INTRODUCTION
Hey guys, here is a quick guide on how to counter Evelyn. Skip to the HOW SHE KILLS YOU section if you don't want to learn about her skills and other basics.
I'm writing this because a lot of people seem to having trouble countering a well played Evelynn. I play a fairly traditional Evelynn, and fairly well, so hopefully this guide can help you turn the tables on this tricksy wench when she attempts to gank you.
Also, Evelynn is not a particularly strong hero, imo. She is an AP dependant, fragile, melee attacker with a crappy attack. She contributes almost nothing to a push. She is nothing but a ganker, though a ganker who, if you do not know how to counter her, can mercilessly destroy your whole team. If you do know how to counter her, she is subpar, at best.
This guide is also intended for newbies. Eve already doesn't fare very well at higher play levels, but is one of the most fearsome noob killers around.
WHY YOU SHOULD TAKE THIS ADVICE TO HEART
I just played a game where I went 42-3-2 with her. Final team kill score was 44-13. By the end of the game, I had achieved over 1 hero kill per minute. This was a particularly bad matchup admittedly, though not if you would have judged it by the summoner levels. In most games where I play her, I go 15+ kills, 6-10 assists, and 2 or less deaths, so while the typical session usually isn't quite so omgcrazy, I still am a fairly dominant presence.
I was not with a preformed either, no one on either side was, we all solo queued.
HER ABILITIES
1) Hate Spike
This is the little pink spammable lightning bolt that she has. Mid and endgame, when I'm at 350-500 AP with her, It's doing somewhere between 200-300 a shot, and the cooldown is less than a second. When Evelynn kills you, 98% of the time, it's with this skill.
2) Stealth
This is Evelynn's initiator move. When cast, there is a small delay (~1.5 secs), and then she fades into invisibility. If she attacks a target while stealthed, the target is stunned (I believe the stun starts at 1 second, and scales up to 2 or a bit more at max level). It is also how she sets up her positioning, both for attack and escape.
3) Ravage
This spell is a low damage nuke of sorts. Additionally, if cast on the enemy when you are behind them, it will temporarily lower your armor. Expect this to be cast on you, but you really won't notice much, and in the grand scheme of things, it's not this that kills you, but that Hate Spike.
4) Ult
This is an activatable skill that Evelynn is able to fire off every time an enemy champion dies. It gives her substantial increases to both her move and attack speed. Additionally, if she kills a champion, she will regain a bunch of health. Think Bloodseeker from DotA for that aspect.
5) Passive
Her passive prevents enemy creeps AND turrets from targetting Evelynn for attack, unless:
A) She is the only available target, or
B) She is the closest target
More on this later.
HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Evelynn relies on psychology to score kills. The spell that does the most damage for her, Hate Spike, has a significant drawback. You cannot specifically target it. The cast range on it is not huge, and it will randomly strike a target in the area when you fire it.
The reason she relies on psychology is this:
Normally, when she jumps you, she will hit you with the bonus damage opener from stealth, stunning you. She then ravages you, and starts spiking. As you are down anywhere from 25-50% of your HP within half a second, you freak out. Your first reaction is to run. This is what kills you most of the time against her.
Normally, unless she jumps you in the jungle, or while you are switching lanes or something, you are NOT alone. This means, if she wants her spike to target you, she has to be VERY careful with her positioning. This is why you are always jumped by her slightly off to the side, away from your friendly creeps; she doesn't want to risk tagging them with her spike spam, she wants to tag YOU.
So, when you run away, what you are doing is effectively ensuring there is no one but you and her around. That makes you the only available target for hate spike. Being the only available target for hate spike makes you dead.
The same kind of thing applies to Ryze & his ult. Think Omnislash from Jug in DotA. Most dangerous when you're alone, only a laugh if you're surrounded by pals.
