Boards›Gameplay

Cassiopeia Twin Fang expectations

RiotRiotRepertoir·1/25/2016, 4:10:58 AM·223 votes·29,670 views

Hi everyone,

As Cassiopeia is one of the mages we're looking at for the mid season mages update and I'm the designer heading up her changes, I'm looking to get opinions/feedback from players on what some of their specific expectations for her are.

One thing I'm having a difficult time assessing is what players' desires are as far as Twin Fang goes, and I do have some concern that opinion will be far from unanimous. I know a lot of players want Cass to be more "poison mage" than she currently is, and I think I have a good grasp on how that may be able to manifest, but I don't really know what that means as far as what they want from Twin Fang. It may just be that you want Twin Fang to remain mostly as it is now, with kit changes elsewhere. It may be that you want there to be more times where casting Twin Fang isn't the best thing to be doing.

Any opinions on the matter would be greatly appreciated. For what it's worth, I'm probably not going to be able to invest time in hundreds of responses to this thread, but I will check in on it periodically to get your ideas.

Thanks, Repertoir

Edit: Thanks for all the input here. I'm not sure exactly what this means is going to come of Cass or Twin Fang, but I am going to try a some iterations based on what's going on here. I don't think this single thread can really provide a singular correct direction to take things, but it's at least given me some perspective on how people feel about the ability. For what it's worth, I'm probably going to test out some stuff where E has cool interactions on poisoned targets that aren't simply a reset (and probably lower the cooldown baseline), and I'd also like to test out some different iterations that seek to put some more gameplay behind when it's actually a good time to go in and E spam (unlike on Live, where the answer is basically always), and make those times really rewarding. Thanks again!

828 Comments

seireikhaan1/25/2016, 4:35:29 AM196 votes

I don't particularly care for it as a "machine-gun" type spell, because I had always felt machine-gun made more sense as Ryze's niche. I think it would be more interesting to have twin-fang as a catalyst for enabling her poisons on targets. Perhaps separating q and w(and maybe R?) into actually different poisons, and having Twin Fang enable a different additional effect based on poisons that are currently applied to the target. Basic example - if applying twin fang to a target poisoned with noxious blast, the target suffers an additional % hp DOT for the remainder of the poison, while applying twin fang to a target poisoned with miasma applies a stronger slow for the duration of the miasma poisoning.

FacerollKatarina1/25/2016, 4:18:08 AM121 votes

I'm not a cass player so honestly ignore my opinion if you want but from someone who plays against her, it's really not fun to get hit with one low damage ability and then get melted by twin fang because you got hit with one poison. I think she needs less power in her twin fang and more power in her other abilities if that makes sense. Ignore me if I'm wrong I might have no idea what im talking about lol

Auryiel1/25/2016, 4:19:42 AM58 votes

I'm hoping her E becomes more of a spell you use opportunistically. What I mean by that is that currently, with the sustain it provides and the fact that it's Cass' only source of meaningful damage, all you want to do is use your E. Every time you interact with enemy champions, it's mostly about your E. Try and hit a poison so you can start E spamming or run away because it's not safe to use your E spam.

The way I see it, her E should be used either when Cassiopeia gets jumped on as a means to fend off her attackers (but if her poisons are stronger obviously that can't be as good as it is right now) or as a means to finish off her targets once she's softened them up with her poisons. It should be a risky spell that you use only in certain situations, not the core of her kit. I'm hoping you can hit that sweet spot where using her E spam is risky, but rewarding enough that you'll want to do it from time to time without making you want to only do that. Not sure how you'd do that (damage based on missing health?) but I'm no designer ^_^

Or... just change it completely!

Hellioning1/25/2016, 4:37:07 AM54 votes

Honestly, I wouldn't mind if Twin Fang was removed in favor of another poison.

Assuming that it stays, though, I want Twin Fang to accentuate your poisons, rather then the other way around. Instead of having it refresh on a poisoned unit, just give it a naturally low base cooldown (like, 2 seconds, reduce damage appropriately) and have it slightly extend any poison on the target. Or maybe have it do something similar to what it does now, increase the damage of poisons, but have it extend to the other effects as well, like making someone stunned by her ult be stunned for longer and increasing Miasma's slow.

Strawberrycocoa1/25/2016, 4:23:13 AM39 votes

Not Twin Fang related but just sharing my thoughts, but I think Cass needs a new passive that isn't just something you sit on until you poison enough people. I'd still like to see something that rewards her for poisoning enemies, but the current reward for that is slow to arrive and doesn't feel very rewarding.

My suggestion would be something that coincides with the idea of envenoming a target to debilitate and weaken them into death. Perhaps an MR shred stacking with the length of time they remain poisoned, until they eventually reach negative MR unless they disengage or kill Cass (or Cass runs out of mana XD)

Or perhaps a return to her old mana discount passive would help since she spams a lot, although a better idea than just copy-pasting the old one in might be something like an X mana cost discount when damaging a poisoned foe.

