The guide will be updated shortly
UPDATED LAST: Made some changes mostly in the mythic item tier list section.
PLANNED UPDATES: I started playing this build a little differently than I used to. So I want to rework the runes section a lot, and the ability order. But the version I have here right now isn't bad, I just don't think it's superior, but you can still use it and win!

My Summoner name is "I was born once" on EUW, I also have an EUNE account. I've been playing League of Legends since season 2, but only really took the game seriously in around 2021. Since then I've been gold on one of my accounts, and I'm constantly trying to improve, and I swear you're gonna see me in high elo one day. Unless I get bored. Or the IRS catches me... (THIS IS A JOKE MY DAD PAYS ALL MY TAXES). I'm an artist (I would make this guide prettier if I didn't have one million other projects to take care of lol I'll just stick to basics this time), and I enjoy playing video games, mostly League.

Before we start, here is a link to my other on hit Neko guide you can read too if you want :)

... Why?

You might be wondering, why would you even consider building this over the normal Neeko build? Well first of all, as much as I love her, she's obviously not the most popular midlaner for a reason. She's got many things about her that just aren't the best in the current meta when it comes to her performance in midlane, if anybody ever plays her she's now only seen being played as a support. I am aware she's going to get reworked, and hopefully this guide will be viable after that as well, but I came here to make these few last months of this version of Neeko insane and incomprehensive, you're welcome. Neeko has an insane range when it comes to the various ways you can build her and still make it work, so besides my love for attack speed on champions, I deided to make her autoattacks a bit more crucial to her playstyle, without making her ad. All the runes and items I play with also make this build be able to snowball pretty well, which is usually a problem on Neeko since she kind of falls off even during the mid game (this build still doesn't really make her THE carry, but when she snowballs well enough she absolutely will be miles ahead of everyone and be able to actually carry).

PROS

🍅 The swag you'll emanate while wearing this build on you
🍅 Insane snowball potential compared to standard Neeko mid
🍅 Her autoattacks actually become useful, even outside of her third W passive shot (that also becomes easier to use) she can do some serious damage even without using any abilities
🍅 You get to bully your lane opponent because she's very opressive early
🍅 Neeko has tons of CC, which also make it easier to autoattack your opponent to death if they didn't die from the burst (which they usually don't, even in normal Neeko builds)
🍅 You will probably have one of the highest damage done to turrets scores almost every game

CONS

💔 Cringe people will hate your swag (aka teammates will probably get upset when they see you build BOTRK Xddd)
💔 Good luck playing against champions with range longer than yours honestly (and there's like a lot of them)
💔 Squishy (that's why despite it's many flaws crown is one of the best choices for mythics imo)
💔 This build is extremely high risk high reward, if you fall behind pray your teammates carry you because you'll be extremely useless, you can still use her insane ability to destroy turrets though, you could build Nashor's and Hullbreaker if you're brave
💔 Neeko remains immobile, even more so without the Rocketbelt
💔 You get a debuff that makes you unable to pay taxes on time

PASSIVE ABILITY

Inherent Glamour ✦ Neeko's passive is not the most useful passive in the game, for this build there's not much to say about it except for the obvious, use your disguises to hide your ult winding up, even if it's obvious you are in disguise it will be harder for enemies to figure out when to flash. I recommend hotkeying her passive so you can quickly transform, I myself don't do it because I'm stupid but you absolutely should.

Q

Blooming Burts ✦ Her Q is one of the most impactful abilities outside of W and of course her ultimate in this build (in general it's her main source of damage usually, but in this build it shares it's place with her W passive). Use it early to kill minions alongside your W and poke champions out of your auto attack range. But mostly focus on hitting it after you also hit her E, since it can consume a lot of mana and not hitting it kind of hurts you, and popping only one bloom instead of three isn't always worth it.

