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Morgana Build Guide by Emi

Support -The Tormented Protector-

Support -The Tormented Protector-

Updated on October 7, 2016
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League of Legends Build Guide Author Emi Build Guide By Emi 128 8 2,795,829 Views 90 Comments
128 8 2,795,829 Views 90 Comments League of Legends Build Guide Author Emi Morgana Build Guide By Emi Updated on October 7, 2016
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Table of Contents

Introduction
Getting Ready
Abilities/Skills

Item Choices
Gameplay



Welcome
Hi there, and welcome to my Morgana support guide! You will be shown example builds and how to utilize her a abilities in a way to benefit your team as a whole. Keep in mind this guide will be very long. If you believe this guide has helped you, leave an upvote!


About Morgana
Why is Morgana a viable choice? Morgana possesses a skill set that can be used to protect her team and be utilized as a support. She has a long ranged snare and a massive AOE slow/stun. Due to these abilities, she can easily set up kills for her carry all the while being able to peel enemies off of them as well. Not to mention, Her Black Shield can keep your carries safe from the CC abilities of the current meta picks.
About Me
Hi there! I'm Emikadon, a Plat V ranked player on the NA Server. I main Support and ADC, and Morgana is one of my favorite supports to play.

This guide is a free to use resource, but if you find it's really helped you, a donation is always appreciated! Any tiny thing helps! :)


Other Guides/Resources
If you liked this guide, you should check out my others as well! I have 4 published ones at the moment, and you can find all of them here. In addition, I have a Graphic Café and a Review Shop, which are free-to-use resources if you need some help on any guides you write yourself!


lore





If you're really dedicated to learning more about Morgana and you want to hear it from the pros, check out any of the following articles. They all discuss what the pros we see in the LCS think are the best way to build and play Morgana. Just click on the title to go to the actual page, or you can just open the spoiler for the article itself!



Play like the Pros: Mistake's Morgana Support
By James ''Obscurica'' Chen, November 26, 2013
article



Morgana - Fallen from Mid to Bot
By Mattias "Gentleman Gustaf" Lehman, February 28, 2014
article



Why has support Morgana seen a resurgence in competitive play?
By Tobias "Reggíe" Wilson, March 7, 2014
article



Support Morgana in LCS - Return of the Exile
By Daniel "Spellsy" Biery, March 12, 2014
article



The Rise and Predicted Fall of Morgana Support
By Amber Burney, March 30, 2014
article





Pros
+ High damage
+ Self-sustain
+ 2 stuns/slows
+ Sets up kills nicely
+ Black Shield
Strengths
Morgana is a support who has fantastic AP ratios on her skill set due to her being played as a Mid laner often. In addition to her powerful spells, her passive makes her hard to push out of lane. Thus, she can pressure the enemy bot lane with her constant presence. She has 2 major stuns/slows, and one of them is a huge AOE. These used correctly can set up kills easily for her carry. Her black shield makes all CC useless so long as it isn't broken, and this makes the big three (Annie, Leona, and Thresh) much less intimidating.



Weaknesses
Even though Morgana's sustain for herself is huge, she has no outside heal for her team. In addition, she is very squishy early game, and can easily be bursted down. Her abilities have ridiculously long cooldowns, which can be dangerous if they've been wasted or if you're stuck in an extended trade. Finally, Morgana is short-ranged. She has one of the shortest autoattack ranges in the game at only 450. This is shorter than every single ADC, with the exception of Urgot. She also has no escape and is very slow. Poor positioning is a guaranteed kill for the enemy team.
Cons
- No outside heal
- Squishy Early game
- Long cooldowns
- Short-ranged
- No mobility



