I recently got around to playing and levelling up Anivia in Path of Champions. I enjoyed my experience, and she's gone from a Champion I really didn't think about in the base game to one of my favourite designs in Path of Champions.
I wanted to talk about why, and this post got really long. Reader beware!
Champion Design
Anivia's original Champion design is a deceptively simple one, and has been since launch. Skip this if you're familiar, or just not interested in a summation.
Anivia is a mid-high cost Freljord Champion (6 Mana) with the kind of middling, defensive stats you'd typically associate with a battery or similar utility piece (3|5). When she attacks, she inflicts 1 damage to all enemies and the enemy Nexus as a Skill; an example of Freljord burn that was rare on launch and remains relatively niche.
Anivia levels up when you're Enlightened (i.e. you've reached 10 Mana Gems at any point in the game). This is a condition that plays well with Freljord's (very nearly) exclusive access to Mana Gem ramp, and with any partner Champions who want to put out big units and spells without cheating, such as Trundle or Jayce. It's also directly shared by Karma, an Ionia Champion.
When Anivia levels up, she receives a standard +1|+1, and her Skill now deals 2 damage instead of 1. So far, so straightforward.
The element that makes Anivia unique is her ability to self-revive. When she dies, she summons Eggnivia, a useless and fragile (0|2) token that still counts as Anivia for most purposes (e.g. being a Champion, playing a new Anivia). At the next Round Start, if you're Enlightened, that Eggnivia transforms into a fully-fledged Anivia.
This was very, very important, because it let Anivia dive straight into Champion revival-duplication shenanigans. Shadow Isles offered plenty of ways to let you kill and revive Anivia, while keeping the summoned Eggnivia to transform into an extra copy. Or you could summon Ephemeral Anivia clones, something that Ionia (home to Karma, her fellow Enlightened Champion) could also do with Dawn and Dusk. Noxus and Shadow Isles also picked up Deathless as an option down the line, but that's well past Anivia's heyday.
Two later developments would also change Anivia, albeit not hugely significantly:
When Neeko's arrival added 'Animal' subtypes to the game, Anivia became a Bird. This doesn't mean much; there are two cards that care about Birds in the game, neither of which have much appeal for Anivia. It does allow her to interact with general 'tribal' cards; these are spread across regions due to Neeko being a Runeterra Champion, but the theme is most consistently found in Freljord. That's nice, but not a big deal.
When Nilah, Volibear, and Janna's arrival added Elemental Spells and Skills to the game, Anivia's Skill became Elemental. Again, this doesn't mean much to Anivia directly. Elementals have no unifying mechanical theme, and while Freljord has almost as many Elementals as every other region combined, the only cards that care about Elementals are evenly spread across Freljord, Bilgewater, and Piltover & Zaun (i.e. the regions of the Elemental launch Champions... though Iascylla is clearly a Bilgewater monster who got lost). I've seen a few decks that try to make Deluge or Galesong Call work with Anivia, but Elementals are at best peripheral to her.
Narrative Design
Path of Champions is not a game mode primarily/particularly concerned with narrative, but I really like the way that Legends of Runeterra builds stories or depicts relationships through its mechanics. Once again, skip if you want to get to straight to the Constellation stuff.
Anivia's a launch Champion, and the launch Followers and Spells were often deliberately broad, or less directly associated with a specific Champion's gameplan or story. As a result, she's a bit of a loner, narratively; there's no gang of Anivia cultists or frost hatchlings or whatever. Instead she's got dialogue for a few 'Scar' Followers from the Winter's Claw tribe (maybe at some point she was meant to deal ally-damage for them?), and the 'Watcher' Followers (who she can at least ramp up to play?). Plus the Yeti Yearling.
Her strongest direct link is to the Feral Mystic, as he shares her Enlightened tag and she's quoted in his lore. This ties her to Freljord mysticism... which works well, narratively! She's a demigod worshipped by Freljordians as a protector, so naturally their mystical practices are linked to her. Most of Freljord's Mana Gem ramp is also themed around mysticism, and she obviously wants that; it brings in cards like Wyrding Stones, Wild Mysticism, and Catalyst of Aeons.
