Mganga: The Clown Prince of Heals

Build and Guide Mganga: The Clown Prince of Heals

Cheat Sheet
Quick Level:

Fortunate Gift

Detonation

Toxic

Talent: Sprint

Items: Orb of the Magi, Enchanted Kicks, Frosty’s Revenge, Hecate’s Diadem, Virtue’s Necklace, Staff of Nuul

Arcana: Violate, Devour, Hex

Introduction
In a game that includes the actual Joker you wouldn't think it would need an evil jester character. Instead of a deranged crime lord, Mganga is a deranged master of black magic, which oddly includes the power to heal allies. Mganga is thus both a Mage and Support class hero, capable of dealing damage over time as well as providing bursts of damage and healing through his Detonation ultimate ability.

Skill Build
Toxic (Mganga creates a poisonous cloud at the target area that slowly spreads and deals magic damage for 4 seconds and slows enemy movement speed by 30% for 2 seconds) Leveling improves damage and lowers cooldown.

Toxic creates a medium-size circle of ongoing poison damage. It can be an effective laning and jungling tool when combined with Mganga’s other abilities.

Toxic can be tricky to land on solo enemy heroes. Predict where they’re going, or wait until they stop to clear the lane. Toxic has a long cooldown until it’s leveled up, and we want to prioritize leveling Fortunate Gift first.

The slowing effect should let you to follow up with a quick Fortunate Gift and Detonation for maximum burst damage.

Toxic is the single best way to affix multiple Voodoo marks on enemy heroes; pay attention to the stack number that appears above an enemy, and use Detonation when they either reach the full 5 stacks, or are about to get out of range.

The best time to use Toxic is during the initial engagement of a big team fight. Drop Toxic on as many enemy heroes as possible and combine it with your allies AOE stuns for maximum saturation.

Fortunate Gift (Mganga hurls magic items in a line to cause magic damage to any enemy he hits. If he hits an ally hero, he will affix a healing mark on them that will recover HP) Leveling improves damage.

Fortunate Gift is a fairly short-ranged beam attack on a 5-second cooldown. The key is that it can apply Voodoo marks to allied heroes (and Mganga himself) as well as enemies. Fortunate Gift is effective at dealing damage, clearing lanes and jungling, and healing allies. It’s versatility is why we’re prioritizing it when leveling up.

Because FG can heal your allies, you’ll want to position yourself behind the team, and target the most amount of both allies and enemies as possible. Follow up with Detonation to heal/hurt everyone with a mark.

One cool side effect of FG is that it always applies a Voodoo Mark on Mganga himself, letting you self heal when you use Detonation. Don’t hesitate to use that quick combo to keep yourself alive, as Detonation has a relatively quick cooldown.

Detonation (Mganga sets off explosions that deal magic damage to all nearby enemies and heal friendly heroes. Marked friendly heroes gain 50% more healing effect per stack, marked enemies take 50% more damage per stack) Leveling improves damage and lowers cooldown.

Unlocking the strategy around Mganga’s Voodoo Stacks and Denotation is the key to success.

Mganga’s Voodoo passive means every attack or ability adds a Voodoo Mark to an enemy. Those marks act as multipliers for Detonation, increasing damage by a whopping 50% per stack.

Try to wait until you get a full 5 stacks on an enemy before using Detonation - but be mindful of the range. Detonation’s range is larger than Toxic and Fortunate Gift, almost as big as the playing field. But it does you no good to activate Detonation if the enemy has escaped your grasp.

Due to its relatively low cooldown compared to most ultimate abilities, it’s better to activate it early than risk a hero escaping.

Activating Detonation when you have marks on everyone - allies and enemies combined, can be the deciding factor in a big late game team fight.

PASSIVE: Voodoo (Normal attacks and abilities inflict a continuous poison effect that deals magic damage and adds 1 Voodoo Mark, up to 5, to enemy heroes)

Mganga primarily deals poison damage over time, with the exception of Detonation. Note that it’s just not abilites but also his basic attacks that apply poison and Voodoo Marks. A big number will appear over marked enemies that denotes how many stacks they have. Your goal in every fight is to get those stacks as close to 5 before using Detonation. Toxic is the best way to apply stacks but requires that enemies remain inside the circle.

