Hello there. Do you like explosions? I like explosions...controlled explosions, that is, and by controlled I mean controlled into the enemy champion's face. My name is Thunderscourge, and I hope to provide for you all to deal obscene amounts of structure damage in your games following the new Runes Reforged rework that is coming out in the near future which has given to Ziggs many, many gifts.

I've had it said about me that I am a very objective focused player, as I prioritize destroying towers, getting dragons, and the occasional Baron over hunting down my actual enemies which obviously can be good or bad depending on the situation. What it means though is that when I saw Ziggs and played him for the first time I was in love, as the ability to delete enemy towers is what I have always wanted to do and now I was able to with two presses of a single button! There is quite the thrill when you just wander bot lane where the enemies think their 1/3rd HP tower can protect them and then it suddenly is gone, or getting first tower in a surprise burst of damage when your enemy backs, or split pushing the enemy base and destroying everything in sight while your team distracts the other team briefly.

So this build is designed to capitalize on Ziggs' tower destructive qualities which can earn your team a lot of gold, limit your enemy's movement and safety, and push to win. If you want a more kill-y build, there are plenty of those out there, but this is for those of you who like me prioritize base destruction over all.

Note: Until I have had the chance to really playtest it all and see how it feels I will refrain from suggesting specific items along with this and refrain from matchup details. If you MUST have such things however I will put an item section for you to read through, but it all is preliminary and should be taken with a grain of salt in relation to normal Ziggs builds.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy!

Link to build




Sorcery Runes: Big surprise, I know, but here are the selections you should take for this Aloha Snackbar build.



Arcane Comet: You already poke people, so more poke = more time they are not in lane protecting their tower! Take this and rain blue fire down upon your foes! Think of it as a free mini-Xerath ult which follows your attacks as you poke your enemy all the way back to their healing fountain. The other options are not really meant for Ziggs given his kit, so this is the way to go.



The Ultimate Hat: This slot unfortunately was not too ideal for Ziggs, as while if you are facing a magical assassin like LeBlanc or Katarina you obviously should take Nullifying Orb, you should be able to conserve your mana once you get the hang of Ziggs so Manaflow Band is not too useful especially later on and after laning phase. This leaves this option with its ult cooldown, which is nice, as there have been countless times when my ult is just barely on cooldown when it is needed and which will let you semi-spam it later in the game.



Transcendence: More cooldown, more bombs thrown, more cooldown on your passive, more damage to tower. Pretty simple. Celerity does not give enough move speed to really save you from assassins, but your W may if it is off cooldown, so this is better for offense and defense. Absolute Focus can work for split pushing, but offers no utility, so Transcendence wins out overall.



Gathering Storm: Scorch can be taken if you want even more poke damage, but this will make your pokes and your tower damage do even more especially as time goes on and helps combat an issue I have with Ziggs and that is that late-game he does not feel like he does as much in teamfights. As such, this is the best option though if you want early game pressure go ahead for Scorch. If you truly must wander and roam a lot, Waterwalking exists, though it is far more situational.



Resolve Runes: This is where things get a bit...creative! +15 Ability Power is nice, but what we are truly here for is one rune in particular...



Demolish: This is the true keystone to this build. "Charge up a powerful attack against a tower over 4 seconds, while within 600 range of it. The charged attack deals 125 (+30% of your max health) bonus physical damage. Cooldown 45 seconds." For those who are wondering, your auto-attack range is 550, so 600 range is actually not as short as you may be thinking. So when you are pushing your enemy under tower and harassing him? You charge up Demolish and can unleash a devastating hit on the enemy tower as a bonus. When you push your enemy out of lane and shove it under tower to deny him farm? You can use Demolish. You have used Demolish enough and utilized your passive to shred tower? You press W and get first tower. Ziggs is a demolition expert, so this is our true secret ace and gift from this coming update. The one flaw is that its bonus damage comes from your max health, but let us observe it: 30% of max health. Say you are a few minutes into the game and have roughly 1000 health, that means you get 300 bonus damage, making demolish deal 425 damage in total! This is on top of your base damage, your passive which deals bonus damage to structures, and so you should not want for destructive capabilities with this hidden Keystone. Late-game when you have about 2000 health or so? 725 damage, roughly a third of a tower's health (depending on the tower) in free damage which when paired with your W taking out towers that have 1/3rd of their HP left means you can literally auto-attack and W many towers to instantly destroy them so long as they have previous damage on them. It also pairs with this next rune, which is...



