Prestige Spirit Blossom Master Yi

Master Yi getting a Prestige Spirit Blossom skin felt like Riot acknowledging that Yi players deserve nice things too. October 6, 2022 release. Jennifer Wuestling did the splash showing Yi in this golden spiritual warrior form with cherry blossom petals and divine energy radiating from his blade. The community has complicated feelings about Master Yi as a champion but the skin itself is hard to argue with.

Golden blade meditation energy

The model takes Spirit Blossom Master Yi’s ethereal design and applies the Prestige gold treatment. White and gold robes, golden mask, a blade that shimmers with divine petal energy. The movement animation has golden cherry blossom petals trailing behind Yi which looks especially good when Highlander is active and he is running at full speed through the jungle.

Alpha Strike on Q sends Yi into his untargetable bouncing sequence with golden slash effects on each target. The reappearance after Alpha Strike has a golden burst. Meditate on W heals with golden energy waves and the damage reduction visual has a warm golden shield effect. Wuju Style on E empowers auto attacks with golden true damage indicators. Each auto during Wuju Style leaves a brief golden slash mark.

Highlander on R activates with a golden aura explosion. Movement speed and attack speed boosted, Yi runs across the map with golden streaks and blossom petals trailing. Resets on kill during Highlander maintain the visual chain of golden energy. Getting a triple or quadra kill with Highlander active on this skin creates this constant stream of golden particle effects that does not stop until you do. Did exactly that in an ARAM game around 3 AM last week. Four kills in maybe 6 seconds. The golden streak across the map looked like a comet.

No new voice lines. Micha Berman’s Master Yi voice applies. New recall with Prestige-enhanced Spirit Blossom meditation sequence. The recall has Yi in a meditation pose with golden petals swirling upward into a mandala pattern before the teleport completes. Solid recall animation, maybe top 3 among Prestige skins I have seen. Not sure if it’s just me but the recall sound design on this one specifically feels more polished than most Mythic tier skins from the same year.

Mythic availability

Prestige Spirit Blossom Master Yi is Mythic tier with Special pricing. Released October 6, 2022. Part of the Spirit Blossom skinline. No chromas. Available through Mythic shop rotation.

For the Yi faithful

Master Yi has a massive skin catalog with Inkshadow at Legendary and PROJECT Yi at Legendary. Both have full voice reworks that this Prestige does not. But the Spirit Blossom Prestige has a visual appeal that neither Legendary matches in terms of pure aesthetic beauty. The golden cherry blossom effects on a champion whose kit is about speed and resets creates this flowing visual rhythm that feels unique to this skin.

If you play Yi jungle or mid and you have the Mythic Essence, this is one of the prettier Prestige skins in the game. The Alpha Strike and Highlander effects specifically are top notch. Worth it for Yi mains who want the golden treatment on an already good Spirit Blossom base skin. Spammed this in Diamond for about two weeks straight after getting it and the skin genuinely made me want to play more Yi which is something I cant say about most cosmetics. (sidebar for jungle mains: the golden trail during Highlander actually helps you visually track your own pathing through teamfight chaos which sounds dumb but matters when you are trying to clean up a fight with resets) Fair warning, if you play against a lot of exhaust or heavy CC comps, you spend most of the game looking at the base model waiting for your moment and the golden payoff window is shorter than you would like. But when it hits, it hits.