3.3.11
1.3.11
Release notes v.1.0.0.112
New Skins in the Store
Jarvan, the Exemplar of Demacia
- Commando Jarvan
- Dragon Slayer Jarvan
- Hextech Anivia
- Loch Ness Cho’Gath
- The Login Queue will now update your position more regularly
- The Login Queue will no longer lock the focus of the application
- You can now disable the Music at the main login page
- Clickable URLs can now be sent via player to player chat
- Updated the splash art for Twitch, Evelynn, Katarina, and Annie
- Fixed several bugs with the Login Queue
- Fixed a bug where your IP/RP balance would display incorrectly as 0
- Fixed a bug where Summoners would display as Level 1 before displaying their correct Level and Rating
- Fixed a bug where the display style for the Buddy List was overly dark
- Fixed a bug where the Recently Purchased section of the Profile was working incorrectly
Jarvan, the Exemplar of Demacia
- Dragon Strike: Jarvan IV charges through his opponent, dealing physical damage and lowering their armor by a %. This will pull Jarvan IV to a Standard if it encounters one, knocking up all enemies in his path.
- Golden Aegis: Jarvan IV calls upon the ancient kings of Demacia to shield him from harm and slow surrounding enemies. Triggers automatically if damage would reduce Jarvan below 300 Health if it is not on cooldown.
- Demacian Standard: Passively grants Jarvan bonus attack speed and armor. Active: Throws a Demacian flag, dealing physical damage and granting passive benefits to nearby allies.
- Cataclysm (Ultimate): Jarvan IV heroically leaps at his target, dealing physical damage and creating a circle of terrain around them for a few seconds.
- Martial Cadence (Passive): Jarvan IV exploits his target's opening, dealing 8% of the target's current HP as magic damage. This effect cannot occur on the same target for 6 seconds.
- Glacial Storm initial mana cost decreased to 75/125/175 from 100/150/200
- Ace in the Hole
- Projectile speed increased to 3200 from 2200
- Range increased to 1600/1900/2200 from 1400/1800/2200
- Initial cast time leading up to the channeling time has been significantly decreased
- Trueshot Barrage now scales with bonus attack damge at a 1.0 ratio
- Decisive Strike
- Movement speed boost increased to 3 seconds from 2
- Total duration available to proc the silence and hit reduced to 6 seconds from 7
- Bonus damage ratio increased to 150% from 120%
- Judgment cooldown reduced to 14/13/12/11/10 from 15/14/13/12/11 seconds
- Monsoon no longer slows enemies who re-enter the storm
- Heavenly Wave base heal increased to 35/55/75/95/115/135 from 30/45/60/75/90/105
- Spirit Bond cooldown reduced to 15/14/13/12/11/10 from 20/18/16/14/12/10.
- Soul Shield Increased the shield strength by 10 at all ranks.NEED TO BE WRITTEN CORRECTLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- Mantra cooldown reduced to 25 seconds from 30 seconds.
- Ethereal Chains ability power ratio increased to 0.5 from 0.4 for both damage components
- Twisted Advance levelup tooltip now correctly displays the increase in mana cost
- Fixed a bug where Maokai's death animation would not play if he is slain during Twisted Advance
- Mace of Spades ability power ratio increased to 0.4 from 0.2
- Fixed a bug that was causing Poison Trail to have a 1 second cooldown upon activation
- Fixed a bug with Boomerang Blade that was causing certain items to not show their bonus attack damage in the tooltip
- Fixed a bug with Acid Hunter that was causing missile lock to shoot further then intended
- Primordial Burst ability power ratio increased to 1.2 of Veigar's ability power and reduced to 0.8 of his target's ability power
- Fixed a bug where the particle on Time Warp would not persist through the full duration of the movement speed modifier at later ranks
- Fixed a tooltip bug where Haunting Guise said it provided 180 Health and 20 Ability Power, when it actually provided 200 Health and 25 Ability Power
- Morello's Evil Tome cooldown reduction increased to 20% from 15%
- Sight and Vision Wards can now be stacked 5 per slot
- Tiamat
- Attack damage increased to 50 from 42
- Mana regeneration per 5 seconds increased to 5 from 4
- Shop tooltip is now more descriptive, matching the inventory tooltip
- Spirit Visage increased healing and regeneration effects reduced to 15% from 20%
- Ghost duration decreased to 10 from 14
- Death Timers have been reduced on Summoner's Rift to 12-50 seconds from 28-50 seconds
- Minions
- Melee minion magic resist now increases 1.25 per 3 minutes (up from 0.5)
- Ranged minion armor now increases 1.25 per 3 minutes (up from 0.5)
- Cannon minion armor and magic resist now increase 3 per 3 minutes (up from 2)
- After 20 minutes, cannon minions now spawn every 2 waves (up from every 3 waves)
- Cannon minions and super minions now reduce turret damage by 65% (up from 50%)
- Fixed a tooltip bug "This unit receive..." with cannon minions and super minions
- Minions now deal about 50% more damage to turrets
- Turrets
- Turrets deal about 10% less base damage to champions
- Turrets now have 20% armor penetration
- Fixed several typos in the Options Menu
League of Legends - Jarvan IV Champion Spotlight
Welcome to the Jarvan Champion Spotlight, summoners! Finally completing the five-piece Demacian brigade, Jarvan is ready to take the Fields of Justice by storm. Don’t believe me? Let the video prove it to you!
