Hello there guys, my name is Ilke994 and obviously I am a LoL player like many of you. I started playing LoL back in October of 2010 (no Kitty Cat Katarina for me :( ) and I fell in love with game instantly. I kept playing and on magical day of 14'th of December, EU servers got serpentine beauty, Cassiopeia. I naturally in life love snakes and now I got one in my favorite game, I got her along both skins and I used her as my main ever since.

Many people found Cassiopeia underpowered and sucking back in the day, and we saw slight buffs, but not major one and there is a reason - she never sucked in the first place. Cassiopeia relies on quick hands and precision to being her potential on the Summoner's Rift and if you believe you have what's needed, with just a few weeks of practice you will discover the beauty of extremely powerful AP carry, with burst, AoE DPS, AoE slow and AoE stun - how awesome is that!

Now that sometime has passed since November 2011 when I wrote that, we can see Cassiopeia had major spotlights and is very much used nowadays, our goal had finally come to an accomplishment, we even got 2 additional skins! She is still the monster she always was, and probably one of the most balanced champions in the game, an amazing AP hypercarry.

Just like every (almost every >.>) champion, Cassiopeia has her good sides and bad sides, the main problem of Cassiopeia is that 3/4 skills are skill shots and 1/4 depends on well landed skill shot. So let us take a look.

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Marvelous Pros: +Amazing mid laner, great harassment damage, amazing farm, high range and movement speed. +Has great number of disables for a single team member. +Very hard to gank, even due to being squishy, slow with Miasma and hit with Noxious Blast to gain speed, use Petrifying Gaze and Flash if needed.

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Poisonous Cons -Very squishy, this is a problem you can quite easily get over with some positioning, but until you do, you will find Petrifying Gaze quite hard to land. -A lot of skill shots, meaning she needs practice, but this is not so much of a con for me, it's where the fun is hidden. -Un-reliable disables, needs skill.

Q u i n t s

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Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed: These will put your speed up through the roof, I recommend these for this kind of build, you'll notice how much easier it is to beat Orianna and Syndra in these. Greater Quintessence of Ability Power: Used to be my preference in season 2, but with new changes, I think they are good for classic Cassiopeia build, not for mine tho.

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Q u i n t s

M a r k s

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Greater Mark of Magic Penetration: These are your one and only option and I am not giving any other one, simply because you NEED these to deal DMG with any AP carry and most of you should have this and if you don't and are getting them because of this guide, trust me I did you an amazing favor there. The DMG boost they give early is great and I wouldn't trade them for anything else on Cass.

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M a r k s

S e a l s

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Greater Seal of Scaling Mana Regeneration: The best seals you can get and ones I see extremely important, although there are alternatives, these give you enough mana regen to hold through the game and with Athene's Unholy Grail, you can go without blue buff even.[/color] Greater Seal of Mana Regeneration: A very good alternative to Greater Seal of Scaling Mana Regeneration. They will even better hold you through early game while fading towards mid game and becoming quite un-seeable in late game, still a recommended alternative. Greater Seal of Armor: If you don't have mana runes, you may go between AP, HP and armor, it is purely preference that depends on your play style.

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S e a l s

G l y p h s

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Greater Glyph of Magic Resist: These are the best glyphs, I pair them with 2 for Scaling Magic Resistance for the sake of scaling up well, but these should usually be the choice for protection. Greater Glyph of Scaling Ability Power: If you don't have Magic Resistance, you may wanna go with these for some early game AP, it will make your early game stronger, especially level 6+.

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G l y p h s

• New Cassiopeia: Ghost + Teleport
• Intermediate Cassiopeia: Exhaust (or Ignite) + Flash
• Skilled Cassiopeia: Ignite) + Flash
  

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Flash: Since the freaking beginning of time (Which for LoL would be 2009 :x) had been the most OP summoner spell ever. I do realize it was nerfed, also was hated upon for it's OPness, but really, this "nerf" did next to nothing to it and it is still extremely viable and OP. Cassiopeia uses to escape over walls, or to position herself for better attack. Please do note that doing + most of the times won't work, because it is predictable, you must either do it from bush or have a really, uhm, low intelligence (******ed -.-) enemy.

