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Malzahar Build Guide
Comments (73)
Malzahar Counter Picks
MALZAHAR
Malzahar #1
by Reginald
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RUNES>
9 Greater Mark of Insight
9 Greater Seal of Replenishment
9 Greater Glyph of Insight
3 Greater Quintessence of Fortitude

MASTERIES>
Offense (9)


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Utility (21)


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SKILL ORDER>
Level 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18
Summon Voidling (Passive)
Call of the Void X X X X X
Null Zone X X X X X
Malefic Visions X X X X X
Nether Grasp X X X
ITEM BUILD>
Starting Items: boots-of-speedhealth-potion3

Core Items: void-staffrabadons-deathcap

Final Items: sorcerers-shoesrabadons-deathcapvoid-staffbanshees-veilzhonyas-hourglass


deathfire-grasp This item is good, if you team lacks damage as a last item.


Starting items with Malzahar usually only has 2 routes.

sapphire-crystalhealth-potion2 OR boots-of-speedhealth-potion3


You usually want to start Boots of speed and three potions, when the enemy has roamers, so you'll be able to back off and avoid early level 1 ganks. Boots of Speed and three potions is always good regardless of the composition you're playing against.

Mana Crystal and 2 Health Potions is when you want to rush that early catalyst-the-protector and out lane your opponent slowly with pokes. If you go Sapphire Crystal, you should rush catalyst. You don't want to go this item build against a strong lane, because many times you'll see yourself buying boots before going straight catalyst. Only go this build if you're confident you can buy Catalyst after the first base run.


If you started with boots-of-speedhealth-potion3 , you have two routes to go from; either stack 2-3 dorans ring or go straight catalyst.

The difference between both builds is very clear. With Catalyst, you'll be poking and trying to out last your opponent. With Doran's Ring, you'll be going with a more aggressive build and you'll do more damage.

The Significance of stacking 2-3 dorans-ring is to avoid burst damage from your opponents. If you're laning against a strong lane with roamers, you'll want to go dorans ring because it'll help you survive. Whereas, if you go straight for catalyst - your early game will really hurt because you'll get zoned from experience.

The lane you choose, can easily determine your item build. If you were to go mid lane, you can go any item build preferred and won't be punished. However if you go top lane, choose your early build wisely because you can be in for immense pain. Always build your items on the match up.


These are builds I usually go:
boots-of-speedhealth-potion3 -->dorans-ringdorans-ring, Boots of speed into sorcerers-shoes blasting-wand needlessly-large-rod ---> rabadons-deathcap -- > void-staff, Depending on their composition you'll either build zhonyas-hourglass OR banshees-veil. If they have multiple stuns, I recommend Banshees.

Remember you do not need to initiate with your ultimate. You can always go Hour glass and ult after all the incoming damage. Playing Malzahar is all about using your ultimate at the right time. Do not be afraid to Ult Tanks, your pool melts them.


This is the most standard build here:boots-of-speed health-potion3 ---> catalyst-the-protector blasting-wandneedlessly-large-rod ===> rabadons-deathcap . Here is the tricky part, if they have multiple stuns, you want to finish up your catalyst into a banshees-veil, If you feel confident that you can kite and play like a boss go void-staff. Then finish up banshees after void staff, if you go voidstaff first. Now, you can either go zhonyas-hourglass or will-of-the-ancients. If its more of a poke fight and the enemy does not have engagement, you can go with will-of-the-ancients. If you're a main target Get zhonyas-hourglass . For your last and final item, you can either go guardian-angel OR deathfire-grasp depending on your team composition and whether you lack survivability or damage.



Introduction
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[champ/malzahar.png] His dance is awesome.

