Jinx
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Excellent (9/10)
Low Investment
Rare Relics OK
Jinx is widely regarded as one of the most powerful and efficient champions in the game. Her ability to deal massive direct Nexus damage through discarding cards allows her to bypass most board states and end encounters as early as Turn 1 or 2. She requires minimal investment to function at an elite level, making her a premier choice for speed-clearing content.
Rapid Deployment
The cornerstone of Jinx's kit. Upon being summoned, this discards your hand to trigger her Star Power multiple times, dealing significant Nexus damage, and immediately refills your hand with Pow-Pows.
Reduces Jinx's cost based on damage dealt to the enemy Nexus. This allows for a Turn 1 summon, immediately activating the Payload sequence.
Provides further cost reduction via Plunder, ensuring Jinx can be played immediately even if Packed Powder has not stacked sufficiently.
Strategy
This build focuses on summoning Jinx on the very first turn. By reducing her cost to 0 or 1 mana, you can immediately discard your hand using The Loose Cannon's Payload. This triggers her Star Power for massive board and Nexus damage, often ending the game instantly or clearing the board for a swift victory.
Infinite Payload Loop
- Triggers the discard-and-damage sequence upon summon.
Revives Jinx when she dies. This allows you to intentionally target Jinx with her own Pow-Pows to kill her, triggering a revive and re-activating the Payload summon effect.- A second copy provides an additional revive, extending the loop. Alternatively, use Death's Foil or Echoing Spirit for consistency.
Strategy
This strategy exploits revival mechanics to trigger Jinx's summon effect multiple times in a single turn. After summoning Jinx and refilling your hand with Pow-Pows, target Jinx herself with the damage spells. She will die, revive via Guardian Angel, and trigger The Loose Cannon's Payload again, discarding your hand for a second burst of Nexus damage.
Budget Burn
- Essential for Jinx's operation. Obtainable from the Garen 2-star campaign.
- Enables early summoning by reducing cost via Plunder.
Increases the damage of all skills and spells, amplifying both the Star Power discard damage and the Pow-Pows.
Strategy
An accessible build for players without Epic relics. The goal remains to play Jinx as early as possible. Luden's Tempest ensures that her Star Power damage scales high enough to clear tougher units and threaten the Nexus.
Other Relic Options
Generates a fleeting copy of Jinx each round. This can be used as discard fodder or, more effectively, to cast 'Get Excited!' which discards cards to trigger her passive.
Generates Warning Shots on summon. Ideally placed in a slot before Loose Cannon's Payload so the Warning Shots are generated and then immediately discarded for extra damage.
Effective in slower, high-difficulty adventures like Lissandra. Once mana 6 is reached, it duplicates every spell, doubling the output of Pow-Pows and other burn spells.
Constellation
Jinx possesses one of the strongest base kits in the game. Her 1 and 3-star powers define her playstyle, making her effective immediately. While her constellation upgrades provide significant power spikes, she is fully functional for most content at just 3 stars.
What's the Worst that Could Happen?
When you play or discard a card, deal 1 to enemy Nexus.
Wreak Havoc
+1 Starting Mana. When you level up a champion, create a Super Mega Death Rocket! in hand.
What's the Worst that Could Happen? II
When you play or discard a card, deal 1 to enemy Nexus and 1 to a random enemy.
Sorcery
Round Start: Refill your spell mana.Review
Grants 'Get Excited!' a mana potion and draws a Jury-Rig at game start. This is an excellent consistency upgrade, often fixing mana curves and ensuring you have fodder for discard effects.
Manaflow
Game Start: Get a mana gem.Review
Provides 'Ethereal Remitter' support (Manasoul Student). While helpful, this is generally considered a lower-impact upgrade compared to her other stars and is not required for her success.
Get Jinxed!
Your spells and Skills deal double damage.Review
Doubles the damage of all damage spells and skills. This upgrade is transformative for Nightmare difficulty adventures, allowing Jinx to bypass high health pools and 'Tough' modifiers that would otherwise wall her chip damage.
Gameplay Tips
The Loose Cannon's Payload Interaction
Jinx's optimal gameplay revolves entirely around this relic. It discards your entire hand upon summon. Because Jinx's Star Power deals damage to the Nexus and board for every card discarded, this results in a massive burst of damage instantly. It then replaces your hand with 'Pow-Pows', ensuring you have removal spells available immediately.
Turn 1 Priority
Jinx is an aggressive champion. Your primary goal is to draft items or use relics (like Packed Powder or Scourge's Stash) that reduce her cost, allowing you to play her on Turn 1. The sooner she lands, the sooner you clear the enemy board and apply pressure.
Bypassing Tough
Enemies with the 'Tough' keyword (reducing damage taken by 1) are Jinx's hardest counter, as her Star Power deals damage in increments of 1 (or 2 at 3-stars). Against Lissandra or weekly mutations with Tough Nexus, you must rely on the 6-star damage doubling, Luden's Tempest, or the 'Perfection' power to scale your damage instances above 1.
The Commander Ledros Interaction
If you have Jinx at 6 stars, her damage doubling effect applies to Commander Ledros's skill. Ledros cuts the enemy Nexus health in half; Jinx's power doubles that damage, resulting in an instant One-Turn Kill (OTK) against the enemy Nexus regardless of its total health.
Avoid Decking Out
Jinx cycles through her deck extremely quickly due to her discard mechanics and hand-refilling capabilities. In longer adventures like Aurelion Sol, be mindful of your deck size to avoid losing by running out of cards.