A lot of the "problems" ive seen from streams and high ELO youtube videos are less "malzahar being strong" and a lot more people not respecting him. I get that lowering bases is a potentially good thing balance wise, especially if you want to tune him more for the late game, but WHY is he getting base nerfs with no scaling buffs?!
Why nerf him without waiting a couple patches for people to learn that malzahar should be respected?
ForgiveColour6 votesSo the counterplay i got from your thread is stay in fountain so he cant get you. Got it thanks very helpful
Paroe4 votesSo the counterplay i got from your thread is stay in fountain so he cant get you. Got it thanks very helpful
The counterplay is dont let his E jump to you and respect his Q and R. Hes got less range than most mages and still pushes extremely hard.
Why would you just LET him harass you? Because across all ELOs thats what i see; people just letting malzahar harass them and then crying when he kills them because they didnt respect him. Further, his burst window IS his ult. If he doesnt kill you with an EWRQ hes -generally - not going to unless he ignites you or youre as mobile as he is.
ForgiveColour6 voteschecked your match history and you spam malz with tp exhaust lol why dont you try ghost and flash and tell me how easy it is for your opponent to avoid you
Paroe1 voteschecked your match history and you spam malz with tp exhaust lol why dont you try ghost and flash and tell me how easy it is for your opponent to avoid you
I actually use ex/TP because i have a problem with dumb positioning. Not using flash (since i use it as a crutch) in normals helps tremendously to curb bad habits and forces me to better my positioning. And even if i did use ghost/flash (why would i? Thats a dumb combo for a squishy with no survivability and mediocre burst) how would that change anything? I can get one more Q off or maybe get that ult i was looking for. But... thats it? I have 385ms and no mobility. Most champions id be fighting have mobility at least. And in late game team fights what would flash/ghost even do? I can run away... woo? Id rather have flash/tp so i can TP for that clean up or scare off a potential team fight.
ForgiveColour1 voteslol.
Arakadia4 votesHis E is going to zone you extremely hard.
And respecting a bs skill like his ult is not counterplay.
Paroe4 votesHis E is going to zone you extremely hard.
And respecting a bs skill like his ult is not counterplay.
His E chooses the closest target. The only time its "zoning" is when theres one minion left. It doesnt prioritize champions. Also, his ult has average base damage and low cast range compared to other ultimates from midlaners. Even a riven R2 outranges his ult. Further... his ult is 125 base at level one going up to 375 at rank 3. Thats not a whole lot for a single target ability. If he just pops it randomly without his target being low enough its going to be wasted.
Why are you trying to 1v1 the malzahar anyway? Oh right, its because you dont respect him.
Don't let him harass you with three targeted damage spells? One of which gives him incredibly good lockdown that cannot be avoided without counterpicking or building QSS.
His Q is a skill shot. His E is a targeted DoT. His W attacks whoever is under E or R, but otherwise targets the nearest enemy. His ult is a 1:1 suppress. He is CC'd for as long as you and if youre not dead or almost dead by the time his ult ends, hes very likely going to die because most champions are either faster than him or have mobility and can catch him very easily.
Staying out of his highly telegraphed Q is pretty easy. Staying out of his E is pretty easy. Staying out of his ult range is pretty easy. And... If you get flash ult ignited, thats kind of par for the course isnt it? I mean... Flash kit ignite is strategy numero uno in the casters big book of plays.
Psyrix2 votes"Why are you trying to 1v1 the malzahar anyway?" .....Are you saying that you shouldn't be trying to fight the malzahar unless there are 2/more allies present against him?
Arakadia1 votesYes, because he's a dueling mage. Thus you should have no chance.
Kappa.
Jinzo Torrance1 votesYou can build a QSS if you want to a 1v1 Malzahar, as voidling easily die to AoE now so they aren't a problem anymore.
He has a 1v1 ultimate, you're not supposed to beat him in a 1v1 if he has it up and you're not with someone who can interrupt it, also you can interrupt it yourself by using delayed CC like Draven E or Xerath E.
Jinzo Torrance1 votesYes, respecting the range of a spell is counterplay, what the hell are you saying? Do you think you can just walk up to a Annie, Liss, Malz, Xerath or any fucking champion without being blown up and them dying?
