Many people are arguing that the reworked assassins do not have the necessary burst to be an assassin or their burst is too delayed. I believe the Intention or one intention was to change what defines an assassin from the old definition.
So what is an assassin by your definition and do these reworks satisfy that? I know it's early to ask, but I'm curious to your thoughts.
Stephenizgod11 votesAssassin players: Assassins no longer have burst
ADC players: Assassins have too much burst
Tank players: Assassins are able to kill me
Support players: Assassins are too mobile, I can't stop them
Mages players: Why do Assassins have as much burst as us
Fighter/Bruiser players: Assassins are able to 1v1 duel me
Everyone has differing opinions on this and they are all biased. Currently right now the assassins all do very different things, like Talon is impossible to chase or escape and Rengar is just straight up beating everything down, LeBlanc has crazy instant damage once that thing is ready, Katarina is just sorta flopping around everywhere really fast, Fizz is a stupid champion and always will be, Shaco is way better as an AP champion, etc. Individually they were given identities (not saying they are good or bad, just a statement) but as a Class i feel like they were muddled pretty badly with Divers/Fighters. The biggest offenders in my opinion are Kha, Rengar, and Fizz.
Sona x Rubick1 votesNo
i play everything except assassins, and all of what you said is just not true.
Stephenizgod1 votesOk so because it is not true for you that means it must not be true for anyone... I am not making this up, just repeating what I have seen other people complaining about.
LankPants1 votesEveryone has differing opinions on this and they are all biased. Currently right now the assassins all do very different things, like Talon is impossible to chase or escape and Rengar is just straight up beating everything down, LeBlanc has crazy instant damage once that thing is ready, Katarina is just sorta flopping around everywhere really fast, Fizz is a stupid champion and always will be, Shaco is way better as an AP champion, etc. Individually they were given identities (not saying they are good or bad, just a statement) but as a Class i feel like they were muddled pretty badly with Divers/Fighters. The biggest offenders in my opinion are Kha, Rengar, and Fizz.
Then there's Akali, who had her identity on shroud stripped away and replaced with a generic blink. She just generally does nothing. I'd argue Shaco currently fits that too.
Stephenizgod1 votesI haven't seen her played yet, but I have heard terrible things lol.
Riot has a tendency to pick balance over identity, Akali might be more balanced but if it comes at the cost of her identity and enjoy-ability, it is not worth it. I feel for Akali and Shaco mains, I lost my main when they did the Mage Update. Malzahar is just terrible, he is absolutely no fun to play as or against and his identity was slashed and twisted into a garbage push suppress bot champ with no real kill threat.
Takazaki5 votes
Tentacle Advisor23 votesTo be fair, that Kha'Zix did creep over in Jhin's direction, with enough time in-between for Jhin to realize, "Hey, maybe I should consider moving. I mean, he is inching his way over here right now."
Very Hard Engage5 votesbut the same can be said about literally any other champion in the game.
thats not counterplay, thats general awareness.
counterplay is when you have the tools to deny them what they do, in jhins case, he specifically only has his W to potentially snare a khazix, which is easily rendered obsolete by khazix's own leapstrike, mitigating minor counterplay back down to none, find yourself a tank to stand behind.
in order to deal with any assassin these days you need to have 2 built in utilities, like a stun and a root, or a stun and a slow, thats counterplay.
no stun? enjoy just being flashed on and dieing.
Ralanr19 votesThat's why ADCs are meant to rely on their team to peel.
Very Hard Engage3 votesi agree, assassins > adcs
but at the same time most mid laners have one utility ability to mitigate an assassin leaving again, very little counterplay for the majority of matchups.
its straight up tanks who deck assassins, which aren't too good right now because of how strong pen is. in addition riots been hurting hard cc for the past few seasons and no1 ever thinks about the repercussions.
BoilTheOil1 votesgaren has hard cc?
Very Hard Engage1 votessilence isn't considered cc?
YumaS2Astral1 votesIt is CC, but it is soft CC (cannot interrupt channels and cannot proc the new tank mastery)
Very Hard Engage1 votessilences are still as effective against assassins, even riven.
Tentacle Advisor11 votesbut the same can be said about literally any other champion in the game.
thats not counterplay, thats general awareness.
