Welcome to my in-depth guide on onlyguides.com for Kog'Maw
My name is Lukke and I'm a professional ADC Coach. I'm mostly playing on EUW where I peaked around 350 LP. So far I've been coaching for more than one year with hundreds of satisfied students. In the past, I've played other MOBA games like Dota 2 and Smite which help me view the game from a different angle.
I've been playing League of Legends and also ADC since S6 and I'm basically playing every single ADC and also a lot of mages on bot lane. I'm always trying to outsmart my opponents and get ahead with the best possible runes and best possible build.
Kog'Maw
is one of my favorite, if not the most favorite ADC in League. I was studying this champion more in-depth and I'm willing to share my knowledge with you.
So what changed that
Kog'Maw
is great in this patch. Honestly, he has been sleeper OP for a while but now 2 things from patch notes helped him. First, smaller one would be
Caitlyn
nerf. It's nothing major, but
Caitlyn
is massive lane bully champion that
Kog'Maw
struggles against. Lowering her wave clear and lowering her AD per level tiny bit is always good for
Kog'Maw
. Usually I'm not picking him into her but if you want to be pure
Kog'Maw
one trick it is for sure doable. You just won't have a lane priority and you most likely have to take
Second Wind
.
More meaningful change for
Kog'Maw
is
Blade of The Ruined King
buff. Even though this item is not the greatest statwise, it's passive is great for
Kog'Maw
. All he cares about is attack speed and sustain/survivibility. 2% are quite a lot to be honest. You will always have really high attack speed with
Kog'Maw
and if you pair it with
Runaan's Hurricane
then we are able to deal a lot of damage from
Blade of The Ruined King
's passive.
I will start this Guide with a general build overview, then we move to Spells and Skill Path. After this, we will take deeper look at Runes, Build, and Summoner Spells.
In the end, I will tell you how to generally play the laning phase, midgame, and team fights. The last part of this guide will be devoted to matchups.
Best Overall Runes
Spells
Skill Priority
Q
Best Overall Build
This would be like the most basic
Kog'Maw
build that I would recommend but there is way more to know about his build - so we need to adjust our build for every single game. Keep reading and you will for sure understand what will be the best build for your game!
Time to feast!
Kog'Maw
is a pretty under-picked ADC, because the majority of players think that he is boring. But actually, he is sleeper OP even for soloQ and if you can play
Kog'Maw
on a high level, you will also perform on other ADCs.
Passive
Icathian Surprise
Once you die will turn into Zombie with bonus movement speed and you cannot auto attack enemy champions. But you can move and after 4 seconds you will explode, dealing 125-550 (based on level) true damage.
For the current season, this passive is not the greatest since you don't want to die as ADC, but you can get a few kills or assists with this.
Little trick for
Kog'Maw
's passive is that you can stay still after you die and wait for what enemy champions will do. Sometimes that will run right into you.
Q
Caustic Spittle
Kog'Maw
launches a corrosive ball of spit in a line in the target direction. This ball will do magic damage and you will also reduce armor and magic resistance for 4 seconds after hitting. You also gain bonus attack speed!
This is the best spell for
Kog'Maw
's and it will help you will poke and overall DPS. For each extra point, you get 5% attack speed, 50 extra magic damage, and 2% resistance reduction. This is important to understand because we want to put more points into this spell early.
This spell is great against
Aftershock
supports.
W
Bio-Arcane Barrage
Kog'Maw
empowers his basic attacks for the next 8 seconds. You also get bonus attack range and you deal bonus on-hit (magic) damage.
Realistically speaking for the early game you only need to put one point to your W because you gain only 20 attack range and extra 1% bonus damage for the extra point. This is not a lot for the early game and it will be more effective in the mid to late game.
Here you can see how little difference between each rank (first, second and third) it is. You don't need to put more than one point to your W early. BUT you want to fully max it to midgame.
E
Void Ooze
Kog'Maw
spews a ball of ooze in the target direction. Once again you deal magic damage and also you slow all enemy hits.
Base values for this spell are 75 magic damage and 20% slow. For each extra point, we get 45 magic damage and 8% slow. And also +10 mana cost.
We will be maxing this spell as the last one because for
Caustic Spittle
and
Bio-Arcane Barrage
are simply better spells for on-hit Kog'Maw.
