Mid Year Mage Updates - Cassiopeia Direction

RiotRiotRepertoir·Mar 1, 2016·1 votes·208,386 views

Hi all,

It's time for the post where we talk about the direction we want to take Cassiopeia. Now that we've done a few of these, you probably know what to expect from this, but in case you've missed those ones, I'll reiterate. This will not be an exhaustive list of the exact mechanics changes or numerical changes you can expect to see in the update, as that is all still pending. Instead, I hope this informs interested parties in the kinds of things they can expect to see.

When it came to deciding which mages we wanted to update with this group, we knew we wanted to get to Cassiopeia, but we actually had a pretty hard time trying to determine what exactly we wanted to accomplish on her. As I've mentioned previously, there isn't a prescriptive formula we can apply to all these various mages to ultimately achieve the best results for each of them, but here's what we're thinking for Cass.

A lot of players have asked for "Poison Mage" when talking about Cassiopeia. This update does not intend to make Cassiopeia a "Poison Mage," at least not in a way that some players seem to desire (or fear, depending on your stance). To truly make her a "Poison Mage" would require large alterations to the champion that may achieve that feeling, but that we ultimately thought would no longer be Cassiopeia. That said, Cassiopeia is a mage that utilizes poisons, and it currently feels like there is not enough power allocated to these parts of her kit, so we'd like to redistribute some power in the kit off of Twin Fang and Aspect of the Serpent, and into other areas. If you don't like Cassiopeia because you expected a "Poison Mage" out of her and didn't get one, then you may not still like her following these changes. If you don't like Cassiopeia because the way Twin Fang works makes her feel one-dimensional, then hopefully this will appeal to you. At the end of the day, we do think Twin Fang is important to the identity of Cassiopeia, but the power budget that has been allocated to it is a bit out of whack.

Let's get into some expectations. Feel free to drop some questions/comments below if anything is unclear. This isn't a heavily wordsmithed post, so there's likely some stuff I don't say correctly the first time.

Here's some stuff we're happy with about Cassiopeia and are unlikely to change:
Despite facing gameplay not being perfect, Petrifying Gaze provides some really cool high moments.
Twin Fang as a high cadence spell.
Twin Fang's power being unlocked by Poisons.
Cassiopeia feels swift and deadly.
Here's some stuff we're less happy with and are actively trying to resolve:
Aspect of the Serpent forces a carry curve in an unnatural, somewhat feel-bad way.
Poisoning should be more about harming/disabling enemies than empowering Cassiopeia.
The amount of power allocated to Twin Fang makes Cassiopeia feel one dimensional.
Noxious Blast and Miasma's targeting types can result in lame "place your circles here" gameplay.
Miasma's output (damage/slow) isn't very interesting and doesn't feel particularly "poison-y."
Here's what I hope (these designs are still in progress) will be true of Cassiopeia following her changes:
Cassiopeia will still feel like Cassiopeia and not "brand new LoL Poison Mage." Tweaks here and there, but still Cassiopeia.
Cassiopeia's poison spells will feel like they stand alone rather than feeling like slaves to Twin Fang.
Cassiopeia will still be pretty heavy on the inputs side of things, namely frequency.
Avoiding getting poisoned will still feel like one of the main things you're thinking about when playing against Cassiopeia.
Poisons will feel less like generic DoTs.
Cassiopeia still feels like a medium-short range mage.

That's about all I've got for now. Again, if anything is unclear, or if you have further questions, ask it below.

Cheers, Repertoir

904 Comments

MandaariMar 1, 201654 votes

Noxious Blast and Miasma's targeting types can result in lame "place your circles here" gameplay.

Where did this one come from? It seems like simple mechanics are automatically branded as lame. What's wrong with circular AoEs all of a sudden?

RiotRiotRepertoirMar 1, 201636 votes

Where did this one come from? It seems like simple mechanics are automatically branded as lame. What's wrong with circular AoEs all of a sudden?

It's not their simplicity. It's that they are often cast in exactly the same way. More of a comment about their similarity in cast type than the cast type itself.

MandaariMar 1, 201629 votes

To clarify, are you saying that the problem lies in:

Circlular AoEs across champions are generally cast similarly?

Cassy's Q and W are both circular AoEs, thus her abilities within her own kit are too similar?

RiotRiotRepertoirMar 1, 201652 votes

The second. Thanks for following up.

