Viktor is one of the most under played mage champions in the game. It is because of this that I have decided to make this guide. He has very high damage throughout the entire game, and has insane harass that can help him overcome even the most difficult lanes. The hardest part of playing Viktor is not bragging after you destroy the entire enemy team and carry your team to VIKTORy. While Viktor can fill more roles than just the burst mage, this guide will be focusing on the burst mage build, with perhaps more builds to follow in the future.

Pros:

• Can fit multiple roles on a team, such as burst mage, and support mage
• Insane harassment ability through Death Ray
• Two area of effect crowd controls that will destroy the enemy team's ability to team fight
• Starts with The Hex Core, which gives AP/level, so you can get higher amounts of AP than your opponent without using AP runes
• Not played very often, so not many people know how to play against him very well
• His name is almost victory, nuff said

Cons:

• Very squishy early to mid game until you get your Rod of Ages, and Rylai's Crystal Scepter
• Weak against crowd control from the enemy team. He has to be able to get all of his spells off in order to be effective
• His Death Ray takes some getting used to before you can use it effectively

Recommended Summoner Spells:

Having Flash on Viktor is very useful for having a way to both initiate, and flee from a fight. It is useful for flashing into a fight to use your combo, or to flash through a wall in order to get away from an enemy champion.



Ignite is great for securing kills on your lane opponent early game. Those early kills allow Viktor to get his items much faster and begin to snowball out of control.

Possible Alternatives:

Ghost is a great alternative to Flash as it allows you to move faster than usual for a short amount of time. This is much more useful for trying to make it to a team fight, or running away from an enemy over a distance. The only problem is that if your enemy has a stun or disable of some sort, Ghost becomes very useless.



Teleport is nice to have for any mid or solo top champion, as it allows you the luxury of going back to shop whenever you have it up, rather than having to rely on your jungler (assuming you have a jungler at all) to cover your lane for you. If I were to take Teleport I would swap it out for Ignite.



I would only recommend grabbing Exhaust if nobody else you your team is getting it. However good Exhaust can be when trying to kill somebody alone, it is not as useful on Viktor as it would be your team's tankier champions that tend to get further into the action in team fights than Viktor does.



The only situation where you will want to take Cleanse is if you are against Kassadin, Morgana, Galio, or Rammus. It will allow you to be rid of Kassadin's silence and kill him after he uses his ult to flash up to you, therefore rendering his advantage of the silence over you useless, and leaving him with no way to escape for a few seconds without wasting one of his own summoner spells. It will also allow you to get rid of Morgana's snare, or the stun on her ult, although, if she is ulting you, it is probably going to kill you when the second part goes off. Finally, if will allow you to get out of Galio's ult and Rammus's taunt. All of this being said, you can also just get a Banshee's Veil or Quicksilver Sash instead of wasting a summoner spell slot on a spell that has a ridiculous cooldown when compared to either of these items.

Do NOT Take These Summoner Spells, EVER!:

NEVER, EVER, EVER take Clarity on Viktor, or on any mage for that matter. It is one of the most useless summoner spells in the game after the first 10 minutes of the game. There are plenty of items that offer mana regeneration without wasting a perfectly good summoner spell slot.



Probably the second most worthless summoner spell in the game (yes it is more useful than Clarity). Revive at least has a useful function late game. Have you ever been dead waiting to respawn and watched helplessly as the enemy team pushed your Nexus to win the game? I have, and in that instance I wished I had Revive to come and save the day. Well, it sounds good, but honestly, is one person going to really make a difference in the above situation? Probably not, that and Revive has a ridiculous cooldown of 5 minutes. Therefore, Revive is still not a very useful spell, don't get it.



Plain and simple, this is not a support build and therefore you have no reason to be taking Clairvoyance.



Also plain and simple, fairly useless. Promote is only good against champions that are horrible early game pushers. And even then, your job in mid lane is not to rapidly push the enemy turret, it is to farm and attempt to deny the enemy's mid from getting farm. Thus, Promote is useless to Viktor.



Reason #1: See Clarity, substitute the word heal in for any instance of the word clarity.
Reason #2: See Exhaust, substitute the word heal in for any instance of the word exhaust.
Basically, to sum it up for you and save you the time, and because the above directions don't really make sense or work, Heal is useless after 10 minutes into the game, and is also better on a tankier champion than it is on Viktor.



