Introduction Pros & Cons Abilities Tipps Summoner Spells Main Runes Secondary runes

Shards Itemization Early game Mid game Late game & Teamfight Afterword

Hi Im Janosch Online Cloud V2 a EUW Challenger Kassadin Vladimir two trick and currently the highest ranked kassadin player in the world. I started playing the game back in Season 10 as a Nasus Teemo player, but quickly moved to mid lane and started playing mainly Vladimir and Kassadin. Season 13 I peaked at 989Lp Challenger. I also Stream on twitch so feel free to ask me any questions that are still unclear after this guide there. My Social Media: Youtube Stream Discord Twitch

Pros				Cons
+Good Teamfight. +High Snowball potential. +Great scaling +Low skill floor high skill cap +Fun Playstyle				-Weak laning phase. -Easy to gank pre 6. -Unforgiving if you fall behind. -No utility. -Bad Skirmishing.

		Passive: Void Ston	Void Stone makes you permanently ghosted use this to your advantage by sitting in minions to block projectiles
		Q Ability: Null Sphere	Null Sphere can interrupt channels like Crowstorm or Tides of Blood. Use Null Sphere on the Opponent or a minion to block incoming magic damage in Lane.
		W Ability: Nether Blade	Nether Blade is an auto attack reset so make sure to aa w to maximize damage. Use Nether Blade at the end of your combo so you regain the maximum amount of mana. Nether Blade is unstoppable which means as soon as the cast animation on an opponent starts it will always go through. This means it will follow flashes, go through abilities like Sanguine Pool, and can be combined with Zhonya's Hourglass.
		E Ability: Force Pulse	Use Force Pulse early in your combo so you get it back faster. In lane if you only want to short trade it's wise to use Force Pulse later to slow your opponent and escape. You can E flash.
		R Ability: Riftwalk	As long as you're halfway through a wall with Riftwalk you can go through it. Be patient with your Riftwalk in the early game since it's your only mobility on a 5 second cooldown. You can both R->Flash and R->E-> Flash.

In 99% of your Kassadin games you will take Flash Teleport. You can go ignite against all-in melee ignite user champions like Ekko, Katarina, or Fizz but i dont recommend it.

	Flash	Flash allows Kassadin to escape ganks and lethal situations in the early game. It can also be combined with Riftwalk and Force Pulse. Always take Flash!
	Teleport	Teleport is used to get back into lane to not miss minions and refilling health and mana. It also allows Kassadin to split push and Teleport to the team if a fight breaks out. Always take Teleport against Ranged Champions Orianna Akshan
	Ignite	Ignite gives you extra kill pressure in lane. It's a high-risk, high-reward summoner spell.I don't recommend it unless you're playing against worse players than yourself.

Conqueror

Conqueror is great against melee champions that have some form of healing Sylas Swain Vladimir or are inherently tanky Galio Nautilus. If you decide to go Conqueror always build Rod of Ages. Conqueror also is great if the enemy team is heavy on one damage type because you can build either Frozen Heart or Abyssal Mask and become unkillable.

Main Rune Page Options

Always take Presence of Mind and Legend: Tenacity nothing else is viable in these two Rows. Last Stand and Coup de Grace are both good but I prefer Last Stand.

Electrocute

Electrocute is a great option against squishy melee mids Fizz Qiyana Ekko.
Electrocute is way easier to proc against melee champions and the extra damage lets you fight back in the early game.
Electrocute can also be taken against squishy ranged champions but becomes harder to use.

Main Rune Page Options

Always Sudden Impact Taste of Blood is sht after nerfe. Almost Always Eyeball Collection you can go Ghost Poro in slow games if you know how to use it.
Ultimate Hunter if you're building Rod of Ages. Ingenious Hunter if you're planning on building Crown of the Shattered Queen.

First Strike

First Strike should be taken against low range squishy champions where you can reliably get the first hit in. For this Rune to work you have to play around it. Every time your First Strike is up try to poke and try to not lose it to random poke. In every Matchup you go Electrocute you can also take First Strike except Yasuo since if you damage his shield Way of the Wanderer you won't get gold and he can block the First Strike projectile with his Wind Wall. First Strike also worsens the higher range your opponents are keep that in mind.

Main Rune Page Options

If you need to build Zhonya's Hourglass second item swap Magical Footwear for Perfect Timing. Future's Market and Minion Dematerializer are both viable. Future's Market allows you to get to your core items faster while Minion Dematerializer help with last hitting, fixing bad wave states and pushing waves faster.
Biscuit Delivery can also be taken if you need more sustain in Lane. Last Row you will always take Cosmic Insight nothing else is viable in this Row.

Arcane Comet

Take Arcane Comet against squishy ranged champions if the game requires you to be strong early. Green Flags for Comet would be volatile jungle and sidelane matchups. Fo example: Rek'Sai against Kha'Zix jungle and double ingache sup bot + Draven against Kalista. You want to be able to support these lanes/your jungler as fast as possible or at least stop your laner from impacting them.

