Welcome to my AP Ezreal guide! I have reached gold before, but I honestly play this game more for ***** and giggles than anything else. Hence AP Ezreal.

I'm on the NA server, summoner name: Hipster Sora

I'll try and keep this updated with major changes in each patch, and if you guys like the guide itself i'll try to make it look more pretty as well.


NOTICE: This build is optimal for lategame, during which you will be deleting people. Math explained later, but you'll want a teamcomp which can support your lackluster earlygame.

Levels 1-3 you should be dominating. Really set the tone of lane here, and you can actually trick your enemy laner into thinking you have the advantage the whole of lane. An auto attacker's dream is to have more attack speed early, not more AD. Ezreal's passive gives him a **** ton of AS, especially if you can stack it up. Since we back slightly earlier than most mages, and start AD, we want to spam our Qs the first few levels in order to stack that passive. You are looking to GO IN on this boi. Here are a few requirements in order for you to Arcane Shift in.

1) You've cleared enough enemy minions to have a positive trade
2) You've landed some Q's on your enemy laner or minions for passive stacks
3) Their CC / important cooldown is down

The optimal time to trade with your autos is level 2. At this point, most mages have an ability focused towards clearing, and an ability for CC. You want to wait for them to use one if not both of those abilities, and then you E into them given your passive is up. Make sure E damage goes onto them and not a minion if possible. Auto them, toss out those Qs, and have a mental timer for when their abilities come back up. Auto until their abilities are about back so you can disengage and wait for your E to be back and their abilities used before trying again.

You can easily get a kill on unsuspecting mid mains if they have no mobility. Q to chunk them down, and all in with this strategy. Ignite if it means a for sure kill, if you're unsure just let them back as you'll heal up with dBlade anyway and can use river plants for mana.

If you manage to win lane this way and your enemy laner is scared of you, use this to roam bot.

I cannot tell you how many times i've won a game as AP Ezreal simply because I saw the enemy jungler come into our territory to contest a buff on my minimap and I clicked there first. It might mean losing a few minions, but it often means either a kill and/or putting the enemy jungler behind. Ezreal can easily kite most junglers while dealing lots of Q/auto damage to them. You will always win the 2v1, and if you click first you'll always be there first.

Waveclear is AP Ezreal's most noticeable weakness... but it's also one of his strengths. Against clearing mages like Taliyah, you're pretty much destined to be pushed in under tower while she roams and picks up kills. If I were you, I would ban the most meta / most played waveclear mage. Against lesser mages, you can actually push them in and roam at the cost of a bunch of mana.

His ultimate, Trueshot Barrage allows him to clear waves as quick as any waveclear mage, and from a global range. If you shoot it down mid, it'll clear not only the wave in lane but thin the next wave. This allows you to have INSANE waveclear for those two minion waves, since the second wave will all die with a Q each. If you ever want to roam, you have to ult down mid to hit both waves. You can leave immediately if need be, but I suggest thinking ahead before your roam and Qing each minion in the next wave.

When ult is not in play, you'll be relying on Mystic Shot and auto attacks to waveclear. You generally want to last hit with autos only, and use Q for when you mess up. Once you acquire Tear or Archangel's, it's smart to Q spam to push waves. Make sure not to miss CS. In extreme situations, like you're about to miss a cannon, you may want to consider using Arcane Shift to secure that gold. Consider how this puts you at a disadvantage in lane though, and if you can be killed if you don't have your E up. Q spam to get it back ASAP.

DO NOT FORGET! Mystic Shots landing reduces all ability cooldowns. When your ult is on CD, SPAM Q EVERYWHERE! In lane, on jungle camps you pass, on champions, on scuttle on dragon on rift on baron!

It's also worth noting that Minion Dematerializer is pretty important to Ez's clear both in lane and with cross map ults.

If you were lucky enough to get a lane you can push in somewhat decently, congrats! You're able to roam. There are two strategies you really want to do after pushing in.
1) The Bot Roam. Push, then run down river to bot. It's best to coordinate this with your top using TP and/or your jungler ganking. Botlane, no matter what, is the most important lane to get ahead. And it offers 2 kills/assists for you, the midlaner as opposed to top's single (and generally tanky) enemy.
2) It's a Trap! If you've notice that your enemy midlaner responds to your pushes and roams, it's time to buy a control ward. Hide in a bush, place a c-ward down to make sure there's no vision first. If there is, clear it and act like you're going to keep walking bot for a second. When the enemy mid comes to roam, unleash your full combo on them. RQWE. You may need to ignite or Q again after depending on who it is and how much AP you have. You can also use this strategy in reverse when your mid roamed bot to catch them coming back!


