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Choose Champion Build:
Spells:
Flash
Ignite
Ability Order
Phenomenal Evil Power (PASSIVE)
Veigar Passive Ability
Introduction
Hello, I am ArchonofFail and this is my first guide for my favorite champion


Disclaimer: The first character sheet is what I normally go. The second is a mix off alternate choices which shouldn't necessarily be taken together. I will go over each of these later in the guide.
Thank you to Jhoijhoi for making an awesome guide to making guides which really helped me figure out the formatting and such for this guide. Thanks to various other guides for showing me tricks I didn't know especially Psiguard. Finally thanks to my team SL9 KR3W for helping me practice and generally being awesome.
Pros
+ Some of the highest burst in the game late game. + Constantly becomes more powerful from farming with ![]() + Incredible AoE stun. + Very strong ganks. + Free ![]() + He will swallow your soul. |
space |
Cons
- Very blue buff reliant early game. - Very weak early game. - Very squishy. - Requires a lot of practice and skill to pull of his combo quickly. - Very reliant on farm. - He will swallow your soul. |












In this image, the enemy is inside the




In this image, the enemy is immediately stunned and you can start unloading on them.






Top picks





Other options







Runes





Some alternate possible runes:
Runes




If you think the laning phase will go on for a long time (past level 9) you can take scaling mana regeneration seals. If you feel you needs additional HP to survive in the laning phase you can take either flat or scaling HP seals, I personally prefer scaling but don't use either. A very strong alternative to ability power glyphs is magic resist glyphs (both scaling and flat). These will help you counter enemy harass and be able to win trades better and stay in lane longer. HP quintessences are a fairly good option for the same reason HP seals are. Finally movement speed quintessences are always a very strong pick if you want more mobility to dodge skill shots, roam, and position better in team fights.
This may look a bit confusing but it is actually quite simple. R > Q > E until rank 3 > W > remainder of E. This is because rank 3


The alternate skill order at the top is the alternate start I run if my team is going to invade, or I am afraid of an invade from the other team. I obviously max


The four main core items on













Standard:
Alternate options:
Somewhere in between all the four core items mentioned above, I usually get a

Once I have the other four core items, I will finish the


Other options are


Another good item is

Finally another extremely strong choice is

Another good item is an




I almost always start with
Boots and three
Health Potions. The boots allow you to be more mobile and the three potions give you sustain in lane so you don't have to base. You can also start
Doran's Ring if you think you won't need the
Health Potions and want more HP and mana, but you almost always will so I don't recommend it.
In lane you should focus on trying to get as much farm with
Baleful Strike as possible. Early on though,
Baleful Strike won't be off cooldown enough to get every last hit, so you will need to get some last hits with your auto attacks. If you have the mana once you hit level two, throw some
Dark Matters towards the enemy laner, this will keep then off guard and if you use it right you can deny them farm.
Once you hit level four you can start using
Event Horizon to land
Dark Matter and
Baleful Strike on the enemy laner for strong harassment. Try to get blue buff from your jungler as soon as possible since it will reduce the cooldown on
Baleful Strike and give you enough mana to get more farm with it as well as having the additional mana for harassment.
If you want to push down your tower early and have the mana for it, you can use your
Dark Matter to push the lane down. This is risky though since it uses up mana and puts you in a vulnerable position for ganks.
If one of your other lanes needs it, coming with your jungler to gank one of the side lanes is incredibly strong. Event horizon combined with whatever CC your jungler and other laner have sets up easy kills with your burst.
On your first trip back to base, there are three main options for items you can buy. The first which I usually get is a Blasting Rod which you can later build into your any of your three core items (
Rod of Ages,
Rabadon's Deathcap, and
Deathfire Grasp) and will give you a lot more damage in lane. If I am losing and have enough money, I will get a Catalyst the Protector which will allow me to survive better against the enemy's harassment and builds into a
Rod of Ages. If I don't have enough money for a Blasting Rod and I want to get an early gold advantage I will build Kayge's Lucky Pick for the gold and it allows me to get an early
Deathfire Grasp for additional burst in ganks or early teamfights.




