Thanks for your comments @amaster507 .
Yes, it will be possible to apply count along with cascade.
With the current design of count queries, this could be handled by making two queries, first a count query to get the number of UIDs with given conditions and then a query with pagination to obtain the result. These queries could also be run simultaneously.
Why would you want to disregard the first directive. With the current design, it will be possible to count with cascade directive. Querying for other fields will have to be done separately.
A more general question is to whether to have separate count queries or to somehow accomodate the count part in the query itself as it is done in DQL.