Don't forget! In the first few minutes of the game you should be pushing harder than normal to respond to any jungle shenanigans that go on. I've personally gotten 3 kills in the last 7 games before writing this that came from pushing and responding to seeing a fight close by.

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Keystone: Electrocute
+++
Klepto is very good for passive lanes, but most of the time you'll be aiming to kill your opponents. The best way to do that is Electrocute. It is so easy to proc this keystone with Ezreal, especially when building to a gunblade. W+E+auto is all you need. Auto Q auto works. Auto EQ. WE Gunblade. So easy. Situationally, Dark Harvest is better... but imo you give to much of your lane phase away for not enough lategame reward. Plus you can accidentally proc Dark Harvest on an engaging tank, and not have it for the squishies. Electrocute is a lot harder to accidentally proc while still keeping you useful.

Magical Boots can be switched out for perfect timing if you're building Zhonya's, but I prefer the movespeed and free boots mid more.

Minion Dematerializer is a must. Take it. It helps your early waveclear sooo much and if you know how to use it correctly. To use it correctly use 1 on melees, 1 on cannons, and the rest on the casters.

Cosmic Insight's 5% CDR for everything is very nice, helps you ult and Q more. Take it.

+++
Secondary: Sorcery (+13 AD early game, +24 AP mid-late)
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Transcendence: This rune gives you A TON of AP from items like Nashor's, Luden's, and any other CDR items past your core items. It also lets you get 45% CDR with one complete item.

Gathering Storm: Alongside our deathcap, we'll be getting a pretty massive amount of AP as the game goes on. AP Ezreal is very good at waveclearing on a global scale, which generally has a game-lengthening effect one might describe as stalling for late game. Make use of that 100 AP!

Ultimate Hat is a trap

Upon research, it turns out Ultimate Hat is actually just trash for people not taking advantage of it immediately; like Karma.

I thought Ultimate Hat was additive 15%, but apparently, it's multiplicative 15%, so
ADDITIVE: 60% CDR = 48s R
What it really is, MULTIPLICATIVE: 53.75% CDR = 57s R
As opposed to: 45% = 66s R

So you would think you'd save 20 seconds, but instead we're only really saving 10 seconds. I think 20s would have been worth it, but 10s is absolutely not.

Ezreal absolutely loves loves LOVES the new rune system and how it's introduced adaptive damage. Because AP is so weak early based on Ezreal's ratios, Ezreal actually wants to be AD for the early game instead of AP. Because of this, it's best to start with Doran's Blade or Doran's Shield. This starts us off with our adaptive damage shifted towards AD, which with Klepto/Sorcery we get 13 AD.

Then we want to buy Tear followed by a Sheen. These are both mana items, so they don't change our adaptive damage towards AP. Nice. Now it comes time decide which AP Item you're going to rush: Lichbane, or Archangel's. I personally suggest...

ARCHANGEL'S!
This item is overall a much better first full item than Lich Bane for several reasons.
1) 45% CDR. Remember how we took that rune, Transcendence? Well, it gives us 10% CDR at 10 minutes. And our sheen gives us 10% CDR. And Archangels gives us another 10% CDR, and Haste's 10% CDR. And then we have the last 5% from Cosmic Insight. 45% CDR with only one full item. Nice.
2) +8 mana per cast. The tear->Archangels upgrade changes it from +4 mana per cast to +8 mana per cast. This doubles your stacking, getting you the active shield twice as fast. And let's not forget; more mana means more AP now. It also means you have more mana to cast spells in lane with.
3) Lich Bane rush sucks. It's a cold truth. While Lich Bane has a super good passive, the passive is mostly an AP ratio on your Q. You don't have that much AP with just a tear and a Lich Bane. Be smart, don't rush a Lich Bane first item.

Most of these should be pretty self-explanatory, but here goes.

Luden's Echo: Through transcendence and seraph's awe, it has 125 AP. That, plus 500 mana, and the passive which gives you a tiny bit of burst and some waveclear.

Nashor's Tooth: Through transcendence, it has 120 AP. What really matters about this item though is that it gives your Q and autos an extra 15% AP ratio. In combination with Sorc Elixir late game, you destroy towers. It gives you a surprising amount of DPS so you're not just standing around, **** in hand, while your abilities are on cooldown.