LITTLEBOY321Mar 1, 201622 votes

Ezreal has 3 straight line skill shots, they all function slightly differently.

Cassiopeia has two circular AoE poison spells that also function very differently.

Yorick has 3 ghouls....

I could go on and on - How is similarity and coherence in a champion's kit a bad thing?

TehNACHOMar 1, 201616 votes

Well to be fair, one collides on first strike, second passes through, third has a wide aoe and has a reeeeaaaally long delay.

The big mechanical difference between Cass' is one lasts longer.

Also, Yorick is an admittedly terrible champion design by Riot themselves. There's more than one reason why he isn't part of the free rotation.

EDIT: So I feel like people are misunderstanding what "terrible champion design" means.

It doesn't necessarily have to do with how strong Yorick is guys.

so chadMar 2, 20169 votes

The only problem with casting Q and W right now is that neither are really worth casting for anything other than the Poison debuff so you can spam E. I can tell you no one considered them too similar when they were both useful. Miasma was a particularly powerful zoning tool (one of the most damaging skills in the game if enemies remained in the area), now its just an instant cast poison and occasional bush checker. Fix that one and you don't have to worry about them both being circular AOEs which is completely fine.

HellioningMar 1, 201652 votes

I keep trying to type words and those words keep coming out as aggressive and incredibly salty.

In an attempt to keep things civil, I'm just going to boil them down to a couple of sentences.

I'm still not sure what you guys seem to have against Cass. I'm not sure why you think Twin Fangs is a fun and interesting spell, or that you think it's appropriate for Cass' kit to be twitchy and mechanics intensive. I want a DoT champion, not an arthritis-inducing champion. And her ult still sucks.

MandaariMar 1, 201636 votes

Keep in mind that just because you feel that way doesn't mean everyone does. Everything you dislike about her I like about her.

HellioningMar 1, 201612 votes

That's great. Go play Ryze.

Actually, you can't even play Ryze anymore because they capped his passive at five spells. I do not understand Riot sometimes.

EROTIC RAID BOSSMar 1, 201621 votes

{quoted}

That's great. Go play Ryze.

Actually, you can't even play Ryze anymore because they capped his passive at five spells. I do not understand Riot sometimes.

You can go play something else too

HellioningMar 1, 201619 votes

What 'DoT champs' are there in the League? Swain, maybe, but his 'wade into the enemy and restore health' isn't something I expect in a mage. Brand's focused entirely on his burst pattern, Malz' biggest success cast is more akin to a burst mage than a sustained damage mage, Rumble is more than a bruiser...

While if you want the Twin Fangs gameplay, you can play literally any ADC.

EROTIC RAID BOSSMar 1, 201610 votes

I'd definitely say it's still Malz but whatever. You seem to think what you want from cass is more legitimate than other fans even though the version of cass you want has never existed

Ren ExMar 1, 201643 votes

Malz is a burst-over-time champion. It's weird, but his ideal scenarios are about 1-rotating you, not landing successive DoTs and letting you burn out.

And Cass was ORIGINALLY a DoT mage that used her poisons primarily. It was the original, so it most definitely existed.

In fact, the current version of her, was something that the long-time Cass players like myself hated. She went from a complex, but simple, character, to "Land Poison, Spam E".

MandaariMar 1, 20169 votes

Where does this argument that there is only one champion that can be remotely similar to another come from? Ryze deals consistent magic damage with low cooldowns, so Cassy can't possibly be like that. Champions have similarities. Varus and Ashe are both carries with CC ults. Xerath and Ziggs both have siege spells with good waveclear. Garen and Darius are both kiteable AD bruisers with an execute ultimate. Similarity is OK.

HellioningMar 1, 201619 votes

There's nothing saying that there can't be two spammy magic damage dealers.

I'd rather neither of them be Cass because that's not who Cass was to me.

RiotRiotRepertoirMar 1, 2016142 votes

I'm not sure why you think Twin Fangs is a fun and interesting spell, or that you think it's appropriate for Cass' kit to be twitchy and mechanics intensive.

Nowhere did I say that Twin Fang is fun and interesting. I did say that it is core to Cassiopeia, which I do believe is true.

I want a DoT champion, not an arthritis-inducing champion.

You're welcome to play any of the lower intensity champions in the game then, but it's not fair for us to turn Cassiopeia, who has always been higher intensity, into something else because it didn't match some people's original expectations for her. Changes like that run the risk of completely alienating players that already enjoy the champion.

