I guess that makes sense, one of the things that always worries me when dealing with high cost builds is the necessity for lots of gold. I just worry that if your team gets pushed and you lose the money from killing enemy champs due to them getting you first. It can be much harder to build a high cost build like yours. Still you reasoning is sound, but if you go with that logic, why not grab a 2nd Deathcap? You get 155 more AP vs Zonya's 100 AP.

True, it is expensive (another reason 5/6 are so interchangeable i guess). For vlad, ap is king, it's his hp, it's his damage, and it's his healing. Once you have the deathcap you're well off, and the others can come in time. At deathcap you can almost guarantee that you'll last hit every mob unless there's another aoe champ nomming on them too. This stacks up to quite a bit of gold. You're not going to see the end of this build in a 20 minute game, but it'll make sure you're smiling at the end of those hour long games.

Still it is quite expensive for a moment where you ARE going to get ganked. If their team jumps you and you pop the active, they will just wait for you to come out of it and BOOM, dead. Same with the 5% HP thing. It is too reliant on your team being there. Wouldn't a more well rounded item work better? I see what you mean with Morello's. However The Ionian boost are pretty worthless in my opinion. You could take Mercury's Treads and beef up your MR and reduce those nasty stun and fear effects. If you need them for the early CDR, I can see it working then however.

But i think cheapening your build is a much better solution, if you end up with lots of money, go for it. But getting 3 super high cost items to make the build seems kinda like a waste. Sure when you get them you will rock their socks off, but you might have a harder time getting to them cause your not able to get to them quickly enough.

Well, not quite maxed. CDR is at 39.something% Morello's could work if you didn't get the Ionian boots. Honestly though, the armor is nice, and it has one of the highest strait ap values in the game. The active is also really nice for those times when 4-5 champs jump out of the bushes at you, or you're at like 5% hp and you see karthus' ult coming down.

Looks like you've got plenty of AP to go around, why the Zonya's however? Do you need the active ability? I would think that using a cheaper item such as a Morello's Evil tome. Then again my Math may be off and your CDR might already be maxed. But either way i i like the build. Especially the massive Transfusion damage potential.

Hey, I'm glad I inspired you. My current build that I'm experimenting with is basically a mixture of your CDR and nuke builds. Just enough CDR to drop that transfusion every second and a half to second, and enough ap to make it hurt like a biotch. Your guide looks really good, and really clean. Can't wait to update mine now.

My pleasure, you actually inspired me to write a guide of my own. I'll be publishing my guide hopefully tonight if not tomorrow. I'll be sure to link. PM me if you have any other questions.

4/16/2011 - Added my build check it Vladimir - The Vlad Compendium

@Viking Biker. Wow... That's exactly the kind of information I was looking for. Time to spend the next few days doing math to re-optimize the build.

And it sucks that Transfusion is considered aoe. The core reason I go for WotA over something like Hextech Gunblade though is that effects more than just me. Still, I think some revising of the build is in order.

A brief breakdown of Magic Pen - Well I guess not so brief.

"Let's start by discussing what MR does. Whenever a target takes Magic damage, the amount of damage they take is reduced by MR/(100+MR). Thus, the amount of damage they end up taking = Damage(1-(MR/(100+MR)). And if you do the math, 1 = 100+MR/(100+MR), so it ends up equaling damage*100/(100+MR). Thus, each point of MR decreases your damage dealt, but by a decreasingly effective amount. How so? The first 100 MR cuts damage from 100% to 50%, a 50% reduction. The second 100 MR cuts damage from 50% to 33%, a 17% reduction. The third 100 MR cuts damage from 33% to 25%, an 8% reduction. The fourth 100 MR cuts damage from 25% to 20%, a 5% reduction. You get the picture. However, you can also think of it this way: for every 1 MR they have, you need 1% more spell damage to kill them. If you'd normally need 1000 spell damage and they have 100 MR, your damage is cut in half, so you need 2000 damage to do that 1000 HP. If they have 200 MR, you need 3000 damage (as your damage is cut into a third) to do that 1000 HP. Each 100 MR increases the amount of damage needed to kill a champion by 100% of the base damage it would take.

