Evelynn, am I the only one . . .

Okay, I know that I am not "good" at league by any stretch of the imagination - I have terrible reflexes, fat fingers, etc. ... Basically, any trait that makes for a bad-to-sub-par league player, I possess. That being said, I think I play and enjoy this game enough to know when a champion is just irredeemably flawed. I am looking at you, Evelynn.

The thing about Evelynn is that she has a great character concept and possesses wonderful aesthetics. Not to be too punny, but I was entranced ; ) by her guile and "apparent" prowess. That being said, she is all style and no substance.

I think my biggest gripe with her is that it seems like she was entirely overbalanced to account for her stealth features. In fact, her entire kit is premised around the player tagging ONE adversary (in-stealth), terminating said adversary (out-of-stealth, duh), and peeling out before things get too sticky (see her ult, the "bitch-slap, back-flip, dismount extraordinaire").

This would be fine if the execution, again, was not entirely focused on, and accounting for, overbalancing her stealth feature. Aside from the occasional "the stars are aligned" moments when she is actually able to properly bait/kill her target, 99% of the time, any player worth their salt will react cautiously to the entirely unsubtle "I am about to seduce the utter shite out of you, sir" animation (which points out her general direction...). Further, actually tapping the player, despite all efforts, is exceedingly difficult. Whether being cock-blocked by a well-intentioned minion/champion, or reacted-to by a wise marked player, hitting Evelynn's target to proc her burst is a problem. Here is the worst part: even when she finally executes a proper seduce-and-kill play, typically her damage is so sub-par that the enemy, very likely, and after tremendous effort on the part of Evelynn, will survive. Aside from the burst provided by an extremely awkward delay mechanic, (and the bitch-slap ult), her damage is not there.

Given that Evelynn's play style is so centered around this one-on-one, cat-and-mouse dynamic, her performance in team fights is awful. As stated above, in order for her to do any damage, she has to mark her target AND wait for the mark to proc. (Given how fast the tides of team fights change, waiting two seconds is an eternity. Moreover, once the mark's effects have subsided, she needs to wait about another TEN seconds to repeat her burst combo). Finally, given that she has NO gap closer, actually reaching her target is overly difficult. Any enemy teammate with a stun, slow, etc., can entirely negate the effect of her mark, rendering Evelynn practically useless, again, for the duration of her cool down. If her early game ganks were effective, her team fight weaknesses would not be as much of a problem; but her ganks, given her awkward mechanics, are not great relative to other solid junglers.

Below I criticize the efficacy of her stealth ability. Aside from my criticisms directed towards her stealth, I acknowledge that it has some undeniable utility. Inexplicably, though, she does not gain access to her stealth until level 6 >.<. I would also like to point out that the fact that her Q and W are turbo-charged against jungle monsters is a tacit admission on the part of the developers that her damage is not really there without cutting cool downs and amplifying damage. This damage disparity is especially apparent when Evelyn attempts to clear lane minions, or, I don't know, attack enemy champions >;o).

With respect to her stealth, I know that it is "technically" permanent stealth, which is theoretically very powerful. However, in practical experience, the stealth has such a wide detection breadth, (about the width of a lane), that when the time comes to ambush an enemy, the enemy is little more surprised of the ostensibly stealthed Evelynn than they would be when any other jungle attempts an ambush. If it were up to me, I would keep the Demon Shade healing effect, but I would prefer they they scrap the stealth feature entirely in favor of some kind of gap closer + raising her sustained damage viability. Again, as the stealth feature stands now, enemies too easily detect Evelynn for her to consistently get close enough to actually execute her combos as intended. (People don't react kindly to malevolent, lascivious women appearing from the mist - most either run from her, naturally, or blow-up on her, also natural).

I guess my overall impression of Evelynn is she is more trouble than she is worth. There are just too many variables out of the control of the player to justify all the strings attached to her abilities. Again, I attribute these constraining "strings" to the fact that the devs balanced around her stealth feature. I feel, however, that the Evelynn's final kit does not properly utilize the constraints imposed to her stealth ability, and the stealth ability should be scrapped in favor of a proper, more reliable gap closer.

Just my two cents. <3 , still