And her ult still sucks.

Very subjective. Even more constructive.

Ren ExMar 1, 2016122 votes

Nowhere did I say that Twin Fang is fun and interesting. I did say that it is core to Cassiopeia, which I do believe is true.

I beg to differ.

When I think of Cassiopeia, I think of the Medusa that is wittling you down, denying you areas to go to, and has the expected high-moment of stopping you in your tracks for trying to face her.

I don't think of someone fishing for a poison tag, to then throw some random, snake-themed projectiles at me whose only counterplay is literally "don't get hit by anything else first".

There's nothing "core" about Twin Fangs. Every single rework and post about it as always said that Twin Fangs was designed as a "downtime spell", something for her to do while her poisons were on CD. There's nothing core about a filler spell.

You're welcome to play any of the lower intensity champions in the game then, but it's not fair for us to turn Cassiopeia, who has always been higher intensity, into something else because it didn't match some people's original expectations for her. Changes like that run the risk of completely alienating players that already enjoy the champion.

Just like how Ryze went from being an accessible, simple, one-dimensional character for beginners to learn with to an annoyingly unbalanceable, and skill-intensive machinegun whose best use scenarios rely less on player skill and more on latency/ping?

Or how Poppy went from being an assassin, to a tank, the exact opposite of her original playstyle?

Or how Sion has nothing of either of his original playstyles (besides HP farm-stack) since rework, and is now much, much more difficult champion to play effectively?

Kinda funny how you want to talk about "alienating players" when reworks and updates in the past had no qualms about completely changing a character.

RiotRiotRepertoirMar 1, 201671 votes

When I think of Cassiopeia, I think of the Medusa that is wittling you down, denying you areas to go to, and has the expected high-moment of stopping you in your tracks for trying to face her.

I don't think of someone fishing for a poison tag, to then throw some random, snake-themed projectiles at me whose only counterplay is literally "don't get hit by anything else first".

That's totally understandable. However, this is all contingent upon your expectation that Cassiopeia be more like a Medusa. I agree that Medusa and Twin Fang spam don't necessarily go hand-in-hand, and that if we were to create Cassiopeia from scratch today, Twin Fang might not be part of the equation. That said, we're trying to refine a character that utilizes her existing sources of power, one of which is Twin Fang, into something that is more balanced (thematically speaking, not power). Twin Fang has undeniably always been one of Cassiopeia's threats, so we don't want to get rid of that. We want to balance things out so that it's not playing such a disproportionately high role in that power distribution.

Kinda funny how you want to talk about "alienating players" when reworks and updates in the past had no qualms about completely changing a character.

Not sure there's a point to a comment like this, as I'm sure the desired outcome isn't that we should just change characters without regard to identity.

Ren ExMar 1, 2016153 votes

That's totally understandable. However, this is all contingent upon your expectation that Cassiopeia be more like a Medusa. I agree that Medusa and Twin Fang spam don't necessarily go hand-in-hand, and that if we were to create Cassiopeia from scratch today, Twin Fang might not be part of the equation. That said, we're trying to refine a character that utilizes her existing sources of power, one of which is Twin Fang, into something that is more balanced (thematically speaking, not power). Twin Fang has undeniably always been one of Cassiopeia's threats, so we don't want to get rid of that. We want to balance things out so that it's not playing such a disproportionately high role in that power distribution.

I used the Medusa comparison because, at the end of the day, Cassiopeia is clearly based on Medusa and the Gorgons. Even without her appearance, she's still a champion that is utilizing poisons in half her kit, a third AoE spell designed for lockdown, and a single high-damaging spell tied to a mechanic involving Poisons.

If you were really trying to balance Cassiopeia thematically, then Poisons and her snake motif should be what's catching your eye, not Twin Fang.

And, you know what? I can deny that Twin Fang has always been on of Cassiopeia's threats, because her pre-rework incarnation, the version that I loved to play, had it as a filler-spell. Her main threat was how much damage she could do in an area, over time, witht he proper team to lockdown and slow the enemies. She wasn't about tagging someone then bursting them down with her E. The E was there just to give her something to do while she waited for her Q to come back, give her some semblance of 1v1 potential, and to maintain her old Deadly Cadence passive.