Voidstaff: I'm personally not a fan of this item, as Ezreal's job is more to do extreme damage to squishies rather than mess with tanks. If they do have 3 people building MR, it might be worth it. It's up to you. But I don't like it.

Rylai's: You buy this item mostly for the slow. It's the same concept as blue Ezreal, but the slow applies on all abilities. This makes your abilities easier to land in succession, helps catch out people, and can help you get your team kills by slowing someone down from across the map with ult.

Zhonya's: **** item imo for AP Ezreal. It does have 10% CDR for transcendence, but it's simply not worth it unless you absolutely NEED the active because of the enemy's team. In this situation, it's better to take the stopwatch rune.

Morello's: Less AP than other options, but it gives you 15 mpen, grievous wounds, and some health. The 15 mpen is arguably much more valuable for deleting squishies than the 20 AP difference you might see on other items, but I'd mostly buy this item in situations where you need the grievous wounds.

Gunblade: I don't suggest building this item at all, but a lot of people like to rush it. People swear by it, and for that sole reason I'm putting it in as a situational. It gives you sustain, some AD, some AP, and a NASTY active. It's one of the better items actually if you're a bad player who can't reliably hit skillshots, since the active does slow and do considerable damage.

Q>E>W
Points in R immediately at 6, 11, and 16
First point in W upon getting Sheen

Why is Q first?
What makes AP Ezreal work right now is that he can waveclear by using his ultimate. His ultimate has a super long cooldown though, but your Q reduces that by 1.5s per hit. You'll be using Q to
-Stack Tear
-Farm
-Poke
-Get Klepto Procs

So why E next?
Most of it has to do with its benefits over maxing W. These are
1) Safety, blink CDR >>>>>> minor poke tool during lane
2) E can be used to CS while W can not
3) E's base damage is stronger, and early game does get bonuses from your AD

Why is W last?
It always pains me to max W last since it used to be optimal to max W first arguably in Season 7, but in Season 8 AP Ezreal is all about the Q. With the item reworks and new runes, your Q actually does considerably more damage than your W while being longer range. Being in range to hit a W generally means either you're going to get a kill because you QEWQ'd a squishy, or because you got engaged on and need to blow everything trying to kill this guy / dissuade him from attacking you.

Why don't I put a point in W until I get sheen?
Early on, you are an AD champion. You have 0 AP. That means you are going to be doing less damage with E than Q at a cost of more mana. W is only worth using as a minor poke tool and Sheen proc. So when you launch W, you also want to auto the enemy. This is also a Klepto proc, nicely enough. Once you get Sheen, you also have enough mana to use W as a stacking tool while poking with sheen procs.

Mystic Shot, Ezreal's Q, is absolutely disgusting on AP Ezreal. Looking at Ezreal's ratios you would think that his W is his biggest hitter, but in truth it is his Q.

Ezreal's base Q without any AP will do about 200+ damage before resistances, physical damage. This is from its base damage and it's 110% AD ratio.

Ezreal's base Q including AP, has an AP ratio of 40%.

With Lich Bane, you'll be adding an additional 75 AD damage, but more importantly an extra 50% AP ratio on his Q, bringing him to a 90% AP ratio on a 1.5s ability.

With Luden's Echo, you'll be adding another 100 magical damage and an additional 10% AP Ratio to your Q. Are you counting how much base damage and AP ratio damage we're building up now?

With Nashor's tooth, we'll get 15 magic damage onhit, as well as an extra 15% AP ratio for his Q.

Elixir of Sorcery adds 25 true damage

Total Base Damage: 415 mixed physical/magical/true damage
Total AP Ratio: 115% AP

With the promised 1000 AP lategame, Ezreal's Q is going to be hitting for a whopping 1500 damage before resistances just about every Q.



During the mid-late game area, if you land a single Q on a squishy target you should be able to kill them with a single EWQ follow up assuming your abilities land.

There are three stages of Ezreal's W.

Early Game

During this time, Ezreal's W is solely a tiny bit of poke AND a Sheen proc. This takes up a lot of mana, but it is a stack and a Sheen proc is a Sheen proc.

Mid Game

You're an AP champion now. W hurts. Use it for poke, use it for burst. If anyone walks up to you, WQ them. EWQ combo REALLY hurts if you land everything. What really matters during this time for W is using it on your auto-attacking team members during teamfights, tower taking, and dragon/baron plays.

