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[Skyrunner]

That's very impressive but I just want you to keep in mind that playing mages or ADCs top lane to counter fighters is literally the Devil, Satan.

Whadyamean?

Then you'll meet the rare, super speedy damage Garen. He's probably my favorite top, sustain along with escape wrapped into a large damage buff. The ult's scaling on missing health along with the flat bonus is great against all people.

I dunno, but I havem't seen Garen in a long while.

[GreatJustice]

The last Garen I saw was pretty funny. He did okay in lane, but whenever he spotted the enemy team he immediately charged straight into them before any of us could get into range, apparently thinking "I'm Garen, I'm a tank, nothing can kill me!" before being bursted down and leaving us with no one to initiate.

Anyhow, I was wondering if someone could give me advice on which champ to try. I generally play mid Malzahar, though I occasionally play mid Heimerdinger, top/support Teemo, support Soraka, support Blitzcrank, and adc Twitch. I've gotten pretty good with Malzahar, but I find there are some situations where he just isn't able to carry as hard as I need him to. I've been looking at Karthus and Xerath, though I'd like to hear any suggestions. Preferably the champ would have good scaling and not be a huge hassle to learn.

[Flying Dice]

Xerath is pretty good all around. You've got good base damage and ratios, great poke, great CC, inbuilt mana sustain better than TF's, easy roams, great waveclear... pretty much the only thing you don't have is mobility, and with good timing you can negate that with a E+W combo on anyone that jumps on you.

Vel'koz is similar in a lot of respects, except that he gives up the mana sustain for better early trades.

[The Scout]

Don't get Karthus. He's not very viable to play mid currently, with the other champs with higher scaling and mobility.

[xaritscin]

The last Garen I saw was pretty funny. He did okay in lane, but whenever he spotted the enemy team he immediately charged straight into them before any of us could get into range, apparently thinking "I'm Garen, I'm a tank, nothing can kill me!" before being bursted down and leaving us with no one to initiate.

Anyhow, I was wondering if someone could give me advice on which champ to try. I generally play mid Malzahar, though I occasionally play mid Heimerdinger, top/support Teemo, support Soraka, support Blitzcrank, and adc Twitch. I've gotten pretty good with Malzahar, but I find there are some situations where he just isn't able to carry as hard as I need him to. I've been looking at Karthus and Xerath, though I'd like to hear any suggestions. Preferably the champ would have good scaling and not be a huge hassle to learn.

people usually seem to think that because garen is a 450 IP champ he will be easy to get kills or win matches, pretty much like Master Yi, but one cannot be so idiotic to think that, there's many counters to him. garen is easy to use however, well played you can pretty much win the match even without having gotten any kills. a fed garen can withstand the enemy damage enough to get one or two kills in the teamfights as the initiator. but depends heavily in the organization of the team.

having to rely only in cooldowns and having higher life regen makes him annoying to fight againts. you just need a champion that doesnt allow him to recover quickly enough to stay in line....and have a jungler with enough CC, once he spends the Q he wont be able to get any escape, unless he spends his flash too

[xaritscin]

Don't get Karthus. He's not very viable to play mid currently, with the other champs with higher scaling and mobility.

karthus just needs to stay enough time farming in line to advance, is passive enough that he even can get kills while not being the place. you dont rush to poke the enemy, you just try to stay enough time in the line to outfarm him, and if you need kills, rely in the other lines with your ult....as simple as that.

[Flying Dice]

One thing to note with Karthus is that, if you're sieging or can force a fight, it's often better to use your ult right as/just before your team engages, rather than saving it in the hope of getting a bunch of kills after you die/they scatter.

[Arcvasti]

Karthus is pretty awesome and one of my favorite mids Is he about as fragile as an icicle? Yes. Is he as immobile as a glacier? Yes. Can he unleash undying undodgeable[Mostly. Fuck you Fizz.] fury from beyond the grave? Yes. Do those advantages and disadvantages balance out?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Yes. Yes they do. If you think otherwise, you are obviously one of THEM and should be executed immediately.



^That was a joke. Don't hit me.