R
Living Artillery
Kog'Maw
launches a ball of acid into the air that drops to the target location after 0.6 seconds. Damage is increased by 0% - 50% (based on the target's missing health). You will also reveal them for 2 seconds.
If they are below 40% maximum health this spell will crit.
Overall it is not that hard to hit but you can always chain it with your suport's stun or slow. Or you can also use your
Void Ooze
.
I do one thing a little bit differently unlike any other Kog'Maw player. I put one extra point into Q:
Caustic Spittle
for early game aggression, because like I said before you get only real value from your W:
Bio-Arcane Barrage
with your first point.
Skill Path
Kog'Maw
1
1
1
1
2
2
2
2
3
3
3
3
4
4
4
4
5
5
5
5
6
6
6
6
7
7
7
7
8
8
8
8
9
9
9
9
10
10
10
10
11
11
11
11
12
12
12
12
13
13
13
13
14
14
14
14
15
15
15
15
16
16
16
16
17
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17
17
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18
18
Before I was also trying maxing it fully and putting 5 points early to my
Caustic Spittle
which felt good the for laning phase. The issue is that League is not only about the laning phase and we need to fully max our W before reaching midgame.
That's why I decided to put only 3 points to Q:
Caustic Spittle
instead of 5. Usually, people put only 1 or 2 points but having one extra point will increase our early game DPS even more.
If I play with
Lulu
I sometimes don't even skill my E:
Void Ooze
, but that's up to you. That spell is really useful so putting one point to it is rewarding.
Now we will talk about runes for a bit because there is a lot of options that you can go and how you can adjust them to your specific game.
Basic
With Lulu
So there are many options that he can edit so I will explain every rune that might be good for
Kog'Maw
.
If we don't have
Lulu
I prefer running
Hail of Blades
so I can be more aggressive early on. Realistically speaking you can even play this champ with all in support and
Hail of Blades
will provide you extra burst. Also,
Lethal Tempo
is slower and the majority of soloQ games are pretty fast.
The only option for the first slot is
Taste of Blood
.
Cheap Shot
or
Sudden Impact
are bad runes for
Kog'Maw
.
This is purely up to you. Choose a rune that you will stack the fastest. In lower elo, you will get a lot of assists and kills early on so
Eyeball Collection
will probably be your best rune.
For higher elo, I would recommend
Zombie Ward
or
Ghost Poro
. If you know that your support will run sweeper
Zombie Ward
will be better.
Ghost Poro
is also pretty easy to stack and also we can get 2 stacks with the first or second wave. If we run to bot and ward middle push. Once the ward expires you gain the first stack and the second one once they enter the bush. Ff you run
Ingenious Hunter
it will lower also your trinket cooldown.
Surely
Ingenious Hunter
is the best rune out of these 4. Yes, for soloQ
Relentless Hunter
might be good as well but overall
Ingenious Hunter
is just the best out of them. We will reduce the cooldown of our
Galeforce
and also trinkets.
Treasure Hunter
is awful rune and DO NOT take it. Value from it is really low (I would say that this is the worst rune in the game). The base value is 0 and you need kills for it.
Here we have 2 options. We can go with Precision or Resolve.
Resolve overall is a bit better because
Conditioning
will give you at least 12-14 armor/magic resist after the 12th minute. With that, you can take
Overgrowth
which will give you like 150 HP in the mid game and later even more. If we have shields and heals in a team
Revitalize
will be better in that case. Also if we will have a tough matchup for us we can even take
Second Wind
to survive a laning phase.
In the Precision tree we only need
Legend: Alacrity
and with it we can take
Presence of Mind
. If you don't feel like you struggle with mana you can take
Overheal
,
Cut Down
or
Last Stand
. Never take
Coup de Grace
.
Yes,
Lethal Tempo
scales better so if I know that I will be able to auto-attack and also if I have an enchanter I will go with this keystone. You don't necessarily need
Lulu
, but with her, it is for sure the easiest to use.
Here we have only 2 real options.
Presence of Mind
or
Overheal
if you think that you don't need mana.
I would choose between
Legend: Alacrity
and
Legend: Bloodline
. This is basically up to you what you prefer. Personally, I prefer
Legend: Alacrity
for an earlier spike, but I need to play more carefully since I don't have lifesteal.