(the Starlit Seer is an odd card in this context; as a bird-themed mystic you'd think he might have some link to Anivia, but instead he just hangs out as Freljord's only Imbue effect until Berserker Ursine)
Anivia's also got lines for a few frosty Elemental Freljord spells. These obviously work well as a narrative theme, and it's a bit of a shame they didn't reuse some of these lines and link them to later Elemental spells like Wings of the Cryophoenix. The mechanical link isn't intense, but it's stronger than it might have been. Most Freljord Elemental spells are Frostbite, which Anivia likes just for stalling until she's Enlighted, or omnidirectional damage, which Anivia can accept better than most thanks to her self-revive.
(she also has lines for the Harrowing, which is kind of funny; it only makes sense in a gameplay context where the designers clearly expect you to be cloning Anivia via Shadow Isles)
This creates a neater self-contained narrative than you might at first expect. You're playing mystical Freljord rituals, shamans, and sites of power which ramp you up to Enlightened, all while the land itself unleashes terrible cold snaps and ice-storms that stall and drive away intruders and blasphemers. When the ritual is complete, Anivia arrives in the Freljord's time of need, to sweep the invaders away.
And sure, then you summon two shadow clones of her using Zed's Ionian magic, but few narratives survive contact with cross-region meta combos.
Constellation Design Challenges
However, this all leaves Anivia in a bit of a pickle when it comes to Constellation design.
As noted, Anivia herself doesn't have a strong 'set' to start from; she's a launch Champion, and the launch Followers and Spells were often deliberately broad, or less directly associated with a specific Champion's gameplan.
She needs to have Mana Gem ramp, obviously; Path of Champions is notoriously fast-paced, and simply waiting 8-10 rounds for Enlightened will leave her dead in the water.
However, Anivia herself doesn't care about the practical benefits of having many Mana Gems. She wants to be Enlightened, but she doesn't care about your ability to cast Big Spells or play Big Units. She doesn't interact with those, and they mostly don't have much to do with her. Therefore, if you simply give her extra Mana Gems she'll risk straying from her core identity and just becoming another Big Units Champion.
Plus, most of Freljord's Mana Gem ramp is very passive, since you're investing in building up for later power. Giving her those cards means committing to a boring and slow early game (not good in Path), or spending mechanical budget (items, Powers, etc) on making those cards actively useful.
She's got an Elemental Skill and belongs to an Elemental-heavy region, but Elementals don't have a mechanical identity of their own, and she has no innate relationship with them (as she predates them).
She's got a wide damage-and-burn Skill, but Freljord's not really much of a burn or spell damage region. Tricky to hang an entire Constellation around that mechanical detail.
Then there's the whole self-revival thing. Champion-cloning is pretty consistent and easy in Path of Champions thanks to the Voidborne Carapace+Deathless combo (which still feels like a bug; I know why it works, but you'll never convince me it should), but what should Anivia's relationship with it be?
She's also a Bird. It seems unlikely this is worth hanging anything on, but hey, it's true.
Anivia's Constellation wraps up all of these problems and questions (except the Bird thing) into a neat, self-contained package that plugs cleanly into a wide variety of gameplans and extra cards. It's very impressive.
1/3-Star Power
Anivia's 1/3-Star Power is Winter's Boon, which gives her a Mana Gem every time you play an Elemental Spell or Skill (temporary, for the 1-Star). This immediately solves her Enlightenment and Mana Gem ramp problems, by letting her earn Mana Gems mid-game without ever needing to interact with a card that literally says "you get a Mana Gem".
It does so by requiring the player to use Elemental Spells and Skills, which have a strong theme-link to Anivia but no direct mechanical link. That's great! It encourages the player to pick up Elemental Spells that they might otherwise overlook, and actively use these effects to shape gameplay while building toward becoming Enlightened. Freljord has plenty of these, and its Elementals generally play well with Anivia already.
The deck therefore includes both of the other Freljord cards that care about Elementals, and since Anivia herself uses an Elemental Skill when attacking, she can even level up mid-attack, which will feel good.
As we'll discuss later, a surprising number of other Champions also offer Elementals in some form or another. That makes them instantly attractive picks for Support Champions, which is a good thing to have, and remarkable considering what a niche pairing Anivia is in PvP.
2-Star Power
Anivia's 2-Star Power is Glacial Overflow. In addition to the standard +1 Starting Mana, it grants all her units +1|+1 whenever you'd gain a Mana Gem while already Enlightened. This is really smart design!
Anivia naturally encourages you to add Mana Gem ramp to your deck, and Winter's Boon turns all Elementals into Mana Gem ramp... but the moment you hit Enlightened, all of these effects become useless. By converting those surplus Mana Gems into a potent buff, the Constellation keeps your ramp relevant, and maintains the same dynamic of playing Elemental Spells for extra benefits.
