Inkha, The Phantom Edge

, is a melee assassin who utilize stealth to help him take down his target, while providing him protection to make sure he can finish his job properly. Unlike other assassins who focus on burst damage, Inkha starts the assassination with sustained damage to chip down the enemy's health, then finish them off with burst damage.
Check out my other champions: 
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*Lor'Mak, The Void Destructor
*Adria & Lianne, The Twin Souls
*Klishma, Messenger Of Light
*Rhus, Lord Of The Swamp
*Draxxar, The Automata Commander
*Amelia, The Heroine
*Jericho, The Mind Of Darkness
==Lore==
 
The Black Rose was undoubtedly one the most notorious secret cults in all over Valoran. Even to this day, little is known about this organization, unless you are one of its members. However, when outsiders know too much than they are supposed to, they must be eliminated. This is when Inkha shows up and do his job: making sure that his victims will never be able to speak about what they know.
Inkha’s family used to be known for holding a secret art of sword fighting that allows those who mastered it to take down any opponents with swiftness. Due to this, many of Inkha’s ancestors are talented swordsmen, and had actively served in the Noxian army for generations. Several of them even fought in the Rune Wars, allowing them to combine magic and might, thus making the family’s unique fighting style even deadlier. However, everything has its own price – centuries of participating in Noxian wars had claimed countless lives of Inkha’s family, and those who managed to survive never recovered from the devastation of battle.
Therefore, in order to preserve the family’s sword art, Inkha’s great grandfather refused to let any of his sons join the war between Noxus and Demacia. The Noxian authority, however, treated this action as treason, and Inkha’s family was banished from the empire. The homeless family wandered from place to place to seek for help, but all they could get was rejection: They could not go to Demacia, since the authority believed that they were Noxian spies; Ionia seemed like a peaceful land, but was too far to reach; Zaun and Piltover had strict policies for refugees; and Biglewater was not safe enough to be called home.
At the time of utmost desperation, came and took the family into its arms, providing them with a new home and protection. In exchange, The Black Rose has only one demand: In each generation, the oldest son of the family will serve as the secret assassin for the organization. In order to protect the identity of the assassin and his family, he will not be called by his real name, but by a codename: Inkha. Whenever an Inkha dies, his sons will step up and become the new Inkha, thus keeping the legacy alive.
…Or so the stories go. No record of such family still exists, and those who remembered anything about them are long gone. Legends about Inkha are told among the assassin society as if he was a myth, a ghost that can get in and out of any place he pleases, and will always get the job done. Therefore, Inkha’s appearance at the Field Of Justice immediately caused mass attention. No one knows what his purpose is, and Inkha himself does not provide any particular reasons. One can only speculate that Inkha is here for a murder, but the obvious questions still remain: Who will die, when, and how?
==Abilities==
==Strategy==
*Shadow Of The Roses is a powerful tool for ganking. The invisibility will surprise the enemy; the bonus movement speed allows Inkha to get closer to his target; while the bonus damage will assure that Inkha takes little time to get his job done.
**Thanks to his passive, Inkha can take the role of a scout, walking between brushes without being seen, and possibly killing any unexpected victims.
**One thing to note is that Inkha can only gain stealth upon leaving a brush. That means his target can still see him coming if they have vision in that bush. 
**Shadow Of The Roses is not an ideal tool for escaping, due to the fact that the timer will reset when Inkha is in combat. 
*Cursed Blade’s passive gives Inkha substantial dueling power, due to the debuff that makes Inkha’s basic attacks deal more damage, providing a reliable source of sustained damage. If the trade does not look good for Inkha, he can activate the ability to deal massive burst damage. By doing this, the enemy champion would be low on health, and has to back off.
**Another use of Cursed Blade is to prevent the target from fleeing. Cursed Blade’s active slows the enemy by a fair amount, enabling Inkha to chase down his target. However, be noted that its range is very short. Thus, it may be wise to activate it early at 1 or 2 marks to make sure that the damage and the slow can be applied before the enemy can use their mobility spells to get out of range.