Late Game

Oh my god, this ability is godly. With it's 250 base damage and it's 80% AP ratio, this ability is what ends up getting you kills. The downside to it... is it's short range. If you're ever in range to W, it either means you're getting a kill with it or you're in danger of being killed by someone jumping in your face. It's a very good poke tool against enemy frontline, and can be devastating to engagers. If anything, it's a giant AS buff to your ADC, who will melt the tank.

Ya'll ever heard of "Get out of Jail Free" card? Yeah, this isn't it. You can't play Ezreal in a solo-lane and expect E to save you when you're pushed up and getting ganked. Botlane it generally works out because you have a support who will exhaust and CC, but now you're alone. A jungler with CC and a midlaner WILL kill you, little to no doubt. When you use this ability offensively, Q as much as possible to get it back up. Optimally, only use it offensively when you have surrounding vision or know where the jungler is.

Arcane Shift is still arguably one of the most mobile spells in the game. You can use it to escape Veigar cage, Anivia ult+wall, Taliyah wall or shove, any hooks, imporant CCs, etc. It's just such a great ability which has many uses... but most importantly on AP Ezreal is

THE DAMAGE. WOO BABY does this **** hurt. It has a deceptively high 75% AP ratio which you probably never noticed playing him ADC. It mostly does tickle damage on ADC Ezreal, but on AP Ezreal it's nasty damage. It also has a very high base damage amount of 280.

What's difficult is actually landing this ability. It auto-targets the NEAREST unit, no matter what. Champion, minion, it's all the same. A good way to land this ability is to stay in the back middle of your minion wave. To avoid your Q, enemies typically stand behind their own minion wave in a similar spot and only come around the side you're not currently on to farm more easily. That's when you E to that side making sure they're the closest unit, and toss a Q in as well before IMMEDIATELY backing off to avoid a retaliation trade.

With 45% CDR and a fully stacked Ultimate Hat, this ability's cooldown goes down to 48 seconds. Q spam and you can make it closer to 30 seconds. AP Ezreal is only a thing right now because new Archangel's allows him to be manaless while scaling like a god in addition to the new runes giving him more waveclear and AP than ever.

Your ultimate should be used for three reasons.
1) Waveclear. Because of it's low cooldown once you get Archangel's and a Sheen, you want to be spamming it to waveclear until you get max Ultimate Hat stacks. Throughout the game you'll be shooting it down mid and to the sidelanes at times to get tons of CS.
2) Damage. This ability is the straight nasty. 650 base damage + 90% AP ratio will legitimately take 60% of any squishy's health bar, and this can be done globally. Snipe with it across the map, or use it in a teamfight. Disgusting damage.
3) Wave Manipulation. More on this in it's own section later on, but R can be used to manipulate your sidelane waves to start pushing favorably. Someone will have to leave and go clear the minion wave you started building, and by then your ultimate will be back up and ready to use in the 4v5 teamfight you just created. If no one leaves, the big wave you caused now crashes into an enemy tower dealing heavy damage and maybe even taking it.


Sidenote: This ability is also the main reason we take Minion Dematerializer. Without the rune, this ability may not actually kill the minions you shoot it at but leave them at 1hp. Sad, but no longer! Minion Dematerializer has saved us! Huzzah!

AD Ezreal players will be familiar with this. Some AP mids are getting to know it. Here is EVERYTHING you need to remember about tear stacking while playing AP Ezreal broken down into a few tips.

1) A. B. S. A Always. B Be. S Stacking. Always. Be. Stacking. No matter what you think you're doing, you should be stacking. Just bought tear? STACKING. Walking to lane? STACKING. Roaming? STACKING. CSing? STACKING. Trading? STACKING. About to back? YOU BETTER CAST THOSE THREE SPELLS TO BE STACKING. Seriously though, stacks. On AD Ezreal you want to be stacking asap in order to get muramana, but on AP Ezreal it's more about just having a bigger mana pool in general since the only bonus Seraph's gives you over Archangel's is the shield. It's about becoming a manaless champion as early in the game as you can.

2) Despite the first point, you actually do have to be careful with your mana early game. You should be Qing as much as possible to stack, since more Qs means more stacks means more mana. W and E should only be used to stack while in base or before backing; never just cast W or E just to stack and for no other reason, unless you're in base or backing.

3) With Tear+Sheen, Ezreal is essentially like an Annie-like champion. Q costs absolutely nothing, but other spells have a cost. You can spam Qs all day, but W E and R all take significant amounts of mana from you. Make sure you do not waste your mana on W E or R without other purpose. Otherwise, you have infinite mana.