In all seriousness, Karthus is decently viable. A mostly automatic hit global ult that hurts their whole team is devastating at the right time. That plus his DPS with aura and Q spam make him pretty awesome if used correctly. His main weakness is mobility and inadequate tankiness for his range. With the proper application of Flash, passive, semi tank mage items and a suitable teamfight ult[Varus, Amumu, maybe Jarvan.], those are mostly nullified. Is he the best mid laner? No. But Rito changes the game with nerfs or buffs[Sometimes]. He could BECOME the best mid laner in the future. And he isn't the worst mid laner right now. What more could you ask for? Awesome voice acting. He has that too.

FAKEEDIT: In response to the original poster, I would probably recommend getting Xerath because its a pain to learn to Karthus properly. Having little burst, no hard cc and one of the most different farming mechanisms in the game make him tricky and unpopular. Whereas Xerath is decently simple and incorporates easy to learn concepts such as "Hit them with the laser" and "Stun them then kill them to death". He's also "meta", which means other people who aren't me like him because he makes things boring[<--Overgeneralization, please don't hit me].

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
On a similar note, I have been debating on which champion to get next. Xerath is sort of neat and is apparently "meta" now[Please refer to my earlier definition of "meta"]. But I've also been having fun with Ahri because bursting down the other mid laner is fun sometimes[Even if afterwards I can't do anything ELSE, its still fun]. And there is also Vel'Koz who is like Xerath but more purple and with up to 80% more tentacles.

One thing to note with Karthus is that, if you're sieging or can force a fight, it's often better to use your ult right as/just before your team engages, rather than saving it in the hope of getting a bunch of kills after you die/they scatter.

^This. While using it to KS is fun, it is also educational[Which means that it teaches you not to do that because its a bad idea]. And its really good on ARAM where poked enemies STAY poked unless they have several healers.

[GreatJustice]

Yeah, Karthus seems to be very weak in lane, but even so I've seen a few fed Karthuses that can melt anyone that comes close and then rake in kills by ulting at opportune times. Regardless, the main reason I was looking at him is because he seems to contrast nicely with Malzahar, letting me have two completely different mid laners with different functions that can cover very different team comps as necessary. To compare:

Spoiler: BORING CHAMP ANALYSIS (click to show/hide)

Malzahar:
+ Ludicrously strong in lane and in dueling
+ Has no real hard counters, with his biggest problems coming from long range poke champs with no kill pressure
+ Massive burst damage can 100-0 about half of champs when on even terms
+ Pushes well, farms well, takes objectives well
+ Fairly versatile in terms of builds (personally, I alternate between a more "tanky Malzahar" build centred on Rylais, Zhonya's and Liandry's and a "hyperfed carry sustain Malzahar" centred around Athenes, WoTA and Rabadon's
+Lots of utility thanks to his extremely long silence, his max HP shred, his voidlings and his suppression

-Carrying potential limited by the fact that he can only exert pressure on other lanes/jungle if he's already safely secured his own lane
-His late game is pretty good so far as burst mages go, but he certainly falls behind
-No mobility to speak of, and unless he's fed he can only take on enemies 1v1, meaning he's vulnerable to ganks/jungler camping
-Not quite as strong in teamfights


vs Karthus

-Squishy, more or less short ranged
-Very weak in lane, hard countered by assassins, no burst at all
-No mobility

+Strong late game
+Can exert pressure on other lanes without dominating his own
+Very high damage and effectiveness in teamfights
+Basically infinite carrying potential (in the right hands)

I might be wrong about Karthus, but I think he has sufficient carrying potential for what I need.