Technically speaking, yes, general awareness is a form of counterplay that can be applied to any and every champion/role.
Jhin is a Marksman. Marksmen are generally vulnerable to 2 main things: Assassins and Mages. This is something the player should be aware of. (Honestly, every player should be aware of what game element each role is strong/weak against.) Assuming that player knew/knows this, then they should not have been where they were at that time. Why? Because they were alone.
Assassins prey on isolated targets (no pun intended towards that Kha'Zix). The solution to that is to have someone nearby to assist in stalling the assassin's kill attempt. The best bet would be to have the team's tank be with Jhin during this time. Is that always possible? No. For all we know, the tank could have either been dead already or simply just not around that area, at that time. If either of those are the case, then there should be no complaints (in my opinion) that Kha'Zix had the opportunity to assassinate Jhin. Jhin's counterplay (i.e. a teammate to peel for him; preferably a tank) was not available, therefore Kha'Zix has the opportunity to carry out his role's job: Assassinate the Marksman.
counterplay is when you have the tools to deny them what they do, in jhins case, he specifically only has his W to potentially snare a khazix, which is easily rendered obsolete by khazix's own leapstrike, mitigating minor counterplay back down to none, find yourself a tank to stand behind.
This is explained above.
in order to deal with any assassin these days you need to have 2 built in utilities, like a stun and a root, or a stun and a slow, thats counterplay.
no stun? enjoy just being flashed on and dieing.
Marksmen are intentionally not given a loadout of assassin-repellent spells and tools. If they were to have those, it'd make assassins obsolete. Yes, I understand where you're coming from. Believe me, I understand completely. However, by stating that the Marksmen should have more tools to repel Assassins would almost be the same as saying Assassins should not be in the game. Because by giving Marksmen a full loadout of assassin-repellent, there'd be no point in having the assassin class, in the first place.
Again, I totally understand where you're coming from. I've been under the mercy of the assassin class while playing a Marksman. (Ashe, to be more specific, so I completely understand.) When I compare the assassins from how they were to the way they are now, I realize that though the assassins were doing what they were meant to do, they were not doing so within the theme of an actual assassin. It was more like they were gods/goddesses passing down judgment on whoever they pleased. [For lack of a better comparison.] Now, they actually feel like assassins, in terms of theme.
P.S. - It's *dying, by the way. (Not trying to be an ass. I just write as a side hobby and spelling errors are kind of a pet peeve of mine.)
Very Hard Engage1 votes"While counterplay is a type of meaningful choice, it’s so important to League of Legends as a competitive multiplayer game that we consider it a pillar of our design values. A fight loses its excitement if the first punch wins – it's what you can do after that adds depth and complexity. We try to prevent hard counters and abilities with no room for reaction, as no game should be over without a real show of skill."
~ MORELLO
assassins hard counter adcs, no questions asked. there is no wiggle room, there is no decision making, 1v1, you lose every time. thats by design.
except those who do have the tools to counter, do it back exceptionally hard.
the reason why assassins always manage +/- 50-50 win rates isn't because they're valued to the team, but because they managed to snowball so hard that the enemy team just couldn't fight back when dead, so you took objectives for free netting a win.
but they lose games when you dont feed, and you just group 5v5 down the mid lane, and the assassin cant do jack back. netting the team the win.
thats poor champion design and goes against what riot considered counterplay.
Astôlfo3 votesYes, you quoted something that proves exactly why Riot panders to shitty players. Good job I guess?
Sure, they're feast or famine, which isn't good, but that's sort of the entire point of the assassin role. Reducing that by adding delays to their abilities to make them less 'feast' was a fucking horrible decision. And 'famine' depended on the enemy team being good or the assassin player being shit, which really isn't the fault of the assassin itself. If an assassin snowballs and 'feasts' and said team with assassin wins because of the assassin, the enemy team is bad and deserved it.
Yes, that's why they're not played in Worlds. So what? That is entirely irrelevant.
Very Hard Engage2 votesassassins should not exist in league, im sorry solo q abusers, and assassin mains, but it literally goes against league when you do any 100-0 action against a squishy. you are meant only to get in and out and finish off low hp targets, not be a primary source of damage for a team.
the only reason they continue to exist is because they are widely popular, sell skins, are cool to the young kids, and any time they dont have a +50% win rate they get so much grief about how weak the champion is, not attributing the champion being balanced, but because the class by design is flawed.