Smite is used on junglers, Viktor is not a jungler, problem?



Viktor is not an auto attacker, therefore the attack speed bonus from Surge is useless to him, and if you are looking for some extra damage, then take Ignite.

I use the masteries I have put on this guide for one reason, and that reason is to maximize damage. If you try to spec for the utility tree, you will not do the damage needed to be a true AP carry for your team, thus, speccing into the offense tree is a must.

Marks:

Greater Mark of Magic Penetration gives you magic penetration that you need in order to maximize your damage.

Seals:

They do not make magic penetration runes for seals, so use whatever you would like. I myself prefer mana regeneration runes, although I wish I had flat mana regeneration runes instead of per level ones, they are much more useful for that early game mana regeneration that most mages badly need.

Glyphs:

Greater Glyph of Scaling Ability Power synergizes with The Hex Core and gives you even more Ability Power just for leveling up.

Quintessences:

Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed gives you Move Speed that you greatly need in order to chase down fleeing foes.

A Note:

Power Transfer may be more spammable than Death Ray, however, it only has 10 more base damage at each level, while Death Ray has a .05 higher AP ratio than Power Transfer. This may not seem like much, but at 500 AP, your Power Transfer would be doing its base damage of 260 + (.65 * 500 = 325) for a total of 585 magic damage, while at 500 AP, Death Ray would be doing its base damage of 250 + (.7 * 500 = 350) for a total of 600 magic damage. You also have to take into account that Power Transfer is a single target ability, whereas Death Ray is an area of effect ability capable of hitting as many things as it wants (in a straight line). Therefore, for farming capabilities, Death Ray is far superior. Also, in a team fight, hitting one enemy with Power Transfer results in 585 magic damage under this scenario, whereas hitting 5 enemies with Death Ray results in 3,000 magic damage, a huge difference. Not to mention that Death Ray is far better for harassing your lane opponent than Power Transfer. So overall, maxing Death Ray over Power Transfer is a win in just about every way possible.

and 2
These starting items allow you to rush a Catalyst the Protector as fast as possible.

OR

and 3
Standard starting items for the current meta game, although, I'm not entirely sure why.

OR


Gives you a little bit more AP to start with, some HP for trading harass with your opponent, and a little bit of mana regeneration.

You need the magic penetration and movement speed early game to help with your harassing of the enemy mid.


This helps majorly with your farming efforts, as it adds a damage over time effect to your Death Ray, as well as giving you the a decent amount of AP for a relatively low amount of gold.


Your bread and butter item. It makes you tankier by giving you HP, gives you AP, gives you mana, and gives you lane sustain through the passive effect on level up.

Massive amounts of AP for more damage, what more could you ask for?


An item that makes you tankier, gives you more AP and applies a slow on spell damage, awesome!

Does the enemy team have a lot of magic resistance? If so, get a Void Staff.


Are you getting focused in team fights? If so, get a Zhonya's Hourglass.


Is the enemy team stacking HP? If the answer to that question is "Yes," then get a Deathfire Grasp.


Are you getting fed like crazy? If so, you should get a Mejai's Soulstealer.


Is the enemy team full of healers, or crazy health regenerating champions? If it is, get a Morello's Evil Tome.


Do you need a little bit more burst damage? If so, get a Lich Bane.


Does the enemy team have a ton of magi that are ripping you apart? If so, get an Abyssal Mask.

Use your auto attacks to farm early game and harass your lane opponent whenever you get the chance. Once you get some AP, you should be able to clear waves easily using a combination of Death Ray and Power Transfer, as well as auto attacks. Continue to zone your opponent as often as you can, and once they are low enough, go in for the kill. Your typical combo is to open up with Gravity Field, followed by Power Transfer, then right as they are about to get stunned throw out Chaos Storm and Death Ray, followed by another Power Transfer if it is off of cooldown. This combo ensures that they are not able to dodge your Death Ray, and that they take a lot of damage from Chaos Storm, as they are forced to sit in it for at least half of the duration before they can get out of range of it, also, most of the damage they will be able to do back to you will be absorbed by your Power Transfers.

Come time for team fights, sit in the back of your team until the fight is entirely started, then lead with a Gravity Field on as many enemies as possible, followed by a Death Ray, again hitting as many of them as possible. Follow up with Chaos Storm, and then use Power Transfer on anyone that is low enough to get a kill off of. You must do this quickly to ensure you do the maximum amount of damage you can do while they are all stunned by your Gravity Field. Once your spells are off cooldown, repeat the process until the team fight is over.