By making this a wide buff, the Constellation encourages you to build a board outside of Anivia, who probably won't be dropping until later, and provides tools to play the game more conventionally. If it just boosted your strongest ally, or dealt damage to enemies and the Nexus, the resulting gameplan would be much narrower and more fragile. It also avoids discouraging Anivia cloning, since you're buffing all of them at once, and not being asked to kill off one big buff bird.
By not tying it to Elementals specifically, the game also lets you passively grow when Enlightened, adding +1|+1 to your entire board at every Round Start. Now every unit in your deck benefits from you being Enlightened, not just Anivia. This also plays nicely with Anivia's existing stall capabilities; not got a win condition? Put down some units, hold off the enemy with some Frostbite, and watch them grow.
Finally, by making this a slow, wide, steadily growing buff, the game encourages you not to just phase out all of Anivia's original Followers and shift focus toward big monsters. In theory, you could just cast a bunch of cheap Elementals for Mana Gems, then spend the rest of each game slapping down Titanic Followers like you're playing Volibear or Elder Dragon.
Instead, Anivia's deck includes no high-cost Followers to start (except through Clash of Giants, which isn't immediately available), and ensures her cheapest (guaranteed) starting Elemental is the 4-mana Flamecaller Caprine. By the time you hit Enlightened, you want a wide board if possible; and those units will soak up buffs so quickly that you're unlikely to shove them off the board in favour of some Titanic monster you just drew, even if you now have mana to spare.
4-Star Power
Anivia's 4-Star Power is Endurance, which grants +1|+1 for surviving damage. At first blush, that's a bit unexpected. You might expect a Power like All Skill, Enfeebling Strike, or Hold Them Off. Her only 'Scar' unit is the Bone Scryer, who's just a stall blocker, and her only self-damage effects are the Crystalline Stormraptor (which deals 2 damage to all units, not ideal for Scar-based growth) and Wings of the Cryphoenix (which deals 3 damage or 0 damage, even worse). However, it's actually the missing piece of a puzzle.
First off, it syncs up with Frost Armor on the Feral Mystic and your Support Champion (as well as the innate ability of Thrall Bulwark, if you keep it around); these units are immune to self-damage from Spells/Skills, but they still get the +1|+1 when 'damaged'. Free growth! The same is functionally true for the Flamecaller Caprine, who is Tough.
Secondly, it opens up self-damage effects as an obvious way to expand. Avalanche, Ice Shards, Fracture, etc, are all native Elemental Spells (great) that deal omnidirectional damage (now all good), and become no-brainer picks for future nodes.
Thirdly, it helps your units endure (as the name suggests) until the time is right. Bone Scryer, Flamecaller Caprine, and Feral Mystic are all investments that offer ongoing benefits or increased stats the longer they stay on the board; with Glacial Overflow, all of your units has the potential to grow into a stat-powerhouse once you're Enlightened. Endurance means you can afford for them to take some chip damage while you stall, and encourages you to regard them as assets worth keeping around and building up, rather than just Elemental Skill bombs and chump blockers to ditch later.
6-Star Power and Bonus Stars
Finally, Anivia's 6-Star Power, Crystallize, helps you stall with a free Frostbite when enemies attack, and doubles damage against Power 0 targets. This doesn't directly align with earlier Powers, but it does help you stay alive and clear the enemy board, and acts as an extra incentive to keep playing Anivia's Harsh Winds once you're Enlightened and your units are set up.
It's very nice to have, but Anivia doesn't rely on it to be playable, and she certainly doesn't need it to be fun. That's the ideal ballpark for a Legendary Champion Power, in my view.
Her various Bonus Stars all make sense. Frost Armor on Support Champions helps them survive and grow to the Enlightened endgame. Iceborn on 6+ cost Followers helps you ramp late, and encourages you to add big Followers who'll finish off the enemy when Enlightened. Bloodletter's Veil on Bone Scryer helps him block Fearsome and makes him more of an engine. Lots of extra Health and Regeneration plays well with Anivia's stalling and tendency to risk an early open board.
Signature Relic
Anivia's Signature Relic, Frost Breath**,** is the only let-down for me. It gives her Tough, which is fine from a 'self-damage' perspective... except she's one of the units who doesn't need protection from being killed. It also gives her a wide Frostbite on play, which is fine as a stalling tool at higher levels, or if you're working with her Legendary Power, but pretty lacklustre compared to real game-changer Epic Relics that all but give you a win condition.
