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A couple months back, Riot gave us a look at an upcoming champion known as the “Nine Tails Fox.” She now has a name – Ahri – and something of a skillset, which means we could see her in the next couple patches. I’m going to try to avoid saying “Akali 2.0” as much as possible, but looking at her skillset it’s difficult to avoid that kind of comparison.

Here’s an excerpt from Morello’s post about Ahri:

Ahri’s gameplay style revolves around mobility and managing position to aim her spells. When played properly, Ahri darts around teamfights, picking off wounded stragglers and harrying soft enemies.

This is largely accomplished through her ultimate, which allows her to dash multiple times before going on cooldown. Ahri can either use all three quickly to chase, burst, or escape, or she can spread out their uses to keep enemies guessing and juke around the battlefield. Combining this with her high magic damage and her Seduction ability to lock enemies down, she can strike from unexpected angles or bait enemies into overcommitting to disadvantageous situations.

Ahri’s major gameplay decisions are based on her assessment of risk/reward. Her burst is high, but must be in short range to maximize it. This creates a dynamic that requires her to endanger herself to reach full potential. Play it safe and have more light damage, or commit and go for the kill? Use your dash for damage, or save it for escape? The choices are constant with these opposed strengths and weaknesses.

So her ultimate is a three-dash ability, though it sounds like it has limited duration. It also seems to be untargeted, which could make her even more frustrating to play against than Akali. I’m also a little concerned about giving such a mobile champion an ability that can “lock enemies down.”

I was happy to read this line, though: “This creates a dynamic that requires her to endanger herself to reach full potential.” As long as that’s true, I’m willing to wait to pass judgement on the character. One of Akali’s biggest balance issues is that she does not have to put herself in harm’s way to deal big damage. Twilight Shroud allows her to avoid a lot of incoming damage while still abusing her opponents. It seems like Seduction with Ahri could do the same thing, but I would guess that’s a single-target ability, which leaves Ahri open to enemy fire. Still, she could devastate a solo lane, and we all know what it’s like to play against a fed assassin. No fun for anyone.