Honestly, I like how both of them sound, however, I have yet to play either of them. I have enough to buy one of them, and was wondering which one is more worth it (I plan on eventually getting both, however. This is more of a "Which should I get first" kind of thing).

Though they kinda share the crown of The Chase and Escape King, they are vastly different gameplay-wise. Shaco is best used as jungler, while his highlights are made of cunning mindgames, strategic JitBing, bold and daring swashbuckling in the nick of health and other adrenaline-filled nonsense. Kassadin, on the other hand, is like steamroll on meth: he gloriously enters the fray in the pool of azure pain, nullball falls, everyone dies. He's all about brute disables and crapload of semi-ranged burst, little to no finesse here. Choice is yours. But overall, I'd say, binary choices are better solved with taking BOTH options. Shaco or Kass? Why, of course Shaco AND Kass is better. IPs are trivial matter, really.

Zuthuzu speaks the truth here, not much to add really.

PS: Kassadin is for ez mode newbs :] (I main shaco)

Well, if they're pretty much even, I guess it comes down to what fits me best at the moment: I have almost no runes to speak of, and am only at level 17. If shaco doesn't require full runes/masteries to be viable, then I take him (Since I love jungling and ganking.) If Kass is the better pick in this situation, then I'll just pick up shaco when I get a little higher up in levels/have better runes.

you need to learn how to jungle with shaco, read my guide to learn how!

http://solomid.net/guides.php?g=45

Yes, well, jungling at 30 isn't the problem. My question is whether or not it is viable for ME at where I am currently at with my summoner level. Because if its not, I'd rather get a champ I can use *now* rather than one I have to wait to use.

Takes a lot of skill to jungle well with Shaco. I think the mistake most new Shacos make is that they consider him a godmode ganker...and they try ganking so much that they neglect their farm and end up useless. Granted, Shaco needs to gank quite a bit, but you need to balance that with your farm. Remember, 15 cs > 1 kill.

I actually saw a Shaco that had merely 23 cs at 25 minutes into the game. I only counterjungled him a few times at wraiths, so I really wondered what he had been doing the whole match.

Now, to point out my newbishness even more, I must ask: The heck is CS? (I may or may not be right, but does it basically translate into creep/minion kills?)

So I decided to go with Shaco: Its my first stealth champ, and I love jungling/ganking. Thanks for helping me decide, however!

Cs = creepscore.

I'm not sure what benchmarks for junglers are, but a solo laner should have 100 cs by 20 minutes max. I've seen Top Elo players get this amount in as less as 13 minutes, but that takes near-perfect lasthit skill.

As a jungler, your cs will be lower than that of the soloes, so don't sweat it much. Concentrate on keeping up your levels, and at minimum staying on par with the duo lanes. If you ever fall below duo lane levels, stop roaming and start farming.