Just a simple question really:
Why is Gauntlet so much better than Mallet (even for manaless champs)?
All these tanky builds always seems to have gauntlet but mallet hasn't been in nearly as many builds. why is that?
Edit: Thanks for the explanation guys I understand now ^-^
Elite4Runner2 votesFrozen Mallet is much more simple so I will start with that.
650 Health
Very reliable item for tanks. Health is generally one of the most core features for any tanks because even armor and magic resistance is useless without it. Enemies can pretty much always deal more damage than than you can mitigate. So even if you can significantly reduce the amount of damage you take, it means nothing if the enemy can quickly burn through your messily health pool.
40 attack damage
Makes you into more of a bruiser. Works great for AD scaling casters or auto attackers. Simple, more damage stats, more damage dealt.
Icy Passive
This is where the difference really comes from in my opinion. You can really only take advantage of this item if you regularly auto attack your enemy, which can actually be more difficult for melee champions. I would really suggest this item for marksmen who are good at kiting or keeping enemies from running away so they can continue to harass, or fighters who can naturally stick to their enemy, but want that extra slow to ensure that it is more difficult to escape.
Iceborn Gauntlet is a bit more tricky.
65 Armor
As said before, armor is a good defensive stat for reducing damage, but not as effective without health. I would expect to see this more in conjunction with items that provide health or champions with built in health. Also works fairly well on champions who can either scale on armor, or expect to receive the occasional poke, but don't expect a full on assault.
20% Cooldown Reduction
Quite simply, this works well on casters. This single item gives almost half the amount of CDR possible.
500 Mana
Great amount of mana for champions who frequently run into mana issues. Also synergies well for casters.
Spellblade Passive
I am about to say the magic word that I think will finally answer your overall question. .. Casters. This item works great with champions who naturally have low cooldowns, which are lowered even more by the CDR provided, sustained by the mana. The Armor is really more of a bonus, and likely simply a side effect of the build path, but it helps. The closer you can get your cooldowns, or cycle your abilities to 1.5 seconds, the more useful this item becomes. Also, keep in mind that this effect grows larger in radius based on how much armor you have. So stacking armor can improve it's effectiveness (although I rarely go for this). And most important, the bonus damage added to your next auto attack from spellblade is based on 125% of your BASE AD so champions who have high base AD are even better with this.
So in summary
Frozen Mallet is better for auto attacking marksmen and fighters.
Iceborn Gauntlet is good for casters.
I hope this helps. Sorry if I over explained anything.
EndlessSorcerer1 votes
WukongMain1 votesim going to assuming the CDR for one, also the slow in iceborn is slightly AoE.
and it can proc on abilities like Ezreals poke thing. and it builds from Sheen...that thing is so op :D
PrinnyLopunny1 votesMallet are geared toward ability reliant champs while Gauntlet is for the more auto attack based ones.
Gauntlet: Armor, Mana, CD, Sheen, AoE Slow Mallet: HP, Atk, AA Slow.
Also Gauntlet gives armor which benefits more champs than the hp from mallet, unless you're a hp scaling champ like Volibear. 
The number of Gauntleteers vastly outnumbers Malleters.
MunchCrunchLunch1 votessheen passive is better for splitpushing. since it does damage to turret. full damage. sheen passive scales better than pure ad on autos in taking down turrets.
#2. waveclear from the aoe.
20% cdr. crazy mana
frozen mallet is much better on ranged champions. because this is the league of mobility. even if you get close and auto someone. they use their mobility escapes and frozen mallet is basically useless. I buy mallet on graves. or sometimes other ad carries because I can kite with it. and it gives me a lot of tankiness. there aren't many cdr option for tanks. spirit visage. gauntlet and frozen heart are the only ones. fh gives a little more armor but no sheen passive and less mana. and no slows. the as slow is pathetic and not worth prioritizing. and it got nerfed 3 times in a row. so your only cdr armor option is gauntlet since its cheap and got buffed not too long ago. and again. sheen passive. gives you damage while being tanky
mallet isn't great on tanks because you'd rather have resitances + health. you don't want pure health items on full tanks because of how much armor pen there is now. thats why you see crazy armor stacking.