W

Shapesplitter ✦ This ability is the entire reason I am making this guide and decided to create this build. For some reason I could not stand how her W passive potential isn't fully explored, you sort of just hit it once any time you get the chance instead of doing what I decided to do, shred enemies with it. Usually when it's not fully charged you just... don't even get to use it. And what's even the point of it on a burst mage anyways?? Ahem. Well. Thanks to the attack speed, you get to poke your enemies with your W passive and later on torture them with it much better, not really even losing any of the damage you normaly have. Even if you do have quicker attack speed still try to charge your W to poke your enemy with it, of course you can also charge it on them. BECAUSE NOW YOU CAN. You can now constantly quickly charge your W passive and constantly release it onto the enemy champion creating a lot of free damage. Not to mention it's usefulness against turrets... oh that sweet sweet nashor's tooth W damage to turrets... I also have a tip or two on the clones, try to make them hit the wall when you escape, so it moves around and makes your enemies think it's you. Deactivate traps with your clone, like Teemo shrooms or Caitlyn traps. The clone has around 1.5 seconds before it becomes targetable, so you can keep that in mind if you want to predict a Blitzcrank grab and make your clone take the hit. It's an amazing counter to Nunu & Willump because you can easily activate your clone before his snowball hits you and completely block it far away from you.

E

Tangle-Barbs ✦ It's a very simple ability, my only advice is to try and hit a minion in front of a champion to make the root longer. You can make your enemies paranoid by walking around in circles since they can't hide behind minions to avoid getting hit. Your combos are E Q empowered W attack then continue to AA or run away or E ultimate Q empowered W AA. And you know, if it's safe continue to deal more W damage. Pro tip for using this ability is that you can use E and then immediately flash so that there's no delay between casting and throwing it so you can surprise your enemies. The range of your E follows your position but the ability always hits the place you were pointing to when you pressed E.

R

Pop Blossom ✦ Her ultimate is huge, but it sadly can also be very easily avoided. I recomend using r (preferably in a disguise) and then as soon as the disguise is broken or you're about to cast it flash into the enemy team/enemy champion. You actually can rather safely jam yourself in the middle of the enemy team and survive, but it still is always a risk so take that into consideration. But if you manage to land it you can just safely remove yourself from there, if you didn't use E to keep the enemies in place before you can use it after your ult stuns them so you have more time to kill them/escape.

DARK HARVEST

Dark Harvest - This rune is the best option for how mixed this build is, since it relies both on auto attacking and abilities. You could also swap this for electrocute, but I find that electrocute doesn't really help as much as dark harvest does, personaly I often end up low on health alongside my lane opponent, and dark harvest not only provides more snowballing but is also useful in getting the upper hand in these kinds of sittuations alongside last stand. It's true that electrocute comes with less risk, but you will also not snowball with it as hard.
Cheap Shot VS Sudden Impact - I think I mentioned this before (I don't know honestly I'm getting tired at this point), but from my own experience both runes bring similar results. The only difference is that you don't really have to think about activating cheap shot, while you have to press W for sudden impact to work, so unless you enjoy pressing W cheap shot is the superior option due to just how much CC Neeko has. You'll easily deal tons of damage with it without even really thinking about it which is always ideal.
Eyeball Collection - Kill > get more ap > life is good. Don't worry if you buy BOTRK first and you get AD, you can use this to your advantage too untill you buy a mythic and it transfers to AP.
Ultimate Hunter- Gives you ability haste on your ultimate that you still very much need despite the wacky build. As I mentioned before, this build doesn't take away your ap damage, so it's still good to have your ultimate ready as soon as possible.

Legend: Alacrity - The more attack speed the better! Unless it takes away from your damage, but overall two things you want to seek in this build are more ability power and more attack speed.
Last Stand - Neeko is squishy and you will probably almost always be barely alive, so last stand is a perfect choice. Alongside Dark Harvest it creates an advantage when you and your opponent are both low on health, which leads to you surviving with one hp, which makes you feel successful in life. It's just me? Okay then.

