The Nexus Obelisk (colloquially called the Fountain Laser) is a type of turret in League of Legends that possesses the highest structure damage output in the game and presides over a team's spawn platform, mainly for the purpose of preventing spawn-camping by an opposing team (or the act of slaughtering enemies immediately as they re-enter the game).
They are untargetable and are not destructible in any way whatsoever, although they may be pinged.
Gameplay
On Summoner's Rift, Proving Grounds, Twisted Treeline, and Howling Abyss, the Nexus Obelisk sits in the very corner of the map, behind the spawn point itself. On the Crystal Scar, there are three Nexus Obelisks on each team: two located at the base entrances, and one near the shop.
In all of its iterations, the Nexus Obelisk attacks using a single-target laser that deals 1000 damage per tick at two ticks per second (or 2000 damage per second). This damage is dealt as true damage, that additionally bypasses every effect in the game, such as shields, , , untargetability and invulnerability effects. Furthermore, it will not flag the champion recieving such damage as 'in combat'.
Untargetability may still drop turret aggro.
The Nexus Obelisk does not prioritize champions over minions, even if those champions are in combat with opposing champions. It also ignores monsters.
Effects ignored
- (On the Obelisk itself)
- Shields
The Obelisk will not acknowledge any of these effects should a champion within range possess them and will behave as if they did not have them.
is not put on cooldown when ignored.Effects respected
- Untargetability
- Stasis
- (Dismounting and remounting work as usual)
While , and will still trigger as normal if they are taken down by the laser, their resulting form can be targeted again. goes untargetable shortly and spawns new units to be targeted while he goes untargetable, which means aggro can be traded away for them, while will imminently keep the aggro on her through the instant transition to Eggnivia.
Strategy
Because of its remote location, incorporating the Obelisk into any large strategy is usually impossible. It simply exists to prevent players from being spawn-killed in their fountain. Nonetheless, it can see significant use at times when a team is on the brink of defeat and conducting a last stand at their Nexus. Champions with crowd control that is able to reposition enemies (particularly displacement effects such as with ) can be used to force them into range of the Obelisk, usually resulting in a quick kill.
Baiting enemies into the Obelisk's range can also achieve the same result. As many players are aware of this trick, this is usually more effective with enemy minions than champions, although their priority system and low aggro range can make this difficult to pull off with large groups.
Diving an enemy Fountain is a seemingly nonsensical endeavour, however players will sometimes still want to do so, for example to finish their prestigeous Pentakill. For this case, it's important to remember that the Nexus Obelisk will target the first targetable unit of the enemy team that enters its range, and will only switch to a new target whenever either the current target leaves the range, dies or becomes untargetable otherwise. It cannot target multiple people simultaneously. This means that while whoever tanks the laser may go down to it, if executed correctly you can specifically keep certain players alive for longer than others.
Since champions are not prioritized over minions, one champion-specific strategy to dive the Fountain more easily is to use minions into the fountain, so that allied champions can freely enter for a short while without getting targeted.
to teleport a number of alliedTrivia
- In Spectator Mode, the Obelisk can be highlighted before the match begins (i.e. before Champions spawn and the timer starts ticking). During this time the Obelisk has 9999 HP and 25 AD. Once Champions spawn, the Obelisk's AD will increase to ~1100 and ramp up from there until reaching its full value.
- Despite not using a visible model a Nexus Obelisk that is considered destroyed will use the turret ruins model from the red (Magus) faction, facing southwest.