For better or for worse, assassins have always been a very present part of League of Legends. Known for completely evaporating health bars, these high risk and high reward champions offer some of the most exciting and splashy plays in the game if you can pilot them correctly. Much to the dismay of ADC’s everywhere, in this article I’ll be naming the top 10 best assassin champions so you can one-shot with confidence

10. Diana

Diana is an assassin that can do a little bit of everything. Poke damage, defensive shields, engage, dashes, the works. She’s an extremely versatile character that can be effectively used in a lot of different ways

What Makes Diana A Great Assassin: 

• Diana can instantly reset the cooldown of her dash by jumping to minions afflicted by her debuff. This means she can jump from a minion to en enemy and take them by surprise
• Unlike a lot of assassins, Diana’s ultimate is not only high AOE damage but it also offers CC to help your team kill the enemies

See Diana In Action: 

9. Akali

Akali is an extremely fun champion, even after the changes to her kit. 3 dashes and an invisibility ring still make for a highly entertaining and skill expressive assassin that still has no trouble jumping to you from across the lane

What Makes Akali A Great Assassin:

• Akali has 3 dashes, 1 on her E and 2 on her ultimate. If she lands even one of them then she’s going to stick to you until one of you are dead, and chances are that’s gonna be you
• Akali has one of the most unique abilities in the game, the ability to drop an invisibility ring around her. This allows for some great jukes and outplays, especially when you combine it with all the mobility she has

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8. Katerina 

Katerina can easily be one of the most mobile assassins in the game if played right. This mobility combined with an extremely high damage ultimate and versatile build path makes Katerina a great option

What Makes Katarina A Great Assassin:

• Katarina can reset her dash after picking up one of her Daggers, which can be placed from her Q and W. With enough planning, you can cast an instant speed dash up to 3 times which is extremely hard to play against
• Katarina has a new build path in preseason, which has her going full AD in addition to her full AP build. Versatility is never a bad thing, and now that Katerina has multiple options depending on the enemy team she automatically becomes a lot more useful

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7. Talon:

Talon is an assassin that excels at roaming, transferring the lead he gains in lane to the rest of his team to put them ahead and ensure the victory. He also has a great ultimate that can be used both offensively and defensively

What Makes Talon A Great Assassin:

• Talon can use his E to run to the other lanes faster than pretty much any champion, allowing him to quickly set up ganks and help out his team
• Talon’s ultimate allowing him to go invisible and to gain movement speed is great for running down an enemy and taking them by surprise or slipping out of a sticky situation

See Talon In Action: 

6. Zed

The iconic assassin, Zed can be highly oppressive both in the laning phase and later in the game. The multitude of dashes and jukes he can provide offer a playstyle that’s both fun and skill-expressive

What Makes Zed A Great Assassin:

• Zed’s lane combo of throwing out his W clone before using it to extend the range of his other abilities chunks the enemy laner out of at least half of their health. And if Zed has ultimate, then he can simply jump to his clone and ultimate the enemy laner to secure the kill
• Zed being able to jump back to his shadows makes him extremely slippery in a fight, if he ultimates from the backline then he can just pick off someone from the enemy team and blink back to safety without getting punished

See Zed In Action: 

5. Shadow Assassin (Kayn)

Kayn, specifically shadow assassin Kayn, benefits from a wide variety of boons. High damage, CC, and being able to traverse half the map in just a few seconds

What Makes Shadow Assassin Great:

• Before Kayn becomes a shadow assassin, he spends time farming in the jungle. Kayn has an incredibly fast clear speed and has a kit that is great for ganks, making it easy to set his team ahead and transition into the late game where he can obliterate people like a shadow assassin
• One of the bonuses that Kayn gets for taking the shadow assassin form is the massive buff to his E, allowing him to speedily walk through the walls of Summoner’s Rift. This is the ultimate ability to take someone by surprise from the most unsuspecting of angles and melt through their health bar

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4. Evelynn

Evelynn is unique in that most of the game for her is spent being invisible due to her passive. This makes her ganking potential excellent as she can sneak behind the enemy laner and by the time they’ve noticed it’s far too late

What Makes Evelynn A Great Assassin:

• Being able to be permanently invisible is amazing for a jungler, it’s almost too easy to set up ganks for your laner if the enemy is even the slightest bit pushed up past their turret
• Evelynn has one of the best ultimates for as assassin. Not only does it deal very high damage, which is increased even further on low-health enemies, but it also makes her invulnerable and blinks her backward. This is the best tool for assassinating the backline and dipping out before you die

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3. LeBlanc

Leblanc is one of the most slippery and hard to kill characters in the game. It’s hilarious to watch an enemy team try to desperately lock her down after she one-shots one of their squishy’s only to be tricked and turned around every time

What Makes LeBlanc A Great Assassin:

• Similar to Zed, LeBlanc also generates clones that can be returned too. Unlike Zed, this ability does a very high amount of damage on impact and is on a far shorter cooldown. And her being able to get a second clone off her ultimate is just icing on the cake
• To help along with her fantastic burst damage, LeBlanc also has a bit of CC in her kit. The root off of her E is quite easy to hit after dashing up into an enemy’s face and being able to copy it with her ultimate to keep them rooted for even longer is quite the CC chain

See LeBlanc In Action: 

2. Pyke

Pyke is very unique in that he is the only support assassin in the game, a seemingly odd combination that works quite well. Combining high damage with a lot of CC makes it so that Pyke can easily carry bot lane and the game itself

What Makes Pyke A Great Assassin:

• Pyke’s kit is great for running down an enemy. Hooking them closer to you and slowing them, going invisible and gaining a high amount of movement speed, and a dash that’s also a stun are all picture-perfect tools for making sure the enemy can’t escape from you
• Pyke’s ultimate can singlehandedly win a team fight if he gets enough resets off with it. Being able to execute multiple enemies gives his team such a huge advantage, and his allies still gaining gold off of Pyke killing them makes it almost like you’ve killed them twice

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1.Fizz

Widely considered to be one of the most annoying champions of all of League of Legends, Fizz lives up to that title. Absurdly high damage, an extremely impactful ultimate, and being able to become completely invulnerable from a basic ability undeniably make Fizz the best assassin in the game

What Makes Fizz A Great Assassin:

• The combination of a dash and invulnerability is one of the strongest abilities in the game. It can be used in so many different ways and makes Fizz next to impossible to deal with because of how easy it is for him to dodge all your damage and CC
• Fizz’s ultimate and the AOE damage and knockup it provides is super impactful. Its fantastic engage becomes the enemy teams first instinct is to walk away from whoever the ultimate is attached to, making the rest of the team flight an easy 4v5

See Fizz In Action: 

As much as they might make us want to pull our hair out sometimes, assassin characters are undeniably some of the most exciting characters in the game. With high burst damage, dashes, jumps, and a plethora of other unique abilities the assassin class undeniably remains one of the most fun classes in League of Legends

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