So, next time you're fighting an Evelynn, you should now have a much better idea of where and when she will jump you. Expect a stun out of nowhere as the last friendly creep in your area dies and the next wave hasn't arrived yet. Expect a stun directly after your creep wave arrives and fully engages the enemy creeps. In that situation, it will come 180 degrees away from the closest friendly target. Back, and to the left or right.
Just understanding how utterly reliant she is on positioning and timing is important, and knowing that will drastically increase the chances of your survival. Most important of all, DONT PANIC when she attacks you. It's forgetting that you have your flash available because you freak out and try to run that gets me the kills.
She also has an immense amount of synergy with other champions who have stuns, particularly due to her stealth. In general, if you see champions stop their lane farming behavior and move to actually engage you, and you don't see her icon on the minimap, assume she's going to let another hero initiate on you, then land her stun on you when the first one drops. She will do this every time if she is in the area. She always retains the opportunity of initiating herself, and will do so if she catches you alone for sure. She may not want to initiate in full teamclashes though, as she will likely instantly die if she gets focus fired or disabled even once.
A bit about her passive skill as well. Essentially what it does is enable her to creep dive or tower dive with significantly lower risk. As long as there is ANY other target available for the turret that is closer than Eve, it will attack that target, not her. In most laneups, people last hit/harass etc., then tower hug a big when their health gets to around 1/3 or so before they pill back to base to heal and shop. This is when an Evelynn can get you. If you're tower hugging, you are not comitting your full champion dps to the enemy creep waves. This will result in a very fast push on your lane. Once a siege creep gets in range of a tower, Eve is free to walk right up to you and finish you off. A favorite tactic of mine is to walk back towards my tower till I am out of your LoS, then double back using the grass patches, through your jungle, to come at you from behind or the side when you think you are safely tower hugging or retreating. I especially love it when people pull back half a screen from a tower, think they are safe, and try to pill. Nomnomnom.
Also, expect her to always be faster than you. Evelynn is the one hero so far that Boots of Speed is actually a good first choice on, due to her early game gank potential and towerdiving ability. My second purchase is the ms 3 boots. That usually is enough to ensure I can get in your face and stun you, which is all I need.
HOW TO PREVENT EVELYNN FROM BECOMING A PROBLEM IN THE FIRST PLACE
The best way to deal with Evelynn is by preventing her from growing into anything more than an annoyance in the first place.
First tool:
Clairvoyance.
Map knowledge = power. This cannot be overestimated in importance. Map knowledge > spells, gold, xp, all. I only get into the obscene 40+ kill games when a WHOLE TEAM of people forgets to bring any clairvoyance. When one or two of the enemy has it, I'm lucky to hit 20. I've never played a team where everyone brought it, but I imagine I would be kept under 10. Maybe under 5. As I said in my thread of the same title, 'You are crazy to not take Clairvoyance' as a spell. On every hero, all the time, but even moreso if you're fighting an Eve.
Second tool:
Harassment.
Evelynn is made of paper. She does not have a good sized mana pool either. While her hate spike is very, very cheap, she really only has maybe 30 seconds total of spamtime on it before she will be OOM, at least in early and mid game. Which is where you need to crush her to prevent her from getting strong anyways.
Stealthing is -not- cheap for her to do, and takes a decent chunk of her total pool. Also, a good Evelynn needs to save a decent amount of her mana for farming last hits with. Her attack animation is crap, as is her physical damage for the most part. Hate spike is so fast and powerful, its used as her primary farming tool. You need to agressively harass her EVERY time she is in range. She will fold before you do.
She cannot accomplish all of her goals unless she gets farmed. If she is using her mana to last hit, she isn't killing you with it. If she is ganking, she isn't getting gold and xp. And a good Evelynn will not have an open summoner spell slot for teleport, so mobility and wasted time is always an issue for her.
All you have to do to shut her down is not die to her repeatedly in the first 20 minutes of the game. If your team can accomplish that, the enemy Eve is in for a rough ride.
Third tool:
Disables.
