this guide is **** **** you zilean

^ I think this guide is a Mid Zilean

If going bot, you should mention a gold generation item ( Spellthief's Edge would be the best one for Zilean, imo) and Sightstone.

I know it is tempting to build full damage from the start, but your partner will need to get all the minions he can in order to scale well after laning phase, therefore you should go for a gold gen item from the start.

Oh, shoot! I didn't really specify where I play him. I usually will play him bot lane with a partner, able to utilize his poke whenever an enemy goes for their creep. And yeah, he is really squishy, but I briefly touched on how he needs to run in quickly and get out as soon as possible. Thank you for the help, and I'll fix that rewind problem.

And thank you as well Nyara for those tips! Swapping Morello for WoA is probably a good idea, same with the point in alchemist. As said before, I made this first build for bottom, which is why I like expose weakness. If I do make a build for mid though, I'll keep what you said in mind!

Good Matchups (You counter them):

- Heimeirdinger (Hard)
- Karthus (Hard, but he will ultimate another lane anyway)
- Kassadin (Hard, but nobody cares as he will roam anyway)
- Swain (Hard)
- Ahri (Soft)
- Cho'Gath (Soft)
- Akali (Soft)
- Yasuo (Soft)
- Fizz (Soft)
- Kha'Zix (Soft)

You counter them because they have no way to harass you while you can free-farm and free-harass with no worries, even when Kha-Zix, Yasuo and Akali have cheap gap-closers, just bomb them, slow them, run, and if you will not survive, revive yourself and end the job, not really hard. Not even the jungler should cause you too much problems, with your revive and Time Warp, you'll be fine. Yes, some of them can Hard CC you, but you outrange their Hard CC quite easily or it is really easy to evade that.

Bad Matchups (Your Counters):

- Ziggs (Hard)
- Gragas (Hard)
- Zyra (Hard)
- Veigar (Hard)
- Brand (Hard)
- Talon (Hard)
- Lux (Soft)
- Kennen (Soft)
- Elise (Soft)
- Annie (Soft)

Basically, anything with a long range Hard CC counters you or/and who can harass you over your already outstanding range. Sadly, the first two are somewhat omnipresent because they are OP and counter almost all the mid's already, but that is a problem for all the mid laners anyway. I could recomend going support or top (your matchups are pretty much the same from the Teemo's ones) if you got hard countered. Xerath doesn't count because you can easily evade his harass and Hard CC with Time Warp. Anyway, you're more useful than most of them for your team and at split pushing.

Any other matchup is neutral; for example you outrange Katarina, but her Griveous Wounds in exchange really make a hurt on our revive, revive we will often use when she uses her ultimate. More skill based fights than anything else.

A good reason to use Zilean Mid is to make awesome ganks, Zilean's Time Warp will pretty much make any gank successful, so, even if you got hard countered, you can still win the lane as long your jungler doesn't screw it up.

By other hand, a huge problem is that Zilean is really, really blue addict, if for any reason you cannot get dat blue, you'll pretty much lose the lane, it is the biggest shame of Zilean Mid.

Suggestions to the guide? Swap those two points on defense to utility, pick Alchemist and Runic Affinity: Mana Potions are useful until we got our Grial, buffing them up makes everything better. Runic Affinity give us 33+ seconds of blue: not reasons to drop that miracle. Swap Expose Weakness with Spell Weaving: it isn't that hard to autoattack your enemy laners, so the few extra APs we got from it comes handy. I could also recommend swaping Morrellon with Will of the Ancients unless there is something like a Dr. Mundo on the enemy team, Vampirism really comes handy and 5% CR isn't that game breaking.

If built like that, you will die with the most basic combo of any champion, especially assassins (think of Kha'zix, Le Blanc, Fizz, Zed). You won't even be able to farm properly to get your basic items.

Zilean can't keep up with most of mid champions today, unless he dominates completely the lane. Unfortunatelly, many of the fotm champions have mechanisms to avoid or mitigate his harass. Unlike S3, he finds a better spot to be with a partner in a duo lane at S4. In my opinion, Zilean is neither weak or strong. He is outdated.

You have 6 points on Rewind.

Alright, thank you for the help! This is my first guide, so it is a little weak. I'll try out Hybrid Pen., see how it works!

IMO, greater mark of hybrid penetration works better for Zilean because he has a more longer AA range(600) than others so that whenever he uses his AA to poke, it will deal more damage :3

BTW, add more chapters, this guide is too short. And icons too.

For the runes and spells, maybe add some alternatives? :3

anyways, good luck ^^