Hi guys,
so the new season has started and it has brought some pretty big changes to LOL. New items, new recepies, new visuals, new map, new timers and monsters and new mana/hp recharge system.
However so far, most of these changes don't really concern you as Malzahar. There are no real new ap items for mid lane. A lot of the new things concern jungle and other lanes/classes. We still build the same stuff on Malzahar and nothing has been changed about that.
So carry on and I will inform you if there is anything new, that affects Malzahar.

- Deathfire Grasp was deleted from the game

What's up guys,
I'm Funky and this will be my first guide. I'm currently in the Gold division and I main mid lane. I bought Malzahar very late, I was avoiding him and did not think he was super good for me to spend IP on him. Oh boi was I wrong.

I struggled a lot to get to gold because the lower elo is full of trolls. I'm not perfect but I believe I am good enough to make a guide for you guys. Malzahar is a very strong and also a safe pick if you want to get out of the elo hell. He is very scary and if the enemy team is good he is forcing them to buy items they would not normally buy. He is strong in all the phases of the game, especially late game he is a monster.

+PROS

+ one of the strongest AP carries
+ superb dmg
+ easy to play
+ has built in sustain
+ voidlings do pretty good dmg
+ very safe to play from afar
+ his ult can totally incapacitate people and
when it ends they are dead
+ has silence
+ his silence is a wide skillshot = can silence
the whole enemy team
+ he melts tanks down thanks to his W + Liandry's
+ nobody really counters him hard except for Gank Plank
+ his E gives you back mana if you kill with it
+ his E jumps to the next closest target (I did penta like that :D)
+ voidlings can tank turrets


-CONS

- his ult can be canceled in many ways (silence, kick, stun, etc)
- very easily countered by just 1 item :(
- single target oriented, althogh 2 spells are AoE and E jumps to another targets
- he is a huge threat so he is focused first
- no escapes or gap closers
- voidlings do what they want most of the time (focus targets with E on them)

Runes are pretty standard. I used to take all AP for the most dmg early game but it is wise to take the MR runes for the little tankiness they provide. If you are vs AD mid you can switch those for armor runes. Other than that I would go with this. Of course if you like to be tankier you can mix it up and pick health runes etc. It's really up to you. But in my opinion this works the best for me.

Always max E Malefic Visions first. Second max Q Call of the Void and last W Null Zone. Of course whenever you can put a point in R Nether Grasp. Make sure you have 1 point in W Null Zone at lvl 5 for your ult combo.

Passive

Summon Voidling
Malzahar's passive is pretty cool. After you cast 4 spells you will sommon a voidling that will fight by your side and attack everything around. After a while he will grow and become stronger. Voidlings focus the targets with your E on them. So it's good to E Malefic Visions your enemy when you have the voidling out so he will go and attack him for you while you can stay behind and farm safely.

Q

Call of the Void
This is a great spell for 2 reasons. Actually 3. It is silence. It is wide AoE. It has great damage. Use this whenever you see the enemy channeling abilities like Katarina R, Miss Fortune R, or when you sence they are about to use it you can do this to prevent them from doing it for a sec. Also you can interrupt Teleport with it. If the enemies are lined up you can use this to dmg the whole team with 1 spell.

W

Null Zone
This is an amazing tank melting ability. It goes 8% of Max HP + 1% for every 100 ap you have as magic damage. So, if you have 700 AP it does 15% of the enemy's max health. But that's not all. This is why Liandry's Torment is the core item on Malz. Combined with Rylai's Crystal Scepter your W does additional 2% of max hp damage. That gets you to 17% of their max hp as dmg!!! So lets say the enemy tank with 4k HP decides to jump at you. If you use your combo right and W where he is staning and R him so he can't walk away from it you will do cca 680 dmg with only your W. If you unleash your full combo EQWR ignite, nobody can survive it.