If he uses E on you it means he's pretty close to you (which he shouldn't be because: 1) he's at danger because he got no follow up; 2) he can ult you without even using Flash (same problem as Annie)), so you should trade back using your AoE spell to clear his voilings as they spawn and then dodge the delayed Q after his E is about to end and you take no damage while he loses the trade badly.
You can't just expect to just walk over any champion disrespecting their damage or abilty range and then call it BS.
Violet Fields1 votesThe counterplay is dont let his E jump to you and respect his Q and R. Hes got less range than most mages and still pushes extremely hard.
Why would you just LET him harass you? Because across all ELOs thats what i see; people just letting malzahar harass them and then crying when he kills them because they didnt respect him. Further, his burst window IS his ult. If he doesnt kill you with an EWRQ hes -generally - not going to unless he ignites you or youre as mobile as he is.
No the counterplay is 
.
Wukong Airlines5 votes"" Because Fiora / Laila sin / Yasusu / Luciana / Twitcherina are all less of a cancer problematic champs so we'll focus on nerfing something else INSTANTLY after it becomes viable even for a patch because no one was expecting to learn how to play against it, and since we're so goddamn liberals we'll stick to nerfing the latter hurd tu play chimps through adding 20 mana cost / 0.001 AS and 10 cd ultimate early level "" - Dorito
Malicious Metal5 votesBecause a 56% win rate warrants a nerf.
Paroe4 votes[{quoted}](name=Malicious Metal,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=xmPGfJ2k,comment-id=0003,timestamp=2017-06-14T01:13:35.240+0000)
Because a 56% win rate warrants a nerf.
After one patch? People still dont bother respecting malzahar as a champion. You dont think people letting the E jump to them, eating Qs because they think they can just heal it back up, and trying to all in you when theyre within kill range of your ult is the reason for his ONE PATCH win rate?
I had a game against a riven - a mastery 7 riven - who constantly let me harass her and then complained in all chat when she dies to her own all in when below 300 health at level 7. "GG malzahar broken. 100-0 no counterplay supress"; I EWR'd and then Q'd to refresh my E. If riven had respected malzahar, she very likely would have snowballed because anyone who DOES respect him tends not to get hit by Es and stays out of his Q and R range when he can kill them.
Blastermine3 votes56% winrate is always op.
remember that people tried the "they just don't know how to play against it" argument after Ahri got that 200 movespeed bonus on q.
NvestmentPlanker3 voteshe's a braindead champ that helen keller could solo kill an enemy on. he's bullshit and automatically gets a free kill lvl 6 with ignite. literally takes zero skill to play. and even if you are unable to land Q, your jungler can just gank every time you have your ult and it's free. his ult needs to be a skill shot like leblanc E. if they can make warwick's ult a skillshot, they can do the same to malzahar.
Slythion4 votesI remember when a 1/3 Malzahar flashed + ulted + ignited me for a kill despite me being a 6/1 Xerath with ROA (early) stacking + a null-magic mantle. I only give the kda's because I can't remember the level difference, but I guarantee you I had at least 1 level over him.
There wasn't anything in that situation where I should've "respected" him more, his base damages are simply too high and that's that.
Paroe1 votesI remember when a 1/3 Malzahar flashed + ulted + ignited me for a kill despite me being a 6/1 Xerath with ROA (early) stacking + a null-magic mantle. I only give the kda's because I can't remember the level difference, but I guarantee you I had at least 1 level over him.
There wasn't anything in that situation where I should've "respected" him more, his base damages are simply too high and that's that.
theyre really not... especially when compared to a xerath like you. Also even at 1/3 if his farm was enough for at least his morellos than its more than feasible for him to all in you like that. If he flash ulted you AND killed you then you were already low enough for that to happen in the first place. Its the same thing as if he had been hit by enough of your damage that you could stun and ult him. ANYONE can flash ult. Its not limited to malzahar.
Slythion2 votestheyre really not... especially when compared to a xerath like you
I'm well aware of Xerath's base damage (why do you think he was 1/3 or something to begin with? hue). I even made a post about whether people agreed with me that he was pretty sleeper-op at the moment, maybe like 5 days ago or something :3
If he flash ulted you AND killed you then you were already low enough for that to happen in the first place.
I was (to my memory) maybe 80% hp, I'd have to check the replay though. I definitely wasn't below 50% though. Of course he did put his E on me as well, and maybe Q, so it's not like it was purely his ult. We are talking about all his base damages of course.
