Magic Pen on Vel'Koz
Why is magic pen better for velkoz or other champions than others? I've never really understood why some champions benefit more from pen than others. Would love an explanation on this if someone would be so kind. Thanks :)
8 Comments
the main reason magic pen is really good on vel'koz is because he has lowish cooldowns and high base damage and just eh scalings so the magic pen makes it easier to deliver more of the high base damages he has
i think its mostly the ultimate but honestly every mage relies on spell pen unless your reall far ahead or there isnt any tanks spell pen is always the best choice
yes its all about the base damage and scaling. some champions have mediocre scaling so building up your damage with AP is more expensive. some mages have incredible scaling so magic pen isnt worse on them than on others, its just not as cost-effective as buying ap. a great example here would be victor. his scaling and raw damage is so high, you want to stack as much ap as possible before getting any pen.
Vel'Koz is in one of the weirdest boats damage-budget-wise, he has pretty "eh" scalings and fairly equal bases. So where as most champs like malz you go whoa this guy has nuts scalings, lets make AP or Elise, holy base damage bae lets go MPen- Vel'Koz falls into this weird spot. Why? Because if either were good he would be too good because of his passive (410 true damage on a double proc at level 18). Basically Vel is 100% a combo mage. I think the overall most efficient build on him is something like:
Sorc shoes (cuz MPen isnt awful) Mana / CDR item (because he is a combo mage and needs to spam) NLR item (mage) Liandrys (because MPen isnt bad and burn incase he misses a combo)(also synergizes pretty well with his Q/R) Void staff (because sadly its core on every mage) Situational item (I like Rylais)
TL;DR with 0AP at level 18 his full combo onto a single target will do 1880 magic (before resistances) and 615 true damage. Which I guess is like qwewr. Just play him support.
I would rather buy sustain and defensive items, since his Passive Procs deal true dmg. The most dmg I've ever dealt in a game as Velkoz I started behind and built tanky ( I had a Frozen Heart for god's sake ) and with mana sustain I could survive long enough in fights with sustained continuous ranged dps and true dmg off procs. I havn't sincerely tried a full tank Vel buid since but this topic makes me reconsider looking into it.
Low scalings, high bases. Basically the Magic Pen capitalizes on those high bases so you end up dealing more damage than standard flat AP builds.