Her original state had her kit spread into her Q and W doing most of her damage, with E tacked on. Her rework, which was very poorly recieved by the people that actually played her, turned her into a 1v1/single-target champion first and foremost, when the rest of her kit still screams AoE/teamfight mage.

Not sure there's a point to a comment like this, as I'm sure the desired outcome isn't that we should just change characters without regard to identity.

The point of this comment is that, while you're claiming that you don't want to "alienate the players that already enjoy the champion", any time there's big backlash towards a dramatic shift in a champion, it's ignored. Cass was reworked away from a thematic that suited her, and still suits her, which alienated a LOT of players from her. Trundle lost his entire identity years ago. Sion retains a SINGLE TRAIT from his original kit, and nothing of his original playstyle.

I'm seriously not trying to be rude, I just feel it has to be said. Anytime there's a huge change for a champion, that players react negatively to, it's simply pushed aside. Anytime input is asked for, it's brushed aside, and ignored, in favor of the ideas that are already in the reworking Rioters head.

This happened with Cass' original rework, and, frankly, I'm still salty about that. I, and a lot of other Cassiopeia players, lost a champion that we loved to play, in favor of Ryze 1.5, and it feels terrible.

Kojiro SasakiMar 1, 201697 votes

I have no idea why people are downvoting this guy, He's completely right. Is it his tone? I was a big time Cass player before the rework, and I've never really liked the idea of spamming Twin-fang, but I dealt with it. Once that became core and central to her kit, I stopped enjoying playing her.

You also forgot about them moving Morde from mid-lane to some kind of wierd bot-lane mage carry, but then now they're trying to change that too but it seems to just be making it worse? I just don't even know. Oh also, I was a Karma player before her rework, also. Not anymore.

Don't feed us lies about not alienating players. You've done it before. you've done it with THIS CHAMPION. What most people who played Cass wanted was a poison mage first and foremost. When you pick her up, that's the first thing that strikes you. "She's a snake lady who casts poison, cool" Twin-fang has nothing to do with it. I'd prefer her twin fang be something like "When used on a poisoned enemy, Increases the poisons duration and power a small amount" as an a example Though I'd prefer for it to be removed entirely.

MortyMar 1, 201617 votes

It's a combination of his tone, and the fact that he's just wrong. I've played cassio extensively both pre and post rework, and E has always been pretty staple to her gameplay. Yes, pre-rework had more damage in her Q, but you were still sure as hell mashing that E key when you hit that poison. Most of the changes they did to cassio was to move her damage from a level 2 power spike monster that snowballed like mad, to a more consistent champion with a late game hyper carry mentality. He also keeps talking about how they seem to be neglecting the poison thematic, when they've clearly stated multiple times they want to put more power into her poisons, but don't want that to be her only thing. DoT's are boring as shit to play with, and quite frankly are pretty anti-fun for the enemy too.

Also, you guys keep whining about "alienating players" because of the champions reworks. You were a Karma player but aren't anymore? Congrats bro, I'm real sorry for your loss. She went from a champion with a really weird and unintuitive playstyle to one that makes sense and feels rewarding. Complaining about Sion? That champion had NO cohesiveness whatsoever, he was half AD and half AP, half assassin and half tank; it literally made no sense with the evolution of the game. Poppy was just overall stupid as shit and low-key broken. That's coming from someone who played multiple games as poppy with a decently high win-rate, including a smurf that was poppy only. *nothing about her said Poppy, made sense, or gave her an identity. People react negatively at first, until they actually learn the champion again; and guess what, a majority of people enjoy the reworks more. So far, every champion that I've played that has been reworked, I've been sad at first, but then I grow to love them far more than I did prior. Sorry for this long-winded aggressive rant, but you guys are just too much.

TaroganMar 2, 20168 votes

I will say that I liked Cassiopeias play style way more before. I felt like it was easier to kite enemy champions and I felt like I was capable of making big plays if I played it right. I haven't felt the same sort of thing since the rework. I played her a few times and didn't enjoy her style so I stopped. That story is probably true of the majority of Cassiopeia players, just because one person feels different doesn't make it true. If it wasn't true Rito wouldn't be looking to rework her kit to make her more interesting to play. I would be willing to bet that she has a low play percentage and bad survey results. That being said I am all for a rework. Anything to bring her identity back to the speedy kiting poisoning champion I used to love.