28.2.11
Improve Microing - a guide to Smartcast and Selfcast
In Starcraft, an immensely popular RTS game, there is microing and macroing (nouns). Macroing means building up economy by managing workers and buildings to achieve the greatest efficiency; microing means controlling each units to achieve the best positioning leading to higher survivability and damage output. In league of Legends, only microing exists because you only control one unit -your champion. Microing in LoL is necessary to position yourself to last hit, harass the enemy champions, and most importantly, survive. If you watch pros' livestream, you will see that they are constantly clicking -some might say a bit excessive- to move their characters around even by an inch at a time. Pros are constantly aware of their positions and their enemy's position, of course, being familiar with the range of autoattacks and skills for most characters, they can move in and out without getting a scratch. Sometimes you will see two pros moving back and forth without attacking (except for last hit) as if they are in an invisible tug of war. For pros, microing is their second nature.
Microing a champion to its fullest potential requires more than just clicking the mouse. There are several hotkeys that are very useful. For example, the "A" key allows you to move to a location while attacking everything in your path -decent for last hitting. The "S" key allows you to stop everything you are doing (moving, casting, w.e), which can help you last hit if you timed your previous hit too early. The "H" key acts as a sentry by rooting you in a position while attacking everything that comes in range until you decide to move. There are many other hotkeys which I won't go in to detail. You can find them in game via "esc" -> menu -> "key bindings", and experiment with each of them.
The two most important microing mechanisms in my opinion are smartcast and selfcast. Smartcast allows you to instantly cast a skill (except for self-buffs) at your cursor location without needing to aim and then click manually. Selfcast allows you to instantly cast a skill on yourself (heals, buffs) without needing to click on yourself. Both of them saves you a precious second, which could be the difference between life and death, kill or miss. The problem with smartcast and selfcast at the moment that discourages most players from using them (many don't even know what they are) because of the awkward default key setup. To smartcast, you have to press "shift" + skill key, which is difficult for many players because you have to basically shift your entire hand to smartcast, defeating the purpose of casting quickly. Selfcast exhibits the same problem by forcing you to press "alt" + skill key, very awkward. (if you are a pianist, you might do better). Therefore, I will teach you how to make smartcast and selfcast viable again.
Hotkey setup overview
Smartcast and selfcast custom key settings cannot be made up of 2 separate key combinations, such as "T" + "skill key" -the key binding program won't let you do that. But that's ok, its better to assign it to one key for selfcast or smartcast because its much easier than pressing 2 keys. I do not recommend assigning smartcast for skills that require some AOE aiming (e.g. ashe's volley) because unless you can imagine the spread range in your head (your cursor is at the middle of the AOE skillshot), you will miss a lot. For assigning keys, you can assign whatever you want, but keep the following in mind:
1. must be easy to reach
2. "tab" cannot be reassigned
3. make sure you do not forget the other key you unbinded to bind your new hotkey.
4. make sure you change hotkey setup for different characters. But most primary skillshots are Q (e.g. kennen's shuriken)
5. most of the time, unless you are playing a support with 2 different buff mechanisms, stick with 1 extra hotkey (smartcast or selfcast, not both), it's enough. But if you have rapid finger dexterity and want to control 8 or more hotkeys, be my guest.