LETHAL TEMPO

Lethal Tempo - It puts more emphasis on your auto attacks and the W passive, but it costs you a lot of the damage from your abilities since it doesn't provide anything for them like Dark Harvest does. It can work, in my experience it just never worked as well, so I usually don't go with this keystone. UNLESS I am building the on hit build I recently concocted (that is a completely different thing)
Triumph VS Presence of Mind - Triumph helps you survive close calls, which there will be plenty of. Presence of mind helps you with poking, which can also be useful. Choose Presence of Mind when you feel safe and like you will be able to poke safely.
Legend: Alacrity - The more attack speed the better! Unless it takes away from your damage, but overall two things you want to seek in this build are more ability power and more attack speed.
Last Stand - Neeko is squishy and you will probably almost always be barely alive, so last stand is a perfect choice. Alongside Dark Harvest it creates an advantage when you and your opponent are both low on health, which leads to you surviving with one hp, which makes you feel successful in life. It's just me? Okay then. You can also go Coup de Grace if you're feeling like you will easily be able to outperform your lane opponent.

Resolve tree
Bone Plating - helps you take less damage and survive better, in the resolve tree there isn't really any better alternative and it's a pretty decent rune.
Overgrowth - once again, I imagine it helps you survive on one digit health. You can take demolish if you want to destroy even more towers.
Domination tree
Cheap Shot VS Sudden Impact - From my own experience both runes bring similar results. The only difference is that you don't really have to think about activating cheap shot, while you have to press W for sudden impact to work, so unless you enjoy pressing W cheap shot is the superior option due to just how much CC Neeko has. You'll easily deal tons of damage with it without even really thinking about it which is always ideal.
Eyeball Collection - Kill > get more ap > life is good. Don't worry if you buy BOTRK first and you get AD, you can use this to your advantage too untill you buy a mythic and it transfers to AP.

So before I start (PLEASE I BEG YOU. MOBAFIRE PLEASE DON'T DELETE THIS I WILL THROW MYSELF OFF A CLIFF. PLEASE) anyways, I wanted to encourage you to ward in certain places if you are a low elo player (or even if you are higher this might come in handy). Perhaps not right at the start of the game, but there's a place inbetween the entrance to your lane from your side of the map and the bush that's divided by a short wall. Ward inbetween this wall so you have clear vision of both possible ganks from the bushes and ganks from behind your own turret. This isn't the best strategy for every time, but I find warding there increases your chances of surviving against ganks with champions like Kayn or Zac who don't particularly care walls exist. There is also a bush near the entrance to the river at the opposite side, ESPECIALLY if you are low elo I encourage you to buy one control ward and put it right at the edge of the bush. Nobody in iron will ever check that bush, and you get a free scuttle crab forever. I will manage some pictures explaining to you the placements that I am talking about:

For the opposite team the places are reversed but I believe you understand what I'm talking about.
So it's time to get to the gameplay...

Early Game

Early game for Neeko here is all about abusing your enemy. Make them cry. Beat them to death. Multiple times preferably, keep poking them with your W and Q, and whenever you manage to E them throw your entire combo on them if you can, but while you do that remember to watch the minion waves. Usually try poking when you have cleared most of the enemy minions to not make them agro you (you can also quickly poke and then press your W because it takes off enemy minion agro off of you, but wasting your W on poking isn't very desirable since it's your only form of escape outside of flash), and don't worry about pushing too hard, in midlane you often should push harder especially if the enemy champion can roam. Because if your minions hit their tower when they are away they will lose a lot of farm on it, and might not even get any kills so they are forced to stay (it of course depends on the situation, sometimes you might wanna stay close to your turret for example when the enemy has Evelynn or Twitch jungle).
So the three most important things for early game are
1 Try to push as hard as possible (unless it's not worth it)
2 Opress your enemy as much as you can unless doing so would be dangerous to you
3 WATCH OUT FOR GANKS, keep your W ready for the clone.
If dominating or at least slowing down your opponent is impossible, don't force it. You will only make things worse, if you don't feel like you can do it either try to outfarm them or try looking for ganks, while remembering to keep the enemy minion wave away from your turret when you leave.