FrittatasMar 2, 201633 votes

I can agree with you that it is frustrating that riot has consistently played both sides of the fence (oh we want to stick with the original theme, then the next moment rework the champion to something not with the original theme at all). Now sometimes, it IS the right call to go in a completely different direction and honestly in my opinion, I thought the ryze rework and the poppy rework, while massive, were IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION as far as gameplay goes.

I'm not objecting to massive overhauls of champions, I just don't want some b.s. cop out comment of "this is the original theme of the champion" when that hasn't stopped riot before from making champions better in the past.

Earl EulrichMar 1, 201622 votes

Changes like that run the risk of completely alienating players that already enjoy the champion.

so far i have not seen a single rework that did not heavily alienate the original playerbase...why suddenly start caring? The original Cassio relied mostly on her q to get her dmg across where it mattered, not so much on scaling to finally reach a point where she could melt through the frontline to eventually find the target she wanted to dmg in the first place. So everyone that wants her to be that "dot-mage" opposed to the "machine-gun" mostly is part of the already alienated originial playerbase. right now her identity is that of a slower scaling ap-marksmen that also is less reliable and can´t siege turrets...so why would anyone play her when he can just pick corki for the ap-marksmen that still can siege, lanebully and has the reliable rightclicking aswell?

SnaketitsMar 1, 201664 votes

I must say, I'm extremely disappointed by your unwillingness to turn her into a poison-mage. In case you haven't noticed it yet, she needs a full rework and not a semi one like you're suggesting if you intend to fix all of her issues. Otherwise you'll simply nerf her into the ground again just for her to remain irrelevant for a couple more years. That's not how you make anyone happy around here.

Changes like that run the risk of completely alienating players that already enjoy the champion.

You already alienated her original playerbase during the initial rework and those who sticked around for some time abandoned the ship shortly after she became completely unbearable to play as. Her pickrate has reached an all-time record low with 1%, that's close to 2/3 of her playerbase gone. You seriously need to consider those who played her in the first place, the poison-mage direction is the only way to go.

If I understand you right, you're intending to keep her current passive in place. Aspect of the Serpent really doesn't belong in her kit, you need to get rid of it - we've been telling you this since 2014 and even after all this time you still don't want to do it. We don't want to collect stacks for 40 minutes just to stay handicapped throughout the game, that absolutely needs to change.

Speaking of games and their common duration, this meta leaves zero room for lategame-hypercarries which is why Cassio's current winrate is pretty much in the gutter (when are you finally going to buff her?). You need to restore her ratios, that's the only way to make her powerful again. I'd be more than willing to get rid of this awful hypercarry-fantasy, old Cass already did a far better job at that without being handicapped throughout the game.

I also don't understand why you refuse to improve her ultimate, it's far too unreliable due to its delay, short range and lack of follow-up. It's also extremely hard to hit if anyone decides to randomly click behind them which makes the gamecode think they're looking the other direction which is enough to evade the stun, then there's the majority of champions who have access to some form of mobility which makes any attempt at hitting them pretty much pointless. It's simply one of the worst ultimates in the entire game right now.

She desperately needs a poison-effect on her R if you want her to make proper use of that ability, otherwise she's pretty much screwed due to her Q and W being on cooldown most of the time which makes it impossible to follow up with any Twin Fangs. She has far too many restrictions in her gameplay and receives too little reward for the insane risks she has to take. Also what use is an aoe-slow/stun if she can only target a single person afterwards? She needs her aoe-damage back, period.

I'm still extremely disappointed that you don't intend to replace any of her moves, I don't see how this is going to improve her current situation if she's still stuck with the same moveset without actually returning to her original state which you're trying to avoid at all costs for some strange reason.

To be honest, I don't see a bright future ahead of her after hearing what you had to say. I fear this is just going to be another half-hearted rework like back in 4.16 where Cass only receives some slight changes without actually being looked at, otherwise you'd finally consider a fullblown rework on her which she desperately needs.

Also on a sidenote, when is she finally going to receive a proper VU? Literally all of her assets (with the sole exception of the textures) are from 2010 - she still has the same animations (and lack of recall), same basemodel and same ability-icons. She also hasn't seen a skin in over 3 years, are you going to address any of those things during the update?

SuperLuigiLXIVMar 1, 201631 votes

{quoted}

Nowhere did I say that Twin Fang is fun and interesting. I did say that it is core to Cassiopeia, which I do believe is true.