Mansana1/25/2016, 4:44:50 AM38 votes

How often does a snake bite when it tries to eat its meal? Once maybe twice? Then it swallows. How lethal are those bites? How much pain/ what is the aftermath? Should the bite inflict poison?

General Veers1/25/2016, 1:05:31 PM30 votes

In general, I would like to see Cass focus more on utility than damage. I think you've got a great opportunity to turn her into League's debuff extraordinaire. You should consider playing up the 'gorgon' aspect of her in addition to the 'poison' aspect - in my mind Cass is Medusa more than as a poisonous snake.

The Necromancer and Mesmer classes from Guild Wars 1 have a large number of examples of cool debuffs.

EDIT - brought the ideas to the top. These debuffs should perhaps be paired, with one effect thats debilitating for mages and another for autoattackers on the same spell. Maybe even give buffs for ally casts.

Short Sightedness - reduces range of autoattacks and maybe spells

Double vision - Leblanc style clones appear. These clones would be hallucinations that vanish when attacked, and not player controllable.

Confusion - all the enemies look the same (you just see 5 identical shadows)

Migraine - Slows spell casting and auto attacking. If hit by twin fang during animation, that action is cancelled.

Pacifism - Debuff that deals flat damage every time the enemy AAs or casts.

Blurred vision - Crits deal dampened damage, rather than amped damage.

Heavy feet - can't dash for duration, or dashes move at a greatly reduced speed.

Ringing Ears - Cannot cast summoner spells

Petrify - Tag them a few times, they get stunned

Dreadful Gaze - enemy cannot face cassiopia

Fatigued - Adds +X% cooldown to spells cast while debuffed

Cursed - lowers crit chance

Hysteria! - While debuffed, Charm allies within X units on spell cast or AA.

Pariah - Take DoT while near allies.

Tainted Remedy - Healing damages you instead.

Antidote - on ally cast, cleanse (and go on longer cooldown).

Apply Poison - On Ally cast, next X AAs from ally apply dot and a debuff

Stone Armour - On ally cast, give +Armour and immunity to knockup and displacement CC

X8ViEhkPS01/25/2016, 4:56:07 AM22 votes

Honestly I'd rather have ability completely reworked to work with her poisons in a much more meaningful way. This is probably a terrible idea but something maybe like

Targeted ability deals damage. If unit is poisoned increase duration of the poison/slows target. If target is in the miasma circle lowers vision. Something debilitating.

There should almost definitely be some interaction with E while inside of Miasma.

OverpoweredSoap1/25/2016, 4:24:00 AM21 votes

I think what the general idea is, is that her other spells should not have to suffer (damage wise) so that her E can do damage.

When I played Cass before her rework (and I actually do kind of like her after her rework, but not as much as before) she had damage all across the board.

People paid for standing in her W.

And her Q did decent enough damage.

Crowe Stalker1/25/2016, 5:14:40 AM17 votes

I don't play Cassiopeia, nor own her, but I have played her a few times and from every person I've ever asked about it, no one likes Twin Fang. Cassiopeia shouldn't Machine Gun if she hits a poison spell. Maybe Twin Fang could have a three second cooldown for some kind of poison amplification (refreshing duration or increasing damage) the spell however, should have a reasonably long cooldown. If Cassiopeia pushes you out of lane, it should be because she hit a lot of her poisons, not because you got hit by poison once and suddenly you need to hide in a trench or get gunned down.

RiotRiot King Cobra1/25/2016, 3:53:11 PM16 votes

I'm not big on thematics, but Twin Fang spam (along with Noxious Blast spam) is iconic to Cassio to me. It's not so much where the damage comes from (whether it's Twin Fang amping NB damage or vice versa for example), but the fact that when those abilities are spammed together she's one of the few mages in the game that can actually kite out and duel other champs that most mages struggle handling in an all-in (such as Jax and Riven).

I think removing the CD reset on Twin Fang would be the wrong way to change Cassio.

Rakvir1/25/2016, 7:00:48 AM14 votes

Speaking STRICTLY in the sense of Twin Fang and nothing else (as this is what the thread was made for), I would imagine Twin Fang to be a passive ability (though able to be toggled for whatever reasons, much like Cho'Gath's E), in where her auto-attacks would be amplified to mimic current Twing Fangs and have an internal cooldown, giving her more reason to auto-attack and build cooldown reduction.

As it stands, her starting passive amps up to 25% and it really feels bad to not have 5% CDR on a rune page for her so she can efficiently itemize to take advantage of it, especially since Boots of Lucidity got altered to only give 10% and not 15%. Morello's is the only, if you will, "good" CDR item (besides Athene's) to build on her and she wastes 5% CDR anyway if she takes it.

By giving Cass reason to auto-attack as a decent part of her kit, she is free to build things like Nashor's Tooth and remove the need to spam the E key and not feel bad if she's not doing enough damage to take advantage of the Grievous Wounds on Morello's nor feel bad she can't compete with the burst that Athene's just simply doesn't give (though undoubtedly, sustained dps is what Cass is all about), despite the MR/mana regen it has.