Items
Orb of the Magi - More ability damage, reduced cooldown and a passive that grants you health and mana restore with every level up. You’ll want to nab the Orb as your first item to get the biggest advantage with that unique passive.
Enchanted Kicks - If there were boots that added ability power we’d be wearing those, but the Enchanted Kicks’ Magic Pierce is the next best thing.

Frosty’s Revenge - It sounds like the dark sequel to a children’s movie, but Frosty’s Revenge is a useful mage item that adds to your power and speed. Its unique passive makes your Toxic slow enemies even more, as well as adding a slowing effect to Fortunate Gift.

Hecate’s Diadem - More power please! The Diadem adds a flat 200 power boost as well as a 35% power increase and Magic Pierce. Your subtle poison damage won’t be so subtle.

Virtue’s Necklace - Everything the Mage/Support needs with Ability Power, reduced Cooldowns, and more mana and mana regen. If you’re constantly healing your team in the late game (as you should) you can quickly run into mana issues. The Necklace will help, not to mention restoring mana with kills or assists. You’ll get lots of assists.

Staff of Nuul - Basically another Orb of the Magi, but with a big 45% Magic Pierce to help bypass any Magic Defense items your opponents may have taken.

Recommended Talents
Sprint - The most boring talent is still one of the most useful. Mganga has no natural way of escaping a bad fight, and often has to get uncomfortably close to hit anyone. Sprint can and will save your life.

Recommended Talents
Red: More Ability power means more damage and better healing. Talisman (I), Corruption (II), Violate (III), and Enlightened (III).

Purple: Magic Life Steal works well with Mganga’s poison, letting him constantly keep himself in top shape. Absorption (I), Revelation (II), Sap (III), and Devour (III)

Green: You can add even more magic life steal or just boost ability power. Disruption (I), Spellbound (II), Corrosion (II), Hex (III), Consume (III)

Early Game
You should team up with a melee fighter most of the time. Keep them between you and the enemy, though you won’t really be healing until you get Detonation at level 4.

Mganga can solo a lane as both abilities work well for wave clear, but be wary that most enemies can out damage you early on. Stay safe and let your poison do the talking.

Mid Game
At this point you can dive into the jungle on occasion for more gold and XP. Otherwise you need to be where the bulk of the team fighting is. Support your frontline with healing from Fortunate Gift and Detonation, and spread Voodoo stacks to opponents whenever you can.

You can defend a lane by yourself but be wary of trying to push one in. Your abilities do squat against towers and an ambush hero can quickly pick you off.

Late Game
The late game is Mganga’s time to shine. Your unique combination of damage and healing will come in very handy during big team fights.

Be with the team at all times. Position yourself behind warriors and try to hit as many allies as possible with Fortunate Gift. Watch those Voodoo numbers and time your Detonations to do the maximum amount of healing and damage.

Look to sync up your Toxic placement with your teammates’ stun or slowing abilities, such as Thane’s Avalon’s Fury or Diaochan’s Diamond Dust.

Prioritize your team’s health first. Plenty of heroes can deal damage, but very few can heal their allies and sustain their team through the end.

FAQ/Tips
Toxic can be used as an escape tool since it slows movement speed, but you’ll probably still need Sprint to fully disengage.

Familiarize yourself with Detonation’s range. Don’t try and chase unless you have a lot more HP than your target, either Detonante early or let them escape while the poison continues to tick away.

When fully leveled Detonation only has a 12 second cooldown. Don’t be stingy!

Use FG to put Voodoo stacks on your teammates and activate Detonation as a group heal, even when not currently fighting. Entering a battle with more HP than your opponents can make all the difference, and you should be able to use Denotation offensively soon enough in the next fight.

Matchups
If you don’t have a strong frontline you shouldn’t have drafted Mganga. Ideally you want at least two melee-focused heroes out in front whom you can hit with FG while also targeting enemies.

Mganga works particularly well with allies who can also slow or stun enemies in an area, letting you combo with Toxic to land those precious Voodoo stacks. Most tanks and warriors have good AOE stuns or slows that just ache to have a Toxic added in.

Mganga doesn’t like nimble, fast heroes who can dodge his abilities and either get in his face, like Raz or Skud, or dance around at range and deal lots of burst damage like Valhein and Violet. Stay out of their range and don’t engage them one on one.