Tag Team was core to Quinn's play, but nobody seemed to have a problem removing that when it was decided she get a rework.

I am genuinely curious where the line is for "we need to preserve the feel of this champion" vs "this has got to go" when it comes to updating champions. Where's the tipping point between pleasing players and crafting the rework that makes the champion better? Yeah, you might alienate the current players if you change Twin Fang, but you've done that many a time in the past. There is always a new crowd who likes the new kit. Case in point, I love new Poppy. And new Poppy is both more balanced and arguably a better interpretation of her character than old Poppy was.

So how do you decide which champions have to change and which don't?

RetillinMar 1, 201650 votes

{quoted}

Nowhere did I say that Twin Fang is fun and interesting. I did say that it is core to Cassiopeia, which I do believe is true.

It is core due to the last re-work/update FORCING it to be core. I don't think people really enjoy the AP Urgot feel. It wasn't core BEFORE Stashu made it be the majority of her "gameplay" (or lack there of).

OblongOtterMar 1, 201636 votes

I feel like this is the most important comment in the thread. Hate against her rework dominated the boards for months from just about everyone who loved Cass before. IIRC it even ran Stashu off the boards for a long while. The only time people play her after her rework is when she's so broken you can't ignore her.

I understand that maybe this is easier to balance around, but Riot can't just pretend that they don't want to alienate Cass players, at least not after Stashu just covered his ears to daily backlash and alienated everyone who played her even once.

Kasey ChambersMar 1, 201641 votes

I don't like how Cassiopeias passive scales as the game progresses. Getting to 250 or 500 stacks is such a sudden power spike, but not in a way that feels good. Suddenly gaining 25% permanent CDR at a seemingly arbitrary time in the game is just strange, and in an instant makes her far more forgiving (lower CD on E if you hit a non-poisoned target, lower CD on poisons if you miss them). No other champion power spikes in such erratic and instant ways other than certain ult ranks (e.g. Kennens rank 3 ult suddenly allowing him to stun the entire enemy team with his ult alone, as opposed to 3.5 people).

I will compare Cassiopeia to another "late game carry" mage, Veigar. When facing Veigar you think "if we let this game go late he will gradually become a major threat", but when facing Cassiopeia it is more like "she is 25 stacks off a massive AP bonus, we need to engage now or she will be far stronger". And then after 25 stacks are gained that window closes forever. It just feels contrived more than anything with such janky powerspikes happening at inconsistent times of the game due to some enemy teams being far more susceptible to poison poke than others.

If the current passive is going to stay, I would like to see it become a linear increase rather than sudden spikes. For example, instead of 5%/10%/30% AP at the breakpoints, make her passive cap at 600 stacks and each stack provides +(0.05% AP), totaling at +30%. This would work similarly for CDR, giving a small amount of CDR/stack until 300 stacks where it caps at 25%. The Twin Fangs heal is a bit harder to measure since it contains a flat heal amount that early on would be healing for amounts like 0.4 hp, but you get the idea. You might have noticed I increased the cap points slightly, that is simply to offset the fact that Cassiopeia would have partial benefits sooner, particularly the CDR.

Other than that, I like that Cassiopeia currently has a reliable way to Rylais slow her target and still have her E available. Miasma is reasonably reliable, if you don't use it on a target that is about to dash it is fairly confirmed to hit. Once you have Rylais you can then slow them with Twin Fangs and hit a much easier Q, allowing the pain train to begin. I believe that some form of getting a reliable reduced CD E to apply Rylais single target slow on a target, either through Miasma or Petrifying Gaze followed by Noxious Blast is necessary with the amount of mobility in the game, otherwise targets with dashes can just hamstring Cassiopeias damage output by avoiding poisons and never having to deal with rapidfire Twin Fangs.

RiotRiotRepertoirMar 1, 201638 votes

If the current passive is going to stay, I would like to see it become a linear increase rather than sudden spikes.

We're not thrilled with how the passive has played out.

LisbethMar 1, 201632 votes

{quoted}

To truly make her a "Poison Mage" would require large alterations to the champion that may achieve that feeling, but that we ultimately thought would no longer be Cassiopeia.

The irony here is that after all the changes you've given her in the past she doesn't really feel like Cassiopeia to her fans now anyway.

Karma DeifiedMar 1, 201630 votes

"brand new LoL Poison Mage."

