Reign of Gaming

"AP mid" is used to describe a set of champions that typically play in mid lane BECAUSE they scale with AP. That's how it really is.

Let me explain in detail: Mid lane is where you want the champion that is the overall strongest/most versatile on your team. From mid lane you have access to jungle, bot and top. That's the entire map. And that's the reason you typically don't put your ranged AD carry mid: He's weak early and kinda meh midgame, only becomes god in late game. You don't want that kind of champion on the most important position during laning phase. Bruisers are strong early and midgame, so they actually were a good choice mid lane, if only their items didn't suck. And that's why you put your AP champ mid: He's as strong/versatile as a bruiser during the entire laning phase, but scales off of AP, opening up the absolute best item choices in the game.

The major flaw in YOUR train of thought is the following: "The fact that you mainly see AP champions at mid is merely because of the meta." And then you go full stop. You know, there's a reason why meta puts APs mid, and it's the exact thing I described above. APs have by far the best itemization, because they're getting all the love from Riot. And it's gonna continue in S3. Want a proof? Take a look at the new/reworked items. APs came off ahead of everyone else again. Heads and heels above, that is.

Yea well, despite Riot trying their best to deny it; it's pretty obvious AP champs get all their love. Reason for that is simple: AP mid is what everyone wants to play. You join champ select, and the first lines of chat typically look like this: guy 1:"i mid" guy2:"me mid" guy3:"mdi ortroll praty deluxe!"

Riot is making their money by selling champions and skins. How do you sell the most champions (and therefore skins) with minimal effort on Riots' side? Pick the type of champion that is most popular, and give these kinds of champions all the love. That's why we have bruiser that are.. well.. bruisers. And that's why we have assassin that are.. assassins. That's why we have ranged ADs that do.. physical damage at range. But also, that's why we have AP mids who function like bruisers, AP mids that function like assassins, AP mids that deal damage at range, AP mids that cc the shit out of you, AP mids that shield stuff, AP mids that AoE down entire teams, .... Basically, AP mids do everything all other roles combined do, only difference being they scale with AP.

So in the end, it's not really a problem of assassin not getting enough love. It's really a problem of AP mids getting ALL the love, the other roles not getting anything and assassins just being the weakest amongst those "non-AP-mids".

I also don't really see a chance  of assassins being viable again in S3, because Riot really has no intention whatsoever to balance the roles in their game. They clear intend is to keep the superioty of AP mids, because that's their easiest way to make money.

I kinda fear the jungle rework to be honest.

I didn't really like what they did to the jungle with the S2 rework, so bringing it back closer to the S1 jungle by itself is a good thing, in my very humble opinion.

What I'm really afraid about tho is how Riot is planning to force which champs should jungle and how good they should perform. S2 jungle rework was a huge disaster in one specific way: They promised a lot of stuff and explained their goals behind the rework, and achieved pretty much the complete opposite. If Riot has learned their lesson, they will now know the following: A rework alone isn't enough. When they name champion variety and AP junglers as goal of the rework, they will most likely have to actively force it with buffs/nerfs/tweaks/whatever to specific champions.

And here's the thing I'm afraid of: The buff/nerf list Stonewall already talked about in his post. Except that this list isn't speculation or "most likely there", it's definately there. This list includes certain AP champs (Diana, Fiddle..) that Riot wants to jungle, and I fear they will make them viable junglers no matter what. If they don't work as junglers even after the jungle rework, Riot will force them on us by either buffing them, nerfing everyone else or doing even more changed to the jungle.

And then there's the nerf list, and I can already name 2 champions on this list 100% guaranteed: Lee Sin and Nocturne. Which is kinda sad, because these champions are amazingly fun to play and pretty popular amongst players, and the thing Riot seems to never learn is that repeatedly nerfing a certain champion will eventually make him vanish from the meta, regardless of how popular that champ might have been before the nerfs. They're really shortsighted on that matter for some reason.

TLDR;: Jungle rework yay (more like S1 again), but afraid of Riot artificially forcing the results they promised.