Formerly OP #3: Old Evelynn

For eight straight seasons you couldn't see her coming. That was the entire point.

With League of Legends Classic bringing back old kits on July 29, we're digging up the champions whose "old kit" earns an audible groan. First up: the demon who spent nearly a decade invisible.

Formerly OP

Old Evelynn

Season 1 – Season 7 · Ended Patch 7.20

For eight straight seasons you couldn't see her coming. That was the entire point.

With League of Legends Classic bringing back old kits on July 29, we're digging up the champions whose "old kit" earns an audible groan. First up: the demon who spent nearly a decade invisible.

You're laning. You have wards up, or you think you do. There's no minion wave threat on the map, no jungler on your tracker, nothing pinged. And then you're dead, because a purple imp nobody has seen since character select just walked out of a bush, deleted half your health bar, and vanished again before your team even finishes typing "where." That was Evelynn for the better part of a decade, and it's why League of Legends Classic bringing her old kit back onto the roster on July 29 is the kind of announcement that makes veteran players reach for their pink wards on reflex.

When, And For How Long

Evelynn shipped as one of League's original 40 champions in October 2009, and she stayed a permanent-invisibility jungler for essentially the entire life of that kit, all the way from Season 1 through Season 7. Riot finally ended the era with her full visual and gameplay rework in Patch 7.20, released in October 2017. That's roughly eight years of a live, unaddressed problem champion, longer than almost any other kit-defining flaw the game has ever tolerated.

The Old Kit

The Data Dragon icons below show the current versions of these ability slots, since Riot's asset pipeline doesn't keep a historical archive of pre-rework art. The descriptions are all the old kit.

Passive: Shadow Walk

Stand still out of combat for a little over a second and Evelynn faded into full invisibility, no level requirement, no camouflage compromise, just gone. Landing an attack or a spell broke the stealth and stunned the target for a few seconds, and then she simply faded out again a moment later. There was no counterplay to this short of a ward, a pink trinket, or an Oracle's Elixir sitting on exactly the right patch of grass.

Q: Hate Spike

A near instant bolt of magic damage at the closest enemy that could cleave onto a second target nearby for half value. It cost almost nothing to spam, which meant Evelynn could poke a lane down from stealth, fade back out, and repeat the process until someone made a mistake.

W: Dark Frenzy

The forgettable one. A low cooldown self buff that cleansed slows and added a burst of movement speed, with no damage attached and nothing flashy to show for it. Most Evelynn players from this era couldn't tell you its name if you asked, but it's the reason she could never simply be kited away from once she had already committed to a target.

E: Ravage

A single target hit that stripped a chunk of the target's armor and magic resistance for several seconds. Combined with a jungler suddenly appearing behind you, this was the button that turned "I can probably survive this gank" into "I cannot."

R: Agony's Embrace

A ground targeted burst that hit everyone caught in its radius and scaled up hard against low health targets, giving Evelynn a self buff on cast as well. This was the kill button at the end of an invisible approach, and against a target already whittled down by Hate Spike [Q] and stripped by Ravage [E], few survived to tell the tale.

Why It Was OP

Big numbers get nerfed in a patch or two. Permanent invisibility from level one is a structural problem, and that's what kept Evelynn relevant, banned, and despised for the better part of a decade even as her damage rose and fell with every balance pass. A handful of things stacked on top of each other to make her uniquely miserable:

No information, ever. Every other threat in the game gives you something to react to, a ward tick, a missing minion, a jungle timer. Evelynn gave you nothing. The only real answer was buying dedicated true sight items and consumables specifically because she existed, an ongoing gold tax that no other single champion demanded of the entire enemy team.

Two roles, one champion. In League's earliest seasons, before jungle and mid lane fully separated into their modern identities, Evelynn could go either, an invisible skirmisher in lane or an invisible skirmisher in the jungle. Later balance patches pushed her toward a jungle only identity, but that early flexibility only added to how oppressive she felt in a less specialized meta.

Inevitability, not just damage. A gank you can't see coming isn't a 50/50 you might win. It's a kill that happens on Evelynn's schedule, whenever she decides your ward coverage has a gap. Ravage [E]'s resistance shred and Agony's Embrace [R]'s execute scaling meant that once she committed, the fight was usually already decided before you knew it had started.

The Fall

Evelynn's permanent stealth survived years of smaller tuning passes, cooldown adjustments, and damage nerfs without ever fixing the actual complaint. Riot eventually concluded the identity itself needed to change and gave her a full visual and gameplay rework in Patch 7.20, released in October 2017.

What Changed

Stealth now only activates after level six, and it's camouflage rather than true invisibility, meaning nearby enemies can still spot her if they're looking. Hate Spike [Q] survived the rework in name only as her new clear and poke tool, while Allure [W], Whiplash [E], and Last Caress [R] replaced Dark Frenzy [W], Ravage [E], and Agony's Embrace [R] outright. It remains one of the most complete kit overhauls the game has ever shipped.

Where She Stands Now

Modern Evelynn is a jungle only assassin who spikes hard once Demon Shade [Passive] unlocks at level six, chaining Allure [W]'s charm into Whiplash [E]'s execute damage and Last Caress [R]'s untargetable burst to delete a single target in one rotation. She's nowhere near the current top of the jungle tier list, more of a snowbally, high skill ceiling pick that specific players still terrorize solo queue with rather than a champion the whole roster fears on sight. The stealth is real, but it's a level six power spike now, not an eight year unsolved design flaw.

Nominate The Next One

Old Evelynn's rework remains one of the most complete identity changes this series has covered. Catch up on the rest of the series below, then drop your nomination for the next one in the comments.