In lane you should focus on trying to get as much farm with



Once you hit level four you can start using




If you want to push down your tower early and have the mana for it, you can use your

If one of your other lanes needs it, coming with your jungler to gank one of the side lanes is incredibly strong. Event horizon combined with whatever CC your jungler and other laner have sets up easy kills with your burst.
On your first trip back to base, there are three main options for items you can buy. The first which I usually get is a Blasting Rod which you can later build into your any of your three core items (





In team fights, your job is to stay in the back, wait for a good chance to land
Event Horizon on as many people as possible then start ****ing up their carries. Usually your combo should be
Event Horizon followed by
Dark Matter, then your
Deathfire Grasp before the
Dark Matter lands, a
Baleful Strike, then if you are going for their AP Carry or an AP bruiser you should then use
Primordial Burst followed by another
Baleful Strike. If you are going after the AD Carry and he isn't dead yet, you should let your teammates clean up while trying to get hit their AP Carry with
Primordial Burst and throwing
Dark Matter and
Baleful Strike into their team. If you think the teamfight will be over quickly or you won't be able to get to their AP Carry you should use your
Primordial Burst on their AD Carry since it still does huge damage even if they don't have AP. If the teamfight goes long enough you can use another
Event Horizon to help your team escape or clean up.
One of the most important things to avoid is getting caught out of position and getting stunned. If the enemy AP Carry (or any member of their team) gets a silence or a stun or anything on you, you will basically end up being worthless and your team will probably lose the teamfight. You should almost never be in the front of your team and should wait for your team to engage before going in.
Event Horizon is a great counter-engage, but if you use it to early, you miss out on the opertunity to stun their carries so this is mostly up to your discretion.
You also need to watch out for poke champions like
Karthus or
Lux who can poke you down before you can engage on them, or assassin champions like
LeBlanc or
Talon who can burst you down before you can properly get into the fight. Against assassins you need to practice using
Event Horizon on yourself before they manage to silence you, or use
Flash to get away and let your team take care of them.













One of the most important things to avoid is getting caught out of position and getting stunned. If the enemy AP Carry (or any member of their team) gets a silence or a stun or anything on you, you will basically end up being worthless and your team will probably lose the teamfight. You should almost never be in the front of your team and should wait for your team to engage before going in.