Standard Summoner Spells



Flash is the standard for any champion, due to the sheer amount of uses of this summoner spell. Morgana has very little mobility, so Flash can be used as an escape tool if the situation ever calls for it. By flashing away from an enemy or even over terrain, you can avoid a situation that ends up with you dead. It can also be used offensively. One of the ways Morgana can initiate teamfights is by Flash + Soul Shackles + Zhonya's Hourglass to CC the entire enemy team.
Exhaust is typical for any support. It renders their ADC useless for 2.5 seconds, and it can secure kills with its slow. Also, it can shut down any assassins that come to burst your ADC/APC. With the rise of champions like LeBlanc and Zed, it can save your carry's life more often than not. In addition, it'll help you out in early laning trades as well.
Heal can be great for saving you and your carry, especially early game. It heals for a really nice chunk of health, as well as grants movement speed. It can give you just that little burst of movement so that you can escape. Plus, it can heal an ally, which will help them escape (in this case, most likely your ADC). However, it doesn't stack very well, so only get it if your ADC did not.
Ignite is a very aggressive summoner in general. It isn't taken very much anymore since the buff on Exhaust, but it can still have its uses. It can be used to kill secure, since it'll take of that tiny bit of health left if the enemy escapes. In addition, it has a healing reduction debuff, which will destroy any chances of the enemy ADC's health regen through Life Steal.



In this build, I am focusing on emphasizing Morgana's high damage output, all the while maintaining her survivability early game, when she is the squishiest. The following are recommended runes, but there are also other viable runes listed if they do not fit your style of playing.

Recommended Runes

greater mark of hybrid penetration
MARKS

Hybrid Pen runes are the go to marks for most supports, since it allows both your autoattack and abilities to do more damage. Even with Morgana's extremely low autoattack range, she can poke with them in conjunction with her long ranged spells.
SEALS

At the very start of the game, you can have an addition 72 health. This helps provides a little extra survivability and helps in early game trades due to the increased tankiness.




GLYPHS

Most enemy supports deal magic damage when they poke, so these will minimize the impact they have on you. Also, they help out a bit later against the enemy APC.




QUINTS

The combination of health seals and armor quints is very useful. This will still give you enough defense against any auto attack poke from the enemy and will make you tankier early game.





alternative runes



In regards to masteries, 0/18/12 are the way to go. On an AP Support like Morgana, the 18 points in the cunning tree are really good for early game poke and harass, while the 12 points in resolve tree give you more survivability and playmaking potential.


Cunning Tree

  • Wanderer allows you to roam more efficiently, so placing down wards or roaming to help other lanes won't lose you as much exp. Secret Stash helps you with sustain, which is especially useful if you had a bad trade.
  • Bandit synergizes very well with Spellthief's. The passive gold generation will help since you don't CS, and each time you manage to autoattack, you'll get a total of 8 gold instead of 5.
  • Precision + Thunderlord's Decree is very powerful. Not only does it give you the ability to take control of the lane with its burst, but it's easy to proc with your W as well.


Resolve Tree


  • Recovery is more of a filler mastery than anything. However, it outweighs Unyielding because the only armor/MR you have are from your runes. If you'd prefer to have a late game edge instead of early, that's another option.
  • Tough Skin migh not seem like much, but it's actually very noticeable in the long run. The damage reduction will add up, and can sometimes save your life with the extra 15-20 health in a fight.
  • Veteran Scars give you a bit more survivability. Since you'll most likely be building resistances later, this will make them more efficient.
  • Insight is very strong. It decreases your summoner spells by a lot, and that will give you more playmaking potential. For example, the more often your Flash is up, the more often you can Flash + ult.





Morgana is a heavy damage dealing support, much like Annie, who also has some skills that that can lock down enemy champions, thus setting up kills for her carry. She also is able to protect her carry with these same skills. In this section, I'm going to explain the basics of her abilities and provide some tips to keep in mind.


Soul Siphon (Passive)
Morgana is granted 10% / 15% / 20% bonus spell vamp.

Useful tips
  • Soul Siphon is Morgana's main source of sustain.
  • By coordinating with your ADC, you can use your Tormented Soil to spell vamp off of minions.

Things to note
  • If you do spell vamp off of minions, be careful not to push the wave too quickly. Pressuring the lane is good, but be careful of ganks!


