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For me she is an appealing champion, but every game on her feels sooo sweaty. You need to farm items, dodge skillshots (because you are in everyone's range), kite as hell, land every Q, monitor mana pool, go above and beyond to ult people, while there are so many characters, who, though won't deal the same DPS are able to do it faster/more consistent/ or from a distance. She can be menace to deal with in some team comp, but there are a lot of situations, when you are pretty much useless and can not play the game, because everyone is faster than you or has greater range.
@@scarletwarlock9325she doesn't look like she's from anywhere in Runeterra, you could say she looks slightly Shuriman cus of the headpiece or smthn but even that's a stretch, she never evolved from ye olden days where the League of Legends was a thing and every character was a tired fictional archetype
I think 1 of the key usages of Cassiopeia's W that was missed is that often times the best usage of W is as a stand your ground tool where if you're playing into a target that is going to dash into you then if you place your W underneath yourself and force your enemy to stand in it if they want to hit you, then all you really need to do is be capable of surviving their initial burst.
@@einjharrelraca I mean your reasoning is highly fallacious, there's a reason Cassiopeia builds for 3 items that increase her durability, in addition to the fact she has built in sustain in her kit through healing with her E, ROA, and Conqueror.
@@Hail_Fire 3 items in a game where matches are decided at 1 item and over at 2. Also you mentioned ROA and conquerer as built in healing. they aren't. her only inbuilt healing is on e, and requires a monstrous amount of mana + time to mean anything. As for the ROA debate. wow, such a broken item. its only a smaller spike than serrated dirk as a completed item until it has all 10 stacks, again, in a gamestate where matches are decided at 1 item, and ending at 2. If cassio uses her w defensivly like you suggest, that means she dies. cause if its at her feet that means it isnt grounding anyone that isnt already on her. Just to put into perspective how little she really heals. with ROA and conquerer, and we can even assume she just always have fully stacked conquerer, her e heals 16% ap and then 5% post mitigation damage + 10 hp for roa at 1 item against a base mr target this would end up being 8 + 4 + 10 = 22 hp 22 hp when in the best case scenario for her isnt all that amazing, especially considering this is assuming 100% up time on her poison, which isnt possible anymore. you cant even argue its a lane sustain tool, because against minions it heals 5 hp each cast against a poisoned target.
@@einjharrelraca People cry too much about assassins when they're rarely even in the meta. Like oh no, Akali and Zed are actually somewhat playable. Better cry until Rito nerf them again because I can't play against champs that literally lose the game if they go even in lane. Cass actually does really well into most assassin picks btw. It's mages that out push & out range her that are most of Cass's problems. Why play Cass when you can play Lux and accomplish more for a fraction of the effort.
@@Microtardz people cry about assassins because any game they can get even the tiniest of leads into, they INSTANTLY become the most zero counterplay garbage in this game, and well, every game has a real easy target in it for any assassin to collect that 1 kill that breaks them. Cass also does OKAY into assassins at best. She does will into people who are shit at playing assassins and get carried by their class, but if the assassin player has even the tiniest semblence of how their champion works, shes a free matchup for them. Also if they have a are on an ad assassin and have a brain brain they can take nullifying orb in their runes, and go hexdrinker before their dirk and cassio has been negated from existance until 3 items. As for your, "why play cass when you can play lux and accomplish more for a fraction of the effort" yes. thats what they did. its why her playrate is always shit.
Her grounding, paired with her being incredibly strong with Rylays (which doesn't have an AD counterpart anymore now that FM is gone). In this league of mobility... I'd say she is extremely strong, but has a high skill floor due to her core mechanics having low forgivability.
@@joshuaosei5628 oh no. as if getting someone to half health is a feat in league 2024. XD actually it might be a feat in league 2024, that takes restraint to get them to half and not just 100-0 them in a blink XD
@@einjharrelraca Youre saying Seryldas = FM essentially because theres so much dmg in the game. This applies to Rylais too, Rylais slows even a 100% HP target despite all the damage being in the game. So when homeboy says Rylais doesnt have an AD counterpart now that FM is gone, he is right. Seryldas is conditional, Rylais isnt. Frozen Mallet used to give HP and its respective damage, just as its AP counterpart STILL does. Anything else?
@@marcuslesesne6239 frozen mallet applied only on auto attacks not abilities. by your logic sylda's is closer to rylai's than frozen mallet ever was, because both rylai's and syylda's apply on abilities, not auto attacks.
the thing that makes cass worth learning is how oppressive she is when played correctly. other champs and kits will be better on average in most games, but cass can be really oppresive, which some other champs can't really apply that pressure into the early/mid game
The thing with how item-reliant she is is the items she buys aren't to augment her playstyle, they're to shore up her weaknesses and I'm glad you mentioned that specifically. If you play a marksman, the champs aren't good without items but they still feel like the same champ at 1 item and at 6 items, just with more damage. Cassio isn't like that. After you get your items you feel unstoppable but early on she feels straight up dysfunctional. No mana, no sustain, no bulk, auto-lose trades if you miss Q yet no reliable way to land Q early, all of her items are just covering these weaknesses. It works out because the items cover for her very well and she's still a strong champ, but early game Cassio is as close to playing as an actual caster minion that I've ever experienced and I've been a Neeko main for 4 years
@@CarmenLC If games go long you kinda need rabadon or you get outscaled hard by ADCs but if you have it and take gathering storm you are at 1K AP and you melt. Isue is you can buy it kinda late and at that point you are not sure if game will be decided in 5 min (then starting to build rabadon would be pointless) so you might rather go fo some short term return in form of liandry or even going 1 tank item like randuin or force of nature.
One thing I really enjoy about Cass is that you buy Serfas, Rod of Ages, Frozen Heart, Spirit Visage and for runes Conqueror with maxout healing... And than you deal less damage, but you are surprisingly tanky and healing bit too much. 1v3 becomes surprisingly easy if you hit your spells and kite properly. Also very nice way to see enemy team rage
Well, I think it's hard to really find any angle to change her, since her win rate is actually quite good. Buffing her is out of question as a result. They could opt for making her more popular by making her easier to play, but that would alienate her dedicated playerbase and might even take away her identity. Amongst mages, she is the heaviest movement and timing based champion, in a similar bracket as Azir or old Aurelion Sol and just like them, hard to play and not "appealing" to a broader audience. The thing is, you can't really change that, without fundamentally reworking her E. So, all Riot can do right now, is make sure that she doesn't get out of hand in the hands of dedicated one-tricks, while still having her feel powerful enough to be a worthwhile champion. And she kinda.. is in that spot right now. In the past.. years, the only spikes to her winrate or playrate have always been tied to system changes that benefitted or hurt her accidentally.
I have an idea that would consider the problems Vars has pointed out while making her as least alienating her playerbase and E. You remove the grounded effect from Miasma. It keeps her inherently harder to balance, because she can hard counter an entire mechanic, but also has that mechanic tied to a hyper carry kit, making her possible to be toxic against when you cannot Flash or dash away while she kills you. You could instead make her Miasma follow enemies it hits, like Noc Q. This would also remove her need to rush Rylais as often. You rework Q slightly. It can now be detonated earlier, but can also grow in size before manual or automatic explosion. This would improve her consistency of her damage, and it ties to the last change I would like to suggest. Make her E also damage all poisoned enemies within range around the target, possibly for reduced damage. This makes her have much better and less committal waveclear with the previous Q change, and lets her DPS multiple enemies.
One of the biggest problem with League is that the talentless hacks over at Riot actually brainwashed their community into thinking that completely redoing champions periodically, while the same time essentially deleting what those champions once were, is a good thing, when it is in fact a symbol of a broken mess of a game that is impossible to properly balance.
Cassio is so underrated as a lane bully! Sure she scales well-ish but as someone who mained for 5 years and still plays her at times she feels the best in the early game pre-6 and at 2 items.
its because she was kicked out of mid lane. She cant play into other mages, she just lacks the wave clear and early pressure to deal with them. And she can no longer lane into any of the assassin rouster because serrated dirk is now 600 gold cheaper than seekers, and her core item being ROA is waaaay too slow to compete with a champion class that 100-0s people while missing half their kit at a component item.
Cass is insanely strong, but as someone who plays her a lot her biggest issue is she is both difficult to play and impossible to blind pick. She requires the dedication of a one trick, but is situational. If someone plays a long range control mage like Viktor, Syndra, or Ori, or the enemy pick a poke/disengage bot like Cait Seraphine, the game is completely unplayable. In the right situations, however, where teams want to dive into you, she is psychotic. But most people don’t want to invest hundreds of hours for a pocket pick unless they really love the character.
She deserves the next Champion graphical update. Other than that I just want lots of little buffs for her like a tiny buff to the range on her Q and W would be so nice.. And then reduced mana costs across the board. Nothing crazy drastic but just a little something. I think her base kit/concept is perfect tbh.