**Cursed Blade is a potential execute if the enemy is not paying attention on how much health they currently have.
*Blink Of An Eye is Inkha’s gap closer and assassination tool. Upon using it on a champion, he gains a big burst of attack speed for 3 seconds, so that Inkha can easily apply all 3 marks of Cursed Blade on his target.
**Blink Of An Eye can either be used before or after activating Cursed Blade, depending on the type of champion Inkha is fighting. If the target does not have a lot of mobility, then Blink Of An Eye can be used first to maximize Cursed Blade’s damage. However, if the enemy has a lot of mobility, then Blink Of An Eye must be used after Cursed Blade as a gap closer.
**Blink Of An Eye can be used as a mean to escape. Inkha can use Blink Of An Eye on a minion or monster to run away from his pursuer.
*Diversion is an ability that has various uses. However, its cooldown is rather long, and requires the player to have sharp decision-making skill.
*Diversion can be used to provide vision of the enemy. The trap itself provide some standard vision for 2 minutes, while the clone gives 3 second of true sight.
**With smart placement, Diversion will block the enemy escape path, due to the fact that they will have to stop running and attack the clone for 1 second. The clone itself deals a considerable amount of damage, thus securing a kill.
**Diversion can also be used to duel the enemy champion. If you expect that you may not be able to kill the enemy champion within 2 seconds, you can put down a trap under your feet. After 2 seconds, a clone will be summoned, giving Inkha more damage, and 1 second of not being attacked (due to the clone taunting the enemy).
**Diversion can be used to ambush by-passers. All he has to do is put down a trap(s) in a bush, while standing in the same bush. When the trap springs, Inkha has to stand still and attack the enemy champion, pretending to be one of the clones. The enemy champion will either run away, or stay and try to destroy the clones. Either way, they will take a large amount of damage from the clones, and Inkha can use Cursed Blade and Diversion to kill them.
**Inkha can assassinate the enemy with Diversion without being anywhere near to the target. All he has to do is put down 2-4 traps on top of each other so that when an enemy champion step on them, 2-4 clones will pop up at the same time and attack them, possibly killing the enemy champion if they have low health, or get them on low health so that Inkha can finish them off.
*Death Wish helps Inkha takes the most advantage of his passive. While invisible, Inkha moves faster than normal, enabling him to chase down his victim. In addition, Death Wish gives Inkha continuous intervals of stealth, which will proc the bonus damage from Shadow Of The Roses throughout its duration
**Death Wish can be used on low-health target, and would most likely to score a kill.
**After using his ultimate, Inkha can cast Blink Of An Eye on the target to immediately gain stealth, while getting closer to them.
**Though not very popular, Death Wish can be used as an escape tool. When you’re low in health, use Death Wish on the nearest enemy champion, then walk into the mist to gain stealth. The enemy champion will then try to walk toward a source of true sight (mostly a turret) to gain vision of Inkha, and then kill him. While in stealth, Inkha can sneak into a bush and run away, or use Blink Of An Eye on a minion/monster to create some distance between him and his pursuers.
*Shadow Of The Roses is a very useful tool to control your lane opponent. Inkha can go into a bush, then sneak out with invisibility, and attack the enemy for bonus damage. 
**Do not underestimate the psychological effects that Shadow Of The Roses brings to lane. If done correctly, Inkha can force his target to back off and hug his turret to avoid taking free damage from Inkha.
**His passive should best be used as a tool to escape ganks from the enemy jungler, since they cannot attack what they cannot see.
*Cursed Blade’s passive helps Inkha greatly Inkha decides to push lane, due to bonus damage on minions. However, the active from Cursed Blade is not very helpful, as Inkha has to get dangerously close to the enemy in order to use it.
**The story is different if Cursed Blade is used to aid your jungler in a gank. The burst damage can finish off the target even before he/she has time to react. Even if it fails to give Inkha the kill, the slow is still valuable, giving you and your teammate a choice of whether to back off or keep chasing.
*Blink Of An Eye can be used to initiate a trade with the enemy champion. If you see the enemy throwing a skill shot at you, you can immediately us Blink Of An Eye to dodge it, avoiding a considerable amount of damage. With the bonus attack speed, you can easily put 3 marks on them to make your basic attacks deal more damage, then finish off with Cursed Blade active.
