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Recommended Items
Spells:
Exhaust
Flash
Items
Ability Order
Death Defied (PASSIVE)
Karthus Passive Ability
Introduction
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Hi there, my name's Crystalfortress, and this is my guide to AP Mid Lane
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OFFENSE
The offense tree is extremely important for any kind of AP or AD carry, as it gives some sizable bonuses to the damage that they will be focusing on dealing. The route I take through the tree is fairly regular, other than the point in
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UTILITY
The utility tree is great for AP Casters, as the Mana regeneration can really help early game, the summoner spell cooldown reduction is helpful, but most of all, the buff duration is really helpful for relying better on blue buff.
ALTERNATIVES
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MY PREFERRED RUNES
QUINTESSENCES
Ability Power to deal more damage. Fairly simple choice.
SEALS
Currently the best defensive seals in my opinion, as armor seals were nerfed. Scaling because they surpass their flat alternatives around level 6, and your safe laning phase doesn't require the early health.
GLYPHS
Magic resist is useful against AP mid laners, who are the norm these days. They'll protect you against a lot of their damage so you can stay in lane longer.
MARKS
These marks are by far the best for AP mid laners. They provide more damage and stay relevant throughout the game better than any other mark. Not hybrid because you don't harass or farm with your autoattacks.
ALTERNATIVE RUNES
QUINTESSENCES
These are what I'm currently using on all of my rune pages, but that's just because I haven't bought any other quintessences yet. They work fine on all champions.
SEALS
I would consider running these against an AD mid laner like
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GLYPHS
These could be used instead of magic resist in the situation where you won't be needing the extra magic damage defense, whether because you counter your lane opponent or because you are against an AD mid laner.
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MAIN SUMMONER SPELLS
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ALTERNATIVE SUMMONER SPELLS
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ABILITY LEVELING EXPLANATION
This is the way that I would probably level my abilities against most laners. You obviously want to start with
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ABILITY EXPLANATIONS
PASSIVE
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MAIN SPELLS
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This spell is a one-point wonder. It creates a wall centered at the targetted location, with the wall itself extending equally to the right and left at an angle perpendicular to
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ULTIMATE ABILITY
One of the most awesome and feared ultimates in the game. When you press R,
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STARTING ITEMS
The ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
A solid start, providing you with a huge amount of health sustain and a little bit of mana sustain (you don't really need that much if you are playing safe, since a lot comes from ![]() ![]() ![]() |
EARLY GAME ITEMS
catalyst the protector
catalyst the protector is important for building into ![]() ![]() ![]() |
The second ingredient in ![]() |
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if you can afford one, picking up an early ![]() ![]() ![]() |
A very good item to build early game if you are against an AD mid laner, as it provides you with a good amount of armor to help mitigate their physical damage. It also builds into ![]() |
This can be a good item to build if you are against an AP mid laner that is giving you a lot of trouble in lane. It also builds into ![]() ![]() |
RUSH ITEM SETS
These are your three core offensive items, so against an AP mid opponent, it's best to rush them. You'll be doing pretty humongous damage, have lots of mana, and nice defensive stats in health and a nice shield active from ![]() |
Important items to rush agaisnt AD opponents. Virtually the same as the set against AP opponents, but instead of finishing seraph's embrace, you start to build into ![]() |
CORE ITEM SET
The boots that you will almost always get. Simply the best tier 2 boot choice in most situations, because you don't need the added mobility of ![]() ![]() |
An extremely important item for ![]() |
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A great item on ![]() ![]() |
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ALTERNATIVE ITEMS
This item could be a good replacement for ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
I often take this item instead of ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
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EARLY GAME
Playing as
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MID GAME
Usually, your strategy throughout the mid game is very similar to the early game: farm, farm, farm. You want to make sure to have as much of a gold advantage as you can by the late game, which is when you start to really have an impact on the game. Make sure to continue using
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LATE GAME
Now is when
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- A lot of enemies forget about
Death Defied and stick around in
Karthus' damage zone after they've killed him. Try to take advange of this by making sure to die in the right spot in a teamfight.
- Single-target
Lay Waste does an exceptional amount of damage, especially considering it only has a 1 second cooldown. When harassing or dueling with an enemy, try to hit only them with it.
Karthus farms in a pretty unique way. What you want to do is never use your autoattack to farm, and instead rely on
Lay Waste. It has a low enough cooldown and mana cost that you can use it constantly for this purpose. It is often easier to last hit an enemy minion with
Lay Waste if you hit it with the single-target damage. This takes some getting used to, especially if it is near other minions, but the recent visual update has given
Lay Waste a visual circle showing the area of effect on cast. Take a while to get accustomed to the area of effect, and it quickly becomes easy. You can also quickly toggle
Defile on then off to secure a CS if your
Lay Waste is on cooldown.
- In solo queue, it can often be hard for allies to communicate that someone is getting away low enough that
Requiem would secure the kill. I would suggest giving them some sort of code word to quickly type in chat in this event. Something quick and simple that you can easily remember. I like to use a simple "kr" myself, which I remember because it stands for Karthus R.
- One highly underrated part of
Lay Waste is the small vision bubble that it grants when cast. You can use it to check bushes from very far away, since most enemies lurk near the corners when looking for a jump on someone.
Wall of Pain also gives vision, but it has a long cooldown and is your only form of crowd control, so I probably wouldn't use it for that.
- Enemies that can temporarily become untargettable or invincible can use this to avoid the damage from
Requiem. However, if you see them using these abilities to get out of sticky situations, try to remember their cooldowns and see if you can't take advantage of the ability's downtime.
- Don't forget to turn off
Defile when you are not using it. It uses huge amounts of mana.
- The new dance (ctrl+3) after the visual update makes a really annoying noise. Spam it, and your enemy may just rage quit. (just kidding, don't be that guy)
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SYNERGIES
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COUNTERS
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6/7/2014: Moved
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8/8/2014: Changed Exhaust to the main summoner spell other than
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