4) Archangel's. Get this item ASAP after tear and sheen. It DOUBLES the number of stacks/mana you get per cast. +8 mana per cast also means it effectively reduces your spell costs by 8 mana, after the 25% cost reduction. This means max rank Q only costs 22 mana. This is why you're manaless as far as Qs go. And once you get archangels, W now enters the realm of CAST IT TO STACK. Get Seraph's ASAP for that shield and to truly, officially, be manaless.

5) When stacking, stacking happens fastest with Qs that actually LAND. When you're roaming or walking into lane or through jungle, Q on any target you can to get it to land. This not only reduces your ult's CD, but allows you to cast Q again sooner to stack.



A last note I want to leave is that while Seraphs is super strong once completed, you may consider not building this item until later. It stacks quickly, and gunblade is a better rush for pure damage and dueling.

If you're against a mage who can push you in, you can pretty much forget about trading. If you're not getting pushed in... AP Ezreal is now Q focused. You have to learn how to use Mystic Shot and Arcane Shiftcreatively. A lot of enemies also won't dodge your Trueshot Barrage if they're full health and trying to clear, so sometimes you can land some burst on them this way. Don't just ult them to ult them though; try to catch them behind their wave with it when you already want to ult the wave to push. Here's a few tips on how to trade as Ezreal
1) Kill a low minion the enemy mid is hiding behind and then Q immediately through the space this dead minion leaves. This works better the less minions there are in lane for your Q to clip.
2) EQ. E to the side, making sure the enemy mid is the closest unit. Q them, and then walk away to avoid a retaliation trade.
3) Autos. Early game you're AD Ezreal. Your autos hurt. Practice the trading stance and auto the enemy mid as much as possible.
4) Angle Q around minions to just miss them to the side. Enemy mids tend to hide behind their minions, but have to come out around the sides to farm. Time this and watch their movement patterns.


Your bread and butter is going to be landing W's, waiting a second, and then hitting that E. Toss in an auto, a cutlass active, a gunblade active, a Q, whatever you need to proc electrocute. It'll chunk.

AP Ezreal is ****ing nasty. No one expects the damage, but a full combo will reliably 100-0 by midgame two items. If you land a non-damage reduced ultimate on a squishy, EWQ them. They're dead. As you play AP Ezreal you'll get a feel for how much his Q, W, and E do. They all burst pretty hard. By lategame with the right items and buffs, you can actually reach 1000 AP.

If you EVER see a squishy nearby who you can full combo before they react, do it. Here is a clip of just my R and E killing a squishy, and I get a tower for my trouble.
https://i.gyazo.com/9590d5fd7d948bc15b1b2caa650026bd.mp4

This is a hard to grasp concept it seems, as most people below plat do not engage in wave manipulation. To explain in a bullet format instead of paragraph, I think a Q&A type explanation will be most beneficial.

Q: Why would I want to use my ult to manipulate side lane waves?
A: Creating a super wave by using wave manipulation creates a problem for the enemy team. They either have to ignore the super wave which will net you a tower, or they have to send someone to clear it resulting in a 4v5. The benefit of wave manipulation should now be immediately clear to you.

Q: When is the best time to manipulate a wave in order to form a super wave?
A: About 1 minute before an objective. Super waves take about 2 to 2 and a half minutes to form, so starting this a minute before an objective comes up. This objective could be baron or dragon spawning, or if your team is planning on grouping in a specific lane.

Q: So now that I know why and when, how do I manipulate a wave to form a super wave?
A: Assuming no previous wave manipulation is in effect... this depends on where your minion wave is now. If it's on your side of the map, your spawning minions will arrive in lane faster than the enemy minions and it will naturally push. If it is closer to the middle of the map, then you need only take 2 or 3 caster minions to push the wave. If it is closer to the enemy's side, you should try to hit as many of the minions as you can from the angle you're at. All casters for sure and as many melees and the cannon as you can fit.

Q: Is there anything else to consider?
A: Most definitely. A lot of the time, enemy super waves can form either intentionally or naturally. This super wave will start pushing into your towers, and it does not follow the rules that your super wave will form on its own closer to your side of the map. You must ult an enemy superwave in advance to begin forming your own.

Q: When an enemy superwave has formed and i'm the closest to it, what's the best course of action?
A: If there are no objectives, you should head straight to the super wave. When you get there, position yourself to hit most of the wave as well as something else across the map. This "something else" can be enemy champions.... or it could be the other side lane's minion wave, destroying the enemy's super wave in addition to starting your own.
If there are objectives, you should just ult the enemy super wave and immediately head to the objective while landing Qs on anything you can to reduce ult CD.