This is pretty significant, so how can you counteract it?

First, any MR reduction effects like Abyssal Scepter and Amumu's Passive (and a number of other abilities - anything that says it "Reduces the target's magic resistance by <X>") take effect, reducing the displayed number of their MR. This can go into the negative. Negative values for MR increase the damage dealt by the amount that that much positive MR would block. So if someone has -100 MR, since positive 100 MR blocks 50% of damage they take 50% more damage.

Secondly, any Flat Magic Penetration effect applies. This includes any Runes that provide Magic Penetration, the Sorcerer's Boots, and Haunting Guise. These effects work much like MR Reduction, in that they subtract a flat amount from the target's MR for the purposes of determining how much damage they take, but with two major exceptions:
1) Flat Magic Penetration applies only on your damage, it has no visible effect on the target. Any -MR effect reduces the target's MR versus everyone's damage, and it is visibly displayed on the target's character information.
2) Flat Magic Penetration is capped at 0 MR. Any Penetration beyond this point is simply ignored. Additionally, since flat MPen is applied after Magic Resistance Reduction, if your reduction does not take them below 0, nothing will (and if it does, all your MPen is wasted).

Finally, any % Magic Penetration effect applies. This currently encompasses the Void Staff and the Archaic Knowledge Mastery. If a champion has only one of these effects, it applies directly to whatever MR is remaining after -MR and flat MPen have applied. If the champion has both of these effects, they apply one after another (as % Penetration stacks multiplicatively), resulting in a net reduction of 49%.

So what do you get when you put this all together?

Let's say you're using a simple skill, like Gragas's Level 1 Ultimate. It deals 200 damage, +1 for each AP you have. let's assume that's 200, for a total of 400 damage. Your target has 300 MR, meaning your damage will be reduced to a mere 100. However, the following things hold true:
The target has been standing on Morgana's Black Soil for 5 seconds (-40 MR)
The target is within range of your Abyssal Scepter's aura (-20 MR)
Gragas has 15 MPen from Runes, Sorc Shoes, and a Haunting Guise (50 MPen)
Gragas has a Void Staff and Archaic Knowledge (Combined 49% Magic Pen)

So the target's MR, though normally 300, has been reduced to 240. Additionally, Gragas ignores 50 of that, and then 49% of the remaining 190. This means that for the purposes of his spell, the target is treated as though he has 97 MR, resulting in only a 49% Reduction, meaning he still takes 202 damage (instead of just 100)."

Courtesy of Wildfire393 - LoL forums

This is why I don't like flat Mpen (except for runes) and focus more on the percentages, I.E. From masteries and items like the void staff. This is also why Archaic knowledge is so beneficial. A target with enough MR will completely negate any damage you put out increased by that 10 AP but you can actually end up doing more damage with a percentage based Magic Reduction.

Also a note about Spell Vamp, I don't think i explained this well the first time. This time with percentages!

There is no limit on spell vamp apart from what you can get with items.
Multi-target spells automatically steals 33% of the listed value, i.e. 15% spell vamp is 5% spell vamp on multi target spells. It stacks like life steal, 15%+15% = 30%. If you add more AP? It steals for an (x)% of the damage the spell does, not the base value of the spell. To clarify further, spell vamp restores a percentage of health corresponding to the damage dealt with a spell after damage mitigation has been applied. For spells that have an AP ratio, the damage (and hence, life steal) of that spell can be increased, but the actual damage dealt is still subject to the same damage mitigation.

This is why I'm not fond of Spell Vamp on Vlad, since RIOT has deemed ALL his spells to be multi-target for balancing purposes and only benefit from 1/3 of the effect; if it's healing you're looking for, Stack more AP and get a Spirit Visage.