At this point, Riot might as well give back her old stacking passive without taking away her current one and give her The smolder treatment, where stacking gives her "E" some extra properties. Imagine her "E" with a tiamat-like effect or work like Runnan's (even both), It could sound op but considering what when already have in The game It seems quite tame.
She would basically make Ryze obsolete, considering she already offers more zone control with her AOE stun + grounding effect, while Ryze at least has higher burst and AOE.
@@lissandrafreljord7913 you mean The same way that Briar made Warwick obsolete? Nah I don't think so. But If that's The case, it's not like Riot is not willing to rework hin for The 70th time to solve his issues :^V
@@caesar1512 I personally think it would be cool if they added true damage to her poison, such that she would have to unlock it by landing 5 stacks of Twin Fang on her poisoned target. In the late game, it would mean she would start melting tanks faster, considering she is still a very vulnerable immobile shorter ranged mage that has no form of guarantee peel with her ult and miasma (meanwhile Azir has wall and dashes away, Kayle got her ult, ASol can just fly through walls and land E, while melting tanks with much more ease).
@@caesar1512 that what I has be saying for so long she new a rework on her pasive which gave her to choose between tenacity, move speed, armor every 3 or for lvl also she need a bit of range cuz almost 98% mage has more range them cassio as a main is a pain in the ass play against neeko, xerathx wawei, velkoz, Annie, anivia syndra lissandra Viktor lux
She's a menace in aram. As a casual aram enjoyer, whenever I encounter her in Aram, she just counter a lot of play making and engage attemps. Lucky not many want to play her lol
I think the biggest problem is that she requires set-up. If you miss your Q, your E will have about a quarter of the damage output. The CD on her Q is fairly short, but basically if you're in the middle of a fight and whiff that Q (or your enemy flashes or whatever), then you're shit out of luck for several gut-wrenching seconds. Or even if you land your Q, you'll only do damage to the person you hit, and if there's multiple enemies, you won't be able to damage them if you haven't poisoned them first. Thankfully you have your W in case of emergencies to inflict poison, but you also need your W to stop dashes and it has a long cooldown, so like Vars said you have to know when to properly use it for defense vs. offense. Also as somebody who plays Cass, one of my biggest gripes is her passive. The fact that you CAN'T buy boots means two things- 1) you won't ever be able to benefit from the very gold-efficient passives that boots can give (not being able to get merc treads can sometimes really hurt). 2) Even with your passive giving you MS, you're still going to end up being slower than your lane opponent early-mid game once they've bought boots. Her passive gives 4 MS per level (and she starts from a pitiful base of 328), so it's not until level 12 that she's actually broken even compared to just getting a normal pair of boots (level 15 if you'd have bought swifties). Compare that to somebody like Janna, whose passive gives +6% MS (and gives it to allies walking towards her AND adds 30% of your bonus MS on-hit), and whose W passively gives 6-10% (+2% per 100 AP), but she can still buy boots. She's faster than Cassiopeia at level 1, and (assuming a build with at least 350 AP), she's faster than her at level 18, WITHOUT boots. And of course they're different champs with different kits (and Cass gets MS from her Q if she lands it) but in general the only real game impact her passive has is negative impact that you have to play around not being able to buy boots even if you need them. Sure, it means she's viable to go 6 items with no boots- but there's other champions in certain matchups that can ditch boots as well to greed for 6 items, and actually end up in a better position than Cass for it.
I dislike the passive, boots would be so much nicer into most mage matchups. The "upside" of having 6 full itemslots feels diminished since you cant get fullbuild most games anyway and even if you do, Cass buys so many utility items in comparison to other mages that she needs a slot more to actually get some damage.
@@peschionator7873 yeah, it feels even worse considering that some of her power balance went into that passive, so she's losing power elsewhere in her kit for the privilege of not being able to buy boots (and getting some scaling ms as compensation)
Amazing video! It's the first time I've heard a non-Cassiopeia player discuss the champion without being completely disconnected from her reality and straight up yap
Cass E is one of the few thing that has a center to center range. So it is not a true 700 range, as attack range is edge to edge. This also means that the bigger she is and the bigger her target is, the lower her E range. You usually have between 650 and 550 effective range, around 600 on normally sized champions (it is actually a bit less than that, by memory).
i disagree with some of your points. She as an AP ''AA'' champion means that her E scaling of AP makes all her poisoned E damage seems like you are getting hit by a crit, since the E will roughly deal around 800 damage each since she a high base damage on her E and 70% of 800 AP is roughly 600, also her lack of on hit is compensated by the fact she is burning you with her Q, Liandrys and blackfire torch. She is THE duelist mage, in fact this is her more clear identity, she is the best 1v1 mage in the entire game and easily top 5 best duelists in the game, a good Cassio will make sure you are getting hit by her Q, and if you get hit you are doomed, she has a lot of mind games behind her duels, and they are very overwhelming and stat checky. There are champs who can keep with her or have straight up advantadge in a 1v1 in the late game like Fiora, Kayle and Yasuo (with a wave), but all of them are not even guaranteed win, cause there is a lot of room for counterplay for both sides. also a correction for you Vars. her 700 range on her E would be insanely powerful if wasn't by the fact it is treated center to center instead of edge to edge like an AA, so her 700 E range ignores completaly hitbox range, while AAs counts their AA range + the enemy hitbox range, for example the 550 range Vayne hitting a Caitlyn will mean Vayne has her 550 innate range + 120 from Caitlyn's hitbox, totalizing 670 range in total, which is -30 range compared to Cassiopeia's E, so Cassio's E true range in average is around 580 agaisn't most champs, thats why it is so painfully low to a mage, since she has no invisibility or innate ms boost like Vayne's R and Q.
Yes, she is probably the only mage who can 100 to 0 most types of champs in most situations, if she plays it well. Sure Vlad, Ryze, ASol, Malz are all pretty strong too, but they definitely don't have the same dueling power as Cassio throughout all of early, mid, and late game.
I still listen to the badministrator song for cass. Every time it gets me inspired to give her a shot I open the game and immediately change my mind. I wonder how Cass performs in arena actually.
She is one of my favourite champions and i played her consistently in ranked as well. 2 issues though 1. There are champions who have so much mobility to bite the w 2. If you use w/r and haven't killed them all you dead 3. You need to hit her anilities 4. You need to avoid skillshots cause you play from really close
As a cassio main with ~4m mastery and masters peak. I agree wholeheartedly with many of these points. A common issue with cass mains is when they get to high level play they "Burn out" and a common sentiment is "Why do i play cass if X just does the same thing with less work". She requires so much engagment and focus to play well each game can become exhausting. And you often are barely rewarded for putting in that effort because thats just what you are SUPPOSED to do. This is a similar issue to azir and anivia. Tons of work to pull off what you are meant to do. Only dedicated mains tend to want to put in that effort. I know you touched on these points already. Just putting in my own personal experience.
I love Cass! I went on like a 6 month spree of playing her back in like 2014. There's no feeling like hitting your q and chaining e in a tense fight or hitting a 5 man ult.
As someone who loved her original version and I would go as far as to say I mained after her first rework with her stacking passive - I don't personally like her current version because she doesn't have enough mana to kill enemies in the laning phase unless her opponent is extremely obliging. I love picking her up in FGMs that cover mana issues. After her first rework, I loved playing her bottom lane as the carry - the old refund on her E covering the cast cost plus a percentage made farming and trading in a 2v2 really engaging. I think her refund really needs to be tuned like Malzahar/Xerath, so that she can play around refilling her mana rather than merely getting to "farm for free". Having to stack mana items feels like I'm sacrificing my power spikes. I really prefer her having a Marksman playstyle though - I hope they don't ever make her more "mage-like". You mentioning the lack of crit chance reminds me of the fact they get Syndra a built-in Collector so she wouldn't need to buy it, and how they gave Brand a built-in Rylais and Morgana a built-in Shurelya's. Maybe Cassiopeia just needs an extra effect on her Twin Fang saying "Twin Fang has a 25% chance to Critically Strike for X% bonus damage for every Legendary Item." I kinda wish her passive had an AP ratio, even if it was really low - it's currently a bit lame as-is. Her old Deadly Cadence was fun to use; her old Quest Passive was fun to use; but getting a free item slot doesn't *feel* good in most games because you have to get to super-late game before you really feel it, especially since she doesn't really feel faster than other champions at other stages of the game (not factoring other effects like her Q or Phase Rush). P.S. I hadn't seen the poison icon I made for the wiki in a while. It was nice to see. Thanks for using the wiki!