Playing when you are ahead

When you are ahead, depending on how much ahead you are you should try getting Dark Seal stacks. If your lane oponent won't let you kill them any more or if they are afk because of how amazing you are at what you do you should leave lane and try looking for more victims. Alternatively if nobody cares, try pushing as far into the enemy base as possible since Neeko can do that VERY fast, but you'll have to watch the minimap and look out for the enemy team comming for you, ESPECIALLY if you have a lot of stacks on you. Try to also secure objectives if possible, and don't forget to farm as much as you can. For farming tips, you can watch the mini map. When the minions get close to your turret go to that lane if your team isn't in any immediate danger and clear the wave. Depending on how confident you feel you can go further and further towards the enemy base to farm more.

Playing when you are behind

Being behind with this build is particularly hard, because you are getting punished even harder than usual. You will probably end up with the lowest damage dealt in the entire team, but that's okay. Try to shift your focus on taking down turrets. If you are an easy target it might be reasonable to retreat and try farming whatever you can. Depending on how badly it's going you might want to hold on to your Dark Seal for a bit longer or completely sell it. Sadly there's not much you can do, when you lose with this build you just lose. You can still impact the game but it's going to be difficult. Try focusing on CC and assistance of your team mates instead of your own damage and kills in that scenario, unless there is no one else who could be more capable than you.

Getting abused in lane

If you didn't ban Xerath LeBlanc and Syndra at once you might stumble upon matches where you have the displeasure of fighting against them. And sometimes you just have to cut your loses and try to survive without dying as long as you can. The really really bad thing about this build is that you can't just stay and do nothing, because you will automatically lose. If you can't farm, roam. If you can't roam, farm. Always try to think of an idea you can do something, gather more resources to not fall off and become completely useless. At least you will die trying soldier.

There is more to life than kills

Sometimes you might get too focused on getting kills, and while kills can provide you with a lot of gold, it's not always good to go after them. So what if you killed that Yuumi when the enemy has slain the Elder Drake, and you weren't there because you chased around a Yuumi that was baiting you. My point is to be aware of your surroundings, think logicaly while you play. Watch the minimap, look for taking objectives and play around them, FARM. You can take kills of course, but League is a game where every move requires you to weight your options. Sometimes you have to scrifice a kill to get your team ahead in different ways.

I have experienced many games where it was extremely difficult to deal with certain champions, and really I could not figure out how to deal with them, champions like Syndra or LeBlanc can not only outdamage you the entire laning phase, but can basically poke you for free, and usually there's nothing you can do about it. But getting Doran's Blade and focusing more on poking with your auto attacks have helped me deal with these kinds of champions significantly. So whenever you play against a champion that can outdamage you early, go with this hybrid build, and remember to max your w first instead of q , q isn't as effective against someone who can deal consistently big dammage to you that you can't really keep up with if you didn't max your w (also an important thing to mention is, you need to land your q, and when it comes to certain champions missing even a SINGLE SKILLSHOT can be catastrophic. And since most of us aren't robots,and it's awfully difficult to land it when a Le Blanc is zooming around the lane like a cat at 3 am after overdosing on catnip this is why I recommend taking this route when you're having trouble. And yeah sure you can waste your entire mana trying to first land your root and back to base every 3 minutes but it's really the same story). You can also totally just build normal ad on hit, whatever floats your boat, but I really enjoy my version with Nashor's rush (although I feel like the damage is a bit lacking, but I don't feel like it's a big problem for me).
Again, the link for that build is here, it's not a part of this guide any more.

Thank you for reading my guide! And please keep in mind that I am doing this for fun, I'm not here with an intention to overthrow every single other Neeko build there is, this is stupid and I can't play the game :D

See you around and good luck ^^