Dark Binding (Q)
Morgana releases a sphere of dark magic that travels in a line, dealing magic damage and rooting the first enemy unit it hits for a short time.

Range: 1300
Cooldown: 11
Cost: 50 / 60 / 70 / 80 / 90 Mana
Magic Damage: 80 / 135 / 190 / 245 / 300 (+ 90% AP)
Root Duration: 2 / 2.25 / 2.5 / 2.75 / 3

Useful tips
  • You can use this ability to check bushes, as the animation will stop moving. There will also be a distinct sound, like a cage being locked.
  • By chaining the root from this ability into the AOE of your W, you can prevent the enemy from escaping the magic damage of Tormented Soil. This is useful for poking and harassing from a distance.
  • With AP, this ability alone can do massive amounts of damage. It has a really good AP ratio (90%), so building AP scales really well with her kit.

Things to note
  • Dark Binding has a very long cooldown, and it doesn't decrease with rank. If you're going to use it to check bushes, be wary if you miss. It gives the enemy a full 11 seconds where you don't have a reliable stun.
  • The animation is pretty slow moving, so be sure to aim the direction where you think they will go while they try to dodge!


Tormented Soil (W)
Morgana infects target 175-radius area for 5 seconds, causing enemy units who stand on the location to take magic damage every half second. The damage is modified by 0.5% for every 1% of the target's missing health.

Range: 900
Cooldown: 10
Cost: 70 / 85 / 100 / 115 / 130 Mana
Minimum Damage per Half Second: 12 / 19 / 26 / 33 / 40 (+11% AP)
Maximum Damage per Half Second: 18 / 28.5 / 39 / 49.5 / 60 (+16.5% AP)
Minimum Total Damage: 120 / 190 / 260 / 330 / 400 (+ 110% AP)
Maximum Total Damage: 180 / 285 / 390 / 495 / 600 (+ 165% AP)

Useful tips
  • When using Tormented Soil to harass an enemy, place it somewhat behind them. This is because they will naturally run backwards and doing so will cause them to take at least 2-3 ticks of damage.
  • Low health champions can even be killed outright since Tormented Soil deals more damage to lower health champions.
  • Each tick of damage does the extra 15 damage from Spellthief's Edge, as well as gives the bonus gold. Thank you Astrolia for this tip!
  • By getting your W second, you can push very quickly for the early level advantage. However, be sure you know where the jungler is!

Things to note
  • The spell damage per half-second is not very significant, so be sure to place it where the enemy will take at least several ticks.
  • Using this to spell vamp off of minions will push the lane. Be careful you have everything warded when doing so!


Black Shield (E)
Places a shield around target friendly champion for up to 5 seconds, absorbing magic damage and preventing disables while the shield holds.

Range: 750
Cooldown: 23 / 21 / 19 / 17 / 15
Cost: 55 Mana
Shield Strength: 95 / 160 / 225 / 290 / 355 (+ 70% AP)

Useful tips
  • Black Shield has no cast time, making it very useful to cast when enemy CC is still in it's animation. For example, if Leona uses her Zenith Blade, she has the projectile time whereas you do not.
  • Casting Black Shield on champions with channeled abilities, like Katarina or Caitlyn will help keep their abilities from being interrupted.
  • During a teamfight, you can use this ability on your ADC to ensure they do not get locked down. The prevention of CC will let them do their job: dealing sustained damage to the enemy team.

Things to note
  • Remember that the CC immunity is tied to the shield. If your opponent does too much magic damage and breaks the shield, you will lose your CC immunity along with it.
  • All physical attacks will damage your health, as the shield only blocks magic damage.


Soul Shackles (R)
Morgana latches chains of energy onto nearby enemy champions for 3 seconds, dealing initial magic damage to them after a brief delay of 0.5 seconds and reducing their movement speed by 20% if the target(s) stay within 1050 range.
If the target(s) does not break the tether after 3 seconds, they are dealt the same amount of magic damage again and they are also stunned for 1.5 seconds.