Malzahar is one of the strongest competitive casters in league of legends due to his design. He has a silence,stun, and an ability to melt tanks. If you're learning Malzahar, the key to being proficient is positioning. Although positioning is very important on every single caster and ad carry, malzahar requires very specific positioning in team fights. Your object is to silence the correct targets and at the same time immediately pick up your "threats". Threats are champions that does high damage or champions that can stun you or aoe stun. For example, if you can silence and ult and amumu before he can pull his ultimate off, you'll easily win your teammates the game. Rarely will you ever find yourself able to use your ultimate on an enemy carry or ap caster that is ranged. Basically, when playing Malzahar, your goal is to kill their tanks, before they kill yours. Once you kill their tanks, the enemy carries are easy kills.
Commentary on Malzahar
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Runes
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For Runes, I go with Health quintessence to survive early game in lane and in team fights. The runes are just for me to take extra damage, however you should never be out of position regardless, or you'll find yourself dead.


Forr Marks and Glpyhs, I go with magic penetration because with my early [skills/malzahar/w.png], I'll be able to do full damage with Sorcerer Boots.

Lastly, I go with Mana Regen Seals to help with Poke late game and early lane sustainability, however you should be given blue buff unless your team has a better poke champion. Poke champions are champions with specific skills to harass in team fights and pushing.

Runes are all preference, go with runes that help you win ;).
Masteries
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Mastery wise, I go with the standard caster build 9/0/21. 9 into offense for archaic knowledge for the penetration. 21 into utility for shorter summoner spells. These are probably the absolute best for malzahar, unless someone can recommend better masteries o.o.
Summoner Spells
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[summoners/ghost.png][summoners/flash.png]

Explanation:


Flash Ignite may be better in solo queue, but in competitive play I recommend ghost/flash because you'll need to kite. Always try to position perfectly. however you'll always find yourself being focused, so the summoners help you survive. With Ghost/Flash you'll find yourself doing infinitely more damage lategame than flash/ignite due to the fact that you'll live longer and your ability to kite. If you play against a heal composition, you may need to go flash/ignite. If you can pull off flash/ignite without dying, THEN DO IT =). If you find yourself dying then go with ghost flash. You'll always be the main target, if your opponents are smart. The more games you play on malzahar, the better you'll get. Experiment!
Skills
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[skills/malzahar/p.png] Passive: Summon Voidling

After casting 4 spells, Malzahar summons an uncontrollable Voidling to engage enemy units for 21 seconds. Voidlings have 200 + 50 x lvl Health and 20 + 5 x lvl Damage.

Voidlings Grow after 7 seconds (+50% Damage/Armor), and Frenzy after 14 seconds (+100% Attack Speed).

Explanation:


Voidlings are sometimes annoying, but sometimes very useful. Just remember that most of the time, your lane will always be pushing. The positive effect that voidlings give is that your pushing power immense early game. With the pushing power, you can push the creeps to their tower, making them lose gold because tower will be last hitting your creeps. Voidling also helps you avoid harass damage because your opponent will never engage on you, if your voidling is out - unless you're so low that you're a free kill. If you low bro, go back to base. When you're 6, always try to make use of your voidling- Make sure that when you use your [skills/malzahar/w.png][skills/malzahar/r.png] combo, your voidling will spawn. If it does, your opponent should be taking 15% +250 + 150 from voidling + 1 auto attack from yourself. Do the math, thats the hp your opponent will die at. (If you have sorc boots, or your spells wont do full damage).




[skills/malzahar/q.png] Q: Call of the Void

Malzahar opens two portals to the void. After a short delay, they fire projectiles which deal 80 / 135 / 190 / 245 / 300 (+80% of ability power) magic damage and silence champions for 1.4 / 1.8 / 2.2 / 2.6 / 3 seconds.

Cost 90 / 100 / 110 / 120 / 130mana
Range 900

Explanation:


Call of void is very effective in team fights and ganks. This spell can easily win you a fight, if used correctly. You can silence a warwick ultimate, stop amumu from ulting or even silence 5 players and annihilate them. Using this skill as effectively as possible will win you games. There are two ways to use this spell, focus on a very big threat target like amumu and predict his pathing, Or silence and go for numbers of champions you silence. People usually go with the number of champions, usually its more effective. Silencing a specific target is very difficult due to the animation time.
With golem, you can just spam silence to harass. When pushing, you can spam silence on nothing to summon your voidling to push towers down.



