How do you beat AP Zac?

Trolosaurus·Jan 8, 2016·3 votes·718 views

He just murders me before I'm able to actually do anything By the time i've saved up to buy resistances its too late

23 Comments

junglerboy16Jan 8, 20162 votes

item 3102 is a really solid item against him because it helps you avoid either his initial leap from E (which hurts on AP Zac), or it blocks one hit from his ult (his other engage tool), which negates a large portion of his burst.

item 3190 is good if he's diving your whole team and you need both the aura and the shield active to survive.

item 3156 good for carries vs any bursty AP champ because of the resists and shield.

Other than items, the best thing to use against him is generally hard CC (because if he has enough AP to hurt you badly, he'll be pretty squishy), and mobility. Zac's E is his only reliable mobility, and it's on a fairly long cooldown most of the game, meaning if you can kite well you can probably avoid most of his damage.

LeBlanc JameśJan 9, 20161 votes

Blu3 Blood BluesJan 8, 20161 votes

sounds like you dont actually know how to play safe or dodge his e otherwise you should actually be in no harm.

LeBlanc JameśJan 8, 20162 votes

He was asking advice. So why don't you share with him how to dodge his e and play safe instead of tell him what he is doing wrong? He knows he's doing something wrong because he's getting beat by AP Zac often.

Blu3 Blood BluesJan 8, 20161 votes

{quoted}

He was asking advice. So why don't you share with him how to dodge his e and play safe instead of tell him what he is doing wrong? He knows he's doing something wrong because he's getting beat by AP Zac often.

because its fairly simple and if he cant figure out with subtle ways of helping him he wont figure out how to do it and always need seomeones help. If you cant play vs a zac in lane well i cant really help you out from a simple point of view since it in itself is extremely simple

LeBlanc JameśJan 9, 20161 votes

Some things that are simple to some aren't to others. He is smart enough to ask for help when he needs it. Your toxic B.S. trying to make him feel stupid is ridiculous.

AyRe CoNteMpTJan 8, 20161 votes

resistances dont help, you need to survive only his initial damage and then dps him hardcore for a good trade. he IS strong tho.

junglerboy16Jan 8, 20161 votes

Not really, a lot of his damage comes from his highly spammable % health damage on his W. With a fair amount of AP (say 350) he's doing 15% of your max health every 5 seconds, even more frequently with CDR.

AyRe CoNteMpTJan 8, 20161 votes

wow 5 seconds, what champions do you play that a 5 second combat window doesnt allow you to trade? if he is in range to W, he is in range of darius, garen, renekton, fiora, jax, trundle, illaoi and whatever you'd play top and all of these champions outtrade zac pretty well, pretty fucking well indeed. he is only strong if he can trade with you in a minionwave at the same time as pushing the wave so he can sustain up everything for free but if your champion has aoe abilities that trade and push at the same time too, he gets outpushed and outtraded and cant sustain up for free.

renekton, darius, garen, illaoi and multiple others can do this. fiora cant and trundle cant either but trundle is just much stronger and sustains even better. i dont know about the fiora matchup but man, not like fiora ever had problems against anyone.

CrossetteJan 8, 20161 votes

He has more abilities that contain burst.

He was saying that W is a big source of damage, not ALL of it.

TrolosaurusJan 8, 20161 votes

[{quoted}](name=AyRe CoNteMpT,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=hysebXd6,comment-id=000100000000,timestamp=2016-01-08T21:06:27.682+0000)

wow 5 seconds, what champions do you play that a 5 second combat window doesnt allow you to trade? if he is in range to W, he is in range of darius, garen, renekton, fiora, jax, trundle, illaoi and whatever you'd play top and all of these champions outtrade zac pretty well, pretty fucking well indeed. he is only strong if he can trade with you in a minionwave at the same time as pushing the wave so he can sustain up everything for free but if your champion has aoe abilities that trade and push at the same time too, he gets outpushed and outtraded and cant sustain up for free.

renekton, darius, garen, illaoi and multiple others can do this. fiora cant and trundle cant either but trundle is just much stronger and sustains even better. i dont know about the fiora matchup but man, not like fiora ever had problems against anyone.

well last game I was getting two shot as Kindred

E stuns me preventing me from ulting, W kills me

AyRe CoNteMpTJan 9, 20161 votes

well if you get hit by his E, you kinda missunderstood kindred as a champion

junglerboy16Jan 8, 20161 votes

A: I never said that a 5 second combat window doesn't allow me to trade, or anything even remotely related to that.

B: My whole point is that is just the base cooldown. With a CDR build (which most AP bruiser Zacs go for) that cooldown can be as low as 2.75 seconds. This ability is highly spammable.