Range: 600
Cooldown: 120 / 110 / 100
Cost: 100 Mana
Magic Damage: 175 / 250 / 325 (+ 70% AP)
Total Magic Damage per Target: 350 / 500 / 650 (+ 140% AP)

Useful tips
  • Soul Shackles can hit stealthed enemies. Thus, if the ability lights up but you see no one else around, they are invisible.
  • Used in conjunction with Dark Binding can stun the enemy for nearly 5 whole seconds.
  • Going untargetable does not break the shackle. The only way to escape it is to physically walk out of the range. So champions like Fizz or Vlad cannot escape this way.

Things to note
  • Using this spell in teamfights often requires you to be in the very heart of the fight. If you don't have any defensive items, you can be wiped out easily. Stay back and peel for your carry, and save your ult for the enemy ADC/APC to lock them down.
  • Even though the ability itself cannot be interrupted by CC, other forms of disables, like slows or stuns, will hinder you from keeping up with enemies.




Dark Binding
Tormented Shadow
Black Shield
Soul Shackles
1



Q
2



E
3



W
4



Q
5



Q
6



R
7



Q
8



E
9



Q
10



E
11



R
12



E
13



E
14



W
15



W
16



R
17



W
18



W



#1. Soul Shackles
6 / 11 / 16

#2. Dark Binding
1 / 4 / 5 / 7 / 9

#3. Black Shield
2 / 8 / 10 / 12 / 13

#4. Tormented Shadow
3 / 14 / 15 / 17 / 18
For Morgana, she only has 2 major CCs that make her viable as a support. The first, and most reliable, is her Q, Dark Binding. Even at rank 1, it is one of the longest duration CCs in the game at 2 seconds. By rank 5, it's at 3 seconds. This 3 second root is more than enough to catch out, burst down, and clean up the enemy with just you and your carry. Max it first, as it won't only scale with root duration, but also with damage. It has a 90% AP ratio, and that hurts a lot.

Next max E, Black Shield. The 5 second CC immunity is priceless in most cases, and by rank 5, it shields almost 400 magic damage. This is especially good in teamfights, where the AP carry on the other team will be present. I don't usually max this first, as the base 100 shield should be enough to keep it from breaking from the support's damage. However, if you're going against high magic damage supports, it may be worthwhile to max this first, as they can easily break your shield by level 6.

Lastly max W, Tormented Shadow. When in a duo lane, this can push the lane too quickly and can lead to the possibility of ganks. Take a point in it early for the extra harass potential. However early game, your job is not to deal damage (unless you're poking, of course), but to protect your carry, so the other abilities are more viable in this case.

And of course, always take a point in your ultimate, Soul Shackles, whenever you can. The cooldown is decreased, and the damage it deals increases with each rank. It will be available at levels 6, 11, and 16.


Usually, you want to put your very first point into Dark Binding for the catch potential. If you invade/are invaded, the 2 second snare is more than enough time for your team to catch and kill a person. Even if you don't invade, you can pull off level one trades as soon as you get in lane due to the long range.

Next, you typically want to take a point into E so you can go for a level 2 all in with little danger of being traded back on. Black Shield will make most supports useless due to the CC immunity. If you engage, immediately putting the shield on your ADC will allow him/her to freely attack without worrying about the enemy support stunning then.

Finally, whether you take Tormented Shadow or a second point into Dark Binding is completely up to your playstyle. I myself prefer having the extra pushing power and utility, but the extra damage on Q is pretty nice since it doesn't cost that much more mana. However, by taking your W, you have a little more pushing power, as well as a way to safely proc your Spellthief's Edge.



This item synergizes extremely well with Morgana due to her Tormented Soil easily procing 3 ticks for the +15 gold. Your abilities themselves deal a little more damage, since you have 5 extra AP, as well as a bonus 15 damage on each proc of the gold item.


These are absolutely essential because Morgana does not have a spammable heal. If you get into an all in trade and come out low, these will ensure you stay healthy for any additional trades afterwards.