Astôlfo2 votes"solo q abusers" LUL. Literally anything can abuse solo Q. And solo Q means jackshit when it comes to balancing.
No, it does not. If an assassin 100-0'd a squishy, said squishy champion player played horribly in that specific situation and deserved to be deleted.
Uh no. You're meant to instantly delete any squishy AND low-health targets.
I'm sorry you don't know how to deal with an assassin. Must be tough. Oh wait, Riot pandered to you and gutted them. Must feel good being able to be crappy at the game and have Riot pander to you?
Very Hard Engage1 votesheres a thought, bring back veigar stun, and ziggs Q, lets see how much fun you have when i land skill shot after skill shot leaving you 0 room to lane against someone whos ranged. lets add in a chalice to the mix.
but wait... those things are oppressive and leave no room for counterplay... nerf and nerf...
assassins, literally pressed R on me and i died without any room for counterplay... buff buff buff????????
id love to see an assassin build lifesteal as a first item just to not get foced out of lane by a good mage, the same way an assassin forces a mage to build roa/zhonyas.
Astôlfo3 votesNo assassin can just press R for a 100-0. They need their full combo.
And the vast majority of assassins had an absolutely shit laning phase pre-rework. Why make it even more shit?
Anidan1 votesY'know, normally I'm nicer... but right now I'm thinking you might just be an idiot.
With statements like "assassins shouldn't be in League" up there, I'm glad you're not on the balance team because you'd be terrible at it. The further statement of something like "assassins, literally pressed R on me and i died without any room for counterplay... buff buff buff?" is even worse because I can't think of any time an assassin has pressed only his ult on me and I died, unlike, say, a fed Veigar who I have seen just press R and kill someone from full health - specifically the mage who was building AP like his role says he should and he was punished for it because "fuck you, I'm Veigar."
Assassins have a place in League. Burst counters sustained damage because burst means that sustained damage can't last long enough to pump out their damage, meaning that assassins are supposed to be strong against marksmen, who are strong against tanks, who are strong against assassins, and so on. It's cyclical balance and, as Kassadin so wisely said, "balance must be preserved."
This idea of "EVERY SINGLE THING IN THIS ENTIRE GAME DOWN TO THE TINIEST DETAIL MUST HAVE COUNTERPLAY" is ironically the most harmful thing in this entire game, because it means whoever has the most tools with which to counterplay their enemy is going to be the strongest when it reaches that counterplay singularity, and until that singularity is reached the strongest people are going to be ones that eliminate the most counterplay to establish their own consistency despite the rampant counterplay balancing that is going to see many champions on a rotating door of viability.
Do you get angry when you get headshot by a sniper halfway across the map because you didn't get a warning signal sounding that his targeting reticle is nearing the general vicinity of your face? No, because that'd be stupid - your team is supposed to make it unsafe for him to get a good sniping position, and if he does then he deserves to get kills off your poor play. Likewise, if an ADC is alone and gets jumped on by an enemy assassin he should be killed for being alone near what is supposed to be his counter, not get a 2 second window to fight back and fix his mistakes because of some misguided principle of counterplay. The ADC's counterplay to the asssassin is to stay near an ally who can peel him and allow him to fight back the assassin, not to be able to kill the assassin himself. If an assassin catches you alone, do you really think they're going to give you a 2-3 second warning that they're going to kill you? You think Corvo or other assassins in games, or even in real life, willingly gave their victims warning before their death (or other punishments, in Corvo's case, I'm not judging how you play if you do)? No, because then they'd get their buddies and try to repel them, like they should.
Chembaron Yamada1 votesI agree that his idea of "assassins shouldn't be in the game" is completely wrong. They are a fun role and deserve to be in the game.
But I agree with Riot's way to handle them by giving them delayed burst, too. If you were fighting against Rengar for example, he jumped on you in stealth and instantly killed you. Staying next to your team mates mostly didn't help in that situation, you were completely helpless and had to accept: if you are the adc in the team, you will be dead at the beginning of every team fight.
That was just not fair. If you get deleted from the game completely without any control over it, it is just a bad game experience. They still have burst to kill an adc fast. It is just delayed so there is a time window for the opponent to react and actually protect the target.
