaTime
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