With coordination with your ADC, you can have sufficient vision coverage with just these alone. Vision at the moment is very weak because of the short duration and long cooldown, so be sure you don't accidentally waste a charge!.


First Buy

The first thing that you should be buying is Sightstone. Sightstone will hold 4 wards, which refill upon visiting the shop, which is enough to cap out the max ward per person of 3 wards. This will provide sufficient ward coverage for laning phase.


If you do not have enough gold for Sightstone, or you feel like you won't need quite as many spammable wards, you can upgrade Spellthief's Edge into Frostfang. This will give bonus damage on your poke, as well as give a lot more gold income.


Another item you can get on your first recall. This item gives you much more mobility, and you can get to lane much faster. It'll allow you to roam just a tiny bit more for warding, and the +25 Movement speed is great for chasing down kills.


Finally, as soon as you get Sightstone switch out your Warding Totem for Sweeping Lens. If you're going back to lane, this will increase your control over the enemies' wards exponentially. Even after the laning phase, Sweeping Lens can help you clear wards over Baron or Dragon.



The 105 movement speed out of combat allow you to do roam, ward, or help other lanes without missing a lot lane experience. Plus, this lets you reposition yourself quickly for good bindings, shields, or ults.

If you'd rather have the extra damage, you can grab these instead. It will make your abilities hurt more, but still provides a good amount of movement speed for you to do your job as a support.
If the enemy team has a lot of magic damage, the 25 MR can go a long way. Also, the tenacity can help you survive against heavy CC team compositions.


And now for the infamous debate as to getting Frost Queen's Claim and talisman of ascension. Here, I'm going to explain the situations in which you should get one of the other. I will list the pros and cons of getting each and compare them, but in an actual game, it is up to you to decide which one you should get! However, keep in mind that selling and rebuying such an expensive item is extremely cost inefficient. If you decide to sell, be sure that you're willing to spend the extra gold!

VS
talisman of ascension
  • 50 AP gives more damage.
  • Casting spells gives you gold.
  • Builds from starting item.
  • AOE slow against enemy.
  • More health and mana regen.
  • Safer gold generation.
  • Bonus passive movement speed.
  • AOE speed up for team.

So as you can see, both items have really good aspects to them. However, you can also see that they are very different. Frost Queen's Claim builds directly out of your starting item, and the AP makes your abilities more powerful in both damage and utility. In addition, the active is good for chaining your own CC, and can be used to disengage, peel, chase, and even escape.

In contrast, talisman of ascension offers more sustain because it gives 15 health and mana per 5, in addition to getting 10 health for every minion that dies near you. The active can be used for quick engages or swift disengages. However, this does not build from your starting item, and thus you will be spending more gold by selling Frostfang and then upgrading from there.


> As soon as you have finished Frost Queen's Claim and Sightstone, you want to build start building towards Zhonya's Hourglass. The stats and active allow you to contribute in terms of damage as well as utility.

> 120 AP will increase your individual abilities' damage by a huge amount. It also gives 50 armor, which is nice since you'll be in the middle of the enemy team to maximize your ult's potential. In addition, it will give you some defense against the enemy ADC.

> The main, important reason why this item is so good is the active. The 2.5 second stasis will make you completely untargetable, but the chains from your ultimate will still be channeling. The invulnerability will make sure you're safe from people who try to shut you down before you get the stun off.

> Don't start building this until you already have Frost Queen's Claim and Sightstone. This is because the other items provide more utility and will benefit your team more if they are built first. Damage is a luxury. Besides, the active isn't very useful until teamfights start breaking out.



.
UTILITY
.
. > Mikael's Crucible offers a lot of utility with the massive amounts of mana regeneration so you can spam your abilities, 10% CDR so they'll be available more often, and 40 MR against magic damage teams.

> The active can save someone's life due to it acting as a cleanse. It will remove any hard CC like stuns, snares, taunts, suppresses, silences, etc. as well as heal the target for a percentage of their maximum health.