Pros
-Insane burst
-Decent mobility
-Ult ganks
-Catch and Assassination potential
-Incredibly fun
-5 man ult damage is the most damage of any spell in the game
-All skillshots

Cons
-All skillshots
-Your main weakness is lots of waveclear on the enemy mid
-Gets pushed in easy and out roamed as a result of the above
-Easily gankable by certain junglers (ZAC)
-Takes a while to scale into godmode

If you've looked into Ezreal at all, you've heard a few of these tips/tricks already. Some are more obvious than others, so read all. Put in order of most obvious to least obvious.

You can check bushes with Q. Landing it makes that distinctive sound, and the skillshot stops short. Your passive is also proc'd, and you can see this on your HUD. Because your passive is proc though, any spell would work. Including W. This is especially helpful for wide bushes like Tri and trying to check bushes at odd angles, like approaching red side blue buff from the river. W would even tell you how many people are in the bush, but approaching a bush close enough to W is dangerous.

EQ'ing is a very good way to catch someone out who is low but juuuust out of range for your Q to normally hit. Your Q does buckets of damage, for sure 1/3rd a squishies health at low. EQ can get you kills, but beware your E being put on CD.

You can E into your own W by casting W and then E immediately after. This can give you a AS boost, and also refresh your passive.

Your passive isn't AS important on AP Ezreal, but it's really decent for taking towers and objectives early. Coincidentally, after you clear a wave and head towards the tower, you'll have passive stacks. You can then E into your W to both refresh the passive stacks and give yourself the AS buff from your W. This is mana depleting and puts half your spells on cooldown though, so only do it when no one is around and you're trying to take the tower. You can also ult the next incoming wave or a sidelane's wave to give you a delayed but still for sure 5 passive proc.

Your E homes in on the closest unit, no matter what. Even if they're invisible. You can use this to finish off an Evelynn, Rengar, Twitch, or Kha'zix who went invisible, or just to watch the skill's bolt hit them so you know where they are for a second.

Most midlaners aren't used to trading with an Ezreal like how most ADCs/Supports are. You can use this to your advantage by killing a minion they're standing behind with an auto attack followed immediately by a Q to hit them. Kill minion, hit Q.

Only available in the early game, you can use the above strat alongside minion dematerializer to kill a full health minion and get a Q off the same way.

QWE all work similarly. When you begin to cast them, a short channel or cast-time occurs. This allows you to change the cast's location, moving the ability, but keep it heading in the same direction. For Q and W,

R is unique. You can't flash out of the animation, and you can't reposition the ult, but you can reposition the ult animation. The ult will shoot off from the original location, but most non-Ez mains aren't aware of this. Use this to your advantage by flashing mid R cast to make mind games. CAN ONLY BE DONE RELIABLY ONCE PER GAME. Some creative uses are:
1) Start the cast while being chased and IMMEDIATELY flash into a bush or over a wall before they see the animation start. Ult hits them, unleash full combo on them for the kill
2) Only really works on melees... When being closely followed like the above but there is nowhere to flash out of vision to, you can ult directionally opposite from where the enemy is coming at you from, i.e. in the direction you're running. They'll think you ****ed up your ult cast and keep running towards you. This is when you flash, and they walk through the original cast location. They have no idea that the ult will come out from behind them and hit.
3) In lane, ult is easily dodged by enemies who see the cast. They'll side step. Once they start to change directions, flash so the animation looks like the "new" location would hit them. They'll either waste their own flash dodging it and/or sidestep BACK into your actual ult's hitbox.

Most midlaners these days seem to never get past 700 AP. So why does AP Ezreal get to 1000? It's due to Seraph's Embrace and the runes Transcendence and Gathering Storm. These give Ezreal a lot of bonus AP from overcapped CDR and mana. This in combination with a few other buffs will easily net AP Ezreal around if not more than 1000 AP. Fire Drakes, Elder Dragon, blue buff, Elixir of Sorcery, and Baron buff can all be instrumental in obtaining 1000 AP as well.

I used to have a section on the VGU changes and why they mattered, but I deleted because hopefully you should know by now. With the VGU, an update came shortly after that hurts his damage against minions, but keeps his damage against champions large. Good change for killing!

9.6
You can only build one tear item now; not terrible for AP Ezreal, but RIP our hybrid ADC boy.

Current PBE
Right now they're thinking about making transcendence grant 3ap instead of 2ap. Definitely suggest the 1-10% CDR slot now!