You also need to watch out for poke champions like






- To get the full potential out of Veigar, you should learn how to smart cast your
Baleful Strike,
Dark Matter,
Primordial Burst, and
Deathfire Grasp. But DO NOT try to smart cast
Event Horizon. No matter how good you are, you really need to have the target icon to properly hit people with it. Having these skills on smart cast will make you be able to throw out your combo just a bit faster before the
Event Horizon wears off on them.
- As stated above in the skill descriptions, make sure to hit your opponent with the edge of
Event Horizon instead of putting it around them to instantly stun them. (See above for more details and pictures)
- You can use
Dark Matter to check bushes without having to face check them since
Dark Matter reveals the location where it will land.
- Make sure between team fights to continue farming your
Baleful Strike. When you are walking past a lane throw one onto a minion or if you walking through the jungle pop down a
Dark Matter +
Baleful Strike to clear out the camp, the AP really adds up and you lose practically nothing for doing it.
- If you are just learning
Veigar, play a few games against friends or bots to get the hand of how to smart cast on him properly, and how to properly utilize this
Event Horizon. These skills are tricky and take a lot of practice to use properly.
- If you set your
Deathfire Grasp to your first or second item slot it is easy to put into your combo since it right above where your hand should be anyway for your other skills.
- Use
Baleful Strike or have your allies clear out spell shields like
Banshee's Veil,
Spell Shield, or
Shroud of Darkness before trying to stun with
Event Horizon or use
Primordial Burst.
- Only do this in a premade if you want to troll and get a ton of AP, you can build a
Rabadon's Deathcap and either four or five Archangel's Staffs depending on whether you want boots or not. This is definitely the build you want to go if you just want to one-shot AP carries.
- I will add more to this list when I think of things.
Veigar has a fairly weak laning phase and generally does well in a fairly passive lane. He does well against people like him who focus on farm and not as much on harassment although he can do fine against more aggressive lanes if you can dodge skillshots and avoid getting CCed.
Since I have played as and against a large number of AP Carries in mid, I will try to go over as many matchups as I can. I will include as many unconventional AP Carries as possible but I will not cover AD Carries played in mid, unless they can be built AP (like Tristana). The exception to this being Talon who is an AD who is often played in mid to be a counter the current metagame.
All ratings are my opinions and are somewhat subjective so do not take them as fact by any means.
Ahri is a tough matchup since she has better sustain than you with
Essence Theft, strong harassment with
Orb of Deception, strong CC with
Charm, and can jump on you with
Spirit Rush for huge burst before you can do anything. Try to run her out of mana since you have much better mana sustain with your passive. If you can dodge her
Orb of Deception and
Charm, farm up, and burst her down once you hit level six, the lane is definitely winnable. TL:DR: Dodge
Charm and
Orb of Deception, get ganks and burst her down.
Difficulty: Hard (8/10)
Akali can be tough once she hits level six, but before that you should be able to take advantage of her with your range. Try to force her to farm with her spells so she can't use them as effectively to harass you. Try to force to base early but poking her with
Baleful Strike and
Dark Matter. If she puts her
Twilight Shroud down, stay back since she can get up close which is what you want to avoid. Once she hits level six try to not let her jump on you and stun her when she does and you should be fine. TL:DR: Make her waste spells farming, outfarm her until six.
Difficulty: Easy (4/10)
Amumu mid is fairly rare, but if you do see it, you should be in good shape, this is an incredibly easy matchup as long as you stay behind minions so he can't hit you with
Bandage Toss. Don't underestimate his burst damage though. Once he hits six if he gets a
Bandage Toss and a
Curse of the Sad Mummy especially combined with a jungler's CC he can easily pick up a kill if you are ready. However if you can deny him farm since he has to get in melee range for it and harass hime down, there is almost nothing he can do about it. TL:DR: Stay behind minions, watch out for ganks.
Difficulty: Easy (3/10)
Anivia is an interesting matchup because she is very similar to
Veigar although her stun is less reliable and her burst is a bit higher early on. The most important thing is to NEVER let her hit you with
Flash Frost. She shouldn't be spamming it too much or she will run out of mana, but if it hits you and she has her
Frostbite ready you will be stunned and she can easily take off half your health or more. Also don't let her with her
Glacial Storm since this will also apply the chilled debuff and make her
Frostbite deal double damage. If you can avoid her skills though, you definitely have the advantage in the matchup since she has a weak early game. You have more reliable burst, more mana regen, and better harass. Take advantage of this advantage early to force her out of lane. TL:DR: NEVER get hit by
Flash Frost, harass her to take advantage of your pre-six advantage.
Difficulty: Medium (6/10)
Annie is another champion who is very similar to
Veigar. She will be trying to farm with her
Disintegrate just like you with your
Baleful Strike. Your stun is more reliable then hers, but watch out when she has her stun, you will see by the little aura around her. Remember that when she has it up she wont want to use abilities on minions to farm because she wont want to waste it. Use this time to keep her away from minions to deny her farm. She has comparable burst to you once she hits level six with
Summon: Tibbers and the stun from [Pyromania] she will destroy you if you aren't careful. If you don't let her stun you though you can harass her down and win the lane. TL:DR: Watch out for her stun, take advantage of it since if she has it she wont want to farm with spells.
Difficulty: Medium (7/10)
Brand isn't too difficult of a matchup. He is very reliant on landing his
Sear, a skillshot, and his
Pillar of Flame which is dodgeable to burst you. As long as you don't let him hit you with both you will be fine. Watch out for him using
Pillar of Flame to keep you away from minions, if he is doing this too much and you can avoid it, you can use
Dark Matter to harass him and pick up last hits. If your jungler or another member of your team comes into lane and he uses
Pyroclasm on you, make sure to run away from the other person so that it doesn't keep bouncing between you two. TL:DR: Dodge his stuff, he has to land multiple spells to be effective.
Difficulty: Easy (4/10)
Cassiopeia is a very difficult matchup. She has very strong harassment and can burst you down easily once she gets her ult. Your best chance it to keep moving to make it hard for her to hit you with
Noxious Blast. She can zone you very easily with her
Miasma, make sure not to get hit by it because it will hurt and slow you down allowing her to hit her
Noxious Blast easier. Her
Petrifying Gaze has a very short range so you should be able to avoid it in lane fairly easily. Watch out for her using
Flash in combination with
Petrifying Gaze to land it easier. Make sure to buy lots of potions to survive her poke and try to get your jungler to gank a lot since she doesn't have very good escape. Try to get a lot of ganks and burst her down once you hit six and you can come out on top. TL:DR: Hard matchup, dodge her spells as best as you can, get lots of ganks since she has very little escape.
Difficulty: Counter-pick (9/10)
Cho'Gath is fairly easy since he has melee auto attacks and needs to be in melee range for his
Feast. The main thing is to farm up and dodge his
Rupture. If you keep your distance there isn't anything he can really do to stop you from farming which is exactly what you want. He is very naturally tanky so you shouldn't really waste your mana trying to harass. Just use your spells to farm, don't get hit by
