Hello and welcome to my guide to Morgana, The Fallen, in the Midlane! I am LunarVortex, a Midlane Morgana main.

I haven't played any SoloQ in season 12 yet because I find ranked stressful and I'm currently more focused on university and playing other games, but I peaked at Dia 1 in season 11, making me, I believe, the highest ranked midlane Morgana main/OTP on EUW at that time.

I also managed to hit Dia with a 77% winrate on midlane Morgana before.

On leagueofgraphs I peaked at rank 34 Morgana world when I was coming off of a 19 game winstreak on a smurf.

I want to start this guide off by clarifying two things.

First, this is by no means a perfect Morgana guide and I am certainly not a perfect player. While reaching Diamond means that I probably know a thing or two about the game, it also means that I am still very far away from the best players. There's a lot of players out there who are much better than me - both at playing Morgana and at playing the game in general. I am not claiming that this is the Morgana bible or anything like that. I am writing this guide to provide an introduction and a starting point to Midlane Morgana for casual and average players. The point of this guide is to provide you with the necessary tools to pick up this really cool champion, get familiar with it, and act as a basis for you so you can start having fun playing this champion and get better at it on your own.

Second, I want to emphasize that I do not consider Morgana a top tier midlaner. If you are looking for a FOTM pick you can stomp Solo/Duo and climb the ranks with immediately, this might not be the right guide for you. Instead, this is a guide for all those who like to have fun with picks that might be a little rare or unusual but still playable. Picks that can definitely work, but make everyone else in the lobby go 'Huh? That's a thing?'. Morgana has some very clear and severe weaknesses as a midlaner. There's a reason why you do not see her much in sololanes at higher levels of play. That does not mean that you cannot ever play ranked matches with her, but rather, that you might have to put in more effort and practice to reach the same results with this pick than you would with a meta champion.

PROS + strong AP scalings + good utility + oppressive when ahead + very versatile build + can farm and break freezes safely + still useful when behind Morgana is capable of dealing a surprising amount of damage when built full AP. People are so used to seeing her as a support that you will be constantly underestimated. Despite not knowing the match-up, many opponents will be extremely cocky, try to dive you, try to 1v1 you, and fail because they do not expect your damage. With four viable builds including four different mythic items, she is also quite versatile and can fulfill a variety of different roles in a team and adapt to different enemy teamcomps. She also has the benefit of being both oppressive when ahead as well as still being useful when behind.

CONS - bad trading in lane - high mana costs - very reliant on hitting Q - many hard match-ups - terrible early game - highest DPS ability is stationary Morgana's biggest weakness as a midlaner is the very early laning phase. Her long cooldowns and high mana costs make it very hard to properly trade with many meta midlaners. You will often find yourself getting outtraded even when playing correctly and it's easy to fall behind once your enemy realizes how long your cooldowns are and punishes you accordingly. A single missed Dark Binding often results in having to burn your Black Shield for nothing, which often means surrendering any lane pressure for the next 20+ seconds. Before getting your Lost Chapter, you also have very little lane priority and helping your jungler in scuttle fights is difficult.

In this section, I will go over the runes you should be using. Instead of giving you exact rune page that you can copy, I want to explain to you when you should use which rune and equip you with the necessary knowledge to build your own rune pages for midlane Morgana. First, I will go over all keystone runes that I consider viable. Then, I will talk about minor runes. Keep in mind that runes are highly situational and also highly dependent on your personal playstyle. There is no universally 'right' rune page. The best rune page always depends on the enemy team, your team, your preferences, and your playstyle. If you are looking for some example pages to use, check the pages at the very top of the guide and read the notes there.Keystone runes:

Arcane Comet

Sorcery - Arcane Comet is probably the best 'allrounder' keystone rune for midlane Morgana. It deals high base damage, has good AP scalings, doesn't require you to do anything special to make use of it (just play the game as you normally would) and generally works in almost all situations. On top of that, it is located inside the Sorcery tree, which also contains many powerful minor runes. Your W will consistently reduce Arcane Comet's cooldown, resulting in a lot of total damage dealt. It also has the upside of being able to deal AoE damage and hit multiple enemies during teamfights. On the other hand, it's main downside is that it can be dodged, especially when activated with your W instead of your Q.

Summon Aery

Sorcery - Summon Aery deals less damage than Arcane Comet overall and can also not deal AoE damage, but it comes with a few upsides as well. First of all, it cannot miss. Second, and most importantly, it can be activated with your autoattacks, meaning you can use it without spending any mana. This is especially beneficial for consistent poke during the laning phase against melee opponents. It will also bolster your supportive capabilities, providing a shield to allies when you E them. Just like Arcane Comet, it has the benefit of being on the Sorcery tree, which holds some of the strongest minor runes for Morgana.

Unsealed Spellbook

Inspiration - Unsealed Spellbook is a utility-heavy keystone that is much stronger than it's playrate might suggest. People tend to avoid this rune because they find it awkward to use, but it can be extremely powerful in the right hands. Due to it's pro-active nature, playing with Unsealed Spellbook requires some practice and you will probably take a while to get used to it. It requires you to think ahead in time and figure out which summoner spells you will need, in advance. When done right, you will often have access to the exact summoner spells you need in any given situation, making you very hard to fight for your opponents. Even at higher levels of play, enemies will often lose track of which summoner spells you have available, making you very unpredictable for them and allowing you to bait them into towerdives or unfavorable fights.

Minor runes:

Manaflow Band

Sorcery - Manaflow Band is a nice little rune that helps with midlane Morgana's mana issues. It's also very easy to activate with your W. Simply place your W in a way that it will also hit the enemy champion when using it for waveclear, if possible.

Trans-cendence

Sorcery - There isn't much to be said about Transcendence, other than that it's a very decent allrounder rune. You can almost never go wrong picking this. Reduced cooldowns on your Q and E especially are always good.

