There’s a reason why Irelia has been dubbed the “nerf queen” both before and after her rework. This champion possesses an incredible dash potential with her Q – Bladesurge, and it’s well-known that if you take down a target with this ability, its cooldown resets immediately. If you’re skilled enough, even if a target is killed while Irelia is dashing towards it, this Q ability will also reset.
The difference lies in the fact that when you use Bladesurge to kill minions, the second use of the ability will lock the animation (dashing towards the enemy), and you cannot use other abilities or skills. If you target an enemy with Bladesurge but they die mid-dash, you can use Q immediately after, but since the animation of the first use hasn’t completed yet, the second use will break the animation, allowing you to use other abilities or skills while dashing.
Irelia’s skillset also facilitates breaking animations as her W – Transcendent Blades can deal damage simultaneously with her Bladesurge. As shown in the video above, when you use W on a low-health minion and immediately use Q on it, you can still unleash other skills or items like Tiamat during the dash.
Specific combo steps:
1. Use E – Flawless Duet to hit an enemy champion.
2. Use W – Transcendent Blades a second time targeting a low-health unit, and as soon as possible, use Q – Bladesurge on that target or an enemy marked.
3. During the dash of the first Bladesurge, immediately use the second Bladesurge on the enemy champion.
4. During the dash of the second Bladesurge, quickly use the ultimate Blade Surge. Note that the direction will typically be behind the enemy champion because Bladesurge takes Irelia behind the enemy; when landing on the target, this skill will hit. If you use the ultimate while dashing forward in front of Irelia, that skill will fly into oblivion.
5. Use the combo as usual.
The goal of these combos is to prevent opponents from dodging Irelia’s abilities, especially her ultimate. If you’ve played Irelia long enough, missing R – Blade Surge is quite common; it’s not that you’re bad, but the animation for this skill is too cumbersome, giving opponents ample time to react. With the aforementioned animation-breaking skill, you can launch R while still dashing, making it very difficult for opponents to evade.
Despite its effectiveness, this combo is very difficult to execute and requires a lot of quick reflexes to succeed. So be sure to practice extensively in the Practice Mode before “dancing” in ranked matches.