Like I said before - never take
Coup de Grace
it's a bait ever since they removed AD from it. I always choose between
Cut Down
and
Last Stand
. As ADC you will be always underleveled so
Cut Down
is great options, but on Kog'Maw you might buy HP items. So if I know that I will build HP items I will take
Last Stand
.
Here we are choosing between Resolve and Domination, where Resolve is slightly better once again.
Value from
Conditioning
and
Overgrowth
or
Revitalize
is just too high to ignore. Yes, you can play
Taste of Blood
and
Ingenious Hunter
when you go for
Galeforce
but even in this case, I would most likely go with Resolve. My job is to survive as long as possible and deal as much damage as possible. Resolve will help you with surviving part.
What is the best build for Kog'Maw?
There are many items that
Kog'Maw
wants to buy so you need to make sure you choose the best ones!
I will start with boots since this is pretty easy. Best boots are obviously
Berserker's Greaves
. You can even rush it as your first item since
Kog'Maw
works with attack speed well. In later stages, you can replace them with
Plated Steelcaps
if you feel like you are in danger.
Here is quick item tl;dr. If you want to know more about items then keep reading.
TL;DR
Best DPS item fog
Kog'Maw
. I rush this item only with
Lulu
. Must buy item.
After buff you can rush this item if you want to go mythicless early. Also great item for
Kog'Maw
.
Rushing
Berserker's Greaves
every single game. With full build you can swap them.
We are buying a lot of on-hit items and
Runaan's Hurricane
works great with them.
One of the best if not the best tank items for him. Great against champs that are diving in.
Don't rush this item early. After reaching level 9/10 this item is great. With Mythic I'm choosing between
Blade of The Ruined King
and
Wit's End
.
I'm always choosing between
Elixir of Wrath
and
Elixir of Iron
. Mostly I prefer extra AD but in cases where you don't need it,
Elixir of Iron
is also a great option.
If you know that fight will end after specific fight make sure you buy Elixir before it.
Starting Items
In a past I've been starting with
Boots
and 4
Health Potion
because I could recall on 800g and buy
Berserker's Greaves
that are insane for
Kog'Maw
. Nowadays I start with
Long Sword
and 3
Health Potion
so I can rush
Vampiric Scepter
due to heavy poke meta. If enemy botlane has more or less skillshots take
Boots
.
Starting with
Doran's Blade
is awful because most of the ADCs will run
Cut Down
and also one bad trade and your laning phase is over.
Doran's Shield
is not ideal as well. I would rather have more
Health Potion
with
Boots
or
Long Sword
so I can get the first item sooner.
Which first item should I buy?
This one is a little bit more complicated. If you look only at pure DPS - the best DPS item for
Kog'Maw
is
Guinsoo's Rageblade
. In the actual match, I rush
Guinsoo's Rageblade
only with
Lulu
. Without her, you need other items.
If you want to rush mythic
Galeforce
or
Immortal Shieldbow
are your best items. Lately, I prefer
Galeforce
a bit more. But both items are really good for
Kog'Maw
. In rare games where you don't need any peel items and you will auto-attack a lot you can buy
Kraken Slayer
, but that is pretty rare.
The last item that I will mention that you can rush is
Blade of The Ruined King
that got buffed in patch 12.3 and as you know
Kog'Maw
loves everything that this item provides. So you can even go with a mythicless path. Rushing
Wit's End
is not that effective so if I need magic resist I will go this item as a second one. If you want to buy a mythic item later you can even buy
Crown of the Shattered Queen
just for the passive (you also have decent AP scalings) - you buy Crown only in cases where they can't procc your shield easily and they have heavy dive in.
What other offensive items do I want to buy?
In every game, you should buy
Guinsoo's Rageblade
because that item is just made for
Kog'Maw
. If the enemy team has a lot of magic damage
Wit's End
is a great item for that.
Runaan's Hurricane
is also a great item since it applies on-hit effects. If you want a crit item and you think that you won't use side bolts from
Runaan's Hurricane
effectively you can buy
Phantom Dancer
. Last but not least
Blade of The Ruined King
is extremely good for
Kog'Maw
.