Absolute Focus

Sorcery - Absolute Focus can be used in matches where you have reason to believe that you will spend a lot of time above 70% HP, like when playing against teams that can only play out teamfights front-to-back and have very little immediate backline access. In that case, this rune can net you a lot of damage due to Morgana's high AP scalings. However, since it shares a spot with Transcendence, you should only use it if you're sure that you will achieve a high uptime on it throughout the match.

Sorch

Sorcery - Scorch is a nice rune that will add quite a bit of damage during the early- and midgame. It's also very easy to active for you, thanks to your W. It does share a spot with Gathering Storm, which can be used for more lategame power instead.

Gathering Storm

Sorcery - Gathering Storm is a strong lategame-oriented rune that works well for Morgana due to her high AP scalings. It shares a spot with Scorch, which can be used for more early- to midgame power instead.

Magical Footwear

Inspiration - Magical Footwear is a simple rune. It provides you free rank 1 boots that are worth 300 gold and also increases your movement speed by 10, which is worth another 120 gold. So, effectively, this rune saves you 420 gold, allowing you to reach your item powerspikes quicker. However, it takes some time to become active and before that, you are not able to buy any kind of boots. This can hurt you a lot in matchups where you need to dodge a lot of skillshots and usualy want to buy boots early, such as Xerath or Vel'Koz. Avoid picking it in those matchups.

Perfect Timing

Inspiration - Perfect Timing is similar to Magical Footwear in the way that it saves you some gold since it gives you a free component that then builds into one of your most common items, Zhonya's Hourglass. Do note however, that it only contributes 250 gold towards Zhonya's Hourglass, even though a Stopwatch normally costs 600 gold. Because of this, it gives you 170 less free gold than Magical Footwear, but it also gives you a one-time-use Stopwatch that can save your life when used correctly.

Future's Market

Inspiration - Future's Market is a very interesting rune that can be used to reach item powerspikes quicker than usual. When starting with a Sapphire Crystal instead of a Doran's Ring, with Future's Market, Lost Chapter only costs around 750-800 gold and can be bought around the 4 minute mark. This can be huge for midlane Morgana since her ability to gain lane priority and help her jungler heavily depends on it.

Minion Dematerial-izer

Inspiration - Minion Dematerializer is a rather complicated minor rune that requires some thinking on your part to be useful. Each individual Minion Dematerializer can either be used to empower your waveclear against a certain type of minion for the rest of the game, OR to quickly shove a cannon wave when necessary, for example when the enemy midlaner has just recalled and you want to crash your cannon wave into their tower to make them miss the cannon. With the 10.25 nerf to Morgana's W damage, she lost the ability to clear caster minions with one full W at certain points, most importantly at levels 5 and 6. Using one Minion Dematerializer on a caster minion early on will "revert" this nerf in terms of waveclear.

Biscuit Delivery

Inspiration - Biscuit Delivery is a nice rune in matchups where you might want some extra HP and/or mana, like against champions that have much stronger trading than you (like Orianna) or can poke you a lot (like Vel'Koz). However, even in other matchups, you can pretty much never go wrong picking this rune.

Cosmic Insight

Inspiration - Cosmic Insight is a simple rune that's almost always nice to have, because reduced summoner spell cooldown is always good. Reduced item cooldown is also great, if you buy any items that have some form of cooldown, obviously. For our mythics, this applies to Luden's Tempest, Crown of the Shattered Queen and Everfrost, whereas Liandry's Torment does not benefit from it.

Cheap Shot

Domination - Cheap Shot is a rune that synergizes well with Morgana's kit and adds a nice bit of damage. It is especially useful when you are using Everfrost.

Taste of Blood

Domination - Taste of Blood is a niche rune can be used for extra sustain in poke- or trade-heavy matchups. Most of the time, you won't need this.

Ghost Poro

Domination - Ghost Poro can provide a nice bit of extra vision and ability power, as long as you place a lot of wards (which you should). If you struggle with warding, it will take too long to stack and won't be worth taking.

Eyeball Collection

Domination - Eyeball Collection can provide some extra ability power. Unless there's absolutely nothing going on, it usually stacks faster than Ghost Poro which it shares a slot with. However, it obviously won't give you any extra vision.

Ingenious Hunter

Domination - Ingenious Hunter is a very underrated rune. Since the season 11 preseason changes, it also reduces the cooldown of passive item abilities, not just active ones. It's not unusual for Morgana to have 2 items that benefit from this, mostly the mythic and Zhonya's Hourglass, sometimes even more. Do NOT pick this rune if your mythic item is going to be Liandry's Torment.

Presence of Mind

Precision - Presence of Mind is nice rune that helps a bit with Morgana's high mana costs, especially during teamfights. However, it's generally not a rune that would dictate whether you're going for Precision or not. Most of the time, this is just a "filler" rune for when you are taking Precision anyway for Cut Down.

Legend: Tenacity

Precision - While Legend: Tenacity is nice to have against teams with a lot of cc, most of the time you'd be taking this as a "filler" rune for when you are taking Precision anyway for Cut Down and need a second rune to fill up the remanining slot, similar to Presence of Mind.

Cut Down

Precision - Cut Down has been rather underrated for the longest time, often ignored by players in favor of Coup de Grace. However, it will net you a good amount of damage against teams with a lot of HP. Works well together with Liandry's Torment when playing against tanky teams.

Font of Life

Resolve - Font of Life synergizes well with Morgana's kit, especially when building Everfrost. However, since it scales with your HP, and you usually won't be building a lot of that, the healing that comes from it is rather insignificant. Most of the time, you'd be taking this rune as a "filler" rune when opting into Resolve for Bone Plating.

Bone Plating

Resolve - Bone Plating is a "last resort" type of rune that can be taken to ensure your survival in matchups where the general safety of your kit is not enough, most notably Fizz. It should only be taken against champs that want to kill you in a single attempt and have no ways of activating and thus wasting your Bone Plating before going in.