*As stated above, Diversion is extremely useful tool for vision control. Placing a few of them in bushes or in the river will protect you from ganks and roams.
**Diversion can turn a 1v1 situation into a 2v1, or even a 3v1. The unexpected damage from the clones will surprise the enemy, and can even help Inkha get a kill.
**Inkha can use Diversion as a zoning tool. However, this is not very mana-efficent, and the clones themselves don’t deal much damage early game, which makes Diversion have few uses in lane, except for vision control.
*Upon acquiring Death Wish, Inkha hits his power spike of the game. Death Wish constantly gives Inkha stealth, allowing him to proc his passive multiple times. Combining with Cursed Blade, Inkha’s duel potential is top-notch. Most of the time, the opponent would think that they can kill Inkha while completely forgetting his potential damage output, and end up being killed instead.
**Even if the enemy decides not to fight Inkha and choses to run instead, the invisibility that Death Wish provide will make him move faster, possibly catching up with the fleeing enemy so that Inkha can get close enough and activate Cursed Blade.
**Death Wish should only be used if Inkha is certain that he can finish off his target before they can make it back to their turrets, and that Death Wish can kill the target before the effect ends.
**Death Wish is a long-range, single-target ability. If you see your opponent trying to go back to base, you can use your ultimate on them to delay their back for 10 seconds, or in some cases, score a kill by doing so.
*Shadow Of The Roses makes Inkha a very strong counter-jungler. Inkha can sneak between bushes unseen, waiting for the right moment to show up and kill the enemy jungler with the bonus damage from his passive, or at least steal jungle buffs from them.
*Cursed Blade helps Inkha tremendously in the jungle due to the bonus damage on his basic attacks. The active has rather low cooldown, which means Inkha can activate Cursed Blade to finish off a jungle camp. By the time he walks to another camp, the ability should be ready to use again.
*Inkha can clear jungle camps very quickly thanks to his clones. Before a camp spawns, Inkha can put down multiple traps on top of each other, so that he will get 2-3 clones to tank the damage from the monsters. With good execution, Inkha can clear the jungle at impressive speed without taking too much damage.
**Be noted that his clones can also benefit from Cursed Blade’s passive. In other words, clone attacks can deal bonus damage on marked enemies. Therefore, it is better for Inkha to get 3 marks on the monster camps first, and then use his clones later for maximum damage.
**When invading the enemy jungler, it is likely that they would be on low health, and will be forced to run. Inkha can place his clones to block their escape paths.
**Inkha can simply just put his traps around the enemy’s jungle to harass them. The damage from the clones can chip down a good amount of health from the enemy jungler, causing them to go back to base more frequently, have slower clearing time, and cause them to constantly have low health, so that you can kill them.
**Don’t forget that Diversion provide a lot of vision. You can put down your traps at key locations in your jungle, as well as the enemy jungle for better control.
*Although Blink Of An Eye is the only ability in Inkha’s kit that deal AoE damage, it should not be maxed first, due to the fact that it has long cooldown, and that it does not give Inkha attack speed when used on neutral monsters. 
*Blink Of An Eye should better be used to fight the enemy jungler, should Inkha encounters them while walking between jungle camps. The bonus attack speed should help Inkha out-trade the enemy jungler, forcing the enemy to think twice before engaging. Make sure that Cursed Blade is not on cooldown to maximize Inkha’s damage during these trades.
*Death Wish has pretty much the same use in the jungle, as it is in lane. The only difference is that Inkha will have less chance to use it in the jungle.
*Whether Inkha is laning or jungling, his ganking potential is one of the best. He has sustained damage, burst damage, gap closer, and crowd control, which perfectly serve his role as an assassin.
**Put down his trap on the enemy’s escape path. For safety measures, Inkha can invest another trap to prevent counter-ganks.
**Upon leaving a bush, Inkha’s passive will give him stealth, movement speed, and bonus damage, which enables him to get close to the target and deals massive damage.
**Attack the enemy to proc the bonus damage from Shadow Of The Roses. Keep attacking them to build up marks from Cursed Blade.