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Ignite: My 2nd favorite next to , it has a very viable role, most of the time this is the spell that will give me that one early kill or boost my DMG with strategies I use below and I can't live without it, it is such a great addition to your DoT spells. Although to make this useful you must be able to land these abilities, I wouldn't ever switch it for the other abilities because this one ALWAYS gives me first blood, I'll explain how in strategies.

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Exhaust: This is quite viable spell for Cassiopeia, although it's main purpose for me is to reduce enemy damage on me and slow them just enough to land my skill shots on them. I used it back when I wasn't as secure in my skill shots as I am now, so if you are insecure in your landing, use this instead of until you are sure you can handle without it. Also very useful vs melee champions on mid, and I prefer it to counter bursts rather than .

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Teleport: I am not a big fan of this summoner spell on Cassiopeia, although it is viable. It can be very good if you have no other option but going solo top or for new summoners who can't use flash effectively, but I doubt there are many of you with this problem. It depends on your play style if you prefer farming and pushing over killing, then do take this.

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Deadly Cadence(Passive): I am not sure if there could be made a better and more fitting passive for . It helps so much with mana management from early to late game, along with mana runes and Athene's Unholy Grail, you practically can't lose mana if you use your mana correctly. When low on mana and have to attack or cast to defend yourself it can be a life saver, really amazing.

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Noxious Blast (Q): The core of are her poisons, and this is primary one, the most damaging potion she has, the most spammable one and it even gives her bonus movement speed, it is not hard to land and with a bit of practice you'll get a hang of it, it is just like Karthus's Lay Waste, press Q and after a short delay (about 0.5 seconds) a poison will blow up and affect targets in small AoE.

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• Use it to spam in lane constantly, do note if you stack up to 5 Deadly Cadence stacks with this and keep spamming it just when Deadly Cadence is about to run out, along MP5 runes you will lose no mana. but be careful and don't push your lane too hard.
• You can hardly make strategy above work if enemy has Boots, if that case just farm and when enemy comes in for the last hit, punish him with a Noxious Blast, it always works for me.
• Next to being offensive, it is much of a defensive tool too. If you are escaping use this on enemies behind, it will give you MS and damage them and just in case they are unskilled (stupid :x) enough you can eventually turn and finish them off.
• When you hit an enemy champion with it, you will see buff icon on you, this can be used to very well check bushes.

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Miasma (W): Let's go over the mechanics of this skill first, so basically you throw down the cloud of poison and it instantly slows and starts spreading to apply the same effect, it also gives vision. This is mainly your slowing and farming skill, while spreading circle is quite useful in team fights. Also, use this BEFORE Noxious Blast when turning on someone, the slow and poisoning are instant unlike with the other skill.

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• If you have the blue buff, you can use this skill again before it's duration goes away, use this advantage and mana regeneration to scout bushes, never head in and face check, that is pretty much a death wish.
• It is much easier to land than Noxious Blast so you might want to land it first and slow the target before hitting off your Q[/color].

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Twin Fang (E): So how this skill works, you hit someone with your poison and then you use this skill on them and it's cooldown is refreshed to 0.5 seconds instead of 4. AD carry has auto attack, you have this, no better way to put it, of course don't use it to farm unless you have blue and have to fast push. Note that it works with any poison, not just your own.

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• One of most often made mistakes, even by me would be hitting Twin Fang before proccing your Noxious Blast, and yes this can happen, due to Noxious Blast having delay on it, you might wanna wait for it to hit before instantly firing Twin Fang, you might end up on 4 seconds cooldown, which is not nice. ESPECIALLY watch this after you Petrifying Gaze someone, make sure your poison procs first or use your W skill before Q.
  
• Yes, this skill works with other poisons, not just your own, but don't rely on this. It is just a safety net for you, still aim your poisons because DoT deals amazing damage.
• In early game while this is level 1, you don't really wanna spam it on enemies, use only Noxious Blast to harass, don't follow up with this UNLESS you are going in for kill, it will burn your mana down and distract you from much needed farm.
• One thing I discovered is that, this skill eats Morgana's Black Shield alive, just spam it on her shield and it will be gone before you know it, laning against Morgana is not really a problem.
• Now days I smart cast everything, I recommend you do it too.

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Petrifying Gaze (R): Ah, finally, my favorite thing about Cassiopeia, her ultimate. This amazing skill is high damage stun/slow with a "short" range. Actually range is not short at all, it is all question of positioning, if target is facing you he will be stunned, if not he will get a decent slow, both of these allowing you to easily follow up with your skills.