They could change her e into an auto attack so that she could buy items like nashor's or guinsoo like azir and make he e into a passive that makes that her abilities gain crit chance according to ap so having a certain amount of ap would make her a real ap marksman making her shots deadlier as the game goes on
To give her a bit more flexibility, I would add a passive: She can mark enemy on applying poison to them. Then on her fang, for X number of enemy marked by her, all of them take X times 10% (can be tweak ofc) of the fang damage . It would put Cass in the situation of either poison everyone to spread damage or focus down one opponent.
Cassio could go a long way if they switched her ult and miasma (like they have done to other champs). Make the miasma an ult level ability that covers a large area around her for a long duration and her stun a line skill shot stun. Make her a hard counter to all assasins, brusers, and fighters. Maybe her stun is very short and close range but greatly reduces the damage u do for a longer duration.
one thing barely touched on is that in the current state of lethality, Cass struggles to actually do her damage. An ADC clicks on a target, and they shoot. Cassio needs to hit Q, and THEN she starts doing damage. With burst damage being as high as it is right now, if you go into a fight with an annie and hit Q, annie can have you eat her *entire* combo before your first Twin Fang is on target. It might not sound like much, but it's a major cause of why Cassio builds so much durability, and with mage durability items not being particularly good atm, a major cause of why Cassio doesn't do well. The funny thing is she's a very easy character to fix. The mechanics that fix her are already in her kit. They just haven't been embraced. Not mentioned at all is that Twin Fang heals Cassiopeia on hit, and with the rate she fires them, this healing can be very substantial. But she has the lowest base armor in the game and pretty meh HP. If they leaned into making Cassio a regenerating bruiser mage, she'd require no mechanical changes and actually be an extremely good and likely popular character. Boost her durability, drop her damage a bit, and bam, we have only changed some numbers and Cassio is good.
You actually cooking with that idea. And her aoe spells would make sense too because bruisers wanna be in the middle of a fight. Somewhat ranged Sylas would be pretty interesting to watch for sure
She just need a new pasive which give her the option on every 3 lvl to choose a stat between tenacity , move speed or armor, like aphelios pasive and also a bit of range cuz the 98 % of the mid lanes mage have more range them her
@@kenplay That would do it, particularly if they make her abilities work like everyone else's where it's edge to edge instead of canter to center. I just didn't want to add any mechanics and just use numbers adjustment.
What I've always loved about Cassio is that she teaches you flexibility. You can build her is different but similar ways ( for example: slightly more defensive and tanky, or full damage)
You still get slowed, she can set yp W to root you, Q + E, E, E while dancing around the poison while you try to catvh her to land your first skill or A.A. By that time you either are dead or super low health. She is tanky so by the timr you finally get to her, you can't kill her. I am assuming this in case you play Nafiri, the Yasuos, Zed, Irelia, Yi, Jax, Trynda etc. If you are a mage you still lose close range since she outdps you.
There are ways to empower her e with cdr wich is the equivalent of attack speed for abilities. Also there is items that proc on abilities which she also ends up buyi g often like liandry and rylais.
Dying on Cassio, because enemy Yone dodged your W, dashed out from Q and turned back on your R, blowing you in the process, while you deal 0 damage, even though you have massive gold advantage kinda sucks.
I agree yone is bullshit, what I do is ult him when he q in and than I get a guaranteed w on him and juste dps him while running in direction of his shadow
I know it's late but there's this AP item that reduces your ability damage by 1/3rd but your abilities proc a chainlightning with a short cooldown. I forgot what was it's name tho, it came at the same time as Sundered Sky, etc.
i have one tricked cassio for 8 years, currently played last split and this split as a OTP cass bot main, she does work, a big part of the problem is suppourts not knowing how cassio works, especially her mana pool early and how to utilize miasma properly
It would be cool to see an update in her kit. Maybe make her the mage version of Vayne by adding true damage in her kit, but more practically in her poison, such that after 5 stacks of twin fangs, the poison starts dealing DoT max % health true damage to melt tanks in the late game faster.
I think you kind of nailed it. She's a deceptively hard champ to play because everything you do has to very little margin for error, lest you burn through your mana and your pressure is gone in an instant. The mobility creep in this game has also not been kind to her as you can easily dodge everything she throws at you, and she's more dependent on landing those abilities for any kind of escape potential, which then means she's easy to gank especially pre-6. Even the fact that she doesn't buy boots is somewhat of a hinderance because it denies her from reaching the same major power-spikes around the early-mid game that most mages have. That and like, I feel like the state of mid lane right now is that everyone either wants to play a very safe, long-range poke mage or an assassin/skirmisher that has tremendous kill pressure up close. Nothing in-between, and Cass doesn't excel at either.
As a Cass main, this is entirely spot on. She's limited by mana very hard early, and her chase potential is killed once enemy builds boots early on. Her positioning is extremely important, and requires a good frontline to succeed in team fights. Honestly though all things considered, a W buff would go a LONG way into making her viable; it's just to inconsistent with its long cooldown to be largely useful
I've always seen her as the mage you want if the enemy team is going heavy on being beefy. Her damage into tanks is nothing to sneeze at and her bulk lets her endure the slap fights. But in this league of damage meta, ehhhhh
I loved her old passive she felt like a far bigger late game treat. But currently poke or burst mages do the same or more but far easier. My suggestion would be a second passive like her old one but at the breakpoints gaining magical crit on her E.(Late game power)
I would like to see them switch her to a new resource system I've dubbed "potency". The bar's neutral state is full, or "engorged", and as she uses abilities it lowers to "depleted". The lower the bar, the more bonus move speed and bonus ability power she gets, but also the shorter her ability ranges become (aside from ult). The base size of her w and e should be larger, but also decrease in size the lower the bar gets. The potency meter only starts regenerating after not using abilities for a time. This would give her better poke range and coverage when her bar is fuller. More sustain because she isn't tied down by mana. Also makes her more potent in prolonged fights/all-ins, with the downside being that she is more vulnerable due to reduction in ability ranges - she has to get into the dnager zone.
People can be kinda bad and keeping targets poisoned, which is what her E relies on to deal so much damage. I usually get Seraphs, Rylais, then Liandrys and Shadowflame to get a triple burn going when you get tagged with poison. Even if I don't decide to chase you down and E you to death, your still losing a sizable chunk of your health off of one Q hit.
I think a big part of why no one plays her is because of how much her early game has been crippled. Cass used to be a notorious lane bully and she was able to keep up the pressure because her E would allow you to profit on mana. She still has the same early damage that she used to, but after two trades, you've got no mana to do anything else. So instead you're forced to play nice and farm up tear stacks so that you can scale into lategame. They really did double down on her ADC playstyle and she's all the more mediocre for it.
One thing I wish had been touched on at least a little in this vid, specifically in the idea of her being played bot lane or not, is the fact that poison from other champs counts for empowering her E so a Twitch or Teemo support can set up her E without her having to land Q or use W.
This isn't to argue against the video, but small fun little tidbit, there's boosters who use Cassio + pyke bot lane to snowball game out of control lol
It's a lot of fun to play her for me (I am a fan of both mages and marksmen) but I simply find her so mechanically demanding that I often throw games with her after becoming fed during laning phase.
I feel like it would be great if they make her ult so that when enemies are facing her they will be stunned, if not they will be rooted instead for the same or half of the stun's duration.
Honestly it’d be more balanced if her miasma was a giant ring like trundle. Switch the grounding to Q. The whole grounding aspect is something that I’ve seen only be a target vs one person on enemy team or a zoning tool. Q is already hard to hit/easy to dodge, so making Q the grounding ability makes more sense. But since people dodge it so frequently, having W just be there for poison, will make her kit more forgiving. W doesn’t do much damage anyways so just have it be a giant ring. Either that or make her ult do a 3-5 second grounding regardless of stun.
I love Cassio but she is insanely unforgiving, now more than last season. Most mages can give you a hard time if they can space correctly. Your passive is a detriment in these matchups since you cant just rush boots to close the gap or dodge skillshots like any other champion. Even when fed, most of your damage is single target and takes some time so it is harder to carry with a lead than with other mages. Now with gargoyles stoneplate gone Cassio lost her best defensive item. In my experience you cant afford to not build somewhat defensively unless you are either a god or you have a team that actively plays around you (good luck finding that in soloq).
Imo there isn't really any reason to play Cass when Veigar or Syndra exist, they have much better options to deal with mobility with added CC without their 60 second cooldown ability
@@souporcat syndra? What is she gonna do vs Irelia or Yasuo? Also Yone bypasses Veigar's E. Meanwhile Cass stops all of them specially Yone who can't go back to his body.