So usually my build has boots 4 offensive items and one defensive item. I would not consider any other offensive item. Maybe
Bloodthirster
in rare cases.
What defensive items can
Kog'Maw
buy?
My most bought defensive item will easily be
Randuin's Omen
. Remember this item only reduces AD and crit damage from those you hit by your active (so you are not building item to lower crit of enemy ADC).
If they have one abnoxious carry that can kill you buy
Anathema's Chains
and mark that enemy champion with it.
Force of Nature
is really good magic resist item. You can even consider items like
Frozen Heart
or
Gargoyle Stoneplate
. So always think what will be the best option for you.
This one will be relatively simple. The most used Summoner Spell will be
Exhaust
because in every match there is someone that wants to dive in.
Heal
is also decent but mostly I prefer
Exhaust
and let my enchanter support play with
Heal
.
Summs
If you need a
Cleanse
against something like
Leona
don't be afraid to take it. Last but not least Summoner Spell that I recommend is
Ghost
. Extremely underused and amazing with
Lulu
if you don't need anything else.
We have to divide the laning phase into 2 categories. Laning Phase with
Hail of Blades
and Laning Phase with
Lethal Tempo
since the early game will be different. With both runes, there is one thing that we need to focus on. One thing that will define every single matchup (doesn't matter what lane you play or what champion you play - Cooldowns. It might sound obvious but believe me when I say that even Master Tier players are not playing around it and not trying to abuse it as much as possible.
So how do we wanna play around them? It's pretty simple. If you or your teammate use some of your key spells make sure to play extra careful for a few seconds because if you start a trade you will most likely lose. On the other hand, if enemy ADC or support use some of their key spells make sure to abuse it and play as aggressively as possible. If you will focus on this you will succeed in more trades.
Laning Phase with
Hail of Blades
With
Hail of Blades
we can play more aggressively early on. Basically, since level 1 we can always pop or W
Bio-Arcane Barrage
and do quick auto attacks to secure trade in our favor. Like I said before make sure we know what spells enemy bot lane used and when we can play aggressive and when not.
So with
Hail of Blades
we are not that weak early which is great for
Kog'Maw
. Since level 2 we can even poke enemy bot lane with
Kog'Maw
's Q:
Caustic Spittle
. Level 3 will be much better for you for poking since we put another point into
Caustic Spittle
and even if we are not able to trade auto attacks we will be able to poke at least.
Level 4 I usually take my E:
Void Ooze
. Another spell that you can use as your poking tool but also you can all in with this slow. Once we hit level 5 we will have 3 points in our Q:
Caustic Spittle
and this will be obnoxious for enemies to deal with. After reaching level 6 we are pretty much safe because we can farm further away.
If we are playing on redside we can take Frog a few times as well. Just make sure your jungler isn't pathing towards it and also that he has multiple camps up so you are not straight up stealing resources from him.
Also if you are playing
Ghost Poro
make sure to ward early so we are getting a first few stacks as soon as possible. You can test a couple of times which rune you stack fastest. If
Zombie Ward
,
Ghost Poro
or
Eyeball Collection
. One thing for
Ghost Poro
you cannot stack it with a Blue trinket.
Laning with
Lethal Tempo
Here we have to play a bit slower since we are not that strong early on. On the other hand with
Lethal Tempo
we are able to win long fights, especially with
Lulu
. So if you feel like there will be long fights on bot lane you can for sure play
Lethal Tempo
. This rune got changed a tiny bit and it scales with level, but since level 6 attack speed from
Lethal Tempo
is the same as before.
Also if you know that you will have a free laning phase I take
Lethal Tempo
every single time.
Hail of Blades
is more or less mainly for laning phase and early to mid game.
This will be pretty easy to explain since Mid Game as an ADC is really simple. All we are trying to do is securing Mid lane priority so we can move towards side lanes or enemy jungle. Obviously, sometimes you won't be able to get mid lane priority. In that case, wait until the enemy team shoves it but this time they will be the one with the first move.
In this game period, we must maintain 10 cs per minute without any issues. Don't be afraid to do what is called Cycling - getting timers of enemy camps and a few seconds before it spawns get lane priority and move towards that camp (you can really get ahead just from cycling camps). Same thing we do before drake spawns - we secure mid priority so they must go through chokes.