As I said before, she is made out of paper. Usually, a single disable will provide enough time for any 2-3 champs to kill her. 2 chained disables will usually provide enough time to kill even a semi-fed Eve. In teamfights, if she waits until the battle is going and then pops in with a stun, it is often worth dropping your current target to get rid of her. Remember, Hate spike is essentially 200-300 damager PER SECOND if you leave her be. That has to be one of the highest and most sustainable dps sources in the whole game. Definately big enough to take 2 seconds to stop killing the enemy tank and wipe the smirk off her little face.
CONCLUSION
Well, that's about it for now. I may update this with some more specific information if I think of anything important that I left out, or if people have further questions.
Hope this helps somewhat
Are people interested in 'Counter' guides? They have been a speciality of mine for years, I could do more of them if people would like to see them.
This is the little pink spammable lightning bolt that she has. Mid and endgame, when I'm at 350-500 AP with her, It's doing somewhere between 200-300 a shot, and the cooldown is less than a second. When Evelynn kills you, 98% of the time, it's with this skill.
2) Stealth
This is Evelynn's initiator move. When cast, there is a small delay (~1.5 secs), and then she fades into invisibility. If she attacks a target while stealthed, the target is stunned (I believe the stun starts at 1 second, and scales up to 2 or a bit more at max level). It is also how she sets up her positioning, both for attack and escape.
This spell is a low damage nuke of sorts. Additionally, if cast on the enemy when you are behind them, it will temporarily lower your armor. Expect this to be cast on you, but you really won't notice much, and in the grand scheme of things, it's not this that kills you, but that Hate Spike.
4) Ult
This is an activatable skill that Evelynn is able to fire off every time an enemy champion dies. It gives her substantial increases to both her move and attack speed. Additionally, if she kills a champion, she will regain a bunch of health. Think Bloodseeker from DotA for that aspect.
5) Passive
Her passive prevents enemy creeps AND turrets from targetting Evelynn for attack, unless:
A) She is the only available target, or
B) She is the closest target
HOW SHE KILLS YOU
Evelynn relies on psychology to score kills. The spell that does the most damage for her, Hate Spike, has a significant drawback. You cannot specifically target it. The cast range on it is not huge, and it will randomly strike a target in the area when you fire it.
The reason she relies on psychology is this:
Normally, when she jumps you, she will hit you with the bonus damage opener from stealth, stunning you. She then ravages you, and starts spiking. As you are down anywhere from 25-50% of your HP within half a second, you freak out. Your first reaction is to run. This is what kills you most of the time against her.
Normally, unless she jumps you in the jungle, or while you are switching lanes or something, you are NOT alone. This means, if she wants her spike to target you, she has to be VERY careful with her positioning. This is why you are always jumped by her slightly off to the side, away from your friendly creeps; she doesn't want to risk tagging them with her spike spam, she wants to tag YOU.
So, when you run away, what you are doing is effectively ensuring there is no one but you and her around. That makes you the only available target for hate spike. Being the only available target for hate spike makes you dead.
The same kind of thing applies to Ryze & his ult. Think Omnislash from Jug in DotA. Most dangerous when you're alone, only a laugh if you're surrounded by pals.
So, next time you're fighting an Evelynn, you should now have a much better idea of where and when she will jump you. Expect a stun out of nowhere as the last friendly creep in your area dies and the next wave hasn't arrived yet. Expect a stun directly after your creep wave arrives and fully engages the enemy creeps. In that situation, it will come 180 degrees away from the closest friendly target. Back, and to the left or right.
Just understanding how utterly reliant she is on positioning and timing is important, and knowing that will drastically increase the chances of your survival. Most important of all, DONT PANIC when she attacks you. It's forgetting that you have your flash available because you freak out and try to run that gets me the kills.
She also has an immense amount of synergy with other champions who have stuns, particularly due to her stealth. In general, if you see champions stop their lane farming behavior and move to actually engage you, and you don't see her icon on the minimap, assume she's going to let another hero initiate on you, then land her stun on you when the first one drops. She will do this every time if she is in the area. She always retains the opportunity of initiating herself, and will do so if she catches you alone for sure. She may not want to initiate in full teamclashes though, as she will likely instantly die if she gets focus fired or disabled even once.