Overgrowth: For every 10 minions that die near you, you get 0.2% max health...not just minions YOU kill, but minions in general. This means if your jungler comes mid and steals some farm you don't get (as) punished, as you still get health! Now you may be wondering why this is a good rune to take, and there are two reasons for it which are actually pretty simple. 1) It gives you health, which means you can survive longer when attacked, possibly allowing you to use your W and E to escape an ambush. 2) It empowers Demolish very slightly, so while obviously not a major boost I have once been denied a tower by less than 5 hp because it was just that much higher than my execution range of my W, so every bit counts! Mainly survival based though, though getting in a couple extra damage on your Demolish is nice. For people to calculate easy numbers, say you get 200 farm and 200 other farm is killed around you during the entire game, that is 400. This would give you 8% bonus health, or rather about 160 in total should you have 2000 health. So 160 bonus health, not a bad amount to have, especially since it continues to increase as time goes on.

Starting Items
Doran's Ring/Potion x 2/Trinket

This should be your start in most games. It gives you some early power to your pokes thanks to the AP from Doran's Ring, a bit more health from it as well, Mana Regen, and even more mana if you kill minions. Health potions for sustain, and trinket because you need that.



First Back/Early Game
Lost Chapter/Fiendish Codex/Sorcerer's Shoes/Seeker's Armguard

In most circumstances you should be working towards your Morellonomicon, but if facing a dangerous lane opponent such as an assassin working on Zhonya's Hourglass early is crucial so you should instead build towards it with Seeker's. Fiendish Codex is a component of both of them and so is also a good early-game buy, but if you are building normally I would recommend Lost Chapter so that in the Early-Mid game you do not have to be so stingy with your abilities. Get upgraded boots a bit earlier if you are in a poke matchup which requires you dodge a lot (or if you intend to run away a lot, but hopefully things aren't going that way!) so that you can get that edge over your foe.



Main Core Build
Morellonomicon/Sorcerer's Shoes/Rabadon's Deathcap/Lich Bane/Liandry's Torment/Void Staff

This is a generalist build which goes along with our goals of blowing things up, but which should be altered depending on the situation and the matchup. Morello for Cooldown, Sorcerer's Shoes for the penetration and movement speed, Rabadon's for massive damage, Lich Bane for more damage and tower destruction, Liandry's for penetration and a bit of the old Deathfire's Touch, and Void Staff so that you do not deal negligible damage to the enemy team's tanks.

Alternate order for this would be as follows, will have to test most efficient route: Morellonomicon -> Sorcerer's Shoes -> Rabadon's Deathcap -> Void Staff -> Liandry's Torment -> Lich Bane



Defensive Options
Zhonya's Hourglass/Banshee's Veil

These should help you not explode the way the enemy's towers should be: instantly.


Other recommendations
Control ward(s)/Elixir of Sorcery/Refillable potion

Control wards are necessary to prevent getting caught by surprise, elixirs are good for when you are full build or will not be backing for a long time yet don't have enough for any other item and thus the gold you have is worthless, and refillable potion is an option in case you need it for further sustain early in the game.

To improve turret destruction capabilities, I shall now present for you some basic information that you may or may not know, particularly small little details that the game does not explain to you all too well on its own such as half your AP being added to your damage on turrets.

For a basic calculation on what Ziggs would do in an ideal situation to a tower with my build late-game, Ziggs would deal 1010(Passive) + 107 (Attack damage) + 350 (bonus turret damage = 50% of AP) + ~100 (elixir gains) + 125 (Demolition base damage) + ~600 (Demolition bonus damage = 30% of max HP) + ~425 (Lich Bane bonus if ability has been used) damage in a single hit on tower late game. In total? That is 2717 damage in one hit, not accounting for any bonus AP from the new Runes such as Gathering Storm.

This damage will be reduced to about 2282 damage by the turret's remaining Magic Resistance, as Turrets are effected by Magic Penetration, which the build affords plenty of and will reduce the turret's late game MR of 70 to 19, which offers 16% magic resistance. This is because the 30% reduction from Void Staff is applied, then then flat 30 reduction, which leaves you with ((.7 x 70)-30) = 19. Magic Damage through Resistance is calculated normally as 100/(100+MR), so 100/(100+19) = 84%, or rather 16% reduction.

