This is a non Snowballing item guide. The whole idea of this guide is to be able to pwn faces with Kassadin without the worry of losing stacks on items such as ( Mejai's Soulstealer for example.) I understand how good of an item this can be but it will make them want to focus you more for that fact and lets face it, with this build they will still want to focus you and you will be able to kill low health characters with ease with a 7 stack Riftwalk and blue buff when you have the right gear. This guide will give him more survivability as well.

For runes I go with:
9 Greater Mark of Magic Penetration Magic pen is always a nice stat to have as an AP carry.
9 Greater Seal of Vitality The extra health is always a plus and you will be happy to have these when you have narrow escapes.
9 Greater Glyph of Ability Power The more AP you have the better off you are in keeping your opponet at bay in early game. This will help alot because you should be more concerned with getting ur core mana items such as Catalyst the Protector and Tear of the Goddess so it can start getting stacks.
3 Greater Quintessence of Ability Power Same deal as why to take the Greater Glyph of Ability Power You are going with mainly defensive masteries for survivability so it helps to have the extra AP.

Ok. So you might be wondering why I go defensive masteries mainly. Well the reasoning behind this is that you want to be able to survive early game and be succesful at farming. you have 2 health pots in beginning game with that mana crystal for a reason. You get the last hits and shoot whoever tries to stop you with with null sphere when they try to stop you. Let them know you aren't gonna back down from getting your farm. So... 0/21/9 is my favorite way to go. The 9 points in utility should be easy to understand but I will lay it out for you, 3 in Perseverence to help with regen. 1 in Spacial Accuracy to allow you a little less time to get back from using Teleport and to help the cooldown. Especially nice when midding. Push the lane and blue pill back. Get your gear and get back before they have even reached your turret. :D 4 in Expanded Mind Leveling faster is always nice but so is the extra mana when you rely as much on MANA as AP. 1 in Meditation because extra mana regen is nice when you need MANA to keep up your harass when farming.

Allright. The whole idea of my build sequence will now be explained. Sapphire Crystal and 2 Healh Potion because you want to have the extra mana and health pots if getting harrased. It's nice to be able to rush Catalyst the Protector and be able to do better in the laning phase because of the extra mana and health you get back everytime you level. You then want to get your Sorcerer's Shoes Self explanitory. Faster movement and MAGIC PEN. :D I then go for a Blasting Wand and Tear of the Goddess Yes you only have 1 core item complete but the idea here is that you can start building up your Tear of the Goddess and you now have the Blasting Wand for a little more damage. This part here is the most dangerous part in my item build. You will not deal as much damage but you can still make your pressence felt enough in team fights and even be able to turn fights around in this phase. Get those assists or killsteals at this point haha. You then want to make your Rod of Ages I know it is an over time item but I dont rush it because I want Tear of the Goddess before completing it to start building up more mana and even have more mana. When you have enough gold you can finish your Archangel's Staff Then you want to go for Abyssal Sceptor I choose this item over Banshee's Veil Because I don't want to have to make 2 Catalyst the Protector and The Abyssal Sceptor gives you and your TEAM more magic pen and you get the AP and Magic Resist from it. Plus You have Cleanse when the Initiation starts, to get you out of trouble. As for my 5th Item I build Rabodan's Death cap OMG.. DID Kassadin just melt me? is that possible? Mwhahaha. Enjoy having people type Kassadin OP in /all chat. As for the last item. It is up to you. I prefer Zhonya's Hourglass].basically you get your [[RiftWalk to as many stacks as possible without be mana starved..drop in on a team fight with a Riftwalk If they start to focus you. Use Zhonya's Hourglass...chill for a bit...when it wears off you can Riftwalk again out of the fight or even back into the fight depending on what is going down. Melt some more faces. P.S. BUY as many Sight Ward as needed. It may be nice to be able to get your items faster if you don't buy any....but they really are the best item in the game considering they help for ganking and anti-ganking and to know what is going on in the jungle. You may feel like you are building your gear slower because of this but no matter what character you play MAP AWARENESS wins fights.

I feel that Cleanse is a must for Kassadin. Without this single spell he would not be as good. It's fun to Riftwalk into a Veigar who is relying on his AOE stun zone and Cleanse then proceed to own him.

My second favorite Summoner Spell is Teleport It allows you to go back and get back into farming with ease. Also nice for ganking and saving turrets.

I dont use any other summoner spells for Kassadin..I feel they are the most effective and why try to fix something when it isn't broken?

The idea of this skill sequence is to help damage output. Null Sphere should be maxed out first because it is your best harrass spell and works very nicely for silencing and damaging enemies. Force Pulse is the second spell you should max out. It not only does good damage but it helps for chasing. When you have enough AP you can melt whole minion waves with the cone. Riftwalk is one of the most awesome ult abilities in the game in my opinion. Get it at 6,11,16. With enough AP you can kill low health characters(not low health from fighting but low health as in carries with no defensive gear.) WIth a well placed high stacked Riftwalk although I would not suggest attempting it unless you have blue buff so that you can get a 5-7 stack without being mana starved. Nether Blade is really only useful in late game. Max it last. Nice way to get mana back in a teamfight and be able to either HighStack Riftwalk or Null Sphere someone.

Kassadin is an awesome mid. He can stand toe to toe with just about any champ that you typically get in mid. The Idea is to last hit minions and harrass Their mid enough to mess up their farm or if they threaten your farm. With that being said, use Null Sphere to keep them at bay. It does a considerable amount of damage and silences them. If you are going against a mid that is super agressive towards you dish it back to them. Let them know you are a force not to be messed with. Null Sphere them any time they get within your range of the spell. Stay in the lane as long as possible without blue pilling. You want to be able to atleast buy Catalyst the Protector before you first go back. Try to push the lane enough before you go back if you can so you can buy your gear and Teleport back in before they reach your turret. I personally try to keep Sight Ward in each gank bush in mid at all times during the laning phase. It may cost more but it gives you enough awareness to handle mid with little to no help in the early to mid game.

Okay. This build I have put together is basically a sucessful build that doesnt rely on Mejai's Soulstealer No matter how good you think you are it is a BIG risk to go with such an item. You may be doing good with it but you die once you lose stacks. You lose AP...you do less damage...if you were carrying your team(or not) you do less damage...It may cause you to die again...FACT: People with snowballing irems like Mejai's Soulstealer get focused...even though Kassadin is an escape artist there are ways of catching champs and good teams have good chasers and cc. It's my personal opinion as to why I dont use snowballing items on casters...I don't mean to offend anyone but I feel that there are much better items..id rather have a assured amount of AP then the possibliity of it varrying and maybe even costing you the game. In fact everyone has their own playstyles. Use my guide or not it is fine. I just wanted to put my way of playing, an underused yet good champ if played right, out there. GL HF