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Kassadin, The Void Walker (Rework Idea)

The Highest Noon·12/27/2018, 9:39:28 PM·1 votes·1,344 views

Because I think I'm not the only one who expected it to occur some time around Kai'Sa's release, and it's nowhere in sight. So, while we're waiting...let's talk about Kassadin.

From what I recall about his creation, Kassadin is intended to be a counter-mage. He has the mobility to avoid most mage attacks with his R and passive even though his R-range has been drastically reduced, a shield to block magic damage on his Q, he used to have a Silence on his Q but I think it's now a Channel Interrupt..? I suppose that's all. Back then it all came together well, to the point of him being banned from most games, but nowadays it's just...pretty obsolete.

As for his design, let's face it: He looks like doodoo. His design has no place in the game. He's wearing a skirt, has no legs, and isn't even wearing a shirt even though he has shoulder pauldrons. That shit is ugly, Riot. Leave the shirtlessness to his human skin.

Now, let's talk how we can update him.

His lore's pretty fine. He was a traveller with a group and he had his wife and Kai'Sa with him. Void nonsense occurred, Kai'Sa was lost, wife's missing and probably dead (OR A NEW CHAMP!?) but I think some things should change. Old lore says he goes around collecting artifacts to fight the Void, but I think it should lean towards Kai'Sa's backstory. Whereas she bonded with a voidspawn and uses it as a weapon, I think that the Void should affect Kassadin as well. The exposure should've left it's mark on him--Void marks cover his body, only seen as he uses his abilities--and he now has a third eye that taps into the Void. As well, he's strange voices that keep beckoning him to open his eye to achieve true sight--the voices of The Watchers who wish for him to somehow free them from their frozen prison. Too bad he's from the desert, tho. Ain't nobody got time for yo frozen shenanigans, Watchers. The change at some points caused items to react as he neared them. Specifically, the Nether Blade should be the focus but he doesn't want to rely on Void power. The items were attracted to him, or him to them, which fully unlocked crazy Void power that he intended to keep at bay yet also use to get answers regarding that Void event and discover what happened to his family. The usual nonsense.

Visually:

  • Put some clothes on him. When I consider his design, I think Varus. Varus doesn't have a shirt but he actually has "pants" and "gloves". The shirtlessness actually suits his design. If you're gonna make Kassadin shirtless, make him look at least decent. If he remains a counter-mage assassin, he shouldn't be in a skirt. Give the dude pants. Matter of fact, I think that his design should be tossed entirely. It doesn't really look well nor does it fit the current environment. He fights against the Void and is searching for his daughter. He needs a design to suit that.
  • As a character, he's a man who uses the power of the Void against voidspawn. Look at Kai'Sa, who uses voidspawn against themselves. Kassadin's design should be similar, notably different in that he doesn't have voidspawn but Void magic within himself. He should look like someone who uses not just magic but tools of his own. Look at Swain. His redesign suits him perfectly.
  • Give the Nether Blade some effort and value in his model. We should SEE it, even though he doesn't rely on it. It's an important aspect of his character.

In terms of gameplay:

  • He was supposed to be a counter-mage assassin, but I think it'd be better to make him an magic damage fighter. Think Diana, who at one point was classified as a fighter even though she's been a damn assassin forever. His kit felt like more of what you'd expect from someone who'd be in the fight for a while, not someone meant to go in, burst a single-target, then go out. No matter what, make sure his class suits his kit and vice-versa.
  • Auto Attacks should be strikes from magic-imbued fists! When's the last time that we had a humanoid champion use fisticuffs?
  • Passive: Void-touch-- Kassadin's new, Void-empowered self. The magic damage reduction suits him being a counter-magic champion, but I feel like it could be more. Not just ignoring unit collision, neither. Instead, how about...keep the no collision, remove the magic damage reduction and the magic damage shield from his Q. Instead, as he's in combat he builds magic damage reduction until it reaches a point where it overflows and becomes a shield that activates at the first time he takes magic damage. It has a cooldown that's reduced as he takes more magic damage. That makes sense if he becomes a fighter. As an assassin, you can just remove the stipulation that he's in combat, and just have the shield build while he's not in combat with an enemy champion/not taking magic damage, to a certain point.
  • Q: Null Tear-- Generically tossing a projectile to a point-and-click target just feels dull. How about...it takes aspects form his E and becomes a projected energy wave from the slash of his Nether Blade.
  • W: Nether Blade of Ho'Rok-- (I think that if it's a Void weapon, it should also have the voidspawn naming convention. It's the same name, just with an apostrophe in the middle lol)-- A weapon created by The Watchers to fight them which Kassadin uses sparingly. Standard empowered attack that gives range to his auto-attacks with the use of the Nether Blade. Only lasts so long until the effect ends. Every number of attacks is especially strong and "drains" power from the enemy to return mana OR the first empowered attack returns mana. That idea's pretty great and should remain.
  • E: Riftstep-- It's what you think--his old ult, except this doesn't do damage. The old Rift Walk is a cool concept for him, but feels like it shouldn't be an ultimate. Instead, remove the damage and make it a standard ability. Now, I know what you're thinking. "ZOMG NOT MORE MOBILE CHAMPIONS" but it's Kassadin. He's the ORIGINAL mobility abuser. He deserves this. Anyway, the old Rift Walk animation is trash. Instead, give it the speed that Kai'Sa's ult travels even if it lacks the distance. It's cooler that way. As well, give it a re-cast limit. Two to four-five times (the number of charges can increase as he levels the ability/levels up), because again he doesn't want to rely on Void powers. If he uses all the charges, he has drastically reduced movement speed and/or attack speed and/or increased ability cooldowns while it's on CD. If you haven't noticed, I believe his abilities and usage of them should be heavily tied to his lore and character.
  • R: The Void Unleashed-- Kassadin releases his power, fully opening his Void Eye, and becomes a physical aspect of The Watchers, which gives him increased movement speed and empowering his abilities.They all have lowered cooldown; Q has increased range, W gives increased attack speed and lasts throughout the duration of the Ultimate, and E deals damage at the target location or along it's travel path with it's final cast causing a massive AoE blast. Just something to provide cool interactions with his abilities.

