Zed is the best assassin riot has ever designed by far

Zed has a lot of power invested into his kit, in the form of mobility, damage and safety in damage, much like many assassins. But compared to every other assassin in the game, Zed has counterplay to every part of his kit. He's hard countered by itemization, you can still keep his burst to a minimal by playing around his death mark (which admittedly isn't easy to do but it can be done) and he falls off late game and turns more into a split push role.

Meanwhile, basically every other assassin in the game is straight cancer. Reset assassins like Kha, Kat and even Yi (who plays much more like an assassin now, let's be honest), aren't fun to play against. Kha in particular is the most frustrating of the above because of his potential to heal during an all-in, stealth, mobility, extremely high single target damage and then the resets. At least Kat and Yi have to jump in the middle of a team to do their largest portion of damage whereas Kha just waits for any target to get low to pick them off and start flying around. Naturally all 3 are fantastic at cleaning up.

I shouldn't even have to explain leblanc or fizz.

Diana becomes as durable as a bruiser while dishing out assassin level damage. She does have some counterplay but most of that goes away when teamfights happen when it's literally impossible to miss any of her spells. She's a slightly better designed Akali but her design is still unfun as shit to play against but at least there's some form of counterplay there. Do I even need to explain Akali?

Rengar...lol. The only champion in history of league who got reworked into the same exact champion. He legit might be the most unfun assassin to play against and the most horribly designed of all of them. They just need to rework him into a bruiser. That's what they intended to do. It didn't work.

Talon is a lot healthier since his silence was removed, he's still a pain in the ass to play against and his gameplay is extremely binary but next to leblanc, he literally does nothing if he gets behind whereas most assassins have very good rebound potential (particularly reset assassins).

If I need to explain Kassadin, potentially the most nerfed champion in history, the only champion who has spent two seasons being completely perma banned, then you must be new. He is still good, despite his winrate because riot has turned him into an extremely powerful late game clean up assassin but his lane phase is very drawn out since his burst isn't nearly as bad as it used to be. But his design is still utter shit despite him probably being the most balanced he's ever been at the moment and when he gets items, there's still very little you can do to outplay him.

Of all these champions, zed has the most counterplay and his role diminishes as the game goes on while most of these champions, probably excluding Talon and Leblanc, become powerhouses late game in fights, sieges, skirmishes and the whole 9 yards. While he might be frustrating to play against and have snowball potential like any assassin, there's always a moment to outplay zed where his burst isn't instant, itemization hard counters him and he offers very little utility. And I'd argue of all the assassins, his clean up potential is the worst.

Downvote me to hell and back, it's true. I'd rather face zed at his strongest than literally any of the champions mentioned above at their strongest