Its the same thing as if he had been hit by enough of your damage that you could stun and ult him. ANYONE can flash ult. Its not limited to malzahar.
it's not quite the same due to Malzahar's ult also oppressing you for the entire duration of it's damage + the D.O.T from his E. Your comparison doesn't fit because for it to be accurate, you'd have to say my stun would last long enough to land all 3-5 shots from my ult as Xerath. Only champions that it really makes sense to make that argument for would be for assassins who have insta-casts like Zed or Akali. Even someone like Cass has a cast-animation for her ultimate, which Malz does not. It's an instant cast.
Paroe1 votesI'm well aware of Xerath's base damage (why do you think he was 1/3 or something to begin with? hue). I even made a post about whether people agreed with me that he was pretty sleeper-op at the moment, maybe like 5 days ago or something :3
I was (to my memory) maybe 80% hp, I'd have to check the replay though. I definitely wasn't below 50% though. Of course he did put his E on me as well, and maybe Q, so it's not like it was purely his ult. We are talking about all his base damages of course.
it's not quite the same due to Malzahar's ult also oppressing you for the entire duration of it's damage + the D.O.T from his E. Your comparison doesn't fit because for it to be accurate, you'd have to say my stun would last long enough to land all 3-5 shots from my ult as Xerath. Only champions that it really makes sense to make that argument for would be for assassins who have insta-casts like Zed or Akali. Even someone like Cass has a cast-animation for her ultimate, which Malz does not. It's an instant cast.
You said he flash ulted - not flash ER. He probably flash EWR'd too.
Malzahar has one AoE ability, you, xerath, have four AoE abilities. It would make sense that his 1v1 is particularly strong wouldnt you think? If he got off his E, two voidlings, a Q, followed by his ult then its perfectly reasonable for you to have died. He got his ENTIRE kit off. Do you have a link to the game? We could look and see when he killed you and how much AP he had at the time. Also, malzahars ult is a supression. its self CC - why does it need a cast animation when its self CC? Respect him and youre usually going to be fine. Dont respect him and theres your problem. You wouldnt stay at low health against an LB, a xerath, a yasuo, or a lux, why would you against a malzahar? a mage who is designed for his ult to be a finisher...?
Arkale1 votesJust so you know, Malz does have a short animation on his ult. Or maybe just a cast delay.
Jinzo Torrance3 votesActually they removed the 0.25 seconds cast time on his ultimate during the MYMU patch.
Arkale1 votesJust looked and damn. thanks for telling me.
Visionova3 votesHis Q and E both have an 80% AP ratio (and that's before accounting for E refreshes), and his R has both a 110% direct AP ratio and an extra 0.5% of target HP per 100 AP on the null zone.
Those are already pretty huge ratios for how low his cooldowns can get. Especially since he actually builds full AP now, being a mid laner again.
Paroe2 votesHis Q and E both have an 80% AP ratio (and that's before accounting for E refreshes), and his R has both a 110% direct AP ratio and an extra 0.5% of target HP per 100 AP on the null zone.
Those are already pretty huge ratios for how low his cooldowns can get. Especially since he actually builds full AP now, being a mid laner again.
A lot of his damage is single target and DoT. Hes not like ziggs, lux, xerath, twitch, fizz, zed, or riven who can and have bursted down entire teams. His - what is now average base damage and scaling - is good. It doesnt need nerfs or buffs, and even if they did want to tailor his lategame more, base damage nerfs without scaling compensation is NOT the way to go about it. Dots have their damage heavily penalized by HP regen and MR; thats actually why DoT mages originally had massive bases and ratios. in exchange for not having a whole lot of burst, they had scaling decay that could very easily be counterbuilt with HP regen and MR.
NGNL Asian3 votesReasons why I don't like malzahar:
*Obnoxious Laning phase *You're forced to build qss against him, literally forced *His base damage and ap scaling is also pretty obnoxious
Paroe2 votes[{quoted}](name=NGNL Asian,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=xmPGfJ2k,comment-id=0004,timestamp=2017-06-14T01:37:03.230+0000)
Reasons why I don't like malzahar:
*Obnoxious Laning phase *You're forced to build qss against him, literally forced *His base damage and ap scaling is also pretty obnoxious
Not really forced.... Just dont let him harass you. His Q is pretty well telegraphed as well. You just need a handle on "when can his all in kill me" and "when do i need to play safe".