First rework converted Cass from poison Mage to "brand new AP Marksman with no auto attack damage."

In all honesty, it'd make more sense to revert Cass and work from there. The rework brought nothing of value to Cass, putting it lightly.

RiotRiotRepertoirMar 1, 201632 votes

First rework converted Cass from poison Mage to "brand new AP Marksman with no auto attack damage."

Right. She should more like a poison mage that Cassiopeia specifically was intended to be, not just turned into an unrecognizable poison mage for the sake of poison. I hope that makes sense.

ShadowParkerMar 1, 20164 votes

What type of carry do you intend for her to be now?

dapositivevikingMar 1, 201621 votes

HellioningMar 1, 201612 votes

That makes me hope a bit.

I apologize for my earlier comments. I can't say I regret what I said, but I do regret the said I worded them. Cass gets me upset.

ThryaleMar 1, 20168 votes

aye, but it'll be okay. I have hope. If cass 3.0 looks more like cass 1.0 then I will be happy. I mainly want my rylai-liandri build back and to be able to siege towers and kite mundos for days while watching everything die. :D

HellioningMar 1, 201612 votes

I just want to be able to cast a poison spell without feeling like I have to cast a direct damage spell to do anything.

ArthurRamboMar 1, 201624 votes

I love twin fangs! I understand moving power around in the kit but I really hope it doesn't feel too weak in the update. I love spammy champs like that, and I personally really enjoy the way her burst power is gated behind having to land q or w.

RiotRiotRepertoirMar 1, 201632 votes

I love twin fangs! I understand moving power around in the kit but I really hope it doesn't feel too weak in the update. I love spammy champs like that, and I personally really enjoy the way her burst power is gated behind having to land q or w.

Imagine that Twin Fang does 65% of Cassiopeia's damage at the moment, with 35% elsewhere (making these up). We're probably looking at pulling things closer to 50/50. I think a good sweet spot would be if felt like it was still going in for to really amp up the damage, but that you weren't completely zoned from effectiveness if you couldn't.

MandaariMar 1, 201642 votes

What about making her Twin Fangs not deal a lot of damage, but make her poisons infinitely stack-able (maybe cap vs monsters) like Kalista's rend. Just make it so Twin Fangs grants a Q stack and resets the timer on her poison debuff to the full duration. You still have the same play pattern she has currently but the damage comes from her poisons. She lands Q, lands a bunch of Es, and the target melts from DoTs.

Happy middle ground?

Edit: Also let me clarify my proposal. Her E damage goes way down. Her Q poison duration goes up and it stacks. Her E refreshes the duration and applies another stack. Her W can, idk, spread her poisons to nearby enemies like Brand E or something. instead of what it does now. The key thing to remember is that she can spam E to up her damage, but she doesn't have to be spamming it to actively be doing damage.

FuzzkatMar 1, 201621 votes

Please please please, take a technical pass on her ultimate. Recode it, reconfigure it, whatever you have to do to make it as reliable as you can. Because no matter how well the update goes, if her ultimate is deemed by players as buggy or unreliable we won't ever get to see her in competitive play.

I don't know about you but seeing a pro play a mechanically intensive champion like Cass is something I want.

RiotRiotRepertoirMar 1, 201613 votes

Are there specific issues with it that need fixing? Please share!

Emperor of SushiMar 1, 201648 votes

Yeah Make it tho that her Ult hit box isnt in front of the model of Cassio. IF a lee sin or xin jumps you and you ult it dont hit them even if you are clearly behind them. Make her Ult hit box like lux ult hitbox that it starts in center of the cassio model not in front of her. It is rlly frustrating when you ult someone in front of you and it dont hit cause he was to close to your model. That should be immiediatly fixed. Also bugs with stunning opponts who are clearly not turned towards me or not stunned opponents who are cleary turned towards me.

KrosanMar 1, 201628 votes

Frankly, I don't think a spell with the desired effect (the stun) being locked on a character facing dependency is ever going to feel reliable when it's used in a game with instantaneous turning. It also widens the mechanical gap in terms of skill required to play against her, since few players below plat/diamond are going to have the reactions or mechanical skill to intentionally change facing to dodge the ult.

Not to tell you how to do your job, but I think the ult would have a much better feel to it if the stun effect was guaranteed and some other aspect of it, such as the damage effect, was facing-dependent.

CarnicoreMar 1, 201615 votes