Good build for a very tanky champ

Thats very good to know! I play several other tanks and would have grabbed nimbleness on instinct.
Thanks for clarifying.

I took the points in Hardened Skin over Nimbleness and that last point in dodge is because of a team-fight reason. If enemies are going to be hitting you, you're going to want to stay inside of your ult, thus keeping them inside of it.

Nimbleness is good on tanks who move around alot, like Shen; however, Maokai has Vengeful Maelstrom, which bumps his damage reduction to 24%. Most of your time in any team fight will be in there. Twisted Advance gives you plenty of chasing power, and if you really need an escape mechanism, get Flash over Fortify.

Good guide, very detailed.

But why not get nimbleness in the def tree? the speed increase is so nice!

+1

solid tank build. Your items are all in nice sync. This is TANK! to the very root.
I try to make him more of a killer since all his spells deals damage and uses ignite most often since it's a swain/soraka/sona/trynda/Eve/Gangplank and so on killer spell (hate heals)

+1

Like I said, what I wrote is only my opinion and I don't force anyone to play like I do:) Magic res and flat hp runes will be very good too, especially in early game, because in late game you will get everything you need (hp, armor, more mr and so on) from items. I just don't want to spend more IP on runes (over 45,000 so far), so I stick with the ones I already bought.
Well... in my history of playing LoL I bought Frozen Heart... once. Really. I usually play non-mana champions or champs who don't need it like AD carries, so this is why I'm not a fan of this item... but maybe I should give it a try:D

Originally I had the runes you described, actually. XD I changed them out for better early game health and Magic Resist, since you'll be getting a lot of armor from Glacial Shroud in the beginning: Getting a good bit of health, Armor, and Magic Resist all by about Lvl6. The MR is great, but it's something you shouldn't worry about too much while tanking. Since I'm pouring the Marks into health, I can substitute in the Quints for MR, which helps a lot against casters early game. Seals could probably be better off at Health per Lvl, so it's something I'll number crunch for.

I picked Frozen Heart for 3 reasons)Big early game mana boost, massive armor boost, and it's passive to hinder any melee champs early-mid game, staggering them slightly in the late game. It supplies 3 great tanking abilities Maokai needs in the first 25 minutes of the game, and later on can prove to be useful against teams that don't have a great comp.


So yeah, I'm gonna do some number crunching and better set up the ruins.

Thanks for the comment.

Very solid build, lots of explanations - great thing to help players that are new to Maokai.
I like your items, but I'm not a big fan of Frozen Heart. Good to know that you mentioned that last 3 items are situational and should be bought after considering your enemy's strengths. It's nice that you talk about so many situational items and so many ways of building them in different orders!
I don't like Fortify, so I'm glad that you added some explanations about other summoner spells players can use. I would use Ghost, it's my favourite SS for almost every champion in the League. And I agree that Clarity is a must, I used it on every game with Maokai.
I would also change runes a little bit: magic pen marks (because all 4 spells are dealing good magic dmg), flat hp quints and hp per lvl seals. But it's just me.
I hope I could help with my little suggestions:) And you have +1 from me, I really like your guide! Keep it up! :D

Also... FIRST xD