Hello everyone, and welcome to my guide to playing a succesful Mordekaiser! First of all I'd like to start off by saying this guide will not ensure any victory. My personal favorite build is the hybrid build, and I find it works especially well on Mordekaiser. If you do not like one or two of the items I recommend in this build, please state your reasons in the comment box down below. Any good commentary is appreciated ;)

First of all, let me explain why I took these Masteries for Mordekaiser. While it seems pretty obvious, Mordekaiser's main abilities rely on the damage he deals with his spells. As such, the point in Burning Embers and Archaic Knowledge are highly appreciated, as these increase the damage done with your spells and as such in turn increase your shield regen. The points in offensive mastery are simply to make last hitting minions a bit easier, even though Mordekaiser is EXTREMELY good at this. You can take that mastery out if you are confident in your farming skills. All of my points in Defense are to increase overall survivability, as Mordekaiser will
be rather weak early-game. If he doesn't charge his shield enough, he can get harassed extremely easily. But I will come back to that later on in this guide. The last point in Ardor is just useful, and since I just had a single point left, I figured it would be nice to deal a little more damage.

As for the Summoner Skills, Ignite is once more obvious since it is a great combo with Mordekaiser's Children of the Grave. Flash gives a great opportunity to tower dive if your opponent is low, using flash to get into Ignite range and comboing it with Children of the Grave. Also, since Mordekaiser often has trouble getting out of ganks, flash can be used to jump over walls, denying your opponent the kill.

On to the Glyphs of Focus, Mordekaiser's passive relies on his skills. The more skills Mordekaiser spams in addition to having Spell Vamp, the harder he is to kill. Having these Cooldown Reduction runes will help you with that late-game, although they offer little benefits early game because Mordekaiser uses his health to use skills.

The marks of insight, which work great on nearly every champion, are simply another way for Mordekaiser to gain more Shield quicker. The faster Mordekaiser charges his shield, the better; because it allows him to be just that little bit more squishy then the opponent, while not losing any health at all. Combined with the Quintessences for Ability Power, this makes sure a first level Mordekaiser can farm all the melee minions in a wave immediately. But I'll come back on that later.

The seals of resilience give Mordekaiser a nice little buff on his hands, since his main problem early-game are all-physical champions such as Vayne and Nocturne. Especially Vayne can be a pain, since she is so much faster. This might just give you that edge you need to keep your shield up and running until she can't chase you anymore.

My first point in the skill sequence is ALWAYS Creeping death, because it can be used both offensively and defensively. Using this on one of your melee minions in addition to your increased Ability power and Magic Penetration will easily get rid of those melee minions on the front row of your opponent's minion waves. Also, the minion will start gathering Shield energy for you, so you can actually go in for some last hitting, too, as well as getting cash and experience from simply staying behind your minions. I love this skill! When people try to gank you or attack you directly, you can even use it on a minion so it gathers more Shield for you while you run away, or you could use it on yourself for the extra defenses. I recommend the first option is the opponent has stuns, the second if they are more damage-focused. Maxing this ability soon will also give you a clear advantage in farming, since it will allow you to solo minion waves without damage by level 3. Any enemy would find this plenty annoying.

If your enemies aren't annoyed enough by that, the second level skill point goes to syphon of destruction. While your minion (or you yourself) is charging your shield simply by attacking the enemy minion, Syphon of Destruction will allow you to constantly harass an enemy champion, even if they are ranged. Using this skill well is key to many victories, as by constantly harassing your enemy like this, you can keep them away from the minions, denying experience, charge your shield or even kill them, given they are low enough on health and you don't fail at a tower dive.

Logically, at level 6, a point goes into Children of the Grave. By this point you should've been able to harass your enemy quite a lot, leaving them at relatively low health. If your enemy has around three bars left, you can attempt a tower dive and take them down quickly, using flash to get into range for Syphon of Destruction and Ignite, using Children of the Grave as the finishing move (since it has the longest range). If you already have Hextech Gunblade, you could also slow them first using its nuke, before comboing the rest of your skills on them. If this works, you will be secured with a fine little ghost, which is yours to control at will. Because of this, I recommend taking down high damage characters like Master Yi or Miss Fortune first, since a high-damage ghost is a real pain for the opponent. Remember to control the ghost with Alt-click!

Finally, Mace of Spades. While this isn't a bad skill, it requires Mordekaiser to get really close to his enemy, or to hit a different enemy for less damage. Since Mordekaiser's speed isn't that great, this is often a problem, as such the reason why I don't max this until late-game.

Personally, my first item is Amplifying Tome and a health pot. This ensures your skills don't go to a waste, the pot gives you better laning and the tome also gives you the ability to quickly build into Hextech Gunblade, which is REALLY important for Mordekaiser. The sooner you get spell vamp, the better; because your spells cost health when cast, this will replenish that just as quickly. The rest of the bonuses Hextech gives are also a great addition, mostly the mini-nuke. It does a little magic damage over a relatively large range, slowing the enemy hit. This is very important to Mordekaiser as he often can't chase down a fleeing opponent. This slow will surely bring them into your range, as well as being a good combo with Ignite and Children of the Grave.

Once you have built the Hextech Revolver, you should start building on your shoes. By this time you should have a good idea of how this battle is going to be, what your opponent's focus will be. Based on that you can either go for the Mercury Threads or the Sorcerer's shoes. I personally prefer the Merc Threads because they require you to build a Null-Magic Mantle first, giving you a bonus even if you can't afford the Merc Threads yet.

Thirdly, I use Nashor's tooth. It's main advantage is the cooldown reduction, although the attack speed and ability power greatly enhance its usefulness. This will allow you to be a lot more squishy and to damage the towers a lot better -- if, of course, you can get to them. Which brings me to my next item.

The next choice of item is either Nature's Force, or Thornmail, depending on your opposing team. If they are going for an all-out physical build, or if you are being constantly harassed by a physical type champion, Thornmail is a great idea, as the 30% damage return makes your opponent harass himself as you keep up the shield, and the armor bonus also increases your chances of surviving any random gank or teamfight. If your opponent's team is focusing ability power, your best choice is obviously Nature's force. The movement speed bonus and magic resist greatly increase your survivability overall, as well as making you that little bit faster. If you are doubting which item to take, I recommend taking Nature's Force, because of the 8% movement speed bonus. Either way, at the end of the build, you will need both.

The last item often differs based on the situation. I'd say if I was still getting killed by AP stackers despite having Nature's force, I'd go for either Banshee's Veil or Guardian Angel. I guess the magic resist is obvious, but I recommend taking Banshee's Veil if the opponent has a lot of stuns or throws, and taking Guardian Angel in case your opponent just damages the hell out of you. If your team is on the winning side, and you want to keep that edge, I recommend taking the Abyssal scepter, mostly for it's aura. This will give you and your allies a little more damage, as well as once more increasing your damage and shield regen.

I'll explain more about this build later, but right now I've got to get some sleep. It's 1 am and I got to go to school tomorrow. You're free to leave a comment about what you think of the build so far, and I appreciate (almost) any comment! Thank you for reading thus far!