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Malzahar buffs are needed

MalzMetaOnly·Apr 12, 2019·6 votes·2,989 views

So overall, I think this champion needs a general buff since it was nerfed super hard way back in patch 8.2 Malz can barely do anything in laning phase with such low base damage it becomes almost impossible to get out of lane with a positive score. It becomes more of a game survive the enemy jungler and laner because a jungler never comes to gank for a malz period from what I have seen from my own games and spectating other games as well.

Malzahar is in a weird state right now. Buff him, and every other role is screaming delete this champ because he is too op keep him nerfed and he is barely able to make a lasting impact on the team on wins and losses it. Useless that is the best word to describe playing malzahar and it really just a shame for this champion since he got nerfed then power creeped by the ever rotating game that is league of legends.

Moreover, I would like for this champ to get some kind of bone to be able to be fun to play again because it sucks the fun out of one of my favorite champs in the game Any sort of ideas are welcomed since the champ on paper is brain dead but in practice isn't.

21 Comments

TobykachuApr 12, 20195 votes

The problem with Malzahar is that ever since his rework he has become the pinnacle of anti fun game design and unlike Zoe, Yasuo or even Akali, he lacks any meaningful skill expression in his kit. Trying to dive on top of him and kill him is almost impossible - between his ultimate locking you down for so long, his free spellshield, a low cooldown AoE silence and his swarm of minions that make chasing him an extremely arduous task. All of this on an extremely easy to play champion results in him being completely exhausting to play against and every single time he's become even moderately strong since his rework he is forced to be significantly nerfed due to how much players hate fighting him.

At this point the best buff they can do for him is simply revert him to how he was before the class update.

SociopathFriendApr 12, 20191 votes

At this point the best buff they can do for him is simply revert him to how he was before the class update.

Well no the best buff would be to change him again and ideally avoid both what makes his current kit a problem and what made his older kit a problem.

And that, frankly, is the R. Without his R being point-and-click the rest of his kit can be evolved into something useful.

The problem of course is that the R is the main reason most people play Malzahar.

ParoeApr 12, 20193 votes

{quoted}

Well no the best buff would be to change him again and ideally avoid both what makes his current kit a problem and what made his older kit a problem.

And that, frankly, is the R. Without his R being point-and-click the rest of his kit can be evolved into something useful.

The problem of course is that the R is the main reason most people play Malzahar.

That his old kit was 'toxic' is a myth perpetuated by people who never understood malzahar or his weaknesses. His old kit was one of the most balanced in the game and he held a very small niche of being an anti-assassin. His playstyle was ambush predator; when someone went all in on him, using their mobility to close the gap, he assassinated THEM instead of the other way around. Most people who complained about malzahar at the time were (is it shocking?) Assassins, Vaynes, Lucians, Rivens, and Fioras. Champions with very strong all-ins who were easily shut down by malzahars single-target (Malzahar was also easily shut down due to his immobility versus their burst; tit for tat). The only champion who was arguably more balanced was swain at the time who had received only one nerf (a rework to his passive that wasnt really a nerf).

Fact of the matter is, the problems present in old malzahar are even worse in the current iteration of him and in his current state he FEELS very weak because his damage was slashed by over 400+1.2AP and his waveclear (which is the worst of all battle mages and most regular mages) is very bad without his one-shot-by-design voidlings.

What NEEDS to happen is the following;

Malzahars passive needs to be reworked from a spell shield to a spell sword.
Malzahars voidlings need to be buffed to their pre-rework state, including being summoned automaticaly once stacks have been reached.
An active component can be added to malzahars voidlings to frenzy them.
Malzahars E needs to be buffed to 320+0.8AP over its duration. Its a DoT, it is inherently MUCH weaker than burst.
Malzahar needs 550 attack range and 345 movement speed. He is not a support and his is immobile, he should never had had his base stats touched in the first place.

