The Nexus is a card.

Maybe some of you already knew, but someone else probably didn't.

As usual, there's a bit of backstory: I was just asked if a Path of Champions power is bugged, "my units have Evolve but it's not working". This provided me with the perfect opportunity to talk about this. But first, some other examples.

Obviously, the nexus can be targeted. It's not quite a unit with power, but it definitely has health. Something as simple as Mystic Shot can target the nexus, in addition to targeting units.

Most Wanted is a special card in that it uses the nexus to denote the player. To my knowledge it's the only card that can exclusively target the nexus. (Not counting burn skills, though they also appear in a new light if you consider the nexus as a card.)

So it can be targeted, can be damaged by spells or unblocked attackers, it can even be killed. It may even be obliterated. This is just speculation, but I've always thought of Fiora as a Vengeance for the Nexus. A direct kill that bypasses damage. Ryze offers another option. He obliterates everything on the enemy board if you trigger his wincondition, so it seems reasonable he obliterates all enemy cards, including their Nexus. However, proving this is next to impossible. (If you know how, great! Bask in your secret knowledge in the comments.)

Finally, it can have effects applied to it. Zoe and Out of the Way are the most notable effects, in the base game. Which brings us tooo...

Path of Champions powers. They're applied to a nexus as well. If it's a player power, to their nexus; If it's an encounter power, to the foes'. It might still affect cards on the other side, but the origin is a nexus. Knowing that, you may be able to deduce what happens in the following picture:

Aatrox has a lethal attack during this weeks 3-Star weekly challenge. (Image shared with permission)

Why is the damage lower, and why does the challenging Joraal die? Note the impact stacks, the entire attack should deal 49 damage. Joraal has 5 health and tough, against 5 power. Well, Aatrox simply kills the enemy Nexus. And the player's units lose Evolve.

The power simply goes away as soon as Aatrox kills the enemy Nexus, just like an aura on another card. This can be observed with any TPoC power, though it's easily noticeable with stat or keyword auras (try Nautilus' path).

So yeah, there you have it. League of Legends has the long-running joke that "everything is a minion", for LoR I hopefully managed to prove that everything is a card. Have a nice day, kings, queens and themperors.

Edit: Fixed some things that Reddit apparently f*cked up.

External link →