Overgrowth

Resolve - Overgrowth is another filler rune that you usually only take when you opt into Resolve for Bone Plating and have a slot left. It's a bit of extra HP, that's it.

Flash

When to pick: Flash is absolutely mandatory for Midlane Morgana in every possible situation. It's also easily the strongest summoner spell in the game. Take Flash every match. How to use: Flash is extremely versatile and can be used in a variety of different situations. It can be used to chase or escape enemies. It can be used to traverse terrain in creative ways, like blinking through walls. It can also be used in combination with Morgana's abilities, as explained below. Flash and Soul Siphon: Flash will very rarely be used together with your passive ability, Soul Siphon. The only case where this would make sense is flashing into range of some neutral or enemy unit to damage it with your abilities if a harmful damage-over-time effect would otherwise kill you, like flashing towards a jungle camp and placing your Tormented Shadow on it shortly before you would otherwise die to a DoT. This is an extremely rare case and will almost never happen to you in an actual match, but I'm including it here for completeness sake. Flash and Dark Binding: Flash can reposition yourself before throwing out your Dark Binding to reach an enemy that is otherwise out of range or hidden behind other units. When trying to bind a very mobile enemy, instead of throwing out Dark Binding from far away and giving them plenty of time to dodge, you can also close the distance with Flash and attempt to bind them from close up to surprise them and reduce the time they have to react to it. However, keep in mind that you cannot combo Dark Binding + Flash in the same way Ahri for example can Charm + Flash. When using Dark Binding and then flashing right after, the binding will simply be cast from your original position. Flash and Tormented Shadow: You can however combo Tormented Shadow and Flash like that, meaning you can buffer Tormented Shadow to be cast at a position out of range and then flash into range for it to cast. This is rarely useful but can sometimes be used to finish off an escaping enemy with a single tick of Tormented Shadow and Luden's Tempest or any damage dealing runes. Flash and Black Shield: Black Shield can also be buffered, meaning you can combo Black Shield + Flash to come in clutch and safe an ally's life. Flash and Soul Shackles: Flash can also be used to reposition yourself for Soul Shackles, either before casting it, or after the cast to stay within tether range of escaping enemies to ensure the application of the ability's second part.

Teleport

When to pick: Teleport is an amazing and versatile summoner spell that can be used almost every match. You can almost never go wrong picking Teleport, however, there are certain cases and match-ups where Ignite, Barrier or Exhaust might be more useful (see below). Generally speaking, if you're not sure what to pick or you do not need any of the other options, go with Teleport (alongside Flash of course). How to use: As Morgana, early on in the game, you will often use your Teleport to get back to lane after taking bad trades, which can happen a lot against some of the meta midlaners. Having Teleport available can make it easier for you to find good recall timings, especially before dragon or herald fights, which can prevent you from giving up even more early game map pressure than you already do by picking Morgana in the midlane. With that beind said, don't hesitate to use your Teleport to counter enemy towerdives in sidelanes. Morgana is an extremely hard champion to towerdive due to her crowd control and her ability to slow down and stall out fights, so your presence can easily turn around a four man towerdive from the enemy team in the botlane. During the later stages of the game, having Teleport ready can allow you to splitpush on the opposite of the map while an objective is up. That said, keep in mind that Morgana is usually not a very strong 1v1 champion unless you're extremely far ahead, so try to avoid confrontations with typical splitpush champions such as Fiora. Don't "live" in the sidelane, only do this to quickly pick up big waves. Teleport and Black Shield: Teleporting takes 4 seconds and Black Shield lasts 5 seconds, meaning you can use Black Shield on yourself right before teleporting to protect yourself during the channel time and for up to one additional second after arrival. This can be very useful when teleporting into proximity of a champion like Ahri who might be looking to Charm you upon arrival.

Ignite

When to pick: Whenever you want that extra bit of damage for increased kill potential against vulnerable opponents. You should not pick it for the healing reduction part, simply buy an early Oblivion Orb if that's what you're going for.

Barrier

When to pick: Whenever you need a bit of extra survival. This is often the case against assassins or other champions with a lot of burst. Good examples would be Fizz or Talon. The cool thing about Barrier is that you can use it in advance and you don't have to target the enemy with it, unlike with Exhaust. It also has a very low cooldown (in comparison to other summoner spells) of 3 minutes, making it an amazing tool against champions who will be looking to kill you with their burst frequently. Barrier and Black Shield: Unfortunately, the shield provided by Barrier never takes priority over the shield provided by Black Shield, even when casted after, meaning you cannot use Barrier to prevent your Black Shield from breaking. If this was a thing, I'd probably run Barrier all the time. Riot pls.

Exhaust

When to pick: Whenever you need a bit of extra safety against champions who are capable of dealing a lot of damage over a few seconds. Bonus points if they're also very mobile. Good examples are Yasuo, Sylas, Irelia or Akali. Unlike Barrier, Exhaust is usually not mandatory for the match-ups where you would use it and you can use Teleport or Ignite instead if you prefer that. How to use: Use it on an enemy champion trying to kill you, ideally right before they will deal a lot of damage to you. Yasuo when he is looking to ult you, Zed when he ults you, et cetera. The movement speed slow will also make it easier for you to fight back and hit them with your Dark Binding and Soul Shackles. You can also use it to make sure a critical Dark Binding lands, or to keep a priority target inside your Soul Shackles in an important fight.

PASSIVE ABILITY

Soul Siphon Ability: Morgana Heals for 20% of the damage dealt by her abilities to champions and large minions and jungle monsters. How to use: There's really not much to be said about this ability. It's a little bit of passive healing. It's nice to have. You will very rarely make conscious decisions based around this ability. It's just kinda there and it's nice. The exception is when you want to regain a little bit of HP before or after a teamfight from jungle camps. It does have a special interaction with Tormented Shadow though, that I will talk about when we get to that ability.