> This is especially useful because the current meta picks have a lot of CC (Nami, Thresh, Maokai, etc.)
. > Locket of the Iron Solari is most known for the +20 MR Aura it provides for nearby teammates, as well as bonus health regeneration. In addition to that, you have 20 MR for yourself as well as 400 health.

> The active is a low cooldown shield, which shields all nearby allies for a good amount of health. It can be used during teamfights, individual skirmishes, or taking down objectives.

> Coordinate with your tank to make sure you don't overlap. The aura does not stack, so it's generally advised you don't get more than one per team.
.


A really nice item that gives you a good mix of damage and utility. The 40 AP will increase the effectiveness of all your skills. The CDR and mana regen will allow you to spam your abilities, and the movement multiplier will let you roam and ward much easier. Finally, your shield will let someone on your team have increased attack speed. This works out nicely, because usually the person shielding will probably be your ADC, who will make good use of the attack speed buff.
The 75 AP is a huge amount, and the 20% CDR is nothing to laugh at. Just be sure you don't go over the cap of 40%. The passive is extremely useful, since it applies grievous wounds, which is detrimental if the enemy team relies on healing for sustain. If you manage to get the passive on the enemy ADC, their Life Steal will be cut in half, and your team can lock them down and kill them. In addition, if the enemy has a health regen champion like Dr. Mundo, Nasus or Irelia, this will cut down their survivability by a lot.
Zeke's Harbinger is good if your ADC is snowballing well and you can afford to give up some utility in your build. The 50 AP will help your own damage, the armor will help your survivability during teamfights or individual skirmishes, and the 10% CDR will allow your abilities to come up more often. The active allows you to bind to someone (most likely your ADC) and, if timed right, will give your ADC a huge boost in damage during fights. However, it's very difficult to coordinate the 100 charges due to the long charging time and short window in which you can use it, so the item is situational.


Randuin's Omen and Frozen Heart are very similar, and accomplish pretty much the same thing. However, they have slight differences that make them more more viable in one situation, or less viable in another.

VS
  • 70 Armor
  • 500 Health
  • 10% A.S. Reduction
  • 35% Slow on active
  • 100 Armor
  • 400 Mana
  • 15% A.S. Reduction
  • 20% CDR

Randuin's Omen provides less armor than Frozen Heart, but it makes up for it with the 500 health, which increase the effectiveness of the armor. Also, while the Attack Speed reduction is less, it is not by very much. In addition to these stats, Randuin's provides an active, which slows neaby enemies by 35%. This synergizes extremely well with Morgana's ultimate. If you ult and then use the active, you will stun more easily, since it'll be more difficult to escape you.

In contrast, Frozen Heart provides more Armor, but no health to really make use of it. However, it does provide 400 mana, which increases your mana pool significantly. While it may not give as much tankiness compared to Randuin's, it reduces nearby Attack Speeds by more, and does not require the enemy to physically autoattack you to apply the debuff. Finally, it offers a 20% cooldown reduction.

Typically, you choose to get Randuin's Omen when you really need the survivability when diving headfirst into teamfights. The active makes a big difference if you need to focus on landing a good AOE stun. On the other hand, if you're not as worries about how long you live, taking Frozen Heart will let you spam your abilities more, as well as shut down A.S. carries more efficiently.


.
MAGIC
RESISTANCE
.
. > Provides 450 health, 55 MR, and 45 health regen per 5 if your spell shield is popped. Really nice against heavy magic damage enemies.

> The spell shield will protect you if there are any long ranged skill shots on the enemy team (Blitzcrank, Leona, Thresh, so on). Especially since no activating or timing is required and it will refresh every 40 seconds.

> While it doesn't provide a lot of utility for the rest of your team, it contributes by helping you not get caught out and can prevent 4v5 teamfights from happening.
. > Gives slightly 50 less health than Banshee's at 400 total, but gives more reliable health regeneration. In addition to the tanky stats, it gives 40% CDR.

> This will increase your spell vamp passive even more. Putting down a Tormented Soil in the middle of a teamfight will give you a lot of health back even during the fight.

