New Mage player and the Archangel's Staff

[quote=Tadanori Oyama]I've gotten comfortable with playing LOL but a few things aren't lining up for me with items. The foremost is that I like to play Mages and I often build an Archangel's Staff on them. I don't see an Archangel's Staff on the high rated guides of the Champions I play. I seems like a good all around item for a Mage to me so I figure I must be missing something. Can someone with more experience enlighten me?[/quote]

[quote=Luther3000]Archangel's is pretty bad on most mages because most of them have little need for the mana or mana regen. It also takes a long time for most champions to stack the passive. It's just more effective to build items like [[Rabadon's deathcap]], [[rod of ages]] or [[zhonya's hourglass]] in most situations.[/quote]

[quote=Xenasis]Depends which champion. It's exceptional in some situations (farmy ones rather than kill based ones) on those that spam abilities (Anivia, maybe Kass) and require lots of mana late game. Other than that, though Cass, for example, spams abilities all the time, her passive means she doesn't need lots of mana late game and she'd rather have something like a RoA/WotA because of that fact. RoA would be when she needed bulk, WotA for lane dominance. Basically - If your champion spams a lot of spells, needs a lot of mana late game, and can't get any better items, it's great. As a downside, you sacrifice your early game, pretty much. That 1k gold could've been better spent elsewhere, and AA needs to be fully stacked to give the most AP.[/quote]

[quote=Jpikachu1999]The reason that many guides don't get [[Archangel's Staff]], is because it simply takes too long to charge up. To get the most out of it, to even make it cost efficient, you need to have it around 75% charged up. Most AP carries go through bursts, where they cast 3 spells in around 2 seconds, which still only grants one mana increase. Not to mention most AP carries have fairly long cooldowns. [[Rod of Ages]] is generally a better choice, as it gives a large mana pool increase, and quite a bit of health for survivabiility. In fact, with the release of Athene's Unholy Grail, it's probably a better option for mages that need mana regeneration.[/quote]

[quote=Mowen]Usually the jungler gives the mage blue buff which helps a lot with mana, but in low level games you won't always see this. I prefer catalyst if I'm having mana / lanestay problems since it provides you with survivability as well and ROA is nice. Tear ONLY provides mana, no survival / damage so you will be pretty weak until you get more items. Like Xenasis said it's good on farmy champs (I was thinking [[veigar]]) and it's also good on Ryze since mana = damage.[/quote]

[quote=Tadanori Oyama]I see. I generally play Brand, Malzahar, or Veiger. Based on what you've said Brand and Malzahar wouldn't benefit from the Staff. Would Veiger be viable, given his last hitting with Baleful Strike? EDIT: Oops. As I was posting it seems that question has been answered above. Thank you for the information everyone.[/quote]

[quote=animorte]Catalyst makes the entire early-mid games exponentially easier. I usually only get Archangel's on champions with low cooldown abilities and I generally rush Tear, but don't max it until later, leaving room for other defense or damage. You still get the mana bonus without maxing it, unlike RoA.[/quote]

[quote=Luther3000]I wouldn't get it on Veigar, I prefer to just rush [[Deathfire grasp]] and [[rabadon's deathcap]] and one shot kill everyone in the game.[/quote]

[quote=iownedya]^ I don't know, but it gives the most AP in game with rabadon's. It is bad because it makes you squishy and it takes a while for it to charge. Plus, it is pretty expensive. This is only good for [[ryze]] really...[/quote]