Q

Dark Binding Ability: Morgana hurls a blast of starfire that Roots the first enemy hit for [2 / 2.25 / 2.5 / 2.75 / 3] seconds and deals [80 / 135 / 190 / 245 / 300] (+0.9 AP) magic damage. Cooldown: 10 seconds Cost: 50 / 55 / 60 / 65 / 70 mana How to use: Morgana's most iconic ability, which can be used in a variety of different ways: 1. For safety. Dark Binding is a great tool to keep enemies away from you and your vulnerable allies and prevent them from closing the distance and dealing damage, whether you're being chased across the map, or an enemy tries to jump on you during a skirmish. 2. To catch a single enemy out of position. Taking down an important enemy right before an objective comes up can often decide the game during it's later stages. This goes hand in hand with building good vision and denying enemy vision. The more vision you have, the easier it is to make those picks, and if the enemies do not have vision, they are more likely to walk into your Dark Binding. 3. To start a fight. Sometimes it can be hard to initiate fights when your team lacks the necessary tools to do so. Hitting a Dark Binding, even on a low priority target, can change that. 4. To help your kiteable allies get in range. Sometimes, for some champs, especially juggernauts or bruisers, getting in range and laying down the damage they're capable of can be a pain. Your Dark Binding can change that easily. 5. To keep enemies inside your Tormented Shadow. Tormented Shadow is your highest damage dealing ability, so you want enemies to stand in it as much as possible. If they're not standing still on their own, you gotta make them. 6. To set up for Soul Shackles. Hitting a Dark Binding is useful for both getting into position to use Soul Shackles initially, and also to stay in position while using Soul Shackles for the second instance of damage and the cc. 7. To prevent the enemy jungler from reaching a neutral objective. Rooting the enemy jungler outside of Smite range while a dragon or baron is going down is an easy way to secure the objective for your team. 8. To deal damage. Sometimes, damage is the best kind of cc. Especially if it leads to death. Dark Binding can provide a nice bit of burst damage. 9. To lasthit minions. In some match-ups, you might have to resort to lasthitting from afar. While your Tormented Shadow can easily take care of the smaller minions most of the time, you might need to throw a Dark Binding to secure a cannon minion sometimes. 10. To disrupt enemy movement. Many abilities that include some form of movement can be interrupted by Dark Binding. A Lissandra won't be able to re-activate her Glacial Path while rooted. Ekko and Yasuo won't be able to ult. You get the idea. 11. To disrupt enemy playpatterns. Some champions need to move to a certain location to make use of their abilities. Ekko needs to move into his Parallel Convergence to gain the shield. Draven wants to catch his axes. Et cetera. Your Dark Binding can stop them from doing so.

W

Tormented Shadow Ability: Morgana ignites the ground for 5 seconds, dealing [12 / 22 / 32 / 42 / 52] (+0.14 AP) magic damage per second, increased by up to 170% based on the targets' percentage missing health. This ability's cooldown is reduced by 5% every time Morgana is healed by Soul Siphon. This ability deals 155% damage to non-epic jungle monsters. Cooldown: 12 seconds Cost: 70 / 85 / 100 / 115 / 130 mana How to use: This is Morgana's main damage dealing ability. While the damage on the tooltip might not look like much at first, keep in mind that this goes up based on the target's missing health. A target at 50% health will alrady take 85% more damage from this ability. It is also her main ability for clearing minion waves and jungle camps. As a midlaner building a bunch of AP items, a lot of your playstyle will ideally revolve around this ability. If you're a Support Morgana player trying her out in the midlane for the first time, this might need you some time to adjust to. Since this ability costs a crazy amount of mana, you absolutely don't want to waste it when you're already low on mana. Using it just for one or two ticks is rarely worth it unless you're getting a kill with that. Ideally, you want to make sure that your enemies are forced to stay inside it for at least half of the duration. This is where your Dark Binding and Soul Shackles come into play. In the middle of a messy teamfight, you can often put it on the ground without rooting someone inside it because there will be lots of potential targets and many people won't even notice it among all the other flashy effects around them. Every single time you receive healing from your passive Soul Siphon, the current cooldown of this ability will be reduced be 5% of it's maximum cooldown. Keep in mind that Soul Siphon does not heal you for dealing damage to small minions or small jungle monsters, only cannon- and superminions as well as large and epic jungle monsters. So if, for example, you want to reduce the cooldown of your Tormented Shadow while pushing a wave, hitting just the caster or melee minions is not enough, you need to hit the cannon aswell (if there is one). This ability will be able to fully kill caster minions over it's full duration for most of the game. An exception are the levels 5 and 6, assuming you haven't gone base to buy more ability power yet. In that case, casters will survive with a small amount of HP. Using one Minion Dematerializer on a caster minion will fix this problem.

