Talk:Elise/@comment-5224716-20150124205925/@comment-15667791-20150507061258

Being an assassin is more than just deleting people. Being an assassin is deleting people efficiently. The more unique cogs that a champion has to work around, the more problems they have assassinating. By your definition, Krozel, Amumu could assassinate, as he has about as much CC and relevant chasing power as Elise has (plus his CC doubles as a gap-closer, meaning if you hit one, you hit the other, too! no half-n-halfs that let the enemy get away).

A true assassin can work around nasty situations and still net his kill. Elise, on the other hand, better not be facing a second enemy, and even if she isn't, she better not be CC'd during the bulk of her damage, or she's as good as peeled. I haven't seen a jungler that has zero hope of netting a kill in lane solo in a long time. However, Elise is about as low as it gets. She practically works herself out of contention with a focus on %HP related burst, which makes her more effective against tanks, but not so much that she can actually kill them. As such, she was balanced to then be weaker against squishies. In other words, her viability as a tank-shredder comes at the cost of being weaker against squishies. Simple, obvious fact that has doomed her chances at being an assassin for all these seasons. She can kill, like many champions, but the effort required is simply too high to be a legit assassin.