Champions that should have hotkeys assigned for smartcast include:
1. champions with skillshots in any form (e.g. ezreal's "Q", Anivia's Wall, Annie's bear...)
2. optional: champions with targetable heals (e.g. taric's heal)
3. not recommended: champions with targetable skills (e.g. Yi's Alpha Strike)
Below I will show you my recommended setup.
The "T" hotkey (QWER+T)
Perhaps the best hotkey for assigning and extra smartcast or selfcast skill is the "T" hotkey. In this setup, your index finger controls both "R" and "T" -very convenient. Remember for most characters only assign one extra hotkey, be it smartcast or self-cast. In Ragnarök Online (popular mmorpg), I use battlemode (/bm) setup when PvPing and use up to 37 hotkeys. But this is not RO, and any keys more than necessary will screw up your game.
The draw back of using "T" as hotkey could be that you might accidentally press "R". But with practice and a calm nerve, not a problem.
To assign, follow the steps below:
1. in game, press "esc" -> menu -> "key bindings"
2. scroll down to find smartcast/selfcast skill X (whatever you want to setup), and assign "T" to the secondary hotkey. (or primary, w.e)
3.the "T" key's default use is for something else. Find it and unbind the default use.
Remember for most characters only assign one extra hotkey, be it smartcast or self-cast, choose the BEST SKILL. For champions with many skillshots, choose the BEST ONE.
"T" key skills smartcast champions examples (skillshot focused):
-Kennen's Q (shuriken)
-Corki's R (rocket)
-Blitzcrank's Q (grab)
-malphite's R (charge)
and many other "Q" and "R" skillshots, etc...
"T" key skills selfcast champions examples (self-buff focused):
-morgana's E (shield)
-Kayle's (E or R, your choice)
-Taric's Q and Soraka's E (heal)
and many other shields and heals.
OPTIONAL: The "Y" hotkey (QWER+TY, or QWERTY)
Use this setup if you are a support heavy champion with multiple self or smartcast skills, like Zilean (and only Zilean), or if you think you are 1337 and can control keys like mad, you can also assign another skillshot key to "Y". Again, not recommended.
To setup "Y", follow similar instruction for "T". Make sure remove "Y" default binding (camera lock).
For Zilean, I recommend the following:
-2 selfcasts, no smartcast
-"T" for selfcast "E", Time warp, to speed yourself up
-"Y" for selfcast "R", Chrono shift, revive yourself.
Good luck and have fun!
26.2.11
Improving your Laning - Mini Guide
Hey guys I translated a nice writedown from my friend BlackSteal so enjoy and learn :P
Original post by: BlackSteal
Translated by: Candy Panda
The Laning phase is one of the most important aspects in LoL and its early game.
Laning usually includes the static remaining on a lane, with a few exeptions. Also laning can have a heavy impact on the later game due to snowballing.
While laning you can run into different scenarios which I will explain one for one. The typical lanes in LoL consists of 1 Toplaner, 1 Midlaner and 2 Botlaners and 1 Jungler. I will use this as standart for the following examples.
If your enemy team decides to play without jungler try to use your jungle advantage and play aggresively since a jungler allows you to turn a 2v2 or 1v1 fight to a 2v3 or 1v2 fight. Also he can hold the lane for you if you have to go back so no experience is wasted.
General thoughts before the game:
The game starts.
Pre Laning Phase
Against which champion I have to lane and am I able to do so?
You always have the choice to swap the lane with your teammates but always remember to keep the 1-1-2 sheme.
If you know beforehand that you wont be able to lane against the champion you will probably face then try to swap your lane or use certain tricks to hold yourself as good as you can
Which of the enemy champions can have influence on my lane and which of my allies have?
You should basically always rely on the fact that the enemy will react properly while your team doesnt, that way you wont encounter situations where you rely too much on your teammates and get dissapointed.
Ezreal, Gankplank, Karthus, Pantheon, Shen, Soraka, Twisted Fate all of those can have direct influence to your lane as soon as they hit level 6 so always keep an eye on the level of these champions and take that into consideration when you want to engage. Also champions who have the summoner spell "teleport" or have abilities that move them quickly around the map(Kassadin, Rammus) can do that.
Which jungler my enemy has and in what way he will be able to gank me?