@@Yokai_Yuri Syndras e easily deals with most assassin attempts, and usually is able to turn the damage back with the balls used to push them away. What? Last I remember Yone can't go through veigars cage, nor does Cass w stop him from going back. It's completely unstoppable, he can't go back unless the time runs out or he does it himself. Sure it stops him from initially casting it, but no Yone is going to cast it in Cass w range because the second they go back they're getting an ult to the face so that's more of a skill issue. (I stand corrected on Veigar Yone interaction, he gets stopped on his way back but not on the initial dash so you're right my bad)
@@Yokai_Yurishe’s gonna push them with E, one of the best get off me abilities in the game; you picked two creep reliant champs to argue against a champion that controls creep lmao
The main issue with cass is her mana. Her passive was perfect back in the day, as it decreased her mana costs by 50% when fully stacked iirc. You're forced to build a tear on her no matter what, that's what sets her back due to tear items relying on stacks and games being shorter nowadays. The same occurs with anivia, mana costs are way too high in the current state of the game, so you'll end up with no mana when trading, unlike other mages. Even with the rune that increases mana regen when attacking champions, cass can still run out of mana, it's insane how much mana you need in order to actually deal damage, whereas other mages can nuke you with their ult and still have over 80% of their mana. Additionally, you forgot to mention cass' reliance on poison. Her DPS drops whenever a target isn't poisoned, and you can't keep them poisoned 100% of the time reliably, hence why rylai's another must in her build. The final nail in the coffin is her current passive. While free ms is great and all, the lack of boots wrecks her early game completely. You can't roam as fast as other mages, plus you'll struggle dodging and kiting until you level up some more. If cass had her original passive, she'd be a different story nowadays, but by the time you've stacked that tear and are building rylai's, you'll be wondering why you didn't bring a different mage to the match.
I still find it interesting that almost 14 years later, Cass can STILL empower her E from allied Singed Q poison and Teemo E and R poisons. It baffles me how such a legacy mechanic has gone under the radar for so long, but it makes it very fun when some of us old farts quee up with these old champs can totally make the enemy team hate their life lol
i think its about the player base it self, Mostly i saw want to play flashy or One shot champion rather than chipping down the enemy bit by bit (like you said neutral)
Than God barely anyone plays her, I play top and I just picked her up a week ago and it is so much fun, there are almost no match ups that are unplayable, also no one ever bans Cassio ever
To make her consistent again, I'd imagine she needs something like a very short duration low damage poison effect on her e so that she can reliably proc poison. alternatively, let her ult push away anyone who isn't stunned, that way she can place w and push the enemies into it. Also, the whole boots thing was novel for its time, but it really isn't working in her favor these days
let her e scale with levels, every levelput in e, hitting a poisened enemy extends poison time by 1-2 seconds lvl 1, 1 sec lvl 2 1.25 etc so u can reliable use her e, u dont need to build rylai to be able to keep hitting poison, just 1 q and if they fk up they die, but wait 1-2 sec and she has to hit q again.
Listening to this vid she sounds kinda like an AP Juggernaut which is kinda cool. Or maybe Bruiser is the word I’m thinking of. Mix of DPS and tankiness.
The only true AP juggernaut is Mordekaiser, as juggernauts are melee champs. You can make an arguement for AP Voli, AP Udyr, and maybe AP Cho'Gath, Rumble, Shyv (not really), and Singed.
To be fair Riot deliberately removing her from bot lane and they were explicit about it in the patch notes. They nerfed her base armor and base HP, and gave a magic resistance compensation buff.
Imo cassio does everything you want from a champion. Although I generally agree with the points you mentioned but I love the fact that her style changes based on the enemy team comp. She's not a xerath or a syndra but she has the same control, she's not a malzahar or TF but she has the same kill pressure. One of the things that are absolutely undervalued in my opinion is her no boot design, the only or second champion (yummi players, I SEE YOU ON THAT FED KHAZIX YOU BASTARD!) She emphasises the need for XP translating into better macro play. I love this champion's design because it's unique and she scales so beautifully. I will admit she's a nightmare to play against in the hands of a good player and this is different from other otps. A cassio otp really makes the game feel hopeless by level 2 even if they're a silver player. (I hover between plat 4 and gold 1 nothing special here) Also she brings back that old gameplay and a longer game which I like. But then I'm reminded cassio is in the game and I get depressed again... This is my personal opinion, feel free to disagree, (probably a Kat Otp "go brrrrrr") I admire any cassio player, even though most of them never really gave off the nicest impression when I played with them. Have a nice day and thank you for reading!
Cassio is actually one of my favorite battle mages. Viktor is fun, but i suck with his laning phase and trying to last hit, and im just really inconsistent with vladimir. But Cassiopeia is one I can bith blind pick and counter pick with. Plus playing her in urf is the only reason ill play the damn game mode. But i just prefer more assassin type characters like akali, or for marksman, twitch.
As an Anivia support enjoyer, I can see why Cassiopeia's kit makes sense: she's supposed to be a more single-target and consistent version of Anivia, as they have the same E (double damage if hit by another spell), a zoning W and ult, and damage boost on Q. Though, because of this, Cass is much more gold-dependent and ironically much shorter-ranged, much less safe and less consistent than Anivia - not to mention lacking that revive which would 90% help good Anivias survive a rough early game and tower dives. Overall, Cass is just incredibly punishing to play - both when you're weak and strong - while getting outclassed at her only niche: single target, consistent AP damage by literally every other battle mage (Ryze, Brand, Anivia) as they are safer/ easier to play on a micro and macro level, yet have higher reward if played correctly. It's traggic, really - but I thank the gods for not having to deal with a good Cass since mages already burst through magic shield like butter
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Cass is like Anivia. You rarely see them in your games but when you do, you better pray they're your teammate.
cassiopeia 🤝anivia
not letting a minion wave push ever
Vladimir is still a good af champion, simply unpopular, just like Cass.
nah, cuz if theyre on my team theyre first timing her.
That's my experience with Leblanc. Absolutely nobody picks her except her day 1 otps with 3k hours on her.
A skinless Leblanc will go 18-3 every time.
Me when I main anivia and my backup is cass
For me she is an appealing champion, but every game on her feels sooo sweaty. You need to farm items, dodge skillshots (because you are in everyone's range), kite as hell, land every Q, monitor mana pool, go above and beyond to ult people, while there are so many characters, who, though won't deal the same DPS are able to do it faster/more consistent/ or from a distance.
She can be menace to deal with in some team comp, but there are a lot of situations, when you are pretty much useless and can not play the game, because everyone is faster than you or has greater range.
So real. You explained it perfectly
This is the best explanation
Pretty much. Cass is fun as, but it feels like theres zero downtime. You're always clicking like a mad man.
This is TRUE! I love Cass but she is so draining to play. 3 games in a row and my hands started to shake
Not to mention the god-forsaken E. Imagine if you had 3.0 attack speed, and had to right click, not attack move, every single time you want to attack.
She doesnt look like nicky bois version thats the main reason shes unpopular
Yep, if Nicky bois Cassio would be the official one, then oh boy, I would play her zoomed in
REAL
Riot should just fking hire Nickiboi and his goobers to be the new designer team.
She doesnt even look like she is from Noxus.@minichad5456
@@scarletwarlock9325she doesn't look like she's from anywhere in Runeterra, you could say she looks slightly Shuriman cus of the headpiece or smthn but even that's a stretch, she never evolved from ye olden days where the League of Legends was a thing and every character was a tired fictional archetype
I think 1 of the key usages of Cassiopeia's W that was missed is that often times the best usage of W is as a stand your ground tool where if you're playing into a target that is going to dash into you then if you place your W underneath yourself and force your enemy to stand in it if they want to hit you, then all you really need to do is be capable of surviving their initial burst.
the issue with that plan is that this is league of legends 2024. Remember, non-assassin squishies are playing dodgeball. one hit and you're out.
@@einjharrelraca I mean your reasoning is highly fallacious, there's a reason Cassiopeia builds for 3 items that increase her durability, in addition to the fact she has built in sustain in her kit through healing with her E, ROA, and Conqueror.
@@Hail_Fire 3 items in a game where matches are decided at 1 item and over at 2.
Also you mentioned ROA and conquerer as built in healing. they aren't. her only inbuilt healing is on e, and requires a monstrous amount of mana + time to mean anything.
As for the ROA debate. wow, such a broken item. its only a smaller spike than serrated dirk as a completed item until it has all 10 stacks, again, in a gamestate where matches are decided at 1 item, and ending at 2.
If cassio uses her w defensivly like you suggest, that means she dies. cause if its at her feet that means it isnt grounding anyone that isnt already on her.
Just to put into perspective how little she really heals. with ROA and conquerer, and we can even assume she just always have fully stacked conquerer, her e heals 16% ap and then 5% post mitigation damage + 10 hp for roa
at 1 item against a base mr target this would end up being
8 + 4 + 10 = 22 hp
22 hp when in the best case scenario for her isnt all that amazing, especially considering this is assuming 100% up time on her poison, which isnt possible anymore.
you cant even argue its a lane sustain tool, because against minions it heals 5 hp each cast against a poisoned target.