Arakadia2 votesDon't let him harass you with three targeted damage spells? One of which gives him incredibly good lockdown that cannot be avoided without counterpicking or building QSS.
Arkale2 votesYou're talking about his ult like it's a basic ability.
Arakadia1 votesNo I'm not.
A basic ability usually doesn't have incredibly good lockdown that cannot be avoided. If I were talking about his ult like it was a basic ability, I would use words like "short cooldown" and try to make it fit in.
Arkale2 votesYou're grouping it up with the others as though they all have the same worth.
three targeted damage spells? One of which
Side Note: only his ult and space aids are targeted
Arakadia1 votesHis Voidling's damage cannot be avoided. They will focus you if there's nothing else OR if he uses his targeted E. So the entirety of his W damage is undodgable.
Paroe2 votesHis Voidling's damage cannot be avoided. They will focus you if there's nothing else OR if he uses his targeted E. So the entirety of his W damage is undodgable. A basic ability usually doesn't have incredibly good lockdown that cannot be avoided. If I were talking about his ult like it was a basic ability, I would use words like "short cooldown" and try to make it fit in.
They have 201HP at level 18 (or rank 5 - im not entirely sure) and die to one auto. They also only have 400MS - if you cant kill them you can usually out run them.
Are yoricks ghouls also unavoidable damage? Regardless its not "a point and click".
Also, 
As you can see, LOTS of champions have hard CC or semi-hard CC (roots) on either an extremely easy to land or traditional point and click ability. Some of them are even marksman. So why are you saying an ultimate must compete with a basic ability again?
Arakadia1 votesIf his Voidlings have 400 ms, there is no way you can out run them without a speed boost or dash. Or maybe if its late game and you invested in movement speed.
Yorick ghouls are not unavoidable damage because he has to land his E for them to target you, effectively making them avoidable.
Where did I say an ultimate must compete with a basic ability?
All your examples were terrible too. Either the CC is avoidable, lasts a way shorter duration, is merely a root so you can still defend yourself if your ranged or in melee range, delayed, very conditional, or some combination of said exceptions. Only Annie, who's CC is tied to a passive not an active, and to a lesser extent Nautillus have this problem.
Fiddle's fear is bs too, but one bs old design doesn't justify another bs old desing.
Paroe1 votesIf his Voidlings have 400 ms, there is no way you can out run them without a speed boost or dash. Or maybe if its late game and you invested in movement speed.
Yorick ghouls are not unavoidable damage because he has to land his E for them to target you, effectively making them avoidable.
Where did I say an ultimate must compete with a basic ability?
One of your arguments was that his ultimate ability was to strong because it wasnt a skillshot - i just showed you a myriad of champions with even better CC on a regular ability. Yoricks ghouls and malzahars voidlings follow the same pet AI. saying that malzahars are "unavoidable" while yoricks arent is just blind hatred towards malzahar. That blind hate is something a lot of people have, and its their excuse when it comes to discussions.
400MS isnt a lot either. Any champion with mobility and every marksman will out run that with boots and a %ms item. Further, the only time his voidlings are a threat right now is when he ults with them... because due to the previous set of nerfs to them he has to be within basic attack range or else they slow down dramatically. Any ranged champion who gets the E on them will just walk away unless theyre CC'd. If they dont, it comes down to the crux of the thread... They dont respect malzahar.
All your examples were terrible too. Either the CC is avoidable, lasts a way shorter duration, is merely a root so you can still defend yourself if your ranged or in melee range, delayed, very conditional, or some combination of said exceptions. Only Annie, who's CC is tied to a passive not an active, and to a lesser extent Nautillus have this problem.
Fiddle's fear is bs too, but one bs old design doesn't justify another bs old desing.
All of my examples are point and click easy to land semi(hard) CC. None of them are delayed or overly conditional. The only ones that are conditional is irelia and xayah; both of which have very easy to meet conditions.
Arkale2 votesTo add onto this, he can only spawn voidlings on top of himself, so unless you're hugging him, or he's ulting, they likely won't hit you.
Arakadia1 votesNONE of the champion's you showed me had better CC on a basic ability than Malzahar. Not even Annie's targeted stun can reach 2.5 seconds, its always 1.5.