A bit about her passive skill as well. Essentially what it does is enable her to creep dive or tower dive with significantly lower risk. As long as there is ANY other target available for the turret that is closer than Eve, it will attack that target, not her. In most laneups, people last hit/harass etc., then tower hug a big when their health gets to around 1/3 or so before they pill back to base to heal and shop. This is when an Evelynn can get you. If you're tower hugging, you are not comitting your full champion dps to the enemy creep waves. This will result in a very fast push on your lane. Once a siege creep gets in range of a tower, Eve is free to walk right up to you and finish you off. A favorite tactic of mine is to walk back towards my tower till I am out of your LoS, then double back using the grass patches, through your jungle, to come at you from behind or the side when you think you are safely tower hugging or retreating. I especially love it when people pull back half a screen from a tower, think they are safe, and try to pill. Nomnomnom.
Also, expect her to always be faster than you. Evelynn is the one hero so far that Boots of Speed is actually a good first choice on, due to her early game gank potential and towerdiving ability. My second purchase is the ms 3 boots. That usually is enough to ensure I can get in your face and stun you, which is all I need.
HOW TO PREVENT EVELYNN FROM BECOMING A PROBLEM IN THE FIRST PLACE
The best way to deal with Evelynn is by preventing her from growing into anything more than an annoyance in the first place.
First tool:
Clairvoyance.
Map knowledge = power. This cannot be overestimated in importance. Map knowledge > spells, gold, xp, all. I only get into the obscene 40+ kill games when a WHOLE TEAM of people forgets to bring any clairvoyance. When one or two of the enemy has it, I'm lucky to hit 20. I've never played a team where everyone brought it, but I imagine I would be kept under 10. Maybe under 5. As I said in my thread of the same title, 'You are crazy to not take Clairvoyance' as a spell. On every hero, all the time, but even moreso if you're fighting an Eve.
Second tool:
Harassment.
Evelynn is made of paper. She does not have a good sized mana pool either. While her hate spike is very, very cheap, she really only has maybe 30 seconds total of spamtime on it before she will be OOM, at least in early and mid game. Which is where you need to crush her to prevent her from getting strong anyways.
Stealthing is -not- cheap for her to do, and takes a decent chunk of her total pool. Also, a good Evelynn needs to save a decent amount of her mana for farming last hits with. Her attack animation is crap, as is her physical damage for the most part. Hate spike is so fast and powerful, its used as her primary farming tool. You need to agressively harass her EVERY time she is in range. She will fold before you do.
She cannot accomplish all of her goals unless she gets farmed. If she is using her mana to last hit, she isn't killing you with it. If she is ganking, she isn't getting gold and xp. And a good Evelynn will not have an open summoner spell slot for teleport, so mobility and wasted time is always an issue for her.
All you have to do to shut her down is not die to her repeatedly in the first 20 minutes of the game. If your team can accomplish that, the enemy Eve is in for a rough ride.
Third tool:
Disables.
As I said before, she is made out of paper. Usually, a single disable will provide enough time for any 2-3 champs to kill her. 2 chained disables will usually provide enough time to kill even a semi-fed Eve. In teamfights, if she waits until the battle is going and then pops in with a stun, it is often worth dropping your current target to get rid of her. Remember, Hate spike is essentially 200-300 damager PER SECOND if you leave her be. That has to be one of the highest and most sustainable dps sources in the whole game. Definately big enough to take 2 seconds to stop killing the enemy tank and wipe the smirk off her little face.
CONCLUSION
Well, that's about it for now. I may update this with some more specific information if I think of anything important that I left out, or if people have further questions.
Hope this helps somewhat
Are people interested in 'Counter' guides? They have been a speciality of mine for years, I could do more of them if people would like to see them.