While anything can happen in any single game of League of Legends, these are the champions that will typically be mid in a game, as well as how Viktor fairs against each one.

I have colored the champion's names based on how well Viktor performs against them.

Green means that you shouldn't have any problem absolutely ****ting on them.
Yellow means that you should have a fairly easy lane against them.
Orange means that you may have some difficulty against them.
Red means be careful when facing this person, they can **** on you.

Ahri:
Ahri is difficult for most mages to handle, however, you shouldn't have too much of a problem with her as your Death Ray has as much range as her Q, if not more.

Akali:
Akali is cake, she is a melee champion with very little harass she can do to you without taking significant damage in return. Your Chaos Storm will also reveal to you where she is in her stealth bubble, and enable you to prepare a Gravity Field + Death Ray combo for her when her bubble is almost gone.

Anivia:
Anivia has decent range on her stun and can be one of the more difficult people for Viktor to lane against. Just be sure you dodge her stun and you will have no problems against her.

Annie:
Annie has extremely high damage on her spells, and the ability to stun out of nowhere. Keeping an eye on the number of stacks she has on her passive will let you know how aggressive you can be against her at that current time.

Brand:
Brand has a very large range on his abilities and very high damage, he can be very difficult to lane against. Grabbing Boots early game against him can make laning against him a LOT easier, as dodging his W will negate a large portion of his damage against you. Also, grabbing some early magic resistance can mean the difference between feeding him, and getting fed off of him.

Cassiopeia:
Cassiopeia is a highly combo dependent champion that relies on landing her Q or W on you before using her E to be able to do damage. So, getting Boots as a starting item against her will ensure she has a hard time doing so.

Fiddlesticks:
All of Fiddlesticks's damage comes from his Bountiful Harvest, which is easily shut down with your Gravity Field. Just throw it down whenever he is about to Bountiful Harvest and he will run away crying.

Fizz:
Fizz is ridiculously over powered right now, and I don't see Riot nerfing him anytime soon. He has the ability to dash in and hit you for about half of your HP at level 3-4 depending on how he is leveling his skills. He also has the ability to dodge anything you may throw back at him. Take great caution when facing him.

Galio:
Galio is a tank, that is specifically designed to counter mage champions. . . yeah have fun with this one. You probably won't be able to damage him at all, and his Q hurts in a way that is not fun. He is usually played as a support tank in bot lane, however, he is occasionally taken to mid lane to counter a difficult mage champion.

Gragas:
Gragas out ranges you by far, has just as much damage as you do, and a spell that makes him take less damage. Not fun to lane against as any mage really, however, he is manageable if you play properly and wait for him to throw his barrels at minions before going in to harass him.

Heimerdinger:
Heimerdinger can be easily beaten if you ignore his turrets and focus him from afar with Death Ray. The only thing you have to watch out for are his rockets because a few hits from them can send you back to base easily.

Karthus:
Karthus is never fun to lane against, as he can spam his Q all day long and do damage to you while you are waiting on cooldowns to retaliate. That being said, Boots early on in the game can make it easy to dodge his Q, and therefore make him very easy to lane against.

Kassadin:
Kassadin is one of the worst match ups for Viktor, as he has one of the longest silences in the game, and it has a pretty long range (a little longer than your Power Transfer). You are best off just farming against him, as trying to harass him usually ends up in you taking significantly more damage than he does.

Katarina:
Katarina can be very annoying to lane against due to her ability to leap to anything that isn't a structure, whether friendly or not. This makes her able to dodge your Death Ray if she times it right. You do, however, completely shut her ult down and effectively make her useless late game, so survive the lane phase and laugh as she becomes useless in team fights against your team.

Kennen:
Kennen is a ***** to lane against for a lot of people because of the fact that his Q has a long range, his E makes him super fast, his W does not require him to aim it at all, just requires him to have a Mark of the Storm on you to use it, and he doesn't use mana to power his spells. So basically, once he gets Hextech Revolver he can lane forever. You can, however, shut him down with your crowd control if you are able to get it off before he gets his crowd control off. Basically, dodge his Q and stun/silence him before he an ult and you should have no issue bursting him down.