> This is a pick when you need heavy, heavy sustain. The 20 health regen per 5 seconds plus the increased regen passive are more self-oriented and doesn't provide much utility.
.



In this section, I will describe how you should play Morgana early game and add any tips and tricks that you can keep in mind while playing. Playing smart and taking advantage of Morgana's amazing kit is essential to getting past laning phase and making sure your ADC is able to get fed and carry.


DON'T OVEREXTEND
Morgana is one of the most short-ranged supports in the game. In fact, baring melee champions, she is the most short-ranged. Her auto attack range is only 450, which is a whole 200 less than let's say Caitlyn, who is well known for her super long range. Due to this tiny autoattack distance, it is extremely easy to get caught out when you're poking with your AA. Make sure that you're always looking at the enemies' zones, and be careful to not get into a spot where both the enemy support and ADC can engage on you. A couple autoattacks is not getting bursted down to less than half health or even getting killed outright.

LANDING YOUR CC
Morgana's snare on her Dark Binding is one of the longest roots in the game. 2 seconds at the very first rank, which then increases to 3 seconds by rank 5. With any additional AP, it does quite a bit of damage as well. However as a consequence, it has a ridiculously long cooldown as well. The root and damage together could land you a kill should you decide to go all in on the enemy. But if you end up missing, you have a period of time in which a major ability is not available to you, which leaves you at a disadvantage if the enemy counter-engages.

In addition to your Q, you have your ultimate Soul Shackles, which when used correctly can easily land you a double kill. However, due to the channeling nature of your spell, you won't always be able to land the stun on both the enemy ADC and the enemy support. If the two of them split, you'll have to make a split second decision on who you'd rather have stunned. Generally, you want to prioritize the ADC but if they manage to somehow get away under their tower (such as using Flash or some sort of dash ability), it can be very dangerous to dive.

INTIMIDATE THE ENEMY TEAM
Even if your Tormented Shadow doesn't do much damage since you aren't going to max it until very last, you can force the flight reaction from the enemy team. In general, people will shy away from a sudden dark and scary spot when it's suddenly thrown on them, so you can use this ability to scare the enemy duo into playing more passively.

For example, after snaring the opponent with your Dark Binding, you can place your W directly on top of them to make them squirm a bit. No one likes being forced in the same spot
while taking damage and being able to do nothing about it. Keep in mind this will chunk your mana bar. Use this tactic sparingly. You don't want to go OOM just in case the enemy jungler shows up. Always have at least 150 mana so you can cast Black Shield and Dark Binding to help get out of bad situations.

If you ever push up to the enemy tower, you can place your W next to the tower, which makes the difficulty of CSing under tower even more difficult. This is amazing for applying huge amounts of pressure and make enemy ADC very sad. However, this will most likely draw the attention of the opposing jungler, so be sure you have everything warded.

USE YOUR BLACK SHIELD WISELY
Do not use it to shield incoming poke or harass. The cooldown on this spell is extremely long (over 20 seconds), and early game this can be very dangerous if you allow it to be baited out. Black Shield is what makes Morgana such a valued support, since it blocks all incoming CC so long as the shield is not broken. This is beyond helpful against heavy CC dealers, like Leona, Braum or Thresh, and can virtually make them in terms of Crowd Control.

Most of signature CC moves have a wind-up time, like Thresh's Death Sentence, Leona's Zenith Blade, Taric's Dazzle, so on, which allows you to apply your Black Shield on your ADC before the CC actually reaches them. At first, it may be a little difficult because you have to be very quick, but with practice your reaction time will dramatically improve. Even if you can't land your shield in time before the inital CC lands (Thresh's Death Sentence for example), you stop any additional CC from adding on top of it (Thresh's Flay). This way, a bad situation won't be a really bad situation.

HOW TO WARD
These are the generic warding spots. Of course, now the Vision Wards are visible, so they will need to be actively defended. Or you can be clever and stick them somewhere where they can't be seen by the enemy team, while simultaneously granting you vision. Also, since each person can only put down 3 wards at a time, be sure to coordinate with your teammates about warding.

