User blog comment:HeresyHorus/Syndra, a tale of a lost potential/@comment-15244341-20131030092305/@comment-15244341-20131101104011

No. You just ignored all of my arguments and went to attack the assassins thing. Ok, lets dance. First: mages are FARM dependant. They don't NEED to kill, which is whole my point. You can't farm for 20 minutes as LeBlanc, Akali, Fizz or any assassin. You need to start getting kills or you won't be dominant enough to one shot people which is your job. Syndra, Karthus, Swain, Lux, Morgana, Lissandra... Those don't mind getting kills, but can do just fine with farming and helping their jungler when they gank their lanes or other lanes. This is a thing which is so damn obvious it isn't funny seeing people forget it. You need farm, not being 10/0 at 40 minutes with 50 CS and wondering why everyone else is ahead. And mages do not fall off as hard as assassins. The only champions that will never fall off are the ones that deal super impossibly high DPS (Marksmen and maybe Cassiopea/Karthus) or the ones with amazing utility. However, mages still get utility. Assassins don't. There is a turning point. When you have a low cooldown, mid damage spammable AoE with long range and no cast animation your bloody champions does not dreaking fall off. Not to mention two CC spells in an AoE. Compare that to most assassins: chunk or die.

Only AD assassins or champions with skills/passives made to do that have OK autoattacks. This is something so utterly retarded as an argument I don't even know what to say. My autoattacks as a mage can't compare to Diana's Passive, Fizz's trident or 100AD Zed's autoattacks is a derpy argument to make. Of course, they NEED that shit to even farm. And the second you get autoattacked to death in an autoattack duel by Zed or Fizz they deserve the kill because you apparently forgot what spells are made for (winning as a mage). Also, there are two assassins that scale better than average: Kassadin and Zed and they do EXCLUSIVELY because of their mobility. Their autoattacks being nothing to take into account.

Maw is awful and a defensive item, since the damage it gives is shit for AD assassins compared to the options and price. GA gives no damage unless you are assassin Malphite. So yeah, no damage there again. Mercurial Scimitar is, again, an expensive item you buy to save your ass from getting killed, not to kill. Zhonya is so freaking broken Riot outright stated no equivalent will ever be made for ADs. See, it gives 120 freaking AP. 50 bloody armor. STASIS WHICH RENDERS ASSASSINS USELESS. The components are also something any mage will want. So yeah, give ADs Zhonya, you get QSS upgrades. Have fun with invincible ADs. also it sounds as if you don't like picking items to play against your lane. Well, then thats your problem. The second an assassin gets a defensive item and you do too, you are at an advantage, since you do have better harass than they do.

You can't say mages have high cooldowns because they usually don't have them in ALL their spells. The character you speak about in this blog is honestly one of the best counterarguments: 2.4 second cooldown on her main damage skill which puts her at no risk and has an AoE. LeBlanc is widely known as an unviable pick because her cooldowns make it impossible to kill two targets in a full scale teamfight unless it drags on for long or you are hypersuperfed. Most assassins need more than one rotation in a dangerous place to kill you and this is fine, because they are risking their hides to do so. Assassins kits make then get close (most are melee; Ahri and LeBlanc being exceptions which also have to get closer than normal to deal damage) to the enemy, while forcing them to buy damage. So they have no health/resistances. So they die when focused. Which you should do. Zed jumping your carry? Have some CC and get exploded. There, no assassin. Mages? Syndra, Orianna, Lux, Nidalee, Xerath, Vlad, Swain.... they stay at their optimal range, throw spells at the best target at that moment and try to stay alive. Them being weak against jumped on is not a complain to make, is something you have to deal with by virtue of build/game design which is fine.

Assassins are the meta because the way S3 made resistances and % pen. Mobility combined with being a counter of most not mobile mages makes them good picks in midlane. Being a Swain main, I have zero trouble with assassins simply because my champion does well against them, and a Talon mid lane is candy party for me. If you pla Xerath, Lux or Syndra, then they are COUNTERPICKING you. Assume it, you are at a disadvantage and that sucks, but that's how your champion works. And they are safe picks because no one plays their counters, no one swaps lanes, no one knows how to peel and people are stupid. If you complain about unmatched mobility with a safe laning fase (Zed) or just too much kill potentential while being hard to CC (Kassadin) then I'll say that I agree. But nope, damage is something ALL assassins do in grand numbers and their job description.

Also, assassins with hard escapes (go through walls, cover bug distances...): LeBlanc (has a good amount of the damage in her kit and ult doubling is not recommended most of the time), Zed (might need W to kill now, before had to calculate if he needed the triple shuri to kill tankier champs), Kassadin, Ahri (sort of assassin, sort of mage, now an assassin and most of the times needs at least two jumps to kill), Fizz (not every wall), Kha (if he kills someone), Katarina (if she kills someone and you have a ward/minion). Note this means that two rely on being successful at a kill, three have to decide between damage and escaping (LeBlanc, Zed and Ahri) and two do what they want (Kassadin, Fizz). The rest of the assassins have a do or die approach (Akali, Diana), bad escapes (Talon, Akali, Riven) or mediocre ones (Evelynn, Elise I guess could be).

Their kits are still better at snowballing (escape or not) because, again, they need to be ahead, not at par with the enemy team. You need to de able to burst in your combo or you. are. useless. Not so hard to figure. Also, less effective CC power in mages is stupid. Mages have a whole subgroup of utility mages dedicated to having support skills on almost every slot such as Lissandra, Zyra, Morgana... And let me reiterate it again. No assassin has an AoE slow with better than average damage plus a long range AoE stun which ALSO deals damage.

Syndra's ultimate is hard to execute and that is no counterargument about damage. The only one that deals more damage is Veigar's (against AP and with a farmed Q) or maybe Fiddle's (which requires a load of skill and good positioning to use at all). Neither of those have the long range AoE damage Syndra does.

I don't play anything but tanky champions and Syndra and LeBlanc from time to time, so you have no clue as what to I like or dislike. I dislike not being able to play aggresive all the time and enjoy much more being in the middle of a teamfight and useful during it. I play mainly Shen, Sejuani and Swain. Bot lane I play Leona. So no, I'm not an assassin lover. I do dislike people complaining about assassins damage without knowing what is actually to play an assassin against a competent team.

And on a final note: the difference is that junglers have the option of lane ganking or counterganking, normal mid laners of farming and pushing and assassins do lose the game if they just farmfarmfarm. Again, as Kahvin said above hate assassins if you want, but don't throw false statements around. One last time: Mages can snowball and want to snowball. Assassins NEED to snowball.