Theres also the very real fact that malzahar is held to a disturbing double standard when it comes to interaction and counterplay. Zed, Talon, Ahri, Leblanc, Fizz ALL have 0 interaction kits who either farm safely until they can all in or who have the sheer mobility to decide when a trade happens. They all also farm MUCH better than malzahar, shove MUCH better than malzahar, and have MUCH LESS counterplay than malzahar does.

Malzahar is immobile. If hes shoving mindlessly you ask for jungle support and pop his long CD passive. Malzahar has short ranges. Punish him when he tries to do stuff. Malzahars voidlings die in one auto and have at most 350 or so HP. Malzahars Q has a very long wind up AND animation. Punish it, and dodge it. If his E is on YOU hooray, he just lost 120 mana for a 240+0.6AP ability that cant even clear casters in the five seconds it takes any assassin and most mages to clear the entire wave!

Zed? His Q range is over 1000 and has a base damage of 360+1.2 bAD, potentially 500 plus something like 1.6 bAD if his shadow shurikens hit you too.

Ahri? 120+0.35AP magic +120+0.35AP true damage. It goes from safely behind her melee behind your casters, and its easy as heck to land with a low cooldown.

Leblanc? She Ws at you. Its instant. You cant avoid it without burning mobility.

Fizz? Point and click, applies on hit effects and he just tricksters away with invulnerability.

But its okay for THEM to have low interaction kits because theyre mobile, amiritefellas?

SociopathFriendApr 18, 20192 votes

That his old kit was 'toxic' is a myth perpetuated by people who never understood malzahar or his weaknesses. His old kit was one of the most balanced in the game and he held a very small niche of being an anti-assassin. His playstyle was ambush predator; when someone went all in on him, using their mobility to close the gap, he assassinated THEM instead of the other way around. Most people who complained about malzahar at the time were (is it shocking?) Assassins, Vaynes, Lucians, Rivens, and Fioras. Champions with very strong all-ins who were easily shut down by malzahars single-target (Malzahar was also easily shut down due to his immobility versus their burst; tit for tat).

I mained Malzahar for several seasons- and his kit was not fun to play around for anyone and for the same reasons he's not fun to play around now. If he presses R you're not allowed to play the game for 2.5 seconds and there is nothing you can do about it- especially if he flashes. Almost once per game I would have someone in all-chat complain about the R back in the day and you'd find the same complaints in-game today. That IS toxic by most measures of the term for the same reason Annie Tibbers stun is considered toxic. The bouncing visions WOULD be toxic if they hadn't been gutted in damage to the point of nigh-uselessness- Fiddlesticks isn't supposed to have an overly strong E for similar reasons. I happen to LIKE those abilities but that doesn't mean they aren't designs that should be changed.

Malzahars passive needs to be reworked from a spell shield to a spell sword.

Malzahars voidlings need to be buffed to their pre-rework state, including being summoned automaticaly once stacks have been reached.
An active component can be added to malzahars voidlings to frenzy them.
Malzahars E needs to be buffed to 320+0.8AP over its duration. Its a DoT, it is inherently MUCH weaker than burst.
Malzahar needs 550 attack range and 345 movement speed. He is not a support and his is immobile, he should never had had his base stats touched in the first place.
I disagree but mainly because Malzahar does not have a sword, he has a sacrificial dagger, used for sacrifice not combat; specifics would be the point of that call. 2 and 3) I do agree making the Voidlings more central to Malzahar's kit was a bad decision but it's one the community seemingly overwhelmingly wanted despite Riot openly stating minionmancers are hard to balance. Their impact needs to be lessened so that Malzahar can function better- there's no minion-based champion that has ever been just "okay". Heimer, Zyra, Azir, even Oriana technically have all traditionally been pains to deal with.
Remember one reason it's weaker is you have an opportunity to refresh the Duration with both of Malzahar's other spells, potentially getting tripled Duration. 960 + 2.4AP from vision damage alone not counting other spells does not sound healthy.
No comment on this

XilixerApr 13, 20191 votes

this is all false. The only time Malzahar is a rough matchup is for a specific characters like yasuo. His spellshield is easily breakable and has a long cooldown early game, his minions die to literally everything in the game in 1 or 2 hits, even if he hits 6 he doesn't do enough damage with a full rotation to actually kill you meaning if you die to him it's your own fault, his E and Q both cost a ton of mana to use and do laughable damage early game unless he is ahead.

ggigotfedApr 12, 20193 votes

Base damage he's a dot % nuke late game. You literally have a free "jungle come get this kill" button. Press R either they rush qss or take cleanse and taking cleanse means they have no kill potential in lane.