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• Think about positions, think outside of box, no one said you are limited to being in front of a target or close to them, this skill is actually most effective when used over walls or trees and you can see that in video below.
• With Rylai's Crystal Scepter the slow will be very high and it might compensate for missed stuns, but remember stuns are better.
• Try to use it from the bush, enemies won't see it coming and you have the highest chance of hitting the stun.
• It is very effective for escaping, use it and then use Miasma and Noxious Blast on stunned target, you will be out in no time.
• I love using it for mind games, when some cocky squishy (mostly Vayne) is chasing me, I just turn around, stun her and then burst her down with Miasma Noxious Blast Ignite Twin Fang combo.

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I am expecting a little bit of weird-eyes at me for this, but here goes. With my build you need to farm early game and kite, hence I max Noxious Blast first. But, you can see I pick my Twin Fang twice after level 1. This is because Cassiopeia actually has a very powerful all-in at level 3, and if you wanna go all-in or jungler comes, having 2nd level of Twin Fang is much more useful than another point of Noxious Blast.

You can take 3rd level of Twin Fang earlier if you feel like you can OWN your enemy. Now, I pick Miasma at level 7 because you don't exactly need it before that, only times I'd recommend it before level 7 is vs melee champions with a lot of jumps so you can land poison on them. And it's best to have 2 points in Miasma before maxing out
Twin Fang .

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Alright, we will go through each and every item of this build and explain it's use and the reason these items are better than some other items like rod of aegis. So your first question must be "Why Green Anaconda?", well the reason for this name is your movement speed and size of Cassiopeia's model really, green anaconda being one of the largest snakes in the world.
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UNIQUE Passive - Enhanced Movement: +60 Movement Speed UNIQUE Passive - Slow Resist: Movement slowing effects are reduced by 25%. (Unique Passives with the same name don't stack.) These are my preferred boots, I get them 100% of the time because I need the super movement speed and the slow reduction is a nice bonus.

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+50 Ability Power +300 Health UNIQUE Passive - Eyes of Pain: +15 Magic Penetration UNIQUE Passive: Dealing spell damage applies a damage-over-time effect for 3 seconds that deals bonus magic damage equal to 2% of the target's current Health per second. This bonus damage is doubled against movement-impaired units and capped at 100 damage per second vs. monsters. An outstanding item, your pokes on the enemy team will deal insane damage, not to mention the way you'll burn through tanks. You might not have a lot of AP with this item and build, but the overall DMG is insane.

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+500 Health +80 Ability Power UNIQUE Passive: Dealing ability damage slows the target's Movement Speed by 35% for 1.5 seconds (15% for multi-target and damage-over-time spells). With the most recent changes, you get to slow one target for 30% constantly, it's insane now and great item to have, not to mention HP and AP.

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+60 Ability Power +40 Magic Resist +15 Mana Regen per 5 seconds +20% Cooldown Reduction UNIQUE Passive: Restores 12% of maximum Mana on kill or assist. UNIQUE Passive - Mana Font: Increases Mana Regen by 1% for every 1% of missing Mana.. Mana regeneration is something every Cassiopeia needs really, magic resist is great early game and you will be able to spam your spells much easier than before, it had a great build-up and is a good follow up on your starting items. It will also let you teamfight without blue buff, which is amazing for you and you can't do that without this item.

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+70 Ability Power UNIQUE Passive: Magic damage ignores 35% of the target's Magic Resist (applies before Magic Penetration). Wrecking through tanks like butter. Seriously, the way MR now works is first % and then this reduction and it'll render MR useless against you.

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+120 Ability Power +50 Armor UNIQUE Active - Stasis: Champion becomes invulnerable and untargetable for 2.5 seconds, but is unable to move, attack, cast spells, or use items during this time (90 second cooldown). This is the BEST finishing item. If you have all other items you'll be massive treat for the enemies and they will focus you, there is nothing more distracting than having your focused target disappear, this is the time your team can abuse to destroy their team.

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Let's get this from the top. You picked Cassiopeia and are heading for the mid lane, knowing our community I'll say HOPEFULLY alone. Now what you must remember in lane is that Cassiopeia is a monster with a weakness to ganks, hence you start with a ward and you have to place it where you believe ganks will come from.