[skills/malzahar/w.png] W: Null Zone

Malzahar creates a zone of negative energy for 5 seconds. The zone damages nearby enemies for 5/6/7/8/9% (+0.01%) of their max health each second (damage to Monsters is capped).

Cooldown 16 seconds

Cost 90 / 100 / 110 / 120 / 130 mana

Range 800


Explanation:



This is one of the strongest spells in the game and destroys tanks. You want to combo Null Zone with your ultimate, Nether Grasp. As you Null Zone, go for number of champions, then ult the closest enemy target in the Null Zone.





[skills/malzahar/e.png] E: Malefic Visions

Malzahar infects his target's mind, dealing 80 / 140 / 200 / 260 / 320 (+80% of ability power) magic damage over 4 seconds. If the target dies during this time, the visions pass to a nearby enemy and Malzahar gains 10 / 14 / 18 / 22 / 26 mana.

Cost 60 / 75 / 90 / 105 / 120mana
Range 600

Explanation:


You level up this spell first to farm and harass. Just combo this with Null Zone and Nether Grasp on an enemy champion o.o.





[skills/malzahar/r.png] R: Nether Grasp

Malzahar channels the essence of the Void to suppress the target (stuns and disables summoner spells), dealing 250 / 400 / 550 (+150% of ability power) magic damage over 2.5 seconds.

Cost 150mana
Range 575

Explanation:



As I've said many times, Malzahar is all about positioning. If you're going to use your ultimate on someone, make sure he dies. Do not overextend to waste your ultimate on an enemy carry and end up dying. If you can pull off your ultimate on an enemy carry and kill him without being punished, then do it. However most of the time, you'll find yourself comboing Null Zone and Nether Grasp on an enemy tank.


Skill Order
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You always level up [skills/malzahar/e.png] first.

If you're in need of the silence time, then max [skills/malzahar/q.png] after.

However, I usually max [skills/malzahar/w.png] second.


Early Game
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As Malzahar early game, you want to farm and play safe. When you voidling is up, you have the choice to harass your opponent. If you can auto attack them, when they're last hitting that would be best. You have to understand your match-ups in lane. If you're laning against a strong lane, play safe and wait till 6. When you reach 6, you can easily kill your opponent with voidling,null zone and nether grasp with a jungle gank easily. Malzahar starts to become strong at level 6, so your objective is to reach that point.
Mid Game
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Mid game is all about dragon control and buff control. Malzahar is very strong at this point because if you were to find someone in the jungle with a teammate, they're pretty much dead with your ultimate. Your objective is to farm and pull off ganks and kills when your lane is pushing. Malzahar is very strong in 2 or 3 confrontations mid game because the target you're ulting will instantly die. Your voidling at this point will be insanely strong as well.
Late Game
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For Late Game,you want to play safe and stay on the back. Use your ultimate on the closest target and avoid damage. Try to Null zone for numbers and ult a person while they're standing in Null zone. By Late game, you should have death cap and void staff. The person you ult should still melt. Avoid ulting targets that have quicksilver sash. By Late game, you'll usually find all your opponents to have quick silver sash and this item is very strong against Malzahar, so you have to be careful. You can also choose not to ult any target and just wait till later in the fight to ult. You dont need to blow your ultimate at the beginning of the fight. There are always cases where you can save your ultimate. Most of the time though, you'll find yourself ulting a tank at the beginning of a fight.
Final Comments
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Malzahar is a very strong caster and usually always good in competitive play. Learning Malzahar is very tricky and hes all about positioning and using your ultimate on the right target. Ulting the correct target is the difference between winning and losing a team fight. His bread and butter skills are Null zone and Call of void. Using Null zone and call of void correctly will change the outcome of a team fight. League is all about decision making and you'll get better as you play more. =)