@Viking Biker - That's some good food for thought. The debate of embers vs archaic knowledge brings up a question I've never had satisfactorily answered. Some items give you magic pen as a static number, and some as a percentage. Does the percentage modify the number, or is it something that directly counts against the enemies magic resist? If it modifies the number, I don't see archaic knowledge being better than embers, if it directly cuts their magic resist by 15% I would agree with you that it's better than embers. I had forgotten to consider just how quickly the leveled runes stack. I also haven't tried CD reduction runes, but will be giving them a shot now for sure. As far as will of the ancients, I find it incredibly effective. It usually doubles or triples the amount of hp I'm pulling back from a transfusion, and gives it as an aura to all my teamies. I've never had someone knock it before :P. Zhonya's Hourglass is really hard to argue with, but I'm not that good at timing the drop on it very well, and I always end up using it just before I need it, or not fast enough. It's a good choice, but not one that works for me. I'm going to experiment with the different rune builds and alter the guide if I find some that work better.

I'd give you a +1 but there are some things you need to change.

1. Please remove the point in burning embers and put it into Archaic knowledge. %15 magic pen is way more useful than 10 AP. Think of how much you use Transfusion...

2. Get rid of Will of the ancients. I know the idea you were going with, but keep in mind that Vlads spells are all considered AOE (yes even Transfusion) that being said, all of Vlad's spells will NEVER get the full spell vamp listed on the the item. Also keep in mind that spell vamp is mitigated by the targets MR. Thus you're still not likely to get the full spell vamp unless you have godly MP. Which, lets face it, you're not going to get because stacking AP is more beneficial that Magic Pen considering Vlad's passive. If you are looking for life return, get a Spirit Visage. Not only do you get some HP and a self healing perk (which stacks with tides). So you're getting some CD reduction which helps makes Transfusion a 2 sec CD or less with cool-down glyphs.

Furthermore, how useful is it? Are you going to be burning that Ignite every time its off CD for 10 AP? I seriously doubt it. If you do, then I suggest you take the short bus on the way to the summoner platform. he-he!

3. Remove those flat health seals. Yuck! Think about it, are you really telling me that 45 Health at level one is better than 175 health at 18? If you say for early game then I'll add this: 1 Health per level seal will equal your 1 flat health seal at level 5. yup..level 5. To continue, health per level seals will almost quadruple your seals at 18 (3.9 times more health to be exact.)

That's it.

Some food for thought though:

Items:

Item wise it varies with Vlad, but to be honest I wouldn't go the lichbane route. In ranked or even most games you're not going to be soloing towers unless it's theirs in your lane during the lane phase.
Better items to consider in it's stead are:
Zhonya's Hourglass - the clicky can save you so much and even get a you some kills against cocky players (who are waiting for that ignite to tick on you or who are tower diving)

Runes:

I used to play with Greater Glyphs of Force...until I played with flat cool-downs. Haven't gone back since. Being able to Transfusion in what seems like less than 2 seconds is a great feeling and an incredible harassing tool.
I'm willing to bet that the damage output by being able to do all of your abilities more quickly greatly surpasses that 28 AP...I'd give you the math to prove it but I am going to play a match here in a few and that would take too long.

Quintessences:

Health is good for Vlad. It's his mana and life so you want as much as you can get, but let's analyze it a little:
You start with 3 Health quints= 78 health. Which doesn't sound bad on paper. This gives you almost 2 bonus AP (40 health is 1 AP) via Vlad's passive. That's ho hum really.
I start with 3 flat AP quints = 15 AP. This gives me 27 bonus health via Vlad's passive. now you say well, that's 51 less health. True but now my level 1 Transfusion hits that much harder and heals for that much more... I can auto-attack you once and take away 51 health, there's nothing you can do to negate my 15 AP unless you buy MR. Basically, I'll harass harder early game and heal more which I think is worth the 51 HP, not to mention I'll gain that 51 health and then some with my health per level glyphs.

Think about it. But over all your build is not too bad. Fix those things and you get a +1 from me.

Fair enough, I like it