E

Black Shield Ability: Morgana grants an ally champion [80 / 135 / 190 / 245 / 300] (+0.7 AP) Magic Shield for 5 seconds. The shield prevents Disabling and Immobilizing effects until it breaks. Cooldown: 24 / 22 / 20 / 18 / 16 seconds Cost: 80 mana How to use: Black Shield is usually used to fullfill one of two goals. Either to prevent magic damage, or to prevent crowd control. It is rarely used with the intention of preventing both at once, since taking too much magic damage will break the shield, after which it stops preventing crowd control. Due to it's extremely high cooldown, it is very important to get the most out of this ability and absolutely never waste it. While this goes for many other abilities aswell, this is even more important for an ability like this which has a baseline cooldown of 26 seconds at rank 1. Since you will always be maxing this ability last when playing Midlane Morgana, it's baseline cooldown will be 26 seconds for the first 13 champion levels of the game. Do not waste this. Do not use it to spellshield a bit of poke unless that would literally kill you otherwise. During the laning phase, you will almost always keep this ready at all times to get you out of emergency situations (like for escaping ganks) or to prevent taking really bad trades by spellshielding an important crowd control ability such as Ahri's Charm. When doing so, it is very important that you don't use it too early. If you use it too early, that will allow the enemy to break it before using their cc. If you panic and press E as soon as the enemy Ahri steps out of the minion wave towards you, she will break it with her other abilities before charming you or simply wait it out and go for a trade again soon because now she knows that your shield is on a long cooldown. So try to use it as late as possible to force the enemy to commit. Don't let the enemy bluff and bait your shield if possible. Only use it to prevent damage if preventing a tiny bit of damage is important for some reason and you know whoever you're currently fighting won't try to cc you anytime soon. You can also use it during your ultimate. When using your ultimate, enemies will often look to cc you to gain distance. Use your Black Shield to stay in range. During the later stages of the game, don't be selfish with your Black Shield. Use it to set your allies up for success. A well timed Black Shield can make an engage from your team's frontline even better because it can prevent the enemy team from disengaging by using tools such as Poppy's Keeper's Verdict or Janna's Howling Gale. It can also protect your allied carries from getting taken out of the fight. Finally, it can also prevent the enemies from interrupting your allies while channeling important abilities. If, for example, your team has a Jhin and the enemy team has a Bard, the Bard will sometimes look to use his ultimate to interrupt your Jhin's ultimate. Use your Black Shield to prevent the interruption. If you have an Ardent Censer, Black Shield can also be used to boost a hypercarry's damage during key fights.

R

Soul Shackles Ability: Morgana chains herself to nearby enemy Champions, dealing [150 / 225 / 300] (+0.7 AP) magic damage and Slowing them by 20%. After 3 seconds, enemies unable to break the chains take an additional [150 / 225 / 300] (+0.7 AP) magic damage and are Stunned for 1.5 seconds. While casting this ability, Morgana gains [5% / 30% / 55%] Move Speed towards enemies she has chained. Morgana gains True Sight of all enemies affected by this ability. Cooldown: 120 / 110 / 100 seconds Cost: 100 mana How to use: Morgana's ultimate ability is a very powerful tool that can easily turn around duels or small skirmishes as well as large scale teamfights. Not only can it provide amazing crowd control, it also grants you movement speed for it's duriation, making it easier to dodge, chase or escape. On top of that, when building a lot of AP, it can also provide huge amounts of burst damage to single priority targets or entire teams due to it's amazing 140% AP ratio (70% per instance of damage). While it does require some more foresight and planning, Soul Shackles can be used for many of the same things Dark Binding can be used. To catch enemies out of position, to lock down priority targets, to peel for yourself or allies, to deal damage, et cetera. However, since it affects everyone around you, it is also a powerful tool for zoning and splitting up teams. Enemies will often look to get out of your ultimate as quickly as possible, giving you the ability to spread out grouped up enemies and separate them from eachother. Since your ultimate cannot be dodged, only outranged, it can also be used as a setup for Dark Binding against mobile enemies. For example, when trying to kill a Yasuo, opening the fight with Dark Binding is usually a bad idea since he can use both his Wind Wall and his Sweeping Blade to avoid it. Opening the fight with Soul Shackles makes it much harder. Yasuo in particular can only outrange it if there's viable dash targets outside of the tether range and he cannot windwall it either, making it nearly impossible for him to escape and outplay you. Then, after stunning him with the second instance of Soul Shackles, you can simply bind him during the stun for a long chain of cc. Unlike when playing Support Morgana, you don't necessarily have to use Soul Shackles as an engage or zoning tool against entire teams. It is perfectly fine and often worth it to use it against a single priority target. "One man ults" are often not a bad thing on AP Morgana. Since most players are not used to seeing AP Morgana, they will often not respect the sheer damage your ult can provide in 1v1 situations. You can also use it to simply finish off low HP carries after hitting them with your Q-W. Finally, it also interacts amazingly well with Everfrost and Zhonya's Hourglass. Everfrost makes it much easier to get into and to stay in ult range while Zhonya's Hourglass provides a great way of staying safe during your ult since it's active ability will not break the chains. Especially when paired with Zhonya's Hourglass or a Stopwatch, Soul Shackles can turn around any tower dive and turn it into a deathtrap for your enemies.

Ability max order:

The ability max order of Midlane Morgana is pretty straight forward: Max your W - Tormented Shadow first, Q - Dark Binding second, and E - Black Shield last, while putting points into R - Soul Shackles whenever possible.
Soul Shackles should be skilled whenever possible because it is your ultimate and strongest ability and can be key in a variety of situations.

Tormented Shadow is your main damage dealing ability aswell as your main tool for waveclearing and sustain, which is why it should be maxed first. However, keep in mind that the manacost of this ability goes up significantly every time you put a point into it. Especially at higher ranks (3-5), you need to make sure to not waste this ability or use it for nothing unless you absolutely have the mana to do so.

Dark Binding should be maxed second since the root duration gets longer with each point you put into it, giving you more utility, safety and kill potential while also making it easier to keep enemies inside your Tormented Shadow for longer periods of time.

Black Shield should be maxed last since it does not provide any damage or crowd control. Putting points into it will increase it's shield size and reduce it's cooldown, which is very useful, but simply not as useful as maxing Tormented Shadow and Dark Binding.

Generally speaking, for Midlane Morgana, putting points into it is extremely useful for each of all four abilities. There's absolutely no ability that is "useless" to max by any means. Putting extra points into them is great for every single one, it's simply a matter of which is best.
Skill sequence during the first 4 levels:

The ideal skill sequence for the first 4 points can vary a lot depending on the midlane match-up, the junglers and whether either team is invading or not. Don't use your first skillpoint immediately, wait and see what happens so you can still skill Q quickly if there's an invade happening.

Definitely skill Q when your team plans to invade.

