Mana - moonay. Mana - moon. Man - ay - mün - ay. Mmnailfezoslhgouepoughs. It doesn't matter how you pronounce Manamune. And there's no doubt about Archangel's Staff. But what do these two items have in common? Tear of the Goddess you say? Yes, that's true! These two items provide a lot of mana, but only if they are fully stacked, and that's not always easy. When should you upgrade your Tear of the Goddess and when shouldn't you get one in the first place?
All your mana are belong to us!
Let's start with the basics:
+350 Mana +7 Mana Regen per 5 seconds UNIQUE Passive: Each time you use an ability, your maximum Mana increases by 4 (3 second cooldown). Bonus caps at +1000 Mana. Does not stack with Archangel's Staff or Manamune.This item gives you 150 mana for 205 gold which is gold efficient (100 gold = 50 mana) and after that, your mana will only increase! A very cost efficient item for sure! And it only gets better, after 250 spell casts (with a three second interval between casts) you have 1000 extra mana!
The amount of spells that will be used!Now let's not forget this item has two beautiful upgrades, Manamune and Archangel's Staff. Manamune is obviously designed for characters that want to have a lot of Attack Damage and a large mana pool (Corki, Blitzcrank, Ezreal) while Archangel's Staff is the casters' counterpart (Blitzcrank, Karthus, Anivia).
Tear of the Goddess is obviously the best on Ryze. Ryze grows so much stronger with this item, it's not even funny. Two of his skills scale with mana and since he can really spam his spells, he can stack it up at lightning speed. Rush this item on him.
You want to stack your Tear of the Goddess like these dishesBuilding a Tear of the Goddess in the lane is a dangerous choice as it leaves you with no defensive or offensive capacities in most cases. The only upside is a more quickly stacked Tear of the Goddess which thus gives you for a more powerful late game. But
League of Legends is all about winning your lane (at this current moment), so it's pretty risky. Some champions like Anivia and Kassadin really need that Tear of the Goddess because they require a very high amount of mana in order to be used successfully. They have pretty high base damage so rushing it on them is pretty risk free.
Other choices like Karthus or Cassiopeia do spam their spells a lot, but they don't need the Tear of the Goddess per se because they either have a natural way to regain their mana or lower mana costs. Getting it a bit later doesn't hurt because it will be stacked in no time so it's better to focus on damage while laning (and you should get the blue buff anyway).
A tricky example is Singed. While his passive screams "GIVE ME MANA", he doesn't spam his spells (toggling spells does
not count) so it will take ages before you reach full stacks.
Better make sure your Tear of the Goddess is full as fast as possible!It's also good building up a few stacks when you are refilling your mana and health at spawn. Use any abilities that aren't super long cooldown ultimates and enjoy your free mana!
Building a Manamune requires a particular set of abilities and synergy. Building a Manamune on Blitzcrank is super effective because it goes extremely well with his passive and Powerfist. Corki, Ezreal and Urgot are also prime examples of potential targets for Manamune because they have to spam their spells to poke and performing at their best.
Manamune
+350 Mana +7 Mana Regen per 5 seconds +20 Attack Damage UNIQUE Passive: Grants Attack Damage equal to 2% of your maximum Mana. UNIQUE Passive: Each time you basic attack, your maximum Mana increases by 1 (3 second cooldown). Each time you use an ability, your maximum Mana increases by 4 (3 second cooldown). Bonus caps at +1000 Mana. Does not stack with Tear of the Goddess or Archangel's Staff.So with this upgrade you also gain 1 extra mana for each auto attack (3 seconds cooldown) so it becomes easier to stack it up. But when is it good to upgrade to Manamune?
To make a long story short, buying a Manamune will
instantly pay off. No need to charge up your Tear of the Goddess because it's cost efficient right off the bat! Your Manamune will you give 47 Attack Damage at max mana excluded your base mana so it's essentially a BF sword with a lot of mana!
Archangel's Staff
+400 Mana +25 Mana Regen per 5 seconds +45 Ability Power Passive: Grants Ability Power equal to 3% of your maximum Mana. UNIQUE Passive: Each time you use an ability, your maximum Mana increases by 4 (3 second cooldown). Bonus caps at +1000 Mana. Does not stack with Tear of the Goddess or Manamune.Upgrading your Tear of the Goddess into an Archangel's Staff gives you 18 mana regen per 5 seconds, 50 mana and 5 Ability Power for 1000 gold. These stats are really minimal and to make the calculations easier, we will be working with the Ability Power only as this is the most important part of Archangel's Staff (except if your name is Kassadin, then you focus on the mana).
Long story short, to gain more than you pay you need 1400 mana. This equals a fully stacked Tear of the Goddess! But if you build other mana items (Frozen Heart, Catalyst the Protector) you should have no trouble reaching 1400 mana. Just look at your mana before upgrading your Tear of the Goddess.