One of your arguments was that his ultimate ability was to strong because it wasnt a skillshot - i just showed you a myriad of champions with even better CC on a regular ability. Yoricks ghouls and malzahars voidlings follow the same pet AI. saying that malzahars are "unavoidable" while yoricks arent is just blind hatred towards malzahar. That blind hate is something a lot of people have, and its their excuse when it comes to discussions.
Except Malzahar just presses E on you, or if he feels like trying his Q, and suddenly his voidlings become unavoidable damage that sprints at you. Yorick on the other hand, has to spend the time digging graves, which requires multiple Q's which put him in MELEE range, and then he has to land his E.
It is not blind hatred. There is a massive difference. Malzahar presses E and his voidlings out run you. Yorick has to land his E, after digging graves which gave you plenty of time to move the wave or punish him, and even then after his E mark falls off you can out run his ghouls.
400MS isnt a lot either. Any champion with mobility and every marksman will out run that with boots and a %ms item. Further, the only time his voidlings are a threat right now is when he ults with them... because due to the previous set of nerfs to them he has to be within basic attack range or else they slow down dramatically. Any ranged champion who gets the E on them will just walk away unless theyre CC'd. If they dont, it comes down to the crux of the thread... They dont respect malzahar.
I'm not saying his voidlings are a threat. I'm saying their more unavoidable damage.
Respecting Malzahar shouldn't be counterplay. You can't say "Respect Pantheon" as counterplay. Counterplay, is being able to dodge abilities or prevent Malzahar from being as successful.
And what % item would you suggest? Someone like Sol or Brand or Brand or Cass aren't going to be buying Ludens most likely and can't break the 400 cap via the lack of % movement speed items for Mages.
And for assassins, all their bonus movement speed items are out of combat only, so they will have a rough time outpacing Malzahar's voidlings.
All of my examples are point and click easy to land semi(hard) CC. None of them are delayed or overly conditional. The only ones that are conditional is irelia and xayah; both of which have very easy to meet conditions.
Xayah's is not such an easy condition. The time she COULD root you is not often at all.
And your examples are not good examples.
For example, Ryze's 1 second, possibly 2 second, ROOT is not at all comparable to a 2.5 second SUPPRESSION. Vayne's E is a displacement that conditionally can be a stun, but you have to aim the stun. Kennen has to do some combination of run THROUGH YOU, which is very dangerous, land his Q skill shot which you can dodge, charge his W passive, which you can see and force him to waste on cs, and burn his W cooldown. And even then Kennen's stun does not last 2.5 seconds, nor is it a suppression.
I also don't think you know how downvoting works. You don't just downvote whomever your arguing with because you disagree, you downvote because it doesn't promote good discussions.
NGNL Asian1 votesNot really forced.... Just dont let him harass you. His Q is pretty well telegraphed as well. You just need a handle on "when can his all in kill me" and "when do i need to play safe".
nice. He hits lv6, EWR me while his lee just Ws in E aa and bright before the malz ult ends, QRQ, dead me.
EWR me, sejuani comes in and is able to stack her E up to stun me later on.
EWR me, master yi gets infininite damage on me while im locked down
flash R me, I can't do anything.
warpenguin5553 votesMalz main here, honestly hes kinda OP right
LyingOnLine2 votesHe's getting nerfed because he's overpowered.
It's quite literally as simple as that.
Paroe1 votesHe's getting nerfed because he's overpowered.
It's quite literally as simple as that.
Hes really not. Hes not even as powerful as other meta champions like talia or orianna. Its just that he was JUST changed and no one respects him - thats the problem. Thats why his win rate is so high (after a SINGLE PATCH mind you).
LyingOnLine2 votesFun fact! Riot expects champions who have just been majorly changed or reworked to have lower winrates than they should as people get used to playing them.
When major changes go out or a champion releases and they have reliably very high winrates? It's because the champ is overpowered, not because of puerile excuses like "you need to get used to playing against them".
So yes, it's because he's OP. Wildly OP, as a matter of fact. 55% winrate is inexcusable. 55% winrate on a newly released update is beyond inexcusable.
Paroe1 votesFun fact! Riot expects champions who have just been majorly changed or reworked to have lower winrates than they should as people get used to playing them.