**As mentioned above, use your Cursed Blade’s active and Blink Of An Eye wisely depending on the victim’s mobility.
**At this point of the game, Death Wish is not suitable for assassination yet. Rather, it should be used for bonus damage, or to prevent the enemy from going back to base, which gives you and your teammates a 10-second window to dive towers and force a kill.
*Due to how Shadow Of The Roses work (interaction with bushes), Inkha and his teammates should initiate team fights in the jungle or near objective monster camps (Baron Nashor and Dragon), where there are plenty of bushes for Inkha to sneak around and assassinate the enemy carries.
*Most of Inkha’s active abilities, namely Cursed Blade, Blink Of An Eye, and Diversion have pretty much the same uses as they are in the earlier stages of the game: Diversion for vision and traffic control; Cursed Blade for damage; and Blink Of An Eye for gap closer. The main difference is that these abilities now require much more on timing, and good decision-making.
*Much like other assassin, the key to playing Inkha is to make sure that you remain unseen. People cannot try to avoid something if they cannot see it.
*First, Inkha should walk out of the bush, get close to the enemy, then use Death Wish to extend the stealth duration. If done correctly, Inkha will gain 6 seconds of stealth from Shadow Of The Roses, plus 10 more second from Death Wish, for a staggering total of 16 seconds of stealth, the highest in the game.
*Another the strategy is to use Blink Of An Eye on the enemy champion while in stealth, use the bonus attack speed to mark the enemy 3 times, then activate Cursed Blade for a quick burst combo. If the enemy is not dead by then, use Death Wish to buy yourself some time to finish them.
*The psychological impact of Death Wish is most notable in team fights. Upon being casted on with Death Wish, the enemy carries will become alert, and are most likely to make mistakes. Here are the possible outcomes :
**The enemy carry will decide to run away from the fight. This is good news for your team, because the enemy’s main damage source is no longer there. This also makes Inkha’s job much easier, as he can easily take down the enemy carry when they are isolated. Sometimes, the enemy support will follow their carries to give them extra protection, making it a 4v3 fight for your friends, and will likely result in a successful battle for your team.
**The enemy will decide to maintain their position. This is also favorable for Inkha. Most of the time, carries will stand in the back and deal damage from afar. This is when they are vulnerable to assassination. Realizing that their carries are being attacked, their teammates may try to exit the fight to peel for their carries. However, without any means to reveal Inkha, they will be wasting time and resources trying to find him, while he is perfectly safe by remaining invisible. The distraction from Death Wish’s mist should be great enough that the enemy team will become disorganized, leading to bad team fights.
**The enemy carry will choose to group with their team. If this happens, then Inkha’s job is not done yet, so be patient. As mentioned, carries need to stay in the back line in order to assure their safety and damage output. Grouping with the team will make them more vulnerable, allowing your teammates to kill them without further help. As the enemy carries takes enough damage and decides to flee, it is time for Inkha to finally show up as the clean-up squad.
==Development==
Hi, there. It’s me again, Peter from Vietnam. 
When playing in ranked games, I usually take on the role of a Top Laner, or a Jungler. Therefore, most of the champions I play are fighters, like , , , and . I used to think that they are the most important members of the team, as they are the first to enter a fight, and are the last to get out. They are the one who carry the team into late game, so that their teammates can unleash their full potential. Fighters always seemed to be the right choice for me: they can always take care of themselves and their teammates.
That’s why I used to have a negative idea about assassins for a very long time. I couldn’t even understand why they exist: They have never been the ones who start a fight, and they always exit a fight even with full health. They may get a few kills here and there, but none of them seemed to have any significant impact. Most of them are hard to use, and relies heavily on team composition. The enemy team’s assassin was always a god, while ours is a complete idiot. I began to despise those who play assassins.
However, things finally came to a new chapter. In recent months, I’ve been picking up assassins, such as , , and , and that completely changed my perception. All this time, I had considered assassins as trash champions, because they never seemed to have a specific role. After playing a few of them, I finally began to understand what they are made for: to shut down the enemy’s carries before they can have any impact in team fights. Playing them requires high level of skills and decision making but in the end, it is still extremely satisfying to 1-shot someone.