Anyhow, here's the situation in more detail; I recently hit level 30, and want to do well in my placement games. However, I have very few champs that I actually play regularly, those being, more or less in order, Malzahar, Twitch, Teemo and Heimerdinger. Teemo is only really useful in specific situations (eg. top lane vs someone like Tryndamere or support against a short ranged adc) and recent changes to ADC items have made my old reliable Twitch build/playstyle seemingly uneffective (specifically, rushing BT and going for very aggressive ambushes using my long stealth), so that leaves Heimer and Malzahar as champs I play regularly and am good with. Heimer has basically no carry potential at all, so I've been working hard on getting good enough with Malzahar that I can carry whatever team I get to victory. Indeed, this seems to work about half the time, with many games where I go 18-3, roam enough to help my teammates win lane, and then win very quickly before our team's incapability of teamfighting becomes an issue. However, I've run into the following issues that make Malzacarry tricky:

-If I'm laning against someone that's very cautious and has some range, I can't leave lane without them hammering the tower. So I'm basically glued to lane as other lanes are slowly lost to attrition, until we reach late game where I'm the only one capable of dealing damage, I'm not fed so I can't carry, and then I get focused and die.

-If the enemy jungler knows what he's doing, he'll recognize that Malzahar is ludicrously strong in lane and can get fed early if he doesn't help mid out. So he'll camp the hell out of mid, turret dive (with mid support) to guarantee kills, and generally besiege Malzahar for the entire early game. When this happens to me, unless I get very lucky with timing and manage a double kill the usual result is that I'm dependent on my jungler to make up for me having no global presence, no kill pressure and inadequate farm, with the usual result being that he does nothing and we lose in late game.

-Some teams are simply too bad to carry, simply because they don't understand when to initiate a teamfight, how to focus in a teamfight, how to play cautiously if behind or how to take other objectives when the team is behind. I've legitimately had situations where half the team (consisting of mid silver players) was focusing the support in a close team fight because "she's low", and where I ult combo someone wreaking havoc upon our team, but they simply run away instead of finishing them off.

These are all things that have happened in games I've played, by the way. Hell, all were exemplified in the last game I played.

Spoiler: Silly rant (click to show/hide)

So I started the game and discovered I was laning against Yasuo. "Oh boy!" I thought to myself, "I basically hard counter Yasuo, this should be easy!"

So I started laning and discovered that this Yasuo was quite aggressive. He engaged in many trades with me, especially when my E was down or my mana was low. I generally came out ahead, and figured that I'd wipe him out come level 6. Suddenly, Lee Sin jumped out of the bush, beat my face in along with Yasuo, and secured a kill.

"Damn, I was too cocky there," I thought, "I'll play passively for a bit until I can take Yasuo." So I continued trading hits with Yasuo, but avoided going too far ahead so as not to get ganked. At one point, Yasuo got my health very low, but I got his very low and he appeared to be backing. So I went to my own turret to back. Suddenly, Lee Sin jumped out of the jungle behind me, killed me, and escaped as Yasuo returned to lane with a health pot. So I was basically shut down early game.

After another inconsequential 1-1 exchange with Yasuo, things turned around as I began roaming. I rescued my Wukong from Teemo and decisively turned the lane around, to the point where Wukong could beat Teemo on his own, and then I won a good team fight in bot lane. By mid game, my KDR was something like 9/3/5 and our team comp seemed to be effective in all the team fights. However, right before the most important teamfight yet, our Wukong said "brb" and left for about three minutes. Ignoring this, our bot lane (responsible for the score being even close, by the way, having basically fed all game) charged into a very pointless 4v5 that we lost, and it was all downhill from there. Wukong arrived in time to see us lose two inhibitors, but by that point there was little we could do even with a functional team comp.

So yeah, point is I want a mid champ that works with team compositions Malzahar might not work with, that works nicely in teamfights and can carry very, very hard, or at least can affect other lanes early on without necessarily having to dominate mid first.

Oh, and on a completely unrelated note, how's Zilean? Most of what I've seen is that he's close to being a ridiculously high mana champ that can't burst or poke and only has a few tricks, but I've seen a few people claim that he's highly underrated and works very well in mid lane under certain situations.

[frostshotgg]

Big minus for Malz you skipped over, his mana pool is absurdly tiny. He can't endure poke wars for long.

[Flying Dice]

On a similar note, I have been debating on which champion to get next. Xerath is sort of neat and is apparently "meta" now[Please refer to my earlier definition of "meta"]. But I've also been having fun with Ahri because bursting down the other mid laner is fun sometimes[Even if afterwards I can't do anything ELSE, its still fun]. And there is also Vel'Koz who is like Xerath but more purple and with up to 80% more tentacles.

