EUPiLoL#4 - Mage Malphite

A Burst/Initiation oriented Malphite is something that I've always thought of, but never actually acted on. Malphite's role has always been somewhat shaky. Riot doesn't even regard him as a tank, and he lacks true "tanking" abilities (taunts for example) outside of his amazing initiation capabilities. He has noticeably large ratios for AP, but in order to truly utilize him to his full potential, one must invest in armor. Let's ignore his base capabilities for now and jump straight to item ideas.

For a mage oriented Malphite, there are four stats that we are going to be focusing on. These stats are AP, Health, Armor, and Magic Penetration. That being said, I believe that a Doran's Ring suits him best as a first item. Boot wise, I am going to opt for Sorcerer's shoes, of course leading up to the Sunfire Cape as his first real item, and following through with an Abyssal Scepter.

Doran's Ring
Sorcerer's Shoes
Sunfire Cape
Abyssal Scepter

This is a core build that makes a mage oriented Malphite decently potent without missing out on defense (You are still expected to be tanky.)  Past that, I found a number of items could be of use.

I need to be more tanky, but I still want to fill a mage Malphite role.

Luckily with all that mana pen, you'll still be able to cut through squishies, although I would suggest investing in armor based items like Frozen Heart, or Randuins. Your core build allows for 110ish Armor/MR (160ish armor with your W activated), so you're already somewhat tanky. Zhonya's Hourglass isn't something that I would suggest, as you won't really see much use in it's active (in my opinion.).

In the event that you need magic resist, I would suggest a Banshee's veil, as at the very least the health on it will improve your shield.

AP Route

My favorite route for this style of play. There are a lot of things you can do. You can rush for a Rylais if you want. (health+AP is sexy on Malphite), you can get a Deathcap, and you can even opt for a Deathfire Grasp in the event that they are stacking heavy duty HP.

Rylai -> Deathcap -> Lichbane is my favorite AP related route.

They are stacking magic resist.

Haunting Guise -> Void staff can solve this problem, although I would only suggest Void Staff if 4/5 of them at least have 100 MR, as it isn't cost effective otherwise.

The Role of an AP Malphite

AP Malphite is an amazing choice if you're solo queuing. What you are essentially doing is sacrificing some of your tanking ability in order to add a large amount of burst to your initiation, and to give yourself better ganking potential in the mid game. You can still act as an off tank, if need be, but I find that he works best in teams that do a lot flash damage with a lot of CC (Kassadin, Veigar, Fiddlesticks). He works very well with other mage-like characters. AP Malphite's farming ability is also slightly less than the average armor stacking Malphite, although that isn't a big deal at all.

Pros
- Burst
- Multipurpose (Can Initiate, Gank, and perform some nice burst.)
- Less reliant on your team to get kills

Cons
- Less tanking ability
- More of a solo queue pick. I wouldn't go AP malphite on a team that knew what they were doing.
- Your teammates might rage at you if you don't perform well, thus making AP Malphite look bad. ;P

Spell Choices

I prefer Exhaust/Ghost. Although Flash, Ignite, Teleport, and Fortify are all  nice choices in my opinion.

Runes

You'll want to invest heavily in cooldown and/or heavily into magic penetration, as he needs a nice chunk of both.

Masteries

I prefer the classic 9/0/21.