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Comments: 73
  • x2theone2x
    6 months ago
    This guide in my opinion is still top notch for players in terms of items, skill order, and masteries.
  • CarnivalNights
    9 months ago
    These "featured" guides that haven't been updated in over a year should have that tagged removed from them.
  • EatingSteak
    10 months ago
    Over a year old as of writing this comment. Any chance for an update?
  • THE ART OF JOHN
    11 months ago
    officially a leap year old pls update :(.
  • jowow
    11 months ago
    kidding me bro?ghost on malza?FAIL!
  • Sepah
    11 months ago
    update this plz regi
  • Nipul
    1 year ago
    Regibro! Please update it! It's nearly 1 year ago, and there are still some Malz players out there!
  • 2346273454
    1 year ago
    DrunkenJudgement im not sure if you are serious or trolling.

    "The usual enemy will not purchase any magic resist until late game."
    fail right there.

    Expect most tanky DPS to have ~74-150 MR at 20 minutes. Some udyr with mercs + wits end will have 80+ MR.
    A galio will have 270 at 20 minutes.

    By the time you get a void staff (30 minutes usually) the enemys which you can ult will have 130+ MR.
    so about 100 after flat magic pen, the void staff will penetrate 40 MR. And you say that a void staff isn't worth it..

    "Tanks cannot be killed fast" I'm sorry, but ANYONE dies instantly with all 5 lategame. I don't care if it is a singed' AD carries with 60% crit 250 AD 1.7 attack speed and a last wisper and IE will melt any tank instantly. Smart people playing squishies DO focus tanks, unless you have some sort of godmode. (Karthus, Trynd, etc etc).
    All it takes to kill a tank is malz + any AD carry, the tank will be dead before your ult is done.
  • ALCP
    1 year ago
    Outdated
  • DrunkenJudgement
    1 year ago
    I'm not too sure if this guide is being serious or has a subtle troll face in the background.

    In regards to magic penetration, this guide mentions the following runes and items
    Greater Mark of Insight - 0.95 x 9 = 8.5 magic penetration
    Greater Glyph of Insight - 0.57 x 9 = 5.1 magic penetration
    Sorcerers Shoes - 20.0 magic penetration
    Subtotal Magic Penetration = 33.6 Magic penetration
    Void Staff - 40% magic penetration 

    Note: these runes and items are first priority.

    The usual enemy will not purchase any magic resist until late game. Thus, their magic resist will remain at 30 (with the exception of a very few champs, that have increasing magic resist per level, for example volibear)

    So if the calculation for magic damage follows the sequence 1) magic reduction flat 2) magic reduction % 3) magic penetration flat 4) magic penetration % and u cannot go below 0 magic resist through magic penetration stats (I.e. no bonus damage generated), then it means that you will have inefficiently used 6 glyph slots that could have been used for something else and 2,300 gold to purchase a void staff, which % magic penetration is doing nothing throughout most of the game.

    Furthermore, after inefficiently using gold to purchase the void staff mid game, lets assume that the enemy finally decides to puchase a negatron late game, which grants ~50 magic resist, for a total of 80 magic resist. Netting the 33.6 Magic Penetration from Sorcerers Shoes and Runes, the enemy is left with 46.4 Magic Resist. The void staff will then generate 18.6 magic penetration (40% of the 46.5 magic resist left). Now, the enemy, left with 27.8 magic resist, will take some heavy damage, partly justifying your possession of a void staff. So the real question is, what else can I buy for 2300 that would generate a better return on investment - an abysmal scepter, for 350 more gold, will reduce magic resist by 20 (1000 range) for every enemy around you, provide you with similar AP, AND grant you 57 magic resist. So, in this aspect, it seems that you did not do your homework.

    Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention, although the voids staff will do serious damage to tanks since the moment you purchase it, tanks should not be the primary focus because, although you might be dealing ton of damage, ur ally units cannot deal similar amount of damage on tanks, so they will refrain from doing so. So in the end, u'll be the only moron ulting and attacking a tank.
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