If I take all these information and box them in 1 packet, then send it to santa claus I will hopefully get enough information back to make myself a plan of how I want to lane the first 10 minutes of the game. I think beforehand if I can stand a Level 1 fight and at which level I will be able to start harrass. An important point here aswell is the item choice. If I know I will lane against a Miss Fortune I will grab the Dorans Shield or the Clotharmor and not the Null-Magic Mantle right? ;)
Im honest, when I play all these things run through my head. I dont write this because I think it COULD be like this, no it should be the standard. Generally I think about those things and I try to look what I can do/cant do in my lane.
If you know what your lane will be like we can go to the next step:
Early Laningphase
First: Is it really the enemy I expected and if not can I even control the lane against the current one?
Often your teammates agree with swapping lanes since they want to win aswell right?
However, you should check following criteria aswell: Enemys starting item, Summonerspells and changes on his base stats. You can try to hit the enemy once and look how fast he regenerates. But for the most part experience will come in handy now. There are 1 million ways a lane could be like and I you cant describe them all.
Anyway I will try to describe the most common ones now:
-A person dominates in every aspect the other one: Lets hope youre the dominating person. If thats the case, use your advantage. Dont push your lane too much, the creeps should be on your side of the lane but not in your tower since then they will get pushed themselves. Try to keep the enemy out of experience and gold range while you get the most gold possible. Your enemy will try to be passive and you dont have to change that. Dont get aggresive even if he backs up to his tower. In most cases that will just backfire on you since you cant get lasthits anymore and youre waaaaaay to far away from any help so the jungler can easily kill you. If you dominate try to keep him out of xp and gold range, nothing more. If you try to kill him you will waste your advantage most likely.
However, if youre the person who gets dominated you should come to following conclusion: First, why did it even come to that? Sure, some laners are better then others but theres no champion who is completly helpless against another. On the other hand you want to keep your loss as small as possible. Most likely your enemy will try to last hit your creeps which will push his creeps sooner or later to your tower. But you should still keep them away from your tower range. This way your lane wont get pushed and you cant be ganked so easily. if you dont get in xp range for 1 or 2 creep waves, then it is like this and theres nothing you can do about it. Better back of first instead of getting killed. if you have no change in a direct fight against him then dont fight.
Harrass vs Fighter: First of all heres my definition of those classes: A harrass champion can poke from long range while having some form of health regeneration, this way he can slowly dominate the lane. Often he likes to trade some hits since he will get his life back easily anyway while you dont. Anyway, the fighter on the other hand has alot of burst potential and is usually stronger in a direct 1v1 fight. However hes fairly weak in terms of regeneration and harrassment.
If your champion is a harrasser you should try to fight a bit. You try to get the enemy so low that even if he wants a direct fight he will loose. This way you get the lane control. The advantage of the harrasser is that if he has the advantage he can usually keep it. if youre the fighter you want to search the direct fight. Lets imagine the follwing. An Ezreal gets harrassed constantly by a Vladimir lvl 5. His creeps are pushing since he has to use Q on the creeps to heal your Mystic shot. You can use ghost and search the direct fight since you know that he is really weak at level 5 due to long cooldowns. Anyway dont chase too long since he can turn it around when his cooldowns are up again.
Generally you can give every champion the tag fighter or harrasser. There are special cases but you cant describe them all.
Try to think of every possibility the enemy has. Generally I recomment to stay passive and farm. Especially against good enemys you get a nice position advantage this way, since he has to walk through your creeps to harass you. Look for his mistakes and use them to your advantage.
Original post by: BlackSteal
Translated by: Candy Panda
The Laning phase is one of the most important aspects in LoL and its early game.
Laning usually includes the static remaining on a lane, with a few exeptions. Also laning can have a heavy impact on the later game due to snowballing.
While laning you can run into different scenarios which I will explain one for one. The typical lanes in LoL consists of 1 Toplaner, 1 Midlaner and 2 Botlaners and 1 Jungler. I will use this as standart for the following examples.
If your enemy team decides to play without jungler try to use your jungle advantage and play aggresively since a jungler allows you to turn a 2v2 or 1v1 fight to a 2v3 or 1v2 fight. Also he can hold the lane for you if you have to go back so no experience is wasted.
General thoughts before the game:
The game starts.
Pre Laning Phase
Against which champion I have to lane and am I able to do so?
You always have the choice to swap the lane with your teammates but always remember to keep the 1-1-2 sheme.