Yet, by playing them, I noticed a few problems. Their play style has always been the same: “hit-and-run”. That is, deal as much damage your target as fast as you can, then get the hell outta there, even if you can't kill them properly. Many of them lack lane pressure, and are forced to go into the jungle. Some have unhealthy kits that do not provide much counter play. I decided that I need to solve these problems: I am going create a new assassin champion that everyone can enjoy playing with and against. “Here we go again”, I said to myself. It was a cold night, and I was staring at the sky as New Year’s Eve fireworks lit the starless sky.
Again, I made a few criterion on my creation:
*The champion must have standard a kit of an assassin: burst damage, gap closer, a slow, hard CC (optional) and stealth. (like )
*The champion must have some psychological pressure on his/her victims, thus causing them to make bad decisions, and they will be punished for that. (like )
*There must be some outplay potential for both the assassin and the victim, thus creating a fair fight involving mind games between the two players. (like or )
*The champion’s kit should reward the player for going all-in, and provide necessary tools to escape. (like)
Despite having all the standards and stuff, it was still very hard to imagine how my new champion would be like. It was like playing several jigsaw puzzles that have been mixed up together: you have to try to put the small pieces together, guess what that piece belong to which picture, and then combine them. For months, I had been trying to develop the champion’s kit so that they meet the requirements, while also trying to make them fit the theme. Even when I’m done, I had to start from scratch because the kit did not fit the lore, or because the result was not what I expected to be.
Eventually, after a few months of work, I came up with Inkha, The Phantom Edge, the champion that you are seeing right now. Due to the fact that he is the combination of multiple existing champions, he has somewhat the combined strengths of the champions that made him. At the same time, he has the combined weakness of them all, along with a few that I added in myself to balance his power. So far, this is the piece of work that I am most proud of, but yet not my biggest. I’ll see you guys again soon, with even more imaginative champions.
==Trivia==
*Other than Inkha, The Black Rose does employ a number of assassins that are always standing by for orders. However, the Inkhas are considered as the most elite, and only take orders directly from .
*It is believed that before his death, General Du Couteau was having a personal investigation on The Black Rose, Inkha was ordered to stop him from gaining too much information.
*Inkha is ’s rival, due to the fact that Inkha has always been considered a deadlier assassin than Talon, and that Inkha is the cause of General Du Cocteau’s disappearance. 
*Due to the financial power and the political influence of The Black Rose, Inkha and his family lead a life of noblemen, which makes it hard for everyone to believe that Inkha is secretly working as an assassin. 
*In order to prevent the secrets of The Black Rose from being exposed, the Inkhas are only allowed to marry women who are daughters or sisters of a Black Rose member. 
==Patch history==
Version 1.1 (March 3rd,2016):Reworked ultimate, giving Inkha more outplay potential
*Old active:
Inkha dashes forward, dealing physical damage to all enemy champions in a straight line, applying on-hit effect, and enters stealth for 1 seconds at the end of the dash.
If Inkha hits an enemy champion, Death Wish can be casted again for 2 more times with no additional cost. Each cast can only be activated after 2 seconds of leaving stealth, within the next 10 seconds
*New Active:
Inkha curses an enemy champion. For the next 10 seconds, the selected target will be surrounded by a dark magical mist that deals magic damage over the duration.
If Inkha steps into the mist, he will gain stealth. Attacking or using an ability will reveal him for 0.75 seconds.
Version 1.2 (May 23rd,2016):Rewarding Inkha for making risky plays.
W: Blink Of An Eye
*New effect: Using Blink Of An Eye on a marked enemy champion will reduce its cooldown by 20% per mark.
Version 1.3 (June 2nd, 2016): Inkha should be be able to stick to his target and finish the job, rather than making risky plays and die before being able to do anything.
W: Blink Of An Eye
*Removed: Using Blink Of An Eye on a marked enemy champion will reduce its cooldown by 20% per mark.
Q: Cursed Blade
*New effect: Cursed Blade is now a targeted dash.
*Range increased to 500 from 350.
Version 1.4 (Dec 8th, 2019): His passive should be more consistent and easier to use
INNATE: Shadow of the roses
*Removed: Shadow of the roses no longer has a cooldown
*New effect: Inkha now channels for 3 seconds upon entering a bush. If the channel is complete, he gains stealth upon leaving it.
==Gallery==