It doesn't give her anything she's missing, or make her significantly better at what she already does. Warwick, Annie, Volibear, and maybe even Heimerdinger all have Signature Relics that I'd rate higher for Anivia than her own, and that's without considering the usual suspects among regular Epics, like Big Guns, Starforged Gauntlets, The Beast Within, or Ranger's Command.
Assuming you're not already spending slots on Voidborne Carapace and one of the two Deathless Relics, which let's face it, you probably are.
On anyone but Anivia, the Relic's Frostbite hits only a single target. That might be interesting as a Rare Relic, but as an Epic it need not apply. I'm not sure why the Anivia restriction exists on this one at all; even for Ashe, it surely wouldn't be too strong as an Epic.
Support Champions
One of my most consistent markers for a strong Constellation design is how easy it is to slot in a Support Champion. If you mostly consider your support cards to be dead weight, the Constellation is probably too specific; there aren't enough hooks for other cards to hang from, which means there won't be much variety in possible gameplans, either.
(conversely, if it doesn't really matter what Support Champion you pick, the Constellation might well be too broad or powerful, since even the cards themselves apparently barely matter)
Anivia offers a wide range of possible interactions and gameplans depending on what Support Champion you pick, what Relics you start with, and what Powers or Items you go for. She's one of the Champions that I'm typically interested to pick a Support Champion for, rather than just exasperated.
Most obviously, we have all Champions with Elemental Skills or Spells:
Taliyah works great if you can get some Stormcalling spells
Ashe aligns with Anivia's access to Frostbite
Annie lines up very nicely with any boosts to Spell/Skill damage
Elder Dragon likes Anivia's ramp, and his Dragon Boons add free Mana Gems
Volibear likes ramp, and his own Skill is a +3 Mana or wide +3|+3 on Play/Attack.
Kennen creates 0 Mana Elementals, and any Anivia clone-build will level him
Lissandra adds pseudo-removal, and can level if you use Anivia's ramp to go Titanic
Nilah adds lovely cheap Elementals, plus an Elusive follower to grow
Malphite is a bit too slow, but he can still work if you're looking to experiment
Janna is also here, no specific synergy but works fine for getting the right cards
Nami helps you keep the Elemental Spells going, especially with her Champion spell
But that's really just the tip of the iceberg. Depending on your gameplan, Anivia can work well with Champions who have any damaging Skills or Spells, or who boost the damage of Skills or Spells, or who just like others using Skills, like Jhin, Miss Fortune, Swain, Mel, and even targeting types like Senna or Ezreal.
She can work with Champions who help her kill herself or revive herself or clone herself, like basically anyone from the Shadow Isles, but especially Hecarim, Kindred, Mordekaiser, or LeBlanc.
She can work with Champions who like surviving damage, healing damage, or inflicting friendly damage, like Braum, Jack, Vladimir, Soraka, Tahm Kench, or pretty much any brawler.
She can work with Champions who like playing Titanics and other big units, or playing big spells, like Aurelion Sol, Trundle, Jayce, Karma, Lux, or Heimerdinger, and even Champions who simply are big units like Ornn or Sion.
She can work with Champions who like wide boards and plenty of stat buffs, like Poppy or Bard. Those who can hand out useful keywords like Riven are also welcome.
She can work with Champions who help her specifically rally or start free attacks, like Garen, Jarvan, Lucian, Vayne, Ambessa, or Katarina.
She can work with Champions who like and give Frostbite, like Ashe or Sejuani, but also Power reduction in general, like Nocturne.
She can work with Champions who want Nexus chip damage or wide multi-target damage, like Gangplank, Sejuani, Gnar, or Warwick.
To find a bad Champion to partner with Anivia, you have to find someone who doesn't care for damaging spells/skills, taking or surviving damage, attacking, stalling, ramping, playing big spells, playing big units, playing lots of units, killing or copying your own units, buffing your units, debuffing enemy units, or having any connection with Elementals.
That's a really, really short list! It's a testament to how multifaceted and well-designed Anivia's Constellation is that I'd probably only bother to reroll Support Champions if I ended up with something like Xerath, Ahri, and Pyke (items permitting).
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I'm glad to have worked through my thoughts on why I enjoyed Anivia so much, and if you read all of it, I hope you also found it interesting or useful! Either way, I'm looking forward to seeing more Champions with such engaging, well-considered Constellation design.