If you know beforehand that you wont be able to lane against the champion you will probably face then try to swap your lane or use certain tricks to hold yourself as good as you can
Which of the enemy champions can have influence on my lane and which of my allies have?
You should basically always rely on the fact that the enemy will react properly while your team doesnt, that way you wont encounter situations where you rely too much on your teammates and get dissapointed.
Ezreal, Gankplank, Karthus, Pantheon, Shen, Soraka, Twisted Fate all of those can have direct influence to your lane as soon as they hit level 6 so always keep an eye on the level of these champions and take that into consideration when you want to engage. Also champions who have the summoner spell "teleport" or have abilities that move them quickly around the map(Kassadin, Rammus) can do that.
Which jungler my enemy has and in what way he will be able to gank me?
If I take all these information and box them in 1 packet, then send it to santa claus I will hopefully get enough information back to make myself a plan of how I want to lane the first 10 minutes of the game. I think beforehand if I can stand a Level 1 fight and at which level I will be able to start harrass. An important point here aswell is the item choice. If I know I will lane against a Miss Fortune I will grab the Dorans Shield or the Clotharmor and not the Null-Magic Mantle right? ;)
Im honest, when I play all these things run through my head. I dont write this because I think it COULD be like this, no it should be the standard. Generally I think about those things and I try to look what I can do/cant do in my lane.
If you know what your lane will be like we can go to the next step:
Early Laningphase
First: Is it really the enemy I expected and if not can I even control the lane against the current one?
Often your teammates agree with swapping lanes since they want to win aswell right?
However, you should check following criteria aswell: Enemys starting item, Summonerspells and changes on his base stats. You can try to hit the enemy once and look how fast he regenerates. But for the most part experience will come in handy now. There are 1 million ways a lane could be like and I you cant describe them all.
Anyway I will try to describe the most common ones now:
-A person dominates in every aspect the other one: Lets hope youre the dominating person. If thats the case, use your advantage. Dont push your lane too much, the creeps should be on your side of the lane but not in your tower since then they will get pushed themselves. Try to keep the enemy out of experience and gold range while you get the most gold possible. Your enemy will try to be passive and you dont have to change that. Dont get aggresive even if he backs up to his tower. In most cases that will just backfire on you since you cant get lasthits anymore and youre waaaaaay to far away from any help so the jungler can easily kill you. If you dominate try to keep him out of xp and gold range, nothing more. If you try to kill him you will waste your advantage most likely.
However, if youre the person who gets dominated you should come to following conclusion: First, why did it even come to that? Sure, some laners are better then others but theres no champion who is completly helpless against another. On the other hand you want to keep your loss as small as possible. Most likely your enemy will try to last hit your creeps which will push his creeps sooner or later to your tower. But you should still keep them away from your tower range. This way your lane wont get pushed and you cant be ganked so easily. if you dont get in xp range for 1 or 2 creep waves, then it is like this and theres nothing you can do about it. Better back of first instead of getting killed. if you have no change in a direct fight against him then dont fight.
Harrass vs Fighter: First of all heres my definition of those classes: A harrass champion can poke from long range while having some form of health regeneration, this way he can slowly dominate the lane. Often he likes to trade some hits since he will get his life back easily anyway while you dont. Anyway, the fighter on the other hand has alot of burst potential and is usually stronger in a direct 1v1 fight. However hes fairly weak in terms of regeneration and harrassment.
If your champion is a harrasser you should try to fight a bit. You try to get the enemy so low that even if he wants a direct fight he will loose. This way you get the lane control. The advantage of the harrasser is that if he has the advantage he can usually keep it. if youre the fighter you want to search the direct fight. Lets imagine the follwing. An Ezreal gets harrassed constantly by a Vladimir lvl 5. His creeps are pushing since he has to use Q on the creeps to heal your Mystic shot. You can use ghost and search the direct fight since you know that he is really weak at level 5 due to long cooldowns. Anyway dont chase too long since he can turn it around when his cooldowns are up again.
Generally you can give every champion the tag fighter or harrasser. There are special cases but you cant describe them all.
Try to think of every possibility the enemy has. Generally I recomment to stay passive and farm. Especially against good enemys you get a nice position advantage this way, since he has to walk through your creeps to harass you. Look for his mistakes and use them to your advantage.