LeBlanc:
Pre-level 6, LeBlanc is cake to lane against, as she really can't do anything to you. Once she hits level 6, however, she can burst the **** out of you before you ever get a chance to react to it. Early magic resistance will allow you to survive her burst and effectively make her useless.

Lux:
Lux's range makes her very annoying to lane against. She also has a shield which can completely nullify Ignite. That being said, if you dodge her spells, you can easily out lane her, as she has pretty long cooldowns on her spells and will run out of mana very quickly if she is not careful.

Malzahar:
Although Malzahar is an extremely strong pusher early game, all of his damage is damage over time. Not allowing him to get you with his E or Q will effectively shut him down pre-level 6. After level 6, all you need to do is bait his ult, and make sure you throw down Gravity Field right before he uses it, thus cancelling his ult after 1.5 seconds of it channeling and negating most of the damage it would have otherwise done. Without his ult, there is no way he can kill you if you aren't being an idiot.

Mordekaiser:
Mordekaiser has a shield he can charge up that will allow him to soak up every last bit of damage you can do to him, therefore making him virtually unkillable without the help of a jungler with at least a disable of some sort.

Morgana:
Morgana is Viktor's absolute worst match up (hence why I decided to give her a color of her own). Her shield makes so you cannot do anything at all to her, while she is able to slowly whittle you down until finally she kills you with her ult. If the other team has a Morgana on it, go to a different lane, or stay in mid and suck your thumb while you wait for her to inevitably kill you or take your turret down because you have to go back to base so often.

Nidalee:
Nidalee is cake, all you need to do is dodge her spears and she cannot do anything to you. In fact, she shouldn't even be in mid, she should be in top lane building tanky dps.

Orianna:
Orianna is pretty easy to lane against if you can dodge her ball. If not she can be a nightmare. Picking up Boots early can aid in dodging her ball and allow you to control the lane more easily.

Ryze:
Ryze is another one of those champions that is very hard to lane against for many mages, however, as long as you stay away from him he should be easy to handle.

Soraka:
Soraka usually will go bot lane to support, however, she is able to mid. She has a pretty long silence that can be your demise and therefore can be difficult to lane against. This coupled with her ability to get mana regeneration and stay in lane forever due to her ability to heal makes her very annoying to lane against.

Swain:
Pre-level 6, all you need to do is dodge Swain's snare and you can easily lane against him. Once he hits 6, however, he will have enough sustain that you will not be able to kill him. Once this happens, just continue to dodge his snares and farm like crazy.

Talon:
Due to Talon's silence and incredible burst damage, he can be an extreme pain in the *** to lane against. Try to harass him as much as possible without letting him get close to you.

Teemo:
Oh no! Teemo just blinded me, what should I do? Oh I know, Gravity Field, Death Ray, and Power Transfer his little mouse *** back to base every time he comes in to "harass" you with his blind, nuff said.

Twisted Fate:
Twisted Fate has ridiculous range on his cards, however, they are quite easy to dodge. If you can continually dodge his cards and harass him back, he will be no problem to lane against.

Veigar:
Veigar is one of the most annoying magi in the game. His full combo can destroy even the tankiest of champions in the game. Trying to harass him post-level 6 can spell out your doom. Proceed with caution.

Viktor:
May the best Viktor win.

Vladimir:
Vladimir has incredible lane sustain, and can prove to be difficult to lane against, just because of the fact that you probably won't be able to kill him.

Xerath:
Even though Xerath has a very long range on his abilities, if you are able to dodge them, he will not be able to do anything to you. Just throw down your Gravity Field whenever he roots himself in place and prepare to harass the living **** out of him.

Ziggs:
Ziggs can be very annoying to lane against due to his range and ability to harass. Try to dodge his bombs and you should be just fine.

Zilean:
Zilean's bombs are extremely annoying and can be very painful if you allow him to hit you with them continuously. Try harassing him without letting him place bombs on you and you should be fine.

First and foremost, I would like to thank you for reading my guide, and ask that you vote so I may know how good of a job I did or didn't do on this. Also, comments would be very appreciated as well. That being said, I just want to say that Viktor is a very powerful mage if played correctly. Getting used to him can be difficult, but well worth the effort. He can destroy 90% of the magi in the game if you play properly against them. I do hope you enjoyed this guide, and that it helps you to be successful with Viktor, and thank you again for taking the time to read it.