Also, another big thing I don't see much of (especially in lower ELOs) are Lane Wards. For some reason, a lot of people are very touchy about putting wards down the middle of a lane. But you should come to see this as a major advantage. If you had a handy ward down pre-teamfight, it can make landing your Dark Binding for a potential catch out much easier. In addition, it makes up for lost tower vision, which is useful in the case of seeing the enemy splitpushers before they get to your tower that's still standing.

This is from a series of videos in the LeagueCraft 101 series. They have fantastic videos, and I've learned a lot from them. I linked this from the Support Leaguecraft 101 video. It shows you how to ward along with tricks (warding over walls) at 47:58. If you have the time, watch all of it because it covers supporting mechanics and decision making as well.



Last chapter, I discussed tips and tricks on how to get through the laning phase. Here, I will go through what is expected of Morgana support during teamfights. The supports job is to CC and control the tide of the fight. Knowing what your job is and how to execute it is vital in making sure that the fight swings your way.


CC AS MANY PEOPLE AS POSSIBLE
Morgana's ult, Soul Shackles is a large AOE ability that can CC almost the entire team if positioned correctly. Because of this, it is her job to get in the teamfight, and lock down as many people as she possibly can. One of the best ways to get as many targets as possible is by catching the enemy off guard. The best form of initiation that Morgana can offer is her Flash + Soul Shackles combo. This allows you to gap close to the enemy, and then hitting R while you're in the center of the entire team.

After you have your ult active, you can immediately Zhonya's Hourglass so that you become untargetable while your own allies catch up and start wreaking havoc. This will allow you to stay alive, despite the fact that you're right in the center of the chaos. Alternatively, if you don't have flash, you can initiate with your gold item ( Frost Queen's Claim or talisman of ascension both of which can be useful to starting the fight) and then chain that into your ult as your come into range. This option is good if you need to make sure your carry isn't immediately being picked off by assassins.

PROTECTING YOUR TEAMMATES
In the current top meta team comps, there is always at least one assassin on each team. Your job is to make sure that assassin fails in killing your squishies. If the enemy assassin succeeds, then you basically lose that teamfight because you don't have your damage dealing champions to clean up the fight. Keep in mind that it is not only assassins that will try and force their way to the back line. If your ADC/APC mispositions themselves, they leave themselves at risk against everyone else on the enemy team as well.

Sometimes you won't have the option of being in the middle of the fight and using a large scale Soul Shackles. Sometimes you have to stay in the far back, playing babysitter. Instead of using your ult to initiate, you use it to peel anyone who threatens your carries. If someone has a lot of burst damage (like Zed or Akali) and is diving into the back line for the kill, you need to make sure you Exhaust them before they can do anything. In addition, using your Black Shield will protect someone from all CC, which can mean the deciding factor between you winning or losing the teamfight.




We've pretty much gone through every thing you need to know as to how to build or play Morgana. Now, I'm going to go over the different match-ups you might encounter, and how you would deal with them. I will give each match-up/synergy a rating, and then tell you how you should go about playing in that specific one so that you can take full advantage of it!


Easy
Annie
Medium
Blitzcrank
Medium/Hard
Janna


Hard
Karma
Medium
Leona
Medium
Lulu


Medium/Hard
Lux
Medium
Morgana
Easy
Nami



Medium
Nidalee
Easy/Medium
Sona
Easy
Soraka



Easy
Taric
Easy/Medium
Thresh
Medium
Zyra




And that's the end of my Support Morgana guide! In summary, Morgana is a heavy damage support, all the while able to maintain some utility through her abilities that allow her to protect her carry. In this guide, I hope I've showed you a good way to build and play Morgana that allows her to be a major threat to the enemy team. If you have any suggestions, any suggestions at all, please comment and tell me what to improve! All feedback is welcome, so long as they're aimed at helping me improve. If you enjoyed the guide and it helped you, please upvote! It always makes my day~

Thank you for reading!


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