25.2.11
22.2.11
Common Misconceptions About Items - Void Staff vs. Abyssal Scepter
Today will be a rather brief article about casters. The main theme will be magic penetration, which will be abbreviated from here on out as MPen.
With the introduction of Rabadon’s Deathcap, it’s plausible for casters to reach obscene amounts of ability power now, exceeding 500 if a caster is fed (and he won’t even need Mejai’s Soulstealer!). If you see an 800AP LeBlanc run up to your, what’s your first thought? I’m going to have to go with “Oh, shit.”
Yet let’s say that she’s got a Rabadon’s Deathcap and multiple Archangel’s Staves. With all that AP, she’s still only got around 30 magic penetration from her boots and runes – less if she doesn’t have these.
Whenever a person sees that the majority of the damage they took was from a caster, especially burst casters like Annie, Ryze, or Veigar, they go out and buy magic resist items. Regardless of whether you’re a tank or a carry, a good player will adapt his build to counter his enemies. Say you get the most logical choice – a Banshee’s Veil. That’s 50 magic resist right there (I won’t even talk about the bubble).Say you play a typical 30 magic resist squsihy champion. Against a mage with typical 30 magic pen, you have 0 MR and are now taking the full brunt of their abilities. Yet with one Banshee’s Veil, that 50 magic resist negates a good 33% of their damage. Buy an Abyssal Scepter after that and half of their magic damage is down the drain.
What can we conclude from this? Against any good team, your role as a caster becomes less effective based on how much magic resist your enemies have. Thus purely stacking AP is [b]not an option[/b] in any game with relatively skilled players. MPen becomes absolutely essential at this point.
There are five items in the game that either give magic penetration or reduce magic resist – Sorcerer’s Shoes, Haunting Guise, Malady, Void Staff, and Abyssal Scepter. We’ll rune out Malady because it’s not common on most casters, and we’ll rule out Haunting Guise because it’s an item you typically sell towards late-game. Sorcerer’s Shoes will also be ruled out because you should almost always be getting it whenever you play a caster, except in scenarios that will be explained later.
This brings us to the main issue of the day – Void Staff vs. Abyssal Scepter. Let’s go over some stats, shall we?
Void Staff
-2295 gold
-recipe: Blasting Wand, Amplifying Tome
-UNIQUE Passive: 40% Magic Penetration
Abyssal Scepter
-2650 gold
-Recipe: Blasting Wand, Negatron Cloak
-+57 Magic Resist
-UNIQUE Passive: Reduces the magic resistance of all nearby enemies by 20
At a first look, Void Staff seems like a better item. More magic penetration and a smaller cost – it seems like you should only buy Abyssal Scepter when either the enemy team is magic-damage heavy or your own team is magic-damage heavy.
But this isn’t true. Let’s do some calculations. The following calculations assume you’re running 9 MPen Marks, Sorcerer’s Shoes, and the Archaic Knowledge mastery.
Given the existing equipment, you have 28.55 magic penetration and an additional 15% MPen. Remember that magic resist calculations are calculated in the following order:
Percent reduction
Flat reduction
Flat penetration
Percent penetration
Meaning that against a 100 MR target, you’ll first penetrate through 28.55 MR, then an additional 15% of the remaining 71.45 MR, for a total of 29.36 effective magic penetration.
Now Abyssal Scepter gives us a flat 20 magic resist reduction, meaning that it is applied before both your flat MPen and percent MPen. Let’s completely skip the fact that it gives AoE MR reduction, and that it gives you MR, and that it’s slightly more expensive. For now, we’ll only be considering the change in magic resist regarding one enemy opponent.
Against a typical squishy that gets a Banshee’s Veil, they’ll probably have around 80 magic resist. Let’s take the case where you have Abyssal Scepter first. As soon as you get within range of them, Scepter procs its effect and their MR drops down to 60. Then your flat MPen comes in and reduces that 60 down to 61.45. Finally, the remaining 15% from Archaic mastery comes in, bringing their final magic resist down to a meager 26.73. That’s quite substantial.
Now let’s say you have a Void Staff instead. First, the flat MPen from boots and runes kicks in, reducing 80 down to 51.45. After the percent MPen from masteries and Void Staff is accounted for, they have an effective 26.24 magic resist.
(Note that for these calculations I assumed multiplicative percent magic penetration instead of additive – it only amounts to a difference of about 3 MR in either case.)