Main Rune Page Options

Manaflow Band and Transcendence never change. You can change Scorch to Gathering Storm if you want some extra scaling.

Shards

Disclaimer! double defensive shard is worse than double offensive but if greeding will cost you the lane then dont greed!
Swap Shield with Tenacity and Slow Resist depending on Matchup
Shield + Shield can be taken against hard ad Matchups Pantheon Akshan
Tenacity and Slow Resist + Tenacity and Slow Resist can be taken against ap Midlane and Jungler Syndra Fiddlesticks or Gragas Ahri.
Swap Shield with Flat Health if you have a free lane Aurelion Sol Twisted Fate
Swap Ability Haste with Adaptive Force if you're planing to build Luden's Tempest.

Secondary Rune Page Options

Domination

Domination is great for snowballing. If you think there will be a lot of fighting early domination is a great choice. If you can manage to get some kills or assist early and get those juicy Ultimate Hunter stacks my good will you be strong. 3.6 seconds instead of 4.63 at 6 and 2.52 seconds instead of 3.24 seconds cooldown on Riftwalk at level 11 with only Rod of Ages sounds pretty good doesn't it? Also Ingenious Hunter should be taken with Crown of the Shattered Queen.

Take Taste of Blood if you need more sustain. Taste of Blood is especially good vs melee champions because you can permanently proc it. If you dont need the extra sustain go Sudden Impact for more damage.

Always take Ultimate Hunter if you're building Rod of Ages and you have Domination. Take Ingenious Hunter if you're planning on building Crown of the Shattered Queen.

Resolve

Resolve should be taken to either scale with Conditioning Overgrowth or survive lane/have more lane pressure with Bone Plating or Second Wind.

Demolish is also viable to punish champions that like to roaming Katarina Talon.

Take Conditioning if you're in an easy matchup. Second Wind helps you survive lanes where you get poked a lot Syndra Akshan. Bone Plating is good against champions that want to run you down and have no long ranged ability to proc Bone Plating before they go in like Tryndamere or Irelia.

Overgrowth is my go to rune when I take Resolve. It just makes you tankier and gives you some extra scaling. Unflinching can be taken instead if the enemy team has a lot of crowd control Leona Fiddlesticks or slows Zilean.

Precision

Precision should be your go to if you dont need Resolve. It will provide you with extra mana and depending on what you need tenacity or extra damage.

If you're running Precision secondary always take Presence of Mind. It provides you with more mana, more mana ->goog

Take Legend: Tenacity if the enemy team has a lot of crowd control Leona Fiddlesticks Nautilus. Remember that Tenacity doesn't work on knock ups Grand Entrance or supressions Nether Grasp.

Coup de Grace and Last Stand are both good if you dont need tenacity. I prefer Coup de Grace when I play a more burst oriented build Electrocute/ First Strike and Last Stand whit a tankier setup Conqueror.

Sarting Items

	DORAN'S SHIELD	Start Doran's Shield against heavy poke.
	Dark Seal	Start Dark Seal against anything else.

As you get more comfortable in harder matchups you can start to go Dark Seal.

Mythic Item

Build Crown of the Shattered Queen never because the item sucks after the changes.

Rod of Ages is always a great option and can be built every game. Rod of Ages excels against Control Mages and in slower paced games.

Build Luden's Tempest if the enemy team is squishy, you are solo ap and your team is low damage.

Boots

Does the enemy team have a lot of crowd control and you don't have Legend: Tenacity build Mercury's Treads.
Do you play Rod of Ages and don't have either Ultimate Hunter nor Transcendence go Ionian Boots of Lucidity.
The enemy team has 3+ ad damage auto attacker build Plated Steelcaps.
You don't need the above?-> Go Sorcerer's Shoes

Second Item

99% of games go Archangel's Staff.
If you get instantly one shot as soon as you go in go Zhonya's Hourglass. Example Team comp: Riven Rek'Sai Fizz Nautilus Kai'Sa

Third item and onwards

You are doing well but your team is dog water and the game looks doomed? Build a Mejai's Soulstealer
The enemy team is stacking magic resist build Void Staff.
Against lots of ap Champions build Abyssal Mask.
Against lots of ad Champions build Frozen Heart.
Need more damage build Rabadon's Deathcap
Want a 2.5 seconds of invulnerability to play with go Zhonya's Hourglass.
Need a spell shield against spells that could kill you in an instant Evelynn Zoe go Banshee's Veil.

Early game

This is the part of the game where you are at your weakest points. Your Goals for the early game are as follows conserve hp while getting as much farm and exp as possible. Something that helps with that is visualizing how much damage you will take if you go for x minion. Both Gold and HP are resources and it is not worth to loss 200hp for 1 minion. Whenever you go for minions try to bait out spells and block the magic damage with Null Sphere.


