Assassin Update (Message for Riot)

I understand that not all mages were changed in the mage update, and I hope the same holds true for the assassin update. Honestly, I think you guys did a good job with the mage update. Xerath is a lot better, but nobody realizes it yet. Malzahar, Swain, Vladimir, and Zyra were all borderline troll picks before and have all become legitimate, viable picks. The champions that needed reworks received reworks, and the champions that didn't need touching didn't receive touching. Well, I sort of think of Cassiopeia as an exception.

I played Cassiopeia a lot before the rework, and I didn't understand why she was even receiving a rework. She was a very good pick, but a lot of skill was required to really bring out her full potential. She wasn't spammed in competitive, but she was picked a good amount in different scenarios. She was played in a total of 13 games in the spring season, which I see as a pretty healthy number. I made a large post commenting on the fact that I didn't see why she was receiving a rework, but now, I'm willing to grant you that it wasn't a horrible rework, even if I still don't think it was too necessary before.

I think there are a lot of assassins that could really use a rework, and I think there are some that are still competitively viable. I think it would be negative for game health, in a sense of champion diversity, if some of the assassins are unnecessarily changed. TLDR: Please don't change Leblanc and Kassadin. As a Kassadin main, he's actually really good right now, but he's hard to figure out so people haven't been able to unlock his full potential. I've been a Kassadin player since season 3, through all the nerfs and the rework and the later buffs. The two assassins that I believe are in a healthy state right now are Kassadin and Leblanc, and I just really hope I don't see them in the assassin update.

Still, there are a lot of champions that need some touching up. Akali, Diana, and Talon seem like some of the more obvious champions that need some changing. And now, I'd like to offer my personal insight and explain why some assassins, like Akali, Diana, and Talon, aren't very good as far as assassins go.

Being an assassin always means two things: You're squishy, and dealing damage requires getting up close to enemy champions. There in lies how assassins are able to get punished, if they aren't careful. Now, being squishy and in the middle of the enemy team for too long is never going to end well for you. Leblanc and Kassadin are good assassins for the same reasons that Akali, Talon, Diana, and now Fizz are bad assassins. Leblanc and Kassadin have windows of time when they go in that the enemy team can punish them, but they also have ways to get out after going in. Kassadin has a low CD ult at level 16, and leblanc can go back to her distortion. It's the maneuverability of an assassin that makes them good, on top of their ability to dish out a lot of damage in a short amount of time. Akali, Talon, and Diana all have ways to get in and deal a lot of damage, but they don't have any ways to get out after going in. Once you go in with one of these champions, there's no going back. Fizz has become a similar case, since his trickster is on a 6 second cooldown with maximum cooldown reduction.

So, when you try to think of how to rework these champions to make them good again, know that there are 2 criteria that every GOOD assassin must be able to meet. 1). They must be able to deal a lot of damage in a short amount of time. 2). They must have some way of being able to get out after going in.