Cassiopeia/Strategy

Template:C-top

Skill usage

• Don't hesitate to spam your spells since Deadly Cadence makes each additional cast cheaper. Noxious Blast does not require a target, so maintaining your 5 stacks is easy with a decent-sized mana pool.
  • Try to acquire 5 stacks of Deadly Cadence before casting Petrifying Gaze to lower its mana cost significantly.
• Cassiopeia is a great harasser in all stages of the game. All three of her basic abilities, especially Noxious Blast, can be used constantly in lane to zone, capable of dealing huge amounts of damage over time at a safe distance.
• Noxious Blast has a slight delay; lead your enemy when targeting with Noxious Blast to ensure the hit, or use it on them when they will have to stand still to last-hit.
• Using Noxious Blast in the brush does not reveal Cassiopeia, so when in the side lanes, use the brush to your advantage to harass with little to no retaliation from enemy minions.
• When chasing/fleeing, be sure to use your Noxious Blast on an enemy champion to speed yourself up, and Miasma to slow them down.
• Using Miasma in the middle of the lane when enemy minions are coming will slow them and deal some damage giving advantage to your minions, this tactic is best used in pushes as intentionally pushing your lane during the laning phase opens yourself up to ganks.
• Since Miasma grants vision over the area affected, it can be used to check brush.
• Noxious Blast can also be used to check brush, as it gives you a movement speed bonus (and a buff icon) if an enemy is hit. If you cast it in a brush, and notice the buff icon, you know that an enemy is there.
• Twin Fang becomes extremely powerful if the target is poisoned, allowing you to deal out large amounts of damage with its low conditional cooldown.
  • It is very highly recommended to smart cast Twin Fang, as it will make it much easier to land the maximum amount of Twin Fang allowed by the duration of your poison effects.
  • If the situation is favorable, try to cast Twin Fang while directly on top of your target, as Twin Fang's reduced cooldown begins when the poisoned target is hit and not on spellcast.
  • Due to Twin Fang having the potential to be constantly refreshed, don't be afraid to target durable melee champions if necessary. Unlike many other mages that rely on burst damage, Cassiopeia and her Twin Fang can realistically cut through tough enemies with time, accuracy, and enough mana.

• Twin Fang is reduced to 0.5 seconds cooldown before recast, if the target is poisoned. However it doesn't matter who poisoned the target. So if you have a team-mate such as Teemo or Singed who have a poison effect on their skills, use it in your favor.

• Try to use Petrifying Gaze offensively, and usually against more than one target. That said, it can also be used when being ganked to escape enemies.

• • It is, however, safest to use it when a teamfight has happened. The enemy will be less likely to manage to turn around with their attention split amongst five champions - and more likely to all be facing you since that is largely required to fight your team.
• Using Petrifying Gaze followed by Miasma, Noxious Blast and Twin Fang can turn most 1v1 fights and mid game turret dives in your favor.
• Petrifying Gaze also allows Cassiopeia to be a very strong anti-ganker. Simply casting it when your lane opponent and the enemy ganker are in range, then bursting down the weaker one with your combo can turn the 2v1 into a 1v1. This tactic is only effective when your Petrifying Gaze stuns both targets.
• Cassiopeia can proxy through the use of Noxious Blast and Miasma

