So you decided you want a new mid laner but not a traditional glass cannon mage or ad assassin . You thought about and but they just didn't feel right. Then you discovered the boy who shattered time and thought, wow, I really suck with this champ but I love his kit! This guide will show you the basics of playing Ekko and how to carry your team with the boy genius.

Flash Is the standard spell for most champs. It helps you get into or out of almost any situation. Take this, just take it plz.
Ignite is what I take as my second spell on Ekko. Since Ekko is mostly about burst damage, your opponent could flash under their turret and escape with a sliver of health. Ignite should help you secure some early kills if the rest of your combo fails.
Other Options
Ghost is ok in the later stages of the game for chasing but because you're in the mid lane it won't be used to its full potential covering such a short distance back to your turret.
Teleport is ok but you can use your ult instead.
I wouldn't take Heal or Barrier because if you really need the extra defense you're probably just losing your lane and there's nothing you can really do about that.

Ekko is a unique champ in the sense that he is ap, melee and has good poke. I would say Fizz and Diana are the two closest champs in play style but they still don't have the same feeling about them when you're actually in game. Ekko's w Parallel Convergence and passive Z-Drive Resonance allow him to cs pretty well while his q Timewinder can keep ranged opponents at bay. His e Phase Dive is great for engage and escape and the stun from w is a constant threat to any lane opponent. Ekko can also kill pretty early on with his w, e, q combo. Remember that you're opponent can't see where you're w will land until late but they can see your clone if he's in vision range. So make sure to cast Parallel Convergence from behind your minion wave so they can't see it coming until it's too late. Then Phase Dive into your stun (use a minion for blink if u can't reach your target), q , ignite and passive for the kill. Once you reach 6 you can dive with this as well because you have an instant disengage with Chronobreak if your shield isn't enough.
One of the coolest things about this champ is that your ult can act as a free Teleport as long as you activate it within 4 seconds of your recall. You could say that it's a bit of a waste but it's cd is low enough that it doesn't cause you too much trouble.

Pros

Great burst
Easy engage/disengage
ult = get out of jail free card
Unlike most assassins, he can last pretty long in team fights
Good cs
Decent poke for a melee champ
Low Ult cd
Free tele with ult

Cons

Melee
Falls behind if he doesn't get fed
Squishy
w can be tricky to land
e can only dash through skinny walls

I put mostly AP runes because I like the extra burst on assassins but Ekko can also benefit from mana, mana regen, cooldown reduction, move speed and health (and other defensive runes). I always find that runes are personal preference so try out some different combos and see what works best for you.

Just like runes, it really depends on how you want to play. If you want to go more on hit, put points into attack speed. If you find you're too squishy, put points into defense. As long as you focus on AP and offense as your main tree, you should be fine.

A pretty standard sequence for any champ. Max your ult, your bread and butter ability, your secondary ability and your utility ability in that order. Timewinder is essential to Ekko's laning and trading so you must max it first (after ult), no exceptions. Phase Dive is your secondary ability. It can deal some damage and get you out of some pretty sticky situations, so you max it second (after ult). Parallel Convergence already does its job at level 1 for this guide. It's mainly used for its stun and cs so you don't need to level it until the end. It's shield does get more powerful as you level up the skill but the stun is the main focus of this ability and the duration serves its purpose at level one. As with most all champs, you wanna put points into your ult whenever you can. Chronobreak's damage, heal and cd are incredible for helping Ekko win fights and stay alive so don't go saying I'm gonna be like Tiger Udyr and forget about R because Ekko is not an Udyr and right now phoenix Udyr is better anyway so you should still put points into R!!!

In a team fight, most assassins have one job: take out the adc and sacrifice yourself. Ekko is an exception, he doesn't have to die :D. Your main damage comes from your w, e, q combo which should be able to kill an adc however, your stun covers such a large area that you should be able to take out a squishy without much harm to yourself from the enemy team. After this you can be extremely annoying to the enemy team. You could chose to try and draw away another member of their team from the fight, seeing as how you should be in their back line, to give your team an edge or you could stay right in the middle of the fight and use Chronobreak right before death. This way you can heal to almost full health and deal a ton of AoE damage to the enemy team. If you do this, just make sure you don't get hit by any hard cc that would prevent your ult like a morgana Dark Binding or a Sejuani ult.

If you've actually read the entire guide, congrats, you should be able to play Ekko in the mid lane and you have a much longer attention span than I would have expected. He is a very unique assassin in the way that he can survive in longer fights and is almost impossible to stop once he gets fed. Remember to w, e, q squishy targets, especially Teemo when he thinks he's split pushing safely, and punish anyone who dares challenge you by ulting to safety and going back in to murder their sorry champ. Good luck with your Ekko play and I hope that I'll be seeing a lot of good Ekko players in the future.