@@einjharrelraca People cry too much about assassins when they're rarely even in the meta. Like oh no, Akali and Zed are actually somewhat playable. Better cry until Rito nerf them again because I can't play against champs that literally lose the game if they go even in lane.
Cass actually does really well into most assassin picks btw.
It's mages that out push & out range her that are most of Cass's problems.
Why play Cass when you can play Lux and accomplish more for a fraction of the effort.
@@Microtardz people cry about assassins because any game they can get even the tiniest of leads into, they INSTANTLY become the most zero counterplay garbage in this game, and well, every game has a real easy target in it for any assassin to collect that 1 kill that breaks them.
Cass also does OKAY into assassins at best. She does will into people who are shit at playing assassins and get carried by their class, but if the assassin player has even the tiniest semblence of how their champion works, shes a free matchup for them. Also if they have a are on an ad assassin and have a brain brain they can take nullifying orb in their runes, and go hexdrinker before their dirk and cassio has been negated from existance until 3 items.
As for your, "why play cass when you can play lux and accomplish more for a fraction of the effort" yes. thats what they did. its why her playrate is always shit.
I feel like I saw this exact video two to three years ago
nope i been asking for a vid like this since 3 yrs ago
I feel the same way too.
Thankfully she isn't played often.
Was gonna type that, hate facing her top especially
Yeah, she has to have one of the most annoying kits to play against, especially if your champ is reliant on movement abilities.
I mean because of Vanguard... there's less players. (Send help)
I'm glad she played less because she less likely to be banned so I can pick her.
@@1dingerr cassio is 200 years for the 200 years champions.
Her grounding, paired with her being incredibly strong with Rylays (which doesn't have an AD counterpart anymore now that FM is gone).
In this league of mobility...
I'd say she is extremely strong, but has a high skill floor due to her core mechanics having low forgivability.
Serylda's????????????????????????????????
It only works when they’re below half though
@@joshuaosei5628 oh no. as if getting someone to half health is a feat in league 2024. XD
actually it might be a feat in league 2024, that takes restraint to get them to half and not just 100-0 them in a blink XD
@@einjharrelraca Youre saying Seryldas = FM essentially because theres so much dmg in the game. This applies to Rylais too, Rylais slows even a 100% HP target despite all the damage being in the game. So when homeboy says Rylais doesnt have an AD counterpart now that FM is gone, he is right. Seryldas is conditional, Rylais isnt. Frozen Mallet used to give HP and its respective damage, just as its AP counterpart STILL does.
Anything else?
@@marcuslesesne6239 frozen mallet applied only on auto attacks not abilities. by your logic sylda's is closer to rylai's than frozen mallet ever was, because both rylai's and syylda's apply on abilities, not auto attacks.
the thing that makes cass worth learning is how oppressive she is when played correctly. other champs and kits will be better on average in most games, but cass can be really oppresive, which some other champs can't really apply that pressure into the early/mid game
how can you be oppressive when 90% of midlane champions are mages who just outrange and outpush you
@@ВладФилаткин-п3ч by getting gud
That stupid hwei that hits u from far away@@ВладФилаткин-п3ч
The thing with how item-reliant she is is the items she buys aren't to augment her playstyle, they're to shore up her weaknesses and I'm glad you mentioned that specifically. If you play a marksman, the champs aren't good without items but they still feel like the same champ at 1 item and at 6 items, just with more damage. Cassio isn't like that. After you get your items you feel unstoppable but early on she feels straight up dysfunctional. No mana, no sustain, no bulk, auto-lose trades if you miss Q yet no reliable way to land Q early, all of her items are just covering these weaknesses.
It works out because the items cover for her very well and she's still a strong champ, but early game Cassio is as close to playing as an actual caster minion that I've ever experienced and I've been a Neeko main for 4 years
when u have 6 item slots but 4 are dedicated to mana/speed/slow so u have no damage
@@CarmenLC If games go long you kinda need rabadon or you get outscaled hard by ADCs but if you have it and take gathering storm you are at 1K AP and you melt.
Isue is you can buy it kinda late and at that point you are not sure if game will be decided in 5 min (then starting to build rabadon would be pointless) so you might rather go fo some short term return in form of liandry or even going 1 tank item like randuin or force of nature.
One thing I really enjoy about Cass is that you buy Serfas, Rod of Ages, Frozen Heart, Spirit Visage and for runes Conqueror with maxout healing... And than you deal less damage, but you are surprisingly tanky and healing bit too much. 1v3 becomes surprisingly easy if you hit your spells and kite properly. Also very nice way to see enemy team rage
11:46
I remember when this was performed on a pro play match, Everyone tried to play her just to do this.
Shes gotten like no changes in years
Yeah after an awkward period of like 4 reworks in 2 years
Well, I think it's hard to really find any angle to change her, since her win rate is actually quite good. Buffing her is out of question as a result. They could opt for making her more popular by making her easier to play, but that would alienate her dedicated playerbase and might even take away her identity. Amongst mages, she is the heaviest movement and timing based champion, in a similar bracket as Azir or old Aurelion Sol and just like them, hard to play and not "appealing" to a broader audience. The thing is, you can't really change that, without fundamentally reworking her E.
So, all Riot can do right now, is make sure that she doesn't get out of hand in the hands of dedicated one-tricks, while still having her feel powerful enough to be a worthwhile champion. And she kinda.. is in that spot right now. In the past.. years, the only spikes to her winrate or playrate have always been tied to system changes that benefitted or hurt her accidentally.
I have an idea that would consider the problems Vars has pointed out while making her as least alienating her playerbase and E.
You remove the grounded effect from Miasma. It keeps her inherently harder to balance, because she can hard counter an entire mechanic, but also has that mechanic tied to a hyper carry kit, making her possible to be toxic against when you cannot Flash or dash away while she kills you. You could instead make her Miasma follow enemies it hits, like Noc Q. This would also remove her need to rush Rylais as often.
You rework Q slightly. It can now be detonated earlier, but can also grow in size before manual or automatic explosion. This would improve her consistency of her damage, and it ties to the last change I would like to suggest.
Make her E also damage all poisoned enemies within range around the target, possibly for reduced damage. This makes her have much better and less committal waveclear with the previous Q change, and lets her DPS multiple enemies.
One of the biggest problem with League is that the talentless hacks over at Riot actually brainwashed their community into thinking that completely redoing champions periodically, while the same time essentially deleting what those champions once were, is a good thing, when it is in fact a symbol of a broken mess of a game that is impossible to properly balance.
@@pvshkaname a singular game that is balanced, outside of rock paper scissors, pong and chess/checkers
Cass has a special place for me, since I started playing LoL when she was just released (with breaks of course)
Cassio is so underrated as a lane bully! Sure she scales well-ish but as someone who mained for 5 years and still plays her at times she feels the best in the early game pre-6 and at 2 items.
Agreed, I've hit so many first bloods as cass mid
ofc she scales well, shes a snake!
@@somethingsafoot Lol xD thanks for the laugh xD
I usually see her exclusively on top lane rather than mid, though even then not often.
I hope anyone who plays Cassio top has an awful life
its because she was kicked out of mid lane. She cant play into other mages, she just lacks the wave clear and early pressure to deal with them. And she can no longer lane into any of the assassin rouster because serrated dirk is now 600 gold cheaper than seekers, and her core item being ROA is waaaay too slow to compete with a champion class that 100-0s people while missing half their kit at a component item.
Cass is insanely strong, but as someone who plays her a lot her biggest issue is she is both difficult to play and impossible to blind pick. She requires the dedication of a one trick, but is situational. If someone plays a long range control mage like Viktor, Syndra, or Ori, or the enemy pick a poke/disengage bot like Cait Seraphine, the game is completely unplayable. In the right situations, however, where teams want to dive into you, she is psychotic. But most people don’t want to invest hundreds of hours for a pocket pick unless they really love the character.
Actually her kit is simple to understand and to do but you need to have good reaction to make heavy dmg and to be a good carru
Ah yes, the ultimate ability "Petrifying Geese".
One goose is already dangerous, so you can only imagine its power.
NickyBoi would like to have a word with you
Snakeman himself
She deserves the next Champion graphical update. Other than that I just want lots of little buffs for her like a tiny buff to the range on her Q and W would be so nice.. And then reduced mana costs across the board. Nothing crazy drastic but just a little something. I think her base kit/concept is perfect tbh.
At this point, Riot might as well give back her old stacking passive without taking away her current one and give her The smolder treatment, where stacking gives her "E" some extra properties.
Imagine her "E" with a tiamat-like effect or work like Runnan's (even both), It could sound op but considering what when already have in The game It seems quite tame.
