Hi there. My name is Boancă Tudor aka Stelar from EUNE, ROMANIA. I started playing Azir from the very release on the PBE and now hardcore on live. Today I will try to help you guys understand and learn this champion. Believe me, it takes a while because he is unique. Let's get started!

•Azir is a sustain damage and also a burst damage champion. He has an amazing zoning kit, a very good splitpush time due to his "W", escape with "E" and also juke possibilities with "E" and a lot of utility with the slow from "Q", knockup from "E" and protection from "R" and he can beat anything anywhere ^^.
•I will tell you from the beginning because lots of you might wonder: Azir shines in mid to late game, especially late.
•He will begin to be feared after he will get his Nashor's Tooth due to the AP and attackspeed (Attackspeed from Nashor's is the CORE power in his build I say, but not only from Nashor's but from the passive too [The more CDR = The more AS])
•His Teamplay is awesome because he can you his "R" to knock back the enemy champions and to zone them from getting to Azir and the other champions in the backline. His "R" can be combined very well with other champions skills such as: Yasuo's ult, Orianna's ult, Malphite's ult, Wukong's ult and so on! So place yourself and your wall wisely in teamfights !

The runes that I chose I personally think are the best for him because:
•High AP start: You won't have much attack speed at the beginning (I mean you are really slow untill Stinger) and you need as much damage as you can in one AA from a soldier.
•Armor: You will need it even if the mid laner is an AP caster. Minions and jungle ganks hurt !
•CDR: As you can see, Azir is based only on his skills, so he is a caster. The more soldiers you have on the battlefield, the more your enemies will get hurt/will die. Also it's good for your escapes with "E" combined with "Q". This helps if you recently used your "Q" to harras and an enemy jungler comes unexpected for a gank.
W->Q->E = Escape.
•MR: 90% of the cases you will face an AP mid laner, you need that MR or you will be just food for the enemy mid laner! Swap the MR blues with CDR blues if you face an AD midlaner and also an AD jungler. Keep the MR blues if not!

As for the items, I can't say much...
•The Nashor's Tooth and Athene's Grail are the core items for this build, after that you should build those 3 items in the order you need them:
•Rabbadon's Deathcap- If you need more damage
•Void Staff- If you need more magic penetration (if enemy is building MR(Magic Resist))
•Zhonya's- If the enemy team will hunt you down and just focus you with all the burst.

•REMEMBER: Nashor's tooth is a must have even if the soldier won't proc it's 2nd passive !
The attack speed, ap and cdr from it are very very good on Azir because he needs them for his soldiers and it works very well with his passive !

•BOOTS: I personally think you should go for the Magic Pen boots because you will have enough CDR from the items. If you go for Rod of Ages instead of Athene's Unholy Grail, then you can use the CDR boots.

•Max "Q" 1st for the cooldown reduction. If your enemy will run away from a soldier you need to move your soldiers to your enemy's current location as they are the primary source of damage that you got. Also the "Q" deals a lot of damage as you max it.
•Max "W" 2nd for the soldiers spawn rate. You need your soldiers as often as you can get them because as I said, they are the primary damage source for Azir!
•Max "E" 3nd because in this build, you use your "E" just for escapes. The cooldown of "E" scales with the CDR so if you have more CDR you have more "E" dashes around.
•Add points in "R" when you can. It will make your wall bigger and it will deal more damage ! The wall is the main source of keeping Azir alive when he gets nuked by enemy melee champions. (Zhonya's too!)

•I personally preffer Ignite and Flash for normal matchups.
•I recommened you to use "Exhaust" when facing a burst damage enemy mid laner such as "Syndra, Zed, Fizz, Veigar Talon(now that you can use exhaust after he jumps on you [Talon's "E" won't silence you anymore!]) and so on..."
•Use Heal instead of Ignite if feel more confortable with it but ignite is very good in trades and last hitting champions. You are very squishy and you might get dived but at least you get one of them with you!

•Try to play him as defensive as you can. He is very squishy!
•Use your soldier wisely! If the enemy manages to dodge all of their damage, it's bad news for you my friend because they are the only source of damage and escape(except Flash). Place the soldiers WISELY!

•The main harrasing combo with Azir is "W" near an enemy champion, instant AA him, "Q" in him again after 0.5s from the AA and AA again.
W->AA->wait->Q->AA
•Another way to harras is to spawn 2 soldiers "W" and then "Q" to enemy and AA with both.
W->W->Q->AA
•And after you get you "Q" at rank 4 or 5 you can do another awesome harras move which is a bit more complicated but works and deals lots of damage. You spawn a soldier "W", AA the enemy, wait, Q in the enemy, AA again, when you see you "Q" is almost useable again spawn another soldier, AA, "Q" with both in your enemy and AA with both.
W->AA->wait->Q->AA->W->AA->Q->2x AA.
•There is also a combo to engage on an enemy and throw him/his team back to your team but this a very high risk/high reward move.
You have to "W", "Q" as back as you can into your enemy back, "E" to that soldier. You can knock up enemies while traveling or just arive to your soldier and instant after this you "R" back to your team throwing all the enemies around with the wall into your team. This can also be done using your flash to get a better position then use "R" to knock the enemy champs.
W->Q->E->(Flash)->R back.