Starting with W, on the other hand, can be helpful to match the push of lane opponents that will be looking to shove the wave into your tower immediately, such as Ekko, Nunu, Aurelion Sol etc. In a case like that, do your best to match their push because you do not want to end up in a situation where you need to lasthit under your tower - Morgana is terrible at that. In a lane that you expect to be a complete farming fest without any sort of kill pressure, you can also skill W at level 1 and start using it to stack your Manaflow Band quickly (while also using it to match the enemy's degree of push).

Whether you want E on level 2, 3 or 4 depends on whether there's anything important you might have to spellshield, obviously. This could be an early gank by a jungler that relies in cc to some extend, but also a lane opponent who plans to all-in you at level 2. In some matchups where your E is almost entirely useless (such as Talon), you can delay putting your first point into E until level 4 and put a second point into W instead at level 3. Only do this when you're not at danger of getting ganked though.

Basically, think about what your lane opponent will be trying to achieve during the early levels and make an informed decision on what to skill based on that. Also think about who the enemy jungler is, where they are most likely starting, whether there's any chance that they will level 2 gank you, level 3 gank you, et cetera.

Mythic items:

In this section, I will cover the viable mythic items on Morgana and explain when to pick which one. I don't really think there is a "default" option. Instead, you should make your choice based on the match.

Everfrost

Everfrost is a very solid choice, especially now that it's cost has been lowered to 2800 in exchange for losing some AP. It's very useful to keep people inside your W and Ultimate, to set up or follow up your Q, and for defensive purposes. It really shines when the enemy team is very melee-heavy, or when they heavily rely on reaching you. Note that the active ability can also be used to remove spellshields from a target.

Liandry's Anguish

Liandry's Torment is a great option against tanky teams, and/or for more consistent DPS. I believe it is also a great option for inexperienced or lower rank players, since it does not require any additional input or a high Q hit rate to reach it's maximum potential, unlike Everfrost or Luden's Tempest.

Luden's Tempest

After the buffs to the item in 11.6, I consider Luden's Tempest a viable option into squishy teams once again. It is especially effective if the enemy team is not only squishy, but also has an immobile backline, as the flatpen will help you 100-0 key targets off of a single Q. It will rarely deal as much total damage as Liandry's Torment over an entire teamfight, but the point of Luden's Tempest is to take out a single target at the start of a fight and create a lot of threat with your Qs. If you feel like your Q aim is off, you might want to consider skipping this in favor of a different mythic, as a high Q hit rate is crucial for generating threat with Luden's Tempest.

Legendary items:

In this section, I will talk about your legendary item options. None of them are absolutely mandatory. They all have certain situations where they shine, and it's important that you understand that in order to make the right decisions.

Zhonya's Hourglass

Possibly the most iconic item for Morgana, and for a good reason. Not only does it provide decent stats for an acceptable price, it also grants you access to a versatile active ability that synergizes well with Soul Shackles. Since activating this item does not break Soul Shackles' chains, it is a very good option to stay safe while you're waiting for the second part of your ultimate to happen. Just be aware that you obviously cannot move while in stasis, meaning it's relatively easy for enemies to get away from you during this time. Zhonya's Hourglass can be a good fit in many matches, but sometimes, you just don't need it. If you rarely find yourself inside the enemy team and there's also very little physical damage threat in the enemy comp, you might want to skip this for something else.

Horizon Focus

Horizon Focus has been reworked in patch 11.23, turning it from a more niche option into a more general item. The Hypershot passive is triggered by any Q (regardless of range), W from over 700 range (any range if you have Rylai's Crystal Scepter), and both instaces of R. It increases ALL damage you deal to marked targets afterwards, including runes and other items. It also gives vision on affected targets for 6 seconds. The build path has gotten a bit better, now that it does not build from a Needlessly Large Rod anymore.

Morello- nomicon

Morellonomicon is a decent buy if there's a lot of healing on the enemy team. However, in many cases, having just an Oblivion Orb will be enough until you reach teamfighting stage. Morellonomicon is especially useful against champions with healing that's particularly impactful when they're low health.

Void Staff

Void Staff provides a lot of value against targets with medium to high amounts of magic resist. The more MR the enemy team has, the more valuable this item will be over other choices. However, since almost all champions in the game consistently gain MR as they level up, it will be a very valuable item during the later stages of the game regardless most of the time. The build path also got improved significantly with season 11, making it a lot less awkward to buy.

Banshee's Veil

Banshee's Veil is a good item for when there's a lot of magic damage and/or a lot of critical, high impact abilities on the enemy team that you absolutely do not want to get hit by, especially those that are too fast for you to react to with a Black Shield. It is also generally very gold efficient vs double AP mid/jungle.

Mejai's Soulstealer

Mejai's Soulstealer is the feast or famine item in League of Legends. It can generate insane amounts of AP, especially when you consider it's low price, but just a single death can mean losing a lot of that value again. I consider it to be a bit less risky on Morgana than on many other champions because Tormented Shadow and Black Shield make it very easy for her to get takedowns without exposing herself to too much danger. However, you still shouldn't buy it unless you're confident and the enemy team has no easy ways to take those stacks off you quickly. If you are not sure how well you will be able to stack it and protect the stacks, consider buying a Dark Seal first and only upgrading it once you've reached 8-10 stacks. This item works great in combination with items that provide extra safety, like Zhonya's Hourglass or Banshee's Veil, to make losing the stacks less likely.

Demonic Embrace

Demonic Embrace should be bought against teams with a lot of HP. Against moderately tanky teams, Liandry's Torment will be enough most of the time. Demonic Embrace is the kind of item you'd want against 3-4 HP stacking enemies, or if the enemy team has 1-2 hypertanks keeping them in the game single-handedly. While the passives of this item are still strong against less tanky teams, the stats it provides (no haste and only 70 AP) are relatively poor, which is why I personally only get it in games where the passive will be amazing.

