@RiotStashu: I think I know how Cass's passive can work. @Everyone else: Hear me out.
@Brackhar/anyone who worked with him on original Cassiopeia: If you're around, fact-check me.
In another thread, Stashu mentioned this:
So, the question is, what sorts of things make sense to come over game time in ways which you can't control super well? One answer is 'just make it an evolution system like Kha'Zix/Victor,' but I think that design space is starting to get a bit crowded and it's really important that we preserve what makes those champions feel unique. Stats sort of work, but they create a similar feeling of the game playing keep-away with your power. Somehow the Twin Fang augment works, as it's power in a way which adds some softer decisions and doen't really change Cassiopeia's combat pattern. So, if we're going to swap out the stats for more interesting things that feel exciting to get rather than necessary, it would have to fit along these lines.
Honestly, I think a much better comparison for Cass would be a different evolution system:
: Yo.
Rengar's Bonetooth Necklace is a good example of a linear evolution passive that does work without feeling boring--and while he technically doesn't NEED it to function, it does successfully give him a linear evolution path that feels fun--and more importantly, meaningful.
Let's look at it:
UNIQUE Passive - Mementos of the Hunt: Rengar collects trophies when killing Champions and gains bonus effects based on how many trophies he has. Kills and assists grant 1 trophy.
3 Trophies: Rengar gains 25 Movement Speed whilst out of combat or in brush. 6 Trophies: Increases the range of Rengar's Leap by 125. Active upgrades at 6 Trophies. 12 Trophies: Thrill of the Hunt's duration is increased by 5 seconds. 20 Trophies: Thrill of the Hunt's Movement Speed while stealthed is doubled. (Unlisted: According to LoL Wiki, Rengar gains the upgraded trinket effects at 20 trophies as well.)
The Bonetooth necklace page on LoL Wiki mentioned something about the Head of Kha'Zix giving increased vision range to Knifecat in brush as well, but it wasn't on the Rengar page itself.
A few major things stick out:
- Rengar has a separate, highly iconic passive already and doesn't require Bonetooth Necklace to function
This I think would probably be the first comparison most old Cass players would make; it does not require much explanation. I will say that Viktor has no passive besides the Hex Core and its upgrades, though--I think that what's important is that he's balanced around not needing Necklace. That being said: Thresh is balanced around needing his souls to scale properly, so perhaps there are better reasons than this.
- Rengar's effects grant him effects he can explicitly play around, bonuses that are not easily mimicked by convenient itemization/masteries.
All of Bonetooth Necklace's bonuses give Rengar a new strategic tool or enhance the strategic potential of his existing tools. The first bonus makes him even more dominant in brush--and the out-of-combat movement speed also makes him consider roaming to find more trophies. The second bonus improves one of his most iconic abilities--his brush leap--by improving its cast range (which, as Stashu mentioned of Syndra in another thread, is normally sacrosanct.) The third bonus lets him ult from a further distance--or more effectively psych out his opponents. The fourth bonus lets him hunt from even further away--and lets him get to his opponents more quickly, giving them less time to react.
Righteous Glory and Boots of Mobility and are the only two things that can vaguely mimic the bonuses Bonetooth Necklace provides--and neither are 1 to 1 fits for those bonuses.
- The Necklace stacks in a visceral manner that Rengar is strongly rewarded for pursuing.
Necklace rewards Rengar for getting kills/assists. Kills and assists are good, but Rengar wants them more than other people do, so he plays in a way meant to get him more kills/assists than other champions. Kills and assists also feel inherently good to obtain.
- The Necklace gives Rengar an "Aghanim's Scepter"--making his highest moment [his ultimate] feel even better to use.
Rengar's passive makes his high points--such as being strong in brush--feel even better. As such, he isn't compensating for something.
- Some of the Necklace's benefits are strategic advantages (such as stronger roaming potential).
Strategic benefits (like Dragon's new "global stacking passive" and the MS boost out of combat on Necklace) provide an effect that changes how you play in the long-term--appropriate for a stacking passive meant primarily to give benefits over a long-term period of time.
- The Necklace--and its enhancements--all tie into some aspect of Rengar's fantasy/gameplay.
This is probably the thing that sticks out the most to me. Rengar is a trophy hunter--as Rengar gains more and more trophies, he gets a passive that gives him...well, a trophy collection. As he claims trophies (kills/assists), he gets to feel more and more accomplished.
His bonuses also enhance his gameplay in ways that make him feel like a hunter (or a goddamn lion, that's also part of his fantasy). Rengar gets more movement speed in brush and while out of combat, letting him reach his quarry faster while tracking them (or fighting inside his hunting grounds, brush.) The range increase takes one of the most iconic parts of Rengar (his passive) and makes it even stronger--anything the tall grass touches is his. His ultimate gets first a duration boost, letting him track his quarry longer and psychologically toy with them, while his final boost makes the rush of hunting your quarry becomes all-consumingly fast.
All this combines to make Bonetooth Necklace totally work out for Rengar.
Bonetooth Necklace tl;dr: Bonetooth necklace works because Rengar doesn't need it to function or be satisfied and it's satisfying both to stack and benefit from stacks. Most importantly, it fits his flavor like a glove.
: Back to me.
Now, before we get into Cass's passive, I want to discuss her fantasy/thematic identity/flavor for a moment.
The boards have all been stirring with her "venom mage" fantasy/gameplay, which seemed to strongly take a back seat to her "mage ADC" gameplay when the Cassiopeia rework was initially launched.