C: Since when are we talking about lane Zac?

Also, my whole point about his W being spammable is that it is his main persistent damage. Q deals low damage, E is on a high cooldown, and W deals % health damage on a very low cooldown. Because it deals % HP damage, resistances are more effective against the majority of his damage after his initial jump (health doesn't help nearly as much).

Imo, the best thing to do against an AP Zac is buy Banshees and then flat MR. Banshee's blocks his first hit, which is usually his E unless you're really bad and he can Q you to pop the shield.

AyRe CoNteMpTJan 9, 20161 votes

A: you said "his highly spammable % damage W" which implies that, for whatever reason, he can use it more than once in a trade with you. we are not talking lategame teamfights here, we are talking laning. none of zacs abilities is "highly spammable" in lane, because of this he only has one combo (EautoWQ -> walk away) but even then he can get traded back and he will lose the trade.

B: "with a cdr build" implies at least 2 items. we are talking laningphase here.

C: since the OP said "i cant save up money for resistances" because the only time you meet zac without having time to buy resistances is when you lane against him. every other scenario holds at least the option of you buying mr/hp.

so we are talking ap zac jungle now? well, how do you beat him? let your jungler kick his ass because ap zac is an extremely weak duelist and all he can do is assassinate. have a strong jungler (not shaco) who can duel good and zac is history. ap zac in lane, you need a strong toplaner (not malphite, not mundo) who can actively trade and outpush him.

against any kind of zac build, you need DAMAGE and probably hexdrinker or, as a mage, abyssal. a banshees is way too defensive. if you see his E coming, you can either dodge it, dash it or even flash it and then give him a taste of YOUR damage. if its AP zac he is super squishy (literally same squishyness as a full damage xin or something) so if you dont die to his initial burst, he will die first.

junglerboy16Jan 9, 20161 votes

No, it means that in an all-out brawl it is his main DPS. Also, neither me or the OP said this was laning phase, we're talking about Zac diving carries and killing them.

Also, just because he said "I didn't have time to stack resist" simply means his core took longer to complete than he should have, and that he didn't modify his build appropriately, not that he was facing him in lane.

We have also been talking about "AP Zac" the whole friggin time, it's literally in THE TITLE OF THE POST.

Most AP bruiser Zacs that you will ever see start out Cinderhulk (strong starting item in the jungle) and then pick up bruisery AP items (like Abyssal Scepter or Liandry's) and then keep beefing up. He isn't squishy at all, he is more of an AP fighter with the durability of an average fighter.

You keep trying to force your opinion on the matter by warping the situation and the determining factors in the outcome.

AyRe CoNteMpTJan 9, 20161 votes

blablabla, you literally named 3 MR items while the OP clearly said he didnt have time to buy resistances. i would really like to ask my favorite question about your mental state but im afraight i might get banned for it so lets just leave it at this: you are wrong at everything and i dont care what else you have to say.

junglerboy16Jan 11, 20161 votes

I'm glad I don't have to keep explaining logic to fools, enjoy your ignorance buddy.

Spaceman5pffJan 11, 20161 votes

[slayer-pantheon-popcorn]

ZeroleraJan 8, 20161 votes

That % health damage is going to be reduced by whatever resistances you have. At best it's only going to be doing 7-8% of your max health every 5 seconds. Also a zac that has that much AP should not be able to remain in the middle of your team for 30+ seconds to actually make that skill worth anything. The original jump is what's really dangerous however he has to aim it well.

Stiv1234Jan 8, 20161 votes

He has a really weak early game versus ranged champs. When he is already fed, hes similar to Fiddle: If he catches you offguard, youre fucked, so try to ward as much as possible so you can see his long range engages coming.

BoulderoxJan 8, 20161 votes

Zac has decently long cooldown,s so if you can dodge or survive his initial burst, the worst he can do is AA and w you, which isn't reliable to spam with even 45% cdr making ~2.5 CD and with blons only makes 1.5 which still isn't spamable and you don't have the stick potential while blob collecting.

x Kuro xJan 9, 20161 votes

Split push and murder towers. Zac hits towers like a wet noodle and yearns for teamfights. It wont matter that he killed you once if you have a huge objective advantage.

I used to main zac, until i got tired of having 8/0/10 and still losing because i couldn't personally push a tower fast. Now i main trundle and im much happier.

LadyRenlyJan 9, 20161 votes

Funny how downvoted this thread is, considering AP Zac is pretty lame when he builds AP(usually the blobby bastard will buy Rylais and Liandries before just finishing tank)

It's just as annoying and obnoxious as AP Malphite