Rupture, and play safe so you don't get ganked by their jungler. Also he is extremely mana intensive, so he cannot keep up harassment without mana regen. TL:DR: Very mana intensive, force him to waste his spells farming, watch out for ganks.
Difficulty: Easy (3/10)
Ezreal (AP) is fairly easy, although if you aren't careful he can put out a lot of burst with
Essence Flux and
Trueshot Barrage. Remember that
Essence Flux passes through minions so you can't hide behind minions to avoid it. Every one of his spells except
Arcane Shift is a skillshot so you should be able to not take too damage. Unlike AD Ezreal, his
Mystic Shot won't do much damage, but his other spells really hurt once he builds up a bit of AP. Be careful when recalling when you are low on HP because his
Trueshot Barrage will do a ton of damage and can easily pick you off and is on a very short cooldown. Make sure to catch him with the edge of
Event Horizon since he can just
Arcane Shift out of it if you don't. TL:DR: Everything is a skillshot and dodgeable, his burst is very underrated, watch out for it, don't get picked off by
Trueshot Barrage.
Difficulty: Easy (4/10)
Fiddlesticks isn't too hard. He has insane sustain with
Bountiful Harvest but you can interrupt it if you stun him when he is in the middle of it. Also remember that
Bountiful Harvest has a really short range so you can use this to keep him from using it on you. Try to avoid getting hit by
Terrify because it sets up his
Bountiful Harvest nicely and allows him to heal himself and hurt you. Watch out for
Reap's silence, it can screw up your farming, and generally prevent you from doing anything. Also watch for when he stands in place and starts channeling, this is him using his
Crowstorm and your queue to get away from him. Don't underestimate his
Crowstorm's damage, it synergises well with jungler CC and can melt you real fast. TL:DR: Watch out for
Reap, try to stun him when he tries to
Bountiful Harvest, and watch out for ganks combined with
Crowstorm.
Difficulty: Medium (5/10)
Fizz can be tricky especially once he gets
Chum the Waters. Watch out for his
Urchin Strike into you which will get him right on top of you allowing him to land is other spells. Early on you should be able to out damage and zone him. Watch out for
Playful / Trickster since he can dodge all your spells including your
Primordial Burst and
Deathfire Grasp which can be the most frustrating feeling ever when he dodges all your damage with it. Once he has his
Chum the Waters you can not let him hit you with it. When you get knocked up, especially if he has his own
Deathfire Grasp, he easily has enough damage to kill you before you can do anything. If you can avoid his
Chum the Waters though you should be fine and be able to easily win the lane. TL:DR: Zone him before he gets six, watch out for his burst once he hits six, he can dodge your ult with
Playful / Trickster.
Difficulty: Medium (6/10)
Galio is really hard for
Veigar. He gains AP by building magic resist with
Runic Skin. He also has strong harass with
Resolute Smite and
Righteous Gust.
Resolute Smite is ground targeted and can be dodged,
Righteous Gust is a skillshot but moves very fast and is hard to dodge. Once he has some items, don't even try to burst him down and when the game gets to lategame, good luck even touching him. Try to farm and not get harassed down. His
Idol of Durand will lock you in place if he lands it synergising great with ganks. Try to stay from him so he can't hit you with it. Try to play super passive and farm as much as you can. TL:DR: Don't try to harass because of
Runic Skin, dodge his stuff and don't get caught in
Idol of Durand.
Difficulty: Hard (8/10)
Gragas can be a big problem, he has strong harass with
Barrel Roll and can sustain health with
Happy Hour and mana with
Drunken Rage. He will poke you down and then set up to finish you off by throwing
Explosive Cask behind you, followed by a
Body Slam to slow you down. He is manageable however if you run forward when he uses
Explosive Cask and then stun him. He has fairly good escape with
Body Slam so ganks won't be that effective against him. Generally try to burst him down before he can wear you down, but down use too much mana poking him since he will heal it back with
Happy Hour. TL:DR: Dodge barrels, don't let him catch you out with Explosive Cast, he heals with
Happy Hour.
Difficulty Medium (7/10)
Heimerdinger is a really weird champion. He gets countered by very fast burst which
Veigar provides in spades. His
Hextech Micro-Rockets really hurt but they can be avoided easily. How they work is they target the three nearest units
Heimerdinger has vision on. So if you keep three minions in between you and him, these are basically worthless except for farming. His
H-28G Evolution Turret are fairly tanky early on and take about three
Dark Matters or
Baleful Strikes so it isn't really worth it. His CH-1 Concussion Grenade is very slow moving so you should always be able to dodge it unless you are very close to him. Just farm until you hit six, then burst him down. TL:DR: Keep three minions between the two of you because of
Hextech Micro-Rockets, avoid the turrets.
Difficulty: Easy (2/10)
Janna (AP) is fairly terrible. She has a terrible early game which you can take advantage of to harass her down early. Until she gets some levels and AP she does pitiful damage and her
Eye of the Storm isn't very strong. Watch her
Howling Gales, they are easy to dodge if you see them coming but they can catch you off guard for a knock up if you don't. She only has two sources of damage (
Howling Gale and
Zephyr) both do very little damage and aren't worth worrying about until she has a lot of AP. Farm to your heart's content, destroy her with your poke and burst, and question the other team's sanity for picking an AP carry with so little to hurt you. TL:DR: She has no damage, don't get ganked and question the other team's sanity.
Difficulty Laughable (1/10)
Karma a surprisingly underrated AP Carry, but still not that good. She can catch you off guard by using
Soul Shield with a
Mantra charge which will hurt a lot. She can also heal herself using a
Mantra charge with
Heavenly Wave. Also if she uses
Spirit Bond on you it will do a small DoT and slow you which can be fairly strong. The problem is, none of these spells actually do that much damage.
Soul Shield is surprisingly one of the best shields in the game, so watch out for it. You can farm fairly safely and then burst her down and there isn't much she can do against it. TL:DR: She has underrated burst and one of the best shields, watch out for her burst, and play safe.
Difficulty Easy (3/10)
Karthus can be really extremely if you aren't very careful. People will tell you to "Just dodge the
Lay Waste" but it really isn't that easy when you actually try to do it. A smart
Karthus will use these to zone you away from minions so try to get what farm you can and not take too much damage. If you and your jungler can jump on him though, he has no good way to escape except
Wall of Pain which isn't that reliable, and
Flash. Also if you see him using
Requiem, try to stun him and interrupt it. This will cancel it and save your teammate. Also consider getting a
Zhonya's Hourglass against him to avoid
Requiem if you can cancel it. Try to avoid his
Wall of Pain since it will usually allow him to land one or more free
Lay Wastes, oftentimes nearly half your HP. TL:DR: Dodge
Lay Waste, don't get hit by
Wall of Pain, and stun him if he tries to
Requiem near you.
Difficulty: Hard (8/10)
Kassadin
Katarina
Kayle (AP/AS)
Kennen (AP)
Kog'Maw (AP)
LeBlanc
Lulu (AP)
Lux
Malzahar
Maokai
Master Yi (AP)
Mordekaiser
Morgana
IN PROGRESS
Since I have played as and against a large number of AP Carries in mid, I will try to go over as many matchups as I can. I will include as many unconventional AP Carries as possible but I will not cover AD Carries played in mid, unless they can be built AP (like Tristana). The exception to this being Talon who is an AD who is often played in mid to be a counter the current metagame.
All ratings are my opinions and are somewhat subjective so do not take them as fact by any means.