When major changes go out or a champion releases and they have reliably very high winrates? It's because the champ is overpowered, not because of puerile excuses like "you need to get used to playing against them".
So yes, it's because he's OP. Wildly OP, as a matter of fact. 55% winrate is inexcusable. 55% winrate on a newly released update is beyond inexcusable.
When a champion is REWORKED yes you have a point. But malzahar wasnt reworked. Not entirely. His playstyle is exactly the same as it was pre ultimate getting a base damage again. This is no different than, say, caitlyns headshots scaling with her crit chance/crit multiplier. It would be a net buff to the existing playstyle... in which case you would expect win rate to RISE because people wouldnt really know how to play against it.
In malzahars case you had a champion with one of the lowest killing abilty kits in the game who was largely ignored aside from his easily seen threats - the voidlings - being giving a good base damage on his ultimate. People already didnt respect the champion of malzahar - THATS THE PROBLEM. Because people didnt respect him they dont respect his current damage and end up losing 1v1 or not focusing him during teamfights like they should. Like i said in the opening post, its not that malzahar is to strong its that people just dont respect him.
LyingOnLine2 votesOr we could simply apply Occam's Razor to his 55% WINRATE and realize that his numbers are just way too fucking big.
Paroe1 votesOr we could simply apply Occam's Razor to his 55% WINRATE and realize that his numbers are just way too fucking big.
Comparing him to other mages... no, theyre not. DoTs like his E are heavily influenced by MR and HP regen too; thats why old DoT mages had such high bases and scaling.
"Why are you trying to 1v1 the malzahar anyway?" .....Are you saying that you shouldn't be trying to fight the malzahar unless there are 2/more allies present against him?
Would you try to 1v1 the lux, the xerath, or the LB? No. You wouldnt.
Malz main here, honestly hes kinda OP right
Strong yes but thats because people dont know how to play against him. Its been ONE patch. Hes still just a heavily nerfed version of himself. A shell.
Psyrix1 votesWould you try to 1v1 the lux, the xerath, or the LB? No. You wouldnt.
Umm....Yes....yes you would. The moment it is a requirement for more than 1 champion to be present to kill another (assuming they are the same level) there needs to be a nerf to balance that because at that point the champion becomes oppressive. What makes matters worse is that he's so good at pushing lane, from there it is easy to poke the enemy with q and w under tower. It's not like a skillshot is supposed to be impossible to hit, and good malzahar players will be able to land the q (which is also a silence, paired when u inevitably buy rylais and liandry becomes alot more damage). It's not like the nerf is overboard anyways, they are barely love taps. He's not gonna be gutted by a 20 base dmg decrease on his q, nor by 5% ap decrease on the ult
Raoul2 votesSo in trying to nerf Support Malza, they made an OP midlaner? Well, thats a first time, normaly its the other way around xD
Shadow Hazard1 votesor maybe admit that it was probably actually better before the rework.
Paroe3 votes[{quoted}](name=Shadow Hazard,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=xmPGfJ2k,comment-id=0005,timestamp=2017-06-14T01:51:46.477+0000)
or maybe admit that it was probably actually better before the rework.
... just about everyone who played malzahar pre-rework agrees that his pre-rework version was a LOT more balanced and healthy than his post-rework version. He was an anti-assassin and relied on people to come to HIM instead traditional assassin methods. It was his niche, and it made him a fantastic counter pick against champions like zed or talon because he could stay outside their effective ranges and wait for them to mess up.
Post rework he was an objective focused jungler in a jungle where objectives made or broke games. After his voidlings were nerfed he became an anti-snowballer whose entire job was to not die and be an auxiliary support. After his base stats were nerfed became a support because his core - liandries rylais - was pretty cheap as far as utility items go. EotW, rylais, and liandries was his core for a long time. After his voidlings were nerfed he just didnt have a place to go. After his mini-rework where his voidlings were turned into a fantastic waveclear tool and his ult got its base damage back (which fixed the entire reason why he was a support to begin with; low killing ability) he has become a decent laner again, even if his AD variant has been homogenized and no longer exists (something which riot said they wouldnt do when he was reworked originally).
All told his existence post rework has given him a net nerf compared to his balanced and healthy anti-assassin self pre-rework. However at the moment he is similar enough to pre-rework malzahar that he feels good to play again. Lower bases and less range in general, but still good to play.