2282 may not be 2767, but it DOES still essentially put towers in the late game execution range of 35%. Why is this? Turrets have just over 3000 health, so if you deal 2282 damage to them you can press W and execute them immediately. So in the time it takes you to throw a Q to wave clear their minions, AA, throw W on the tower (but not activate it), and then AA it again the tower is done. Given the 45 second cooldown on Demolish, further towers will take a bit of time if you are split pushing and rushing them all down, but you still will deal considerable damage regardless, just not as much.

Now, one thing that should be noted is that not all turrets are created equal, so when discussing them in this guide I will refer to them by their names. They are as follows:

Nexus towers: Located in front of the nexus, there are two of them.

Inhibitor towers: Located in front of each inhibitor, guarding the entrances to the base.

Inner towers: Located in front of the inhibitor towers.

Outer towers: Located in front of the inner towers.

Important Details to know:

Turrets have set health, but their Armor/Magic Resistance scale up with time until they eventually hit 70 Armor/MR. You should outscale them, but don't just think they are completely static entities.

Inhibitor and Nexus towers regenerate health at a fairly fast pace, so try to take them out all at once rather than risk the chance of your attacks on them having been wasted.

Everyone on your team gets 100 gold when an Outer tower is destroyed, 125 for an Inner tower, 150 for an Inhibitor tower, and 50 for a Nexus tower. 250 gold is given locally for the destruction of an Outer tower, 175 for an Inner, 50 for Inhibitor, and 0 for Nexus, which all together with the previous amount really adds up. 3 Outer (300) + 3 Inner (375) + 3 Inhibitor (450) + 2 Nexus towers (100) = 1225 free gold in total for your entire team, and perhaps 1000+ more of which can be yours via this strategy since you will be a wrecking ball for their turrets all by yourself allowing you to collect the Local bonuses.

Turrets that are alive have one major purpose for you (except as a target), and that is to deny your enemy gold and experience by having them kill your minions. As such there are arguments for not destroying every possible enemy tower, but for our purposes the only good turret is a dead turret.

Most likely know this, but turrets take severely less damage (66.66666% less approximately) when you do not have minions around, so make sure to remember this handy little fact when split-pushing! As powerful as you are, having minions will make your day much easier. Of course this does not apply to turrets you can just execute, as that does not require minions, but for other turrets it still does apply.

If any of my math is wrong, please feel free to message me and let me know so I can update it. This is just some basic stuff to give you an idea of why I believe this will be a viable build, for while it may not be as ideal for teamfights or general utility, it will destroy any turrets in your path.

The Strategy of Destroying the Enemy Base (Alternatively, "All Your Base Are Belong To Us")

Outer towers are the ones you start with in lane, and you will be prevented from dealing much damage to them early game not only because your opposing laner will likely be poking back and forth with you, but also because of your low AP at this time, and the fact that fort he first 5 minutes turrets take less damage in the game. This is not horrible though since you would deal pitiful damage to them anyways even if you did manage to attack it, so use this time to focus on your farm instead to hit them harder later on.

After this early-game period you will have a couple items, maybe a bit of AP, and this is where you need to start packing on the damage. Poke your laner out of lane, force them to back, and use this time to abuse their tower. By the time a laner (without teleport) gets back you can push from your tower to theirs almost surely, since your Q ought to kill their backline minions or come close to it in one hit, at which point you attack their tower.

If you are facing someone who roams, do NOT chase, as someone like Zed, LeBlanc, Ekko, or other roaming midlaners can turn around on you and kill you extremely easy if you try to help your poor botlane/jungler/toplane. Instead you will do more for your team by taking first tower and spam pinging that your laner is missing. Make sure to ward so you don't get ganked either by a returning midlaner or the enemy jungle, but make sure you get in every auto-attack you can to push down that tower as fast as you can. Your execution range will only be 25-30% at this stage, so you may not be able to do that, but if you can threaten it with one more push you will have drawn pressure from elsewhere as many players do NOT want to give up first tower. If they kill your botlane or push them out of lane and look to take tower, you should try to rush their mid tower down first. If necessary, throw your ult down bot-lane to clear their minions to slow theirs while you wait for a minion wave to arrive and assist your own push.