And using "real life logic" or stuff like that is not correct in that case. How many times in real life there will be an cat jumping at me and murder me while it was invisible even if it was standing right next to me?
And even without thinking about that fantasy stuff: in real life, no assassin would just jump in a group of enemies and kill a target. Too much risk for them. Assassination needs to be prepared. You could argue that is their new design. They prepare their burst in some way, after preparation is done they jump in and kill you.
Anidan1 votesYou have a good point. The only thing I can really argue against, or am willing to argue against because the good points you brought up are respectable enough that I can't see any sense in arguing with it because they could change my mind, is that unfortunately Rengar didn't happen to change much with his rework - still blowing people up from stealth. Delayed burst is fine, in my mind, but it's the telegraphing of that burst that kills me a bit because for some of them it might as well be a giant neon sign over the assassin's head saying "STOP ME NOW! I'M GIVING YOU OVER A SECOND'S WARNING TO STOP ME BEFORE I DO MY DAMAGE, STOP ME NOW AND I'LL DO NEARLY NOTHING!" which also doesn't feel particularly great for the assassin, either.
And also, why did Akali need her passive changed from a constant to what it is now? That just seems strange and unintuitive compared to before.
Chembaron Yamada1 votesRengar is still too strong, I agree with that. But his new kit is actually easier to balance, they can just tweak numbers now. Before, his Q was an empowered AA instead of a skillshot. So when the animation started there was no way to escape the damage. No dash, blink, flash.... nothing could save you in that moment. Now you are able to escape the skillshot.
And his ult got new counterplay. The closest enemy gets marked, so you know the direction he is coming from. The primary targets can hide behind tankier allies. And he can't just sneak through them, because it is camouflage instead of inivisibility now. I think they will nerf him in the future (and Kha probably too) and he will be fine.
Having clear indicators for burst is fine for me, too. It isn't actually new, they did it with new champions like Ekko too. His 3 hit passive is clearly indicated, like many other stuff in this game. To land the burst, you got to outplay the enemy. Seems fair to me.
About Akali: She will get a VGU in the future, I think the changes were just meant to fit her a bit more into the assassin part.... The old passive gave her spellvamp.... which is mostly good for extended fights, fitting more for a bruiser or tank than an assassin. Her new passive fits the style of an assassin more, doesn't it? Giving her a small time window of improved strength (with bigger heal and damage), but losing benefit in extended fights.
Takazaki2 votesassassins hard counter adcs, no questions asked. there is no wiggle room, there is no decision making, 1v1, you lose every time. thats by design.
http://plays.tv/video/5825e97444a99067e6/adcs-are-hard-countered-by-assassins
Ralanr1 votesDang lifesteal.
Takazaki2 votesI imminently bought a 
i was salted
Ralanr1 votesDid it work?
Takazaki1 votesNo, my team was 
We had no way to engage and therefor lost a battle of attrition
Ralanr1 votesThe power of team comps!
Takazaki1 votes 
plz no rub it
Ralanr1 votesSorry man. I'm a Sion Main so I'm usually the engage on my team.
I've played without a engager on my team and every time it happens I'm like "How are we supposed to start teamfights? I made a mistake."
Ralanr2 votesI'm unranked. Long ago I realized most people had that mindset.
Instead of fighting it, I decided to help my team satisfy it safely. It's fun.
Chembaron Yamada1 votes"Tell me again why assassins aren't played in worlds? Because team cooperation decks them into the dirt"
One of THE strongest champions in worlds. Is an assassin, seems everyone is forgetting that. You are welcome.
Very Hard Engage1 votesyeah but you can dodge the spear. boom there goes half her damage and all of her combo.
you cant dodge point and click.
Chembaron Yamada1 votesI did never say she has no counterplay. She is still an assassin though, the statement that assassins didn't get played in worlds is false.
Very Hard Engage1 votesexcept you're not thinking of assassin in the same fashion, shes not out to brawl your adc or score a pick, shes out to be a team player and make ganks happen. shes not melting whoever she focuses. she offers more than just killing someome.
she doesn't have willy nilly in and out "missed me" mechanics
nidalee is borderline not even an assassin. as i recall she was mage first support second.
she just doesn't play the way an assassin does. you look at khazix and rengar and go "whats the difference" oh right, unique conditions to activate abilities... but otherwise they do all the same stuff.