No doubt you rush a ludens ekko instead of liandry's all you do in lane is press Q once time, maybe W to speed up the rate in which your HIV spreads to minions and refunds mana, and if anyone tries to gank you "lmao free banshee's" then summon your puppies silence and dot all while moonwalking away.

Zane ZephyrApr 12, 20194 votes

can't cleanse his ult

I memba balance Apr 12, 20193 votes

Your champion literally "sucks the fun" out of any player that has to play against that braindead, point and click ranged suppression bullshit ultimate. Absolute cancer champ should remain 25 feet under the dirt. Make his ultimate a skill shot like Leblanc E where the suppression will take place after "X" duration of being attached to a champion. Then we can talk buffing his kit. His R is one of the most stupid abilities in the game.

ParoeApr 12, 20191 votes

[{quoted}](name=I memba balance ,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EEKIXrBw,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2019-04-12T06:05:25.391+0000)

Your champion literally "sucks the fun" out of any player that has to play against that braindead, point and click ranged suppression bullshit ultimate. Absolute cancer champ should remain 25 feet under the dirt. Make his ultimate a skill shot like Leblanc E where the suppression will take place after "X" duration of being attached to a champion. Then we can talk buffing his kit. His R is one of the most stupid abilities in the game.

/) AUTO ATTACKS (\

STop the abuse! 2.25 total AD scaling point and click nukes with less than 1 second cooldown need to go!

I memba balance Apr 12, 20191 votes

ah yes. 2.25 scaling on an RNG basis unless you've spent almost 12k gold getting an Infinity Edge and 3 other Zeal crit items. Because that compares to literally getting a free kill in lane every time your dumbass ultimate is off cooldown. Nothing like forcing AP Champions into delaying their builds by 1300 Gold to buy an item that builds into nothing that gives AP so it's just a dead item when the active is on CD.

ParoeApr 12, 20192 votes

[{quoted}](name=I memba balance ,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=EEKIXrBw,comment-id=000300000000,timestamp=2019-04-12T06:44:40.348+0000)

ah yes. 2.25 scaling on an RNG basis unless you've spent almost 12k gold getting an Infinity Edge and 3 other Zeal crit items. Because that compares to literally getting a free kill in lane every time your dumbass ultimate is off cooldown. Nothing like forcing AP Champions into delaying their builds by 1300 Gold to buy an item that builds into nothing that gives AP so it's just a dead item when the active is on CD.

If you think malzahar can legitimately 100-0 unless very fed ive got some bad news bud. Also, banshes veil hurts malzahars damage output a TON unless hes got some penetration. Maybe you should try counter building the squishy mid-range immobile mage with 705+2.25AP guranteed damage if no one CC's him out of his ult or just kills him while hes self CC'd?

MalzMetaOnlyMay 4, 20191 votes

His R only has 0.8 Ap ratio now thanks to that nerf back in 8.2 of last year because Phreak himself said. "Malz won't be hot garbage just close to it"

MoonscourgeApr 12, 20192 votes

Nope. He could do with some nerfs actually.

As long as he keeps a permanent spellshield, braindead waveclear and one of the best catch ultimates in the game he can't be buffed. Other champions have to sacrifice something in their kit to get just two of those, he just gets three for no price at all.

XilixerApr 12, 20192 votes

His waveclear is literally the only one that has counterplay. ATTACK THE MINIONS. They will die to any skill or auto attack easily, will give you gold for it and will make malzahar waste mana.