Now wait a minute. We’ve got around the same total magic resist for both targets. Sure, Void Staff costs slightly less. But what are we missing out on?
Abyssal Scepter gives you 57 magic resist. FIFTY-SEVEN MAGIC RESIST. against any magic damage, you’re suddenly a lot beefier, and you didn’t even need to buy a defensive item like a Banshee’s Veil. In addition, Scepter gives reduced magic resistance in an aura to all nearby enemies, not just the one you’re targeting. That means that on a magic-damage heavy team, you’re greatly helping out your teammates who haven’t got sufficient magic penetration. To me, those bonuses are well worth 400 gold or so, since you're getting roughly the same magic penetration against a slightly bulky enemy (we're maybe talking a mage that gets a Banshee's Veil for defense).
If you really want to do actual calculations, consider that Abyssal Scepter gives 20 flat MR reduction. We need to calculate when the 40% penetration from Void Staff starts to beat Scepter.
Working backwards, we have 20/(0.4)=50
50/(0.85)=58.82
58.82+28.55=87.37
My math isn’t perfect here, as there are minor percentile errors – but these prove to be negligible. There’s a reasonable level of leeway where I would gladly trade 5-10 additional magic penetration from Void Staff in exchange for the bonuses that Scepter gives me.
In short, unless all your enemies have around 100 or more magic resist, you really don’t need to buy Void Staff. This is, again, assuming that you go with MPen boots and marks, and take Archaic Knowledge. Abyssal Scepter proves to be better in almost all cases where your priority targets have less than 100 MR.
Obviously, use prudence with these decisions. Many casters sometimes forgo the standard Sorcerer’s Shoes in favor of Mercury’s Treads or Ionian Boots of Lucidity – in this case, the calculations are no longer as relevant and you may find that Void Staff is efficient at a lower base MR.
Regardless, what we see here is that Abyssal Scepter is almost always more effective against squishy targets compared to Void Staff with the standard mage rune/mastery layout. Magic penetration is an essential part of playing a caster, so when you’re deciding between these two items next time, think of this article to tell you what to play.
I hope this helped you with another item discrepancy that you may have had. Next week... I’m not quite sure what I’ll be going over, actually. I’m welcome for suggestions. Anyway, thanks for reading, and I’ll see you guys next time.
With the introduction of Rabadon’s Deathcap, it’s plausible for casters to reach obscene amounts of ability power now, exceeding 500 if a caster is fed (and he won’t even need Mejai’s Soulstealer!). If you see an 800AP LeBlanc run up to your, what’s your first thought? I’m going to have to go with “Oh, shit.”
Yet let’s say that she’s got a Rabadon’s Deathcap and multiple Archangel’s Staves. With all that AP, she’s still only got around 30 magic penetration from her boots and runes – less if she doesn’t have these.
Whenever a person sees that the majority of the damage they took was from a caster, especially burst casters like Annie, Ryze, or Veigar, they go out and buy magic resist items. Regardless of whether you’re a tank or a carry, a good player will adapt his build to counter his enemies. Say you get the most logical choice – a Banshee’s Veil. That’s 50 magic resist right there (I won’t even talk about the bubble).Say you play a typical 30 magic resist squsihy champion. Against a mage with typical 30 magic pen, you have 0 MR and are now taking the full brunt of their abilities. Yet with one Banshee’s Veil, that 50 magic resist negates a good 33% of their damage. Buy an Abyssal Scepter after that and half of their magic damage is down the drain.
What can we conclude from this? Against any good team, your role as a caster becomes less effective based on how much magic resist your enemies have. Thus purely stacking AP is [b]not an option[/b] in any game with relatively skilled players. MPen becomes absolutely essential at this point.
There are five items in the game that either give magic penetration or reduce magic resist – Sorcerer’s Shoes, Haunting Guise, Malady, Void Staff, and Abyssal Scepter. We’ll rune out Malady because it’s not common on most casters, and we’ll rule out Haunting Guise because it’s an item you typically sell towards late-game. Sorcerer’s Shoes will also be ruled out because you should almost always be getting it whenever you play a caster, except in scenarios that will be explained later.
This brings us to the main issue of the day – Void Staff vs. Abyssal Scepter. Let’s go over some stats, shall we?