Chembaron Yamada2 votesNot melting whoever she focuses? She actually plays alot like an assassin. She hits a target with her spear, jumping in with increased range to that target, killing it in a heartbeat and jumping out of danger again.
And just because she is a hybrid doesn't mean she is "borderline assassin". She is put in the assassin list by riot and her whole playstyle and kit is indicating that she is one.
Nidalee brings alot of utility too, that's right. She is still able to do what other assassins are able to: jump in, kill and get out again.
And her roles are primary assassin and secondary fighter btw.
zrWQMdGHtY2 votesIt's Lee and Yi
Ralanr2 votesA diver and a skirmisher.
I get you're pissed but those classes hasn't had their updates yet so of course their going to show some problems in comparison.
zrWQMdGHtY3 votesSeriously stop it... My job is to kill ADCs and Mages and at the moment I don't even have a way to counter them never less assassinate them, I just literally got turret dived from full HP by a vayne, she gave me 3 basics and I died and she didn't even have that many items and all I could do it is to watch how I died, because she didn't care I shunpoed and Wed on my minions, she got me in less than 0.5 secs because of her mobility... I cant counter anything at the moment except Lee Sin pre level 6... The moment he gets 6 he just Rs me when he sees me hoping around and hitting him damage and then I'm instant Qed and dead... Katarina literally counters nobody... Before there was 100 counters and 1 item to counter her, now there's 133 counters and 10 items to counter her... Like seriously... Sure there's people acting all cool saying "just l2p I'm winning games", c'mon get real... we both know you aint the one that carries and most of the times you just get basically bad enemies when you're fed as Kat... Literally all my 8/0 8/1 games as her at the moment are vs people who are too busy flaming how skilless and brainless my champ is than actually trying to dodge my daggers...
Katarina is in a horrible state at the moment and this has to be changed... You cant be scared to engage the one who you are suppose to counter.. .She's not a kamikaze, she's the most elegant bloody assassin in the game ,with her elegance removed she's just a pretty corpse...
So as I said, just stop it,, there's no just shunpo on dagger, there's no just practice, there's no "l2p", it's just that, everyone bursts fasters, hits fasters, runs faster, CCs faster... you're a no factor to the game. Just that 5th player who either will give the 200 missing damage, or feed... nothing more... Old Katarina never had that proble meven when behind or enemy counters her hard and has much magic resist... This is just a horror flick...
League of ADCs...
P.S U were going to add me on steam to have a conversation, or you got scared that I might bite?
Ralanr3 votesI haven't added you yet because I don't go on Steam often (I like once a month).
And again, if Riot feels she's under performing they'll buff her or give some Quality of life changes (like increased dagger speed). Comparing her to champions who are in classes that still need updates just seems pointless because we don't know how they'll change in their roster updates.
Maybe Lee will lose damage and gain more durability in a diver update? We don't know.
As for "you shouldn't be afraid to engage on your counter" I have to kinda disagree because I think you should always carefully approach a fight. If you didn't fear engaging someone as a squishy assassin, then where exactly is the risk?
Astôlfo3 votesNo, not really. An assassin should NEVER be afraid about engaging an isolated ADC, unless said assassin is either extremely low health or behind (at which point they shouldn't be engaging anyways), or the ADC is absurdly ahead while the assassin hasn't even hit their powerstride yet (like 4-8 something kills/0 ADC vs an assassin who hasn't even completed first item). In every other case, it should be a near guaranteed win for the assassin in the fight with something like a 95 to 5 percent chance, favoring the assassin. So why should an assassin be afraid of a 95% chance of killing the ADC?
Alas, the assassin rework gutted most of them except for Kha'zix who's still silly strong in plain damage at the moment due to how much it's increased effectively, but still has enough delays and countermeasures/counterplay measures to not make it flat-out overwhelmingly OP.
Ralanr1 votesNo, not really. An assassin should NEVER be afraid about engaging an isolated ADC, unless said assassin is either extremely low health or behind (at which point they shouldn't be engaging anyways), or the ADC is absurdly ahead while the assassin hasn't even hit their powerstride yet (like 4-8 something kills/0 ADC vs an assassin who hasn't even completed first item). In every other case, it should be a near guaranteed win for the assassin in the fight with something like a 95 to 5 percent chance, favoring the assassin. So why should an assassin be afraid of a 95% chance of killing the ADC?