Ahri's a lot of fun to play, but you definitely want to practice with her a lot before you think about picking her in ranked. The Charm hitbox is deceptively small if you just go by the projectile, and the way her burst functions can be a bit strange if you aren't used to it. Also, obviously, learning which walls you can ult over.

It's funny, actually, when I got to thinking about my statement earlier re: Vel'Koz, it is an absurd degree of similarity.

Let's break down Xerath's QWE into a couple things:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Function:
-Long range poke (Q)
-Waveclear (Q)
-High-damage slow (W)
-Hard CC (E)

Form:
-Straight-line skillshot (E)
-AoE linear skillshot (Q)
-Circular AoE skillshot with variable effects depending on where the enemy is in it (W)

And... Vel'Koz

Function:
-Long range poke (Q)
-Waveclear (W)
-High-damage slow (Q)
-Hard CC (E)

Form:
-Straight-line skillshot (Q)
-AoE linear skillshot (W)
-Circular AoE skillshot with variable effects depending on where the enemy is in it (E)

:V

[Skyrunner]

Loss after loss in ranked. This makes me sad.

[GreatJustice]

Big minus for Malz you skipped over, his mana pool is absurdly tiny. He can't endure poke wars for long.

His E rebuilds his mana really fast though, and generally you can do fine with one mana item (usually Athene's for me). At any rate, I never had problems with his mana, but some people use his Q and W more than I do.

[frostshotgg]

The problem with relying on his E come pokewars is that you're maybe going to gain a few dozen mana once per wave if your team doesn't out of hand nuke the wave in such a way as to stop you getting bounces. Meanwhile, even one skill costs over 100 mana, so you can only afford to toss out a q or w once every 5 waves? It's not sustainable in the slightest and so Malz is basically a sitting duck in sieges.
As far as mana items go, Malz has the double whammy problem if having gigantic mana costs and an abysmal mana pool. The mana costs being so large basically means athene's isn't sufficient to sustain him chucking out a skill more than once every wave or so, and the problem with going that route is that your mana pool is basically nonexistant, if you don't buy a mana item, you're going to run out of the stuff within a couple rotations of skills. On the flip side, mana items only serve to stave off the problem, giving you one or two extra rotations before you're back at point a, and buying multiple mana items is an untenable waste of slots that's not even worth discussing.

This isn't to say that Malz has no place on any team, but he's a vastly inferior choice on any team that doesn't hard engage at the first opportunity. He cannot deal with sieges and other extended fights to save his life.

[GreatJustice]

Early game, his E costs quite a bit less, so pretty much any use of it (if used properly) will get him his mana back with interest, letting him periodically poke with a Q. Yeah, you can't just spam your abilities constantly like Ziggs, but that isn't Malzahar's main strength, and your cooldowns are too long for that sort of thing anyway. The main trick is to utilize those voidlings to maximize mana gain from the E and possibly also benefit most from pokes. So I put my E on a minion, voidling spawns, kills wave, possibly jumps to enemy champ, and I've basically won the exchange. If I feel the need, I can use my Q and W to bully the enemy for a while, and then play more passively once I hit 50% mana or so, which is completely fine for me since my E can bounce indefinitely and my voidling can farm E'd minions near the enemy tower while I'm standing a bit in front of my own tower. The only time I ever have problems with mana management is when I'm forced to spam abilities and my build doesn't have a mana item yet, which is usually either when I'm getting ganked by another lane + jungle, when I'm roaming and get stuck in a prolonged early teamfight, or when I'm laning against an AD mid with jungle support and built Seeker's Armguard instead of Chalice of Harmony.

In late game, my mana regen from Athene's is sufficient that I can poke with Q and bounce my E indefinitely and do just fine. Mind, there are specific circumstances where I burn through mana pretty fast, like where I'm being sieged at a turret by multiple enemies and I'm the only one capable of doing significant damage for whatever reason, but besides those I can usually poke regularly in sieges and still have enough mana left over to nuke someone into nothing with a EWR combo, which is about as much as is necessary.