If you are ahead keep pushing your lead by taking turrets, objectives and contesting enemy camps. Honestly, just from contesting every single camp without any fighting, we can slowly secure a free win.
You will be the main target to focus in most of your games so make sure you play carefully.
Kog'Maw
is easy to punish early if you don't have any peel. You job in Team Fights is obvious. Deal as much damage as possible and also survive as long as possible.
How do we achieve this you might ask? The first major mistake that I see from
Kog'Maw
is using their W:
Bio-Arcane Barrage
way too early. You must have trigger discipline. You fight similar to Twitch with his R:
Spray and Pray
. Be patient and if you have multiple enemies close to you press it and kill all of them. With
Lethal Tempo
you can get a few initial stacks before using your W so then you have almost immediately your extra range ready.
Another mistake that I see quite a lot is not using your spells during Team Fight. Most of
Kog'Maw
just press W:
Bio-Arcane Barrage
and they just auto attack. Remember to use all of your spells, but mainly Q:
Caustic Spittle
since it is reducing armor and magic resistance. With lower attack speed or once the enemy gets out of your range you can spam a bit your R:
Living Artillery
as well. The least important spell is E:
Void Ooze
, but don't get me wrong. Slow from it is also great for Team Fights and it will help you do a couple of more attacks.
Last but not least we will go over
Kog'Maw
's matchups and also which support should be picked with him. Generally, you don't want to coin flip most matchups since you will win in the long run.
Matchups
Synergies
Laning against Caitlyn is somewhat difficult. Especially if she plays with something like Lux or Karma. They will be able to get lane priority easily and it's up to them what they will do throughout the laning phase.
If they will not get a head or you will be slightly behind you are winning the long run.
Draven is an aggressive laner but with Kog'Maw you can survive it well. Especially against him, I would take Hail of Blades. Just make sure we are not giving him early kills - in any other situation we are winning.
Jinx is one of the best if not the best ADC at the moment. Kog'Maw is great against Jinx since you match her scaling well.
The Laning phase is somewhat even but if she wants to get lane priority she can just go to rocket form and shove it faster than you.
There are two different builds on Varus at the moment. Poke and on-hit/crit. Both of them are annoying early on but you can outscale him easily.
You will have a hard time against poke variation but you should be able to survive. If you will be scared just take Second Wind
Tristana and any other all-in champion are bad against Kog'Maw. You can take exhaust and you are chilling. Not doing anything crazy early on will give you free win since enemy ADC will have time ticking bomb - he must do something to win against Kog'Maw
Something similar to Caitlyn. He can hurt during the laning phase but once you survive against him you are unleashed and you can 1v9 the game.
Easy to play matchup. Your only job is to secure lane priority so you can hide behind creeps. If Ezreal gets lane priority against you it will be much easier for him to hit Qs.
Zeri is a weird matchup for you. She is weak from level 1 to 4 but after that, she is relatively strong. It's the fight of two hyper carried - who will kill the rest of the team faster.
Jhin is an aggressive cleaner. It might be harder for you to play against him since he has such a high range but overall playable as well.
You are her counter. Even though not many players pick Kog'Maw into her. You can easily smash her. Just to make sure I take Hail of Blades.
Even matchup - maybe a bit in Vayne's favor but it is a skill match-up. If a support match-up will be good for you choose Lethal Tempo.
We all know this lane Kog'Maw Lulu and there is nothing to add. It is really strong scaling lane. If you pick all in against it Lulu can just use polymorph and they win trade and long trades are not winnable what so ever.
The best support that you can pick with Kog'Maw.
Karma is somewhat budget Lulu since she is not buffing your attack speed but her shield can be much bigger if she builds Moonstone.
Braum is great defensive support that helps us survive laning phase against more aggressive bot lanes. You can also procc his passive fast if you take Hail of Blades so don't be afraid to trade when you can. This lane is also powerful.
This will be it from my Detailed Kog'Maw Guide!
If you have any questions or feedback let me know on my Discord -Lukke#7602
Have a great one and good luck with climbing and have fun with Kog'Maw, he deserves it.
Kog'Maw
Caitlyn
Icathian Surprise 
Caustic Spittle 
Bio-Arcane Barrage 
Void Ooze 
Living Artillery 
Lulu
Leona
Spray and Pray