Difficulty: Hard (8/10)




Difficulty: Easy (4/10)




Difficulty: Easy (3/10)







Difficulty: Medium (6/10)





Difficulty: Medium (7/10)






Difficulty: Easy (4/10)







Difficulty: Counter-pick (9/10)




Difficulty: Easy (3/10)










Difficulty: Easy (4/10)











Difficulty: Medium (5/10)










Difficulty: Medium (6/10)










Difficulty: Hard (8/10)










Difficulty Medium (7/10)








Difficulty: Easy (2/10)





Difficulty Laughable (1/10)







Difficulty Easy (3/10)













Difficulty: Hard (8/10)













IN PROGRESS
I find Veigar to be an incredibly strong AP Carry. He some of the highest burst in the game and is very fun to play. He is however very difficult and takes a lot of practice to get good at. If you practice him though, he makes a very worthwhile addition to your champion pool. Thank you for reading and don't forget to leave a constructive criticism and vote. I would love to have some good feedback since this is my first guide. Thanks again for reading :)
Version 1.0 (8/18/12) Initial release.
Version 1.1 (8/18/12) Updated matchups up to Gragas.
Version 1.2 (8/18/12) Updated matchups up to Karma.
Version 1.3 (8/18/12) Updated summoner spells.
Version 1.4 (8/19/12) Updated late game items with pictures and spread it out (thanks BlackIceT!).
Version 1.5 (8/19/12) Updated matchups up to Karthus and added TL:DRs.
Version 1.6 (9/18/12) Updated item builds.
Version 1.1 (8/18/12) Updated matchups up to Gragas.
Version 1.2 (8/18/12) Updated matchups up to Karma.
Version 1.3 (8/18/12) Updated summoner spells.
Version 1.4 (8/19/12) Updated late game items with pictures and spread it out (thanks BlackIceT!).
Version 1.5 (8/19/12) Updated matchups up to Karthus and added TL:DRs.
Version 1.6 (9/18/12) Updated item builds.
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