Now, harass from level 1 with Noxious Blast, don't use your
Twin Fang at level 2 for it will be like an auto-attack, but at level 3, go ALL IN, use Noxious Blast and follow up with
Twin Fang and keep going, eventually you'll flash in, use ignite and try to finish the target off. This is how I usually get FB, and it is why you can't push, you'll need space for this, and don't turret-dive.

Remember, with maxed Noxious Blast you'll have a lot of farm power, use it to push your lane (past level 5), and go farm wraiths or wolves. I don't suggest roaming as Cassiopeia, call out for missed, but push forward and take that tower out! It will either lock your opponent in lane or give your team global 150 gold.

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Being Cassiopeia you are naturally mana hungry and a spammer, blue buff here helps you a lot, but don't expect to get the first blue buff, you will hopefully get the second one. Once you have the blue buff start being a lot more aggressive, spam without stopping and harass enemy's mind out. Of course respect line between aggressive and reckless, don't overextend while harassing. If your jungler is Fiddlesticks make a sad face and forget about this buff completely..

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You love this part of the game, you got your Twin Fang stronger and you can do some serious single target and AoE damage, mid and late game are pretty much the same, try to gather your team in one lane and push out the first set of turrets if you didn't already.

The most important part of mid game for you is positioning, you must work and practice on this, no guide can help you, but remember your spells are not restricted by walls, not even your ulti, do feel free to take a safe spot and spam your abilities.

Another good strategy is to get into bush and cast from there, always be behind a tank and don't stupidly rush in like I do sometimes, yes I get cocky...

Remember your goal is victory not an amazing K/D/A, so head towards pushes and always have a ward on dragon, you really wanna control dragon and take it every single time you can, also ward Baron Nashor because if enemies get it, it can be nasty. Due to your naturally long range you can harass enemies who pile up to try and steal him, but be careful and don't do this if there's Blitzcrank on the enemy team.

With Cassiopeia you REALLY wanna push to get the objectives {Dragon, Turrets, Baron, Blue etc)

Rest of the game should be push for victory.

Here's the video made by pro Cassiopeia player who plays on 2000 elo, it is amazing and shows just how viable Cassiopeia is, a really good watch so come and see:

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The title must be confusing for you, but "snake in the grass" is name of a extremely powerful strategy Cassiopeia can use, this strategy requires quick hands, and amazing amount of map awareness to work, along with several wards.

The point of this is catching enemy unprepared while you are in a bush, you wanna know where your mid enemy went for a gank, and once he starts returning, you enter the bush you believe he will pass, as soon as he is close to the bush, you do this combo:

Petrifying Gaze > Miasma > Noxious Blast > Ignite > Twin Fang

And you spam your fangs until enemy is dead, this combo is INSANE surprise burst and can catch unaware enemy off guard and net you a quick and easy kill, which is very useful, but it can't always be done as I said maybe your enemy has wards there and so, map awareness is the key of this strategy working.

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This was requested part so here I am writing it up, how should Cassiopeia act in late game team fights.

First of all the biggest mistake by most Cassiopeia players is rushing in close range to get that Petrifying Gaze off. This may be alright if you have Zhonya's Hourglass and can do it properly while placing Miasma and Noxious Blast after and not getting stun on your head. It is really hard to do so I don't exactly recommend it.

What I do recommend is standing back on quite a range, let your tank and melee off-tank DPS initiate the fight, you should come in a bit later. Your range is very high on Miasma and Noxious Blast, use these two to attack the squishies, or well the target team is focused onto.

A bit later when their protection is gone, which you should judge, you should come closer and spam Twin Fang to finish them off. As for your ulti, it needs special mention. I suggest you to position yourself to try and use it over wall, or maybe you can flash into the fight suddenly and use it, but make sure your tank is always in front of you, chose the moment when you can catch most people into it.

I don't suggest you to look for moment when you can stun all 5 because you will never use it, use your ulti on most people possible for DMG + Slow and if someone is stunned then you are at luck - of course this only counts for team fights, in 1v1 or 1v2 or so, always try to make stun priority over DMG.