Delusional af
She would basically make Ryze obsolete, considering she already offers more zone control with her AOE stun + grounding effect, while Ryze at least has higher burst and AOE.
@@lissandrafreljord7913 you mean The same way that Briar made Warwick obsolete? Nah I don't think so.
But If that's The case, it's not like Riot is not willing to rework hin for The 70th time to solve his issues :^V
Her twinfang is in a good place but,
She deserves a buff to her other abilities
like: a wider Q, a longer range on ult, things like that.
I think they should add another effect to her passive while having the no boots passive
@@caesar1512 I personally think it would be cool if they added true damage to her poison, such that she would have to unlock it by landing 5 stacks of Twin Fang on her poisoned target. In the late game, it would mean she would start melting tanks faster, considering she is still a very vulnerable immobile shorter ranged mage that has no form of guarantee peel with her ult and miasma (meanwhile Azir has wall and dashes away, Kayle got her ult, ASol can just fly through walls and land E, while melting tanks with much more ease).
Agree on this, her ult radius range is so bad you have to almost walk up in melee range
@@caesar1512 that what I has be saying for so long she new a rework on her pasive which gave her to choose between tenacity, move speed, armor every 3 or for lvl also she need a bit of range cuz almost 98% mage has more range them cassio as a main is a pain in the ass play against neeko, xerathx wawei, velkoz, Annie, anivia syndra lissandra Viktor lux
She's a menace in aram. As a casual aram enjoyer, whenever I encounter her in Aram, she just counter a lot of play making and engage attemps. Lucky not many want to play her lol
I think the biggest problem is that she requires set-up. If you miss your Q, your E will have about a quarter of the damage output. The CD on her Q is fairly short, but basically if you're in the middle of a fight and whiff that Q (or your enemy flashes or whatever), then you're shit out of luck for several gut-wrenching seconds. Or even if you land your Q, you'll only do damage to the person you hit, and if there's multiple enemies, you won't be able to damage them if you haven't poisoned them first. Thankfully you have your W in case of emergencies to inflict poison, but you also need your W to stop dashes and it has a long cooldown, so like Vars said you have to know when to properly use it for defense vs. offense.
Also as somebody who plays Cass, one of my biggest gripes is her passive. The fact that you CAN'T buy boots means two things- 1) you won't ever be able to benefit from the very gold-efficient passives that boots can give (not being able to get merc treads can sometimes really hurt). 2) Even with your passive giving you MS, you're still going to end up being slower than your lane opponent early-mid game once they've bought boots. Her passive gives 4 MS per level (and she starts from a pitiful base of 328), so it's not until level 12 that she's actually broken even compared to just getting a normal pair of boots (level 15 if you'd have bought swifties). Compare that to somebody like Janna, whose passive gives +6% MS (and gives it to allies walking towards her AND adds 30% of your bonus MS on-hit), and whose W passively gives 6-10% (+2% per 100 AP), but she can still buy boots. She's faster than Cassiopeia at level 1, and (assuming a build with at least 350 AP), she's faster than her at level 18, WITHOUT boots. And of course they're different champs with different kits (and Cass gets MS from her Q if she lands it) but in general the only real game impact her passive has is negative impact that you have to play around not being able to buy boots even if you need them. Sure, it means she's viable to go 6 items with no boots- but there's other champions in certain matchups that can ditch boots as well to greed for 6 items, and actually end up in a better position than Cass for it.
I dislike the passive, boots would be so much nicer into most mage matchups. The "upside" of having 6 full itemslots feels diminished since you cant get fullbuild most games anyway and even if you do, Cass buys so many utility items in comparison to other mages that she needs a slot more to actually get some damage.
@@peschionator7873 yeah, it feels even worse considering that some of her power balance went into that passive, so she's losing power elsewhere in her kit for the privilege of not being able to buy boots (and getting some scaling ms as compensation)
Amazing video! It's the first time I've heard a non-Cassiopeia player discuss the champion without being completely disconnected from her reality and straight up yap
Cass E is one of the few thing that has a center to center range. So it is not a true 700 range, as attack range is edge to edge. This also means that the bigger she is and the bigger her target is, the lower her E range. You usually have between 650 and 550 effective range, around 600 on normally sized champions (it is actually a bit less than that, by memory).
i disagree with some of your points.
She as an AP ''AA'' champion means that her E scaling of AP makes all her poisoned E damage seems like you are getting hit by a crit, since the E will roughly deal around 800 damage each since she a high base damage on her E and 70% of 800 AP is roughly 600, also her lack of on hit is compensated by the fact she is burning you with her Q, Liandrys and blackfire torch.
She is THE duelist mage, in fact this is her more clear identity, she is the best 1v1 mage in the entire game and easily top 5 best duelists in the game, a good Cassio will make sure you are getting hit by her Q, and if you get hit you are doomed, she has a lot of mind games behind her duels, and they are very overwhelming and stat checky. There are champs who can keep with her or have straight up advantadge in a 1v1 in the late game like Fiora, Kayle and Yasuo (with a wave), but all of them are not even guaranteed win, cause there is a lot of room for counterplay for both sides.
also a correction for you Vars. her 700 range on her E would be insanely powerful if wasn't by the fact it is treated center to center instead of edge to edge like an AA, so her 700 E range ignores completaly hitbox range, while AAs counts their AA range + the enemy hitbox range, for example the 550 range Vayne hitting a Caitlyn will mean Vayne has her 550 innate range + 120 from Caitlyn's hitbox, totalizing 670 range in total, which is -30 range compared to Cassiopeia's E, so Cassio's E true range in average is around 580 agaisn't most champs, thats why it is so painfully low to a mage, since she has no invisibility or innate ms boost like Vayne's R and Q.
Yes, she is probably the only mage who can 100 to 0 most types of champs in most situations, if she plays it well. Sure Vlad, Ryze, ASol, Malz are all pretty strong too, but they definitely don't have the same dueling power as Cassio throughout all of early, mid, and late game.
I still listen to the badministrator song for cass. Every time it gets me inspired to give her a shot I open the game and immediately change my mind.
I wonder how Cass performs in arena actually.
Ridiculous. In arena if she has a signed duo it's basically a free win.
She is one of my favourite champions and i played her consistently in ranked as well.
2 issues though
1. There are champions who have so much mobility to bite the w
2. If you use w/r and haven't killed them all you dead
3. You need to hit her anilities
4. You need to avoid skillshots cause you play from really close
As a cassio main with ~4m mastery and masters peak. I agree wholeheartedly with many of these points. A common issue with cass mains is when they get to high level play they "Burn out" and a common sentiment is "Why do i play cass if X just does the same thing with less work".
She requires so much engagment and focus to play well each game can become exhausting. And you often are barely rewarded for putting in that effort because thats just what you are SUPPOSED to do.
This is a similar issue to azir and anivia. Tons of work to pull off what you are meant to do. Only dedicated mains tend to want to put in that effort.
I know you touched on these points already. Just putting in my own personal experience.
People barely played cass because they couldn't hold their load for the entire match.
What does this mean bro
Bro
Spirit blossom cass has me actin up everytime
@@sevaneken3461 😟
What?
I love Cass! I went on like a 6 month spree of playing her back in like 2014. There's no feeling like hitting your q and chaining e in a tense fight or hitting a 5 man ult.
Yes, finally a „Why no one plays Video“ 10/10
I just played a Cass game and got an S- and mastery 2 when this released. I thought I was being watched
As someone who loved her original version and I would go as far as to say I mained after her first rework with her stacking passive - I don't personally like her current version because she doesn't have enough mana to kill enemies in the laning phase unless her opponent is extremely obliging. I love picking her up in FGMs that cover mana issues. After her first rework, I loved playing her bottom lane as the carry - the old refund on her E covering the cast cost plus a percentage made farming and trading in a 2v2 really engaging. I think her refund really needs to be tuned like Malzahar/Xerath, so that she can play around refilling her mana rather than merely getting to "farm for free". Having to stack mana items feels like I'm sacrificing my power spikes.
I really prefer her having a Marksman playstyle though - I hope they don't ever make her more "mage-like". You mentioning the lack of crit chance reminds me of the fact they get Syndra a built-in Collector so she wouldn't need to buy it, and how they gave Brand a built-in Rylais and Morgana a built-in Shurelya's. Maybe Cassiopeia just needs an extra effect on her Twin Fang saying "Twin Fang has a 25% chance to Critically Strike for X% bonus damage for every Legendary Item."
I kinda wish her passive had an AP ratio, even if it was really low - it's currently a bit lame as-is. Her old Deadly Cadence was fun to use; her old Quest Passive was fun to use; but getting a free item slot doesn't *feel* good in most games because you have to get to super-late game before you really feel it, especially since she doesn't really feel faster than other champions at other stages of the game (not factoring other effects like her Q or Phase Rush).