While landing Qs and Ws are rewarded, we shouldn't leave her kit to be unplayably punished if she can't seem to land them to build poison stacks. By allowing items like Nashor's to be seriously considered, she is at least able to contribute with damage she can actually hit should the enemy team be able to predict her skill shots. In the case of Nashor's, while yes 5% CDR is still going to, ahem, "waste", at least it offers a workaround to other glaring areas.

Envy Sin1/25/2016, 4:53:39 AM12 votes

There are sooooo many suggestions for cass already. Just look up the QQ threads lol.

I personally want her to be a heavy poison mage. Not a hyper carry E caster.

The Nuban1/25/2016, 10:11:17 PM9 votes

I love the mechanic of kiting with twinfangs a lot, and that is one of the main reasons why I main Cass, so if anything I would like to see something like that stay in her kit, even if it becomes just an "option". Honestly I'm pretty fond of her kit as is, and I like the idea of living and dying by hitting poison, but I don't think she necessarily has to be a "poison mage" because really I see her as a snake, shes toxic, her personality is toxic, and generally shes more about getting in on people and just tearing them down as fast as possible than about slowly wearing them down. Again, this is just how I view her as a champion, I may be completely wrong. Mainly I would just like to see her not change too much from the high-damage, high-skillcap kiting type mage she is right now.

Thryale1/25/2016, 8:28:05 AM8 votes

Hey Rep! Thanks for hearing us out on this, we really appreciate it!

For me personally, I've always seen Cass's E as her "trusty side-arm." It was her key tool for finishing off her weak prey before they could run away, but more importantly, it was her core defensive mechanism.

When I played old cass, unless I was ridiculously fed, I found myself using her E more often as my last line of defense before the enemy killed me rather than using it to mow down my opponents left and right. A common situation I'd find myself in would be the enemy dives me, I drop my W and stun them with my ult then Q+EEEEE till they either died, I died, or I escaped some how.

Once team fights break out, I'd use my E a lot less unless I was using it to kill an enemy that dove deep to kill an ally of mine.

For suggestions worth trying, I'd like to see you experiment with %missing hp on her E to help emphasize using it as a finisher. I don't think it needs to be turned into a skill shot as the simplicity of a point and click on cass still has merits. I just think the current iteration does too much damage and forces cass to play too aggro at ranges she's not comfortable playing at.

To me, cass felt kinda like ahri. You skirt around the edges of a fight whittling down your foes until the time was right to strike the killing blow. So maybe try to play up some of those aspects. Focus on the 'back-and-forth' nature of cass and her prey while still giving cass tools to deal with divers while still rewarding the enemy for getting in her face.

Melledoneus1/25/2016, 4:27:24 AM8 votes

Finally. RiotRepertoir, why couldn't you be the guy who worked on the Shen rework... I would have loved to talk grumble grumble...

Flawless Fetus1/25/2016, 3:52:36 PM7 votes

I think if you guys simply reverted her last rework most people would be satisfied.

Oerba No Naja1/25/2016, 9:25:50 PM7 votes

Her twin fangs is a huge part of her identity ( before and after her first rework ) . You may think its a good option to rework it because a rly litlle part of the boards want a full poison champ . Pls dont , there is a huge part of silent players who enjoy her twin fangs and the mechanics it gives ( spam with poison / hit and run it gives a good skill cap to the champ ) . And the old cassio who everyone enjoyed had twin fangs as a main dps spell tho . Also , thats why cassio has a unique gameplay ( she is not like the other mages " throw spells and see how it goes , wait cd , do it again " ) .

Pls riot do not rework her twin fangs into a poison . PLS i have tons of games on cassio and i can tell you that her twin fanngs should stay the same . just balance it around her new kit .

Nagma is back1/25/2016, 9:46:54 PM7 votes

her twin fangs spam and unique ineterraction with poison is unique and is A BIG PART of Cassiopeia . But i would like to be less dependant on this tool , but i dont want it to get reworked either . it gives good skill cap to the champ ( hit and run like a adc bro ) but the frequency is too op and cant spam it to her maximum potential when kitting , only a good script could do it . a full poison kit just cant work since Dots are easy to deny think about of the possible qss , shields , heals ; zhonyas , mickael . It just cant work and make cassio not fun to play . Her twin fangs is doing what her poison fails , secure kill : sure all ins . Its a great reliant tool .

  • her poison and her twin fangs is such a charismatic duo , thats why you guys should not remove it .

**Do not rework her twin fangs , balance it in return of a empowered poison and a new passive . **

Sakuri Ono1/25/2016, 4:47:48 AM4 votes

Riot, your design team should spend some time playing one of your competitor's games, Smite.

There is a unit over there named Serqet.

Her entire kit uses poisons and everything is poison synergized.

What I want for Cass is for her E (and maybe her R) to be removed entirely in favor for a fully linked poison-kit ala Serqet.