Alas, the assassin rework gutted most of them except for Kha'zix who's still silly strong in plain damage at the moment due to how much it's increased effectively, but still has enough delays and countermeasures/counterplay measures to not make it flat-out overwhelmingly OP.
So then I have to ask, where is the high risk?
I'm not trying to bash assassins, I'm just trying to get a better view of their side (even though I'll admit I probably have some bias showing).
Astôlfo2 votesThe high risk doesn't apply to solo hunting, nor should it ever apply to a 1v1. The high risk applies to actually intelligent players, or against them, rather.
No intelligent player will be wandering off on their own if they're squishy or low-health, and especially not if they have no vision at all of the surrounding area to warn them of incoming threats. So the risk level is about dancing around teams or grouped up players, as any intelligent team would do so past early/laning phase, where teamfights are the norm. This is where assassins have to learn to outmaneuever and bait out/dodge/escape (through something like QSS or Zhonya's for example) the rest of the enemy team and their efforts to stop them and manage to successfully kill the ADC. Or alternatively, manage to successfully flank in complete secrecy so that they can pick off the ADC before the enemy team realizes they were there, by checking for/sweeping/removing wards so that they can be sure they will not be seen, or alternatively, make it so that they can get close enough they'll still kill their target even if they are seen, before they can be disabled and locked down to be shredded instantly.
Tentacle Advisor1 votesAn assassin should NEVER be afraid about engaging an isolated ADC...
Thematically speaking, Assassins should always consider the strengths/weaknesses of their intended targets, no matter who they are. Comparing the in-game assassins to assassins of reality, they are pretty much similar in theme now. Before, Assassins could just "oh, look, an adc." Boom, adc's dead. Now, they actually have to consider their options, their ability availability, their total possible damage output, their intended target's positioning (are they alone or grouped; do they have CC, do they not; is their utility down, is it not), etc.
Honestly, I don't really see a problem with the assassins right now. The way I look at it, they're better this way, and much easier to deal with. Besides, they literally got switched no more than a day or two ago. It's almost like players feel that they'll just be used to a champ rework the day of it's implementation. If you feel you aren't doing damage, it's probably because you are playing the champ the same way you were before the rework. You have to adjust.
Not calling you out for being bad or anything, I'm just sayin'. Give it time and you may find that you can output more damage than you currently believe.
Astôlfo2 votesI mean, it is thematically considered. But you're comparing a wolf to a lamb. Said lamb (squishy) is literally the intended target of said wolf (assassin). So it basically should be '"oh, look, an adc." Boom, they're dead.' That's not a problem.
Sure, they have to consider their options, but now all their options are fucking shit. They were far better pre-rework. Yay, they're now braindead easy to deal with. Woohoo? So much for learning how to play against them instead, by actually being intelligent.
Yes, in the case I can hit my full combo, it'll probably do even more damage. So what? The only players that'd eat said full combo are the ones that are blitheringly stupid.
Tentacle Advisor4 votesBefore I continue, I should point out that my viewpoint on this whole thing is that of the "lamb". I've almost never played assassins (except Ahri; and a couple of ARAM games) so I am almost always the Marksman [or the support] in these situations.
And I can honestly tell you that I still fear assassins. Especially as the support. [Ever played Soraka when the enemy has an Assassin like Zed or Katarina? It ain't fun, I'll tell ya' that.] However, now that their window of "slaughter the target" opportunity has been increased, I can at least do something before I inevitably die. Even if it's a simple last-minute (second) heal or silence zone. Or a last-minute (second) spell shield as Morgana. I at least have the privilege of attempting to hinder the assassin.
Automated Riven2 votesraka is amazing into bot kat and zed. silence field makes it imposible for zed to get off his damage on the adc and leaves him in the middle of the team for 1.5 seconds before he can warp back out thats not even mentioning that zeds entire combo is predicted by .75 seconds before he can even do damage. and an instant cast silence on kat reduces her ult to does nothing and she is unable to shumpo back out. If you arent saving the silence for zed and kat your doing your job wrong.