Locke

Piloting Locke means fighting with your own health bar always in view. This melee assassin-mage hybrid plays mid lane and turns on-hit magic damage into kills. His Silver Stake passive scales each attack harder as the enemy’s health drops, so the whole plan is to push targets into that execution range and close them out before they can run.

The kit pays off for patient setup. Ritual Nails summons Soul Nails that damage and mark foes, and attacks that consume those marks add bonus damage, so a strong Locke builds up marks before committing to a fight. Ashen Pursuit is the engage tool: a teleport that flows into a dash, carrying him through enemies to his chosen target, which is useful for crossing the 125-range gap a melee champion has to close. Soul Ignition is the most unusual piece. It burns Locke himself, granting attack speed and move speed in exchange for his health, and later returns part of the damage he absorbed. The real skill is ending the fight before that self-inflicted damage starts to hurt.

Finishing the ritual

Purgatory wraps the sequence with a thrown binding artifact that can outright execute low-health enemies. Sealing champions away also gives Locke extra power, so every kill fuels the next one. The weaknesses are built into the design: he hurts himself, must fight up close, and contributes little to his team when he falls behind. Locke suits players who like fast, all-in dueling, where managing resources means betting with their own life total.