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Laning is extremely important part of being a good Cassiopeia, so I decided to make this section with replays which show you how to lane against champions that may seem tougher for you to lane against, but first you must know how to use these replays:
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Your LoLReplay (Using this Guide) Here. You have to have LoLReplay to watch these replays. Download LoLReplay Here. The program, LoLReply, allows you to record your own games and replay them at any time. An hour of gameplay is about 7 MB; 100x smaller than an average quality video, so don't worry about the files taking up space :) LoLReplay is great because it allows you to see how you could have handled a situation better, it allows you to analyze possible other routes or paths you could have taken. It also allows you to show off :P

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Kassadin is actually not such a difficult enemy for Cassiopeia as many may think. The main problem is that most of us when he shoots Null Sphere go back as if we can freaking dodge the spell or something, but we can't. Remember this, on early levels this one spell and Force Pulse are all he has after that he has nothing, so stand up to him, surprise him and fight right back into his face as he does to attack you just as silence fades use Noxious Blast and spam the **** out of him. Replay. Status: Permabanned. Since in ranked he is permabanned I had to play normals till I found one, this is normal game, not ranked.

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So called "classic counter" to Cassiopeia and other casters. I don't know for others but I beat the **** out of this *****, she has silence, true but it doesn't last forever, she has her one burst and after that she is done and down to you, you abuse this. I also recommend you take one Giant's Belt before Rabadon's Deathcap to survive her burst. Up to level 5 you can harass her hard down, don't stop harassing her, make her pay for existing, if she goes onto you, you go right back, you must make balance when it is good to attack and when not, let her come to you and once she is afraid, you go into her. At level 6 situation changes as she has her ulti and you should go more def and get your jungler to help you with her. Replay. Status: Rarely Banned. Since she is rarely banned she was picked as counter to me on mid. Yes this was ranked game, I handled her with balance between aggression and passive play, you can see for yourself.

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I myself take Sion to be harder than both of the above, just because his shield can get really big and strong and stun can interrupt you, but remember his stun range is shorter than your harass range. I don't suggest you to go right into him when his shield comes up, but try to take it down from semi-risky range using damage and then go right up against him in lane - ask your jungler for help. Replay. Status: Permabanned. This was normal game as in my elo and server this guy is permabanned. I won the lane but I lost the game due to my team being quite..idiotic, but oh well in the end I lost my will to play and it was morning and I'm not giving you more excuses, but we lost - still it is worth watching the laning phase because I handled Sion really well.

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This guy is very tricky, first thing first, you don't want him farming. Try to harass him quite aggressively, if he is one of these good Veigars he will probably stand up to you and make you back off, or if he is bad he will back off and you will dominate him, lvl 6 on you will need help to down him, good or bad Veigar, you must back away because burst is so hardcore, I suggest some HP before the Deathcap and maybe QSS to dispel the stun. Replay. Status: Available. This Veigar wasn’t bad, he was one of better Veigar's I've seen, I also made some stupid mistakes in this video, but you are supposed to see it so you don't make them yourself. In the end I end up with higher farm although he has decent farm himself, we win the game.

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Alright, I was people complain about Morgana who really isn't much of a big deal if I am honest, sure she has spell vamp, farm, shield, but you have spam and she stands no chance to your harassment, also you have farm power with Miasma and Noxious Blast, if she ulties you, try to flash away, you won't stun her or slow because she will probably have shield but know that your Twin Fang practically eats her shield up. Replay. Status: Permabanned. In this game Morgana did fine against me, we ended up with same score actually, although my farm was higher, we won in the end.

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These three are the most often mentioned ones, if you find ANY other champion that makes a lot of problems for you, post in comments and I will write up and make a replay of how to counter that champion in lane.

Many thanks to these amazing persons who made this guide even better:

• jhoijhoi: I should make this girl co-author of the guide, she helped me a lot and this guide is based on her guide to make guides. If you like this guide along with +repping me, I suggest you +rep her as well and check out her amazing guides right here: Ashe, Vayne, Morgana, Nasus, Warwick, Guide about making Guides.
• Nurok: Outright awesome Cassiopeia player, he is one responsible for high elo video above, I suggest everyone to go to his channel, watch LoL videos subscribe and leave a comment :)

All in all, that is all I can tell you about our beautiful snake Cassiopeia, rest of it is up to your practice, if you have any questions do make a comment and if you disagree with something don't downvote me right away, leave a comment and I'll either explain or agree with you and fix something within my guide.

Be quick on your fingers, and practice, her skills will soon become 2nd nature to you and then you will truly unlock beauty of this champion.

Hope I helped and have fun with Cassiopeia :D

-ilke994.