P.S. I hadn't seen the poison icon I made for the wiki in a while. It was nice to see. Thanks for using the wiki!
They could change her e into an auto attack so that she could buy items like nashor's or guinsoo like azir and make he e into a passive that makes that her abilities gain crit chance according to ap so having a certain amount of ap would make her a real ap marksman making her shots deadlier as the game goes on
To give her a bit more flexibility, I would add a passive:
She can mark enemy on applying poison to them.
Then on her fang, for X number of enemy marked by her, all of them take X times 10% (can be tweak ofc) of the fang damage .
It would put Cass in the situation of either poison everyone to spread damage or focus down one opponent.
Cassio could go a long way if they switched her ult and miasma (like they have done to other champs). Make the miasma an ult level ability that covers a large area around her for a long duration and her stun a line skill shot stun. Make her a hard counter to all assasins, brusers, and fighters. Maybe her stun is very short and close range but greatly reduces the damage u do for a longer duration.
Now that everyone can one shot tanks, that means everyone can one shot her too.
Been waiting for this one for two years! Instantly pressed play!
As a Wild Rift player, this is the only champion that I have no idea of what it does. Never seem anyone complain about or praise her online.
Small correction at 5:30 the current iteration of shadowflame gives magic crit to low health enemies
one thing barely touched on is that in the current state of lethality, Cass struggles to actually do her damage. An ADC clicks on a target, and they shoot. Cassio needs to hit Q, and THEN she starts doing damage. With burst damage being as high as it is right now, if you go into a fight with an annie and hit Q, annie can have you eat her *entire* combo before your first Twin Fang is on target.
It might not sound like much, but it's a major cause of why Cassio builds so much durability, and with mage durability items not being particularly good atm, a major cause of why Cassio doesn't do well.
The funny thing is she's a very easy character to fix. The mechanics that fix her are already in her kit. They just haven't been embraced. Not mentioned at all is that Twin Fang heals Cassiopeia on hit, and with the rate she fires them, this healing can be very substantial. But she has the lowest base armor in the game and pretty meh HP. If they leaned into making Cassio a regenerating bruiser mage, she'd require no mechanical changes and actually be an extremely good and likely popular character. Boost her durability, drop her damage a bit, and bam, we have only changed some numbers and Cassio is good.
You actually cooking with that idea. And her aoe spells would make sense too because bruisers wanna be in the middle of a fight. Somewhat ranged Sylas would be pretty interesting to watch for sure
She just need a new pasive which give her the option on every 3 lvl to choose a stat between tenacity , move speed or armor, like aphelios pasive and also a bit of range cuz the 98 % of the mid lanes mage have more range them her
@@kenplay That would do it, particularly if they make her abilities work like everyone else's where it's edge to edge instead of canter to center.
I just didn't want to add any mechanics and just use numbers adjustment.
What I've always loved about Cassio is that she teaches you flexibility. You can build her is different but similar ways ( for example: slightly more defensive and tanky, or full damage)
there's nothing more satisfying being an opponent of cassiopeia and correctly predicting an ult to not get stunned
You still get slowed, she can set yp W to root you, Q + E, E, E while dancing around the poison while you try to catvh her to land your first skill or A.A. By that time you either are dead or super low health. She is tanky so by the timr you finally get to her, you can't kill her. I am assuming this in case you play Nafiri, the Yasuos, Zed, Irelia, Yi, Jax, Trynda etc. If you are a mage you still lose close range since she outdps you.
@@Yokai_Yuri > The Yasuos
you fuckin killed me there
Skip ad button: 2:12 because there is no stupid time stamp for that again
I will say that Twinned Fang can “scale” with ability haste and “on hit effects” like Rylais.
There are ways to empower her e with cdr wich is the equivalent of attack speed for abilities. Also there is items that proc on abilities which she also ends up buyi g often like liandry and rylais.
I love playing Cass, wish she did get more movement from her passive though
Dying on Cassio, because enemy Yone dodged your W, dashed out from Q and turned back on your R, blowing you in the process, while you deal 0 damage, even though you have massive gold advantage kinda sucks.
then just play yone. you know he is a cheater champ?
I agree yone is bullshit, what I do is ult him when he q in and than I get a guaranteed w on him and juste dps him while running in direction of his shadow
I know it's late but there's this AP item that reduces your ability damage by 1/3rd but your abilities proc a chainlightning with a short cooldown. I forgot what was it's name tho, it came at the same time as Sundered Sky, etc.
Honestly, if they made the Q bigger or have less delay, so it'd be harder to side step, she'd be in a much better place automatically.
i have one tricked cassio for 8 years, currently played last split and this split as a OTP cass bot main, she does work, a big part of the problem is suppourts not knowing how cassio works, especially her mana pool early and how to utilize miasma properly
It would be cool to see an update in her kit. Maybe make her the mage version of Vayne by adding true damage in her kit, but more practically in her poison, such that after 5 stacks of twin fangs, the poison starts dealing DoT max % health true damage to melt tanks in the late game faster.
Can confirm, i used to main her, but after the asol rework there is a superior danger noodle.
I think you kind of nailed it. She's a deceptively hard champ to play because everything you do has to very little margin for error, lest you burn through your mana and your pressure is gone in an instant. The mobility creep in this game has also not been kind to her as you can easily dodge everything she throws at you, and she's more dependent on landing those abilities for any kind of escape potential, which then means she's easy to gank especially pre-6. Even the fact that she doesn't buy boots is somewhat of a hinderance because it denies her from reaching the same major power-spikes around the early-mid game that most mages have.
That and like, I feel like the state of mid lane right now is that everyone either wants to play a very safe, long-range poke mage or an assassin/skirmisher that has tremendous kill pressure up close. Nothing in-between, and Cass doesn't excel at either.
As a Cass main, this is entirely spot on. She's limited by mana very hard early, and her chase potential is killed once enemy builds boots early on. Her positioning is extremely important, and requires a good frontline to succeed in team fights. Honestly though all things considered, a W buff would go a LONG way into making her viable; it's just to inconsistent with its long cooldown to be largely useful
i remember playing a lot of teemo supp with a cassio apc. also twitch. cause the poison counted for her poison
Whenever I face champs like orriana, zoe, azir and asol, I always use Cassiopeia since most of the time they are facing forward to trade with you.
I've always seen her as the mage you want if the enemy team is going heavy on being beefy. Her damage into tanks is nothing to sneeze at and her bulk lets her endure the slap fights. But in this league of damage meta, ehhhhh
That Penta steal was criminal
I love that barely anybody plays Cassiopeia, because as a one trick Cass main, not many people know what to expect of me.
I loved her old passive she felt like a far bigger late game treat. But currently poke or burst mages do the same or more but far easier. My suggestion would be a second passive like her old one but at the breakpoints gaining magical crit on her E.(Late game power)
That penta steal was hard to watch
The problem with cassiopeia is that she gets so much hp and shields by building full ap but often can't fit many resistances
I would like to see them switch her to a new resource system I've dubbed "potency". The bar's neutral state is full, or "engorged", and as she uses abilities it lowers to "depleted". The lower the bar, the more bonus move speed and bonus ability power she gets, but also the shorter her ability ranges become (aside from ult). The base size of her w and e should be larger, but also decrease in size the lower the bar gets. The potency meter only starts regenerating after not using abilities for a time.
This would give her better poke range and coverage when her bar is fuller. More sustain because she isn't tied down by mana. Also makes her more potent in prolonged fights/all-ins, with the downside being that she is more vulnerable due to reduction in ability ranges - she has to get into the dnager zone.
Haven't tried it but i feel rushing blackfire torch on her this split would make laning vs her a nightmare.
"Cassiopeia is best in neutral and advantage"- Sounds exactly like a marksman to me.
People can be kinda bad and keeping targets poisoned, which is what her E relies on to deal so much damage. I usually get Seraphs, Rylais, then Liandrys and Shadowflame to get a triple burn going when you get tagged with poison. Even if I don't decide to chase you down and E you to death, your still losing a sizable chunk of your health off of one Q hit.
All of these is why i love playing her on top lane!
Man i wish you would make a kassadin video ,doesn’t matter about what just that its about kassadin
I think a big part of why no one plays her is because of how much her early game has been crippled. Cass used to be a notorious lane bully and she was able to keep up the pressure because her E would allow you to profit on mana. She still has the same early damage that she used to, but after two trades, you've got no mana to do anything else. So instead you're forced to play nice and farm up tear stacks so that you can scale into lategame. They really did double down on her ADC playstyle and she's all the more mediocre for it.