Rylai's Crystal Scepter

Rylai's Crystal Scepter used to be a super niche item. However, with patch 11.23, it sees a lot more use, partially due to the changes to previously viable items such as Cosmic Drive. It also synergizes well with the reworked Horizon Focus. Other than that, it is very useful when there's a very mobile/fast enemy hypercarry tearing your team apart. Something like a lategame Vayne can be very hard to hit with your Q or R due to her stealth etc. With Rylai's Crystal Scepter, you can slow those types of champions with your W before attempting to Q them, or to simply allow your teammates to collapse on and focus the target easier.

Shadowflame

Shadowflame is a new item added in patch 11.23 that surves only one purpose: Damage, mainly against low MR targets. I'll be completely honest with you, I'm lazy and haven't done the math on when this item is good, when it is better or worse than Void Staff etc. I will do some math and crunch some numbers for this item soon, but in the meantime, I can only say that it feels pretty good for when you simply want more damage against a squishy team. Take this with a grain of salt, since a feeling is just that, a feeling.

Rabadon's Deathcap

Rabadon's Deathcap is the item capable of providing the highest raw AP numbers in the game. It's a great pick on Morgana due to her high AP ratios. It also synergizes well with Gathering Storm and Mejai's Soulstealer. However, it is very expensive and the build path is extremely awkward due to it's lack of small steps, making it very hard to buy when behind. Usually, due to it's high price, you should only buy it as your last item.

The early laning phase is easily Morgana's weakest point in the game. You can look for kills whenever opportunities arise, but most of the time, your job during this phase will be damage limitation and to reach level 6 and get your Lost Chapter.

The ideal starting items are a Sapphire Crystal and a Refillable Potion. Morgana wants to get her Lost Chapter and her mythic ASAP since she is quite weak without items. However, these starting items can be a bit too greedy against assassins in particular. In some matchups ( Zed, Qiyana and Fizz immediately come to mind), you simply need the max HP from Doran's Ring to survive their level 6 all-in.

Try to pick up as much farm and experience as you can without exposing yourself to too much risk. Try to keep the minion wave somewhere near the middle of the lane. You absolutely don't want it inside your own tower since Morgana is not great at lasthitting under tower.

When using the Minion Dematerializer rune, use one of them on a caster minion as soon as they become available. This way, you can make sure that one full W will always be enough to fully kill them. The other two can be used on different types of minions to improve your overall waveclear further, or they can be saved for situations where you really need to shove a certain cannon wave quickly, for some reason. This can be helpful when the enemy midlaner recalls before a cannon wave and does not have Teleport. In that case, you can use a Minion Dematerializer on a cannon minion to shove the wave to get platings and hopefully make your lane opponent lose gold and exp.

When using the Future's Market rune, you will need around 750-800 gold to get your Lost Chapter if you started with a Sapphire Crystal. This is usually achievable around the 4 minute mark. By getting a 4 minute Lost Chapter and them teleporting back to lane, you can get a surprising amount of early lane priority that is usually not possible for midlane Morgana.

You can look for trades during this phase if the enemy laner happens to walk into your Dark Binding, but mostly you will just be farming and chilling. In matchups against champions that want to get in your face, don't just throw your Dark Binding out on cooldown, save it for when you need it, or you will be punished for it.

When trading with the enemy laner, weave in a lot of autoattacks when possible since you usually have nothing better to do while waiting for your cooldowns to come back up, but be mindful of the minion aggro this will cause. Also do not use your Black Shield to shield some simple poke during those trades. It's usually not worth it due to it's high cooldown. Save it for when you get ganked or to shield yourself from any dangerous cc the enemy laner might try to chunk you with, such as Ahri's Charm, Syndra's Scatter the Weak or Zoe's Sleepy Trouble Bubble. In these cases, try to use it as late as possible to make it harder for the enemy to break it before the cc lands. Don't let them bluff and bait our your shield.

If your jungler ganks your lane, make sure to chain your cc together. If they have any kind of very easy-to-use cc such as Zac's Elastic Slingshot or Rammus' Frenzying Taunt, wait for them to use it first before you attempt to hit your Dark Binding for an almost guaranteed hit. Doing so will often result in a kill. If the enemy laner has some form of cc that they can use to prevent your melee jungler from closing the distance, consider using Black Shield to prevent the disengage and enable your jungler to get in melee range. Don't overextend too far during those ganks though, as you are still susceptible to counterganks since your 2v2 capabilities are limited, especially pre level 6.

Once you hit level 6 and gain access to Soul Shackles, the game becomes a lot easier. You now have enough damage to kill most lane opponents in a 1v1 if they make a mistake, such as blowing one of their key spells for nothing. If you have trouble hitting your Dark Binding when trying to go for a kill, you can now also start the fights by walking up to your enemy and instantly using Soul Shackles as long as they don't have any dash to get out of easily and then simply chain your Dark Binding to the end of Soul Shackles' stun. When going for these aggressive plays, be very mindful of enemy jungler ganks once again. You have little to no 1v2 capabilities as Morgana. Only go for 1v1 kills when you know the enemy jungler (and the enemy support, if they like to roam) won't be close enough to join the fight.

Once you have both your R and your Lost Chapter, you can start playing the lane more proactively in many matchups and keep shoving the wave to generate pressure and create space for your own jungler.

The midgame is when Morgana really starts to come online. You should have your Mythic item now, and ideally also a second item and possibly also a Dark Seal with a stack or two. Don't be afraid to join skirmishes now. Help your team to fight for dragons and towers.

If you are new to Midlane Morgana and only know her from the Support role so far, chances are that you are stronger than you realize during this phase. She starts dealing a lot of damage with 1-2 items and Tormented Shadow maxed out. You can often take squishy enemies down to half HP with one Dark Binding + Tormented Shadow.

Don't forget to pick up cs through all of this. While Morgana is decently strong on 1-2 items, you still scale well into the lategame, so make sure to never stop farming. Pick up minion waves in sidelanes if nobody else is taking care of them. Take jungle camps whenever they're up and nobody else is taking them, you can kill most camps quickly without losing HP, thanks to Soul Siphon and Tormented Shadow.