However, Cass's theme ultimately encompasses more than that. She also draws on the mythological Medusa, a woman cursed to be a monster with snakes for hair that could petrify those who looked at her (hence Cass's ultimate); she also plays up the "snake" aspects considerably.
While her venoms might be a key aspect of what made her enjoyable, they were also part of a larger fantasy--the fantasy of a naga mage or more likely a viper/cobra mage: watching at a distance, harassing with poisons while swaying with deadly cadence, then lashing away at a weakened opponent, striking bite after bite after bite until they succumb to venom and blood loss. Her viper/cobra (and perhaps naga) inspirations are probably why her Twin Fang has been played up so much in her rework--yeah, some cobras spray their venom, but vipers and many other cobras inject their venom--and also note that the naga, according to Wikipedia, as described in the Mahabharata as "ever bent on biting other creatures."
As hinted, Deadly Cadence also might have had ties to her "cobra mage" feel in that it strongly encouraged her to cast Q every 4.5 seconds, giving her a sense of rhythm (much as a cobra's sway has rhythm). However, it had a much more cerebral connection to her various fantasies/inspirations than her other abilities--and while I think that the "rhythm" aspect of Deadly Cadence should be reincorporated into Cassiopeia somehow (possibly through a second passive), it still felt a bit tacked-on from a flavor perspective and I can see why it was replaced.
From that same flavor perspective, Cassiopeia's (much loathed) new passive, Aspect of the Serpent, initially seems even more tacked on. However, as I researched this wall of text, I realized something: Aspect of the Serpent ties another aspect of her "medusa fantasy," the curse, directly into her gameplay--as she learns to embrace her curse, she grows stronger and stronger. If done well, it could really give the player that same feeling of embracing a terrible curse--and truly becoming the hyperscaling Medusa monster Stashu originally intended. Thinking about it that way, I can see why Stashu stuck to his guns--that's actually a really cool idea. A "fully realized" version of her passive would indeed make sense on Cassiopeia.
The main problem with it, then, is that the execution was horrible enough to turn Teemos to stone. I think Stashu has noticed this as well, but I think I have an additional perspective to add here.
As it stands, the passive's stacking mechanisms and bonuses don't actually make you viscerally feel like you're embracing the aspect of the serpent. That, I think, is the crux of the issue. While the application method vaguely feels appropriate (in a very cerebral manner), that's it. It's weak and doesn't even have interaction with her other Medusa-specific ability.
Yeah definitely. I've experimented with a number of more 'interesting' mechanics as rewards for the breakpoints. Ultimately, they all, much like the current stat-y one, created a feeling in the player of "but why do I have to wait?" Basically, when you get a tool that alters the way you approach your core combat pattern, the kit feels incomplete without it. The healing on E is kind of cool and adds some decisions, but none that really change the way you approach combat, except that now you are kind of just stronger.
I think the issue is that rather than embracing the curse and its power, you're embracing some lifesteal on your autoattack replacement (which does vaguely make sense) and two stat boosts that can be directly replicated by useful itemization. For the more "interesting" mechanics--again, the issue is that it shouldn't just make her feel stronger, it should make her feel like she's embracing the curse and being rewarded with the curse's power as a result. It's probably a good idea to use mechanisms that make her more interesting--but unless they make you feel like you're embracing the curse and further enhance her "high points", they're still going to fail to provide an answer to the "why have to wait" question.
Not only that, but the stacking mechanisms--poisoning people and time--are very, very subtle. Perhaps "poisoning champions" could also stack a reworked Deadly Cadence (providing some tactical benefit that feels like embracing her curse in the moment--then strategically improving her in the long run)? What about making kills/assists provide extra stacks ("killing people with venom and fangs" is certainly a serpentine thing to do--and it also lets Cass progress through her power curve faster if she gets ahead [like other champions with hyperscaling power curves--which was one reason why her power curve felt so bad in the first place])?
At least one effect should provide a strategic bonus. One pair of changes I think might produce a VERY good "max stacks" effect (albeit a crappy one for Dominion) that would also fit her "hypercarry" power curve: let her Twin Fang target towers without stacks (normally going on full CD while doing so), then let Miasma corrode and damage structures at max stacks of Aspect of the Serpent. Boom--Cassiopeia suddenly becomes a much bigger threat, one that with Sorcery elixir can shred towers in a matter of seconds (albeit far later than when Azir and Ziggs reach that point, and with worse counter-siege potential than either.) The raw impact of the effect more than justifies the wait--she can now poison and Twin Fang even buildings to dust. It should be paired with another thematically-appropriate final passive (since tbh it does feel a bit "metagamey"--and again, Dominion loses out), but still--it works.
Additionally, the final bonus (or at least the penultimate bonus), rather than simply giving more %ability power, should enhance her ultimate somehow. It's the signature Medusa ability; the Medusa-themed passive should interact with it somehow. It's one of her highest points; like Rengar, an ult enhancement from the stacking passive would be in order.
Finally, I'll say this: If you find a direction for Aspect of the Serpent that works, give Cass voice lines related to her passive. Vayne has a line for learning Silver Bolts and Syndra has multiple lines for hitting max level on each of her basic abilities; Cass has...nada.
Cass's passive tl;dr: The "embrace the curse" theme of her passive makes total sense for a Medusa-inspired champion; what doesn't make sense is everything else about her current passive; I have some ideas about how to make the passive more interesting. I apologize for having bad formatting after the final quote, but please--actually read this section for details; I've been thinking about this for 8 or 9 hours and writing this for like 5 or 6 of those. ;_;