TBH I LOVE this idea, but I'm sure there are probably balance issues among others. I just want Kassadin to become something both useful and amazing without being broken and forever complained about. Tell me what you think, what you'd change, what you'd like to add, etc. I'm curious and hopeful. I may have missed some things because I was jumping around this long talk, so excuse me if so.

Update: If he doesn't have a bunch of Dad jokes that Kai'Sa receives reaction lines to, as well as Kai'Sa having jokes for him of her own that he gives wholesome reponses to, just throw away the whole Champion.

7 Comments

ChaosReyn12/27/2018, 10:18:38 PM2 votes

You have a fair amount of good points, but I do have a couple of counter-arguments to things.

  • The point and click Q is something I think should still be left alone in terms of actual gameplay (though the design could be re-done) because it should be a reliable way of giving yourself a small magic shield to block some trade,and giving a big "F%%% YOU!" to people like Fid or Kat who rely on channeled effects. This is a pretty central piece of his tech as an anti-mage, which brings me to my next point.
  • He should remain an anti-mage. LoL honestly doesn't have enough of them. Ever since they changed Galio, he's become less an anti-mage and more of a generalized utility tank. Morgana is still very much an anti-mage, but she's been demoted to support in most games due to her lack of reliable damage if she misses her snare - a feat Kassadin has fewer problems with specifically BECAUSE of having such simplistic abilities. Kassadin is a very rare breed of champion with a very specific job to fill in being an anti-mage assassin, but can get royally screwed by someone who can simply right click him and keep on him long enough. Sort of in the same way Pantheon is like an anti-adc assassin, but gets royally screwed by someone that smashes their face into a keyboard instead of right clicking.

This leads into a point of my own: in order to "fix" Kassadin, I believe Riot should focus more on his ability to stop ability damage not just magic damage. Malzahar's bubble can stop any ability, not just a magical one. Pantheon, again, can stop one attack command, even if its empowered, but can't block actual abilities unless they empower a basic attack command or trigger on-hit effects. Kassadin needs something similar to those in his kit somewhere, but true to him being an anti-mage instead of an anti-whatever-tf-you-casted he needs to have a kit that's specifically stronger against mages...which he mostly has in his mobility, but only if you know how to counterplay a burst mage combo. Part of his issue is in the designs of some of these burst mages, and I'm going to specifically call out Syndra as an example here. Even if Kassadin dodges Syndra's Q every single time, all she has to do is spawn enough orbs to press R and chunk the hell out of him, which also moves her orbs in place for E/W. Basically, the current reason Kassadin is weak isn't necessarily because he's outdated and useless, but because some people (glares at champs like Syndra and Kai'Sa) don't really give you any openings they can't just immediately get themselves out of.

Kai'Sa gets picked by a LOT of people, especially around my elo, because no matter how hard you get destroyed early game with her, there's a point in the game where you build enough stats that if you screw up, you have an option to cover it. If you get caught, you press E and nobody can target or catch you. You get zoned out and caught alone in a teamfight, but your friends cc'd the adc halfway across the lane? Press R for freelo. Champions like Syndra are the same for Kassadin, again especially in low elo: you miss every Q? Just press R, pull all your orbs around him in a fan, Q yourself so if he jumps on you, he still gets hit, and press E/W. Congratulations: you screwed up royally, missed like 4 consecutive Qs, and got jumped on, but your braindead ultimate/aftercombo means it didn't matter and you killed the arguably better player for no reason at all.

Which brings me to my idea for how to fix Kassadin's biggest issue: simply make anything homing in on him lose its tracking when he jumps. Problem solved. Screw Syndra, this is KASSADIN, AN ANTI-MAGE SUPPOSED TO COUNTER HER. Definitely increase the cooldown if you implement this - you don't want him dodging every other autoattack from an adc - but give him the ability to not be countered by point and click abilities because that's just detrimental to his kit, his role, his identity, and his playability.

YCondition1/13/2019, 10:01:50 AM2 votes

I feel like riot is trying to move away from anti champions. Kassadin does fill a unique roll but what happens if you are the syndra and ult a low kassadin, he dodges on a four second cool down... It would feel very anti-fun. Also hopefully the meta won't be so consistently AP mages midlane, yes kassadin sould be weaker against non mages but if you make him too anti mage no one would be able to blind pick him which would make him a unbalanced champion again, either op or under powered. Imstead could he have a ability that gives damage reduction for a short period , not countering directly mages but definitely make it.more difficult to straight burst.

The Highest Noon1/10/2019, 7:19:35 AM1 votes

Whenever a Kassadin rework drops, we need dad jokes.