Talk:Vladimir/@comment-25254389-20150126223611/@comment-5211662-20150127045209

Actually, he is more of a mage than a tank. There are some reasons why he is labeled as a Mage/Tank. First, he gains a lot of HP thanks to his passive. Second, he sustains himself very well; Third, he can become untargetable thanks to his Sanguine Pool so he doesn't have to actually tank anything (especially if he decides to buy Zhonya's Hourglass) The combination if untargetability, high amounts of HP, as well as healing sustain, means that Vladimir breaks the rule that mages are squishy and die in seconds, and he actually survives extremely well during teamfights. Obviously he will die if he is alone, but sometimes he can tank just as well as an actual tank, if not better, because he can actually do damage.

He can't really be a tank as he lacks the CC to do that. However, you can build him as more of an off-tank than as a mage. This is viable, but many times it is better to just go AP. He is stronger with an AP build; off-tank builds are mostly to battles where you are struggling, can't carry, your teammates are already carrying for you and/or you are required to be the frontline tank.

His offensive abilities may not scale with 100% of Ability Power, but that doesn't mean Vladimir doesn't scale well with ability power. Also, there aren't many mages apart from Veigar that scale well with ability power, and Veigar's survivability just can't be compared to Vladimir. Don't forget that he has very good base damage too!