One thing I wish had been touched on at least a little in this vid, specifically in the idea of her being played bot lane or not, is the fact that poison from other champs counts for empowering her E so a Twitch or Teemo support can set up her E without her having to land Q or use W.
pretty sure only teemo and singed poison work
@@5with426 According to the internet Twitch works too unless it was changed recently, but I haven’t tested it myself.
Hey can you do the Shurima region video or those aren't a video format anymore?
great canal btw
This isn't to argue against the video, but small fun little tidbit, there's boosters who use Cassio + pyke bot lane to snowball game out of control lol
Yeah, I was also going to say, that this video kinda explains the rationale for why they are paired together in the botlane.
Well, only if they add a smart AI on Twin Fang, like prioritizing champions who have been hit by Q for example, it would help her a lot.
How do you know I watch your videos when I’m eating? 😂
In holland its between 17:00 and 18:00 perfect for after dinner vids
It's a lot of fun to play her for me (I am a fan of both mages and marksmen) but I simply find her so mechanically demanding that I often throw games with her after becoming fed during laning phase.
Seems like she should be really good with blackfire torch being so meta
I feel like it would be great if they make her ult so that when enemies are facing her they will be stunned, if not they will be rooted instead for the same or half of the stun's duration.
great video, you should make the same about Swain, would be interesting :D
Honestly it’d be more balanced if her miasma was a giant ring like trundle. Switch the grounding to Q.
The whole grounding aspect is something that I’ve seen only be a target vs one person on enemy team or a zoning tool. Q is already hard to hit/easy to dodge, so making Q the grounding ability makes more sense. But since people dodge it so frequently, having W just be there for poison, will make her kit more forgiving. W doesn’t do much damage anyways so just have it be a giant ring. Either that or make her ult do a 3-5 second grounding regardless of stun.
I love Cassio but she is insanely unforgiving, now more than last season. Most mages can give you a hard time if they can space correctly. Your passive is a detriment in these matchups since you cant just rush boots to close the gap or dodge skillshots like any other champion. Even when fed, most of your damage is single target and takes some time so it is harder to carry with a lead than with other mages. Now with gargoyles stoneplate gone Cassio lost her best defensive item. In my experience you cant afford to not build somewhat defensively unless you are either a god or you have a team that actively plays around you (good luck finding that in soloq).
The saddest part is she is one of the better champions in the current game because virtually EVERYONE has movement she can hard counter.
Imo there isn't really any reason to play Cass when Veigar or Syndra exist, they have much better options to deal with mobility with added CC without their 60 second cooldown ability
@@souporcat syndra? What is she gonna do vs Irelia or Yasuo? Also Yone bypasses Veigar's E. Meanwhile Cass stops all of them specially Yone who can't go back to his body.
@@Yokai_Yuri Syndras e easily deals with most assassin attempts, and usually is able to turn the damage back with the balls used to push them away. What? Last I remember Yone can't go through veigars cage, nor does Cass w stop him from going back. It's completely unstoppable, he can't go back unless the time runs out or he does it himself. Sure it stops him from initially casting it, but no Yone is going to cast it in Cass w range because the second they go back they're getting an ult to the face so that's more of a skill issue. (I stand corrected on Veigar Yone interaction, he gets stopped on his way back but not on the initial dash so you're right my bad)
@@Yokai_Yurishe’s gonna push them with E, one of the best get off me abilities in the game; you picked two creep reliant champs to argue against a champion that controls creep lmao
@@souporcat Syndra and Veigar can't do anything if the enemy has a Mundo, Maokai, Ornn, etc. Too many tanks make them obsolete.
The main issue with cass is her mana. Her passive was perfect back in the day, as it decreased her mana costs by 50% when fully stacked iirc. You're forced to build a tear on her no matter what, that's what sets her back due to tear items relying on stacks and games being shorter nowadays. The same occurs with anivia, mana costs are way too high in the current state of the game, so you'll end up with no mana when trading, unlike other mages.
Even with the rune that increases mana regen when attacking champions, cass can still run out of mana, it's insane how much mana you need in order to actually deal damage, whereas other mages can nuke you with their ult and still have over 80% of their mana.
Additionally, you forgot to mention cass' reliance on poison. Her DPS drops whenever a target isn't poisoned, and you can't keep them poisoned 100% of the time reliably, hence why rylai's another must in her build.
The final nail in the coffin is her current passive. While free ms is great and all, the lack of boots wrecks her early game completely. You can't roam as fast as other mages, plus you'll struggle dodging and kiting until you level up some more. If cass had her original passive, she'd be a different story nowadays, but by the time you've stacked that tear and are building rylai's, you'll be wondering why you didn't bring a different mage to the match.
I still find it interesting that almost 14 years later, Cass can STILL empower her E from allied Singed Q poison and Teemo E and R poisons. It baffles me how such a legacy mechanic has gone under the radar for so long, but it makes it very fun when some of us old farts quee up with these old champs can totally make the enemy team hate their life lol
i think its about the player base it self, Mostly i saw want to play flashy or One shot champion rather than chipping down the enemy bit by bit (like you said neutral)
Than God barely anyone plays her, I play top and I just picked her up a week ago and it is so much fun, there are almost no match ups that are unplayable, also no one ever bans Cassio ever
It's because she didn't want to crush my bones
To make her consistent again, I'd imagine she needs something like a very short duration low damage poison effect on her e so that she can reliably proc poison. alternatively, let her ult push away anyone who isn't stunned, that way she can place w and push the enemies into it. Also, the whole boots thing was novel for its time, but it really isn't working in her favor these days
let her e scale with levels, every levelput in e, hitting a poisened enemy extends poison time by 1-2 seconds lvl 1, 1 sec lvl 2 1.25 etc so u can reliable use her e, u dont need to build rylai to be able to keep hitting poison, just 1 q and if they fk up they die, but wait 1-2 sec and she has to hit q again.
I mean I picked her up and she's crazy rn. Got a 4k in my first game too
Listening to this vid she sounds kinda like an AP Juggernaut which is kinda cool. Or maybe Bruiser is the word I’m thinking of. Mix of DPS and tankiness.
The only true AP juggernaut is Mordekaiser, as juggernauts are melee champs. You can make an arguement for AP Voli, AP Udyr, and maybe AP Cho'Gath, Rumble, Shyv (not really), and Singed.
To be fair Riot deliberately removing her from bot lane and they were explicit about it in the patch notes. They nerfed her base armor and base HP, and gave a magic resistance compensation buff.
Imo cassio does everything you want from a champion. Although I generally agree with the points you mentioned but I love the fact that her style changes based on the enemy team comp. She's not a xerath or a syndra but she has the same control, she's not a malzahar or TF but she has the same kill pressure.
One of the things that are absolutely undervalued in my opinion is her no boot design, the only or second champion (yummi players, I SEE YOU ON THAT FED KHAZIX YOU BASTARD!)
She emphasises the need for XP translating into better macro play.
I love this champion's design because it's unique and she scales so beautifully.
I will admit she's a nightmare to play against in the hands of a good player and this is different from other otps. A cassio otp really makes the game feel hopeless by level 2 even if they're a silver player. (I hover between plat 4 and gold 1 nothing special here)
Also she brings back that old gameplay and a longer game which I like. But then I'm reminded cassio is in the game and I get depressed again...
This is my personal opinion, feel free to disagree, (probably a Kat Otp "go brrrrrr")
I admire any cassio player, even though most of them never really gave off the nicest impression when I played with them.
Have a nice day and thank you for reading!
Cassio is actually one of my favorite battle mages. Viktor is fun, but i suck with his laning phase and trying to last hit, and im just really inconsistent with vladimir. But Cassiopeia is one I can bith blind pick and counter pick with. Plus playing her in urf is the only reason ill play the damn game mode. But i just prefer more assassin type characters like akali, or for marksman, twitch.
Cassio is like the AP version of Ashe on steriods. I still think she is super viable in every role: top, mid, bot, jungle..
I play her and she's amazing. I have a 64% win rate in 95 games. She's a sleeper champ that people and have forgotten how she works.
As an Anivia support enjoyer, I can see why Cassiopeia's kit makes sense: she's supposed to be a more single-target and consistent version of Anivia, as they have the same E (double damage if hit by another spell), a zoning W and ult, and damage boost on Q. Though, because of this, Cass is much more gold-dependent and ironically much shorter-ranged, much less safe and less consistent than Anivia - not to mention lacking that revive which would 90% help good Anivias survive a rough early game and tower dives. Overall, Cass is just incredibly punishing to play - both when you're weak and strong - while getting outclassed at her only niche: single target, consistent AP damage by literally every other battle mage (Ryze, Brand, Anivia) as they are safer/ easier to play on a micro and macro level, yet have higher reward if played correctly. It's traggic, really - but I thank the gods for not having to deal with a good Cass since mages already burst through magic shield like butter
Everytime i see 3-4 melee’s with dashes im having a field day. Then a mage shows up