Build usage

• Buying Rylai's Crystal Scepter, Will of the Ancients and Liandry's Torment along with using Twin Fang on a poisoned enemy gives her much more chasing potential, health sustain, burst and sustained damage but don't forget to hit the enemy with Noxious Blast from time-to-time to refresh the poison and the movement speed bonus for yourself.
  • Due to the recent buff on Rylai's proc with Twin Fang, it is a good idea to purchase it for chasing potential.
  • Also, Rylai's Crystal Scepter plus Miasma adds a very powerful slow to your enemies, giving Cassiopeia more time to chase and land Twin Fang easily.
• Void Staff works fine on Cassiopeia if enough enemies have a high amount of magic resistance, as the potential low-cooldown and damage on Twin Fang lets Cassiopeia be less stringent in choosing targets compared to other mages.
• Buy spell vamp items like Will of the Ancients to quickly restore health when hitting poisoned targets with Twin Fang.
• A Catalyst the Protector is a perfect early game item for Cassiopeia allowing her to spam her spells more often with the extra mana and some health for survivability. This can then build offensively into an early Rod of Ages or a more defensive Odyn's Veil.
• Getting a Tear of the Goddess and then upgrading it into an Archangel's Staff will greatly increase Cassiopeia's ability power, as well as solving any mana problems that you may have. It is also quite easy to gain charges with the low cooldowns on her spells, as well as constant refreshing of her passive.
  • Cassiopeia's doesn't necessarily need a mana fix, thanks to her passive and low mana costs. However, due to her naturally low cooldowns and poke-heavy style of play in lane, she can easily charge Tear of the Goddess, whose ultimate upgrade Seraph's Embrace, gives Cassiopeia more AP than any other item save Rabadon's Deathcap and Mejai's Soulstealer at level 18, as well as a nice active. The AP it gives will be even greater if you plan to build other mana items such as Rod of Ages.
• Avoid building cooldown reduction. Because Noxious Blast's damage tick is constant and can only be reapplied, and using Twin Fang on a poisoned enemy reduces the cooldown to 0.5 seconds (which cannot be further reduced by CDR), Cassiopeia does not gain the significant benefit from CDR as other mages do.
  • Therefore, Rabadon's Deathcap will be the major purchase for when you want more damage as Cassiopeia.

Recommended builds

Countering

• If you can predict when Cassiopeia will use Petrifying Gaze such as at the beginning of a fight or at the end, you can avoid the 2 second stun.
  • You will hear Cassiopeia gasp before she activates Petrifying Gaze (.65 casting time), so you have a brief moment to react to Cassiopeia.
• Cassiopeia relies heavily on landing Petrifying Gaze so that Miasma and Noxious Blast are unavoidable.
• When dueling her she will put  Miasma right on you, despite the constant damage from it the time needed to move out will let her spam Twin Fang to death. It's better to stay in the venom and outburst her.
  • Mages with strong regenerative abilities like Swain, Vladimir, or Fiddlesticks can better outlast her DoT damage.
• Even with her passive, avoiding several of her abilities (better said Noxious Blast which is very predictable) will quickly lead to mana problems.
• Cassiopeia lacks a powerful instant nuke apart from Petrifying Gaze, other mages who can nuke potently or disabling her like Malzahar or Xerath can effectively counter her mid-late game
• Cassiopeia has excellent range on Noxious Blast and as its main harassing tool, outranging her is highly beneficial, mages like Lux and Brand have a clear advantage.
  • These mages can also outburst her if done correctly.
• Cassiopeia is a very powerful harasser. Noxious Blast allows her to give her lane opponent a hard time, but also be wary for Miasma, as it can set you up for ganks, make landing Noxious Blast or especially Twin Fang extremely easy, or zone you from minions very effectively. Buying Boots of Speed is a good and cheap way to limit her harassment.
• Cassiopeia is extremely proficient at 1v1 fights, having the most sustained damage of all mages (maybe only matched by Vladimir). Therefore it is not recommended to engage her alone. Since Cassiopeia has very high ability power scaling, she remains a constant threat to AD carries late game, since if she lands her ultimate, she can easily kill an AD carry without resistances within the 2 second stun Petrifying Gaze provides her.
  • Champions who can outmatch her sustained damage but also survive the 2 second stun like Vladimir, Kayle, Elise, or Swain can potentially duel and kill her.
• Due to Noxious Blast and Miasma, Cassiopeia is very powerful at kiting. If she gets Rylai's Crystal Scepter she will be almost impossible to reach if played correctly; do not engage her with a champion without strong gap closers or excellent ranges while also being able to withstand her damage in a 1v1 fight.
• Avoiding her Noxious Blast and Miasma is critical for your survival, as they deal heavy DoT, and being poisoned allows Cassiopeia to spam her Twin Fang on you.
  • Also, avoid being hit by the poisons of other champions: Singed's Poison Trail, Teemo's Toxic Shot/ Noxious Trap, or Twitch's Deadly Venom which will also allow Cassiopeia to spam her Twin Fang.

Champion Spotlight

Template:C-bot