You are extremely hard to dive for almost any enemy due to Dark Binding, Black Shield and Soul Shackles. Don't be afraid to defend towers even when slightly outnumbered, as long as your abilities are ready. Bonus points if you have a Stopwatch or Zhonya's Hourglass.

Always keep a Control Ward on the map and at least one more in your inventory during this phase of the game. As discussed in the item section, vision is extremely valuable for Morgana as it makes landing your Dark Binding significantly easier. Vision is also just great in general.

When skirmishing, either use your Dark Binding to stop enemy fighters, divers or assassins from reaching you and stay safe, or use it to lock down priority targets like enemy carries so your team can go and take care of them. Don't be afraid to go for one man ults during this stage of the game. While a 5 man montage worthy ult always looks great, it is often impractical during messy and chaotic midgame skirmishes and you're much better off just using Soul Shackles to burst down one or two important targets or to ensure your own safety.

While not as strong as your mid game, you can still have a lot of impact in the late game, thanks to your good AP scalings and amazing utility. You are usually not dealing quite as much damage as some other mages during the late game, but a single well aimed Dark Binding on a high priority target can easily decide the game when the deathtimers and stakes are high, and so can a single clutch Black Shield on an important teammate.

Try to group with your team at all times now. You are not a splitpusher. You can catch sidelane waves if necessary if you have Teleport ready, but don't live in the sidelane and don't try to match dedicated splitpush champions 1v1. Try to group with your team because, like I said above, a single good Q or E in a teamfight can decide the game.

Just like during the midgame, vision is still extremely important. Keep buying Control Wards as long as you have inventory space left and use them to build and deny vision, making your Dark Binding easier to hit.

How you want to use Soul Shackles during this phase of the game depends on the enemy team composition and on whether you have Zhonya's Hourglass. If they have a lot of burst damage and can blow up a squishy target quickly, going for huge teamfight ults can be too risky. Consider using it to ensure your and your ADC's safety against enemy assassins and divers instead. However, if the enemy team is not necessarily capable of instantly oneshotting you the second you go for a big ult, and especially if you have Zhonya's Hourglass, you can start looking for bigger ults on 3+ targets now, especially against lots of immobile champions and tanks.

Don't forget to keep your Tormented Shadow on the ground at all times since it will deal a significant amount of damage during this phase of the game. Reposition it when necessary.

How the f*** do I hit Dark Binding?

Practice, practice, practice. Unlike some players, I do not believe that you have be "naturally made" for skillshots. The more you play champions with skillshots, the better you will get at hitting them. However, there are a few tips I can think of that go beyond just practicing:

1. Use vision to your advantage. If the enemy cannot see you while you're casting Dark Binding, that leaves them with less time to react.
2. Figure out a specific enemy player's dodge pattern. Many players always dodge skillshots in the same way. They have a preferred direction to dodge in, or maybe they like to stand still and "dodge" by making you think they're going to dodge when they aren't. Try to remember these patters and use it to your advantage.
3. Enemies close to a wall have less directions to dodge in. Pretty self-explanatory. Players in the middle of a wide open space have much more options when dodging than players who are sandwiched between a tower and a wall.
4. If the enemy you're trying to hit is very mobile and someone on your team has a CC ability that is much easier to land, wait for them to use it first.
5. Attempt to hit enemies when they are distracted. A Xerath or a Jhin using ult and trying to snipe your far away teammates often won't have his attention focused on you and might not see you coming while he's stationary.
6. Think about what an enemy is currently trying to do to correctly predict their path of movement. Where are they going? Why? Do they know where you are? Do they know you can see them? Et cetera.
7. Use the chaos of teamfights to your advantage. It's much harder for your enemies to spot out a single Dark Binding when their entire screen is currently filled with spells.

I hope this helps. Other than that, just practice.Where can I learn more about Midlane Morgana?

You could check out the Morgana Mains subreddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/MorganaMains/). You can also always send me a friend request on EUW to ask me any questions that you might have and I'll do my best to answer them.Can I replace X rune / item / summoner spell with Y?

Of course. I am just here to give recommendations. Maybe something else suits your own playstyle better. Actively thinking about what to build etc. and not just blindly following guides is always a good thing.Should I firsttime Midlane Morgana in SoloQ after reading your guide?

While Morgana is a pretty easy champion to pilot, she has significant weaknesses in sololanes and it takes some practice and also experience with match-ups to cover them. I recommend trying her out in Draft or Flex first.Why did you write this guide when you've barely peaked D1?

Because I wanted to! I enjoy writing these kind of things and I saw that there wasn't many in-depth or up-to-date guides for Midlane Morgana on Mobafire at the time of me writing this. There generally isn't a lot of higher elo Midlane Morgana players overall, so you will have a hard time finding very high elo content for her. My intention behind this guide was to share what I've learned with Morgana with the casual and average playerbase. If you're something like Master and higher, this guide is probably not for you. Sorry!

Thank you so much for checking out my guide! It means a lot to me. This is the first guide I've ever done. I mostly wrote it because I enjoy playing Midlane Morgana and because I was looking for a little project to work on.

I'm not a native English speaker, I hope my English wasn't too terrible!

Please let me know if you have any kind of constructive feedback, both for the content of this guide as well as for the structure of the guide itself.

I hope that you've learned something from this guide and that I've inspired you to try out Midlane Morgana!

My future plans for this guide:

1. Keep making changes to the item and rune section as the season 12 meta develops.

2. Create a more detailed matchup section with clear recommendations for runes, items and summoner spells.

3. Include video examples of many things in the guide.

4. Make a full video version of this guide for those who prefer watching and listening over reading.

Since this was my first time doing literally anything on Mobafire, I've made use of a bunch of tutorials and code templates to make this guide happen. Almost every code in this guide is based on examples provided by jhoijhoi in her guide to making a guide, which you can find here: https://www.mobafire.com/league-of-legends/build/making-a-guide-101506