This guide has been just what the doctor ordered for me. I've always been a support type of guy (I main medic in TF2 for example) and I've always loved Zilean. Until this guide, I was pretty good early-mid game, but just felt absolutely useless late game. I have improved as a Zilean dramatically since this guide, and I feel like the rest of the team really sees me as a huge asset.
Biggest tips from this guide that helped me:
-Don't spam double-bomb early game. It chews through your mana
-SLOW YOUR ENEMY! This has made the biggest difference for me. Slow when they tower-dive, slow when they gank, slow when they push, slow when we push. Slow, slow, slow.
-Use rewind even when you have nothing to combine it with. I used to "save" rewind so I could do double-bombs. Bad move.

Anyway, thank you SO MUCH for this guide. It has made me an infinitely better Zilean. I can't thank you enough.

AWESOME BUILD. Here's a screen from my first match ever with Zilean playing support / AP with this build. 0 deaths! I saved about 5 or 6 of my teammates from death including myself from the ultimate. Such a fun support champion so play +1 vote!

Just recently got my Groovy Zilean skin to sport this build! :D

Extremely solid guide. Got 1+

I love your guide man, I already loved playing Zil but this guide, item build, explanation, ... Made me the favorite support in my team.

@whiteknightphantom:

Zilean was and is never effective with the GP5 Support builds.

He's not that kind of support that heals, or shields. He needs farm.

Is Zilean still effective if he is played the usual way most supports are played? gold per second item build etc. ?

I would like to say I been using this guide for a very long time. I love it to death, truly my most favorite support character. I can easily cite my games that I went 10-2-30+ but thats sort of redundant at this point.

I really look forward seeing you update this guide. I do agree that GP5 items would be good insert into this build, its very effective the way it is. Core items arent to difficult to achieve even without GP5 and everything beyond that is just icing on the cake. This build also works alot better with new masteries. With a 10% CDR compared to a 6% CDR you get much closer to cdr cap.

EDIT: New build is pretty different, I havent tested it yet but build makes alot of sense. CDR doesnt really matter for zilean until he has the mana to support it. So rushing Cap does makes the most sense.

This guide is good. I've been looking for something more fun to fill the support niche and this was an incredibly fun experience. I went 7/4/17 and had more kills and less deaths than most of my teammates. Zilean is not the most ideal support role but it was definitely more fun than I anticipated. Thank you for the experience.

@Pølsemanden:

This guide is a bit outdated. This was made back in Q3 of 2010.
GP5 items weren't really prominent then.

I've only been doing minor grammar and format tune-ups. I haven't really been focusing on Zilean.
When I get the time, I'll probably scrub this guide really good.

only thing that bothers me is that u don't get any GP 5 items.. for such an expensive build.. U won't be getting very far in your build with the carry getting all the last hits, and u buying wards..

@Horseburner:

Thank you.

Was wondering if people still looked at this one. ^^