Void Staff
-2295 gold
-recipe: Blasting Wand, Amplifying Tome
-UNIQUE Passive: 40% Magic Penetration
Abyssal Scepter
-2650 gold
-Recipe: Blasting Wand, Negatron Cloak
-+57 Magic Resist
-UNIQUE Passive: Reduces the magic resistance of all nearby enemies by 20
At a first look, Void Staff seems like a better item. More magic penetration and a smaller cost – it seems like you should only buy Abyssal Scepter when either the enemy team is magic-damage heavy or your own team is magic-damage heavy.
But this isn’t true. Let’s do some calculations. The following calculations assume you’re running 9 MPen Marks, Sorcerer’s Shoes, and the Archaic Knowledge mastery.
Given the existing equipment, you have 28.55 magic penetration and an additional 15% MPen. Remember that magic resist calculations are calculated in the following order:
Percent reduction
Flat reduction
Flat penetration
Percent penetration
Meaning that against a 100 MR target, you’ll first penetrate through 28.55 MR, then an additional 15% of the remaining 71.45 MR, for a total of 29.36 effective magic penetration.
Now Abyssal Scepter gives us a flat 20 magic resist reduction, meaning that it is applied before both your flat MPen and percent MPen. Let’s completely skip the fact that it gives AoE MR reduction, and that it gives you MR, and that it’s slightly more expensive. For now, we’ll only be considering the change in magic resist regarding one enemy opponent.
Against a typical squishy that gets a Banshee’s Veil, they’ll probably have around 80 magic resist. Let’s take the case where you have Abyssal Scepter first. As soon as you get within range of them, Scepter procs its effect and their MR drops down to 60. Then your flat MPen comes in and reduces that 60 down to 61.45. Finally, the remaining 15% from Archaic mastery comes in, bringing their final magic resist down to a meager 26.73. That’s quite substantial.
Now let’s say you have a Void Staff instead. First, the flat MPen from boots and runes kicks in, reducing 80 down to 51.45. After the percent MPen from masteries and Void Staff is accounted for, they have an effective 26.24 magic resist.
(Note that for these calculations I assumed multiplicative percent magic penetration instead of additive – it only amounts to a difference of about 3 MR in either case.)
Now wait a minute. We’ve got around the same total magic resist for both targets. Sure, Void Staff costs slightly less. But what are we missing out on?
Abyssal Scepter gives you 57 magic resist. FIFTY-SEVEN MAGIC RESIST. against any magic damage, you’re suddenly a lot beefier, and you didn’t even need to buy a defensive item like a Banshee’s Veil. In addition, Scepter gives reduced magic resistance in an aura to all nearby enemies, not just the one you’re targeting. That means that on a magic-damage heavy team, you’re greatly helping out your teammates who haven’t got sufficient magic penetration. To me, those bonuses are well worth 400 gold or so, since you're getting roughly the same magic penetration against a slightly bulky enemy (we're maybe talking a mage that gets a Banshee's Veil for defense).
If you really want to do actual calculations, consider that Abyssal Scepter gives 20 flat MR reduction. We need to calculate when the 40% penetration from Void Staff starts to beat Scepter.
Working backwards, we have 20/(0.4)=50
50/(0.85)=58.82
58.82+28.55=87.37
My math isn’t perfect here, as there are minor percentile errors – but these prove to be negligible. There’s a reasonable level of leeway where I would gladly trade 5-10 additional magic penetration from Void Staff in exchange for the bonuses that Scepter gives me.
In short, unless all your enemies have around 100 or more magic resist, you really don’t need to buy Void Staff. This is, again, assuming that you go with MPen boots and marks, and take Archaic Knowledge. Abyssal Scepter proves to be better in almost all cases where your priority targets have less than 100 MR.
Obviously, use prudence with these decisions. Many casters sometimes forgo the standard Sorcerer’s Shoes in favor of Mercury’s Treads or Ionian Boots of Lucidity – in this case, the calculations are no longer as relevant and you may find that Void Staff is efficient at a lower base MR.
Regardless, what we see here is that Abyssal Scepter is almost always more effective against squishy targets compared to Void Staff with the standard mage rune/mastery layout. Magic penetration is an essential part of playing a caster, so when you’re deciding between these two items next time, think of this article to tell you what to play.
I hope this helped you with another item discrepancy that you may have had. Next week... I’m not quite sure what I’ll be going over, actually. I’m welcome for suggestions. Anyway, thanks for reading, and I’ll see you guys next time.
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