I really dislike how item-dependent Mordekaiser has become, but Riot claims he's toxic otherwise...

darkdill··1 votes·389 views

Trying out Mordekaiser in Ascension, he is really showing how weak he has become. Terrible base HP, slow as all hell, dependent on AD/AP items to deal any damage, and I honestly did not find him tanky at all even once his durability got built up. Those shields seem to take bonus damage from EVERYTHING, or they're bugged and don't take resists into account. It feels like Morde is glassy even if you go tank builds on him.

But then again, that's Riot's MO when they don't want you playing a broken Champion: they nerf him/her into near-unusability. Happened to Yorick, happened to Taric, and now it's happened to Mordekaiser. Riot's defense? "He's toxic, so we're making him unplayable."

Care to challenge this claim?

6 Comments

PermabannedGaren1 votes

A tank-built Mordekaiser is far and away the tankiest champion in the entire game lol.

He's tankier in summoner's rift where he has minions to leech shield off of and use his W.

darkdill1 votes

Honestly, I've found Mundo is tankier. Garen can give Morde a run for his money too with his super regen.

Malicious Metal1 votes

Tank morde is literally the worst build you could possibly run

PermabannedGaren1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Malicious Metal,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=jxqdetzA,comment-id=00000001,timestamp=2016-10-04T18:59:35.524+0000)

Tank morde is literally the worst build you could possibly run

Well that's obviously not true, a full attack speed crit Mordekaiser is obviously far inferior, but what makes you say that friend?

A tanky (Rylai's is still perfectly able to fit into this kind of build btw) Mordekaiser has a better-scaling shield, good sustained damage, scales incredibly with dragon, and has a better late game than a Mordekaiser who built a bunch of damage. Now, AP Mordekaiser does do more burst damage, but he's far easier to focus down.

A Mordekaiser who built only a Sterak's for damage, Natural Talent for his mastery, and took standard AP runes does 965 damage with all three hits of his Q alone. The full duration of his W will do 526. His E 288.5. His ult a little over 36% of the enemy's max HP. All his abilities put together add up to a total of 1,779.6 damage plus 36% of the nerd you ulted's HP, which for an ADC will be about 684 damage, for a total of 2,463.6 damage. Assuming they didn't buy any MR (which a lot of ADCs like Jinx, Jhin, or Miss Fortune don't) and have standard Mr runes, this does 1,847.7 damage to the enemy ADC.

So using just the full duration of your abilities allows Mordekaiser with just a sterak's to nearly 100-0 the enemy ADC. A Rylai's alone would probably have killed them (I'm not mathing that shit out). This also doesn't account for the fact that before his W and ult finished their durations, he could have E'd twice, and possibly gotten more Qs in. And of course he would have hit them with normal auto attacks during this time, they would be burned over time by a sunfire if he bought it, and taken extra damage from his deadman's proc, etc. I also like Thornmail on a tanky Mordekaiser since he tends to get a lot of armour, which will further damage them.

Now, it is entirely possible that the enemy team has devoted CC toward you to peel you, but that's okay. While a punk fuck ass AP Mordekaiser would likely die to being focused down, a heavily tank-built Mordekaiser is extremely tough to crack, and absorbing CC that could be used on someone else on his team (like an assassin, a Vayne, or whatever) is not a bad thing.

item 3068 item 3053 item 3111 / item 3047 item 3065 item 3742 item 3116 Is an example build (I've tried Morde builds with no Rylai's with success but I also play against shitters so it's hard to say for me how effective it is) that will still let you deal enough damage to be a threat to the ADC (and let's be honest, that's what his main job is), but makes you really hard to just focus down and kill even when peeled for.

Malicious Metal1 votes

You built both Steraks and Rylais making this a BRUISER build. Heck, I run something similar with Gunblade instead of Sunfire, the rest's pretty much the same :P

PermabannedGaren1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Malicious Metal,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=jxqdetzA,comment-id=0000000100000000,timestamp=2016-10-04T23:50:26.135+0000)

You built both Steraks and Rylais making this a BRUISER build. Heck, I run something similar with Gunblade instead of Sunfire, the rest's pretty much the same :P

I mean technically any build that isn't YOLO full damage on Mordekaiser is a bruiser build because he's a bruiser. The same is true of Mundo, who builds full defense.

I do usually refer to it as tanky Mordekaiser or building tanky to emphasize that you still build some damage (though the Sterak's I buy mostly for the defense tbh, it is a huge power spike to his tankiness after you get some resistances).

What do you think of a Mordekaiser build that swaps Rylai's for Thornmail if against a lot of auto attackers (which isn't unusual, considering Yasuo's popularity top and mid and Graves' popularity in the jungle).

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