2nd goal is to keep the wave on our side and prevent it from ending up frozen in front of the enemy turret. So how do we do that? In lower elos, it will be enough to just not hit the wave and let your opponent push the wave over and over again. In higher elos you have to try to contest the wave and hit it whenever you get the opportunity and keep it as small as possible so if the wave crashes it doesn't bounce back. Keeping the wave smaller will also allow you to freeze the wave on your side of the lane making it harder for the enemy to harass because they have to overextend. You need atleast 3 full hp caster minions to freeze.

But what do we do if the wave still bounces?
One option is to stand in the wave and bait a trade so the opponent uses spells on the wave and takes minion aggro. If they don't fall for this then you should first get a ward out to spot if the enemy team is trying to gank you. If you are strong enough to win 1v1 and 2v2 slow push the wave, ping your team for assistance, hover your jungler/vision, protect your wave, and try to crash with a big wave. If you are weaker and the enemy mid has Ignite start to heavy trade and then recall and Teleport back. Then with the hp advantage, you protect the wave, ping assistance, and slow push crash. If you are weaker and the enemy has Teleport you can try the same thing but if they are good they will just use their teleport. So in this spot, the only thing you can do is play safe and wait for the wave to push back or ask your team to help you shove the wave.

3rd goal is to minimize the impact that our laner has. Always keep an eye on where your opponent is and ping your team if he is roaming. If a fight breaks out try to keep your laner interested in you so they don't move instantly, but be careful to not throw your lane for it.

As soon as you get strong enough/wave clear to get lane priority it's time to impact the map and get ahead. While pushing the wave you can ask yourself:

Can you bully your opponent out of lane or kill them? Trade more aggressively and look for a kill/dive.

Can you roam to a sidelane?
Green Flags for roams: The enemy is overextended immobile and has low hp, your team has gank setup/cc, enemy is at low hp under tower and easy to dive, summoner/ults on cooldown.

Is Dragon or Herald up? Tell your jungle to start them and help him on it. But before playing for an objective check how strong the enemy is relative to your team and who has and doesn't have prior.

Your jungler wants to invade? Push the wave and go help him.

The enemy team is making a play and you can collapse and win the fight? Go for it!

Nothing obvious you can do? Then you can look to get some deep vision/clear vision or hover towards your jungler/lanes. Even if you only hide in a brush your enemy laner will still ping you missing and as a result of that the enemy sidelines will have to play more passive because you could be roaming.

But always remember that if you do something on the map you are on a tight schedule because you don't want to miss any farm midlane. Unless something has a high chance of turning out well and will give you more value than the wave in mid don't overstay. If you lose your farm and don't get anything in return you will become a walking minion.

Mid game

If your botlane tower has fallen it's time to move to sideline. This is imported because the enemy bot will come mid and try to take your tower. As a result of that your support will come mid to defend the tower. This is a big no no because you never want to share exp and you lack the wave clear to defend the tower.

So what do we do in sidelane? Simply push the wave and move towards mid to pressure the enemy bot and protect yours. If you don't need to protect your botlane feel free to pressure your laner in sidelane, but keep an eye on the enemy team as they might try to collapse on you if you overextend. Also Always keep track of your laner because they might try to force a play mid lane.

If you see lots of people grouping get ready to move because a team fight might break out. If you can move or Teleport there in time and win the fight go for it. Remember that some fights are just lost and don't hurt yourself more by moving there. You always have to remember to farm or even a Lee Sin will outscale you because he has more gold than you.

If your Teleport is up make sure you're on the opposite side of the next objective. You can then use your Teleport to get to your team or look for flanks. Sometimes if your team lacks vision around the objective and your team has no one to face check brushes then it is wise to group at least 20 seconds earlier, so your team can establish some control and walk up reliably. If you manage to get 1 or 2 dragons that will already delay the enemy soul win condition by a lot and allow you to scale.

Late Game

Even in the late game you want to keep side laning and farming. If your Teleport is up be on the opposite side of the next objective. If your teleport is down be on the same side. Force people to deal with you by pushing waves and going for towers. If they send a lot of people to deal with you then that is great because your team can push on the other side of the map. Always look to pick people of on sidelane you're insanely mobile so even if you go in you can get out again. If you do manage to get a pick then look to force objektivs or fights 4v5. Before going to sidelane you must assess the level of ingache the enemy team comp has because sometimes you can't sidelane when an objective is coming up, but instead have to group early.

Teamfighting

As for teamfighting your main focus will be killing the enemy caries or peel for your adc. If your Flash is up you can look to one shot the enemy caries. If it is down look to get your spells out and reposition with Riftwalk until the enemy uses their cc and you can find an angle to get on top of the carries. You can also look to flank over walls and get on top of the enemy carries this way, but be careful if the enemy team has a lot of cc.

Team fights are too fast so you won't be able to actively think in the moment that is where priming comes into play.
Activly ask yourself thes questions:
How does my team comp want to play?
Who on the enemy team can kill me?
What summoner spells are up?
What cc abilities does the enemy team have?

I hope you enjoed this guide and i was able to help you improve your gameplay. If you still have any questions feel free to ask them in my Discord or in my Twitch chat