In the mid-late game when teamfights are happening everywhere, keep an eye out for enemy towers that you can execute. If you walk into a lane, throw a W, and get free gold for all of your team, why not do so? Keep heavy map awareness, and see if you can push into their Inner Towers if they still remain. Removing these will make enemies less willing to go out and farm, limiting their ability to act on the map. If an Inhibitor Tower is vulnerable and you know where the enemy team is (or at least 4/5 of them), go for it and take it down! They regenerate health, so be careful though to not try and attack one which may have once been low enough to execute but now will require a bit more work to do so.

Once you have taken care of their Inner Towers, focus on their Inhibitor Towers nonstop. Every time the enemy team is busy, make a point of taking these out. If you can open up their base and threaten inhibitors you not only earn your entire team gold, but you force them onto defense. Be careful though because these are the most dangerous to actually get, as even the Nexus Turrets only have two directions you can be attacked from (front and back) while you have multiple avenues of being ambushed or surprised at the Inhibitor Towers, especially at the mid-one where there are many more (from behind the tower/from behind you/to the right/to the left/right jungle/left jungle). Ward where you can, but for the most part just be cautious and wary of enemy spawn timers and who is alive and where they are (or aren't).

When you are finally at their base and pushing their Nexus, you can deprive the enemy team of their innate defense against Super Minions by shredding their last two towers for at this point you should be at or nearing full-build. AA-W and no more Nexus turret! Them not having these means that they have to stay at base and clear them out, opening up your team to take Baron or Elder or push down some untouched turret elsewhere and accomplish other objectives if not flat out ending the game.

So, when the enemy towers are all dead what do you do? Group with your team, help them however you can, but your passive works on structures, not just turrets, so you can still damage Inhibitors and the Nexus fairly well and should get in what attacks you can on them when possible even if your ability to shred towers is no longer needed.

Ziggs is still a (mostly) immobile Mage who the enemy assassins and fed carries will love blowing up, and he still is a great poke champion, but I ought to explain some pros and cons which particularly apply here compared to some other builds for this character.

Pros

Ziggs will shred any tower he is alone with. If you can isolate yourself for a few moments with a pushed wave, you get a tower for free essentially. With teleport this can especially be powerful for splitpushing when the enemy team is tangled up somewhere. With 4 seconds you can deal hypothetically about half of a tower's health, AA it again with your empowered AA via your passive and then press W to execute it. In essence, in about 4-6 seconds you can destroy a full-health tower if you have minions aiding your efforts and you have some decent AP behind your attacks.

Following from this, if played right you will have much more map dominance than your opponents, as they will not have turrets protecting them on most of the map. If you notice a half-health or damaged turret it is as good as dead in a few moments, meaning you can clean the entire map of them up pretty easily, depriving your opponents of their aid as safety nets and giving your team more room to act without as great a fear of enemy reprisal. Objectives win games, so push forward to their base and demoralize them with how they have no towers left!

Compared to most builds, with the itemization I have suggested you can deal essentially true damage to squishy targets and a fair amount still to tanks, unlike how a normal Ziggs build will leave you dealing kind of pitiful damage to those very same tanks while affording you other kinds of bonuses like some movement speed via Luden's or other such nice passives.

Cons

This part will require some playtesting to really gauge specific weaknesses to this build in particular, as while I could hypothesize of how it will fall short, it is not really something one can get the feel for through theorycrafting alone.

Runes Reforged is going to bring Ziggs a lot more tools for his overall playstyle be it granting him a Keystone in the form of Arcane Comet which will rain fire down upon our enemies and force them out of lane, or be it the hidden Keystone for him in the form of Demolish which essentially doubles his turret execution capabilities, so I'm looking forward to trying it out and updating this guide as soon as it becomes available! Until then I can only really theorycraft, so I hope you will bear with me as I update this as needed. If you have any suggestions in terms of itemization or any other such related ideas please do share, as I look forward to optimizing this "unique" build as best as I can!

In addition, I'll add some things like matchups and the like as soon as I can. This is my first guide, so I am still getting used to the format and everything, so bear with me as I tinker around!