His spellshield and his R are the only 2 things keeping him even remotely viable because the rest of his kit has been nerfed considerably to the point where he barely does damage and any Malzahar main would tell you that they would love to remove the spellshield in favor of some buffs.

SyrileApr 12, 20192 votes

{quoted} His spellshield and his R are the only 2 things keeping him even remotely viable because the rest of his kit has been nerfed considerably to the point where he barely does damage and any Malzahar main would tell you that they would love to remove the spellshield in favor of some buffs.

Strangely enough, as weak as he is early, his mid game is pretty strong even not counting his R. I think his ultimate is overrated by most non-Malzahar players. However, his passive could use some work. I love the anti-CC and damage reduction. But, it really needs to not be busted by an auto-attack from Annie at 625 range or Ahri at 550. It should require a skill to hit it or an auto-attack that would deal over X% of your health, etc. Otherwise, it is pretty decent. Though the 30 second cooldown at level 1 is ridiculous when almost every champion has more range and movement speed than Malzahar, including the ones he is supposed to counter.

XilixerApr 12, 20191 votes

he does damage later in the game. Problem is, is usually the malzahar player is gonna be behind because laning phase is so rough. Anyone that has more range than him is a complete nightmare for him to deal with.

SyrileApr 12, 20192 votes

{quoted}

he does damage later in the game. Problem is, is usually the malzahar player is gonna be behind because laning phase is so rough. Anyone that has more range than him is a complete nightmare for him to deal with.

I am almost always up early game with Malzahar because I focused my build on that and on improving early game matchups a lot with him. The problem is, the enemy has to be pretty awful to actually die to a Malzahar any time before he gets item 3151 Fortunately, a lot of mid lane players love to be cocky and BM you because they are playing hyper-mobile champions that make them feel invincible (and they are against a lot of players). This lets me take advantage of them pretty easily.

But, playing against Malzahar is really easy with just a little bit of consideration. That is why he is so weak. Players refuse to learn how to play against him and just cry that he is non-interactive, despite being one of two champions you can interact with his wave-clear on, having a passive that does not work the way it should, having voidlings that were nerfed when they were already weak, and doing almost no damage at all while having no movement speed, no early clear, no sustain to speak of (since E does no damage for the first few levels)... These things force him to be aggressive to actually do anything at all. Which makes him very interactive.

It is a fundamental misunderstanding of how to play the game that causes people to complain about Malzahar. With the continuous buffs to all the overloaded, overpowered champions, you have to outthink and outplay (by a great amount) every opponent with him for the first 25 minutes of the game. Much easier to just pick Ahri or Zed or Talon or Lux and crush him... But they are not fun at all.

GFREEMENApr 12, 20192 votes

AD Malz pls. I miss my jungler/Top laner

XilixerApr 12, 20191 votes

jungle malzahar is one of the reasons why he turned out the way he is. The first thing from his rework he was completely broken in jungle and was only good in jungle while was bad in midlane.

SyrileApr 12, 20192 votes

Considering that most assassins (what he used to counter) now counter him, yeah, he needs them. Funny thing about Malzahar... He is said to be non-interactive, but someone above pointed out some of the problems with this. And the thing about the "no skill" for him is hilarious as well. It is easier to go into a game with almost any assassin and most of the "hard champions" as a first time on those champions (with certain exceptions) and do well than it is with Malzahar because he simply does no damage at all early game, has abysmal wave clear compared to most champions, has a ton of trouble CSing early. If you are unfamiliar with him, he is really hard to actually affect the game if your opponent knows how to play. On the other hand, my first time or two on Talon or Ahri or Zed or Yasuo, I had much more impact on the game. The damage in the game is way too high with no cooldowns on most champions (Malzahar still has very high cooldowns early) and too much mobility and burst and roaming potential.

And with so much AoE and threat on the enemy laner, his voidlings die instantly so even his wave clear is basically impossible if they know what they are doing.

Vulkus IApr 12, 20191 votes

Press R to autowin.

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