E

Malefic Visions
This is your main spell. It is a great damage ability, great farming ability and also a great zoning ability. It allows you to do tons of damage while staying safely behind. If your E kills it's target it will jump on the closes one and refresh its duration. You can use this to zone your enemies who wants to come closer for last hits. For example when there are last 3 ranged minions you just E one and if you have enough AP your E will kill it, jumping to the next one and then to the last one. If the enemy player is standing near the minion when the E kills it, it will jump on him. If your opoonent knows malzahar he will stay back which is good for you cause he is missing CS. If he doesn't know Malz then he will get the E and taste your damage. In teamfights if you E somebody who is low then your E will jump to another person after the first one dies. I managed to get a penta kill like this when 5 low enemies started running away from me and I E'd the last one and it killed him and jumped to another one untill they were all dead and I had penta. :D

R

Nether Grasp
Your ult is one of the best ults in the game. But it is high risk high reward. On lower ELO people don't know how to defend themselves against it. In high rankes you would be easily denied. :( ... Anyway, by pressing R you incapacitate your target, making them unable to cast spells, move, zhonyas or flash. They can do just nothing unless they have a way to break your ult - like Gangplank W Remove Scurvy. If you use your full combo E-W-R-Q when they try to run-Ignite or E-Q-W-R-Ignite and you make sure that the enemy is standing in your W as you ult him 98% your target will die. You can also use this to stop a fleeing enemy.

These items are the best combination for Malzahar and his abilities. You benefit from everything you get in this build and all of those items are perfectly viable for Malzahar in any situation.

- Sorcerer's Shoes Standard shoes for Ap carries, the Mpen is good.

- Haunting Guise this is perfect early game item. It's quite cheap and if you start with Amplifying Tome you will be able to get it on first back, it provides you with little ap but the penetration in combination with Sorcerer's Shoes it gives you 30 magic penetration which is especially in early game pretty sweet

- Liandry's Torment this is CORE item for Malzahar, you get this every game no matter what. This item combined with your W Null Zone gives you 17% of enemy's HP as magic damage. So OP. That's why Malza melts tanks, especially in this HP stacking meta. :)

- Rabadon's Deathcap standard item for every AP carry. Gives you tons of AP = tons of Dmg. If you buy Rabadon as your last item it gives you more than 300 AP!

- Rylai's Crystal Scepter this item is not good on everybody but it works great with Malzahar. It doubles the Liandry's Torment passive which is great. Also the HP you get is always good as the carries get often focused, so being a bit beefy helps a lot.

- Zhonya's Hourglass this item gives you a lot of AP, good amount of Armor which is always good and most of all the active that makes you invincible for 2 secs. Use this against Zed ult, Karthus ult and anytime you need to save your ***. Don't forget to use it. ;)

- Void Staff Buy this if the enemy is stacking magic resist. Together with Mpen boots and liandry you will hurt ;)

- Rod of Ages This is a great item. The reason I don't always build it is that it slows me down from my usual build. You need to build the catalyst the protector which is a good item but costs you your early gold and gives you no ap, only survivability. You can go for this if you play vs somebody hard and you plan on playing it safe. If you wanna be agressive this is not the best item. Buy Rabadon's Deathcap if you want to be agressive. Also, if you want to buy Rod of Ages you need to probably start with it. It takes 10 minutes to charge fully so combined with the time you need to build it, the sooner the better.
- update: in this assasin meta I quite often get RoA, just to get the extra tankiness to survive, depends on the matchups

Other Choices:

- Guardian Angel I don't usually get this for Malz, but if you are focused hard and need to survive go for it.

- Banshee's Veil if the enemy has ap heavy team you might wanna consider building this item.

Malzahar is one of the characters who can lane absolutely safely while still harassing your opponent. Your main harassing tool is Malefic Visions. I've seen Malzahars who spam their abilities trying to poke me when E is the only non-skillshot ability for harassing. Farm creeps with E. In the beginning you don't have enough AP for your E to kill the creeps so help it with a few autos if you want to get the E passive and if you want it to jump to another target, which you always should.

Harass your enemy with a few Es here and there. Keep farming. Your E will eventually take them low enough because they can't defend against it. As soon as you get 6 wait for your opponent to come close enough. When they do E them then W under their feet and R when they stand in the W. This is important as it will do a lot of Dmg. If you miss your W you will probably not kill your target. During R you can Ignite. If the target isn't dead you can Q them as they are running from you.

Never use only your R if you want to kill your enemy 1v1. Use all you have and then R. You can use R to stop a running enemy and let your team kill him.

So this is it. If you are trying to find a mid AP carry that is not used that often but is still very strong I strongly suggest you to try Malzahar. You will be surprised what he can do and how strong he is. :) Go for it and let me know if I can make this guide better and how your games with Malz were.

Funkyliani

My best Malzahar games: